Selected Comments on the Psalms 1181–1199

[Ps 7, continued] Of the same. “When I am lifted up,” he says, “I will draw all to myself.”

“Let the wickedness of sinners come to an end,” and so on. When someone no longer sins, his wickedness comes to an end; or the wickedness of sinners is the devil.

“If you do not turn back,” down to “will come down,” and so on. Perhaps these things are said in a veiled way about the devil. For besides these things he too “travailed with injustice,” and so on, being wrath. But the Father of the one who said, “I am the life,” will not prepare instruments of death in his bow; he sets his bow in the cloud, so as not to bring the water of the flood upon the earth. That is why we must think these things are said about the devil. And the burning arrows are the evil one’s, which he has wrought for those burned and inflamed by passions.

Of the same, on “And in it he has prepared instruments of death,” and so on. Instruments of death are impure rational beings, or souls that have death; as instruments of life are souls that have life. For so the Lord named Paul a chosen instrument.

“Behold, he travailed with injustice, conceived toil, and brought forth lawlessness,” and so on. The one who loves not God but pleasure, in proportion to the pleasures he serves, conceives a single toil, continuous and without interval, and travails with injustice, and brings forth lawlessness. Conversely, the one who loves not pleasure but God, in proportion to the toils he undertakes for virtue, conceives a good emotion, joy, single and continuous, without interval, and travails with righteousness, and brings forth good order; and so he becomes a child of good order, hating every lawlessness.

Of the same, on the same. He brought forth lawlessness, since he conceived toil and travailed with injustice; for this is the sequence of nature. Ahithophel travailed when he proposed his wicked counsel.

“He dug a pit and hollowed it out, and he will fall into the hole he made. His toil will return upon his head, and his injustice will come down upon his crown,” and so on. Perhaps the pit is a place of punishment, into which, by the providence of God, he who dug it will fall. His crown is level with the rest of his body, for nothing of him is above; that is why he is somewhere called a dragon. Fittingly, then, his injustice, which was lifted up and exalted against the knowledge of God, being brought down, will come down upon his crown.

[Ps 8] “For the end, for the winepresses, a psalm of David,” and so on. In the eightieth and eighty-third psalms too

[Ps 8, continued] you will find the title “For the winepresses.” With these let us take what concerns Noah planting a vine, and Jacob’s blessing of Judah, “binding his colt to a vine,” and that of Issachar, who, “seeing that rest was good and the land rich, put his shoulder to labor and became a farmer.” And indeed Uzziah was a farmer, having vinedressers in the hill country. And the wife of every righteous man “is like a fruitful vine on the sides of his house,” from which comes “wine that gladdens the heart of man.” And the Preacher planted vineyards and dug a winepress. And Solomon says: “Let your winepresses overflow with wine.”

Of the same. Winepresses are rational natures that have received the fruits from the spiritual vine.

“Out of the mouth of infants and nursing babes you have perfected praise,” and so on. In Matthew, first those who went before the Savior, and also those who followed him, “cried out, saying: Hosanna to the son of David; blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord; hosanna in the highest.” And a little later it is written that when the chief priests and the scribes saw the wonderful things he did, and the children crying out in the temple and saying, “Hosanna to the son of David,” they were indignant and said to him: “Do you hear what these are saying? And Jesus says to them: Yes. Have you never read: Out of the mouth of infants and nursing babes,” and so on. Matthew, then, seems to call the same crowds children, and the Savior calls them not simply children but infants and nursing babes, teaching us, through the words of the psalm he quoted with allegory, to allegorize the psalm too. You will inquire whether “the house of David” and “the son of David” are the same. And if they are not the same, the text of Matthew has been corrupted by the copyists, and ought to have either “to the house of David” twice or “to the son of David” twice.

“Because of your enemies, to destroy the enemy and avenger,” and so on. By enemy and avenger understand the true Nebuchadnezzar. Christ destroyed the devil through fishermen, unlettered men, infants in malice.

