The Life of David: As Reflected in His Psalms Part 4

VII.--THE EXILE--_CONTINUED_.

There are many echoes of this period of Engedi in the Psalms. Perhaps the most distinctly audible of these are to be found in the seventh psalm, which is all but universally recognised as David's, even Ewald concurring in the general consent. It is an irregular ode--for such is the meaning of s.h.i.+ggaion in the t.i.tle, and by its broken rhythms and abrupt transitions testifies to the emotion of its author. The occasion of it is said to be "the words of Cush the Benjamite." As this is a peculiar name for an Israelite, it has been supposed to be an allegorical designation for some historical person, expressive of his character. We might render it "the negro." The Jewish commentators have taken it to refer to Saul himself, but the bitter tone of the psalm, so unlike David's lingering forbearance to the man whom he never ceased to love, is against that supposition. s.h.i.+mei the Benjamite, whose foul tongue cursed him in rabid rage, as he fled before Absalom, has also been thought of, but the points of correspondence with the earlier date are too numerous to make that reference tenable. It seems better to suppose that Cush "the black" was one of Saul's tribe, who had been conspicuous among the calumniators of whom we have seen David complaining to the king. And if so, there is no period in the Sauline persecution into which the psalm will fit so naturally as the present.

Its main thoughts are precisely those which he poured out so pa.s.sionately in his eager appeal when he and Saul stood face to face on the solitary hill side. They are couched in the higher strain of poetry indeed, but that is the only difference; whilst there are several verbal coincidences, and at least one reference to the story, which seem to fix the date with considerable certainty.

In it we see the psalmist's soul surging with the ground swell of strong emotion, which breaks into successive waves of varied feeling--first (vers. 1, 2) terror blended with trust, the enemy pictured, as so frequently in these early psalms, as a lion who tears the flesh and breaks the bones of his prey--and the refuge in G.o.d described by a graphic word very frequent also in the cotemporaneous psalms (xi. 1; lvii. 1, etc.). Then with a quick turn comes the pa.s.sionate protestation of his innocence, in hurried words, broken by feeling, and indignantly turning away from the slanders which he will not speak of more definitely than calling them "this."

(3) Jehovah, my G.o.d! if I have done this-- If there be iniquity in my hands--

(4) If I have rewarded evil to him that was at peace with me-- Yea, I delivered him that without cause is mine enemy--

(5) May the enemy pursue my soul and capture it, And trample down to the earth my life, And my glory in the dust may he lay!

How remarkably all this agrees with his words to Saul, "There is neither evil nor transgression in my hand, ... yet thou huntest my soul to take it" (1 Sam. xxiv. 11); and how forcible becomes the singular reiteration in the narrative, of the phrase "my hand," which occurs six times in four verses. The peculiarly abrupt introduction in ver. 4 of the clause, "I delivered him that without cause is mine enemy," which completely dislocates the grammatical structure, is best accounted for by supposing that David's mind is still full of the temptation to stain his hands with Saul's blood, and is vividly conscious of the effort which he had had to make to overcome it. And the solemn invocation of destruction which he dares to address to Jehovah his G.o.d includes the familiar figure of himself as a fugitive before the hunters, which is found in the words already quoted, and which here as there stands in immediate connection with his a.s.sertion of clean hands.

Then follows, with another abrupt turn, a vehement cry to G.o.d to judge his cause; his own individual case melts into the thought of a world-wide judgment, which is painted with grand power with three or four broad rapid strokes.

(6) Awake for me--Thou hast commanded judgment.

(7) Let the a.s.sembly of the nations stand round Thee, And above it return Thou up on high.

(8) Jehovah will judge the nations.

Judge me, O Jehovah, according to my righteousness and mine integrity in me!

Each smaller act of G.o.d's judgment is connected with the final world-judgment, is a prophecy of it, is one in principle therewith; and He, who at the last will be known as the universal Judge of all, certainly cannot leave His servants' cause unredressed nor their cry unheard till then. The psalmist is led by his own history to realize more intensely that truth of a Divine manifestation for judicial purposes to the whole world, and his prophetic lip paints its solemnities as the surest pledge of his own deliverance. He sees the gathered nations standing hushed before the Judge, and the Victor G.o.d at the close of the solemn act ascending up on high where He was before, above the heads of the mighty crowd (Psalm lxviii. 19). In the faith of this vision, and because G.o.d will judge the nations, he invokes for himself the antic.i.p.ation of that final triumph of good over evil, and asks to be dealt with according to his righteousness. Nothing but the most hopeless determination to find difficulties could make a difficulty of such words. David is not speaking of his whole character or life, but of his conduct in one specific matter, namely, in his relation to Saul.

