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Psalms 138
Psalms 139
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Psalms 139 β€” Commentary 4
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Benson
Benson Commentary Psalm 139:1 To the chief Musician, A Psalm of David. O LORD, thou hast searched me, and known me . Psalm 139:1-3 . O Lord, thou hast searched me, and known me β€” That is, known me exactly, as men know those things which they diligently search out. Thou knowest my down-sitting, &c. β€” All my postures and motions; my actions, and my cessation from action. Thou understandest my thoughts β€” All my secret counsels, designs, and imaginations; afar off β€” Before they are perfectly formed in my own mind. Thou knowest what my thoughts will be in such and such circumstances, long before I know it, yea, from all eternity. Thou compassest my path β€” Thou watchest me on every side, and therefore discernest every step which I take. The expression is metaphorical, and seems to be taken either from huntsmen watching all the motions and lurking places of the beasts they hunt, and endeavour to catch; or from soldiers besieging their enemies in a city, and setting watches round about them. And my lying down β€” When I am withdrawn from all company, and am reflecting on what has passed during the day, and am composing myself to rest, thou knowest what I have in my heart, and with what thoughts I lie down to sleep; and art acquainted with all my ways β€” At all times, in all places, and in all situations and circumstances. Thou knowest what rule I walk by, what end I walk toward, and what company I walk with. Psalm 139:2 Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandest my thought afar off. Psalm 139:3 Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways. Psalm 139:4 For there is not a word in my tongue, but , lo, O LORD, thou knowest it altogether. Psalm 139:4-5 . There is not a word in my tongue, &c. β€” Thou knowest what I speak, and with what design and disposition of mind. There is not a vain word, not a good word, but thou knowest it altogether β€” What it means, what thought gives birth to it, and with what intention it is uttered. Or, as others render the clause, When there is not a word, &c. thou knowest what I am about to speak, either in prayer to thee, or in conversation with men, when I have not yet uttered one word of it. Thou hast beset me behind and before β€” With thine all-seeing and all-disposing providence; so that, go which way I will, I am under thine eyes, and cannot escape its penetrating view in any way possible; and laid thy hand upon me β€” Thou keepest me, as it were, with a strong hand, in thy sight, and under thy power. Psalm 139:5 Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me. Psalm 139:6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it. Psalm 139:6 . Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, &c. β€” It is such a knowledge as I cannot comprehend, much less describe. I cannot conceive, or even form any idea in what manner thou dost so perfectly know all things, especially things which have yet no being, and seem to depend on many casualties and uncertainties. Dr. Hammond renders the verse, Such knowledge is admirable, above me: it is high; I cannot deal with it. But the sense of the original of the last clause, ?? ???? ?? , seems better expressed in our translation. The mind of the psalmist, when he uttered these words, was evidently impressed β€œwith such a veneration and awe of the infinite Jehovah, the fountain and support of universal life and being; and he found his faculties so swallowed up, and, as it were, lost in meditating on so deep and immense a subject; that man’s reason, in its utmost pride and glory, and with its most boasted improvements and acquisitions of knowledge, seemed now so debased, so weak, so narrow, and, in comparison with infinity, so despicable, that he could proceed no further without expressing his admiration at such a boundless scope of intelligence as he could neither explain nor comprehend:” see Foster’s Discourses, vol. Psalm 1:4 to. p. 76. Psalm 139:7 Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? Psalm 139:7-12 . Whither shall I go from thy Spirit? β€” From thy knowledge and observation; or, from thee who art a Spirit? Whither shall I flee from thy presence? β€” I can go nowhere but thou art there, observing and judging, approving or disapproving: nor are there any means imaginable by which I can escape the reach of thy all-penetrating eye, or withdraw myself from thy universal and unbounded presence: neither can an ascent to heaven, nor a descent to the state of the dead, secure me from thine inspection, or divide me from thee. Nay, though I were able, with the swiftness of the rays of the rising sun, in an instant to shoot myself to the remotest parts of the earth or sea, even there should thy hand lead me β€” I should still exist in thee: thy presence would be diffused all around me; and thine enlivening power would support my frame. If I say, Surely the darkness, &c. the darkness and the light are both alike to thee β€” β€œEqually conspicuous am I, and all my circumstances, all my actions, under the thickest and most impenetrable shades of night, as in the brightest splendours of the noon-day sun.” Dr. Horne, who very properly applies this doctrine of the divine omniscience and omnipresence to practical purposes, very justly observes here, We can never sin with security, but in a place where the eye of God cannot behold us; and, he asks, β€œWhere is that place? Had we a mind to escape his inspection, whither should we go! Heaven is the seat of his glory, creation the scene of his providence, and the grave itself will be the theatre of his power; so that our efforts will be equally vain whether we ascend or descend, or fly abroad upon the wings of the morning light, which diffuseth itself with such velocity over the globe, from east to west. The arm of the Almighty will still, at pleasure, prevent and be ready to arrest the fugitives in their progress. Darkness may indeed conceal us and our deeds from the sight of men; but the divine presence, like that of the sun, turns night into day, and makes all things manifest before God. The same consideration which should restrain us from sin, should also encourage as to work righteousness, and comfort us under all our sorrows; namely, the thought that we are never out of the sight and protection of our Maker. The piety and the charity which are practised in cottages, the labour and pain which are patiently endured in the field, and on the bed of sickness; the misery and torment inflicted by persecution in the mines, the galleys, and the dungeons; all are under the inspection of Jehovah, and are noted down by him against the day of recompense. He sees, and he will reward all we do, and all we suffer, as becometh Christians.” Psalm 139:8 If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there . Psalm 139:9 If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; Psalm 139:10 Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. Psalm 139:11 If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. Psalm 139:12 Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee . Psalm 139:13 For thou hast possessed my reins: thou hast covered me in my mother's womb. Psalm 139:13 . Thou hast possessed β€” Or, thou dost possess, my reins β€” The most inward and hidden part of my body, supposed also to be the seat of men’s lusts and passions: thou dwellest in them, thou art the owner and governor of them, and therefore must needs know them. My most secret thoughts and intentions, and the innermost recesses of my soul, are subject to thy control. Thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb β€” With skin and flesh, as it is expressed Job 10:11 . Dr. Waterland renders this verse, Thou hast formed my reins; thou hast compacted me. Psalm 139:14 I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well. Psalm 139:14 . I am fearfully and wonderfully made β€” Thy infinite wisdom and power, manifested in the singular and curious structure of man’s body, fill me with wonder and astonishment, and with the dread of thy Majesty. Marvellous are thy works β€” Both in the lesser world, man, and in the greater; and that my soul knoweth right well β€” I am well assured, both by thy word, and by the contemplation and study of thy works, that they are wonderful, although I do not so accurately understand them in all their parts as I wish to do. Psalm 139:15 My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Psalm 139:15 . My substance was not hid from thee β€” Hebrews ???? , my bone. So the LXX. ?? ?????? ??? . Bone may be here taken collectively for bones, or, rather for the whole fabric of the bones: or may be put synecdochically for the whole body, as being the most substantial part of it, as in Psalm 35:10 . When I was made in secret β€” In the womb; termed, in the next clause, in the lowest parts of the earth, in a place as remote from human eyes as the lowest parts of the earth are. He seems to allude to plants and flowers, the roots and first rudiments of which are formed under ground. And curiously wrought β€” Exquisitely composed of bones, muscles, sinews, arteries, veins, nerves, and other parts, all framed with such wonderful skill, that even heathen, upon the contemplation of the human body in all its parts, and observing how admirably they were formed for beauty and use, have broken forth into admiration and adoration of the Creator. The word ????? , here rendered, curiously wrought, signifies, embroidered, or, wrought with a needle. β€œThe process,” says Dr. Horne, β€œwhereby the fΕ“tus is gradually formed and matured for the birth, is compared to that of a piece of work wrought with a needle, or fashioned in the loom; which, with its beautiful variety of colour, and proportion of figure, ariseth, by degrees, to perfection, under the hand of the artist.” Thus also Bishop Lowth, speaking of metaphors in the Hebrew poetry, taken from things