EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS

EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS.

Title.—“After he had gone in to Bathsheba.” This was the devil’s nest-egg that caused many sins to be laid, one to, and upon another. See the woful chain of David’s lust, 2 Sam. xi. and xii.—John Trapp.

Title.—“When Nathan the prophet came unto him as he (i.e., David) had come unto Bathsheba.” The significant repetition of the phrase came unto, is lost in the English and most other versions. “As” is not a mere particle of time, simply equivalent to when, but suggests the ideas of analogy, proportion, and retaliation.—J. A. Alexander.

Whole Psalm.—This Psalm is the brightest gem in the whole book, and contains instruction so large, and doctrine so precious, that the tongue of angels could not do justice to the full development.—Victorinus Strigelius, 1524-1569.

Whole Psalm.—This Psalm is often and fitly called The Sinner’s Guide. In some of its versions it often helps the returning sinner. Athanasius recommends to some Christians, to whom he was writing, to repeat it when they awake at night. All evangelical churches are familiar with it. Luther says, “There is no other Psalm which is oftener sung or prayed in the church.” This is the first Psalm in which we have the word Spirit used in application to the Holy Ghost.—William S. Plumer.

Whole Psalm.—I cannot doubt the prophetic bearing of this Psalm upon the nation of Israel. In the latter day they shall consider their ways: repentance and self-loathing will be the result. Blood-guiltiness heavier than that of David has to be removed from that nation. They will become the teachers of the Gentiles when first the iniquity of their own transgression has been purged away.—Arthur Pridham.

Whole Psalm.—This is the most deeply affecting of all the Psalms, and I am sure the one most applicable to me. It seems to have been the effusion of a soul smarting under the sense of a recent and great transgression. My God, whether recent or not, give me to feel the enormity of my manifold offences, and remember not against me the sins of my youth. What a mine of rich matter and expression for prayer! Wash, cleanse me, O Lord, and let my sin and my sinfulness be ever before me. Let me feel it chiefly as sin against thee, that my sorrow may be of the godly sort. Give me to feel the virulence of my native corruption, purge me from it thoroughly, and put truth into my inward parts, that mine may be a real turning from sin unto the Saviour. Create me anew, O God. Withdraw not thy Spirit. Cause me to rejoice in a present salvation. Deliver me, O God, from the blood-guiltiness of having offended any of thy little ones; and so open my lips that I may speak of the wondrous things thou hast done for my soul! May I offer up spiritual sacrifices; and oh! let not any delinquencies of mine bring a scandal upon thy church; but do thou so purify and build her up, that even her external services, freed from all taint of corruption or hypocrisy, may be well-pleasing in thy sight.—Thomas Chalmers.

Verse 1.—“Have mercy upon me, O God.” I tremble and blush to mention my name, for my former familiarities with thee only make me more confounded at being recognised by thee after my guilt. I therefore say not, “Lord, remember David,” as on a happier occasion; nor as propitiating thee, I used to say, to thy “servant,” or, “to the son of thy handmaid.” I suggest nothing that should recall my former relation to thee, and so enhance my wickedness. Ask not, then, Lord, who I am, but only forgive me who confess my sin, condemn my fault, and beseech thy pity. “Have mercy upon me, O God.” I dare not say my God, for that were presumption. I have lost thee by sin, I have alienated myself from thee by following the enemy, and therefore am unclean. I dare not approach thee, but standing afar off and lifting up my voice with great devotion and contrition of heart, I cry and say, “Have mercy upon me, O God.”—From “A Commentary on the Seven Penitential Psalms, chiefly from ancient sources.” By the Right Rev. A. P. Forbes, Bishop of Brechin, 1857.

Verse 1.—“Have mercy.” The Hebrew word here translated have mercy, signifieth without cause or desert; Psalm xxxv. 19; lxix. 4; Ezekiel xiv. 23; and freely, without paying any price, Exodus xxi. 11. And it is made use of in Lev. vi. 8, where Noah is said to have found grace in the eyes of the Lord, that is special favour, such as the Lord beareth to his chosen in Christ Jesus.—Charles de Coetlogon, A.M., in “The Portraiture of the Christian Penitent,” 1775.

