Bellarmine on Psalm 50: Verses 11 and 12

1542-1641. Rijksmuseum, CC0, Wikimedia Commons

We continue with the commentary on Psalm 50 written by the great polymath, Scripture scholar and apologist, St Robert Bellarmine (1542-1641).

“One of Bellarmine’s confreres in the College of Cardinals called him ‘the most learned churchman since St. Augustine’and I’d agree with that,” Fr. Baker[1] said. “His knowledge of Scripture and Theology — he seemed to know the entire Bible by heart, plus the teachings not only of nearly every pope, but of many bishops, too! — it’s just astonishing. Bellarmine was truly a polymath.” [From an interview published in the National Catholic Register in September 2017]
[1] Author of a translation of Bellarmine’s Controversies of the Christian Faith, published by Keep the Faith Books (2016)

The Latin is reproduced courtesy of the Digital Collection site  - UANL and is followed by my fairly literal translation. The Scripture excerpts (Douay Rheims/Vulgate) are taken from the DRBO site but the verse numbering follows that of Bellarmine’s Latin text.

Verse 11

Create a clean heart in me, O God: and renew a right spirit within my bowels.

Cor mundum crea in me, Deus, et spiritum rectum innova in visceribus meis.

He responds to these words with: “Thou shalt wash me, and I shall be made whiter than snow:” for he asks not only that God may blot out his sins but that He may also pour forth His justice which will renew his soul and nake it again beautiful and full of light; and this is contrary to the heretics who consider justification is in the forgiveness of sins alone. Now he says: “Create a clean heart in me, O God;” this is understood, according to the Schools, as concerning a creation of cleanliness and not of a (new) heart; for the it is not the substance of the heart which perishes through sin but its cleanliness. And so the meaning is: Create cleanliness in my heart; and he says, properly enough, “create” (as from nothing) since God will have found nothing in the sinner’s heart from which He might make cleanliness but rather from His great mercy he justifies men without any of their merits. For even if sinners are disposed to justification through faith and penitence, yet this faith, penitence and other similar gifts are of God. “And renew a right spirit within my bowels,” not “renew my bowels.” By “bowels” are understood the interior things of the soul, that is, the will  itself, which was a little earlier called the heart. By “ a right spirit” is understood a right affection, which

is nothing else than charity; for through cupidity the heart’s affection is made twisted as it is turned towards lower things, and chiefly towards the self; but through charity, as it is turned to higher things, it is directed to Almighty God. And so a right spirit is renewed in the bowels when, the heart being cleansed by grace, there is renewed in the soul a pious affection for God, which had been lost through sin and in place of which a twisted cupidity had been substituted.

Verse 12

Cast me not away from thy face; and take not thy holy spirit from me.

Ne projicias me a facie tua, et spiritum sanctum tuum ne auferas a me.

Here he now asks for perseverance, mindful of his own weakness, lest perhaps having been raised up through grace, he should fall once again. In Scripture, “cast away from the face of God” is said of one who who is abandoned and forsaken, never to be accepted in grace: see I Kings xvi: “ And the Lord said to Samuel: How long wilt thou mourn for Saul, whom I have rejected?” 1 and II Kings vii: “ But my mercy I will not take away from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I removed from before my face.” 2 and IV Kings xxiv: “For the Lord was angry against Jerusalem and against Juda, till he cast them out from his face:” 3 He therefore says: “Cast me not away from thy face;” that is, do not allow me to fall into sin, lest perhaps you remove me forever from your grace; for it avails me little to be washed, made whiter than snow and to have a right spirit renewed within me if in the end I am cast away from thy face in the company of sinners. So that Thou cast me not away from thy face, “take not thy holy Spirit from me,” that is, grant me the spirit of perseverance, through Thy grace making it so that Thy holy Spirit, remaining in me always, may preserve a right spirit within my bowels. It should be noted at this point that it is indeed a Church dogma4 that no-one is forsaken by God unless he himself first abandons God; that is, the Holy Spirit is not taken away from the just unless they themselves  through sinning extinguish the Spirit within them. But it pertains to the gift of perseverance that a man may not sin (again) and that he may not extinguish the spirit; the Apostle says of this: “ Now we pray God, that you may do no evil.” 5  Concerning this gift, we understand this part of the Psalm “ take not thy holy spirit from me” as meaning not “take not...if I shall sin” but rather “take not...that I may not sin.”

[1] And the Lord said to Samuel: How long wilt thou mourn for Saul, whom I have rejected from reigning over Israel? fill thy horn with oil, and come, that I may send thee to Isai the Bethlehemite: for I have provided me a king among his sons.  Dixitque Dominus ad Samuelem : Usquequo tu luges Saul, cum ego projecerim eum ne regnet super Israel? Imple cornu tuum oleo, et veni, ut mittam te ad Isai Bethlehemitem : providi enim in filiis ejus mihi regem. [I Reg. xvi. 1]
[2] But my mercy I will not take away from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I removed from before my face. Misericordiam autem meam non auferam ab eo, sicut abstuli a Saul, quem amovi a facie mea. [II Reg. vii. 15]
[3] For the Lord was angry against Jerusalem and against Juda, till he cast them out from his face: and Sedecias revolted from the king of Babylon. Irascebatur enim Dominus contra Jerusalem et contra Judam, donec projiceret eos a facie sua : recessitque Sedecias a rege Babylonis. [IV Reg. xxiv. 20]
[4] See Concilii Tridentini, sess. VI, cap. xiii, S. Augustini tract. 2 in Joannem, et S.Prosperi resp. 7 ad objectiones Vincentianas. 

[5] Now we pray God, that you may do no evil, not that we may appear approved, but that you may do that which is good, and that we may be as reprobates. Oramus autem Deum ut nihil mali faciatis, non ut nos probati appareamus, sed ut vos quod bonum est faciatis : nos autem ut reprobi simus. [II Cor. Xiii. 7]

Totus tuus ego sum

Et omnia mea tua sunt;

Tecum semper tutus sum:

Ad Jesum per Mariam.