Deeper Commentary
Psa 132:1
I have discussed on 1 Sam. 4:3 how there was always a tendency to use the ark as a talisman; and God was against that. The religious eclipsed the spiritual as regards the ark, several times in Israel's history. And I suggest David was not immune to this. He brings the ark to Zion without any Divine command to do so and without consultation with Him [David earlier asks God for guidance about his decisions in 2 Sam. 5, but not in the context of the ark]; and there was the disaster with Uzzah the first time he attempted it. This is to be compared to Israel's defeat when they took the ark with them into battle against the Philistines in the time of Eli. David clearly also veered towards seeing the ark as a talisman. It was almost as if he wanted to underwrite his own enthronement in Jerusalem by having Yahweh enthroned there also over the ark. Likewise David's desire to permanently locate the ark in a physical temple in Jerusalem can be seen as a desire to legitimate the enthronement of his dynasty in that city. As Adele Berlin noted, "temple-building is crucial to the dynastic promise. The link between the two is common in ancient Near Eastern temple-building literature, where the builder of the temple receives a divine blessing for dynastic stability". God's response was that He needed no temple, but He would build David's "house" or dynasty. But on the other hand, David often 'gets it' about the lack of need for the ark's physical presence. His psalms speak of how he lived permanently beneath the shadow of the cherubic wings, as if he lived on the mercy seat, on the sprinkled blood. In 2 Sam. 15:24-29 he flees from Absalom, and refuses the suggestion he take the ark with him. But, so true to real spiritual life, he also had tendencies towards needing the physical and religious when it came to the ark. Just as we pine for the religious at times, whilst also rejoicing in God's presence in our hearts quite regardless of religious context. David wrote at least two Psalms about bringing the ark to Zion, Ps. 68 and Ps. 132. Ps. 68 clearly expects God to bring victory to Israel because of the ark's presence in Zion, and Ps. 132 seems to reason that once the ark is in Zion it will be there forever. This wasn't to be the case. But we see in David's reasoning that he still considered the ark as some kind of physical guarantee of God's presence, and the legitimization of his own enthronement in Jerusalem- and that of his dynasty after him, as he imagined. He was proven wrong- the ark disappeared, his dynasty was cut off, Jerusalem and the temple were destroyed. But God's spiritual presence in human hearts continued and became the stronger after these things. We marvel at how God works through human weakness to achieve His wider purposes.
A Song of Ascents-
This mutuality between God and man is brought out by the structure of
several of the Psalms, in which God and David are shown to be involved in
a dynamic, two way relationship. Consider Bullinger's analysis of Ps. 132:
A (vv 1,2) David swears to God
B (3-5) What David sware
C (6,7) Search for a dwelling place
D (8) Prayer to enter into rest
E (9) Prayer for priests
F (9) Prayer for saints
G (10) Prayer for Messiah
This was responded to by God:
A1 (v 11) God swears to David
B1 (11,12) What God sware
C1 (13) Designation of the dwelling place
D1 (14,15) Answer to prayer in D
E1 (16) Answer to prayer in E
F1 (16) Answer to prayer in F
G1 (17, 18) Answer to prayer in G.
Yahweh, remember David and all his affliction-
Ps.
132, which was written after David’s time (:8,10), includes a prayer to God
to reward David for all his afflictions (:1). Even after a man’s death,
faithful men prayed for his salvation; so it seems. This needs some
reflecting upon as to its implications. 2 Tim. 1:16 records Paul praying
that the Lord would
give mercy to the house of
Onesiphorus; yet the same phrase is used in v. 18 about receiving mercy at
judgment day.
The "afflictions" of David are presented as a pattern for those of the exiles (s.w. Ps. 107:17). They too denied their sin initially and struggled to accept its consequences; but David's path of repentance and restoration was to be theirs. But for the most part they refused to follow this.
