Deeper Commentary
Psa 72:1
A Psalm for Solomon-
This Psalm has many similarities with coronation hymns of the
surrounding nations. I suggest on :5 that the Psalm was written by David
in the closing months of his life, and was likely intended as a coronation
hymn for Solomon.
David's hopes and expectations for Solomon are expressed in Psalm 72,
"A Psalm for Solomon". The Hebrew title can equally mean "A Psalm of
Solomon", although the Davidic authorship is clinched by the final
verse "the prayers of David, the son of Jesse, are ended". David was so certain that his expectations would be fulfilled.
David's prediction that Solomon would wisely judge his people (Ps. 72:2)
was perhaps why Solomon asked God to give him wisdom to judge God's
people. His wise judgment of the prostitutes, and his willingness to
consider such cases, was surely a living out of David's expectation that
he would deliver the poor, needy and those with no helper (Ps. 72:12).
The
prediction that Solomon would be given of the gold of Sheba (Ps. 72:15)
was fulfilled by Solomon's willful trading with Sheba to get gold from
there, and one wonders whether he in fact invited the Queen of Sheba to
visit him in order to fulfil the prediction that the rulers of Sheba would
come to him with gifts (Ps. 72:10).
God would only have a permanent physical house when His people were
permanently settled, never to be moved again (2 Sam. 7:10), i.e. in the
Kingdom. Yet Solomon perceived that his kingdom was in fact the final
Kingdom of God. David made this mistake, in assuming in Ps. 72 that
Solomon’s Kingdom would undoubtedly be the Messianic one… and Solomon
repeated the error, yet to a more tragic extent.
God, give the king Your justice; Your righteousness to the royal son-
The idea of a gift of righteousness had been learned by David after
his sin with Bathsheba (Ps. 32:1-4)- when he had no righteousness of his
own. But righteousness was imputed by grace through faith, and Solomon
knew little of grace and faith. The Proverbs,
true as they are so
far as they go, reveal a self-congratulatory, works-based spirit which has
little to say about grace. This Psalm was written at the
end of David's life, and again reflects how he has failed to learn the
lessons from his sin with Bathsheba. He assumes righteousness can be
inherited and just given by God to someone because of their father. He
seems to have quite forgotten his death sentence and the wonder of being
counted righteous by grace through faith.
The prayer in this verse for "justice" to be given to Solomon is tantamount to asking God to give Solomon the wisdom to judge Israel justly. Solomon's request for exactly this was therefore a living out of this parental hope and expectation. Yet still God was thrilled that Solomon did ask for this wisdom, rather than assuming he would be made wise because David had prayed he would be. "The King's son" David understands as the promised Messianic son.
"Give the king Your justice" with the result of being able to
"judge Your people" (:2) is all language echoed by Solomon when he as "the
king's son" [NEV "royal son"] asks God for wisdom exactly in order to do
this (1 Kings 3:5). His request for wisdom, followed immediately by the
account of his wise judgment of the poor prostitutes, all fulfilled this.
But it shows that his request for wisdom, whilst commendable and pleasing
to God, was a living out of David's parental expectations for him
expressed in this Psalm. And perhaps that's why the wisdom wasn't absorbed
by him personally, and he turned away from personal faith in Yahweh.
Psa 72:2
He will judge Your people with righteousness, and Your poor with justice-
"He will..." can be rendered "Let him..." . Actually most of the verbs in Ps. 72 can be read like this, as optatives, rather than simple statements of the future. The Psalm therefore wishes that this is how Solomon will reign; but it has its real fulfilment in the true seed of David, the Lord Jesus, and His Kingdom. The Psalm repeatedly wishes Solomon to rule with justice. God had told David in 2 Sam. 22 that he who rules over men must be just, and thus cut down David's claims to have been a glorious Messianic ruler in 2 Sam. 23. For David had not been "just". We think of his behaviour to the descendants of Saul when the Gibeonites complain, of how the cunning woman of Tekoah manipulates him, of his unjust refusal to discipline his sons, of his assigning equal blame to Mephibosheth and Ziba and many other things- that led to Absalom's rebellion on the basis that David was not judging Israel justly. David's humbled response had been to interject "Truly my house [family] is not so with God". He now seeks to change outcomes by praying that Solomon will be just.
