FOR THE DIRECTOR of music. With stringed instruments. A maskil of David.
1Listen to my prayer, O God,
do not ignore my plea;
2hear me and answer me.
My thoughts trouble me and I am distraught
3at the voice of the enemy,
at the stares of the wicked;
for they bring down suffering upon me
and revile me in their anger.
4My heart is in anguish within me;
the terrors of death assail me.
5Fear and trembling have beset me;
horror has overwhelmed me.
6I said, “Oh, that I had the wings of a dove!
I would fly away and be at rest—
7I would flee far away
and stay in the desert;
Selah
8I would hurry to my place of shelter,
far from the tempest and storm.”
9Confuse the wicked, O Lord, confound their speech,
for I see violence and strife in the city.
10Day and night they prowl about on its walls;
malice and abuse are within it.
11Destructive forces are at work in the city;
threats and lies never leave its streets.
12If an enemy were insulting me,
I could endure it;
if a foe were raising himself against me,
I could hide from him.
13But it is you, a man like myself,
my companion, my close friend,
14with whom I once enjoyed sweet fellowship
as we walked with the throng at the house of God.
15Let death take my enemies by surprise;
let them go down alive to the grave,
for evil finds lodging among them.
16But I call to God,
and the LORD saves me.
17Evening, morning and noon
I cry out in distress,
and he hears my voice.
18He ransoms me unharmed
from the battle waged against me,
even though many oppose me.
19God, who is enthroned forever,
will hear them and afflict them—
Selah
men who never change their ways
and have no fear of God.
20My companion attacks his friends;
he violates his covenant.
21His speech is smooth as butter,
yet war is in his heart;
his words are more soothing than oil,
yet they are drawn swords.
22Cast your cares on the LORD
and he will sustain you;
he will never let the righteous fall.
23But you, O God, will bring down the wicked
into the pit of corruption;
bloodthirsty and deceitful men
will not live out half their days.
But as for me, I trust in you.
LIKE PSALM 54 before it and the several psalms succeeding it,1 Psalm 55 is a plea for deliverance from the attack of one’s enemies.2 It is particularly poignant since it seems to respond to the hurt of betrayal by a close friend (55:12–14, 20–21). This fact has led some to connect the psalm to Judas’s betrayal of Jesus.3 Others, drawing on the similarity of 55:6–8 with Jeremiah 9:1–2 and the description of faithless friends in 9:4–6, even suggest Jeremiah as author or at least the inspiration for this psalm.4 Identification of the betrayer as Ahithophel, the wise counselor of David who defected to Absalom,5 does not fit well with the contents of the psalm. Most commentators are content to leave a final identification of the faithless friend unresolved.
Numerous difficulties and uncertainties beset the text of this psalm, as evidenced by the extensive textual apparatus in BHS and the considerable variations in the translations.6
The structure of Psalm 55 is less clear than for some of the laments. After a brief invocation of God to hear (reminiscent of 54:2), the body interweaves descriptions of emotional distress as the result of attack with pleas for divine action against the enemy and confident trust in God. For the purpose of discussion the psalm may be divided into the following sections: invocation of God (55:1–2a), a description of the psalmist’s distress (55:2b–8), a plea for divine judgment on the enemy (55:9–11), the faithless friend (55:12–14), a renewed call for judgment of the enemy (55:15), a statement of confidence (55:16–19), a reprise of the faithless friend (55:20–21), and a call to confident trust in God (55:22–23).
The Heading (55:0)
NO NEW TERMS appear in the heading of Psalm 55. The complete heading is identical to the opening four words of the heading of Psalm 54 (see comments there). This psalm is the fifth one in the second Davidic collection, which begins in Psalm 51 and extends through Psalm 71. It concludes the group of four maśkil psalms that began with Psalm 52. The immediately following Psalm 56 initiates a new group of five psalms (56–60), each of which is categorized as miktam.7
Invocation of God (55:1–2a)
A TYPICAL PLEA for God to hear the psalmist’s complaint opens the psalm. The phrases are already familiar from the similar plea voiced in 54:2.8 Here in Psalm 55, the psalmist stylishly alternates the positive pleas for divine hearing and response on the periphery (“listen,” v. 1a; “hear . . . answer,” v. 2a) with the negatively expressed request that God “not ignore”9 his “plea” (teḥinnah, v. 1b). As the psalmist in 54:2 sought vindication more than just a hearing, so the speaker of 55:1–2 desires God to “answer.”
