Psalms 65:11

Psa 65:11 Thou crownest the year with thy goodness; and thy paths drop fatness.

Ver. 11. Thou crownest the year with thy goodness] While each month produceth its several fruits or commodities; so that the whole is, as it were, a crown royal; but especially a year of extraordinary plenty, such as was the last of Queen Mary, when wheat was sold for five shillings a quarter, malt for four shillings and eightpence, and a bushel of rye for fourpence (Mr Clark’s Martyrol.).

Thy paths drop] Thy wagon tracks; the clouds are God’s chariot; or, wheresoever thou passest there is plenty.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Psa_65:11

Thou crownest the year with Thy goodness: and Thy paths drop fatness.

Thanksgiving and prayer

Nothing can be more right than that Christian people should publicly render thanksgiving to the God of the harvest. And let there be thankofferings likewise.

I. Crowning mercies calling for crowning gratitude. All the year round God is richly blessing us; both when we sleep and when we work, His mercy waits upon us.

1. If we begin with the blessings of the nether springs, the joyous days of harvest are a special season of favour. The psalmist tells us that the harvest is the crowning of the year. What would it have been for us as a nat:on had there been a total failure of the crops? Or even a partial scarcity. We none of us can fully estimate the amount of happiness conferred by a luxuriant yield. How shall we give praise? By inward gratitude; by words of thanksgiving in psalms and hymns; and by our gifts.

2. And there have been heavenly harvests. In ancient days there was Pentecost. And we have had revivals where spiritual life has been awakened and quickened. How the Lord has blessed us in this respect. As for conversions, has not the Lord been pleased to give them to us as constantly as the sun rises in his place? Scarce a sermon without the benediction of the Most High. We must not forget this. And we are looking for greater things still--the conversion of the whole world to God.

II. Paths of fatness should be ways of duty. The paths of war, how terrible are they, but the paths of God--they drop fatness. It is so in providence. Do but trust the Lord. Yet more in things spiritual. In the use of the means of grace. If you come to them desiring to meet with Jesus, you shall do so, and you shall find our text true. And so is it with the path of prayer, and of communion, and of faith. Let the Lord come into our congregations by His Spirit, then would His paths drop fatness. This is what we want: let us pray for it.

III. Suggestions as to our duty. Yield yourselves to Christ. What a harvest for you that would be. Serve Him more. As Churches let us pray more. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

The first Sabbath in the New Year

Let us note that goodness of God--

I. As to our country.

II. As to our families.

III. As to our personal experience.

IV. As to the universal Church. (R. Watson.)

Crowning blessings ascribed to God

I shall use our text not in reference to the outside world and to the husbandry of man, but we shall see how true it is within the Church, which is the husbandry of God.

I. The Divine goodness ordered. Thou crownest the year, etc. Now, praise must be for God alone: not for any man, however helpful to your souls he may have been. And in this spirit of praise every action of the Church ought to be performed. We shall be helped to praise by remembering how God has answered our prayers; and this in spite of our sins; and what sacred privileges He has admitted us to.

II. The encircling blessing of the Divine goodness is to be conferred. Thou crownest the year, etc. See it in the history of our own Church.

III. And this, also, is of God. Again, we look back on the same history for these last twenty-five years, and we see the goodness of God everywhere. In conversions, in consistent character maintained, in triumphant departures to heaven. Let more come to Him now. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

The crown of the year--A harvest sermon

I. How the harvest, the crown of the year, displays the great goodness of our God. For think--

1. Of the perils that beset the harvest.

2. How God demands mans co-operation, yet reserves to Himself the sole efficiency.

3. The manner of conducting the whole to a successful issue--so slow, still, imperceptible, and yet so all at once.

4. Its fulfilment of the ancient promise.

5. The universality of the blessing.

II. What return is due from us to God? Praise, for--

1. We celebrate the bestowment of forfeited blessings.

2. Harvest blessings serve purposes higher than themselves. They minister to life, and that may lead to salvation.

3. They are pledges of yet greater blessings which God will give. (Isaac Vaughan.)

Thoughts on the harvest

I. Lively gratitude. The ravages of famine have been averted, suspense has been relieved, anxious forebodings dissipated, and a rich recompense has crowned the husbandmans toil. Surely a world so full of Gods goodness should be vocal with His praise.

