Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 74:12
For God [is] my King of old, working salvation in the midst of the earth.
12. For ] Better as R.V., Yet. In spite of His present inactivity God has been and still is Israel’s King. The Psalmist speaks in the name of the nation. Cp. Exo 15:18; Psa 44:4; Hab 1:12.
salvation ] Lit. salvations, manifold and great acts of deliverance.
in the midst of the earth ] As in Exo 8:22, the phrase implies that His wonders are wrought in the sight of all the nations and attest His claim of universal sovereignty (Psa 77:14).
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
12 17. Yet God’s mighty works of Redemption and Creation attest His power to interpose for the deliverance of His people. Cp. Psa 77:10 ff.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
For God is my King of old – That is, the king, or ruler of his people. The people had acknowledged him as their king and ruler, and he had showed himself to be such. This is given as a reason why he should now interpose in their behalf. It is an argument, proper always to be urged, drawn from the faithfulness and unchangeableness of God.
Working salvation in the midst of the earth – Salvation for his people. The reference here particularly is to what he had done for his people in delivering them from bondage in Egypt, and conducting them to the promised land, as is stated in the following verses.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Psa 74:12
For God is my King of old, working salvation in the midst of the earth.
The sovereignty of God
I. Loyally acknowledged. My King.
II. Of ancient date. Of old.
III. Beneficent in operation. Working salvation. At this time, as the psalm indicates, His people were in a most desolate and afflicted state. Was the King working for their salvation? Their misery arose from their sin from their rebellion against His authority and govern-mont. At present, darkness, suffering, and sorrow are here, but they are here because sin is here. God rules to bless.
IV. As a plea for His help. He mentions what God had done for them in olden time, and pleads that as their King He would interpose for them again. As their King–
1. He would possess sovereign authority.
2. He would be faithful to His sovereign obligations.
3. He was immutable. This plea may be used by us–
(1) As communities forming part of His Church. When any portion of His Church languishes, or is afflicted, or is in difficulty, it may plead with the King for help.
(2) As individuals on our own behalf. In our times of perplexity and distress, let us go to our King, and plead with Him for direction and deliverance. (William Jones.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 12. For God is my King of old] We have always acknowledged thee as our sovereign; and thou hast reigned as a king in the midst of our land, dispensing salvation and deliverance from the centre to every part of the circumference.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
My King, in a singular manner: it belongs therefore to thine office to protect and save me.
In the midst of the earth; in the view of the world; so saving thy people so eminently and gloriously, that all people round about them observed and admired it.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
12. Forliterally, “And,”in an adversative sense.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
For God is my King of old,…. Or “but God”, or “verily God”, c. d for these words contain the church’s consolation under all the above melancholy circumstances, taken from what God was, and had been to her, even Christ, who is God over all; he was her King by the constitution and designation of his Father, and so he had been of old, even from everlasting; for so early was he set up as King; and he had in all ages been exercising his kingly office for the good of his church, and continued to do so; and this was her comfort, and is the comfort of saints in the worst of times, that Zion’s King reigneth, see
Ps 46:1
working salvation in the midst of the earth; it is “salvations” e in the plural number, and means both spiritual and eternal salvation, which the Lord has wrought out; and is continually applying to his people; and temporal salvation, which the Lord has been and is daily working out; he continually protecting his people, and saving them from their enemies, and delivering them out of their afflictions and temptations; and which the church considers and improves into an argument to encourage her faith, and expect the time when her walls would be salvation, and her gates praise; and she should have reason to say, now is come salvation and strength, and the kingdom of our God and the power of his Christ; and give him all the glory of it; see
Isa 60:18, which salvation, as it has been, so will be wrought
in the midst of the earth; meaning not in the midst of the land of Judea, or in Judea, the middle of the world, but openly and publicly in all the earth; though Cyril of Jerusalem says f Golgotha is the midst of the earth, where Christ suffered and wrought out salvation; and that it is here referred to.