“For I will see the heavens, the works of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you founded,” and so on. “For I will see the heavens”: we know this thing clearly when we know both its principle and its cause. “The works of your fingers”: you will inquire whether the works of God’s fingers are different from the works of his whole hands, whether the former are a part of the latter. “The moon and the stars, which you founded”: why did he not say the sun? Perhaps because when someone is being introduced, he first understands the things of the night,

[Ps 8, continued] and only later the things of the day.

“What is man, that you remember him? or the son of man, that you visit him?” and so on. If he says this marveling that the Lord remembers man and visits the son of man, it is clear that he visits him to do him good. You will note this because of “I will visit their iniquities with a rod, and their injustices with whips,” and because of “I will not visit your daughters when they commit sexual immorality, nor your brides when they commit adultery,” and the like.

“You made him a little lower than the angels,” and so on. For he too, being made by nature to have knowledge of you, falls not far short. For he is made like you, as far as possible, by taking up holiness and virtue. And because of the image and likeness you assigned him the rule over the mortal living creatures. Paul says to the Hebrews that these words were spoken about Christ. For he says: “But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death.”

“You crowned him with glory and honor; and you set him over the works of your hands,” and so on. The Apostle too named from this “the unfading crown of glory.” And sometimes one crowned with honor did not understand, as in “Man, being in honor, did not understand.” He did not say “over your works,” which I think are the things not seen. First, then, we are in the works of God’s hands, that is, in the things not seen. These things are also understood after the incarnation of our God and Savior; for man has been crowned with glory and honor: “For he raised us up together and seated us together in the heavenly places,” as the Apostle says.

“You put all things under his feet, sheep and all oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea,” and so on. Where there are clean sheep and oxen, he added “all”; but where unclean ones are also possible, as with the beasts of the field, “all” is not said; likewise with the birds of the air and the fish of the sea.

[Ps 9] “For the end, for the hidden things of the son, a psalm of David,” and so on. Hidden things are the secret knowledge of the mysteries concerning Christ, the true God.

[Ps 9, continued] “I will give thanks to you, Lord, with my whole heart; I will tell all your wonders. I will be glad and rejoice in you; I will sing to your name, O Most High,” and so on. The one who loves with his whole heart can give thanks with his whole heart. “I will tell all your wonders,” and so on: when someone, able to show the reason for which the recorded marvels, which are wonderful, came to be, and what they are symbols of, has done what is said. To see this is the work of the Savior alone. And if creation too, and all that God made, are his wonders, it will appear much more that the prayer is the Savior’s. For who will tell all the wonders of the Father except the Lord, to those who are perfect and able to understand such great marvels — those about whom it will rather be said: “But we speak wisdom among the perfect”? “I will be glad and rejoice”: he asks those who are glad in certain things whether they are glad in God, so that they may either remain in their gladness or depart from it. And the one who has gone up on the high mountain, Zion, and lifts up his voice, sings to the name of the Most High.

“When my enemy is turned back, they will grow weak and perish from before your face,” and so on. Who will grow weak and perish from before the face of God (since “the face of the Lord is against those who do evil”), he has left us to understand, without saying beforehand. When the enemy, advancing in vice, is abolished, and steps back because he is hindered, then those strong in vice will grow weak. Then, insofar as they sin, they will perish, the face of God working this in them; for when it is understood, it makes earthly things vanish.

“You sat on a throne, you who judge righteousness,” and so on. The throne of God is Christ, and the throne of Christ is the bodiless nature.

“You rebuked nations, and the ungodly perished; you blotted out their name,” and so on. “You rebuked” signifies correction, as is clear from “Convince, exhort, rebuke.” “You blotted out their name”: God blotted out the name of Abram, making him Abraham; and that of Sarai, calling her Sarah; and that of Simon, naming him Peter. So it follows that the name of those he rebuked is blotted out; especially since the psalm adds: “Declare among the nations his deeds, for he who requires their blood has remembered.” Note also that it is not said, “You blotted out their name from the book of the living” (for the nations were not written in the book of the living), but rather, in keeping with the bonds written against them, from the book of debtors, or the book of the dead, kept by the steward of injustice, as is likely, who writes down the dead and writes them in the earth. For the Savior writes the names of the disciples in heaven.