II. Adoring wonder. Instead of assuming a stolid indifference and unconcern, as many do, or taking the laws of nature and arrangements of Providence as things of course, in presence of processes whose operation, repeated from year to year, testifies to a Power before which all the achievements of human skill are utterly insignificant, let us go through life finding each day new cause for intelligent wonder and admiration, and fresh reason for declaring to all around the wondrous works of God. Nor, while cherishing feelings of adoring wonder in contemplating the wonders of nature and of Providence, ought we to forget the more amazing things in Gods character and in Gods law, in the person and work of Him who is Wonderful, in the operations of the Holy Spirit on the hearts and lives of men.

III. Humble dependence. And, while cherishing feelings of humble dependence for the bounties of Providence, let us be daily constrained to acknowledge ourselves debtors to Divine grace.

IV. Restful confidence. Men may alter their intentions or be defeated in their purposes; their promises are precarious, being dependent upon many contingencies; but the laws of nature reflect the immutability of their Author. As the seasons revolve fresh proof is afforded of Gods faithfulness which anew should strengthen confidence and call forth praise. After we have done our part we can repose our faith in the constancy of nature and experience the satisfaction and comfort which proceed from committing the result to Him who giveth the increase. Besides, our confidence is based not only on the high attributes of a God whose nature is unchangeable, and on the covenant into which God was pleased to enter with Noah and his seed, but specially on the securities of that covenant which cannot be broken into which God has entered with Jesus as our representative and Saviour. We may well trust in the Lord.

V. Enlarged benevolence. The worlds harvests are for the worlds inhabitants. We are all children of the common Father, members of the same great family, and if some perish from hunger or are stinted in their supply of bread, this is due, not to want of the precious commodity in the world, but to the thoughtlessness and improvidence of men. Let us imitate the Divine example by devoting of the gifts of His bounty as He may prosper us for the relief and help of those whose necessities are greater than our own, and who have, therefore, a claim on our sympathy and assistance. Freely ye have received, freely give. (T. B. Johnstone, D. D.)

Gods crowning of the year

God is from everlasting to everlasting, and there are no limits of days, or seasons, or years, in His boundless existence. The diurnal rotation of our earth on its axis never glooms Him in shadows; nor does its circuit round the sun affect Him by the successive alternations of spring, summer, autumn, and winter. And yet the guiding hand of God is ever present with all His works, moulding and fashioning them to sublimer ends. God has been working through all eternity, and Gods labour is always being crowned with Gods harvest. By all the slow processes of Divine growth, by all the convulsions of internal elements and external commotions, God has perfected, and beautified, and crowned our world with His goodness. We have reached the season when we should thank Him for the harvest crown that He has placed upon our year. We should realize our dependence on the harvest, and then we should feel more grateful for the exquisite harvest weather with which He has blessed our year. In former times, before the means of distributing were so greatly multiplied, each country had to subsist largely on its own harvest. Then drought was followed by famine, and multitudes perished of hunger, blow, we are so linked with other people in interdependence that we share in their harvests and they in the fruits of our labours, and the powers of carrying by land and sea are so complete that the worlds harvests are for the worlds inhabitants. To-day, then, we thank Almighty God for crowning the great worlds industry with the great worlds harvest. God is always crowning the year with His goodness. He crowns the ermined winter with a diadem of snow. He decks the spring like a bride, clothed in emerald and wreathed with lilies. He floods the summer with light and heat, and fills it with sweet scents and sweeter songs. He poises the sun and smites the autumn into gold, and crowns it with yellow harvests and rosy fruit. But God not only crowns the harvest as a whole with His goodness. He crowns it in all its parts, and in all its stages, in early spring He silvers the fields with daisies, or makes them gleam like a cloth of gold with yellow buttercups. And the crowns that God bestows with such regal bounty are as lovely in form as they are exquisite in colour. As we study the tiniest flower that lifts to heaven its chalice of flame, we see with what marvellous wisdom and beauty God decks the little things which He has caused to grow. But when we lift our minds from the unit to the whole, we see God all the world round crowning the year. Not only every tree in its grace and beauty, but every forest in which it waves. Not only the little flowers in our gardens and in our fields, but every growth in garden, field, or prairies throughout the world. Gods crowns are placed on the results of labour. God works and man works, and the Divine crown adorns the outcome of their efforts. The laws of nature and the processes of grace run so closely on parallel lines that they have been considered by some identical. And just as God has crowned with glory the prodigious work of redemption, so He crowns with salvation the faith that worketh by love. (W. Wright, D. D.)

