1 O God, Thou hast cast us off, hast broken us,
Hast been angry with us--restore us again.
2 Thou hast shaken the land, hast rent it--
Heal its breaches, for it trembles.
3 Thou hast made Thy people see hard things,
Thou hast given them to drink reeling as wine.
4 Thou hast given a banner to them that fear Thee,
[Only] that they may flee before the bow. Selah.
5 That Thy beloved ones may be delivered,
Save with Thy right hand, and answer us.
6 God has spoken in His holiness,--I will exult:
I will divide Shechem, and measure out the valley of Succoth.
7 Mine is Gilead, and mine Manasseh,
And Ephraim is the strength of my head,
Judah, my baton of command.
8 Moab is my wash basin,
Upon Edom will I throw my shoe,
Because of me, Philistia, shout aloud.
9 Who will bring me into the fenced city?
Who has guided me into Edom?
10 Hast not Thou, O God, cast us off?
And goest not out, O God, with our hosts.
11 Give us help from the oppressor
For vain is help of man.
12 In God we shall do prowess:
And He, He will tread down our oppressors.
This psalm has evidently a definite historical background. Israel has
been worsted in fight, but still continues its campaign against Edom.
Meditating on God's promises, the psalmist anticipates victory, which
will cover defeat and perfect partial successes, and seeks to breathe
his own spirit of confidence into the ranks of his countrymen. But
the circumstances answering to those required by the psalm are hard
to find. The date assigned by the superscription cannot be called
satisfactory; for David's war there referred to (2 Sam. viii.) had
no such stunning defeats as are here lamented. The Divine Oracle, of
which the substance is given in the central part of the psalm, affords
but dubious indications of date. At first sight it seems to imply the
union of all the tribes in one kingdom, and therefore to favour the
Davidic authorship. But it may be a question whether the united Israel
of the Oracle is fact or prophecy. To one school of commentators,
the mention of Ephraim in conjunction with Judah is token that the
psalm is prior to the great revolt; to another, it is proof positive
that the date is after the destruction of the northern kingdom. The
Maccabean date is favoured by Olshausen, Hitzig, and Cheyne among
moderns; but, apart from other objections, the reappearance of vv.
5-12 in Psalm cviii. implies that this piece of Hebrew psalmody was
already venerable when a later compiler wove part of it into that
psalm. On the whole, the Davidic authorship is possible, though
clogged with the difficulty already mentioned. But the safest
conclusion seems to be Baethgen's modest one, which contrasts strongly
with the confident assertions of some other critics--namely, that
assured certainty in dating the psalm "is no longer possible."
It falls into three parts of four verses each, of which the first (vv.
1-4) is complaint of defeat and prayer for help; the second (vv. 5-8),
a Divine Oracle assuring victory; and the third (vv. 9-12), the flash
of fresh hope kindled by that God's-word.
The first part blends complaint and prayer in the first pair of
verses, in each of which there is, first, a description of the
desperate state of Israel, and then a cry for help. The nation is
broken, as a wall is broken down, or as an army whose ordered ranks
are shattered and scattered. Some crushing defeat is meant, which
in ver. 2 is further described as an earthquake. The land trembles,
and then gapes in hideous clefts, and houses become gaunt ruins. The
state is disorganised as in consequence of defeat. It is an unpoetical
mixture of fact and figure to see in the "rending" of the land
allusion to the separation of the kingdoms, especially as that was not
the result of defeat.
There is almost a tone of wonder in the designation of Israel as
"Thy people," so sadly does the fate meted out to them contrast with
their name. Stranger still and more anomalous is it, that, as ver.
3 _b_ laments, God's own hand has commended such a chalice to their
lips as should fill them with infatuation. The construction "wine of
reeling" is grammatically impossible, and the best explanation of the
phrase regards the nouns as in apposition--"wine which is reeling," or
"reeling as wine." The meaning is that God not only sent the disaster
which had shaken the nation like an earthquake, but had sent, too, the
presumptuous self-confidence which had led to it.
Ver. 4 has received two opposite interpretations, being taken by
some as a prolongation of the tone of lament over disaster, and by
others as commemoration of God's help. The latter meaning violently
interrupts the continuity of thought. "The only natural view is
that which sees" in ver. 4 "a continuation of the description of
calamity" in ver. 3 (Cheyne, _in loc._). Taking this view, we render
the second clause as above. The word translated "that they may flee"
may indeed mean to lift themselves up, in the sense of gathering
round a standard, but the remainder of the clause cannot be taken as
meaning "because of the truth," since the preposition here used never
means "because of." It is best taken here as _from before_. The word
variously rendered _bow_ and _truth_ is difficult. It occurs again in
Prov. xxii. 21, and is there parallel with "truth" or faithfulness in
fulfilling Divine promises. But that meaning would be inappropriate
here, and would require the preceding preposition to be taken in the
impossible sense already noted. It seems better, therefore, to follow
the LXX. and other old versions, in regarding the word as a slightly
varied mode of spelling the ordinary word for a bow (the final dental
letter being exchanged for a cognate dental). The resulting meaning is
deeply coloured by sad irony. "Thou hast indeed given a banner--but
it was a signal for flight rather than for gathering round." Such
seems the best view of this difficult verse; but it is not free
from objection. "Those who fear Thee" is not a fitting designation
for persons who were thus scattered in flight by God, even if it is
taken as simply a synonym for the nation. We have to make choice
between two incongruities. If we adopt the favourite view, that the
verse continues the description of calamity, the name given to the
sufferers is strange. If we take the other, that it describes God's
gracious rallying of the fugitives, we are confronted with a violent
interruption of the tone of feeling in this first part of the psalm.
