Page:04.BCOT.KD.PoeticalBooks.vol.4.Writings.djvu/535

 as Asaph, also, in Psa 78:3, appeals not to the written but to the spoken word. That which has been heard follows in the oratio directa. Psa 44:3 explains what kind of “work” is intended: it is the granting of victory over the peoples of Canaan, the work of God for which Moses prays in Psa 90:16. Concerning ידך, vid., on Psa 3:5; Psa 17:14. The position of the words here, as in Psa 69:11; 83:19, leads one to suppose that ידך is treated as a permutative of אתּה, and consequently in the same case with it. The figure of “planting” (after Exo 15:17) is carried forward in ותּשׁלּחם; for this word means to send forth far away, to make wide-branching, a figure which is wrought up in Ps 80. It was not Israel's own work, but (כּי, no indeed, for [Germ. nein, denn]= imo) God's work: “Thy right hand and Thine arm and the light of Thy countenance,” they it was which brought Israel salvation, i.e., victory. The combination of synonyms ימינך וּזרועך is just as in Psa 74:11, Sir. 33:7, χείρα καὶ βραχίονα δεξιόν, and is explained by both the names of the members of the body as applied to God being only figures: the right hand being a figure for energetic interposition, and the arm for an effectual power that carries through the thing designed (cf. e.g., Psa 77:16; Psa 53:1), just as the light of His countenance is a figure for His loving-kindness which lights up all darkness. The final cause was His purpose of love: for (inasmuch as) Thou wast favourable to them (רצה as in Psa 85:2). The very same thought, viz., that Israel owes the possession of Canaan to nothing but Jahve's free grace, runs all through Deut. 9.

Verses 4-8
Psa 44:4-8 (Hebrew_Bible_44:5-9) Out of the retrospective glance at the past, so rich in mercy springs up (Psa 44:5) the confident prayer concerning the present, based upon the fact of the theocratic relationship which began in the time of the deliverance wrought under Moses (Deu 33:5). In the substantival clause אתּה הוּא מלכּי, הוּא is neither logical copula nor predicate (as in Psa 102:28; Deu 32:39, there equivalent to אתּה הוּא אשׁר, cf. 1Ch 21:17), but an expressive resumption of the subject, as in Isa 43:25; Jer 49:12; Neh 9:6., Ezr 5:11, and in the frequently recurring expression יהוה הוא האלהים; it is therefore to be rendered: Thou-He who (such an one) is my King. May He therefore, by virtue of His duty as king which He has voluntarily taken upon Himself, and of the