"To the choirmaster: according to Do Not Destroy. A Miktam of David.
Do you indeed decree what is right, you gods?
Do you judge the children of man uprightly?
2 No, in your hearts you devise wrongs;
your hands deal out violence on earth.
3 The wicked are estranged from the womb;
they go astray from birth, speaking lies.
4 They have venom like the venom of a serpent,
like the deaf adder that stops its ear,
5 so that it does not hear the voice of charmers
or of the cunning enchanter.
6 O God, break the teeth in their mouths;
tear out the fangs of the young lions, O Lord!
7 Let them vanish like water that runs away;
when he aims his arrows, let them be blunted.
8 Let them be like the snail that dissolves into slime,
like the stillborn child who never sees the sun.
9 Sooner than your pots can feel the heat of thorns,
whether green or ablaze, may he sweep them away!
10 The righteous will rejoice when he sees the vengeance;
he will bathe his feet in the blood of the wicked.
11 Mankind will say, “Surely there is a reward for the righteous;
surely there is a God who judges on earth.”"
Psalm 58
It would be very easy to misunderstand this Psalm. The vehemence of some of the utterances seems to many to be utterly alien to the spirit of love that breathes in the New Testament, and it is not surprising that many are prompted to consign so much of the Psalter to the realm of the sub-Christian, and even anti-Christian. But this is altogether too facile a judgment to pass upon it, and one which owes more to the liberalism of the 19th century and the radicalism of the 20th than to the spirit of the New Testament itself. Furthermore, it does not really look at what the Psalm is saying. The theme is the certainty of the judgment of God against wickedness. There seems to be three divisions, 1-5, 6- 9, 10, 11. In the first, the iniquity rampant in the world is described, and in the remainder, vengeance is called for with the last two verses expressing the joy and relief of the righteous, in the realisation that the universe lies under the government of a truly righteous God. What we need to see is the call for vengeance is not because of personal wrong, and the plaint is against the rulers of the people. The AV words in 1 'O congregation' are rendered in the modern versions 'O ye gods', and the reference is to those who hold divine power, i.e. power given them by God (cf Romans 13:1 'the powers that be are ordained of God'). The question in 1 is hurled out against the rulers for their failure to administer justice. Rampant injustice is certainly in view here, and the striking metaphor in 4, 5 indicates that it is injustice so hardened and impervious to better influence that there is nothing left except the intervention of Divine judgment. This is the scenario with which the Psalm deals, and which explains the fierce and terrible notes in 6-9.