Psalm 18:10 Kommentar

This psalm we met with before, in the history of David's life, 2 Sa. 22. That was the first edition of it; here we have it revived, altered a little, and fitted for the service of the church. It is David's thanksgiving for the many deliverances God had wrought for him; these he desired always to preserve fresh in his own memory and to diffuse and entail the knowledge of them. It is an admirable composition. The poetry is very fine, the images are bold, the expressions lofty, and every word is proper and significant; but the piety far exceeds the poetry. Holy faith, and love, and joy, and praise, and hope, are here lively, active, and upon the wing. I. He triumphs in God (Psa 18:1-3). II. He magnifies the deliverances God had wrought for him (v. 4-19). III. He takes the comfort of his integrity, which God had thereby cleared up (Psa 18:20-28). IV. He gives to God the glory of all his achievements (Psa 18:29-42). V. He encourages himself with the expectation of what God would further do for him and his (Psa 18:43-50). To the chief musician, A psalm of David, the servant of the Lord, who spake unto the Lord the words of this song in the day that the Lord delivered him from the hand of all his enemies.

INTRODUCTION TO PSALM 18 To the chief Musician, a Psalm of David. This is the same with that in Sa2 22:1, with some variations, omissions, and alterations: the servant of the Lord; not only by creation, nor merely by regeneration, but by office, as king of Israel, being put into it by the Lord, and acting in it in submission and obedience to him; just as the apostles under the New Testament, on account of their office, so style themselves in their epistles: who spake unto the Lord the words of this song; that is, who delivered and sung this song in so many express words, in public, before all the congregation of Israel, to the honour and glory of God: in the day [that] the Lord delivered him from the hand of all his enemies, and from the hand of Saul, Not that this psalm was composed and sung the selfsame day that David was delivered from Saul, and set upon the throne; for it seems to have been written in his old age, at the close of his days; for immediately after it, in the second book of Samuel, it follows, "now these be the last words of David", Sa2 23:1, but the sense is, that whereas David had many enemies, and particularly Saul, who was his greatest enemy, the Lord delivered him from them all, and especially from him, from him first, and then from all the rest; which when he reflected upon in his last days, he sat down and wrote this psalm, and then sung it in public, having delivered it into the hands of the chief musician for that purpose. There are two passages cited out of it in the New Testament, and applied to Christ; Psa 18:2, in Heb 2:13, and Psa 18:49 in Rom 15:9; and there are many things in it that very well agree with him; he is eminently the "servant" of the Lord as Mediator; he was encompassed with the snares and sorrows of death and hell, and with the floods of ungodly men, when in the garden and on the cross God was his helper and deliverer, as man; and he was victorious over all enemies, sin, Satan, the world, death and hell; as the subject of this psalm is all along represented: and to Christ it does most properly belong to be the head of the Heathen, whose voluntary subjects the Gentiles are said to be, Psa 18:43; and which is expressed in much the same language as the like things are in Isa 55:4; which is a clear and undoubted prophecy of the Messiah; to which may be added, that the Lord's Anointed, the King Messiah, and who is also called David, is expressly mentioned in Psa 18:50; and which is applied to the Messiah by the Jews (q) as Psa 18:32 is paraphrased of him by the Targum on it; and he said; the following words: (q) Echa Rabbati, fol. 50. 2. & Midrash Tillim in Tzeror Hammor, fol. 47. 3.

He made darkness his secret place,.... Which, and the dark waters in the next clause, are the same with the thick clouds in the last, in which Jehovah is represented as wrapping himself, and in which he lies hid as in a secret place; not so as that he cannot see others, as wicked men imagine, Job 22:13; but as that he cannot be beheld by others; the Targum interprets it, "he caused his Shechinah to dwell in darkness;'' his pavilion round about him were dark waters, and thick clouds of the skies; these were as a tent or tabernacle, in which he dwelt unseen by men; see Job 36:29; all this may design the dark dispensation of the Jews, after their rejection and crucifixion of Christ; when God departed from them, left their house desolate, and them without his presence and protection; when the light of the Gospel was taken away from them, and blindness happened unto them, and they had eyes that they should not see, and were given up to a judicial darkness of mind and hardness of heart; which were some of the dark, deep, and mysterious methods of divine Providence, with respect to which God may be said to be surrounded with darkness, dark waters, and thick clouds; see Rom 11:7.

