1 <A Song of the going up. Of Solomon.> If the Lord is not helping the builders, then the building of a house is to no purpose: if the Lord does not keep the town, the watchman keeps his watch for nothing.
For we are workers with God: you are God's planting, God's building. In the measure of the grace given to me, I, as a wise master-builder, have put the base in position, and another goes on building on it. But let every man take care what he puts on it. For there is no other base for the building but that which has been put down, which is Jesus Christ. But on the base a man may put gold, silver, stones of great price, wood, dry grass, cut stems; Every man's work will be made clear in that day, because it will be tested by fire; and the fire itself will make clear the quality of every man's work. If any man's work comes through the test, he will have a reward. If the fire puts an end to any man's work, it will be his loss: but he will get salvation himself, though as by fire.
Wisdom and knowledge and wise suggestions are of no use against the Lord. The horse is made ready for the day of war, but power to overcome is from the Lord.
A king's salvation is not in the power of his army; a strong man does not get free by his great strength. A horse is a false hope; his great power will not make any man free from danger. See, the eye of the Lord is on those in whose hearts is the fear of him, on those whose hope is in his mercy;
Then I said, What have these come to do? And he said, These are the horns which sent Judah in flight, and kept him from lifting up his head: but these men have come to send fear on them and to put down the nations who are lifting up their horns against the land of Judah to send it in flight. And lifting up my eyes, I saw a man with a measuring-line in his hand.
May he not let your foot be moved: no need of sleep has he who keeps you. See, the eyes of Israel's keeper will not be shut in sleep. The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade on your right hand.
He will be the builder of a house for my name; he will be to me a son, and I will be to him a father; and I will make the seat of his rule over Israel certain for ever. Now, my son, may the Lord be with you; and may you do well, and put up the house of the Lord your God, as he has said of you.
Son of man, give a word to the children of your people, and say to them, When I make the sword come on a land, if the people of the land take a man from among their number and make him their watchman: If, when he sees the sword coming on the land, by sounding the horn he gives the people news of their danger; Then anyone who, hearing the sound of the horn, does not take note of it, will himself be responsible for his death, if the sword comes and takes him away. On hearing the sound of the horn, he did not take note; his blood will be on him; for if he had taken note his life would have been safe. But if the watchman sees the sword coming, and does not give a note on the horn, and the people have no word of the danger, and the sword comes and takes any person from among them; he will be taken away in his sin, but I will make the watchman responsible for his blood. So you, son of man, I have made you a watchman for the children of Israel; and you are to give ear to the word of my mouth and give them news from me of their danger. When I say to the evil-doer, Death will certainly overtake you; and you say nothing to make clear to the evil-doer the danger of his way; death will overtake that evil man in his evil-doing, but I will make you responsible for his blood. But if you make clear to the evil-doer the danger of his way for the purpose of turning him from it, and he is not turned from his way, death will overtake him in his evil-doing, but your life will be safe.
They make ready the table, they put down the covers, they take food and drink. Up! you captains; put oil on your breastplates. For so has the Lord said to me, Go, let a watchman be placed; let him give word of what he sees: And when he sees war-carriages, horsemen by twos, war-carriages with asses, war-carriages with camels, let him give special attention. And the watchman gave a loud cry, O my lord, I am on the watchtower all day, and am placed in my watch every night: See, here come war-carriages with men, horsemen by twos: and in answer he said, Babylon is made low, is made low, and all her images are broken on the earth. O my crushed ones, the grain of my floor! I have given you the word which came to me from the Lord of armies, the God of Israel. The word about Edom. A voice comes to me from Seir, Watchman, how far gone is the night? how far gone is the night? The watchman says, The morning has come, but night is still to come: if you have questions to put, put them, and come back again.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on Psalms 127
Commentary on Psalms 127 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
Everything Depends upon the Blessing of God
(Note: An Gottes Segen ist alles gelegen .)
The inscribed לשׁלמה is only added to this Song of degrees because there was found in Psalms 127:2 not only an allusion to the name Jedidiah , which Solomon received from Nathan (2 Samuel 12:25), but also to his being endowed with wisdom and riches in the dream at Gibeon (1 Kings 3:5.). And to these is still to be added the Proverbs-like form of the Psalm; for, like the proverb-song, the extended form of the Mashal , it consists of a double string of proverbs, the expression of which reminds one in many ways of the Book of Proverbs ( עצבים in Psalms 127:2, toilsome efforts, as in Proverbs 5:10; מאחרי , as in Proverbs 23:30; בּני הנּעוּרים in Psalms 127:4, sons begotten in one's youth; בּשּׁער in Psalms 127:5, as in Proverbs 22:22; Proverbs 24:7), and which together are like the unfolding of the proverb, Proverbs 10:22 : The blessing of Jahve, it maketh rich, and labour addeth nothing beside it . Even Theodoret observes, on the natural assumption that Psalms 127:1 points to the building of the Temple, how much better the Psalm suits the time of Zerubbabel and Joshua, when the building of the Temple was imperilled by the hostile neighbouring peoples; and in connection with the relatively small number of those who had returned home out of the Exile, a numerous family, and more especially many sons, must have seemed to be a doubly and threefoldly precious blessing from God.
