Breviarium In Psalmos

PSALM 29.

A psalm of song for the dedication of the house of David. The psalm of song, praise with work, the dedication of the house of David, is understood as the resurrection of the Savior, in which all the bodies of life are dedicated. David holds the figure of Christ. The house of David is the house of Christ, that is, the humanity is the house of the divinity. Then he built the house, when he assumed the humanity of the flesh. And then he dedicated it, when he made him rise from the dead. And now the house of David, that is, of Christ, is being built: that is, the Church is being built even to the end, but it is dedicated in the resurrection, when it is to receive immortality. It contains the voice of our redeemer, who through the resurrection of his body dedicated the Church (which is the mother of all) acquired to his name.

I will exalt you, Lord, because you have received me. I will glorify you, exalted Father: because you have received me from death. I will exalt you, Lord. The voice of Christ to the Father, and the voice of the Church to Christ. I will exalt you, I will praise you. Because you have received me, that is, Christ at the right hand of the Father. And Christ received the Church, when he assumed the humanity of the flesh. Nor have you delighted my enemies over me. That they might rejoice in my destruction. How does he say, nor have you delighted my enemies, when both the Jews crucified Christ, and spat on him, and scourged him, and the persecutors are delighted over the Church, when they persecute it? But neither were the Jews delighted over Christ: because they could not destroy him as they wished.

But here it must not be understood of men, but of demons, because they began to take delight when they thought that he was to be led down to hell with thieves, just as he allowed himself to be led by the same one onto the mountain (Luke 4). But the demons were not delighted, because then he bound both the prince and his subjects; so neither will they have delight over the Church on the day of judgment, when the saints will say: Where is your sting, O death? Where is your victory, O death? Death has been swallowed up in victory (1 Cor 15)—that is, in the victory of the saints it has been broken apart.

O Lord my God, I cried to you, and you healed me. O Lord my God. The prayer of Christ, or of the Church. You healed me: you made me rise again, so that the body, subject to mortality, would not be corrupted by death.

You have recalled my soul from the dead: that is, God recalled the soul of Christ, together with the other souls of the saints, from hell. He declares himself raised up by the Father, as the Apostle says: Whoever has believed that God raised him from the dead will be saved (Rom 4). You have saved me from those going down into the pit. That is, from the misery of this present life. Or from the pit of hell, where the souls of sinners are, lest, like them, I should fall headlong into death. Hence the prophet, seeing so immense a miracle, exults and says.

Sing to the Lord, his saints, etc. Because the remembrance of you sanctified you by calling you to the knowledge of his name. Sing to the Lord, his saints. The prophet exhorts the saints to praise him by whom they were saved. And give thanks for the remembrance of his holiness. Remembrance, that is, that you be mindful of the benefits, how he came to redeem you from sin.

For anger is in his indignation, and life is in his will. Not that anger or indignation is in God, but just vengeance. The indignation of God was when Adam sinned. Anger is understood as just vengeance, when he cast him down from paradise. And life is in his will, that is, just as through God just vengeance came upon Adam himself, so through him, that is, God, life was restored, when he assumed the humanity of the flesh. For anger is in his indignation: when he takes vengeance on the impious. And life is in his will: that whoever does his will may remain forever.

At evening weeping will linger. When at his passion all things were covered in darkness, the apostles lingered in weeping and groaning. And at morning, joy. He figured the future glory of the Lord, which blossomed forth at his morning resurrection. At evening weeping will linger, and at morning joy. Evening is spoken of after midday: after midday, Adam in paradise heard the voice of the Lord walking, and hid himself under the leaves of the tree, trembling, because he had transgressed the covenant. By evening is understood this whole present life, because through the sin of Adam all groan even to the end of the world. Weeping, because man has weeping when he recalls the good things of paradise which he lost in Adam. And at morning joy: that is, in the resurrection, when he will now be restored at once to liberty. Or the evening, when Mary and the apostles were weeping at the Passion of the Lord. And morning joy, when he rose, as it was said to the women: Go and tell my brothers to go into Galilee; there they will see me (Matt. 28). And the women said to the apostles: We have seen the Lord, and he said these things to us (John 20). At evening weeping will linger, and at morning joy. This can be taken both of the time of the Passion, as above, and of the resurrection, and of the consummation of the world.

But I said in my abundance: I shall not be moved forever. This is what the redeemed people says: I no longer suffer any want of yours, being satisfied; nor, fixed upon you, am I moved. But I said in my abundance: I shall not be moved forever. It is the voice of Adam in paradise, because he thought he would be there without end. And while he thus thought, and God had given him such great goods, he began to consider what the reason might be why God had commanded him not to touch the forbidden fruit. This, he said, I wish to test. And it happened, and he tested it: because he was cast out.

Lord, in your will you have bestowed strength upon my beauty. And this is the very voice of Adam after he was cast out of paradise for his own fault. Then he knew that the wisdom of light had departed from him: and that he had been placed by God in the abundance of paradise, not by himself. You have turned your face away from me, and I have become troubled. Then God turned his face away from Adam, when he sinned. And then he was troubled, when under the curse he was cast out of paradise. And every man, when he is troubled by his own sins. Or otherwise: Lord, in your will, and not from mine: you have bestowed upon my beauty, that is, upon the body you assumed: strength, that I might know you. You have turned your face away from me, when I sinned: and I have become troubled. For I was still ignorant of the light of your truth. To you, Lord, I shall cry, and to my God I shall pray. Christ the Lord says this, who intercedes to the Father for the redeemed people.

Christ cried out on the cross, and the Church in persecution.

What profit is there in my blood, while I descend into corruption? If I have not risen: for because my blood has been poured out, I shall rise and there shall be profit: so that by my resurrection I may gain all nations. The humanity of Christ speaks to the Father, as if he had said: There is no profit in that I poured out my blood, unless I rise from the dead. Or, what profit is there in my blood, that is, in my people? There is no profit from the Jews: because they do not believe, except that he is only a mere man. Not only did they not believe, but they even opened his side.

Will the dust confess to you? The crowd of the impious, which even now, like dust, is moved by every wind of doctrine, will not be able to be justified, if I do not rise. If I have not risen, the dust will not confess to you. Dust, that is, the impious, or the unfruitful. Or will it announce your truth. That is, your Christ: as if he were saying: If I have not risen, they do not announce it.

The Lord has heard, and has had mercy on me. The Lord has heard, God the Father, and has had mercy on me. The voice of Christ, because he has made me rise again from the dead. The Lord has become my helper. My defender, who has made me the firstborn of the dead.

You have turned my mourning. When I said: My soul is sorrowful even unto death. Into joy for me. When, rising again, I said: Go, tell my brothers, that they may go into Galilee, there they will see me. But these things are said as by Christ, so also by the Church: whose mourning, when the Lord rose again, has been turned into joy, and which thereafter, with the Lord himself and to the Lord himself, now cleansed by the blood of the Lamb, says:

You have cut apart my sackcloth. The covering of my sins: for sackcloth and haircloth belong to sinners. Therefore, while he says: You have cut apart my sackcloth, and elsewhere he says: I clothed myself in haircloth, and humbled my soul in fasting (Ps. 4), and indeed Christ did not use this garment. What is Christ's sackcloth, but the mortality which he assumed from us? Then was this sackcloth cut apart, when he rose again and became immortal. And although he had sackcloth, yet he did not have the work of sackcloth: that is, sin: of which it is written: Who did not commit sin: nor was guile found in his mouth (Isa. 53). For us, therefore, it is necessary to put on sackcloth and haircloth: because we have had the work of sackcloth, that is, sin. You have girded me with gladness.

That is, the joy of the resurrection, whether Christ or the Church in the future: clothing me in the first robe of immortality through your resurrection.

That they may sing to you, my glory. In those who have believed in the glory of the resurrection. And I shall not be pricked. By the stings of sins. Nor Christ: because he had no sin.

Lord my God, I will confess to you forever. That is, without end I will praise you. In these, as I have already said, I sing to you and confess to you: who have been gathered together in me through my resurrection. For all things that are said humbly of Christ in this psalm must be referred rather to the assumption of the body than to the power of the Godhead. We also humbly pray that the Lord may turn our weeping into joy, the burden of our crimes having been forgiven; and, made glad by the mystery of his resurrection, may he deign to raise us up to heaven: for whom he deigned to descend into hell.

PSALM 30.

Unto the end, a Psalm of David, etc. The Psalm contains at its beginning the voice of the Mediator himself; then the people redeemed by his blood, giving thanks, is introduced through the person of the prophet himself. Therefore the Redeemer says to the Father:

In you. Lord, I have hoped, I shall not be confounded forever. In you, Father, is the hope of my strengthening, while adversaries insult me or mock me as they do other men. Or the voice of the prophet says in the person of the Church, I shall not be confounded: because with upright heart I confess the end of the Trinity. In you, Lord, I have hoped. In you, not in myself. I shall not be confounded forever: because those who confess him wholeheartedly shall not be confounded, neither here nor in the future. And in your justice free me, and deliver me. From the pit which they have set for my soul. Because unless we are justified by God, we cannot be justified by ourselves. Whence it is written: He who justifies himself, the same condemns himself (Job 9). Whence also Paul says of certain people: Seeking to establish their own justice, they are not subject to the justice of God (Rom. 10).

Incline your ear to me. The voice of the Church to Christ. By the ear the kindness of God is understood. Christ inclines his ear when he deigns to hear. Or then God inclined his ear when he sent his Word, and heard us in the world; and he inclined it so far as to write our sins with his finger on the earth. Make haste to deliver me. Make haste, that is, hurry: to deliver me. The holy Church wishes to be freed from the body, as Paul says: I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ (Phil. 1).

Be unto me a God protector. The voice of the Church. A God protector. A God defender: because there are many harmful gods, which do not profit. Whence Paul says: There are indeed many gods and many lords: but for us there is one God, one faith, one baptism (1 Cor. 8). Be unto me a God protector, as one who is near. And a house of refuge, that you may save me. Because the Church, in the storm of persecution, has refuge with God. That you may save me from sinners. But the house of refuge is himself in whom the Father dwells. Many wish to flee from the presence of God: but they cannot escape, as the prophet says: And from your face, where shall I flee (Ps. 138)? But we, says the Church, together have refuge in the house: that is, in him who is God.

For you are my firmament and my refuge. To sustain those who rage against me. Or, the firmament of faith: and you are my refuge; he says "my refuge" because the Church has refuge in Christ, as the prophet says: Lord, you have been made a refuge for us (Psalm 89). For your name's sake you will lead me out. So that I may make this known to the nations that will believe. For your name's sake you will be my guide: when I do anything good, the name of the Lord is glorified by this. And you will nourish me. With the saints gathered little by little, you will lead out your Church, which is founded in me. And you will nourish me. Then he nourished the Church, when he took up our flesh. Hence also Paul: For no one hates his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it (Ephesians 5). And he nourished us, that we may be strong.

And you will lead me out of the snare that they have hidden for me. A snare is called a capture; because as long as you are in the way, that is, in Christ, you do not fear to fall into the snare: snares are placed beside the way. The way is Christ, as he himself says: I am the way (John 14). And you, if you are in the way, that is in Christ, you do not fear to fall into the snare of the devil, because every snare is from him. For you are my protector: into your hands I commend my spirit. The voice of Christ to the Father in the Passion, when he commended his soul, and said: Father, into your hands I commend my spirit (Luke 46). What is commended is received safe. And he himself said: I have power to lay down my soul, and I have power to take it up again (John 20).

You are my protector. The voice of the Church. Into your hands I commend my spirit: that is, into your power I commend my soul; the Church took this example from Christ. Saint Stephen also did this; the saints also pray this when they depart from the body, as in that passage: They commend their souls to the faithful Creator in good deeds. The Lord said this while placed on the cross, because he commended his spirit into the hands of the Father: about to receive it back quickly when he himself raises it. Let the people redeemed by the blood of the Lamb now say: You have redeemed me, Lord, God of truth. You who are truth and life: because what God has promised, he does not lie. Just as he promised through his servants the prophets, so he also came and redeemed us by his blood. Hence Paul also says: For you were bought with a great price (1 Cor 6).

You have hated all those who keep vanity, vainly. He says "vainly" not because God hates anyone—far be it from us to think this—but those who love only this present life and despise heavenly things, hoping in vain in the happiness of the seductive world, God hates them. Not that hatred, as I said, falls upon God, but God is said to hate those who do such things, that is, to reject them: because God rejects them.

But I have hoped in you, O Lord. The voice of the Church: Not in myself, but in you I have hoped and I hope, awaiting your resurrection. I will exult and rejoice in your mercy. For what shall I exult, and for what shall I rejoice? For what follows.

