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David stood as an iconic priest-king archetype, something of a hierophant, a figure who mediated the Divine on behalf of the people. Before all of that, he was first a musician. Psalm 35 was one of his many compositions, sung in festival worship and carried into the music of family and community life.
As a king, he didn’t have a royal pedigree or anything that made him deserve the job. It was his character, his heart, that God saw and wanted. David was described as a man after God’s own heart (1 Samuel 13:14). That heart showed up in how he conducted himself and led, in how he fought on the battlefield, and even in how he danced in a linen ephod in front of the Ark of the Covenant, and then led the people in sacrifices and food distribution afterwards.
As a young man, he faced a giant Philistine warrior that the entire Jewish army wouldn’t go near simply because he knew he could with his God, and maybe, in part, because he had already killed lions and bears with the same weapon before (1 Samuel 17:32–37, 1 Samuel 17:48–51).
David: A Life Scored by Conflict and Song
From the beginning, David had obstacles, battles, and an archenemy in Saul. After ascending the throne, there were internal political battles and Jewish heads rolled. After all of that, David had more drama and wars, made some mistakes, and carried all the responsibilities of governing as the second king over Israel, which had previously been a theocracy with judges and organized into twelve tribes (Judges 2:16–19).
David’s music seemed to be a fundamental part of him in a way that music isn’t for me. I can’t think or create that way, and a tune is something I can barely carry in a bucket. However, music, especially in the last few years, has taken on a whole different presence in my life. It can do a lot more for me now than it ever used to. Music has helped me through some things, and it feels more intimate and interesting to me now than before. Related to that and decreasing stimulation sources, I’ve also had to learn to be ok in silence more often because music can sometimes distract me.
What Music Reveals About Us
Worshipping, noticeably more with music, can do things I would have considered charismatic or even Pentecostal before, but it’s really just that after some CBT, IFS (Internal Family Systems), step work, journaling, or meditating, sometimes something hits just right in all of that and the chaos of life, that a bit of a mystical experience happens. They’re usually pretty emotional and raw. There’s been a lot of surprising body, or somatic, work done in the past few years. It wasn’t something I understood for a while, and my insecurities and pride needed a lot of work. PTSD can be a heavy cloud to crawl through.
Morning times became a foundational pillar, and it involves much of the above, usually in sweatpants, with a cup of coffee. Sometimes, after working through a bunch, a worship song will lay me flat. There are a few favorite go-tos now; Lord of All by Crowder and Rise Up Oh Deborah by John Gabriel Arends have broken through some dark, ugly stuff.
It feels similar to what I felt sometimes in corporate worship. It’s a lot more honest emotional confrontation, unwiring trauma, and decades of selfish habits. In other words, and to risk redundancy, mostly long-overdue emotional breakdowns, breaking past shame, somatic trauma work, and ego diminishment. Recently, worship has become more joyous than heavy.
Back to the point: in our times, we understand the importance of music, at least in part, from how it’s used in films to what the lyrics and mindsets of the artists we listen to are trying to convey. Francis Schaeffer’s work, his three books in Trilogy, was a pivotal part of my early Christian formation in Bible college, and then again on this side of recovery. He, like many others, noticed the influence and power of music over society. He noted that “the arts are the prophets of our age.” If you want to see what’s going on in a culture, look at its music. In Escape from Reason, he said, “Art and music are the expressions of a man’s worldview. They are a language. They speak.”
Marcus Aurelius said, “A person’s life is dyed the color of their imagination.” Plato said, “Give me the music of a nation, and I care not who makes its laws.” Over 2,000 years later, Joseph Goebbels, the Minister of Propaganda for Nazi Germany, quoted Plato in a speech. In Total Truth, an important book for me early in ministry, Nancy Pearcey argued that “politics is downstream from culture.” Civilization, like wealth, always trickles up from the base of culture. And culture flows from the heart of humanity.
