John Calvin Commentary Psalms 71

In thee, O Jehovah! do I put my trust. It has been thought that the occasion of the composition of this psalm was the conspiracy of Absalom, and the particular reference David makes to his old age renders this conjecture not improbable. As faith alone opens the way for us when we approach God, David, in order to obtain what he sought, protests, according to his usual manner, that he does not pour out hypocritical prayers at the throne of grace, but commits himself to God with sincerity of heart, fully persuaded that his salvation is in God's hand.

The man whose mind is in a state of constant fluctuation, and whose hope is divided by being turned in different directions (in each of which he is looking for deliverance), or who, under the influence of fear, disputes with himself, or who obstinately refuses divine assistance, or who frets and gives way to restless impatience, is unworthy of being helped by God.

The particle לעולם, leolam, at the end of the first verse, which we have translated for ever, admits of a twofold sense, as I have shown on Psalm 31:1. It either tacitly implies a contrast between David's present calamities and the happy outcome he anticipated, as if he had said, "Lord, I lie in the dust at present as one confounded, but the time will come when you will grant me deliverance."

Or, not to be ashamed for ever, means never to be ashamed. As these verses almost correspond with the beginning of Psalm 31, I would refer to that place for those explanatory remarks which I purposely omit here, not wishing to tax my readers' patience with unnecessary repetition.

In these words of the third verse, Into which I may at all times enter, which are not found in the other psalm, David briefly prays for ready and easy access to God for help, so that he might find in him a secure refuge whenever threatened by any immediate danger.

It is as if he had said, "Lord! Let me always find ready help in you, and meet me with a smile of kindness and grace when I turn to you."

The expression that follows, Thou hast given commandment to save me, is interpreted by some as being in the optative mood, as if David were requesting that he might be committed to the guardianship of angels.

But it is better to retain the past tense of the verb and to understand him as encouraging himself, from his past experience, to hope for a happy outcome to his present calamities.

Nor is there any necessity to limit the verb, thou hast given commandment, to the angels.

God, no doubt, employs them in defending his people. But since he has innumerable ways of saving them, I believe the expression is used indefinitely. It teaches us that he gives commandment concerning the salvation of his servants, as he has purposed, whenever he gives some manifest token of his favor toward them in his providence. What he has determined in his own mind, he executes sometimes by his nod alone, and sometimes through the agency of humans or other creatures.

Meanwhile, David implies that such is the all-sufficient power of God, considered in itself, that without resorting to any external help, his commandment alone is abundantly adequate to bring about our salvation.

O my God! deliver me from the hand of the wicked man. Here he uses the singular number; but he is not to be understood as indicating one man only. It is highly probable that he includes the whole host of the enemies who assaulted him. We have observed elsewhere how greatly it contributes to our confidence in obtaining our requests when we are so assured of our own integrity that we can freely complain before God that we are unjustly and wickedly assaulted by our enemies. For we ought not to doubt that God, who has promised to be the defender of those who are unjustly oppressed, will, in that case, undertake our cause.

For thou art my expectation, O Lord Jehovah! The Psalmist here repeats what he had said a little before concerning his trust or confidence.

But some, perhaps, may be inclined to refer this sentence rather to the matter or ground given to him for hope and confidence than to the emotions of his heart, supposing that he meant that by the benefits God had bestowed on him, he was provided with well-grounded hope.

And certainly, he does not here simply declare that he hoped in God, but with this he joins experience and acknowledges that even from his youth he had received signs of Divine favor, from which he could learn that confidence is to be placed in God alone.

By referring to what God had done for him, he expresses the real cause of faith (if I may say so), and from this we can easily perceive the powerful influence that the remembrance of God’s benefits had in nourishing his hope.

Upon you I have been sustained from the womb. This verse corresponds with the preceding one, except that David proceeds further. He not only celebrates the goodness of God which he had experienced from his childhood, but also those proofs of it which he had received prior to his birth.

An almost similar confession is contained in Psalm 22:9-10, which magnifies the wonderful power and inestimable goodness of God in human generation. The way and manner of this would be altogether incredible, if it were not a fact with which we are quite familiar. If we are astonished at that part of the history of the flood, in which Moses declares (Genesis 8:13) that Noah and his household lived ten months amid the offensive nuisance produced by so many living creatures, when he could not draw the breath of life, do we not have equal reason to marvel that the infant, confined within its mother’s womb, can live in such a condition as would suffocate the strongest person in half an hour?

Thus we see how little we value the miracles God works, because of our familiarity with them. The Spirit, therefore, justly rebukes this ingratitude by commending to our consideration this memorable instance of God’s grace, which is exhibited in our birth and generation.

When we are born into the world, although the mother does her part, the midwife may be present, and many others may lend their help, if God did not—putting, so to speak, His hand under us—receive us into His bosom, what would become of us? And what hope would there be for the continuation of our life?

Indeed, if it were not for this, our very birth would be an entrance into a thousand deaths. God, therefore, is most appropriately said to take us out of our mother’s bowels. The concluding part of the verse corresponds to this: My praise is continually of you; by which the Psalmist means that he has been provided with reason for praising God continuously.

I have been as a prodigy to the great ones. He now makes a transition to the language of complaint, declaring that he was held in almost universal abhorrence because of the great calamities with which he was afflicted. There is an apparent, although only an apparent, discrepancy between these two statements: first, that he had always been crowned with the benefits of God; and, secondly, that he was regarded as a prodigy on account of his great afflictions. But we may draw from this the very profitable doctrine that he was not so overwhelmed by his calamities, heavy though they were, as to be insensible to the goodness of God which he had experienced.

Although, therefore, he saw that he was an object of detestation, yet the remembrance of the blessings which God had conferred upon him could not be extinguished by the deepest shades of darkness that surrounded him, but served as a lamp in his heart to direct his faith. The term prodigy expresses no ordinary calamity.

If he had not been afflicted in a strange and unusual manner, those who were familiar with the miserable condition of mankind would not have shrunk from him with such horror and regarded him as so repulsive a spectacle. It was, therefore, a higher and more commendable proof of his constancy that his spirit was neither broken nor enfeebled with shame, but reposed in God with the stronger confidence, the more he was cast off by the world.

The sentence is to be understood adversatively, implying that, although men abhorred him as a monster, yet, by leaning upon God, he continued despite all this unmoved. If it is thought preferable to translate the word רבים, rabbim, which I have rendered great ones, with the word many, the sense will be that David’s afflictions were generally known and had acquired great notoriety, as if he had been brought out onto a stage and exposed to the view of the whole people.

But in my opinion, it will be more suitable to understand the word as great men or the nobles. There is no heart so strong and impervious to outward influences that it is not deeply pierced when those who are considered to excel in wisdom and judgment, and who are invested with authority, treat a suffering and afflicted man with such indignity that they shrink with horror from him, as if he were a monster.

In the next verse, as if he had obtained the desire of his heart, he expresses his resolution to offer grateful acknowledgment to God. To encourage himself to hope with greater confidence for a happy outcome to his present troubles, he promises loudly to celebrate the praises of God, and to do this not only on one occasion, but to persevere in this practice continuously.