Because you have regarded my humility. I will exult in body, I will rejoice in mind. He regarded it then, when he took up flesh, because the Church was contemptible, captive, and despised. I will exult and rejoice in your mercy, for the benefit of such great loving-kindness, that you might redeem me by your death; because you have regarded my humility, placed in that hope through which the things that are not seen are desired. You have saved my soul from its necessities. The necessities of the body are many: that is, to eat, to drink, to sleep, or anything else that must necessarily be done; but the necessity of the soul is altogether one: that is, eternal life. God has saved the soul from its necessity, because he has given it eternal life, which is its necessity. Accordingly, you have saved from the necessities of perpetual death my soul, which was bound to you by charity.

You have not shut me up into the hands of the enemy. Those are shut up into the hands of the enemy who persevere in their sins. But I, says the Church, shall not be shut up, because I do not wish to persevere in evils. You have set my feet in a spacious place. You have enlarged the unity of the Church throughout the whole world. How does it say, in a place? Is God local? Both local and not local. He is local to those who come to him, and not local, because he is everywhere; but he is found in a place by those who seek him purely. As that passage: And the place was moved in which they were sitting (Acts 4). In a spacious place my feet. The feet are the holy preachers, who carry the word of preaching throughout the whole world: or into the Church, which by your resurrection you have enlarged into the breadth of freedom.

Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I am troubled. Have mercy on me; as if he were saying: Make mercy in me, for I am troubled. It is the voice of those who are troubled by any tribulation. Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I am troubled. No longer fearing death, but dreading the pursuit of the vilest men. My eye is troubled with anger. The Church is troubled over vices and sins, both her own and those of others. But it must be prayed that anger not be turned into hatred, nor the speck become a beam. Or the eye is troubled concerning the future judgment. My eye is troubled with anger, with which I beheld you in mind. My soul, with which I loved you. And my belly, with which I remembered you. All these things are troubled because of former delights.

Because it has failed in sorrow. For this reason in sorrow: because the Church cannot correct the wicked, nor separate the wicked from the saints until the end. Whence the Lord said: Allow both to grow until the harvest, and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers: Gather first the tares, and bind them into bundles to be burned (Matthew 13). My life and my years in groanings. As long as I am here in the present life, every man has groaning and weeping: Because my life has failed in sorrow, and my years in groanings; until I suffer persecution for your name. The present life fails, because for me there are times, to confess perpetuity.

My strength has been weakened in poverty. The voice of the Church. The Church has been weakened among evil men, among whom she dwells here in the present life; because more are sinners, and few are saints. Or otherwise: My strength has been weakened in poverty. The health of this body, amid the torments of sufferings. And my bones have been troubled. My strength, certainly. The bones are the strong saints; or the bones, the virtues of the Church, or of the saints. They have been troubled, by him. Whence above he says according to the apostle: We know that every creature groans together; not only that, but we ourselves groan within ourselves (Romans 8).

I have become a reproach above all my enemies. Those who persecute me because of your name. I have become a reproach to my neighbors. The voice of Christ, and the voice of the Church: the Jews said many reproaches to the Lord, and the heretics and persecutors say them to the Church. And greatly to my neighbors. Who will draw near to believe. And a fear to my acquaintances. Because my friends, on account of fear of enemies, withdrew far from me. The whole psalm can be understood both of David according to history and of the Lord according to prophecy. Exceedingly, and a fear to my acquaintances, that is, to the apostles, who feared in the passion. Or the acquaintances are bad Christians, who say they believe in God and deny it by their works, and despise the life of the saints. They are called neighbors through faith; and do not, on account of Christianity.

Those who saw me fled outside from me. That is, the apostles, who saw Christ seized in the passion, and, leaving him, fled. Or the Jews flee the sacraments of the mystery of the Church, that is, the body and blood of Christ. All who saw me fled outside from me: not understanding my inner hope, for which I suffer; they fled to outward visible things. I have been cut off like a dead man from the heart. They forgot me in heart, as if I were already dead. I have been cut off like a dead man from the heart. That is, the Jews regarded Christ as a dead man, as nothing.

And I have become like a lost vessel. So the Jews regarded Christ as a lost vessel; that is, as a dead man in his own sin. So are the saints among the heretics, like a lost man. Because I heard the reproach of many. That is, of Christ from the Jews, and of the Church from the heretics. Round about those who dwell there. That is, round about Christ, and round about the Church: whom those aforementioned surrounded. Because I heard the reproach of many, dwelling round about. They were reproaching me, placed in the pilgrimage of this earth: following the circuit of the times, and unwilling to return to the eternal fatherland.

When they came together against me; they took counsel to take my soul. The persecutors gathered together and made a counsel, that they might take my soul, to consent among themselves in the crimes of death. That they might take my soul: that is, the Jews Christ; and the heretics, the Church. They took evil counsels, and not good. They took counsel, that they might seek and take away the soul of Christ, the Jews; and the heretics, the soul of the Church.

But I have hoped in you, Lord; I have said: You are my God. You who alone are strong to deliver. Or it is the voice of the Church. In you I have hoped. In you, not in myself. And sinners say: In you I have hoped. But the saints have both faith and works. Sinners hope in God, and do not fear him. My lots are in your hands. That is, the grace of the Holy Spirit. Not through myself, but from you comes the conduct of this life, which is carried on in this world.

Deliver me from the hand of my enemies, and from those who persecute me. Let them not prevail against me.

Make your face shine upon your servant. Make it shine, that is, look upon and discern whoever among your saints is better. And save me in your mercy; Lord, let me not be put to shame, for I have called upon you. Let the illumination of your regard shine forth upon me, so that I may not be put to shame, but be saved from these persecutors.

Let the impious be put to shame, and be led down into hell. Let the impious be put to shame—the demons, the heretics, or those who do not believe in the resurrection. Let them be put to shame then, when they see those saints whom they held in contempt crowned, and themselves condemned. Or those who, forsaking the true God, adore wood and venerate stones. Let deceitful lips be made mute, which speak iniquity against the just man: in pride and in abuse. Mocking the Crucified, and not knowing the Risen One. Seeing these things, the prophet exclaims with rejoicing and says:

How great is the multitude of your sweetness, O Lord, which you have hidden for those who fear you! For your sweetness is abundant in many ways, which you have reserved for those who fear your name, and you have not shown it in these temptations, lest, having received security, we should depart from the way of justice. Or: How great is the multitude of your sweetness, O Lord! That is, how great a glory, how great rewards you have prepared for your Church, that it might remain always with the angels without end forever. Which you have hidden for those who fear you; that is, you have hidden the good things of the saints in yourself.

You have made perfect for those who hope in you. You have made perfect: as if he were saying, you will make perfect. In the sight of the children of men. Who were not ashamed to confess what they believe before kings and powers, as the prophet says: And I spoke of your testimonies in the sight of kings, and I was not confounded (Ps. 118). Which you have hidden for those who fear you: Because here through tribulation they do not fully receive the reward, but they await it in the future. And you have made perfect for those who hope in you. With hope consummated, you have repaid in visible form the things that were awaited. In the sight of the children of men; who had sought human things, and not heavenly things. Or when they will go into eternal punishment: but the just into eternal life.

You will hide them in the hidden place of your countenance, from the turmoil of men. For the illumination of your face will cover them, lest they be thrown into turmoil by human malice. In the hidden place of your countenance—that is, in the hidden things of your righteousness; that is, in your secret place, as with Job, and all that he had was hidden in God. From the turmoil of men, from the persecution of sinners.

You will protect them in your tabernacle, from the contradiction of tongues. In the tabernacle of faith, they are veiled from the clamor of evil tongues, who say: Who knows these things? Or who has returned from the dead?

Blessed is the Lord. To whom every creature gives blessing. How does he say: Blessed is the Lord? Does he have need of our blessing? No, but that we may be deemed worthy to receive blessing from him. Because he has made his mercy wonderful in a fortified city. In the city of Jerusalem, in the middle of the world. It is called a fortified city because it is firm and strong, and all the nations surround it in a circle. In the circuit of the whole Church spread abroad: there the Lord has made his mercy wonderful, because there he was born, there he suffered, there he rose again, and from there he ascended to the heavens, as the prophet says: He has wrought salvation in the midst of the earth (Ps. 73). Or otherwise: the heavenly Jerusalem is fortified by the assembly of angels and of men.

But I said in the excess of my mind. When the Church remembers paradise, how it could be immortal, and considers how it could be there, and recalls what it was, and how God spoke to Adam through an angel (Gen. 3), and how it saw God with its inner eyes: when the Church thinks on these things, then it is in the excess of its mind. But I said in the excess of my mind: I am cast out from the face of your eyes. The people say this, turned to Christ: I thought, it says, that I was cast out from the contemplation of your lights, and I was terrified, when you permitted such great things to be suffered for your name; or, I am cast out from the countenance of your eyes. Adam, when he transgressed the command of God, then was cast out from the face of God (ibid.), both he, and we, and all his posterity after him.

Therefore you heard the voice of my supplication, when I cried out to you. Therefore, says the Church, you heard the voice of my prayer: because I knew where I could be; and I know where I now am. You heard the voice of the inner man, praying to you in the splendor of the mind, and you removed dreadful tribulations.

Love the Lord, all you his saints; for the Lord will require the truth, and he will repay abundantly those who act with pride. When these are humbled, he will set his saints in great constancy. Love the Lord, all you his saints. Love, that is, cherish him. For the Lord will require the truth from those who persevere in goodness to the end, as it is said: He who perseveres to the end, this one will be saved (Matt. 24).

Act manfully. That is, immovably. And let your heart be strengthened, all you who hope in the Lord. Your heart: that is, your soul, always in the Lord. Act manfully, and let your heart be strengthened, all you who hope in the Lord. Keep your purpose bravely and steadfastly, that you may reap the fruit in Christ. Him we humbly entreat to instill in our minds the care of loving him, and continually to confess him who suffered for us, that we may be worthy to fight manfully with the arms of humility against iniquitous pride.

PSALM 31.

The understanding of David. The understanding of Christ. There is a twofold understanding in this title, especially concerning that Publican and Pharisee who were praying in the temple (Luke 18): because the one was justifying himself, and the other was condemning himself, that is, accusing himself. The psalm contains the voice of the prophet, showing that a man can be saved not by his own merits but by the grace of God, if he confesses his sins.

Blessed are those whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the immortal, the praiseworthy or the glorious. Yet no one can be blessed in himself unless he receives it from him who justifies the ungodly: that is, from God. Whence also Paul says: But to him who believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is reckoned as righteousness (Rom. 4). Blessed are those whose iniquities are forgiven: whose sins are washed away by the Lord through confession. In what ways are sins forgiven? In three. They are forgiven through baptism; they are covered through love; they are not imputed through martyrdom. And whose sins are covered, through love: according to that saying: Love covers a multitude of sins (James 5). Or, whose sins are covered: that is, so that here they may be veiled through repentance, lest they be revealed in judgment.

Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin. Whoever in this world has been able to cleanse himself diligently, even through martyrdom. What is read is not seen; what is not seen is not imputed; what is not imputed will not be punished. Nor is there deceit in his mouth. This is in the mouth of him who confesses himself a sinner, like Nathanael. Hence the Lord said: Behold a true Israelite, in whom there is no deceit (John 1). And of that Publican, of whom we spoke above, who confessed himself a sinner, saying: God, be propitious to me a sinner (Luke 18). Nor is there deceit in his mouth, but believing God in truth, he retained in his heart what he confessed with his mouth.

Because I was silent, all my bones grew old within me. I did not bring forth confession unto salvation: therefore all my strength grew old in the weakness of the flesh. Because I was silent, all my bones grew old within me, while I cried out all day long. I was silent—this is the voice of the wicked. I was silent: that is, their sins are silent, and in confession they are unwilling to speak. The bones grew old, that is, the virtues which they ought to have had grew old through sin. While I cried out: that is, they cry out. If they have anything good, they display it through vanity, as that impious Pharisee did, who said: God, I give you thanks, because I am not like other men, extortioners, adulterers. While I cried out all day long: in the moment of this life.

For day and night your hand has been heavy upon me. Your power. When I was impious and blasphemous, your hand was heavy upon me—that is, your power—because upon those who do not amend themselves here, the hand of God is heavy, that is, the power of vengeance on the day of judgment. I was turned into affliction. In the constant tribulation of your scourges. While the thorn is fixed in me. The sting of a sinful conscience. I was turned into affliction while the thorn is fixed in me: affliction, that is, misery. While the thorn is fixed in me: that is, while the consciousness of sin pricks me.

I have made my offense known to you, and I have not hidden my injustices. But I confessed and laid bare all things. For I know that you quickly forgive offenses, when they have been fully disclosed to you, and therefore I said:

I will confess my injustices against myself to the Lord. For I did not pronounce these against the Lord, but against myself, so that I might be justified: I said, I pronounced my injustices against myself to the Lord, and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. The prophet speaks in the person of those who are converted, like that son who set out for a far country and said: I will go to my Father (Luke 15). He spoke in his heart, where God is seen: And you forgave the impiety of my sin. What I had previously done, you mercifully pardoned.