When The Text Opens A Song
Music, like all art forms, is a magical thing when it isn’t being used to manipulate the masses. It captures a sense of reality that is deeply true and somehow transcends time, distance, and even intellect. It lets us experience another person’s depth of reality. We see something in art because the artist is creating from within. That’s the point we’re trying to steer this ship toward, and that David was a musician before he was a king.
Earlier this week, I was in a “spot” and pulled out my Bible to read something. It was one of those “God, what is the answer here?” moments where you flip a Bible open randomly and start reading. It landed on Psalm 35, and was what I needed.
I’ve spent a lot of my life with this sense of fighting, resistance, trying to prove myself, or feeling like people were constantly against me. I didn’t know why I was afraid and scared all the time. Clearly, I’m far from a David, and he didn’t write or compose this for me to see myself in him. Yet, there were things he learned in worship and life that he wanted to communicate, for anyone to experience that encountered his Spotify hit. Music was probably something that helped keep him healthy, and it may have faded from his life when he wasn’t. His psalms, history, and human behavior all point in that direction.
“The enemy is not primarily the Philistine, but the liar—the one who seeks destruction through slander and deceit, making the battle intensely psychological and spiritual.”
— Walter Brueggemann
Psalm 35
Imagine this like a line-by-line breakdown of a favorite song that hits you in the feels, not a “bible study.”
Contend, O Lord, with those who contend with me;
V. 1
fight against those who fight against me!
It’s intriguing to me to consider the character of the young David; surely a little clueless about his full destiny ahead, but with a vision of enough of it. It seems a little like Joseph: the youngest son who rises to leadership because of character and trust in God. But what does trusting God look like on a battlefield? How does one be loving while swinging a sword? And what about the 400 foreskins?
Besides the point: this was David’s life, and it was the hand of cards he had to play. He had people and empires to contend with, and not only on the battlefield. His own son, Absalom, revolted and was killed in the conflict (2 Samuel 18:5–15). It’s always those closest to us, and those we are closest to, who end up hurt the most. We can all be like suicide bombers—the blast begins with us, and the damage radiates outward. Where friends or family turn into enemies is where the deepest wounds can fester.
Take hold of shield and buckler
v. 2
and rise for my help!
Perhaps, David was inviting an egoless mindset, God as the ultimate ruler and judge. David also had less than perfect systematic theology, like all of us. Goodness, we can just look at our world, headlines, and social media feeds to see how we use these Scriptures to attack others or to hide ourselves behind proof-texted fig leaves. These verses are poetry and aren’t about literal warfare for either Old Testament followers of YHWH or New Testament followers of Jesus Christ. David is trusting the same God as Joshua. When he was about to face Jericho, he asked the angel of the Lord, “Are you for us, or for our adversaries?” And he said, “No…” (Joshua 5:13-14). God simply is. God will do His part even if we don’t do ours. We never controlled the outcomes or other people, or our enemies, real or false, close or far.
I’ve learned some about fighting too much and trying too hard, about being my own shield and buckler, and about refusing help. It was deeper for me than just human relationships. Ultimately, I wasn’t even willing to trust God with Reality and my life. I wanted to be in control. Nor is this unique to a recovering pastor.
We need to put effort into change, to be good and loving. If we’re a big ship, it can take a lot of inertia to get our ship on a different course. There’s a stage of grace, of surrendering control, to be able to let God fight the battles again, especially while we’re in the midst of them and safety seems satirical. We have to learn how to stop living by the sword if we’ve been swinging them wildly.
Draw the spear and javelin
v. 3
against my pursuers!
Say to my soul,
“I am your salvation!”
Salvation is a word I was good at preaching, but didn’t have it. I thought salvation was about getting out of Hell and following predefined commands, and thus ensued years of processing stuff behind ego, in shame and denial, in emotional turmoil and guilt—doctrines that weren’t fundamental to faith and Scripture. Salvation is being free from yourself and the freedom to be fully alive, as a person and corporately.