sacred, observes, β€œIn that most perfect hymn, where the immensity of the Omnipresent Deity, and the admirable wisdom of the Divine Artificer, in framing the human body, are celebrated, the poet uses a remarkable metaphor drawn from the nicest tapestry work; When I was wrought as with a needle, &c. He who remarks this, and at the same time reflects on the wonderful composition of the human body, the various implication of veins, arteries, fibres, membranes, and the inexplicable texture of the whole frame, will immediately understand the beauty and elegance of this most apt expression. But he will not attain the whole force and dignity of it, unless he also considers that the most artful embroidery with the needle was dedicated, by the Hebrews, to the service of the sanctuary; and that the proper and singular use of this work was, by the immediate prescript of the divine law, applied in a certain part of the high- priest’s dress, and in the curtains of the tabernacle. So that the psalmist may well be supposed to have compared the wisdom of the Divine Artificer particularly with that specimen of human art, whose dignity was, through religion, the highest, and whose elegance was so exquisite, that the sacred writer seems to attribute it to a divine inspiration.” β€” Lowth’s Eighth Prelection. Psalm 139:16 Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them. Psalm 139:16 . Thine eyes did see my substance β€” Hebrews ???? , my rude mass, as Dr. Waterland renders the word: massa rudis et intricata adhuc, says Buxtorf, neque in veram formam evoluta, a mass, yet rude and entangled, and not unfolded into proper form. When the matter, out of which I was made, was an unshapen embryo, without any form, it was visible to thee how every part, however minute, would be wrought; and in thy book all my members were written β€” Before any of them were in being they lay open before thy eyes, and were discerned by thee as clearly as if the plan of them had been drawn in a book. Thy eternal wisdom formed the plan, and according to that, thy almighty power raised the structure. The allusion to the needlework seems to be still carried on. β€œAs the embroiderer hath his book or pattern before him, to which he always recurs; so by a method as exact were all my members in continuance fashioned; and as from the rude skeins of silk, under the artificer’s hands, there at length arises an unexpected beauty, and an accurate harmony of colours and proportions; so, by the skill of the divine workman, is a shapeless mass wrought into the most curious texture of parts, most skilfully interwoven and connected with each other, until it becomes a body harmoniously diversified with all the limbs and lineaments of a man, not one of which at first appeared, any more than the figures were to be seen in the ball of silk. But then, (which is the chief thing here insisted on by the psalmist,) whereas the human artificer must have the clearest light, whereby to accomplish his task, the divine work-master seeth in secret, and effecteth all his wonders within the dark and narrow confines of the womb.” β€” Horne. Psalm 139:17 How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them! Psalm 139:17-18 . How precious also, &c. β€” β€œFrom the wonders of God’s forming hand, the psalmist proceeds to those of his all-directing providence, which afford additional proofs of the divine omniscience and omnipresence.” Are thy thoughts unto me β€” Thy counsels, or contrivances, in my behalf, which are admirable and amiable in my eyes, and replete with kindness. Thou didst not only form me at first, but ever since my conception and birth thy thoughts have been employed for my good, preserving, providing for, and blessing me. How great is the sum of them! β€” Thy gracious counsels, designs, and providential dispensations toward me are numberless. If I should count them β€” Hebrew, ????? , rather, shall I count them? that is, shall I attempt to count them? They are more in number than the sand β€” I might as well undertake to number the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with thee β€” Thy wonderful counsels and works on my behalf come constantly into my mind, not only in the day-time, but even in the night-season, whenever I awake. β€œThe thoughts and counsels of Jehovah,” says Dr. Horne, β€œconcerning David, his appointment to the throne, his troubles, and his preservation in the midst of them, were precious and delightful subjects of meditation and praise, never to be exhausted of the rich matter they contained. With these in his mind he lay down at night, and when he awoke in the morning his thoughts naturally recurred to the pleasing theme. He began where he had left off, and found himself, in heart and soul, still present with God, still ruminating on him and his works.” Psalm 139:18 If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand: when I awake, I am still with thee. Psalm 139:19 Surely thou wilt slay the wicked, O God: depart from me therefore, ye bloody men. Psalm 139:19 . Surely, thou wilt slay the wicked, O God β€” And as thou hast precious and gracious thoughts toward me, (which thou also hast toward all that love and fear thee,) so thou wilt not now desert me and leave me in the hands of those wicked men who, unmindful of thy presence and thy all-seeing eye, regard not by what means they plot my ruin. But rather, as thou knowest all things, and art perfectly acquainted β€œwith the justice of my cause, and the iniquity of my adversaries; and as thou hast formed, and hitherto in so wonderful a manner watched over and preserved me, thou wilt slay the wicked, and deliver me, as thou hast promised to do, out of their hands. Depart from me, therefore, ye bloody men β€” I trust in my God, and will have no connection in the way of treaty or friendship with you.” Thus David, in this verse, draws the intended conclusion from the premises so largely expatiated upon in the former part of the Psalm. Psalm 139:20 For they speak against thee wickedly, and thine enemies take thy name in vain. Psalm 139:20 . For they speak against thee wickedly β€” It is not so much me that they persecute, in opposing, misrepresenting, and speaking against me, as virtue and piety, in persecuting which they oppose and speak against thee; contemning thy omniscience and omnipresence, and thy superintending providence. And thine enemies take thy name in vain β€” Or, according to the order of the Hebrew words, They take thy name in vain, and are thine enemies. Or, are haters of thee, as it follows, Psalm 139:21 . They abuse thy blessed name with oaths, blasphemies, and perjuries, calling thee to witness the truth of their lies and calumnies. Or, as some render the clause, Thine enemies take thee to falsehood, (the words; thy name, being not in the Hebrew,) β€œthey take thee, only to swear falsely by thee.” Psalm 139:21 Do not I hate them, O LORD, that hate thee? and am not I grieved with those that rise up against thee? Psalm 139:21-22 . Do not I hate them that hate thee? β€” I appeal to thee, the omnipresent and omniscient God, whether I do not perfectly hate them, (that is, hate their ways,) so far as they are enemies to thee and goodness. Am I not grieved β€” With the folly and sin of those that rise up against thee? β€” That act in open hostility against thy authority. I am grieved to see their wickedness, and to foresee the ruin in which it will certainly end. I count them mine enemies β€” I am no less grieved with their enmity against thee than if they directed it against myself. β€œA faithful servant hath the same interests, the same friends, the same enemies, with his Master, whose cause and honour he is, upon all occasions, in duty bound to support and maintain. A good man hates, as God himself doth; he hates not the persons of men, but their sins; not what God made them, but what they have made themselves. We are neither to hate the men on account of the vices they practise, nor love the vices for the sake of the men who practise them. He who observes invariably this distinction, fulfils the perfect law of charity, and hath the love of God and of his neighbour abiding in him.” β€” Horne. Psalm 139:22 I hate them with perfect hatred: I count them mine enemies. Psalm 139:23 Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: Psalm 139:23-24 . Search me, O God β€” Do thou, who art the searcher of hearts, judge whether I do not speak this from my very heart, and deal with me accordingly. See if there be any wicked way in me β€” Hebrew, ???? ??? , way of trouble or grief; any course of life, or temper of mind, which is a source of grief or trouble, either, 1st, To myself, as all sin is to the sinner, sooner or later; or, 2d, To others, as I am accused of causing much trouble, and designing evil to the king and kingdom; and lead me in the way everlasting β€” In the way of godliness, the way which is right and good, and leads to everlasting life; whereas the way of wickedness, to which this is opposed, will perish, as is said Psalm 1:6 , and bring men to utter destruction. Or, as the words may be rendered, In the old way, which is the good way, as it is called Jeremiah 6:16 , the way of righteousness and holiness, which may well be called the old way, because it was written on the hearts of men from the beginning of the world, whereas wickedness is of later date. Observe, reader, they that are upright can take comfort in God’s omniscience, as a witness of their uprightness, and can, with an humble confidence, beg of him to search and try them, and discover them to themselves, for a good man desires to know the worst of himself. Nay, they have no objection, but rather desire to be discovered to others. He that means honestly could wish he had a window in his breast, that any man might look into his heart; for his ruling desire is, in all things, to know and do the will of God. Psalm 139:24 And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. Benson Commentary on the Old and New Testaments Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com . Used by Permission.
