Psalm 4:2 Komentář

David was a preacher, a royal preacher, as well as Solomon; many of his psalms are doctrinal and practical as well as devotional; the greatest part of this psalm is so, in which Wisdom cries to men, to the sons of men (as Pro 8:4, Pro 8:5), to receive instruction. The title does not tell us, as that of the former did, that it was penned on any particular occasion, nor are we to think that all the psalms were occasional, though some were, but that many of them were designed in general for the instruction of the people of God, who attended in the courts of his house, the assisting of their devotions, and the directing of their conversations: such a one I take this psalm to be. Let us not make the prophecy of scripture to be of more private interpretation than needs must, Pe2 1:20. Here I. David begins with a short prayer (Psa 4:1) and that prayer preaches. II. He directs his speech to the children of men, and, 1. In God's name reproves them for the dishonour they do to God and the damage they do to their own souls (Psa 4:2). 2. He sets before them the happiness of godly people for their encouragement to be religious (Psa 4:3). 3. He calls upon them to consider their ways (Psa 4:4). III. He exhorts them to serve God and trust in him (Psa 4:5). IV. He gives an account of his own experiences of the grace of God working in him, 1. Enabling him to choose God's favour for his felicity (Psa 4:6). 2. Filling his heart with joy therein (Psa 4:7). 3. Quieting his spirit in the assurance of the divine protection he was under, night and day (Psa 4:8). To the chief musician on Neginoth. A psalm of David.

INTRODUCTION TO PSALM 4 To the chief Musician on Neginoth, a Psalm of David. This psalm is inscribed "to the chief musician", or "conqueror" (d): who excelled others in the art of music, and carried the glory from them; who was very skilful, and instructed others in it, and was the master of the song, as Chenaniah, Ch1 15:22; who set the tune, led on the psalm, and had the whole direction and management of it; and so the Jewish doctors (d) generally understand it of one that presided over the rest of the musicians and singers; and to such an one was this psalm sent, to be sung in public worship: for the psalms of David were not composed for private use only, but for public service; and were committed into the hands and care of the chief of the singers, as Asaph and others; see Ch1 16:7; by whom they were preserved and transmitted to future ages for the use of the church, not only in the former but in the present dispensation. The Septuagint interpreters, and after them the Vulgate Latin and Ethiopic versions, render it "unto the end", or for ever; to this agrees the sense of R. Saadiah Gaon (e), who says, "this is a psalm of David, who gave it to one of the singers to sing it continually,'' as if it was "for ever"; but the former sense is best, to understand it of the chief musician, or precentor, who is said to be "on neginoth": the singular; "neginah", is used in the title of Psa 61:1, and it is sometimes rendered "a song", as in Job 30:9; hence the Vulgate Latin version here renders it "in songs"; and the Septuagint renders it "in psalms"; and then the meaning is, that this person was the chief man that presided over the songs and psalms: though the Jewish writers (f), for the most part, interpret it of a musical instrument so called; not such an one as was blown, as the pipe and trumpet, but what was played upon with the hand; see Sa1 16:16; a stringed instrument, which was touched with the fingers as an harp, or struck with a quill or bow as a violin. And as there were various instruments of music used in the temple service, so there were persons set over them, some over one sort, and some over another; and this man presided over the instruments that were played with the hand: and it looks as if this psalm was to be sung to such an instrument, by its being inscribed and sent to him. Aben Ezra takes the word to be, "the beginning of a song"; and the Targum renders the whole, "to sing upon the chorus" or "dances". It is called "a Psalm of David", being written by him, under the inspiration of the Spirit of God; the occasion of it was Absalom's rebellion; and it was written when he fled from him, as the preceding, as Kimchi thinks; but, according to Lightfoot and others, it was the rebellion of Sheba, Sa2 20:1, though others refer it to the time of his distresses and persecutions by Saul; according to the Jewish Rabbins (g), where there are the words , as they are both in this title, the psalm belongs to future time, to the world to come, to the times of the Messiah. (d) "victori", Pagninus, Montanus, Vatablus; "vincenti", Munster. (d) Jarchi, Aben Ezra, Kimchi, & Ben Melech in loc. (e) Apud Aben Ezra in loc. (f) Kimchi & Ben Melech in loc. and others in Aben Ezra in loc. (g) Kimchi Praefat. in Psalm.

