1Do not keep silent, O God!
Do not hold Your peace,
And do not be still, O God!
2For behold, Your enemies make a tumult;
And those who hate You have lifted up their head.
3They have taken crafty counsel against Your people,
And consulted together against Your sheltered ones.
4They have said, “Come, and let us cut them off from
being a nation,
That the name of Israel may be remembered no more.”
5For they have consulted together with one consent;
They form a confederacy against You:
6The tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites;
Moab and the Hagrites;
7Gebal, Ammon, and Amalek;
Philistia with the inhabitants of Tyre;
8Assyria also has joined with them;
They have helped the children of Lot. Selah
9Deal with them as with Midian,
As with Sisera,
As with Jabin at the Brook
Kishon,
10Who perished at En Dor,
Who became as refuse on the
earth.
11Make their nobles like Oreb and like Zeeb,
Yes, all their princes like
Zebah and Zalmunna,
12Who said, “Let us take for ourselves
The pastures of God for a
possession.”
13O my God, make them like the whirling dust,
Like the chaff before the
wind!
14As the fire burns the woods,
And as the flame sets the
mountains on fire,
15So pursue them with Your tempest,
And frighten them with Your
storm.
16Fill their faces with shame,
That they may seek Your name,
O Lord.
17Let them be confounded and dismayed forever;
Yes, let them be put to shame
and perish,
18That they may know that You, whose name alone is the Lord,
Are the Most High over all the earth.
Commentary
Vs.
1-5
1Do not keep
silent, O God!
Do not hold Your peace,
And do not be still, O God!
2For behold, Your enemies make a tumult;
And those who hate You have
lifted up their head.
3They have taken crafty counsel against Your people,
And consulted together against
Your sheltered ones.
4They have said, “Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation,
That the name of Israel may be
remembered no more.”
5For they have consulted together with one consent;
They form a confederacy
against You:
Once again Israel is faced with aggression from her neighbors, for God’s enemies are their (our) own. Thus, the Psalm opens with a cry for help, for God Himself not to keep silent, nor hold His peace, nor be still, but rather rise to their (our) defense. Verses two through eight then lay out Israel’s just cause. For it is God’s enemies who make the tumult, it is they who have initiated the attack and assault on Israel. For those who hate God have lifted their heads, and so it is they who have set themselves and their desires against Him (vs. 2), by scheming His people's overthrow. And yet this is the ongoing history of God’s people, of all who believe and obey Him, of finding themselves in the cross hairs of this world’s wrath. Verses three to five then lay out the nations scheming plans, beginning with their arrogant boast of how they have taken crafty counsel against God’s people and consulted together against His sheltered ones. Thus, while we seek to live our lives in peace and prosperity they are always watching, always seeking ways to harass or outrightly attack us without a just cause. Verse four then lays out their ambitious, and dare I say foolhardy plans in seeking to destroy Israel from under heaven so that it might cease being a nation forever, that Israel’s name be remembered no more. Now the odds of this ever occurring are zero. And yet this foolhardy stance of theirs in wanting to destroy God’s servants name from under heaven never ceases, from generation to generation, His enemies in every generation will try to do so. Now this is not the work of one nation, rather Israel’s neighbors, the peoples that God allows to remain around them have formed this confederacy against them, against God.
Vs. 6-8 6The tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites;
Moab and the Hagrites;
7Gebal, Ammon, and Amalek;
Philistia with the inhabitants
of Tyre;
8Assyria also has joined with them;
They have helped the children
of Lot.
