Psalm 68:1-11

1 To the Overseer. -- A Psalm, a song of David. Rise doth God -- scattered are His enemies! And those hating Him flee from His face.

2 As the driving away of smoke Thou drivest away, As the melting of wax before fire, The wicked perish at the presence of God.

3 And the righteous rejoice, they exult before God, And they joy with gladness.

4 Sing ye to God -- praise His name, Raise up a highway for Him who is riding in deserts, In Jah [is] His name, and exult before Him.

5 Father of the fatherless, and judge of the widows, [Is] God in His holy habitation.

6 God -- causing the lonely to dwell at home, Bringing out bound ones into prosperity, Only -- the refractory have inhabited a dry place.

7 O God, in Thy going forth before Thy people, In Thy stepping through the wilderness, Selah.

8 The earth hath shaken, Yea, the heavens have dropped before God, This Sinai -- before God, the God of Israel.

9 A shower of free-will gifts thou shakest out, O God. Thine inheritance, when it hath been weary, Thou hast established it.

10 Thy company have dwelt in it, Thou preparest in Thy goodness for the poor, O God.

11 The Lord doth give the saying, The female proclaimers [are] a numerous host.

Psalm 68:1-11 Meaning and Commentary

To the chief Musician, A Psalm [or] Song of David. The Targum makes the argument of this psalm to be the coming of the children of Israel out of Egypt, and the giving of the law on Mount Sinai; in which it is followed by many of the Jewish interpreters: but Aben Ezra rejects such an interpretation of it, and thinks that David composed it, concerning the war he had with the uncircumcised nations, the Philistines and others, 2 Samuel 8:1, &c. And so the title of the Syriac version begins, "a psalm of David, when the kings prepared themselves to fight against him:" and Kimchi says it was composed on account of Sennacherib's army coming against Jerusalem, in the times of Hezekiah, and so delivered by David, under a spirit of prophecy concerning that affair; though he owns that some of their writers interpret it of the war of Gog and Magog, in the times of the Messiah they yet expect. But they are much nearer the truth, who take it that it was written on occasion of the ark being brought to the city of David; seeing it begins with much the same words that Moses used when the ark set forward in his times, Numbers 10:35; and the bringing of which was attended with great joy and gladness, 2 Samuel 6:14; such as the righteous are called upon to express in this psalm, Psalm 68:3. And this being a type of Christ, and of his ascending the holy hill of God, may be allowed of; for certain it is that this psalm treats of the coming of Christ, and of blessings by him, and of victory over his enemies; and particularly of his ascension to heaven, as most evidently appears from Ephesians 4:8; and from prophecies in it, concerning the calling of the Gentiles. Wherefore the latter part of the Syriac inscription of it is very pertinent; "also a prophecy concerning the dispensation of the Messiah, and concerning the calling of the Gentiles to the faith." Jarchi interprets Psalm 68:31 of the Messiah.