1 The fool says in his heart, There is no God;
They corrupt; they make abominable their doings;
There is no one doing good.
2 Jehovah looketh down from heaven upon the sons of men
To see if there is any having discernment,
Seeking after God.
3 They are all turned aside: together they are become putrid;
There is no one doing good,
There is not even one.
4 Do they not know, all the workers of iniquity,
Who devour my people [as] they devour bread?
On Jehovah they do not call.
5 There they feared a [great] fear,
For God is in the righteous generation.
6 The counsel of the afflicted ye would put to shame,
For God is his refuge.
7 Oh that the salvation of Israel were come out of Zion!
When Jehovah brings back the captivity of His people,
May Jacob exult, may Israel be glad!
This psalm springs from the same situation as Psalms x. and xii. It
has several points of likeness to both. It resembles the former in its
attribution to "the fool" of the heart-speech, "There is no God," and
the latter in its use of the phrases "sons of men" and "generation" as
ethical terms and in its thought of a Divine interference as the
source of safety for the righteous. We have thus three psalms closely
connected, but separated from each other by Psalms xi. and xiii. Now
it is observable that these three have no personal references, and
that the two which part them have. It would appear that the five are
arranged on the principle of alternating a general complaint of the
evil of the times with a more personal pleading of an individual
sufferer. It is also noticeable that these five psalms--a little group
of wailing and sighs--are marked off from the cognate psalms iii.-vii.
and xvi., xvii., by two (Psalms viii. and xv.) in an entirely
different tone. A second recast of this psalm appears in the Elohistic
Book (Psalm liii.), the characteristics of which will be dealt with
there. This is probably the original.
The structure of the psalm is simple, but is not carried out completely.
It should consist of seven verses each having three clauses, and so
having stamped on it the sacred numbers 3 and 7, but vv. 5 and 6 each
want a clause, and are the more vehement from their brevity.
The heavy fact of wide-spread corruption presses on the psalmist, and
starts a train of thought which begins with a sad picture of the deluge
of evil, rises to a vision of God's judgment of and on it, triumphs in
the prospect of the sudden panic which shall shake the souls of the
"workers of iniquity" when they see that God is with the righteous, and
ends with a sigh for the coming of that time. The staple of the poem is
but the familiar contrast of a corrupt world and a righteous God who
judges, but it is cast into very dramatic and vivid form here.
We listen first (ver. 1) to the psalmist's judgment of his generation.
Probably it was very unlike the rosy hues in which a heart less in
contact with God and the unseen would have painted the condition of
things. Eras of great culture and material prosperity may have a very
seamy side, which eyes accustomed to the light of God cannot fail to
see. The root of the evil lay, as the psalmist believed, in a
practical denial of God; and whoever thus denied Him was "a fool." It
does not need formulated atheism in order to say in one's heart,
"There is no God." Practical denial or neglect of His working in the
world, rather than a creed of negation, is in the psalmist's mind. In
effect, we say that there is no God when we shut Him up in a far-off
heaven, and never think of Him as concerned in our affairs. To strip
Him of His justice and rob Him of His control is the part of a fool.
For the Biblical conception of folly is moral perversity rather than
intellectual feebleness, and whoever is morally and religiously wrong
cannot be in reality intellectually right.
The practical denial of God lies at the root of two forms of evil.
Positively, "they have made their doings corrupt and abominable"--rotten
in themselves and sickening and loathsome to pure hearts and to God.
Negatively, they do no good things. That is the dreary estimate of his
cotemporaries forced on this sad-hearted singer, because he himself had
so thrillingly felt God's touch and had therefore been smitten with
loathing of men's low ways and with a passion for goodness. "Sursum
corda" is the only consolation for such hearts.
So the next wave of thought (ver. 2) brings into his consciousness the
solemn contrast between the godless noise and activity of earth and
the silent gaze of God, that marks it all. The strong anthropomorphism
of the vivid picture recalls the stories of the Deluge, of Babel, and
of Sodom, and casts an emotional hue over the abstract thought of the
Divine omniscience and observance. The purpose of the Divine quest is
set forth with deep insight, as being the finding of even one good,
devout man. It is the anticipation of Christ's tender word to the
Samaritan that "the Father seeketh such to worship Him." God's heart
yearns to find hearts that turn to Him; He seeks those who seek Him;
they who seek Him, and only they, are "wise." Other Scriptures present
other reasons for that gaze of God from heaven, but this one in the
midst of its solemnity is gracious with revelation of Divine desires.
