Psalms 79:3-13

3 They dumped out their blood like buckets of water. All around Jerusalem, their bodies were left to rot, unburied.
4 We're nothing but a joke to our neighbors, graffiti scrawled on the city walls.
5 How long do we have to put up with this, God? Do you have it in for us for good? Will your smoldering rage never cool down?
6 If you're going to be angry, be angry with the pagans who care nothing about you, or your rival kingdoms who ignore you.
7 They're the ones who ruined Jacob, who wrecked and looted the place where he lived.
8 Don't blame us for the sins of our parents. Hurry up and help us; we're at the end of our rope.
9 You're famous for helping; God, give us a break. Your reputation is on the line. Pull us out of this mess, forgive us our sins - do what you're famous for doing!
10 Don't let the heathen get by with their sneers: "Where's your God? Is he out to lunch?" Go public and show the godless world that they can't kill your servants and get by with it.
11 Give groaning prisoners a hearing; pardon those on death row from their doom - you can do it!
12 Give our jeering neighbors what they've got coming to them; let their God-taunts boomerang and knock them flat.
13 Then we, your people, the ones you love and care for, will thank you over and over and over. We'll tell everyone we meet how wonderful you are, how praiseworthy you are!

Psalms 79:3-13 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.

Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved.