"Thou hast also given me the shield of Thy salvation, And Thy right hand hath holden me up, And Thy lowliness hath made me great."
G.o.d"s strength, G.o.d"s buckler, G.o.d"s supporting hand, G.o.d"s condescension, by which He bows down to look upon and help the feeble, with the humble showing Himself humble--these have been his weapons, and from these has come his victory.
And because of these, he looks forward to a future like the past, but more glorious still, thereby teaching us how the unchanging faithfulness of our G.o.d should encourage us to take all the blessings which we have received as but the earnest of what is yet to come. He sees himself pursuing his enemies, and smiting them to the ground. The fierce light of battle blazes through the rapid sentences which paint the panic flight, and the swift pursuit, the vain shrieks to man and G.o.d for succour, and the utter annihilation of the foe:--
(42) "And I will pound them like dust before the wind, Like street-filth will I empty them out."
Then he gives utterance to the consciousness that his kingdom is destined to extend far beyond the limits of Israel, in words which, like so many of the prophecies, may be translated in the present tense, but are obviously future in signification--the prophet placing himself in imagination in the midst of the time of which he speaks:--
(43) "Thou deliverest me from the strivings of the people (_i.e._, Israel), Thou makest me head of the heathen; People whom I knew not serve me.
(44) At the hearing of the ear they obey me.
The sons of the stranger feign obedience to me.
(45) The sons of the stranger fade away, They come trembling from their hiding-places."
The rebellion which weakened his early reign is subdued, and beyond the bounds of his own people his dominion spreads. Strange tribes submit to the very sound of his name, and crouch before him in extorted and pretended submission. The words are literally "lie unto me," descriptive of the profuse professions of loyalty characteristic of conquered orientals. Their power withers before him like a gathered flower before a hot wind, and the fugitives creep trembling out of their holes where they have hid themselves.
Again he recurs to the one thought which flows like a river of light through all the psalm--that all his help is in G.o.d. The names which he lovingly heaped together at the beginning are in part echoed in the close. "The Lord liveth, and blessed is my rock, and the G.o.d of my salvation is exalted." His deliverances have taught him to know a living G.o.d, swift to hear, active to help, in whom he lives, who has magnified His own name in that He has saved His servant. And as that blessed conviction is the sum of all his experience, so one glad vow expresses all his resolves, and thrills with the expectation which he had cherished even in his lonely exile, that the music of his psalm would one day echo through all the world. With lofty consciousness of his new dignity, and with lowly sense that it is G.o.d"s gift, he emphatically names himself _His_ king, _His_ anointed, taking, as it were, his crown from his brows and laying it on the altar. With prophetic eye he looks onward, and sees the throne to which he had been led by a series of miracles enduring for ever, and the mercy of G.o.d sustaining the dominion of his house through all generations:--
(49) "Therefore will I give thanks to Thee among the nations, O Jehovah, And to Thy name will I strike the harp:
(50) Who maketh great the deliverances of His king And executeth mercy for His anointed, For David and his seed for evermore."
And what were his purposes for the future? Here is his answer, in a psalm which has been with considerable appropriateness regarded as a kind of manifesto of the principles which he intended should characterize his reign (Psa. ci.): "I will walk within my house with a perfect heart. I will set no wicked thing before mine eyes." For himself, he begins his reign with n.o.ble self-restraint, not meaning to make it a region of indulgence, but feeling that there is a law above his will, of which he is only the servant, and knowing that if his people and his public life are to be what they should be, his own personal and domestic life must be pure. As for his court and his ministers, he will make a clean sweep of the vermin who swarm and sting and buzz about a throne. The froward, the wicked, privy slanderers, proud hearts, crafty plotters, liars, and evil-doers he will not suffer--but "mine eyes shall be upon the faithful in the land; he that walketh in a perfect way, he shall serve me." He is fired with ambition, such as has brightened the beginning of many a reign which has darkened to cruelty and crime, to make his kingdom some faint image of G.o.d"s, and to bring the actual Israel into conformity with its ancient Magna Charta, "Ye shall be to me a holy nation." And so, not knowing perhaps how hard a task he planned, and little dreaming of his own sore fall, he grasps the sword, resolved to use it for the terror of evil-doers, and vows, "I will early destroy all the wicked in the land, that I may cut off all wicked doers from the city of the Lord." Such was his "proclamation against vice and immorality" on his accession to his throne.
