1 Be gracious to me, O God, according to Thy loving-kindness:
According to the greatness of Thy compassions blot out my
transgressions.
2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,
And from my sin make me clean.
3 For I, I know my transgressions:
And my sin is before me continually.
4 Against Thee, Thee only, have I sinned,
And done what is evil in Thine eyes:
That Thou mightest appear righteous when Thou speakest,
And clear when Thou judgest.
5 Behold, in iniquity was I born;
And in sin did my mother conceive me.
6 Behold, Thou desirest truth in the inward parts:
Therefore in the hidden part make me to know wisdom.
7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean:
Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
8 Make me to hear joy and gladness;
That the bones Thou hast crushed may exult.
9 Hide Thy face from my sins, and all my iniquities blot out.
10 A clean heart create for me, O God;
And a steadfast spirit renew within me.
11 Cast me not out from Thy presence;
And Thy holy spirit take not from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of Thy salvation:
And with a willing spirit uphold me.
13 [Then] will I teach transgressors Thy ways;
And sinners shall return to Thee.
14 Deliver me from blood-guiltiness, O God, the God of my salvation;
And my tongue shall joyfully sing Thy righteousness.
15 Lord, open my lips;
And my mouth shall declare Thy praise.
16 For Thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it:
In burnt offering Thou hast no pleasure.
17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit:
A heart broken and crushed, O God, Thou wilt not despise.
18 Do good in Thy good pleasure to Zion:
O build the walls of Jerusalem.
19 Then shalt Thou delight in sacrifices of righteousness, burnt
offering and whole burnt offering:
Then shall they offer bullocks on Thine altar.
The main grounds on which the Davidic authorship of this psalm is
denied are four. First, it is alleged that its conceptions of sin
and penitence are in advance of his stage of religious development;
or, as Cheyne puts it, "David could not have had these ideas" ("Aids
to Dev. Study of Crit.," 166). The impossibility depends on a theory
which is not yet so established as to be confidently used to settle
questions of date. Again, the psalmist's wail, "Against Thee only
have I sinned," is said to be conclusive proof that the wrong done
to Bathsheba and the murder of Uriah cannot be referred to. But is
not _God_ the correlative of _sin_, and may not the same act be
qualified in one aspect as a crime and in another as a sin, bearing
in the latter character exclusive relation to God? The prayer in ver.
18 is the ground of a third objection to the Davidic authorship.
Certainly it is hopeless to attempt to explain. "Build the walls of
Jerusalem" as David's prayer. But the opinion held by both advocates
and opponents of David's authorship, that vv. 18, 19, are a later
liturgical addition, removes this difficulty. Another ground on which
the psalm is brought down to a late date is the resemblances in it to
Isa. xl.-lxvi., which are taken to be echoes of the prophetic words.
The resemblances are undoubted; the assumption that the psalmist is
the copyist is not.
The personified nation is supposed by most modern authorities to be
the speaker; and the date is sometimes taken to be the Restoration
period, before the rebuilding of the walls by Nehemiah (Cheyne, "Orig.
of Psalt.," 162); by others, the time of the Babylonish exile; and,
as usual, by some, the Maccabean epoch. It puts a considerable strain
upon the theory of personification to believe that these confessions
of personal sin, and longing cries for a clean heart, which so many
generations have felt to fit their most secret experiences, were not
the wailings of a soul which had learned the burden of individuality,
by consciousness of sin, and by realisation of the awful solitude of
its relation to God. There are also expressions in the psalm which
seem to clog the supposition that the speaker is the nation with great
difficulties--_e.g._, the reference to birth in ver. 5, the prayer for
inward truth in ver. 6, and for a clean heart in ver. 10. Baethgen
acknowledges that the two latter only receive their full meaning when
applied to an individual. He quotes Olshausen, a defender of the
national reference, who really admits the force of the objection to
it, raised on the ground of these expressions, while he seeks to parry
it by saying that "it is not unnatural that the poet, speaking in the
singular, should, although he writes for the congregation, bring in
occasional expressions here and there which do not fit the community so
well as they do each individual in it." The acknowledgment is valuable;
the attempt to turn its edge may be left to the reader's judgment.
