2 Samuel 22:11

And he rode upon a cherub, and did fly: and he was seen upon the wings of the wind. [See comments on Psalms 18:10].

And he rode upon a cherub, and did fly: and he was seen upon the wings of the wind. And he road upon a cherub.

(11) He was seen.—Psalms 18, “he did fly.” The two words are exceedingly alike in the Hebrew, and either could easily be mistaken for the other. The form in the psalm is far more poetical.

Verse 11. He rode upon a cherub, and did fly - he was seen upon the things of the wind.] In the original of this sublime passage, sense and sound are astonishingly well connected. I shall insert the Hebrew, represent it in English letters for the sake of the unlearned reader, and have only to observe, he must read from the right to the left. רוח כנפי על וירא ויעף כרוב על וירכב ruach canphey al vaiyera :vaiyaoph kerub al vayirkab wind the of wings the upon seen was he and :fly did and cherub a upon rode he The clap of the wing, the agitation and rush through the air are expressed here in a very extraordinary manner. Other beauties of this kind will be noted in the exposition of the Psalm alluded to above. I now subjoin Dr. Kennicott's remarks on this chapter: - "The very sublime poetry contained in this chapter is universally admired, and yet it cannot be perfectly understood, till it is known WHO is the speaker, who the person thus triumphant over mighty enemies, whose sufferings occasioned such a dreadful convulsion of nature, and, who, upon his deliverance, inflicted such vengeance on his own people, and also became thus a king over the heathen. Should we be told that this person was David, it will be very difficult to show how this description can possibly agree with that character: but if it did in fact agree, yet would it contradict St. Paul, who quotes part of it as predicting the conversion of the Gentiles under Christ the Messiah. Romans 15:9; Hebrews 2:13; and see Peirce's Commentary, p. 50. Now if the person represented as speaking through this Divine ode be David only, the Messiah is excluded. In consequence of the difficulties resulting from each of these suppositions, the general idea has been that it relates both to David and to the Messiah as a prophecy of a double sense; first, as spoken by David of himself, and yet to be understood in a secondary sense, of the Messiah. But it must be remarked here, that if spoken only of David, it is not a prediction of any thing future, but a thanksgiving for favours past, and therefore is no prophecy at all. And farther, it could not be a prophecy descriptive of David unless the particulars agreed to David, which they evidently do not. If then David be here necessarily excluded from the single sense, he must be excluded also from the double sense, because nothing can be intended by any sacred writer, to relate to two persons, unless it be TRUE of both; but it not being the case here as to David, we must conclude that this song relates only to the Messiah; and on this subject an excellent Dissertation, by the late Mr. Peirce, is subjoined to his comment on the Epistle to the Hebrews.

11. he rode upon a cherub] As the Shechinah, or mystic Presence of God in the cloud of glory, rested over the Cherubim which were upon the “Mercy-seat” or covering of the Ark (ch. 2 Samuel 6:2), so in this Theophany God is represented “riding upon a Cherub,” as the living throne on which He traverses space. The Cherubim appear in Scripture (a) as the guardians of Paradise (Genesis 3:24): (b) as sculptured or wrought figures in the Tabernacle and Temple (Exodus 25:17-20; Exodus 26:1, &c.): (c) in prophetic visions as the attendants of God (Ezekiel 10:1 ff; cp. Ezekiel 1; Isaiah 6; Revelation 4). The Cherubim of the Tabernacle and Temple seem to have been winged human figures, representing the angelic attendants who minister in God’s Presence: those of Ezekiel’s vision appear as composite figures (Ezekiel 10:20-21), symbolical perhaps of all the powers of nature, which wait upon God and fulfil His Will. was seen] The true reading is that preserved in Psalms 18:10, did fly, a peculiar word used of the swooping of an eagle (Deuteronomy 28:49; Jeremiah 48:40; Jeremiah 49:22). The consonants of the two words are so nearly alike (ειγΰ–ειψΰ), that the rarer word would be easily altered into the more common one. For “the wings of the wind” cp. Psalms 104:3.

11. Rides upon a cherub — Jehovah communed with Moses from between the two cherubim that spread their wings over the mercy-seat.Exodus 25:22. So here he is represented as moving forth upborne on a cherub’s wing.