Psalms 120 - Introduction

CXX.

This is the first of the fifteen “songs of degrees,” as the title appears in our version (“of steps” in the LXX. and Vulg.; literally, of goings up). The probable meaning of this strange inscription is discussed in the General Introduction. That the Psalms so entitled formed a collection made with some definite intention can hardly be questioned. But whatever that intention, the position of this psalm in the collection is unaccountable. Even if the title denotes a rhythmical peculiarity — a kind of climactic progress in the verse — it is only just observable here, while there is not the slightest touch in the poem, which can be brought into peculiar connection or association with a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, or with the return from the captivity. One thing is clear; we are again, after the long gnomic 119th Psalm, in the region and air of lyric song, this fragment, for it is nothing more, being bright and intense with passion and fire. If the poem is personal, it records an experience which every phase of life in all ages presents, the mischief arising from slander. If — the more probable conjecture — it is national, then we must look for its motive in the complications which would naturally arise when Israel had to struggle amid foreign powers and influences to maintain its religious and national existence. The “enemy to peace” (Psalms 120:6; comp. Psalms 129:5; Ezra 4:1) has been most plausibly identified with the Samaritans. (See 2 Kings 17:24 seq., and Josephus, Ant. xi., 2:1.)

Title. — “Song of degrees.” Rather, lyric song of goings up, or ascents.