FOR THE DIRECTOR of music. According to mahalath. A maskil of David.
1The fool says in his heart,
“There is no God.”
They are corrupt, and their ways are vile;
there is no one who does good.
2God looks down from heaven
on the sons of men
to see if there are any who understand,
any who seek God.
3Everyone has turned away,
they have together become corrupt;
there is no one who does good,
not even one.
4Will the evildoers never learn—
those who devour my people as men eat bread
and who do not call on God?
5There they were, overwhelmed with dread,
where there was nothing to dread.
God scattered the bones of those who attacked you;
you put them to shame, for God despised them.
6Oh, that salvation for Israel would come out of Zion!
When God restores the fortunes of his people,
let Jacob rejoice and Israel be glad!
Original Meaning
PSALM 53 IS a close duplicate in verses 1–5a and 6 to the earlier Psalm 14:1–7. One set of variations between these two compositions is due to the use in Psalm 53 of the divine epithet ʾelohim instead of the Tetragrammaton yhwh that appears in Psalm 14 (cf. 14:2 = 53:2; 14:4 = 53:4; 14:7b = 53:6b). This is often taken as one of the clearest evidences of the existence of an Elohistic Psalter extending from Psalms 42–83, in which it is supposed that the divine name Yahweh has been suppressed and replaced by ʾelohim.1 The most significant variant observed between these psalms lies in the comparison of 14:5a–6 with 53:5b–d (see below).
Like Psalm 14, our current psalm is an extended wisdom meditation on the folly of the wicked, who deny the effective existence of God and live corrupt lives through the oppression of the poor. The meditation is divided into three stanzas, with a concluding single verse. In this case, however, because of the textual difference in 53:5, the second stanza is composed of only two verses (53:4–5) rather than three as in stanza one (53:1–3) and in Psalm 14. Verse 5 is expanded in Psalm 53 to include four lines rather than the two lines found in 14:5. This effectively balances the two lines of 14:6 that are not included in Psalm 53.
Thematic structure follows the poetic structure with a description of the foolishness of evildoers and the divine response (53:1–3), a depiction of divine judgment on the wicked (53:4–5), and an expression of communal hope for restoration from exile (53:6).
The Heading (53:0)
THE HEADING SHARES with the more simple heading of Psalm 14 a reference to “the director of music” and attribution to David.2 It expands those simple components with one new term—a possible tune or tuning for harp accompaniment (ʿal maḥalat) that occurs elsewhere only in the heading to Psalm 88. In addition, the poem is acknowledged as a maśkil,3 the second of four consecutive psalms that bear this designation in their headings (Pss. 52–55).4 Psalm 53 is the third psalm attributed to David in the second collection of Davidic psalms (Pss. 51–71).5
The Folly of the Evildoers (53:1–3)
SEE THE COMMENTARY on 14:1–3 for discussion on these verses.
Judgment on the Wicked (53:4–5)
FOR 53:4, SEE comments on 14:4. Having described the corruption of human beings (beneʾadam in v. 2) in terms that seem absolute, the psalmist now indicates there are those “poor” who are oppressed by the powerful fools and who receive divine care and protection. As a result, the wicked are condemned for treating the poor as consumable objects.
It is in 53:5 that the greatest variation from Psalm 14 occurs. A careful comparison of the Hebrew text of these psalms offers tantalizing clues that a faint or fragmentary text may have lain behind one or both of these textual versions.6 Despite clear and distinctive divergence in wording at this point, the main thrust of the parallel passages remains the same: The wicked who refuse to acknowledge Yahweh—either in actuality or practicality—will be overwhelmed with dread and destruction by the very one whose existence they deny. God is the protector of the poor and will bring to judgment the oppressive deeds of the wicked.
In Psalm 14, the emphasis is placed on the protective power of God in behalf of the poor, while in Psalm 53, God’s power is unleashed in judgment on the wicked. One way of reading the rather enigmatic phrase “there was nothing to dread” (53:5b) is that destruction came on the wicked when they least expected it—out of the blue, so to speak—that is, when everything seemed to be going their way. Another way to understand this phrase is to see the wicked as becoming so paranoid under the divine attack that they will see destruction everywhere, constantly glancing over their shoulder anticipating the next attack.
In a passage reminiscent of the well-known “dry bones” passage (Ezek. 37), the scattered bones depict the spiritual death of the wicked and their rejection by God. In Ezekiel, the dead bones of the Israelites, judged for their sin, in the Exile, are regathered, reknit, clothed with new flesh and skin, and reenlivened to live new life before their God. In Psalm 53, the reverse is envisioned for the wicked—scattered bones, the horrible effects of spiritual abandonment.
Communal Hope for Restoration (53:6)
SEE COMMENTS ON 14:7. As in Psalm 14, our present version concludes with an expression of the hope of the community for restoration. Once again, the NIV’s translation of the Hebrew šebut as “fortunes” rather than the more common (and more likely) “captivity” obscures the link this verse makes with the exilic community. It also avoids the clear implication that, at least in its present form, the psalm reflects a period far later than the time of David.
