詩篇註釋 第 1 章 第 17/24 段

sitting, you spoke against your brother, and against your mother's son you laid a stumbling-block: he came to the thought of the plot against Uriah, which he wrote concerning the necessity of his being slain in the war.

'For I acknowledge my lawlessness.' And again:

'Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God.' And again, having heard, 'I will convict you, and set it before your face,' he says:

'Turn away your face from my sins.' And again he was inquiring:

'I will not accept young bulls out of your house, nor he-goats out of your flocks;' to which he added:

'For if you had desired sacrifice, I would have given it.' The matters concerning Uriah and the reproof of Nathan are written in the second book of Kingdoms.

Before Nathan came to him he did not confess concerning his sin, being held fast as if by torpor and drunkenness.

But neither did the prophet arrive immediately after the sin.

For it was not fitting that his free will be cut short, and that he become worse while the wickedness was hidden in the depths.

But when he had brought all his evil into the open, and the disease, an interval of time having passed, had come to its crisis and was subsiding, and was taking on a settled state, then in due season, amid stability, the prophet as a physician applies the remedy that comes through reproofs — the affliction being no longer raw, nor indeed still inflamed.

Fittingly, then, does Scripture also mark the time, saying:

But before this, while the soul was still troubled, either he would not have endured the reproofs, or he might even have done some dreadful thing against the prophet, after the manner of those who rave in sickness, who rise up against parents and dearest friends and even against the physicians themselves.

What then was the cause of so great a sin in so great a man? Nathan himself taught it by means of the parable;

for apart from a diabolical power so great a man would not have driven himself into such folly — one who even in the prime of his vigour had been continent.

Accordingly, while he was fleeing from Saul, he had with him in the wilderness Ahinoam;

and he had Abigail, her own husband having died;

yet nowhere does he appear during the flight to have approached them;

for neither did he have children, except after the death of Saul.

For the time of flight was a time of supplications and prayers.

But after the kingship, says the Scripture, children were born to him in Hebron.

And the spirit that overthrows great souls Solomon knew, and said:

'If the spirit of the ruler rises up against you, do not leave your place.'] Have mercy on me, O God, according to your great mercy.

For it belongs to the compassions of God alone to wash the hands of murderous bloodshed.

And he who fashioned nature has mercy upon it;

for he knows that, being greatly sick with weakness, it is easily shaken down into the profane passions of the flesh.

For the inventor of sin easily plunders the human mind, having as his fellow-worker the law that rages in the members of the flesh.

One must therefore draw near to the physician of spirits, that he may work strength for the mind;

for all strength is from him.

For it is written that 'Every sin shall stop its own mouth.' For according to the Apostle:

'It is God who justifies; who is he that condemns?' And the transgression is a lawlessness, because it has a double violation of the law.

'Wash me thoroughly from my lawlessness,' and so forth.

) But in saying 'Wash me thoroughly,' see again, as is likely, that it looks toward the mystery of Christ.

For the Law too had its cleansing through water, which the all-wise Paul also calls to mind, saying:

'For if the blood of bulls and goats, and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling those who have been defiled, sanctifies unto the purity of the flesh.' Yet the type was powerless for the washing away of sin, and was performed only for the purity of the flesh;

but the grace and power that comes through Christ and through holy baptism, surpassing the cleansing under the Law, washes more thoroughly;

rather, it works cleansing altogether, even of the soul itself.

) 'He is impious who says to a king:

You transgress the law,' says the divine Scripture somewhere.

Since therefore there was no one able to convict me who had sinned, and you alone set me right, 'Against you, and you alone, have I sinned.' And well has he added:

'And I have done what is evil in your sight;' for this too is set down in the history:

'for the thing that was done,' it says, 'appeared evil in the sight of the Lord.'

'So that you may be justified in your words, and prevail when you are judged.'

) 'I indeed,' he says, 'became the occasion of evils, but your righteousness shines forth even thus.'

For when a judgment takes place, and the things done by you toward me are brought into the midst, and the things dared by me are set in comparison with those, you will be shown to be righteous and loving to mankind, while I shall appear lawless and ungrateful.

