Have you ever been tempted to distrust God? Of course, you have…especially when it seems like society is coming unraveled. In this psalm, David asks the question, “If the foundations are destroyed, what can a righteous man do?” And God’s answer to this question is inspired!
To the choirmaster. Of David.
1-2 In Adonai I take refuge. How can you say to my soul, “Flee like a bird to your mountain”? [or “Your mountain has fled like a bird.”] 2 For behold, the wicked bend the bow. They have fitted their arrow to the string to shoot in the dark at the upright in heart.
חצם (chitzam) This form 2x – Ps.64:4
3 [Question:] If the settled things are destroyed, what can the righteous man do?
שת (sheit) = “Seth” (9x) / “buttocks”(2x) / “spinners”(1x) / “pillars”(1x)
4-7 [Answers:] Adonai is in His holy temple; Adonai’s throne is in heaven. His eyes see; His eyelids test the children of man. 5Adonai tests the righteous, but His soul hates the wicked and the one who loves violence. 6 He will rain snares on the wicked. Fire and sulfur and a scorching wind shall be the portion of their cup. 7 For Adonai is righteous; He loves righteous deeds. The upright shall behold His face.
REFERENCES:
Verse 2
Psalm 64:2-4 Hide me from the secret plots of the wicked, from the throng of evildoers, who whet their tongues like swords, who aim bitter words like arrows [חצם, chitzam], shooting from ambush at the blameless, shooting at him suddenly and without fear.
Verse 3
Genesis 4:25 And Adam knew his wife again, and she bore a son and called his name Seth (שת, sheit), for she said, “God has appointed for me another offspring instead of Abel, for Cain killed him.”
2 Samuel 10:4 So Chanun took David’s servants and shaved off half the beard of each and cut off their garments in the middle, at their buttocks [שת, sheit] and sent them away. (+Isaiah 20:4)
Isaiah 19:9-10 The workers in combed flax will be in despair, and the weavers of white cotton. Those who are the spinners (שת, sheit) of the land will be crushed, and all who work for pay will be grieved.
If the foundations, the moral and societal foundations of the world, are destroyed, what can the righteous man do? When the moral foundations of society are in ruins, what good can possibly come of the individual deeds of a righteous person? (R’ Adin Steinsaltz)
Ephesians 2:5 Even when we were dead in our trespasses, [God] made us alive together with Messiah – by grace you have been saved – and raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Messiah Yeshua.
Verse 4-5
Psalm 7:9 Oh, let the evil of the wicked come to an end, and may You establish the righteous – You who testthe minds and hearts, O righteous God!
Verse 6
Proverbs 22:5 Thorns and snares [פחים, pachim] are in the way of the crooked; whoever guards his soul will keep far from them.
Genesis 19:24 Then Adonai rained on Sodom and Gomorrah sulfur and fire from Adonai out of heaven.
Verse 7
Psalm 97:11 Light is sown for the righteous, and joy for the upright in heart.