Psalms 69 - Introduction

LXIX.

If we cannot identify the author of this psalm with any other known individual, we must certainly set aside the traditional ascription to David. Psalms 69:10, cannot by any ingenuity be worked into his known history. Psalms 69:20 does not give a picture of David’s condition at any time, for he always found a Nathan or a Barzillai even in his darkest hour. The conclusion (see Note Psalms 69:33), if not, as some think, a liturgical addition of a later date than the rest of the psalm, speaking as it does the language of past exile times, is another argument against the inscription. It also makes against an opinion shared by many critics, that refers this, together with Psalms 10, &c., to Jeremiah. The real author is lost in the general sufferings of these victims of religious persecution (Psalms 69:9), for whom he speaks (Psalms 69:6.) The expression of this affliction is certainly figurative — and never has grief found a more copious imagery — and therefore we cannot fix the precise nature of the persecution. There appear, however, to have been two parties in Israel itself, one zealous for the national religion, the other indifferent to it, or even scornful of it (Psalms 69:9). It is on the latter that the fierce torrent of invective that begins with Psalms 69:22 is poured — an invective we can best appreciate, if we cannot excuse it, by remembering that it was the outcome, not of personal hatred, but of religious exclusiveness. Except Psalms 22, no other hymn from ancient Israel supplied more for quotation and application to the young Christian community, when searching deep into the recognised sacred writings of their nation to prove that the despised and suffering one was the Christ. That in so doing they fastened on accidental coincidences, and altogether ignored the impassable distance between one who could be the mouthpiece of such terrible curses and Jesus Christ, need not blind us to the illustration which is thrown on Him and His life by the suffering and endurance of this, as of all martyrs in a right cause. The psalm falls into stanzas, but not all of equal length. The parallelism is varied by triplets.

Title. — See title Psalms 4, 45