O ye sons of men,.... Meaning great men, the nobles of Israel; and so the Jewish interpreters (k) generally explain it; such as Ahithophel, and others, who were in the conspiracy with Absalom, Sa2 15:12, and so they were the kings and princes of the earth, and the rulers of the Jewish sanhedrim, the chief priests and elders, who were the enemies of Christ; and such, generally speaking, have been the persecutors of the saints; these men of power and authority, of dignity and honour, and who were in high places, and boasted of their titles and grandeur, the psalmist addresses by way of expostulation in the following words; how long will ye turn my glory into shame? Meaning either God, who was his glory, Psa 3:3; whom they reproached when they said there was no help for him in him; or his tongue, the instrument of praise, and the songs of praise he expressed by it, Psa 7:8; which they jeered and scoffed at: or rather his royal glory and majesty, which they attempted to vail by casting him down from his excellency, by dethroning him, and setting up Absalom in his room. So the Jews endeavoured to turn the glory of Christ into shame, which lay in his being the only begotten of the Father; by denying his sonship, by condemning him to death; because he said he was the Son of God; and by mocking at him under that character on the cross; and also by their spitting upon, buffeting, and crucifying the Lord of glory; by reproaching his Gospel, ministers, and people; and by not acknowledging him as the Messiah, and submitting to his righteousness. And wicked men do as much as in them lies to turn the glory of the saints into shame, by aspersing their character, taking away their good name and reputation among men; by reproaching and reviling them, and speaking all manner of evil of them; and by persecuting them in the most violent manner; how long will ye love vanity; or "a vain thing" (l). Such as the placing of Absalom upon the throne, on which their hearts were set; and such was the vain imagination of the Jews, with which they pleased themselves, that Jesus should die, and his name perish; and such are all the attempts of wicked men to ruin and destroy the people and interest of Christ; for no weapon formed against them shall prosper; and seek after leasing? Or "a lie" (m); or that which fails and deceives, as a lie does: and such were all the counsels and designs of the great men of Israel against David: and so the Jews may be said to seek after a lie, when they seek after another Messiah besides Jesus of Nazareth: for every other proves a "Bar Cozbi", that is, the son of a lie; as the false Messiah in Adrian's time was called by themselves. And so do all such as seek after and embrace false doctrines, errors, and heresies, and are given up to believe them. Now the psalmist suggests that these great men were obstinate, and continued in these sinful practices; and that in the issue all their efforts would be vain and fruitless; and which he further strengthens by observing to them what follows. Selah; on this word; see Gill on Psa 3:2. (k) Jarchi, Aben Ezra, Kimchi, & Ben Melech in loc. (l) "inane", Pagninus, Montanus, Vatablus, Cocceius; "inanem rem", Piscator. (m) "mendacium", Pagninus, Montanus, Tigurine version, Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, &c.

David seems to be speaking here of those who, when being tested and put through various trials, would rather do anything than find refuge in God. Why is it necessary, he asks, to be disturbed and upset at the conditions of the times? What makes you hand yourselves over to vanity, you heavy-hearted people? Why do you seek lies and leave the truth behind? Rather than being informed by these things, know that the Lord God is the one who watches and controls everything, the one who never ever deserts his own righteous ones but always does miraculous things for them. You yourselves, as the upright, know that the Lord is going to be near to you and me whenever you will call out to him.

Let us flee from lying, brothers, as if it were a sword to the soul.… And just as in war allies are distinguished from enemies by the watch word, so also in the war of human affairs the friends of God are recognized by truthfulness and by not spreading falsehood; the liars slaughter themselves with the sword of their own tongue. The mouth that does not perjure or lie surely is pleasing to God in its speech. For if we respect the friend and family member who does not lie, and when he asks for something, we grant it, how much more God who has no respect for lying grants benefit to him. When he sees a pure and spotless truthful tongue, he receives his words just like a gift on a tray.… As purple and a crown befit the king, so not lying befits the Christian. So those close to him respect him, friends, neighbors and business associates: the demons fear him, the angels love him, and as they rejoice they open the gates of the kingdom of heaven to him.

“Futile” is the word used of that thing that is empty, when there is something in name but nothing in substance. The Greeks have many names for their gods but not a trace of substance; so too in many other matters: wealth has a name but not a trace of substance; glory has a name but not a trace of substance; power has a name, and the name remains unsupported by fact. So who would be so heedless as to go in search of bare names of things and pursue hollow things that one ought avoid? Are not the pleasures and prosperity of life things of that kind? Do they not all mislead and deceive? Even if you cite glory and wealth and power, they are all futility. Hence Ecclesiastes also said, “Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.” This is the very reason the inspired author is distressed, seeing such absurdity in life. I mean, it is like this: if you saw someone avoiding the light to seek out darkness, you would say, “Why are you doing this strange thing?” So too the inspired author: “Why do you love futility and seek falsehood?”