Perowne accepts the rendering _from before the bow_, but takes the
verb in the sense of mustering round, so making the banner to be a
rallying-point, and the giving of it a Divine mercy.
The second part (vv. 5-8) begins with a verse which Delitzsch and
others regard as really connected, notwithstanding the Selah at the
end ver. 4, with the preceding. But it is quite intelligible as
independent, and is in its place as the introduction to the Divine
Oracle which follows, and makes the kernel of the psalm. There is
beautiful strength of confidence in the psalmist's regarding the
beaten, scattered people as still God's "darlings." He appeals to Him
to answer, in order that a result so accordant with God's heart as the
deliverance of His beloved ones may be secured. And the prayer has no
sooner passed his lips than he hears the thunderous response, "God has
spoken in His holiness." That infinite elevation of His nature above
creatures is the pledge of the fulfilment of His word.
The following verses contain the substance of the Oracle; but it is too
daring to suppose that they reproduce its words; for "I will exult"
can scarcely be reverently put into the mouth of God. The substance of
the whole is a twofold promise--of a united Israel, and a submissive
heathendom. Shechem on the west and Succoth on the east of Jordan,
Gilead and Manasseh on the east, and Ephraim and Judah on the west, are
the possession of the speaker, whether he is king or representative of
the nation. No trace of a separation of the kingdoms is here. Ephraim,
the strongest tribe of the northern kingdom, is the "strength of my
head," the helmet, or perhaps with allusion to the horns of an animal as
symbols of offensive weapons. Judah is the ruling tribe, the commander's
baton, or possibly "lawgiver," as in Gen. xlix. Israel thus compact
together may count on conquests over hereditary foes.
Their defeat is foretold in contemptuous images. The basin for washing
the feet was "a vessel unto dishonour"; and, in Israel's great house,
no higher function for his ancestral enemy, when conquered, would be
found. The meaning of casting the shoe upon or over Edom is doubtful.
It may be a symbol for taking possession of property, though that
lacks confirmation; or Edom may be regarded as the household slave
to whom the master's shoes are thrown when taken off; or, better, in
accordance with the preceding reference to Moab, Edom may be regarded
as part of the master's house or furniture. The one was the basin for
his feet; the other, the corner where he kept his sandals.
If the text of ver. 8 _c_ is correct, Philistia is addressed with
bitter sarcasm, and bidden to repeat her ancient shouts of triumph
over Israel now, if she can. But the edition of these verses in Psalm
cviii. gives a more natural reading, which may be adopted here: "Over
Philistia will I shout aloud."
The third part (vv. 9-12) is taken by some commentators to breathe
the same spirit as the first part. Cheyne, for instance, speaks of
it as a "relapse into despondency," whilst others more truly hear
in it the tones of rekindled trust. In ver. 9 there is a remarkable
change of tense from "Who will bring?" in the first clause, to "Who
has guided?" in the second. This is best explained by the supposition
that some victory over Edom had preceded the psalm, which is regarded
by the singer as a guarantee of success in his assault of "the fenced
city," probably Petra. There is no need to supplement ver. 10, so as
to read, "Wilt not Thou, O God, which," etc. The psalmist recurs to
his earlier lament, not as if he thought that it still held true, but
just because it does not. It explained the reason of past disasters;
and, being now reversed by the Divine Oracle, becomes the basis of
the prayer which follows. It is as if he had said, "We were defeated
because Thou didst cast us off. Now help as Thou hast promised, and we
shall do deeds of valour." It is impossible to suppose that the result
of the Divine answer which makes the very heart of the psalm, should
be a hopeless repetition of the initial despondency. Rather glad faith
acknowledges past weakness and traces past failures to self-caused
abandonment by a loving God, who let His people be worsted that they
might learn who was their strength, and ever goes forth with those who
go forth to war with the consciousness that all help but His is vain,
and with the hope that in Him even their weakness shall do deeds of
prowess. "Hast not Thou cast us off?" may be the utterance of despair;
but it may also be that of assured confidence, and the basis of a
prayer that will be answered by God's present help.