Psalms 79:1-8

1 O God, the heathen have invaded your land. 1 They have desecrated your holy Temple and left Jerusalem in ruins.
2 They left the bodies of your people for the vultures, the bodies of your servants for wild animals to eat.
3 They shed your people's blood like water; blood flowed like water all through Jerusalem, and no one was left to bury the dead.
4 The surrounding nations insult us; they laugh at us and mock us.
5 Lord, will you be angry with us forever? Will your anger continue to burn like fire?
6 Turn your anger on the nations that do not worship you, on the people who do not pray to you.
7 For they have killed your people; they have ruined your country.
8 Do not punish us for the sins of our ancestors. Have mercy on us now; we have lost all hope.

Psalms 79:1-8 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO PSALM 79

\\<>\\. This psalm was not written by one Asaph, who is supposed to live after the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans, or, according to some, even after the times of Antiochus, of whom there is no account, nor any certainty that there ever was such a man in those times; but by Asaph, the seer and prophet, that lived in the time of David, who, under a prophetic spirit, foresaw and foretold things that should come to pass, spoken of in this psalm: nor is it any objection that what is here said is delivered as an history of facts, since many prophecies are delivered in this way, especially those of the prophet Isaiah. The Targum is, ``a song by the hands of Asaph, concerning the destruction of the house of the sanctuary (or temple), which he said by a spirit of prophecy.'' The title of the Syriac versions, ``said by Asaph concerning the destruction of Jerusalem.'' The argument of the psalm is of the same kind with the Seventy Fourth. Some refer it to the times of Antiochus Epiphanes; so Theodoret; but though the temple was then defiled, Jerusalem was not utterly destroyed; and others to the destruction of the city and temple by Nebuchadnezzar; and why may it not refer to both, and even to the after destruction of both by Titus Vespasian? and may include the affliction and troubles of the Christians under Rome Pagan and Papal, and especially the latter; for Jerusalem and the temple may be understood in a mystical and spiritual sense; at least the troubles of the Jews, in the times referred to, were typical of what should befall the people of God under the New Testament, and in antichristian times.

Cross References 1

  • 1. 79.1 2 K 25.8-10;2 Chronicles 36.17-19;Jeremiah 52.12-14.
Scripture taken from the Good News Translation - Second Edition, Copyright 1992 by American Bible Society. Used by Permission.