Secretly and with mysterious reckoning he represents his incarnation through [images of] darkness and thick clouds. At last he returns to the same place from whence he had set forth: and he ascends into the heavens with the cherubim and flies, although he had not descended with those cherubim, without the cherubim he himself bowed the heavens and descended. On his return it is said, “And he mounted on cherubs, and he flew,” with the body he had assumed.

"And He mounted above the cherubim, and did fly" [Psalm 18:10]. And He was exalted above the fullness of knowledge, that no man should come to Him but by love: for "love is the fulfilling of the law." [Romans 13:10] And full soon He showed to His lovers that He is incomprehensible, lest they should suppose that He is comprehended by corporeal imaginations. "He flew above the wings of the winds." But that swiftness, whereby He showed Himself to be incomprehensible, is above the powers of souls, whereon as upon wings they raise themselves from earthly fears into the air of liberty.

"And he flew." Here he treats of the changes of the air according to corporeal effects; and there is a threefold change: namely in winds, in clouds, and in thunder; and he treats of each. Regarding the first he proposes three things. First, the efficient cause of all these changes. Second, the matter. Third, the manner. Now the cause of all these is the celestial body, which by its motion causes these alterations of the air; and therefore he says, "he inclined the heavens," that is, he directed the power of the celestial bodies toward these effects, because they have this from God. "And he descended." Although God, remaining immovable, works all things, he is nevertheless said to move through his effect, inasmuch as he produces mobile effects. Wis. 7: "Wisdom is more mobile than all mobile things." And according to this he is said to descend, inasmuch as he causes the power of the heavens to descend. The matter of the winds is haze, or dry smoke, not so thin that it ascends all the way to fire, but subsisting; and he says, "under his feet," that is, under his power; and all of it is from God. The manner: "He ascended upon the Cherubim." It should be noted that the Jews imagine that just as a king has a chariot, so God also has a chariot, which is the Cherubim; and they imagine God as corporeal and similar to the Cherubim. And therefore in Jerome's Psalter it is said even word for word, "He rode upon the Cherubim." And these have a false imagination, because the things said figuratively in Scripture are signs of spiritual truth. Now divine wisdom is said to move inasmuch as it causes motion in mobile things. But whatever God causes in these lower things, he causes through the ministry of spiritual creatures; hence Augustine says that God moves corporeal creatures through spiritual ones. But the spiritual creature does not do this by its own power, but with God presiding. And the Cherubim are said to do this especially because the name is interpreted as "fullness of knowledge," and God does all things through his knowledge. And he is said to be "above the Cherubim" because God's knowledge exceeds that of the angels. And therefore God does this, "flying," that is, causing to fly. And through the Cherubim, that is, through his knowledge, and above them whom he exceeds. And he said "he flew" because the motion of the wind is not uniform; and he says "the wings of the winds" on account of the swiftness of their motion. Mystically, the mystery of the incarnation is set forth here. And first the incarnation of Christ is set forth, through which he went out and came into the world. Second, his ascension, by which he went to the Father, at "he ascended upon the Cherubim." Third, those things that were done in the Church after Christ's ascension, "and he made darkness." He says therefore, "He inclined the heavens and descended," etc. If some great person shows humility to some lowly person from a village, he is said to do an injury and abasement to the whole place over which he presides. So the Son of Man is said to humble himself and incline the heavens, because he willed to come to us in humility. "He descended," that is, he appeared visibly: Bar. 3: "Afterward he was seen upon earth and conversed with men." 1 Jn. 1: "What we have seen and heard and our hands have handled of the word of life." He descended therefore by humility, taking on human flesh, dying, and teaching humble things. Or "he inclined the heavens," that is, the preachers, "and descended," making them say things comprehensible to men. "And haze," that is, the devil and all the wicked, "under his feet," that is, Christ's: Ps. 109: "I will make your enemies your footstool." Of the ascension he says, "He ascended upon the Cherubim." Eph. 4: "He who descended is the same who ascended above all the heavens, that he might fill all things." "Above the Cherubim," that is, above the orders of angels: Eph. 1: "Setting him at his right hand in the heavenly places, above all principality and power and virtue and dominion," etc. "And he subjected all things under his feet, and gave him as head over all the Church, which is his body." Jer. 32: "O most mighty, great, and powerful, the Lord of hosts is your name, great in counsel and incomprehensible in thought." And he says especially "above the Cherubim," because he not only ascended so as to be superior to them, but because he is incomprehensible to them. "He flew, he flew" -- a double flight is understood here. First, inasmuch as his fame after the ascension grew throughout the whole world in a short time; hence he says, "upon the wings of the winds," that is, more than feathers that are scattered by the impulse of winds, because in a short time, before three years: Ps. 18: "Their sound has gone forth into all the earth," etc. Because before the destruction