Psalms 90:12
in Psalms 90So teach us to number our days, that we may present a heart of wisdom.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
So teach us to number our days, That we may get us a heart of wisdom.
KJV
So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.
⋯
This verse in Psalms 90
Commentary
13 notes on this verseMake your right hand thus known, and those fettered in heart in wisdom. Your right hand, with which you made the world, enlighten the world. "For the arm of the Lord, to whom has it been revealed?" Your right hand, with which you made man, let it itself take up and save the human body. And those fettered in heart in wisdom. It can be understood thus: those who before wandered freely, let them be fettered by your wisdom.
This site's exposition
Who knows the power of Your anger
on Psalms 90:11-12
Verse 11 asks who knows the power of God's anger, and the psalm lets the question stand. Verse 12 asks God to teach the counting of days. The second half asks that a heart of wisdom be brought in, where the Hebrew verb is bo, to bring.
This site's exposition
teach us to number our days
So ties the prayer to the span in verse 10. Charles Spurgeon observed that counting is a child's sum, yet the best of men need the Lord to teach them this one. Matthew Henry recalled the man in the Gospel who counted on many years and died that night.
The record, by era
The Church Fathers3 voices
Make known your right hand, and those fettered in heart in wisdom. In some manuscripts it says "the learned," in others it says "the fettered." "Learned" means one thing, "fettered" means another. What then does he say: Make known your right hand? Why so long do you draw back your right hand, O God? "Why do you turn away your hand into your bosom?" it says in another psalm. What is being said is this: We are laid low in sickness, we lie in sins: send forth your right hand, and lift us up. Why so long do you keep your right hand in your bosom? Let your heart pour out your good Word: send forth your right hand, and set us free. Make known to us the mystery which was hidden from the generations. Make known your right hand. What are you stealing away by stealth, O Arius? He did not say, make your right hand: for God was never without his right hand. But what did he say? Your right hand, which always existed, and was in your bosom, make it known. Since we cannot know him remaining in his deity, let him take on manhood, and thus let us understand him. Make known your right hand thus, and those fettered in heart in wisdom: those who have the fetters of wisdom, that is, who are fettered in the heart through your wisdom. Do not let it trouble you that the passage is obscure. The prophets had wisdom: but that very wisdom, as it were, fettered them; they could not fly without Christ. See, then, what he says: Send forth your right hand, that is, your Son, and make him known to us; and let the prophets, who prophesied, as it were, the shadow, begin to preach the Lord more manifestly.
"Make Your right hand so well known" [Psalm 90:12]. This is the reading of most of the Greek copies: not of some in Latin, which is thus, "Make Your right hand well known to me." What is, "Your right hand," but Your Christ, of whom it is said, And to whom is the Arm of the Lord revealed? [Isaiah 53:1] Make Him so well known, that Your faithful may learn in Him to ask and to hope for those things rather of You as rewards of their faith, which do not appear in the Old Testament, but are revealed in the New: that they may not imagine that the happiness derived from earthly and temporal blessings is to be highly esteemed, desired, or loved, and thus their feet slip, when they see it in men who honour You not: that their steps may not give way, while they know not how to number Your anger. Finally, in accordance with this prayer of the Man that is His, He has made His Christ so well known as to show by His sufferings that not these rewards which seem so highly prized in the Old Testament, where they are shadows of things to come, but things eternal, are to be desired. The right hand of God may also be understood in this sense, as that by which He will separate His saints from the wicked: because that hand becomes well known, when it scourges every son whom He receives, and suffers him not, in greater anger, to prosper in his sins, but in His mercy scourges him with the left, that He may place him purified on His right hand. [Matthew 25:33] The reading of most copies, "make Your right hand well known to me," may be referred either to Christ, or to eternal happiness: for God has not a right hand in bodily shape, as He has not that anger which is aroused into violent passion.
A commentator
Desert FathersThe Desert Fathers, Sayings of the Early Christian Monks · Written before 500.
proposed
A hermit said, 'If you lose gold or silver, you can find something as good as you lost. But the man who loses time can never make up what he has lost.'
The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices
5 Thou carriest them away as with a flood; they are as a sleep: in the morning they are like grass which groweth up. 6 In the morning it flourisheth, and groweth up; in the evening it is cut down, and withereth. This psalm is entitled a prayer of Moses.
quarantine:scripture (2026-07-29) — scripture-overlap:88%@v4-6
Lord, give us grace duly to consider how few they are, and how little a while we have to live in this world." Note, 1. It is an excellent art rightly to number our days, so as not to be out in our calculation, as he was who counted upon many years to come when, that night, his soul was required of him.
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — odd-straight-quotes
5 more voices on this verse
The Puritans and the Awakening1 voice
So teach us to number our days,....
The Nineteenth Century4 voices
So teach us to number our days - Let us deeply consider our own frailty, and the shortness and uncertainty of life, that we may live for eternity, acquaint ourselves with thee and be at peace; that we may die in thy favor and live and reign with thee eternally.
So teach us to number our days. Instruct us to set store by time, mourning for that time past wherein we have wrought the will of the flesh, using diligently the time present, which is the accepted hour and the day of salvation, and reckoning the time which lieth in the future to be too uncertain to allow us safely to delay any gracious work or prayer. Numeration is a child's exercise in arithmetic, but in order to number their days aright the best of men need the Lord's teaching.