In vv. 1-9 the psalmist's cry is chiefly for pardon; in vv. 10-12 he
prays chiefly for purity; in vv. 13-17 he vows grateful service. Vv.
18, 19, are probably a later addition.
The psalm begins with at once grasping the character of God as the
sole ground of hope. That character has been revealed in an infinite
number of acts of love. The very number of the psalmist's sins
drove him to contemplate the yet greater number of God's mercies.
For where but in an infinite placableness and loving-kindness could
he find pardon? If the Davidic authorship is adopted, this psalm
followed Nathan's assurance of forgiveness, and its petitions are
the psalmist's efforts to lay hold of that assurance. The revelation
of God's love precedes and causes true penitence. Our prayer for
forgiveness is the appropriation of God's promise of forgiveness. The
assurance of pardon does not lead to a light estimate of sin, but
drives it home to the conscience.
The petitions of vv. 1, 2, teach us how the psalmist thought of sin.
They are all substantially the same, and their repetition discloses
the depth of longing in the suppliant. The language fluctuates between
plural and singular nouns, designating the evil as "transgressions" and
as "iniquity" and "sin." The psalmist regards it, first, as a multitude
of separate acts, then as all gathered together into a grim unity. The
single deeds of wrong-doing pass before him. But these have a common
root; and we must not only recognise acts, but that alienation of heart
from which they come--not only sin as it comes out in the life, but as
it is coiled round our hearts. Sins are the manifestations of sin.
We note, too, how the psalmist realises his personal responsibility.
He reiterates "my"--"_my_ transgressions, _my_ iniquity, _my_ sin." He
does not throw blame on circumstances, or talk about temperament or
maxims of society or bodily organisation. All these had some share in
impelling him to sin; but after all allowance made for them, the deed
is the doer's, and he must bear its burden.
The same eloquent synonyms for evil deeds which are found in Psalm
xxxii. occur again here. "Transgression" is literally _rebellion_;
"iniquity," _that which is twisted_ or _bent_; "sin," _missing a
mark_. Sin is rebellion, the uprising of the will against rightful
authority--not merely the breach of abstract propriety or law, but
opposition to a living Person, who has right to obedience. The
definition of virtue is obedience to God, and the sin in sin is the
assertion of independence of God and opposition to His will.
Not less profound is that other name, which regards sin as "iniquity"
or distortion. Then there is a straight line to which men's lives
should run parallel. Our life's paths should be like these conquering
Roman roads, turning aside for nothing, but going straight to their
aim over mountain and ravine, stream or desert. But this man's passion
had made for him a crooked path, where he found no end, "in wandering
mazes lost." Sin is, further, missing an aim, the aim being either the
Divine purpose for man, the true Ideal of manhood, or the satisfaction
proposed by the sinner to himself as the result of his sin. In both
senses every sin misses the mark.
These petitions show also how the psalmist thought of forgiveness. As
the words for sin give a threefold view of it, so those for pardon set
it forth in three aspects. "Blot out";--that petition conceives of
forgiveness as being the erasure of a writing, perhaps of an indictment.
Our past is a blurred manuscript, full of false and bad things. The
melancholy theory of some thinkers is summed up in the despairing
words, "What I have written, I have written." But the psalmist knew
better than that; and we should know better than he did. Our souls may
become palimpsests; and, as devotional meditations might be written by
a saint on a parchment that had borne foul legends of false gods, the
bad writing on them may be obliterated, and God's law be written there.
"Wash me thoroughly" needs no explanation. But the word employed is
significant, in that it probably means washing by kneading or beating,
not by simple rinsing. The psalmist is ready to submit to any painful
discipline, if only he may be cleansed. "Wash me, beat me, tread me
down, hammer me with mallets, dash me against stones, do anything with
me, if only these foul stains are melted from the texture of my soul."
The psalmist had not heard of the alchemy by which men can "wash their
robes and make them white in the blood of the Lamb"; but he held fast
by God's "loving-kindness," and knew the blackness of his own sin, and
groaned under it; and therefore his cry was not in vain. An anticipation
of the Christian teaching as to forgiveness lies in his last expression
for pardon, "make me clean," which is the technical word for the
priestly act of declaring ceremonial purity, and for the other priestly
act of making as well as declaring clean from the stains of leprosy.
