Psalm 37 (1928 BCP)
Psalm 37 (1928 BCP) is Noli aemulari in the Psalter of the 1928 Book of Common Prayer. It is appointed at Evening Prayer on the Seventh Day of the monthly Psalter. This alphabetic wisdom-psalm confronts the spectacle of prosperous wrongdoing, calling the faithful away from envy and anger toward trust, active goodness, patience, and hope in the Lord.[1]
The 1928 Prayer Book text
FRET not thyself because of the ungodly; * neither be thou envious against the evil doers.
2 For they shall soon be cut down like the grass, * and be withered even as the green herb.
3 Put thou thy trust in the LORD, and be doing good; * dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed.
4 Delight thou in the LORD, * and he shall give thee thy heart's desire.
5 Commit thy way unto the LORD, and put thy trust in him, * and he shall bring it to pass.
6 He shall make thy righteousness as clear as the light, * and thy just dealing as the noon-day.
7 Hold thee still in the LORD, and abide patiently upon him: * but grieve not thyself at him whose way doth prosper, against the man that doeth after evil counsels.
8 Leave off from wrath, and let go displeasure: * fret not thyself, else shalt thou be moved to do evil.
9 Wicked doers shall be rooted out; * and they that patiently abide the LORD, those shall inherit the land.
10 Yet a little while, and the ungodly shall be clean gone: * thou shalt look after his place, and he shall be away.
11 But the meek-spirited shall possess the earth, * and shall be refreshed in the multitude of peace.
12 The ungodly seeketh counsel against the just, * and gnasheth upon him with his teeth.
13 The Lord shall laugh him to scorn; * for he hath seen that his day is coming.
14 The ungodly have drawn out the sword, and have bent their bow, * to cast down the poor and needy, and to slay such as be upright in their ways.
15 Their sword shall go through their own heart, * and their bow shall be broken.
16 A small thing that the righteous hath, * is better than great riches of the ungodly.
17 For the arms of the ungodly shall be broken, * and the LORD upholdeth the righteous.
18 The LORD knoweth the days of the godly; * and their inheritance shall endure for ever.
19 They shall not be confounded in the perilous time; * and in the days of dearth they shall have enough.
20 As for the ungodly, they shall perish, and the enemies of the LORD shall consume as the fat of lambs: * yea, even as the smoke shall they consume away.
21 The ungodly borroweth, and payeth not again; * but the righteous is merciful and liberal.
22 Such as are blessed of God, shall possess the land; * and they that are cursed of him, shall be rooted out.
23 The LORD ordereth a good man's going, * and maketh his way acceptable to himself.
24 Though he fall, he shall not be cast away; * for the LORD upholdeth him with his hand.
25 I have been young, and now am old; * and yet saw I never the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging their bread.
26 The righteous is ever merciful, and lendeth; * and his seed is blessed.
27 Flee from evil, and do the thing that is good; * and dwell for evermore.
28 For the LORD loveth the thing that is right; * he forsaketh not his that be godly, but they are preserved for ever.
29 The unrighteous shall be punished; * as for the seed of the ungodly, it shall be rooted out.
30 The righteous shall inherit the land, * and dwell therein for ever.
31 The mouth of the righteous is exercised in wisdom, * and his tongue will be talking of judgment.
32 The law of his God is in his heart, * and his goings shall not slide.
33 The ungodly watcheth the righteous, * and seeketh occasion to slay him.
34 The LORD will not leave him in his hand, * nor condemn him when he is judged.
35 Hope thou in the LORD, and keep his way, and he shall promote thee, that thou shalt possess the land: * when the ungodly shall perish, thou shalt see it.
36 I myself have seen the ungodly in great power, * and flourishing like a green bay-tree.
37 I went by, and lo, he was gone: * I sought him, but his place could no where be found.
38 Keep innocency, and take heed unto the thing that is right; * for that shall bring a man peace at the last.
39 As for the transgressors, they shall perish together; * and the end of the ungodly is, they shall be rooted out at the last.
40 But the salvation of the righteous cometh of the LORD; * who is also their strength in the time of trouble.
41 And the LORD shall stand by them, and save them: * he shall deliver them from the ungodly, and shall save them, because they put their trust in him.
Fret, trust, and do good
The opening command is not indifference to evil. The psalm sees the sword bent against the poor (verse 14), but it refuses the false remedy of becoming heated and envious. Its verbs make a disciplined sequence: trust the Lord, do good, delight in him, commit one's way to him, be still before him, and wait. Faith is therefore neither passivity nor a private guarantee that one will receive every desired thing; it is the reordering of desire and conduct under God's rule.
Alexander MacLaren notes that the psalm’s imperatives are mutually illuminating:
The tendency to murmur at flaunting wrong must be repressed if the disposition of trust is to be cultivated; and, on the other hand, full obedience to the negative precepts is only possible when the positive ones have been obeyed with some degree of completeness.