"O you sons of men, how long heavy in heart" [Psalm 4:2]. Let your error, says he, have lasted at least up to the coming of the Son of God; why then any longer are you heavy in heart? When will you make an end of crafty wiles, if now when the truth is present ye make it not? "Why do ye love vanity, and seek a lie?" Why would ye be blessed by the lowest things? Truth alone, from which all things are true, makes blessed. For, "vanity is of deceivers, and all is vanity." [Ecclesiastes 1:2] "What profit has a man of all his labour, wherewith he labours under the sun?" Why then are you held back by the love of things temporal? Why follow ye after the last things, as though the first, which is vanity and a lie? For you would have them abide with you, which all pass away, as does a shadow.

What are the lies you are seeking? I will tell you right away. You all want to be happy, I know. Find me someone, let him be a robber, a villain, a fornicator, a sorcerer, sacrilegious, defiled by every imaginable vice, up to his neck in misdeeds and crimes of all sorts, who does not want to live a happy life? I know you all want to live happy lives. But what is it that makes a person’s life happy? That is something you are not all seeking after. You are seeking gold, because you imagine you will be happy with gold; but gold does not make one happy. Why seek after lies? Why do you want to get to the top in this world? Because you imagine you will be happy with honor from people and worldly triumphs; but worldly triumphs do not make one happy. Why seek after lies? And whatever else you may seek after here, when you seek it in a worldly way, when you seek it by loving earth, when you seek it by licking the dust of the earth, the reason you are seeking it is in order to be happy; but nothing at all that is of the earth will make you happy.… What you are seeking is deceptive; what you are seeking is lies.

Do you want to be happy? If you like, I will show you what will put it in your power to be happy. Continue with that text: “How long with a heavy heart? Why do you love futility, and seek after lies? Know.” Know what? “That the Lord has magnified his holy one.” Christ has come to our miseries; he was hungry, he was thirsty, he was tired, he slept, he performed wonders, he suffered evils, he was scourged, crowned with thorns, smeared with spittle, slapped around and beaten, nailed to a tree, wounded with a lance, laid in a tomb; but on the third day he rose again, all toil at an end, death dead. There you are, fix your eyes on his resurrection. Because hasn’t the Lord magnified his holy one, to the extent of raising him from the dead and giving him the honor of sitting at his right hand in heaven? He has shown you what you should savor, if you really wish to be happy. Here, you see, you simply cannot be. In this life you cannot be happy. Nobody can.… But [Christ] came down and … he took your bad things.… He promised us his life, but what … he did is even more unbelievable; he paid us his death in advance. As though to say, “I am inviting you to my life, where nobody dies, where life is truly happy, where food does not go bad, where it provides nourishment and undergoes no diminishment. There you are, that is where I am inviting you, to the region of the angels, to the friendship of the Father and the Holy Spirit, to the everlasting supper, to be my brothers and sisters, to be, in a word, myself. I am inviting you to my life.… So now, while we are living in this perishable flesh, by a change of habits let us die with Christ, by a love of being just let us live with Christ. We are only going to receive the happy, blessed life, when we come to him who came to us and when we begin to be with him who died for us.

Their deceit, in fact, was in claiming God does not exercise providence, and their futile thinking was the conviction that the judge does not exercise surveillance. This thought constantly overtakes sinners: they think they will not pay the penalty, rejecting the judge’s role along with his providence. This is not so, however, he is saying, not so!

Then when he says, "O sons," etc., he turns to the exhortation of others: and concerning this he does two things. First he rebukes sinners; second he exhorts them to amendment, at "And know," etc. Concerning the first he does two things. First he recalls their condition; second he charges their fault, at "Why do you love"; he recalls their condition saying, "sons of men": which can be understood in two ways. First in a bad sense, thus: "sons of men," as if men according to their lower nature, corruptible and prone to sin. Gen. 6: "My spirit shall not remain in man forever because he is flesh." And again, chapter 8: "The senses and thoughts of men are prone to evil from their youth." "Sons of men," therefore; as if to say, you show yourselves to be sons of men, that is, of sinners, namely of Eve and Adam. "How long will you be heavy of heart?" Is. 1: "Woe to the sinful nation, to the people heavy with iniquity," etc. Second in a good sense: because man insofar as he is man is the image of God: hence "sons of men," not of beasts. Ps. 48: "Man, when he was in honor, did not understand," etc. And "O heavy of heart," that is, because you ought to have a heart that is grave and stable, how long will you not turn to God? And this is what Jerome has: "Sons of the noble, how long will my honored ones shamefully love vanity, seeking falsehood?" And so he fittingly charges the fault: "Why do you love," etc. For in sin two things are to be considered: namely, the will adhering to the thing, and the disordered intention. First, therefore, he touches upon the disordered love when he says, "Why do you love," etc., that is, something vain, not solid -- for temporal things are vain because they do not contain anything solid, but only a passing good. Eccl. 1: "Vanity of vanities, and all is vanity." Why therefore do you love, etc., as if to say, why do you love temporal things? Second, he touches upon the depraved intention when he says, "and why do you seek after falsehood," that is, why do you love riches, so as to have sufficiency? For Eccl. 5: "The covetous man shall not be filled with money." Jer. 4: "I looked upon the earth," etc. Or "falsehood," that is, an idol, 1 Cor. 8: "An idol is nothing." How long, therefore, do you love and seek this, and do not turn to God?

