Fathers

Psalms 141

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Yahweh, I have called on you. Come to me quickly! Listen to my voice when I call to you. Let my prayer be set before you like incense; the lifting up of my hands like the evening sacrifice. Set a watch, Yahweh, before my mouth. Keep the door of my lips. Don’t incline my heart to any evil thing, to practice deeds of wickedness with men who work iniquity. Don’t let me eat of their delicacies. Let the righteous strike me, it is kindness; let him reprove me, it is like oil on the head; don’t let my head refuse it; Yet my prayer is always against evil deeds. Their judges are thrown down by the sides of the rock. They will hear my words, for they are well spoken. “As when one plows and breaks up the earth, our bones are scattered at the mouth of Sheol.” For my eyes are on you, Yahweh, the Lord. In you, I take refuge. Don’t leave my soul destitute. Keep me from the snare which they have laid for me, from the traps of the workers of iniquity. Let the wicked fall together into their own nets while I pass by.

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What the Fathers say

Psalms 141:9

Western Saints

Augustine of Hippo

"Keep me from the trap which they have laid for me" [Psalm 141:9]. What was the trap? "If you consent, I spare you." In the trap was set the bait of the present life; if the bird love this bait, it falls into the trap: but if the bird be able to say, "The day of man have I not desired: You know:" [Jeremiah 17:16] "He shall pluck his feet out of the net," etc. …

Exposition on Psalm 141 ↗

Jerome

Keep me from the snare which they have set for me. Always either heretics or demons stretch snares for us. For faults are near to virtues. They have set a snare for me in almsgiving, if I stretch out my hand so that men may see, and, as though doing a good deed, I come into a fault and into sin. But if I give a tunic to a brother so that another may see, they have set a snare for me. Always nets are stretched for stags and snares are set, where the hunter has caught their tracks. …

Homily 51, on Psalm 140 ↗