The first part of the Psalm recalls David's otherwise unrecorded
vow to bring the ark to Zion and build a temple for it. This is followed
by a quotation of the promises to David in 2 Sam. 7 which followed the
bringing of the ark to Zion in 2 Sam. 6. But then there is interpretation
added by the subsequent author or user of the Psalm- therefore, it is
reasoned, God should establish the seed of David as king and make Zion and
the temple eternal. Because that was what David wanted. But all this
misses how the promises to David were a recalibration or even criticism of
David's attitude. God didn't want a physical temple. He would make David's
"house" eternal through the promised seed of David, Messiah. The kingly
dynasty of David was overturned, the crown was removed, "until He come
whose right it is", the Lord Jesus (Ez. 21:25-27). Despite being given the
promises of 2 Sam. 7, of unconditional grace to David, David slipped back
to the literal and religious, wanting still to ensure a temple was built
by his immediate son, Solomon. But that temple was destroyed. The author
of this Psalm continues David's fantasy for an eternal literal "Zion" and
literal dynasty lasting for ever, wrongly conflating [as David did] the
ark with the temple. Thus Solomon's dedication of the temple in 2 Chron.
6:41,42 is very similar to the bringing of the ark to Zion in 1 Chron. 16,
and is almost a quotation of Ps. 132:8-10 about bringing the ark to Zion.
At the time David brought the ark to Zion, he clearly had in mind building
a permanent house for it there. All this missed the point that this was
not to be the true interpretation, because God had explained that the
"house" was to be of people, and the seed of David who would reign
eternally would be Messiah, His son and David's son.
Psa 132:2
how he swore to Yahweh, and vowed to the Mighty One of Jacob-
The idea is that despite his afflictions (:1), David was not so
swamped by them that he had no thought for the work of God's house. And in
this he was the pattern for the exiles. David was self aware that his
afflictions had militated against his temple project, but he can conclude
in 1 Chron. 22:14: "Behold, in my affliction I have prepared for the house
of Yahweh".
"The mighty one of Jacob" is a phrase used to the exiles in Is. 49:26; 60:16.
Psa 132:3
Surely I will not come under the roof of my house, nor go up into my
bed-
A case can be made that the psalm is not simply David being
remembered and quoted; but David himself speaking. In this case, he would
be asking for God to accept Solomon as the Messianic seed (:10,17) for the
sake of David's hard work for the temple. But such things cannot be
predicated upon the works of another. We see here David labouring under
misplaced ideals. He was fixated upon his son Solomon becoming the
Messianic seed, and he thought that his own works could somehow bring this
about. He [and the exiles] ought to have focused more upon the
promises to Abraham than those to himself.
And yet we can discern here an allusion to the words of David's faithful friend Uriah whom he effectively murdered. He refused to go up to his bed nor come under the roof of his own house because he preferred identity with God's suffering people, His "house" (2 Sam. 11:11). David later remembered these words, and alludes to them when he thinks of arranging the building of the temple. The words of Uriah haunted him, and he commendably vows to follow his noble example. In this we see David's humility and repentance.
But there is another take on the connection with Ps. 132. We note
that Uriah mentions that the ark, along with David's troops, is in a tent
and not in a house, and so Uriah will not go down to his house (2 Sam.
11:11). This is clearly to be connected with David's vow that "I will not
enter my house or get into my bed; I will not give sleep to my eyes or
slumber to my eyelids' until I find a place for the Lord, a dwelling place
for the mighty one of Jacob" (Ps. 132:3-5). The ark was still in a tent;
and David was in his house, he had got into his bed- whilst the ark was
still in a tent. Uriah's mention of the ark surely alludes to this
situation. David's sin gives the lie to his apparent passion for the ark.
God had responded to his "vow" by telling David that God didn't want this.
Instead, God would build him an eternal family through his Messianic Son,
and he would [by implication] be resurrected to witness this. But instead
of rejoicing in that, instead David was just involving himself in
opportunistic sex and thus showing no regard for the great promises made
about his family. For David was hardly paying any attention to his family
and seed by casually sleeping with another man's wife and getting her
pregnant. In this we see the progression of theme in 2 Samuel. David's
refusal to accept God's grace in the covenant made with him led him to
still want to build a temple, and this lack of focus upon the grace to be
shown to his own "house" or family led him to the sin with Bathsheba.
