A psalm of David, when he fled from the face of Abessalon his son.
To the end, for the eighth, a psalm of David.
Unto the end, a psalm of David.
To the end, a psalm of David himself.
To the end, for the servant of the Lord, David himself.
To the end, a psalm of David himself.
To the end, a psalm of David himself.
A psalm of David himself, of the consummation of the tabernacle.
To David himself for understanding.
On the first part of the psalm.
A psalm to David himself, on the remembrance of the Sabbath.
Psalm CVIII.4891 Lat. CVII. Why no exposition is here given.
1. I have not thought that the CVIIIth Psalm required an exposition; since I have already expounded it in the LVIIth Psalm,4892 Ps. lvii. 8–12, lx. 5–12. and in the LXth, of the last divisions of which this Psalm consisteth. For the last part of the LVIIth is the first of this, as far as the verse, “Thy glory is above all the earth.” Henceforth to the end, is the last part of the LXth: as the last part of the CXXXVth is the same as that of the CXVth,4893 Ps. cxxxv. 15, cxv. 4. from the verse, “The images of the heathen are but gold and silver:” as the XIVth[4899] and LIIId,4894 Ps. liii. with a few alterations in the middle, have everything the same from the beginning to the end. Whatever slight differences therefore occur in this CVIIIth Psalm, compared with those two, of parts of which it is composed, are easy to understand; just as we find in the LVIIth,4895 Ps. lvii. 7, 8. “I will sing and give praise; awake, O my glory:” here,“ I will sing and give praise, with my glory.”4896 Ps. cviii. 1. Awake, is said there, that he may sing and give praise therewith. Also, there, “Thy mercy is great” (or, as some translate, “is lifted up”) “unto the heavens;”4897 Ps. lvii. 10. but here, “Thy mercy is great above the heavens.”4898 Ps. cviii. 4. For it is great unto the heavens, that it may be great in the heavens; and this is what he wished to express by “above the heavens.” Also in the LXth, “I will rejoice, I will divide Shechem:”4899 Ps. lx. 6. here “I will be exalted, and will divide Shechem.”4900 Ps. cviii. 7. Where is shown what is signified in the division of Shechem, which it was prophesied should happen after the Lord’s exaltation, and that this joy doth refer to that exaltation; so that He rejoiceth, because He is exalted. Whence he elsewhere saith, “Thou hast turned my heaviness into joy; Thou hast put off my sackcloth and girded me with gladness.”4901 Ps. xxx. 11. Also there “Ephraim, the strength of my head:”4902 Ps. lx. 7. but here, “Ephraim the taking up of my head.”4903 Ps. cviii. 8. But strength cometh from taking up, that is, He maketh men strong by taking up, causing fruit in us; for the interpretation of Ephraim is, bearing fruit. But “taking up” may be understood of us, when we take up Christ; or of Christ, when He, who is Head of the Church, taketh us up. And the words, “them that trouble us,” in the former Psalm,4904 Ps. lx. 12. are the same with “our enemies,” in this.4905 Ps. cviii. 13.
2. We are taught by this Psalm, that those titles which seem to refer to history are most rightly understood prophetically, according to the object of the composition of the Psalms.…And yet this Psalm is composed of the latter portions of two,4906 Ps. lvii. Tit.; Ps. lx. Tit. whose titles are different. Where it is signified that each concur in a common object, not in the surface of the history, but in the depth of prophecy, the objects of both being united in this one, the title of which is, “A Song or Psalm of David:”4907 Ps. cviii. Tit. resembling neither of the former titles, otherwise than in the word David. Since, “in many places, and in diverse manners,” as the Epistle to the Hebrews saith, “God spoke in former times to the fathers through the Prophets;”4908 Heb. i. 1. yet He spoke of Him whom He sent afterwards, that the words of the Prophets might be fulfilled: for “all the promises of God in Him are yea.”4909 2 Cor. i. 20.