Psalms 20

Psalms 20A PRAYER for the use of the ancient church in time of war. Addressing her visible head, she wishes him divine assistance and success, Psalms 20:2-6 (1-5), and expresses a strong confidence that God will answer her petition, Psalms 20:7-9 (6-8), which she then repeats and sums up in conclusion, Psalms 20:10 (9). There is no trace of this psalm having been composed with reference to any particular occasion, its contents being perfectly appropriate to every case in which the chosen people, under their theocratic head, engaged in war against the enemies of God and Israel.

1. To the Chief Musician. Written for his use and entrusted to him for execution. As in all other cases, this inscription shews the psalm to have been written, not for the expression of mere personal feelings, but to be a vehicle of pious sentiment to the collective body of God’s people. —A Psalm by David. The correctness of this statement is not only free from any positive objection, but confirmed by the whole tone and style of the performance, as well as by its intimate connection with the next psalm. See below, on Psalms 21:1.
2. (Psalms 20:1). Jehovah hear thee in the day of trouble! The name of Jacob’s God exalt thee! The name of God, the revelation of his nature in his acts. “May those divine attributes, which have been so often manifested in the experience of the chosen people, be exercised for thy protection. See above, on Psalms 5:12 (11).— The God of Jacob, of the patriarch so called, and of his seed. See Matthew 22:32.—Exalt thee, raise thee beyond the reach of danger. See above, on Psalms 9:10 (9), Psalms 18:3; Psalms 18:49 (2, 48).
3. (Psalms 20:2). (May Jehovah) send thee help from (his) sanctuary, and from Zion sustain thee. The mention of Zion and the sanctuary shows that Jehovah s appealed to as the king of his people, and as such not only able but bound by covenant to afford them aid. See below, on Psalms 20:10 (9.) Sustain thee, hold thee up, the same verb that is used in Psalms 18:36 (35). Both verbs may also be translated as simple futures, will send, will sustain; but see below.
4. (Psalms 20:3). (May Jehovah) remember all thy gifts and accept thy offering. Selah. The word remember in the first clause seems to involve an allusion to the memorial, a name given in the sacrificial ritual to that part of the vegetable offering which was burnt upon the altar. See Leviticus 2:2; Leviticus 6:8 (15).— The word translated gifts, although properly generic, is specially used to denote the vegetable offerings of the law, while the word translated offering is the technical name of the principal animal sacrifice. They are put together to describe these two species of obligation. Compare Psalms 40:7 (6), Jeremiah 17:26, Daniel 9:27.— The verb translated accept means elsewhere to make fat (Psalms 18:5), or to remove the ashes of the altar. (Exodus 27:3, Numbers 4:13).

Some give it here the sense of turning into ashes or consuming, others that of pronouncing fat, and therefore fit for sacrifice. In either case acceptance is implied. The optative form of the verb in the original seems to confirm the sense already put upon the foregoing futures. From this verse it has been inferred, with some probability, that the whole psalm was specially intended to be used at the sacrifice offered by the Israelites before a campaign or a battle. (See 1 Samuel 13:9-10). To this some add the supposition, that the selah, in the verse before us, marks the pause in the performance of the psalm, during which the sacrifice was actually offered. See above, on Psalms 3:3 (2). 5. (Psalms 20:4). (May he) give thee according to thy heart, and all thy counsel (or design) fulfil. This is not a vague wish for success in general, but a prayer for success on the particular occasion when the psalm was to be used.— Thy heart, thy desire. Thy counsel, the plan which thou hast formed and undertaken to execute in God’s name, and for the protection or deliverance of his people. 6. (Psalms 20:5). May we rejoice in thy deliverance, and in the name of our God display a banner! May Jehovah fulfil all thy petitions! The phrase thy deliverance may mean that wrought or that experienced by thee. In all probability both ideas are included. In the name of our God, and therefore not as a mere secular triumph.

The second verb seems to be connected with a noun used by Moses to denote the banners under which the four great divisions of the host marched through the wilderness (Numbers 1:52; Numbers 2:2-3; Numbers 2:10; Numbers 2:18; Numbers 2:25; Numbers 10:14). Hence the conjectural translation, “may we set up (or display) a banner.” But as the participle of the same verb seems, in the only other place where it occurs (Son 5:10), to signify distinguished or exalted, others follow the Septuagint and Vulgate in translating, may we be lifted up or magnified.— The last clause is a comprehensive prayer, equivalent in meaning to Psalms 20:5 (4) above, and including not merely what had been expressly specified, but all that the theocratic sovereign might desire or attempt in conformity with God’s will, whether known to the whole body of his followers or not. This clause concludes the first division of the psalm by recurring to the theme with which it opens, and with which again the whole psalm closes. See below, on Psalms 20:9 (10). 7. (Psalms 20:6). Now I know that Jehovah has saved his Anointed— he will hear him from his holy heavens— with the saving strength of his right hand. What was asked in the foregoing context is here said to be already granted. Hence some imagine that a battle or other decisive event must be supposed to intervene. But this, besides being highly improbable and forced in so brief a composition, is forbidden by the immediate recurrence to the future form, he will hear. A far more natural solution is, that this verse expresses a sudden conviction or assurance that the preceding prayers are to be answered.

