Psalm 44, part 1, you have cast off, and put us to shame

 

Psalm 44:1 ¶  «To the chief Musician for the sons of Korah, Maschil.» We have heard with our ears, O God, our fathers have told us, what work thou didst in their days, in the times of old. 2  How thou didst drive out the heathen with thy hand, and plantedst them; how thou didst afflict the people, and cast them out. 3  For they got not the land in possession by their own sword, neither did their own arm save them: but thy right hand, and thine arm, and the light of thy countenance, because thou hadst a favour unto them. 4  Thou art my King, O God: command deliverances for Jacob. 5  Through thee will we push down our enemies: through thy name will we tread them under that rise up against us. 6  For I will not trust in my bow, neither shall my sword save me. 7  But thou hast saved us from our enemies, and hast put them to shame that hated us. 8  In God we boast all the day long, and praise thy name for ever. Selah.

 

The Psalmist here, possibly David, reminds the Israelites in song how they got where they were in his day.

 

Deuteronomy 7:1 ¶  When the LORD thy God shall bring thee into the land whither thou goest to possess it, and hath cast out many nations before thee, the Hittites, and the Girgashites, and the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than thou;

 

God planted the Israelites in the land taken from these nations.

 

Exodus 15:17  Thou shalt bring them in, and plant them in the mountain of thine inheritance, in the place, O LORD, which thou hast made for thee to dwell in, in the Sanctuary, O Lord, which thy hands have established.

 

Psalm 80:8 ¶  Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt: thou hast cast out the heathen, and planted it.

 

Isaiah 5:1 ¶  Now will I sing to my wellbeloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My wellbeloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill:… 7  For the vineyard of the LORD of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah his pleasant plant: and he looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry.

 

Jeremiah 2:21  Yet I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a right seed: how then art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine unto me?

 

They didn’t get the Promised Land by their own power, their own ability.

 

Deuteronomy 8:16  Who fed thee in the wilderness with manna, which thy fathers knew not, that he might humble thee, and that he might prove thee, to do thee good at thy latter end;

17  And thou say in thine heart, My power and the might of mine hand hath gotten me this wealth.

 

Deuteronomy 9:3  Understand therefore this day, that the LORD thy God is he which goeth over before thee; as a consuming fire he shall destroy them, and he shall bring them down before thy face: so shalt thou drive them out, and destroy them quickly, as the LORD hath said unto thee.

4  Speak not thou in thine heart, after that the LORD thy God hath cast them out from before thee, saying, For my righteousness the LORD hath brought me in to possess this land: but for the wickedness of these nations the LORD doth drive them out from before thee. 5  Not for thy righteousness, or for the uprightness of thine heart, dost thou go to possess their land: but for the wickedness of these nations the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee, and that he may perform the word which the LORD sware unto thy fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

6  Understand therefore, that the LORD thy God giveth thee not this good land to possess it for thy righteousness; for thou art a stiffnecked people.

 

He pleads with God, his King, to deliver Jacob, whose name was changed to Israel.

 

Genesis 32:28  And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed.

 

Psalm 89:18  For the LORD is our defence; and the Holy One of Israel is our king.

 

Isaiah 33:22  For the LORD is our judge, the LORD is our lawgiver, the LORD is our king; he will save us.

 

The Psalmist acknowledges that because of God they can push down their enemies and crush them.

 

Psalm 18:39  For thou hast girded me with strength unto the battle: thou hast subdued under me those that rose up against me. 40  Thou hast also given me the necks of mine enemies; that I might destroy them that hate me. 41  They cried, but there was none to save them: even unto the LORD, but he answered them not. 42  Then did I beat them small as the dust before the wind: I did cast them out as the dirt in the streets.

 

The bow and sword did not save them.

 

Psalm 20:7  Some trust in chariots, and some in horses: but we will remember the name of the LORD our God.

 

Psalm 33:16  There is no king saved by the multitude of an host: a mighty man is not delivered by much strength. 17  An horse is a vain thing for safety: neither shall he deliver any by his great strength.

 

Hosea 1:7  But I will have mercy upon the house of Judah, and will save them by the LORD their God, and will not save them by bow, nor by sword, nor by battle, by horses, nor by horsemen.

 

But it was God Himself who put Israel’s enemies to shame.

 

Psalm 40:14  Let them be ashamed and confounded together that seek after my soul to destroy it; let them be driven backward and put to shame that wish me evil.

 

They should constantly praise God and give glory to His name. God is their deliverer, their benefactor, and the reason they exist.

 

Psalm 44:9 ¶  But thou hast cast off, and put us to shame; and goest not forth with our armies. 10  Thou makest us to turn back from the enemy: and they which hate us spoil for themselves. 11  Thou hast given us like sheep appointed for meat; and hast scattered us among the heathen. 12  Thou sellest thy people for nought, and dost not increase thy wealth by their price. 13  Thou makest us a reproach to our neighbours, a scorn and a derision to them that are round about us. 14  Thou makest us a byword among the heathen, a shaking of the head among the people. 15  My confusion is continually before me, and the shame of my face hath covered me, 16  For the voice of him that reproacheth and blasphemeth; by reason of the enemy and avenger.

 

This Psalm goes from hope and triumph in the Lord, expectation of blessings, to defeat and a feeling of having been abandoned by God or worse, appointed to destruction. This, too, we can find in some of our own troubles at times when things seem like they are coming to a bad end for us and we wonder where God’s deliverance is. Just think of what Israel would eventually face.

 

Psalm 43:2  For thou art the God of my strength: why dost thou cast me off? why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?

 

This was threatened in the Law given to Moses.

 

Leviticus 26:17  And I will set my face against you, and ye shall be slain before your enemies: they that hate you shall reign over you; and ye shall flee when none pursueth you.

 

This passage also seems to prophesy the judgment on Israel that results in the fall of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah as well as the subjugation of Israel by the Romans in Christ’s time and the dispersal of the Jews from Palestine that happened on several occasions from the carrying away by the Assyrians, the Babylonians, and the Romans. The phrase and hast scattered us among the heathen suggests a time for the Israelites that is prophesied that is far beyond David’s day.

 

Deuteronomy 4:27  And the LORD shall scatter you among the nations, and ye shall be left few in number among the heathen, whither the LORD shall lead you.

 

 

 

But, on an immediate level it can be a lamentation of struggles against Israel’s and God’s enemies that David would have to continue the fight against or as the traditional introduction to Psalm 60 says;

 

Psalm 60:1 ¶  «To the chief Musician upon Shushaneduth, Michtam of David, to teach; when he strove with Aramnaharaim and with Aramzobah, when Joab returned, and smote of Edom in the valley of salt twelve thousand.» O God, thou hast cast us off, thou hast scattered us, thou hast been displeased; O turn thyself to us again.

 

David was engaged in war with many of the kingdoms around him during his reign with much bloodshed resulting.

 

For us, though, I still think of the simplest explanation of this passage that would compare to our own feelings in a time of adversity as we wait on something that we pray God will do.