Psalms 118:84
How many are the days of thy servant: when wilt thou execute judgment on them that persecute me?
Open Psalms 118:84 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Quot sunt dies servi tui ? quando facies de persequentibus me judicium ?
- Septuagint (Swete)
- πόσαι εἰσὶν αἱ ἡμέραι τοῦ δούλου σου; πότε ποιήσεις μοι ἐκ τῶν καταδιωκόντων με κρίσιν;
- Hebrew (WLC) shown from Psalms 119:84
- כַּמָּ֥ה יְמֵֽי עַבְדֶּ֑ךָ מָתַ֬י תַּעֲשֶׂ֖ה בְרֹדְפַ֣י מִשְׁפָּֽט
Haydock's commentary
Servant. The just may lawfully desire the term of their sufferings, with submission to God's will, (Worthington) and to be freed from the power of persecutors, (Hebrew, "the proud;" Berthier) and from exile, after their enemies are punished, Psalm xxxviii. 5. (Calmet)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Augustine Expositions on the Book of Psalms, Caph
84. “How many are the days of Thy servant? when wilt Thou be avenged of them that persecute me?” ( ver. 84 ). In the Apocalypse, these are the words of the Martyrs, and long-suffering is enjoined them until the number of their brethren be fulfilled. The body of Christ then is asking concerning its days, what they are to be in this world, and that no man might suppose that the Church would cease to exist here before the end of the world came, and that some time would elapse in this world, while the Church was now no more on earth; therefore, when he had enquired concerning the days, he added also respecting the judgment, showing indeed that the Church would exist on earth until the judgment, when vengeance shall fall upon Her persecutors. …
St Augustine Expositions on the Book of Psalms, Caph
86. Lastly, he addeth, “All Thy commandments are truth: they have persecuted me unjustly; O be Thou my help” ( ver. 86 ). And the whole sense dependeth upon the foregoing: “How many are the days of Thy servant: when wilt Thou be avenged of them that persecute me?” For that they may persecute me, they have related to me these pleasant tales; but I have preferred Thy law to them, which on that account hath pleased me more, because all Thy commandments are true; not as in their discourses, where vanity aboundeth. And for this reason “they have persecuted me falsely,” because in me they have persecuted nothing save the truth. Therefore help Thou me, that I may struggle for the truth even unto death; because this is at once Thy commandment, and therefore it is also the truth.