Psalm 42

Psalms 42:1-2

The psalm opens Book II in the sons of Korah's own voice, a hart panting after water brooks becoming the soul's thirst for God, for the living God. Spurgeon reads the image as pursuit under pressure, a hunted animal's desperate need rather than a leisurely desire, matching the psalmist's own circumstance away from the sanctuary. When shall I come and appear before God asks after a specific access the psalmist presently lacks.

Psalms 42:3-4

Grief becomes the psalmist's daily food, tears his meat day and night, while enemies taunt him with where is thy God, a question that treats his absence from worship as proof of God's absence from him. Verse 4 answers with memory rather than argument, going with the multitude to the house of God with the voice of joy and praise, a specific remembered festival procession. Henry notes the pain is sharpened rather than eased by the memory, since what is recalled is exactly what is now denied him.

Psalms 42:5

This refrain, why art thou cast down, O my soul, and why art thou disquieted in me, hope thou in God, falls again at 42:11 and once more at 43:5, three times across two psalms with no title of its own dividing them, which is the standing textual evidence that 42 and 43 were composed as one poem. The psalmist answers his own question rather than waiting for another to answer it, addressing his soul directly and commanding it to hope. Delitzsch reads the refrain as the structural key to both psalms, marking each of the poem's three movements.

Psalms 42:6-7

The psalmist locates his depression geographically, remembering God from the land of Jordan, and of the Hermonites, from the hill Mizar, the far north of Israel rather than Jerusalem, placing the psalm's setting away from the temple he longs for. Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of thy waterspouts turns that region's own cascades and floods into a picture of trouble answering trouble, wave after wave. Barnes reads all thy waves and thy billows are gone over me as drawn directly from that region's own waters, the poet's real surroundings supplying his metaphor.

Psalms 42:8-9

Against the flood of trouble the psalmist sets a settled confidence, the Lord will command his lovingkindness in the daytime, and in the night his song shall be with me, day and night both claimed for God despite verse 3's day and night of tears. Verse 9 still asks the hard question directly to God as my rock, why hast thou forgotten me, holding confidence and complaint together rather than letting one cancel the other. Henry notes the psalmist prays even while questioning, refusing to let his confusion silence his prayer.

Psalms 42:10-11

The taunt returns nearly word for word from verse 3, where is thy God, but now felt as a sword in my bones, the mockery no longer merely heard but physically wounding. The psalm closes its first movement with the refrain a second time, why art thou cast down, O my soul, hope thou in God, the psalmist again preaching to himself rather than resolving the trouble. Spurgeon reads the self-address as the psalm's own method, faith renewed by direct command to the soul rather than by a change in circumstance.