詩篇註釋殘篇 第 1 章 第 5/40 段

He prays with the eyes of the inner man to see the uprightness according to which God will judge, bringing forth the judgment from His own presence; or he prays to behold the virtue of uprightness.

And if he prays to see it, he does not yet possess it as present; from which it follows that he is not boastful, thus offering up his prayer.

These things must be regarded as spoken concerning perfect virtue, which arrives at last, only after very many things have first been accomplished.

And through the foregoing words great boldness of the speaker is displayed.

For if he says these things before God, he displays much purity in himself;

for the heart of everyone who endures grievous things is tested, when, though afflicted in everything, he is not crushed, but by enduring to the end is shown to be righteous;

such was Job, to whom God said:

'Do you think I have dealt with you for any other reason than that you might be shown to be righteous?'—besides his heart having been tested by the Lord and tried by fire, and no unrighteousness having been found in him. It is fitting to see what is signified by 'You have visited me by night.'

And consider whether he calls the condition of grievous things 'night' because of its lightlessness and its having nothing cheerful, in which God, having visited him, declared him approved, and, having tried him by fire through afflictions, showed him cleansed of all unrighteous deeds.

'You have visited me by night' may also be said in this way:

since the hidden things of the heart are not manifest except to Him alone, to whom it is said 'You alone know the hearts of men,' they are named 'night'—the very things which, though being dark to others because of their incomprehensibility, have been made manifest to You who tested me, because You visited me by night.

In accord with this is 'If I beheld iniquity in my heart, let not the Lord hear me.'

To recount the works of men by deed and disposition, and moreover by word, belongs to the wicked.

But what are the works of these men, or those concerning which the Apostle writes?

For 'where there is strife and jealousy among you, are you not carnal, and do you not walk according to man?' The works of men prove to be a hindrance to speaking, as is also the fact that no iniquity is found in the one who has been tried by God through temptations and the like.

The ways that lead to virtue seem to be hard, having much that is rough.

For how is the way not hard which commands the one struck on one cheek to offer the other also readily for the receiving of insult? Besides these, that way seems rough along which one contends unto death for the sake of the truth,

there being times when this is accomplished through the bitterest tortures, and the threat of fire and sword, and the assault of wild beasts. Yet even if these ways and those akin to them are hard, they are nevertheless kept because of the words of the lips of God who commands, and they are made easy, so that they no longer contain anything hard or heavy.

John therefore writes: 'And his commandments are not burdensome'; and Jesus says to those who hear his words: 'My yoke is easy and my burden is light.'

For through much habituation and exercises applied without interruption, even the heaviest loads appear very light, and things bitter and unpleasant are set right with great ease.

And the paths of the Lord and of his saints are the keepings of the commandments—or rather, the activities in accordance with virtue, shown to be smooth and level from being continually trodden by those who hasten to reach their goal.

And their goal is blessedness and the rendering of the promises.

When the Lord perfects them in his paths, the one who has obtained this request says: 'Without iniquity I ran and directed my course,' and: 'I ran the way of your commandments when you enlarged my heart.'

The words 'I will cry out' must be understood spiritually.

For one must not cry out to the invisible God with a louder voice, but with intensified thought;

and this is the cry of the inner man.

...his [mercy] upon those who hope in him, when the acts of mercy done for their benefit have something more marvelous about them, since God, inclining toward us, hearkens to the words of our voice—which is nothing other than his power that condescends through goodness to receive our words.

To this end you will take the words: 'The eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous, and his ears are toward their supplication.'

Since the right hand of God is none other than his only-begotten Son—as was said a little earlier, when the words 'Delight is at your right hand unto the end' were set forth—the devil and his angels resist it, and along with them men who are sorcerers and wicked; from whom the holy one, longing to remain unharmed, says to God:

'Guard me from those who resist your right hand, as the apple of my eye, that my mind may remain unharmed;

but also, in the shelter of your wings shelter me from the face of the ungodly who long to surround me with misery.'

It is possible to speak of the ungodly and those who resist the right hand of God as being various in conception, while being the same in their underlying subject.

The words 'Guard me as the apple of an eye' belong not to everyone, but only to the one enlightened in soul, who has the eyes of the heart enlightened.

The words 'In the shelter of your wings you will shelter me' must be understood spiritually;

for the sheltering powers of God are called his wings, through which he shelters and leads to good cheer the one who beseeches to be delivered from the ungodly who devise misery against him.

And these are certain invisible enemies who make wretched those who are captured by them, by casting them into sin.

