TRV
Augustine of Hippo
Nicene & Post-Nicene · AD 325–500
7,530 passages across 62 books of the Bible · Who was this?
On Psalms
20 of 2,560-
Psalms 18:2
"O Lord, My stay, and My refuge, and My deliverer" [Psalm 18:2]. O Lord, who hast stayed Me, because I sought refuge with You: and I sought refuge, because You have delivered Me. "My God is My helper; and I will hope in Him." My God, who hast first afforded me the help of Your call, that I might be able to hope in You. "My defender, and the horn of My salvation, and My redeemer." My defender, because I have not leant upon Myself, lifting up as it were the horn of pride against You; but have found You a horn indeed, that is, the sure height of salvation: and that I might find it, You redeemed Me.
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Psalms 18:3
"With praise will I call upon the Lord, and I shall be safe from Mine enemies" [Psalm 18:3]. Seeking not My own but the Lord's glory, I will call upon Him, and there shall be no means whereby the errors of ungodliness can hurt Me.
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Psalms 18:3
There you have something you can do. Praising, call—but remember it is the Lord you praise and call on. Because if you praise yourself, you will not be saved from your enemies. Praising, call on the Lord, and you will be saved from your enemies.
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Psalms 18:4
"The pains of death," that is, of the flesh, have "compassed Me about. And the overflowings of ungodliness have troubled Me" [Psalm 18:4]. Ungodly troubles stirred up for a time, like torrents of rain which will soon subside, have come on to trouble Me.
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Psalms 18:5
"The pains of hell compassed Me about" [Psalm 18:5]. Among those that compassed Me about to destroy Me, were pains of envy, which work death, and lead on to the hell of sin. "The snares of death prevented Me." They prevented Me, so that they wished to hurt Me first, which shall afterwards be recompensed unto them. Now they seize unto destruction such men as they have evilly persuaded by the boast of righteousness: in the name but not in the reality of which they glory against the Gentiles.
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Psalms 18:6
"And in Mine oppression I called upon the Lord, and cried unto My God. And He heard My voice from His holy temple" [Psalm 18:6]. He heard from My heart, wherein He dwells, My voice. "And My cry in His sight entered into His ears;" and My cry, which I utter, not in the ears of men, but inwardly before Him Himself, "entered into His ears."
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Psalms 18:7
"And the earth was moved and trembled" [Psalm 18:7]. When the Son of Man was thus glorified, sinners were moved and trembled. "And the foundations of the mountains were troubled." And the hopes of the proud, which were in this life, were troubled. "And were moved, for God was angry with them." That is, that the hope of temporal goods might have now no more establishment in the hearts of men.
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Psalms 18:8
"There went up smoke in His wrath" [Psalm 18:8]. The tearful supplication of penitents went up, when they came to know God's threatenings against the ungodly. "And fire burns from His face." And the ardour of love after repentance burns by the knowledge of Him. "Coals were kindled from Him." They, who were already dead, abandoned by the fire of good desire and the light of righteousness, and who remained in coldness and darkness, re-enkindled and enlightened, have come to life again.
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Psalms 18:9
"And He bowed the heaven, and came down" [Psalm 18:9]. And He humbled the just One, that He might descend to men's infirmity. "And darkness under His feet." And the ungodly, who savour of things earthly, in the darkness of their own malice, knew not Him: for the earth under His feet is as it were His footstool.
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Psalms 18:10
"And He mounted above the cherubim, and did fly" [Psalm 18:10]. And He was exalted above the fullness of knowledge, that no man should come to Him but by love: for "love is the fulfilling of the law." [Romans 13:10] And full soon He showed to His lovers that He is incomprehensible, lest they should suppose that He is comprehended by corporeal imaginations. "He flew above the wings of the winds." But that swiftness, whereby He showed Himself to be incomprehensible, is above the powers of souls, whereon as upon wings they raise themselves from earthly fears into the air of liberty.
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Psalms 18:11
When God wished to appear visibly to people and desired also to teach them in person what he had first laid down in the law, he tempered the force, the power of the divine, by taking on the human and “made the darkness his cover round about him,” when he concealed himself in the tent of the flesh.