The 'so that,' therefore, is here not indicative of cause;

for he has made provision for all men.

'For behold, I was conceived in iniquities.'

) But he says this not because the working of sin is natural (for then it would be unpunishable), but because proneness to slipping has been allotted to nature;

yet nevertheless one prevails by resolve and by toils, and is not held fast by necessity, because of free will.

) And those in Babylon might also say, in a certain manner, to God:

'If you wish to demand of me a reckoning for the offences I committed against you, it is time for you also to exact it from our forefathers;

for neither did they appear well-disposed.'

In a certain manner, then, I have inherited the ill-disposition of the fathers, and from them I am dragged along into sinning.

) It is the custom of the saints to propitiate God and to call him to mercy through very many utterances indeed at times, but also through accusing themselves, hastening to bring forward the weakness inherent in human nature.

One may indeed hear men crying out:

'As for man, his days are as grass.' And again:

'Remember what my substance is.' And setting this forth still more vividly, the most sorely-tried Job cried aloud unto God:

For he says that the very beginning of our coming-to-be does not take place apart from the defilement of the love of the flesh.

For marriage, confessedly, is honourable, and the thing is beyond reproach in the sight of God;

yet should one scrutinize the occasion of the union, he will find in it a craving of the flesh,

even that itself, though the act done be not reckoned against one as a sin.

The union, then, is condemned if it have not the law as its arbiter, and the true starting-point of the matter, which is the desire for the begetting of children.

Accordingly, insofar as it pertains to mere cravings and to the motion of the flesh, 'in iniquities is our conception, and in sins do our mothers conceive us.'

But if the coming-to-be of bodies has as its root the love of the flesh, then it is altogether diseased in some way, and so too are the things begotten from it.

And so the most holy Paul made a very great outcry against the motions of the flesh, speaking thus:

'For I delight in the law of God according to the inner man;

but I see another law warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.'

'O wretched man that I am!

who shall deliver me from the body of this death? But thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord'—through whom the law of sin has been tamed, and the assault of the fleshly motions is subdued to... impulses, and not willingly.

and this, among the other things, the Only-begotten Word of God accomplished when He became man.

And the divinely-inspired Paul will again confirm it:

'For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God, sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh, that the ordinance of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit.' 'For behold, Thou hast loved truth; the hidden and secret things of Thy wisdom Thou hast made known unto me.'

He showed that from the beginning the nature of men has fallen under sin, ever since the transgression in Eve, and that coming-to-be has come to be under a curse.

He weaves his discourse from far back, in order to show the greatness of God's gift, since He has delivered us from so long a curse through the washing of regeneration.

Here, however, it seems that by 'truth' he names the life that is unfeigned in truth and righteousness;

for whoever has not chosen so to live, lies unto God.

'Strange children have lied unto me.' Of such a kind also is that saying: 'The labour of the olive shall lie.' And you may approach it in yet another way:

namely, that the law was too feeble for the cleansing of sin, sprinkling with water for the washing of the flesh.

But incomparably better is that which is possible through the grace that is in Christ, which is able to do away with every defilement.

He testifies, then, that God loves the truth.

And Christ is the Truth, and the things that come through Him; even as the law consists of types and shadows.

'Thou therefore, O Lord,' he says, 'who art the Truth and lovest truth, and desirest us to pass our life in truth, wilt cleanse us from the ancient sin, and cause us to be made white as snow.'

And as for 'the hidden things Thou hast made known unto me'—inasmuch as all things that were to be, which God appointed in His own wisdom, He revealed to him through the Holy Spirit.

And perhaps too he magnifies his own sin unto his shame, showing that he sinned not through ignorance, but having knowledge from the law, and being honoured moreover with kingship and prophecy.

'Thou shalt sprinkle me with hyssop, and I shall be cleansed.'

By 'hyssop' he likens the working of the Holy Spirit, inasmuch as it warms and scours away all the defilement within us.