XI.--THE KING--_CONTINUED_.
The years thus well begun are, in the historical books, characterized mainly by three events, namely, the bringing up of the ark to the newly won city of David, Nathan"s prophecy of the perpetual dominion of his house, and his victories over the surrounding nations. These three hinges of the narrative are all abundantly ill.u.s.trated in the psalms.
As to the first, we have relics of the joyful ceremonial connected with it in two psalms, the fifteenth and twenty-fourth, which are singularly alike not only in substance but in manner, both being thrown into a highly dramatic form by question and answer. This peculiarity, as we shall see, is one of the links of connection which unite them with the history as given in the Book of Samuel (2 Sam. vi.). From that record we learn that David"s first thought after he was firmly seated as king over all Israel, was the enthronement in his recently-captured city of the long-forgotten ark. That venerable symbol of the presence of the true King had pa.s.sed through many vicissitudes since the days when it had been carried round the walls of Jericho. Superst.i.tiously borne into battle, as if it were a mere magic palladium, by men whose hearts were not right with G.o.d, the presence which they had invoked became their ruin, and Israel was shattered, and "the ark of G.o.d taken," on the fatal field of Aphek. It had been carried in triumph through Philistine cities, and sent back in dismay. It had been welcomed with gladness by the villagers of Bethshemesh, who lifted their eyes from their harvest work, and saw it borne up the glen from the Philistine plain. Their rude curiosity was signally punished, "and the men of Bethshemesh said, Who is able to stand before this holy Lord G.o.d, and to whom shall He go up from us?" It had been removed to the forest seclusion of Kirjath-jearim (the city of the woods), and there bestowed in the house of Abinadab "upon the hill," where it lay neglected and forgotten for about seventy years. During Saul"s reign they "inquired not at it," and, indeed, the whole worship of Jehovah seems to have been decaying. David set himself to reorganize the public service of G.o.d, arranged a staff of priests and Levites, with disciplined choir and orchestra (1 Chron. xv.), and then proceeded with representatives of the whole nation to bring up the ark from its woodland hiding-place. But again death turned gladness into dread, and Uzzah"s fate silenced the joyous songs, "and David was afraid of the Lord that day, and said, How shall the ark of G.o.d come unto me?"
The dangerous honour fell on the house of Obed-edom; and only after the blessing which followed its three months" stay there, did he venture to carry out his purpose. The story of the actual removal of the ark to the city of David with glad ceremonial need not be repeated here; nor the mocking gibes of Michal who had once loved him so fondly. Probably she bitterly resented her violent separation from the household joys that had grown up about her in her second home; probably the woman who had had teraphim among her furniture cared nothing for the ark of G.o.d; probably, as she grew older, her character had hardened in its lines, and become like her father"s in its measureless pride, and in its half-dread, half-hatred of David--and all these motives together pour their venom into her sarcasm. Taunts provoke taunts; the husband feels that the wife is in heart a partisan of the fallen house of her father, and a despiser of the Lord and of His worship; her words hiss with scorn, his flame with anger and rebuke--and so these two that had been so tender in the old days part for ever. The one doubtful act that stained his accession was quickly avenged. Better for both that she had never been rent from that feeble, loving husband that followed her weeping, and was driven back by a single word, flung at him by Abner as if he had been a dog at their heels! (2 Sam. iii. 16).
The gladness and triumph, the awe, and the memories of victory which cl.u.s.tered round the dread symbol of the presence of the Lord of Hosts, are wonderfully expressed in the choral twenty-fourth psalm. It is divided into two portions, which Ewald regards as being originally two independent compositions. They are, however, obviously connected both in form and substance. In each we have question and answer, as in psalm xv., which belongs to the same period. The first half replies to the question, "Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord, and who shall stand in His holy place?"--an echo of the terror-struck exclamation of the people of Bethshemesh, already quoted. The answer is a description of the _men who dwell with G.o.d_. The second half deals with the correlative inquiry, "Who is the King of Glory?" and describes the _G.o.d who comes to dwell with men_. It corresponds in substance, though not in form, with David"s thought when Uzzah died, in so far as it regards G.o.d as drawing near to the worshippers, rather than the worshippers drawing near to Him. Both portions are united by a real internal connection, in that they set forth the mutual approach of G.o.d and man which leads to communion, and thus const.i.tute the two halves of an inseparable whole.