The savagery and cruelty of those who resist is indicated by the saying that his soul is encompassed by his enemies, who have closed up their fat because of their attachment to matter.

For they are wholly and entirely material and fleshly, sold under sin, and from much self-indulgence and luxury they were filled with fat, as it were, and grease.

Wherefore Symmachus renders it: 'With their fat they were fenced up';

wherefore also their mouth speaks arrogance, uttering nothing friendly or fitting in a steadfast manner.

These enemies, out of much boastfulness, as it were surround the one who speaks these things, in order to injure and destroy the one who has come to be within their nets.

For they practice nothing useful or good, since they have become transgressors of the divine laws by having set their eyes upon the earth, turning aside and becoming lawless;

for this is shown from their having set their eyes upon the earth: that they wish to look upon things temporal and to be minded toward things earthly, turning aside from being unwilling to walk the straight way, but rather the crooked ways—by which the one who has them is made wretched.

'For woe,' it says, 'to those who forsake straight ways to walk in ways of darkness, whose ways are crooked and their tracks winding.'

These, then, set their eyes upon the earth in order to turn aside; but those who bear the image of the heavenly one set their eyes in heaven, in order to direct aright the straight way that leads up to the heavens.

Since, while you are long-suffering, they thought you were asleep, not being punished immediately for the murderous dispositions they held, [the Psalmist says]: 'Arise henceforth, O Lord, that you may forestall them by tripping them up.'

For it will be profitable for them to suffer this, lest, ever running toward evil, they increase their own perdition;

for having encompassed my soul and doing all the rest unless they be hindered, they injure it most grievously.

Whence, 'Trip them up, that they may no longer prevail against me, once you have delivered my soul from every such one—and for this reason named ungodly';

for 'Deliver my soul from the ungodly.'

'He will take his sword out of their hand';

for they held it, having been reasonably given it;

but it is taken away from them since they do not use it as they ought.

For those who become occupied with material and earthly things, cleaving to them, cast away the soul's exaltation and the wealth they would have had, had they not preferred material things.

For this reason they are even named 'those who are not,' as in the text: 'Do not hand over your scepter to those who are not.'

For those who agree together and are of one mind for evil, the division of their life is beneficial;

for what they had purposed to do as evil, being of one mind, they cast away as unaccomplished, having fallen into dissension among themselves—as happened to those who had purposed to build a tower and a city for their own evil;

for God, doing them good, confounded their tongues, so that each no longer understood what was said by his neighbors, in order that the ignorance which took hold might, by making them fall into dissension with one another, render their purpose unaccomplished.

This, then, is what is signified in the words: 'Divide them in their life.'

'And their belly was filled with your hidden things';

and the hidden things of God are those unworthy of his remembrance, of all which they left the remnants to their infants after their belly had been filled.

That the culpable things are unworthy of the sight of God is shown from the case of Cain (for 'he went out from the face of God') and from the words: 'The lawless shall not remain before your eyes.'

Having gorged themselves on the remnants of these things that are far from God, they left them to their infants, being filled with swine's flesh, that is, with unclean things.

For of all who defile themselves, the more grievous are those who both injure themselves and become a cause of harm to others—which is shown by the words: 'And they left the remnants to their infants.'

For they are not able to deceive the perfect one;

wherefore concerning them it is written:

'For inasmuch as they wronged infants, they shall be slain, and scrutiny shall destroy the ungodly.'

A reading is transmitted that has: 'They were filled with sons';

on account of whom they had their fill of grandsons unto satiety.

Being divided in their own life, they suffered manifold harm.

For not only they themselves, but also their infants were sated with the hidden things of God.

'Those men, then, are thus,' it says, 'according to what has been said; but I shall be seen in righteousness before your face';

for virtue is not among the things hidden from you, as is the wickedness of those men.

And those men, being self-willed and supposing themselves to be full of all things while having nothing—so as to seem thereby already to have been sated—but I, knowing in part now, shall then be sated, when your glory appears, subsisting according to the perfect thing that is to come, upon which it is then possible to gaze 'face to face.'

It is possible to understand the glory of God that is to be seen as the only-begotten Son, concerning whom it is written:

'All flesh shall see his salvation, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed.'

Each of these is fulfilled when 'We beheld his glory, the glory as of the only-begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.'

Let there also be numbered together with the enemies from whom he was delivered the various invisible ones as well.

Let there also be spoken, with reference to each phrase, the things that are apparent.

'For the end,' it says, 'to the servant of the Lord, to David.'

By 'end' in these words we must understand victory over all the enemies;

for it is for the sake of this that wars are waged, and all things that tend toward a king's valor.