The poor or "afflicted" could refer to the prostitutes whom Solomon judged, as the parade example of those to whom he would bring justice and righteousness. We have an interesting window as to what these things mean, in that he didn't condemn them to death but let them live. This was justice to the spiritually poor. Despite the clear condemnation of prostitution in the Mosaic law.
Solomon ultimately failed to do this, whipping the people and abusing them to complete his endless, obsessive building projects. The prophecy had possibility of later fulfilment in Zerubbabel, but that too didn't come about; and so it was reapplied finally to the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus. Or we can simply understand that these are David's wishes for Solomon which he failed to fulfil; but they will come true in David's greater descendant, the Lord Jesus.
The majestic prophecy of Jer. 23:5-7 had prophesied that when Israel returned from Babylon, “the branch” would rise and save them “and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth”, i.e. establish the Messianic Kingdom (cp. Ps. 72:2; Is. 9:7). But Zerubbabel, the “branch-from-Babylon”, lead the people back from Babylon, half heartedly built a temple- which faithful men wept at, when they saw how feeble it was compared to that which should have been (Ezra 3:12). And then he beat it back to Babylon.
David so often parallels righteousness and justice / truth (Ps. 9:8; 33:5; 37:6; 72:2; 94:15; 99:7; 103:6; 106:3). Indeed, this parallel is so common in God's word. What it means is that the righteousness of God is a just righteousness. It's not fake, 'I'll turn a blind eye'. It is true, real, valid, and has integrity underpinned in the very essential justice of God Himself. Justice and righteousness may appear abstract ideas, mere theology. But the result is that the person who believes God's righteousness is imputed to him or her... will feel this, they will know it to be true, they can by grace, in faith, quietly hold their head up before God. And David after Bathsheba is our example. He believed and felt this imputed righteousness. It's not so much a case of 'forgiving ourselves' after God has forgiven us, but rather of being swamped by this very real and legitimate sense that truly, we have been counted righteous. And Paul in Romans holds up David after Bathsheba as the personal example to " every one who is Godly" in their time of spiritual need. See on Ps. 41:12.
Psa 72:3
The mountains shall bring prosperity to the people, the hills will
bring the fruit of righteousness-
This is better translated to the effect that the mountains [an
intensive plural for the one great mountain, Zion] would bring peace to
the little hills. The vision was of the surrounding nations, the hills,
being brought to peace with God through the function of the sanctuary in
Zion which David planned for Solomon to build. But Solomon intermarried
with the surrounding peoples, and was influenced by them to idolatry
rather than bringing them to Israel's God. And David is
wrong to predicate blessing upon the existence of a grandiose temple in
Zion.
David hopes and prays that the conditions of the future Kingdom of God would be experienced in Solomon, whom he wrongly assumed would be the Messianic son of David (:1).
Psa 72:4
He will judge the poor of the people, he will save the children
of the needy and will break the oppressor in pieces-
See on :2. These poor and afflicted were epitomized in the two
prostitutes whom Solomon judged with grace and not condemnation. His
judgment concerned their children. Those women are thus seen as "the
needy" rather than simply sinners.
