Deeper Commentary
Or 'degrees'.
Hezekiah’s response to being granted another 15 years of life was to edit
and produce the Songs of Degrees, so named after the degrees of the sundial.
Four of the 15 Psalms were by David, one by Solomon; and the other 10 it
seems Hezekiah wrote himself but left anonymous. These ten Psalms would
reflect the ten degrees by which the sun-dial went backwards. The point to
note is that Hezekiah taught others in an anonymous way in response to the
grace he had received. True preaching reflects a certain artless
selflessness. These songs of ascents were presumably also intended to be
sung by the exiles as they returned to Zion, and then every time they went
up to Jerusalem to keep a feast. But there is no evidence this happened.
For they didn't return in the kind of faith implied in these Psalms. The
plural "ascents" would then be an intensive plural referring to the one
great ascent, to Zion. Much of the language of these Psalms is typical of
David's language when under persecution by Saul. But the Psalm was
reapplied to Hezekiah, and then to the exiles on their return from
Babylon, and then by extension to all God's people on their journey
zionwards.
I will lift up my eyes to the hills. Where does my help come from?-
"The hills" may be an intensive plural referring to the great hill of
mount Zion. But the hills were associated with idolatry and the high
places. David and subsequent users of the Psalm may have meant that they
looked not to the hills but to Yahweh, the creator of heaven and earth
(:2).
Psa 121:2
So often, the fact Yahweh is creator is presented as a reason to
trust Him for help. To minimize His creative power through faithless
scientific theory simply takes away our grounds for personal faith.
Psa 121:3
The idea is that the restoration was to be permanent, and never again
would Israel go into captivity and have to leave Zion.
God had allowed the feet of His people to be moved out of their land, but the intention was that this was to be temporary, and their return would be a witness to the Gentiles amongst whom they lived- leading them to join in and also come to Zion in penitence and faith. And then He would not again allow their feet to be moved from their land (s.w. Ps. 66:9).
Psa 121:4
We note that the confident statement that Yahweh doesn't slumber nor sleep for His people was disavowed by the exiles, and perhaps by David too in his low moments in Ps. 44:23: "Wake up! Why do You sleep, Lord? Arise! Don’t reject us forever". To accuse God of sleeping seems as inappropriate as the disciples' demand for the Lord Jesus to awake from sleep because His apparent sleeping showed that He didn't care that they perished (Mk. 4:38). He did of course care for their perishing. He gave His life for that.
Psa 121:5
The songs of ascents, part of the restoration Psalms, are relevant to any ‘ascent’ or ‘going up’ to the Lord’s house. They are full of reference to God’s eternal purpose with Jerusalem and the temple. It seems to me that they may have been re-written under inspiration with reference to God’s people returning from Babylon to Jerusalem. “The Lord is thy keeper…the sun shall not smite thee by day…” (Ps. 121:5,6)- reference to Israel’s exodus from Egypt, but also to God’s miraculous keeping them on the desert journey from Babylon to Jerusalem, without a guard from the Babylonian authorities.
Psa 121:6
The exiles were comforted that as the pillar of cloud and fire
protected Israel on their journey to the promised land, so God would be
with them in returning from exile. Not being smitten by day nor night is
the language of Ps. 91:6 [see note there]. They were to follow the path
intended for Joshua, and earnestly believe they could participate in the
restored kingdom of God. There is allusion to the belief that there was
some demonic power in the moon; hence Ps. 91:6 LXX "from ruin and the
demon of the midday". Whatever belief in demons the people held, the
simple truth was that God destroyed the wilderness generation; all was
under His absolute control. There is no radical evil in the cosmos.
Psa 121:7
As discussd on :6, the "evil" may refer to their wrong understandings
of cosmic evil. The Lord Jesus never actually stated that demons don't
exist; rather did His miracles demonstrate that God was so far superior to
their power, that effectively they didn't. And the same logic is being
used here.
Psa 121:8
The idea may be that the regular pilgrimages to Zion to the keep the
feasts (cp. Ps. 122:1), going out and coming in, were envisaged as now being eternally
established. We note "going out and coming in", and not the other
way around. The implication is that Zion was to be the actual abode of the
worshipper, even if he only came in and out for a brief period three times
/ year.
This could imply that "forever", eternity, was seen as beginning with the
coming in to Zion. The restoration of the exiles could potentially have
been the time of the reestablishment of God's Kingdom on earth; but that
possiblity was precluded by Israel's lack of faith and repentance.
We can begin living the eternal life now, in that we can now act as we
shall eternally. We shall be eternally appreciating, trusting, loving and
praising God's Name, just as He keeps us noth now and eternally- and we
can begin those experiences with Him right now. This is an Old Testament
form (also in Ps. 113:2; 115:18; 121:8; 125:2; 131:3) of the Lord's
teaching as recorded in John's Gospel, that we can have and live the
eternal life right now. We have that life not in the sense that we shall
never die, but in that we can begin living and being now as we shall
eternally live and be.
Previous Chapte