The goodness of God

To teach man of God is Natures greatest work. She tells of His attributes, the nightly panorama of the starry heavens speaks His power, the tiny floweret His skill. But if there is one chord in Natures song sung sweeter than the rest it is the goodness of God.

I. Gods goodness is manifested in the harvest. Certain seasons speak to us and teach us lessons; and it is necessary, in the hurry and scurry of modern civilization, that something should remind us of the hereafter, or we might think, with the secularist, that this life only demands our attention. And in contemplating the harvest we are led to think of the goodness of God. The harvest is, as it were, the crowning point of Gods goodness. Thou crownest the year with Thy goodness. As if the psalmist would say that the goodness of God in preparing the ground and in blessing the springing of the seed reached its highest manifestation in the ingathering of the earths increase. Gods promise to Noah still stands secure, although our friends the farmers, with their usual characteristic, have prophesied with lugubrious faces the failure of the harvest. The goodness of God is further exhibited in the bountiful provision which He has made for all His creatures. So ample is it that even birds know how to get their food. He provides for man physically, intellectually, and spiritually. In the physical world mans wants are supplied, both for food and clothing, from the lower order of animals and from plants. In the intellectual sphere man finds food for his intellect in the realms of agriculture, astronomy, physics and metaphysics, arts and sciences, and in the more humble, and yet, perhaps, more useful occupations of the home life. But does Gods goodness stop here? Oh, no. God has provided in His Word for all mans requirements in the spiritual world.

II. Note some characteristics of Gods goodness. It is continuous. The goodness of the Lord endureth continually. Gods goodness is satisfying. We shall be satisfied with the goodness of Thy house. Nothing short of God and His goodness can satisfy the souls deep longings. None but Christ can satisfy. We cannot understand the souls yearnings, but we know they are there. But, says somebody, Gods goodness does not satisfy me. Then be assured that you are out of harmony with goodness and with God. A man who has no soul for the beautiful will spend a miserable half-hour if taken to the Royal Academy. One with no soul for music can see no beauty in the production of the Elijah. Gods goodness is universal. The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord. Why, then, so much misery and starvation in our streets? Because man has placed himself outside the pale of Gods goodness by sin. If we could dig clown deep into the very cause of misery, we should find this true.

III. Gods goodness demands much of us. What are we going to give Him? An adequate return? We cannot. At best we can but pay a few shillings in the pound. Shall we give Him our intellect, to think for Him, and use the best means of building up His kingdom? Shall we give Him our possessions, our riches, our wealth, to be used in His service? Shall we give Him our hearts, that He may rule and reign as Lord of every motion there? Shall we give Him our life--aye, and before the best of it is gone? (H. M. Draper.)

Great Britains present joys and hopes

I. Every year is crowned with Gods goodness.

1. The annual revolutions of the heavenly bodies, and the benefit we receive by their light and influences, in the several seasons of the year.

2. The annual fruits and products of the earth, grass for the cattle, and herbs for the service of men, with these the earth is every year enriched for use; as well as beautified and adorned for show. The harvest is the crown of every year, and the great influence of Gods goodness to an evil and unthankful world.

II. Some years are, in a special manner, crowned with the goodness of God more than other years.

1. God and His providence must be owned in all the blessings of the year. Whatever has been or is our honour, our joy, our hope, comes from Gods hand, and He must have the praise of it.

2. The goodness of God must in a particular manner be acknowledged, as that in which all our springs are, and from which all our streams flow.

3. These blessings which flow from the goodness of God have crowned this year; He in them has crowned it. That word shall lead us into the detail of those favours, which we are this day to take notice of, with thankfulness, to the glory of God. A crown signifies three things, and each will be of use to us.

(1) It dignifies and adorns.

(2) It surrounds and encloses. And--

(3) It finishes and completes.

And accordingly this year has been dignified, surrounded, and finished with the blessings of Gods goodness.

III. Application.

1. Has God thus crowned the year? Let us cast all the crowns of it at His feet, by our humble, grateful acknowledgments of His infinite wisdom, power, and mercy. What we have the joy of, let God have the praise of.

2. Has God thus crowned the year? Let not us then profane our crown, nor lay our honour in the dust, by our unworthy walking. Let the goodness of God lead us to repentance, and engage us all to reform our lives and families, to be more watchful against sin, and to abound more in the service of God, and in everything that is virtuous and praiseworthy.