d “atqui Deus”, Junius Tremellius, Piscator “at Deus” Vatablus, Cocceius; “equidem”, Tigurine version; “certe”, Schmidt. e “salutes”, Pagninus, Montanus, Tigurine version, Cocceius, Gejerus. f Cateches. 13. sect. 13. p. 180. Vid. Amamae Antibarb. Bibl. l. 3. p. 798, &c.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
With this prayer for the destruction of the enemies by God’s interposition closes the first half of the Psalm, which has for its subject-matter the crying contradiction between the present state of things and God’s relationship to Israel. The poet now draws comfort by looking back into the time when God as Israel’s King unfolded the rich fulness of His salvation everywhere upon the earth, where Israel’s existence was imperilled. , not only within the circumference of the Holy Land, but, e.g., also within that of Egypt (Exo 8:18-22). The poet has Egypt directly in his mind, for there now follows first of all a glance at the historical (Psa 74:13-15), and then at the natural displays of God’s power (Psa 74:16, Psa 74:17). Hengstenberg is of opinion that Psa 74:13-15 also are to be understood in the latter sense, and appeals to Job 26:11-13. But just as Isaiah (Isa 51:9, cf. Psa 27:1) transfers these emblems of the omnipotence of God in the natural world to His proofs of power in connection with the history of redemption which were exhibited in the case of a worldly power, so does the poet here also in Psa 74:13-15. The (the extended saurian) is in Isaiah, as in Ezekiel ( , Psa 29:3; Psa 32:2), an emblem of Pharaoh and of his kingdom; in like manner here the leviathan is the proper natural wonder of Egypt. As a water-snake or a crocodile, when it comes up with its head above the water, is killed by a powerful stroke, did God break the heads of the Egyptians, so that the sea cast up their dead bodies (Exo 14:30). The , the dwellers in the steppe, to whom these became food, are not the Aethiopians (lxx, Jerome), or rather the Ichthyophagi (Bocahrt, Hengstenberg), who according to Agatharcides fed , but were no cannibals, but the wild beasts of the desert, which are called , as in Pro 30:25. the ants and the rock-badgers. is a permutative of the notion , which was not completed: to a (singular) people, viz., to the wild animals of the steppe. Psa 74:15 also still refers not to miracles of creation, but to miracles wrought in the course of the history of redemption; Psa 74:15 refers to the giving of water out of the rock (Psa 78:15), and Psa 74:15 to the passage through the Jordan, which was miraculously dried up ( , as in Jos 2:10; Jos 4:23; Jos 5:1). The object is intended as referring to the result: so that the water flowed out of the cleft after the manner of a fountain and a brook. are the several streams of the one Jordan; the attributive genitive describe them as streams having an abundance that does not dry up, streams of perennial fulness. The God of Israel who has thus marvellously made Himself known in history is, however, the Creator and Lord of all created things. Day and night and the stars alike are His creatures. In close connection with the night, which is mentioned second, the moon, the of the night, precedes the sun; cf. Psa 8:4, where is the same as in this passage. It is an error to render thus: bodies of light, and more particularly the sun; which would have made one expect before the specializing Waw. are not merely the bounds of the land towards the sea, Jer 5:22, but, according to Deu 32:8; Act 17:26, even the boundaries of the land in themselves, that is to say, the natural boundaries of the inland country. are the two halves of the year: summer including spring ( ), which begins in Nisan, the spring-month, about the time of the vernal equinox, and autumn including winter ( ), after the termination of which the strictly spring vegetation begins (Son 2:11). The seasons are personified, and are called God’s formations or works, as it were the angels of summer and of winter.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
| Acknowledgments of Divine Power. | |
12 For God is my King of old, working salvation in the midst of the earth. 13 Thou didst divide the sea by thy strength: thou brakest the heads of the dragons in the waters. 14 Thou brakest the heads of leviathan in pieces, and gavest him to be meat to the people inhabiting the wilderness. 15 Thou didst cleave the fountain and the flood: thou driedst up mighty rivers. 16 The day is thine, the night also is thine: thou hast prepared the light and the sun. 17 Thou hast set all the borders of the earth: thou hast made summer and winter.
The lamenting church fastens upon something here which she calls to mind, and therefore hath she hope (as Lam. iii. 21), with which she encourages herself and silences her own complaints. Two things quiet the minds of those that are here sorrowing for the solemn assembly:–
I. That God is the God of Israel, a God in covenant with his people (v. 12): God is my King of old. This comes in both as a plea in prayer to God (Ps. xliv. 4, thou art my King, O God!) and as a prop to their own faith and hope, to encourage themselves to expect deliverance, considering the days of old, Ps. lxxvii. 5. The church speaks as a complex body, the same in every age, and therefore calls God, “My King, my King of old,” or, “from antiquity;” he of old put himself into that relation to them and appeared and acted for them in that relation. As Israel’s King, he wrought salvation in the midst of the nations of the earth; for what he did, in the government of the world, tended towards the salvation of his church. Several things are here mentioned which God had done for his people as their King of old, which encouraged them to commit themselves to him and depend upon him.
1. He had divided the sea before them when they came out of Egypt, not by the strength of Moses or his rod, but by his own strength; and he that could do that could do any thing.
