Page:02.BCOT.KD.HistoricalBooks.A.vol.2.EarlyProphets.djvu/1012

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above,” is, strictly speaking, a substantive, “height,” used in an adverbial sense, as in Hos 11:7, and probably also 2Sa 7:16), i.e., whom God had lifted up out of humiliation to be the ruler of His people, yea, even to be the head of the nations (2Sa 22:44). Luther's rendering, “who is assured of the Messiah of the God of Jacob,” is based upon the Vulgate, “cui constitutum est de Christo Dei Jacob,” and cannot be grammatically sustained. David was exalted on the one hand as “the anointed of the God of Jacob,” i.e., as the one whom the God of Israel had anointed king over His people, and on the other hand as “the lovely one in Israel's songs of praise,” i.e., the man whom God had enabled to sing lovely songs of praise in celebration of His grace and glory. זמיר = זמרה does not mean a song generally, but a song of praise in honour of God (see at Exo 15:2), like מזמור in the headings to the psalms. As David on the one hand had firmly established the kingdom of God in an earthly and political respect as the anointed of Jehovah, i.e., as king, so had he on the other, as the composer of Israel's songs of praise, promoted the spiritual edification of that kingdom. The idea of נאם is explained in 2Sa 23:2. The Spirit of Jehovah speaks through him; his words are the inspiration of God. The preterite דּבּר relates to the divine inspiration which preceded the utterance of the divine saying. בּ דּבּר, literally to speak into a person, as in Hos 1:2. The saying itself commences with 2Sa 23:3.

Verse 3

2Sa 22:3   3  The God of Israel saith,
The Rock of Israel speaketh to me:
A Ruler over men, just,
A Ruler in the fear of God.   4  And as light of the morning, when the sun rises,
As morning without clouds:
From shining out of rain (springeth) green out of the earth.   5  For is not my house thus with God?
For He hath made me an everlasting covenant,
Provided with all, and attested;
For all my salvation and all good pleasure,
Should He then not cause it to grow?
As the prophets generally preface their saying with “thus saith the Lord,” so David commences his prophetic saying with “the God of Israel saith,” for the purpose of describing it most emphatically as the word of God. He designates God “the God” and