As if he had said: “Such are my requests, and I know that Jehovah has already granted them, so that in his purpose and to the eye of faith, his Anointed is already safe, and has already triumphed.” The change to the first person singular does not indicate a different speaker, but merely puts what follows into the mouth of each individual believer, or of the whole body viewed as an ideal person. The second member of the sentence may be best explained as a parenthesis, leaving the third to be construed directly with the first, as in the version above given.

In this verse we have two examples of a common Hebrew idiom, one of them a very strong one. The phrase translated from his holy heavens might seen; to mean the heavens of his holiness; but the true construction is his heavens of holiness, i.e. the heavens where the Holy One resides, and from which his assistance must proceed. See above, on Psalms 2:6; Psalms 11:4. The attribute of holiness is mentioned to exalt still further the divine and sacred nature of the warfare and the victory to which the psalm relates. Another example of the Hebrew idiom before referred to is the saving strength of his right hand, which literally rendered is the strengths of the salvation of his right hand. The plural strengths may either be intensive, or refer to the various exertions of the power here described.

The right hand has the same sense as in Psalms 18:36 (35). Here, as in Psalms 18:50 (51), His Messiah or Anointed One includes the whole succession of genuine theocratic kings, not excepting him whose representatives they were, and in whom the royal line was at the same time closed and made perpetual. 8. (Psalms 20:7). These in chariots and these in horses, and we in the name of Jehovah our God, will glory. All the objects are connected by the same preposition with the same verb, namely, that at the end of the sentence. In order to retain the preposition, which must otherwise be varied, and thereby obscure the structure of the sentence, the verb glory, which is construed with the preposition in, has been substituted for the strict sense of the is verb, we will cause to be remembered, i. e. mention or commemorate. See Exodus 23:13, Amos 6:10, Isaiah 48:1; Isaiah 63:7. The insertion of the verb trust, in the English versions of the first clause, is entirely gratuitous.

These and these is the Hebrew idiom for some and others. Compare this to this, in Exodus 14:20, Isaiah 6:3.— The verb, in the case before us, may have been selected in allusion to the cognate form in Psalms 20:4 (3) above. “As God has remembered thy offerings, so we will cause his name to be remembered."— Our God is again emphatic and significant, as shewing that the whole psalm has reference to the covenant relation between God and his people represented by their theocratic sovereign. With the contrast in this verse compare 1 Samuel 17:45, Isaiah 31:3, Psalms 33:16-17. 9. (Psalms 20:8). They have bowed and fallen, and we have risen and stood upright. Here, as in Psalms 20:7 (6), the past tense expresses the certainty of the event, or rather the confidence with which it is expected. The emphatic they at the beginning means the enemies and oppressors of God’s people. We have arisen seems to imply a previous prostration and subjection.— The last verb occurs only here in this form, which is properly reflexive, and may be explained to mean, we have straightened ourselves up. 10. (Psalms 20:9). Jehovah, save! Let the King hear us in the day we call, or still more closely, in the day of our calling. The Septuagint and Vulgate make the king a part of the first clause: “Jehovah, save the king” (Domino salvum fac regem). But this not only violates the masoretic accents, which, though not ultimately binding, are entitled to respect as a traditional authority, but separates the verb in the last clause from its subject, so that both the ancient versions just referred to have been under the necessity of changing the third into the second person (hear us). The first clause is besides more expressive and emphatic without the king than with it.

Nothing could be more pregnant or sonorous than the laconic prayer, Jehovah, save! The object is, of course, to be supplied from Psalms 20:7 (6), and from the tenor of the whole psalm. The other construction, it is true, enables us to make the King of this verse the same person with the Anointed of Psa 20:7 (6). But far from any disadvantage, there is great force and beauty, in referring the expected blessing to the true King of Israel, whom David and his followers only represented. See Deuteronomy 33:5, Psalms 48:3 (2), Matthew 5:35.— By taking the last verb as a future proper (the King will hear us) the psalm may be made to close with a promise, or rather with a confident anticipation of God’s blessing. Most interpreters, however, prefer to make it optative, and thus to let the psalm conclude as it began, with an expression of intense desire. Psalms 21 Psalms 21As in the eighteenth psalm, David publicly thanks God for the promises contained in 2 Samuel 7, so here he puts a similar thanksgiving into the mouth of the church or chosen people. In Psalms 21:2-7 (1-6), the address is to Jehovah, and the king is spoken of in the third person. In Psalms 21:8 (7) this form of speech is used in reference to both. In Psalms 21:9-13 (8-12) the address is to the king. In Psalms 21:14 (13) it returns to Jehovah. As to the substance or contents of these successive parts, the first praises God for what he has bestowed upon the king, Psalms 21:2-7 (1-6).

