Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Psalms 128:1 - 128:1
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
The כִּי in Psa 128:2 signifies neither “for” (Aquila, κόπον τῶν ταρσῶν σου ὅτι φάγεσαι), nor “when” (Symmachus, κόπον χειρῶν σου ἐωθίων); it is the directly affirmative כִּי, which is sometimes thus placed after other words in a clause (Psa 118:10-12, Gen 18:20; Gen 41:32). The proof in favour of this asseverating כִּי is the very usual כִּי עַתָּה in the apodoses of hypothetical protases, or even כִּי־אָז in Job 11:15, or also only כִּי in Isa 7:9, 1Sa 14:39; “surely then;” the transition from the confirmative to the affirmative signification is evident from Psa 128:4 of the Psalm before us. To support one's self by one's own labour is a duty which even a Paul did not wish to avoid (Act 20:34), and so it is a great good fortune (טֹוב לְךָ as in Psa 119:71) to eat the produce of the labour of one's own hands (lxx , τοὺς καρποὺς τῶν πόνων, or according to an original reading, τοὺς πὸνους τῶν καρπῶν);
(Note: The fact that the τῶν καρπῶν of the lxx here, as in Pro 31:20, is intended to refer to the hands is noted by Theodoret and also by Didymus (in Rosenmuller): καρποὺς φησὶνῦν ὡς ἀπὸ μέρους τὰς χεῖρας (i.e., per synecdochen partis pro toto), τουτέστι τῶν πρακτικῶν σου δυνάμεων φάγεσαι τοὺς πόνους.)
For he who can make himself useful to others and still is also independent of them, he eats the bread of blessing which God gives, which is sweeter than the bread of charity which men give. In close connection with this is the prosperity of a house that is at peace and contented within itself, of an amiable and tranquil and hopeful (rich in hope) family life. “Thy wife (אֶשְׁתְּךָ, found only here, for אִשְׁתְּךָ) is as a fruit-producing vine.” פֹּרִיָּה for פֹּרָה, from פָּרָה = פָּרַי, with the Jod of the root retained, like בֹוכִיָּה, Lam 1:16. The figure of the vine is admirably suited to the wife, who is a shoot or sprig of the husband, and stands in need of the man's support as the vine needs a stick or the wall of a house (pergula). בְּיַרְכְּתֵי בֵיתֶךָ does not belong to the figure, as Kimchi is of opinion, who thinks of a vine starting out of the room and climbing up in the open air outside. What is meant is the angle, corner, or nook (יַרְכְּתֵי, in relation to things and artificial, equivalent to the natural יְרֵכֵי), i.e., the background, the privacy of the house, where the housewife, who is not to be seen much out of doors, leads a quiet life, entirely devoted to the happiness of her husband and her family. The children springing from such a nobel vine, planted around the family table, are like olive shoots or cuttings; cf. in Euripides, Medea, 1098: τέκνων ἐν οἴκοις γλυκερὸν βλάστημα, and Herc. Fur. 839: καλλίπαις στέφανος. thus fresh as young layered small olive-trees and thus promising are they.