What is to be the issue of the strongly contrasted situation in these
two verses: beneath, a world full of godless lawlessness; above, a fixed
eye piercing to the discernment of the inmost nature of actions and
characters? Ver. 3 answers. We may almost venture to say that it shows a
disappointed God, so sharply does it put the difference between what He
desired to see and what He did see. The psalmist's sad estimate is
repeated as the result of the Divine search. But it is also increased in
emphasis and in compass. For "the whole" (race) is the subject.
Universality is insisted on in each clause; "all," "together," "not
one," and strong metaphors are used to describe the condition of
humanity. It is "turned aside," _i.e._, from the way of Jehovah; it is
become putrid, like a rotting carcase, is rank, and smells to heaven.
There is a sad cadence in that "no, not one," as of a hope long
cherished and reluctantly abandoned, not without some tinge of wonder at
the barren results of such a search. This stern indictment is quoted by
St. Paul in Romans as confirmation of his thesis of universal
sinfulness; and, however the psalmist had the wickedness of Israel in
the foreground of his consciousness, his language is studiously wide and
meant to include all "the sons of men."
But this baffled quest cannot be the end. If Jehovah seeks in vain for
goodness on earth, earth cannot go on for ever in godless riot.
Therefore, with eloquent abruptness, the voice from heaven crashes in
upon the "fools" in the full career of their folly. The thunder rolls
from a clear sky. God speaks in ver. 4. The three clauses of the
Divine rebuke roughly correspond with those of ver. 1 in so far as the
first points to ignorance as the root of wrong-doing, the second
charges positive sin, and the third refers to negative evil. "Have all
the workers of iniquity no knowledge?" The question has almost a tone
of surprise, as if even Omniscience found matter of wonder in men's
mysterious love of evil. Jesus "marvelled" at some men's "unbelief";
and certainly sin is the most inexplicable thing in the world, and
might almost astonish God as well as heaven and earth. The meaning of
the word "know" here is best learned from ver. 1. "Not to know" is the
same thing as to be "a fool." That ignorance, which is moral
perversity as well as intellectual blindness, needs not to have a
special object stated. Its thick veil hides all real knowledge of God,
duty, and consequences from men. It makes evil-doing possible. If the
evil-doer could have flashed before him the realities of things, his
hand would stay its crime. It is not true that all sin can be resolved
into ignorance, but it is true that criminal ignorance is necessary to
make sin possible. A bull shuts its eyes when it charges. Men who do
wrong are blind in one eye at least, for, if they saw at the moment
what they probably know well enough, sin would be impossible.
This explanation of the words seems more congruous with ver. 1 than
that of others, "made to know," _i.e._ by experience to rue.
Ver. 4 _b_ is obscure from its compressed brevity "Eating my people,
they eat bread." The A.V. and R.V. take their introduction of the "as"
of comparison from the old translations. The Hebrew has no term of
comparison, but it is not unusual to omit the formal term in rapid and
emotional speech, and the picture of the appetite with which a hungry
man devours his food may well stand for the relish with which the
oppressors swallowed up the innocent. There seems no need for the
ingenuities which have been applied to the interpretation of the
clause, nor for departing, with Cheyne, from the division of the verse
according to the accents. The positive sins of the oppressors, of
which we have heard so much in the connected psalms, are here
concentrated in their cruel plundering of "my people," by which the
whole strain of the psalm leads us to understand the devout kernel of
Israel, in contrast with the mass of "men of the earth" in the nation,
and not the nation as a whole in contrast with heathen enemies.
The Divine indictment is completed by "They call not on Jehovah."
Practical atheism is, of course, prayerless. That negation makes a
dreary silence in the noisiest life, and is in one aspect the crown,
and in another the foundation, of all evil-doing.
