Psalm 18 read:
1 Finally, a psalm to David
2 The heavens declare the glory of God, but the firmament declares the work of His hand. 3 Day of days the verb spits out, and night of night the mind speaks. 4 Speech is not worth, lower than words, whose voice is not heard. 5 Their words went out into all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world. Set Your village in the sun, 6 and He, like the Bridegroom who proceeds from His palace, will rejoice, like the Giant who leads the way. 7 From the end of the heaven is His departure, and His meeting to the end of the heaven, and there is nothing that can hide His warmth. 8 The law of the Lord is blameless, converting souls, the testimony of the Lord is sure, making children wise. 9 The justifications of the Lord are right, gladdening the heart, the commandment of the Lord is bright, enlightening the eyes. 10 The fear of the Lord is pure; it endures forever: the destinies of the Lord are true, they are justified, 11 more desirable than gold, and more precious than stones, and sweeter than honey and honeycomb. 12 For Your servant keeps me, and I will always keep you; your reward will be great. 13 Who understands the Fall? Cleanse me from my secret things, 14 and from strangers, spare your servant; if they do not possess me, then I will be blameless and cleansed from great sin. 15 And the words of my mouth will be pleasing, and the teaching of my heart will be made before You, O Lord, my Helper and my Deliverer.
Psalm 18 in Russian:
1 To the director of the choir. Psalm of David.
2 The heavens proclaim the glory of God, and the firmament proclaims the work of His hands.
3 Day imparts speech to day, and night reveals knowledge to night.
4 There is no tongue, and no speech, where their voice is not heard.
5 Their sound goes through all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world. He made a dwelling for the sun in them,
6 And it comes out like a bridegroom from his bridal chamber, rejoicing like a giant to run the race:
7 From the end of the heavens is his departure, and his march to the end of them, and nothing is hidden from his warmth.
8 The law of the Lord is perfect, strengthening the soul; The revelation of the Lord is true, making wise the simple.
9 The commandments of the Lord are righteous and make glad the heart; The commandment of the Lord is bright, it enlightens the eyes.
10 The fear of the Lord is pure and endures forever. The judgments of the Lord are true, all are righteous;
11 They are more desirable than gold and even much fine gold, sweeter than honey and drops of honeycomb;
12 And Your servant is protected by them; in keeping them there is great reward.
13 Who can discern his own faults? Cleanse me from my secrets
14 And restrain Thy servant from evil deeds, lest they prevail over me. Then I will be blameless and pure from great corruption.
15 May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, my rock and my Savior!
Bible Online
1(17-1) ^^To the director of the choir. The servant of the Lord David, who spoke the words of this song to the Lord, when the Lord delivered him from the hands of all his enemies and from the hand of Saul. And he said: ^^ (17-2) I will love you, O Lord, my strength!
2 (17-3) The Lord is my rock and my refuge, my Deliverer, my God is my rock; in Him I trust; my shield, the horn of my salvation and my refuge.
3 (17-4) I will call upon the venerable Lord and I will be saved from my enemies.
4 (17-5) The pangs of death have seized me, and the torrents of iniquity have terrified me;
5 (17-6) The chains of hell have encircled me, and the snares of death have entangled me.
6 (17-7) In my distress I called on the Lord and called to my God. And He heard my voice from His palace, and my cry came to His ears.
7 (17-8) The earth shook and was shaken, the foundations of the mountains trembled and moved, for [God] was angry;
8 (17-9) smoke arose from His wrath, and from His mouth a consuming fire; hot coals [fell] from Him.
9 (17-10) He bowed the heavens and came down, and darkness was under His feet.
10 (17-11) And he sat on the Cherubim and flew, and was carried away on the wings of the wind.
11 (17-12) And he made darkness his covering, casting the darkness of the waters and clouds of air around him.
12 (17-13) Because of the brilliance before Him, His clouds, hail and coals of fire fled.
13 (17-14) The Lord thundered in the heavens, and the Most High gave His voice, hail and coals of fire.
14 (17-15) He sent forth His arrows and scattered them, a multitude of lightnings, and scattered them.
15 (17-16) And springs of water appeared, and the foundations of the world were revealed at Thy terrible [voice], O Lord, at the breath of the spirit of Thy wrath.
16 (17-17) He stretched out [his hand] from on high and took me, and brought me out of many waters;
17 (17-18) He delivered me from my powerful enemy and from those who hated me, who were stronger than me.
18 (17-19) They rose up against me in the day of my trouble, but the Lord was my strength.