Psa 132:4
I will not give sleep to my eyes, or slumber to my eyelids-
This appears to be a studied disregard for the revelation of Ps.
127:2, which urges David and his seed not to stay up late planning to
build a physical temple, but to accept sleep from God and trust Him to
build him a house in the sense of a Messianic seed and family /
kingdom.
Psa 132:5
until I find out a place for Yahweh, a dwelling for the Mighty One
of Jacob-
In the context of the exiles, the allusion may be to Jer. 29:14,
which says that the repentant exiles would "find" the "place" (s.w.) of
Yahweh in their return to their God and to Zion. Earlier whilst on the run
from Saul, David longed to be in the "place... and dwelling" of Yahweh, at
the sanctuary operated by Samuel (s.w. Ps. 26:8). There was no temple, but
Yahweh still had a place and dwelling on earth. But now later in Ps. 132:5
David seems to feel that Yahweh needed a more grandiose "place...
dwelling", otherwise He would have no dwelling place. Over the years, he
had come to focus more upon the physical and external rather than upon the
essential and the spiritual. This is a tendency for all of us. "Dwelling"
is the usual word for "tabernacle". Yahweh had a dwelling place, in the
tabernacle. But David seems to think that this wasn't quite enough, and
there was the need for him to build some more physical structure for His
presence. This is a far cry from the younger David in the wilderness, who
felt that he was in the presence of Yahweh, right under His cherubic
wings, although far from the physical sanctuary.
Psa 132:6
Behold, we heard of it in Ephrathah-
This clearly alludes to David's bringing of the ark to Zion. He
protests that this shows his concern for the things of the sanctuary, and
he sees this as coming to fuller term in his desire to build a temple and
see his son enthroned as a king-priest in Zion. "Ephrathah" was another
name for David's home town of Bethlehem (Gen. 35:19; 48:7; Ruth
4:11). He may be saying that from his earliest boyhood days he had heard
of the ark and had dreams for glorifying it, and he found it much later in
Kirjath Jearim, "city of forests", or "Jaar".
We found it in the field of Jaar-
"Jaar" is "forests". It could be argued that "Ephrathah" referred not
only to Bethlehem, but was also the name for the area around
Kirjath-jearim, "city of forests". The firstborn son of Caleb’s wife
Ephrath [a form of "Ephrathah"] was Hur (1 Chron. 2:19), who is called
‘the father’ of Bethlehem (1 Chron. 4:4). Hur’s son Shobal was ‘the
father’ of Kirjath-jearim, and his son Salma the ‘father’ of Bethlehem (1
Chron. 2:50,51). It was from Kirjath-jearim that David brought up the ark
to Zion (1 Sam. 7:1,2; 1 Chron. 13:5,6).
We note David omits all the problems he had with the transport of the ark to Zion, the slaying of Uzzah, his own temporary disillusion with the whole project. In the bigger picture we look back upon our lives and see how our overall intention to serve God was blessed and all worked out- in the bigger picture and broader perspective.
Psa 132:7
We will go into His dwelling place. We will worship at His
footstool-
This initially referred to David's invitation to the people to come up to
Zion and worship once he had moved the ark there. But it becomes used as
an invitation for the exiles to return to Zion.
The ark is called both the throne of God and also His footstool (Ps. 94:5;
132:7,8; 1 Chron. 28:2). Above or sitting upon the cherubim, the pagan
mind expected to see Israel's God. But there was (to their eyes) an empty
throne. Yahweh had to be believed in by faith. And His supreme
manifestation was through the blood of sacrifice. Cassuto gives evidence
that the Egyptians and Hittites placed their covenant contracts in a box
beneath the throne of their gods; and the tables of the covenant were
likewise placed beneath the throne of Yahweh. This similarity begged the
comparison yet stronger- Israel's God was not seated there. He
had to be believed in by faith. Such a concept of faith in an invisible
god was quite foreign to the pagan mind; and yet the whole tabernacle plan
was designed to have enough points of contact with the pagan tabernacles
in order to elicit this point in very powerful form: the one true God is
invisible and must be believed in.
