Psa 10:1-2 | KD | STEP | This Psalm and Ps 33 are the only ones that are anonymous in the First book of the Psalms. But Ps 10 has something peculiar about it. The lxx gives it with Ps 9 as one Psalm, and not without a certain amount of warrant for so doing. Both are laid out in tetrastichs; only in the middle portion of Ps 10 some three line strophes are mixed with the four line. And assuming that the ק-strophe, with which Ps 9 closes, stands in the place of a כ-strophe which one would look for after the י-strophe, then Ps 10, beginning with ל, continues the order of the letters. At any rate it begins in the middle of the alphabet, whereas Ps 9 begins at the beginning. It is true the ל-strophe is then followed by strophes without the letters that come next in order; but their number exactly corresponds to the letters between ל and ק, ר, שׁ, ת with which the last four strophes of the Psalm begin, viz., six, corresponding to the letters מ, נ, ס, ע, פ, צ, which are not introduced acrostically. In addition to this it is to be remarked that Ps 9 and are most intimately related to one another by the occurrence of rare expressions, as לעתּות בצּרה and דּך; by the use of words in the same sense, as אנושׁ and גּוים; by striking thoughts, as “Jahve doth not forget” and “Arise;” and by similarities of style, as the use of the oratio directa instead of obliqua , Ps 9:21; Psa 10:13. And yet it is impossible that the two Psalms should be only one. Notwithstanding all their community of character they are also radically different. Ps 9 is a thanksgiving Psalm, Ps 10 is a supplicatory Psalm. In the latter the personality of the psalmist, which is prominent in the former, keeps entirely in the background. The enemies whose defeat Ps 9 celebrates with thanksgiving and towards whose final removal it looks forward are גּוים, therefore foreign foes; whereas in Ps 10 apostates and persecutors of his own nation stand in the foreground, and the גוים are only mentioned in the last two strophes. In their form also the two Psalms differ insofar as Ps 10 has no musical mark defining its use, and the tetrastich strophe structure of Ps 9, as we have already observed, is not carried out with the same consistency in Ps 10. And is anything really wanting to the perfect unity of Ps 9? If it is connected with Ps 10 and they are read together uno tenore , then the latter becomes a tail-piece which disfigures the whole. There are only two things possible: Ps 10 is a pendant to Ps 9 composed either by David himself, or by some other poet, and closely allied to it by its continuance of the alphabetical order. But the possibility of the latter becomes very slight when we consider that Ps 10 is not inferior to Ps 9 in the antiquity of the language and the characteristic nature of the thoughts. Accordingly the mutual coincidences point to the same author, and the two Psalms must be regarded as “two co-ordinate halves of one whole, which make a higher unity” (Hitz.). That hard, dull, and tersely laconic language of deep-seated indignation at moral abominations for which the language has, as it were, no one word, we detect also elsewhere in some Psalms of David and of his time, those Psalms, which we are accustomed to designate as Psalms written in the indignant style ( in grollendem Stil ).

‏ Psalms 10:1-2

Plaintive and Supplicatory Prayer under the Pressure of Heathenish Foes at Home and Abroad