Of the same. If the name here signifies the evil

[Ps 9, continued] condition, and he blotted out the sinner’s name, then he blotted out his worst condition.

“And let those who know your name hope in you, for you have not forsaken those who seek you, Lord,” and so on. Those who seek the Lord, and are not those forsaken by him, have known his name.

“Sing to the Lord who dwells in Zion,” and so on. He sings who has Christ within himself. The Prophet said this according to the old opinion of the Jews. Yet there is also an intelligible and heavenly Zion. And God dwells in every soul that is a Zion — which is interpreted “watchtower” — continually watching and contemplating divine things. He requires the blood of the nations from those who killed them, and remembers them, raising them up. So “Their memory perished with a noise” will be transferred to the swords. But he remembers those for whom he became a refuge.

“Declare among the nations his deeds,” and so on. What deeds? All that Christ told the disciples of John the Baptist: “Go and tell what you see: the blind see again, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the dead are raised.” These, then, are the deeds befitting God; and the apostles declared to the nations also that through death came immortality, through the cross salvation, through burial resurrection, and the putting to death of the devil who put us to death.

“You who lift me up from the gates of death, so that I may declare all your praises in the gates of the daughter of Zion,” and so on. The gates of death are the sins unto death, from which the one who has not even thought of committing them is lifted up; and he alone can declare all the praises of the Lord in the gates of the daughter of Zion, that is, in the virtues.

“The nations are stuck fast in the corruption they made. In this snare which they hid their foot has been caught. The Lord is known executing judgments,” and so on. The nations are stuck fast, as in mud, in the body, because of the corruption they made; and their foot has been caught, clearly the intelligible foot. And the Lord is known, since, when the judgment comes upon them, they will know the one who judges in righteousness.

“Let the sinners be turned back into Hades,” and so on. As paradise is the dwelling of the righteous, so Hades is the place of punishment of sinners. “Let them be shut in,” he says, “so that they may not see the soul of Jesus coming down and going up, turned away within.” For those who expected it, as if they were looking out while shut up in Hades, were first the prophets, then all the other righteous; or first the sinners among us, then the nations.

[Ps 9, continued] “The endurance of the poor will not perish forever,” and so on. As the Spirit is not quenched, so endurance does not perish. For “the Lord is the Spirit,” and “My endurance is the Lord.” So too in the Galatians Christ is formed, though he is without form. Here he is also said to sleep: “Awake, why do you sleep?”

“Arise, Lord, let not man prevail,” and so on. To the one who says, “My strength,” you will say that God is now the one who is strengthened as holy, his human thoughts and movements having been done away.

[Ps 9:22 LXX / 10] Psalm 10 (according to the Hebrew). “Why, Lord, do you stand far off?” and so on. One might answer the person who raises the difficulty with “Behold, those who remove themselves far from you will perish,” and with “I am a God near at hand, and not a God far off,” says the Lord in the prophets. By not helping those who are wronged, you seem not to be present to what is happening; you seem rather to stand far off and not even see; which increases the wickedness of the wicked, and sets the poor on fire and casts them into despondency.

“For the sinner is praised in the desires of his soul,” and so on. Often some who sin prosper in the world. For the Apostle too said this: “Wicked men and impostors will go on to worse, deceiving and being deceived.” And in another psalm it is sung: “These are sinners, and prospering forever they have held on to riches.” Sinners and the unjust, then, are praised by themselves and by their flatterers and parasites, and being praised they are moved further to sin.

“According to the multitude of his wrath he will not seek,” and so on. Who? The Lord, or the sinner? Perhaps the sinner. For he does not inquire about the wrath of God, nor that he has a multitude of sins; that is why he sins according to multitude.

“His ways are profaned at all times,” and so on. The righteous man blesses the Lord at all times; but the sinner profanes his ways at all times. “Are profaned,” instead of “are sunk in vice.”