The Psalmist’s Distress (55:2b–8)
THE PSALMIST’S CIRCUMSTANCE is dominated by mental and emotional turmoil. The latter half of verse 2 is made difficult by two uncommon verbs (rwd and hwm), and debate continues over the defining roots and their meaning in this context.10 Despite the difficulties, the atmosphere of personal pain and uncertainty remains clear. The last half of verse 2 seems to go with verse 3. The “voice” of the enemy could be the “battle cry” of the surrounding attackers or just the constant sniping of the psalmist’s detractors (cf. 55:12). The word that the NIV takes as “stares” occurs only here in the Old Testament and thus is difficult to interpret, with some commentators understanding the meaning as “pressure.”
The root of yamiṭu (NIV “bring down”) is well known with the meaning “shake, quake, move” and is commonly used in the psalms to speak about either shaken or unshakable foundations.11 The Hiphil stem with this root, however, occurs only here and in 140:10, where the meaning is equally unclear. The NIV incorporates the most general sense of moving into its translation. The enemy’s angry attack against the psalmist is described with the verb śṭm, normally rendered “bear a grudge against, harbor animosity toward.” Other commentators translate this verb as “hunt,” “persecute,” or even “revile.”12
My heart is in anguish. The descriptions of inner turmoil continue as the psalmist’s heart “writhes” in anguish under the assault of “terrors of death,”13 “fear and trembling,” and “horror.”14 The attack begins from without (lit., “falls upon me”), infects the inner emotions (lit., “enters into me”), and flows on to overwhelm the psalmist (lit., “covers me”).
I would fly away. The distress is so great and so all-consuming that the psalmist wishes only to flee. His agitated inner deliberation reveals a desperate edge, while the desire to take on the wings of a “dove” (yonah) in order to fly away to a secure place of rest15 is reminiscent of the attempt of Jonah (whose name is the word for “dove” [yonah]) to flee the call of Yahweh by taking a boat from Joppa to the farthest reaches of the Mediterranean Sea (Jonah 1:1–3). Wild “doves” often nested in remote and inaccessible cliffs in more deserted regions—thus the psalmist’s image of fleeing to the security and rest of the desert.16
I would hurry to my place of shelter. Elsewhere psalmists use the verb ḥwš in the imperative to call Yahweh to “hurry” to their deliverance.17 Here, however, the poet is tempted not to wait for divine deliverance but to exercise self-deliverance by fleeing to a “place of shelter.” In the Hebrew text, the psalmist desires to flee from “the wind of slander, from the windstorm.” The word soʿah (“slander”) is used only here and is thus uncertain. The NIV, following one of the suggestions in the BHS textual notes, emends the earlier phrase to refer to another type of storm. Holladay understands soʿah as from the verb sʿh, meaning “slander.”18 In light of the later description of the verbal attacks of the enemy (55:12), it seems possible that the psalmist is using the image of the storm to describe the destructive potential of slander. Tate, after reviewing all the options, opts for a translation emphasizing the “raging” or “sweeping” nature of the storm.19
Plea for Judgment on the Enemy (55:9–11)
INDICATING THAT THE problem faced is hostile speech, the psalmist appeals to God to “confuse” and “confound” (lit., “split”) the enemy’s tongue.20 While the language is not precisely the same, our passage recalls the Tower of Babel story in Genesis 11, where Yahweh “confuses” the “lips” of the unified people building the city in the Plain of Shinar, with the result that they stop building the city and are scattered across the face of the earth as the beginnings of all the nations and families of the earth.
Again, while the contexts are not identical, it is interesting to note that reference to “the city” appears for the first time in this psalm in relation to confusing the speech of the wicked (55:9b). The psalmist may be drawing on the Tower of Babel narrative to speak a word of divine condemnation to the contemporary context. Confusion of speech is needed in his view because the city has become a place of “violence and strife” (ḥamas werib).21
“Violence” (ḥamas) is an attack that sheds blood or takes human life.22 The city in the psalmist’s experience is a place where “destructive forces are at work” (lit., “misery/ruin is in her midst”) and the wicked “prowl” ceaselessly about, seeking occasion for malicious and abusive action (55:10). The irony is that the city walls, built to provide protection from the attack of the enemy, are entirely ineffective when the true enemy is within—a point to which the psalmist will return in the next section. The walls hem in the populace, preventing them from escaping the malicious plans of the wicked, who roam the city wall like watchmen but are on the alert to do evil to their own people. As a result, the city is the scene of constant struggle, with “destruction,” “threats” or oppression, and “lies” in her “streets.”23
The Faithless Friend (55:12–14)
RETURNING TO THE theme of betrayal from within introduced in the preceding section, the psalmist describes in more personal terms the faithless friend who has become the attacker. “Insults”24 and attacks are to be expected from an external enemy and endured from behind the protection of strong walls. But the psalmist is being attacked by a fellow Israelite, who is of the “same stripe” (NIV “companion”).25 The use of ʾenoš (“vulnerable human/man,” 55:13) in this context emphasizes the openness and vulnerability of the relationship between these two. The attacker is an intimate associate, whom the psalmist knows well from long experience and as a “close” confidant. The “sweet fellowship” shared is confidential conversation between friends who trust each another.
