Psalm 90 v5 - Truth as a shield

Scuto circúmdabit te véritas ejus: non timébis a timóre noctúrno.

His truth shall compass you with a shield: you shall not be afraid of the terror of the night.

The key word in verse 5 of Psalm 90 is truth: God’s truth, that is revealed doctrine, protects us from the errors of heresy and thus the fear of hell (the terrors of the night), and this is why we must believe it ‘firmly and truly, at all times’.

Understanding the Latin

The Vulgate of the verse is:

Scuto circúmdabit te véritas ejus: * non timébis a timóre noctúrno.

The key vocabulary is:

scutum, i, n. a shield, buckler.

circumdo, dedi, datum, are,  to surround, beset, encompass with a hostile intent; to gather round

veritas, atis,  truth. grace, kindness ,goodness, fidelity to promises, Faithfulness

timeo, ere 2, to fear, be afraid of.

timor, oris, m.  fear, terror; an object of fear.

nocturnus a um by night, nighly

Accordingly, a word by words translation runs:

Scuto (with a shield) circúmdabit (he will encompass) te (you) véritas (truth) ejus (his): non (not) timébis (you will fear) a (+ablative = by, from) timóre (fears, terrors) noctúrno (by night).

The Douay-Rheims therefore translates it as ‘His truth shall compass you with a shield:

you shall not be afraid of the terror of the night’.

Although the reference to truth is in St Jerome’s translation from the Hebrew (‘scutum et protectio veritas eius, non timebis a timore nocturno’), the word doesn’t appear in the Hebrew Masoretic Text (which instead refers to a shield and buckler), so a number of the modern translations (though not, on this occasion, the neo-Vulgate) have either dropped out the reference altogether (Grail), or changed it from truth to ‘faithfulness’ (Pian, RSV, Knox).

The terror of the night

The reference to the darkness of night is one of the key reasons for assigning this psalm to Compline, but it is of course meant metaphorically as well as literally.

First, we are all, as Isaiah's reference to the people who walked in darkness, and the first chapter of St John's Gospel make clear, a people who walk in the darkness of sin and error, in danger of the seductions of the devil.

As St Jerome puts it:

The devil always lurks in darkness, 'shooting from ambush', Scripture says, 'at the innocent man.'  

But Christ's light, manifested to us by the truth of the Incarnation shines in the darkness, keeping us safe from all evil.

How does he seduce and attack?

One of the most obvious ways is doctrinal error, as St Cassiodorus explained:

The terror of the night, then, is the cloudy persuasion of heretics. 

Another key tactic, St Augustine suggested, is to work on our pride:

One is a sinner, and the other a sinner: but suppose one that presumes upon himself is a despiser, confesses not his sins, and he will say, if my sins displeased God He would not suffer me to live. But another dared not even raise his eyes, but beat upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner.  Both this was a sinner, and that: but the one mocked, the other mourned: the one was a despiser, the other a confessor, of his sins. But the truth of God, which respects not persons, discerns the penitent from him who denies his sin, the humble from the proud, him who presumes upon himself from him who presumes on God. 

Sleep as the little death

Secondly, the terrors of the night can be seen as a reference to our natural fear of death  - and judgment: our journey to sleep each night foreshadows our eventual journey into the next life.

But here too, God offers hope to us, as St Robert Bellarmine pointed out:

The truth of faith protects us like a shield also when it gives us a certainty that eternal happiness is prepared for the just, and torments everlasting for the sinner after this life; and that judgment will be held on the last day, when all men shall have to render the most exact account of all their deeds, words, thoughts, desires, omissions; in short, of every idle word, however brief, they may have uttered. 

Using truth as a shield

St Augustine interprets the verse as assuring us 'that He will not confound those whose trust is in themselves with those who hope in God'.

But in order to ensure we truly trust in God and not ourselves, we have to lift up the shield which God gives us.  St Robert Bellarmine suggested that the means of doing this lie in daily scrutiny of our sins, and meditation on the truth of the faith, arguing that reflections on the truths of the faith:

would easily protect us from all temptations, 'both in adversity and prosperity, if we would daily use them as a shield; that is, if we daily and faithfully meditate on these truths of our religion. Who is he that would not bravely bear up against any terror whatever, by reflecting seriously on those words of our Lord? "And fear not those that kill the body, and cannot kill the soul; but rather fear him that can destroy both soul and body in hell." And who is there that will not despise the empty pleasures of this world, and the occasions of wronging their neighbor, when they seriously reflect on the following words of our Divine Master? "For what doth it profit a man if he gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" 

Psalm 90: Qui habitat 

Vulgate	Douay-Rheims
Laus cantici David.	The praise of a canticle for David
Qui hábitat in adjutório Altíssimi, * in protectióne Dei cæli commorábitur.	He that dwells in the aid of the most High, shall abide under the protection of the God of Jacob.
2  Dicet Dómino : Suscéptor meus es tu, et refúgium meum: * Deus meus sperábo in eum.	He shall say to the Lord: You are my protector, and my refuge: my God, in him will I trust.
3 Quóniam ipse liberávit me de láqueo venántium, * et a verbo áspero.	For he has delivered me from the snare of the hunters: and from the sharp word.
4  Scápulis suis obumbrábit tibi: * et sub pennis ejus sperábis.	He will overshadow you with his shoulders: and under his wings you shall trust.
5  Scuto circúmdabit te véritas ejus: * non timébis a timóre noctúrno.	His truth shall compass you with a shield: you shall not be afraid of the terror of the night.
6  A sagítta volánte in die, a negótio perambulánte in ténebris: * ab incúrsu et dæmónio meridiáno.	Of the arrow that flies in the day, of the business that walks about in the dark: of invasion, or of the noonday devil.
7  Cadent a látere tuo mille, et decem míllia a dextris tuis: * ad te autem non appropinquábit.	A thousand shall fall at your side, and ten thousand at your right hand: but it shall not come near you.
8  Verúmtamen óculis tuis considerábis: * et retributiónem peccatórum vidébis.	But you shall consider with your eyes: and shall see the reward of the wicked.
9  Quóniam tu es, Dómine, spes mea: * Altíssimum posuísti refúgium tuum.	Because you, O Lord, are my hope: you have made the most High your refuge.
10  Non accédet ad te malum: * et flagéllum non appropinquábit tabernáculo tuo.	There shall no evil come to you: nor shall the scourge come near your dwelling.
11  Quóniam Angelis suis mandávit de te: * ut custódiant te in ómnibus viis tuis.	For he has given his angels charge over you; to keep you in all your ways.
12  In mánibus portábunt te: * ne forte offéndas ad lápidem pedem tuum.	In their hands they shall bear you up: lest you dash your foot against a stone.
13  Super áspidem et basilíscum ambulábis: * et conculcábis leónem et dracónem.	You shall walk upon the asp and the basilisk: and you shall trample under foot the lion and the dragon.
14  Quóniam in me sperávit, liberábo eum: * prótegam eum quóniam cognóvit nomen meum.	Because he hoped in me I will deliver him: I will protect him because he has known my name.
15  Clamábit ad me, et ego exáudiam eum : * cum ipso sum in tribulatióne : erípiam eum et glorificábo eum.	He shall cry to me, and I will hear him: I am with him in tribulation, I will deliver him, and I will glorify him.
16  Longitúdine diérum replébo eum: * et osténdam illi salutáre meum.	I will fill him with length of days; and I will show him my salvation.

You can.a find the next part of this series here.