Psalm 6:8
time to pull some weeds
My eye is troubled through indignation: I have grown old amongst all my enemies. (Psalm 6:8 DR)
One of the quirks of our fallen condition is that even though our rationality gives us some capacity for foresight in that we can see the end result of continuing on a certain course, this same foresight can also lead to indifference, paralysis or sometimes even a doubling-down.
We have probably all know people who have a particular vice or personal struggle that from an objective perspective leads nowhere good, but yet they still go down that road, often even knowing themselves that it will end in ruin. Chemical and other such addictions are perhaps the most well-known and immediately destructive, but “lesser” vices or addictions can have just as tight a grip on our lives. And though we can often see that it likely leads to bad outcomes, and even though we often know the remedy for the bad habit, the wounds of the Fall make it difficult for us to have self-mastery and the force of habit sometimes seems to never let go.
The Psalmist speaks of two related phenomena here, the first being what he describes as his eye being troubled through indignation, which is not simply anger but unjust anger (ultimately from the Latin indignus, lit. not dignified, not worthy). This anger of his arises from the darkening of his intellect through sin, which causes a blindness to truth and to the light of God. St. Augustine compares it to someone who sees the setting sun and fears the inevitable darkness that results (cf. Expositions on the Psalms, 6, 8.). However, that this fear still remains means that his interior sight is not completely blinded, for he still fears judgment which is the potential basis of at least the most basic contrition:
It is then the beginning of this anger, which in this life every sinner suffers. In fear therefore of the day of judgment, he is in trial and grief; lest he be brought to that, the disastrous commencement of which he experiences now. (St. Augustine, Expositions on the Psalms, 6, 8.).
This indignation leads to the second phenomenon which is his realization and self-accusation that he has been unable to conquer his vices; this is what he describes when he says he has grown old amongst all my enemies. To be sure, there is a literal aspect to this in that it can certainly refer to his human enemies who still surround him, but even here it comports with the ultimate reference to sin, for the fact that his human enemies surround him is proffered as evidence by him that God has not freed him from such enemies because of his sins. Or perhaps (like his forebears) he was not faithful in rooting them out as he should, and thus he found them still surrounding him.
Whichever reading is possible (and likely both), the main focus of his words are on his sins and how they still trouble him. When you see a weed in your garden, if you are not careful and diligent to literally root it out it will keep coming back and—even worse—is likely to spread and choke out all the plants you wish to cultivate. Vice and sin are in a similar manner like weeds which must be eradicated as soon as possible before given a chance to proliferate.
The other day I was helping my mother weed a garden bed at my house, and my negligence had allowed a massive weed to take root that was several feet tall. The stalks were easy enough to break off and one could cosmetically remove it so that by all outward appearances it was gone, but it would just keep coming back. We tried to pull it out by the roots, but it was too large and deeply rooted. A small shovel started to break as we tried to uproot it, and finally I had to grab a large shovel and dig a fairly large hole around it to finally get the entirety of the root, which was surprisingly massive. And naturally while doing this I caused damage to some of the plants surrounding it. Had I dealt with it when it first peeked above the ground, it would have been much easier to root out and some of the good plants wouldn’t have been damaged.
In a similar manner we cannot allow ourselves to grow old amongst these sorts of enemies, that is, our vices and sins. The longer they remain and the more deeply rooted they become, the more difficult and painful it is to completely uproot them.
I don’t know why I chose an old computer as a basis for this animation, but I found this great photo and isolated it in Photoshop, using Generative Fill to remove any logos.
Then brought it into After Effects and used a script to animate the typing text complete with blinking cursor. I added in some background textures and color correction and that was it. Simple and sweet.
Enjoy.
My eye is troubled through indignation: I have grown old amongst all my enemies.
(Psalm 6:8 DR)
View a higher quality version of this gif here: