Commentary on Psalms Volume 3 John Calvin (continued)
COMMENTARY ON PSALMS - VOLUME 3 of wretched desolation; yea, even those small churches in which he dwells are torn and scattered. What are these humble erections, when compared with that splendid edifice described by Isaiah, Ezekiel, and Zechariah? But no desolation ought to prevent us from loving the very stones and dust of the Church. Let us leave the Papists to be proud of their altars, their huge buildings, and their other exhibitions of pomp and splendor; for all that heathenish magnificence is nothing else but an abomination in the sight of God and his angels, whereas the ruins of the true temple are sacred.
Psalm 102:15-18
15. And the nations shall fear the name of Jehovah, 148 and all the kings of the earth thy glory. 16. For Jehovah hath built up Zion, and hath appeared in his glory. 17. He hath regarded the prayer of the solitary, 149 and hath not despised their prayers. 150 18. This shall be registered for the generation that is to come: and the people to be created shall praise him. 151
15. And the nations shall fear the name of Jehovah The prophet here describes the fruit which would result from the deliverance of the ancient tribes; which is, that thereby God's glory would be rendered illustrious among nations and kings. He tacitly intimates, that when the Church is
"Craindront ton nom, Seigneur." — Fr. "Shall fear thy name, O Lord!"
The original word for the solitary is,הרערha-arar; and asערערsignifies the tamarisk or myrtle, some translate, "the afflicted or dejected man;" the myrtle being an emblem of a low and depressed state of the Church. Accordingly, in the Chaldee, it is "the prayer of the desolate," and in the Septuagint, "the prayer of the humble." Houbigant derives the word from,רעעfrangere, to break, and renders it, "the afflicted." Others read, "the destitute," supposing the word to come from,ערהwas naked, as Fry: "'When he hath turned himself to the prayer of the destitute' — the people emptied, and poured forth — made bare or stripped naked." Others prefer the version, "He regarded him when exciting his prayer," as if the root of the Hebrew term were,עורto excite
Horsley translates the verbs in the 16th and 17th verses in the present, — "Truly Jehovah is building Zion; He appeareth in his glory. He regardeth the prayer of the destitute, And their prayer he despiseth not."
He regards the Psalm as a "prayer and lamentation of a believer, in the time of the last Antichristian persecution;" and after observing that the 16th and 17th verses are rendered by our English Bible in the future, he says, "These futures, in the original, are all present; 'buildeth — appeareth — regardeth — and despiseth not.' The Psalmist in his confidence of the event speaks of it as doing."
"Le Seigneur." — Fr. "The Lord." In the Hebrew it is,יהJah