"To the choirmaster: according to Lilies. A Maskil of the Sons of Korah; a love song.
My heart overflows with a pleasing theme;
I address my verses to the king;
my tongue is like the pen of a ready scribe.
2 You are the most handsome of the sons of men;
grace is poured upon your lips;
therefore God has blessed you forever.
3 Gird your sword on your thigh, O mighty one,
in your splendor and majesty!
4 In your majesty ride out victoriously
for the cause of truth and meekness and righteousness;
let your right hand teach you awesome deeds!
5 Your arrows are sharp
in the heart of the king's enemies;
the peoples fall under you.
6 Your throne, O God, is forever and ever.
The scepter of your kingdom is a scepter of uprightness;
7 you have loved righteousness and hated wickedness.
Therefore God, your God, has anointed you
with the oil of gladness beyond your companions;
8 your robes are all fragrant with myrrh and aloes and cassia.
From ivory palaces stringed instruments make you glad;
9 daughters of kings are among your ladies of honor;
at your right hand stands the queen in gold of Ophir.
10 Hear, O daughter, and consider, and incline your ear:
forget your people and your father's house,
11 and the king will desire your beauty.
Since he is your lord, bow to him.
12 The people of Tyre will seek your favour with gifts,
the richest of the people.
13 All glorious is the princess in her chamber, with robes interwoven with gold.
14 In many-colored robes she is led to the king,
with her virgin companions following behind her.
15 With joy and gladness they are led along
as they enter the palace of the king.
16 In place of your fathers shall be your sons;
you will make them princes in all the earth.
17 I will cause your name to be remembered in all generations;
therefore nations will praise you forever and ever."
Psalm 45
The nature of this Psalm is completely different from that of the last three. Yet there is much to learn from it about the nature of spiritual experience, and this is a reminder that there are many different facets in spiritual life. Whatever else it is, it is not dull or stereotyped. On a first reading, the Psalm does not seem to have any specifically religious content. It is, as the scholars point out, an Epithalamion, a nuptial song celebrating the marriage of a king to his queen, a common and popular literary and poetic expression that lends itself to a particular kind of treatment. If it were no more than this, however, its inclusion in Holy Writ could hardly be justified. The scholars alternate between trying to identify the king in the Psalm, whether Solomon or a later monarch, and deciding that it sets forth an ideal - a poetic ideal. Maclaren says, 'Much of the Psalm applied to an historical occasion, the marriage of some monarch: but there is much that as obviously goes beyond it'. Either, then, the Psalm is hyperbole, outstripping even poetical licence, or there appear in it characteristics of the ideal Monarch whom the Psalmist knew to be promised to Israel.... The singer sees the Messiah shining, as it were, through the shadowy form of the earthly king, whose limitations and defects, no less than his excellencies and glories, pointed onwards to a greater than Solomon. What is quite certain is that the early Christian Church saw more than Solomon or an ideal king - they saw Christ. This much is clear from the fact that the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews quotes from it in reference to Christ and His excellency. In Hebrews 1:8, 9, verses 6 and 7 are specifically quoted as referring to the Son of God. We see therefore the significance of the Psalm, and learn the lessons it has for the spiritual life, when we understand that Christ is the king it portrays.