Chapter Fifty-Five

According to the inscription, the psalm was written by David during his flight from Saul to the Philistines at Gath, where they recognized in him the recent victor over Goliath, and therefore probably treated him with suspicion. This last circumstance could have prompted David to feign madness before them (1 Sam 21:10-15). “O dove, silent in distance” refers either to David’s position in a hostile land as a lonely and defenseless exile—that is, it is a gentle, figurative expression denoting his external and inner state at that time—or points to the motive of performance, after the manner of a song beginning with these words.

Have mercy on me, Lord, for I am surrounded on all sides by enemies seeking to destroy me (2–3). I trust in You and believe in the reality of Your determination concerning me (4–5). My enemies watch me closely. Will You not punish them? (6–8) My afflictions are recorded with You and You are my defender, therefore I do not fear the attacks of my enemies and for the salvation You have sent I will render to You my vows (9–14).

Psalm 55:2. Have mercy on me, O God! for a man seeks to devour me; pressing hard every day, he oppresses me. “A man seeks to devour me.” By the word “man” David denotes the Philistines, among whom he had to move and who could not be favorably disposed toward him as the recent victor over Goliath. They could regard him with suspicion and see in him a spy on behalf of the Hebrew people hostile to them, and therefore watched his words and deeds closely.

Psalm 55:5. In God I will praise His word; in God I trust, I will not be afraid; what can flesh do to me? “In God I will praise His word.” By “word” is understood God’s determination concerning David, by which he was destined to become the king of the Hebrew people. “To praise” means to give thanks and glorify. David thanks God for such a determination concerning him, not because he finds satisfaction for his vanity here, but because he sees in it God’s favor toward him, and therefore he, living among Philistines, the evil enemies of his people, does not waver in his faith in his salvation: God, having made such a word concerning him, will not leave it unfulfilled and will therefore save David, which is why David says: “I will not be afraid; what can flesh do to me?”

Psalm 55:8. Will they not escape vengeance for their unrighteousness? In Your anger, O God, bring down the peoples. God is righteous. In the attitudes of the Philistines surrounding David, he sees unjust enmity, undeserved by him as an innocent and involuntary exile from his homeland. The hostile attitude was nourished not only toward him but also toward all Hebrews, and not only by the Philistines but by all pagans, therefore David’s prayer for his own salvation passes into a prayer also for his people: “In Your anger, O God, bring down the peoples” (pagan peoples).

Psalm 55:9. You have recorded my wanderings; put my tears in Your vessel—are they not in Your book? A characterization of God’s vigilant attention to humanity. All the sufferings of the latter are as it were recorded by the Lord (“my wanderings are recorded”); the Lord preserves them as if in a vessel: He as it were writes down all by which the human being is unjustly wronged.

Psalm 55:13. Upon me, O God, are Your vows; I will render praise to You, The vows made by David before God are indicated in the following verse.

Psalm 55:14. For You have delivered my soul from death, [my eyes from tears,] and my feet from stumbling, so that I walk before the face of God in the light of the living. To walk “before the face of God in the light of the living” means by one’s deeds neither to offend nor to violate God’s commandments, and to be always guided by the remembrance that the Lord sees you, His face is turned toward you. “In the light of the living” can be rendered as “for the enlightenment of the living,” that is, a person’s activity in accordance with God’s will is important not only as an expression of the sincerity of his convictions but also as a means of religious and moral enlightenment of other people.