Psalms 22 - Introduction

A.M. 2944. B.C. 1060.

It is confessed, that David was a type of Christ, and that many Psalms, or passages in the Psalms, though properly and literally understood of David, yet had a further and mystical reference to Christ, in whom also they were accomplished. But there are some other Psalms, or passages in the Psalms, which, either by the sacred penman of them, or, at least, by the Holy Ghost inspiring him, were directly and immediately intended for, and are properly and literally understood of, the Messiah; though withal there may likewise be in them some respect and allusion to the state of the penman himself, who, as being a type of Christ, must, of course, in many things resemble Christ. And this seems evidently to be the case with this Psalm, which was understood of the Messiah by the Hebrew doctors themselves, as it was also by Christ and by his apostles. And there are many passages in it which were most literally accomplished in him, and cannot, in a tolerable sense, be understood of any other. And therefore it cannot reasonably be doubted that David, though he had some reference to his own condition in some parts of it, yet was carried out by the Spirit of prophecy beyond himself unto Christ, to whom alone it truly and fully agrees, and to whose sufferings and the glory that should follow, it bears a clear and striking testimony. David speaks here of the humiliation of Christ, Psalms 22:1. Of his exaltation; 22-31.

Title. Aijeleth Shahar That is, the hind of the morning. It may seem strange to the reader, on the first view of the subject, that such a title as this should be given to this solemn and mournful Psalm. And he may think that the forty-second Psalm might much better have borne such a title, because, as the hart panteth after the water-brook, so panted the soul of the penman of it after God: but there may appear to him no propriety in giving such a name to a Psalm on the sufferings and glory of the Messiah. And yet there are passages in this Psalm which seem to justify the appellation. For instance, Many bulls have compassed me, &c., have beset me round; they gaped upon me as a ravening, roaring lion: especially Psalms 22:16, Dogs have compassed me; the assembly of the wicked have enclosed me; words which evidently allude to the eastern method of hunting, namely, by assembling great numbers of people, and enclosing the creatures they hunt; and as the psalmists in the forty-second Psalm, rather chose to compare himself to a hart than a hind, the present much better answers this title; in which he speaks of the hunted soul of the Messiah in the feminine gender, Psalms 22:20, Deliver my soul from the sword, my darling from the power of the dog. Thus any one who reflects on the circumstances of David, at the time to which the fifty-sixth Psalm refers, and considers the oriental taste, will not wonder to see that Psalm entitled, The silent dove afar off, or, in distant places. Fenwick, however, thinks that the title of this Psalm should be rendered, The strength of the morning; and that it relates to Christ, as being the bright and morning-star, or day-spring from on high, as he is called, Luke 1:78; to Him, the dew of whose birth is of the womb of the morning. The title, therefore, says he, leads us to observe and contemplate, in this Psalm, the depth of that love and condescension which made the Son of God humble himself in the way here described, and even to the death of the cross, though he be the bright morning-star, and day-spring from on high. See Delaney and Dodd.