Expositors
Expositor's Bible Commentary Psalm 139:1 To the chief Musician, A Psalm of David. O LORD, thou hast searched me, and known me . Psalm 139:1-24 THIS is the noblest utterance in the Psalter of pure contemplative theism, animated and not crushed by the thought of God’s omniscience and omnipresence. No less striking than the unequalled force and sublimity with which the psalm hymns the majestic attributes of an all-filling, all-knowing, all-creating God, is the firmness with which the singer’s personal relation to that God is grasped. Only in the last verses is there reference to other men. In the earlier parts of the psalm, there are but two beings in the universe-God and the psalmist. With impressive reiteration, God’s attributes are gazed on in their bearing on him. Not mere omniscience, but a knowledge which knows him altogether, not mere omnipresence, but a presence which he can nowhere escape, not mere creative power, but a power which shaped him, fill and thrill the psalmist’s soul. This is no cold theism, but vivid religion. Conscience and the consciousness of individual relation to God penetrate and vitalise the whole. Hence the sudden turn to prayer against evil men and for the singer’s direction in the right way, which closes the hymn, is natural, however abrupt. The course of thought is plain. There are four strophes of six verses each, -of which the first ( Psalm 139:1-6 ) magnifies God’s omniscience; the second ( Psalm 139:7-12 ), His omnipresence; the third ( Psalm 139:13-18 ), His creative act, as the ground of the preceding attributes; and the fourth ( Psalm 139:19-24 ) recoils from men who rebel against such a God, and joyfully submits to the searching of His omniscient eye, and the guidance of His ever-present hand. The psalmist is so thoroughly possessed by the thought of his personal relation to God that his meditation spontaneously takes the form of address to Him. That form adds much to the impressiveness, but is no rhetorical or poetic artifice. Rather, it is the shape in which such intense consciousness of God cannot but utter itself. How cold and abstract the awestruck sentences become, if we substitute "He" for "Thou," and "men" for "I" and "me"! The first overwhelming thought of God’s relation to the individual soul is that He completely knows the whole man. "Omniscience" is a pompous word, which leaves us unaffected by either awe or conscience. But the psalmist’s God was a God who came into close touch with him, and the psalmist’s religion translated the powerless generality of an attribute referring to the Divine relation to the universe into a continually exercised power having reference to himself. He utters his reverent consciousness of it in Psalm 139:1 in a single clause, and expands that verse in the succeeding ones. "Thou hast searched me" describes a process of minute investigation; "and known [me]," its result in complete knowledge. That knowledge is then followed out in various directions, and recognised as embracing the whole man in all his modes of action and repose, in all his inner and outward life. Psalm 139:2 and Psalm 139:3 are substantially parallel. "Down-sitting" and "uprising" correspond to "walking" and "lying down," and both antitheses express the contrast between action and rest. "My thought" in Psalm 139:2 corresponds to "my ways" in Psalm 139:3 , -the former referring to the inner life of thought, purpose, and will; the latter to the outward activities which carry these into effect. Psalm 139:3 is a climax to Psalm 139:2 , in so far as it ascribes a yet closer and more accurate knowledge to God. "Thou siftest" or winnowest gives a picturesque metaphor for careful and judicial scrutiny which discerns wheat from chaff. "Thou art familiar" implies intimate and habitual knowledge. But thought and action are not the whole man. The power of speech, which the Psalter always treats as solemn and a special object of Divine approval or condemnation, must also be taken into account. Psalm 139:4 brings it, too, under God’s cognisance. The meaning may either be that "There is no word on my tongue [which] Thou dost not know altogether"; or, "The word is not yet on my tongue, [but] lo! Thou knowest," etc. "Before it has shaped itself on the tongue, [much less been launched from it], thou knowest all its secret history" (Kay). The thought that God knows him through and through blends in the singer’s mind with the other, that God surrounds him on every side. Psalm 139:5 thus anticipates the thought of the next strophe, but presents it rather as the basis of God’s knowledge, and as limiting man’s freedom. But the psalmist does not feel that he is imprisoned, or that the hand laid on him is heavy. Rather, he rejoices in the defence of an encompassing God, who shuts off evil from him, as well as shuts him in from self-willed and self-determined action; and he is glad to be held by a hand so gentle as well as strong. Thou God seest me may either be a dread or a blessed thought. It may paralyse or stimulate. It should be the ally of conscience, and, while it stirs to all noble deeds, should also emancipate from all slavish fear. An exclamation of reverent wonder and confession of the limitation of human comprehension closes the strophe. Why should the thought that God is ever with the psalmist be put in the shape of vivid pictures of the impossibility of escape from Him? It is the sense of sin which leads men to hide from God, like Adam among the trees of the garden. The psalmist does not desire thus to flee, but he supposes the case, which would be only too common if men realised God’s knowledge of all their ways. He imagines himself reaching the extremities of the universe in vain flight, and stunned by finding God there. The utmost possible height is coupled with the utmost possible depth. Heaven and Sheol equally fail to give refuge from that moveless Face, which confronts the fugitive in both, and fills them as it fills all the intervening dim distances. The dawn flushes the east, and swiftly passes on roseate wings to the farthest bounds of the Mediterranean, which, to the psalmist, represented the extreme west, a land of mystery. In both places and in all the broad lands between, the fugitive would find himself in the grasp of the same hand (compare Psalm 139:5 ). Darkness is the friend of fugitives from men; but is transparent to God. In Psalm 139:11 the language is somewhat obscure. The word rendered above "cover" is doubtful, as the Hebrew text reads "bruise," which is quite unsuitable here. Probably there has been textual error, and the slight correction which yields the above sense is to be adopted, as by many moderns. The second clause of the verse carries on the supposition of the first, and is not to be regarded, as in the A.V., as stating the result of the supposition, or, in grammatical language, the apodosis. That begins with Psalm 139:12 , and is marked there, as in Psalm 139:10 , by "even." The third strophe ( Psalm 139:13-18 ) grounds the psalmist’s relation to God on God’s creative act. The mysteries of conception and birth naturally struck the imagination of nonscientific man, and are to the psalmist the direct result of Divine power. He touches them with poetic delicacy and devout awe, casting a veil of metaphor over the mystery, and losing sight of human parents in the clear vision of the Divine Creator. There is room for his thought of the origin of the individual life, behind modern knowledge of embryology. In Psalm 139:13 the word rendered in the A.V. "possessed" is better understood in this context as meaning "formed," and that rendered there "covered" {as in Psalm 140:7 } here means to plait or weave together, and picturesquely describes the interlacing bones and sinews, as in Job 10:11 . But description passes into adoration in Psalm 139:14 . Its language is somewhat obscure. The verb rendered "wondrously made" probably means here "selected" or "distinguished," and represents man as the chef d’oeuvre of the Divine Artificer. The psalmist cannot contemplate his own frame, God’s workmanship, without breaking into thanks, nor without being touched with awe. Every man carries in