And 'end' is rightly said of that for the sake of which the other things exist, while it itself exists for the sake of nothing.

Since, therefore, victory has come to be, one must give thanks to none other than to God who bestowed it.

For it is said to him by Ezra:

And David offers up this song to the Lord, as His servant and worshipper, wisely and faithfully setting forth all the words of thanksgiving in that day (that is, in the illumination), when all his enemies and Saul the king of Israel were brought to nothing, while David was delivered from them unharmed.

And these things are according to the literal history.

Of all the nations that raged and the peoples that meditated vain things, and moreover of the kings that stood up and the rulers that were gathered together against him in the same place.

You will say that he was also delivered from the hand of Saul, from him who then held sway over the Jews, together with his manner of behaviour; for it is not improbable that he ruled over them in a savage-minded fashion, and with him an evil spirit, since they had said that they had no king but God.

For how could they, having denied God, not be ruled over by some base person? And torrents of iniquity they are called, as another says, both because those who do not nobly withstand temptations come into iniquity.

But if the foregoing words refer to the death that follows sinners, and to the Hades which has a correspondence to it, then the birth-pangs of death and of Hades are the sins that lead to death.

Correspondingly with this understanding, you will call the torrents of iniquity the streams of wickedness, and the snares of death the sins accomplished in practice.

According to the former interpretation, the foregoing verses fit the dispensation of the Lord according to the flesh.

For they have much kinship with the saying 'Now is my soul troubled' and with 'My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death.'

And the prayer has much boldness arising from a pure conscience, since he said that his calling upon the Lord had ascent, and that his cry had come before God.

See whether this is in harmony with 'To us there is one God, the Father, and one Lord, Jesus Christ.'

We shall understand God as the Father, and the Lord as the Son—unless indeed both titles are spoken of the same, since both the Father and the Son are God and Lord, on account of the identity of Godhead and Lordship.

But how, when he said 'He heard my voice out of His holy temple,' is it said as of something yet to come, that his cry will enter into the ears of God?

To this one person will say:

When God has already hearkened, so that he who prayed came to be outside the affliction, he believes that, having cried out again to God, he has Him receiving into His ears and before His presence the cry sent up by him.

But he who perceived that, at the very moment of his calling, the One entreated assented from His holy temple, is confident that the things for which he prayed will attain their outcome, since the cry sent up from a pure disposition will enter into the ears of God and before His presence.

These mountains he removes from those who have been deceived, who has all the faith that is as a grain of mustard seed.

Among these was also the spirit of lunacy, concerning which the Saviour says:

'If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye would say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place.'

'There went up smoke in His anger.'

The worthless matter being consumed—matter that bears an analogy to the things built by base men upon Christ, who is the foundation, namely wood, hay, stubble; that is, base deeds and worst opinions (wherefore, being wholly consumed by the wrath that came upon them)—sent up smoke.

'Coals were kindled from Him.'

The coals sometimes signify the punishments, and at other times the fiery and burning words of God which purify the reasonings of the soul.

It signifies the punishments in the passage 'If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink;'

'for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head.'

And in 'Coals of fire shall fall upon them, and Thou shalt cast them down.'

But the fiery word is made clear in what Isaiah says: 'And there was sent one of the seraphim.'

For the soul that is prepared for virtue it warms, and it will kindle its reasonings so as to render them bright and radiant; but it will burn up the deeds of sinners, purifying them; and those who have not received this fire, the eternal fire will burn.

And the phrase 'He bowed the heavens and came down' this one too has rendered in accord with the discourse concerning the dispensation.

For since the Saviour is said to dwell in the heavens, having become man He changes His dwelling;

for upon the earth He was seen, and dwelt among men.

He comes down, not by way of transition (for these are proper to bodies or to things clothed with a body), but according to that in respect of which He is said to dwell in the heavens;

for being in the form of God, He came down having taken the form of a servant, no local change taking place with respect to Him.

'And He rode upon the cherubim, and did fly.'

The word 'cherubim' is taken to mean 'fullness of knowledge;'

where, therefore, there is much knowledge, or rather the purest knowledge,

thence, mounting up through the lofty and exalted understanding, He flies.

Nor should one despair of the possibility that some kind of immortal living creatures, having attained the fullest knowledge, are signified by this name.

And upon these rational living creatures too, therefore, God, having mounted, flies through the swiftest understanding.

'He flew upon the wings of the winds.'

If one takes what is said as referring to the sensible winds, he will say that God, according to His providential word, mounting upon the wings of the winds—that is, upon their lofty ascent—leads them wherever He Himself wills;

for He is one who brings forth the winds out of His treasuries.