3. Let Gods goodness to us engage, and increase, our goodness to one another: it is justly expected, that they who obtain mercy should show mercy, and so reflect the rays of the Divine goodness upon all about them; being herein followers of God as dear children; followers of Him that is good, in His goodness. (M. Henry.)

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Psa_66:1-20

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Psa 65:11-12. Thou crownest the year with thy goodness — Thou, by thy powerful goodness, dost enrich and adorn all the seasons of the year with their proper fruits and blessings. And thy paths — Either, 1st, Thy clouds, (as the word מעגליךְ, is rendered in the Liturgy version,) upon which God is frequently said to walk or ride, and which drop fatness upon the earth; or the outgoings, or ways of the divine goodness. Wherever God goes, speaking after the manner of men, or works, he leaves the tokens of his mercy behind him, he dispenses rich and salutary blessings, and thus makes his paths to shine after him. Mudge renders this verse, Thou encirclest the year with thy richness, and the tracks of thy wheels drop fatness. God is considered, he thinks, in his chariot, riding round the earth, and from that chariot, that is, the clouds, everywhere distilling fatness, fertility, and increase. They — God’s paths, the clouds; drop upon the pastures of the wilderness — And not only upon the pastures of the inhabited land. The deserts, which man takes no care of, and receives no profit from, yet are under the care of the divine providence; and the produce of them redounds to the glory of God, as the great Benefactor of the whole creation. For hereby they are furnished with food for wild beasts, which, being God’s creatures, he thus takes care of and provides for. And the little hills — He intends chiefly the hills of Canaan, which, for the generality of them, were but small, if compared with the great and high mountains which are in divers parts of the world. He mentions the hills, because, being most dry and parched with the sun, they most need, and are most benefited by the rain; rejoice on every side — That is, all around, as being clothed with verdure, enamelled with flowers, and rendered fertile for the use of man and beasts. Nothing can be more elegant and poetical than the personifying of the hills, the pastures, and valleys in this and the following verse. But, indeed, as Dr. Delaney justly observes, this whole paragraph, from the 9th verse to the 13th, is “the most rapturous, truly poetic, and natural image of joy that imagination can form.” The reader of taste cannot but see this in any translation of it, however simple. “When the divine poet had seen the showers falling from heaven, and Jordan overflowing his banks, all the consequent blessings were that moment present to his quick, poetic sight, and he paints them accordingly.”

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

12. (Psa 65:11). Thou hast crowned the year of thy goodness, and thy paths drop fatness. The first clause may either mean, thou hast crowned the year with thy goodness, or, as some prefer to construe it, thou hast crowned the year of thy goodness, the year distinguished by thy goodness, with particular instances and proofs of that goodness. The obvious meaning of the strong but beautiful figure in the last clause is, that wherever he appears his movements are attended by a rich and fertilizing influence. Fatness is as usual a figure for rich food, and that for general abundance

Joseph Addison Alexander, The Psalms Translated and Explained (1850) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

thy paths--ways of providence (Psa 25:4, Psa 25:10).

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 11. Thou crownest the year] A full and plentiful harvest is the crown of the year; and this springs from the unmerited goodness of God. This is the diadem of the earth; עטרת ittarta, Thou encirclest, as with a diadem. A most elegant expression, to show the progress of the sun through the twelve signs of the zodiac, producing the seasons, and giving a sufficiency of light and heat alternately to all places on the surface of the globe, by its north and south declination (amounting to 23° 28' at the solstices) on each side of the equator. A more beautiful image could not have been chosen; and the very appearance of the space termed the zodiac on a celestial globe, shows with what propriety the idea of a circle or diadem was conceived by this inimitable poet.

Thy paths drop fatness.] מעגליך magaleycha, "thy orbits." The various planets, which all have their revolutions within the zodiacal space, are represented as contributing their part to the general fructification of the year. Or perhaps the solar revolution through the twelve signs, dividing the year into twelve parts or months, may be here intended; the rains of November and February, the frosts and snows of December and January, being as necessary for the fructification of the soil, as the gentle showers of spring, the warmth of summer, and the heat and drought of autumn. The earth's diurnal rotation on its axis, its annual revolution in its orbit, and the moon's course in accompanying the earth, are all wheels or orbits of God, which drop fatness, or produce fertility in the earth.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

