But as for me, when they were sick, my clothing was
sackcloth: I humbled my soul with fasting; and my prayer returned into mine own
bosom (Ps. 35:13).
With respect to sackcloth and fasting, he used them
as helps to prayer. The faithful pray even after their meals, and do not
observe fasting every day as necessary for prayer, nor consider it needful to
put on sackcloth whenever they come into the presence of God. But we know that
those who lived in ancient times resorted to these exercises when any urgent
necessity pressed upon them. In the time of public calamity or danger they all
put on sackcloth, and gave themselves to fasting, that by humbling themselves
before God, and acknowledging their guilt, they might appease his wrath. In
like manner, when any one in particular was afflicted, in order to excite
himself to greater earnestness in prayer, he put on sackcloth and engaged in
fasting, as being the tokens of grief.
When David then, as he here tells us, put on sackcloth, it
was the same as if he had taken upon himself the sins of his enemies, in order
to implore from God mercy for them, while they were exerting all their power to
accomplish his destruction. Although we may reckon the wearing of sackcloth and
sitting in ashes among the number of the legal ceremonies, yet the exercise of
fasting remains in force amongst us at this day as well as in the time of
David.
When God, therefore, calls us to repentance, by showing us
signs of his displeasure, let us bear in mind that we ought not only to pray to
him after the ordinary manner, but also to employ such means as are fitted to
promote our humility. In conclusion, the Psalmist says that he behaved and
acted towards them as if each of them had been his brother. (Commentaries)
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