Psa 65:9-13 | KD | STEP | The praise of God on account of the present year’s rich blessing, which He has bestowed upon the land of His people. In , God is thanked for having sent down the rain required for the ploughing (vid., Commentary on Isaiah , ii. 522) and for the increase of the seed sown, so that, as vv. 12-14 affirm, there is the prospect of a rich harvest. The harvest itself, as follows from v. 14 b , is not yet housed. The whole of , is a retrospect; in vv. 12-14 the whole is a description of the blessing standing before their eyes, which God has put upon the year now drawing to a close. Certainly, if the forms רוּה and נחת were supplicatory imperatives, then the prayer for the early or seed-time rain would attach itself to the retrospect in , and the standpoint would be not about the time of the Passover and Pentecost, both festivals belonging to the beginning of the harvest, but about the time of the feast of Tabernacles, the festival of thanksgiving for the harvest, and vv. 12-14 would be a glance into the future (Hitzig). But there is nothing to indicate that in the retrospect changes into a looking forward. The poet goes on with the same theme, and also arranges the words accordingly, for which reason רוּה and נחת are not to be understood in any other way. שׁקק beside העשׁיר (to enrich) signifies to cause to run over, overflow, i.e., to put anything in a state of plenty or abundance, from שׁוּק ( Hiph . , to yield in abundance), Arab, sâq , to push, impel, to cause to go on in succession and to follow in succession. רבּת (for which we find רבּה in ) is an adverb, copiously, richly ( ; ; ), like מאת, a hundred times ( ). תּעשׁרנּה is Hiph . with the middle syllable shortened, Ges. §53, 3, rem. 4. The fountain (פּלג) of God is the name given here to His inexhaustible stores of blessing, and more particularly the fulness of the waters of the heavens from which He showers down fertilizing rain. כּן, “thus thoroughly,” forms an alliteration with הכין, to prepare, and thereby receives a peculiar twofold colouring. The meaning is: God, by raising and tending, prepared the produce of the field which the inhabitants of the land needed; for He thus thoroughly prepared the land in conformity with the fulness of His fountain, viz., by copiously watering (רוּה infin. absol . instead of רוּה, as in ; ; ; ; Hos 6:9) the furrows of the land and pressing down, i.e., softening by means of rain, its ridges (גּדוּדה, defective plural, as e.g., in Rth 2:13), which the ploughshare has made. תּלם (related by root with Arab. tll , tell , a hill, prop. that which is thrown out to a place, that which is thrown up, a mound) signifies a furrow as being formed by casting up or (if from Arab. ṯlm , ébrécher , to make a fracture, rent, or notch in anything) by tearing into, breaking up the ground; גּדוּד (related by root with uchdûd and chaṭṭ , the usual Arabic words for a furrow as being formed by cutting into the ground. In the year in itself appears as a year of divine goodness (טובה, bonitas ), and the prospective blessing of harvest as the crown which is set upon it. For Thou hast crowned “the year of Thy goodness” and “with Thy goodness” are different assertions, with which also different (although kindred as to substance) ideas are associated. The futures after עטרתּ depict its results as they now lie out to view. The chariot-tracks (vid., ) drop with exuberant fruitfulness, even the meadows of the uncultivated and, without rain, unproductive pasture land (Job 38:26.). The hills are personified in in the manner of which Isaiah in particular is so fond (e.g., ; ), and which we find in the Psalms of his type (Psa 96:11., Psa 98:7., cf. ). Their fresh, verdant appearance is compared to a festive garment, with which those which previously looked bare and dreary gird themselves; and the corn to a mantle in which the valleys completely envelope themselves (עטף with the accusative, like Arab. t‛ṭṭf with b of the garment: to throw it around one, to put it on one’s self). The closing words, locking themselves as it were with the beginning of the Psalm together, speak of joyous shouting and singing that continues into the present time. The meadows and valleys (Böttcher) are not the subject, of which it cannot be said that they sing; nor can the same be said of the rustling of the waving corn-fields (Kimchi). The expression requires men to be the subject, and refers to men in the widest and most general sense. Everywhere there is shouting coming up from the very depths of the breast ( Hithpal .), everywhere songs of joy; for this is denoted by שׁיר in distinction from קנן. Thanksgiving for a National and Personal Deliverance From onwards we find ourselves in the midst of a series of Psalms which, with a varying arrangement of the words, are inscribed both מזמור and שׁיר (Ps 65-68). The two words שׁיר מזמור stand according to the accents in the stat. constr . ( ), and therefore signify a Psalm-song . This series, as is universally the case, is arranged according to the community of prominent watchwords. In we read: “To Thee is the vow paid,” and in : “I will pay Thee my vows;” in : “Blessed be Elohim,” and in Psalms 67:8: “Elohim shall bless us.” Besides, Ps 66 and have this feature in common, that למנצח, which occurs fifty-five times in the Psalter, is accompanied by the name of the poet in every instance, with the exception of these two anonymous Psalms. The frequently occurring Sela of both Psalms also indicates that they were intended to have a musical accompaniment. These annotations referring to the temple-music favour the pre-exilic rather than the post-exilic origin of the two Psalms. Both are purely Elohimic; only in one instance (Psa 6:1-10 :18) does אדני, equally belonging to this style of Psalm, alternate with Elohim . On the ground of some deliverance out of oppressive bondage that has been experienced by Israel arises in Psalms 66 the summons to the whole earth to raise a shout of praise unto God. The congregation is the subject speaking as far as Psa 66:12. From the person of the poet appears in the foreground; but that which brings him under obligation to present a thank-offering is nothing more nor less than that which the whole congregation, and he together with it, has experienced. It is hardly possible to define this event more minutely. The lofty consciousness of possessing a God to whom all the world must bow, whether cheerfully or against its will, became strong among the Jewish people more especially after the overthrow of Assyria in the reign of Hezekiah. But there is no ground for conjecturing either Isaiah or Hezekiah to be the composer of this Psalm. If עולם in signified the world (Hitzig), then he would be (vid., ) one of the latest among the Old Testament writers; but it has the same meaning here that it has everywhere else in Old Testament Hebrew. In the Greek Church this Psalm is called Ψαλμὸς ἀναστάσεως; the lxx gives it this inscription, perhaps with reference to , ἐξήγαγες ἡμᾶς εἰς ἀναψυχήν.

