"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
What has been said about 4, 5 about injustice being so hardened and impervious to change that there is nothing left except judgment, paints a picture very different to the one we are often asked to believe about the Psalms, and their hot-blooded and vehement cries for vengeance. It is only when it is clear that there is no likelihood of change of heart that judgment becomes inevitable. This is worth remembering. It is easy to be critical of the Psalmist's vehement desire for God to judge, when you have not been in the Psalmist's position; easy too, to forget that what we have here is no mere petulant hurling of judgment upon enemies by a bloodthirsty David, but rather the expression of something that in the nature of the case has become inevitable. The God of the Old Testament is represented as a long-suffering God, not a vengeful deity, and we must not forget it. It is perhaps ironic - and this is the second lesson - that the Psalms have come in for so much criticism on account of their bloodthirsty cries for vengeance from a generation that not only condones bloodthirstiness, but advocates it - and is determined to legitimise it - in its desire to rid the world of injustice. It needs to be realised that even in his greatest moments of vehemence, the Psalmist still appeals to God to judge wicked and lawless judgment. He does not presume to take the law into his own hands in an attempt to overthrow the government himself. It is God's prerogative so to do, not man's. There is absolutely no support for any revolutionary theory here or anywhere else in the Psalms, but on the contrary an absolute recognition of the sanctity of law and order. Two wrongs do not make a right, and the true attitude of the people of God is to appeal to Him to redress the wickedness of the earth. If He chooses to delay action, and hold back from doing justice, for whatever reason, can it be right for man to intervene and take matters into his own hands. What modern man needs to learn is that you cannot turn the parts of society you do not like upside down, without the danger of turning all society upside down. Revolution wipes out some injustices and inequalities, but produces a whole crop of new ones, often worse. Authoritarianism of the right can be replaced by authoritarianism of the left. To forment the revolutionary spirit is to tamper with the very structure of the universe. It cannot be done with impunity.