But if one takes as 'winds' the wise men who are lifted up by the Spirit and send forth breaths after the manner of winds, then God, mounting upon their wings too, flies everywhere;

and their wings are the higher and loftily-soaring conceptions.

And the apostle Paul spoke of 'winds of teaching,' speaking concerning the heterodox: 'By every wind of teaching, in the sleight of men, in craftiness after the method of error.'

As, therefore, in the case of blameworthy teachers there are winds upon whose wings the people-deceiving spirits mount, so, mounting upon the wings of every wind of true teaching, God breathes where He wills.

And this is what it means to have flown upon the wings of the winds.

Preeminently and truly, God who dwells is unapproachable light—the Son, who is the true light, and the Holy Spirit, who is the very subsistence of knowledge and wisdom—even as it is said of this light 'And the light is with Him.'

On account of the incomprehensibility concerning His essence, He is said to have set darkness as His hiding-place.

For that which is obscure and incomprehensible on account of the depth of the matter is called darkness.

For in this sense also darkness is spoken of in 'He shall understand a parable and a dark saying;'

and 'God who reveals deep things out of darkness,' making manifest and clear the things hidden by obscurity and difficulty of comprehension.

As it is not possible to behold him who is enclosed within a tent unless one enters into it, so also it is not possible to see God, who is encompassed by obscurity and difficulty of comprehension, unless one casts oneself within the veil of that difficulty of comprehension.

Thus, for instance, it is said concerning Moses that he 'entered into the thick darkness where God was;'

for having applied his mind to the conception of God, and to His work of creation and His providence, he knew that God is contained within these; so that, having opened a little this tent that is about Him, he might, from that which is according to the image behold Him whose image it is, and from the creation and providence behold the Creator and the One who provides.

In many places of Scripture we find the clouds used allegorically.

For when he calls the house of Israel a vineyard, and speaks of clouds receiving commandment no longer to rain upon it, we find these to be none other than the prophets.

No longer, then, is there among them the 'Thus saith the Lord,' and the 'The word of the Lord came unto me;'

up to these clouds does the truth shine forth.

These clouds, then, flowing down upon souls, are a rain of spiritual words—not of the earth, but of the air;

for having renounced earthly things and no longer minding them, being lifted up and exalted by their own virtue and by the working Spirit, they are of the air.

The water in them, then, before it attains outcome and clarity through Jesus, is said to be dark on account of its being hard for the many to contemplate.

This coming to pass because He who had been proclaimed beforehand by them was now present.

When the dark clouds have come forth into light through clarity, no pretext for any defence is left to those who sin;

wherefore straightway, after the shining forth of the clouds, there follows 'hail and coals of fire.'

Now if punishments are signified through these designations, and the things prophesied concerning Christ have attained their fulfilment,

God straightway thunders from heaven, either through the mighty voice of the words fulfilled by Jesus, or by casting into each mind the most exalted words of theology which God speaks concerning the only-begotten Son, all but crying aloud this:

'This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased;' but also, revealing His Son, the Most High gives a voice to those who have discerned loftily concerning Christ, when not flesh and blood revealed it to them, but the heavenly Father revealed His own Son.

Just as, for those who have prepared their mind for the vision of God and have opened the hearing of the inner man, the Lord thunders from heaven and the Most High utters His voice, so that, lifted on high by the thunder coming from heaven, they may depart from earthly things and draw near to heaven, bearing the image of the heavenly One, and may receive the lofty conceptions given by the Most High;

so likewise against those who are disposed contrariwise the Lord sends forth arrows able to throw into confusion those who formerly were of one mind concerning evil.

By «arrows» here He means the words that proclaim beforehand the punishments;

for the threats are able to agitate and to throw the soul into tumult; and whenever He makes clear and illumines, after the manner of lightnings, the threats spoken in riddles, He will throw into confusion those who have been scattered by the aforesaid arrows.

For those who are scattered cast off their concord toward evil, since they have come to be in disturbance and confusion.

When all the aforesaid things have come to pass, «the springs of the waters shall be seen».

And if one should call «springs of waters» the notions concerning God and concerning good things that have been sown within us, he will say that these are made manifest when the ignorance and wickedness lying upon the soul are drawn back.

For these things, once stripped away, will no longer hide the springs of good things that are within us.

But if one should also call «springs to be made manifest» all divinely inspired, spiritual Scripture that is veiled by obscurity, take note;

for whenever, upon our turning to the Lord, the veil of ignorance and obscurity is taken away, the springs of the waters that lie within will be made manifest, so that one may easily draw from each, according to the saying, «Draw water with gladness out of the springs of salvation».

