USB ~ Psalms 124

God, the Rescuer of the People

1 A song of ascents. Of David. Had not the LORD been with us, let Israel say, a

2 Had not the LORD been with us, when people rose against us,

3 Then they would have swallowed us alive, b for their fury blazed against us.

4 Then the waters would have engulfed us, the torrent overwhelmed us; c

5 then seething water would have drowned us.

6 Blessed is the LORD, who did not leave us to be torn by their teeth.

7 We escaped with our lives like a bird from the fowler’s snare; the snare was broken, and we escaped.

8 † Our help is in the name of the LORD, the maker of heaven and earth. d * Psalm 124 A thanksgiving which teaches that Israel’s very existence is owed to God who rescues them. In the first part Israel’s enemies are compared to the mythic sea dragon (Ps 124:2b -3a; cf. Jer 51:34) and Flood (Ps 124:3b -5; cf. Is 51:9-10). The Psalm heightens the malice of human enemies by linking them to the primordial enemies of God’s creation. Israel is a bird freed from the trapper’s snare (Ps 124:6-8)—freed originally from Pharaoh and now from the current danger.

Footnotes

†. 124:8 Our help is in the name: for the idiom, see Ex 18:4.

124:1 Ps 129:1.
124:3 Prv 1:12.
124:4 Ps 18:5; 69:2.
124:8 Ps 121:2; 146:6.