Psalm 41

Introduction to Psalm 41 and the Five Books of Psalms

“Welcome to Torah Today Ministries, our continuing series Tehillim Talks, our studies in the Psalms. And in this episode, we are going to be looking at Psalm 41. Now in the very first teaching in this series, I introduce you to the fact that the Book of Psalms, which is comprised of 150 Psalms, the Book of Psalms is broken down into five sections.

And with Psalm 41, we bring the first section of Psalms to a close. Now, if you recall back in the very first Psalm, when I introduced the series, I showed you how the Genesis Book, the first book is comprised of Psalms 1 through 41. And in the next episode, Psalm 42, that begins the Exodus Book.

And here you can see that Psalms 73 through 89 are the Leviticus Book, 90 through 106 are the Numbers Book. And then 107 to the end is the Deuteronomy Book. Now, this division or these divisions are not arbitrary.

There’s something that takes place at the end of Psalm 41, Psalm 72, Psalm 89 and Psalm 106 that occurs only in these four Psalms, which lets us know that something’s coming to a close and then a new section is beginning. So when we get to the last verse of 41, I’ll show you what that thing is. And then you can watch for it at the ends of each of these divisions of the Book of Psalms.

So let’s get right in to Psalm 41. It opens with, to the Choir Master, a Psalm of David. And it begins with ashrei, happy.

Contented is the one. If your translation says baruch or blessed, you need to fix it. It’s ashrei, which is also the very first word of the first Psalm. Contented is the man who walks not, and the counsel of the ungodly, and so on (Psalm 1:1). So contented is the one who is thoughtful for the poor. And this word thoughtful means to understand the poor, to have insight into them, to think about them, to let the poor occupy the mind.

Psalm 41:1–3 — Thoughtful for the Poor and God’s Promises

“And there are five things here that God promises to the one who is thoughtful of the poor. Here they are. First, in the day of trouble, Adonai delivers him.

Second, Adonai protects him and keeps him alive. Third, he is called contented in the land. And there is the same word, ashrei.

Number four, you do not give him up to the soul of his enemies. Your translation probably says will, but the word there is nefesh, soul. We’ll look at that in just a moment.

And then the fifth, Adonai sustains him on his sickbed. In his illness, you restore him to full health (Psalm 41:1–3). And here you’ll notice the dotted red line in the left side, and that’s my symbol, which we haven’t seen for quite a while.

But that’s the symbol I came up with when we come to a phrase that is extremely difficult to translate, even to understand in Hebrew. If you look at various Hebrew translations, this phrase, in his illness, you restore him to full health. The last part of verse three, it’s rendered all different kinds of ways.

“And to be perfectly honest, I don’t know how best to translate it. So I’ve gone with this. I think this is from the ESV.

But you can look at the various translations and maybe cobble together something that seems satisfactory to you. But whatever it’s saying, God is involved with this man, this person who’s involved and thoughtful of the poor. And when such a person falls ill, God is present and God is at work and active, even when that person is ill.

So that’s about as far as we can go with that. I want us to look at this word delivers. It’s a kind of an unusual word.

It’s the word malat. There you see it. And the word really means to escape.

Some translations may have the word to save. But that is not exactly what this word means. I mean, if you escape from a dangerous situation, you could say you’ve been saved from it.

But escape and being saved by a savior are a little bit different. This word malat is what is used in Joel 2.32, which says, and it shall come to pass that everyone who calls in the name of Adonai shall escape, malat (Joel 2:32). Of course, most translations say shall be saved.

And Paul quotes this verse in Romans 10.13 (Romans 10:13). But again, the emphasis of this word is you escape. There’s a bad situation.

God shows you a door. He shows you a way of getting out and bringing you through. And this word soul, which is translated will in most translations, is the word nefesh.

So what does it mean you did not give him up to the soul of his enemies? Well, you must remember that the soul has made up the mind, the will and the emotions. And most enemies, the enemies of our souls, we could call wolves.

But they’re not the kind of wolves that eat our flesh. These are spiritual wolves that want to consume our souls. In other words, they want your mind to be absorbed into thinking the way they think.

They want your will to be aligned with their will. They want your feelings and emotions to be swallowed up into theirs. So what they want to do is consume your mind, will and emotions into their own.

And just like a wolf can eat a sheep and the sheep is now inside the wolf, spiritual wolves want to absorb you into themselves. And so it says here that the person who is mindful of the poor, that Adonai sustains him on his sick—I’m sorry—that God does not give him up to the soul of his enemies. And you could put the word will there, but it’s a broader word.

