to hear intelligently (often with implication of attent… · verb, qal perfect, 1st person common plural
ears
בְּאָזְנֵ֬ינוּbe.'a.ze.Nei.nu
H241
broadness. i.e. (concrete) the ear (from its form in ma… · preposition + noun, common feminine dual construct + pronominal suffix
God
אֱלֹהִ֤ים'E.lo.Him
H430
gods in the ordinary sense · noun, common masculine plural absolute
fathers
אֲבוֹתֵ֥ינוּ'a.vo.Tei.nu
H1
father · noun, common feminine plural construct + pronominal suffix
told
סִפְּרוּsi.pe.ru-
H5608
properly · verb, piel perfect, 3rd person common plural
work
פֹּ֥עַלPo.'al
H6467
an act or work (concretely) · noun, common masculine singular absolute
didst
פָּעַ֥לְתָּpa.'Al.ta
H6466
to do or make (systematically and habitually) · verb, qal perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
days
בִֽ֝ימֵיהֶ֗םvi.mei.Hem
H3117
a day (as the warm hours) · preposition + noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine plural
times
בִּ֣ימֵיBi.mei
H3117
a day (as the warm hours) · preposition + noun, common masculine plural construct
old
קֶֽדֶםKe.dem
H6924
the front · noun, common masculine singular absolute
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Psalms 78:3-6 Which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us.
Exodus 13:14-15 And it shall be when thy son asketh thee in time to come, saying, What is this? that thou shalt say unto him, By strength of hand the LORD b…
Deuteronomy 6:20 And when thy son asketh thee in time to come, saying, What mean the testimonies, and the statutes, and the judgments, which the LORD our God…
Judges 6:13 And Gideon said unto him, Oh my Lord, if the LORD be with us, why then is all this befallen us? and where be all his miracles which our fath…
Joel 1:3 Tell ye your children of it, and let your children tell their children, and their children another generation.
Psalms 42:1 As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God.
Psalms 77:5 I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient times.
Numbers 21:14-16 Wherefore it is said in the book of the wars of the LORD, What he did in the Red sea, and in the brooks of Arnon,
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Psalms 44:1-8
Some observe that most of the psalms that are entitled Maschil - psalms of instruction, are sorrowful psalms; for afflictions give instructions, and sorrow of spirit opens the ear to them. Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest and teachest.
In these verses the church, though now trampled upon, calls to remembrance the days of her triumph, of her triumph in God and over her enemies. This is very largely mentioned here, 1. As an aggravation of the present distress. The yoke of servitude cannot but lie very heavily on the necks of those that used to wear the crown of victory; and the tokens of God's displeasure must needs be most grievous to those that have been long accustomed to the tokens…
We have heard with our ears, O God,.... The church being in distress calls to mind the past favours of God to his people, in order to encourage her faith and hope; and this expression, delivered in such a form, shows the clearness, evidence, and certainty of what was heard; and which was heard not only as a tradition from father to son; but being recorded in the writings of Moses and the prophets, and these things read both in private and in public, were heard with the ear;
our fathers have told us what works thou didst in their days, in the times of old: such as the signs and wonders in Egypt, the slaying of the firstborn there, and the bringing of the people of Israel from thence with a m…
Psalm 44:1-3
1. O God! we have heard with our ears, our fathers have declared to us, the work which thou hast done in their days, even in the days of old. 2. Thou hast expelled the heathen [or nations [130] ] with thy hand, and planted them [131] thou hast wasted the peoples [132] and multiplied them, [or made them [133] to spread.] 3. For they got not possession of the land by their own sword, and their own arm did not save them, but thy right hand, and thy arm, and the light of thy countenance, because thou hadst a favor for them.
1. O God! we have heard with our ears. The people of God here recount the goodness which he had formerly manifested towards their fathers, that, by showing the…
The Church Fathers
The majesty that with the Father dwelled, His spirit and thought, the way of his designs, Which made not by his hand or spoken word, Breathed from the Father's heart, declared his will.
"O God, we have heard with our ears; our fathers have told us the work that You did in their days, and in the days of old" [Psalm 44:1]. Wondering wherefore, in these days, He has seemingly forsaken those whom it was His will to exercise in sufferings, they recall the past events which they have heard of from their fathers; as if they said, It is not of these things that we suffer, that our fathers told us! For in that other Psalm also, He said this, "Our fathers trusted in You; they trusted, and Thou delivered them. But I am a worm and no man; a reproach of men, and the outcast of the people." They trusted, and Thou delivered them; have I then hoped, and have You forsaken me? And have I believed upon You in vain? And is it in vain that my name has been written in Your Book, and Your name has been inscribed on me? What our fathers told us was this:
Listen to this, all you who are heedless of your children, who ignore their singing diabolical songs, while you pay no attention to the divine stories. Those people were not like that; on the contrary, they passed their life without interruption in stories of God's great deeds and achieved a double advantage. On the one hand, it was a good experience for them to keep in mind the divine favors, and they were the better for it; on the other, their offspring gained no little grounding in the knowledge of God from these stories, and were moved to imitation of virtue. For them, you see, books were the mouths of their forebears, and these stories were a feature of every study and every employment, nothing being more agreeable or more profitable. After all, if mere adventure stories, fables and fictions generally divert the listeners, much more do these stories reveal his beneficence, power, wisdom and care, stimulate the listener with enjoyment and make them more observant. You see, those who were present during the events and eyewitnesses passed them on for our hearing, and hearing is equally effective for faith development as sight.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Psalms — The psalms are the production of various authors. “Only a portion of the Book of Psalms claims David as its author. Other inspired poets in successive generations added now one now another…
Sheep · Illustrative: Of those under God’s judgment — Illustrative: Of those under God’s judgment
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
(Heb.: 44:2-4) The poet opens with a tradition coming down from the time of Moses and of Joshua which they have heard with their own ears, in order to demonstrate the vast distance between the character of the former times and the present, just as Asaph, also, in Psa 78:3, appeals not to the written but to the spoken word. That which has been heard follows in the oratio directa. Psa 44:3 explains what kind of "work" is intended: it is the granting of victory over the peoples of Canaan, the work of God for which Moses prays in Psa 90:16. Concerning ידך, vid., on Psa 3:5; Psa 17:14. The position of the words here, as in Psa 69:11; 83:19, leads one to suppose that ידך is treated as a permutativ…
Ps 44 This national lament after defeat in battle continues the tone of the previous two psalms, including reflecting on an unspecified moment in Israel’s history and calling on God for salvation. The people recite God’s past acts of rescue (44:1-3), acknowledge God’s power to save (44:4-8), describe their humiliation in exile (44:9-16), claim their innocence and lament the injustice of their current situation (44:17-22), and cry for vindication (44:23-26).
44:1 we have heard . . . of all you did: The story of redemption encompasses the story of God’s favor and power in his past acts of rescue (see 78:1-4; see also Pss 105–106).
Spurgeon's Treasury of David on Psalms 44:1
We have heard with our ears, O God, our fathers have told us, what work thou didst in their days, in the times of old.
We have heard with our ears, O God. Thy mighty acts have been the subjects of common conversation; not alone in books have we read thy famous deeds, but in the ordinary talk of the people we have heard of them. Among the godly Israelites the biography of their nation was preserved by oral tradition, with great diligence and accuracy. This mode of preserving and transmitting history has its disadvantages, but it certainly produces a more vivid impression on the mind than any other; to hear with the ears affects us more sensitively than to read with the eyes; we ought to note…
