Psalms 36:37
Keep innocence, and behold justice: for there are remnants for the peaceable man.
Open Psalms 36:37 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Custodi innocentiam, et vide æquitatem, quoniam sunt reliquiæ homini pacifico.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- φύλασσε ἀκακίαν καὶ ἴδε εὐθύτητα, ὅτι ἐστὶν ἐνκατάλιμμα ἀνθρώπῳ εἰρηνικῷ.
- Hebrew (WLC) shown from Psalms 37:37
- שְׁמָר תָּ֭ם וּרְאֵ֣ה יָשָׁ֑ר כִּֽי אַחֲרִ֖ית לְאִ֣ישׁ שָׁלֽוֹם
Haydock's commentary
Remnants, or rewards. (Worthington)
Hebrew acharith, "the reward," (Pagnin) "the last end of man is peace," (Montanus; Haydock) or "the posterity (ver. 38.) of such a man shall be happy." (Calmet)
"There are future things for the peaceful." (Symmachus)
The expectations of the just are not confined to this world. They have something laid up for heaven, whereas the wicked have nothing. (Haydock)
These lose all by death; and the thought makes them take refuge in the foolish hope of being annihilated. (Berthier)
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
Clement of Alexandria The Stromata, or Miscellanies, Chapter V. On Contempt for Pain, Poverty, and Other External Things
The conversion, however, which leads to divine things, the Stoics say, is affected by a change, the soul being changed to wisdom. And Plato: “On the soul taking a turn to what is better, and a change from a kind of nocturnal day.” Now the philosophers also allow the good man an exit from life in accordance with reason, in the case of one depriving him of active exertion, so that the hope of action is no longer left him. And the judge who compels us to deny Him whom we love, I regard as showing who is and who is not the friend of God. In that case there is not left ground for even examining what one prefers, the menaces of man or the love of God. And abstinence from vicious acts is found, somehow, [to result in] the diminution and extinction of vicious propensities, their energy being destroyed by inaction. …
St Augustine Expositions on the Book of Psalms, Part 3
14. “Keep innocency” ( ver. 37 ); keep it even as thou usedst to keep thy purse, when thou wert covetous; even as thou usedst to hold fast that purse, that it might not be snatched from thy grasp by the thief, even so “keep innocency,” lest that be snatched from thy grasp by the devil. Be that thy sure inheritance, of which the rich and the poor may both be sure. “Keep innocency.” What doth it profit thee to gain gold, and to lose innocence?