The thunder-peal of the Divine voice strikes a sudden panic into the
hosts of evil. "There they feared a fear." The psalmist conceives the
scene and its locality. He does not say "there" when he means "then,"
but he pictures the terror seizing the oppressors where they stood
when the Divine thunder rolled above their heads; and with him, as
with us, "on the spot" implies "at the moment." The epoch of such
panic is left vague. Whensoever in any man's experience that solemn
voice sounds, conscience wakes fear. The revelation by any means of a
God who sees evil and judges it makes cowards of us all. Probably the
psalmist thought of some speedily impending act of judgment; but his
juxtaposition of the two facts, the audible voice of God and the swift
terror that shakes the heart, contains an eternal truth, which men who
whisper in their hearts, "There is no God," need to ponder.
This verse 5 is the first of the two shorter verses of our psalm,
containing only two clauses instead of the regular three; but it does
not therefore follow that anything has dropped out. Rather the
framework is sufficiently elastic to allow of such variation according
to the contents, and the shorter verse is not without a certain
increase of vigour, derived from the sharp opposition of its two
clauses. On the one hand is the terror of the sinner occasioned by and
contrasted with the discovery which stands on the other that God is in
the righteous generation. The psalmist sets before himself and us the
two camps: the panic-stricken and confused mass of enemies ready to
break into flight and the little flock of the "righteous generation,"
at peace in the midst of trouble and foes because God is in the midst
of them. No added clause could heighten the effect of that contrast,
which is like that of the host of Israel walking in light and safety
on one side of the fiery pillar and the army of Pharaoh groping in
darkness and dread on the other. The permanent relations of God to the
two sorts of men who are found in every generation and community are
set forth in that strongly marked contrast.
In ver. 6 the psalmist himself addresses the oppressors, with
triumphant confidence born of his previous contemplations. The first
clause might be a question, but is more probably a taunting
affirmation: "You would frustrate the plans of the afflicted"--and you
could not--"for Jehovah is his refuge." Here again the briefer
sentence brings out the eloquent contrast. The malicious foe, seeking
to thwart the poor man's plans, is thwarted. His desire is
unaccomplished; and there is but one explanation of the impotence of
the mighty and the powerfulness of the weak, namely that Jehovah is
the stronghold of His saints. Not by reason of his own wit or power
does the afflicted baffle the oppressor, but by reason of the strength
and inaccessibleness of his hiding-place. "The conies are a feeble
folk, but they make their houses in the rocks," where nothing that has
not wings can get at them.
So, finally, the whole course of thought gathers itself up in the prayer
that the salvation of Israel--the true Israel apparently--were come out
of Zion, God's dwelling, from which He comes forth in His delivering
power. The salvation longed for is that just described. The voice of the
oppressed handful of good men in an evil generation is heard in this
closing prayer. It is encouraged by the visions which have passed before
the psalmist. The assurance that God will intervene is the very
life-breath of the cry to Him that He would. Because we know that He
will deliver, therefore we find it in our hearts to pray that He would
deliver. The revelation of His gracious purposes animates the longings
for their realisation. Such a sigh of desire has no sadness in its
longing and no doubt in its expectation. It basks in the light of an
unrisen sun, and feels beforehand the gladness of the future joys "when
the Lord shall bring again the captivity of His people."
This last verse is by some regarded as a liturgical addition to the
psalm; but ver. 6 cannot be the original close, and it is scarcely
probable that some other ending has been put aside to make room for
this. Besides, the prayer of ver. 7 coheres very naturally with the rest
of the psalm, if only we take that phrase "turns the captivity" in the
sense which it admittedly bears in Job xlii. 10 and Ezek. xvi. 53,
namely that of deliverance from misfortune. Thus almost all modern
interpreters understand the words, and even those who most strongly hold
the late date of the psalm do not find here any reference to the
historical bondage. The devout kernel of the nation is suffering from
oppressors, and that may well be called a captivity. For a good man the
present condition of society is bondage, as many a devout soul has felt
since the psalmist did. But there is a dawning hope of a better day of
freedom, the liberty of the glory of the children of God; and the
gladness of the ransomed captives may be in some degree anticipated even
now. The psalmist was thinking only of some intervention on the field of
history, and we are not to read loftier hopes into his song. But it is
as impossible for Christians not to entertain, as it was for him to
grasp firmly, the last, mightiest hope of a last, utter deliverance from
all evil and of an eternal and perfect joy.