Psalms 72:16

May there be abundance of corn in the land upon the top of the mountains:

May the fruit thereof rustle like Lebanon;

And may men flourish out of the city like grass of the earth.

A prayer for the fertility of the land, and the prosperity of the people. The poet would see the cornfields stretching up to the very top of the hills, and hear the wind rustling through the ears of corn as through the cedars of Lebanon, a name in itself full of associations of beauty and fertility (Hosea 14:5 ff.). It is doubtful whether the verb means to wave, as A.V. shake, or to rustle. Grassis emblematic of freshness, beauty, abundant and vigorous growth. Cp. Job 5:25; Isaiah 27:6. The increase of the population was a marked feature of Solomon's reign (1 Kings 4:20), and is a common characteristic in the pictures of the Messianic age (Isaiah 49:20 ff.).