Most expositors recognise a choral structure in the psalm, as in several others of this date, as would be natural at the time of the reorganization of the public musical service. Probably we may gain the key to its form by supposing it to be a processional hymn, of which the first half was to be sung during the ascent to the city of David, and the second while standing before the gates. We have then to fancy the long line of worshippers climbing the rocky steep hill-side to the ancient fortress so recently won, the Levites bearing the ark, and the glad mult.i.tude streaming along behind them.
First there swells forth from all the singers the triumphant proclamation of G.o.d"s universal sovereignty, "The earth is the Lord"s and the fulness thereof; the world and they that dwell therein. For He hath founded it upon the seas and established it upon the floods." It is very noteworthy that such a thought should precede the declaration of His special dwelling in Zion. It guards that belief from the abuses to which it was of course liable--the superst.i.tions, the narrowness, the contempt of all the rest of the world as G.o.d-deserted, which are its perversion in sensuous natures. If Israel came to fancy that G.o.d belonged to them, and that there was only one sacred place in all the world, it was not for want of clear utterances to the contrary, which became more emphatic with each fresh step in the development of the specializing system under which they lived. The very ground of their peculiar relation to G.o.d had been declared, in the hour of const.i.tuting it to be--"all the earth is Mine" (Exod. xix. 5). So now, when the symbol of His presence is to have a local habitation in the centre of the national life, the psalmist lays for the foundation of his song the great truth, that the Divine presence is concentrated in Israel, but not confined there, and concentrated in order that it may be diffused. The glory that lights the bare top of Zion lies on all the hills; and He who dwells between the cherubim dwells in all the world, which His continual presence fills with its fulness, and upholds above the floods.
Then, as they climb, a single voice perhaps chants the solemn question, "Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord, or who shall stand in the place of His holiness?"
And the full-toned answer portrays the men who shall dwell with G.o.d, in words which begin indeed with stringent demands for absolute purity, but wonderfully change in tone as they advance, into gracious a.s.surances, and the clearest vision that the moral nature which fits for G.o.d"s presence is G.o.d"s gift. "The clean-handed, and pure-hearted, who has not lifted up his soul to vanity, nor sworn deceitfully;" there is the eternal law which nothing can ever alter, that to abide with G.o.d a man must be like G.o.d--the law of the new covenant as of the old, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see G.o.d." But this requirement, impossible of fulfilment, is not all. If it were, the climbing procession might stop. But up and up they rise, and once again the song bursts forth in deeper and more hopeful words, "He shall _receive_ the blessing from Jehovah, and righteousness from the G.o.d of his salvation."
Then that righteousness, which he who honestly attempts to comply with such requirements will soon find that he does not possess, is to be received from above, not elaborated from within; is a gift from G.o.d, not a product of man"s toils. G.o.d will make us pure, that we may dwell with Him. Nor is this all. The condition of receiving such a gift has been already partially set forth in the preceding clause, which seems to require righteousness to be possessed as the preliminary to receiving it. The paradox which thus results is inseparable from the stage of religious knowledge attained under the Mosaic Law. But the last words of the answer go far beyond it, and proclaim the special truth of the gospel, that the righteousness which fits for dwelling with G.o.d is given on the simple condition of _seeking_ Him. To this designation of the true worshippers is appended somewhat abruptly the one word "Jacob,"
which need neither be rendered as in the English version as an invocation, nor as in the margin, with an unnecessary and improbable supplement, "O G.o.d of Jacob;" but is best regarded as in apposition with the other descriptive clauses, and declaring, as we have found David doing already in previous psalms, that the characters portrayed in them, and these only, const.i.tuted the true Israel.
This is the generation of them that seek Him, That seek Thy face--(this is) Jacob.
And so the first question is answered, "Who are the men who dwell with G.o.d?"--The pure, who receive righteousness, who seek Him, the true Israel.