The psalmist’s former relationship with the detractor is lifted beyond close friendship to that of spiritual communion (NIV “sweet fellowship”) by the addition of the final phrase in 55:14 (“as we walked with the throng at the house of God”). The location of the “sweet fellowship” is the temple precincts, so that the two have been spiritually connected and compatible. This last comment heightens the travesty represented by the betrayal.
Verse 14 may also reflect on the larger context to which the psalm speaks. We know of similar circumstances in the experience of the exilic community where, embattled by pressures to assimilate with the majority culture, the exiles developed particularly close relationships to preserve their religious and national identity. Thus, it was particularly disturbing when those within this close community became the perpetrators of abuse and injustice on their fellows. The attempt of the two elders to force Susanna to submit to their sexual desires is one example of the way a “friend” could become an “attacker.”26 While it is not necessary that this psalm was written for the exilic context, it would certainly have continued to speak to that community’s circumstance.
Renewed Call for Judgment (55:15)
THE CALUMNY OF betrayal by an intimate associate brings the psalmist to harsh words. “Death”—sudden, unexpected death—seems the only punishment appropriate for the enemy’s abandonment of friend and God’s covenant.27 Tricked by death, they should be brought down to Sheol (NIV “grave”) while still alive—an indication of the abrupt and unexpected nature of their departure. The picture is reminiscent of “The Descent of Ishtar to the Netherworld,”28 where the goddess Ishtar, seeking to wrest control of the netherworld from her sister Ereshkigal, descends to the abode of the dead, apparently thinking her deity should shield her from the effects of death. After having passed through the seven gates into the heart of the realm of death, however, she is powerless to return until later freed by the command of the supreme deity, Ea.
The biblical connection to the descent of the psalmist’s enemies is the destruction of Dathan and Abiram as a consequence of their rebellion against God and their rejection of Moses’ leadership (Num. 16:1–35, esp. vv. 30, 33). To demonstrate that God had judged their insolence and that their death was not the ordinary lot of human beings, the ground opened up and Dathan, Abiram, and their families (lit.) “went down alive to Sheol.” Rather than just destruction, the psalmist is calling for a public indication of God’s rejection and judgment on his enemies.
The reason for the psalmist’s condemnation of the enemies is stated in more general terms: “for evil finds lodging among them.” Unlike God, who in 5:4 is described as “you are not a God who takes pleasure in evil; with you the wicked cannot dwell,” these people have created an environment where evil can grow unchecked. Their tolerance—even acceptance—of evil is diametrically opposed to the attitude of radical rejection of evil that is at the heart of the Davidic Psalm 101:4, 7–8:
I will have nothing to do with evil. . . .
No one who practices deceit
will dwell in my house;
no one who speaks falsely
will stand in my presence.
Every morning I will put to silence
all the wicked in the land;
I will cut off every evildoer
from the city of the LORD.29
By contrast, the speaker in Psalm 101 will constantly observe “the faithful in the land, that they may dwell with me” (101:6a).
Statement of Confidence (55:16–19)
IN CONTRAST TO the quick and certain destruction of the wicked, the psalmist is confident of divine deliverance. When he calls in distress, God answers and saves. The psalmist will be “ransomed unharmed”30 despite the lopsided advantage enjoyed by his foes (55:18). His confidence is founded on the eternal enthronement of Yahweh as king (55:19)—a king who therefore can hear the pleas of the oppressed and who will act to deliver them from their foes. These foes are described as unrelenting in their evil and in their rejection of God (“[they] never change their ways and have no fear of God”).
Reprise: The Faithless Friend (55:20–21)
THE PSALMIST RETURNS to the subject of treacherous attack by a close friend. The opening statement sets the context for the two metaphorical images that follow. The attacker is a “close friend” (šelom) who “violates” (lit., “curses”) his covenant of friendship.31 In the first image, the psalmist exploits the various nuances of the verbal root ḥlq, which can mean “be smooth, slippery”32 and thus “false” and is related to an identical root with the sense “divide, separate.” The slippery language cloaks the real sentiment and motivation of the opponent behind false words. The lack of integrity—incongruence between inner reality and outward profession—makes true intimacy impossible and ultimately destroys any hope of friendship. The enemy’s smooth lies conceal the hostile intent that lurks in the heart.33 The second image is similar to the first: The enemy’s words appear “more soothing” than oil used to anoint and soften, while in reality their intent is to cut and maim like “swords.”