11 Thou crownest the year with thy goodness Some read — Thou crownest the year of thy goodness; as if the Psalmist meant that the fertile year had a peculiar glory attached to it, and were crowned, so to speak, by God. Thus, if there was a more abundant crop or vintage than usual, this would be the crown of the year. And it must be granted that God does not bless every year alike. Still there is none but what is crowned with some measure of excellency; and for that reason it would seem best to retain the simpler rendering of the words, and view them as meaning that the Divine goodness is apparent in the annual returns of the season. The Psalmist further explains what he intended, when he adds, that the paths of God dropped fatness, — using this as a metaphorical term for the clouds, upon which God rideth, as upon chariots, as we read in Psalm 104:3 The earth derives its fruitfulness from the sap or moisture; this comes from the rain, and the rain from the clouds. With a singular gracefulness of expression, these are therefore represented as dropping fatness, and this because they are the paths or vehicles of God; as if he had said, that, wherever the Deity walked there flowed down from his feet fruits in endless variety and abundance. He amplifies this goodness of God, by adding, that his fatness drops even upon the wilder and more uncultivated districts. The wilderness is not to be taken here for the absolute waste where nothing grows, but for such places as are not so well cultivated, where there are few inhabitants, and where, notwithstanding, the Divine goodness is even more illustrated than elsewhere in dropping down fatness upon the tops of the mountains. Notice is next taken of the valleys and level grounds, to show that there is no part of the earth overlooked by God, and that the riches of his liberality extend over all the world. The variety of its manifestation is commended when it is added, that the valleys and lower grounds are clothed with flocks, as well as with corn. He represents inanimate things as rejoicing, which may be said of them in a certain sense, as when we speak of the fields smiling, when they refresh our eye with their beauty. It may seem strange, that he should first tell us, that they shout for joy, and then add the feebler expression, that they sing; interposing, too, the intensative particle, אף, aph, they shout for joy, yea, they also sing The verb, however, admits of being taken in the future tense, they shall sing, and this denotes a continuation of joy, that they would rejoice, not only one year, but through the endless succession of the seasons. I may add, what is well known, that in Hebrew the order of expression is frequently inverted in this way.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

(11) Thou crownest.—Better, hast crowned. We generally connect the idea of completion with this metaphor, but the original thought in the Hebrew word, as in the Greek στέφω, is probably to encompass. Comp. the Latin corono in Lucretius, 2:802—

“Sylva coronat aquas ingens nemus omne.”

All “the circle of the golden year” had been attended by Divine goodness. The meaning seems to be that God had made a year which was naturally prosperous still more abundant.

Paths.—The root from which the Hebrew word is formed means to roll, or revolve, and it often means the track made by a wheel. This idea may be present since God is often represented in Hebrew poetry as riding on a chariot of clouds, generally with the association of wrath and destruction (Psa_18:10; Psa_68:4), but here, with the thought of plenty and peace following on His track, as in the Latin poet—

“Te fugiunt venti, te nubila cœli

Adventumque tuum, tibi suaves dœdala tellus

Submittit flores, tibi rident æquora ponti

Placatumque ridet diffuso lumine cœlum.”

LUCRETIUS, i. 6.

But it is more natural to give the word the meaning revolutions, and to think of the blessings brought by the “seasons as they roll.”

Fatness.—A cognate accusative to the word “drop” used absolutely in the next verse. (Comp. Pro_3:20.)

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

11. Thou crownest &c.] Thou hast crowned the year of thy goodness, added fresh beauty and perfection to a year already marked by special bounty, and thy paths drop fatness, rich blessings fall as Thou traversest the land, an allusion probably to an unusually copious fall of the ‘latter rain,’ which was more uncertain than the early rain, and was most anxiously looked for as a special blessing (Job_29:23; Pro_16:15; Jer_3:3; Zec_10:1).

P.B.V. clouds (Great Bible, not Coverdale, who has fotesteppes) seems to be intended as an explanation of paths. Cp. Nah_1:3.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Thou crownest the year with thy goodness,.... The whole circling year, from one end of it to the other; particularly that season of it when the harvest is gathered in; the seed being sown, the earth watered, the springing of it blessed, and the corn brought to perfection, the year is crowned with a plentiful harvest: this may denote the acceptable year of the Lord, the year of the redeemed, the whole Gospel dispensation, Isa 61:2; in certain seasons and periods of which there have been great gatherings of souls to Christ; at the first of it multitudes were converted in Judea, and in the Gentile world, which were the first fruits of the Spirit; and in all ages there have been more or less instances of this kind; and in the latter day there will be a large harvest, when the Jews will be converted, and the fulness of the Gentiles brought in;