his own body reasons enough for reverent gratitude. The word for "bones" in Psalm 139:15 is a collective noun, and might be rendered "bony framework." The mysterious receptacle in which the unborn body takes shape and grows is delicately described as "secret" and likened to the hidden region of the underworld, where are the dead. The point of comparison is the mystery enwrapping both. The same comparison occurs in Job’s pathetic words, "Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither." It is doubtful whether the word rendered above "wrought like embroidery" refers to a pattern wrought by weaving or by needlework. In any case, it describes "the variegated colour of the individual members, especially of the viscera" (Delitzsch). The mysteries of antenatal being are still pursued in Psalm 139:16 , which is extremely obscure. It is, however, plain that a sets forth the Divine knowledge of man in his first rudiments of corporeity. "My shapeless mass" is one word, meaning anything rolled up in a bundle or ball. But in b it is doubtful what is referred to in "they all." Strictly, the word should point back to something previously mentioned; and hence the A.V. and R.V. suppose that the "shapeless mass" is thought of as resolved into its component parts, and insert "my members"; but it is better to recognise a slight irregularity here, and to refer the word to the "days" immediately spoken of, which existed in the Divine foreknowledge long before they had real objective existence in the actual world. The last clause of the verse is capable of two different meanings, according as the Hebrew text or margin is followed. This is one of a number of cases in which there is a doubt whether we should read "not" or "to him" (or "it"). The Hebrew words having these meanings are each of two letters, the initial one being the same in both, and both words having the same sound. Confusion might easily therefore arise, and as a matter of fact there are numerous cases in which the text has the one and the margin the other of these two words. Here, if we adhere to the text, we read the negative, and then the force of the clause is to declare emphatically that the "days" were written in God’s book, and in a real sense "fashioned," when as yet they had not been recorded in earth’s calendars. If, on the other hand, the marginal reading is preferred, a striking meaning is obtained: "And for it [ i.e., for the birth of the shapeless mass] there was one among them [predestined in God’s book]." In Psalm 139:17-18 the poet gathers together and crowns all his previous contemplations by the consideration that this God, knowing him altogether, ever near him, and Former of his being, has great "thoughts" or purposes affecting him individually. That assurance makes omniscience and omnipresence joys, and not terrors. The root meaning of the word rendered "precious" is weighty. The singer would weigh God’s thoughts towards him, and finds that they weigh down his scales. He would number them, and finds that they pass his enumeration. It is the same truth of the transcendent greatness and graciousness of God’s purposes as is conveyed in Isaiah’s "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My thoughts than your thoughts." "I awake, and am still with Thee,"-this is an artless expression of the psalmist’s blessedness in realising God’s continual nearness. He awakes from sleep, and is conscious of glad wonder to find that, like a tender mother by her slumbering child, God has been watching over him, and that all the blessed communion of past days abides as before. The fiery hatred of evil and evil men which burns in the last strophe offends many and startles more. But while the vehement prayer that "Thou wouldest slay the wicked" is not in a Christian tone, the recoil from those who could raise themselves against such a God is the necessary result of the psalmist’s delight in Him. Attraction and repulsion are equal and contrary. The measure of our cleaving to that which is good, and to Him who is good, settles the measure of our abhorrence of that which is evil. The abrupt passing from petition in Psalm 139:19 a to command in b has been smoothed away by a slight alteration which reads, "And that men of blood would depart from me"; but the variation in tense is more forcible, and corresponds with the speaker’s strong emotion. He cannot bear companionship with rebels against God. His indignation has no taint of personal feeling, but is pure zeal for God’s honour. Psalm 139:20 presents difficulties. The word rendered in the A.V. and R.V. (text) "speak against Thee" is peculiarly spelt if this is its meaning, and its construction is anomalous. Probably, therefore, the rendering should be as above. That meaning does not require a change of consonants, but only of vowel points. The difficulty of the last clause lies mainly in the word translated in the A.V. adversaries; and in the R.V. "enemies." That meaning is questionable; and if the word is the nominative to the verb in the clause, the construction is awkward, since the preceding "who" would naturally extend its influence to this clause. Textual emendation has been resorted to: the simplest form of which is to read "against Thee" for "Thine adversaries," a change of one letter. Another form of emendation, which is adopted by Cheyne and Graetz, substitutes "Thy name," and reads the whole, "And pronounce Thy name for falsehoods." Delitzsch adheres to the reading "adversaries," and by a harsh ellipsis makes the whole to run, "Who pronounce [Thy name] deceitfully-Thine adversaries." The vindication of the psalmist’s indignation lies in Psalm 139:21-22 . That soul must glow with fervent love to God which feels wrong done to His majesty with as keen a pain as if it were itself struck. What God says to those who love Him, they in their degree say to God: "He that toucheth Thee toucheth the apple of mine eye." True, hate is not the Christian requital of hate, whether that is directed against God or God’s servant. But recoil there must be, if there is any vigour of devotion; only, pity and love must mingle with it, and the evil of hatred be overcome by their good. Very beautifully does the lowly prayer for searching and guidance follow the psalmist’s burst of fire. It is easier to glow with indignation against evildoers than to keep oneself from doing evil. Many secret sins may hide under a cloak of zeal for the Lord. So the psalmist prays that God would search him, not because he fancies that there is no lurking sin to be burned by the light of God’s eye, like vermin that nestle and multiply under stones and shrivel when the sunbeams strike them, but because he dreads that there is, and would fain have it cast out. The psalm began with declaring that Jehovah had searched and known the singer, and it ends with asking for that searching knowledge. It makes much difference, not indeed in the reality or completeness of God’s knowledge of use but in the good we derive therefrom, whether we welcome and submit to it, or try to close our trembling hearts, that do not wish to be cleansed of their perilous stuff, from that loving and purging gaze. God will cleanse the evil which He sees, if we are willing that He should see it. Thoughts of the inner life and "ways" of the outer are equally to be submitted to Him. There are two "ways" in which men can walk. The one is a "way of grief or pain," because that is its terminus. All sin is a blunder. And the inclination to such ways is "in me," as every man who has dealt honestly with himself knows. The other is "a way everlasting," a way which leads to permanent good, which continues uninterrupted through the vicissitudes of life, and even (though that was not in the psalmist’s mind) through the darkness of death, and with ever closer approximation to its goal in God, through the cycles of eternity. And that way is not "in me," but I must he led into and in it by the God who knows me altogether and is ever with me, to keep my feet in the way of life, if I hold the guiding hand which He lays upon me. The Expositor's Bible Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com . Used by Permission.