The righteous integrity which he calls G.o.d to vindicate is not general sinlessness nor inward conformity with the law of G.o.d, but his blamelessness in all his conduct to his gratuitous foe. His prayer that G.o.d would judge him is distinctly equivalent to his often repeated cry for deliverance, which should, as by a Divine arbitration, decide the debate between Saul and him. The whole pa.s.sage in the psalm, with all its lyrical abruptness and lofty imagery, is the expression of the very same thought which we find so prominent in his words to Saul, already quoted, concerning G.o.d's judging between them and delivering David out of Saul's hand. The parallel is instructive, not only as the prose rendering of the poetry in the psalm, explaining it beyond the possibility of misunderstanding, but also as strongly confirmatory of the date which we have a.s.signed to the latter. It is so improbable as to be almost inconceivable that the abrupt disconnected themes of the psalm should echo so precisely the _whole_ of the arguments used in the remonstrance of the historical books, and should besides present verbal resemblances and historical allusions to these, unless it be of the same period, and therefore an inlet into the mind of the fugitive as he lurked among the rugged cliffs by "the fountain of the wild goat."

In that aspect the remainder of the psalm is very striking and significant. We have two main thoughts in it--that of G.o.d as punis.h.i.+ng evil in this life, and that of the self-destruction inherent in all sin; and these are expressed with such extraordinary energy as to attest at once the profound emotion of the psalmist, and his familiarity with such ideas during his days of persecution. It is noticeable, too, that the language is carefully divested of all personal reference; he has risen to the contemplation of a great law of the Divine government, and at that elevation the enemies whose calumnies and cruelties had driven him to G.o.d fade into insignificance.

With what magnificent boldness he paints G.o.d the Judge arraying Himself in His armour of destruction!

(11) G.o.d is a righteous Judge, And a G.o.d (who is) angry every day.

(12) If he (_i.e._, the evil-doer) turn not, He whets His sword, His bow He has bent, and made it ready.

(13) And for him He has prepared weapons of death, His arrows He has made blazing darts.

Surely there is nothing grander in any poetry than this tremendous image, smitten out with so few strokes of the chisel, and as true as it is grand. The representation applies to the facts of life, of which as directed by a present Providence, and not of any future retribution, David is here thinking. Among these facts is chastis.e.m.e.nt falling upon obstinate antagonism to G.o.d. Modern ways of thinking shrink from such representations; but the whole history of the world teems with confirmation of their truth--only what David calls the flaming arrows of G.o.d, men call "the natural consequences of evil." The later revelation of G.o.d in Christ brings into greater prominence the disciplinary character of all punishment here, but bates no jot of the intensity with which the earlier revelation grasped the truth of G.o.d as a righteous Judge in eternal opposition to, and aversion from, evil.

With that solemn picture flaming before his inward eye, the prophet-psalmist turns to gaze on the evil-doer who has to bear the brunt of these weapons of light. Summoning us to look with him by a "Behold!" he tells his fate in an image of frequent occurrence in the psalms of this period, and very natural in the lips of a man wandering in the desert among wild creatures, and stumbling sometimes into the traps dug for them: "He has dug a hole and hollowed it out, and he falls into the pitfall he is making." The crumbling soil in which he digs makes his footing on the edge more precarious with every spadeful that he throws out, and at last, while he is hard at work, in he tumbles. It is the conviction spoken in the proverbs of all nations, expressed here by David in a figure drawn from life--the conviction that all sin digs its own grave and is self-destructive. The psalm does not proclaim the yet deeper truth that this automatic action, by which sin sets in motion its own punishment, has a disciplinary purpose, so that the arrows of G.o.d wound for healing, and His armour is really girded on for, even while it seems to be against, the sufferer. But it would not be difficult to show that that truth underlies the whole Old Testament doctrine of retribution, and is obvious in many of David's psalms. In the present one the deliverance of the hunted prey is contemplated as the end of the baffled trapper's fall into his own snare, and beyond that the psalmist's thoughts do not travel. His own safety, the certainty that his appeal to G.o.d's judgment will not be in vain, fill his mind; and without following the fate of his enemy further, he closes this song of tumultuous and varied emotion with calm confidence and a vow of thanksgiving for a deliverance which is already as good as accomplished:

(17) I will give thanks to Jehovah according to His righteousness, And I will sing the name of Jehovah, Most High.

