13 You will arise and have mercy on Zion; For it is time to have pity on her. Yes, the set time has come.
The seventh angel sounded, and great voices in heaven followed, saying, "The kingdom of the world has become the Kingdom of our Lord, and of his Christ. He will reign forever and ever!" The twenty-four elders, who sit on their thrones before God's throne, fell on their faces and worshiped God, saying: "We give you thanks, Lord God, the Almighty, the one who is and who was{TR adds "and who is coming"}; because you have taken your great power, and reigned. The nations were angry, and your wrath came, as did the time for the dead to be judged, and to give your bondservants the prophets, their reward, as well as to the saints, and those who fear your name, to the small and the great; and to destroy those who destroy the earth."
Sing and rejoice, daughter of Zion; for, behold, I come, and I will dwell in the midst of you,' says Yahweh. Many nations shall join themselves to Yahweh in that day, and shall be my people; and I will dwell in the midst of you, and you shall know that Yahweh of Hosts has sent me to you. Yahweh will inherit Judah as his portion in the holy land, and will again choose Jerusalem.
Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that the word of Yahweh by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished, Yahweh stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and [put it] also in writing, saying, Thus says Cyrus king of Persia, All the kingdoms of the earth has Yahweh, the God of heaven, given me; and he has charged me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever there is among you of all his people, his God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and build the house of Yahweh, the God of Israel (he is God), which is in Jerusalem. Whoever is left, in any place where he sojourns, let the men of his place help him with silver, and with gold, and with goods, and with animals, besides the freewill-offering for the house of God which is in Jerusalem. Then rose up the heads of fathers' [houses] of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests, and the Levites, even all whose spirit God had stirred to go up to build the house of Yahweh which is in Jerusalem. All those who were round about them strengthened their hands with vessels of silver, with gold, with goods, and with animals, and with precious things, besides all that was willingly offered. Also Cyrus the king brought forth the vessels of the house of Yahweh, which Nebuchadnezzar had brought forth out of Jerusalem, and had put in the house of his gods; even those did Cyrus king of Persia bring forth by the hand of Mithredath the treasurer, and numbered them to Sheshbazzar, the prince of Judah. This is the number of them: thirty platters of gold, one thousand platters of silver, twenty-nine knives, thirty bowls of gold, silver bowls of a second sort four hundred and ten, and other vessels one thousand. All the vessels of gold and of silver were five thousand and four hundred. All these did Sheshbazzar bring up, when they of the captivity were brought up from Babylon to Jerusalem.
Then the angel of Yahweh replied, "O Yahweh of Hosts, how long will you not have mercy on Jerusalem and on the cities of Judah, against which you have had indignation these seventy years?" Yahweh answered the angel who talked with me with kind and comforting words.
Blessed is he who waits, and comes to the one thousand three hundred thirty-five days. But go you your way until the end be; for you shall rest, and shall stand in your lot, at the end of the days.