So teach us to number our days. Instruct us to set store by time, mourning for that time past wherein we have wrought the will of the flesh, using diligently the time present, which is the accepted hour and the day of salvation, and reckoning the time which lieth in the future to be too uncertain to allow us safely to delay any gracious work or prayer. Numeration is a child's exercise in arithmetic, but in order to number their days aright the best of men need the Lord's teaching. We are more anxious to count the stars than our days, and yet the latter is by far more practical. That we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. Men are led by reflections upon the brevity of time to give their earnest attention to eternal things; they become humble as they look into the grave which is so soon to be their bed, their passions cool in the presence of mortality, and they yield themselves up to the dictates of unerring wisdom; but this is only the case when the Lord himself is the teacher; he alone can teach to real and lasting profit. Thus Moses prayed that the dispensations of justice might be sanctified in mercy. "The law is our school master to bring us to Christ", when the Lord himself speaks by the law. It is most meet that the heart which will so soon cease to beat should while it moves be regulated by wisdom's hand. A short life should be wisely spent. We have not enough time at our disposal to justify us in misspending a single quarter of an hour. Neither are we sure of enough life to justify us in procrastinating for a moment. If we were wise in heart we should see this, but mere head wisdom will not guide us aright.
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
proposed
So teach us to number our days - literally, “To number our days make us know, and we will bring a heart of wisdom.” The prayer is, that God would instruct us to estimate our days aright: their number; the rapidity with which they pass away; the liability to be cut down; the certainty that they must soon come to an end; their bearing on the future state of being. That we may apply our hearts unto wisdom - Margin, “Cause to come.” We will bring, or cause to come, a heart of wisdom. By taking a just account of life, that we may bring to it a heart truly wise, or act wisely in view of these facts. The prayer is, that God would enable us to form such an estimate of life, that we shall be truly wise; that we may be able to act “as if” we saw the whole of life, or as we should do if we saw its end. God sees the end - the time, the manner, the circumstances in which life will close; and although he has wisely hidden that from us, yet he can enable us to act as if we saw it for ourselves; to have the same objects before us, and to make as much of life, “as if” we saw when and how it would close. If anyone knew when, and where, and how he was to die, it might be presumed that this would exert an important influence on him in forming his plans, and on his general manner of life. The prayer is, that God would enable us to act “as if” we had such a view.
How the passage was read
What the Jewish commentators add
So teach the number of our days And just as in the beginning, make known in the world the number of our long days, and since we enjoy longevity, we will be able to acquire intelligence, and we will acquire in them a heart of wisdom.
1 more on this passage, in their own words ▾
Who knows the might of Your wrath In these few days, who can acquire intelligence to know the might of Your wrath and to fear You, and as for You—Your fear is Your anger.
This section is reception history: how the passage was read and kept in the Jewish tradition. Where a reading parts from an essential of the Christian faith, the section says so at that point.
Texts and citation data: Sefaria; each excerpt follows its version’s licence. 3 further sources are cited on this chapter that carry no English text this site may quote or only restate the verse.
The words behind it
7 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| לִמְנ֣וֹת | limnot | to count | H4487 → | 28 times |
| יָ֭מֵינוּ | yameinu | days our | H3117 → | 2304 times |
| כֵּ֣ן | ken | thus | H3651 → | 771 times |
| הוֹדַ֑ע | hoda' | teach [us] | H3045 → | 945 times |
| וְ֝נָבִ֗א | venavi' | so we may bring | H935 → | 2568 times |
| לְבַ֣ב | levav | a heart of | H3824 → | 252 times |
| חָכְמָֽה׃ | chokhmah | wisdom | H2451 → | 153 times |
לִמְנ֣וֹתto count
limnotH4487 →28 times
יָ֭מֵינוּdays our
yameinuH3117 →2304 times
כֵּ֣ןthus
kenH3651 →771 times
הוֹדַ֑עteach [us]
hoda'H3045 →945 times
וְ֝נָבִ֗אso we may bring
venavi'H935 →2568 times
לְבַ֣בa heart of
levavH3824 →252 times
חָכְמָֽה׃wisdom
chokhmahH2451 →153 times
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
John 9:4While it is daytime, we must do the works of Him who sent Me. Night is coming, when no one can work.
it leads to
- John 12:35
Then Jesus told them, “For a little while longer, the Light will be among you. Walk while you have the Light, so that darkness will not overtake you. The one who walks in the…
- Ephesians 5:16
redeeming the time, because the days are evil.
- John 4:34
Jesus explained, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to finish His work.
- Ecclesiastes 9:10
Whatever you find to do with your hands, do it with all your might, for in Sheol, where you are going, there is no work or planning or knowledge or wisdom.
- John 11:9–10
Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours of daylight? If anyone walks in the daytime, he will not stumble, because he sees by the light of this world.
- John 12:35
Through
Proverbs 4:7Wisdom is supreme; so acquire wisdom. And whatever you may acquire, gain understanding.
it leads to
- Ecclesiastes 7:12
For wisdom, like money, is a shelter, and the advantage of knowledge is that wisdom preserves the life of its owner.
- Ecclesiastes 9:16–18
And I said, “Wisdom is better than strength, but the wisdom of the poor man is despised, and his words are not heeded.”
- Proverbs 23:23
Invest in truth and never sell it—in wisdom and instruction and understanding.
- Ecclesiastes 7:12
Where this verse is studied
By subject
Wisdom35 verses
About Psalms
This page draws on 11 works. Open the list of works
This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Augustine of Hippo, Exposition on Psalm 90; Charles Spurgeon, The Treasury of David; Charles Spurgeon, The Treasury of David, Vol. 4; Desert Fathers, The Desert Fathers, Sayings of the Early Christian Monks; Jamieson, Fausset and Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jerome, Homily 67, on Psalm 89 (Alternate Series); Jerome, Homily 19, on Psalm 89; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763) and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.