force of the Hebrew bsn which might mean ‘‘ birth-pangs,”’ or the cords of a hunter catching hisprey. In the Hebrew version the parallelism, such a favourite figure in Hebrew poetry, decides in favour of the latter meaning, as in R.V. Ps. xviii. 4, 5 (LXX xvii.), Sheol and Death are personified as hunters lying in wait for their’ prey with nooses and nets (Kirkpatrick, Psalms, in loco, the word
7wi7}1) meaning snares by which birds
or beasts are taken (Amos iii. 5)). In
84
ἦν δυνατὸν κρατεῖσθαι αὐτὸν ὑπ αὐτοῦ.
25. Δαβὶδ γὰρ λέγει eis
αὐτὸν, “΄ Προωρώμην 1 τὸν Κύριον ἐνώπιόν µου διὰ παντός": ὅτι ἐκ
δεξιῶν pod ἐστιν, ἵνα μὴ σαλευθῶ: 26. διὰ τοῦτο εὐφράνθη ἡ καρδία
1 προωρωµην ΒΡΕ; προορ. SAB*CDE, so Tisch., W.H., Weiss, Wendt, Hilg.
(see Winer-Schmiedel, p. 102).
the previous verse the parallelism is also maintained if we read ‘‘the waves of death” (cf. 2 Sam. xxii. 5) “‘ compassed me, the floods of ungodliness made me afraid”. It is tempting to account for the reading ὠδῖνας by supposing that St. Luke had before him a source for St. Peter’s speech, and that he had given a mistaken rendering of the
word ban. But it would certainly seem that λύσας and κρατεῖσθαι are far more applicable to the idea of the hunter’s cords, in which the Christ could not be bound, since He was Himself the Life. A similar mistake in connection with the
same Hebrew word "ΓΙ may possibly occur in 1 Thess. v. 3 and Luke xxi. 34. There is no occasion to find in the word any reference to the death-pains of Christ (so Grotius, Bengel), or to render ὠδῖνες pains and snares (Olshausen, Nésgen), and it is somewhat fanciful to explain with St. Chrysostom (so Theophylact and Oecumenius) 6 θάνατος ὥδινεκατέχων αὐτὸν καὶ τὰ δεινὰ ἔπασχε.- καθότι: only found in St. Luke, in Gospel twice, and in Acts four times (Friedrich); gener- ally in classical Greek καθ ὅ τι (cf. Tobit i. 12, xiii. 4).—ovK ἦν Suvarov... yap: the words primarily refer to the proof which St. Peter was about to ad- duce from prophecy, and the Scripture could not be broken. But whilst Baur sees in such an expression, as also in iii. 15, atransition to Johannine conceptions of the Person of Jesus, every Christian gladly recognises in the words the moral impossibility that the Life could be holden by Death. On the impersonal construc- tion, see Viteau, Le Grec du N. Τ., p. 151 (1893). — κρατεῖσθαι ... in’, cf. Luke xxiv. 16 (John xx. 23), only in these passages in passive voice in N.T., but cf. for similar use of the passive voice, 4 Macc. ii. 9, and so in Dem. Schmid compares this verse where the in- ternal necessity of Christ’s resurrection is thus stated with 1 Peter iii. 18, show- ing that the πνεῦμα in Him possessed this power of life (Biblische Theologie des N. T., p. 402).
Ver.25. Δανεὶδ γὰρ λέγει: the words which follow are quoted by St. Peter
from Psalm xvi.; and it has been said that the Apostle’s argument would be the same if the Psalm were the work of some other author than David. But if the following Psalm and the Psalm in ques- tion may with considerable reason be attributed to the same author, and if the former Psalm, the seventeenth, may be referred to the period of David’s persecu- tion by Saul, then David’s authorship of Psalm sixteen becomes increasingly prob- able (Kirkpatrick). In Delitzsch’s view whatever can mark a Psalm as Davidic we actually find combined here, ε.δ., coincidences of many kinds which he regards as undoubtedly Davidic (cf. v. 5 with xi. 6, v. 10 with iv. 4, v. I1 with xvii. 15), and he sees no reason for giving up the testimony afforded by the title. But it is plain that David’s experience did not exhaust the meaning of the Psalm, and St. Peter in the fulness of the gift of Pentecost interprets the words εἰς αὐτὸν, “‘ with reference to Him,” 7.e., the Messiah (cf. St. Paul’s interpreta- tion of the same Psalm in xili. 35), On the application of the Psalm as Messianic, cf. Edersheim, Fesus the Messiah, ii., p. 717.--Προωρώμην: not 6] foresaw,” but ‘‘I beheld the Lord always before my face,” LXX; Heb., ‘‘I have set the Lord always before me”’. --Κύριον-Ξ- Jehovah.—ék δεξιῶν pov: asa defence and helper. Cf. παραστάτης, Xen., Cyr., iii., 3, 21. The imagery may be taken from that of the trials in which advocates stood at the right hand of their clients (Psalm cix. 31), or there may bea reference to a champion who, in defending another, would stand on his right hand; cf. Psalm cx. 5, cxxi. 5 (Kirkpatrick, and Robertson Smith, Expositor,. 1876, p. 351).—tva μὴ σαλευθῶ: although the verses which follow contain the chief Messianic references in St. Peter’s inter- pretation, yet in the fullest sense of the words the Christ could say προωρ. κ.τ.λ. (see Felten, in loco). But because the Father was with Him, He could add διὰ τοῦτο εὐφράνθη ἡ καρδία pov: ‘the heart’ in Ο.Τ. is not only the heart of the affections, but the centre of the man’s whole moral and intellectual nature (Oehler, Theol. des A.T., Ρ.71).--εὐφράνθη,