Verse 1.—“Mercy,” “lovingkindness,” “tender mercies.” I cannot but observe here, the gradation in the sense of the three words made use of, to express the divine compassion, and the propriety of the order in which they are placed, which would be regarded as a real excellence and beauty in any classical writer. The first, הָנֵּנִי, denotes that kind of affection which is expressed by moaning over any object that we love and pity that στοργὴ, natural affection and tenderness, which even brute creatures discover to their young ones, by the several noises which they respectively make over them; and particularly the shrill noise of the camel, by which it testifies its love to its foal. The second, כְּחַסְדֶּךָ, denotes a strong proneness, a ready, large, and liberal disposition to goodness and compassion powerfully prompting to all instances of kindness and bounty; flowing as freely and plentifully as milk into the breasts, or as waters from a perpetual fountain. This denotes a higher degree of goodness than the former. The third, רַחֲמֶיךָ, denotes what the Greeks express by σπλαγχνίζεσθαι; that most tender pity which we signify by the moving of the heart and bowels, which argues the highest degree of compassion of which human nature is susceptible. And how reviving is the belief and consideration of these abundant and tender compassions of God to one in David’s circumstances, whose mind laboured under the burthen of the most heinous complicated guilt, and the fear of the divine displeasure and vengeance!—Samuel Chandler.

Verse 1.—“According to the multitude.” Men are greatly terrified at the multitude of their sins, but here is a comfort—our God hath multitude of mercies. If our sins be in number as the hairs of our head, God’s mercies are as the stars of heaven; and as he is an infinite God, so his mercies are infinite; yea, so far are his mercies above our sins, as he himself is above us poor sinners. By this that the Psalmist seeketh for multitude of mercies, he would show how deeply he was wounded with his manifold sins, that one seemed a hundred. Thus it is with us, so long as we are under Satan’s guiding, a thousand seem but one; but if we betake ourselves to God’s service, one will seem a thousand.—Archibald Symson.

Verse 1.—“Tender mercies,” or, according to Zanchy in his treatise upon the attributes of God, such a kind of affection as parents feel when they see their children in any extremity. 1 Kings iii. 26.—Charles de Coetlogon.

Verse 1.—“Blot out my transgressions.” מְחֵה, mecheh, wipe out. There is reference here to an indictment: the Psalmist knows what it contains; he pleads guilty, but begs that the writing may be defaced; that a proper fluid may be applied to the parchment, to discharge the ink, that no record of it may ever appear against him: and this only the mercy, lovingkindness, and tender compassions of the Lord can do.—Adam Clarke.

Verse 1.—“Blot out my transgressions.” What the Psalmist alludes to is not, as Mr. LeClerc imagines, debts entered into a book, and so blotted out of it when forgiven; but the wiping or cleansing of a dish, so as nothing afterwards remains in it. The meaning of the petition is, that God would entirely and absolutely forgive him, so as that no part of the guilt he had contracted might remain, and the punishment of it might be wholly removed.—Samuel Chandler.

Verse 1.—“Blot out,” or, as it is used in Exod. xvii. 14, utterly extirpate, so as that there shall not be any remembrance of them for ever. Isaiah xliii. 25; xliv. 22.—Charles de Coetlogon.

Verse 1.—“My transgressions.” Conscience, when it is healthy, ever speaks thus: “My transgressions.” It was not the guilt of them that tempted you: they have theirs; but each as a separate agent, has his own degree of guilt. Yours is your own: the violation of your own and not another’s sense of duty; solitary, awful, unshared, adhering to you alone of all the spirits of the universe.—Frederick William Robertson.

Verses 1, 2.—“Transgressions” ... “iniquity” ... “sin.” 1. It is transgression, פֶּשַׁע, pesha, rebellion. 2. It is iniquity, עָוֹן, avon, crooked dealing. 3. It is sin, הַטָּאת, chattath, error and wandering.—Adam Clarke.