For this impiety every saint will pray to you in a fitting time. The fitting time for entreating on behalf of sins is this life, in which the saints therefore pray because no one is immune from sins. For this iniquity, or for this remission, as he said above: Blessed are those whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Every saint: that is, through baptism; and he who sins after baptism is afterward forgiven through penitence, or through martyrdom.

Nevertheless in the flood of many waters they shall not draw near to him. Many fruits of floods will surround the impious in judgment, which will not harm the saints. Nevertheless in the flood of many waters they shall not draw near to him. Without distresses, he says, which are compared to waters flooding in, the saints will not be able to draw near to God, because he who has endured to the end, this one will be saved. Or, in the flood of waters: that is, in the variety of the doctrines of heretics; through this they themselves will not draw near to God.

You are my refuge from the tribulation that has surrounded me. The voice of the Church to Christ. Concerning the pressures of this world she says these things. My exultation. Because I rejoice in you. Deliver me from those surrounding me. Either from public enemies, or from sins. When he said, my exultation, redeem me from those surrounding me: how does he say, Redeem me, when the one who is redeemed is in captivity, and those who exult have no need of redemption? This pertains to the sense. It is the voice of those who are with God, and who plead for those who are troubled in that captivity.

I will give you understanding, and I will instruct you in this way in which you walk. What understanding God gives to his Church. That it may understand for what cause the saint is anxious, and he makes sinners prosper. I will give you understanding, and I will instruct you in this way in which you walk. In the way, namely of this confession, let me teach you wisdom, that you may not withdraw from it. I will make you understand, and I will teach you in this way in which you walk. The voice of the Lord speaking and teaching is introduced, how a man may merit his help, if indeed, keeping the commandments of God, he is borne along the right path. And so he says that a man cannot come to perfection of purity. And although he cannot attain to perfection of purity: yet let him not be carried headlong into vices like animals. I will fix my eyes upon you. The voice of Christ to the Church. Fix my eyes upon you: that is, the gaze of the divinity.

I will fix my eyes upon you, so that you may remain in the love of my light.

Be not like the horse, etc. Those who wish to govern themselves not by the will of God but by their own impulse, and who, unbridled, fall into debauchery—these the prophet restrains with terrible words, saying:

With bit and bridle bind their jaws. With the bridle and bit of his own moderation, O God, restrain the idle blasphemies of the wicked. The horse is untamed; the mule, sluggish. This the Church asks of God the Father: that through the bridle—that is, through preaching—he may cause the Gentile people, whom he called horses, to draw near to himself from the broad and spacious way of this world, and may cause the Jewish people, whom he called mules, who are sluggish in believing in God, to come to himself through the bit—that is, through contrition of heart. Those who do not draw near to you, but through pride are kept far away.

Many are the scourges of sinners. Because there are some sinners whose scourges begin in this life, which they will afterward have in the future without end: Many are the scourges of sinners—those who refused to do penance. But mercy will surround those who hope in the Lord. That mercy, so that they may merit eternal life. Those who have right hope and faith in God—God's mercy will surround them, as that saying: The Lord has sent his angel around those who fear him (Ps. 33); and elsewhere: The Lord guards all who love him (Ps. 144).

Rejoice in the Lord, and exult, you just. The prophet urges the Church to rejoice in the hope of eternal life and of regeneration; yet the Church rejoices even here in tribulation. And glory, all you who are upright of heart. As Paul says: He who glories, let him glory in the Lord (1 Cor 1). They are called upright of heart to whom all the judgments of God are pleasing, and who accuse themselves of their own sins, and always praise God, whether in prosperity or in adversity: Rejoice in the Lord, and exult, you just; and glory, all you who are upright of heart. So that your glory may be referred to him, as the Apostle says: He who glories, let him glory in the Lord. Let us suppliantly entreat him, that with our sins covered over through his indulgence, and our offenses no longer reckoned against us, we may deserve to be partakers of the eternal exultation of the saints.

PSALM 32.

Unto the end, a Psalm of David. This psalm contains the voice of the prophet urging the peoples to God, and admonishing the just as to the one in whom they ought to exult.

Exult, you just, in the Lord. The prophet urges the saints to praise God. Exult, you just. Elsewhere he says: Rejoice, but it is one thing. Some exult in the things of this world, some in the circus, some in the theater; but you, says the prophet to each saint, exult in the Lord, and not in the prosperities of the world. Praise befits the upright. He calls upright those who direct their hearts according to the rule of truth, not the wicked, as the prophet says: Woe to those who call sweet bitter, and bitter sweet (Isaiah 5).

Confess to the Lord on the harp. The harp has its hollow downward and has six strings. The works of the saints are understood by the harp, which are the six works of mercy. And of those strings some sing well, others murmur. So too the saints: some are like this, others like that. Confess to the Lord on the harp. In the flesh, deadened to base desires and lusts through the Lord's cross. On the psaltery of ten strings sing to him. In the Decalogue of the commandments. The psaltery has its hollow upward; the preaching or the commandments are understood in the saints, which come from on high. Whence he said: Every best gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no change nor shadow of vicissitude (James 1). Of ten strings, that is, the ten words of the law.

Three commandments on one tablet, which pertain to the mystery of the Trinity, are these: first, Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is one God; second, You shall not take the name of your God in vain; third, Observe the sabbath day (Deut. 6). Seven on the other tablet pertain to love of neighbor.

Sing and a new song. That is, sing to him a new song: that is, a new life, because the new man has come into the world: he has established a new law for us, and a new Church through baptism. Sing to him a new song, because he has risen, because he sits at the right hand of the Father. Sing well to him. He sings well who fulfills in deed what he sings: that is, what he proclaims. In jubilation. Jubilation is so called because neither in words, nor in syllables, nor in letters, nor with the voice can it burst forth, or comprehend how much man ought to praise God. Sing well to him in loud crying. Through the jubilation of certain priests, Jericho, bearing the figure of the world, fell (Josh. 6); now through our prayer, its desires are dashed to pieces.

Because the word of the Lord is upright. Nor is it bent in anyone, but it will prosper in those to whom it directs him. And all his works are in faith. As he says in the Gospel: If you have whole faith, and say to this mountain, Remove yourself and cast yourself into the sea, it will be done (Matthew 17). And all things whatever you ask faithfully: believe that you will receive, and they will come to you. Because the word of the Lord is upright, and all his works are in faith. He is upright in his works. His works are in faith, in the faith of the saints: because what God promises to his saints, he does not lie.

The Lord loves mercy and judgment. How does he say, he loves mercy, when in another place he says: Do not be merciful to the poor in judgment (Exodus 22): that is, do not, on account of the poor man nor on account of the rich man, on account of the neighbor and the stranger, on account of the known and the unknown, turn aside from right judgment: but first judge a right judgment, and afterward let mercy come to aid. He loves mercy, because he redeemed us by taking on flesh, and judgment, he who distinguishes between the wicked and the just. The earth is full of the mercy of the Lord. The whole world. Or the earth, the holy Church, is full of the mercy of God: because as he is everywhere, and his mercy is with him, and is inseparable from him: because he descended not only to guard the just, but to redeem sinners, to make them saved.

By the word of the Lord the heavens were established. The Word of the Father is the Son. The heavens were established: the holy apostles through Him in faith. By the word of the Lord the heavens were established—in that very Word which was in the beginning with God—whether the visible heavens or the apostles were created. By the word of the Lord the heavens were established, and by the spirit of his mouth all their power. The majesty of the Trinity is most clearly declared: the Lord, the Word, the Spirit of the Lord. And by the spirit of his mouth all their power—that is, with the Paraclete cooperating, the powers of these heavens were created. For in the Lord the Father is declared, in the Word the Son, in the spirit of his mouth the Holy Spirit. And because he says "of his mouth," let him not be believed to proceed as though lesser. For just as the Son is from the Father and equal to the Father, so also the Holy Spirit is held to be equal to the Father and the Son. Or, "by the spirit of his mouth all their power," that is, through the Holy Spirit their powers. Because through the Holy Spirit they received various graces, that is, powers. For through ourselves we have had nothing good, except through Him.

Gathering the waters of the sea as in a wineskin. He has shown the sea shut in by shores. Gathering the waters of the sea as in a wineskin. By the waters he signifies the tribulations of the world and the persecutions of the saints: because just as a man presses waters together in a wineskin, and scatters them when he wishes, so the Lord does with the tribulations of the Church, as Paul says: God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able to bear, but will also make a way out, that you may be able to endure (1 Cor. 10). Gathering as in a wineskin, in the new man of the Church: the waters of the sea, the peoples of the world, that they may be new wine, as the Lord says, in new wineskins (Matt. 9): that is, the Gospel precept, stored up in the hearts of believers. Placing the deeps in treasuries, O great power of the Creator, storing up the deeps in treasuries: bringing forth winds from treasuries! Yet here we understand the deeps as the height of heavenly mysteries, according to that saying of the Apostle: O the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God (Rom. 11)! Or, in the treasuries, that is, in the hidden things of God. A treasury, that is, abundance: this is, the depth of the Scriptures. Whence in another place he says: Who brings forth the wind from his treasuries (Ps. 134). For as much as he wished to show us through his servants, so much have we been able to understand through ourselves: that very depth of the Scriptures we can by no means fathom.

Let all the earth fear the Lord. Those who savor earthly things should adore him rather than the creature. But let all the inhabitants of the world be moved by him. Some think these words concern the future judgment, but they look rather to the exposition that follows. By him, moreover, let all be moved, all who inhabit the world. By God himself let all be moved—that is, from unbelief to faith. Or “all”: all creatures come from him, and not as sinners say, that time brings them forth and not God—since God has appointed both times and days and years, and even moments.

For he spoke, and they were made; he commanded, and they were created. Therefore let all things fear him, because by him they were either made or created. “He spoke”—that is, through the Son, who is the Word, he spoke; “he commanded”—through his authority, that is, ineffably.

The Lord scatters the counsels of the nations. According to that saying: There is no counsel, no prudence, no wisdom, no strength against God (Prov. 12). The Lord scatters the counsels of the nations—namely, of the Jews, who as unbelievers murmur against God’s Christ. Or he scatters the counsels of those who wished to build the tower; he destroyed them, as in that saying: Come, let us confound their tongues there (Gen. 11). But he rejects the thoughts of the peoples. That is, the counsels of the Jews, because they could not carry them out except insofar as it was foreordained by God.

But he rejects the thoughts of the peoples: of the Pharisees and Sadducees, or of the other kinds of authorities. And he rejects the counsels of the princes. That is, of Annas and Caiaphas, because they themselves were the princes of their own priests who held the chief place in this crime. All these, with their counsels, the Lord destroyed by rising again.

But the counsel of the Lord remains forever. The counsel of the Lord was that he should rise from the dead, as he also did. This counsel the Jews, or their princes, could not destroy. The thoughts of his heart in generation and generation. Nothing of them shall be diminished, according to that saying: Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away (Matt. 24).

Blessed is the nation whose Lord is its God. That is, those who believe that the Lord created those creatures of which he made mention above: not that time brings them forth. Or, blessed is the nation of the Christians, whose Lord is its God. For it chose to have the Lord as God, having abandoned idols. The people whom the Lord chose for his inheritance. He chose the Christian people for his inheritance, as he said in another psalm: I will give you the nations for your inheritance, and the ends of the earth for your possession (Ps. 2); and elsewhere: The Lord is the portion of my inheritance (Ps. 15); and again: The Lord is my portion (Ps. 118). For his inheritance. With the Jews rejected, we have been adopted as his inheritance.

The Lord looked down from heaven: he saw all the sons of men. That he might have mercy on all: because his looking down was never without mercy. Or the Lord looked down from heaven: that is, he had mercy on us. Upon the sons of men. The sons of men: the sons of Adam. Or the sons of men, the successors of the apostles.

From his prepared dwelling place he looked down upon all who inhabit the earth. He who formed their hearts one by one. That to one may be given the word of knowledge, to another the interpretation of speeches, to another kinds of tongues, and the rest: which one and the same Spirit works. Or, he who formed the hearts of each one. Certain people falsely refer this passage to that opinion, that they think the soul is generated from the soul, and that the souls of all are contained in Adam: because what is said in Greek signifies not one, but each one through many.

He who formed their hearts one by one. He who formed: that is, he made. One by one. He understands all through each one, and knows all at once. Their hearts: their works. He who understands all their works. For he himself is the watchman looking out from day to day upon human acts. He who understands all their works: that is, how each soul has the gift of God, he himself dispenses it. The king shall not be saved by much strength, and the giant shall not be saved in the multitude of his strength. But through righteousness, and the help of God. For God also confounded the strength of Goliath by the hand of David his servant. The king is not made safe by the multitude of his strength. Why?

Because elsewhere it says: The Lord is salvation (Ps. 3). Nor will the giant be saved in the multitude of his strength. He is called a giant for his strength. Nor can he himself be saved through his strength, as above concerning Goliath and David.

