The Pulpit Commentary — Psalms — Volume 3 — Section 3

Ver, 21.-Oh that men, etc.l A repetition idiom of the Authorized Version is a very of vers. 8 and 15. happy one,e.nd exa.ctly expresses the writer's Ver. 22.-And let them se.orifioe the meaning. All the see.man's intelligence is saorifloee of thanksgiving; compare the ex- at fault, and can suggest nothing. pression," the cal'l/e8 of our lips" (Hoe. xiv. Ver. 28.-Then they cry unto the Lord in 2), o.nd see elso Heb. xiii. 15. And declare their trouble, and he bringeth them out of his works with rejoicing; i.e. joyfully pro- their distresses. Practically identical with ole.im the great things that God has done vers. 6, 13, and 19. for them. Ver. 29.-Xe maketh the storm a calm; i.e. he causes the wind ti:> drop, and to be Vere. 23-32.-Fine.lly, there o.re cases succ~eded by a "great calm" (comp. among those whose business requires them Matt. viii. 26). Such sudden ohanges do to traverse the see., where the danger is sometimes occur, not only in inland seas great, and death seems imminent. Let such but on the Mediterranean (see Jonah i. 15)'. persons cast themselves upon God, and So that the waves thereof a.re still; Ii terally, the wa1Jes of them; i.e. of the great waters "cry to him in their trouble," and they too (see ver. 23). will be heard and delivered. Must it not Ver. 30.-Then a.re they glad because be their duty also to give thanks? they be quiet; or, "because they be at rest," i.e. no longer tempest-tossed. So he bri.ngeth Ver. 23.-They that go down to the sea them unto their desired haven; literally, in ships. That many of the Israelites en- the ha1Jen of their desire; i.e. the haven gaged in maritime pursuits appears from 1 where they desire to be. Kings ix. 26-28; x. 22; xxii. 48; 2 Chrou. Ver. 31.--0h that men, etc.! Repeated xx. ::16; as also from Judg. v .17; Ps. xlviii. from vers. 8, 15, and 21. 7; Prov. xxiii. 34; xxx. 19; and from many Ver. 32.-Let them exalt him a.lso in the passages of the Apocrypha.. Joppa was at congregation of the people. The psalmist a.II times an Ismeli te port, from which holds it to be not enough for men who have trade was carried on by the residents (2 received deliverances to thank God in their Chron. ii. 16; Ezra iii. 7; Jonnh i. 3). hearts, or secretly in their chambers. He That do business in great waters; i.e. requires them to make public profession of trade in fish. The "great waters" of the their thankfulness "in tbe congregation of Mediterranean are spoken of in contrast with tho people." The Christian Church main- those of the small inland see.a of Palestine, tains the same attitude. And praise him the sea of Galilee and Lake Merom. in the assembly of the elders. The elders Ver. 24.-Thesa see the works of the Lord, led the congregation and presided in it and his wonders in the deep. Storms, (Ezra iii. 9-ll ; vi. 16-22; Neh. viii. tempests, and sudden deliverances are the 4--9; ix. 4, 5; xii.. 27-43, etc.). ••wonders" especially meant ( comp. Aota xxvii. 14-44; 2 Cor. xi. 25). Vere. 33-42.-Professor Cheyne finds in Ver. 25.-For he oomma.ndeth, and re.iseth this passage-whioh he views as an " ap- the stormy wind (comp. Ps. oxlvii. 15, 18; pendix "to the psalm---.-i falling off from the Jonah i. 4). The operations of nature a.re constnntly spoken of in Scripture as God's earlier portion of tho psalm, and a set of direct doing. Which lifteth up the waves "sentences strung together without much thereof; or, " the waves that are his " reflection." But to others the transition (compare, iu Pa. cxlvii. 17, 18, "his ice, his from specie.I deliverances to God's general cold, his wind "). dealings with mankind seems e.n enlarge- Ver. 26.-They mount up to the heaven, ment and e.n e.dvance in the thought, they go down again to the depths. Tossed on the foaming billows, now 011rried up until although the language may be less graphio they seem e.lmost to touch the sky (see e.nd more commonplace than in the former Gen. xi. 4), a.non sinking into the trough of portion of the composition. the sea., and e.s it were swe.llowed up in its depths. Their soul is melted because of Ver. 33.-Xe turneth rivers into e. w'Jder- trouble; or. "their soul meltcth away in nese. God can, and does, by the operation the trouble" (Cheyne). of his providence, turn lands naturully Ver. 27.-They reel to and fro, and fertile-lands abounding with streams-into stagger like a drunken man. Tho oldest arid wastes, either by such a physical sailor "loses his see.-legs," o.nd sto.ggers catastrophe as that which blasted the cities nbout tho deck like a Jandsrmrn, or like one of the plain (Gen. xix. 2-1, 25), or by such drunk. And 11re at their wit's end; lite- moral ohanges as have turned Babylonia rally, as in the me.rgin, an,l all their from a gnrden into e. desert, a mL,crable v,isdom is swallowed. :Out tho English howling wilderness (comp. Isa. xiii. 15-  THE BOOK OF PSALMS. [PS. cvn. 1-48.