The RV says that Ps. 72 is a Psalm of Solomon (although see on :1)- in which case we have David or Solomon asking God to give him the throne, in return for which he would establish the Messianic Kingdom. His judging of the poor harlots would therefore have been in conscious fulfilment of the predictions he himself had made as to what his Messianic Kingdom would be like- as a time when the poor would be judged by him (Ps. 72:4,13). He came to articulate God’s Kingdom in terms of how he wanted his Kingdom to be. It could be truly said that there is an urgent need for us to be convicted - deeply convicted - of our desperate need for the person of Jesus, His second coming and Messianic Kingdom. Solomon was so obsessed with himself, so inward-looking, so sure of his spiritual pedigree, so sure of the intellectual correctness of his spiritual knowledge that his need for salvation didn't enter his heart. Because he never publicly sinned (unlike David) he lacked the awareness of his own sinfulness which would have helped him realize he was only a primary fulfilment of the Davidic promises. Lack of awareness of our own sinfulness is connected with a lack of true enthusiasm for the Messianic Kingdom. Because he thought the kingdom was with him, Solomon evidently failed to discern the chronic need of his own nature, both physically and morally.
Psa 72:5
They shall fear You while the sun endures; and as long as the moon,
throughout all generations-
David imagined Solomon's kingdom morphing into the eternal Messianic
kingdom. This was parental obsession, overlooking the fact that all men
sin and must die, and are saved from the grave only by grace through
faith. David's assumption that Solomon would live eternally
reflects a total refusal to accept the connection between sin and death;
and a lack of gratitude for his own salvation from death for his sins.
When Shimei threw stones at him to remind him that he deserved death, he
accepted that; but at his end, David demanded Shimei be slain for pointing
that out. Likewise he envisages Solomon's kingdom as spreading out from
beyond the Euphrates worldwide (:11,17). This eternal kingdom was that
promised to his son who would be born after he had slept with his fathers,
and who would be God's only begotten Son. David has lost his focus on the
things of the Kingdom and the name of the Lord Jesus. Instead he has
become obsessed with creating his own narrative, that these things applied
to Solomon. Solomon appears in the historical narrative at the end of
David's life, when Bathsheba manipulates him to make Solomon king. He then
spends the last months of his life in making speeches about Solomon,
falsely claiming that Solomon had been named by God as the promised Son of
the promises to David in 2 Sam. 7. As discussed on 2 Sam. 23 and 1 Kings
1,2, the last words from God through David are in 2 Sam. 23 and the
speeches we have recorded in 1 Chron. 23-29 are all David's false claims
about what he says God has said about Solomon. Psalm 72 was likely written
in this same period. Indeed the final verse "the prayers of David, the son
of Jesse, are ended" could mean that this is the final Psalm of David-
because there are several psalms attributed to David later in the book of
Psalms.
Psa 72:6
He will come down like rain on the mown grass, as showers that
water the earth-
The allusion is to God's last words to David in 2 Sam. 23:4. God had clearly stated that David was not the great Messianic king, and David had agreed, interjecting that "Indeed my house [family] is not so with God". But again he loses that peak of contrition and the insight that comes with true contrition. For now he again seeks to apply those Messianic images to his son Solomon. And in Prov. 16:15 Solomon applies the images to himself: "In the light of the king’s face is life. His favour is like a cloud of the spring rain".
In Prov. 19:12 Solomon speaks as if his own wisdom was like the dew coming down- as if he felt that the mere possession of wisdom made him the Messiah figure which his father had so hoped for him to be in Ps. 72:6. And he says as much in Prov. 29:3: “Whoso loveth wisdom [exactly what Solomon was commended for doing] rejoiceth his father”. He saw his wisdom and knowledge as some sort of a reward in themselves: “the prudent are crowned with knowledge” (Prov. 14:18). This is of course true in a sense, as all the Proverbs are. But Solomon surely had the idea that he, who was so renowned for his knowledge, was somehow thereby rewarded by having it. This assumption by Solomon was likely behind each of the many references he makes to the value of wisdom and the blessedness of the man who has it. It is rather like feeling that ‘we have the truth’ because somehow our correct understanding of doctrines is a reward for our righteousness, and mere possession of doctrinal truth means that we are acceptable to God.
Micah’s description of how “the remnant of Jacob shall be in the midst
of many people as a dew from the Lord, as the showers upon the grass”
(Mic. 5:7) is consciously alluding to the then-famous Messianic prophecy
of Ps. 72:6: “He shall come down like rain upon the mown grass: as showers
that water the earth”. The blessings Messiah brings are to be articulated
through the witness of those in Him.
Psa 72:7
In his days, the righteous shall flourish-
Solomon's later statement that the righteous would flourish is
therefore a reference to this (Prov. 11:28), assuming that David's fantasy
of Solomon having an eternal kingdom was going to be fulfilled in him. In
Ps. 92:11,12, David thinks that he himself will see the righteous
flourishing (s.w. Ps. 72:7). So he may be imagining that he would somehow
be resurrected and see this happening in Solomon's reign. His hope will
come ultimately true, but through the kingdom of the Lord Jesus and not
Solomon.
And abundance of peace-
This had been David's vision of the future Kingdom of God (s.w. Ps.
37:11), but he assumes and wishes that Solomon's kingdom would have become
that. David seems to now fail to understand that "peace" is
primarily peace with God, achievable only through a Saviour. "Solomon"
means 'man of peace' and this accounts for the emphasis upon peace in this
picture of the Kingdom of God. But God had named David and Bathsheba's
child Jedidiah, and actually Nathan came to reinforce this message to
David when he insisted on calling him 'Solomon'. David set his son up for
failure by projecting onto him his expectations that "Solomon" would be
the Messianic man of peace. "Peace" in the Bible is peace with God, and
only the Lord Jesus could achieve that. Life more abundant with God means
"abundance of peace" with Him.
Until the moon is no more- As discussed on :5, David liked to imagine that Solomon's kingdom would be eternal.
Psa 72:8
He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, from the River to
the ends of the land-
David had prophesied that his great son would "have dominion from sea to
sea" (Ps. 72:8). 'Have dominion' is the Hebrew word translated 'rule over'
in 1 Kings 5:15. David's vision of his Messianic son having a world-wide
Kingdom, in which all people blessed him for his grace and beneficence,
was abused by Solomon into justifying 'having dominion' over people as his
personal slaves; and they certainly didn't bless him for it but rather
complained (1 Kings 12:11). It's as if Solomon grabbed the word 'rule over
/ have dominion', wrenched it out of context, and used it to justify his
actions, giving a quasi-Biblical justification to his pure selfishness.
This is where knowledge of God's word can be a dangerous thing; leading
people into a stronger self-justification than they would otherwise have
had if they were guided by self-recognized greed alone.
Psa 72:9
Those who dwell in the wilderness shall bow before him; his enemies
shall lick the dust-
We must read :9-11 in the context of David's vision of Solomon ruling
over the entire eretz promised to Abraham (:8). The references to
the Bedouins of the desert, the kings of Tarshish and Sheba (:10),
therefore refer to the nations on the boundaries of that territory. The
idea is that Solomon was to rule over the entire eretz- and even
beyond, even over the peoples just over the borders of it.
Psa 72:10
The kings of Tarshish and of the islands will bring tribute, the
kings of Sheba and Seba shall offer gifts-
See on :9. These were the areas on the edge of the eretz
promised to Abraham, and indeed the queen of Sheba did come to Solomon
with gifts. We note that "Tarshish" here doesn't refer to the United
Kingdom. The earth was understood as the territory promised to Abraham,
and anything beyond it is spoken of as the sea or islands. The
queen of Sheba did indeed bring such gifts, but the reference to 666
talents of gold coming to Solomon in one year shows how fake was his
kingdom.
Psa 72:11
Yes, all kings shall fall down before him, all nations shall serve
him-
This homage and the gifts of :10 were not to be because these nations
have been forced into submission, as was usually the case in kingdom
building at that time. They fall before him with their gifts because
["for"] of his justice (:12,15). The queen of Sheba brought her gifts from
respect (:10), not because she was forced to. And so it is and shall ever
be in the extension of God's Kingdom upon earth. There can
be no question that these words did have some fulfilment in Solomon: “All
kingdoms brought presents and served Solomon... All the earth sought to
Solomon, to hear his wisdom… and they brought every man his present”. But
this was a surface level imitation of God's Kingdom and was hollow within.