Confident Trust in God (55:22–23)
THIS LAST SECTION contains the psalmist’s call to others to trust God by casting their cares on him (55:22), a statement directed to God expressing confidence of judgment on the wicked (55:23), and a brief profession of his faith and confidence in God (55:23c). In these few verses we see the anguish and fear that dominated the psalmist’s troubled thoughts at the beginning of the psalm (55:1–8) have been resolved into confident trust. This resolution is not the result of the absolute removal of suffering and anguish but the consequence of surrendering cares to God and dwelling in the assurance that God’s ultimate purposes preclude the flourishing of the wicked.
The psalmist can rest assured in the midst of attack because God remains a God who does not take pleasure in evil, and as a result evil must ultimately experience divine judgment. The lives of the wicked, described as “bloodthirsty and deceitful” (55:23), will be cut short and will end in the “pit of corruption” (i.e., the grave) before their time. To the contrary, God “will never let the righteous fall” (55:22), and it is to this latter group that the psalmist’s simple profession of faith makes connection.
Bridging Contexts
FLEEING TO THE DESERT. Judaism and Christianity have had a long history of “fleeing to the desert.” A number of years ago I had opportunity to hike from Jerusalem to Jericho along the Wadi Qelt, a deep, twisting, mostly dry streambed that cuts through the barren wilderness area separating the central highlands of Israel from the Jordan River Valley. Along the way I was impressed by the desolation and isolation of the area and understood better the desperation of the man who was left for dead along the road from Jerusalem to Jericho in the New Testament’s parable of the good Samaritan (Luke 10:25–37).
Yet as we walked along the ancient aqueduct that carried water from the En Qelt spring to Jericho, we began to encounter evidence of human occupation, both contemporary and ancient. We stopped midway in our journey to replenish our water supply at St. George’s monastery, clinging to the side of the Wadi Qelt. Here a small community of monks continue the heritage of withdrawal to remote areas begun centuries earlier. As we continued toward Jericho, we came across ancient worn paths leading down the cliff face to caves where Christian hermits had lived in isolation, going back to the second century A.D. These hermits, the Desert Fathers and Mothers of our own faith, were preceded by centuries by Jewish monastics and militant rebels against the Greeks and Romans. These also withdrew to caves and other desert dwellings that dot the Judean desert from Jericho, to Qumran and En Gedi, and south to the desert fortress of Masada. At this last place, Jewish revolutionaries turned the once grand palace of Herod the Great into a final fortress against the Roman forces, who quelled the First Jewish Revolt in A.D. 66–70.
Even these Jewish recluses were antedated by other, earlier desert dwellers. The first Israelites left Egypt and wandered the desert reaches of the Sinai Desert for forty years (according to the Pentateuch), and the desert wilderness continued to form an important part of the Israelite experience. On two occasions Elijah fled the persecution of Ahab and Jezebel and hid first under a tree in the Wadi Kerith (1 Kings 17) and later in a cave on Mount Horeb (1 Kings 19). During the Maccabean revolt against the Seleucid king Antiochus IV, the rebels under Judas and Simon Maccabeus made use of the wilderness caves to hide from the enemy.
The Qumran sectarians—generally presumed to be Essenes—fled (ca. 175 B.C.) to a remote monastic center on the northwest edge of the Dead Sea and avoided the impurities of a corrupt society and Jerusalem priesthood for well over two centuries. John the Baptist adopted the dress and rustic diet of the early prophets and roamed the Judean wilderness in preparation for the coming of the Messiah (Matt. 3:1; Luke 1:80). Jesus himself withdrew to the wilderness for forty days following his baptism (Matt. 4:1) and apparently returned on occasion for times of self-reflection and renewal (Luke 5:16).
All these examples exhibit two major reasons for withdrawal into the desert. (1) On the one hand, the desert could be a place to seek and find God. Moses took his father-in-law’s flock to the far side of the desert to Mount Horeb/Sinai and encountered God there in the burning bush. The Israelites fled Egypt and traveled through the desert to meet Yahweh at the same mountain. Elijah fled the wrath of Jezebel and came to consult God on Horeb. The Qumran sect’s withdrawal to the Dead Sea was not only an escape from the corruption of society but also a retreat to the purity of the desert, where God could be found without the distractions of city life. Jesus’ own use of the wilderness as a place of prayer follows this age-old pattern and set the foundation for the later Christian desert monastics.