Psa 132:8
Arise, Yahweh, into Your resting place; You, and the ark of Your
strength-
In :14 God apparently confirms this; but we never know if this is
David as it were putting words in God's mouth:
"this is My rest for ever; here will I dwell" (:14). And there is indeed a
connection between the ark and God's resting place:
- Num. 10:33 "The ark of the covenant of the
Lord went before them... to search out a resting place"
- 1 Chron. 28:2 "An house of rest for the ark"
However, the real resting place of God's Name is not in the literal ark, but in the hearts of people humble to God's Word.
The exiles were told: "Where is the house that you build unto Me? and
where is the place of My rest?... to this man will I look, even to him
that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembles at My word" (Is.
66:1,2).
It seems David thought that by bringing the physical ark to Zion, he
was somehow establishing the Messianic Kingdom. But God is far beyond such
external symbols of spirituality. Mark Vincent discerns how David thought that the bringing of the ark to
Zion could have been its’ final homecoming- although Solomon his son
let everything down in reality: “[“Arise O Lord into thy rest” in Ps.
132:8 alludes to “Rise up, O Lord” in Num. 10:35]… The words which Moses
had to utter each time the ark journeyed through the wilderness would no
longer be needed, for the ark had at last reached its final destination.
This is why the Psalm says “Arise O Lord into
thy rest”. David and his people hoped that the ark
had come here for ever, and that God would dwell among and reign over His
people for eternity. Alas, because of the wickedness of Israel, this was
not to be” (Exploring The Psalms , Birmingham: CMPA, 2001, p.
144).
Psa 132:9
Let Your priests be clothed with righteousness, let Your saints
shout for joy!-
The priests clothed with righteousness in Ps. 132:9 parallels
them being clothed with salvation in Ps. 132:16. This reflects the Pauline
teaching that salvation is brought about by being counted righteous by
God's grace. And that is the basis for the joy of the saints. Ps. 24:5,
like Ps. 132, is also in the context of the ark coming to Zion, and the
same point is made- those who have salvation have received the gift of
righteousness from God.
This is the language of God's Kingdom upon earth (Ps. 149:5). It was God who would make this happen (:16), rather than David's manipulation of the physical ark, and getting the people to shout for joy. But as discussed on Ps. 132:8, David mistakenly thought that merely bringing the ark to Zion meant this would come about.
Solomon prayed to God in the terms and language of his father (2 Chron. 6:41,42 cp. Ps. 132:1,8,9). He was familiar with his father’s Psalms- after all, all Israel sung them. It must have been like being the son of a world-famous singer. The words were even in Solomon’s subconscious it seems, for when he tells his son “Give not sleep to thine eyes nor slumber to thine eyelids” (Prov. 6:4) he is alluding unconsciously, it seems (in that it is out of context) to David’s promise not to give sleep to his eyes until he had found a resting place for the ark (Ps. 132:4).
Psa 132:10
For Your servant David’s sake, don’t turn away the face of Your
anointed one-
Whoever prayed Ps. 132:10 asked to be heard “for Your servant David’s
sake”- he or she believed that God would remember David and for
his sake respond favourably [and how much more powerful is prayer
uttered for the sake of the Son of God!].
Psa 132:11
Yahweh has sworn to David in truth, He will not turn from it: I
will set the fruit of your body on your throne-
This and the following verses could be extra revelation from God
confirming David's understanding of the promises made to him in 2 Sam. 7.
But they could also be David's speculations about what God intended rather
than actual replication of some extra Divine revelation. For example,
unlike the covenant with Abraham, God didn't "swear" in the sense of
confirming those promises with an oath. Although Ps. 89:3,39,45 could be
taken as saying that He did in fact do so, although unrecorded in 2 Sam.
7. David clearly has the view that his immediate son Solomon was to be the
fulfilment of the promises of a Messianic seed reigning eternally on his
throne. He indulges this speculation in Ps. 72, but it was not to
ultimately come about in Solomon.
