Commentary on Psalms Volume 1 John Calvin (continued)
JOHN CALVIN
religious observances; but it is to disprove the false reports which were spread against him that David thus confidently appeals to God with respect to them. This is still more fully confirmed by the repetition of the same thing which is made a little after, According to the cleanness of my hands before his eyes In these words there is evidently a contrast between the eyes of God and the blinded or malignant eyes of the world; as if he had said, I disregard false and wicked calumnies, provided I am pure and upright in the sight of God, whose judgment can never be perverted by malevolent or other vicious and perverse affections. Moreover, the integrity which he attributes to himself is not perfection but sincerity, which is opposed to dissimulation and hypocrisy. This may be gathered from the last clause of the 23rd verse, where he says, I have kept myself from my iniquity In thus speaking, he tacitly acknowledges that he had not been so pure and free from sinful affections as that the malignity of his enemies did not frequently excite indignation within him, and gall him to the heart. He had therefore to fight in his own mind against many temptations, for as he was a man, he must have felt in the flesh on many occasions the stirrings of vexation and anger. But this was the proof of his virtue, that he imposed a restraint upon himself, and refrained from whatever he knew to be contrary to the word of God. A man will never persevere in the practice of uprightness and of godliness, unless he carefully keep himself from his iniquity.
Psalm 18:25-27
25. With the merciful thou wilt deal mercifully, 415 with an upright man thou wilt show thyself upright. 26. With the pure 416 thou wilt be pure, and with the perverse thou wilt show thyself perverse. 27 For thou wilt save the afflicted people, 417 and wilt bring down the haughty eyes. 418 "Tu to montreras debonnaire envers le debonnaire." — Fr. "Towards the merciful thou wilt show thyself merciful."
"Envers." — Note, Fr. marg. "That is, towards."
Some read, The humble people, supposing that, as the contrast is between them and proud looks, humility rather than suffering is meant.
This is the literal rendering of the Hebrew text. "The meaning obviously is, that the haughty themselves shall be humbled, however confident they may be." — French and Skinner,