(2) Equally important, however, was the use of the desert wilderness as a place of refuge and protection in times of political danger. Numerous Judean caves explored in recent surveys show evidence of sporadic temporary occupation levels that can be traced by artifacts to periods of unrest and rebellion in Israel. I have cited a number of biblical accounts viewing the desert in this way. This tradition continues from the time of the Conquest up to the use of the caves of Wadi Murabaʿat by Jewish revolutionaries during the Bar Kokhba rebellion (A.D. 132–134).34
It is this latter view of the wilderness—as a place of refuge from attack—that informs the psalmist’s words in 55:4–9. The desert is a refuge, a shelter from the storm raging about him. He longs to escape the fray and “fly away and be at rest.” Clearly the wilderness is not the threat we sometimes perceive it to be. That is because much of the Judean wilderness is not, strictly speaking, desert. Though it can be inhospitable for the novice and dangerous for the unprepared, there are sources of food for the savvy, and springs of water are sufficient for the careful. I remember on my walk along the Wadi Qelt, struggling along the bottom of a dry, desolate canyon and being surprised at first by the sound of trickling water, then turning a corner to see a rushing waterfall splashing into a cool and shady pool at the base of the canyon wall. At such a place David may have watered his troops, or John the Baptist may have satisfied his thirst while marveling at the abundant blessings of God.
Contemporary Significance
WHEN WORDS AND looks can hurt. Trash talk has become an expected part of some forms of athletics. I remember when I played on the offensive or defensive line of my high school football team, one would engage in a sort of simplified psychological warfare with the player across from you. I still remember being taunted, “Hey, little boy, does your mommy know you are out here?” That was, of course, among the gentler comments tossed across the intervening space. I knew what was going on and was determined not to allow it to affect my play adversely. I usually decided to show the speaker just how unconcerned I was with his words and threats by taking him decisively out of the action on the next play!
“Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never harm me!” goes the old adage, a helpful encouragement to children faced by insensitive name-callers. But as we mature, we have to admit that words do harm us and injure us—sometimes deeply and permanently.
Politics is just one place where words are often used to injure, maim, and even destroy an opponent. The story is told that Senator Lyndon Johnson told an advisor to float the word that an opponent of his had engaged in improper relations with an animal. The advisor protested that the claim was patently untrue. Johnson replied, “I know. I just want to see him deny it!” Johnson knew the hard political truth that just to be associated with certain words is destructive, even if the words are untrue. Our words can affect the way someone is viewed by others. They can even undermine the way one feels about oneself.
Looks have harmful effects as well. Consider the tape on the nightly news of an individual arrested for a crime. Handcuffed and hustled by police escort from car to courtroom, such people invariably hide their faces in their hands or behind a coat in order to avoid eye-contact with the crowds around them. Why? Not just to shield their identity; often that is all too well known already. They hide because they do not want to see the looks of the disapproving crowds around them. The looks and stares hurt. They invade our self-awareness and damage our ability to convince ourselves we are alright. It is only the most brazen, unrepentant criminal who stares his public coldly down without emotion.
For the psalmist, words and looks hurt. Because of the voice and stares of the wicked, his thoughts are troubled and distraught. Anguish of heart and terror dominate with fear and trembling and the desire to flee. This distress drives him to God, the only source of refuge and safety.
We have much to learn from the psalmist here. Often when I am attacked, I want to fight back. I want to shut the mouth of that opposing football player with a well-placed block. I want to set people straight about the true character of that rumor monger who is running me down. I want to give as good as I get, and then some. The psalmist calls out to God for refuge (the ability to stand up to the attacks of the enemy), rescue (deliverance from the distress and danger), and redress (setting things right).
Jesus also serves as a model here. Falsely accused and paraded before the eyes of a jeering public to the place of execution, he did not strike back, even though he could have called an angelic army to his defense. Instead, he went willingly to his death, even pausing in the midst of the painful process to forgive his detractors and to usher a penitent criminal into the joys of paradise. Can we follow this model in the face of hurtful words and injuring looks?
It is a hard model for mere humans to realize. To give up the rights of vindication, to forgive the unforgivable, and to seek the restoration of all who are willing at the same time as we are dying, falsely accused and abandoned by our closest friends, seem an impossible task. Yet that is what we by the power of God’s grace are called to do—to allow Christ to live in and through us and to change how we relate to our world. To lose life is to find it after all.