The Prayer Book's “be doing good” and “leave off from wrath” therefore belong together. The Church sings this psalm not to deny injustice, but to prevent grief at injustice becoming the very evil it condemns. Christ's blessing, “Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth” (Matthew 5:5), expressly takes up verse 11 and places its promised inheritance within his kingdom.
The land, peace, and Christian hope
The recurring contrast—evildoers “rooted out,” the faithful inheriting the land—gives the psalm its refrain. It is Israel's covenantal language, and its immediate images are concrete: food in dearth, a durable home, and peace. It must not become a guarantee that every upright person will visibly prosper in this age. The psalm itself acknowledges trouble, falling, persecution, and the spectacle of a wicked person “in great power.”
But though this psalm does not go to the bottom of its theme, its teaching of the blessedness of absolute trust in God's providence is ever fresh, and fits close to all stages of revelation; and its prophecies of triumph for the afflicted who trust and of confusion to the evil-doer need only to be referred to the end to be completely established.
MacLaren's qualification preserves the Psalm's historical voice while receiving it as Christian Scripture. The New Testament does not cancel the promise; it directs hope toward the final judgment and the inheritance prepared by the Father (Matthew 25:34). This is why the Prayer Book's final note names the Lord not merely as the giver of an outcome but as “their strength in the time of trouble.”
Augustine comments on Psalm 36 in the Septuagint/Vulgate numbering, which is Psalm 37 in the Hebrew and Prayer Book numbering. He reads the promise of land eschatologically, resisting its reduction to possession or wealth:
That land in the text, is a certain land of the living, the kingdom of the Saints. Whence it is said: You are my hope, my portion in the land of the living.
This patristic reading is a Christian interpretation rather than the only grammatical sense of the Psalm's land-language. It nevertheless accords with Christ's use of verse 11, and protects the worshipper from confusing God's promise with covetousness. The inheritance is received through the meekness, mercy, and integrity that the Psalm itself commends, not seized by the methods of the wicked.
The promise that the Lord orders a good person's going is not a denial that the righteous fall; the next line says that they are upheld. Augustine relates this perseverance to the way of Christ:
If you delight in the way of Christ, and art truly a Christian (for he is a Christian indeed who does not despise the way of Christ, but delights in following Christ's way through His sufferings), do not thou go by any other way than that by which He Himself has also gone.
Psalm 37 is thus fitting Evening Prayer. It gives a congregation words for its anger at oppression, summons it to mercy and patient obedience, and ends in trust rather than retaliation. “Keep innocency” is spiritual discipline for poor and rich alike, because the Psalm's final confidence rests in the Lord's saving help, not in the believer's ability to control events.
See Also
External Links
- 1928 Book of Common Prayer: Psalms 1–37
- Alexander MacLaren on Psalm 37
- Augustine, Exposition on Psalm 36
References
- ↑ The Protestant Episcopal Church, The Book of Common Prayer (New York: The Church Pension Fund, 1928), The Psalter, Psalm 37, and the monthly Psalter table, Seventh Day Evening Prayer; text and appointment checked against Justus Anglican, The Book of Common Prayer, 1928: Psalms 1–37.
- ↑ The Protestant Episcopal Church, The Book of Common Prayer (1928), The Psalter, Psalm 37, verses 1–9; verified against Justus Anglican, The Book of Common Prayer, 1928: Psalms 1–37.
- ↑ The Protestant Episcopal Church, The Book of Common Prayer (1928), The Psalter, Psalm 37, verses 10–20; verified against Justus Anglican, The Book of Common Prayer, 1928: Psalms 1–37.
- ↑ The Protestant Episcopal Church, The Book of Common Prayer (1928), The Psalter, Psalm 37, verses 21–32; verified against Justus Anglican, The Book of Common Prayer, 1928: Psalms 1–37.
- ↑ The Protestant Episcopal Church, The Book of Common Prayer (1928), The Psalter, Psalm 37, verses 33–41; verified against Justus Anglican, The Book of Common Prayer, 1928: Psalms 1–37.
- ↑ Alexander MacLaren, Expositor's Bible: The Psalms, vol. 1 (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1892), pp. 361–362, “Psalm XXXVII”; Christian Classics Ethereal Library transcription.
- ↑ Alexander MacLaren, Expositor's Bible: The Psalms, vol. 1 (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1892), p. 360, “Psalm XXXVII”; Christian Classics Ethereal Library transcription.
- ↑ Augustine of Hippo, Exposition on Psalm 36, §10 (Psalm 37 in the Hebrew/Prayer Book numbering), in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, vol. 8, trans. J. E. Tweed (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1888); New Advent transcription.
- ↑ Augustine of Hippo, Exposition on Psalm 36, §13 (Psalm 37 in the Hebrew/Prayer Book numbering), in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, vol. 8, trans. J. E. Tweed (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1888); New Advent transcription.