The cleansing, then, shall come to pass through hyssop, that is, through the Holy Spirit.

For they say that the hyssop-herb is exceedingly hot and has a concentrating power;

and indeed the sons of physicians marvel at it, as being able to melt away the impurity in the inward parts and to attenuate right well the congealed matter of the phlegm, and the consistency and thickness that comes of other humours, by reason of the vigour of the natural heat that is in it.

...the working of the Spirit, whose grace makes us to boil in the spirit, and melts away every defilement that is within us, being poured in invisibly after the manner of fire.

And the precious blood of Christ not only frees us from corruption, but also from all impurity that is hidden within, and suffers us not to grow cold unto sloth.

'Thou shalt make me to hear joy and gladness,' and so forth.

'Thou wilt make me,' he says, 'to become a hearer, through the Spirit, of the exultation that shall be in the last times.'

And what could this be, save that knowledge concerning the resurrection? Which he also indicated when he said:

'The bones that have been humbled shall rejoice.' And at what other time shall our decayed bones rejoice, save at the season of the resurrection, according to which, as by prophecy, 'Our bones shall spring up like a herb'? And fittingly, after 'Thou shalt sprinkle me,' he added these things;

for upon the grace of holy baptism there follows the hope of the resurrection, which leads back to their beginnings those who believe in Christ, unto a life unending and thrice-blessed.

For then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun, and, luxuriating in blessings that surpass understanding, they shall possess unceasing gladness.

The cleansing, then, that is wrought through holy baptism is accomplished at once;

for the grace is given in Christ, the Holy Spirit sanctifying and scouring the hearts of them that believe.

But it is also heard, and meanwhile there is a hope that does not lie—namely, the exultation and gladness over the good things that are to come.

For by 'bones' here we must understand the vigorous strengths of the mind.

'Let me hear,' he says, 'the voice of exultation, because my twofold sin has been forgiven and pardoned unto me.'

'Turn away Thy face from my sins,' and so forth.

'Look not,' he says, 'upon the transgressions daringly committed by me, but upon me who bewail them.'

And to ask these things was nothing other than to desire that the grace which is in Christ be given to those upon the earth.

'Create in me a clean heart, O God.'

In Scripture, 'creation' is spoken of not only as the bringing forth from non-being into being, but also as the changing from what already is unto that which is better.

'God created the heaven'—this is to fashion from non-being.

But He also creates whenever He makes the wicked man good;

here 'to create' is a change of things unto the better.

For since he himself, and his heart, had already been created, but had been swept along together into adultery and murder, and was being carried down toward corruption, he says, 'Create in me a clean heart'—not that he had not a heart before, nor speaking of the substance of the soul, but of the noblest manner of life.

And perhaps, too, since the heart of all men has been defiled through the transgression in Adam and through the swerving unto what is base, the saints beseech that a certain re-elementing of the things pertaining to us may come to pass from the Maker of all, who both knows our frame and is able to do all things—which indeed He has done.

For we have been re-created in Christ by the renewing of our mind, and have obtained a clean heart, having been transferred unto the longing for virtue.

'Cast me not away from Thy presence, and take not Thy Holy Spirit from me.'

For from the transgression in Adam, as in the firstfruits of the race, the nature of man came to be in estrangement from God;

and as the race was stretched out into a multitude, and sin tyrannized over all,

there flew away also the Holy Spirit of God that had been breathed into us in the beginning, and the beauty of the image was defaced.

...the God of all, that 'My Spirit shall not abide among these men,'

'because they are flesh.' Saying, therefore:

'Cast me not away from Thy presence, and take not Thy Holy Spirit from me,' he asks two things at once: the release from the estrangement that had befallen, and the return of the Holy Spirit unto us.

For that it had departed—and with reason, seeing that the heart of all men is set upon evil things from youth—he shows full well by saying, 'Take not away.'

Nevertheless, out of the gentleness of God he beseeches that the release from the things that had unexpectedly befallen may come to pass;

and this was the giving back of the Holy Spirit that had flown from us, which indeed came to pass in Christ;

for having taken the likeness unto us, He undid the estrangement, presenting the nature of man in Himself clean and blameless unto God and the Father.