The annual amount of gold brought to Solomon was 666 talents, and there
are many other connections between the descriptions of Solomon's kingdom
and that of Babylon in Rev. 17,18.
Psa 72:12
For he will deliver the needy when he cries; the poor, who has
no helper-
The primary fulfilment was in Solomon's delivery of the poor
prostitutes who cried to him; they had no moral helper, spiritually and
socially despised. And this was what the Lord did in His ministry and
shall ever do, breaking bread with whores and moral outcasts. Solomon's
pity (:13) and gracious judgment of those women thereby gives us a window
onto how the Lord fulfilled these words to the ultimate.
As noted on :11, the astounding justice and loving care of the king of the kingdom would bring other nations to willingly submit and offer gifts (:10,11); not as signs that they had been forced into submission by military prowess. All visions of the Lord Jesus at His return forcing nations to accept Him at the point of a sword... are out of step with all we have seen and known of Him, as well as of these prophecies. These words were not fulfilled in Solomon as David confidently expected; Solomon whipped the people rather than delivering the needy who cried for help. And his throne hardly endured as long as the sun.
Psa 72:13
He will have pity on the poor and needy, he will save the needy
persons-
See on :4. Pity on the surrounding Gentiles is the language of Jonah
4:11 about Nineveh. The old covenant required that Israel show no pity to
the nations of the eretz promised to Abraham, lest they lead the
people into idolatry (s.w. Dt. 7:16). David, as so often, is looking
beyond this to a new situation whereby Israel's king would show them pity,
if like Nineveh they were repentant. But Solomon mixed with those nations
and accepted their idols. David had seen himself as "poor and needy",
needing grace after his sin with Bathsheba and its consequences (Ps.
40:17; 70:5; 86:1; 109:16,22). He wished Solomon to likewise have pity on
the "poor and needy" amongst the Gentiles, those who had likewise repented
(Ps. 72:13). And David was especially desirous to himself see the "poor
and needy" blessed and accepted as he had been (Ps. 82:3,4; 113:7). It is
our personal experience of needing grace which leads us to have a heart
for those like us, the poor and needy. Any other motivation will
ultimately not abide. Solomon appears to glorify his mother Bathsheba for
likewise pitying the poor and needy (Prov. 31:9,20).
Psa 72:14
He will redeem their soul from oppression and violence, their
blood will be precious in his sight-
The Hebrew word
hamas
[basically meaning 'physical violence arising from wicked plans'] is quite
common in Scripture, and the usages speak of how God is provoked by
hamas
to bring judgment upon the enemies of His people (Gen. 6:11-13; Mic. 6:12;
Zeph. 1:9) and also to intervene in order to save His people (Ps. 18:49;
Ps. 72:14). How amazingly appropriate that an organization actually called
hamas
has arisen in these last days to do violence to Israel! If Biblical
history means anything to us, clearly enough God's intervention in
appropriate judgment and salvation cannot be far off. Note how Hagar's
persecution of Sarah- typical of the Arab-Jew conflict- is described as
her
hamas
(Gen. 16:5).
Psa 72:15
They shall live, and to him shall be given of the gold of Sheba.
Men shall pray for him continually, they shall bless him all day long-
As discussed above, an ominous 666 talents of gold came to
Solomon in one year. Solomon only had a surface level fulfilment of these
things, and there was a spiritual void behind the exterior.
The idea is that because the poor and needy would be allowed to "live" and would be treated with justice and grace (:14), Sheba would give her gold and continual prayer be made for the king. It was usual that conquered peoples were forced to pray to the gods of their conquerors, and to give their gold. But as noted on :10,11, the growth of this Kingdom of God would be on a quite different basis. Peoples would be awed by the grace displayed, and would voluntarily come to worship Israel's God, acting as if they had indeed been conquered by Him- but by His love and grace, rather than His sword.