For this is the water that bestows gladness, springs of salvation being present, which were allotted to the discerning race that even now has the power to behold God, according to the saying, «Bless God in the congregations, the Lord from the springs, O Israel».

Since the inhabited world is built up, through the things it does and says and thinks, upon certain foundations laid down beforehand, you would not err in calling one's habits and dispositions the «foundations» of the inhabited world;

and whenever He scatters the wicked with His arrows and throws them into confusion by the flashing of His lightnings, the hidden things of men becoming manifest, God illumining the hidden things of darkness and making manifest the foundations of the inhabited world, He will uncover deep things out of darkness, from His rebuke of the inhabited world against all.

But if one should also call «the foundations of the inhabited world» the godly men, on account of the vigour of their life and the firmness of their virtue, upon which those who live according to Christ are built, it will come about that these foundations too are uncovered, when a rebuke is made against those who sin.

For, since the punishment of these does not touch the foundations, there will be a manifestation and uncovering of them.

God does not immediately let loose the punishments upon those who sin.

For if this were to happen, everything would utterly perish.

«He brings wrath every day».

And this is His «breathing forth a spirit of His wrath», namely His proclaiming beforehand the punishments of wrath;

«For I will chasten them in the wrath of their affliction».

«Out of many waters», that is, out of the turbulent and briny affairs of this life, which are figuratively named «sea», or out of the opposing powers that are thrown together and disturbed;

and take note whether even the doctrines of godlessness are «much water», unable to quench love.

By «mighty enemies» from whom God delivers, one must speak of the invisible ones; and perhaps also of men in positions of eminence and of those who set themselves to deceive through knowledge falsely so called, whenever they are clever in sophistry.

And one would not err in calling «mighty enemies» even one's own reasonings, whenever they are discontented with providence or persist in some other impiety; and one asks to be «delivered from those who hate», whenever they prevail against him, though hating him «without cause»;

for no one who is hated because he is wicked will speak this prayer to God with boldness, but only when he is hated for Christ's sake and for an upright life by the sinners who abhor godliness;

for they regard the righteous man's conduct as a reproof of their own way of life.

And these, who are disposed with hatred toward the righteous man, then most of all set upon him, whenever a season of affliction is at hand.

For, being ignorant of the judgement of providence, they suppose that the righteous man is afflicted for no other reason than because of sins, like those who dispute with Job.

For, God having subjected him to afflictions in order that he might be shown to be righteous, those men kept asserting that the man had fallen into these things on account of impiety and sin;

but moreover, against the one who stumbles all the wicked demons and the devil are strong, so that «affliction» is now to be understood as sin.

For «in the day of affliction», whenever one takes refuge with God, he will have Him becoming his support, that is, propping him up so that, being shaken, he may not fall.

And indeed, concerning the perfect soul that has God the Word as its support, those who receive its ascent and its shining forth say in wonder:

«Who is this that cometh up made white, leaning upon her brother?» For the Lord, becoming a support to someone, leads him out of the narrowness of afflictions, granting him a broad place, according to the saying, «In affliction Thou didst enlarge me».

And one is enlarged in affliction not by being altogether outside the affliction, but by being nobly and reverently stretched out toward it.

«He shall deliver me from my mighty enemies and from those who hate me», even if they have the very greatest power;

«for He desired me», doing all His wishes.

This is altogether the boldness of one who is pure and perfect, who condemns himself in nothing, not even in the smallest thing; whence those who wish this psalm to be spoken in the person of the Saviour attach this expression also to Him, who was tempted in all things according to likeness, apart from sin.

By «righteousness» he means the whole practical virtue, and by «cleanness of hands» he means the practical activities that have become pure and undefiled by being accomplished from the best of habits;

for in many places one can find «the hands» spoken of in reference to the practical powers.

And he says these things not boastfully, as some suppose, but attributing to God the cause of his good deeds.

He «keeps the ways of the Lord» who walks in His commandments, and he «is not ungodly away from his God» who has rightly grasped the doctrines of the truth, thinking blamelessly concerning God, judging in a holy manner concerning Christ, piously considering concerning the Holy Spirit, and holding right opinions concerning the other doctrines in the manner one ought.

For even if His judgements are unsearchable and resemble an abyss because of their incomprehensibility, yet it is possible for one who holds them before his eyes not to be discontented with providence nor to be impious toward the One who provides.

When these things are accomplished, we are well pleased with them.