He is the tower of salvation. — This translation follows the margin of the Hebrew. The text is found in the ancient versions and in Psalms 18:50. “Great deliverance giveth he.” The difference in the original between the consonants of the two words is extremely slight.
This brief review of these two recensions of this magnificent hymn is instructive, as showing that Providence has dealt with the MSS. of the Old Testament as with those of the New, securing them during the long succession of ages from all substantial error, and yet not so destroying ordinary human action but that mere slips of the pen should sometimes creep in, and care and diligence be required to ascertain precisely what was originally written, and sometimes, perhaps, in the merest minutiæ, leaving the original form still uncertain.
The Psalm is a grand anthem of thanksgiving of David for the many mercies he had received — a full and confident expression of his trust in God under all circumstances, and of his well-assured hope in the fulfilment of the Divine promise of the perpetuity of his kingdom through the coming of Him “in whom all the families of the earth should be blessed.”