2. He had destroyed Pharaoh and the Egyptians. Pharaoh was the leviathan; the Egyptians were the dragons, fierce and cruel. Observe, (1.) The victory obtained over these enemies. God broke their heads, baffled their politics, as when Israel, the more they were afflicted by them, multiplied the more. God crushed their powers, though complicated, ruined their country by ten plagues, and at last drowned them all in the Red Sea. This is Pharaoh and all his multitude, Ezek. xxxi. 18. It was the Lord’s doing; none besides could do it, and he did it with a strong hand and an outstretched arm. This was typical of Christ’s victory over Satan and his kingdom, pursuant to the first promise, that the seed of the woman should break the serpent’s head. (2.) The improvement of this victory for the encouragement of the church: Thou gavest him to be meat to the people of Israel, now going to inhabit the wilderness. The spoil of the Egyptians enriched them; they stripped their slain, and so got the Egyptians’ arms and weapons, as before they had got their jewels. Or, rather, this providence was meat to their faith and hope, to support and encourage them in reference to the other difficulties they were likely to meet with in the wilderness. It was part of the spiritual meat which they were all made to eat of. Note, The breaking of the heads of the church’s enemies is the joy and strength of the hearts of the church’s friends. Thus the companions make a banquet even of leviathan, Job xli. 6.
3. God had both ways altered the course of nature, both in fetching streams out of the rock and turning streams into rock, v. 15. (1.) He had dissolved the rock into waters: Thou didst bring out the fountain and the flood (so some read it); and every one knows whence it was brought, out of the rock, out of the flinty rock. Let this never be forgotten, but let it especially be remembered that the rock was Christ, and the waters out of it were spiritual drink. (2.) He had congealed the waters into rock: Thou driedst up mighty rapid rivers, Jordan particularly at the time when it overflowed all its banks. He that did these things could now deliver his oppressed people, and break the yoke of the oppressors, as he had done formerly; nay, he would do it, for his justice and goodness, his wisdom and truth, are still the same, as well as his power.
II. That the God of Israel is the God of nature, Psa 74:16; Psa 74:17. It is he that orders the regular successions and revolutions, 1. Of day and night. He is the Lord of all time. The evening and the morning are of his ordaining. It is he that opens the eyelids of the morning light, and draws the curtains of the evening shadow. He has prepared the moon and the sun (so some read it), the two great lights, to rule by day and by night alternately. The preparing of them denotes their constant readiness and exact observance of their time, which they never miss a moment. 2. Of summer and winter: “Thou hast appointed all the bounds of the earth, and the different climates of its several regions, for thou hast made summer and winter, the frigid and the torrid zones; or, rather, the constant revolutions of the year and its several seasons.” Herein we are to acknowledge God, from whom all the laws and powers of nature are derived; but how does this come in here? (1.) He that had power at first to settle, and still to preserve, this course of nature by the diurnal and annual motions of the heavenly bodies, has certainly all power both to save and to destroy, and with him nothing is impossible, nor are any difficulties or oppositions insuperable. (2.) He that is faithful to his covenant with the day and with the night, and preserves the ordinances of heaven inviolable will certainly make good his promise to his people and never cast off those whom he has chosen, Jer 31:36; Jer 33:20; Jer 33:21. His covenant with Abraham and his seed is as firm as that with Noah and his sons, Gen. viii. 21. (3.) Day and night, summer and winter, being counterchanged in the course of nature, throughout all the borders of the earth, we can expect no other than that trouble and peace, prosperity and adversity, should be, in like manner, counterchanged in all the borders of the church. We have as much reason to expect affliction as to expect night and winter. But we have then no more reason to despair of the return of comfort than we have to despair of day and summer.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
12. But God is my King from the beginning. In this verse, as we have often seen to be the case in other places, the people of God intermingle meditations with their prayers, thereby to acquire renewed vigor to their faith, and to stir up themselves to greater earnestness in the duty of prayer. We know how difficult it is to rise above all doubts, and boldly to persevere in a free and unrestrained course of prayer. Here, then, the faithful call to remembrance the proofs of God’s mercy and working, by which he certified, through a continued series of ages, that he was the King and Protector of the people whom he had chosen. By this example we are taught, that as it is not enough to pray with the lips unless we also pray in faith, we ought always to remember the benefits by which God has given a confirmation of his fatherly love towards us, and should regard them as so many testimonies of his electing love. It is quite clear that the title King, which is here applied to God, ought not to be restricted merely to his sovereignty. He is addressed by this appellation because he had taken upon him the government of the Jewish people, in order to preserve and maintain them in safety. We have already stated what is implied in the words, from the beginning. By the midst of the earth some think that Judea is intended, because it was situated as it were in the midst of the habitable globe. There is no doubt that it is to be understood of a place which stands prominently in view. We find the expression used in this sense in these words which God commanded Moses to speak to Pharaoh,
“
And I will sever in that day the land of Goshen, in which my people dwell, that no swarms of flies shall be there; to the end thou mayest know that I am the Lord in the midst of the earth,” (Exo 8:22.)