In the Old Testament, salvation is often described as deliverance for the entire nation, but here its leader uses it for himself. He is asking to be saved from his circumstances and for the tools to do it, and for God’s assistance. As a musician, he’s inviting his people and us to the same.
Salvation doesn’t happen because you say a prayer and have an experience, or because you can tick a doctrinal box. It is not a public status thing that needs a PR campaign. You and I can always have it right now: we can just be stubborn about it. Salvation is first and foremost internal, and it’s also communal: it’s an inside-out thing. Ontologically, we become healthier in relationships and community. As a worship experience, and not just an exegetical study of Psalm 35, how could diminishing egos, exposing shadows, and becoming more like God’s loving kindness produce anything different?
Let them be put to shame and dishonor
v. 4
who seek after my life!
Let them be turned back and disappointed
who devise evil against me!
Notice David’s possible enmity and unforgiveness here. If so, we all get it. Even if David is literally praying for their harm, David still teaches us Westerners plenty. Judgment, cursing, and vengeance belong to the Lord for a reason: we aren’t God, and we can’t handle it. We need not retaliate or hate in kind. Forgiveness can just take time and feel like death when we refuse to lash out. Taking actions and stances against others, against their good, is not our right and is sinful. David prays that his enemies get the outcomes of their actions, and they see the error of their ways. For himself, he’s praying for the right mindset given everything he was facing as he penned Psalm 35.
We can simply let people’s attacks or misrepresentations fall away, without killing our enemy in our hearts and minds. We have a model in Jesus being silent before his accusers—harder to practice than to dismiss. Marcus Aurelius, two hundred years after Christ, said, “The greatest vengeance is to not be like them,” and Paul the Apostle basically instructed the same mindset when he said:
“Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.’ To the contrary, ‘if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.’ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”
— Romans 12:17–21
This can just be hard to learn and do.
Let them be like chaff before the wind,
V. 5-6
with the angel of the Lord driving them away!
Let their way be dark and slippery,
with the angel of the Lord pursuing them!
It can be difficult to see wrong behavior and not react to it or fall into it yourself. It was difficult for me not to return evil with more evil. Before recovery, I was the dark and slippery one. Now, having been on plenty of sides, I can affirm that arrogant and avoidant ways lead to destruction.
Similarly, as a former slimy sleaze ball who wrestled with a lot of ego and brokenness over four years, I fully attest, personally and professionally, that if we keep doing what is good, if we let people who attack us live their lives while we stay true and loving, an ending will come one way or another. We don’t need to freak out. We can trust God and love our enemies as ourselves.
As an aside, I wonder what the father of the Prodigal Son prayed. I think he had similar words to David here, just said them differently.
For without cause they hid their net for me;
V. 7-8
without cause they dug a pit for my life.
Let destruction come upon him when he does not know it!
And let the net that he hid ensnare him;
let him fall into it—to his destruction!
The traps and games, our avoidance and defenses, the way we take sides, use gossip, inflate facts, diminish our side, or ignore our defects, are one thing. It was easy for me to slip into these, especially before recovery. Sometimes forces still seem to work against our best efforts, and things don’t pan out the way we hope. The “problem” can be on many sides.
Still, we need not retaliate or spread more nets. Throwing dirt always means losing ground. We’re meant to be fishers of men, not enslavers of them. People’s scheming, relationships, and resources can become their own downfall when that house of cards collapses. It was apparently built on you being the key witness anyway, so be truthful and loving and let it be.
Then my soul will rejoice in the Lord,
V. 9-10
exulting in his salvation.
All my bones shall say,
“O Lord, who is like you,
delivering the poor
from him who is too strong for him,
the poor and needy from him who robs him?”
