My wife and I are reading through the Psalms in our evening reading and occasionally a nugget of the Psalms jumps out of the page. Don’t you love it when, after years of reading the “Old Book” passages become alive, reinforcing old teachings or simply warming your heart.
This is the book of Psalms, and it is rich.
I pray I can communicate a portion of the blessing we receive from this wonderful book.
Psalm 76:4 Glorious are you, more majestic than the mountains full of prey.
Psalm 76:5 The stouthearted were stripped of their spoil; they sank into sleep; all the men of war were unable to use their hands.
Psalm 76:6 At your rebuke, O God of Jacob, both rider and horse lay stunned.
In our last post, we considered the the passage in light of a picture of the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, residing in the nations capital, ready to strike. It was a picture of Jerusalem acting as the den for a lion to hide in until the attack.
We also suggested that the attack was the mighty and complete defeat of the Assyrian army under Hezekiah’s reign, and was triggered by the heartfelt repentant prayer of the king. Many factors surely played into the complete decimation of an army of 185,000 men, including the taunting of the Lord’s people, in that fateful night. But one direct, humble and helpless prayer, lit a fire under the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, and the Assyrian’s had no chance.
If this picture is accurate as I have developed it in my mind, Asaph has a response to this salvation the Lion has provided.
Praise. Praise to the One who delivered His people by striking them as a lion from a hidden den.
And yet the Psalmist speaks of the mountains full of prey. Is the psalmist continuing with his description of the defeat of Sennacheribs army, or is Asaph simply changing his topic and beginning a new discussion on mountains?
A key consideration is that Jerusalem in surrounted by mountains, (or by hills if we are thinking of mountains as Everest.) Current names of some of the mountains in the region of Jerusalmem include Mount Zion, the Mount of Olives, the Temple Mount, Mount Scopus, Mount Herzl, Mount of Rest, Mount Hotzvim, and Har Nof.
If this is Asaph’s context, then the Assyrian army could be the object of Asaph’s description of prey. Again, the psalmist describes the defeat in a metaphor of hunting, with the Lion being so much greater than the hunted.
Verse 5 refers to the stouthearted, or the proud “sinking” into a sleep. A metaphor for falling dead! The men of war were helpless against the One from Jerusalem. Asaph goes on to state both the horse and the rider, the formidable power of the Assyrian army, “lay stunned”, as in a deep sleep. There was no waking of these mighty soldiers!
In those ancient days, the Lion of the Tribe of Judah rebuked the mighty army of Assyria. An army that had defeated over twenty cities of the nation of Israel. Israel was in tatters, but the capital stood, and Jerusalem remained.
After all, it was the Lion’s den! And for now there were a people who looked to the Lion for thier help.
Thanks again for coming to visit. I hope you found something of interest in this post and would appreciate a comment, to begin a discussion.
Considering the Bible 