And now the procession has reached the front of the ancient city on the hill, and stands before the very walls and weather-beaten gates which Melchizedek may have pa.s.sed through, and which had been barred against Israel till David"s might had burst them. National triumph and glad worship are wonderfully blended in the summons which rings from the lips of the Levites without: "Lift up your heads, O ye gates! and be ye lift up, ye doors (that have been from) of old!" as if even their towering portals were too low, "and the King of glory shall come in." What force in that name here, in this early song of the King! How clearly he recognises his own derived power, and the real Monarch of whom he is but the shadowy representative! The newly-conquered city is summoned to admit its true conqueror and sovereign, whose throne is the ark, which was emphatically named "the glory,"[S] and in whose train the earthly king follows as a subject and a worshipper. Then, with wonderful dramatic force, a single voice from within the barred gates asks, like some suspicious warder, "Who then is the King of glory?" With what a shout of proud confidence and triumphant memories of a hundred fields comes, ready and full, the crash of many voices in the answer, "Jehovah strong and mighty, Jehovah mighty in battle!" How vividly the reluctance of an antagonistic world to yield to Israel and Israel"s King, is represented in the repet.i.tion of the question in a form slightly more expressive of ignorance and doubt, in answer to the reiterated summons, "Who is He, then, the King of glory?" With what deepened intensity of triumph there peals, hoa.r.s.e and deep, the choral shout, "The Lord of Hosts, He is the King of glory." That name which sets Him forth as Sovereign of the personal and impersonal forces of the universe--angels, and stars, and terrene creatures, all gathered in ordered ranks, embattled for His service--was a comparatively new name in Israel,[T]
and brought with it thoughts of irresistible might in earth and heaven.
It crashes like a catapult against the ancient gates; and at that proclamation of the omnipotent name of the G.o.d who dwells with men, they grate back on their brazen hinges, and the ark of the Lord enters into its rest.
[S] "And she named the child I-chabod (Where is the glory?) saying, The glory is departed from Israel: because the ark of G.o.d was taken."--1 _Sam._ iv. 21.
[T] It has been a.s.serted that this is the first introduction of the name. ("Psalms Chronologically Arranged by Four Friends," p. 14). But it occurs in Hannah"s vow (1 Sam. i. 11); in Samuel"s words to Saul (xv.
2); in David"s reply to Goliath (xvii. 45). We have it also in Psalm lix. 5, which we regard as his earliest during his exile. Do the authors referred to consider these speeches in 1 Sam. as not authentic?
XII.--THE KING--_CONTINUED_.
The second event recorded as important in the bright early years is the great promise of the perpetuity of the kingdom in David"s house. As soon as the king was firmly established and free from war, he remembered the ancient word which said, "When He giveth you rest from all your enemies round about, so that ye dwell in safety, then there shall be a place which the Lord your G.o.d shall choose to cause His name to dwell there"
(Deut. xii. 10, 11). His own ease rebukes him; he regards his tranquillity not as a season for selfish indolence, but as a call to new forms of service. He might well have found in the many troubles and vicissitudes of his past life an excuse for luxurious repose now. But devout souls will consecrate their leisure as their toil to G.o.d, and will serve Him with thankful offerings in peace whom they invoked with earnest cries in battle. Prosperity is harmless only when it is accepted as an opportunity for fresh forms of devotion, not as an occasion for idle self-indulgence. So we read, with distinct verbal reference to the words already quoted, that "when the Lord had given him rest round about from all his enemies, the king said unto Nathan the prophet, See now, I dwell in an house of cedar, but the ark of G.o.d dwelleth in curtains." The impulse of generous devotion, which cannot bear to lavish more upon self than it gives to G.o.d, at first commended itself to the prophet; but in the solitude of his nightly thoughts the higher wisdom speaks in his spirit, and the word of G.o.d gives him a message for the king. The narrative in 2 Sam. makes no mention of David"s warlike life as unfitting him for the task, which we find from 2 Chron. was one reason why his purpose was set aside, but brings into prominence the thought that David"s generous impulse was outrunning G.o.d"s commandment, and that his ardour to serve was in some danger of forgetting his entire dependence on G.o.d, and of fancying that G.o.d would be the better for him. So the prophetic message reminds him that the Lord had never, through all the centuries, asked for a house of cedar, and recalls the past life of David as having been wholly shaped and blessed by Him, while it pointedly inverts the king"s proposal in its own grand promise, "The Lord telleth thee that He will make thee an house." Then follows the prediction of a son of David who should build the house, whose kingdom should be perpetual, whose transgressions should be corrected indeed, but never punished as those of the unhappy Saul; and then, in emphatic and unmistakable words, the perpetuity of David"s house, his kingdom, and his throne, is reiterated as the close of the whole.
