Imprecatory Prayers in the Psalms

[pointer]

Pointer...enjoying reading your post...so don't merely take my questions as anything other than exploring your thinking...

Thank you. That's fine.

Scripture indicates David had some character flaws, but he owned them in a life of repentance which earned him the honor of being referred to "as a man after God's own heart". Scripture gives us an honest and revealing look at David's messed up life. He didn't always practice obedience, patience, and trust in his Lord. But, to his credit his failings grieved him greatly..."create in me a clean heart O God, renew a right spirit within me." So, I'm saying all this to say, "who is David to be giving God advice or directives?"

Someone whose failings grieved him greatly. Someone to whom God had given a clean heart and a right spirit. Someone whose sins had been totally 'wiped', someone for whom there was no condemnation, being justified as righteous by faith through the perfect sacrifice of Christ, to whom be all praise and honour and glory.

Is he working through what God's will is and becomes of one mind with God after a season of prayer and devotion?

Not in these psalms. They are the sentiments of a person entirely in tune with God, and who is suffering persecution for that very reason. If David had been wrong with God at the time he wrote these, he would not have been persecuted (except by God, of course!)

or Is pouring out his anger (righteous indignation or self-centered anger?) in a prayer of cleansing asking God to sort through his emotions and examine his heart. David, did this often in his writings, but is he doing that in these imprecatory psalms?

Not in these psalms. He is expressing righteous indignation, thinking God's own thoughts about those who will deservedly be destroyed terribly, people who will wish themselves never born.

According to how we answer these questions determines how imprecatory prayers fit into our closet time.

New dispensation commands are needed for the new dispensation; Christians have no political theocracy to defend as David did. NT saints are taught how to pray in the NT. "Forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who have wronged us."

"Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who ill-treat you."

'If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God's wrath, for it is written: "It is mine to avenge; I will repay," says the Lord. On the contrary: "If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head." Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.' Rom 12:18-13:1 NIV

Though even there, Paul was quoting the OT (Proverbs 25:21).

[David from New Bern]

Imprecatory is a rarely used word in contemporary language but is is a term used to describe the act of cursing or damning someone who is your adversary or nemise. David wrote 10 inspired psalms that are termed imprecatory. He ask God to pour out His wrath on his enemies and tormentors. His language is not laced with mercy but anger. Thse psalms are 5,11,17,35,55,59,69,109,137,and 140. Are these psalm an honest description of David's attitude and spiritual state and meant to help us identify with David's mind and struggle to bring us to a closer appreciation for the transparency of this "man after God's own heart"? Or are they prescriptive and in fact there to teach us how to pray with authority and power?

What is Imprecatory Prayer?

When you request God take His vengeance on doers of evil? The prayer may range from "Stop them Lord" to "Kill them Lord" or "Send them to the fiery pit". The word is synomous with curse or damn.

[David from New Bern]

Pointer

If these psalms are from a prior dispensation and as you say, different commands apply. What are the value of these imprecatory prayers to us in this age?

[pointer]

Pointer

If these psalms are from a prior dispensation and as you say, different commands apply. What are the value of these imprecatory prayers to us in this age?

To show those who hate God what lies in store for them in the next life- and possibly starting in this. To show that God still defends his saints, as he did David to his dying day. To show that defence of God's name is of paramount importance, though today in a very different way, by keeping disrepute from the church due to false teaching and evil practices. All of very great importance indeed, particularly the last.

[David from New Bern]

Pointer

If these psalms are from a prior dispensation and as you say, different commands apply. What are the value of these imprecatory prayers to us in this age?

To show those who hate God what lies in store for them in the next life- and possibly starting in this. To show that God still defends his saints, as he did David to his dying day. To show that defence of God's name is of paramount importance, though today in a very different way, by keeping disrepute from the church due to false teaching and evil practices. All of very great importance indeed, particularly the last.

The Expositor's Commentary in its comments about Psalm 140 says the writing begins with the request "Rescue me" and concludes in verses 12-13 with a confident "I know" and "Surely". Between verses 1 and 13 David had something satisfied in his Spirit. What do you think it is? By the way I'm in preparation for a Sunday morning sermon on Psalm 140. You are helping me with my sermon preparation. Maybe I owe you an honorarium .

[pointer]

Pointer

If these psalms are from a prior dispensation and as you say, different commands apply. What are the value of these imprecatory prayers to us in this age?

To show those who hate God what lies in store for them in the next life- and possibly starting in this. To show that God still defends his saints, as he did David to his dying day. To show that defence of God's name is of paramount importance, though today in a very different way, by keeping disrepute from the church due to false teaching and evil practices. All of very great importance indeed, particularly the last.

The Expositor's Commentary in its comments about Psalm 140 says the writing begins with the request "Rescue me" and concludes in verses 12-13 with a confident "I know" and "Surely". Between verses 1 and 13 David had something satisfied in his Spirit. What do you think it is? By the way I'm in preparation for a Sunday morning sermon on Psalm 140. You are helping me with my sermon preparation. Maybe I owe you an honorarium .