A horse is false for salvation, but in the abundance of his own virtue he will not be saved. Unless God has been his rider. A horse is false for salvation. The horse, the human body, is the beast of burden of the soul, and therefore false. But in the abundance of his own virtue, he will not be saved: that is, neither the giant nor the king.

Behold. The eyes of the Lord are upon those who fear him. The eyes of God are the gaze of the divinity. Upon those who fear him, who fear him with holy fear. For God protects and defends those who hope in him with heavenly inspection. And in those who hope in his mercy. That he may rescue their souls from death. That is, in this they hope in his mercy, that is, God's, that he may rescue their souls from perpetual death. Or from death, that is, from the devil.

That he may deliver their souls from death: and feed them in famine. When others endure a scarcity of the word of God, these are given life by him.

But our soul waits for the Lord. That is, it is patient in the Lord. Whatever comes to it, whether good or evil, it endures for God's sake, as Paul says: All things are pleasing to me (1 Cor. 10). Or, he feeds them in famine: that is, he pastures them. Whence he said: And he fed them forty years in the desert (Exod. 16). For as often as men have famine, God feeds his servants: perhaps with earthly food, but there is something greater by which he feeds them with spiritual food: that is, with his teaching and his word. But our soul waits for the Lord: because he is our helper and protector. And in him our heart shall rejoice, and in his holy name we have hoped. For we know that no one has hoped in him and departed confounded. Because he is our helper and protector. That is, because he himself is both the helper and the defender of the Church. And in him our heart shall rejoice. That is, our soul shall rejoice in the hope of future recompense, and the Church shall rejoice in tribulation. And in his holy name we have hoped. The name of the Father is the Son.

Let your mercy be upon us, O Lord, as we have hoped in you. This is the prayer of the Church; yet each one ought to consider this verse before it is read, so that he may say faithfully, "as we have hoped in you," lest his mind be elsewhere occupied. Let your mercy be upon us, O Lord: as we have hoped in you. That you who have washed us through baptism may confirm us by the infusion of the Holy Spirit, as we see it done in the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 2). May he now deign to come into us, so that through his light we may be made worthy to become heirs of eternal glory. Amen.

PSALM 33.

A psalm of David, when he changed his countenance before Abimelech, and he sent him away, and he departed. The change of countenance is shown in the change of words: when he pretended that he had been sent by Saul. Or if we wish to understand a true change of face, let us know that Abimelech was the name given for Achis. Nor is there any error in the name, since, being born of that line, he could also be called Abimelech. For Abimelech is interpreted as "my father the king." How does it say that he changed his countenance before Abimelech? Because in the Books of Kings we read thus, that he fled into the city of Geth to king Achis among the Philistines (1 Kings 8). Or how did he dare to walk about in that same place, since he was their enemy, and he himself had earlier killed Goliath, their leader? For this reason he walked there, because of what the women said: "Saul struck down a thousand, and David ten thousand.

And afterward the devil entered into Saul through envy, and said: What remains, except that he alone should have the kingdom? And David came to King Achis. But afterward Achis sent his messengers to bring David to himself, so that they might kill him. And when they had found him at the gate of the city, David knew that they wanted to kill him, and compelled by necessity he turned aside to the citadel. With God's mercy providing, the Holy Spirit fell upon him, and he began to slip, and he kept sending saliva down upon his beard. And when they had brought him to the king, the king said to them: For what reason have you brought this man to me, a madman and a raving maniac against me? David was a beautiful man, and when they seized him, he was beating a drum at the gate of the city, and he was carried in his hands. And when they had released him and he had fled, he sang this psalm: which is wholly concerned with piety, wholly with divine inspection, wholly with restraining the tribulations of the saints. David holds the figure of Christ; Saul the figure of the devil. Abimelech is interpreted, the kingdom of my father. Achis is interpreted as either "how it is," or "ignorance," or "black." David came into Geth to King Achis, and the Lord came into the kingdom of his Father: that is, to the kingdom of the Jews. He changed his countenance before Abimelech: that is, before the kingdom of his father.

Whence holy Paul said: Who, though he was in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but took the form of a servant, made in the likeness of men, and found in fashion as a man: he humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death (Phil. 2). Or otherwise: He changed his countenance, that is, into the priesthood. Then he changed it, when Melchizedek offered bread and wine (Gen. 14). He altered his countenance: because as much as the coming of Christ drew near, so much were those figures opened up; because formerly he used to offer victims, but afterward it was spiritually fulfilled in the New Testament according to the order of Melchizedek: he did not say according to the order of Aaron, but according to the order of Melchizedek. He was playing the timbrel at the gate of the city. The timbrel is stretched from hide. And the Lord stretched out his hands on the cross. The gates of the city are understood as the beginning of our faith, when we believe in the incarnation of Christ. Through the saliva, the weakness of the flesh which he deigned to take up. That beard, the strength of the Godhead. He let him go and departed. Christ let go the Jews, and came among the Gentiles. Whence it is said: Because you judged yourselves unworthy of eternal life: from here we shall go to the Gentiles (Acts 13).

I will bless the Lord at all times, etc. When he says: at all times and always, he teaches us that we ought neither to give way in adversity nor to be puffed up in prosperity, but to bear both prosperous and adverse things with equanimity; and, setting the blessed one before our eyes, in all things that befall us to bless the name of God. I will bless the Lord at all times. I will bless, that is, I will praise the Lord. At all times: in prosperity and adversity. David did this, and now the Church does. His praise shall always be in my mouth. In mouth and heart, with intent mind always to praise God.

In the Lord my soul shall be praised. That is, my life. When the soul, devoted to this pursuit, has borne the harsh things of the world with a calm mind, it is praised together by those who are the Lord's. Let the meek hear. That is, the saints. And let them rejoice. Not over earthly things, but over heavenly ones: those who have no struggle of vices within themselves, those who restrain the clod of their body by such a covenant. For blessed are the meek: for they shall possess the earth.

Magnify the Lord with me. Praise the Father, the Lord. And let us exalt his name together. As if the prophet were saying: As I love, so do you also. Or, let us exalt his name together: the Son, to whom the Father gave the name that is above every name.

I sought the Lord. The Holy Spirit. And he heard me, and from all my tribulations he delivered me. Consuming the corruption of the flesh: which was bringing upon me the tribulations of sins, lest I pray to him more attentively.

Draw near to the Lord. Believe in him. Draw near to the Lord, not in place, but in faith and works. And be enlightened. That is, understand in the mind: because unless you believe, you will not understand. And your faces shall not be confounded. In the judgment in which the wicked are confounded unto condemnation, on the day of judgment.

This poor man cried out. Christ the Lord, who became poor for our sake, cried out to the Father in his passion. Or, this poor man, that is, David, cried out when he said: Lord God, make void the counsel of Ahithophel (2 Samuel 26). And the Church cries out now. And the Lord heard him, and from all his tribulations delivered him. Raising him up from the dead.

The Lord sends his angel around those who fear him, and he will deliver them. That is, he has given them the angel of great counsel. There is no doubt that those who fear the Lord are guarded by angels, just as the Lord himself teaches through the Gospel: Amen, amen I say to you, that their angels daily see the face of my Father, who is in heaven (Matt. 18). They are therefore fortified by angelic protection, who have feared God out of purity of heart.

Taste, etc. Taste is learned through the throat, sight through the eyes, because it is through the eyes that one sees. The prophet says, I have tasted. And how have I tasted: thus I have found through faith, through hope, and through good works. Blessed is the man who hopes in him. Why blessed? Because he has him who has all things: that is, God. Therefore taste is spoken of here, so that when one has come to know God, he may fear him: because just as concerning taste, so elsewhere he said: The beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord (Ps. 110). But when he has begun to fear, then he keeps the commandments, and then he will know that the Lord is sweet: because he himself is the living bread who gives satiety to this world. Blessed is the man who hopes in him, and not in the uncertainty of riches.

Fear the Lord, all you his saints. You who stand firm in his promises, fear, lest having received security you be deceived. For nothing is lacking to those who fear him. Those whose God is Christ lack nothing, that is, they lack no good thing. Seek the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and the rest will be added to you. For the righteousness of God supplies all things.

The rich have lacked and hungered; but those who seek the Lord shall not be diminished in any good. Many are the wealthy of the world, and they lack the glory of God, of whom was also that rich man, at whose door Lazarus lay: who thirsting in torments, because he had not shown mercy, did not merit to receive a drop. But Lazarus, seeking not purple garments but the heavenly kingdoms, merited to be filled with all good things in the bosom of Abraham (Luke 16).

Come, children, hear me: I will teach you the fear of the Lord. It is the prophetic custom to call disciples children, as Paul says: My little children, whom I travail for again until Christ be formed in you (Gal. 4). These he teaches, that first of all they be imbued with wisdom, that is, with the fear of the Lord. Come, children, hear me. Christ calls the Church to come to him, that is, through faith; the holy are called children of God, according to what is said in the Gospel: But as many as received him, he gave them power to become children of God (John 1). And John says in his Epistle: Now we are the children of God (1 John 3). I will teach you the fear of the Lord. As that saying: The beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord (Sirach 1).

And elsewhere he says: From fear is born the compunction of salvation. To this end each one ought to come, that he should have the fear of the Lord.

Who is the man who wishes life. Eternal life, surely. And desires to see good days. In which he may rejoice with the saints in the kingdom of God. Or it is the voice of the prophet asking, and another answers. I wish it, and he says: If you wish, then do what follows, and you will see life, that is, you will have eternal life, and good days, that is, eternal days.

Restrain your tongue from evil, and your lips that they speak no guile. Restrain your tongue, that is, from detraction, or from bitterness: because it is said: Death and life are in the hands of the tongue (Prov. xviii). Because he who guards his tongue guards his soul. And elsewhere he says: The keeper of justice, silence and peace (Isa. xxiii). If anyone thinks himself to be religious, not bridling his tongue, his religion will be vain (James i). And your lips, that they speak no guile: lest you make one thing alike with the mouth, and retain another in the heart.

Turn away from evil, and do good. That is, destroy vices and build up virtues. There is no profit if you destroy and do not build. That is, if you destroy base things and do not build up virtues. As if he were saying: Who is the man who would wish for life without these things? No one. For there was no good in him who destroys no evil. Turn away from evil and do good. All evils proceed from the instigation of the devil, just as good things from God. Leave behind, therefore, what the devil instigates, and work what Christ commands. Seek peace and pursue it. According to the Apostle: Follow peace and holiness, without which no one sees the kingdom of God (Hebr. xii). Or the Jews sought peace, that is, Christ, to kill him, not to imitate him, because to follow is said to be to imitate. Seek peace and follow it, that is, Christ: because he himself is our peace. Or follow, imitate. Whence in the Gospel it is said: Whoever wishes to come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow me (Luc. ix). Seek peace and follow it. It is not enough to flee evil, unless you also do good.

The eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous. For by the inspection of his loving-kindness he continually contemplates them. And his ears are unto their prayers. Because they ask for the things that are just. The eyes of the Lord, that is, the aspect of the Godhead, are upon the righteous. And his ears are unto their prayers. Whatever the saints ask that is good, he hears them; for God both hears and sees us; therefore let us do his will.

But the face of the Lord is upon those who do evil. This psalm runs in the person of the good and in the person of the wicked. For what reason is the face of God upon those who do evil? That he may destroy their memory from the earth. That is, from the land of the living, as the prophet says: Let them be blotted out of the book of the living (Ps. 86). By "face" here we understand wrath, which by threatening anger destroys the memory of sin from the earth, so that it may plant the roots of his goodness (whence it had been cut off). The things that are said of ears, eyes, and face are not to be referred to the corporeality of the Godhead, but to the power of his majesty.

The righteous cried out, and the Lord heard them, etc. Because they cried out from the purity of a whole heart. Or the three young men cried out amid the flames, and the Lord heard them (Dan. 3). The sons of the Maccabees, or now each one of the saints; and he delivers both them and now each one from all tribulations.

The Lord is near to those who are troubled in heart. He is never far from those who endure for his sake. He is with them in tribulation: not in place, but in aid, since God is not local. And he will save the humble in spirit. That he may bestow on them the heavenly kingdoms. The humble in spirit, that is, the soldier, as that saying: Learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart (Matt. 11). Or that saying: Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Many are the tribulations of the righteous. Therefore he who does not suffer tribulation is not righteous. The death of sinners is the worst. The tribulation of the righteous ends in death, but the punishments of sinners begin after death. Or, many are the tribulations of the righteous, and the Lord delivered them from all these. For he is tried, so that being proved he may be made manifest. But in time there will be regard for them, when they have judged the nations and ruled over the peoples.

