Commentary on Psalms - Volume 3 - Bible Study Guides

Comm on Psalms (V3)John CalvinPsalm 72:1-61. O God! give thy judgments to the king, and thy righteousness to the king’s son. 2. He shalljudge thy people in righteousness, and thy poor ones in judgment. 3. The mountains shall bringforth peace to the people, and the hills in righteousness. 121 4. He shall judge the poor of the people;he shall save the children of the afflicted; and shall break in pieces the calumniator. 5. They shallfear thee with the sun; and generation of generations shall fear thee 122 in the presence of the moon.6. He shall descend as rain upon the mown grass; as the showers 123 which water the earth.1. O God! give thy judgments to the king. 124 While David, to whom the promise had been made,at his death affectionately recommended to God his son, who was to succeed him in his kingdom,he doubtless endited to the Church a common form of prayer, that the faithful, convinced of theimpossibility of being prosperous and happy, except under one head, should show all respect, andyield all obedience to this legitimate order of things, and also that from this typical kingdom theymight be conducted to Christ. In short, this is a prayer that God would furnish the king whom hehad chosen with the spirit of uprightness and wisdom. By the terms righteousness and judgment,the Psalmist means a due and well-regulated administration of government, which he opposes tothe tyrannical and unbridled license of heathen kings, who, despising God, rule according to thedictates of their own will; and thus the holy king of Israel, who was anointed to his office by divineappointment, is distinguished from other earthly kings. From the words we learn by the way, thatno government in the world can be rightly managed but under the conduct of God, and by theguidance of the Holy Spirit. If kings possessed in themselves resources sufficiently ample, it wouldhave been to no purpose for David to have sought by prayer from another, that with which theywere of themselves already provided. But in requesting that the righteousness and judgment of Godmay be given to kings, he reminds them that none are fit for occupying that exalted station, exceptin so far as they are formed for it by the hand of God. Accordingly, in the Proverbs of Solomon,(Proverbs 8:15,) Wisdom proclaims that kings reign by her. Nor is this to be wondered at, whenwe consider that civil government is so excellent an institution, that God would have us toacknowledge him as its author, and claims to himself the whole praise of it. But it is proper for usto descend from the general to the particular; for since it is the peculiar work of God to set up andto maintain a rightful government in the world, it was much more necessary for him to communicatethe special grace of his Spirit for the maintenance and preservation of that sacred kingdom whichhe had chosen in preference to all others. By the king’s son David no doubt means his successors.At the same time, he has an eye to this promise:121 In the Septuagint, in righteousness is connected with the following verse — In righteousness he shall judge the poor of thepeople,” Dr Adam Clarke considers this to be the true division.122 “Te craindra,” “shall fear thee,” is a supplement in the French version. There is no supplement in the Latin version.123 “Comme les pluyes drues et longues.” — Fr. “As the plenteous and prolonged showers.”124 “In other places, those events which God himself brings to pass in defending the righteous, and in punishing the wicked,are called his judgments, as in Psalm 36:7; but the statutes promulgated by God for the regulation of human conduct are alsostyled his judgments. In this sense, the judgments and laws of God may be considered as synonymous terms, Psalm 119. 20, 30,39, 52, 75. The clause is justly explained by Jarchi: ‘Knowledge of the judgments — to wit, of the particular rules of right —which thou hast commanded in the law.’ The explication given by Kimchi is suitable also: ‘That he may not err in giving forthsentences, give him knowledge and understanding, that he may judge with judgment and justice.’” — Rosenmüller on theMessianic Psalms, Biblical Cabinet, volume 32, pp. 232, 233.62