The wonderful burst of praise which sprang from David"s heart in answer cannot be dealt with here; but clearly from that time onwards a new element had been added to his hopes, and a new object presented to his faith. The prophecy of the Messiah enters upon a new stage, bearing a relation, as its successive stages, always unmistakably did, to the history which supplies a framework for it. Now for the first time can he be set forth as the king of Israel; now the width of the promise which at first had embraced the seed of the woman, and then had been narrowed to the seed of Abraham, and thereafter probably to the tribe of Judah, is still further defined as to be fulfilled in the line of the house of David; now the personal Messiah Himself begins to be discerned through the words which are to have a preparatory fulfilment, in itself prophetic, in the collective Davidic monarchs whose very office is itself also a prophecy.
Many echoes of this new message ring through the later psalms of the king. His own dominion, his conquests, and his office, gradually became to himself a solemn prophecy of a mysterious descendant who should be really and fully all that he was in shadow and in part. As the experience of the exile, so that of the victorious monarch supplied the colours with which the spirit of prophecy in him painted "beforehand the sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow." In both cla.s.ses of psalms we have two forms of the Messianic reference, the typical and the purely prophetic. In the former the events of David"s own biography and the feelings of his own soul are so portrayed and expressed as to suggest his greater Son. In the latter, the personality of the psalmist retreats into the background, and is at most only the starting-point for wails of sorrow or gleams of glory which far transcend anything in the life of the singer. There are portions, for instance, of the xxii. and lxix. psalms which no torturing can force into correspondence with any of David"s trials; and in like manner there are paeans of victory and predictions of dominion which demand a grander interpretation than his own royalty or his hopes for his house can yield. Of course, if prophecy is impossible, there is no more to be said, but that in that case a considerable part of the Old Testament, including many of David"s psalms, is unintelligible.
Perhaps the clearest instance of distinct prophecy of the victorious dominion of the personal Messiah is the 110th psalm. In it we do see, no doubt, the influence of the psalmist"s own history, shaping the image which rises before his soul. But the attributes of that king whom he beholds are not his attributes, nor those of any son of his who wore the crown in Israel. And whilst his own history gives the form, it is "the Spirit of Christ that was in" him which gives the substance, and transfigures the earthly monarchy into a heavenly dominion. We do not enter upon the question of the Davidic authorship of this psalm. Here we have not to depend upon Jewish superscriptions, but on the words of Him whose bare a.s.sertion should be "an end of all strife." Christ says that David wrote it. Some of us are far enough behind the age to believe that what He said He meant, and that what He meant is truth.
This psalm, then, being David"s, can hardly be earlier than the time of Nathan"s prophecy. There are traces in it of the influence of the history of the psalmist, giving, as we have said, form to the predictions. Perhaps we may see these in Zion being named as the seat of Messiah"s sovereignty and in the reference to Melchizedek, both of which points a.s.sume new force if we suppose that the ancient city over which that half-forgotten name once ruled had recently become his own.
Possibly, too, his joy in exchanging his armour and kingly robe for the priest"s ephod, when he brought up the ark to its rest, and his consciousness that in himself the regal and the sacerdotal offices did not blend, may have led him to meditations on the meaning of both, on the miseries that seemed to flow equally from their separation and from their union, which were the precursors of his hearing the Divine oath that, in the far-off future, they would be fused together in that mighty figure who was to repeat in higher fashion the union of functions which invested that dim King of Righteousness and Priest of G.o.d in the far-off past. He discerns that _his_ support from the right hand of G.o.d, _his_ sceptre which he swayed in Zion, _his_ loyal people fused together into a unity at last, _his_ triumphant warfare on the nations around, are all but faint shadows of One who is to come. That solemn form on the horizon of hope is his Lord, the true King whose viceroy he was, the "bright consummate flower" for the sake of which the root has its being. And, as he sees the majestic lineaments shimmering through the facts of his own history, like some hidden fire toiling in a narrow s.p.a.ce ere it leaps into ruddy spires that burst their bonds and flame heaven high, he is borne onwards by the prophetic impulse, and the Spirit of G.o.d speaks through his tongue words which have no meaning unless their theme be a Divine ruler and priest for all the world.
