Page:04.BCOT.KD.PoeticalBooks.vol.4.Writings.djvu/414

 6-7== For this mercy, which is provided for every sinner who repents and confesses his sin, let then, every חסיד, who longs for חסד, turn in prayer to Jahve לעת מצא, at the time (Psa 21:10; 1Ch 12:22; cf. בּעת, Isa 49:8) when He, and His mercy, is to be found (cf. Deu 4:29 with Jer 29:13; Isa 55:6, בּהמּצאו). This hortatory wish is followed by a promissory assurance. The fact of לשׁטף מים רבּים being virtually a protasis: quam inundant aquae magnae (ל of the time), which separates רק from אליו, prohibits our regarding רק as belonging to אליו in this instance, although like אף, אך, גּם, and פּן, רק is also placed per hypallage at the head of the clause (as in Pro 13:10 : with pride there is only contention), even when belonging to a part of the clause that follows further on. The restrictive meaning of רק here, as is frequently the case (Deu 4:6; Jdg 14:16; 1Ki 21:25, cf. Psa 91:8), has passed over to the affirmative: certo quum, etc. Inundation or flooding is an exemplificative description of the divine judgment (cf. Nah 1:8); Psa 32:6 is a brief form of expressing the promise which is expanded in Ps 91. In Psa 32:7, David confirms it from his own experience. The assonance in מצּר תּצּרני (Thou wilt preserve me, so that צר, angustum = angustiae, does not come upon me, Psa 119:143) is not undesigned; and after תצרני comes רני, just like כלו after בהיכלו in Psa 29:9. There is no sufficient ground for setting aside רני, with Houbigant and others, as a repetition of the half of the word תצרני. The infinitive רן (Job 38:7) might, like רב, plur. רבּי, חק, plur. חקּי, with equal right be inflected as a substantive; and פּלּט (as in Psa 56:8), which is likewise treated as a substantive, cf. נפּץ, Dan 12:7, presents, as a genitive, no more difficulty than does דעת in the expression אישׁ דּעת. With songs of deliverance doth Jahve surround him, so that they encompass him on all sides, and on occasion of exulting meets him in whatever direction he turns. The music here again for the third time becomes forte, and that to express the highest feeling of delight.

Verses 8-10
It is not Jahve, who here speaks in answer to the words that have been thus far addressed to Him. In this case the person addressed must be the poet, who, however, has already attained the knowledge here treated of.