Psalms 110

The LORD said to my lord, "Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet."

1The LORD said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool.

NoteThe King James prints two different Hebrew words the same way. "The LORD" in small capitals stands for God's personal name, YHWH; "my Lord" translates *adon*, an ordinary title of respect for a superior, most often a king. So the line reports what God said to the psalmist's royal master. "Sit at my right hand" places him in the position of highest honor beside a throne. A footstool was a real piece of royal furniture, and ancient carvings and inscriptions show conquered enemies pictured under a victorious king's feet.

2The LORD will reach out from Zion with the scepter that shows your power. Rule right in the middle of your enemies.

2The LORD shall send the rod of thy strength out of Zion: rule thou in the midst of thine enemies.

Note"Rod" here is a scepter, the staff a king carried as the visible sign of his authority, not a stick for beating. Zion was the hill in Jerusalem where the king's palace and the temple stood; the name stands for the city as the seat of government.

3Your people will offer themselves freely on the day you go to battle. Dressed in holy splendor, out of the womb of the dawn, the dew of your youth belongs to you.

3Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power, in the beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning: thou hast the dew of thy youth.

NoteThe Hebrew of this verse is among the most obscure in the whole book, and ancient copies disagree with each other; translators differ over nearly every phrase. "Willing" means volunteering, men presenting themselves for military service without being conscripted. "The womb of the morning" is a picture of the dawn giving birth. "The dew of thy youth" may mean young troops appearing as thickly and freshly as dew at first light; some ancient manuscripts read instead "I have begotten you." The rendering keeps the ambiguity rather than choosing.

4The LORD has sworn an oath and will not change his mind: "You are a priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek."

4The LORD hath sworn, and will not repent, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek.

Note"Repent" in 1611 English meant simply to change one's mind or go back on a decision; it carries no sense of being sorry for wrongdoing. Melchizedek appears in Genesis 14 as king of Salem and priest of God Most High, who met Abraham returning from battle. He is notable because he held both offices at once: in Israel the priesthood belonged only to the descendants of Aaron, and kings were not priests. "After the order of" means "of the same kind as," not "following after him in time."

5The Lord is at your right hand. He will crush kings on the day of his anger.

5The Lord at thy right hand shall strike through kings in the day of his wrath.

Note"The Lord" here without small capitals is a third Hebrew word, *adonai*, a title for God meaning master. Note that the positions have swapped from verse 1: there the king sits at God's right hand, here God stands at the king's, the side on which a champion or protector took his place in battle.

6He will judge the nations. He will pile up the dead. He will crush the leaders of many lands.

6He shall judge among the heathen, he shall fill the places with the dead bodies; he shall wound the heads over many countries.

Note"Heathen" in the King James simply means the nations, the peoples other than Israel; it carries none of the modern sense of savage or uncivilised. "Fill the places" supplies a word the Hebrew does not have: it says only that he fills with corpses. The last line is ambiguous in Hebrew: it can mean he crushes the chief man over a wide territory, or the leaders of many lands; the word for "head" carries both the sense of a skull and of a ruler.

7He will drink from the stream beside the road. So he will lift up his head.

7He shall drink of the brook in the way: therefore shall he lift up the head.

NoteThe picture is of a pursuing warrior pausing only long enough to drink from a stream at the roadside before pressing on. "Lift up the head" is a set idiom for coming through victorious or vindicated, since a defeated or shamed man walked with his head down.