How is it that David, a messianic forefigure of Jesus, connects salvation to his bones, praising God for taking care of the needy and oppressed? This is not unique here—Isaiah’s calling was associated with lifting up the poor (Isaiah 1:17), Ezekiel’s condemnation was about failing to do so (Ezekiel 34:2–4), and Jesus’ evidence to John the Baptist was that souls were being set free and the blind were seeing (Matthew 11:2–5). There is no systematic way around this. God’s kingdom is always with his people on the ground level, not in a location owned by a king or pope. That’s why, when Israel stubbornly demanded a king, the heart of that king mattered.
Malicious witnesses rise up;
V. 11-12
they ask me of things that I do not know.
They repay me evil for good;
my soul is bereft.
The struggle Paul wrote about in Romans concerns the bereft soul that doesn’t know what to do with such situations: “Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.” Conflicts can be difficult to manage well; emotions flare, sides are taken, trenches dug, and before long, people are lost, even if a false sense of status and security is gained.
Forgiveness and responsibility are beasts to learn, especially when we’ve been a beast about it. David, with all his imperfections, was authentic in his heart for God and trying to keep his shit together. We can all relate. He has much our world can learn from, even in how he handled the Bathsheba and Uriah episode (he repented instead of keeping the act going).
How we deal with our sin, others’ sin, and conflict is a reflection of our spiritual walk.
But I, when they were sick—
V. 13–14
I wore sackcloth;
I afflicted myself with fasting;
I prayed with my head bowed on my chest.
I went about as though I grieved for my friend or my brother;
as one who laments his mother,
I bowed down in mourning.
David exposes the disequilibrium he feels at a mismatched situation. He remembers where he’s been and the heart he’s had for the same people. These people were family to him.
How do we talk about the good things we tried to do for others when it felt so unfair and one-sided? Or when we are the ones David would have been praying for, when we’re the bad guys? What about when we’ve been on both sides, like David was? Perhaps, the only defensible ground is humility and love. Maybe that is the higher road.
Loving our enemies and ourselves is no easy thing because it often involves forgiving both them and us. It’s easier to turn love into hate and disgust, to react and fall into defensive mindsets and behaviors that worked before. I think this is part of what Jesus meant when he prayed for forgiveness for those crucifying him, who knew not what they were doing (Luke 23:34). Most of the time, we’re not perfectly innocent. This path of sanctification (individuation for Jungians) is not easy, but it is real work.
Fighting, competing, avoiding, denying, pretending, striving, distracting, inflating, shutting down, withdrawing, or arrogance all come with scientific and spiritual costs and consequences. Grace, love, peace, and the like come not from earning, but accepting…and that can take effort. It may be that we have to learn to forgive and love better.
It’s easy to redefine and defend our notion of love and truth. It can be hard to figure out what is true and loving with the people around us. The battle, though, is on the inside, not against humans. And that itself can be a battle to learn. Especially when the next part David talks about feels heavy and real.
But at my stumbling they rejoiced and gathered;
V. 15-17
they gathered together against me;
wretches whom I did not know
tore at me without ceasing;
like profane mockers at a feast,
they gnash at me with their teeth.
How long, O Lord, will you look on?
Rescue me from their destruction,
my precious life from the lions!
God was always looking, and David knew this. One of the early names for God is Jehovah Jireh, meaning “He who sees.” God understood David’s predicament. God wasn’t concerned with David’s or others’ perceptions of his success or failure; God saw through everyone’s BS anyway. That’s not the point: David, as a created being, expressed his struggle because he was struggling. There were real responsibilities and dangers, and David was a real human God had a relationship with. He mattered, too.
The victim mindset is a danger we must all be aware of when we find ourselves in such situations. Letting patterns become a new normal can turn us into something more. Did David have a part to play in all of the problems he was facing here? Who knows. But from other psalms, like Psalm 51, we know he had internal language and tools to wrestle with his sin, even if Nathan had to use an object lesson to call him out (2 Samuel 12:1-7).