The Lord watches over all their bones. That is, their virtues. Not one of them will be broken. Concerning his saints in the future judgment, how does he say, not one of them will be broken, since many have broken bones, as we read of the holy martyrs? But here bones are understood as firmness, or the virtues of the soul. The Lord watches over all their bones, not one of them will be broken. He speaks of the eternity of everlasting life, which they bear through the hope of faith, or the strength which they have in God himself to keep watch: lest in these tribulations they grow lukewarm, or be broken in any respect.

The death of sinners is the worst. Because both here they are begun, and in the future they are tormented without end. And those who hate the just man will transgress. The Jews hated Christ, or his testament. They hated the just one, that is, Christ, and without cause. They will transgress, that is, they will sin. Or he who now hates the just man, that is, each one of the saints, sins.

The Lord has redeemed the souls of his servants. Christ has redeemed us by his precious blood, and now he redeems us daily. Or, the Lord has redeemed the souls of his servants from the power of the second death. And he will not abandon all who hope in him.

Those who hope in God he will not abandon, neither here nor in the future; but he is with them, according to his promise, even to the consummation of the age. May he deign to grant us that his praise may be continually in our mouth, and that, using his teaching in moderation, we may neither be lifted up by prosperity nor be cast down by adversity.

PSALM XXXIV.

Unto the end, a Psalm of David himself. Unto the end, that is, unto Christ, as that saying: Christ is the end of the law unto righteousness to everyone who believes (Rom. x). Or the end, the perfection of Christ. Whence also the apostles said: Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us (John xiv). And the Lord: He who sees me sees also my Father, because I am in the Father and the Father is in me. In this is the perfection of Christ. David is interpreted as strong of hand, or desirable. And the Lord is strong of hand, because he raised up the bier, and the young man, the son of the widow, arose. Or strong, through whom all things are nourished. Desirable, because the saints desire to see Christ so greatly that they even hand over their bodies for him in martyrdom. Or the psalm contains the sacrament of the Lord's passion.

In this it must be noted that the things said in humility, weeping, and lamentation apply not to the divinity but to the assumed flesh. Therefore he prays to the Lord Father, saying:

Judge, O Lord, those who wrong me; fight against those who fight against me. The Jews and the chief priests, who often fought against the Lord while he was placed in the flesh, wished to do him harm. Judge, O Lord, those who wrong me. This is the voice of Christ in his passion, and the voice of the Church in tribulation. Judge: that is, by the judgment of discernment. Or, judge, that is, discern between me and the Jews; between the Church and its persecutors. Fight against those who fight against me. As if he were saying: Do you take vengeance for me, as is said through Saint Paul: Vengeance is mine, and I will repay (Rom. 12). And again: If God is for us, who is against us (Rom. 8)?

Take hold of arms and shield, and rise up to help me. By arms he designates heavenly aids; by shield, divine protection, which he asks to be ministered to himself according to the weakness of the flesh. But he also defends and fortifies us with spiritual arms, according to the Apostle: Put on the armor of God (Eph. 6). The arms of the Lord are the protection of the divinity. What is stronger, what is more beautiful than Christ standing armed for his saints? As Saint Stephen saw, when he said: Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God the Father (Acts 7). To stand is the part of one fighting or opposing. You cannot change your arms: the Lord, coming near, makes a shield out of arms.

And we ought to take up arms, so that we may be able to resist in the evil day, and stand perfect in all things.

Pour out the spear and shut them in against those who persecute me. Let the sword of your wrath fall upon them and shut them in, lest they be able to wander abroad to do harm. By the spear is understood the Lord's soul, through which God the Father exacts just vengeance. Or the spear is understood as the soul of each of the saints, because God exacts vengeance through holy souls, as through Peter he did concerning Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5), and through Elijah concerning the fifty men (4 Kings 1). O Lord, say to my soul: Your salvation I am. The voice of the Church. Say to my soul, that it may understand that you are my God: you are the salvation of my soul. Say to my soul: Your salvation I am. From me, he says, it shall be given life after death.

Let them be confounded and reverenced who seek my soul, to take it away. When you have raised me up, then let these be confounded. Let them be turned backward and blush who wish me evil. Not that they may advance forward, but let them be turned backward, that they may perish, that is, the demons, the Jews, or the persecutors of the Church, let them be turned back in the future judgment. Let the gentiles be confounded and reverenced concerning idols: let them be confounded concerning their unbelief, unto faith in Christ. Whence Paul says: What fruit therefore did you have then in those things in which you now blush (Rom 6)?

Or, let them be turned back, that is, those who have had an evil course: as the Lord said to Peter: Go behind me, Satan (Matt. 16).

Let them become like dust before the face of the wind: and the angel of the Lord pursuing them. That is, with the angel pursuing, let them be scattered, so that nothing at all, or only a little, may be left of them. Dust is the name given to light and unfruitful men: because as dust before the wind, so are sinners before the divine sentence on the day of judgment. And the angel of the Lord pursuing them. The angel of the Lord, that is, an evil spirit. If evil, why of the Lord? If of the Lord, why evil? Of the Lord: because the Lord created him, the Lord holds him in his power. Evil, not by nature, but by his own contrivance. The devil has the will to harm, but does not have the power to do it, as the prophet says: Sendings through evil angels (Psalm 77): that is, he has as much power as the Lord permits him.

Let their ways be darkness and slippery. Darkness, of ignorance. Slippery, that is, of luxury. Because the devil pursues the one who is given over to these in his mind. Or otherwise: Let them not know the light of truth, nor stand firm in a stable station, but let their steps be slippery, who rage in this passion, and are afflicted by the angel of the Lord's brightness.

Because without cause they hid the destruction of their snare from me. Well, their own, because the destruction which they thought was the Lord's became their own snare. Because without cause they hid destruction from me. Without cause, that is, for no reason, both the Jews against Christ and the persecutors against the Church. They ensnared themselves for vengeance. In vain they reproached my soul. For their reproach had nothing useful in it.

Let the snare come upon them which they do not know. He threatens that destruction which came upon them in the times of Vespasian. Or each sinner is bound by the cords of his own vices on the day of judgment. And let the capture which he hid seize them: let them fall into the snare itself. Into sudden death, surely, which they were secretly plotting against our Lord, as that saying: They dug a pit before my face, and they themselves fell into it (Ps. 56). And again he says: The pit which you had prepared for your brother, you will fall into it (Prov. 26).

But my soul will exult in the Lord. And Christ in the Father, and the Church in Christ. It will delight in his salvation. When it has been raised up by him. Or, it will delight, that is, it will rejoice in his salvation. Our salvation is Christ, because the Church delights in him: as Solomon says: Who is this that comes up whitened, leaning upon her kinsman? (Song 3)?

All my bones will say: Lord, who is like you? In the bones, eternity, or strength, is understood. Which is referred to the apostles: so that those to whom the words of the resurrection first appeared as if delusions may now praise together and say: Who is like you? that is, who, like you, could recall from death? Or the bones, the stronger saints, or the virtues of the saints. Who is like you? As if he were to say, No one. In another place he says: God, who is like you (Ps 70)? that is, no one.

Delivering the poor from the hand of the stronger. Christ poor for us, so that his poverty might make us rich. From the hand of the stronger: that is, from the hand of the Jews God the Father delivered him. Christ poor, speaks in the person of his members. The needy and poor from those who plunder him. From the powers of darkness. Whose greatest strength is that they can plunder your poor.

Rising up, unjust witnesses, who did not know, questioned me. The Gospel speaks of false witnesses; the Prophet, of unjust ones. And those whom the Gospel calls false are questioned; but those of whom the Prophet speaks, they question. Hence it must be understood that the chief priests are the unjust witnesses, who questioned what they did not know, saying: We adjure you by God, that you tell us if you are the Son of God (Matt. 26). But when he said, I am, they rent their garments, and as if for testimony cried out: You yourselves have heard the blasphemy; why do we still seek witnesses? For the testimony was false, in that they said he had blasphemed, who had spoken the truth.

And they repaid me evil for good; barrenness to my soul. While I offered life, they condemned me to death, and to me who promised the fruitfulness of heavenly goods, they brought the want of life. So the Jews did to Christ: for good they returned evil. Barrenness to my soul; that is, just as their souls were barren of good, and full of sin: so they wished the soul of Christ to be.

But I, when they were troublesome to me, was clothed in sackcloth. These are the weapons of the saints. But the whole psalm is spoken in the person of Christ, and through Christ it can be referred to all the saints. I was clothed in sackcloth. And I humbled my soul with fasting. We read of his fasting; we do not read of his sackcloth. But by sackcloth are meant sinners, because it is the garment of penitence. I was clothed in sackcloth. As if he were saying: The Godhead clothed itself with flesh, and from sin condemned sin. But I, when they were troublesome to me, was clothed in sackcloth, and I humbled my soul with fasting, and my prayer shall be turned back into my bosom. For the Lord put on the harshness of the passion, and mourning for the hardness of the unbelieving people; he kept fasting until evening, when at the evening of the world he was offered up for the salvation of the world. His prayer was turned into the bosom of the Father, when he was in no way disappointed by the Father, and the Father did not grant it as to one lesser, but to declare the man he had assumed. Christ fasted three times, not carnally but spiritually. He came hungry to the fig tree; he came thirsty to the fountain. He hungered for the salvation of the human race; he thirsted for the faith of the Church. He hungered in the passion, when all, especially the apostles, denied him, except only the thief who confessed him on the cross. And my prayer shall be turned back into my bosom. That is, he was doing this in the secret of God the Father.

And the saints pray in secret: that is, in the heart, where God is seen, as in the Gospel: When you pray, enter into your chamber, and pray to your Father in secret (Matt. 6). And Anna prayed in the temple (1 Kings 1).

As a neighbor, as our brother. If we take the psalm in the person of David, we take Saul as the neighbor. If in the person of Christ, he calls Judas the traitor a neighbor. Or Christ is neighbor and brother to the Jews: because from them he drew his humanity. Thus I was well-pleasing. That is, to God the Father: he was brother and neighbor because of bodily generation. As one mourning and sorrowful, so I humbled myself. For he mourned when, with an angel strengthening him, drops of his sweat flowed down to the earth like blood. And he was sorrowful when he said: My soul is sorrowful even unto death (Matt. 26). As one mourning and sorrowful. Christ mourned for our sake, as that passage: Seeing, it says, the city, he wept over it (Luke 19). Thus I humbled myself: because Christ was humbled in his passion. Or, thus I was well-pleasing: because he was well-pleasing to the Father through faith and hope.

And they rejoiced against me. The Jews rejoiced when they seized Christ to crucify him. And they gathered together as one. They gathered for this purpose, to crucify Christ, not to believe. Or: they gathered together and assembled against me, when they held the promise of my tradition. Scourges were gathered upon me. They scourged Christ, as he said: You have come to me with swords and clubs (Matt. 26). And Pilate said: I will release him corrected: that is, I will release him scourged. And I did not know. It is asked what he did not know. Some think it refers to the pain of the wounds he suffered on the cross. But it is better referred to sins, that he had no consciousness of sins, for which he was crucified. And I did not know, not because Christ is ignorant of anything, but I did not know, because I did not commit that on account of which this happened to me. Or: they did not know that God lay hidden beneath the veil of the flesh.

They are scattered. From the bond of charity. Nor were they pricked. That they might do penance. They tempted me. In many ways the Jews tempted Christ, as one of them said: Master, which is the first commandment (Matthew 22)? They mocked me with mockery. Deriding and saying: Hail, king of the Jews (John 12). They gnashed on me with their teeth. Crying out, Crucify him. By the movements of the body, the movement of the soul is shown. By the teeth malice is understood: because through malice they crucified him, and gnashed on him with their teeth.

Lord, when will you look. The prophet speaks in the person of the Church. As if he were saying: Look upon the iniquity of the wicked, and distinguish my justice from them. And you will restore my soul from their malignity, from the lions my only one. He calls those persecutors lions, who strove to swallow his soul with their mouth: but they were confounded by his resurrection. Behold, his prayer is turned into his bosom, when the only one, that is, the soul itself, was restored whole to the body. And who, you ask, restored it? He himself with the Father's will, who said: I have power to lay down my soul, and I have power to take it up again (John 10). And from the lions my only one. The lion is the Jewish people itself, because of the strength of their malice. My only one: because the soul of Christ was unique without sin, according to the prophet: Who did not commit sin, nor was guile found in his mouth (Isaiah 53).

I will confess to you, O Lord, in the great Church. That is, in the whole world spread abroad. In a grave people will I praise you. That is, in the Christian people, there will I praise you. He is called grave because he is not light unto sinning: not light, whom the wind shall cast out like dust from the face of the earth, but grave, and founded upon the rock, and firmly keeping the commandments. Hence again he remembers his passion, whereby he rather announces to them the judgment of death, saying:

Let them not rejoice over me who are unjustly adverse to me. The Jews over Christ, and the persecutors of the Church. Who hate me without cause, and nod with their eyes. He says these things that the passion be not repeated, because neither shall the redemption come a second time. And they nodded with their eyes, because they showed nothing good in their work.

