Not only was Jerusalem as the holy city the source of divine protection: the Davidic King, whose royal seat this was, was the specific and particular addressee of God’s promise of protection. The narrative of David’s war with Saul is an embodiment for Israel of God’s miraculous protection of his anointed. Yhwh’s covenant with David in 2 Sam 7 repeats and intensifies the earlier covenant promises of blessing, protection and generation. The Land will be a place of no disruption from the enemies that surround them:
10 And I will appoint a place for my people Israel and will plant them, so that they may live in their own place, and be disturbed no more; and evildoers shall afflict them no more, as formerly, 11from the time that I appointed judges over my people Israel; and I will give you rest from all your enemies. (2 Sam 7:10-11)
The eternal rule of the Son of David – including his castigation – is the guarantee of this promise. The Psalms then give voice to this hope from the perspective of the Messianic King in the face of the experience of radical threat. In taking up the Psalter we are immediately thrown into a world characterised by conflict, confusion, doubt, enmity, and violence: the nations conspire against Yhwh and his anointed (Psalm 2:1-2) hoping to overthrow their rule. The Psalmist pleads with Yhwh for deliverance in the face of personal and national disaster. His character is known: especially his love for justice and his all-knowing perspective. So the Psalmist seeks refuge in God again and again. God is the rock (Ps 19:14) the shield (Ps 3:3), the fortress ( Ps 59:16) and the refuge (Ps 59:16). Sometimes, indeed, the hope is barely present, if at all; and the voice of the Psalmist becomes a cry of despair. Clearly, the affliction of Israel at the hands of evildoers was not yet at an end.
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