Selah
The confederacy is now named. Edom, that is the decedents of Esau, Jacobs’s brother who sold his birthright to him and who has since been hostile towards him is named first. Next named are the Ishmaelites, that is Ishmael the son of Hagar whom God rejected, for He choose Isaac to be Abraham’s heir is named as one of them. (Now it is to note that God completely destroyed Esau’s descendants so they now have no living heirs, see Obadiah 6-16), while the Ishmaelites according to God’s word to Hagar He made into a great nation which many Arab nations can now trace ancestry too (see Gen. 17:20; 21:12; 25:12-18 etc.). Moab and Amon were the decedents of the incestuous sons of Lot, Abraham’s nephew. Their opposition to Israel goes back to when they opposed Israel as they came out of Egypt, while Moab hired Balaam the prophet against them to try to destroy them which by the hand of God royally failed (see Gen. 19:30-38; Num. 23-25, 24:15-25). And yet throughout their nations Biblical history they were mostly hostile towards Israel. The Hagrites are relatively obscure. While Gebal were likely Phoenicians (territorially equivalent to modern day Lebanon), and Amalek was the first to attack Israel when they came out of Egypt (Exodus 17:8-16; also see 1 Samuel 15:1-9) for they were also a descendant of Esau, coming from his grandson (Gen. 36:12). Philistia is the Biblical Philistines, todays Palestinians occupy much of their territory. Tyre was that ancient city whose king God later condemned and destroyed along with it, as being a forerunner of His finial judgment on Satan (Ezekiel 26-28; also see Isaiah 23:1-17). Assyria equates with modern day Iraq, and the children of Lot are all his descendants from the Moabites and the Ammonites. All these united themselves then in a confederacy against Israel, much like the modern Arab nations have done and often do when it serves their own purposes, for in Israel they believe they find their common enemy.
Vs. 9-12 9Deal with them as with Midian,
As with Sisera,
As with Jabin at the Brook
Kishon,
10Who perished at En Dor,
Who became as refuse on the
earth.
11Make their nobles like Oreb and like Zeeb,
Yes, all their princes like
Zebah and Zalmunna,
12Who said, “Let us take for ourselves
The pastures of God for a
possession.”
Because of their seeking to destroy Israel and remove their existence from on earth the call now goes out to God to deal with them as He dealt with the kings who opposed Israel when they came out of Egypt. First mentioned is Midian, a nation descended through Abrahams second wife Keturah whom Abraham sent away from Isaac the heir to land of the east (Gen. 25:6), and though they were "friendly" with Moses during his time with Jethro his later Midianite father-in-law (Exodus 2:11-3:1; 18:2-27) these people afterwards would be enemies of Israel; likely because of Moses wife’s influence on his two sons born to her, for she was not in favor of her sons being circumcised and becoming apart of God’s people (see Exodus 4:24-25). Midian then after Moses’ departure from Jethro his father-in-law openly became Israel’s enemy, beginning with joining Moab in seeking to destroy Israel (Num. 22:1-12 etc.), for which God would command Moses to destroy them (Num. 25:16-18; 31:1-10). Also in the Book of Judges they are clearly seen as Israel’s ongoing oppressor, enemy, and frequent troubler (Judges 6:1-6 etc.). Now Jabin was king of Canaan during the days of Deborah when she judged Israel, and Sisera was the commander of his army; both these God overthrew through His people leaving their corpses to rot like refuse on the earth (Judges 4:1-23). Oreb and Zeeb were the two princes of Midian who were captured and killed by Gideons army with such a mighty slaughter that their overthrow is later cited in a prophecy given through Isaiah (see Judges 7:24-25; Isaiah 10:26). Likewise, Zebah and Zalumnna, two more arrogant Midian princes who thought to overthrow Israel and take possession of their land would fall to their deaths at the hand of Gideon (Judges 8:4-21). All these victories then are rightly cited as God’s defense of His people. Therefore these are recalled by Asaph in asking our God to do the same to their current enemies who were seeking to destroy them from being a nation and take the land He had given them possession of.
Vs. 13-18 13O my God, make them like the whirling dust,
Like the chaff before the
wind!
14As the fire burns the woods,
And as the flame sets the
mountains on fire,
15So pursue them with Your tempest,
And frighten them with Your
storm.
16Fill their faces with shame,
That they may seek Your name,
O Lord.
17Let them be confounded and dismayed forever;
Yes, let them be put to shame
and perish,
18That they may know that You, whose name alone is the Lord,
Are the Most High over all the
earth.
Colorful metaphors now fill this section of the psalms prayer for Israel’s enemies’ judgment. Verse thirteen then asks God to make them like the whirling dust; sucked up from earth and spun around in the air until they are scattered everywhere. While verses fourteen and fifteen ask God to devour them by the power of His flame, like an engulfing flame racing through a tinder dry forest so may He consume them. And so in putting them (and by default all their “gods” to shame) they might then seek His Name! Now this principal of sinners being brought low and later redeemed is a theme throughout the Scriptures (consider Psalm 107). However, verse seventeen and eighteen pivot back to judgment, and here unredeemable judgment, so that they may all know that You, whose name alone is Lord are the Most High over all the earth.
Scripture Quotations
New King James (1982): Thomas Nelson.
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