19 (17-20) He brought me out to a large place and delivered me, for He delights in me.
20 (17-21) The Lord rewarded me according to my righteousness, He rewarded me according to the purity of my hands,
21 (17-22) For I have kept the ways of the Lord, and have not been wicked before my God;
22 (17-23) For all His commandments are before me, and I have not departed from His statutes.
23 (17-24) I was blameless before Him and took heed lest I sin;
24 (17-25) and the Lord rewarded me according to my righteousness, according to the purity of my hands in His sight.
25 (17-26) You deal mercifully with a merciful man, sincerely with a sincere man,
26 (17-27) with the pure it is pure, but with the evil one according to his wickedness,
27 (17-28) For You save the oppressed people, but You bring down the haughty eyes.
28 (17-29) You kindle my lamp, O Lord; My God enlightens my darkness.
29 (17-30) With You I defeat the army, with my God I ascend the wall.
30 (17-31) God! “His way is blameless, the word of the Lord is pure; He is a shield to all who trust in Him.
31 (17-32) For who is God besides the Lord, and who is a defense besides our God?
32 (17-33) God girdles me with strength and arranges for me the right path;
33 (17-34) He makes my feet like the feet of a deer, and places me on my high places;
34 (17-35) He teaches my hands to fight, and my arms break the bronze bow.
35 (17-36) You have given me the shield of Your salvation, and Your right hand upholds me, and Your mercy magnifies me.
36 (17-37) You widen my step under me, and my feet do not falter.
37 (17-38) I pursue my enemies and overtake them, and I do not return until I destroy them;
38 (17-39) I strike them, and they cannot rise, they fall under my feet,
39 (17-40) For You have girded me with strength for war, and have brought down under my feet those who rebelled against me;
40 (17-41) You have turned the rear of my enemies to me, and I destroy those who hate me:
41 (17-42) they cry out, but there is no one to save; to the Lord, but He does not heed them;
42 (17-43) I scatter them like dust before the wind, like the dirt of the streets I trample on them.
43 (17-44) You delivered me from the rebellion of the people, you made me the head of the foreigners; a people whom I did not know serves me;
44 (17-45) because of one rumor about me they obey me; foreigners caress me;
45 (17-46) the foreigners turn pale and tremble in their fortifications.
46 (17-47) The Lord lives and blessed is my protector! Exalted be the God of my salvation,
47 (17-48) God, who avenges me and subdues the nations for me,
48 (17-49) and who delivers me from my enemies! You raised me above those who rebelled against me and delivered me from the cruel man.
49 (17-50) Therefore I will praise You, O Lord, among the foreigners, and I will sing to Your name,
50 (17-51) majestically saving the king and showing mercy to Your anointed David and his descendants forever.
Psalm 18 meaning of prayer:
Why do believers love icons so much? Because every image carries a revelation about our Lord. And the prophet David sang in a psalm the revelation of God given to all who live on earth: The heavens tell the glory of God, but the firmament proclaims the creation of His hand. The sky that we see speaks of the power of the Creator, who created our world with His word. But beyond the visible skies there is an immeasurable depth of the universe. Man's thought is directed into these boundless distances. If they tell you, they will tell you something important. And we tell our loved ones how our soul has been enriched and our mind has been elevated. The Apostle Paul denounced the pagans in his Epistle to the Romans. They knew God through nature: “His eternal power and Divinity from the creation of the world are visible through the consideration of creation.” But people did not go further - they did not turn to the Lord in prayer so that He would give them greater revelation. And this is the origin of paganism: without knowing his Creator, man began to deify nature and its phenomena, attribute the qualities of God to images of animals and birds, sculptures made of stone and metal, and create idols. Thus, people became coarser and lost knowledge of the Lord. And then terrible vices spread among the pagans.
I am reminded of St. Augustine. He went into the jungle of mystical delusions and heretical teachings, but stubbornly searched for the meaning of life. And one day he asked: “Sea, are you my God?” The sea answered: “No, I am the work of His hands.” He turned to the heavens: “Sun, stars, are you the God for whom my soul is seeking?” They said, “No, we are His creatures.” The wind, the elements, all of nature told him that they were created by the Lord. These questions and answers contain the same thing as in the psalm of David: but the firmament declares the work of His hand. When the Lord created the earth, on the first day something chaotic appeared from non-existence - primordial matter. God divided it into water and firmament. The firmament is not only land, but also the sun, moon, and stars.
When we become acquainted with astronomy, amazing laws are revealed to us. At a strictly defined time on earth, morning begins, then evening comes. From the combination of day and night, a day is formed, and in biblical language - a day.