in the first year of his reign I, Daniel, understood by the books the number of the years about which the word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah the prophet, for the accomplishing of the desolations of Jerusalem, even seventy years. I set my face to the Lord God, to seek by prayer and petitions, with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. I prayed to Yahweh my God, and made confession, and said, Oh, Lord, the great and dreadful God, who keeps covenant and loving kindness with those who love him and keep his commandments, we have sinned, and have dealt perversely, and have done wickedly, and have rebelled, even turning aside from your precepts and from your ordinances; neither have we listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land. Lord, righteousness belongs to you, but to us confusion of face, as at this day; to the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all Israel, who are near, and who are far off, through all the countries where you have driven them, because of their trespass that they have trespassed against you. Lord, to us belongs confusion of face, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against you. To the Lord our God belong mercies and forgiveness; for we have rebelled against him; neither have we obeyed the voice of Yahweh our God, to walk in his laws, which he set before us by his servants the prophets. Yes, all Israel have transgressed your law, even turning aside, that they should not obey your voice: therefore has the curse been poured out on us, and the oath that is written in the law of Moses the servant of God; for we have sinned against him. He has confirmed his words, which he spoke against us, and against our judges who judged us, by bringing on us a great evil; for under the whole sky has not been done as has been done on Jerusalem. As it is written in the law of Moses, all this evil is come on us: yet have we not entreated the favor of Yahweh our God, that we should turn from our iniquities, and have discernment in your truth. Therefore has Yahweh watched over the evil, and brought it on us; for Yahweh our God is righteous in all his works which he does, and we have not obeyed his voice. Now, Lord our God, who has brought your people forth out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand, and have gotten you renown, as at this day; we have sinned, we have done wickedly. Lord, according to all your righteousness, let your anger and please let your wrath be turned away from your city Jerusalem, your holy mountain; because for our sins, and for the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and your people are become a reproach to all who are round about us. Now therefore, our God, listen to the prayer of your servant, and to his petitions, and cause your face to shine on your sanctuary that is desolate, for the Lord's sake. My God, turn your ear, and hear; open your eyes, and see our desolations, and the city which is called by your name: for we do not present our petitions before you for our righteousness, but for your great mercies' sake. Lord, hear; Lord, forgive; Lord, listen and do; don't defer, for your own sake, my God, because your city and your people are called by your name. While I was speaking, and praying, and confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my supplication before Yahweh my God for the holy mountain of my God; yes, while I was speaking in prayer, the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision at the beginning, being caused to fly swiftly, touched me about the time of the evening offering. He instructed me, and talked with me, and said, Daniel, I am now come forth to give you wisdom and understanding. At the beginning of your petitions the commandment went forth, and I am come to tell you; for you are greatly beloved: therefore consider the matter, and understand the vision. Seventy weeks are decreed on your people and on your holy city, to finish disobedience, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy. Know therefore and discern, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem to the Anointed One,{"Anointed One" can also be translated "Messiah" (same as "Christ").} the prince, shall be seven weeks, and sixty-two weeks: it shall be built again, with street and moat, even in troubled times. After the sixty-two weeks the Anointed One{"Anointed One" can also be translated "Messiah" (same as "Christ").} shall be cut off, and shall have nothing: and the people of the prince who shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end of it shall be with a flood, and even to the end shall be war; desolations are determined. He shall make a firm covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the offering to cease; and on the wing of abominations [shall come] one who makes desolate; and even to the full end, and that determined, shall [wrath] be poured out on the desolate.
Hear the word of Yahweh, you nations, and declare it in the isles afar off; and say, He who scattered Israel will gather him, and keep him, as shepherd does his flock. For Yahweh has ransomed Jacob, and redeemed him from the hand of him who was stronger than he. They shall come and sing in the height of Zion, and shall flow to the goodness of Yahweh, to the grain, and to the new wine, and to the oil, and to the young of the flock and of the herd: and their soul shall be as a watered garden; and they shall not sorrow any more at all.
Foreigners shall build up your walls, and their kings shall minister to you: for in my wrath I struck you, but in my favor have I had mercy on you. Your gates also shall be open continually; they shall not be shut day nor night; that men may bring to you the wealth of the nations, and their kings led captive. For that nation and kingdom that will not serve you shall perish; yes, those nations shall be utterly wasted. The glory of Lebanon shall come to you, the fir tree, the pine, and the box tree together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary; and I will make the place of my feet glorious. The sons of those who afflicted you shall come bending to you; and all those who despised you shall bow themselves down at the soles of your feet; and they shall call you The city of Yahweh, The Zion of the Holy One of Israel.
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Commentary on Psalms 102 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
Prayer of a Patient Sufferer for Himself and for the Jerusalem That Lies in Ruins
Psalms 101:1-8 utters the sigh: When wilt Thou come to me? and Ps 102 with the inscription: Prayer for an afflicted one when he pineth away and poureth forth his complaint before Jahve , prays, Let my prayer come unto Thee . It is to be taken, too, just as personally as it sounds, and the person is not to be construed into a nation. The song of the עני is, however, certainly a national song; the poet is a servant of Jahve, who shares the calamity that has befallen Jerusalem and its homeless people, both in outward circumstances and in the very depth of his soul. עטף signifies to pine away, languish, as in Psalms 61:3, Isaiah 57:16; and שׁפך שׂיחו to pour out one's thoughts and complaints, one's anxious care, as in Psalms 142:3, cf. 1 Samuel 1:15.
