1 Do me right, O God, and plead my plea against a loveless nation; From the man of fraud and mischief rescue me. 2 For Thou art God my stronghold; why hast Thou cast me off? Why must I wearily go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? 3 Send out Thy light and Thy troth; let them lead me; Let them bring me to Thy holy hill and to Thy tabernacles, 4 That I may come in to the altar of God, To God, the gladness of my joy, And give Thee thanks with the harp, O God, my God. 5 Why art thou bowed down, my soul, and why moanest thou within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet give Him thanks, [As] the help of my countenance and my God.
The second book of the Psalter is characterised by the use of the Divine name "Elohim" instead of "Jehovah." It begins with a cluster of seven psalms (reckoning Psalms xlii. and xliii. as one) of which the superscription is most probably regarded as ascribing their authorship to "the sons of Korach." These were Levites, and (according to 1 Chron. ix. 19 _seq._) the office of keepers of the door of the sanctuary had been hereditary in their family from the time of Moses. Some of them were among the faithful adherents of David at Ziklag (1 Chron. xii. 6), and in the new model of worship inaugurated by him the Korachites were doorkeepers and musicians. They retained the former office in the second Temple (Neh. xi. 19). The ascription of authorship to a group is remarkable, and has led to the suggestion that the superscription does not specify the authors, but the persons for whose use the psalms in question were composed. The Hebrew would bear either meaning; but if the latter is adopted, all these psalms are anonymous. The same construction is found in Book I. in Psalms xxv.-xxviii., xxxv., xxxvii., where it is obviously the designation of authorship, and it is naturally taken to have the same force in these Korachite psalms. It has been ingeniously conjectured by Delitzsch that the Korachite Psalms originally formed a separate collection entitled "Songs of the Sons of Korach," and that this title afterwards passed over into the superscriptions when they were incorporated in the Psalter. It may have been so, but the supposition is unnecessary. It was not exactly literary fame which psalmists hungered for. The actual author, as one of a band of kinsmen who worked and sang together, would, not unnaturally, be content to sink his individuality and let his song go forth as that of the band. Clearly the superscriptions rested upon some tradition or knowledge, else defective information would not have been acknowledged as it is in this one; but some name would have been coined to fill the gap.
The two psalms (xlii., xliii.) are plainly one. The absence of a title for the second, the identity of tone throughout, the recurrence of several phrases, and especially of the refrain, put this beyond doubt. The separation, however, is old, since it is found in the LXX. It is useless to speculate on its origin.
There is much in the psalms which favours the hypothesis that the author was a Korachite companion of David's in his flight before Absalom; but the locality, described as that of the singer, does not entirely correspond to that of the king's retreat, and the description of the enemies is not easily capable of application in all points to his foes. The house of God is still standing; the poet has been there recently, and hopes soon to return and render praise. Therefore the psalm must be pre-exilic; and while there is no certainty attainable as to date, it may at least be said that the circumstances of the singer present more points of contact with those of the supposed Korachite follower of David's fortunes on the uplands across Jordan than with those of any other of the imaginary persons to whom modern criticism has assigned the poem. Whoever wrote it has given immortal form to the longings of the soul after God. He has fixed for ever and made melodious a sigh.