Psalms 7:1

PSALM 7

PLEA FOR JEHOVAH'S HELP

(SHIGGAION OF DAVID; WHICH HE SANG UNTO JEHOVAH; CONCERNING THE WORDS OF CUSH A BENJAMITE)

Addis believed that this Psalm was once two Psalms and that they have been welded together. The first five verses and the last six have the story of an innocent man, slandered, persecuted, and pursued with hatred; "and in Psalms 7:6-11 personified Israel asks for justice at God's hands, and begs him to summon all nations to the great assize (The Final Judgment), that they may attest the Divine Sentence that declares Israel innocent."[1]

The first of these is one of eight passages traditionally associated with David's flight from the wrath of King Saul. "The other seven are: Psalms 34; Psalms 52; Psalms 54; Psalms 56; Psalms 57; Psalms 59; and Psalms 142."[2]

King Saul was of the tribe of Benjamin, and the mention of Cush as a member of that tribe supports the supposition that David was falsely accused of treason against the King and of plotting against him, by members of Saul's tribe. This appears to us far more reasonable than the notion that the "innocent man" in the passage, who was David, of course, was accused of dishonest dealing with some individual as suggested by Arnold Rhodes.[3]

We do know, of course, that David was viciously slandered by Doeg, and that Saul vigorously pursued David with the purpose of killing him.

Psalms 7:1-2

"O Jehovah my God, in thee do I take refuge:

Save me from all them that pursue me, and deliver me,

Lest they tear my soul like a lion,

Rending it in pieces, while there is none to deliver."

It was Saul, or course, who vigorously pursued David with the purpose of putting him to death; and the language here is exactly what we should have expected from David, who himself, was familiar with the way a lion tore in pieces his prey, for he himself had fought and slain a lion when he was tending his father Jesse's sheep. Here he expressed fear that Saul would tear him to pieces unless he should be granted a special deliverance from the Lord.