And yet, according to the manner in which He is conceived, He Himself is the Giver of the Spirit, and through Him the Father sends the Spirit into the saints.

He breathed, at any rate, upon the apostles, saying:

'Receive the Holy Spirit.' For thus also in the beginning it was given to the nature of man.

'Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation.'

He entreats that there may be granted also to the nature of man a participation in the good things that were his in the beginning; which indeed has come to pass for it through the mediation of Christ, who is the exultation and the salvation.

For we have been set free from the dejection over corruption, since death has been overthrown;

and we have been saved, having cast off the burden of sin through holy baptism, and we have been made steadfast by the governing Spirit, which is the manly strength that comes through the Holy Spirit;

which if anyone should choose and settle within his mind, he will assuredly rule over his own desires, and will prove superior to the devil's grasping greed, having the Spirit as governor within himself.

For 'as many,' he says, 'as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.' And again:

'Walk by the Spirit, and you shall not fulfil the desire of the flesh.' 'My tongue shall exult in Thy righteousness.'

He will make Thy righteousness the occasion of a spiritual festival — that righteousness which through faith justifies the ungodly by grace;

that is, our very Lord Jesus Christ Himself, who from God the Father has become for us righteousness and sanctification and redemption.

'O Lord, Thou shalt open my lips.'

Sin is wont to bind the tongue and to stop the mouth.

'Thou shalt open my lips'; for this is a God-given gift;

for 'praise is not comely in the mouth of a sinner.' But it is opened through repentance, and one begins to declare the praise of God.

And the captives too, because it was not permitted them to sing the Lord's song in a foreign land, nor to accomplish sacrifices, pray for their return.

'A sacrifice to God is a contrite spirit.'

The power of spiritual worship does not come through bare intellect alone, but always somehow loves to receive as its accompaniment the sweet fragrance that comes from good works, which we accomplish through obedience and ready compliance.

And obedience we declare to be the fruit of a tender and pliant heart, one that has nothing harsh in it;

such as was that hard and unmanageable heart of the unbending Jews.

And indeed, assuming their person, one of the holy prophets said:

'Why hast Thou made us to err, O Lord, from Thy way? Thou hast hardened our hearts, that we should not fear Thee?' For to hard hearts the word of God is wholly unacceptable.

Therefore a contrite spirit — that is, a soul that is tender and yields to the divine words — would very fittingly serve as a sacrifice to God and as a consecration of spiritual fragrance.

'Do good, O Lord, in Thy good pleasure unto Sion.'

From Cyril and Eusebius. According to the anagogical sense, when, He says, Thou dost do good to Sion — that is, to the Church — having been well pleased to sum up all things in the Son, and when the walls of the Church are built up, which are the priests and mystagogues who fence her round about, then also shall sacrifices be offered up, not by means of blood, but those of righteousness, that is, those of praise.

'and oblation and whole burnt-offerings,' and these are righteousness.

'Then shall they offer up bullocks upon Thine altar.'

The bullock is a sacred animal even according to the Law;

for it is brought as a sacrifice being clean, and indeed greater than both the goat and the sheep;

in the greatness of its body it too serves as a type of the most perfect sacrifice, and of the fragrance that attains to its consummation — plainly, that is, the spiritual fragrance.

For the bulk of the body would be an image of the spiritual magnitude that is conceived as residing in the virtues.

'They shall offer up bullocks upon Thine altar,' he says; that is, most perfect sacrifices.

Or perhaps by 'bullocks' he here names, in a riddling manner, the leaders of the peoples, on account of their spiritual and intelligible manliness, of which a holy life is also a part.

The all-wise Paul brings us to such thoughts, saying that it is written in the Law:

'Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn.' Then adding to these:

'Is it for the oxen that God careth? Or saith He it altogether for our sakes?' From Cyril, from the commentary on the fiftieth Psalm.