You are very welcome to any help that you might find.

I think that at the end of the psalm David simply remembered that God had got him out of tough situations before, and would do so again. But it is not always like that for the saint. Satan vaunts himself up with many devices, and things can look impossible, humanly speaking, at such times. The right response at those times is to pray, which is what David did from the start of the psalm. He did not panic, or admit defeat. He called on God, thinking God's own thoughts, we should remember, and by the end he had had his prayer answered, in the sense that he had quiet confidence that God would be with him again. But also, God had agreed with every thought he had had, and had determined that his prayer would be fully answered. That is because He knows our needs before we know them ourselves.

Edited May 13, 2006 by pointer

[David from New Bern]

I am thinking out loud without the benefit of research or alertness at this hour, but I don't recall any of these imprecatory statements or psalms targetted at his children or Saul. And weren't they the enemy or least the cause of much of the persecution in David's life. Yet, he grieved the passing of Saul, and he spoke no evil directly to his children who betrayed him.

[pointer]

I am thinking out loud without the benefit of research or alertness at this hour, but I don't recall any of these imprecatory statements or psalms targetted at his children or Saul. And weren't they the enemy or least the cause of much of the persecution in David's life. Yet, he grieved the passing of Saul, and he spoke no evil directly to his children who betrayed him.

Saul had to fall on his own sword, we may suppose because he was the Lord's anointed. David correctly would not have raised a hand against him, for that reason. The Amalekite who claimed to have done so was executed without demur. David not only held the Lord's appointee in the highest respect for the Lord's sake, he quite evidently held no personal animosity towards Saul, which attitude is a wonderful model for us.

David was no doubt overcome with sloppiness over Absalom, as Joab had to tell him to get a grip on himself after his son's well-deserved and necessary death. Absalom's attitude to the Lord's anointed (and his own father) was not so different from that of the Amalekite, and probably rather worse, and David's foolish double-think in this regard is much less than admirable.

I think that one must distinguish sharply between Scriptural psalms, which are always divinely inspired, and the life of David, which, quite often, was not.

[David from New Bern]

I am thinking out loud without the benefit of research or alertness at this hour, but I don't recall any of these imprecatory statements or psalms targetted at his children or Saul. And weren't they the enemy or least the cause of much of the persecution in David's life. Yet, he grieved the passing of Saul, and he spoke no evil directly to his children who betrayed him.

Saul had to fall on his own sword, we may suppose because he was the Lord's anointed. David correctly would not have raised a hand against him, for that reason. The Amalekite who claimed to have done so was executed without demur. David not only held the Lord's appointee in the highest respect for the Lord's sake, he quite evidently held no personal animosity towards Saul, which attitude is a wonderful model for us.

David was no doubt overcome with sloppiness over Absalom, as Joab had to tell him to get a grip on himself after his son's well-deserved and necessary death. Absalom's attitude to the Lord's anointed (and his own father) was not so different from that of the Amalekite, and probably rather worse, and David's foolish double-think in this regard is much less than admirable.

I think that one must distinguish sharply between Scriptural psalms, which are always divinely inspired, and the life of David, which, quite often, was not.

Don't let me put words in your mouth...so, if I do correct me. You believe, that the imprecatory psalms express the heart of God and David's willingness to write them under inspiration. But, they may not necessarily reflect where he personally was at spiritually. In other words, not progressive revelation...just revelation.

[pointer]

I am thinking out loud without the benefit of research or alertness at this hour, but I don't recall any of these imprecatory statements or psalms targetted at his children or Saul. And weren't they the enemy or least the cause of much of the persecution in David's life. Yet, he grieved the passing of Saul, and he spoke no evil directly to his children who betrayed him.

Saul had to fall on his own sword, we may suppose because he was the Lord's anointed. David correctly would not have raised a hand against him, for that reason. The Amalekite who claimed to have done so was executed without demur. David not only held the Lord's appointee in the highest respect for the Lord's sake, he quite evidently held no personal animosity towards Saul, which attitude is a wonderful model for us.

David was no doubt overcome with sloppiness over Absalom, as Joab had to tell him to get a grip on himself after his son's well-deserved and necessary death. Absalom's attitude to the Lord's anointed (and his own father) was not so different from that of the Amalekite, and probably rather worse, and David's foolish double-think in this regard is much less than admirable.

I think that one must distinguish sharply between Scriptural psalms, which are always divinely inspired, and the life of David, which, quite often, was not.

Don't let me put words in your mouth...so, if I do correct me. You believe, that the imprecatory psalms express the heart of God and David's willingness to write them under inspiration. But, they may not necessarily reflect where he personally was at spiritually.

God uses no-one as a cipher, otherwise he could just lob down instructions like a recipe book. God changes people, who then give utterance to witness of change. In the Psalms a truly inspired David wrote what he personally then experienced, just as Solomon, Paul, James and Peter did in their writings, though they all sinned egregiously at other times. They all had to be humbled before they could write in an inspired way. God works to change human experience, which then surfaces in the particular expressions of His servants, with their individualities.