On Neginoth, that is, stringed instruments, as the kind of musical accompaniment. On other parts of title, see Introduction., The historical occasion was probably the same as that of the foregoing [see on Psa 3:1]. The writer, praying for further relief, admonishes his enemies of the vanity of attacking God's servant, exhorts them to repentance, and avows his confidence and peace in God's favor. (Psa 4:1-8) Hear--as in Psa 3:4. God of my righteousness--or, "my righteous God, as my holy hill" (Psa 2:6), who will act towards me on righteous principles. thou hast enlarged--expresses relief afforded in opposition to "distress," which is expressed by a word denoting straits or pressure. Past favor is a ground of hope for the future.

sons of men--men of note or prominence (compare Ch2 21:9). turn my glory--or, "royal dignity." into shame--or, "reproach." vanity--a foolish and hopeless enterprise (Psa 2:1). leasing--a lie.

(Heb.: 4:3-4) Righteous in his relation to God he turns rebukingly towards those who contemn his whose honour is God's honour, viz., to the partisans of Absolom. In contrast with בּני אדם, men who are lost in the multitude, בּני אישׁ denotes such as stand prominently forward out of the multitude; passages like Psa 49:3; Psa 62:10; Pro 8:4; Isa 2:9; Isa 5:15, show this distinction. In this and the preceding Psalm David makes as little mention of his degenerate son as he does of the deluded king in the Psalms belonging to the period of his persecution by Saul. The address is directed to the aristocratic party, whose tool Absolom has become. To these he days: till when (עד־מה beside the non-guttural which follows with Segol, without any manifest reason, as in Psa 10:13; Isa 1:5; Jer 16:10), i.e., how long shall my honour become a mockery, namely to you and by you, just as we can also say in Latin quousque tandem dignitas mea ludibrio? The two following members are circumstantial clauses subordinate to the principal clause with עד־מה (similar to Isa 1:5; Ew. 341, b). The energetic fut. with Nun parag. does not usually stand at the head of independent clauses; it is therefore to be rendered: since ye love ריק, that which is empty - the proper name for their high rank is hollow appearance - how long will ye pursue after כּזב, falsehood?-they seek to find out every possible lying pretext, in order to trail the honour of the legitimate king in the dust. The assertion that the personal honour of David, not his kingly dignity, is meant by כּבודי, separates what is inseparable. They are eager to injure his official at the same time as his personal reputation. Therefore David appeals in opposition to them (Psa 4:4) not only to the divine choice, but also to his personal relationship to God, on which that choice is based. The ו of וּדעוּ is, as in Kg2 4:41, the ו of sequence: so know then. The Hiph. חפלה (from פּלה = פּלא, cogn. פּלל, prop. to divide) to make a separation, make a distinction Exo 9:4; Exo 11:7, then to distinguish in an extraordinary and remarkable way Exo 8:18, and to show Psa 17:7, cf. Psa 31:22, so that consequently what is meant is not the mere selection (בּחר), but the remarkable selection to a remarkable position of honour (lxx, Vulg. mirificavit, Windberg translation of the Psalms gewunderlichet). לו belongs to the verb, as in Psa 135:4, and the principal accent lies on חסיד: he whom Jahve Himself, not men, has thus remarkably distinguished is a חסיד, a pious man, i.e., either, like the Syriac חסידא = רהימא: God's favourite, or, according to the biblical usage of the language (cf. Psa 12:2 with Isa 17:1), in an active signification like פּליט, פּריץ, and the like: a lover of God, from חסד (root חס Arab. ḥs, stringere, whence ḥassa to curry, maḥassa a curry-comb) prop. to feel one's self drawn, i.e., strongly affected (comp. ḥiss is mental impression), in Hebrew, of a strong ardent affection. As a חסיד he does not call upon God in vain, but finds a ready hearing. Their undertaking consequently runs counter to the miraculously evidenced will of God and must fail by reason of the loving relationship in which the dethroned and debased one stands to God.