begins with maka'rioi, so the Old Testament Psalter, directed entirely to the application of the Law to the inner life, begins with אשׁרי. The First book of the Psalms begins with two אשׁרי Psa 1:1; Psa 2:12, and closes with two אשׁרי Psa 40:5; Psa 41:2. A number of Psalms begin with אשׁרי, Psa 32:1-11; Psa 41:1-13; Psa 112:1-10; Ps 119; Psa 128:1-6; but we must not therefore suppose the existence of a special kind of ashrê-psalms; for, e.g., Psa 32:1-11 is a משׂיל, Psa 112:1-10 a Hallelujah, Psa 128:1-6 a שׁיר המעלות.
As regards the time of the composition of the Psalm, we do not wish to lay any stress on the fact that 2Ch 22:5 sounds like an allusion to it. But 1st, it is earlier than the time of Jeremiah; for Jeremiah was acquainted with it. The words of curse and blessing, Jer 17:5-8, are like an expository and embellished paraphrase of it. It is customary with Jeremiah to reproduce the prophecies of his predecessors, and more especially the words of the Psalms, in the flow of his discourse and to transform their style to his own. In the present instance the following circumstance also favours the priority of the Psalm: Jeremiah refers the curse corresponding to the blessing to Jehoiakim and thus applies the Psalm to the history of his own times. It is 2ndly, not earlier than the time of Solomon. For לצים occurring only here in the whole Psalter, a word which came into use, for the unbelievers, in the time of the Chokma (vid., the definition of the word, Pro 21:24), points us to the time of Solomon and onwards. But since it contains no indications of contemporary history whatever, we give up the attempt to define more minutely the date of its composition, and say with St. Columba (against the reference of the Psalm to Joash the protegé of Jehoiada, which some incline to): Non audiendi sunt hi, qui ad excludendam Psalmorum veram expositionem falsas similitudines ab historia petitas conantur inducere.[1]
Verses 1-3
The exclamatory אשׁרי, as also Psa 32:2; Psa 40:5; Pro 8:34, has Gaja (Metheg) by the Aleph, and in some
- ↑ Vid., Zeuss, Grammatica Celtica (1853) ii. 1065. The Commentary of Columba on the Psalms, with Irish explanations, and coming from the monastery of Bobbio, is among the treasures of the Ambrosiana.
