Psalms 68:27

The representatives of four tribes are specified as taking part in the procession. Judah and Benjamin naturally represent the South. Jerusalem was on the boundary between them; and the Temple was in the territory assigned to Benjamin (Deuteronomy 33:12; Joshua 18:16), which may account for the place of honour being assigned to it. But why are Zebulun and Naphtali selected to represent the North? Is it as a recognition of their heroic patriotism commemorated in the Song of Deborah (Judges 5:18) of which this Psalm contains so many reminiscences? or is it (on the assumption of the exilic date of the Psalm) an allusion to the prophecy of Isaiah (Isaiah 11:1), that just those tribes which had suffered most severely from the first Assyrian invasion should be restored to honour? This, if the exilic date of the Psalm is adopted, is the most obvious explanation. The prophets from Amos (Amos 9:11 ff.) and Hosea (Hosea 3:5) onward, foretold the restoration of Israel as well as Judah, and their reunion into one state, and the Psalmist sees this hope visibly fulfilled in the festal procession. It may be noted that in Jeremiah 3:17-18, the restoration of the reunited people is placed in close connexion with the conflux of the nations to worship at Jerusalem of which the Psalmist goes on to speak in Psalms 68:28 ff. It is important to remember that the Israelites who returned from Babylon regarded themselves as representing the whole nation, and not the kingdom of Judah only. Cp. Ezra 8:35; Psalms 122:4.

little Benjaminwith their ruler Omit with. Benjamin is called littleas the youngest of the sons of Jacob, and the smallest of the tribes in population and territory (1 Samuel 9:21). Their ruleris explained by the Targ. as an allusion to Saul's kingship; "There was Benjamin, small among the tribes, who first went down into the [Red] Sea, and therefore first received the kingdom": by others it is supposed to mean -conducting them." The word is obscure and possibly corrupt.

and their council Or, company.