Introduction

TITLE.—A Psalm of Asaph.—This is the first of the Psalms of Asaph, but whether it was the production of that eminent musician, or merely dedicated to him, we cannot tell. The titles of twelve Psalms bear his name, but it could not in all of them be meant to ascribe their authorship to him, for several of these Psalms are of too late a date to have been composed by the same writer as the others. There was an Asaph in David’s time, who was one of David’s chief musicians, and his family appear to have continued long after in their hereditary office of temple musicians. An Asaph is mentioned as a recorder or secretary in the days of Hezekiah (2 Kings xviii. 18), and another was keeper of the royal forests under Artaxerxes. That Asaph did most certainly write some of the Psalms is clear from 2 Chron. xxix. 30, where it is recorded that the Levites were commanded to “sing praises unto the Lord with the words of David, and of Asaph the seer,” but that other Asaphic Psalms were not of his composition, but were only committed to his care as a musician, is equally certain from 1 Chron. xvi. 7, where David is said to have delivered a Psalm into the hand of Asaph and his brethren. It matters little to us whether he wrote or sang, for poet and musician are near akin, and if one composes words and another sets them to music, they rejoice together before the Lord.

DIVISIONS.—The Lord is represented as summoning the whole earth to hear his declaration, 1-6; he then declares the nature of the worship which he accepts, 7-15, accuses the ungodly of breaches of the precepts of the second table, 16-21, and closes the court with a word of threatening, 22, and a direction of grace, 23.