For indeed they spoke peaceably to me. And that is: Master, is it lawful to give tribute to Caesar, or not (Matthew 22)? Or when they said: Master, we know that you are truthful, and in truth you teach the way of God (Ibid.). But these peaceful words were full of guile and wrath. And in their anger they thought deceits. Thus they spoke, but they thought, that they might seize him and bind him, as afterward they did. In wrath they did this, as James says: The wrath of man does not work the justice of God (James 1). And as he says elsewhere: Be angry and do not sin (Psalm 4). Let not the sun go down upon your wrath (Ephesians 4).

They have opened wide their mouth against me. They opened wide when they accused me with blasphemies. And, they have opened wide their mouth against me: because they not only sinned against me, but even insulted me, saying: If he is the Son of God, let him come down from the cross, and we will believe him (Matt. 27). They said: Well done, well done. As it says in the Gospel: Well done, good and faithful servant (Luke 19). Or it is the voice of the Jews: as if he were saying: Well, well, we see that what we awaited, those miracles which you were performing, were nothing. Or they said, well: but deceitfully. Our eyes have seen. Because you do not accept the person of a man, nor is there any care for anyone in you.

You have seen, O Lord. Father, their mockeries. As if he were saying: You have seen them for judging. Do not be silent. O Lord. Do not be silent. He is silent now, and is not silent: that is, he is not silent regarding the commandment, he is silent regarding the judgment. I call you as a witness, when I have judged the world. Do not depart from me. Because the Father did not depart from the Son in the passion. But may I cling to your right hand, until they are punished with worthy vengeance.

Arise, O Lord, arise. That is, to my aid. Attend to my judgment. That is, distinguish between me and the Jews. Attend to my judgment, because the punishment is equal, but the guilt is unequal. That is, when he was hanging with those robbers, because he himself was hanging innocent. Arise, and attend to my judgment, how those judging condemned me to death. My God, and my Lord in my cause. The voice of humanity to divinity, he speaks on the part of the flesh. Judge me according to your great mercy. Hence he said, attend to my judgment, that is, make a distinction between me and them.

Judge me according to your justice. Lord my God. I judged the adulteress, that she not be condemned; and these judged me, innocent, worthy of death, therefore let each one deserve judgment according to his own work. Let not my enemies gloat over me, lest they say in their hearts, Well done, well done, to our soul; nor let them say, We will devour him. Let their mouth no longer be opened to devour me, lest they say, we will devour him. A man devours what he puts into his mouth. But in this he says devour, because sinners wish to devour those saints: that is, that they be made one body.

Let them be ashamed and reverent together who congratulate me on my misfortunes. That is, the demons, the Jews, the heretics, and the persecutors: who congratulate me on my misfortunes, that is, not only those who do it, but also those who consent to those who do it. Let them be clothed in confusion and reverence who speak malicious things against me. These aforementioned with eternal confusion. Whence he says: Depart from me, you cursed, into eternal fire (Matt. 25). So that those who judged me as a man may see me judging as God. Hence the prophet speaks to the Father.

Let them exult and rejoice who desire my justice. Those awaiting Christ, who is the justice of the Father. Or, let them exult and rejoice who desire my justice: that is, the saints who desire to fulfill the justice of God, let them themselves exult and rejoice in the recompense of eternal life. And let them say, May the Lord always be magnified: who desire the peace of his servant. The Lord himself is our peace: according to the Apostle (Eph. 2). His servant: that is, of Christ: who is the servant of God the Father. Whence he says: It is a great thing for you to be called my servant (Isa. 49): according to the part of the flesh.

But my tongue also will meditate on your righteousness. My tongue—the saints are those who meditate on the commandments of Christ. All the day long, your praise. All the day long, at all times, to praise God. But my tongue also will meditate on your righteousness: because, having died for the life of the people, you were not abandoned in Tartarus. All the day long, your praise: because, having conquered and triumphed over death, you were received in the heavens by the Father: with whom to you and the Holy Spirit be honor and glory. Amen.

PSALM XXXV.

Unto the end, a psalm of David for the servant of the Lord. This psalm designates the person of the sinner, marks out pride, and shows the fount of eternal light.

The unjust man has said, that he might sin against himself. That is, against himself—the unjust man, that is, the devil with his attendants. That is, the peoples of the Jews: or his remaining members, he sinned against himself. Nor does any other through injustice so speak as to sin, as that one who said: I will set my throne above the stars, and I will be like the Most High (Isa. xiv). For iniquity always pierces itself with its own dart; according to that saying: Son, if you turn out evil, you alone will bear the evils (Prov. xii). Or otherwise: The unjust man has said, that he might sin against himself: that is, he decreed that he ought to sin. There is no fear of God before his eyes. For if he had kept the fear of God before his eyes, he would never commit accursed and abominable things. There is no fear of God before his eyes. That is, before the Jewish people: because if they had held the fear of the Lord before the eyes of their heart, they would never have done such great evils.

Because he acted deceitfully in his sight. The devil, and the Jews, before the sight of God. Or, he acted deceitfully in his sight, goaded by the flame of wicked desire. So that his iniquity and hatred might be found. While he desired iniquity against righteousness, while he could not take it away, he possessed hatred. But the following words also show that these things pertain to Judas the betrayer.

The words of his mouth are iniquity and deceit. But he said: Hail, Rabbi, and with a kiss he handed the master over to his enemies. Behold the words of his mouth, full of deceit and iniquity. The words of his mouth are iniquity and deceit, both in the devil and in the people of the Jews. He refused to understand so as to do good. That is, the devil and his followers: because it is one thing not to be able, and another to be unwilling. And Judas saw Christ daily working many wonders with the apostles, but he did not understand. For wisdom does not enter into a malevolent soul.

He meditated iniquity in his bed. In the secret of the heart, where he ought to have been pricked with compunction, he meditated iniquity, of which we have already made mention above. In his bed, that is, in their heart. He stood by every evil way. Because he stood there, therefore he could attain to no fruit of righteousness. But he did not hate malice. Rather he loved it: because they not only did not hate it, but embraced it.

O Lord, your mercy is in heaven. That is, in the holy angels, who were established there and did not fall. Or, your mercy is in heaven, that is, in the holy Church: O Lord, your mercy is in heaven. Christ the Lord, who in mercy for human labors came down from heaven, to bind up our wounds. And your truth reaches even to the clouds. The truth is Christ, as that saying: I am the way, and the truth (John 14). The clouds are the holy preachers. Whence it is said: I will command my clouds, that they rain no rain upon it (Isaiah 1). For just as clouds carry rain and water the earth, so too the holy preachers carry the rain, that is, the teaching of the Gospel, and water dry hearts. And your truth reaches even to the clouds. Those who refuse to understand the Scriptures spiritually: it must be asked of them how the truth of God reaches even to the clouds.

Your justice is like the mountains of God. A mountain of God is wisdom; a mountain of God is judgment; a mountain of God is sanctification. There are also very many mountains of this kind, in which the hidden things of God are stored away, which human nature can scarcely investigate, according to the Apostle: How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past tracing out (Romans 11). Or otherwise: Your justice is like the mountains of God. Your justice, your commandments. The mountains of God are the saints of greater merit, such as Saint John, or the other apostles. The mountains are illuminated by the sun first, and afterward the valleys. But the mountains, that is, the saints, are not illuminated by themselves, but only by the sun, that is, by Christ.

Hence he said: The sun of righteousness shall rise for you (Malachi 4). And your judgments are like a great deep. A great deep, the hidden judgments of God: because he rejects one and takes up another, as he said: Jacob I loved, Esau I hated (Malachi 1). Or they are the judgments by which either blessedness is brought to the just, or punishment to the wicked. And these are compared to a deep because they are contemplated in the depths of the New and Old Testament.

Men and beasts you will save, O Lord. Rational and irrational persons, according to that saying of the Apostle: I am a debtor to the wise and to the foolish (Romans 1). How you have multiplied your mercy, O God. From the beginning indeed your mercy flowed forth; but then it was multiplied, when you redeemed us by your own blood.

But the children of men will hope in the covering of your wings. Not the offspring of vipers, but those who are perfect in mind according to the image of God hope to be defended under the protection of your cross. Or, the children of men, that is, the children of Christ: because he himself is the Son of man, and the saints are the children of men. In the protection of your wings, or, in the covering. The two wings are the two Testaments, because from there the saints are covered by Christ. And they will be inebriated. That is, these same children: they will indeed be inebriated from the richness of your house, from the fatness of the grace of the Holy Spirit. Your house, the holy Church. Or, they will be inebriated, so that, with their sins forgotten, they may be joined to the virtues. From the richness of your house. From the understanding of the Church's doctrines.

And from the torrent of your pleasure you will give them to drink. The torrent of God's pleasure is the Holy Spirit, who waters every soul with spiritual streams, so that it may bring forth the fruit of holiness.

For with you, Lord, is the fountain of life. Both you are, and with you is the origin of all good things, and you provide baptism, through which, with sins washed away, you may bestow the eternal way. Or the fountain of life: because the doctrine of God is the life of the soul. In your light we shall see light. The light of the Father is Christ. In the light of the Father, Christ, we shall see the light, the Holy Spirit. Your light is the Father: doing whose will, you came to illuminate the hidden things of darkness, so that in you, who are the light of the world, we might deserve to behold that light in the grace of a pure mind. For thus he said to Philip: Whoever sees me sees also my Father (John 14). In his light, that is, in Christ, we shall see the light: that is, the Holy Spirit, who appeared upon the apostles in the form of a illuminating fire (Acts 2). And in your light we shall see light, that is, we shall be illuminated by Christ, as he says in the Gospel: He was the true light that illuminates every man coming into this world (John 8).

Stretch forth your mercy to those who know you. Those who knew you were to come into the world. Of them you say afterward in the Gospel: Many righteous men and prophets desired to see the things that you see, and did not see them (Matt. 11). Not to the proud and the deceitful, but to the clean of heart. Or: show your mercy to those who know you, that is, to those who know you and understand you—show your mercy to them, O Lord. And your justice to those who are right of heart: your justice, your commandments. Those who are right of heart, that is, those who have no duplicity of heart.

Let not the foot of pride come upon me. Lest, lifted up by vanity, I fall into the snare of the devil and be unable to escape: And let not the hand of sinners move me: that is, let not the works of the wicked move me from good to evil. Let it not move me, so that I be torn away from you.

There all those who work iniquity have fallen. In this pride and vanity, against which they ought to have stood, they have fallen. They have been cast out. From the kingdom of God. Nor could they stand. The demons were cast out of heaven: nor could they stand. Heaven could not hold them, because they had already fallen at the feet of pride. But let us pray the Lord, that he instill in us the fear of his name, that he bestow from heaven his mercy, as is his custom: that he take away from us pride, which is hostile to his good things, and turn away all deceit: and that, having enlightened us with the knowledge of his sacred light, he make us worthy of his kingdom. Amen.

PSALM 36.

A psalm of David. The thirty-sixth psalm glorifies the person of the righteous man and marks out the unrighteous; it instructs in morals, teaches the goodness of God, and uproots depravity.

Do not be jealous of the malignant. Jealousy has many interpretations, which in their place must either be understood or expounded; for here it says, Do not be a partaker with the malignant: neither unto zeal nor unto envy, because zeal is anger, according to that which the Lord spoke through the prophet: With great indignation I was jealous for Zion (Zech. 8). But envy is spite, according to that: I killed the young man in my spite (Gen. 4). Nor be jealous of those who do iniquity. Do not imitate those who gather riches through iniquitous frauds and seek honor; but attending to God, seek the goodness of the apostles.

For like grass they shall quickly wither, and like the herbs of the field they shall swiftly fall. Rightly are these things—carnal glory and worldly power—compared to grass (according to Isaiah). All flesh, he says, is grass, and all its glory like the flower of grass (Isa. 40). For the grass has withered, and its flower has fallen. To this sentence the apostle James added: So too the rich man in his ways shall waste away (James 1). By a similar reasoning it must also be understood concerning herbs: because not all herbs are suitable for the weak.

Hope in the Lord and do goodness. The divine word speaks to you as to one who is sick: that among the other graces which are the fruit of the spirit, you may show goodness. Hope in the Lord: have hope always in the Lord. And do goodness: that is, fulfill the commandments. Dwell in the land, the holy Church: or your body. You rule the flesh: not the flesh you. And you shall be fed in its riches. In the sacred volumes. If this land yields the fruit of holiness, then you too will rejoice in the riches of God.

Delight in the Lord, and he will give you the petitions of your heart. The heart always seeks wisdom. Therefore if, having admitted these delights, you delight in the Lord, he will give you the treasures of his wisdom, or whatever you have asked through faith. Whence he said: Because if two of you agree on earth concerning any matter whatever they ask of my Father, it shall be done for them (Matt. 18).

