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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Psalms 17:13 - 17:13
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The phrase קִדֵּם פְּנֵי, antevertere faciem alicujus, means both to appear before any one with reverence, Psa 95:2 (post-biblical: to pay one's respects to any one) and to meet any one as an enemy, rush on him. The foe springs like a lion upon David, may Jahve - so he prays - as his defence cross the path of the lion and intercept him, and cast him down so that he, being rendered harmless, shall lie there with bowed knees (כָּרַע, of the lion, Gen 49:9; Num 24:9). He is to rescue his soul from the ungodly חַרְבֶּךָ. This חרבךְ, and also the יָֽדְךָ which follows, can be regarded as a permutative of the subject (Böttcher, Hupfeld, and Hitzig), an explanation which is commended by Psa 44:3 and other passages. But it is much more probable that more exact definitions of this kind are treated as accusatives, vid., on Psa 3:5. At any rate “sword” and “hand” are meant as the instruments by which the פַּלֵּט, rescuing, is effected. The force of פַּלְּטָה extends into Psa 17:14, and mimatiym (with a Chateph under the letter that is freed from reduplication, like מִֽמֲכון, Psa 33:14) corresponds to מֵרָשָׁע, as יָֽדְךָ to חַרְבֶּךָ. The word ממתים (plural of מַת, men, Deu 2:34, whence מְתֹם, each and every one), which of itself gives no complete sense, is repeated and made complete after the interruption cause by the insertion of יָֽדְךָ ה, - a remarkable manner of obstructing and then resuming the thought, which Hofmann (Schriftbeweis ii. 2. 495) seeks to get over by a change in the division of the verse and in the interpunction. חֶלֶד, either from חָלַד Syriac to creep, glide, slip away (whence חֻלְדָּה a weasel, a mole) or from חָלַד Talmudic to cover, hide, signifies: this temporal life which glides by unnoticed (distinct from the Arabic chald, chuld, an abiding stay, endless duration); and consequently חֶדֶל, limited existence, from חָדַל to have an end, alternates with חֶלֶד as a play upon the letters, comp. Psa 49:2 with Isa 38:11. The combination מחלד מתים resembles Psa 10:18; Psa 16:4. What is meant, is: men who have no other home but the world, which passeth away with the lust thereof, men ἐκ τοῦ κόσμου τούτου, or υίοὶ τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου. The meaning of the further description חֶלְקָם בַּחַיִּים (cf. Ecc 9:9) becomes clear from the converse in Psa 16:5. Jahve is the חֵלֶק of the godly man; and the sphere within which the worldling claims his חלק is הַחַיִּים, this temporal, visible, and material life. This is everything to him; whereas the godly man says: טֹּוב חַסְדְּךָ מֵחַיִּים, Psa 63:4. The contrast is not so much between this life and the life to come, as between the world (life) and God. Here we see into the inmost nature of the Old Testament faith. To the Old Testament believer, all the blessedness and glory of the future life, which the New Testament unfolds, is shut up in Jahve. Jahve is his highest good, and possessing Him he is raised above heaven and earth, above life and death. To yield implicitly to Him, without any explicit knowledge of a blessed future life, to be satisfied with Him, to rest in Him, to hide in Him in the face of death, is the characteristic of the Old Testament faith. חלקם בחיים expresses both the state of mind and the lot of the men of the world. Material things which are their highest good, fall also in abundance to their share. The words “whose belly Thou fillest with Thy treasure” (Chethîb: וּצְפִינְךָ the usual participial form, but as a participle an Aramaising form) do not sound as though the poet meant to say that God leads them to repentance by the riches of His goodness, but on the contrary that God, by satisfying their desires which are confined to the outward and sensuous only, absolutely deprives them of all claim to possessions that extend beyond the world and this present temporal life. Thus, then, צָפוּן in this passage is used exactly as צְפוּנִים is used in Job 20:26 (from צָפַן to hold anything close to one, to hold back, to keep by one). Moreover, there is not the slightest alloy of murmur or envy in the words. The godly man who lacks these good things out of the treasury of God, has higher delights; he can exclaim, Psa 31:20 : “how great is Thy goodness which Thou hast laid up (צָפַנְתָּ) for those who fear Thee!” Among the good things with which God fills the belly and house of the ungodly (Job 22:17.) are also children in abundance; these are elsewhere a blessing upon piety (Psa 127:3., Psa 128:3.), but to those who do not acknowledge the Giver they are a snare to self-glorifying, Job 21:11 (cf. Wisdom Job 4:1). בָּנִים is not the subject, but an accusative, and has been so understood by all the old translators from the original text, just as in the phrase שָׁבַע יָמִים to be satisfied with, or weary of, life. On עֹֽולֲלֹים vid., on Psa 8:3. יֶתֶר (from יָתַר to stretch out in length, then to be overhanging, towering above, projecting, superfluous, redundant) signifies here, as in Job 22:20, riches and the abundance of things possessed.