Psa 132:12
If your children will keep My covenant, My testimony that I will
teach them, their children also will sit on your throne forever-
This repeats the conditional element in the promises to David, which
Solomon failed to fulfil. But the covenant with David is here expanded
into "My testimony that I will teach them", information not contained in
the text of the promises to David. Those promises originally focused upon
one individual, whom the New Testament interprets as the Lord Jesus. But
David here in Ps. 89:30; 132:12 and Solomon in 1 Kings 8:25 chose to
understand the "seed" as the Davidic dynasty down the generations. This
loss of focus upon the future Lord Jesus was what led David and Solomon to
focus instead upon their own dynasty, rather than upon the future
individual son of David who would reign eternally upon David's throne. His
personal immortality came to be interpreted as the eternal
continuance of the Davidic dynasty as kings of Israel throughout future
generations.
Psa 132:13
For Yahweh has chosen Zion, He has desired it for His habitation-
God's promise was that the Messianic seed would reign eternally upon
David's throne in Jerusalem. But David appears to interpret this as
meaning that God had some geographic preference for Zion and would desire
to eternally live there. But the New Testament emphasizes that He has no
such concept of sacred space. His dwelling is in the hearts of
individuals. It seems to me that David's personal fondness for the hill of
Zion was transferred by him onto God. See on Ps. 78:67. This is not to say
that Zion has no significance for God; in the restored Kingdom, He will
"choose Jerusalem again" (Zech. 2:12), although "Jerusalem" there is
paralleled with "Judah". It is the people of Jerusalem and Judah in whom
He shall dwell, rather than having some more intense metaphysical
'manifestation' on one geographical spot rather than on any other.
Psa 132:14
This is my resting place forever. Here I will live, for I have
desired it-
As discussed on :13, it is hard to know whether these words are
Yahweh's direct revelation to David, or his interpretation of what he
thought the promises to him implied. Zion was not God's eternal resting
place at that time; for Ezekiel sees the shekinah glory removing from Zion
and going into exile. It seems to me that David's personal fondness for
the hill of Zion was transferred by him onto God. The word for "desire" is
always used of human desire, never of God; it is the word used of David's
desire to drink water from the well in Bethlehem (2 Sam. 23:15). Solomon
was to be a "man of rest" (s.w. "resting place"; 1 Chron. 22:9). David
imagined therefore that Solomon was to be the king at the time of this
eternal "resting place". But he seems to be confusing his desires for his
son's glory with God's intentions in His own Son the Lord Jesus.
Psa 132:15
I will abundantly bless her provision-
"Bless her provision" is a phrase only used elsewhere about the
blessing of Isaac given to his sons for their hunting venison /
provision (Gen. 27:7,19,25,30,31,33). The phrase is used six times in Gen.
27. But that blessing of Isaac was later revealed not to be that
significant; it was not the Messianic blessing of the true seed of
Abraham. And Jacob effectively gives it back to Esau as unnecessary for
him (see on Gen. 33:11). So again we get the hint that David is talking in
very material terms.
I will satisfy her poor with bread-
Solomon speaks often of how hard work will "satisfy with
bread" (Prov. 12:11; 20:13; 28:19). David his father uses the phrase in
the context of saying that being 'satisfied with bread' is part of God's
gracious blessing (Ps. 132:15). We see here how Solomon became focused
upon works, rather than faith in the blessings which come from Divine
grace. And yet he uses the words his father had used; but he interprets
them as justification of works rather than acceptance of grace.
The ending of poverty meant a time when Israel were obedient to the covenant (Dt. 15:4). But they weren't, and the returning exiles experienced famine (Hag. 1:6). The fulfilment is therefore reapplied to the things of the Lord Jesus.
Psa 132:16
Her priests I will also clothe with salvation, her holy people
will shout aloud for joy-
This is the language of God's Kingdom upon earth (Ps. 149:5). It was
God who would make this happen, rather than David's manipulation of the
physical ark (:8,9). But as discussed on :8, David mistakenly thought that
merely bringing the ark to Zion meant this would come about. The exiles
could have fulfilled this in a restored kingdom (Is. 61:10); but most
preferred to remain in exile, and those who did return were impenitent and
didn't build nor operate the temple system as commanded in Ez. 40-48.