Reveal your way to the Lord. How does he say, reveal? Does God not know something? No, but what you have in your heart, you ought to lay bare to God in speech through your confession. Confess your actions to him; and hope in him always, and he will forgive you your sins. And hope in him. That he can forgive the one who sins. And he will do it. And what, you ask, will he do?

And he will bring forth your justice like a light. To the brightness with which you believed. Your justice: that is, your works in brightness. And your judgment. By which you have chosen the things that are good. As the midday. In the full splendor of his grace, which he reveals before his angels. Or the midday is understood as the works of the saints.

Be subject to the Lord. Not to sin, but be humble before the Lord. And pray to him. For present and ancient offenses. Whence Paul said: First of all, let prayers, supplications, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for kings and for all who are in high places (1 Tim 2).

Do not be envious in him. Do not be jealous of him, as above: And your judgment as the midday. For then the just shall shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father, and all things that are now hidden shall be clear. Or, do not be envious in him who fares prosperously in his way. Let not the brief prosperity of the wicked terrify you. Cease from anger, and forsake fury. Do not strive to do evil. Lay aside anger, lest, enduring iniquity, you be compelled to repay in kind.

He who prospers in his way. He who acts successfully in this hoe. In the man who does injustice. For he hurls himself down by sinning, lest you desire to be with him who does iniquity.

Cease from anger. Which does not work the justice of God (James 1). Forsake fury. Which according to Solomon even destroys the wise (Prov. 19). Or cease, desist from anger of mind, and from fury of body. Do not emulate so as to be malicious. Lest by provoking others to wickedness, you yourself become wicked.

For those who are malicious will be exterminated. Because they have no root of piety. Or they will be exterminated from the land of the living. But those who wait for the Lord, they themselves will inherit the land. That is, the land of promise, which flows with milk and honey.

A little while yet, and the sinner will not be. Wait a little, and the sinner will not be, who will be taken away from here: because he will be crushed by divine vengeance. And you will seek his place, and you will not find it. In the future he will not be: nor will he receive a place of rest, and you will seek his place, and you will not find it. If the devil's place is sin, there will be a time when sin will not be. But this will then be, when we exult in the multitude of peace.

But the meek shall inherit the earth. Those whom no whirlwind of fury drives about, nor the fire of concupiscence inflames. They shall inherit that land of the living, because the gentle and humble shall possess the earth: that is, eternal life. And they shall delight themselves in the multitude of peace. They shall delight: that is, they shall rejoice in the multitude of peace: that is, in Christ, when they have been joined together in the kingdom of Christ, who is our peace.

The sinner shall watch the just man. That, having found an occasion, he may harm him: because through those works of the saints they themselves are tortured and tormented in this present life: that is, inwardly in the mind, by the malice and envy which they have. And he shall gnash upon him with his teeth. With the teeth of wickedness and malice, with which he strives to devour him. By the motion of the body, we have said, he shows the motion of the soul.

But the Lord shall laugh him to scorn: because he foresees that his days will come. The days of the vengeance of the wrath of God. Does the Lord laugh anyone to scorn? No, but because they themselves are worthy to be laughed to scorn in vengeance. For he foresees that his days will come: that is, the Lord knows when his destruction will come.

The sinners have drawn the sword, etc. The sword, or the arrows, of sinners are words of seduction. But the bow, or the sheath, is the mind of those from whom they are brought forth. Or, the sinners have drawn the sword, that is, the sword of the persecutors in persecution. They have bent the bow: that is, their snares against the saints. That they may deceive the poor and the needy. Not the rich of the world, but the poor of Christ. That they may slay the upright of heart. That they may destroy by seduction those who believe rightly. For then the blood of the soul is poured out, when someone is seduced by flattery and falls into sin. But these things must be referred to the heretics, against whom we ought to stand strong: that what the prophet added may come upon them.

Their sword shall enter into their own hearts, etc. For each one who speaks against God, or whose mind overflows in the foolish vanity of arrogance, and not attending to the Scriptures spiritually, corrupts them with a vicious interpretation, slays himself with his own dagger. And just as the peace of the apostles returns to them if the house is unworthy (Matt. 10), so too the sword is driven into the hearts of these men, if it is drawn against the innocent. Or, their sword shall enter into their own hides: that is, vengeance into their souls. And their bow shall be broken, their snare.

Better is a little to the righteous man than the many riches of sinners. For he fears that which the Lord says in the Gospel: What does it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, but suffer the loss of his own soul (Matt. 16)? But the little that he mentioned is faith. Although it is compared to a grain of mustard, it nevertheless has great power. Better is a little to the righteous man than the many riches of sinners. Although they are small, they are better: because Solomon said: Better is a small portion with rest, than a full gift with iniquity (Eccles. 4).

Because the arms of sinners shall be broken: the arms, that is, their strength shall be broken in vengeance, lest they harm the innocent. But the Lord confirms the righteous. In the faith of those who are converted, he strengthens what is weak.

The Lord knows the ways of the immaculate. That is, their manner of life. The Lord knows those who are his; but the unclean and those who do not know him, he does not know. For every ignorant person shall be ignored. And their inheritance shall be forever. In Christ, who is perpetual and eternal. Or it shall be forever: that is, in eternal life.

They shall not be confounded in the evil time. The evil time shows the time of judgment, in which, since the righteous do not suffer hunger, it is said of sinners: Woe to you who are filled, for you shall hunger (Luke 6). They shall not be confounded in the evil time. In the time of examination, which will be evil for the impious. And in the days of famine they shall be satisfied, even if those who are ministers of the word of God cease to be so, and these too shall be refreshed in Christ, who is the living bread. Or, in the days of famine they shall be satisfied: that is, when those sinners are empty, then the saints shall be satisfied from the grace of God. Because sinners shall perish. Because they do not keep the commandments of God, if they do not amend.

But the enemies of the Lord, as soon as they have been honored. In earthly power. And exalted. In vainglory. Failing, they shall fail like smoke. But when death comes, all their glory shall waste away like smoke or mist; because all things pass quickly.

The sinner will be changed, and he will not repay, because he will not restore the Lord's money with interest. He has received a loan from the Lord—that is, the five senses of the body, or riches—and he does not give thanks to God. But the righteous man is merciful and lends, that is, he shows mercy both to himself and to others; that is, he discerns the five senses of the body themselves. Or: the righteous man is merciful and lends. He has received the word, and he supplies spiritual things to the spiritual, so that he may gain not only himself but also others. In this verse, moreover, mercy toward the poor is also to be understood.

For those who bless him shall inherit the earth—the earth in which God's good things are stored up. Those who always praise God, they too shall possess the earth; that is, they are accustomed to possess this earth as well, and afterward they shall possess the land of the living. But those who curse him shall perish, as the Lord promises: I will be an enemy to your enemies, and I will afflict those who afflict you (Exod. 23).

By the Lord the steps of a man will be directed—the steps by which he tries to pass over to him. So too Rebecca went to inquire, not from place to place, but from life to life (Gen. 24); and Moses, his feet unbound, crossed over to see the bush (Exod. 3). And you, if you apply your mind to pass from death to life—not by the steps of the feet, but by the strength of the mind—your steps are directed by the Lord. By the Lord the steps of men will be directed, the senses of each one, as Solomon says: It is a man's part to prepare his way, but the Lord will direct his steps (Prov. 16). And he will desire his way—that he may come to himself, who is the way, the truth, and the life. Or, he desires his commandments.

When he falls, he will not be crushed. Why? Because the Lord strengthens his hand—that is, his works. When he falls, it is on account of the weakness of the flesh, because the just man falls seven times and rises again; he will not be crushed, because the Lord puts his hand under him. To one doing penance, he immediately shows mercy. Thus both David and Peter washed away their sin, once known, with tears, and were strengthened by the Lord.

I was young, and I have grown old, and I have not seen the righteous forsaken. Be not, says the Apostle, children in your minds, but be little ones in malice (2 Cor. 14). So this man was from the beginning of his life a little one in malice, but an elder in divine virtue: he understood that the righteous can never be forsaken by the Lord, nor his seed seeking the bread of heavenly teaching: of which he offered the word to the foolish. Nor his seed seeking bread. His seed, his works. Seeking bread, that is, the word of God.

All the day he is merciful and lends. The day is when each one practices good. So this man, on all the days of his life, lends his Lord's money, not for worldly gain, but to acquire heavenly things. All the day, at every time. He is merciful, from God: that is, he who ministers the teaching of God to others. And his seed shall be in blessing. The works which he performed, or the teaching which he taught, shall be blessed by the Lord. But the seed is also referred to the Christian people, who are enriched in the Church by continual blessing. And his seed shall be in blessing, in abundance and glory.

Decline from evil, in deed. And do good. What God has commanded. Decline from evil, and do good. Decline from evil: from the devil, or from sin, and do good, that is, fulfill the commandments. And dwell in the age of ages. In the Church, in the unity of faith, be with him perpetually. Because the Lord loves judgment. Right judgment, by which he distinguishes the just from the wicked.

And he will not forsake his saints. Who have placed their whole hope in him. They will be preserved forever, that is, in perpetuity, because they have desired eternal things.

The unjust will be punished. In vengeance. And the seed of the wicked will perish. The seed of the wicked: that is, their works will be punished with them in torments, and every work of theirs will be destroyed, because it is iniquitous.

But the just will possess the earth as an inheritance. The earth of the living. And they will dwell in the age of ages upon it. Upon that which is without end: from which pain and groaning flee.

The mouth of the just will meditate wisdom. That is, Christ: whence it says: And in his law he will meditate day and night (Ps. 1). When it says, he will meditate, it signifies a future time, which is understood in the kingdom of God for action: in which the mouths of the just will be filled not with the wine of luxury, nor with voluptuous foods, but with the wisdom of God. And his tongue will speak judgment. When all things are weighed; and not deceitfully, nor with anger, but with right judgment, it declares what it perceives concerning God. For in whom spiritual grace abounds, he searches out all things, even the deep things of God.

The law of his God is in his heart. That is, in the mind of the righteous man. Not only in his mouth and tongue, but also in the deep of his heart, works of holiness shall bear fruit through the law of God. And they shall not be supplanted. By the adversary. His steps. By which he strives to reach God. Or, his steps shall not be supplanted. His senses, by the devil, or by sin.

The sinner considers the righteous man, etc. For the people of the Jews beheld the righteous Son of God and gnashed their teeth at him, because he was burdensome to them even to look upon. So too now the enemy considers each one of us, to destroy him. But if he resists watchfully, what follows will come to pass.

But the Lord will not abandon him in his hands. In his power, surely. Nor will he condemn him when judgment is given to him. The impious man gives judgment, that the righteous man may perish, and the Lord does not condemn him, because he has kept his law. But he does not condemn that righteous man on the day of judgment, when he judges the impious man.

Wait for the Lord, and keep his ways. By firm hope and unfailing observance of the commandments God is awaited; therefore we ought not to be confounded amid the various temptations of the world. Wait for the Lord: whatever befalls you in prosperity and in adversity, wait patiently—that is, endure. He will exalt you, that you may take the land as an inheritance. That land, surely, of eternal blessedness, in which the righteous shall be exalted after their labors are ended. When sinners have perished, you will see. Then the righteous shall see sinners perish, when, with the Lord granting it, they receive the fruit of their reward.

I saw the wicked exalted and lifted up above the cedars of Lebanon, and I passed by, and behold, he was not. When we have crossed the sea of this world, then we shall see that the devil is not, and that sin, his place, in no way appears. The cedar has two interpretations, but in this passage its explanation is this: for just as the cedar appears exalted above the high mountains, and often falls by the impulse of the winds, so too the wicked man who, having forsaken God, trusts in the riches of the world: however much he flourishes, however much he is extolled and lifted up, he will not be found when he has departed from this world. But these things are also referred to Judas the traitor. Or the cedar of Lebanon means the saints, because of the height of their merits, and the priests, because of the fragrance of their good works. The wicked are above them, because they trample and oppress them. I passed by, and behold, he was not.

Let the apostolic company say this, because I have passed through the storm of Jesus' passion; and when he rose again, this one was not there, because he went away and hanged himself with a noose. I sought him, and his place was not found. But that his place was not found, and that his dwelling remained desolate, Peter disclosed in the Acts of the Apostles, when he substituted Matthias in his order (Acts 1). Or, he passed through and behold he was not: I sought him, and his place was not found: that is, the place of the impious man himself. His place was not found: because of the great swiftness with which they fail.

Keep innocence, and see equity. If you harm no one, if you are litigious with no one, you will see Christ, because just as he is the way, the truth, and the life, so too is he understood as equity. For there are remnants for the peaceful man. He who has lived peacefully here, so as to be called a son of God: his remnants, that is, his mortal body, are reserved for the glory of the resurrection, according to that saying of the Apostle: This mortal must put on immortality (1 Cor. 15). The remnants of the impious will perish. Instead of "remnants," the Hebrew has "last things.