The suppliant thinks of his guilt not only as a blotted record or as a
polluted robe, but as a fatal disease, the "first-born of death," and as
capable of being taken away only by the hand of the Priest laid on the
feculent mass. We know who put out his hand and touched the leper, and
said, "I will: be thou clean."
The petitions for cleansing are, in ver. 3, urged on the ground of the
psalmist's consciousness of sin. Penitent confession is a condition of
forgiveness. There is no need to take this verse as giving the reason
why the psalmist offered his prayer, rather than as presenting a plea
why it should be answered. Some commentators have adopted the former
explanation, from a fear lest the other should give countenance to the
notion that repentance is a meritorious cause of forgiveness; but that
is unnecessary scrupulousness. "Sin is always sin, and deserving of
punishment, whether it is confessed or not. Still, confession of sin is
of importance on this account--that God will be gracious to none but to
those who confess their sin" (Luther, quoted by Perowne).
Ver. 4 sounds the depths in both its clauses. In the first the
psalmist shuts out all other aspects of his guilt, and is absorbed
in its solemnity as viewed in relation to God. It is asked, How
could David have thought of his sin, which had in so many ways been
"against" others, as having been "against Thee, Thee only"? As has
been noted above, this confession has been taken to demonstrate
conclusively the impossibility of the Davidic authorship. But surely
it argues a strange ignorance of the language of a penitent soul,
to suppose that such words as the psalmist's could be spoken only
in regard to sins which had no bearing at all on other men. David's
deed had been a crime against Bathsheba, against Uriah, against his
family and his realm; but these were not its blackest characteristics.
Every crime against man is sin against God. "Inasmuch as ye have
done it unto one of the least of these ... ye have done it unto Me"
is the spirit of the Decalogue as well as the language of Jesus. And
it is only when considered as having relation to God that crimes
are darkened into sins. The psalmist is stating a strictly true and
profound thought when he declares that he has sinned "against Thee
only." Further, that thought has, for the time being, filled his whole
horizon. Other aspects of his shameful deed will torture him enough
in coming days, even when he has fully entered into the blessedness
of forgiveness; but they are not present to his mind now, when the
one awful thought of his perverted relation to God swallows up all
others. A man who has never felt that all-engrossing sense of his sin
as against God only has much to learn.
The second clause of ver. 4 opens the question whether "in order that"
is always used in the Old Testament in its full meaning as expressing
intention, or sometimes in the looser signification of "so that,"
expressing result. Several passages usually referred to on this point
(_e.g._, Psalm xxx. 12; Exod. xi. 9; Isa. xliv. 9; Hos. viii. 4)
strongly favour the less stringent view, which is also in accordance
with the genius of the Hebrew race, who were not metaphysicians. The
other view, that the expression here means "in order that," insists
on grammatical precision in the cries of a penitent heart, and clogs
the words with difficulty. If their meaning is that the psalmist's
sin was intended to show forth God's righteousness in judging, the
intention must have been God's, not the sinner's; and such a thought
not only ascribes man's sin directly to God, but is quite irrelevant
to the psalmist's purpose in the words. For he is not palliating his
transgression or throwing it on Divine predestination (as Cheyne takes
him to be doing), but is submitting himself, in profoundest abasement of
undivided guilt, to the just judgment of God. His prayer for forgiveness
is accompanied with willingness to submit to chastisement, as all true
desire for pardon is. He makes no excuses for his sin, but submits
himself unconditionally to the just judgment of God. "Thou remainest
the Holy One; I am the sinner; and therefore Thou mayest, with perfect
justice, punish me and spurn me from Thy presence" (Stier).
Vv. 5, 6, are marked as closely related by the "Behold" at the beginning
of each. The psalmist passes from penitent contemplation and confession
of his acts of sin to acknowledge his sinful nature, derived from
sinful parents. "Original sin" is theological terminology for the same
facts which science gathers together under the name of "heredity." The
psalmist is not responsible for later dogmatic developments of the
idea, but he feels that he has to confess not only his acts but his
nature. "A corrupt tree cannot bring forth good fruit." The taint is
transmitted. No fact is more plain than this, as all the more serious
observers of human life and of their own characters have recognised.