In the second, there is a transition to another theme, Psalms 21:8 (7). The third congratulates the king on what he is to do and to enjoy through the divine mercy, Psalms 21:9-13 (8-12). The fourth returns to the point from which the whole set out, Psalms 21:14 (13). The opinion that this psalm relates to the fulfilment of the prayer in that before it, seems to be inconsistent with its structure and contents as just described. They are rather parallel than consecutive, the principal difference being this, that while the twentieth psalm relates to the specific case of assistance and, success in war, the twenty-first has reference to the whole circle of divine gifts bestowed upon the Lord’s Anointed.

1. To the Chief Musician. A Psalm by David. The correctness of the first inscription is apparent from the structure of the psalm, throughout which the speaker is the ancient church. The correctness of the other may be argued from the general resemblance of the style to that of the Davidic psalms, from numerous coincidences of expression with the same, and from the tone of lively hope which seems to indicate the recent date of the divine communication, especially when compared with psalms which otherwise resemble it, such as the eighty-ninth. The particular resemblance between this psalm and the twentieth makes them mutually testify to one another’s genuineness and authenticity.
2. (Psalms 21:1). Jehovah, in thy strength shall the king rejoice, and in thy salvation how shall he exult! This verse commences the description of God’s favour to the king with a general statement, afterwards amplified in Psalms 21:3-7 (2-6). Thy strength, as imparted to him, or as exercised in his deliverance, which last agrees best with the parallel expression, thy salvation, i. e. thy deliverance of him from the evils which he felt or feared. In thy strength and salvation, i. e. in the contemplation and experience of it. The future verbs show that the gift has not yet been consummated, without excluding the idea of it as begun already.
3. (Psalms 21:2). The desire of his heart thou hast given unto him, and the quest of his lips hast not withholden. Selah. The occasion of the joy and exultation mentioned in the preceding verse is now more particularly set forth. It is easy to imagine, although not recorded, that the great promise in the seventh chapter of 2 Samuel was in answer to the fervent and long-continued prayers of David for a succession in his own family.— The word translated quest occurs only here, but its sense is determined by the parallelism and the Arabic analogy. The combination of the positive and negative expressions of the same idea (given and not withholden) is a favourite Hebrew idiom.
4. (Psalms 21:3). For thou wilt come before him with blessings of goodness, thou wilt set upon his head a crown of gold. This, as Luther observes, is an answer to the question what he had desired. The for connects it with the statement in the foregoing verse, which is here explained and justified. As the preterites in Psalms 21:3 (2) shew that his request was granted in the divine purpose, so the futures here show how it was to be fulfilled in fact. Come before, come to meet in a friendly manner.

