Psalms 82:1-7

1 -- A Psalm of Asaph. God hath stood in the company of God, In the midst God doth judge.

2 Till when do ye judge perversely? And the face of the wicked lift up? Selah.

3 Judge ye the weak and fatherless, The afflicted and the poor declare righteous.

4 Let the weak and needy escape, From the hand of the wicked deliver them.

5 They knew not, nor do they understand, In darkness they walk habitually, Moved are all the foundations of earth.

6 I -- I have said, `Gods ye [are], And sons of the Most High -- all of you,

7 But as man ye die, and as one of the heads ye fall,

Psalms 82:1-7 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO PSALM 82

\\<>\\. This psalm was written for the use of persons in power, for the instruction of kings and princes, judges and civil magistrates; according to Kimchi, it was written about the times of Jehoshaphat, who appointed new judges throughout the land; those that were before having been very corrupt, to whom he gave a charge agreeably to the purport of this psalm, 2Ch 19:5-7, but it seems rather to be written by Asaph, in the times of David, under a spirit of prophecy, and has respect to the times of Christ, when there was a great corruption among the judges and rulers of the Jews, both civil and ecclesiastic. The Syriac version calls it, "a reproof of the ungodly Jews"; our Lord cites a passage out of it in vindication of himself from their charge of blasphemy, Joh 10:34-36.