"A Prayer of Moses, the man of God.
Lord, you have been our dwelling place
in all generations.
2 Before the mountains were brought forth,
or ever you had formed the earth and the world,
from everlasting to everlasting you are God.
3 You return man to dust
and say, “Return, O children of man!”
4 For a thousand years in your sight
are but as yesterday when it is past,
or as a watch in the night.
5 You sweep them away as with a flood; they are like a dream,
like grass that is renewed in the morning:
6 in the morning it flourishes and is renewed;
in the evening it fades and withers.
7 For we are brought to an end by your anger;
by your wrath we are dismayed.
8 You have set our iniquities before you,
our secret sins in the light of your presence.
9 For all our days pass away under your wrath;
we bring our years to an end like a sigh.
10 The years of our life are seventy,
or even by reason of strength eighty;
yet their span is but toil and trouble;
they are soon gone, and we fly away.
11 Who considers the power of your anger,
and your wrath according to the fear of you?
12 So teach us to number our days
that we may get a heart of wisdom.
13 Return, O Lord! How long?
Have pity on your servants!
14 Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love,
that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.
15 Make us glad for as many days as you have afflicted us,
and for as many years as we have seen evil.
16 Let your work be shown to your servants,
and your glorious power to their children.
17 Let the favour of the Lord our God be upon us,
and establish the work of our hands upon us;
yes, establish the work of our hands!"
Psalm 90
The two central sections of the Psalm, 3-6 and 7-12, require some specific com- ment. The words in 3 may be taken either as underlining the temporal nature of man's life as being the creation of a moment before returning to the dust whence he came or as a creative word from God which replaces one generation with a succeeding one, as if to say that God causes men to die without letting them die out. In 4, it is the timeless- ness of God that is in view, and set in contrast with the mortality of perishable man. In 5, 6 the idea is that of early promise leaving only frustration and disappointment and disil- lusionment. It is the sentiment expressed in Ecclesiastes that 'life under the sun', taken by itself and apart from God, is vanity and emptiness. In 7ff the Psalmist's vision is nar- rowed from mankind in general to Israel in particular, a transition marked by the change from the third person to the first. The point that is made is that mortality as such, in itself, would not create this general feeling of desolation and gloom; it is its association with sin that does so. The sentence passed on a whole generation of Israel for its sin, to con- tinue in the wilderness till they died out, is what seems to be in view in these verses. They underline the dreariness, emptiness and purposelessness that sin brings to human life. The verdict in 9, 10 is full of pathos: 'We spend our years (bring our years to an end) as a sigh (or whisper)'. T.S. Elliot's well-known words are very apposite here:
'This is the way the world ends, Not with a bang, but a whimper.'