of Jerusalem. Or "he flew," etc., ascending into heaven, made invisible, and "he flew" from our sight: Acts 1: "A cloud received him out of their sight." Likewise "he flew upon the wings of the winds," that is, above the knowledge of the angels: Ps. 103: "Who makes his angels spirits," etc. Hence it is said in the Book of Causes (ch. 5) that the first cause is above all narration; and tongues do not fail in narrating it except because they fail in narrating its being, because it is above every cause. And the Commentator says that there is no judgment or cognition of it. "And he made darkness," etc. As was said, the things introduced here to show the wondrous power of God by which David was delivered can be referred to corporeal effects in figure and to spiritual ones in mystery. First, therefore, the Psalmist introduces, according as it is expounded regarding corporeal effects, the excellence of divine power in the air, and this in three ways: namely with respect to winds, with respect to rains and clouds, and with respect to lightning. And since the winds were treated above, we must speak of the rains in the air. According to clouds and rains, therefore, we find a twofold change in the air: one from clear to cloudy, another from cloudy to clear. First, therefore, he sets forth the first change. Second, the second, at "before the brightness." Regarding the first he does three things. First he shows the darkness of cloudy weather. Second, he employs a simile. Third, he sets forth the cause of the darkness. He says therefore, regarding the first: "He made darkness his hiding place." It is said that God dwells in heaven. Hence when the clouds hide the sky, God seems to dwell in concealment: Ezek. 32: "I will cover heaven with a cloud." And he puts the simile of a tent; and therefore he says, "Round about him is his tabernacle." For a tent is set up and taken down, like clouds. He says, "Dark water in the clouds of the air." Next he treats of the second change. "Before the brightness," etc., and he uses this simile: when light comes, darkness is expelled; and thus, when God shows his light, the darkness of the mists flees. And therefore he says, "Before the brightness in his sight the clouds passed away, before the brightness of the light from your face the clouds passed away," just as by the brightness or splendor of the sun clouds flee and melt, as is said in the book of Meteorology. Firebrands are set forth in the passing of the clouds, because hail and lightning, or fire, have a similar cause of generation. The ancients indeed say that they are generated in the highest place, which shows that a stronger congelation is caused by a stronger cold. Hence snow requires more cold than water; rain and hail more than snow; and the cold can be so great that it immediately condenses into hail; sometimes first into water and then into hail. And they say that vapors raised higher are greatly congealed, and therefore large hailstones are generated. But the Philosopher says to the contrary that they would be larger on the mountains and in winter; the contrary of which we see, because they are larger in valleys and occur in spring and autumn, and are generated in a nearby place. Likewise, according to the Philosopher, they sometimes come angular, which is a sign that they come from nearby, for the angles melt more quickly. Hence it should be known that it is natural that an opposite acts more strongly upon its opposite. Now it is certain that in the clouds cold and heat are mixed; therefore when the surrounding heat of the air compresses the cold that it cannot consume, then the cold acts interiorly while the heat surrounds it on the outside. Now falling firebrands have a twofold cause of generation: one through smoke ascending above to the place of inflammation, which is inflamed; and thus according to the inflammation it descends until it finds combustible matter. And he touched on this when he said, "Coals were kindled by him." And here he touches on another mode, which is through contrary resistance. In a cloud there is sometimes something hot, and this is compressed inwardly by the exterior cold and is multiplied, so that it brings along thick matter and falls; and therefore coals, fire, and hail have a similar generation, namely compression of cold or heat, as was said. He says therefore, "Before the brightness in his sight," etc. And these passed away together with the coal and hail, which are generated from clouds, as was said.

"The servant of the LORD," which in the Hebrew precedes "David," is a significant part of the title (and not a mere epithet of David), denoting the inspired character of the song, as the production of one entrusted with the execution of God's will. He was not favored by God because he served Him, but served Him because selected and appointed by God in His sovereign mercy. After a general expression of praise and confidence in God for the future, David gives a sublimely poetical description of God's deliverance, which he characterizes as an illustration of God's justice to the innocent and His righteous government. His own prowess and success are celebrated as the results of divine aid, and, confident of its continuance, he closes in terms of triumphant praise. 2Sa. 22:1-51 is a copy of this Psalm, with a few unimportant variations recorded there as a part of the history, and repeated here as part of a collection designed for permanent use. (Psa. 18:1-50) I will love thee--with most tender affection.

cherub--angelic agents (compare Gen 3:24), the figures of which were placed over the ark (Sa1 4:4), representing God's dwelling; used here to enhance the majesty of the divine advent. Angels and winds may represent all rational and irrational agencies of God's providence (compare Psa 104:3-4). did fly--Rapidity of motion adds to the grandeur of the scene.