Illustrator
O Lord, Thou hast searched me, and known me. Psalm 139 God's exhaustive knowledge of man: T. W. Chambers, D. D. This lyric has always been the subject of praise. Aben Ezra said there was none like it in the five books. Lord Brougham spoke of it as "that singularly beautiful poem" Herder said that language utterly failed him in its exposition. Erskine of Llinlathen wanted this to be before him on his death-bed. The title ascribes it to David, an ascription corroborated by its originality and majesty and its correspondence with psalms undoubtedly Davidic. Probably the Aramaic colouring is a mere dialectic variation, existing during the whole period of Hebrew history, and occasionally coming to the front as circumstances suggested it. I. THE DIVINE OMNISCIENCE (vers. 1-6). The poet multiplies expressions to indicate how complete is God's knowledge of him. Whether he be at rest or in motion, in every posture and state, God knows him. Not only his outward acts, but the thoughts from which they spring are at once discerned. Nothing can escape Jehovah's eye, for He is behind and before, i.e. on all sides of man, and His hand is upon him to restrain and control. The strophe closes with a frank confession of the writer's impotence and awe. He cannot comprehend it, which is not strange, for how is the finite to comprehend the infinite? But he knows it and bows in reverence before the sublime truth. II. THE DIVINE OMNIPRESENCE (vers. 7-12). God is everywhere; not only above all as transcendent, but also through all and in all as immanent in nature. This thought is expanded and enforced by its application to all measures of space. Were man to scale the azure vault overhead, it would only confront him with the Divine personality; were he to sound unimaginable depths in the other direction, the result would be the same. H a man mounted on wings, not those of the sun ( Malachi 4:2 ), nor of the wind ( Psalm 18:10 ), but of the dawn, and pursued the farthest flight westward, if he should fly with the same swiftness as the first rays of the morning shoot from one end of the heavens to the other, still he would not get beyond the Divine presence. Beyond the sea, and far out of the sight of man, God's hand would lead him, and God's right hand grasp him. III. OMNIPOTENCE IN THE CREATION OF MAN (vers. 13-18). The singer revolves in mind the secret processes of man's birth and development, and gratitude overflows into praise. He sees how he has been made to differ from the inferior creation in constitution and destiny. It is a fearful distinction ( Genesis 28:17 ). Any signal manifestation of Jehovah's presence, however favourable, inspires awe. The consideration of this single ease leads to the general statement that all God's works are marvellous, a statement which the writer reaffirms as from an experimental conviction of its truth. In the next verse the curious growth and unfolding of the embryo is referred to. It goes on in secret, as far from human vision as if it were deep down in some subterraneous cavern, but God sees it and directs the mysterious and complicated tissue, as if it were a piece of delicate embroidery. Even in its most rudimental form, invisible to any other ken, it is still open to His eyes, and He determines all its subsequent development, recording in His book the days to come, i.e. the various events and vicissitudes of life, even before one of them existed. Struck by this view of God's omniscience as embracing the beginning, the unfolding and the completion of all things, the singer bursts out into a recognition of its value. To him God's thoughts, i.e . His plans and purposes as displayed in these miracles of creation, are precious beyond measure. Nor are they few or slight, but amount to a vast sum, more numerous than the sands of the sea. They are ever before David as an object of adoring wonder, not by day only, but by night; not merely in the watches of the night, but even in his sleep. His meditations are continuous. His communion is unbroken. IV. THE PRACTICAL APPLICATION (vers. 19-24). The greater any man's nearness to God, the more intense is his abhorrence of the impiety which disowns or despises the living God. Nor does such a feeling indicate malevolence. "When a foul crime has been perpetrated, tender-hearted Christian women who would not harm a hair of the enemy's head, but would rather feed him, will express keen resentment, and will be disquieted in mind till they hear that the perpetrator has been convicted and duly punished." The conclusion of the strophe is striking. The poet returns to the opening words of the psalm, and prays for a new experience of Jehovah's searching scrutiny, that he may not be given over to self-conceit. The petition is a proof of humility. Although he had averred so strongly his aversion to the wicked, he prays that this may be no mere outward separation. The All-seeing Eye may detect in him some way that leads to sin and sorrow, though he is unconscious of it. Hence he entreats God to see and disclose it, and then taking his hand to lead him in a way which, unlike the way of the wicked ( Psalm 1:6 ), does not perish, but ends in everlasting life. ( T. W. Chambers, D. D. ) God's omniscience and omnipresence H. Woodcock. I. SOME SCRIPTURAL VIEWS OF THE DIVINE OMNISCIENCE AND OMNIPRESENCE. God is everywhere present β€” 1. By His presence. 2. By His power or agency. 3. In the immensity of space. 4. In highest heaven. 5. In hell. 6. We cannot get away from God's presence. 7. Human inspection is very limited. But God's eye penetrates the darkest abode, the deepest cell, the obscurest corner, the blackest night. 8. Men only see what a man says and does; God sees all that a man is. "To Him all hearts are open, all desires known." God knows us, not relatively, but personally. 9. Specially with His people. "Where are you going?" said Collins, the infidel, to a poor but pious man. "To church, sir," was the reply "What to do there?" "To worship God." "And can you tell me," said the infidel, "whether your God is a great or a little God?" "He is both, sir." "How can He be both?" "He is so great that the heaven of heavens cannot contain Him, and so little that He can dwell in my heart." II. LESSONS. 1. If God is omniscient and omnipresent, then the moral character of His creatures is unveiled to His gaze, and clearly and distinctly known to Him. 2. If God is omniscient and omnipresent, then the final judgment will be a time of full and complete revelation, as well as a time of righteous retribution (Ecclesiastes 11:14; Revelation 20:12 ). Will the disclosures of that day fill us with joy, or cover us with shame? 3. The importance of an interest in Christ. 4. Try to cherish an abiding sense of God's presence. 5. Pray at all times and in all places. 6. Be comforted in every time of trouble. ( H. Woodcock. ) The all-seeing God Monday Club Sermons. : β€” I. IS THERE AN ALL-SEEING GOD? If not, whence our own existence? Whence our expectations of reward for doing right, of punishment for wrong-doing? Whence the material universe? Whence the original plan, stupendous beyond conception, more minute than the most powerful microscope can reveal, which must have preceded the first act of creation? Whence the march and trend of history, always revealing "a power not ourselves, which makes for righteousness," and which sweeps away opposition like dust before the oncoming storm? Who conceived the character of Christ, in an age overlaid and penetrated through and through with error? Whose works of grace, in that same earth, have steadily built up a kingdom of love, of peace, of righteousness? If there is a creator of the universe, He must also be its sustainer: He cannot press material forces into service and go and leave them, as we do a windmill to draw water, for all force depends upon Him for its existence. He who superintends all must be all-seeing, and He who presides over all history must take cognizance of every event. II. WHAT CONCERN HAS OUR LIFE, HERE AND HEREAFTER, WITH THE OMNISCIENCE OF GOD? 1. That exquisite pleasure in sin, which comes from its fancied concealment, is utter folly. 2. God is patient with wrong and sin, because He sees the end from the beginning. 3. Patience under trial and strength in adversity thrive under the all-seeing eye. 4. The friends of God are glad in the sure hope of being more and more consciously under His eye. 5. Corresponding judgments await those who, shrinking from that all-seeing eye, with a repugnance predominant and increasing, must abide its searchings for ever. 6. How priceless the blood of Calvary, in which the saints have "washed their robes and made them white"! ( Monday Club Sermons. ) The all-seeing and all-present One Homilist. : β€” I. THE ALL-SEEING ONE. 1. He sees the whole of an object. At best we can only see the outside of a thing, the curve, the angle, the colour. 2. He sees the whole of every object. How few are the objects we see even thus externally and partially! Some are too small and some too distant. But He sees all, His eye takes in the immeasurable universe. 