“Fret not thyself because of evildoers, neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity.”
The psalmist opens with a wise exhortation: 'Do not fret because of evildoers or be envious of those who do wrong.' The verb 'fret' suggests the anxiety and disturbance that arises from witnessing injustice and the apparent success of the wicked. The exhortation not to be envious suggests that the temptation facing the righteous is to desire to imitate the wicked and share in their apparent prosperity. The opening establishes the fundamental problem the psalm addresses: the righteous facing the injustice of the world.
Church Fathers on Psalms 37:1
On the first part of the psalm. 1. With terror do they hear of the coming of the last day, who will not be secure by living well: and who fain would live ill, long. But it was for useful purposes that God willed that day to remain unknown; that the heart may be ever ready to expect that of which it knows it is to come, but knows not when it is to come. Seeing, however, that our Lord Jesus Christ was sent to us to be our “Master,” He said, that “of the day not even the Son of…
Nicene & Post-Nicene / Ante-Nicene Fathers translations · public domain
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