“He will rule over all his enemies,” and so on. Of temptations, some are brought on through the body,

[Ps 9, continued] some through the soul, some through externals; and some are causes of blows and tortures and persecutions and prisons; others are impure thoughts that beget sin and false doctrines; others bring losses of money, loss of children, and the taking away of wives. And it is clear from these that Satan has ruled over every righteous man. For if Satan will rule over all his enemies, and all the righteous are his enemies, then he will rule over all. Yet he will not rule in everything, clearly, but in something; for Christ alone did no sin, nor was deceit found in his mouth. Or perhaps divine Scripture sets down his will, which is to bring to completion what cannot be done; since “they devised counsels which they will not be able to establish.” For in Job too the devil says falsely: “Having gone round the earth and walked about under heaven, I am here,” though he had persuaded Job to do nothing wrong.

Of the same. If those who progress progress by diminishing vice, the righteous are called those who have acquired a perfect habit of righteousness, and those who progress unhindered. “For the righteous man is his own accuser at the beginning of his speech.” And if righteous, how an accuser? And if an accuser, certainly not perfectly righteous. “And make known to a righteous man, and he will add to receive.” It is rightly said, then, that the devil rules over all his enemies — not the perfect, clearly, but those hastening toward perfection. For if there were not a hatred toward Satan both imperfect and perfect, David would not have said: “I hated them with a perfect hatred; they became my enemies.”

“His mouth is full of cursing and bitterness and deceit,” and so on. The mouth of the wicked offers nothing useful, but whatever produces pain and toil in those who receive it. And the mouths of others are full: of cursing, those of the people who speak evil of the Creator; of reviling, those of revilers; of bitterness, those of the passionate; and of deceit, those of the deceitful.

Of the same. The one who has fallen from holiness, having led himself far from truth and blessing, has a mouth full of cursing, by which he speaks, trying to bring those who are deceived under punishment and curse. His word has, together with deceit, much cleverness; therefore, together with cursing, his word is full of bitterness and deceit.

“He sits in ambush with the rich in secret places,” and so on. In those who have the wealth of ignorance and injustice the devil sits; but in those who possess knowledge and virtue the holy powers rest, of which the birds of heaven nesting in the branches of the mustard plant are symbols — which signifies the kingdom of heaven that is in us potentially.

[Ps 9, continued] “He lies in ambush to seize the poor, to seize the poor when he drags him away,” and so on. This saying must be used against the rich.

“You see, for you consider toil and anger, to deliver them into your hands,” and so on. Satan, working toil and anger, hands over souls to the judge for punishment. “To you the poor man has been left”: from those who come into the inheritance; that is why God chooses the foolish things of the world. “You were a helper to the orphan”: an orphan is one who has cast off his wicked father. “For you,” says the Savior, “are of your father the devil.”

“Break the arm of the sinner and the wicked man,” and so on. If the breaking of the arm destroys sins, and being freed from sins is a benefit, it is in this way that I am persuaded God punishes. By “arm” he means the soul that has wrought wicked things. “His sin will be sought, and will not be found”: either, when the sin of the sinner and wicked man is sought, he himself will not be found, having become wholly sin and wickedness; or there will be a time when his sin will be sought and will not be found, because he has been cleansed.

“The Lord will reign forever, and forever and ever,” and so on. For “the Lord must reign” through the ages “until he has put all his enemies under his feet.” For his kingdom is the contemplation of all the ages that have been and will be, through which contemplation the enemies too become friends. One says: “His sin will be sought, and will not be found.” The Lord reigns forever; and it is the property of kings to take care of those under their hand. “Nations, you will perish from his land.” The land of the Lord is the contemplation of all that has come to be, which we also say is the kingdom of heaven. Nations are those that have not received the saving proclamation, but are cut up into all directions. You will perish, nations, insofar as you are nations; for the whole earth is one nation, if it is of one mind.

“The Lord has heard the desire of the poor,” and so on. The Lord hears the desire at the time when he provides the desired thing to the desiring soul. For they desire that the sinner’s arm be broken and that they be freed from his tyranny; which has also happened. For the desire of a good mind is an effective prayer, which the knower of hearts saw and fulfilled. We must not think that all desires are heard, but only the refined ones. “Your ear has attended to the readiness of their heart.” The Lord’s ear attends to the readiness of heart of the blessed poor, but does not attend to those who are not ready. Each of the wronged, he says, longs for this: for if in the present the vindication of the helpless and lowly comes from God, no one will boast any longer,

[Ps 9, continued] but those who do wrong will stop doing evil, and those who are wronged will stop suffering it.

