Psalm 108
13 verses · BSBPsalms book hub →
Speaks with:Psalms 57×2Psalms 22×2Psalms 60×2Isaiah 63×2Psalms 145×1Psalms 104×1
Summary
Chapter summary
A soldier's morning stitched from two Davidic psalms (57 and 60): 'My heart is fixed, O God… I will awake the dawn.' Thy lovingkindness is great above the heavens. Then the land-grant oracle again: God hath spoken in his holiness: Shechem, Succoth, Gilead, Manasseh, 'Judah is my sceptre,' Moab, Edom, Philistia. 'Who will bring me into the fortified city?… Give us help against the adversary; for vain is the help of man. Through God we shall do valiantly.'
Context
Poetry · David, Asaph, Sons of Korah, others — Psalms overview
The world behind this chapter
Psalms 108The history
This psalm is made of two older ones. The first half is the closing section of Psalm 57 and the second half is the closing section of Psalm 60, joined into a new song. That is not a slip by a copyist; it is how a working songbook behaves. A useful stanza gets lifted and set to a new occasion, exactly as hymn verses are recombined today.
The line about waking the dawn assumes real instruments. The harp and the lyre were wooden framed instruments with gut strings, small enough to carry, and the singer pictures himself up before first light and rousing the sunrise rather than waiting for it.
The middle of the psalm is a land survey spoken by God, and every name on it is a real place with a job. Shechem and the valley of Succoth are the heartland on either side of the Jordan. Gilead and Manasseh are the eastern grazing country. Ephraim is called the helmet because the north supplied the manpower, and Judah the ruler's staff because the king came from there.
The three insults at the end are household images. Moab is the basin a man washes his feet in. Edom is where he throws his sandals when he comes indoors — the corner by the door where dirty footwear goes. Philistia gets a shout of triumph. The fortified city he wants to enter is Edom's rock stronghold in the cliffs south of the Dead Sea.
What it meant to them
Israel is going into hostile country, and the psalm settles the question of ownership before the first sword is drawn: God speaks and hands out the map himself.
It also admits the hard part out loud — God had not been going out with their armies lately. The prayer is not for confidence in the troops but for God to come back to the field, because human help is worthless.
Sources cited
- Walton, Matthews and Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament
- Roland de Vaux, Ancient Israel: Its Life and Institutions
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Psalms 108. Where this site has examined a place the manuscripts differ, the examination is in the manuscripts room. Every place this site examines →
This page draws on Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Calvin, Commentaries; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.