Verse 8
Today if you shall hear his voice, harden not your hearts:
Hodie si vocem ejus audieritis, nolite obdurare corda vestra
This is the second part of the Psalm, in which the Prophet urges God’s people to praise God not only with their voices but also in their works. Now the sacrifice of works most pleasing to God is the obedience we show to His commandments, according to I
Kings xv.: “Doth the Lord desire holocausts and victims, and (or) not rather that the voice of the Lord should be obeyed?”
[1] The Prophet introduces God here so that his exhortation may have more force. The word
eius / his is no objection, for in Scripture, God frequently speaks of Himself, as if He is speaking of another, as in the place just quoted : “Doth the Lord desire holocausts and victims, and not rather that the voice of the Lord should be obeyed?” The Holy
Spirit speaks thus in this verse: “Today if ... his voice,” that is, the Lord’s (voice), “you shall hear,” that is, if you shall hear my voice, who am your Lord, “harden not your hearts.” That word
hodie / today, means at this time, and, as the Apostle says in
Hebr. iii, this exhortation stays in place “whilst it is called today,”
[2] that is, while the time of this life endures; for after this life, there will be time no more, but eternity. The word
si / if seems to show that God does not speak to us at every moment but communicates with us according to the time and place, either through interior inspiration, or through the voices of preachers, or through reading the Scriptures, or in other ways, so that He can make known His will to us. The expression “ harden not
your hearts” indicates that it benefits little to hear the Lord’s voice unless that voice penetrates the depths of the heart, and inclines it to faith and obedience : The hardening of the heart is sometimes attributed to man and sometimes to God; for in Exod. vii, the Lord says : “I will harden Pharaoh’s heart;” and in I Kings vi, it says: “Why do you harden your hearts, as Egypt and Pharao hardened their hearts?”
[3] Now God hardens hearts not by imparting malice but by withholding His mercy, as St.Augustine says in his epist. 105
ad Sixtum and in his tract. 53
in Joann. : thus God hardens (hearts) by withdrawing His presence and His help, which he can do in His hidden judgement but cannot do through injustice. St.Gregory subscribes to this in book xi
Moral., chapter v. God is said to harden the heart in justice when He does not soften a reprobate heart through His grace. Man, however, hardens his heart when he resists the inspirations and voices of God, as is said in
Acts vii : “You always resist the Holy Ghost;”
[4] and man is induced to resist God by the present sweetness of sin, which the Apostle, in
Hebr. iii, calls “the deceitfulness of sin,” when he says: “that none of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.”
[5] In the Hebrew text, the words
Today if you shall hear his voice, are linked to the previous words,
and we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand, today if you shall hear his voice; then begins the next verse with
Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation. But the Apostle, in
Hebr. iii. cites the text we have in the Greek and Latin codices. And so, with the Apostle as judge, the better reading is that of the Septuagint and that of our Vulgate edition, rather than the Hebrew, whatever the blather of modern heretics may say.
[1] And Samuel said: Doth the Lord desire holocausts and victims, and not rather that the voice of the Lord should be obeyed? For obedience is better than sacrifices: and to hearken rather than to offer the fat of rams. Et ait Samuel : Numquid vult Dominus holocausta et victimas, et non potius ut obediatur voci Domini? Melior est enim obedientia quam victimae : et auscultare magis quam offerre adipem arietum. [I Kings xv. 22]
[2] But exhort one another every day, whilst it is called today, that
none of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. sed
adhortamini vosmetipsos per singulos dies, donec hodie cognominatur,
ut non obduretur quis ex vobis fallacia peccati. [Hebr. Iii. 13]
[3] Why do you harden your hearts, as Egypt and Pharao hardened their hearts? did not he, after he was struck, then let them go, and they departed? Quare aggravatis corda vestra, sicut aggravavit Aegyptus et Pharao cor suum? Nonne postquam percussus est, tunc dimisit eos, et abierunt? [I Kings vi. 6]
[4] You stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Ghost: as your fathers did, so do you also. Dura cervice, et incircumcisis cordibus, et auribus, vos semper Spiritui Sancto resistitis; sicut patres vestri, ita et vos. [Acts vii. 51]
[5] But exhort one another every day, whilst it is called today, that none of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. sed adhortamini vosmetipsos per singulos dies, donec hodie cognominatur, ut non obduretur quis ex vobis fallacia peccati. [Hebr.iii. 13]
Totus tuus ego sum
Et omnia mea tua sunt;
Tecum semper tutus sum:
Ad Jesum per Mariam.
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