He was not utterly overcome by desires that tend to pleasure, nor did he regard the prophet as a burden, nor was he vexed at the reproof;

he snatched the corrective word as a gift;

he confessed his transgression at once;

he lamented over his sin.

And just as some strong and skilful charioteer, carried outside the course by the uncontrollable rushings of his horses, blushes and is ashamed;

'Why boastest thou in wickedness, O mighty man, in lawlessness?'

or Rabshakeh, as one entrusted with command against Jerusalem, from which, having set out, he was taken captive by the Assyrians.

As one marvelling and at a loss, quite naturally, is the prelude — that certain men had advanced so far in wickedness that they boast in the very things over which they ought to mourn.

'Like a sharpened razor thou hast wrought deceit.'

and concerning Rabshakeh, as one wishing to deceive the people, so as to betray the city.

Sharp too, and cutting imperceptibly, was the deceit of Judas.

For what could be sharper than that deceit, which, having whetted it on the tongue of betrayal, he arranged with those who seized Jesus, saying:

'Whomsoever I shall kiss, He it is, seize Him'? 'Thou hast loved wickedness above goodness, injustice above speaking righteousness.'

These are also the peculiar traits of Satan — to rejoice, I say, in wickedness and in injustice.

He therefore rebukes also the Jews, who did not receive the righteousness in Christ.

'Thou hast loved all words of engulfing, and a deceitful tongue.'

These things might justly be said also concerning the rulers of the Jews and Judas himself;

for they too reviled the Lord without restraint, and the betrayer employed words full of deceit and hypocrisy.

Bringing death and dragging down the soul of man into Hades are whisperings, slanders, and blasphemy against God.

'He shall remove thee from thy dwelling, and thy root from the land of the living.'

And from the tent — that is, from the place of discipleship — He removed him, and He plucked out the root, as of a thorny plant, from the land of the living and from the husbandry of the apostles.

And these things befell the peoples of the Jews too, who did not receive the justification in Christ.

And this is similar to that saying, 'Let them be blotted out of the book of the living.' And they were removed from the priestly tent, having become captives on account of the Lord's cross [His crucifixion].

'I have hoped in the mercy of God for ever.'

I, he says, have put my trust in none of the vain and grovelling things, but in the divine mercy that pursues after those who are wronged.

In the anagogical sense, the divine Scriptures name Christ the mercy of God, because through Him mercy has come to be for us.

For the Father summed up all things in Him and restored their elements anew.

And he who has borne the fruit of almsgiving also hopes in the mercy of God, knowing that the merciful shall obtain mercy.

And he has his hope not for one age only, but even the interval beyond these, whose measure is infinity, which he names an age of ages.

Brief phrases produce the difference between the two;

and the present Psalm has indeed also the inscription 'Unto the end,' but it abounds further in saying:

which signifies that the Psalm is a victory-song, composed by means of a dance performed with understanding.

For 'delight,' or 'dance,' is what 'maeleth' is interpreted to mean.

Instead of 'Unto the end,' others among the interpreters have rendered it 'A song of victory.'

And that we may examine the whole superscription with precision: the phrase 'Unto the end' would be indicative of the time in which the things prophesied were to be fulfilled — both the events concerning Rabshakeh and the Assyrians, and those concerning the coming of Christ.

He established the choir gathered together in His Church out of all the nations.

And indeed the psalm was composed concerning the rejoicings and choral dances that came to pass in the last times of the age, when the Only-begotten had given His oracle as man.

And the word 'of understanding' is necessarily added, since we have need of understanding in order to grasp the meaning of the psalmody.

God hath scattered the bones of them that please men.

) By 'bones' he means the dogmatic powers of the impious, which they laid down in their own writings, persuading men to worship the creation rather than the Creator.

For also in your heart ye work iniquities in the earth.

) It is not in vain that the phrase 'in the earth' is added; for even if one commits iniquity in the heart, he carries it out in the earth — that is, in regard to material things.

And the Jews too might hear:

Judge uprightly, and reckon within yourselves whether your deeds agree with your words;

for you who reckon unrighteousness in the heart, and think one thing but speak another with the mouth.