This Psalm and Ps 33 are the only ones that are anonymous in the First book of the Psalms. But Ps 10 has something peculiar about it. The lxx gives it with Ps 9 as one Psalm, and not without a certain amount of warrant for so doing. Both are laid out in tetrastichs; only in the middle portion of Ps 10 some three line strophes are mixed with the four line. And assuming that the ק-strophe, with which Ps 9 closes, stands in the place of a כ-strophe which one would look for after the י-strophe, then Ps 10, beginning with ל, continues the order of the letters. At any rate it begins in the middle of the alphabet, whereas Ps 9 begins at the beginning. It is true the ל-strophe is then followed by strophes without the letters that come next in order; but their number exactly corresponds to the letters between ל and ק, ר, שׁ, ת with which the last four strophes of the Psalm begin, viz., six, corresponding to the letters מ, נ, ס, ע, פ, צ, which are not introduced acrostically. In addition to this it is to be remarked that Ps 9 and Psa 10:1 are most intimately related to one another by the occurrence of rare expressions, as לעתּות בצּרה and דּך; by the use of words in the same sense, as אנושׁ and גּוים; by striking thoughts, as “Jahve doth not forget” and “Arise;” and by similarities of style, as the use of the oratio directa instead of obliqua, Ps 9:21; Psa 10:13. And yet it is impossible that the two Psalms should be only one. Notwithstanding all their community of character they are also radically different. Ps 9 is a thanksgiving Psalm, Ps 10 is a supplicatory Psalm. In the latter the personality of the psalmist, which is prominent in the former, keeps entirely in the background. The enemies whose defeat Ps 9 celebrates with thanksgiving and towards whose final removal it looks forward are גּוים, therefore foreign foes; whereas in Ps 10 apostates and persecutors of his own nation stand in the foreground, and the גוים are only mentioned in the last two strophes. In their form also the two Psalms differ insofar as Ps 10 has no musical mark defining its use, and the tetrastich strophe structure of Ps 9, as we have already observed, is not carried out with the same consistency in Ps 10. And is anything really wanting to the perfect unity of Ps 9? If it is connected with Ps 10 and they are read together uno tenore, then the latter becomes a tail-piece which disfigures the whole. There are only two things possible: Ps 10 is a pendant to Ps 9 composed either by David himself, or by some other poet, and closely allied to it by its continuance of the alphabetical order. But the possibility of the latter becomes very slight when we consider that Ps 10 is not inferior to Ps 9 in the antiquity of the language and the characteristic nature of the thoughts. Accordingly the mutual coincidences point to the same author, and the two Psalms must be regarded as “two co-ordinate halves of one whole, which make a higher unity” (Hitz.). That hard, dull, and tersely laconic language of deep-seated indignation at moral abominations for which the language has, as it were, no one word, we detect also elsewhere in some Psalms of David and of his time, those Psalms, which we are accustomed to designate as Psalms written in the indignant style (in grollendem Stil). Psa 10:1-2

The Psalm opens with the plaintive inquiry, why Jahve tarries in the deliverance of His oppressed people. It is not a complaining murmuring at the delay that is expressed by the question, but an ardent desire that God may not delay to act as it becomes His nature and His promise. למּה, which belongs to both members of the sentence, has the accent on the ultima, as e.g., before עזבתּני in Psa 22:2, and before הרעתה in Exo 5:22, in order that neither of the two gutturals, pointed with a, should be lost to the ear in rapid speaking (vid., on Psa 3:8, and Luzzatto on Isa 11:2, נחה עליו). ^{▼▼According to the Masora למּה without Dag. is always Milra with the single exception of Job 7:20, and ימּה with Dag. is Milel; but, when the following closely connected word begins with one of the letters אהע it becomes Milra, with five exceptions, viz., Psa 49:6; 1Sa 28:15; 2Sa 14:31 (three instances in which the guttural of the second word has the vowel i), and 2Sa 2:22, and Jer 15:18. In the Babylonian system of pointing, למה is always written without Dag. and with the accent on the penultimate, vid., Pinsker, Einleitung in das Babylonish-hebräishce Punktationssystem, S. 182-184.}

For according to the primitive pronunciation (even before the Masoretic) it is to be read: lam h Adonaj; so that consequently ה and א are coincident. The poet asks why in the present hopeless condition of affairs (on בצּרה vid., on Psa 9:10) Jahve stands in the distance (בּרחוק, only here, instead of מרחוק), as an idle spectator, and why does He cover (תּעלּים with orthophonic Dagesh, in order that it may not be pronounced תּעלים), viz., His eyes, so as not to see the desperate condition of His people, or also His ears (Lam 3:56) so as not to hear their supplication. For by the insolent treatment of the ungodly the poor burns with fear (Ges., Stier, Hupf.), not vexation (Hengst.). The assault is a πύρωσις, 1Pe 4:12. The verb דּלק which calls to mind דּלּקת, πυρετός, is perhaps chosen with reference to the heat of feeling under oppression, which is the result of the persecution, of the (בּו) דּלק אחריו of the ungodly. There is no harshness in the transition from the singular to the plural, because עני and רשׁע are individualising designations of two different classes of men. The subject to יתּפשׁוּ is the עניּים, and the subject to חשׁבוּ is the רשׁעים. The futures describe what usually takes place. Those who, apart from this, are afflicted are held ensnared in the crafty and malicious devices which the ungodly have contrived and plotted against them, without being able to disentangle themselves. The punctuation, which places Tarcha by זוּ, mistakes the relative and interprets it: “in the plots there, which they have devised.”