Bible Commentaries

Supplicatory Prayer in a Time of Devastation, of Bloodshed, and of Derision

This Psalm is in every respect the pendant of Ps 74. The points of contactare not merely matters of style (cf. Psalm 79:5, how long for ever? with Psalm 74:1, Psalm 74:10; Psalm 79:10, יוּדע, with Psalm 74:5; Psalm 79:2, the giving over to the wildbeasts, with Psalm 74:19, Psalm 74:14; Psalm 79:13, the conception of Israel as of a flock, inwhich respect Psalm 79:1-13 is judiciously appended to Psalm 78:70-72, with Psalm 74:1, and also with Psalm 74:19). But the mutual relationships lie still deeper. Both Psalms have the same Asaphic stamp, both stand in the samerelation to Jeremiah, and both send forth their complaint out of the samecircumstances of the time, concerning a destruction of the Temple and ofJerusalem, such as only the age of the Seleucidae (1 Macc. 1:31; 3:45, 2Macc. 8:3) together with the Chaldaean period

(Note: According to Sofrim xviii. §3, Psalm 79:1-13 and Psalm 137:1-9 are the Psalms for the Kînoth-day, i.e., the 9th day of Ab, the day commemorative of the Chaldaean and Roman destruction of Jerusalem.)

can exhibit, and in conjunction with a defiling of the Temple and amassacre of the servants of God, of the Chasîdîm (1 Macc. 7:13, 2 Macc. 14:6), such as the age of the Seleucidae exclusively can exhibit. The workof the destruction of the Temple which was in progress in Ps 74, appearsin Psalm 79:1-13 as completed, and here, as in the former Psalm, one receivesthe impression of the outrages, not of some war, but of some persecution:it is straightway the religion of Israel for the sake of which the sanctuariesare destroyed and the faithful are massacred.

Apart from other striking accords, Psalm 79:6-7 are repeated verbatim in Jeremiah 10:25. It is in itself far more probable that Jeremiah here takes up the earlier language of the Psalm than that the reverse is the true relation; and, as Hengstenberg has correctly observed, this is also favoured by the fact that the words immediately before viz., Jeremiah 10:24, originate out of Psalm 6:2, and that the connection in the Psalm is a far closer one. But since there is no era of pre-Maccabaean history corresponding to the complaints of the Psalm,

(Note: Cassiodorus and Bruno observe: deplorat Antiochi persecutionem tempore Machabeorum factam, tunc futuramAnd Notker adds: To those who have read the First Book of the Maccabees it (viz., the destruction bewailed in the Psalm) is familiar.)

Jeremiah is to be regarded in this instance as the example of the psalmist; and in point of fact the borrower is betrayed in Psalm 79:6-7 of the Psalm by the fact that the correct על of Jeremiah is changed into אל, the more elegant משׁפחות into ממלכות, and the plural אכלוּ into אכל, and the soaring exuberance of Jeremiah's expression is impaired by the omission of some of the words.

The Psalm begins with a plaintive description, and in fact onethat makes complaint to God. Its opening sounds like Lamentations 1:10. Thedefiling does not exclude the reducing to ashes, it is rather spontaneouslysuggested in Psalm 74:7 in company with wilful incendiarism. The complaintin Psalm 79:1 reminds one of the prophecy of Micah, Micah 3:12, which in itstime excited so much vexation (Jeremiah 26:18); and Psalm 79:2, Deuteronomy 28:26. עבדיך confers upon those who were massacred the honour ofmartyrdom. The lxx renders לעיים by åéïa flourishtaken from Isaiah 1:8. Concerning the quotation from memory in 1 Macc. 7:16f., vid., the introduction to Ps 74. The translator of the originallyHebrew First Book of the Maccabees even in other instances betrays anacquaintance with the Greek Psalter (cf. 1 Macc. 1:37, êáéåáéáêõôïõá). “As water,” i.e., (cf. Deuteronomy 15:23) without setting any value upon it and without any scruple about it. Psalm 44:14 is repeated in Psalm 79:4. At the time of the Chaldaean catastrophe thisapplied more particularly to the Edomites.

