The Psalter of the Blessed Virgin Mary by St Bonaventure : Psalm 80

St Bonaventure Receiving the Banner of St Sepulchre
from the Madonna, by Francesco Solimena (1710). The 
Cathedral of San Paolo in Aversa, Italy. Public domain.

The following posts present the text of The Psalter of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Its authorship is generally attributed to St Bonaventure (1221-15 July 1274) who studied at the University of Paris where in 1243 he joined the Franciscan Order. In 1254, he was made a Master of Theology and took over the leadership of the Franciscan School in Paris. Bonaventure was officially confirmed as seventh Minister General of the Franciscans in 1257. He later wrote a life of St Francis and has been called the second founder of the Order. Appointed Cardinal the year before his death in 1274, he was canonised in 1482 and declared a Doctor of the Church in 1588 with the title of Seraphic Doctor.

I offer this annotated presentation of St Bonaventure’s Psalter as a small gift to our gentle Queen and Mother in gratitude for her many graces and favours, praying for her continued help and protection for the author and his family.

This presentation of St Bonaventure’s Marian Psalms will include: an English translation based upon that of Sr Mary Emmanuel O.S.B. in the 1932 edition published by Herder; the Latin text as published in the Psalterium B. Virginis Mariæ of 1679; the text of the Douay-Rheims Psalms; with footnotes and occasional notes translated from Fillion’s Bible (1900 edition).

Reminder: I began posting an annotated and illustrated version of St Bonaventure's Life of St Francis on the 4th October (his feast day) this year, the 800th anniversary of his death in 1226. To read these posts, please click on our sister blog:

St Bonaventure’s Life of St Francis

Psalm 80

“Let us imitate her humility: her obedience and her meekness.”
The Madonna of Humility, by Fra Angelico (c. 1430).
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC.
Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

1. Rejoice to the Lady, our helper: sing aloud in the joy of your heart[1].

2. Let your affections be enkindled in her: and she will overwhelm your enemies with confusion[2].

3. Let us imitate her humility: her obedience and her meekness[3].

4. All graces shine forth in her: for her capacity was immense[4].

5. Run ye to her with holy devotion[5]: and she will share her good things with you.

Glory be to the Father etc.

1. Exultate Dominæ adjutrici nostræ: jubilate in lætitia cordis vestri.

2. Accendantur affectus vestri in illam: et inimicos vestros induet confusione.

3. Imitemur humilitatem ejus: obedientiam et mansuetudinem illius.

4. Omnes gratiæ radiant in illa: capacissima enim fuit capacitas illius.

5. Currite ad illam cum devotione sancta: et de bonis suis participabit vobis.

Gloria Patri, etc.

Footnotes

[1] Cf. “Rejoice to God our helper: sing aloud to the God of Jacob”: Davidic Ps. LXXX, 2.

[2] Cf. “Let God arise, and let his enemies be scattered: and let them that hate him flee from before his face. As smoke vanisheth, so let them vanish away: as wax melteth before the fire, so let the wicked perish at the presence of God”: Ps. LCVII, 2-3.

[3] Cf. “The prayer of the humble and the meek hath always pleased thee”: Jud. Ix, 16. 

[4] Cf. “She shall give to thy head increase of graces, and protect thee with a noble crown”: Prov. iv, 9.

[5] Cf. “Therefore, let us run; let us run, for we shall go into the house of the Lord. Let us run, and let us not grow weary; for we shall arrive at a place where we shall never be tired.” In Psalmum CXXI Enarratio, from the Enarrationes in Psalmos of St Augustine.

Davidic Psalm LXXX

1 Unto the end, for the wine presses, a psalm for Asaph himself.

2 Rejoice to God our helper: sing aloud to the God of Jacob.  3 Take a psalm, and bring hither the timbrel: the pleasant psaltery with the harp.  4 Blow up the trumpet on the new moon, on the noted day of your solemnity.  5 For it is a commandment in Israel, and a judgment to the God of Jacob.  6 He ordained it for a testimony in Joseph, when he came out of the land of Egypt: he heard a tongue which he knew not.

