Psalms 79:5-13

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.
9 Help us, O God, and save us; rescue us and forgive our sins for the sake of your own honor.
10 Why should the nations ask us, "Where is your God?" Let us see you punish the nations for shedding the blood of your servants.
11 Listen to the groans of the prisoners, and by your great power free those who are condemned to die.
12 Lord, pay the other nations back seven times for all the insults they have hurled at you.
13 Then we, your people, the sheep of your flock, will thank you forever and praise you for all time to come.

Psalms 79:5-13 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.

Scripture taken from the Good News Translation - Second Edition, Copyright 1992 by American Bible Society. Used by Permission.