3. He sees the whole of everything at the same time. II. THE ALL-PRESENT ONE. 1. He is present everywhere, in the entirety of Himself. 2. He is present in all things, yet distinct from all things.Practically, this subject serves three important purposes. 1. To refute some popular errors of human life. (1) There is the error that supposes that formal worship can be of any real worth. "God is a Spirit," etc. (2) There is the error that imagines that death will make some fundamental alteration in their relation to God. 2. To reprove some prevalent impieties in human conduct. (1) Atheism. (2) Indifferentism. 3. To reveal the supreme interest of human life. Cultivate a loving affection for Him. ( Homilist. ) God and ourselves W. Hoyt, D. D. : β€” This psalm sings of β€” I. GOD. 1. His omniscience. (1) He knows our actions, ways, words, thoughts. (2) His knowledge of us is entire, complete. 2. His omnipresence. He is in β€” (1) Heaven. (2) Unseen world. (3) Everywhere. (4) In the dark as well as the light. 3. His omnipotence (vers. 13-16). 4. The separate, personal thinking of God toward every one of us. (1) Innumerable. (2) Constant. II. OURSELVES. Our relation toward such a God should be β€” 1. That of adoring and constantly thoughtful reverence (vers. 17, 18). 2. That of siding with Him against evil (vers. 19-22). 3. That of welcoming the Divine searching (vers. 23, 24). Said Milton , speaking of his travels abroad when a young man: "I again take God to witness that in all places where so many things are considered lawful, I lived sound and untouched from all profligacy and vice, having this thought perpetually with me, that though I might escape the eyes of men, I certainly could not the eyes of God." 4. That of a prayerful seeking of the Divine guidance (ver. 24). ( W. Hoyt, D. D. ) God's knowledge of man W. G. T. Shedd, D. D. : β€” One of the most remark. able characteristics of a rational being is the power of self-inspection. Like the air we breathe, like the light we see, it involves a mystery that no man has ever solved. Self-consciousness has been the problem of the philosophic mind in all ages; and the mystery is not yet unravelled. But if that knowledge whereby man knows himself is mysterious, then certainly that whereby God knows him is far more so. That act whereby another being knows my secret thoughts and inmost feelings is most certainly inexplicable. I. GOD ACCURATELY AND EXHAUSTIVELY KNOWS ALL THAT MAN KNOWS OF HIMSELF. He may be an uncommonly thoughtful person, and little of what is done within his soul may escape his notice; nay, we will make the extreme supposition that he arrests every thought as it rises, and looks at it; that he analyzes every sentiment as it swells his heart; that he scrutinizes every purpose as it determines his will; even if he should have such a thorough and profound self-knowledge as this, God knows him equally profoundly and equally thoroughly. Nay, more, this process of self-inspection may go on indefinitely, and the man grow more and more thoughtful, and obtain an everlastingly augmenting knowledge of what he is and what he does, so that it shall seem to him that he is penetrating so deeply into those dim and shadowy regions of consciousness where the external life takes its very first start, and then he may be sure that God understands the thought that is afar off, and deep down, and that at this lowest range and plane in his experience he besets him behind and before. II. GOD ACCURATELY AND EXHAUSTIVELY KNOWS ALL THAT MAN MIGHT, BUT DOES NOT, KNOW OF HIMSELF. Though the transgressor is ignorant of much of his sin, because, at the time of its commission, he sins blindly as well as wilfully, and unreflectingly as well as freely; and though the transgressor has forgotten much of that small amount of sin, of which he was conscious, and by which he was pained, at the time of its perpetration; though, on the side of man, the powers of self-inspection and memory have accomplished so little towards this preservation of man's sin, yet God knows it all, and remembers it all. He compasseth man's path, and his lying down, and is acquainted with all his ways. And here let us look upon the bright as well as the dark side of this subject. For if God's exhaustive knowledge of the human heart waken dread in one of its aspects, it starts infinite hope in another. If that Being has gone down into these depths of human depravity, and seen it with a more abhorring glance than could ever shoot from a finite eye, and yet has returned with a cordial offer to forgive it all, and a hearty proffer to cleanse it all away, then we can lift up the eye in adoration and in hope. The worst has been seen, and that too by the holiest of beings, and yet eternal glory is offered to us! It is perfectly plain from the elevated central point of view where we now stand, and in the focal light in which we now see, that no man can be justified before God upon the ground of personal character; for that character, when subjected to God's exhaustive scrutiny, withers and shrinks away. Before the Searcher of hearts all mankind must appeal to mere and sovereign mercy. Justice, in this reference, is out of the question. Now, in this condition of things, God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him might not perish, but have everlasting life. The simple question, then, which meets us is, Wilt thou know thyself here, and now, that thou mayest accept and feel God's pity; or wilt thou keep within the screen, and not know thyself until beyond the grave, and then feel God's judicial wrath? The self-knowledge, remember, must come in the one way or the other. It is a simple question of time; a simple question whether it shall come here in this world, where the blood of Christ "freely" flows, or in the future world, where "there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin." ( W. G. T. Shedd, D. D. ) God's presence Archbishop Temple. : β€” The fact that God is always present and knows every minute trifle in our lives, and that His unerring judgment will assuredly take count of every detail of our character and our conduct, neither exaggerating nor omitting, but applying absolute justice; this truth is one of those which lose force from their very universality. God has made us so. We become unconscious of everything by long use. We could never discharge our duties properly if we were to be perpetually distracted by the consciousness of what was around us: and, above all, we might be daunted by the perpetual thought of the presence of God, and so be paralyzed instead of helped. There is, therefore, nothing wrong in our forgetting that we are in the presence of God any more than there is anything foolish in our forgetting that we need air to breathe or light to see by, or that if we fall we may hurt ourselves: just in the same way as we very often, and quite rightly, forget that we are in the company of men who will take notice of our faults. The right state of mind plainly is to have the thought of God's presence so perpetually at hand that it shall always start before us whenever it is wanted. So that whenever we are on the point of doing or saying anything cowardly, or mean, or false, or impure, or proud, or conceited, or unkind, the remembrance that God is looking on shall instantly flash across us and help us to beat down our enemy. This is living with God. This is the communion with Him, and with Christ, which unquestionably helps the struggling, the penitent, the praying, more than anything else. And this perpetual though not always conscious sense of God's presence would, no doubt, if we would let it have its perfect work, gradually act on our characters just as the presence of our fellow-men does. We cannot live long with men without catching something of their manner, of their mode of thought, of their character, of their government of themselves. Those who live much in a court acquire courtly manners. Those who live much in refined and educated society acquire refinement insensibly. Those who are always hearing pure and high principles set forth as the guides of life learn to value and to know them even faster than they can learn to live by them. From the just we learn justice; from the charitable we catch an infection of charity; from the generous we receive the instinct of generosity. So, too, by living in the presence of God and, as it were, in the courts of heaven, we shall assuredly learn something of a heavenly tone, and shake off some of that coarse worldliness, that deeply ingrained selfishness, that silly pride and conceit which now spoils our very best service. In short, to live with God is to be perpetually rising above the world; to live without Him is to be perpetually sinking into it, and with it, and below it. And lest the presence of God should be too much for us, Christ has taken human nature on Him, and has provided that He will be always with us as long