As in the case already with many of the preceding Psalms, the deutero-Isaianic impression accompanies us in connection with this Psalm also, even to the end; and the further we get in it the more marked does the echo of its prophetical prototype become. The poet also allies himself with earlier Psalms, such as Ps 22, Ps 69, and Psalms 79:1-13, although himself capable of lofty poetic flight, in return for which he makes us feel the absence of any safely progressive unfolding of the thoughts.
The Psalm opens with familiar expressions of prayer, such as rise in the heart and mouth of the praying one without his feeling that they are of foreign origin; cf. more especially Psalms 39:13; Psalms 18:7; Psalms 88:3; and on Psalms 102:3 : Psalms 27:9 ( Hide not Thy face from me ); Psalms 59:17 ( ביום צר לי ); Psalms 31:3 and frequently ( Incline Thine ear unto me ); Psalms 56:10 ( ביום אקוא ); Psalms 69:8; Psalms 143:7 ( מהר ענני ).
From this point onward the Psalm becomes original. Concerning the Beth in בעשׁן , vid., on Psalms 37:20. The reading כּמו קד (in the Karaite Ben-Jerucham) enriches the lexicon in the same sense with a word which has scarcely had any existence. מוקד (Arabic mauḳid ) signifies here, as in other instances, a hearth. נחרוּ is, as in Psalms 69:4, Niphal : my bones are heated through with a fever-heat, as a hearth with the smouldering fire that is on it. הוּכּה (cf. יגודּוּ , Psalms 94:21) is used exactly as in Hosea 9:16, cf. Psalms 121:5. The heart is said to dry up when the life's blood, of which it is the reservoir, fails. The verb שׁכח is followed by מן of dislike. On the cleaving of the bones to the flesh from being baked, i.e., to the skin (Arabic bašar , in accordance with the radical signification, the surface of the body = the skin, from בשׂר , to brush along, rub, scrape, scratch on the surface), cf. Job 19:20; Lamentations 4:8. ל ( אל ) with דּבק is used just like בּ . It is unnecessary, with Böttcher, to draw מקּול אנחתי to Psalms 102:5. Continuous straining of the voice, especially in connection with persevering prayer arising from inward conflict, does really make the body waste away.
קאת (construct of קאת or קאת from קאה , vid., Isaiah , at Isaiah 34:11-12), according to the lxx, is the pelican, and כּוס is the night-raven or the little horned-owl.
(Note: The lxx renders it: I am like a pelican of the desert, I am become as a night-raven upon a ruined place ( οἰκοπέδῳ ). In harmony with the lxx, Saadia (as also the Arabic version edited by Erpenius, the Samaritan Arabic, and Abulwalîd) renders קאת by Arab. qûq (here and in Leviticus 11:18; Deuteronomy 14:17; Isaiah 34:17), and כוס by Arab. bûm ; the latter ( bum ) is an onomatopoetic name of the owl, and the former ( k[uk[ ) does not even signify the owl or horned-owl (although the small horned-owl is called um kuéik in Egypt, and in Africa abu kuéik ; vid., the dictionaries of Bocthor and Marcel s.v. chouette ), but the pelican, the “long-necked water-bird” (Damiri after the lexicon el - ‛Obâb of Hasan ben-Mohammed el-Saghani). The Graeco-Veneta also renders קאת with πελεκάν , - the Peshito, however, with Syr. qāqā' . What Ephrem on Deuteronomy 14:17 and the Physiologus Syrus (ed. Tychsen , p. 13, cf. pp. 110 f). say of Syr. qāqā' , viz., that it is a marsh-bird, is very fond of its young ones, dwells in desolate places, and is incessantly noisy, likewise points to the pelican, although the Syrian lexicographers vary. Cf. also Oedmann, Vermischte Sammlungen , Heft 3, Cap. 6. (Fleischer after a communication from Rodiger.))
