What does Psalms Chapter 57 say, and which statements belong to its speaker?

Atlas of Saints · Chapter summary

The Latin incipit is Si vere utique. The speaker’s petitions, recollections and future declarations retain their distinct wording. Edition interpretations remain separate from verse speech; no universal safety or clinical guarantee is established.

Chapter breakdown

The Latin incipit is Si vere utique. The separate heading describes David rebuking wicked people and foretelling punishment. The inscription is unto the end, destroy not, for David. The speaker challenges sons of men to speak justice and judge right things, accusing hearts of iniquity and hands of forging injustice. The wicked are described as alienated and astray from the womb, speaking falsehood. Their madness is compared to a serpent and a deaf asp stopping its ears against charmers and a wizard charming wisely; the text does not identify their offices or certify an incurable diagnosis.

God shall break their teeth and lions' grinders. They shall come to nothing like running water; He has bent His bow until they be weakened. Like melting wax they shall be taken away; fire has fallen and they shall not see the sun. Before thorns know the brier He swallows them alive in wrath. The separate note explains thorns consumed by divine justice before growing strong.

The just shall rejoice seeing revenge and wash hands in the sinner's blood. A separate note interprets this as applauding God's justice and taking punishment as an occasion to cleanse hands from sin. Man shall say there is fruit to the just and God judges upon earth. Future witnessing and judgment are retained rather than a narrated worldwide public overthrow.

The story inside

Opening: The Latin incipit is Si vere utique. Development: The speaker’s petitions, recollections and future declarations retain their distinct wording. Conclusion: Edition interpretations remain separate from verse speech; no universal safety or clinical guarantee is established.

Lessons worth keeping

1
The Latin incipit is Si vere utique.
2
The speaker’s petitions, recollections and future declarations retain their distinct wording.
3
Edition interpretations remain separate from verse speech; no universal safety or clinical guarantee is established.

Test your recall

Which images and requests does the speaker use, and what does the chapter leave unresolved?

Source edition and notes

Douay–Rheims, revised by Richard Challoner (1749–1752). Project Gutenberg no. 1581. Locators refer to lines in the admitted pg1581.txt edition. Source notes may include Challoner commentary.

Lines 61061–61062
If in very deed ye speak justice: judge right things, ye sons of men.
Lines 61064–61065
For in your heart you work iniquity: your hands forge injustice in the earth.
Lines 61070–61071
Their madness is according to the likeness of a serpent: like the deaf asp that stoppeth her ears:
Lines 61076–61077
God shall break in pieces their teeth in their mouth: the Lord shall break the grinders of the lions.
Lines 61082–61083
Like wax that melteth they shall be taken away: fire hath fallen on them, and they shall not see the sun.
Lines 61092–61093
The just shall rejoice when he shall see the revenge: he shall wash his hands in the blood of the sinner.
Lines 61099–61100
And man shall say: If indeed there be fruit to the just: there is indeed a God that judgeth them on the earth.