Psalms 88:52
Wherewith thy enemies have reproached, O Lord; wherewith they have reproached the change of thy anointed.
Open Psalms 88:52 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- quod exprobraverunt inimici tui, Domine ; quod exprobraverunt commutationem christi tui.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- οὗ ὠνείδισαν οἱ ἐχθροί σου, Κύριε, οὗ ὠνείδισαν τὸ ἀντάλλαγμα τοῦ χριστοῦ σου.
- Hebrew (WLC) shown from Psalms 89:52
- אֲשֶׁ֤ר חֵרְפ֖וּ אוֹיְבֶ֥יךָ יְהוָ֑ה אֲשֶׁ֥ר חֵ֝רְפ֗וּ עִקְּב֥וֹת מְשִׁיחֶֽךָ
Haydock's commentary
Wherewith. Or "because," quod. (Haydock)
Change. Hebrew also, "the supplanting or retardment." Why does not your Messias come? How are your kings fallen! though God had promised them an eternal kingdom! Boast no more of his power or veracity. This impious language disturbs me. (Calmet)
They deride the ignominious life of the Messias. (Eusebius)
Sedecias had "exchanged" the promised crown for irons, which was a cutting reproach. (Berthier)
Christ appeared to have left his people. (Worthington)
Infidels objected, that David's piety was ill requited by God, and that the anointed had made a bad exchange; antallagma, Matthew xvi. 26. (Menochius)
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
Origen Origen De Principiis, Chapter VI
7. I think, indeed, that Jeremiah the prophet, also, understanding what was the nature of the wisdom of God in him, which was the same also which he had assumed for the salvation of the world, said, “The breath of our countenance is Christ the Lord, to whom we said, that under His shadow we shall live among the nations.” And inasmuch as the shadow of our body is inseparable from the body, and unavoidably performs and repeats its movements and gestures, I think that he, wishing to point out the work of Christ’s soul, and the movements inseparably belonging to it, and which accomplished everything according to His movements and will, called this the shadow of Christ the Lord, under which shadow we were to live among the nations. For in the mystery of this assumption the nations live, who, imitating it through faith, come to salvation. …
St Augustine City of God, To Whose Person the Entreaty for the Promises is to Be Understood to Belong, When He Says in the Psalm, ‘Where are Thine Ancient Compassions, Lord?’ Etc
But the rest of this psalm runs thus: “Where are Thine ancient compassions, Lord, which Thou swarest unto David in Thy truth? Remember, Lord, the reproach of Thy servants, which I have borne in my bosom of many nations; wherewith Thine enemies have reproached, O Lord, wherewith they have reproached the change of Thy Christ.” Now it may with very good reason be asked whether this is spoken in the person of those Israelites who desired that the promise made to David might be fulfilled to them; or rather of the Christians, who are Israelites not after the flesh but after the Spirit. …
St Augustine Expositions on the Book of Psalms, Psalm LXXXIX
40. “Wherewith Thine enemies have blasphemed Thee, O Lord” ( ver. 51 ), both Jews and Pagans. “Wherewith they have blasphemed.” Wherewith have they blasphemed Thee? “With the change of Thine Anointed.” They objected that Christ died, and was crucified. Madmen, what is your reproach? Although there is now no one to use it: yet supposing some still remaining that so speak, what is your reproach? that Christ died? He was not destroyed, but changed. He is styled “dead” on account of the three days. Wherewith then have thine enemies blasphemed Thee? Not with the loss, not with the perdition of Thine Anointed, but with His “change.” He was changed from temporal to eternal life: He was changed from the Jews to the Gentiles; He was changed from earth to heaven. Let then Thy vain enemies blaspheme Thee still for the change of Thine Anointed. …
The Fathers are given as they wrote. Where a passage lays the Passion on the Jewish people, the Church teaches that it cannot be charged against all the Jews then living, nor against the Jews of today, and that all sinners were its authors (CCC 597, 598).