“The Valley of the Shadow”

We have received the following from a Manchester reader:—

Full Question

I was listening to a talk in the Schools Programme, October 22nd, arranged by Stephen Potter, under the title "The Men that made the Bible," and I was interested in a point brought forward with regard to Psa. 23 : 4. This verse seems to be generally regarded, by those who hold that the soul is immortal, as a proof that when a person is dying, God is with them and they are then walking through the valley of the shadow of death; but, according to the speaker. the verse should read, following the original Hebrew :-
"Yea, now though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil, for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff they be the things which comfort me."

This verse, he said, was altered by the seventy Elders who made the Septuagint Version of the Scriptures, to make it read more smoothly, but with their ideas of the immortality of the soul, they evidently altered the sense of the verse.
I think the above version shews quite clearly that the rod and the staff are intended for those who are very much alive, and who are at present making their journey through life's wilderness.

I am interested to know whether you have heard of this ancient version, which, I think, is the better rendering and seems more in accord with the truth as it is in Jesus.


Answer

The familiar A.V. and R.V. read : “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death . . . . ” The margin gives “deep darkness.” The Septuagint reads “Yea, even if I should walk in the midst of the shadow of death . . . ” We have not previously seen the translation cited by our correspondent, but the emphasis which it places upon present benefits, by the use of the present tense, seems quite justified by the context. We can understand how readily our friends who hold that there is consciousness in death, will seize upon this expression of David as real, ready-to-hand consolation, as they prepare to enter the darkest of all shadows which falls across humanity’s path. A good example of the popular usage of the verse, to which our friend refers, may be found in one of the Bampton Lectures entitled The Witness of the Psalms to Christ and Christianity (p. 99). William Alexander there says,

“God’s love is also concerned in man’s immor­tality. God was their God. He was not like one who created marvelous playthings to destroy them after a few years, who breathed out evanescent bubbles to break for ever upon the summer air of life. When the child is settling itself to sleep, it is not afraid of being destroyed by its mother in the dark. And he was not afraid who wrote :—’When I walk in the deep hollow valley of the shadow of death, I will not tremble at evil’.”

The passage to us, however, seems to be of much wider compass. Adam Clarke remarks

“The reference is still to the shepherd. Though I, as one of the flock, should walk through the most dismal valley, in the dead of the night, exposed to pitfalls, precipices, devouring beasts, etc., I should fear no evil, under the guidance and protection of such a Shepherd. He knows all the passes, dangerous defiles, hidden pits, and about precipices in the way; and he will guide me around, about, and through them.”

A.W., if she is not already familiar with it, would doubtless be interested in the section entitled, “Through the Valley of the Shadow of Death” which commences on p. 47 of the book Everyday Life in the Holy Land, by James Neil (pub. by the Church Mission. to Jews, price 7/6d.). “The word for valley,” says Neil,

“is gay, the Arabic ive, a deep ravine, or gorge-like glen. The wilder­ness of Judea abounds with such ravines. Sometimes these rocky glens have for their sides precipitous cliffs, rising on either hand to a height of 800 feet, whilst their bottoms are in some parts scarce three yards wide, and even in daylight are dark and gloomy. Woe to the strayed sheep caught by wild beasts alone in such a perilous place !”

The colour-plate which forms a frontispiece to this section, represents a solitary sheep seemingly hopelessly imperiled in one such dark defile, beset behind and before by bare-fanged hyenas Closing in upon their prey.

Our own opinion about this matter is paralleled precisely by a remark made by this writer, which seems accurately to state the case:

“The figure here of the very dark ravine does not, as so many commentators have supposed, specially signify the dissolution of the body, although the words may be thus applied. It would appear more properly to mean any time of dire temptation or persecution, any season of gloom or imminent danger, and rather applies to life than death . . . David, therefore, when declaring his fearlessness, what time he was to go through the very dark ravine, is, by a bold and beautiful metaphor, expressing his confidence in Jehovah’s protection in every time of danger.”

The Speaker’s Commentary, also, sees the comprehensiveness of the allusion, whilst permitting the application to the case of death. We read,

“In the midst of this darkness and horror, like that of a horrible pit (Job 28: 3), or of a dark deep, sunless ravine between mountains (ter. 13: 16), or of a wild, uninhabited, desolate wilderness (Jer. 2: 6), or rather, of the grave (Job 10: 21), the wanderer is without fear, guided and supported by the rod and staff of his protecting Shepherd.”

As to the region most likely to have given rise to this memorable passage, two possibilities are before us. Weiss on the Psalms points out that

“The shepherds of Judea had often to lead their flocks away into the wilderness of their own district, or into the regions bordering on the Dead Sea. They were compelled to traverse what were mere ravines and chasms among the mountains, where the thickness of the briars and thistles overhanging from the sides, threw the path at the bottom into almost total darkness. The sheep, quite naturally, recoiled from entering into a passage so frightful, but were forced onwards by the rod in the hand of the shepherd. The trembling sheep little knew that this very path, however terrific, would lead them through into a brighter region, into verdant pastures of quietness and plenty.”

The other possible region is mentioned in an instructive passage found in The Book of Psalms, by John Mason Good, which reads:

“If we suppose David to be describing the scenery immediately around him, and referring to the duties of his own early life, the valley of the deathshade here referred to, was probably that of Tophet, Hinnom, or Gehenna, emphatically denominated the valley of death, or the deathshade, from its being the place in which the bloody idolaters of Moloch buried their children in sacrifice to this detestable idol ; and into which dead impurities were afterwards thrown as a place proverbial for its abominations. This valley, overshadowed with darkness, was situated on the side of the spring of Siloah, and consequently must frequently have been in front of David, not more than three or four miles distant, when keeping his father’s flock at Bethlehem. And as the country on the other side of this celebrated fountain was remarkable for its verdure, and the beauty of its scenery, it is highly probable that it is to this that the poet, in the preceding verse, figuratively applies the appellation of ‘tracks or paths of righteousness’.”

There must be many who, at the present time, finding themselves sitting in darkness and the shadow of death, turn for comfort and consolation to this inspired reflection of the Psalmist of old, and fear no evil, for the Shepherd is with them.