and thy paths drop fatness; the heavens, as Jarchi interprets it; or the clouds, as Kimchi; which are the chariots and horses of God, in which he rides, and are the dust of his feet, Psa 104:3, Nah 1:3; and these drop down rain upon the earth, and make it fat and flourishing; and may mystically design the administration of the Gospel, and the administration of ordinances; which are the paths in which the Lord goes forth to his people, and directs them to walk in, and in which he meets them with a fulness of blessings, and satisfies them as with marrow and fatness.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Thou crownest the year with thy goodness - Margin, the year of thy goodness. The Hebrew is literally the year of thy goodness - meaning a year remarkable for the manifestation of kindness; or a year of abundant productions. But the Hebrew will admit of the other construction, meaning that God crowns or adorns the year, as it revolves, with his goodness; or that the harvests, the fruits, the flowers of the year are, as it were, a crown set on the head of the year. The Septuagint renders it, “Thou wilt bless the crown of the year of thy goodness.” DeWette renders it, “Thou crownest the year with thy blessing.” Luther, “Thou crownest the year with good.” On the whole, the most probable meaning is that expressed in our common version, referring to the beauty and the abundant productions of the year as if they were a crown on its head. The seasons are often personified, and the year is here represented as a beautiful female, perhaps, walking forward with a diadem on her brow.

And thy paths drop fatness - That is, fertility; or, Fertility attends thy goings. The word rendered “drop,” means properly to distil; to let fall gently, as the rain or the dew falls to the earth; and the idea is, that whereever God goes, marching through the earth, fertility, beauty, abundance seems to distil or to fall gently along his path. God, in the advancing seasons, passes along through the earth, and rich abundance springs up wherever he goes.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Thou, by thy powerful goodness, dost enrich and adorn all the seasons of the year with their proper fruits and blessings.

Thy paths; the clouds, upon which God is frequently said to walk or ride, as Job 36:28; 38:26,27; Psa 104:3; Nah 1:3; which sense is favoured by the next verse, where these paths are said to drop, &c.

Drop fatness; make the earth fat and fruitful.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Ver. 11. Thou crownest the year with thy goodness. The harvest is the plainest display of the divine bounty, and the crown of the year. The Lord himself conducts the coronation, and sets the golden coronal upon the brow of the year. Or we may understand the expression to mean that God's love encircles the year as with a crown; each month has its gems, each day its pearl. Unceasing kindness girdles all time with a belt of love. The providence of God in its visitations makes a complete circuit, and surrounds the year.

And thy paths drop fatness. The footsteps of God, when he visits the land with rain, create fertility. It was said of the Tartar hordes, that grass grew no more where their horses' feet had trodden; so, on the contrary, it may be said that the march of Jehovah, the Fertiliser, may be traced by the abundance which he creates. For spiritual harvests we must look to him, for he alone can give "times of refreshing" and feasts of Pentecost.

Ver. 11. Thou crownest the year with thy goodness. Dr. William Whewell, in his Bridgewater Treatise, notes the evidence of design in the length of the year, and although it may not perhaps be considered to be a direct comment on the text, I beg to quote it here, as it may awaken a train of thought, and make more conspicuous the goodness of God, in the revolution of the seasons. "If any change in the length of the year were to take place, the working of the botanical world would be thrown into utter disorder, the functions of plants would be entirely deranged, and the whole vegetable kingdom involved in instant decay and rapid extinction." That this would be the case, may be collected from innumerable indications. Most of our fruit trees, for example, require the year to be of its present length. If the summer and the autumn were much shorter, the fruit could not ripen; if these seasons were much longer, the tree would put forth a fresh suit of blossoms, to be cut down by the winter. Or, if the year were twice its present length, a second crop of fruit would probably not be matured, for want, among other things, of an intermediate season of rest and consolidation, such as the winter is. Our forest trees, in like manner, appear to need all the seasons of our present year for their perfection; the spring, summer, and autumn, for the development of their leaves and consequent formation of their proper juice, and of wood from this; and the winter for the hardening and solidifying the substance thus formed... The processes of the rising of the sap, of the formation of proper juices, of the unfolding of leaves, the opening of flowers, the fecundation of the fruit, the ripening of the seed, its proper deposition in order for the reproduction of a new plant; all these operations require a certain portion of time, and could not be compressed into a space less than a year, or at least could not be abbreviated in any very great degree. And, on the other hand, if the winter were greatly longer than it now is, many seeds would not germinate at the return of spring. Seeds which have been kept too long, require stimulants to make them fertile. If, therefore, the duration of the seasons were much to change the processes of vegetable life would be interrupted, deranged, distempered. What, for instance, would become of our calender of Flora, if the year were lengthened or shortened by six months? Some of the dates would never arrive in the one case, and the vegetable processes which mark them would be superseded; some seasons would be without dates in the other case, and these periods would be employed in a way hurtful to the plants, and no doubt speedily destructive. We should have, not only a year of confusion, but if it were repeated and continued, a year of death... The same kind of argument might be applied to the animal creation. The pairings, nesting, hatching, fledgling, and flight of birds, for instance, occupy each its peculiar time of the year; and, together with a proper period of rest, fill up the twelve months; the transformations of most insects have similar reference to the seasons, their progress and duration. `In every species' (except man's), says a writer (Flemming) on animals, `there is a particular period of the year in which the reproductive system exercises its energies. And the season of love and the period of gestation are so arranged that the young ones are produced at the time wherein the conditions of temperature are most suited to the commencement of life.' It is not our business here to consider the details of such provisions, beautiful and striking as they are. But the prevalence of the great law of periodicity in the vital functions of organised beings will be allowed to have a claim to be considered in its reference to astronomy, when it is seen that their periodical constitution derives its use from the periodical nature of the motions of the planets round the sun; and that the duration of such cycles in the existence of plants and animals has a reference to the arbitrary elements of the solar system, a reference which we maintain is inexplicable and unintelligible, except by admitting into our conceptions an intelligent Author, alike of the organic and inorganic universe.

Ver. 11. Thou crownest the year with thy goodness. God has surrounded this year with his goodness, "compassed and enclosed it" on every side. So we translate the same word, (Ps 5:12), "With favour wilt thou compass (or crown) him as with a shield." He has given us instances of his goodness in every thing that concerns us; so that turn which way we will, we meet with the tokens of his favour; every part of the year has been enriched with the blessings of heaven, and no gap has been left open for any desolating judgment to enter by. Matthew Henry.

Ver. 11. Thou crownest the year. A full and plentiful harvest is the crown of the year; and this springs from the unmerited goodness of God. This is the diadem of the earth. trje ittarta. "You encircle, "as with a diadem. A most elegant expression, to show the progress of the sun through the twelve signs of the zodiac, producing the seasons, and giving a sufficiency of light and heat alternately, to all places on the surface of the globe, by its north and south declination (amounting to 23ø 28" at the solstices) on each side of the equator. A more beautiful image could not have been chosen; and the very appearance of the space, termed the zodiac on a celestial globe, shows with what propriety the idea of a circle or diadem was conceived by this inimitable poet. Adam Clarke.

Ver. 11. Thou crownest. The herbs, fruits, and flowers, produced by the earth, are here finely represented as a beautiful variegated crown, set upon her head, by the hands of the great Creator. Samuel Burder.

Ver. 11. To crown the year of goodness, is to raise it to the highest degree and summit of prosperity, happiness, and glory. To crown, to fill up, to make glorious and joyful: the year of the goodness of God is the time in which he unfolds his own highest goodness; one is crowned, when the effects of this goodness are displayed on the grandest scale, and bring great glory and joy. Such was the time when he shone forth, and the clouds dropped fatness, and all parts of the earth were filled with fertility... The paths of God are the clouds, before called the river of God (see Ps 104:3), now the paths in which God himself seems to move, and whence, from the place of rain, from the river of God, flows fatness itself, or the copious abundance of all that is sweetest and best. Hermann Venema.

Ver. 11. Thy paths drop fatness. When the conqueror journeys through the nations, his paths drop blood; fire and vapour of smoke are in his track, and tears, and groans, and sighs attend him. But where the Lord journeys, his paths drop fatness. When the kings of old made a progress through their dominions, they caused a famine wherever they tarried; for the greedy courtiers who swarmed in their camp devoured all things like locusts, and were as greedily ravenous as palmer worms and caterpillars. But where the great King of kings journeys, he enriches the land; his paths drop fatness. By a bold Hebrew metaphor the clouds are represented as the chariots of God: "He maketh the clouds his chariot; "and as the Lord Jehovah rides upon the heavens in the greatness of his strength, and in his excellency on the sky, the rains drop down upon the lands, and so the wheel tracks of Jehovah are marked by the fatness which makes glad the earth. Happy, happy are the people who worship such a God, whose coming is ever a coming of goodness and of grace to his creatures. C. H. S.