‏ Psalms 65:9-13

The praise of God on account of the present year’s rich blessing, which He has bestowed upon the land of His people. In Psa 65:10, Psa 65:11 God is thanked for having sent down the rain required for the ploughing (vid., Commentary on Isaiah, ii. 522) and for the increase of the seed sown, so that, as vv. 12-14 affirm, there is the prospect of a rich harvest. The harvest itself, as follows from v. 14 b, is not yet housed. The whole of Psa 65:10, Psa 65:11 is a retrospect; in vv. 12-14 the whole is a description of the blessing standing before their eyes, which God has put upon the year now drawing to a close. Certainly, if the forms רוּה and נחת were supplicatory imperatives, then the prayer for the early or seed-time rain would attach itself to the retrospect in Psa 65:11, and the standpoint would be not about the time of the Passover and Pentecost, both festivals belonging to the beginning of the harvest, but about the time of the feast of Tabernacles, the festival of thanksgiving for the harvest, and vv. 12-14 would be a glance into the future (Hitzig). But there is nothing to indicate that in Psa 65:11 the retrospect changes into a looking forward. The poet goes on with the same theme, and also arranges the words accordingly, for which reason רוּה and נחת are not to be understood in any other way. שׁקק beside העשׁיר (to enrich) signifies to cause to run over, overflow, i.e., to put anything in a state of plenty or abundance, from שׁוּק (Hiph. Joe 2:24, to yield in abundance), Arab, sâq, to push, impel, to cause to go on in succession and to follow in succession. רבּת (for which we find רבּה in Psa 62:3) is an adverb, copiously, richly (Psa 120:6; Psa 123:4; Psa 129:1), like מאת, a hundred times (Ecc 8:12). תּעשׁרנּה is Hiph. with the middle syllable shortened, Ges. §53, 3, rem. 4. The fountain (פּלג) of God is the name given here to His inexhaustible stores of blessing, and more particularly the fulness of the waters of the heavens from which He showers down fertilizing rain. כּן, “thus thoroughly,” forms an alliteration with הכין, to prepare, and thereby receives a peculiar twofold colouring. The meaning is: God, by raising and tending, prepared the produce of the field which the inhabitants of the land needed; for He thus thoroughly prepared the land in conformity with the fulness of His fountain, viz., by copiously watering (רוּה infin. absol. instead of רוּה, as in 1Sa 3:12; 2Ch 24:10; Exo 22:22; Jer 14:19; Hos 6:9) the furrows of the land and pressing down, i.e., softening by means of rain, its ridges (גּדוּדה, defective plural, as e.g., in Rth 2:13), which the ploughshare has made. תּלם (related by root with Arab. tll , tell, a hill, prop. that which is thrown out to a place, that which is thrown up, a mound) signifies a furrow as being formed by casting up or (if from Arab. ṯlm , ébrécher, to make a fracture, rent, or notch in anything) by tearing into, breaking up the ground; גּדוּד (related by root with uchdûd and chaṭṭ, the usual Arabic words for a furrow ^{▼▼Fürst erroneously explains תּלם as a bed or strip of ground between two deep furrows, in distinction from מענה or מענית (vid., on Psa 129:3), a furrow. Beds such as we have in our potato fields are unknown to Syrian agriculture. There is a mode which may be approximately compared with it called ketif (כּתף), another far wider called meskeba (משׂכּבה). The Arabic tilm (תּלם, Hebrew תּלם = talm), according to the Kamûs (as actually in Magrebinish Arabic) talam (תּלם), corresponds exact to our furrow, i.e., (as the Turkish Kamûs explains) a ditch-like fissure which the iron of the plough cuts into the field. Neshwân (i. 491) says: “The verb talam, fut. jatlumand jatlim, signifies in Jemen and in the Ghôr (the land on the shore of the Red Sea) the crevices (Arab. 'l - šuqûq) which the ploughman forms, and tilm, collective plural tilâm, is, in the countries mentioned, a furrow of the corn-field. Some persons pronounce the word even thilm, collective plural thilâm.” Thus it is at the present day universally in Ḥaurân; in Edre‛ât I heard the water-furrow of a corn-field called thilm el-kanâh (Arab. ṯlm 'l - qnât). But this pronunciation with Arab. ṯ is certainly not the original one, but has arisen through a substitution of the cognate and more familiar verbal stem Arab. ṯlm , cf. šrm, to slit (shurêm, a harelip). In other parts of Syria and Palestine, also where the distinction between the sounds Arab. t and ṯ is carefully observed, I have only heard the pronunciation tilm. - Wetzstein.)} as being formed by cutting into the ground.

