A Worthy King
Most of us would say that the book of Psalms is like a hymnal. It’s a collection of music texts for ancient Israelite worship. Of course, a more detailed look into the Psalms will show that it is divided into five “books,” perhaps another parallel to hymnals which are often divided into sections based on what the songs are about or what part of the church calendar they are meant for. If you look even deeper into the Psalms, you will discover a number of unique genres: praise, lament, thanksgiving, creation, and wisdom psalms make up the bulk of the Psalter, but there are also the imprecatory, or curse psalms among others. One genre that may get less attention today is the genre of “royal psalm.”
The royal psalms speak about the king or the king’s family. They were likely written for liturgical royal occasions, such as the coronation of a new king. They may also have been used as prayers for the sake of a current king. Perhaps the ancient Israelites even had some sort of patriotic holiday like our modern Independence Day or Flag Day. We can’t be exactly certain about the occasion for the royal psalms, but we can see in them reflections on the idealized values of a king.
Psalm 72 is a royal psalm that prays to God on behalf of a king. While the later parts of the psalm focus on asking God for gifts to the king, the psalm begins by establishing the relationships between God and the king and then the king and the people. The king receives justice and righteousness from God. God is the ultimate power behind the monarchy, and if the king is good and rules well, this is because they have been made a good king by the Lord. The king is God’s instrument on earth for exercising power on behalf of God’s people. The people belong to God, not the king. The king is entrusted with caring for them.
This places some high expectations on the king. He is expected to rule righteously, treat the poor with justice, cause the land to bring prosperity to the people, defend the needy, rescue the poor, and crush the oppressor. A good leader doesn’t seek to help themselves. They aren’t holding power for personal financial gain. Their rule helps the land produce abundantly. The implication is that they exercise proper creation care so that the land is healthy, while also developing an infrastructure that can bring prosperity to all. The king makes life better for the people, but not all people equally.
The king’s first duty is to the poor and needy. The king follows the Law of God, which commands people to support the widow, the orphan, and the stranger. The king protects those who cannot protect themselves, those whom society would reject and forget. However, the oppressor is crushed. While it isn’t entirely clear within this psalm, evidence throughout the Bible indicates that Israel contained both oppressors and oppressed. There were greedy people who hoarded land and became absurdly wealthy by unjust means. The king’s mandate required discerning between the oppressors and the oppressed. He could not remain quietly neutral while the needy fended for themselves. He had to act against the powerful on behalf of the weak.
Unfortunately, in a hereditary monarchy, most of the people praying this psalm in its original context really had no hope of holding a king accountable themselves. This was in God’s hands. They could only hope that God would make the king righteous to properly shepherd the people. If action was taken against the king, it would have to be a violent coup backed by the military or an outright revolution of the people. Both of these options would be very bloody and may result in failure. If you weren’t a courtier, a general, or maybe a high priest, you had no ability to respond to a bad king. You could only pray that God would change him or send a new and better king soon.
Perhaps this is part of the reason why royal psalms don’t seem to carry as much weight for us today. It is certainly wise to pray for good leaders, but if one of our leaders is particularly bad, we only have to keep them for a few years before we get a new one. With things like impeachment and recall, for some elected officials, we don’t even have to wait the full term. Praying for a leader is not as urgent for us today because we can do something if they are bad. Some may say that this reality makes royal psalms irrelevant, but that is exactly the wrong way to think about it. Royal psalms tell us what to pray our leaders will be like, but given our ability to elect our leaders, we can actually hold them to these standards.
Of course, we aren’t electing a king. I think we all can agree that is a good thing. However, governors, senators, representatives, presidents, and any elected official ought to serve the same functions. They should fight oppression, create the conditions for prosperity, and rush to the defense of the poor and needy. The capacity to actively engage in the selection of leadership gives us the opportunity to make these goals a reality. We can hold leaders accountable to Biblical ideals.
Of course, it isn’t right to force our religion on others. We don’t want the state to have power over religious belief. However, Martin Luther believed that the state was God’s instrument for establishing justice in a secular context. The state shouldn’t force everyone to worship in a certain way. Rather, the state should make sure the poor and needy are protected, and oppressors are brought to justice. In effect, the state, however it may be manifested, takes on the role of the king in ancient Israel. The church preaches forgiveness and love, while the state maintains order and protects those who cannot protect themselves.
As Christians, our duty is to love God and serve the poor. This manifests in many ways. Sometimes we give money to charity. Sometimes we deliver food to people in need. Sometimes we protest unjust actions that are harming the poor. Sometimes we organize to better distribute resources within a community so that everyone has what they need. All of these are important facets of the ministry of the church, but these don’t minimize the value of claiming our prophetic voice and holding leaders accountable when they fail to do what is expected. We may preach the good news of salvation in Christ first and foremost, but we also preach God’s Law to the powerful, reminding everyone in authority where their power comes from and what their mandate truly is.
