Psalms 120

Psalms 120:1-7

A cry for help to Jehovah in the midst of sore distress, evidently by an exile under foreign oppression. 4. ‘Sharp arrows of a mighty man, with glowing coals of broom,’ i.e. burning charcoal made of broom. Both expressions are figures for divine judgments: cp. Psalms 140:10. 5. Mesech] i.e. the Moschi, a tribe dwelling near the Euxine Sea: cp. Genesis 10:2, also Herodotus 3.94. Kedar] tribes of N. Arabia famous for their black tents: cp. Son 1:5. Here the two names are probably taken as typical examples of the wild and inhospitable peoples among whom many of the Jews were exiled. 6. Long] the emphatic word ‘all too long.’ Turbulent tribes fond of war surround the writer.