[Ps 10 LXX / 11] … “For behold, the sinners have bent the bow, they have prepared arrows in the quiver, to shoot in the moonless night at the upright in heart,” and so on. Not content, he says, with their own destruction, the sinners, drawing their sins as with a long cord, make war on the men of God and try to shoot them down with the arrows of their vice; and, envying such great purity of their ruling faculty, they put forth darkness against them, as cuttlefish their ink. And they do these things having taken out of themselves the natural notions, right according to nature, which God established.

Of the same. The bow is an impure mind. “I,” he says, “trust in the Lord.” Those who make war are sinners. Who, then, would fear and flee, having God as helper and sinners as enemies? “They have prepared arrows in the quiver.” An arrow is a passionate thought; the quiver is the worst habit, filled with impure thoughts. These are taken in the intelligible sense of the demons who make war; they may also be understood in the sensible sense of sensible enemies. “In the moonless night”: the moonless night is the ignorance of a rational soul. He says they lie in ambush on a moonless night, showing the secrecy of the plot. He calls himself and those with him upright in heart, not boasting, but showing his own mind, and that he did nothing to harm Saul.

“The Lord is in his holy temple; the Lord, his throne is in heaven. His eyes look upon the poor; his eyelids examine the sons of men,” and so on. God dwells in holy and heavenly understanding, reigning in a heavenly and divine way. His watching powers guard the poor. Being good, he examines our affairs with his eyelids and not with his eyes, so as not to watch closely all our sins; for this would be unbearable for human beings. But he looks on the poor with his eyes, making his benefaction abundant, even if the poor man is one; while he reduces the punishments of the many, which also have much that is hidden. In God’s examination there will be much boldness for the good things done. “For we must all appear before his judgment seat, so that each may receive what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.”

Of the same. Let us become poor, so that the eyes of the Lord may look upon us. If the rich are not poor, the Lord does not look upon the rich. With his eyes he looks upon the poor, making his benefaction abundant, even if the one in poverty is one.

[Ps 10, continued] “The Lord examines the righteous and the ungodly; but he who loves injustice hates his own soul,” and so on. Therefore everyone who sins plots against his own soul like someone who hates it. Just as, then, the one who does what is right loves himself, benefiting both himself and his neighbor by leading him to virtue as he leads himself. By “ungodly” he now means the one who, through sinning, despises God, who is also judged with the righteous, as is clear from many places, and from the saying: “And the righteous will be as the ungodly.” For the one who is wholly godless …

Of the same. Even if someone does not say that he hates his own soul, he is proved to hate it by loving injustice; and likewise the one who loves licentiousness.

“He will rain snares upon sinners,” and so on. So that, having brought them under his own snares and taken them into his hands, he may manage them as his own.

“For the Lord is righteous and has loved righteousnesses,” and so on. By “righteousnesses” he means the righteous, naming them from their practice. Such too is “Love is not puffed up,” meaning the one who has love.

[Ps 11 LXX / 12] “Save me, Lord, for the holy one has failed,” and so on. When the holy one fails, the one who survives with greater difficulty needs salvation. “For truths have been diminished among the sons of men.” If the holy have failed and truths have been diminished, truths are not in the holy alone, nor holiness in the true. And since the holy have failed, for this reason truths have been diminished. And perhaps the scarcity of the holy has been the cause of these many heresies. They converse with one another with deceit, sending falsehoods into one another’s hearts through wicked lips; and when we do not occupy ourselves with knowledge, truths are diminished.

“Each spoke vain things to his neighbor,” and so on. Therefore let us offer our neighbors neither an idle word at random, nor a blasphemous one, nor anything reprehensible at all. “Deceitful lips in the heart, and in the heart they spoke.” Since they conceived deceitful things, therefore they spoke …

“May the Lord destroy all deceitful lips, and the boastful tongue,” and so on. For the Lord, making the worse things vanish, destroys them, so that, when what has attached itself has vanished, the first creation of God, to which the worse things attached themselves, may come up again.