23. God, the Righteous Judge

A Meditation of Psalm 109

Psalm 109 is one of the least read psalms because it is a psalm of curse. The others in that group are Psalm 79 and 35. One wonders how these psalms found a place in the book of psalms and in the Holy Scriptures along with the other beautiful and sublime psalms such as 23, 51, 103, 139 etc.

The psalmist observes that he does good while his enemies do evil. He makes a request to God, the righteous judge, to perform His duty by doing good to the psalmist and evil to his enemies in return. This is the summary of this psalm.

According to the popular understanding in the Old Testament, God is king, and His primary responsibility is to be a righteous judge. “It is God who judges: He brings one down, he exalts another” Ps.75:7. “Both good and evil come from God” Joshua 23:15. Occasionally, it so happens that those who do evil deeds prosper while righteous people suffer. In such situations, people like psalmist assume that God, the judge, might be taking a break, or just waiting to see what will happen. Then they take the responsibility of letting God know that once again it is time for God to act. “Awake, O Lord! Why do you sleep? Rouse yourself! Do not reject us forever” Ps. 44:23. This psalm is such a request to God.

Being the judge, it is God’s right and responsibility to do good to good people, and evil to evil people. Kings and judges are appointed by God over a community, and they have the right and responsibility to act on behalf of God.  “When men have a dispute, they are to take it to court and the judges will decide the case, acquitting the innocent and condemning the guilty” Deut. 25:1. Other than that, no human has the right to judge his/her fellow being. “May the Lord judge between you and me. And may the Lord avenge the wrongs you have done to me, but my hand will not touch you” I Sam. 24:12. Therefore, Prophets exhort people “to hate evil, and love good”.  Amos 5:15.

In the Old Testament, God and humans have different standards of morality. God can judge, but humans can’t; God can do evil, but humans can’t. If you do good, God does good to you, and if you do evil, God does evil to you. Coming to the New Testament, we see Jesus deviating sharply from this understanding of God. Jesus presented God as father, and asked people to imitate God as their role model. “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect” Mat.5:48. Thus God and humans have the same standard of morality, and God’s morality is the standard for human’s morality. “God causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous” Mt.5:45. Based on this, Jesus challenged people to love their enemies as God does. 

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