as the world shall last. How shall we learn to walk by His side? The daily prayer in the closet, the endeavour to keep the attention fixed when praying with others, either in our regular services or in family worship. the regular habit of reading the Bible at a fixed time, the occasional reminders of ourselves that God is looking on, β€” these are our chief means of learning to remember His presence. But yet there is another, not less powerful than any, which deserves special mention. Our hearts will put us in mind of God's eye being upon us every now and then involuntarily. The thought will flash across us that God sees us. And this will generally be just when we are tempted to do wrong, or perhaps just when we are actually beginning to do it: some secret sin of which no one knows or dreams perhaps, some self-indulgence, which we dare not deny that God condemns. Then is the moment to choose whether or not we will live in the presence of God; then when the finger of conscience is pointing to Him and saying, "He is looking at you." ( Archbishop Temple. ) God all-seeing: In the mythology of the heathen, Momus, the god of fault-finding, is represented as blaming Vulcan, because in the human form, which he had made of clay, he had not placed a window in the breast, by which whatever was done or thought there might easily be brought to light. We do not agree with Momus, neither are we of his mind who desired to have a window in his breast that all men might see his heart. If we had such a window we should pray for shutters, and should keep them closed. God omniscient Weekly Pulpit. : β€” While the Americans were blockading Cuba, several captains endeavoured to elude their vigilance by night, trusting that the darkness would conceal them as they passed between the American war-ships. But in almost every case the dazzling rays of a searchlight frustrated the attempt, and the fugitives' vessel was captured by the Americans. The brilliant searchlight sweeping the broad ocean and revealing even the smallest craft on its surface is but a faint type of the Eternal Light from which no sinner can hide his sin. ( Weekly Pulpit. ) Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways. Psalm 139:3 God knows and takes strict and accurate notice of all our ways R. South, D. D. : β€” This is so, because β€” I. GOD RULES AND GOVERNS MEN. But this could not be without such knowledge. And so at times He governs men's secret projects. 1. By discovering them, making them known to others. 2. By preventing them. 3. By turning them to other ends than men purposed ( Isaiah 7:7 ; Genesis 45:5 ). II. HE GIVES LAWS TO REGULATE THEM. III. HE WILL JUDGE THEM. 1. He does so in this life where He often gives foretaste of the future ( Deuteronomy 29:18 ), 2. In the day of judgment ( Luke 12:2 ). IV. HE IS OMNISCIENT AND OMNIPRESENT ( Proverbs 15:3 ; Hebrews 4:13 ). Then β€” 1. Presumptuous sin is atheism. 2. Let secret sinners be afraid.Such are those who sin in thought and desire only. God judges such, for they are the roots of sin. Spiritual wickedness is worst wickedness. And they are the product of the man himself, as his actions sometimes are not. And there are secret sins not only thought, but acted, only concealed from men ( 2 Samuel 12:12 ; Habakkuk 2:11 ; Genesis 4:10 ). God will judge them. 3. Let sincere-hearted Christians be comforted. The same sun-rising and break of day that terrifies the robber is a comfort to the honest traveller. Thou that, art sincere, God sees that sincerity in thee that others cannot discern; perhaps thou canst not fully discern it thyself. And He will exalt thee. ( R. South, D. D. ) The record of our lives: W. J. Gregory. I. THAT RECORD IS COMPLETE. II. THAT RECORD MAY BE PRESENTED TO OUR CONDEMNATION. Men are making efforts to recover the secrets of another's brain. It is hard to conceive what the possibility means, as suggested by the results of rapid photography in the vitascope. It is not position that is presented, but action; even the change of face with change of thought. It is the publication of a partial set of records. Who could risk the scrutiny of their whole lives with such publicity? III. BUT THAT RECORD CAN BE BLOTTED OUT. A photographer can remove the sensitive salts in a bath. The picture then has no existence and cannot be exhibited; But we cannot trust our forgetfulness to do this, nor man's charity. But God in mercy has provided a cleansing flood. ( W. J. Gregory. ) God's winnowing H. Macmillan, D. D. : β€” The word in the Hebrew original for "compassest" is "winnowest." This calls up before the mind an image which helps to illustrate the meaning of the verse in a most interesting manner. The mere compassing of our path by God is an elementary, commonplace truth which requires no argument or proof. It is a truism which loses very much the power of truth through our familiarity with it. But when we substitute the winnowing of our path by God's dealings with us, we have not in that case a commonplace fact, but a most suggestive and instructive metaphor. Harvest operations in the East are all carried on in the open air, for the weather at that time of the year is uniformly fine. When the corn is reaped it is not piled into stocks, or gathered into barns, as with us, but threshed on the spot, on some piece of rising ground, beaten hard and smooth, and exposed to the wind. The sheaves are heaped on this spot, arranged in a circle, and over them are driven rude, heavy sledges of wood, having their under-surface stuck full of sharp pieces of hard basalt. Oxen are yoked to these sledges, and a man stands on them to increase their pressure, while another man drives the oxen round and round upon the sheaves until they are mashed to pieces, the straw being broken and crushed, and the grains of corn separated from it. When the grain is all threshed out in this manner, the heaps of mixed corn and broken straw are tossed up before the breeze with a shovel; and then the grain, being heaviest, falls straight down, and the broken straw and chaff, being lighter, is carried by the wind, and forms a heap a little farther on. This explanation will make perfectly clear the allusion of the psalmist: "Thou compassest, or winnowest, my path." It refers to the oxen going round and round on the sheaves laid on the threshing-floor, in order to separate the corn from the straw and chaff. In like manner, the psalmist, by a bold figure, represents God going round and round our path by His dealings with us in providence and grace, in order to purify our nature, and to separate the good from the evil. God humbles Himself to do for us the work which the oxen do for the corn. We are valuable to Him as the corn is to the husbandman. How patiently do the oxen plod on hour after hour, going their constant round, treading down the corn until their task is accomplished. And so how patiently and unweariedly does God compass your path with His providences and gracious dealings, till He has fulfilled in you the good pleasures of His goodness, and prepared you for being presented faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy. Life to every one is a common round of continual beginnings and endings. Each day is a little circle returning where it began. Our range is as narrow as that of the ox that treadeth out the corn among the heap of sheaves. And all this is apt to become monotonous and wearisome. Some are so consumed by ennui that life has lost all relish for them; and some have grown so tired of pacing the irksome daily round that they have put an end to it by violent means. But surely it gives a new zest to life if we realize that all this constant doing of the same things, this constant going round and round the same little circle of daily duties, is not a treadmill penance, a profitless labour like weaving ropes of sand, but is designed to bring out and educate to the utmost perfection of which we are capable all that is best and most enduring in us. And surely it heightens the interest immeasurably to be assured that God has not merely ordained this long ago as part of His great providential plan for the world, but that He is daily and hourly superintending the process of our discipline and education by His personal presence, compassing our path, going round with us in the circle of life's toils and duties, and causing all our experiences, by His blessing, to work together for our good. He will not go round on your sheaves with His heavy dispensations oftener than is required to separate the chaff from the wheat; and you may be certain that not one grain of good in you will be destroyed, not one element of lasting benefit will be injured β€” only the chaff will be blown away and the straw removed. ( H. Macmillan, D. D. ) Such knowledge is too wonderful for me. Psalm 139:6 God's all-knowledge Canon Liddon. : β€” If we had to take our trial for our lives before the tribunal of an earthly judge, there are probably three questions which we should ask ourselves with no little anxiety: Has the judge himself the power, or does he represent some one who has the power, to enforce the sentence which he may pronounce? Is the judge a man of that integrity of character which is fearless when interpreting the plain sense of the law that is to be administered, and equitable when some indistinctness in that law obliges the interpreter to fall back on his own sense of what is probably right? Can the judge command the means of knowing enough of those facts upon which his decision must be based to judge righteous judgment, to have himself and to inspire others with the assurance that innocence is acquitted and that guilt is punished? When we turn our thoughts upwards to the Judge of all men, we know how a serious believer in God must answer such questions as these. I. But, as we look more closely at the subject, CERTAIN FEATURES OF THE KNOWLEDGE WHICH IS POSSESSED BY THE DIVINE MIND stand out before us more distinctly. They show how that knowledge differs from knowledge as it exists in ourselves, and they enable us to understand how the knowledge which belongs to God, as God, is knowledge of an extent and of a kind which makes it certain that when seated on the throne of judgment the Holy Judge of all the earth does right. 