1 To the choirmaster. To the Lilies. A testimony. Of Asaph. A psalm. Shepherd of Israel, give ear — you who lead Joseph like a flock, you who sit on the cherubim, shine forth.
Gregory the Dialogist · AD 604 It should also be known that often the very orders of blessed spirits take on the names of orders neighboring them. For we have said that the Thrones, that is, the seats of God, are a special order of blessed spirits, and yet it is said by the Psalmist: "You who sit upon the cherubim, appear," because, evidently, since in those very distinctions of hosts the cherubim are joined…
Hear Us, O Shepherd of Israel 2 Before Ephraim and Benjamin and Manasseh, stir up your might, and come for salvation for us.
Augustine of Hippo · AD 430 What is, "Thou that feedest Israel, hearken, Thou that conducteth Joseph like sheep"? (ver. 1). He is being invoked to come, He is being expected until He come, He is being yearned for until He come. Therefore may He find "men guiding:" "Thou that conductest," he saith, "Joseph like sheep:" Joseph himself like sheep. Joseph himself are the sheep, and Joseph himself is a sheep.
3 God, restore us, and make your face shine, and we will be saved.
Augustine of Hippo · AD 430 For whatever other words we may say, whatever words the fervor of the suppliant utters at the beginning of his petition to define it or follows up afterward to intensify it, we say nothing that is not found in this prayer of the Lord, if we pray properly and fittingly.
4 LORD God of hosts, how long will you smoke against the prayer of your people?
Augustine of Hippo · AD 430 "O Lord God of virtues, how long will You be angry with the prayer of Your servant?" [Psalm 80:4]. Now Your servant. You were angry at the prayer of Your enemy, will You still be angry with the prayer of Your servant? You have converted us, we know You, and will You still be angry with the prayer of Your servant?
5 You have fed them bread of tears, and made them drink tears by the measure.
Augustine of Hippo · AD 430 "You will feed us with the bread of tears, and wilt give us to drink with tears in measure" [Psalm 80:5]. What is, "in measure"? Hear the Apostle: "Faithful is God, who does not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able to bear." [1 Corinthians 10:13] The measure is, according to your powers: the measure is, that you be instructed, not that thou be crushed.
Caesarius of Arles · AD 542 We have said this, brothers, so that you may know that in the Old Testament God's justice orders a year's punishment to make up for the sin of one day. In other words, the people were tormented in the desert for forty years because of the defection of forty days.
6 You make us strife to our neighbors, and our enemies mock among themselves.
Augustine of Hippo · AD 430 "You have set us for a contradiction to our neighbours" [Psalm 80:6]. Evidently this did come to pass: for out of Asaph were chosen they that should go to the Gentiles and preach Christ, and should have it said to them, "Who is this proclaimer of new demons?" "You have set us for a contradiction to our neighbours." For they were preaching Him who was the subject of the contradi…
7 God of hosts, restore us, and make your face shine, and we will be saved.
Augustine of Hippo · AD 430 "And our enemies have sneered at us." And where are they that sneered? For a long while it was said, Who are they that worship the Dead One, that adore the Crucified? For a long while so it was said. Where is the nose of them that sneered? Now do not they that censure flee into caves, that they may not be seen?
8 You brought a vine out of Egypt; you drove out nations and planted it.
Origen of Alexandria · AD 253 Hear also elsewhere how God plants. The prophet says: "You transferred a vine out of Egypt, you cast out the nations and planted it. You made a way passable before it, you planted its roots, and it filled the earth. Its shadow covered the mountains, and its branches the cedars of God." Do you now notice how God plants and where he plants?
Augustine of Hippo · AD 430 "A vineyard out of Egypt You have brought over, You have cast out the nations, and hast planted her" [Psalm 80:8]. It was done, we know. How many nations were cast out? Amorites, Cethites, Jebusites, Gergesites, and Evites: after whose expulsion and overthrow, there was led in the people delivered out of Egypt, into the land of promise.
9 You cleared a place before it, and it took root and filled the land.
Augustine of Hippo · AD 430 "A way You have made in the sight of her, and hast planted the roots of her, and she has filled the land" [Psalm 80:9]. Would she have filled the land, unless a way had been made in the sight of her? What was the way which was made in the sight of her? "I am," He says, "the Way, the Truth, and the Life." [John 14:6] With reason she has filled the land.
10 The mountains were covered by its shade, and its branches were cedars of God.
11 It sent out its boughs to the sea, and its shoots to the River.
12 Why have you broken through its fences, so that all who pass along the way pluck it?
Origen of Alexandria · AD 253 No one who stands blasphemes Jesus, nor anyone who walks aright; for it was those passing by who blasphemed him (or, as the Greek has it, those going past), who also, once the fence of the vineyard has been broken down by God, gather as their vintage those who have remained; for it is written: "Why have you cast down its fence, and all who pass by the way gather it as their vin…
Augustine of Hippo · AD 430 Then what? "Wherefore have You thrown down her enclosure?" [Psalm 80:12]. Now ye see the overthrow of that nation of the Jews: already out of another Psalm you have heard, "with axe and hammer they have thrown her down." When could this have been done, except her enclosure had been thrown down. What is her enclosure? Her defence.
13 The boar from the forest gnaws it, and what moves in the field feeds on it.
Jerome · AD 420 What is there in human life that can be safe if innocence is made the object of accusation? I am the householder who finds that while he slept the enemy has sown tares among his wheat. "The wild boar out of the wood has rooted up my vineyard, and the strange wild beast has devoured it." I keep silence, but a letter that is not mine speaks against me.
Augustine of Hippo · AD 430 "There has laid her waste the boar from the wood" [Psalm 80:13]. In the boar from the wood what do we understand? To the Jews a swine is an abomination, and in a swine they imagine as it were the uncleanness of the Gentiles. But by the Gentiles was overthrown the nation of the Jews: but that king who overthrew, was not only an unclean swine, but was also a boar.
14 God of hosts, turn back, please; look from heaven and see, and attend to this vine,
Augustine of Hippo · AD 430 But with what profit is this? "O God of virtues turn Thou nevertheless" (ver. 14). Although these things have been done, "Turn Thou nevertheless." "Look from heaven and see, and visit this vineyard." "And perfect Thou her whom Thy right hand hath planted" (ver. 15). No other plant Thou, but this make Thou perfect.
15 and the stock that your right hand planted, and the son you made strong for yourself.
16 It is burned with fire, cut down; at the rebuke of your face they perish.
Augustine of Hippo · AD 430 "Things burned with fire, and dug up, by the rebuke of Thy countenance shall perish" (ver. 16). What are the things burned with fire and dug up which shall perish from the rebuke of His countenance? Let us see and perceive what are the things burned with fire and dug up. Christ hath rebuked what? Sins: by the rebuke of His countenance sins have perished.
17 Let your hand be upon the man of your right hand, upon the son of man you made strong for yourself.
Augustine of Hippo · AD 430 "Let Your hand be upon the Man of Your right hand, and upon the Son of Man whom You have strengthened Yourself" [Psalm 80:17]. "And we depart not from You....You will quicken us, and Your Name we will invoke" [Psalm 80:18]. You shall be sweet to us, "You will quicken us." For aforetime we did love earth, not You: but You have mortified our members which are upon the earth.
18 And we will not turn back from you; give us life, and we will call on your name.
19 LORD God of hosts, restore us; make your face shine, and we will be saved.