(Heb.: 18:11-13) The storm, announcing the approaching outburst of the thunderstorm, was also the forerunner of the Avenger and Deliverer. If we compare Psa 18:11 with Psa 104:3, it is natural to regard כּרוּב as a transposition of רכוּב (a chariot, Ew. 153, a). But assuming a relationship between the biblical Cherub and (according to Ctesias) the Indo-Persian griffin, the word (from the Zend grab, garew, garefsh, to seize) signifies a creature seizing and holding irrecoverably fast whatever it seizes upon; perhaps in Semitic language the strong creature, from כּרב = Arab. krb, torquere, constringere, whence mukrab, tight, strong). It is a passive form like גּבוּל, יסד, לבוּשׁ. The cherubim are mentioned in Gen 3:24 as the guards of Paradise (this alone is enough to refute the interpretation recently revived in the Evang. Kirchen-Zeit., 1866, No. 46, that they are a symbol of the unity of the living One, כרוב = כּרוב "like a multitude!"), and elsewhere, as it were, as the living mighty rampart and vehicle of the approach of the inaccessible majesty of God; and they are not merely in general the medium of God's personal presence in the world, but more especially of the present of God as turning the fiery side of His doxa towards the world. As in the Prometheus of Aeschylus, Oceanus comes flying τὸν πτερυγωκῆ τόνδ ̓ οἰωνόν γνώμῃ στομίων ἄτερ εὐθύνων, so in the present passage Jahve rides upon the cherub, of which the heathenish griffin is a distortion; or, if by a comparison of passages like Psa 104:3; Isa 66:15, we understand David according to Ezekiel, He rides upon the cherub as upon His living throne-chariot (מרכּבה). The throne floats upon the cherubim, and this cherub-throne flies upon the wings of the wind; or, as we can also say: the cherub is the celestial spirit working in this vehicle formed of the spirit-like elements. The Manager of the chariot is Himself hidden behind the thick thunder-clouds. ישׁת is an aorist without the consecutive ו (cf. יך Hos 6:1). חשׁך is the accusative of the object to it; and the accusative of the predicate is doubled: His covering, His pavilion round about Him. In Job 36:29 also the thunder-clouds are called God's סכּה, and also in Psa 97:2 they are סביביו, concealing Him on all sides and announcing only His presence when He is wroth. In Psa 18:12 the accusative of the object, חשׁך, is expanded into "darkness of waters," i.e., swelling with waters (Note: Rab Dimi, B. Taanth 10a, for the elucidation of the passage quotes a Palestine proverb: נהור ענני זעירין מוהי חשׁוך ענני סגיין מוהי i.e., if the clouds are transparent they will yield but little water, if they are dark they will yield a quantity.) and billows of thick vapour, thick, and therefore dark, masses (עב in its primary meaning of denseness, or a thicket, Exo 19:9, cf. Jer 4:29) of שׁחקים, which is here a poetical name for fleecy clouds. The dispersion and discharge, according to Psa 18:13, proceeded from נגהּ גגדּו. Such is the expression for the doxa of God as being a mirroring forth of His nature, as it were, over against Him, as being therefore His brightness, or the reflection of His glory. The doxa is fire and light. On this occasion the forces of wrath issue from it, and therefore it is the fiery forces: heavy and destructive hail (cf. Exo 9:23., Isa 30:30) and fiery glowing coals, i.e., flashing and kindling lightning. The object עביו stands first, because the idea of clouds, behind which, according to Psa 18:11, the doxa in concealed, is prominently connected with the doxa. It might be rendered: before His brightness His clouds turn into hail..., a rendering which would be more in accordance with the structure of the stichs, and is possible according to Ges. 138, rem. 2. Nevertheless, in connection with the combination of עבר with clouds, the idea of breaking through (Lam 3:44) is very natural. If עביו is removed, then עברו signifies "thence came forth hail..." But the mention of the clouds as the medium, is both natural and appropriate.