7 He removed his back from the burdens: his hands had served in baskets.  8 Thou calledst upon me in affliction, and I delivered thee: I heard thee in the secret place of tempest: I proved thee at the waters of contradiction.  9 Hear, O my people, and I will testify to thee: O Israel, if thou wilt hearken to me,  10 There shall be no new god in thee: neither shalt thou adore a strange god.  11 For I am the Lord thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt: open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it.  12 But my people heard not my voice: and Israel hearkened not to me.  13 So I let them go according to the desires of their heart: they shall walk in their own inventions.  14 If my people had heard me: if Israel had walked in my ways:  15 I should soon have humbled their enemies, and laid my hand on them that troubled them.  16 The enemies of the Lord have lied to him: and their time shall be for ever.  17 And he fed them with the fat of wheat, and filled them with honey out of the rock.

Notes

The Israelites are invited to celebrate with fervour a great religious solemnity, and to demonstrate their fidelity to the unique worship of the Most High.

The title: 1: “for the wine presses”: Hebr.’al-haggittit: to the accompaniment of the lyre/guitar of Geth. See Ps. VIII, 1. & note. 

This Psalm has for its theme and objective :

1. exhorting the Hebrews to celebrate with reverence and lively enthusiasm one of the most solemn feasts of the theocratic liturgy; 

2. stirring them to remain ever faithful to the Lord who has showered them with so many graces unto it is filled with desire to bless them forever. The commentators have not managed to agree on the subject of the feast in question, and there is here in fact an exegetical problem which is morally insoluble. The Jewish tradition, and this argument carries weight in such a case, has always been in favour of the so-called Feast of the Trumpets, which was celebrated on the first day of the 7th month (cf. Lev. xxiii, 24; Num. xxix, 1-6). Certain interpreters have opted for the Feast of Tabernacles which took place fifteen  days later (Lev. xxiii, 33 et seq.). Numerous contemporary exegetes favour the Passover. There are difficulties with each of these but we are inclined to favour the first.  

Structure 

The poem may be divided into:

‣ a lyrical prelude, in which the poet addresses to his brethren his pressing invitation concerning the feast (verses 2-6);

‣ the body of the Psalm, in epic strain, Where God himself rouses the Hebrews to have no other gods before him (verses 7-17). There are five strophes: verses 2-4, 5-6, 7-8, 9-13 & 14-17.

3: “the timbrel: the pleasant psaltery with the harp”: the tambourine, the small harp and the lyre: Three instruments which the orientals  love to use in concert.

4: “Blow up the trumpet on the new moon”: the Hebrews made use of two types of trumpet: the hasos’rot, a straight trumpet made of metal (cf. Num. x, 10); and the sofar, a curved trumpet comprising norm a ram or goat horn. 

6: “he heard a tongue which he knew not”: according to a number of interpreters, the language of the Egyptians, so different from Hebrew (cf. Ps. CXIII, 1). The common interpretation is probably better, that this is the voice of God Himself, whom the Israelites had never heard directly and which sounded so frequently in their ears, to reveal great things to them. The original text uses the first person and says : I heard a language which I knew not, but the sense is the same.

7: an allusion here to the  heavy loads which the Egyptians forced the Hebrews to carry in baskets over several years. Cf. Ex. i, 11-14; v, 4 etc.

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The Virgin of Tenderness. >12th century.

SUB tuum præsidium confugimus, Sancta Dei Genitrix. Nostras deprecationes ne despicias in necessitatibus, sed a periculis cunctis libera nos semper, Virgo gloriosa et benedicta. Amen.

Totus tuus ego sum

Et omnia mea tua sunt;

Tecum semper tutus sum:

Ad Jesum per Mariam.

He that hearkeneth to me, shall not be confounded: and they that work by me shall not sin. They that explain me shall have life everlasting. Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) xxiv. 30-31.30-31.