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COMMENTARY ON PSALM 1
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COMMENTARY ON PSALM 1 No title in the Hebrew lessed the man who did not walk in the counsel of the ungodly, take his place in the way of sinners, or rest on the seat of the corrupt (v. 1).1 It is easy to grasp from this that in former times the translators of the divine Scriptures who found titles in the Hebrew text turned them into the Greek language. I mean, they found this psalm and the one after it without titles and left them without titles, not presuming to add anything of their own to the sayings of the Spirit.2 (2) Some of those who have composed treatises on the Psalms say this psalm contains moral teaching, but to me it seems no less dogmatic than moral. In fact, it includes condemnation not only of sinners but also of the ungodly, and urges constant attention to the divine words; from this we gain benefit that is not only moral but also dogmatic. (3) Very appropriately did mighty David set forth a beatitude at the beginning of his composition, imitating him who is both his son and his Lord—I mean, Christ the Savior—who began his teaching to the holy disciples with beatitudes: “Blessed are the poor in spirit,” he said, “because theirs is the kingdom of heaven .”3 Now, Christ the Lord is son of David in his humanity according to that verse of the holy Gospels, “Book of the genealo46 1. Ps 1.1. Whether virtuous women are likewise to be so commended is not a concern of either Hebrew or Greek text. Theodoret, unlike Chrysostom , will not allow this to pass without comment. 2. Naturally, an Antiochene commentator prizes this fidelity of the translator to the text, in line with his school’s accent on akribeia, precision. For Theodoret, however, the fact is also confirmation of his view of the originality of the titles outlined in the Preface, the reasoning being that if later editors supplied some, they would have supplied all. 3. Matt 5.3. gy of Jesus Christ, son of Abraham.”4 But as God he is his Lord and Creator: his own words are as follows, “The Lord said to my lord, ‘Sit on my right.’”5 [868] So he blesses the person who neither shared the way with the ungodly nor took seriously the counsel of sinners (which he called “taking one’s place”), but shunned the abiding contagion of the corrupt. Now, the epithet “blessed” is a divine title; the divine Apostle is witness to this in his exclamation, “O blessed and sole ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords.”6 But the Lord God shared this, too, with human beings, as he did other things. After all, he is called faithful : “God is faithful,” Scripture says, “and through him you were invited into fellowship with his Son.”7 And blessed Moses said, “God is faithful; in him there is no wrong.”8 And he called faithful in turn those human beings who accept his words without reservation. In similar fashion, being God in fact as well as in name, he shared even this appellation with human beings in his munificence, crying aloud, “I said, ‘You are gods and all sons of the Most High, yet as human beings you will die.’”9 (4) The epithet “blessed,” therefore, constitutes the fruit of perfection as far as virtue is concerned. You see, every practice in life looks towards its goal: athletics looks towards olive wreaths, martial arts towards victories and spoils, medicine certainly towards good health and cure of disease, commerce towards amassing wealth and abundance of riches. Likewise, the practice of virtue has as its fruit and goal the beatitude from God. Now, no one seeing only a man declared blessed here should think that womankind is excluded from this beatitude. I mean, Christ the Lord in delivering the beatitudes in the masculine did not exclude women from possessing virtue: his words include men and women. The husband is the head of his wife, remember, as the divine Apostle says.10 Now, the limbs of the COMMENTARY ON PSALM 1 47 4. Cf. Matt 1.1, where our received text reads, “son of David, son of Abraham ,” which would obviously support Theodoret’s point less elliptically. 5. Ps 110.1. It will be more helpful for us to cite the Psalms in the numbering of the Hebrew and of modern versions rather than the Greek (and...