Out of the plaintive question how long? and whether endlessly God wouldbe angry and cause His jealousy to continue to burn like a fire (Deuteronomy 32:22), grows up the prayer (Psalm 79:6) that He would turn His anger againstthe heathen who are estranged from the hostile towards Him, and of whomHe is now making use as a rod of anger against His people. The taking overof Psalm 79:6-7 from Jeremiah 10:25 is not betrayed by the looseness of theconnection of thought; but in themselves these four lines sound much moreoriginal in Jeremiah, and the style is exactly that of this prophet, cf. Jeremiah 6:11; Jeremiah 2:3, and frequently, Psalm 49:20. The אל, instead of על,which follows שׁפך is incorrect; the singular אכל gathers all up as in one mass, as in Isaiah 5:26; Isaiah 17:13. The fact that suchpower over Israel is given to the heathen world has its ground in the sinsof Israel. From Psalm 79:8 it may be inferred that the apostasy which raged earlieris now checked. ראשׁנים is not an adjective (Job 31:28; Isaiah 59:2),which would have been expressed by עונותינו חראשׁנים, but a genitive:the iniquities of the forefathers (Leviticus 26:14, cf. Psalm 39:1-13). On Psalm 79:8 of Judges 6:6. As is evident from Psalm 79:9, the poet does not mean that the presentgeneration, itself guiltless, has to expiate the guilt of the fathers (on thecontrary, Deuteronomy 24:16; 2 Kings 14:6; Ezekiel 18:20); he prays as one of thosewho have turned away from the sins of the fathers, and who can now nolonger consider themselves as placed under wrath, but under sin-pardoningand redeeming grace.

The victory of the world is indeed not God's aim; therefore His ownhonour does not suffer that the world of which He has made use in orderto chasten His people should for ever haughtily triumph. שׁמך is repeated with emphasis at the end of the petition in Psalm 79:9, according tothe figure epanaphora. על־דּבר = למען, as in Psalm 45:5, cf. Psalm 7:1, is ausage even of the language of the Pentateuch. Also the motive, “whereforeshall they say?” occurs even in the Tôra (Exodus 32:12, cf. Numbers 14:13-17; Deuteronomy 9:28). Here (cf. Psalm 115:2) it originates out of Joel 2:17. The wish expressed in Psalm 79:10 is based upon Deuteronomy 32:43. The poet wishes in company with his contemporaries, as eye-witnesses, to experience what God has promised in the early times, viz., that He will avenge the blood of His servants. The petition in Deuteronomy 32:11 runs like Psalm 102:21, cf. Psalm 18:7. אסיר individualizingly is those who are carried away captive and incarcerated; בּני תמוּתה are those who, if God does not preserve them by virtue of the greatness (גדל, cf. גּדל; Exodus 15:16) of His arm, i.e., of His far-reaching omnipotence, succumb to the power of death as to a patria potestas.

(Note: The Arabic has just this notion in an active application, viz., (benı̂) (el) -(môt) = the heroes (destroyers) in the battle.)

That the petition in Psalm 79:12 recurs to the neighbouring peoples is explained by the fact, that these, who might most readily come to the knowledge of the God of Israel as the one living and true God, have the greatest degree of guilt on account of their reviling of God. The bosom is mentioned as that in which one takes up and holds that which is handed to him (Luke 6:38); חיק (על) אל (שׁלּם) השׁיב, as in Isaiah 65:7, Isaiah 65:6; Jeremiah 32:18. A sevenfold requital (cf. Genesis 4:15, Genesis 4:24) is a requital that is fully carried out as a criminal sentence, for seven is the number of a completed process.

If we have thus far correctly hit upon the parts of which the Psalm iscomposed (9. 9. 9), then the lamentation closes with this tristichic vow ofthanksgiving.