Bridging Contexts
LOCATION! LOCATION! LOCATION! Because Psalms 14 and 53 represent close duplicates, they provide us an opportunity to consider how the same psalm might function in an alternate literary context. Psalm 14 immediately follows Psalm 13, a plea for deliverance from arrogant enemies, who anticipate with rejoicing the psalmist’s imminent fall (13:2c, 4). In Psalm 13, the psalmist is “wrestling” with thoughts of possible defeat and divine abandonment (13:1–2) but is able at the end to “trust in [Yahweh’s] unfailing love” for salvation (13:5). In this context, Psalm 14 provides an encouraging vision of the end of the arrogant fools who deny the power of God and (like the enemies of Ps. 13) consume the poor. The unique portion of 14:5 (which does not occur in Ps. 53) reassures the suffering poor that despite the attacks of the enemy, “God is present in the company of the righteous” to strike dread into the hearts of their foes. Following on the heels of this assurance, Psalm 15 then offers the psalmist’s commitment to a life of righteous integrity that qualifies him for the divine presence promised in 14:5 and which consequently “will never be shaken” (15:5c).
By way of contrast, Psalm 53 stands linked together with the preceding Psalm 52 as a combined description of corrupt humanity, who deserve God’s judgment. This excursus on human evil is set in motion by the confessional Psalm 51, where the narrator learned the benefits of deep, cleansing confession before God. Toward the end of that psalm, he responded to the hope of restoration to “the joy of [God’s] salvation” (51:12) by announcing his intention to “teach transgressors your ways” so that “sinners will turn back to you” (51:13). This commitment to teach transgressors is the appropriate kickoff for the strong pictures of human evil in Psalms 52 and 53, which graphically depict the arrogance and folly of the wicked and the futility of their hopes to escape God’s scrutiny and judgment.
As a contrasting positive example standing at the juncture of these two descriptions of evil lies the calm, quiet, confident picture of the flourishing olive tree enjoying a fruitful life within the protective care of God’s house (52:8–9). After the vow to teach transgressors is fulfilled in Psalms 52–53, Psalm 54 returns to the plea to enjoy the salvation of God envisioned in 51:12.
Scattered bones. We are horrified by the idea of cannibalism, yet we are strangely fascinated at the same time. Hollywood has learned to exploit this morbid obsession with productions featuring urbane killers like Hannibal “the Cannibal” Lector in Silence of the Lambs and the even more tortured sequel Hannibal. Cannibalism in times of stress—especially during long sieges of towns—was known in the ancient Near East and is mentioned in the Old Testament.7 Our own history of Western expansion has its dark accounts of the Donner expedition snowed into the northern California mountains with insufficient supplies.
Two passages in Psalm 53 lend themselves to the suggestion of cannibalism. The first is most clear—the reference in 53:4 to the evildoers who “devour my people as men eat bread.” The idea of cannibalistic savagery as a metaphor for the exploitation of the poor and powerless is found in 27:2 and even more graphically in Micah 3:1–3. It is as if one felt they could gain increased personal power by consuming the flesh of one’s enemy, an apt image to apply to the vicious attacks by the rich on those less powerful persons they felt free to manipulate at will.8
The second image is less specific and is capable of varied interpretation. It is only in connection with the first image that the association with cannibalism may come through. I am talking of the image of the scattered bones of the wicked mentioned in 53:5. The image of scattered, fleshless bones appears elsewhere as the aftermath of a military defeat so great that the dead were left behind to waste away unburied. That is certainly the case in the famous “valley of dry bones” passage in Ezekiel 37.9 But connected with the preceding verse, the scattered bones of 53:5 allow a subtle interpretation. Those who consume the flesh of the poor will themselves be consumed by the wrath of God so that their scattered bones will provide mute testimony to those who follow of both their sin and the appropriateness of their punishment.
Contemporary Significance
INCONSPICUOUS CONSUMPTION. Once again I need to be careful, I think, not to identify too easily with the exploited poor in this passage. I would be hard put to describe any exploitation I experience in the relatively easy existence I have today as “being devoured . . . as men eat bread.” That seems a pretty extreme evocation for the kind of manipulation society puts me through.
Now there are those in my society who are being consumed in a radical way, such as throw-away children and young men and women forced into the sex trade to satisfy the lusts of those who have no care for them other than as a source of momentary power and pleasure. Such individuals have become the equivalent to consumable products like bread or water, milk and potatoes to satisfy an appetite. Drug addicts, enslaved to cravings that submerge all aspects of their lives to the need to feed the addiction, fall into the same category of expendable persons, whose only role is to provide power and money to those who supply the drugs.
If I am not one of those throw-away people exploited as an object for my potential to satisfy another’s need, I can identify with their pain and hate the circumstances that continue their exploitation, and I can work to redeem a society so lost that it “devours” its weak and helpless “like men eat bread.” But I must be careful not to feel justified by my anger and freed by my energy. I need to realize just how complex and convoluted life is today, so that my own complicity in the exploitation of others is not always obvious to me or to anyone else. Just where does that silk shirt I enjoy so much come from? Who made it? Are they enslaved workers in an urban sweatshop? Where does our retirement fund place its investments?
The situation requires lots of care and energy, and we will probably never be able to know for sure. But as we learn, these kind of decisions do not seem to me insignificant. Our own consumption—conspicuous or otherwise—often does come at the price of exploiting others, eating them as if they are bread. We must be challenged by this psalm, and others like it, to reflect deeply and carefully on how our lives participate directly or indirectly in the exploitation of those the world considers expendable because they are, for the most part, invisible to us. There are no expendable people to God! And if we claim to be God’s people, there should not be any for us either.