Because Psalm 35 lacks a superscription and cannot be reliably dated, we can’t confidently place Psalm 35 before or after Nathan’s confrontation, but it resonates thematically and can be treated as part of the same spiritual arc. It’s also not the point David was trying to make as an artist.
I will thank you in the great congregation; in the mighty throng I will praise you.
V. 18
This is David re-centering within the context of his community. After scrapes and betrayals, he doesn’t retreat into private bitterness or stay where he was at the beginning of this psalm; he vows public thanksgiving and praise. Gratitude isn’t private therapy. It’s expressed testimony. Proclaiming “I will thank you” in the great congregation detaches the narrative from our limited perspective and reminds us we are not God. It moves the wound into the light and hands it over to the unknown. Both ego and shadow step into the light of fellowship under the same God, who is all in all. There is life, love, and more on the other side. In recovery language: testimony converts shame into story and releases us from the past’s present control. It allows us to change. We don’t hide the wound; we name it in public and let the community reframe it.
Praise, in the same way, pulls the spotlight off ourselves. Everyone knows worship can be performative or hollow. When that happens, the praise is really directed inward, and the internal monologue loops on itself. That slope is far more slippery than most people admit. This isn’t limited to Sunday-morning hymns. It’s the everyday stuff—what we celebrate, who we admire, and the way our praise functions across modern life.
Authentically celebrating others, being grateful for what we get to witness in each other, participating in life, family, teams, and community is real praise. When it’s carried with intention, it helps people be seen, confirms their existence, and breathes more life into existence. For the discipline of detaching from ego, praise has the power to purify. It can move mountains. It can mend wounds that might have calcified. It can require more labor and humility than we’re prepared to give, especially when conflict is ongoing.
Let not those rejoice over me who are wrongfully my foes, and let not those wink the eye who hate me without cause.
V. 19
He’s asking God to stop the cheap victory lap and the ongoing gossip. The “wink” is the social gaslight, the smirk that says, “we know.” As a king, David was no stranger to the risks and nature of leading people. The situations he may have been personally referring to probably involved matters and issues much bigger than just himself.
However, rather than simply a legalistic grievance, this was personal; it’s the spiritual hazard of social humiliation. David prays that the social scoreboard be corrected, and he knows his people, the commoners, would be singing this song at home. He was also teaching them something. He’s modeling how he tried to deal with these problems as the king of his people. He isn’t asking to dominate; he’s asking that slander and glee be exposed. That desire is honest. We all want our dignity back.
For they do not speak peace, but against those who are quiet in the land they devise words of deceit.
V. 20
When peace comes at the expense of others, it is no peace. Historically, most battles were never fought over necessity but through the common relationship of the collective and its top-level leadership: From Troy, supposedly started over a woman, to Hitler and his pathological black swan perfection of capturing an entire nation’s psyche with speeches and ideas. I think of my past relationship fights over 40 years, and most of the time, the details weren’t the issue, but the story around them and how we felt about it all. Most of the baggage I’ve been able to let go of came down to the fact that I was refusing to let go of it. It gave me some sense of power and control, a mirage of choice and identity.
When it’s not just about argument but personal, when distortion and premeditated actions are taken against you, it is into whatever peace is already there, or whatever the existing story is, that a different narrative is introduced. It’s Genesis 3 with the serpent to James 4 and his point about how conflicts even begin: it’s because we humans can be rather selfish, short-sighted, and like ships swayed by the swells.
Peaceful people can be easier to vilify because they won’t answer every lie, and a deception just needs enough people to believe it, even if it’s just one. David knew how the culture of rumor works: it manufactures noise so the truth drowns. Even a simple slip or angry moment can cause more damage to people than we imagined.
They open wide their mouths against me; they say, “Aha, Aha! Our eyes have seen it!”
V. 21
The chorus of triumph, the performative “aha,” is tribal justice via group collusion (c.f. Leadership & Self-Deception). It’s the mob’s verdict before any hearing. Gossip can feel worse than blackmail, since in blackmail, the person has a clear way out. Every leader of Rome understood the power of the mob, and every leader has to wrestle with how they lead.