Our life is determined by the presence of the luminaries in the sky: “A man will go out to his work, and to his work until the evening. Because Thy works have been magnified, O Lord, Thou hast done all things with wisdom.” Firmament, unlike water, seems to us strong, reliable, unchangeable. Although we see stars falling in August. Christ warns: heaven and earth will pass away, but not one jot will escape the law of God. And this iota of the law can be called the real firmament around which the Lord created our world.
The psalm goes on to explain: the universe was created fundamentally. But it is not a simple aid for maintaining life. God does not create anything dead: Day of days vomits the verb, and night of night the mind proclaims. There is an excess of Divine energy in nature. Therefore, one day communicates to another not words, but a verb. The verb is called prophetic: it contains strength, persuasiveness, eternity. And the Creator addresses the prophets: “Proverb!” At night the living universe tells about itself: and the night of night proclaims the mind. And the mind is a whole system of cognition: it covers what happens every day and what will happen later. The Lord opens up the opportunity for us to see this, comprehend it, and pass it on to others; He made man king over all creation - and opened the Divine Book of Nature to us. Speech is not the essence, it is lower than words, and their voices cannot be heard. There are no human dialects that do not understand or hear the language of nature.
Let us remember what was revealed to Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov in trials and tribulations:
I go out alone on the road;
Through the fog the flinty path shines;
The night is quiet. The desert listens to God
And star speaks to star.
It’s solemn and wonderful in heaven!
The earth sleeps in a blue radiance...
Now in cities we can no longer see the twinkling of stars. And in the clear sky you can see how the heavenly army (as it is called in the Bible!) comes out to guard the universe. My soul becomes unusually quiet. The Universe - God's living creation - asks man: “Take care of me, learn from me, work so that I reward you with good.”
The prophet David contemplates nature, which does not cease its gospel for all nations: Their message went out into all the earth, and their words went out to the ends of the world. God placed His village (place of residence, as they will say now) in the sun: Place His village in the sun, and she, like a bridegroom coming from his palace, will rejoice, like a giant mother-in-law in the way. Darkness oppresses the soul, especially in winter. This time is even called uterine: it’s as if we are in our mother’s womb. And we rejoice as soon as the sun appears. It's extraordinary. He gets up in the morning and our feelings immediately wake up: life lives on! Light, warmth, joy spread. And it seems: that’s where God is. But man received a revelation from the Lord Himself: He lives in an unapproachable, incomprehensible light. The sun comes out like a bridegroom from the palace, rejoices - and sets off on its journey like a giant.
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Interpretation
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There are several semantic blocks in this chapter of the Psalter. Verses 2 through 7 show how observation of nature can lead to thoughts about God. His invisible hand is clearly visible throughout creation. Only fools believe that the Sun arose by chance, thanks to the chaotic movement of atoms. Everything in the universe must have a first cause for existence, and that is the Lord. Considering the structure of the universe, the sizes of celestial bodies, the periodicity of their movement, one can draw conclusions about the Creator.
- Psalm 34 - text;
- Look here Psalm 118 in Russian;
- Psalm 101 - text in Russian: .
Judging by the interpretations of the holy fathers, they see in this chapter of Holy Scripture hints of various qualities of God. The sizes of celestial bodies indicate His infinity. The brightness of the firmament indicates that the Creator is the source of light, of life itself. The height at which the stars are located is about power.
- Heaven is the dwelling place of God. The structure of the human body is such that it is directed upward, where its soul will go (compare with animals whose heads are directed towards the ground).
- The constant alternation of day and night refers us to Genesis: it describes not only the process of creation, but also the conclusion of a contract between God and Noah. After the Flood, people were given a promise that “day and night will not cease.” The Lord shows His mercy to man, because daylight helps to work, and the darkness of night helps to rest. The rhythm of life, established from the beginning of time, testifies to the wisdom and providence of the Creator.
- The sun (it is called the same in Russian and in the Church Slavonic translation of the Bible) is worthy of special mention. It was not for nothing that this luminary was previously endowed with the qualities of a deity. It gives vitality to everyone around, regardless of age and religious affiliation. At the same time, as Psalm 18 teaches, the celestial body around which the Earth revolves is a clear witness to the existence of the Creator.
All nations without exception can daily observe how God's laws are implemented on earth. They will no longer be able to say that they have not heard about the One Creator; they will no longer be able to justify themselves by the fact that no one spoke to them about the Gospel. After all, Almighty God turned even stones into witnesses of His power.
