This clause has been variously explained: the interpretation here given has been mostly adopted. In the Barberinean manuscript the whole of this prayer is given in many respects different from the present received text of the Septuagint, and this clause is thus found in it—ἐχορτασας βολιδας της φαρετρας ἀυτου. It is evident that this idea falls in more with the preceding clause than any other; and the Hebrew will admit of a sense bordering on this with less alteration than any other that has been offered. No version has been given without supposing something to be understood. Newcome says, that sixteen MSS. read [שבועת]; by leaving out the [ו], it may be a verb in Kal in the past tense, as rendered above, and writers might have easily put down [אמר] for [אזור]. Then the line in Hebrew would be, [שבעת מטות אזור] “Thou hast filled with arrows the girdle.” It is a description of one equipped for battle; his bow was made ready, and he had filled his girdle, that is, his military guide, with arrows; for this girdle the preceding Greek version introduced the quiver, in which arrows were commonly carried. The word [מטות], means rods or staves, that is, of arrows, as we may take it here. This is the most satisfactory solution of the difficulties connected with this line, of which there have been, as Henderson says, more than a hundred interpretations. The last clause of the verse is thus rendered by Newcome,— Thou didst cleave the streams of the land; and by Henderson,— Thou didst cleave the earth into rivers. The words will not admit the first version; the genitive case in Hebrew is always by juxtaposition; here “streams” and “earth” are separated by the verb. The other version contains hardly a meaning. The most literal rendering is that given by Calvin, and it affords the best sense. The words will admit of the following, which is materially the same,— By streams didst thou cleavest the earth. The allusion evidently to the streams of that water which miraculously issued from the smitten rock, and followed the Israelites in the wilderness.—Ed.