Bible Commentaries

Upward Glance to the Lord in Times of Contempt

This Psalm is joined to the preceding Psalm by the community of thedivine name Jahve our God. Alsted (died 1638) gives it the brief, ingeniousinscription oculus speransIt is an upward glance of waiting faith to Jahveunder tyrannical oppression. The fact that this Psalm appears in arhyming form, “as scarcely any other piece in the Old Testament” (Reuss),comes only from those inflexional rhymes which creep in of themselves inthe tephilla style.

The destinies of all men, and in particular of the church, are inthe hand of the King who sits enthroned in the unapproachable glory ofthe heavens and rules over all things, and of the Judge who decides allthings. Up to Him the poet raises his eyes, and to Him the church,together with which he may call Him “Jahve our God,” just as the eyes ofservants are directed towards the hand of their lord, the eyes of a maid towards the hand of her mistress; for this hand regulates the whole house, and they wait upon their winks and signs with most eager attention. Those of Israel are Jahve's servants, Israel the church is Jahve's maid. In His hand lies its future. At length He will take compassion on His own. Therefore its longing gaze goes forth towards Him, without being wearied, until He shall graciously turn its distress. With reference to the (i) of היּשׁבי, vid., on Psalm 113:1-9, Psalm 114:1-8. אדוניהם is their common lord; for since in the antitype the sovereign Lord is meant, it will be conceived of as plur. excellentiae, just as in general it occurs only rarely (Genesis 19:2, Genesis 19:18; Jeremiah 27:4) as an actual plural.

The second strophe takes up the “be gracious unto us” as it were in echo. It begins with a Kyrie eleisonwhich is confirmed in a crescendo mannerafter the form of steps. The church is already abundantly satiated withignominy. רב is an abstract “much,” and רבּה, Psalm 62:3,something great (vid., Böttcher, Lehrbuch, §624). The subjectivizing,intensive להּ accords with Psalm 120:6 - probably an indication of one andthe same author. בּוּז is strengthened by לעג, like בּז in Ezekiel 36:4. The article of הלּעג is restrospectivelydemonstrative: full of such scorn of the haughty (Ew. §290, d). הבּוּז is also retrospectively demonstrative; but since a repetition of thearticle for the fourth time would have been inelegant, the poet here saysלגאיונים with the (Lamed), which serves as a circumlocution of thegenitive. The Masora reckons this word among the fifteen “words that are writtenas one and are to be read as two.” The Kerîruns viz., לגאי יונים, superbis oppressorum(יונים, part. Kal, likeהיּונה; Zephaniah 3:1, and frequently). But apart from theconsideration that instead of גּאי, from the unknown גּאה, itmight more readily be pointed גּאי, from גּאה (a form of nounsindicating defects, contracted גּא), this genitival constructionappears to be far-fetched, and, inasmuch as it makes a distinction among the oppressors, inappropriate. The poet surely meant לגאיונים or לגּאיונים. This word גּאיון (after the form רעיון, אביון, עליון) is perhaps an intentional new formation of the poet. Saadia interprets it after the Talmudic לגיון, legio; but how could one expect to find such a Grecized Latin word ( λεγεών ) in the Psalter! dunash ben-Labrat (about 960) regards גאיונים as a compound word in the signification of הגּאים היונים. In fact the poet may have chosen the otherwise unused adjectival form גּאיונים because it reminds one of יונים, although it is not a compound word like דּביונים. If the Psalm is a Maccabaean Psalm, it is natural to find in לגאיונים an allusion to the despotic domination of the יונים.