See above, on Psalms 17:13; Psalms 18:6 (5), and compare Deuteronomy 22:5 (4).—Blessings of good, not blessings prompted by the divine goodness, but conferring, or consisting in, good fortune, happiness. See above, on Psalms 16:2.— The reference in the last clause is not to David’s literal coronation at the beginning of his reign, nor to the golden crown which he took from the Ammonitish king of Rabbah favours to himself and his successors. The divine communication in the seventh of 2 Samuel seems to be here viewed, as the only real coronation of David as a theocratic sovereign. The last word in the sentence is the same that was translated pure gold when contrasted with the ordinary word for gold, Psalms 19:11 (10). 5. (Psalms 21:4). Life he asked of thee, thou hast given (it) to him, length of days, perpetuity and eternity. By disregarding the masoretic interpunction, the construction may be simplified without a change of sense. “Life he asked of thee, thou hast given him length of days,” etc. The last words of the verse are often used adverbially to mean for ever and ever; but as they are both nouns, it is best to put them here in apposition with the same part of speech which immediately precedes. This last clause shews that the life which David prayed for was not personal longevity, but the indefinite continuation of his race, an honour which was granted to him, even beyond his hopes and wishes, in the person of our Saviour. Compare 2 Samuel 7:13; 2 Samuel 7:16, Psalms 89:5 (4), Psalms 132:12. 6. (Psalms 21:5). Great shall be his majesty in thy salvation; glory and honour thou wilt put upon him. His personal experience of God’s saving grace, and his connection with the great scheme of salvation for mankind, would raise him to a dignity far beyond that of any other monarch, and completely justifying even the most exalted terms used in Scripture, from the charge of adulation or extravagance. 7. (Psalms 21:6). For thou wilt make him a blessing to eternity; thou wilt gladden him with joy by thy countenance (or presence). He shall not only be blessed himself, but a blessing to others, the idea and expression being both derived from the promise to Abraham in Genesis 12:2, an allusion which serves also to connect the Davidic with the Abrahamic covenant, and thus to preserve unbroken the great chain of Messianic prophecies. Make him a blessing, literally, place him for (or constitute him) blessing. The plural form suggests variety and fulness, as in Psalms 20:7 (6). By thy countenance, or with thy face, i. e. by looking on him graciously, not merely in thy presence or before thee, as the place of the enjoyment, but by the sight of thee, as its cause or source. See above, on Psalms 16:11. 8. (Psalms 21:7). For the king (is) trusting in Jehovah, and in the grace of the Most High he shall not be moved. The consummation of this glorious promise was indeed far distant, but to the eye of faith distinctly visible. In the grace seems to mean something more than through the grace (or favour) of the Most High, as the ground of his assurance, or the source of his security. The words appear to qualify the verb itself, and to denote that he shall not be shaken from his present standing in God’s favour. The use of the third person in this verse, with reference both to God and the king, makes it a kind of connecting link between the direct address to God in the first part of the psalm, and the direct address to the king in the second. 9. (Psalms 21:8). Thy hand shall find out all thine enemies; thy right hand shall find (those) hating thee. Having shewn what God would do for his Anointed, the psalm now describes what the latter shall accomplish through divine assistance. Corresponding to this variation in the subject, is that in the object of address, which has been already noticed. By a kind of climax in the form of expression, hand is followed by right hand, a still more emphatic sign of active strength. To find, in this connection, includes the ideas of detecting and reaching.

Compare 1 Samuel 23:17, Isaiah 10:10; in the latter of which places the verb is construed with a preposition, as it is in the first clause of the verse before us, whereas in the other clause it governs the noun directly. If any difference of meaning was intended, it is probably not greater than that between find and find out in English. 10. (Psalms 21:9). Thou shalt make them like a fiery furnace at the time of thy presence; Jehovah in his wrath shall swallow them up, and fire shall devour them. The ascription of this destroying agency to God in the last clause serves to shew that the king acts merely as his instrument. Thou shalt make, literally set or place, i.e. put them in such or such a situation. A fiery furnace, literally a furnace (or oven) of fire. To make them like a furnace here means, not to make them the destroyers of others, but, by a natural abbreviation, to make them as if they were in a fiery furnace. At the time of thy presence, literally thy face, which may be understood to mean, when thou lookest at them. 11. (Psalms 21:10). Their fruit shalt thou make to perish from the earth, and their seed from (among) the sons of man (or Adam). This extends the threatened destruction of the enemies to all their generations. The same figurative use of fruit occurs in Hosea 9:16. 12. (Psalms 21:11). For they stretched out evil over thee; they devised a plot; they shall not be able (to effect it). The figure of the first clause is the same as in 1 Chronicles 21:10. (Compare 2 Samuel 24:12.) The idea here is that they threatened to bring evil on thee. As the verb to be able is sometimes used absolutely, it is translated, they shall not prevail. 13. (Psalms 21:12). For thou, shalt make them turn their back; with thy (bow) strings shalt make ready against their face. The common version of the first word (therefore) is not only contrary to usage, but disturbs the sense by obscuring the connection with the foregoing verse, which is this: “they shall not prevail, because thou shalt make them turn their back.” This last phrase, in Hebrew, is so strongly idiomatic that it scarcely admits of an exact translation. Thou shalt make (or place) them shoulder. See above, on Psalms 18:41 (40), where a similar idiom occurs. In the verse before us, the chronological succession is reversed; it was by shooting at their face that he should make them turn their back.

The true relation of the clauses is denoted, in the English Bible, by supplying a particle of time: “thou shalt make them turn their back (when) thou shalt make ready (thine arrows) upon thy strings against the face of them.” The version make ready is also a correct one, although some translate the phrase take aim, which is really expressed by another form of the same verb. The true nse of the one here used is clear from Psalms 11:2, and the distinctive use of both from Psalms 7:13-14 (12, 13). 14. (Psalms 21:13). Be high, Jehovah, in thy strength; we will sing and celebrate thy power. Here the psalm returns to God as its great theme, and gives him all the glory. Be high, exalted, both in thyself and in the praises of thy people. See above, on Psalms 18:47 (46). Thy strength and power, as displayed in the strength given to thine anointed. Celebrate by music, as the Hebrew verb always means. There is a beautiful antithesis in this verse, as if he had said: thou hast only to deserve praise, we will give it.