It’s something that’s more inclusive than just the word will. And then we continue. As for me, I said, O Adonai, be gracious to me, heal my soul, for I have sinned against you (Psalm 41:4).

That word for heal is the word rofe, rafa, where we get the word Adonai rofe, Adonai, my healer. Heal my soul. This is a little different from the verse we find in Psalm 23 where it says that Adonai restores my soul, or, returns my soul (Psalm 23:3).

And I’m not quite sure. I’m going to think about this some more, but what is the difference between God returning our souls and God healing our souls? That would be a good discussion for a question for a Bible study group.

So that’s something you may want to think about yourself. And please leave a comment below. And when you come up with a good answer to this question, what is the difference between healing the soul and God returning or restoring the soul?

Heal my soul for I have sinned against you. My enemies say of me in malice, when will he die and his name perish? And when one comes to see me, he utters empty words while his heart gathers iniquity.

When he goes out, he tells it abroad (Psalm 41:4–6). Now I want you to notice something here. There’s a before, a during and an after in this phrase.

So before your enemy comes to see you, he’s saying in his malice, in his hatred of you, I will only die and his name perish. But then he comes to see you, comes to call on you. And it’s all lollipops and sunshine.

And he’s friendly and smiles and tells you he’s wishing the best. Because in verse six it says, and when one comes to see me, one of these enemies, he utters empty words (Psalm 41:6). So when he’s saying, I hope you get well soon, it’s empty.

When he says, God bless you, it’s an empty wish for a blessing. And so his words are saying one thing when his heart is someplace else. And because of this, it says while his heart gathers iniquity.

Because when the heart is feeling hatred, but the lips speak pleasantries, the persons gathering iniquity to themselves are storing up more sin within themselves. And then here’s the after part. When he goes out, what does he do?

He tells it abroad. In other words, oh, so and so is sick. I think they’re gonna die.

And there’s a hopefulness that this person will pass away and the earth will be rid of them. This is reflected in the rest of this section. All who hate me whisper together about me.

They imagine the worst for me. They say, something of Belial has been cast upon him. He will not rise again from where he lies.

Even my close friend and whom I trusted, who ate my bread, has lifted his heel against me (Psalm 41:7–9). Now there are several things here I want to address. First of all, let’s look at this something of Belial.

You find Belial sometimes capitalized in your English translations, and you even find this word at various places in the Apostolic Scriptures. Or sometimes, as here, Belial is not capitalized. It would seem that Belial was some kind of a pagan god or some kind of a demonic thing.

But we also read about the sons of Belial. And the word Belial comes from two Hebrew words, bali and ol. Bali means without, and ol means a yoke, one who is unyoked, someone who’s kind of running wild instead of being yoked and doing some kind of useful and productive work.

But whenever you see this word Belial, you can sum it up this way. Worthlessness. That’s the best equivalent you can come up with for any phrase that contains the word Belial.

So in verse eight, when it says, they say something of Belial has been cast upon him. What they’re saying is he’s become worthless. He’s swallowed up in worthlessness.

He’s a worthless fellow. Now this word whisper, I really had a fascinating insight as I decided to do a little bit of a word study on this word for whisper. There are a few words that are translated whisper in the Hebrew scriptures, and they’re not used very often at all.

But this one is. This one is used eight times and is the word lachash. And there you can see it in Hebrew.

Lamed chet shin, lachash. It’s used, now listen carefully. This is used eight times in the Bible.

Only eight times, but that’s still more than the other words. Eight times, but five of those times, it’s used in reference to an occult practice. An occult practice.

Let me go ahead and just read these five passages to you. The first is Psalm 58, verse five. It says, so that it does not hear the voice of charmers or of the cunning enchanter (Psalm 58:5).

An enchanter is the word lachash. Ecclesiastes 10, 11. If the serpent bites before it is charmed, there is no advantage to the lachash, to the charmer, a snake charmer (Ecclesiastes 10:11).

Isaiah 3, 3. The captain of 50 and the man of rank, the counselor and the skillful magician and the expert in lachash, in charms, and speaking charms or spells (Isaiah 3:3). Isaiah 3, 20, same chapter.

The headdresses, the armlets, the sashes, the perfume boxes and the amulets. The word amulets is also from the word lachash (Isaiah 3:20). And then the fifth reference is Jeremiah 8, 17.

For behold, I am sending among you serpents, adders that cannot be lachash, that cannot be charmed, and they shall bite you, declares Adonai (Jeremiah 8:17). What I want us to see here is though the word is used eight times. Three of those times, it means to whisper.