The simple and natural meaning, therefore, is, that God had wrought in behalf of the chosen people many deliverances, which were as open and manifest as if they had been exhibited on a conspicuous theater.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(12) For.Better, and, or and yet.
My king.The poet speaks for Israel. (Comp. Psa. 44:4; Hab. 1:12.)
In the midst of the earth.Or, as we might say, on the great theatre of the world. Certainly we must not render here land instead of earth, since the wonders of Egypt, &c, are the theme.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
12. For God is my King of old, etc. Having finished his special prayer against his enemies, in which he struggles with the “crying contradiction between the present state of things and God’s relationship to Israel,” (Delitzsch,) the psalmist now proceeds to draw comfort, and fresh argument for divine interposition, from a review of the times when God was Israel’s King, working salvation in the midst of the earth.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Psa 74:12 For God [is] my King of old, working salvation in the midst of the earth.
Ver. 12. For God is my Kiny of old ] He is the same yesterday, today, and for ever. I doubt not, therefore, but he will see to the safety of his loyal subjects.
Working salvation in the midst of the earth
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Psa 74:12-17
12Yet God is my king from of old,
Who works deeds of deliverance in the midst of the earth.
13You divided the sea by Your strength;
You broke the heads of the sea monsters in the waters.
14You crushed the heads of Leviathan;
You gave him as food for the creatures of the wilderness.
15You broke open springs and torrents;
You dried up ever-flowing streams.
16Yours is the day, Yours also is the night;
You have prepared the light and the sun.
17You have established all the boundaries of the earth;
You have made summer and winter.
Psa 74:12-17 This strophe was the psalmist’s way of focusing on God’s wonderful, creative acts (i.e., Genesis 1 or the Exodus). He was the God of creation! He brought this world into being for a purpose. Israel was a crucial part of that purpose (i.e., Psa 74:12, see Special Topic: YHWH’s Eternal Redemptive Plan ).
Notice the parallelism (i.e., You. . ., BDB 61 used seven times with perfect tenses), which could refer to the initial creation of Genesis 1 or the defeat of Egypt and the Exodus.
1. divided (this Hebrew word is uncertain, it follows BDB 830 II, but KB 978 does not affirm this usage) the sea
2. broke the heads of the sea monsters (possibly singular and, therefore, parallel to Leviathan)
3. crushed the heads of Leviathan
4. provided food for the creatures/people of the wilderness (in context creatures seems best, cf. Isa 13:21-22; Isa 23:13; Isa 34:14; Jer 50:39, NRSV, TEV, NJB)
5. broke open springs of water
6. dried up ever-flowing streams
7. prepared light and night
8. established all boundaries of the earth (i.e., seas, seasons, night and day)
9. formed the seasons (i.e., agriculture)
Psa 74:12 my King I think the concept of YHWH as King has two possible references.
1. He was the true leader/sovereign of the covenant people (cf. Psa 89:1-4, see note at Psa 44:4)
2. He is given this title because of this action as creator in His defeat of watery chaos (i.e., Rahab/Leviathan [Canaanite chaos monsters], cf. Job 26:12; Psa 89:5-10; Psa 93:1-5; Isa 51:9)
The OT presents two models of creation.
a. Genesis 1-2 (speaking into existence)
b. Psalms 89; Psalms 96 (defeat of chaos, using mythological images from Sumer, Babylon, and Canaan. This is not intended to give reality to these pagan ANE worldviews but to help relate YHWH’s message to the people of those cultures, see NIDOTTE, vol 4, p. 548, #7)
Psa 74:14 Leviathan This term was common in Ugaritic mythology (cf. Isa 27:1). See below my note from Isa 27:1 :
Leviathan the fleeing serpent Leviathan (BDB 531) seems to be a Ugaritic mythological sea animal (i.e., Job 41:19-21) mentioned in Job 3:8; Psa 104:26; Amo 9:3. However, sometimes it is used as a symbol for an evil nation (cf. Psa 74:13-14, possibly Egypt). It resembles a river snaking through their land. Sometimes this term is linked specifically to Rahab, which is a way of referring to Egypt (cf. Psa 87:4; Psa 89:9-10; and Isa 30:7). It seems to me that, in context, we are talking about a river symbolizing a national enemy, either Egypt or Assyria (cf. Psa 74:12). The reason this term can be used symbolically so easily is that it was previously used in some of the mythological literature of Canaan (cf. Psa 74:12-17; see G. Archer, Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties, pp. 239-240).