We have still another psalm (lvii.) which is perhaps best referred to this period. According to the t.i.tle, it belongs to the time when David "fled from Saul in the cave." This may, of course, apply to either Adullam or Engedi, and there is nothing decisive to be alleged for either; yet one or two resemblances to psalm vii. incline the balance to the latter period.

These resemblances are the designation of his enemies as lions (vii. 2; lvii. 4); the image of their falling into their own trap (vii. 15; lvii.

6); the use of the phrase "my honour" or "glory" for "my soul" (vii. 5; lvii. 8--the same word in the original); the name of G.o.d as "Most High"

(vii. 17; lvii. 2), an expression which only occurs twice besides in the Davidic psalms (ix. 2; xxi. 7); the parallelism in sense between the pet.i.tion which forms the centre and the close of the one, "Be Thou exalted, O G.o.d, above the heavens" (lvii. 5, 11), and that which is the most emphatic desire of the other, "Arise, O Lord, awake, ... lift up Thyself for me" (vii. 6). Another correspondence, not preserved in our English version, is the employment in both of a rare poetical word, which originally means "to complete," and so comes naturally to have the secondary significations of "to perfect" and "to put an end to." The word in question only occurs five times in the Old Testament, and always in psalms. Four of these are in hymns ascribed to David, of which two are (lvii. 2), "The G.o.d that _performeth_ all things for me," and (vii.

9), "Let the wickedness of the wicked _come to an end_." The use of the same peculiar word in two such dissimilar connections seems to show that it was, as we say, "running in his head" at the time, and is, perhaps, a stronger presumption of the cotemporaneousness of both psalms than its employment in both with the same application would have been.

Characteristic of these early psalms is the occurrence of a refrain (compare lvi. and lix.) which in the present instance closes both of the portions of which the hymn consists. The former of these (1-5) breathes prayerful trust, from which it pa.s.ses to describe the encompa.s.sing dangers; the second reverses this order, and beginning with the dangers and distress, rises to ringing gladness and triumph, as though the victory were already won. The psalmist's confident cleaving of soul to G.o.d is expressed (ver. 1) by an image that may be connected with his circ.u.mstances at Engedi: "In Thee has my soul taken refuge."

The English version is correct as regards the sense, though it obliterates the beautiful metaphor by its rendering "trusteth." The literal meaning of the verb is "to flee to a refuge," and its employment here may be due to the poetical play of the imagination, which likens his secure retreat among the everlasting hills to the safe hiding-place which his spirit found in G.o.d his habitation. A similar a.n.a.logy appears in the earliest use of the expression, which may have been floating in the psalmist's memory, and which occurs in the ancient song of Moses (Deut. x.x.xii.). The scenery of the forty years' wanderings remarkably colours that ode, and explains the frequent recurrence in it of the name of G.o.d as "the Rock." We have false G.o.ds, too, spoken of in it, as, "Their rock in whom they took refuge," where the metaphor appears in its completeness (ver. 37). Our psalm goes on with words which contain a further allusion to another part of the same venerable hymn, "And in the shadow of Thy wings will I take refuge," which remind us of the grand image in it of G.o.d's care over Israel, as of the eagle bearing her eaglets on her mighty pinions (ver. 11), and point onwards to the still more wonderful saying in which all that was terrible and stern in the older figure is softened into tenderness, and instead of the fierce affection of the mother eagle, the hen gathering her chickens under her wings becomes the type of the brooding love and more than maternal solicitude of G.o.d in Christ. Nor can we forget that the only other instance of the figure before David's psalms is in the exquisite idyl which tells of the sweet heroism of David's ancestress, Ruth, on whose gentle and homeless head was p.r.o.nounced the benediction, "A full reward be given thee of the Lord G.o.d of Israel, under whose wings thou art come to trust" (Ruth ii. 12). We may perhaps also see in this clause an extension of the simile which unquestionably lies in the verb, and may think of the strong "sides of the cave," arching above the fugitive like a gigantic pair of wings beneath which he nestles warm and dry, while the short-lived storm roars among the rocks--a type of that broad pinion which is his true defence till threatening evils be overpast. In the past he has sheltered his soul in G.o.d, but no past act of faith can avail for present distresses. It must be perpetually renewed. The past deliverances should make the present confidence more easy; and the true use of all earlier exercises of trust is to prepare for the resolve that we will still rely on the help we have so often proved. "I have trusted in Thee" should ever be followed by "And in the shadow of Thy wings will I trust."

