PSALTERIVM

PSALMVS CIX — DIXIT DOMINVS

The Lord Said to My Lord

Dixit Dominus Domino meo is the most cited psalm in the New Testament, declaring Messiah's divine sonship and eternal priesthood. In the 1962 Breviary, it is the first psalm of Sunday Vespers and appears on all major feasts. The phrase 'Thou art a priest forever according to the order of Melchisedech' grounds the Church's theology of Christ's priesthood.

LATINE
Dixit Dominus Domino meo: Sede a dextris meis:
Donec ponam inimicos tuos, scabellum pedum tuorum.
Virgam virtutis tuae emittet Dominus ex Sion: dominare in medio inimicorum tuorum.
Tecum principium in die virtutis tuae in splendoribus sanctorum: ex utero ante luciferum genui te.
Iuravit Dominus, et non paenitebit eum: Tu es sacerdos in aeternum secundum ordinem Melchisedech.
Dominus a dextris tuis, confregit in die irae suae reges.
Iudicabit in nationibus, implebit ruinas: conquassabit capita in terra multorum.
De torrente in via bibet: propterea exaltabit caput.
ENGLISH
The Lord said to my Lord: Sit thou at my right hand:
Until I make thy enemies thy footstool.
The Lord will send forth the sceptre of thy power out of Sion: rule thou in the midst of thy enemies.
With thee is the principality in the day of thy strength: in the brightness of the saints: from the womb before the day star I begot thee.
The Lord hath sworn, and he will not repent: Thou art a priest for ever according to the order of Melchisedech.
The Lord at thy right hand hath broken kings in the day of his wrath.
He shall judge among nations, he shall fill ruins: he shall crush the heads in the land of the many.
He shall drink of the torrent in the way: therefore shall he lift up the head.
NOTA
FONS
Douay-Rheims (1609) / Vulgata
USUS
Sunday Vespers, Christmas, Ascension, Christ the King
CONTEXT
Psalm 110 in Hebrew numbering. Christ quotes it to prove His divinity (Matt 22:44). Hebrews 5-7 develops the Melchizedek priesthood theme. Central to Sunday Vespers.