Sermon Tone Analysis

Psalm 55:1-23 English Standard Version

Psalm 55:superscription

1.

To the choirmaster:

2. with stringed instruments.

3. A Maskil of David.

a. Same superscription as Psalm 54 without the historical reference.

b.

Its lack of a biographical superscription is strange, given its place in a series most of which have such, especially if it concerns David’s relations with Absalom or Ahithophel.59

Perhaps, like Psalm 53 with its obvious link with Nabal,60the redactor wanted to leave the reader to make the connection.[1]

c.

Part of the subcollection of Davidic psalms of Book 2 that are maskil (Psalm 52-55).

Psalm 55:1

1. Give ear to my prayer, O God,

2. and hide not yourself from my plea for mercy!

Psalm 55:2

1. Attend to me, and answer me;

2. I am restless in my complaint and I moan,

Psalm 55:3

1. because of the noise of the enemy,

2. because of the oppression of the wicked.

3.

For they drop trouble upon me,

4. and in anger they bear a grudge against me.

Psalm 55:4

1.

My heart is in anguish within me;

2. the terrors of death have fallen upon me.

Psalm 55:5

1. Fear and trembling come upon me,

2. and horror overwhelms me.

Psalm 55:6-8

1. (v.6)

And I say, “Oh, that I had wings like a dove!

I would fly away and be at rest;

2. (v.7) yes, I would wander far away; I would lodge in the wilderness;

a. 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.[2]

3. Selah

4. (v.8)

I would hurry to find a shelter from the raging wind and tempest.”

Psalm 55:9a

1. Destroy, O Lord,

a. Destroy - to confuse (make unclear) v. — to make unclear, indistinct, or blurred.

2. divide their tongues;

a. Genesis 11:6 And the Lord said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do.

And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them.

b.

Genesis 11:7 Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another’s speech.”

c.

Genesis 11:8 So the Lorddispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city.

d.

Genesis 11:9 Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth.

And from there the Lord dispersed them over the face of all the earth.

i. Genesis 10:25 To Eber were born two sons: the name of the one was Peleg, for in his days the earth was divided, and his brother’s name was Joktan.

1. C.f. Genesis 11:16-19

e. Historically speaking, Psalm 55 has been associated with David’s betrayal by his trusted advisor Ahithophel, who turned against him and joined Absalom’s political coup.

While the prayer of David against Ahithophel in 2 Samuel 15:31 (“Lord, turn Ahithophel’s counsel into foolishness”) is different from the prayer of verse 15, it is not all that different from verse 9, where David prays that the Lord will “confuse the wicked, confound their words.”[3]

f. 2 Samuel 15:31 And it was told David, “Ahithophel is among the conspirators with Absalom.”

And David said, “O Lord, please turn the counsel of Ahithophel into foolishness.”

g. 2 Samuel 16:23 Now in those days the counsel that Ahithophel gave was as if one consulted the word of God; so was all the counsel of Ahithophel esteemed, both by David and by Absalom.

h. 2 Samuel 17:14 And Absalom and all the men of Israel said, “The counsel of Hushai the Archite is better than the counsel of Ahithophel.”

For the Lord had ordained to defeat the good counsel of Ahithophel, so that the Lord might bring harm upon Absalom.

Psalm 55:9b-11

1. (v.9b) for I see violence and strife in the city.

2. (v.10) Day and night they go around it on its walls,

3. and iniquity and trouble are within it;

4. (v.11) ruin is in its midst;

5. oppression and fraud do not depart from its marketplace.

a.

This time he or she surveys the city and finds “Violence and Strife” patrolling the walls, “Iniquity and Trouble” occupying the city, “Ruin,” “Oppression and Fraud” commanding the commercial center—seven personifications in all (vv.

9–11).[4]

b.

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.[5]

Psalm 55:12

1.

For it is not an enemy who taunts me— then I could bear it;

2. it is not an adversary who deals insolently with me— then I could hide from him.

Psalm 55:13

1.

But it is you, a man, my equal, my companion, my familiar friend.

a. Ahithophel (2 Samuel 15-17).

b.

Note the piling up of terms to “express the severity of the accusation”:6 “a man like myself, my companion, my close friend.”[6]

c.

The word translated as [familiar] friend comes from the Hebrew root ydʿ (“to know”) and indicates the most intimate of relationships.[7]

Psalm 55:14

1.

We used to take sweet counsel together;

2. within God’s house we walked in the throng.

Psalm 55:15

1.

Let death steal over them;

a. tc The meaning of the MT is unclear.

The Kethib(consonantal text) reads יַשִּׁימָוֶת עָלֵימוֹ (yashimavet ’alemo, “May devastation [be] upon them!”).

The proposed noun יַשִּׁימָוֶת occurs only here and perhaps in the place name Beth-Jeshimoth in Num 33:49.

The Qere(marginal text) has יַשִּׁי מָוֶת עָלֵימוֹ (yashi mavet ’alemo).

The verbal form יַשִּׁיis apparently an alternate form of יַשִּׁיא (yashi’), a Hiphil imperfect from נָשַׁא (nasha’, “deceive”).

In this case one might read “death will come deceptively upon them.”

This reading has the advantage of reading מָוֶת (mavet, “death”) which forms a natural parallel with “Sheol” in the next line.

The present translation is based on the following reconstruction of the text: יְשִׁמֵּם מָוֶת (yeshimmem mavet).

The verb assumed in the reconstruction is a Hiphil jussive third masculine singular from שָׁמַם (shamam, “be desolate”) with a third masculine plural pronominal suffix attached.

This reconstruction assumes that (1) haplography has occurred in the traditional text (the original sequence of three mems[ם] was lost with only one mem remaining), resulting in the fusion of originally distinct forms in the Kethib, and (2) that עָלֵימוֹ(’alemo, “upon them”) is a later scribal addition attempting to make sense of a garbled and corrupt text.

The preposition עַל(’al) does occur with the verb שָׁמַם (shamam), but in such cases the expression means “be appalled at/because of” (see Jer 49:20; 50:45).

If one were to retain the prepositional phrase here, one would have to read the text as follows: יַשִּׁים מָוֶת עָלֵימוֹ(yashim mavet ’alemo, “Death will be appalled at them”).

The idea seems odd, to say the least.

Death is not collocated with this verb elsewhere.[8]

tc The meaning of the MT is unclear.

The Kethib (consonantal text) reads יַשִּׁימָוֶת עָלֵימוֹ (yashimavet ’alemo, “May devastation [be] upon them!”).