Psalms 87:3
Let my prayer come in before thee: incline thy ear to my petition.
Open Psalms 87:3 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Intret in conspectu tuo oratio mea, inclina aurem tuam ad precem meam.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- εἰσελθέτω ἐνώπιόν σου ἡ προσευχή μου, κλῖνον τὸ οὖς σου εἰς τὴν δέησίν μου, Κύριε.
- Hebrew (WLC) shown from Psalms 88:3
- תָּב֣וֹא לְ֭פָנֶיךָ תְּפִלָּתִ֑י הַטֵּֽה אָ֝זְנְךָ֗ לְרִנָּתִֽי
Haydock's commentary
Prayer. It is represented as a person prostrated before God. Homer (Iliad ix.) says, that "supplications are the daughters of Jupiter, lame....with the eyes downcast, and following after injuries," which admirably shews the conditions requisite for prayer. (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, Psalm LXXXVIII
“O let my prayer enter into Thy presence, incline Thine ear unto my calling” ( ver. 2 ). For even our Lord prayed, not in the form of God, but in the form of a servant; for in this He also suffered. He prayed both in prosperous times, that is, by “day,” and in calamity, which I imagine is meant by “night.” The entrance of prayer into God’s presence is its acceptance: the inclination of His ear is His compassionate listening to it: for God has not such bodily members as we have. The passage is however, as usual, a repetition.