Psa 72:16
Abundance of grain shall be throughout the land, its fruit sways
like Lebanon. Let it flourish, thriving like the grass of the field!-
As a result of just kingship, the blessings for obedience to the
covenant would come about, in terms of agricultural fecundity. "Abundance
of grain" recalls the situation in the seven years of plenty in Egypt, the
implication being that this grain would be shared with the Gentile world
around them, in order to lead them to Israel's God.
AV "There shall be an handful of corn in the earth upon the top of the mountains; the fruit thereof shall shake like Lebanon". The image is of how small beginnings grow into an abundant harvest, a mere handful of grain, sown on the top of a mountain- on a place unlikely to produce anything, usually barren and unproductive. This is the same teaching as in the parable of the grain of mustard-seed, and the parable of the leaven. We are like that handful of corn, born with all against us for spiritual growth. But the Kingdom age will see us flourish eternally.
Psa 72:17
His name endures forever, his name continues as long as the sun-
Again David is imagining Solomon ruling eternally, but without due
regard for the results of sin and the need for the grace of resurrection
and forgiveness. And it was surely Yahweh's Name which should have been
spoken of in this way and not Solomon's.
"Continues" is literally to re-sprout. "The idea is that of a tree which continues always to sprout, or put forth leaves, branches, blossoms; or, which never dies". God had promised to make David a great name, through his Messianic descendant. But David wants his name perpetuated now through Solomon. The idea is that God's Name / personality / character would keep growing or flourishing. His essential being is therefore not static. As Jn. 17:3 puts it, we shall eternally grow in knowing Him as He Himself grows. There will be no boredom in the eternal relationship. His Name shall be renewed (Heb.) for ever suggests that His Name or personality/ character will not remain static.
Men shall be blessed in him, all nations will call him blessed-
LXX “All the families of the earth shall be blessed in him,
all nations shall call him happy”, clearly alluding to the promise of the
seed of Abraham (Gen. 12:3). David had lost focus on his own promised
seed, who was to be the same Messianic seed promised to Abraham; and
instead become obsessed with his narrative about his own son. The allusion is to the
Abrahamic promise of Gen. 18:18: "All the
nations of the earth will be blessed in him". But the promise about
Abraham personally and his seed is too quickly assumed by David to be
relevant to Solomon personally. There is an intended ambiguity in the
grammar, as to whether "be blessed" is purely a prediction, or a command-
to chose to become blessed in him. That choice is now made in terms of
choosing to be baptized into the Lord Jesus, the true seed of Abraham, so
that we might receive the blessing of forgiveness and life eternal
inheriting the earth (Acts 3:25,26; Gal. 3:27-29).
Psa 72:18
Praise be to Yahweh God, the God of Israel, who alone does
marvellous deeds-
This is an invitation for the "nations" of :17 to praise the God of
Israel, not because they have been forcefully subjugated, but because they
recognize that He is the one and only God, who can do such marvellous
things as restoring His sinful people.
Psa 72:19
Blessed be His glorious name forever! Let the whole earth be filled
with His glory! Amen and amen-
As noted on :18 this is David's desire that the entire eretz
promised to Abraham be filled with peoples who genuinely wish to bless the
name of Israel's God and thereby give glory to Him.
Psa 72:20
This ends the prayers by David, the son of Jesse-
I suggested on Ps. 1:1 that this means that for sure Psalms 1-72 were all
written by David, although most of them were edited and reapplied, under
inspiration, to later situations; and I gave reasons for thinking that the
majority of the later Psalms, although not all, were likewise originally
his inspired work. Although above I have suggested that "this
ends..." could suggest Ps. 72 is the last of David's prayers, written for
Solomon in the closing months of David's life. We note there are many
psalms of David later in the psalter.
Previous Chapte
