Psalms 109 · The Lantern

O God of my praise, do not be silent;

For, the mouth of the lawless one and the mouth of the deceiver, against me, are open, They have spoken to me with false tongue;

And, with words of hatred, have they surrounded me, and have made war upon me without cause:

For my love, they have been accusing me, while, I, was at prayer:

Yea they have returned unto me—Evil for good; and, Hatred for my love.

Set in charge over him, one who is lawless, and let, an accuser, stand at his right hand;

When he is judged, let him go out condemned, and let, his own petition, become a sin;

This is certainly what David also says in the Psalms. "Let his prayer become sin," when not only is there nothing of worth sought in his sacrifices but even much of blame.

"Let his days be few" [Psalm 109:7]. By "his days," he meant the days of his apostleship, which were few; since before the Passion of our Lord, they were ended by his crime and death. And as if it were asked, What then shall become of that most sacred number twelve, within which our Lord willed, not without a meaning, to limit His twelve first Apostles?

But still, what is more serious, another asks for the death of an enemy, and the one whom he cannot pursue with a sword, he pursues with prayer. And the one who is cursed still lives, yet the one who curses is already held guilty of his death. But God commands that an enemy be loved, and yet God is asked to kill an enemy.

Let his days become few, his overseership, let another take;

And in those days Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples, and said, (the number of names together were about an hundred and twenty,) Men and brethren, this scripture must needs have been fulfilled, which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake before concerning Judas, which was guide to them that took Jesus.

Let his days be few. His days were made few, but his nights increased: for he was cut off in the middle of his days. The sun withdrew from him, and behold, darkness was multiplied for him. And let another receive his episcopate. This too is interpreted more plainly in the Acts of the Apostles. But it was not only spoken of Judas in that time, it is spoken even to this day.

Petilianus said, "We must consider, I say, and declare how far the treacherous traditor is to be accounted dead while yet in life.

Let his children become fatherless, and his wife a widow;

Let his children, wander about, and beg, Let them be driven out of their ruins;

Let the creditor take aim at all that he hath, and let strangers prey on the fruit of his toil;

Let him have no one to continue lovingkindness, and there be none to favour his fatherless children;

Let his posterity be for cutting off, In another generation, let their name be wiped out;

Remembered be the iniquity of his fathers against Yahweh, and, the sin of his mother, let it not be wiped out;

Let the iniquity of his fathers come into remembrance in the sight of the Lord. They sinned in the desert, he forgave them: now he reckons against them what they sinned then, since they have crucified the Lord. Or let us interpret it otherwise. He reckons against them the cruelty of their murders, and forgives them nothing. And let the sin of his mother not be blotted out.

"Let them always be against the Lord" [Psalm 109:14]. "Against the Lord," means in the Lord's sight: for other translators have rendered this line, "let them be always in the sight of the Lord;" while others have rendered it, "let them be before the Lord always;" as it is elsewhere said, "You have set our misdeeds in Your sight." By "alway," he means that this great crime shoul…

Let them be before Yahweh continually, and let the memory of them, be cut off out of the earth.

Because that he remembered not to show lovingkindness, but pursued the man that was oppressed and needy, that, the downhearted, he might slay.

Because he loved cursing, May it have come upon him, Because he delighted not in blessing, May it have kept far from him;

Because he clothed himself in cursing as his outer garment, therefore may it have entered like water into his inward part, and like oil into his bones;

Be it his, as a garment he shall wrap round him, and for a girdle he shall, at all times, gird on:

This, be the reward of mine accusers, from Yahweh, even of them who are speaking wrongfully against my life.

But, thou, Yahweh, Adonay, deal effectually with me, for the sake of thy Name, Since good is thy lovingkindness, O rescue me;

For, oppressed and needy, I am, and, my heart, is wounded within me.

As a shadow when it stretcheth out, I am gone, I am shaken off like the locust;

My knees, tremble from fasting, and, my flesh, faileth of fatness:

My knees are weakened from fasting. Take consolation, O monk, in fasting: since the Lord too did this. I say that when a monk fasts, he becomes stronger through fasting; and when his knees are weakened by fasting, then he is most of all strengthened. And my flesh is changed on account of oil.

"I became also a reproach unto them" [Psalm 109:24]: through the death of the Cross. "For Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us." [Galatians 3:13] "They looked upon Me, and shaked their heads." Because they beheld His crucifixion, without beholding His resurrection: they saw when His knees were weakened, they saw not when His flesh was chan…

And thus also thou canst shew that all the righteous men and Prophets, either by their own will, or by God's command unto them, endured always tribulations and labours, even as the blessed David maketh known that from the severity of his fasting the very limbs of his body had become enfeebled, saying, "My knees have become sick through fasting, and my flesh faileth of fatness."

So, I, am become a reproach for them, They see me, they shake their head.

Help me! O Yahweh my God, Save me, according to thy lovingkindness:

That they may know that, Thine own hand, this is, Thou, Yahweh, hast done it.

They, may curse if, thou, wilt bless,—Mine assailants, shall be ashamed, but, thy servant, shall rejoice;

Mine accusers shall be clothed with confusion, and shall wrap about them, like a cloak, their own shame.

I will thank Yahweh loudly with my mouth, Yea, in the midst of multitudes, will I praise him;

Because he standeth at the right hand of the needy, To save, from them who would pass sentence on his life.

Psalms109