Psalms 60

The singer girds himself with the almightiness of God, and calls it all his own by faith. Sweet is the music of experience, but it is all for God; there is not even a stray note for man, for self, or for human helpers. “For God is my defence, and the God of my mercy.” With full assurance he claims possession of the Infinite as his protection and security. He sees God in all, and all his own. Mercy rises before him, conspicuous and manifold, for he feels he is undeserving, and security is with him, undisturbed and impregnable, for he knows that he is safe in Divine keeping. S.

Joy-bells ring all through the Bible. The mission of the Gospel is to make happiness. The angel’s announcement of good tidings of great joy is going forth yet on every breeze. The story of the love of Christ is changing darkness to light, despair to hope, tears to laughter, sorrow to rejoicing in all lands. It is the mission of every Christian to be a happiness-maker. Each one of us has power, too, to add something at least to the world’s gladness. We can do this in a thousand ways—by being joyful Christians ourselves, making our lives a sweet song; by telling others the joyful things of the Word of God; by doing kindnesses to all we meet; by comforting sorrow, lifting burdens away, cheering sadness and weariness, and scattering benefictions wherever we go. J. R. M.

Every condition and place we are in should be a witness of our thankfulness; this will make the times and places we live in the better for us. Praise is a just and due tribute for all God’s blessings. It is a debt always owing and always paying; and the more we pay the more we shall owe; upon the due discharge of this debt the soul will find peace. And a thankful heart to God is the greatest blessing of all. Sibs.

FOR THE CHIEF MUSICIAN; SET TO SHUSHAN EDUTH: MICTAM OF DAVID, TO TEACH: WHEN HE STROVE WITH ARAM-NAHARAIM AND WITH ARAM-ZOBAH, AND JOAB RETURNED, AND SMOTE OF EDOM IN THE VALLEY OF SALT TWELVE THOUSAND.

1. O God, thou hast cast us off, thou hast broken us down; Thou hast been angry; O restore us again. 2 Thou hast made the land to tremble; thou hast rent it: Heal the breaches thereof; for it shaketh. 3 Thou hast shewed thy people hard things: Thou hast made us to drink the wine of staggering. 4 Thou hast given a banner to them that fear thee, That it may be displayed because of the truth. [Selah 5 That thy beloved may be delivered, Save with thy right hand, and answer us. 6 God hath spoken in his holiness; I will exult:

I will divide Shechem, and mete out the valley of Succoth. 7 Gilead is mine, and Manasseh is mine; Ephraim also is the defence of mine head; Judah is my sceptre [or, lawgiver]. 8 Moab is my washpot; Upon Edom will I cast my shoe: Philistia, shout thou because of me. 9 Who will bring me into the strong city? Who hath led me unto Edom? 10 Hast not thou, O God, cast us off? And thou goest not forth, O God, with our hosts. 11 Give us help against the adversary: For vain is the help of man. 12 Through God we shall do valiantly: For he it is that shall tread down our adversaries.

THE title takes us back to the longest and the most glorious of David’s wars, that with the Ammonites and their Aramean allies. (See 2 Sam., chaps. 8, 10-12.) While David’s troops were advancing so victoriously in the north the Edomites had fallen upon the unprotected land in the south, and here a new war awaited the victorious host, which called in question all the results achieved in the north. This Psalm refers especially to this Edomitic war. It is only in a general kind of way that the title gives to the Psalm its historical setting. It was composed before the victory in the Valley of Salt, and presupposes that the southern part of the land of Israel was badly laid waste by the Edomites, against whom it could bring into the field no sufficient body of troops. D.

