The perpetuity of the king's reign and of his subjects' peace is the psalmists second aspiration (vv. 5-7). The "Thee" of ver. 5 presents a difficulty, as it is doubtful to whom it refers. Throughout the psalm the king is spoken _of_, and never _to_; and if it is further noticed that, in the preceding verses, God has been directly addressed, and "Thy" used thrice in regard to Him, it will appear more natural to take the reference in ver. 5 to be to Him. The fear of God would be diffused among the king's subjects, as a consequence of his rule in righteousness. Hupfeld takes the word as referring to the king, and suggests changing the text to "him" instead of "Thee"; while others, among whom are Cheyne and Baethgen, follow the track of the LXX. in adopting a reading which may be translated "May he live," or "Prolong his days." But the thought yielded by the existing text, if referred to God, is most natural and worthy. The king is, as it were, the shadow on earth of God's righteousness, and consequently becomes an organ for the manifestation thereof, in such manner as to draw men to true devotion. The psalmist's desires are for something higher than external prosperity, and his conceptions of the kingly office are very sacred. Not only peace and material well-being, but also the fear of Jehovah, are longed for by him to be diffused in Israel. And he prays that these blessings may be perpetual. The connection between the king's righteousness and the fear of God requires that that permanence should belong to both. The cause is as lasting as its effect. Through generation after generation he desires that each shall abide. He uses peculiar expressions for continual duration: "with the sun"--_i.e._, contemporaneous with that unfading splendour; "before the face of the moon"--_i.e._, as long as she shines. But could the singer anticipate such length of dominion for any human king? Psalm xxi. has similar language in regard to the same person; and here, as there, it seems sufficiently accounted for by the consideration that, while the psalmist was speaking of an individual, he was thinking of the office rather than of the person, and that the perpetual continuance of the Davidic dynasty, not the undying life of any one representative of it, was meant. The full light of the truth that there is a king whose royalty, like his priesthood, passes to no other is not to be forced upon the psalm. It stands as a witness that devout and inspired souls longed for the establishment of a kingdom, against which revolutions and enemies and mortality were powerless. They knew not that their desires could not be fulfilled by the longest succession of dying kings, but were to be more than accomplished by One, "of whom it is witnessed that He liveth."
The psalmist turns for a moment from his prayer for the perpetuity of the king's rule, to linger upon the thought of its blessedness as set forth in the lovely image of ver. 6. Rain upon mown grass is no blessing, as every farmer knows; but what is meant is, not the grass which has already been mown, but the naked meadow from which it has been taken. It needs drenching showers, in order to sprout again and produce an aftermath. The poet's eye is caught by the contrast between the bare look of the field immediately after cutting and the rich growth that springs, as by magic, from the yellow roots after a plentiful shower. This king's gracious influences shall fall upon even what seems dead, and charm forth hidden life that will flush the plain with greenness. The psalmist dwells on the picture, reiterating the comparison in ver. 6 _b_, and using there an uncommon word, which seems best rendered as meaning a heavy rainfall. With such affluence of quickening powers will the righteous king bless his people. The "Mirror for Magistrates," which is held up in the lovely poem in 2 Sam. xxiii. 4, has a remarkable parallel in its description of the just ruler as resembling a "morning without clouds, when the tender grass springeth out of the earth through clear shining after rain"; but the psalmist heightens the metaphor by the introduction of the mown meadow as stimulated to new growth. This image of the rain lingers with him and shapes his prayer in ver. 7 _a_. A righteous king will insure prosperity to the righteous, and the number of such will increase. Both these ideas seem to be contained in the figure of their flourishing, which is literally _bud_ or _shoot_. And, as the people become more and more prevailingly righteous, they receive more abundant and unbroken peace. The psalmist had seen deeply into the conditions of national prosperity, as well as those of individual tranquillity, when he based these on rectitude.