The poet proves that everything depends upon the blessing of God from examples taken from the God-ordained life of the family and of the state. The rearing of the house which affords us protection, and the stability of the city in which we securely and peaceably dwell, the acquisition of possessions that maintain and adorn life, the begetting and rearing of sons that may contribute substantial support to the father as he grows old - all these are things which depend upon the blessing of God without natural preliminary conditions being able to guarantee them, well-devised arrangements to ensure them, unwearied labours to obtain them by force, or impatient care and murmuring to get them by defiance. Many a man builds himself a house, but he is not able to carry out the building of it, or he dies before he is able to take possession of it, or the building fails through unforeseen misfortunes, or, if it succeeds, becomes a prey to violent destruction: if God Himself do not build it, they labour thereon ( עמל בּ , Jonah 4:10; Ecclesiastes 2:21) in vain who build it. Many a city is well-ordered, and seems to be secured by wise precautions against every misfortune, against fire and sudden attack; but if God Himself do not guard it, it is in vain that those to whom its protection is entrusted give themselves no sleep and perform ( שׁקד , a word that has only come into frequent use since the literature of the Salomonic age) the duties of their office with the utmost devotion. The perfect in the apodosis affirms what has been done on the part of man to be ineffectual if the former is not done on God's part; cf. Numbers 32:23. Many rise up early in order to get to their work, and delay the sitting down as along as possible; i.e., not: the lying down (Hupfeld), for that is שׁכב , not ישׁב ; but to take a seat in order to rest a little, and, as what follows shows, to eat (Hitzig). קוּם and שׁבת stand opposed to one another: the latter cannot therefore mean to remain sitting at one's work, in favour of which Isaiah 5:11 (where בּבּקר and בּנּשׁף form an antithesis) cannot be properly compared. 1 Samuel 20:24 shows that prior to the incursion of the Grecian custom they did not take their meals lying or reclining ( ἀνα - or κατακείμενος ), but sitting. It is vain for you - the poet exclaims to them - it will not after all bring hat you think to be able to acquire; in so doing you eat only the bread of sorrow, i.e., bread that is procured with toil and trouble (cf. Genesis 3:17, בּעצּבון ): כּן , in like manner, i.e., the same as you are able to procure only by toilsome and anxious efforts, God gives to His beloved (Psalms 60:7; Deuteronomy 33:12) שׁנא (= שׁנה ), in sleep (an adverbial accusative like לילה בּּקר , ערב ), i.e., without restless self-activity, in a state of self-forgetful renunciation, and modest, calm surrender to Him: “God bestows His gifts during the night,” says a German proverb, and a Greek proverb even says: εὕδοντι κύρτος αἱρεῖ . Böttcher takes כּן in the sense of “so = without anything further;” and כן certainly has this meaning sometimes (vid., introduction to Psalms 110:1-7), but not in this passage, where, as referring back, it stands at the head of the clause, and where what this mimic כן would import lies in the word שׁנא .
With הנּה it goes on to refer to a specially striking example in support of the maxim that everything depends upon God's blessing. פּרי הבּטן (Genesis 30:2; Deuteronomy 7:13) beside בּנים also admits of the including of daughters. It is with בּנים (recalling Genesis 30:18) just as with נהלת . Just as the latter in this passage denotes an inheritance not according to hereditary right, but in accordance with the free-will of the giver, so the former denotes not a reward that is paid out as in duty bound, but a recompense that is bestowed according to one's free judgment, and in fact looked for in accordance with a promise given, but cannot by any means be demanded. Sons are a blessed gift from above. They are - especially when they are the offspring of a youthful marriage ( opp . בּן־זקנים , Genesis 37:3; Genesis 44:20), and accordingly themselves strong and hearty (Genesis 49:3), and at the time that the father is growing old are in the bloom of their years - like arrows in the hand of a warrior. This is a comparison which the circumstances of his time made natural to the poet, in which the sword was carried side by side with the trowel, and the work of national restoration had to be defended step by step against open enemies, envious neighbours, and false brethren. It was not sufficient then to have arrows in the quiver; one was obligated to have them not merely at hand, but in the hand ( בּיד ), in order to be able to discharge them and defend one's self. What a treasure, in such a time when it was needful to be constantly ready for fighting, defensive or offensive, was that which youthful sons afforded to the elderly father and weaker members of the family! Happy is the man - the poet exclaims - who has his quiver, i.e., his house, full of such arrows, in order to be able to deal out to the enemies as many arrows as may be needed. The father and such a host of sons surrounding him (this is the complex notion of the subject) form a phalanx not to be broken through. If they have to speak with enemies in the gate - i.e., candidly to upbraid them with their wrong, or to ward off their unjust accusation - they shall not be ashamed, i.e., not be overawed, disheartened, or disarmed. Gesenius in his Thesaurus , as Ibn-Jachja has already done, takes דּבּר here in the signification “to destroy;” but in Genesis 34:13 this Piel signifies to deal behind one's back (deceitfully), and in 2 Chronicles 22:10 to get rid of by assassination. This shade of the notion, which proceeds from Arab. dbr , pone esse (vid., Psalms 18:48; Psalms 28:2), does not suit the passage before us, and the expression לא־יבשׁוּ is favourable to the idea of the gate as being the forum, which arises from taking ידברו in its ordinary signification. Unjust judges, malicious accusers, and false witnesses retire shy and faint-hearted before a family so capable of defending itself. We read the opposite of this in Job 5:4 of sons upon whom the curse of their fathers rests.