Psalm 49

The psalm's argument runs on a legal term. Israel's law allowed a ransom — a payment accepted in place of a life in certain cases, such as when a known dangerous ox killed someone and the owner could redeem his own forfeited life with money. A near kinsman could also redeem a relative sold into debt slavery, or buy back the family land. Everyone knew that a life could sometimes be bought.

So verses 7–8 hit hard: none of them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him, for the redemption of their soul is precious, and it ceaseth for ever. The one transaction money cannot cover is the one that matters.

"Their inward thought is, that their houses shall continue for ever, and their dwelling places to all generations; they call their lands after their own names." Both halves are documented practice. Wealthy families were buried in rock-cut tombs cut into the hillside outside Jerusalem, chambers with benches used by the same household for generations — a house of the dead meant to last. And naming an estate or a town after yourself was how a man tried to stay in the record; the Bible notes Absalom raising a pillar because he had no son to keep his name.

"Like sheep they are laid in the grave; death shall feed on them" reverses the shepherd picture. Here death is the shepherd, and the flock is the wealthy.