Psalm 11
7 verses · BSBPsalms book hub →
Speaks with:Isaiah 26×1Psalms 56×11 Samuel 23×1Psalms 21×1Psalms 64×1Psalms 82×1
Summary
Chapter summary
Counselors urge flight: 'Flee as a bird to your mountain, for the foundations are destroyed.' David refuses: 'In Jehovah do I take refuge.' Jehovah is in his holy temple, his throne in heaven; his eyes behold and try the children of men. He tries the righteous, but on the wicked he will rain snares, fire and brimstone. 'Jehovah is righteous; he loveth righteousness: the upright shall behold his face.'
Context
Poetry · David, Asaph, Sons of Korah, others — Psalms overview
The world behind this chapter
Psalms 11The history
"Flee as a bird to your mountain" was practical advice. The hill country of Judah is honeycombed with caves and steep wadis, and it was the standard refuge for anyone the authorities wanted. David lived in those caves for years. The advisers in this psalm are not cowards; they are giving the obvious counsel.
The threat they describe is night archery. "They make ready their arrow upon the string, that they may privily shoot at the upright in heart" — a bow in the shadows, aimed at a lit doorway or a silhouetted man, was assassination that left no one to accuse.
"If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?" uses building language for civil order. A house or a wall was set on a footing of stone; when the footing shifted, nothing above it could be saved by repairs. The complaint is that the whole structure of justice has gone.
The answer sets a different building against it: "The Lord is in his holy temple, the Lord's throne is in heaven." And what he does there is test — the verb is used of assaying metal, heating ore to see what is really in it. The trial is not a leak in God's security; it is the assay.
What it meant to them
This is a psalm about refusing a reasonable escape. Its first line is the answer to everything the advisers say: in the Lord put I my trust; how say ye to my soul, flee?
The closing image would have carried a hard edge for Israelites who remembered Sodom — fire and brimstone and a scorching wind as the portion of the violent, and the upright left to behold God's face.
Sources cited
- Charles H. Spurgeon, The Treasury of David on Psalm 11
- John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews & Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Psalms 11. 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.