Only a superficial view of humanity or an inadequate conception of
morality can jauntily say that "all children are born good." Theologians
have exaggerated and elaborated, as is their wont, and so have made the
thought repugnant; but the derived sinful bias of human nature is a
fact, not a dogma, and those who know it and their own share of it best
will be disposed to agree with Browning, in finding one great reason for
believing in Biblical religion, that--
"'Tis the faith that launched point-blank her dart
At the head of a lie--taught Original Sin,
The Corruption of Man's Heart."
The psalmist is not, strictly speaking, either extenuating or
aggravating his sin by thus recognising his evil nature. He does
not think that sin is the less his, because the tendency has been
inherited. But he is spreading all his condition before God. In fact,
he is not so much thinking of his criminality as of his desperate
need. From a burden so heavy and so intertwined with himself none but
God can deliver him. He cannot cleanse himself; for self is infected.
He cannot find cleansing among men, for they too have inherited the
poison. And so he is driven to God, or else must sink into despair.
He who once sees into the black depths of his own heart will give
up thereafter all ideas of "every man his own redeemer." That the
psalmist's purpose was not to minimise his own guilt is clear, not
only from the tone of the psalm, but from the antithesis presented by
the Divine desire after inward truth in the next verse, which is out
of place if this verse contains a palliation for sin.
We can scarcely miss the bearing of this verse on the question of
whether the psalm is the confession of an individual penitent or that
of the nation. It strongly favours the former view, though it does not
make the latter absolutely impossible.
The discovery of inherent and inherited sinfulness brings with it
another discovery--that of the penetrating depth of the requirements
of God's law. He cannot be satisfied with outside conformity in deed.
The more intensely conscience realises sin, the more solemnly rises
before it the Divine ideal of man in its inwardness as well as in its
sweep. Truth within--inward correspondence with His will, and absolute
sincerity of soul are His desire. But I am "born in iniquity": a
terrible antithesis, and hopeless but for one hope, which dawns over
the suppliant like morning on a troubled sea. If we cannot ask God to
make us what He wishes us to be, these two discoveries of our nature
and of His will are open doorways to despair; but he who apprehends
them wisely will find in their conjoint operation a force impelling
him to prayer, and therefore to confidence. Only God can enable such a
Being as man to become such as He will delight in; and since He seeks
for truth within, He thereby pledges Himself to give the truth and
wisdom for which He seeks.
Meditation on the sin which was ever before the psalmist, passes into
renewed prayers for pardon, which partly reiterate those already
offered in vv. 1, 2. The petition in ver. 7 for purging with hyssop
alludes to sprinkling of lepers and unclean persons, and indicates
both a consciousness of great impurity and a clear perception of the
symbolic meaning of ritual cleansings. "Wash me" repeats a former
petition; but now the psalmist can venture to dwell more on the
thought of future purity than he could do then. The approaching answer
begins to make its brightness visible through the gloom, and it seems
possible to the suppliant that even his stained nature shall glisten
like sunlit snow. Nor does that expectation exhaust his confidence.
He hopes for "joy and gladness." His bones have been crushed--_i.e._,
his whole self has been, as it were, ground to powder by the weight
of God's hand; but restoration is possible. A penitent heart is not
too bold when it asks for joy. There is no real well-founded gladness
without the consciousness of Divine forgiveness. The psalmist closes
his petitions for pardon (ver. 9) with asking God to "hide His face
from his sins," so that they be, as it were, no more existent for
Him, and, by a repetition of the initial petition in ver. 1, for the
blotting out of "all mine iniquities."
The second principal division begins with ver. 10, and is a prayer for
purity, followed by vows of glad service. The prayer is contained in
three verses (10-12), of which the first implores complete renewal of
nature, the second beseeches that there may be no break between the
suppliant and God, and the third asks for the joy and willingness to
serve which would flow from the granting of the desires preceding.
In each verse the second clause has "spirit" for its leading word,
and the middle one of the three asks for "_Thy_ holy spirit." The
petitions themselves, and the order in which they occur, are deeply
significant, and deserve much more elucidation than can be given here.
