Psalm 79

Psalm 79 belongs to Book III of the Psalms (Psalms 73–89) and is one of the collection of psalms of Asaph that begins with Psalm 73. The preceding Psalm 78 closes with the account of God choosing Zion and appointing David as shepherd. Psalm 79 cries out over the destruction of that same Zion and its temple. The following Psalm 80 addresses God as the "Shepherd of Israel" and continues the same petition.

Structure

• Verses 1–4: The nations have entered God's inheritance, defiled the temple, and laid Jerusalem on heaps. The bodies of God's servants have become food for birds and beasts; their blood has been shed like water, yet there is no one to bury them. The people have become a reproach to their neighbors.
• Verses 5–7: The psalmist asks "how long" God will be angry and pleads with Him to pour out His wrath on the nations that have not known Him and have devoured Jacob.
• Verses 8–10: The psalmist pleads that God not remember the iniquities of former generations but speedily meet the people with His tender mercies. He asks God to deliver them and purge away their sins for the glory of His name, and to avenge the blood of His servants so that the nations will not say, "Where is their God?"
• Verses 11–13: The psalmist asks God to hear the sighing of the prisoner and to preserve those appointed to die. He asks that the reproach with which the neighbors have reproached God be rendered back to them sevenfold. The psalm closes with the promise that the people, the sheep of God's pasture, will give thanks to Him from generation to generation.

Key Verses

• Psalm 79:5 "How long, LORD?": A characteristic cry of the lament psalms, asking God when the suffering will end.
• Psalm 79:9 "Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of thy name": The ground for deliverance and forgiveness is placed not in the people's merit but in God's name.
• Psalm 79:13 "So we thy people and sheep of thy pasture will give thee thanks for ever": The conclusion, in which lament turns into a resolve to give thanks.

People and Places

• Asaph: A temple musician of David's time whose name appears in the superscription. The psalms of Asaph are sometimes understood as the work of Asaph and of the guild of singers that succeeded him.
• Jacob: In verse 7 the name refers to the people of Israel as a whole.
• Jerusalem and the Temple in Jerusalem: Portrayed as defiled and destroyed by foreigners.
• The nations: The Gentile peoples who do not know God.

Interpretive Considerations

• Background: The text does not identify a specific event. Many interpreters associate it with the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BC and the period of the Babylonian exile, while others propose a later date. The apocryphal book of 1 Maccabees (chapter 7) quotes verses 2–3 and applies them to a massacre in the Maccabean period. The psalm is often read together with Psalm 74, which also laments the destruction of the temple.
• Relationship to other texts: Verses 6–7 are nearly identical in wording to Jeremiah 10:25.
• Prayers for vengeance: The requests for retribution in verses 6, 10, and 12 are frequently discussed in connection with the so-called imprecatory psalms. Interpreters read them in different ways:
• as prayers that leave vengeance to God rather than taking it into one's own hands;
• as prayers seeking God's righteous judgment;
• as texts to be reread in light of the New Testament teaching on love of enemies.
• Connection to the New Testament: In Revelation 6:10 the martyrs cry out, asking "how long" God will refrain from avenging their blood. Verses 5 and 10 of this psalm are often cited as background to that passage.