דּמה obtains the signification to be like, equal ( aequalem esse ), from the radical signification to be flat, even, and to spread out flat (as the Dutch have already recognised). They are both unclean creatures, which are fond of the loneliness of the desert and ruined places. To such a wilderness, that of the exile, is the poet unwillingly transported. He passes the nights without sleep ( שׁקד , to watch during the time for sleep), and is therefore like a bird sitting lonesome ( בּודד , Syriac erroneously נודד ) upon the roof whilst all in the house beneath are sleeping. The Athnach in Psalms 102:8 separates that which is come to be from the ground of the “becoming” and the “becoming” itself. His grief is that his enemies reproach him as one forsaken of God. מהולל , part. Poal , is one made or become mad, Ecclesiastes 2:2 : my mad ones = those who are mad against me. These swear by him, inasmuch as they say when they want to curse: “God do unto thee as unto this man,” which is to be explained according to Isaiah 65:15; Jeremiah 29:22.
Ashes are his bread (cf. Lamentations 3:16), inasmuch as he, a mourner, sits in ashes, and has thrown ashes all over himself, Job 2:8; Ezekiel 27:30. The infected שׁקּוי has שׁקּוּ = שׁקּוּו for its principal form, instead of which it is שׁקּוּי in Hosea 2:7. “That Thou hast lifted me up and cast me down” is to be understood according to Job 30:22. First of all God has taken away the firm ground from under his feet, then from aloft He has cast him to the ground - an emblem of the lot of Israel, which is removed from its fatherland and cast into exile, i.e., into a strange land. In that passage the days of his life are כּצל נטוּי , like a lengthened shadow, which grows longer and longer until it is entirely lost in darkness, Psalms 109:23. Another figure follows: he there becomes like an (uprooted) plant which dries up.
When the church in its individual members dies off on a foreign soil, still its God, the unchangeable One, remains, and therein the promise has the guarantee of its fulfilment. Faith lays hold upon this guarantee as in Ps 90. It becomes clear from Psalms 9:8 and Lamentations 5:19 how תּשׁב is to be understood. The Name which Jahve makes Himself by self-attestation never falls a prey to the dead past, it is His ever-living memorial ( זכר , Exodus 3:15). Thus, too, will He restore Jerusalem; the limit, or appointed time, to which the promise points is, as his longing tells the poet, now come. מועד , according to Psalms 75:3; Habakkuk 2:3, is the juncture, when the redemption by means of the judgment on the enemies of Israel shall dawn. לחננהּ , from the infinitive חנן , has ĕ , flattened from ă , in an entirely closed syllable. רצה seq. acc. signifies to have pleasure in anything, to cling to it with delight; and חנן , according to Proverbs 14:21, affirms a compassionate, tender love of the object. The servants of God do not feel at home in Babylon, but their loving yearning lingers over the ruins, the stones and the heaps of the rubbish (Nehemiah 4:2), of Jerusalem.
With וייראוּ we are told what will take place when that which is expected in Psalms 102:14 comes to pass, and at the same time the fulfilment of that which is longed for is thereby urged home upon God: Jahve's own honour depends upon it, since the restoration of Jerusalem will become the means of the conversion of the world - a fundamental thought of Isaiah 40:1 (cf. more particularly Isaiah 59:19; Isaiah 60:2), which is also called to mind in the expression of this strophe. This prophetic prospect (Isaiah 40:1-5) that the restoration of Jerusalem will take place simultaneously with the glorious parusia of Jahve re-echoes here in a lyric form. כּי , Psalms 102:17, states the ground of the reverence, just as Psalms 102:20 the ground of the praise. The people of the Exile are called in Psalms 102:18 הערער , from ערר , to be naked: homeless, powerless, honourless, and in the eyes of men, prospectless. The lxx renders this word in Jeremiah 17:6 ἀγριομυρίκη , and its plural, formed by an internal change of vowel, ערוער , in Jeremiah 48:6 ὄνος ἄγριος , which are only particularizations of the primary notion of that which is stark naked, neglected, wild. Psalms 102:18 is an echo off Psalms 22:25. In the mirror of this and of other Psalms written in times of affliction the Israel of the Exile saw itself reflected.