As here, they whisper together about me (Psalm 41:7). But five of those times, the word for whisper refers to occult practices. This really made an impact on me as I studied it.

Because I think of so many times, and I’m ashamed to say I’ve been involved in this as well. Something’s going on in a group. Maybe it’s a Bible study, or it’s a lesson from the pastor or the rabbi.

And you’re sitting in the back and you’re whispering, making a comment about maybe the guy’s dress looks funny, the way he’s dressed looks odd, or the way his hair is fixed is odd, or somebody over there is doing something, and you start whispering and kind of laughing and giggling together. It’s almost as if God’s saying, this is kind of an occult thing. Whenever you’re drawing attention away from what matters and whispering, which is usually an occult practice, lachash is usually occult in the scriptures, and our whispering, we need to be on the guard that what we do does not align itself with the enemy, who is one who repulses and stands in the way of what God wants to do.

And I know for me, one of the things that grieved me most over the 26 years of pastoring is when I’d be delivering a message, something that God has put on my heart, and I can see people in the front who are catching this, they’re getting it, but there’s somebody back over here and they’re whispering, kind of giggling and distracting the people around them. And in their eyes, what they’re doing is kind of innocent, not doing any harm. And yet the enemy is using that to prevent people from hearing what God’s put on my heart to share.

I never want to be guilty of this ever again in my life. And I challenge you to be the same. There is a time when whispering is necessary so you don’t distract, but we need to be careful that when we whisper, we don’t step over a line into something that is actually accomplishing Satan’s will instead of God’s.

Now you may be wondering, how about the time when Elijah heard God speak to him through a still small voice, or as I often translate it, a thin whisper. That’s a different word than lachash. That’s a khol demama daka, a voice that is very light and very thin (1 Kings 19:12).

And the word daka is a word that’s used to describe the manna, says it was thin (Exodus 16:14). So it’s a very quiet, almost non-existent, demama almost means silent. He speaks to us to a thin, silent voice.

But all that to say lachash is not the word that’s used there when speaking of Elijah when God spoke to him through the thin whisper. And of course, you probably recognize verse nine here, even my close friend and whom I trusted, who ate my bread has lifted his heel against me (Psalm 41:9). Yeshua quotes this verse in reference to Judas.

And you can find him quoting that in John 13, verse 18, when at the last Passover Seder, Yeshua said, I’m not speaking of all of you. I know whom I have chosen, but the scripture will be fulfilled. He who ate my bread has lifted his heel against me (John 13:18).

And as you know, after the Seder, Judas goes out to betray our master. Verses 10 through 12, but you, O Adonai, be gracious to me and raise me up that I may repay them. Now this sounds like taking vengeance, doesn’t it?

Now there is a word for vengeance, but that is not the word here. How does David want to repay his enemies, those who want him dead, those who malign him, whisper about him and spread lies about him? How does he want to repay them?

Well, the word that’s used here is the word shalem. There you see it, shalem, which means to complete. And you may think that sounds very much like another word, which is the word shalom.

Psalm 41:10–12 — Raise Me Up That I May Shalem Them

“think that sounds very much like another word, which is the word shalom.

And shalem is the root for the word shalom. You just add a vav between the lamed and the mem. Let me go ahead and just spell that out for you.

Shalom was spelled shin, lamed, and then there’s a vav here, and then the final mem. So you add one letter and shalem, complete, becomes shalom, which means peace. It’s also the word for greeting and for farewell, but it comes from a word that means complete, because in Hebraic thought and in God’s thought, peace is not the absence of conflict.

Peace comes from completion. When everything’s where it should be, when all the parts are put together, something’s complete. That is the real heart of shalom.

You know, you may think there’s shalom in your home because nobody’s fighting, but that doesn’t mean that the relationships between husband and wife, parent and child are complete in what they should be. The absence of the fighting doesn’t mean there’s true shalom. And we can find this word translated complete in a number of places.

Let me give you the first three places that the word shalem is found in Scripture. I think they’re instructive. The first place we find this word is in Genesis 14, 18.

It says, And Melchizedek, king of shalem—and we in our translation say king of Salem, but it’s the word shalem—the king of completeness brought out bread and wine. He was priest of God Most High, El Elyon (Genesis 14:18). The next place we find it is in the next chapter, Genesis 15, verse 16.