The psalmist goes on to fulfil his resolve. He takes refuge by prayer in G.o.d, whose absolute elevation above all creatures and circ.u.mstances is the ground of his hope, whose faithful might will accomplish its design, and complete His servant's lot. "I will call to G.o.d Most High; to G.o.d who perfects (His purpose) for me." And then a.s.sured hope gleams upon his soul, and though the storm-clouds hang low and black as ever, they are touched with light. "He will send from heaven and save me." But even while this happy certainty dawns upon him, the contending fears, which ever lurk hard by faith, rea.s.sert their power, and burst in, breaking the flow of the sentence, which by its harsh construction indicates the sudden irruption of disturbing thoughts. "He that would swallow me up reproaches (me)." With this two-worded cry of pain--prolonged by the very unusual occurrence, in the middle of a verse, of the "Selah," which is probably a musical direction for the accompaniment--a billow of terror breaks over his soul; but its force is soon spent, and the hope, above which for a moment it had rolled, rises from the broken spray like some pillared light round which the surges dash in vain. "G.o.d shall send forth His mercy and His truth"--those two white-robed messengers who draw nigh to all who call on Him. Then follows in broken words, the true rendering of which is matter of considerable doubt, a renewed picture of his danger:

(4) (With) my soul--among lions will I lie down.

Devourers are the sons of men; Their teeth a spear and arrows, And their tongue a sharp sword

The psalmist seems to have broken off the construction, and instead of finis.h.i.+ng the sentence as he began it, to have subst.i.tuted the first person for the third, which ought to have followed "my soul." This fragmentary construction expresses agitation of spirit. It may be a question whether the "lions" in the first clause are to be regarded as a description of his enemies, who are next spoken of without metaphor as sons of men who devour (or who "breathe out fire"), and whose words are cutting and wounding as spear and sword. The a.n.a.logy of the other psalms of this period favours such an understanding of the words. But, on the other hand, the reference preferred by Delitzsch and others gives great beauty. According to that interpretation, the fugitive among the savage cliffs prepares himself for his nightly slumbers in calm confidence, and lays himself down there in the cave, while the wild beasts, whose haunt it may have been, prowl without, feeling himself safer among them than among the more ferocious "sons of men," whose hatred has a sharper tooth than even theirs. And then this portion of the psalm closes with the refrain, "Be Thou exalted, O G.o.d, above the heavens: let Thy glory be above all the earth." A prayer that G.o.d would show forth His power, and exalt His name by delivering His servant. What lofty conviction that his cause was G.o.d's cause, that the Divine honour was concerned in his safety, that he was a chosen instrument to make known G.o.d's praise over all the world!--and what self-forgetfulness in that, even whilst he prays for his own deliverance, he thinks of it rather as the magnifying of G.o.d, than as it affects himself personally!

The second part continues the closing strain of the former, and describes the plots of his foes in the familiar metaphor of the pit, into which they fall themselves. The contemplation of this divine Nemesis on evil-doers leads up to the grand burst of thanksgiving with which the psalm closes--

(7) Fixed is my heart, O G.o.d! fixed my heart!

I will sing and strike the harp.[K]

(8) Awake, my glory! awake psaltery and harp![L]

I will awake the dawn.

[K] Properly, "sing with a musical accompaniment."

[L] Two kinds of stringed instrument, the difference between which is very obscure.

If the former part may be regarded as the evening song of confidence, this is the morning hymn of thankfulness. He lay down in peace among lions; he awakes to praise. He calls upon his soul to shake off slumber; he invokes the chords of his harp to arouse from its chamber the sleeping dawn. Like a mightier than himself, he will rise a great while before day, and the clear notes of the rude lyre, his companion in all his wanderings, will summon the morning to add its silent speech to His praise. But a still loftier thought inspires him. This hunted solitary not only knows that his deliverance is certain, but he has already the consciousness of a world-wide vocation, and antic.i.p.ates that the story of his sorrow and his trust, with the music of his psalms, belong to the world, and will flow over the barriers of his own generation and of his own land into the whole earth--

(9) I will praise Thee among the peoples, O Lord, I will strike the harp to Thee among the nations.

(10) For great unto the heavens is Thy mercy, And to the clouds Thy truth.

These two mighty messengers of G.o.d, whose coming he was sure of (ver.

3), will show themselves in his deliverance, boundless and filling all the creation. They shall be the theme of his world-wide praise. And then with the repet.i.tion of the refrain the psalm comes round again to supplication, and dies into silent waiting before G.o.d till He shall be pleased to answer. Thus triumphant were the hopes of the lonely fugitive skulking in the wilderness; such bright visions peopled the waste places, and made the desert to rejoice and blossom as the rose.