The same profound consciousness of inward corruption which spoke in
the former part of the psalm shapes the prayer for renewal. Nothing
less than a new creation will make this man's heart "clean." His
past has taught him that. The word employed is always used of God's
creative act; and the psalmist feels that nothing less than the power
which brooded over the face of primeval chaos, and evolved thence an
ordered world, can deal with the confused ruin within himself. What
he felt that he must have is what prophets promised (Jer. xxiv. 7;
Ezek. xxxvi. 26) and Christ has brought--a new creation, in which,
while personality remains unaffected, and the components of character
continue as before, a real new life is bestowed, which stamps new
directions on affections, gives new aims, impulses, convictions, casts
out inveterate evils, and gradually changes "all but the basis of the
soul." A desire for pardon which does not unfold into such longing for
deliverance from the misery of the old self is not the offspring of
genuine penitence, but only of base fear.
"A steadfast spirit" is needful in order to keep a cleansed heart
clean; and, on the other hand, when, by cleanness of heart, a man
is freed from the perturbations of rebellious desires and the
weakening influences of sin, his spirit will be steadfast. The two
characteristics sustain each other. Consciousness of corruption
dictated the former desire; penitent recognition of weakness and
fluctuation inspires the latter. It may be observed, too, that the
triad of petitions having reference to "spirit" has for its central
one a prayer for God's Spirit, and that the other two may be regarded
as dependent on that. Where God's Spirit dwells, the human spirit in
which it abides will be firm with uncreated strength. His energy,
being infused into a tremulous, changeful humanity, will make it
stable. If we are to stand fast, we must be stayed on God.
The group of petitions in ver. 11 is negative. It deprecates a
possible tragic separation from God, and that under two aspects.
"Part me not from Thee; part not Thyself from me." The former prayer,
"Cast me not out from Thy presence," is by some explained according
to the analogy of other instances of the occurrence of the phrase,
where it means expulsion from the land of Israel; and is claimed,
thus interpreted, as a clear indication that the psalmist speaks in
the name of the nation. But however certainly the expression is thus
used elsewhere, it cannot, without introducing an alien thought, be so
interpreted in its present connection, imbedded in petitions of the
most spiritual and individual character: much rather, the psalmist
is recoiling from what he knows only too well to be the consequence
of an unclean heart--separation from God, whether in the sense of
exclusion from the sanctuary, or in the profounder sense, which is
not too deep for such a psalm, of conscious loss of the light of
God's face. He dreads being, Cain-like, shut out from that presence
which is life; and he knows that, unless his previous prayer for a
clean heart is answered, that dreary solitude of great darkness must
be his lot. The sister petition, "Take not Thy holy spirit from me,"
contemplates the union between God and him from the other side. He
regards himself as possessing that Divine spirit; for he knows that,
notwithstanding his sin, God has not left him, else he would not have
these movements of godly sorrow and yearnings for purity. There is no
reason to commit the anachronism of supposing that the psalmist had
any knowledge of New Testament teaching of a personal Divine Spirit.
But if we may suppose that he is David, this prayer has special force.
That anointing which designated and fitted him for kingly office
symbolised the gift of a Divine influence accompanying a Divine call.
If we further remember how it had fared with his predecessor, from
whom, because of impenitence, "the Spirit of the Lord departed, and
an evil spirit from the Lord troubled him," we understand how Saul's
successor, trembling as he remembers his fate, prays with peculiar
emphasis, "Take not Thy Holy Spirit from me."
The last member of the triad, in ver. 12, looks back to former
petitions, and asks for restoration of the "joy of Thy salvation,"
which had lain like dew on this man before he fell. In this connection
the supplication for joy follows on the other two, because the joy
which it desires is the result of their being granted. For what is
"Thy salvation" but the gift of a clean heart and a steadfast spirit,
the blessed consciousness of unbroken closeness of communion with God,
in which the suppliant suns himself in the beams of God's face, and
receives an uninterrupted communication of His Spirit's gifts? These
are the sources of pure joy, lasting as God Himself, and victorious
over all occasions for surface sorrow. The issue of all these gifts
will be "a willing spirit," delighting to obey, eager to serve. If
God's Spirit dwells in us, obedience will be delight. To serve God
because we must is not service. To serve Him because we had rather
do His will than anything else is the service which delights Him
and blesses us. The word rendered "willing" comes by a very natural
process, to mean nobles. God's servants are princes and lords of
everything besides, themselves included. Such obedience is freedom.