There is a parallelism between
1.the fleeing serpent (BDB 638 I) or sea monster (NASB footnote)
2.the twisted sea monster
3.the dragon who lives in the sea
This same allusion is found in (1) Ugaritic poems and (2) Isa 51:9, using Rahab, who is also identified by the term dragon (BDB 1072).
The only apparent connection between this verse and the context is Isa 27:11-12.
1. YHWH as creator, Psa 74:11
2. flowing streams of the Euphrates and the brook of Egypt in Psa 74:12
3. the end of time is like the beginning of time (i.e., Genesis 1-2; Revelation 21-22)
Apparently Isaiah is a compilation of his writings over many years and compiled on the basis of word plays or themes, not history.
Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley
salvation = deliverances. Plural of majesty = great deliverance.
in the midst, &c. Compare Exo 8:22. (Hebrew. Psa 74:15).
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Psa 74:12=-13
Psa 74:12-13
“Yet God is my King of old,
Working Salvation in the midst of the earth.
Thou didst divide the sea by thy strength:
Thou brakest the heads of the sea-monsters in the waters.”
“Yet God is my king of old” (Psa 74:12). With the secular kingdom and the racial nation doomed, there was little the psalmist could do except to remember God’s prior mercies and marvelous blessings wrought upon behalf of Israel; therefore, he turned to them.
“Working salvation in the midst of the earth” (Psa 74:12). This refers to God’s deliverance of Israel from Egyptian slavery before the eyes of all the nations on earth.
“Thou didst divide the sea by thy strength” (Psa 74:13). This is undeniably a reference to God’s deliverance of Israel from the armies of Pharaoh by dividing the sea and marching them across an extensive arm of the Indian Ocean on dry land.
“Thou brakest the heads of the sea-monsters in the waters” (Psa 74:13). The “sea monsters” here are figurative terms applicable to Pharaoh and to Egypt. They were indeed broken in the waters, when Pharaoh ordered his armies to follow Israel into the ocean.
E.M. Zerr:
Psa 74:12. David “got hold of himself” and recalled that God had done great things in the past for the universe and the people of the earth.
Psa 74:13. For a few verses the Psalmist recounted some of the mighty works of God. He went back to the crossing of the Red Sea. Dragons is from TANNIYM, and Strong defines it. “a marine or land monster, i.e. sea-serpent or jackal.” It is also rendered by whale in the A.V. Accord ing to Exo 15:8 the waters were congealed or frozen just before the Israelites crossed over. In the rush and crash of converting the water into two separate walls of ice, some of these whales were caught in the movement and had their heads broken.
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Plead Thine Own Cause, O God
Psa 74:12-23
Yet! Psa 74:12, r.v. There is always some compensating and consolatory thought. God is in the background of our thought. Not only the King, but my King, ever working salvation in the midst of the earth. Faith is quickened as she reviews the marvels of the past, or considers the constant forth-putting of Gods power in nature. See Psa 74:12-15.
The dove is a tender emblem of the Church in her simplicity, weakness, and defenselessness; and there is no plea so potent as to remind God of His Covenant, which has been sealed with the blood of the Cross. Though we are utterly unworthy, He cannot deny Himself. Every time we put the cup to our lips in the Holy Supper, we say in effect. Have respect unto the Covenant, Psa 74:20. This is an invincible argument with God. Go over the different items of that Covenant enumerated in Heb 8:1-13. Place your finger on the one that fits your case, and present that at the bank of heaven, endorsed by the countersign of our Lord. See to it that your cause is so identified with Gods that, in soliciting His help, you may be able to add: Arise, O God; plead thine own cause, Psa 74:22. God is faithful to those whom He has called into the fellowship of His Son.
Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary
God: Psa 44:4, Exo 19:5, Exo 19:6, Num 23:21, Num 23:22, Isa 33:22
working: Exo 15:2-15, Jdg 4:23, Jdg 4:24, 1Sa 19:5, Isa 63:8, Hab 3:12-14
Reciprocal: Exo 7:9 – a serpent Exo 8:22 – midst 1Sa 12:12 – when the Lord Psa 5:2 – my King Psa 20:9 – let Psa 77:5 – General Psa 83:13 – O my Isa 43:15 – the creator Hos 13:10 – I will be thy king Act 7:7 – the nation
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
74:12 For God [is] my King of old, working salvation {h} in the midst of the earth.
(h) Meaning in the sight of all the world.