Expositions on the Book of Psalms (continued)
Psatm XC] ON THE PSALMS. 441 by sacrilegious divination, I go not to worship idols, I bow not before stones ; though I am in the party of Donatus. What does it profit you not to have offended your Father, if he avenges 'your offended Mother? what does it serve you, the reader or listener. '' Lord," he saith, "Thou hast been our refuge from one generation to the other."
3. He adds, how He became our refuge, since He began to be that, viz. a refuge, to us which He had not been before, not that He had not existed before He became our refuge: " Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever the earth and the world were made: and from age even unto age Thou art" (ver. 2). Thou therefore who art for ever, and before we were, and before the world was, hast become our refuge ever since we turned to Thee. But the expression, " before the mountains," etc., seems to me to contain a particular meaning; for mountains are the higher parts of the earth, and if God was before even the earth were formed (or, as some books have it, from the same Greek word, "framed ''5), since it was by Him that it was formed, what is the need of saying that if you acknowledge the Lord, honour God, preach His name, acknowledge His Son, confess that He sitteth by His right hand; while you blaspheme His Church? Does not the analogy of human marriages convince you? Suppose you have some patron, whom you court every day, whose threshold you wear with your visits, whom you daily not only salute, but even worship, to whom you pay the most loyal courtesy; if you utter one calumny against his wife, could you reenter his house? Hold then, most beloved, hold all with one mind to God the Father, and the Church our Mother. Celebrate with temperance the birthdays of the Saints, that we may imitate those who have gone before us, and that they who pray for you may rejoice over you; that "the blessing of the Lord may abide on you for evermore. Amen and Amen."
He was before the mountains, or any certain parts of it, since God was not only*before the earth, but before heaven and earth, and even the whole bodily and spiritual creation? But it may certainly be that the whole rational creation is marked by this distinction ; that while the loftiness of Angels is signified by the mountains, the lowliness of man is meant by the earth. And for this reason, although all the works of creation are not improperly said-to be either made or formed ; nevertheless, if there is any propriety in these words, the Angels are " made ;"' for as they are enumerated among His_ heavenly works, the enumeration itself is thus concluded : " He spake the word, and they were made; He commanded, and they were created ;"'° but the earth was "formed," that man might thence be created in the body. For the Scripture uses this word, where we read, God made, or '" God formed man out of the dust of the ground.''7 Before then the noblest parts of the creation
PSALM XC.!
1. This Psalm is entitled, "The prayer of Moses the man of God," through whom, His man, God gave the law to His people, through whom He freed them from the house of slavery, and led them forty years through the wilderness. Moses was therefore the Minister of the Old, and the Prophet of the New Testament. For "all these things,"' saith the Apostle, '"' happened unto them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, unto whom the ends of the world come." 2 In accordance therefore with this dispensation which was vouchsafed to Moses, this Psalm is to be examined, as it has received its title from his prayer.
2. "Lord," he saith, "Thou hast been our refuge from one generation to another" (ver. 1) : either in every generation, or in two generations, the old and new: because, as I said, he was the Minister of the Testament that related to the old generation, and the Prophet of the Testament which appertained to the new. Jesus Himself, the Surety of that covenant, and the Bridegroom in the marriage which He entered into in that generation, saith, "Had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed Me: for he wrote of Me.''3 Now it is not to be believed that this Psalm was entirely the composition of that Moses, as it is not distinguished by any of those of his expressions * which are used in his songs: but the name of the great servant of God is used for the sake of some intimation, which should direct the attention of
(for what is higher than the rational part of the Heavenly creation) were made: before the earth was made, that Thou mightest have worshippers upon the earth; and even this is little, as all these had a beginning either in or with time; but "from age to age Thou art." It would have been better, from everlasting to everlasting: for God, who is before the ages, exists not from a certain age, nor to a certain age, which has an end, since He is without end. But it often happens in the Scripture, that the equivocal Greek word causes the Latin translator to put age for eternity and eternity for age. But he very rightly does not say, Thou wast from ages, and unto ages Thou shalt be: but puts the verb in the present, intimating that the substance of God is altogether immutable. It is not, He
I Tat. LX X XIX. 2+ Con ak x1 3 John v. 46. 4 Literis. [But see Delitzsch (ed. Clark), vol. ili. p. 48. —C.]
5 Fingeretur. 6 Ps. cxlviii. 5. 7 Gen. ii. 7.