He begins with the solemn words with which a prophetic message is wont to be announced, thus at the outset stamping on the psalm its true character. The "oracle" or "word of Jehovah unto my Lord," which he heard, is a new revelation made to him from the heavens. He is taken up and listens to the Divine voice calling to His right hand, to the most intimate communion with Himself, and to wielding the energies of omnipotence--Him whom David knew to be his lord. And when that Divine voice ceases, its mandate having been fulfilled, the prophetic spirit in the seer hymns the coronation anthem of the monarch enthroned by the side of the majesty in the heavens. "The sceptre of Thy strength will Jehovah send out of Zion. Rule Thou in the midst of Thine enemies." In singular juxtaposition are the throne at G.o.d"s right hand and the sceptre--the emblem of sovereignty--issuing from Zion, a dominion realised on earth by a monarch in the heavens, a dominion the centre of which is Zion, and the undefined extent universal. It is a monarchy, too, established in the midst of enemies, sustained in spite of antagonism not only by the power of Jehovah, but by the activity of the sovereign"s own "rule." It is a dominion for the maintenance of which devout souls will burst into prayer, and the most powerful can bring but their aspirations. But the vision includes more than the warrior king and his foes. Imbedded, as it were, in the very heart of the description of the former comes the portraiture of his subjects, for a witness how close is the union between Him and them, and how inseparable from His glories are those who serve Him. They are characterised in a threefold manner. "Thy people (shall be) willing in the day of Thine array." The army is being mustered.[U] They are not mercenaries, nor pressed men. They flock gladly to the standard, like the warriors celebrated of old in Deborah"s chant of victory, who "willingly offered themselves." The word of our psalm might be translated "freewill offerings," and the whole clause carries us into the very heart of that great truth, that glad consecration and grateful self-surrender is the one bond which knits us to the Captain of our salvation who gave Himself for us, to the meek Monarch whose crown is of thorns and His sceptre a reed, for tokens that His dominion rests on suffering and is wielded in gentleness. The next words should be punctuated as a separate clause, co-ordinate with the former, and adding another feature to the description of the army. "In the beauties of holiness" is a common name for the dress of the priests: the idea conveyed is that the army is an army of priests, as the king himself is a priest. They are clothed, not in mail and warlike attire, but in "fine linen clean and white," like the armies which a later prophet saw following the Lord of lords. Their warfare is not to be by force and cruelty, nor their conquests b.l.o.o.d.y; but while soldiers they are to be priests, their weapons purity and devotion, their merciful struggle to bring men to G.o.d, and to mirror G.o.d to men. Round the one image gather all ideas of discipline, courage, consecration to a cause, loyalty to a leader; round the other, all thoughts of gentleness, of an atmosphere of devotion calm and still as the holy place, of stainless character. Christ"s servants must be both soldiers and priests, like some of those knightly orders who bore the cross on helmet and shield, and shaped the very hilts of their swords into its likeness. And these soldier-priests are described by yet another image, "From the womb of the morning thou hast the dew of thy youth," where we are to regard the last word as used in a collective sense, and equivalent to "Thy young warriors." They are like the dew sparkling in infinite globelets on every blade of gra.s.s, hanging gems on every bit of dead wood, formed in secret silence, reflecting the sunlight, and, though the single drops be small and feeble, yet together freshening the thirsty world. So, formed by an unseen and mysterious power, one by one insignificant, but in the whole mighty, mirroring G.o.d and quickening and beautifying the worn world, the servants of the priest-king are to be "in the midst of many people like the dew from the Lord."
[U] The word translated "power" in our version, has the same double meaning as that has in old English, or as "force" has now, sometimes signifying "strength" and sometimes an "army." The latter is the more appropriate here. "The day of Thine army" will then be equivalent to the day of mustering the troops.
Another solemn word from the lips of G.o.d begins the second half of the psalm. "Jehovah swears," gives the sanction and guarantee of His own nature, puts in pledge His own being for the fulfilment of the promise.
And that which He swears is a new thing in the earth. The blending of the royal and priestly offices in the Messiah, and the eternal duration in Him of both, is a distinct advancement in the development of Messianic prophecy. The historical occasion for it may indeed be connected with David"s kingship and conquest of Melchizedek"s city; but the real source of it is a direct predictive inspiration. We have here not merely the devout psalmist meditating on the truths revealed before his day, but the prophet receiving a new word from G.o.d unheard by mortal ears, and far transcending even the promises made to him by Nathan.
There is but one person to whom it can apply, who sits as a priest upon his throne, who builds the temple of the Lord (Zech. vi. 12, 13).
As the former Divine word, so this is followed by the prophet"s rapturous answer, which carries on the portraiture of the priest-king.
There is some doubt as to the person addressed in these later verses.
"The Lord at thy right hand crushes kings in the day of His wrath."