If desires flow with equable motion parallel to God's will, there is
no sense of restraint in keeping within limits beyond which we do not
desire to go. "I will walk at liberty; for I keep Thy precepts."
The last part of the psalm runs over with joyful vows--first,
of magnifying God's name (vv. 13-15), and then of offering true
sacrifices. A man who has passed through such experiences as the
psalmist's, and has received the blessings for which he prayed, cannot
be silent. The instinct of hearts touched by God's mercies is to speak
of them to others. And no man who can say "I will tell what He has
done for my soul" is without the most persuasive argument to bring
to bear on others. A piece of autobiography will touch men who are
unaffected by elaborate reasonings and deaf to polished eloquence.
The impulse and the capacity to "teach transgressors Thy ways" are
given in the experience of sin and forgiveness; and if any one has
not the former, it is questionable whether he has, in any real sense
or large measure, received the latter. The prayer for deliverance
from blood-guiltiness in ver. 14 breaks for a moment the flow of
vows; but only for a moment. It indicates how amid them the psalmist
preserved his sense of guilt, and how little he was disposed to
think lightly of the sins of whose forgiveness he had prayed himself
into the assurance. Its emergence here, like a black rock pushing
its grimness up through a sparkling, sunny sea, is no sign of doubt
whether his prayers had been answered; but it marks the abiding sense
of sinfulness, which must ever accompany abiding gratitude for pardon
and abiding holiness of heart. It seems hard to believe, as the
advocates of a national reference in the psalm are obliged to do, that
"blood-guiltiness" has no special reference to the psalmist's crime,
but is employed simply as typical of sin in general. The mention of
it finds a very obvious explanation on the hypothesis of Davidic
authorship, and a rather constrained one on any other.
Ver. 16 introduces the reason for the preceding vow of grateful praise,
as is shown by the initial "For." The psalmist will bring the sacrifices
of a grateful heart making his lips musical, because he has learned that
these, and not ritual offerings, are acceptable. The same depreciation
of external sacrifices is strongly expressed in Psalm xl. 6, and here,
as there, is not to be taken as an absolute condemnation of these, but
as setting them decisively below spiritual service. To suppose that
prophets or psalmists waged a polemic against ritual observances _per
se_ misapprehends their position entirely. They do war against "the
sacrifice of the wicked," against external acts which had no inward
reality corresponding to them, against reliance on the outward and
its undue exaltation. The authors of the later addition to this psalm
had a true conception of its drift when they appended to it, not as a
correction of a heretical tendency, but as a liturgical addition in full
harmony with its spirit, the vow to "offer whole burnt offerings on"
the restored "altar," when God should again build up Zion.
The psalmist's last words are immortal. "A heart broken and crushed, O
God, Thou wilt not despise." But they derive still deeper beauty and
pathos when it is observed that they are spoken after confession has
been answered to his consciousness by pardon, and longing for purity
by at least some bestowal of it. The "joy of Thy salvation," for which
he had prayed, has begun to flow into his heart. The "bones" which had
been "crushed" are beginning to reknit, and thrills of gladness to
steal through his frame; but still he feels that with all these happy
experiences contrite consciousness of his sin must mingle. It does not
rob his joy of one rapture, but it keeps it from becoming careless. He
goes safely who goes humbly. The more sure a man is that God has put
away the iniquity of his sin, the more should he remember it; for the
remembrance will vivify gratitude and bind close to Him without whom
there can be no steadfastness of spirit nor purity of life. The clean
heart must continue contrite, if it is not to cease to be clean.
The liturgical addition implies that Jerusalem is in ruins. It cannot
be supposed without violence to come from David. It is not needed in
order to form a completion to the psalm, which ends more impressively,
and has an inner unity and coherence, if the deep words of ver. 17 are
taken as its close.