For even if your words are good, by which you wish to vindicate the Law, yet your heart is full of bitterness, and your deeds likewise are filled with unrighteousness, being a refutation of the thoughts in the heart — thoughts which can lie hidden in the earth, but by no means when all things are judged laid bare.

Then he adds, lamenting over those who have fallen from salvation, the words that follow, saying:

The sinners are estranged from the womb.

) But there are some who, not knowing the custom of the manner of expression in the God-inspired Scriptures, suppose that certain men are estranged from God from the very womb, and, as it were, have gone astray from the belly itself and before the completion of reason.

But this is to say nothing else than that very thing, namely, that evil exists by nature, and that from the very act of creation some came into being good in character, and others evil.

But to think thus — or rather to be deranged thus — belongs to the Manichaeans;

for so it is truer to speak.

For, he says, as being already come into being as sinners, they were estranged from the womb and belly — that is, they became strangers and far off, not having a womb and a spiritual belly able to bring forth good fruits.

For our bodies from the earth give birth according to their own nature;

but the souls of men, as it were from the belly and womb of their own heart, bring forth good fruits, receiving from above and from God the seeds of piety.

They went astray; from the belly they spoke lies.

But they spoke lies not from the belly, but when they had come to maturity of age.

For the phrase 'they were estranged' is the same as 'they went astray,' and the womb the same as the belly, so that what is signified through both is this:

The sinners are estranged from the womb, and they spoke lies;

whose wrath bears the likeness of the father of falsehood, the first serpent.

Their wrath is according to the likeness of the serpent. They shall be brought to nothing like water that passes away.

) The running water does not stay in the same place.

In the like manner, therefore, the impious also do not remain in prosperity, but, as it were like running water, they march headlong toward destruction.

) But when you hear of a 'bow' with respect to God, understand a death-bearing wrath.

Like melted wax they shall be taken away.

And they saw not the sun. And a man shall say:

If then there is fruit for the righteous, and so forth.

) The word 'then' in these passages belongs not to one who doubts, but rather to one who is fully persuaded and has believed and, as it were, already inclines to the conviction that he has the fruit of his love toward God, and His sparing mercy and succour.

For indeed he himself is saved, as I said, when God defends him;

but on his account the sinner is chastised.

Behold, they have hunted my soul.

) For the wretched Jews did not cease bringing the marks of their own perversity upon Christ, and setting snares and treacheries, and contriving every unholy manner of attempts.

And Thou, O Lord, the God of hosts, the God of Israel, and so forth.

Hear then how, even before the Incarnation, as though already come to be in our likeness, He makes His discourses on behalf of the whole world to the Father and God in the heavens.

For God visited those upon the earth even of old, but the visitation was upon Israel only;

and Moses trained them as a tutor, leading them up through type and shadow to the mystery of Christ.

For Christ is the end of the Law and the Prophets.

For the ancient Law was indeed heard, but only throughout Judaea;

whereas the divine and heavenly proclamation has gone round about the whole world under heaven.

For He said this concerning the holy Apostles:

Their sound went out into all the earth, and what follows.

(Of Cyril and Hesychius) And these things, coming to pass humanly with respect to His Father and Lord of hosts and God of Israel, Christ both wishes to see and prays for.

In God let us do valiantly, and He Himself shall bring to nothing them that afflict us.

) Such was Paul, saying:

I can do all things in Christ who strengthens me. And again:

Yet not I, but the grace which is with me. PSALM 60.

Thou hast guided me, for Thou wast become my hope, a tower of strength.

(Of Cyril and Athanasius.) Since it is proper to those who guide to show which way is safe, and to testify which is slippery and harmful — and Christ is found to have done this too, in saying:

I am the way and the door. And the phrase 'a tower of strength' is as though He were saying:

Thou hast become a wall and a security, that I should suffer nothing from the enemies who assail me.

For just as, when enemies have made an assault, those who have a strong tower gain their safety, so, when enemies fight against us, Christ becomes a firm and unshaken tower, and easily saves those who have put their trust in Him.