1. And first of all, then, so far as we know, all, or nearly all, of our knowledge is acquired, and most of it is acquired at very considerable cost of time and labour. Now, nothing corresponding to this can hold good of the mind of God. God does not acquire His knowledge; He ever possessed it. Acquisition implies ignorance to begin with; it implies a limited prospect which is gradually enlarged by effort; it implies dependence upon intermediate sources of knowledge, upon books, teachers, the testimony of others, evidence, experiment. All this is inadmissible in conceiving of the Divine Mind which never could have been ignorant, never dependent upon anything or any person external to itself for obtaining information. Man may be very β€” nay, utterly ignorant β€” not, indeed, without grave loss, but certainly without forfeiting his manhood. In man, knowledge, however important, is yet an accident of his life: it is conceivably separated from it. In God, on the other hand, knowledge is not a separable accident, a dispensable attribute of His existence. As God, He cannot but know, and know on an infinite scale. In God, as St. finely says, to know is the same thing as to exist. There can be in Him no progress from a lower to a higher plane of knowledge, still less from ignorance to knowledge. In Him all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge have ever been exactly what they are. Now, consider how this bears on the duties of a judge. A human judge, whatever his knowledge of the statute book, whatever his experience of proceedings in the courts, is dependent upon the evidence which is brought before him, when charging the jury or when forming his own judgment. If the evidence is confused or imperfect, if it is perjured or untrustworthy, still it is all he has to go upon; he must do the best he can with it; he has no means of arriving at a bound at the truth of the facts independently of that which is deposed to before him. Alas! however excellent his intentions, however absolute his integrity, he cannot escape a liability β€” the human liability β€” to make mistakes. In the Divine Judge this liability does not exist, because His knowledge of facts, not being acquired by weighing evidence, is ever and immediately present to His mind. He sees everything β€” men, events, characters β€” at a glance, and as they are. 2. And as human knowledge is acquired, so it is liable to decompose in our minds. It is less easily acquired than it is forgotten. Here, again, we must see that nothing corresponding to this process, so familiar in the experience of the human mind, is even imaginable in the mind of God. It knows "no variableness, neither shadow of turning." All that is, all that might have been and is not, all that might yet be, whether it is to be or is not to be, is eternally present to it, and it could not forfeit its hold upon any part of this, to us, inconceivably vast field of knowledge without ceasing to be itself. And here, again, the Divine Judge must differ from any human judge. No human judge can prudently trust his memory even to retain what is brought before him in a case that lasts but a few hours; he can only trust his notes. Memory, he knows, is treacherous; it gives way just when we need it most; it refuses to recall a date, a name, a figure, a fact, unimportant generally, but of critical importance then and now Its impotence is, so we think, as capricious as are its good services. In the Awful Mind above and around us nothing like this is possible, because it does not ever, as we do, look back upon any fact as upon something past; it is always in contact with all facts, whether, from our point of view, they be past or present or future, as eternally present to it. 3. And, once more, human knowledge is very limited. "We know in part." As the generations of men who devote themselves to the work of marshalling and increasing the stock of human knowledge succeed each other, each generation is largely occupied in showing how defective was the knowledge of those who immediately preceded it, while it knows that in turn it, too, will be exposed to a like criticism on the part of its successors. So far are we men from possessing the field of universal knowledge that a man never entirely masters any single subject. In the Divine Mind, on the contrary, we cannot conceive partial knowledge of any subject whateve
Matthew Henry
139:1-6 God has perfect knowledge of us, and all our thoughts and actions are open before him. It is more profitable to meditate on Divine truths, applying them to our own cases, and with hearts lifted to God in prayer, than with a curious or disputing frame of mind. That God knows all things, is omniscient; that he is every where, is omnipresent; are truths acknowledged by all, yet they are seldom rightly believed in by mankind. God takes strict notice of every step we take, every right step and every by step. He knows what rule we walk by, what end we walk toward, what company we walk with. When I am withdrawn from all company, thou knowest what I have in my heart. There is not a vain word, not a good word, but thou knowest from what thought it came, and with what design it was uttered. Wherever we are, we are under the eye and hand of God. We cannot by searching find how God searches us out; nor do we know how we are known. Such thoughts should restrain us from sin. 139:7-16 We cannot see God, but he can see us. The psalmist did not desire to go from the Lord. Whither can I go? In the most distant corners of the world, in heaven, or in hell, I cannot go out of thy reach. No veil can hide us from God; not the thickest darkness. No disguise can save any person or action from being seen in the true light by him. Secret haunts of sin are as open before God as the most open villanies. On the other hand, the believer cannot be removed from the supporting, comforting presence of his Almighty Friend. Should the persecutor take his life, his soul will the sooner ascend to heaven. The grave cannot separate his body from the love of his Saviour, who will raise it a glorious body. No outward circumstances can separate him from his Lord. While in the path of duty, he may be happy in any situation, by the exercise of faith, hope, and prayer. 139:17-24 God's counsels concerning us and our welfare are deep, such as cannot be known. We cannot think how many mercies we have received from him. It would help to keep us in the fear of the Lord all the day long, if, when we wake in the morning, our first thoughts were of him: and how shall we admire and bless our God for his precious salvation, when we awake in the world of glory! Surely we ought not to use our members and senses, which are so curiously fashioned, as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin. But our immortal and rational souls are a still more noble work and gift of God. Yet if it were not for his precious thoughts of love to us, our reason and our living for ever would, through our sins, prove the occasion of our eternal misery. How should we then delight to meditate on God's love to sinners in Jesus Christ, the sum of which exceeds all reckoning! Sin is hated, and sinners lamented, by all who fear the Lord. Yet while we shun them we should pray for them; with God their conversion and salvation are possible. As the Lord knows us thoroughly, and we are strangers to ourselves, we should earnestly desire and pray to be searched and proved by his word and Spirit. if there be any wicked way in me, let me see it; and do thou root it out of me. The way of godliness is pleasing to God, and profitable to us; and will end in everlasting life. It is the good old way. All the saints desire to be kept and led in this way, that they may not miss it, turn out of it, or tire in it.