It says, And they shall come back here in the fourth generation (Genesis 15:16). This is the prophecy where God is speaking to Abraham, saying that his children will be slaves in Egypt. He says, But they will come back here in the fourth generation for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet shalem, complete (Genesis 15:16). The third place we find this word is Genesis 33, 18.

And this is when Jacob is returning from Laban, and it says, Jacob came shalem to the city of Shechem. He came complete, he came safely (Genesis 33:18). So this gives us a good picture of what this word means.

And so let’s take it back to our verse. In verse 10, David’s praying, but you, O Adam and I, be gracious to me and raise me up that I may shalem them (Psalm 41:10). So with our understanding of what this word means, how do we interpret this verse?

You know, one of the ways God deals with his enemies is to make them his friends. Bring them to a place of teshuvah, of repentance. Of destroying the lies that they’re believing about God.

Bringing them to their senses. Letting them suffer the consequences of their bad decisions so that they get tired of doing things their own way. And then through God’s patience and longsuffering, through his kindness, they become complete.

I think that is at heart what David is saying here. He’s saying, be gracious to me, raise me up, and then use me to bring them to a place of completion. To bring them to a place of understanding I am not their enemy and I’m not your enemy.

And though they have been my enemies, God bring them a place of completion to where we can be friends. Because the very best way to destroy your enemy is to make them a friend. And this is the way God would choose and prefer of dealing with his enemies.

Because then the enemy is truly destroyed. There is no enemy in sight. What I see in place of my enemy is a new friend.

Verse 11, By this I know that you delight in me. My enemy will not shout in triumph over me (Psalm 41:11). But you have upheld me because of my integrity and set me in your presence forever (Psalm 41:12).

And then we come to the final verse. Which seems to have been added by the redactors of Psalms, the editors of Psalms. Or it might have been there, put there by David himself.

We don’t know, but it says, Baruch Adonai Elohei Yisrael

Psalm 41:13 — Doxology, Amen, and the Five-Book Structure

“Blessed be Adonai, the God of Israel (Psalm 41:13). Now the first word of our psalm is ashrei. And again, your translation may say blessed, but that’s not the word for the first word of the psalm.

It’s the word ashrei. But here it’s the word baruch, the word that we normally think of for the word blessed. Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu.

Blessed are you, O Lord, our God. So blessed be Adonai, the God of Israel, from age to age. Amen and amen (Psalm 41:13).

This is the first time we see the word amen in the Book of Psalms. And we find it twice. And this is what we find at the end of each of these sections in the Book of Psalms.

Now, let me tell you a little bit about the word amen. Amen comes from the word emunah, which you see here. And emunah means faith or faithfulness.

When I think of the word emunah, I think of when Joshua was fighting Amalek there in the valley, and up on the mountain is Moses with Aaron and Hur, and he was holding his staff up. When he held his staff up, Amalek was weakened, but Moses’ arms got tired. So they put a stone for Moses to sit on, and Aaron and Hur held up his hands, and he said, he held up his hands, emunah. He held them up faithfully, steadfast (Exodus 17:10–13).

So when we say the word amen, it’s an expression of faith, and the word amen is almost a prayer in itself. The God would make our requests steadfast. We make the words of our prayers sure and faithful, and bring them to a place of fulfillment.

So amen means to confirm, to support, to cause to stand. And this is a very appropriate way to end a prayer. Amen. And why they repeat it, amen and amen, I don’t know, but I guess they just want to really make sure that God confirms and stands and supports and makes faithful these words that we’ve spoken.

So as I said, the only places you find the word amen, the Book of Psalms, are at the ends of these sections. So here at the end of the Genesis Book, we find the word amen. The next time we’ll see the word amen is in Psalm 72, 19, which brings the Exodus Book to a close. Blessed be his glorious name forever. May the whole earth be filled with his glory. Amen and amen (Psalm 72:19).

Then the next time we find it is in Psalm 89, 52, which brings the Leviticus Book to a close. Blessed be Adonai forever. Amen and amen (Psalm 89:52). And then the last time we find it is in Psalm 106, verse 48, which brings the Numbers Book to a close, and it says, blessed be Adonai, the God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting, and let all the people say, Amen, praise Adonai (Psalm 106:48).

But it’s not necessary to end Psalm 50 with the word amen, because we’re at the end of the Book of Psalms. But I’ll let you read the last verse of the Book of Psalms to see how it ends. And I think you’ll find it ends with an expression of praise, with hallelujah to God.

So we’ve reached the end of the first Book of Psalms. And I look forward to meeting back here with you for Psalm 42 as we begin the Exodus Book. So until then, I wish you shalom and may God bless.”

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