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Psalms 18:11
"And has made darkness His hiding place" [Psalm 18:11]. And has settled the obscurity of the Sacraments, and the hidden hope in the heart of believers, where He may lie hidden, and not abandon them. In this darkness too, wherein "we yet walk by faith, and not by sight," [2 Corinthians 5:7] as long as "we hope for what we see not, and with patience wait for it." [Romans 8:25] "Round about Him is His tabernacle." Yet they that believe Him turn to Him and encircle Him; for that He is in the midst of them, since He is equally the friend of all, in whom as in a tabernacle He at this time dwells. "Dark water in clouds of air." Nor let any one on this account, if he understand the Scripture, imagine that he is already in that light, which will be when we shall have come out of faith into sight: for in the prophets and in all the preachers of the word of God there is obscure teaching.
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Psalms 18:12
"In respect of the brightness in His sight" [Psalm 18:12]: in comparison with the brightness, which is in the sight of His manifestation. "His clouds have passed over." The preachers of His word are not now bounded by the confines of Judæa, but have passed over to the Gentiles. "Hail and coals of fire." Reproofs are figured, whereby, as by hail, the hard hearts are bruised: but if a cultivated and genial soil, that is, a godly mind, receive them, the hail's hardness dissolves into water, that is, the terror of the lightning-charged, and as it were frozen, reproof dissolves into satisfying doctrine; and hearts kindled by the fire of love revive. All these things in His clouds have passed over to the Gentiles.
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Psalms 18:13
"And the Lord has thundered from heaven" [Psalm 18:13]. And in confidence of the Gospel the Lord has sounded forth from the heart of the just One. "And the Highest gave His voice;" that we might entertain it, and in the depth of human things, might hear things heavenly.
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Psalms 18:14
"And He sent out His arrows, and scattered them" [Psalm 18:14]. And He sent out Evangelists traversing straight paths on the wings of strength, not in their own power, but His by whom they were sent. And "He scattered them," to whom they were sent, that to some of them they should be "the savour of life unto life, to others the savour of death unto death." [2 Corinthians 2:16] "And He multiplied lightnings, and troubled them." And He multiplied miracles, and troubled them.
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Psalms 18:15
"And the fountains of water were seen. And the fountains of water springing up into everlasting life," [John 4:14] which were made in the preachers, were seen. "And the foundations of the round world were revealed" [Psalm 18:15]. And the Prophets, who were not understood, and upon whom was to be built the world of believers in the Lord, were revealed. "At Your chiding, O Lord:" crying out, "The kingdom of God has come near unto you." [Luke 10:9] "At the blasting of the breath of Your displeasure;" saying, "Unless you repent, you shall all likewise perish." [Luke 13:5]
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Psalms 18:16
He has sent down from on high, and has fetched Me [Psalm 18:16]: by calling out of the Gentiles for an inheritance "a glorious Church, not having spot, or wrinkle." [Ephesians 5:27] "He has taken Me out of the multitude of waters." He has taken Me out of the multitude of peoples.
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Psalms 18:17
"He has delivered Me from My strongest enemies" [Psalm 18:17]. He has delivered Me from Mine enemies, who prevailed to the afflicting and overturning of this temporal life of Mine. "And from them which hate Me; for they are too strong for Me:" as long as I am under them knowing not God.
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Psalms 18:18
"They have prevented Me in the day of My affliction" [Psalm 18:18]. They have first injured Me, in the time when I am bearing a mortal and toilsome body. "And the Lord has become My stay." And since the stay of earthly pleasure was disturbed and torn up by the bitterness of misery, the Lord has become My stay.
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Psalms 18:19
"And has brought Me forth into a broad place" [Psalm 18:19]. And since I was enduring the straits of the flesh, He brought Me forth into the spiritual breadth of faith. "He has delivered Me, because He desired Me." Before that I desired Him, He delivered Me from My most powerful enemies (who were envious of Me when I once desired Him), and from them that hated Me, because I do desire Him.