TITLE. “When he strove with Aram-naharaim and with Aram-zobah.” An insult offered to David’s ambassadors by Hanun, King of the Ammonites, led to a serious war. Hanun obtained mercenaries from Syria to re-enforce his army, Joab and Abishai his brother, David’s generals, gave them battle. Joab, opposed to the Syrians, gained the first success, and the Ammonites, seeing their allies routed, took to flight into their town. But this defeat provoked a great coalition, embracing all the people between the Jordan and the Euphrates. David, however, fearlessly marched against them at the head of his army; he vanquished all his enemies, and made himself master of the small Aramean kingdoms of Damascus, Zobah, and Hamath, and subjugated the Eastern Idumeans, who met their final defeat in the Valley of Salt. Lenormant. — The Syrians on the north and east, and the Edomites on the south and southeast—the most powerful among all the adjacent kingdoms—made common cause against David, so that this eventful year became a crisis of immensely critical interest to himself and his people. Hence the pertinence of this Psalm. These were live issues, instinct with every element of vital interest. Would their God indeed be with His covenant people? Would He make them victorious over these ancient and mighty nations? C.

3. Infatuation, or “bewilderment”—literally, “reeling, staggering,” as the effects of intoxication. This infatuation is the wine which God has made them drink. The same figure occurs in many other passages. It denotes not merely a Divine punishment, but that kind of punishment which comes of men’s own desperate indulgence of their pride, folly, passion. When men will drink presumptuously of the cup of their own wickedness, God forces it, as it were, into their hands till they have drained the very dregs as the cup of His wrath. Thus God punishes evil with greater evil, pride with presumptuous pride, folly with more desdesperate folly. As is usual in the Old Testament, this, though sin as well as curse, is ascribed directly to God, as is the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart, the sending of the evil spirit into Saul, and of a lying spirit into the false prophets. P.

4. Thou hast given a banner. Thou hast given us by the recent victory, after our prostrate condition, a banner of triumph to lift up (so the Hebrew), because of Thy faithfulness to Thy promise. “The truth” here answers to God’s “holiness” (v. 6). So long as soldiers see their banner uplifted, they flock round it with confidence. But when it is prostrate their spirits and hopes fall. The “banner” is a pledge of safety and a rallying point to those who fight under it. Fauset. — “That it may be displayed because of the truth.” Banners are for the breeze, the sun, the battle. Israel might well come forth boldly, for a sacred standard was borne aloft before them. The truth of God was involved in the triumph of David’s armies, he had promised them victory; and so in the proclamation of the Gospel we need feel no hesitancy, for as surely as God is true He will give success to His own Word. S.

5-7. Shechem, Succoth, Gilead, Manasseh, Ephraim, Judah. The Divine oracle promising victory confirmed David in the possession of the whole of Canaan, in accordance with its original geographical distribution. Shechem represents the east and Succoth the west side of the Jordan. Gilead was the portion of the tribes of Reuben and Gad, and so in conjunction with a part of the tribe of Manasseh covered the territory first reached after the journey through the wilderness, while Ephraim and Judah were the principal tribes between the river and the sea. My sceptre. An allusion to the promise of royal dignity to Judah in Gen. 49 : 10, where the same word is used. It is vested with supreme authority, but his staff or sceptre as its symbol. De Witt.

6. What God speaks “in His holiness” is a declaration or promise for the certainty and inviolability of which He answers with His holiness; it is, therefore, like an oath “by His holiness.” D.

6-8. David having received this word stands assured, that as Shechem and Succoth, Gilead and Manasseh, Ephraim and Judah would willingly submit to him and yield obedience, so, also, that Moab, Edom, and Philistia, who were his professed enemies, should be subdued to him. He expected to conquer and triumph over them because God had decreed and spoken it in His holiness. Caryl.

7. To me (belongs) Gilead and to me Manasseh, and Ephraim the strength of my head, Judah my lawgiver. The idea is that the whole of Canaan rightfully belongs to Israel. The form of expression is analogous to that in the preceding verse, but with a beautiful variation. As the two great divisions of the country east and west of Jordan are there represented by detached points, Shechem and Succoth, so here by the names of extensive districts, Judah and Ephraim, the two largest territories on the west, Bashan and Gilead on the east, the latter called by its own name, the former by that of the tribe which occupied the greater part of it. The last clause does due honor to the military strength of Ephraim, but asserts the civil supremacy of Judah. A.—This verse has reference both to the geographical and to the political division of the Holy Land. Geographically, Gilead and Manasseh denote the Israelitish territory east of the Jordan, as Ephraim and Judah represent Western Palestine. Politically, the two last-mentioned tribes were the most important, the one in the north, and the other in the south; and thus the whole land and nation are, in fact, summed up. P.

