PSALM 64

tongue for tongue, arrow for arrow, suddenly for suddenly [1]

1 Hear my voice, O God, in my complaint;		Preserve my life from dread of the enemy.
2 Hide me [2] from the secret counsel of evildoers,		From the tumult [3] of those who do iniquity,
3 Who have sharpened their tongue like a sword.		They aimed bitter speech as their arrow,
4 To shoot from concealment at the blameless;		Suddenly they shoot at him, and do not fear.
5 They hold fast to themselves an evil purpose;	They talk of laying snares secretly;		They say, “Who can see them?”
6 They devise injustices, saying,	“We are ready with a well-conceived plot”;		For the inward thought and the heart of a man are deep.

7 But God will shoot at them with an arrow;		Suddenly they will be wounded.[4]
8 Their tongue shall be their downfall;		all who see them shall recoil in horror; [5]
9 Then all men will fear,	And they will declare the work of God,		And will consider what He has done.
10 The righteous man will be glad in Yahweh	and will take refuge in Him;		And all the upright in heart will glory. [6]

[1] You won’t find many examples of rhyming words in biblical poetry but you will find “rhyming ideas.” The rhyming ideas of Psalm 64 fit well with God’s rhyming justice: life for life, eye for eye; tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise (Ex.21:23-25). Here in Psalm 64 the injustice of wicked men in vv.1-6 is paralleled by God’s justice in vv.7-10: tongue for tongue, arrow for arrow, suddenly for suddenly, fear for fear, etc.

[2] Other synonymous ideas with hiding include v.4 “concealment” and v.10 “take refuge.”

[3] There are similarities between Psalm 64 and Psalm 2. The tumult of 64:2 is found in the uproar of the nations in 2:1. Psalm 64 ends with a reference to the righteous taking refuge in Yahweh and Psalm 2 ends with, “How blessed are all who take refuge in Him!” Gerald Wilson in his commentary on the Psalms notes, “In Psalm 2, the arrogant confidence of the conspiring nations and kings runs hard against the strong rock of the laughing God enthroned in the heavens. In Psalm 64, the “perfect plan” and “cunning” plot of the evildoers are punctured and dismembered by God, who returns their own implements of destruction upon them” (NIV Application Commentary, 901).

[4] Biblical justice is an identity between sin and its punishment: “you reap what you sow” or “eye for an eye.” “The modern version would be “bumper for bumper, fender for fender”—don’t try to get two years’ free tuition added on to the insurance claim by some phony story about whiplash!” (Walter Kaiser, Hard Sayings of the Bible)

It is in the context of God’s perfect justice: tongue for tongue, arrow for arrow, suddenly for suddenly, fear for fear that we find the mystery of the Gospel of God’s grace. In the Gospel, our just God does not pay back His elect evil for evil, but pays back our evil with His grace (cf. Acts 2:23-24):

Romans 3:23-26 (NASB95)
23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
24 being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus;
25 whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed;
26 for the demonstration, I say, of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

[5] I’ve used the translation of the Jewish Publication Society here instead of the NASB95. This verse is only 7 words in the Hebrew and it is difficult to translate.

[6] Psalm 63 ends similarly with the mouth of the wicked being stopped and “Everyone who swears by Him will glory.”