Although there was a special priesthood, it was clearly God's intention that all Israel should be like priests; they were to be a "Kingdom of priests" (Ex. 19:6). Israel were all “saints”, and yet saints and priests are paralleled in passages like Ps. 132:16. Israel in the wilderness had clothes which didn’t wear out- just as the Priestly clothes didn’t, and were handed down from generation to generation (so Ex. 29:29 implies).
Psa 132:17
There I will make the horn of David to bud. I have ordained a lamp
for my anointed-
David understood the Lord's anointed as his son Solomon, his horn who
would bud in Messianic glory. Hence David is specific that this budding
forth will be in Zion. He begins asking for this in :10, speaking of
Solomon as Yahweh's anointed. But now he assumes his prayer has been
heard, and this will indeed be the case. David is losing his focus upon
the Lord Jesus, the seed who would be his great horn and eternal light in
Zion. Lk. 1:69 defines the horn of David as the Lord Jesus; for Solomon
failed to be as David hoped. He was the "branch of righteousness" which
would "bud [AV "grow up"] unto David" (Jer. 33:15). In the context of the
exiles, this individual who would "bud" could have been Zerubbabel, who
could have rebuilt the temple as required for it to be filled with God's
glory (s.w. Zech. 6:12). But he too failed. The fulfilment has to be in
the Lord Jesus, the eternal lamp or light of the world. "Ordained a lamp"
is the phrase only elsewhere used for the ordering of the lamps upon the
candlestick (Ex. 40:4; Lev. 24:4). The idea is that this Messianic horn of
David was to reign as a king-priest amongst the candlestick of the holy
place; an image used in Rev. 1 of the Lord Jesus, as Solomon clearly
didn't fulfil this.
But a burning lamp is a metaphor for the preservation of the dynasty (Ps. 18:28; 1 Kings 11:36; 15:4; 2 Sam. 21:17). David's idea was that his dynasty would not end; but this didn't come about, for the Davidic line of rulers ended at the captivity. It was only to come true in the person of the Lord Jesus.
The account of bringing the ark to Zion is prefaced by the record of David's sons who were born in Jerusalem. But we read nothing further about them. This could all be read as part of David's attempt to establish his own dynasty in Zion, which God responded to in 2 Sam. 7 by saying that He would establish David's Kingdom in His own way, through David's seed, the Lord Jesus. Ps. 87:5 expresses David's misunderstanding that physical birth in Zion meant Yahweh's establishment: "Yes, of Zion it will be said, This one and that one was born in her; the Most High Himself will establish her". Likewise in Ps. 132:17 David puts words in God's mouth: "There [in Zion / Jerusalem] will I make the horn of David to bud". But the budding of David's horn was fulfilled by God in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, the great "son of David", rather than in David having many sons in Jerusalem. The promises of Divine establishment of David's dynasty through the Lord Jesus were therefore a corrective to David's thinking about establishing his dynasty in his own strength.
Psa 132:18
I will clothe his enemies with shame, but on himself, his crown
will be splendid-
This again assumes that Solomon is to reign in glory and his enemies
shamed. David reasons likewise in Ps. 72. These things were not fulfilled
in Solomon, ultimately, for he turned away. But the words are not untrue;
they come true in the Lord Jesus, although this was not the fulfilment
which David had in mind at the time. "Splendid" is the word usually
translated "blossom", continuing the figure of 'budding' in :17.
The word for "crown" is unusual in that it is also used of the high priest’s diadem (Ex. 29:6). The verb for "splendid" means also to sparkle or glitter, and is the word used of the glittering plate of gold bearing the inscription “Holiness to Yahweh” which the High Priest wore, called in Ex. 29:30, “the plate of the holy diadem”. The impression is that this king will be a priest-king, after the order of Melchizedek (cp. Jer. 30:21; Zech. 6:11-13).
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