“Judah is (or, shall be) my lawgiver”—i.e., all his subjects should be brought under one Head, one governor, who should give them laws according to which they should be ordered or governed, which power and authority belonged to the tribe of Judah according to that prophecy of Jacob to which the Psalmist here alluded. Now in the Church and in matters of religion this one Head is Christ, even that “Lion of the tribe of Judah,” as He is called (Rev. 5 : 5). J. Brinsley.

8. The Psalmist anticipates not the constitution only of the kingdom in its integrity and its firm consolidation by the union of the various tribes, but the extension of the kingdom also by the subjugation of neighboring nations. Those nations are chiefly mentioned which had been from the earliest times the enemies, and the bitterest enemies, of Israel. The order in which they are mentioned is from the east, and thence along the south to the west. None of them was ever completely subjugated, though David greatly reduced them and humbled their power (2 Sam., chap. 8), but triumph over them forms part of the promise of later prophets. See especially Isa. 11 : 14, where it is promised in connection with the union of Ephraim and Judah. The expressions which follow, indicating the subjugation of Moab and Edom, are decidedly contemptuous. P.

Moab (is) my washpot; at Edom will I throw my shoe; at me, Philistia, shout aloud! The three hostile powers with which Israel was most frequently at war are here put together as the objects of a contemptuous address. Moab is likened to the humblest household utensil, the vessel in which slaves were wont to wash their master’s feet. Edom is likened to the slave himself, to whom or at whom the master throws his shoe when about to bathe his feet. A.—The Moabites as well as the Edomites were subdued by David, for David here justly celebrates his triumphs over them; but then was merely typified what Christ at length fulfilled, in that He reduced under His sway all adversé and hostile nations. Calein.

9. Who will bring me (to) the fenced city? Who has led me up to Edom? In reliance on God’s promise, and in the possession of the hope and courage just expressed, His people are ready to go forward, and only waiting for some one to conduct them into the enemy’s country—nay, into his very citadel. The fenced city—literally, city of defence or fortification, a phrase already used in Psalm 31 : 21, is Petra, the famous capital of Idumea, hewn in the rock, and almost perfectly impregnable. A.—The entrance to Petra is by a narrow gorge lined by lofty precipices, formed by the channel of a rivulet. This defile is nearly two miles in length. At some places the overhanging rocks approach so near to each other that only two horsemen can proceed abreast. Tweedie.

Great success must be a stimulus to greater efforts, but must not become a reason for self-confidence. We must look to the strong for strength as much at the close of a campaign as at its beginning. High up among the stars stood the city of stone, but God could lead His servant up to it. No heights of grace are too elevated for us, the Lord being our leader, but we must beware of high things attempted in self-reliance. Excelsior is well enough as a cry, but we must look to the highest of all for guidance. S.

12. Through God we shall do. In war these two must be joined, and indeed in all actions—He, we; God and man. “We shall do valiantly,” for God helps not remiss, or cowardly, or negligent men. And yet, that being done, the work is His; “He shall tread down;” the blow and the overthrow are not to be attributed to us, but to Him. A. Clarke.—From God all power proceeds, and all we do well is done by Divine operation; but still we, as soldiers of the great King, are to fight, and to fight valiantly, too. Divine working is not an argument for human inaction, but

rather is it the best excitement for courageous effort. S.—The Israel of God, His spiritual Israel, are likewise through Him more than conquerors. Though sometimes they may be

tempted to think that God has cast them off, and may be foiled in particular conflicts, yet God will bring them into the strong city at last. H.