Ver. 11. Paths here are properly such tracks as are made by chariot wheels. Henry Ainsworth.

Ver. 11. See "Spurgeon's Sermons, "No. 532: "Thanksgiving and Prayer."

Psalms 65:12*

Charles H. Spurgeon's The Treasury of David (1869–1885) — public domain. Psalms only. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

11. Crownest the year—From the sprouting (Psa_65:10) to the harvest, the year is honoured, distinguished, by God’s blessing. The crowning, as with a chaplet, is at once a finishing act and a token of honour, and completes the cycle of blessings on the year.

Thy paths… fatness—God’s “paths” are his ways, or modes of procedure, and whether in nature, moral government, or redemption, his footsteps, or, as the word literally means, the tracks of his chariot, are rich in blessings of wisdom, power, and grace. Here his way is in nature, with its lesson of providence to man and all living creatures. “He maketh the clouds his chariot,” (Psa_104:3,) which along their pathway distil “upon the pastures of the wilderness,” and “the little hills” are girded with joy.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Thou crownest the year with thy goodness. As God had begun, so he goes on to the "crowning" of the whole. And thy paths drop fatness. As he moves about, visiting the earth (ver. 9), there drop from him fertility and abundance.

The lessons of harvest.

"Thou crownest the year," etc. Men see what they have eyes to see. The farmer looks on the field of golden grain, ripe for the sickle, and sees the reward of his toil and return for his capitol. The painter sees a glorious subject for a picture. The economist thinks of prices, averages, national prosperity. The devout Christian sees God"s hand opening to answer the prayer for daily bread. Now, it is one leading characteristic of the Scripture writers that they see God in everything. In this light let us try to read the lessons of harvest.

I THANKFULNESS. Literal rendering in margin, "Thou crownest the year of thy goodness," which some take to refer to some special year of remarkably bountiful harvest. Perhaps rather the thought is that God"s unceasing goodness runs through the whole circle of the seasons, though the harvest is the crowning manifestation. (Mat_5:45 Act_14:17 2Co_9:10) Grace at meals should be no dead form, but the welling-up and outpouring of new thankfulness for fresh goodness. God"s hand spreads the daily table for all creatures. As the secret spring of life is in him, so all that nourishes and maintains life is from him. Hence our Saviour makes the gift of daily bread the image of himself Bread of Life". (Joh_6:33, Joh_6:35, Joh_6:48-51)

II OBEDIENCE TO LAW. God works according to those unchanging laws which he has ordained unchanging as long as the present order of the world continues. (Gen_8:22) Human labour is profitable only as it conforms to those laws. He who would reap in harvest-time must sow in seed-time. The natural is the image of the spiritual order. (Gal_6:7-9)

III PATIENCE. (Jam_5:7) Here also our Lord bids us see the spiritual order. (Mar_4:26-29) Do not expect ripe ears in January. Be patient with your children, your scholars, your hearers; yea, let the Christian even be patient with himself.

IV COOPERATION. The ploughman, sower, reaper, must join their toil; and the ploughman did not make his plough, the sower his basket, the reaper his sickle. Other hands built the garner. Who can reckon how many hands have combined their labour to place on our table a single loaf? (Rom_14:7)

V HOPE. Under dark wintry skies, beneath frost and snow, the grain is growing, which summer suns shall ripen. The worst harvest that was ever reaped kept Alive the germs of all the harvests that have since grown or ever will. (1Co_15:58) And note, that as long as the grain is stored, it preserves life (even for centuries), but pro duces none. It must be flung away and buried, and, as grain, must perish, for the hidden life to burst forth. Hence our Lord makes it the image of his life-giving death, (Joh_12:24) and St. Paul of resurrection. (1Co_15:35-38)

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

its furrows Heb. תלמיה. They are the rows of the plowshare.

To sate Heb. רוה, like לרוה.

to afford pleasure to its troops Heb. נחתגדודה, like לְנַחֵתגְדוּדֶהָ, to give rest to its troops. To afford pleasure to its creatures, You dissolve it with drops of rain.

You dissolve it Heb. תמגגנה, an expression of melting.

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.