much less that he should put them into action. But perhaps the psalmist wrote פּיך originally, “my reflecting does not go beyond Thy commandment” (according to Num 22:18; 1Sa 15:24; Pro 8:29), - a meaning better suited, as a result of the search, to the nightly investigation. The ל of לפעלּות fo ל need not be the ל of reference (as to); it is that of the state or condition, as in Psa 32:6; Psa 69:22. אדם, as perhaps also in Job 31:33; Hos 6:7 (if אדם is not there the name of the first man), means, men as they are by nature and habit. בּדבר שׂפתיך does not admit of being connected with לפעלּות: at the doings of the world contrary to Thy revealed will (Hofmann and others); for פּעל בּ cannot mean: to act contrary to any one, but only: to work upon any one, Job 35:6. These words must therefore be regarded as a closer definition, placed first, of the שׁמרתּי which follows: in connection with the doings of men, by virtue of the divine commandment, he has taken care of the paths of the oppressor, viz., not to go in them; 1Sa 25:21 is an instance in support of this rendering, where שׁמרתי, as in Job 2:6, means: I have kept (Nabal's possession), not seizing upon it myself. Jerome correctly translates vias latronis; for פּריץ signifies one who breaks in, i.e., one who does damage intentionally and by violence. The confession concerning himself is still continued in Psa 17:5, for the inf. absol. תּמך, if taken as imperative would express a prayer for constancy, that is alien to the circumstances described. The perfect after בּל is also against such a rendering. It must therefore be taken as inf. historicus, and explained according to Job 23:11, cf. Psa 41:13. The noun following the inf. absol., which is usually the object, is the subject in this instance, as, e.g., in Job 40:2; Pro 17:12; Ecc 4:2, and frequently. It is אשׁוּרי, and not אשּׁוּרי, אשׁור (a step) never having the שׁ dageshed, except in Psa 17:11 and Job 31:7.
Verses 6-7
It is only now, after his inward parts and his walk have been laid open to Jahve, that he resumes his petition, which is so well justified and so soundly based, and enters into detail. The אני[1] found beside קראתיך (the
- ↑ The word is pointed אני, in correct texts, as אני always is when it has Munach and Dechî follows, e.g., also Psa 116:16. This Gaja demands an emphatic intonation of the secondary word in its relation to the principal word (which here is קראתיך).