Verse 2.—“Wash me.” David prays that the Lord would wash him; therefore sin defiles, and he was made foul and filthy by his sin; and to wash him much, and to rinse and bathe him, to show that sin had exceedingly defiled him and stained him both in soul and body, and made him loathsome, and therefore he desireth to be washed, and cleansed, and purged from the pollution of sin. Hence we may learn what a vile, filthy, and miserable thing sin is in the sight of God: it staineth a man’s body, it staineth a man’s soul, it maketh him more vile than the vilest creature that lives: no toad is so vile and loathsome in the sight of man, as a sinner, stained and defiled with sin, is in the sight of God, till he be cleansed and washed from it in the blood of Christ.—Samuel Smith.

Verse 2.—“Wash me,” etc. כִּבֵּם is peculiarly applied to the washing and cleansing of garments as fullers wash and cleanse their cloths. 2 Kings xviii. 7; Exod. xix. 10; Levit. xvii. 15.—Samuel Chandler.

Verse 2.—“Wash me throughly from mine iniquity.” No other washing will do it but lava tu, wash thou; so foul, as it will need his washing throughly.—Samuel Page, in “David’s Broken Heart,” 1646.

Verse 2.—“Wash me throughly.” Heb. multiply to wash me; by which phrase he implies the greatness of his guilt, and the insufficiency of all legal washings, and the absolute necessity of some other and better thing to wash him, even of God’s grace, and the blood of Christ.—Matthew Pool.

Verse 2.—“Wash me ... cleanse me.” But why should David speak so superfluously? use two words when one would serve? For if we be cleansed, what matter is it whether it be by washing or no? Yet David had great reason for using both words; for he requires not that God would cleanse him by miracle, but by the ordinary way of cleansing, and this was washing; he names therefore washing as the means, and cleansing as the end: he names washing as the work a-doing, and cleansing as the work done; he names washing as considering the agent, and cleansing as applying it to the patient; and indeed, as in the figure of the law there was not, so in the verity of the gospel there is not any ordinary means of cleansing, but only by washing; and therefore out of Christ our Saviour’s side there flowed water and blood.—Sir Richard Baker.

Verse 2.—“Cleanse me from my sin.” Observe, it is from the guilt, and not from the punishment, that he thus asks deliverance. That the sword should never depart from his house; that the sin, begun, not only secretly even in its full accomplishment, but far more secretly in the recesses of David’s heart, should be punished before all Israel and before the sun; that the child so dear to David should be made one great punishment of his offence; these things, so far as this Psalm is concerned, might, or might not be. It is of the offence against God; of the defiling, although it were not then so expressly declared, God’s temple by impurity, that David speaks.—Ambrose, in J. M. Neale’s Commentary.

Verse 2.—“Sin.” The original word signifies to miss an aim, as an archer does who shoots short of his mark, beyond, or beside it. It is also used for treading aside, or tripping, in the act of walking. In a spiritual sense it denotes deviation from a rule, whether by omission or commission.—Thomas T. Biddulph, A.M., in Lectures on the Fifty-first Psalm, 1835.

Verse 2.—Sin is filthy to think of, filthy to speak of, filthy to hear of, filthy to do; in a word, there is nothing in it but vileness.—Archibald Symson.

Verse 3.—“For I acknowledge my transgressions,” etc. To acknowledge our transgressions, there is confession; and to have our sin ever before us, there is conviction and contrition. To acknowledge our transgressions, I say, is to confess our sins; to call them to mind, to bring them back to our remembrance what we can; to own them with shame, and to declare them with sorrow; to reckon them up one by one, to give in a particular account of them, as far as our memory will serve, and to spread them before the Lord, as Hezekiah did Rabshakeh’s letter, and in an humble sense of our own vileness to implore his goodness, that he would multiply his mercies over us, as we have multiplied our transgressions against him, in the free and full forgiveness of them all. To have our sin ever before us, is throughly to be convinced of it, to be continually troubled in mind about it, to be truly humbled under the sense of it, and to be possest of those dreads and terrors of conscience which may never let us rest or enjoy any quiet within our own breast till we have reconciled ourselves to a gracious God for it.—Adam Littleton.