In Psa 65:12 the year in itself appears as a year of divine goodness (טובה, bonitas), and the prospective blessing of harvest as the crown which is set upon it. For Thou hast crowned “the year of Thy goodness” and “with Thy goodness” are different assertions, with which also different (although kindred as to substance) ideas are associated. The futures after עטרתּ depict its results as they now lie out to view. The chariot-tracks (vid., Deu 33:26) drop with exuberant fruitfulness, even the meadows of the uncultivated and, without rain, unproductive pasture land (Job 38:26.). The hills are personified in Psa 65:13 in the manner of which Isaiah in particular is so fond (e.g., Psa 44:23; Psa 49:13), and which we find in the Psalms of his type (Psa 96:11., Psa 98:7., cf. Psa 89:13). Their fresh, verdant appearance is compared to a festive garment, with which those which previously looked bare and dreary gird themselves; and the corn to a mantle in which the valleys completely envelope themselves (עטף with the accusative, like Arab. t‛ṭṭf with b of the garment: to throw it around one, to put it on one’s self). The closing words, locking themselves as it were with the beginning of the Psalm together, speak of joyous shouting and singing that continues into the present time. The meadows and valleys (Böttcher) are not the subject, of which it cannot be said that they sing; nor can the same be said of the rustling of the waving corn-fields (Kimchi). The expression requires men to be the subject, and refers to men in the widest and most general sense. Everywhere there is shouting coming up from the very depths of the breast (Hithpal.), everywhere songs of joy; for this is denoted by שׁיר in distinction from קנן. Thanksgiving for a National and Personal Deliverance

From Psa 65:1-13 onwards we find ourselves in the midst of a series of Psalms which, with a varying arrangement of the words, are inscribed both מזמור and שׁיר (Ps 65-68). The two words שׁיר מזמור stand according to the accents in the stat. constr. (Psa 88:1), and therefore signify a Psalm-song. ^{▼▼If it were meant to be rendered canticum psalmus (not psalmi) it would surely have been accented למנצּח שׁיר מזמור (for למנצח שׁיר מזמור, according to section xviii. of the Accentuationssystem).}

This series, as is universally the case, is arranged according to the community of prominent watchwords. In Psa 65:2 we read: “To Thee is the vow paid,” and in Psa 66:13 : “I will pay Thee my vows;” in Psa 66:20 : “Blessed be Elohim,” and in Psalms 67:8: “Elohim shall bless us.” Besides, Ps 66 and Psa 67:1-7 have this feature in common, that למנצח, which occurs fifty-five times in the Psalter, is accompanied by the name of the poet in every instance, with the exception of these two anonymous Psalms. The frequently occurring Sela of both Psalms also indicates that they were intended to have a musical accompaniment. These annotations referring to the temple-music favour the pre-exilic rather than the post-exilic origin of the two Psalms. Both are purely Elohimic; only in one instance (Psa 6:1-10 :18) does אדני, equally belonging to this style of Psalm, alternate with Elohim.

On the ground of some deliverance out of oppressive bondage that has been experienced by Israel arises in Psalms 66 the summons to the whole earth to raise a shout of praise unto God. The congregation is the subject speaking as far as Psa 66:12. From Psa 66:13 the person of the poet appears in the foreground; but that which brings him under obligation to present a thank-offering is nothing more nor less than that which the whole congregation, and he together with it, has experienced. It is hardly possible to define this event more minutely. The lofty consciousness of possessing a God to whom all the world must bow, whether cheerfully or against its will, became strong among the Jewish people more especially after the overthrow of Assyria in the reign of Hezekiah. But there is no ground for conjecturing either Isaiah or Hezekiah to be the composer of this Psalm. If עולם in Psa 66:7 signified the world (Hitzig), then he would be (vid., Psa 24:9) one of the latest among the Old Testament writers; but it has the same meaning here that it has everywhere else in Old Testament Hebrew.

In the Greek Church this Psalm is called Ψαλμὸς ἀναστάσεως; the lxx gives it this inscription, perhaps with reference to Psa 66:12, ἐξήγαγες ἡμᾶς εἰς ἀναψυχήν.