Whose right hand? The answer generally given is, "The Messiah"s." Who is the Lord that smites the petty kinglets of earth? The answer generally given is, "G.o.d." But it is far more dramatic, avoids an awkward abruptness in the change of persons in the last verse, and brings out a striking contrast with the previous half, if we take the opposite view, and suppose Jehovah addressed and the Messiah spoken of throughout. Then the first Divine word is followed by the prophetic invocation of the exalted Messiah throned at the right hand and expecting till His enemies be made His footstool. The second is followed by the prophetic invocation of Jehovah, and describes the Lord Messiah at G.o.d"s right hand as before, but instead of longer waiting He now flames forth in all the resistless energy of a conqueror. The day of His array is succeeded by the day of His wrath. He crushes earth"s monarchies. The psalmist"s eye sees the whole earth one great battle-field. "(It is) full of corpses. He wounds the head over wide lands," where there may possibly be a reference to the first vague dawning of a hope which G.o.d"s mercy had let lighten on man"s horizon--"He shall bruise thy head," or the word may be used as a collective expression for rulers, as the parallelism with the previous verse requires. Thus striding on to victory across the prostrate foe, and pursuing the flying relics of their power, "He drinks of the brook in the way, therefore shall He lift up the head," words which are somewhat difficult, however interpreted.
If, with the majority of modern commentators, we take them as a picturesque embodiment of eager haste in the pursuit, the conqueror "faint, yet pursuing," and stooping for a moment to drink, then hurrying on with renewed strength after the fugitives, one can scarcely help feeling that such a close to such a psalm is trivial and liker the artificial play of fancy than the work of the prophetic spirit, to say nothing of the fact that there is nothing about pursuit in the psalm. If we fall back on the older interpretation, which sees in the words a prophecy of the sufferings of the Messiah who tastes death and drinks of the cup of sorrows, and therefore is highly exalted, we get a meaning which worthily crowns the psalm, but seems to break somewhat abruptly the sequence of thought, and to force the metaphor of drinking of the brook into somewhat strained parallelism with the very different New Testament images just named. But the doubt we must leave over these final words does not diminish the preciousness of this psalm as a clear, articulate prophecy from David"s lips of David"s Son, whom he had learned to know through the experiences and facts of his own life. He had climbed through sufferings to his throne. G.o.d had exalted him and given him victory, and surrounded him with a loyal people. But he was only a shadow; limitations and imperfections surrounded his office and weakened himself; half of the Divine counsel of peace could not be mirrored in his functions at all, and death lay ahead of him. So his glory and his feebleness alike taught him that "one mightier than" he must be coming behind him, "the latchet of whose shoes he was not worthy to unloose"--the true King of Israel, to bear witness to whom was his highest honour.
The third characteristic of the first seventeen years of David"s reign is his successful wars with surrounding nations. The gloomy days of defeat and subjugation which had darkened the closing years of Saul are over now, and blow after blow falls with stunning rapidity on the amazed enemies. The narrative almost pants for breath as it tells with hurry and pride how, south, and east, and north, the "lion of the tribe of Judah" sprang from his fastness, and smote Philistia, Edom, Moab, Ammon, Amalek, Damascus, and the Syrians beyond, even to the Euphrates; and the bounding courage of king and people, and the unity of heart and hand with which they stood shoulder to shoulder in many a b.l.o.o.d.y field, ring through the psalms of this period. Whatever higher meaning may be attached to them, their roots are firm in the soil of actual history, and they are first of all the war-songs of a nation. That being so, that they should also be inspired hymns for the church in all ages will present no difficulty nor afford any consecration to modern warfare, if the progressive character of revelation be duly kept in mind. There is a whole series of such psalms, such as xx., xxi., lx., and probably lxviii. We cannot venture in our limited s.p.a.ce on any a.n.a.lysis of the last of these. It is a splendid burst of national triumph and devout praise, full of martial ardour, throbbing with lofty consciousness of G.o.d"s dwelling in Israel, abounding with allusions to the ancient victories of the people, and world-wide in its antic.i.p.ations of future triumph. How strange the history of its opening words has been! Through the battle smoke of how many a field they have rung! On the plains of the Palatinate, from the lips of Cromwell"s Ironsides, and from the poor peasants that went to death on many a bleak moor for Christ"s crown and covenant, to the Doric music of their rude chant--
"Let G.o.d arise, and scattered Let all His enemies be; And let all those that do Him hate, Before His presence flee."