But the unjust, etc.; the remnants of the impious shall perish. Their remnants are not preserved out of pride, so that they may live forever, but so that they may perish into the punishment of the fire of Gehenna.

But the salvation of the just is from the Lord. Through whom they both receive the present life and await to obtain eternal life. But the salvation of the just is from the Lord. He himself is our salvation. And he is their protector in the time of tribulation. He will help them, etc. Therefore he will save them, and he is their protector in the time of tribulation, when they walk through the narrow way that leads to life, full of sorrows and hardships. And the Lord will help them and deliver them from sinners; he will save those who have hoped in him, when he leads them to the perfection of a pure mind. They have merited to come to him, because they have hoped in him. For in all their distresses they placed their hope in him who said: I am God, and besides me there is no other. I will kill, and I will make alive; I will strike, and I will heal (Deut. 32). May he heal all the infirmities of our minds, and grant us to raise our hope with our whole heart, and bestow that it be placed in himself, so that, freed from sins, we may deserve, by his giving, to obtain also the reward of eternity.

PSALM XXXVII.

Unto the end, a Psalm of David for the remembrance of the Sabbath day. Sabbath is interpreted as rest: that is, when the saints rest: that is, when that Church rests in the rest of paradise which it lost in Adam. This psalm shows that if infirmity befalls bodily frailty, the heavenly medicine should not cease to be sought.

O Lord, rebuke me not in thy fury: neither chasten me in thy wrath. The whole psalm is in the person of a penitent: but it can be referred to Christ, as also the sixty-eighth. O Lord, rebuke me not in thy fury: neither chasten me in thy wrath. Wrath is, as we have often said, a commotion of the mind. But fury is irrational vengeance, with the bitterness of gall. Therefore this man, who knows himself a sinner, asks to be rebuked not in wrath but through mercy: nor in fury but through patience.

For thy arrows are fixed in me. The words of doctrine, which like a javelin pierced through my heart, that I might do penance. And thou hast strengthened thy hand upon me. That, as a good master, by the blows of chastisement thou mightest render the afflicted one corrected.

There is no health in my flesh because of the face of thy wrath. I saw the face of thy wrath, yet not the wrath itself: that is, I understood through the holy Scriptures how great are the things thou dost threaten to sinners, and I wasted away, beseeching that that wrath itself might not descend upon me. There is no peace in my bones because of the face of my sins. I have found no rest, neither in my bones nor in my members, until I should cleanse them by repenting.

For my iniquities have gone over my head. For they have grown strong against me, as follows: As a heavy burden they are weighed down upon me. For my sin is not light to me, but I acknowledge that it has imposed upon me the heavy weight of judgment, and has grown up over the crown of my head. As a great weight, so are my sins upon me.

My scars have rotted and become corrupt. It is the custom of swine to use mire or dung in place of good odors, nor do they understand that in these things they wallow most foully. For to me the wounds of my sins stink and putrefy, and I eagerly seek the physician. And why, you ask, have they putrefied? Because of the face of my foolishness. Because I was unwilling to do penance. Because of the face of my foolishness. By this they have putrefied, namely by my foolishness: as Paul says: That which is weak in God is stronger than men (I Cor. 2).

I have become miserable and am bowed down even to the end. Until I was cleansed by confessing, because sins are not forgiven without shame and sorrow. I went about grieving all day long. Judging myself unworthy even to dare lift my eyes to heaven, but I would strike my breast, saying: God, be merciful to me a sinner.

Because my loins are filled with illusions. He declares that he is weakened and filled with those illusions by which the devil entices the human race to sin. God, thou hast known my foolishness: because my loins are filled with illusions. Let each one consider himself and understand the titillating pleasure of the body, and then he can say with the apostle Paul: Wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from the body of this death (Rom. 7)? And that: For I do not do what I want, but what I do not want.

I am bowed down and humbled exceedingly. Unto repentance. I roared from the groaning of my heart. Seeking forgiveness with lamentation. One thing is the groaning of the body, and another the groaning of the heart. The groaning of the body is to groan on account of earthly things or on account of death. The groaning of the heart is on account of one's own sins, or those of others. But Christ had nothing to groan over, because he committed no sin. And my groaning is not hidden from thee. That is, whatever a man has, God knows. Whatever I have done wrong, whatever evil I have done, I have disclosed all to thee with groaning, knowing that hidden things are not concealed from thee.

My heart is troubled within me, my strength has forsaken me. Because I shudder to incur the wrath that I mentioned above. And the light of my eyes is not with me. Because, having set aside the light of truth, I had fallen into the darkness of sins. For our predecessors taught that the prophet pursued the entire order of this psalm in the person of a sinner. Let them think what they wish. But I, from that place where it says: My friends and my neighbors, even to the end of the psalm, see my Lord Jesus Christ surrounded by the Jews, suspended on the cross, and rising again from hell. Therefore the Lord himself says concerning his passion:

My friends and my neighbors drew near against me and stood. The Jews are called friends because of Abraham. Neighbors, because he took flesh from their generation—those who drew near to him so that he might be seized. My friends and my acquaintances stood against me. This can also be understood of the disciples, who, terrified by fear in the passion, withdrew from the Lord: to such an extent that even Peter denied him. Or they stood, bringing accusations against him.

And those who were beside me stood afar off. The apostles or the rest of the disciples, of whom the evangelist says: But when they had apprehended him, all his acquaintances stood afar off (Luke 23). And those who sought my soul were violent. They were violent—not willingly, but the Jews were; or against Peter, when they said: For even you are one of them (Luke 22). Or against James: who, when he was being dragged, left the linen cloth and fled naked from them (Mark 14). And those who sought my soul were violent: namely the Jews, as though the strength were theirs, and they had not received that very power from God.

And those who sought evils for me spoke vanities, and all day long they meditated deceits. Indeed they meditated many deceits; when they asked whether they ought to give tribute to Caesar or not (Matthew 22); or whether the woman caught in adultery should be stoned (John 8). But then they openly bring in deceit, when they produce false witnesses. Or, those who sought evils for me spoke vanity, when they said: He casts out demons in Beelzebub (Luke 11).

But I, as though deaf, did not hear, and like a mute not opening his mouth. Always I bore what they reproached me with, and I was continually silent. Pilate also makes this clear when he says: Do you not answer me? Do you not know that I have power to release you (John 19)? But I, as though mute, did not open his mouth. And before Pilate the Lord did not speak. And Isaiah speaks of the same: Like a lamb led to the slaughter, not opening his mouth (Isa. 53).

And I became like a man who does not hear and has no reproofs in his mouth. For when they smeared me with spittle, struck me with a reed, and mocked me bending the knee, I answered them nothing, being unmoved. And he has no reproofs in his mouth. Thus I was silent when accused, as though having nothing I ought to answer on my own behalf. Christ gave an example in all things, that a man ought patiently to bear scourging and correction.

Because I hoped in you, Lord, you will hear me, Lord my God: that you may raise me up. Or, you will hear me: that is, see their pride and my humility

Because I said: Lest at any time my enemies rejoice over me, and while my feet are moved. The feet of Christ in the passion: or the holy apostles, who ought to have been the feet of Christ: were moved from faith to unbelief. My feet can be moved from their stability, and my enemies insult me: if, humbled in this death of the cross, I have not risen again. They have spoken great things against me. Saying: If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross (Matthew 27).

But I am ready for the scourges. I prepare myself to endure the cross, the spear, the gall, the vinegar, so that through this death I may redeem with my blood the people who are perishing, because Christ came for this, to endure the passion. And my sorrow is always before my eyes. Until I cast out victory into judgment.

For I will announce my iniquity, and I will think for my sin. For just as he was subject to the curse, so that he might rescue us from the curse of the law, so also he declares himself a sinner, he who bore our sins, so that by a pious thought and a plan of mercy, he might rescue us from them. And I will be anxious for my sin. The sin of Christ is the offenses of the human race: on account of which it is also said to the Father that he is now subject.

But my enemies live. Because they were not immediately punished by divine vengeance. And they have been strengthened over me. They have been strengthened in the letter of the law, in which they did not understand what was spiritually announced. And those who hated me unjustly have been multiplied—certainly unjustly and not reasonably, because in this letter they believed their seed would be multiplied like the stars of heaven.

Who repaid me evil for good. They gave me vinegar and gall to drink—me, who bring the sweetness of eternal life. They spoke against me, saying: He saved others; he cannot save himself (Luke 23). Because I followed goodness, so that, fulfilling the will of the Father, I might take up death for the life of the people.

Do not forsake me, O Lord my God; do not depart from me, when I have penetrated the depths of hell.

Attend to my help, O Lord, God of my salvation. It is clear, O Lord Jesus, that the Father attended to you, raising you from the dead on the third day and placing you at his right hand in the heavens above every principality and power, giving you the name that is above every name. Therefore, since the struggles of the flesh are heavy, do you, O Lord, attend to our help, and be our salvation in the time of tribulation.

PSALM XXXVIII.

Unto the end, for Idithun, a Canticle of David. Idithun is interpreted as "leaping over them." This psalm teaches patience, that a man, bridling his mouth, should take heed lest through foolishness of words he fall into sin: because the prophet knows that even for idle words an account must be rendered. It teaches also that we should lay up treasure in the world of those things which pertain to the profit of souls.

I said, I will keep my ways: that I sin not with my tongue. I know no other way to keep the ways of my life: except that I speak not foolish things, nor varied things, nor idle things. By thy words, says the Lord, thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned. I said, I will keep my ways: that is, I have resolved to keep my works: namely, the five senses of the body. That I sin not with my tongue. I shall not sin, I shall not offend: because he who keeps his tongue keeps his soul (Prov. xviii): because death and life are in the hands of the tongue (Isai. xxxii). And again: The cultivation of justice is silence and peace (Eccli. xxviii).

I set a guard upon my mouth. According to that saying: Bind up your money and your gold well, and make a door and a bolt for your mouth. For the guarding of the mouth makes a man blessed, when he utters not vain things, but things worthy of God. When the sinner stood against me. That is, the devil, who curses and slanders the just, and is the instigator of those who lie in wait for the saints.

I was dumb. Lest I should clamor against those who rebuke me. I was dumb, and opened not my mouth, because you have done it. Therefore I bear it patiently, because I know that you have left me to temptations for my proving. And I was humbled. To endure their reproaches. And I was silent from good things. From a good conscience came my security; therefore I did not justify myself before men, nor did I make known the good things that were in me, because I know that the Father who sees in secret will repay me. And my sorrow was renewed. For I had not yet come to the perfect man. For though I endured reproaches with sorrow, yet I did not know how to bless those who curse. Or, my sorrow was renewed. In this the sorrow of Christ is spoken of, because they were not worthy to hear the words of the mystery, as the prophet says: Woe is me, because I have been silent (Isa. 6). Or that saying: I will make your tongue cleave to your palate, because the Lord is provoking (Ezek. 3).

My heart grew hot within me. The Church speaks: from the remembrance of former sins. And in my meditation a fire shall be kindled. What, you ask, were you meditating on? Surely on this: how I might find that fire which consumes sins and enlightens the mind, which is the Holy Spirit, of whom Cleophas and those who were with him said: Was not our heart burning within us, while he spoke to us on the way, and opened to us the Scriptures (Luke 24)?

I spoke with my tongue. That is, I preached to all men, so that this might be fulfilled: If you do not announce to the wicked man his iniquity, I will require his blood at your hand (Ezekiel 3). Make known to me, Lord, my end. And what is the number of my days? The prophet does not seek to have the end of this life made known to him, but that end by which, with the powers emptied out and death destroyed, he may be joined to Christ, who is the end of the law. Nor does he wish to know the number of these days, but of those of which the Lord says: In my Father's house there are many mansions (John 14). And what is the number of my days? That is, number without number, day without day, times without time. What is it? He who always is. That I may know what is lacking to me. That is, that you may make me understand all good things, so that when I have known these, I may know what is still lacking to me, while I dwell in the world, for obtaining the palm of blessedness. For Paul was perfect, who said: I have fought the good fight: I have finished the course.

But now the crown of righteousness is lacking to me, which the Lord will render to me (II Tim. iv). That he does not say these things of his own days, the following words teach.

Behold, you have made my days measurable. According to the old man they have been until now: now I desire the new, that which Abraham saw and rejoiced (John viii). In which we are elsewhere exhorted to rejoice, in which God the Lord has shone upon us. He who is not illuminated by the sun nor by the moon, but shines with perpetual light from the Lord himself. And my substance is as nothing before you. Receiving your brightness with a higher mind: I judged my substance as nothing.

Yet all is vanity, every man living. If he is a sinner, and has flowed in delights, he subsists in vanity. If he is just, and desires to be dissolved, and to be with Christ, the present life is nonetheless vain for him.

Yet in the image of God man passes by, but is vainly troubled. Every man was made in the image of God. If therefore he seems to walk in it, and is engaged in plunder and lusts, he is troubled in action.