1 Jehovah is my Shepherd; I do not want.
2 In pastures of fresh grass He leads me;
By waters of rest He makes me lie.
3 My soul He refreshes;
He guides me in paths of righteousness [straight paths] for His
name's sake.
4 Even if I walk in a gorge of gloom, I fear not evil, for Thou art
with me;
Thy rod and Thy staff--they comfort me.
5 Thou spreadest before me a table in presence of my foes;
Thou anointest with oil my head: my cup is overfulness.
6 Only good and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life,
And my dwelling shall be in the house of Jehovah for length of
days.
The world could spare many a large book better than this sunny little
psalm. It has dried many tears and supplied the mould into which many
hearts have poured their peaceful faith. To suppose that the speaker
is the personified nation chills the whole. The tone is too intense
not to be the outcome of personal experience, however admissible the
application to the nation may be as secondary. No doubt Jehovah is the
Shepherd of Israel in several Asaphite psalms and in Jeremiah; but,
notwithstanding great authorities, I cannot persuade myself that the
voice which comes so straight to the heart did not come from the heart
of a brother speaking across the centuries his own personal emotions,
which are universal just because they are individual. It is the pure
utterance of personal trust in Jehovah, darkened by no fears or
complaints and so perfectly at rest that it has nothing more to ask.
For the time desire is stilled in satisfaction. One tone, and that the
most blessed which can sound in a life, is heard through the whole. It
is the psalm of quiet trust, undisturbed even by its joy, which is
quiet too. The fire glows, but does not flame or crackle. The one
thought is expanded in two kindred images: that of the shepherd and
that of the host. The same ideas are substantially repeated under both
forms. The lovely series of vivid pictures, each but a clause long,
but clear-cut in that small compass, like the fine work incised on a
gem, combines with the depth and simplicity of the religious emotion
expressed, to lay this sweet psalm on all hearts.
Vv. 1-4 present the realities of the devout life under the image of
the Divine Shepherd and His lamb.
The comparison of rulers to shepherds is familiar to many tongues, and
could scarcely fail to occur to a pastoral people like the Jews, nor
is the application to Jehovah's relation to the people so recondite
that we need to relegate the psalms in which it occurs to a late era
in the national history. The psalmist lovingly lingers on the image,
and draws out the various aspects of the shepherd's care and of the
flock's travels, with a ripeness and calmness which suggests that we
listen to a much-experienced man. The sequence in which the successive
pictures occur is noteworthy. Guidance to refreshment comes first, and
is described in ver. 2, in words which fall as softly as the gentle
streams of which they speak. The noontide is fierce, and the land lies
baking in the sun-blaze; but deep down in some wady runs a brook, and
along its course the herbage is bright with perpetual moisture, and
among the lush grass are cool lairs where the footsore, panting flock
may couch. The shepherd's tenderness is beautifully hinted at in the
two verbs: he "leads," not drives, but in Eastern wise precedes and so
draws the trustful sheep; he "makes me to lie down," taking care that
the sheep shall stretch weary limbs in full enjoyment of repose. God
thus guides to rest and lays to rest the soul that follows Him. Why
does the psalmist begin with this aspect of life? Because it is
fittest to express the shepherd's care, and because it is, after all,
the predominant aspect to the devout heart. Life is full of trial and
effort, but it is an unusually rainy region where rain falls on more
than half the days of the year. We live so much more vividly and fully
in the moments of agony or crisis that they seem to fill more space
than they really do. But they are only moments, and the periods of
continued peaceful possession of blessings are measured by years. But
the sweet words of the psalm are not to be confined to material good.
The psalmist does not tell us whether he is thinking more of the outer
or of the inner life, but both are in his mind, and while his
confidence is only partially warranted by the facts of the former, it
is unlimitedly true in regard to the latter. In that application of
the words the significance of the priority given to the pastures of
fresh springing grass and the waters of repose is plain, for there the
rest of trust and the drinking of living water must precede all
walking in paths of righteousness.
Food and drink and rest refresh fainting powers, and this
reinvigoration is meant by "restoring my soul" or life.
But the midday or nightly rest is intended to fit for effort, and so a
second little picture follows in ver. 3, presenting another aspect of
the shepherd's care and of the sheep's course. Out again on to the
road, in spite of heat and dust, the flock goes. "Paths of
righteousness" is perhaps best taken as "straight paths," as that
rendering keeps within the bounds of the metaphor; but since the sheep
are men, straight paths for them must needs be paths of righteousness.
That guidance is "for His name's sake." God has regard to His revealed
character in shepherding His lamb, and will give direction because He
is what He is, and in order that He may be known to be what He has
declared Himself. The psalmist had learned the purpose of repose and
refreshment which, in all regions of life, are intended to prepare for
tasks and marches. We are to "drink for strength, and not for
drunkenness." A man may lie in a bath till strength is diminished, or
may take his plunge and come from it braced for work. In the religious
life it is possible to commit an analogous error, and to prize so
unwisely peaceful hours of communion, as to waive imperative duty for
the sake of them; like Peter with his "Let us make here three
tabernacles," while there were devil-ridden sufferers waiting to be
healed down on the plain. Moments of devotion, which do not prepare
for hours of practical righteousness, are very untrustworthy. But, on
the other hand, the paths of righteousness will not be trodden by
those who have known nothing of the green pastures and waters where
the wearied can rest.
