Context No. 4262 of 4322 · Psalms

Psalms 58:1-11: in context

1Do you indeed speak righteousness, silent ones? Do you judge blamelessly, you sons of men? 2No, in your heart you plot injustice. You measure out the violence of your hands on the earth. 3The wicked go astray from the womb. They are wayward as soon as they are born, speaking lies. 4Their poison is like the poison of a snake, like a deaf cobra that stops its ear, 5which doesn’t listen to the voice of charmers, no matter how skillful the charmer may be. 6Break their teeth, God, in their mouth. Break out the great teeth of the young lions, LORD. 7Let them vanish like water that flows away. When they draw the bow, let their arrows be made blunt. 8Let them be like a snail which melts and passes away, like the stillborn child, who has not seen the sun. 9Before your pots can feel the heat of the thorns, he will sweep away the green and the burning alike. 10The righteous shall rejoice when he sees the vengeance. He shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked, 11so that men shall say, “Most certainly there is a reward for the righteous. Most certainly there is a God who judges the earth.”

This is a hard psalm, a cry against corrupt judges and violent, wicked people who plot injustice and spread their poison. The psalmist's outrage is raw; he calls on God in vivid, even shocking terms to break the strength of the wicked and bring their evil to nothing. And it ends with a confident conclusion: surely there is a reward for the righteous; surely there is a God who judges the earth.

What stands out, beneath the fierce language, is what the psalmist actually does with his anger at injustice. He does not take vengeance into his own hands. He turns his outrage over to God, calling on God to act as judge, and rests in the conviction that God will finally set things right. His confidence is not in his own retaliation but in the God who judges the earth.

Such outrage can be right; wickedness and corruption should grieve and anger us. But the psalm shows what to do with it: not to nurse private vengeance or take justice into our own hands, but to bring our outrage to God, entrusting judgment to the one who judges rightly. Vengeance belongs to God, not to us. There is a God who judges the earth, and we can leave the settling of accounts in his righteous hands.

When I am angered by injustice and evil, do I entrust judgment to God who judges the earth rightly, bringing my outrage to him rather than taking vengeance into my own hands, resting in the conviction that he will finally set all things right?

Sources

Psalm 58:11: "Men shall say, Most certainly there is a reward for the righteous. Most certainly there is a God who judges the earth."
Psalm 58:2: "No, in your heart you plot injustice. You measure out the violence of your hands on the earth."
Romans 12:19: "Don't seek revenge yourselves, beloved, but give place to God's wrath. For it is written, Vengeance belongs to me; I will repay, says the Lord."