The poet goes on advancing motives to Jahve for the fulfilment of his desire, by holding up to Him what will take place when He shall have restored Zion. The evangel of God's redemptive deed will be written down for succeeding generations, and a new, created people, i.e., a people coming into existence, the church of the future, shall praise God the Redeemer for it. דּור אחרון as in Psalms 48:14; Psalms 78:4. עם נברא like עם נולד Ps 22:32, perhaps with reference to deutero-Isaianic passages like Isaiah 43:17. On Psalms 102:20, cf. Isaiah 63:15; in Psalms 102:21 (cf. Isaiah 42:7; Isaiah 61:1) the deutero-Isaianic colouring is very evident. And Psalms 102:21 rests still more verbally upon Psalms 79:11. The people of the Exile are as it were in prison and chains ( אסיר ), and are advancing towards their destruction ( בּני תמוּתה ), if God does not interpose. Those who have returned home are the subject to לספּר . בּ in Psalms 102:23 introduces that which takes place simultaneously: with the release of Israel from servitude is united the conversion of the world. נקבּץ occurs in the same connection as in Isaiah 60:4. After having thus revelled in the glory of the time of redemption the poet comes back to himself and gives form to his prayer on his own behalf.
On the way ( ב as in Psalms 110:7) - not “by means of the way” ( ב as in Psalms 105:18), in connection with which one would expect of find some attributive minuter definition of the way - God hath bowed down his strength (cf. Deuteronomy 8:2); it was therefore a troublous, toilsome way which he has been led, together with his people. He has shortened his days, so that he only drags on wearily, and has only a short distance still before him before he is entirely overcome. The Chethîb כחו (lxx ἰσχύος αὐτοῦ ) may be understood of God's irresistible might, as in Job 23:6; Job 30:18, but in connection with it the designation of the object is felt to be wanting. The introductory אמר (cf. Job 10:2), which announces a definite moulding of the utterance, serves to give prominence to the petition that follows. In the expression אל־תּעלני life is conceived of as a line the length of which accords with nature; to die before one's time is a being taken up out of this course, so that the second half of the line is not lived through (Ps 55:24, Isaiah 38:10). The prayer not to sweep him away before his time, the poet supports not by the eternity of God in itself, but by the work of the rejuvenation of the world and of the restoration of Israel that is to be looked for, which He can and will bring to an accomplishment, because He is the ever-living One. The longing to see this new time is the final ground of the poet's prayer for the prolonging of his life. The confession of God the Creator in Psalms 102:26 reminds one in its form of Isaiah 48:13, cf. Psalms 44:24. המּה in Psalms 102:27 refers to the two great divisions of the universe. The fact that God will create heaven and earth anew is a revelation that is indicated even in Isaiah 34:4, but is first of all expressed more fully and in many ways in the second part of the Book of Isaiah, viz., Isaiah 51:6, Isaiah 51:16; Isaiah 65:17; Isaiah 66:22. It is clear from the agreement in the figure of the garment (Isaiah 51:6, cf. Psalms 50:9) and in the expression ( עמד , perstare , as in Isaiah 66:22) that the poet has gained this knowledge from the prophet. The expressive אתּה הוּא , Thou art He, i.e., unalterably the same One, is also taken from the mouth of the prophet, Isaiah 41:4; Isaiah 43:10; Isaiah 46:4; Isaiah 48:12; הוּא is a predicate, and denotes the identity (sameness) of Jahve (Hofmann, Schriftbeweis , i. 63). In v. 29 also, in which the prayer for a lengthening of life tapers off to a point, we hear Isaiah 65:2; Isaiah 66:22 re-echoed. And from the fact that in the mind of the poet as of the prophet the post-exilic Jerusalem and the final new Jerusalem upon the new earth under a new heaven blend together, it is evident that not merely in the time of Hezekiah or of Manasseh (assuming that Isaiah 40:1 are by the old Isaiah), but also even in the second half of the Exile, such a perspectively foreshortened view was possible. When, moreover, the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews at once refers Psalms 102:26-28 to Christ, this is justified by the fact that the God whom the poet confesses as the unchangeable One is Jahve who is to come.