But life has another aspect than these two--rest and toil; and the
guidance into danger and sorrow is as tender as its other forms are.
The singular word rendered "shadow of death" should probably simply be
"gloomy darkness," such, for instance, as in the shaft of a mine (Job
xxviii. 3). But, even if the former rendering is retained, it is not
to be interpreted as meaning actual death. No wise forward look can
ignore the possibility of many sorrows and the certainty of some. Hope
has ever something of dread in her eyes. The road will not be always
bright and smooth, but will sometimes plunge down into grim cañons,
where no sunbeams reach. But even that anticipation may be calm. "Thou
art with me" is enough. He who guides into the gorge will guide
through it. It is not a _cul de sac_, shut in with precipices at the
far end; but it opens out on shining table-lands, where there is
greener pasture. The rod and staff seem to be two names for one
instrument, which was used both to beat off predatory animals and to
direct the sheep. The two synonyms and the appended pronoun express by
their redundancy the full confidence of the psalmist. He will not
fear, though there are grounds enough for terror, in the dark valley;
and though sense prompts him to dread, he conquers fear because he
trusts. "Comfort" suggests a struggle, or, as Calvin says, "Quorsum
enim consolatio ipsa, nisi quia metus eum solicitat?"
The second image of the Divine Host and His guest is expanded in vv. 5,
6. The ideas are substantially the same as in the first part. Repose and
provision, danger and change, again fill the foreground; and again there
is forecast of a more remote future. But all is intensified, the need
and the supply being painted in stronger colours and the hope being
brighter. The devout man is God's guest while he marches through foes,
and travels towards perpetual repose in the house of Jehovah.
Jehovah supplies His servants' wants in the midst of conflict. The table
spread in the sight of the enemy is a more signal token of care and
power than the green pastures are. Life is not only journey and effort,
but conflict; and it is possible not only to have seasons of refreshment
interspersed in the weary march, but to find a sudden table spread by
the same unseen hand which holds back the foes, who look on with grim
eyes, powerless to intercept the sustenance or disturb the guests. This
is the condition of God's servant--always conflict, but always a spread
table. Joy snatched in the face of danger is specially poignant. The
flowers that bloom on the brink of a cataract are bright, and their
tremulous motion adds a charm. Special experiences of God's sufficiency
are wont to come in seasons of special difficulty, as many a true heart
knows. It is no scanty meal that waits God's soldier under such
circumstances, but a banquet accompanied with signs of festivity, viz.,
the head anointed with oil and the cup which is "fulness." God's
supplies are wont to surpass the narrow limits of need and even to
transcend capacity, having a something over which as yet we are unable
to take in, but which is not disproportioned or wasted, since it widens
desire and thereby increases receptivity.
In the last verse we seem to pass to pure anticipation. Memory melts
into hope, and that brighter than the forecast which closed the first
part. There the psalmist's trust simply refused to yield to fear,
while keenly conscious of evil which might warrant it; but here he has
risen higher, and the alchemy of his happy faith and experience has
converted evil into something fairer. "_Only_ good and mercy shall
follow me." There is no evil for the heart wedded to Jehovah; there
are no foes to pursue, but two bright-faced angels walk behind him as
his rear-guard. It is much when the retrospect of life can, like
Jacob on his deathbed, see "the Angel which redeemed me from all
evil"; but it is perhaps more when the else fearful heart can look
forward and say that not only will it fear no evil, but that nothing
but blessings, the outcome of God's mercy, will ever reach it.
The closing hope of dwelling in the house of Jehovah to length of days
rises above even the former verse. The singer knew himself a guest of
God's at the table spread before the foe, but that was, as it were,
refreshment on the march, while this is continual abiding in the home.
Such an unbroken continuity of abode in the house of Jehovah is a
familiar aspiration in other psalms, and is always regarded as
possible even while hands are engaged in ordinary duties and cares.
The psalms which conceive of the religious life under this image are
marked by a peculiar depth and inwardness. They are wholesomely
mystical. The hope of this guest of God's is that, by the might of
fixed faith and continual communion, he may have his life so hid in
God that wherever he goes he may still be in His house, and whatever
he does he may still be "inquiring in His temple." The hope is here
confined to the earthly present, but the Christian reading of the
psalm can scarcely fail to transfer the words to a future. God will
bring those whom He has fed and guided in journeying and conflict to
an unchanging mansion in a home beyond the stars. Here we eat at a
table spread with pilgrims' food, manna from heaven and water from the
rock. We eat in haste and with an eye on the foe, but we may hope to
sit down at another table in the perfected kingdom. The end of the
fray is the beginning of the feast. "We shall go no more out."