David is naming mob dynamics and how people fake moral outrage to cover their lack of integrity or insight. It’s telling he says they opened their mouths, but they said their eyes have seen: it’s a Hebrew poetic play suggesting they were ultimately blind.
You have seen, O Lord; be not silent! O Lord, be not far from me!
V. 22
Notice that the Hebrew device earlier now reveals that the psalmist was also blind to something. This is the line where theology becomes therapy, and prayer becomes participatory. In this song, he recalls what he had conceptually forgotten in verse 17 (“How long, O Lord?”). God was and is always seeing; it’s kind of uncanny to sit with for a moment.
David’s prayers in verse 17 and here in verse 22 are not naive: he has to say them, to experience them, or else he would risk faking that he already had them. He has to meet God with all of this, and let God reclaim what David was clinging to—the very things that had blinded him. He knows God watches, but seeing without action is agony. He pleads for proximity, not just observation. This is the posture of the faithful: insisting on God’s nearness when reality feels remote. It’s a spiritual cry for corrective presence.
Awake and rouse yourself for my vindication, for my cause, my God and my Lord!
V. 23
“Awake” is deliberately strong and reflects the figurative language often used in religious texts. Obviously, God was not asleep (1 Kings 18:27). God is not limited by our perceptions or prayers and does not need us to wake Him. Rather, this phrasing implies that God’s presence in our lives is invited and surrendered to, requiring faith and trust on our part. It is not automatic; it is petitioned for, so we engage in the work of asking. This is not presumption, but trust that risks appealing to the Divine. David wants God’s justice enacted, not delayed.
Practically, asking for vindication can be dangerous if it turns into vengeance, so David frames his plea within relationship language, “my God and my Lord,” keeping it rooted in dependence, not domination. Jesus promised answers to prayers aligned with His name (Matthew 7:7–11; 1 John 5:14–15), yet as James reminds us, sometimes we do not receive what we ask because our motives are selfish or misaligned with God’s will (James 4:3).
Vindicate me, O Lord, my God, according to your righteousness, and let them not rejoice over me!
V. 24
David asks for vindication “according to your righteousness.” The Hebrew word for righteousness, tsedeq, comes from a root meaning “to be just, right, or in proper order.” In Hebrew thought, this is not merely a legal category; it’s closer to a state of alignment with the good—ethical, relational, and communal integrity woven together. It’s full at-one-ment.
David didn’t dictate the method or outcome. He asks for vindication while yielding the terms. It’s a quiet act of surrender. Somewhere in this posture lies forgiveness and acceptance. This is, after all, the same David who refused to kill Saul, who was taking a dump in a cave, when vengeance was most convenient and most justifiable (1 Samuel 24:3).
So, David doesn’t ask for collateral damage. He asks for justice on God’s terms. It’s a pattern worth borrowing: seek correction, clarity, and rightness, but refuse the temptation to script the outcome. It’s humble, and oddly subversive. It hands over the agenda to the One who sees what we can’t.
Let them not say in their hearts, “Aha, our heart’s desire!” Let them not say, “We have swallowed him up.”
V. 25
David knew how pride and jealousy corrode a person from the inside; he watched it unfold in Saul. When the heart feeds on someone else’s fall, the victory song rots the singer. What David is asking here is subtle: he doesn’t want them to believe his collapse was their rightful desire or rightful win. When we gloat over anyone’s downfall, we rarely receive the moral mirror we actually need.
Cycles of retaliation work like Samson’s spiral—each swing of force blinds the one who swings it. Modern psychology says the same thing: retaliatory behavior reinforces the internal posture that produced the conflict in the first place. Once we descend into mutual striking, once we dig in and lash out, we slowly become the thing we claim to oppose—and can even grow comfortable in that posture.
