Bellarmine on Psalm 95 : Verse 9

Verse 9

Let all the earth be moved at his presence. Say ye among the Gentiles, the Lord hath reigned.

Commoveatur a facie ejus universa terra; dicite in gentibus, quia Dominus regnavit.

Hitherto he has seen, as from afar, the kingdom of the messiah, and he exhorted preachers to announce and people to acknowledge the new king; now he sees him closer at hand and watches him coming; his spirit rejoices, and he urges not only all the peoples but also the heavens and the earth, the seas and the very trees, to offer veneration in rejoicing: not because these are endowed with reason, but so that he might describe his own feelings and the universal joy there would be over the whole world at the coming of Christ. Now some will refer this to the second coming, when He will come to judge the living and the dead : others, to the first coming, when “He is come to seek and to save that which was lost,”[1] but the holy Fathers Jerome and Augustine, and the Greek writers Theodoret and Euthymius, apply it to both comings, and this seems to us to be the more probable interpretation. Accordingly, he says, “Let all the earth be moved at his presence,” that is, let all the inhabitants of the earth be moved by fear and reverence before comes. In Hebrew, it has, Let all the earth tremble in his presence, where a noun of multitude indicates that it is not the elements of the earth that are here to be understood but all its inhabitants. “Say ye among the Gentiles, the Lord hath reigned,” that is, as the earth has trembled, preach ye to all the peoples, that the Lord has brought in the coming of his kingdom. The reference to kingdom is to a spiritual kingdom, where he will reign through faith in men’s hearts : for God reigns always in heaven, and on earth in (His) kingdom of power and majesty; but with the advent of the Messiah, He begins to reign in the hearts of people, where previously the devil reigned through the errors of idolatry, hence the Lord says in John xii: “ Now shall the prince of this world be cast out.”[2] St. Augustine reads this as meaning: for the Lord reigns from the tree (the cross); and this reading was once that of the Septuagint translators, and was erased and removed by the Hebrews, according to St. Justin in Dialog. Cum Tryphone; and Fortunatus, in the hymn which is sung during Passiontide by the Church, from this reading writes thus:

That which the prophet-king of old

hath in mysterious verse foretold,

is now accomplished, whilst we see

God ruling the nations from a Tree.[3]

Although this reading may be the best sense, it is not however found today in the Greek books, nor did they have it in the time of St. Jerome, Theodoret and Euthymius, as is clear from their commentaries: nor is it found in the Hebrew codices nor in the Latin Vulgate.

[1] For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost. Venit enim Filius hominis quaerere, et salvum facere quod perierat. [Luc. xix. 10]

[2] Now is the judgment of the world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. Nunc judicium est mundi : nunc princeps hujus mundi ejicietur foras. [Ioan.xii. 31]

[3] From the Vexilla Regis which was written by Venantius Fortunatus (530-609) and is considered one of the greatest hymns of the liturgy. Fortunatus wrote it in honour of the arrival of a large relic of the True Cross which had been sent to Queen Radegunda by the Emperor Justin II and his Empress Sophia.

Totus tuus ego sum

Et omnia mea tua sunt;

Tecum semper tutus sum:

Ad Jesum per Mariam.