Psalms 40:6

6. According to Hebrews 10:5, Psalms 40:6-10 are the words of Christ, or of David speaking in the person of Christ.

Sacrifice… offering… burnt offering… sin offering The enumeration covers all the offerings necessary to entering into and continuing in covenant with God. The first two are generic terms for bloody and unbloody offerings, the last two specific of bloody sacrifices; the “burnt offering,” עולה , ( ‘olah,) a self-dedicatory sacrifice, the “sin offering,” חשׂאה , ( hhattaah,) an expiation.

Mine ears hast thou opened Literally, ears hast thou digged for me. More naturally the mind turns to boring through the ear of the servant, Exodus 21:6, as the basis of this metaphor. But a different word occurs there, and the noun ( ear) is in the singular, while this is plural. Besides, the import of the passages is not identical. The verb כרה , ( karah,) in the text, has the general sense of to dig, as a pit, a wall, a grave, but allows the sense of to uncover, to open, as in the English text. To open the ears is a figurative expression for to awaken attention, as the inlet to the understanding, (Isaiah 50:4,) the indispensable preparation of a servant in order to perfect obedience. It signifies, also, to reveal, or communicate, as 1 Samuel 20:3; where “show it me,” is literally, uncover mine ear. See also chapter Psalms 22:17; Job 36:10; Job 36:15. The emblematic idea, then, of “mine ears hast thou opened,” is, thou hast revealed to me, caused me to understand, thy most secret will, or mind. The ideas of attentive listening and an inward, hearty obedience, are implied. David’s interior ear had now been opened to receive the will of God in its spiritual sense, and to perceive that animal sacrifice, in itself, was not the ultimate requirement, but the obedience of the heart, of which the ritual form was but the expression. Compare 1 Samuel 15:22; Psalms 51:16-17. The application of all this to Messiah, to whom it primarily refers, (and to David only secondarily,) is made in Hebrews 10:5-9, where it is quoted in proof of the fundamental doctrine of Christianity, namely, that pardon is obtained only by the death of Christ as a sin offering.

Instead of “mine ears hast thou opened,” the Septuagint gives σωμα κατηρτισω μοι , Thou hast prepared me a body. This, not the Hebrew form, the apostle quotes Hebrews 10:5, for the reason, says Hammond, “that the apostle attended more to the sense than to the words, and changed it into those words which more fully and perspicuously expressed the mystery of Christ’s incarnation.” G.C. Storr admits that a body hast thou prepared me, may be brought within the general limits of an ad sensum quotation. To this Professor Stuart also agrees. This would be sustained also by the analogy of New Testament quotations from the Old. Bengel thinks the version of the Seventy is an interpretation rather than a translation of the Hebrew text, the “ears,” as a part, being put for the “body.” Moll, also, thinks the Septuagint is an “enlarged and explanatory translation” of the Hebrew. Olshausen calls it a “free translation,” and thinks that the Septuagint might have considered “ears” to be unintelligible, and substituted the more general idea, “Thou hast prepared for me a body.” This view simply takes כרה , ( karah,) opened, in the sense of prepared, which is admissible, and by synecdoche the “ears” for the whole body. It is in harmony, also, with the scope both of the psalm and the quotation, for the inadequacy of animal sacrifice with the doctrine of atonement unchanged, naturally suggests a higher expiation which Messiah, in his greater fulfilment of the will of God, relating to pardon by atonement, could accomplish only by taking upon himself a human body. On this plan, therefore, “the incarnation of the Son was a prerequisite to obedience, ” ( Alexander,) and hence in itself an act of obedience to the will of God touching the redemptive plan. “It was the first and most direct step to his being made a servant.” Bonar. See note on Hebrews 10:5