The psalmist, in 119:19, tells us this: \u201cI am only a sojourner in the land.\u201d At first blush, this would mean he is a Gentile (ger \u2018anoki<\/em>) dwelling for awhile in the Land of Israel. On top of this, he says \u201cdo not hide your commandments from me.\u201d What to say? The psalmist, in 119:19, tells us this: \u201cI am only a sojourner in the land.\u201d At first blush, this would mean he is a Gentile (ger \u2018anoki) dwelling for awhile in the Land of Israel. On top of this, he says \u201cdo not hide your commandments from me.\u201d What to say?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":197,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1753],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1907","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-psalm-119"],"yoast_head":"\n
\nIf taken to be a social descriptor, the psalmist is a Gentile who, in spite of his Gentile status, wants to learn and hear the commandments. But, my sources don\u2019t show anyone who thinks this.
\nThat means, since the contextual flow of the whole of Psalm 119 suggests a Jewish author, that \u201csojourner\u201d is a metaphor for our sojourn on earth. Which, so it seems to me, fits with 119:17: he wants to live long enough to enjoy observing the Torah (after his effort to learn it). And, this also means that the \u201cdo not hide\u201d is about the same as \u201cdeal kindly\u201d in 119:17.
\nThat\u2019s the process I went through to come to the meaning of the text: in our time on earth we are summoned to join the psalmist of learning Torah and observing Torah. Hence, every weekday we spend time on this blog pondering a passage in the Bible.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"