David prays that the spectacle ends. He knows what happens when a community gets addicted to its own righteousness-performance. This isn’t sentimental. It’s a worship song shaped by real danger, by an actual political and spiritual context thousands of years ago. Psalm 35 was well over 2000 years ago, and even then, the call was always global: stop the spiral before dehumanization becomes normal.
Let them be put to shame and disappointed altogether who rejoice at my calamity! Let them be clothed with shame and dishonor who magnify themselves against me!
V. 26
He petitions for the social consequences of deceit. Shame here is not a petty punishment but a mechanism of communal correction—an ancient way of restoring moral proportion. In the ancient Near East, shame and honor weren’t mere emotions; they were the social tools that kept the fabric from tearing. David’s request fits that world: let the consequences expose the distortion, and let the community recalibrate what it celebrates.
Earlier in the psalm, he wore sackcloth for these same people. The contrast matters. This is the irony we’ll all feel at some point: when it feels like we were there for others and they were not. This is not prescriptive, remember, but a worship experience. It was an atonement practice, where David’s people could follow and experience the same lessons he learned without his specific details, names, and assumptions, because often the story and the feelings are the same.
Let those who delight in my righteousness shout for joy and be glad and say evermore, “Great is the Lord, who delights in the welfare of his servant!”
V. 27
He turns the lens toward the people who care about what is right. Public joy reinforces the good in the same way public scorn reinforces the bad. A little faith goes a long way; small acts of trust have communal effects, just like a little yeast leavens a whole loaf. Vindication here isn’t punitive. It restores the credibility of the person who was attacked and strengthens the community’s confidence in righteousness itself.
This is what the old saints longed for when they imagined a better world, a citizenship not yet realized. Those who love rightness may not always be the loudest in the moment, but they tend to be the ones still standing when the noise fades. That is how a community regains health. It isn’t about tribal wins but about shared repair. In that sense, praise becomes evidence that divine justice is also a form of mercy.
Then my tongue shall tell of your righteousness and of your praise all the day long.
V. 28
This closes Psalm 35’s arc. David’s response to confounding attacks and inner turmoil, to attempting to maintain his character, was his testimony. David prays and praises instead of pursuing punishment. The tongue that once might have replied in gossip or, in his case, the sword, now offers liturgy for the poor. Reactionary anger and protective measures are rewired into righteousness and praise. The anger and fear are set down. We stop being a case study and become a witness to something bigger than our problems. That’s how the soul moves back from being a victim to being in full participation with all of God’s reality.
A Closing Note on Imprecatory Expressions
There are heavier cries in Israel’s prayer tradition than this. Psalm 137 ends with an infamous request to dash Babylonian infants against rocks; a line that refuses to sit neatly inside a devotional reading plan. It wasn’t written by David, but we don’t have to look far in the Davidic corpus to find the emotional equivalent. David prayed some sharp-edged things too: wishing that the wicked be blotted out (Psalm 69) or calling down curses so thorough they read like spiritual scorched earth (Psalm 109).
The point isn’t to pretend these are noble sentiments. They aren’t. Scripture contains the imperfections of humanity and how God works through it all. Imprecatory psalms are like trauma prayers, or the shadow cast by the Light, which it was trying to expose along, when real life has hit us and made us feel things, and we can’t pretend anymore. Israel’s poets wrote from within the struggle of empire, exile, betrayal, and economic instability, not much unlike us today. These Psalms are what happens when the wounds of life come out, and why confession matters in relationships. They show us a human nervous system bleeding in theological ink. Instead of moralizing or sanitizing it, Scripture hands the microphone to the rage and despair so it can be exposed and prayed through rather than acted upon.
If anything, these darker texts help frame David’s restraint here in competing worldviews and agendas. He is not fantasizing about baby bodies bounding off boulders; he is asking for correction.
“The ground of the soul is divine; therefore its true rest is in God, and only in God.”
— Meister Eckhart