The cxlii. is also, according to the t.i.tle, one of the cave-psalms. But considerable doubt attaches to the whole group of so-called Davidic compositions in the last book of the psalter (p. 138-144), from their place, and from the fact that there are just seven of them, as well as in some cases from their style and character. They are more probably later hymns in David's manner. The one in question corresponds in tone with the psalms which we have been considering. It breathes the same profound consciousness of desolation and loneliness: "My spirit is darkened within me;" "Refuge fails me, no man cares for my soul." It glows with the same ardour of personal trust in and love to G.o.d which spring from his very loneliness and helplessness: "I cry unto Thee, O Jehovah! I say Thou art my refuge and my portion in the land of the living." It triumphs with the same confidence, and with the same conviction that his deliverance concerns all the righteous: "They shall _crown themselves in me_, for Thou hast dealt bountifully with me;" for such would appear to be the true meaning of the word rendered in our version "compa.s.s me about;" the idea being that the mercy of G.o.d to the psalmist would become a source of festal gladness to all His servants, who would bind the story of G.o.d's bounty to him upon their brows like a coronal for a banquet.

VIII.--THE EXILE--_CONTINUED_.

As our purpose in this volume is not a complete biography, it will not be necessary to dwell on the subsequent portions of the exile, inasmuch as there is little reference to these in the psalms. We must pa.s.s over even that exquisite episode of Abigail, whose graceful presence and "most subtle flow of silver-paced counsel" soothed David's ruffled spirit, and led him captive at once as in a silken leash. The glimpse of old-world ways in the story, the rough mirth of the shearers, the hint of the kind of black mail by which David's little force was provided, the snarling humour and garrulous crustiness of Nabal, David's fierce blaze of hot wrath, the tribute of the shepherds to the kindliness and honour of the outlaws, the rustic procession, with the gracious lady last of all, the stately courtesy of the meeting, her calm wise words--not flattery, yet full of predictions of prosperity most pleasant to hear from such lips; not rebuke, yet setting in the strongest light how unworthy of G.o.d's anointed personal vengeance was; not servile, but yet recognising in delicate touches his absolute power over her; not abject, and yet full of supplication,--the quick response of David's frank nature and susceptible heart, which sweeps away all his wrath; the budding germ of love, which makes him break into benedictions on her and her wisdom, and thankfulness that he had been kept back from "hurting _thee_," and the dramatic close in their happy union,--all make up one of the most charming of the many wonderful idyls of Scripture, all fragrant with the breath of love, and fresh with undying youth. The story lives--alas! how much longer do words endure than the poor earthly affections which they record!

After a second betrayal by the men of Ziph, and a second meeting with Saul--their last--in which the doomed man parts from him with blessing and predictions of victory on his unwilling lips, David seems to have been driven to desperation by his endless skulking in dens and caves, and to have seen no hope of continuing much longer to maintain himself on the frontier and to elude Saul's vigilance. Possibly others than Nabal grudged to pay him for the volunteer police which he kept up on behalf of the pastoral districts exposed to the wild desert tribes. At all events he once more made a plunge into Philistine territory, and offers himself and his men to the service of the King of Gath. On the offer being accepted, the little town of Ziklag was allotted to them, and became their home for a year and four months.

To this period of comparative security one psalm has been supposed to belong--the x.x.xi., which, in tone and in certain expressions, corresponds very well with the circ.u.mstances. There are many similarities in it with the others of the same period which we have already considered--such, for instance, as the figure of G.o.d his rock (ver. 3), the net which his enemies have laid for him (ver. 4), the allusions to their calumnies and slanders (vers. 13, 18), his safe concealment in G.o.d (ver. 20: compare xxvii. 5; lvii. 1; xvii. 8, etc.), and the close verbal resemblance of ver. 24 with the closing words of psalm xxvii. The reference, however, which has been taken as pointing to David's position in Ziklag is that contained in the somewhat remarkable words (ver. 21): "Blessed be the Lord, for He hath showed me His marvellous loving-kindness in a strong city." Of course, the expression may be purely a graphic figure for the walls and defences of the Divine protection, as, indeed, it is usually understood to be. But the general idea of the encompa.s.sing shelter of G.o.d has just been set forth in the magnificent imagery of the previous verse as the tabernacle, the secret of His presence in which He hides and guards His servants. And the further language of the phrase in question, introduced as it is by a rapturous burst of blessing and praise, seems so emphatic and peculiar as to make not unnatural the supposition of a historical basis in some event which had recently happened to the psalmist.