Psalms 3: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

The speaker tells the LORD how many enemies have risen against him, including people who say God will not rescue him. He answers that the LORD is his shield, that he calls out and is answered from God's holy mountain, and that he can sleep and wake safely because the LORD holds him up. He then asks God to rise up and save him, pointing to enemies God has struck, and ends by saying that rescue belongs to the LORD and asking for God's blessing on God's people.

Claim by Claim

1. 3:1
   • The speaker addresses the LORD.
   • The speaker says that those who trouble him have become many.
   • The speaker says that many rise up against him.
2. 3:2
   • Many say concerning the speaker's life that there is no deliverance for him in God.
   • The word Selah stands at the end of the verse.
3. 3:3
   • The speaker says that the LORD is a shield for him, the word carrying the sense of a shield surrounding him.
   • The speaker says that the LORD is his glory.
   • The speaker says that the LORD is the one who lifts up his head.
4. 3:4
   • The speaker cries out to the LORD with his voice.
   • The LORD answers the speaker from his holy mountain.
   • The word Selah stands at the end of the verse.
5. 3:5
   • The speaker lay down and slept.
   • The speaker awoke.
   • The reason the speaker awoke is that the LORD sustains him.
6. 3:6
   • The speaker says he will not be afraid.
   • What he will not fear is ten thousands of people.
   • Those people have set themselves against him on every side.
7. 3:7
   • The speaker asks the LORD to arise.
   • The speaker asks his God to save him.
   • The speaker says God has struck all his enemies on the jaw.
   • The speaker says God has broken the teeth of the wicked.
8. 3:8
   • Salvation belongs to the LORD.
   • The speaker says God's blessing is upon God's people; the wording is ambiguous between a statement that it is so and a wish that it be so.
   • The word Selah stands at the end of the verse.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

3:1

The King James says "how are they increased that trouble me," which means the number of his enemies keeps growing. This song was written by David when his own son Absalom turned an army against him.

3:2

"Selah" is a Hebrew word left untranslated because nobody knows what it means. It appears seventy-one times in the Psalms and almost nowhere else, and is generally taken to be a direction to the musicians or singers (a pause, a swell, an instrumental break), rather than part of what is being said.

3:3

Three images in a row. A "shield" here is the large body-length kind, and the Hebrew phrase suggests protection on every side rather than in front only. "My glory" means the speaker's honor or standing in other people's eyes, the thing his enemies in verse 2 are trying to strip from him. And to lift someone's head was a set phrase for restoring them: a lowered head meant shame, grief, or defeat, so raising it meant being publicly cleared and given back one's dignity.

3:4

The "holy mountain" is Mount Zion in Jerusalem, the hill where the temple stood and where God was understood to be present among his people. The point is that the answer comes from a specific known place, not from the sky in general.

3:5

Sleeping sounds ordinary, but this is the point of the verse. A man hunted by an army would lie awake all night. Sleeping and waking again meant he was safe.

3:6

The Hebrew word is "myriads", ten thousands. It was the largest round number in ordinary use, and like "millions" in English it usually meant an uncountable crowd rather than a headcount.

3:7

To strike someone on the jaw was a public humiliation, the insult of a superior to an inferior, not primarily an act of injury. Breaking the teeth is the image of a predator disarmed: the animal is still there but can no longer bite. The Hebrew verbs are ambiguous and can be read either as statements about what God has already done or as a continuation of the request, "strike them, break their teeth." Translators are divided; the rendering here takes the first reading.

3:8

"Salvation" translates a Hebrew word meaning rescue or victory, being pulled out of a concrete danger, here enemies in arms. It does not carry the narrower afterlife sense the English word has acquired. The last line shifts from the single speaker to the whole people, and the Hebrew can be read either as a statement ("your blessing is on your people") or as a wish ("may your blessing be on your people").