Psalm 120

Introduction

Psalm 120 opens the collection known as the "Songs of Ascents" (Psalm 120 through Psalm 134), fifteen psalms that share the superscription שִׁיר הַמַּעֲלוֹת — "A Song of Ascents." These were likely sung by Jewish pilgrims making the annual journeys up to Jerusalem for the great festivals (Passover, Weeks, and Booths), and the title may reflect the physical ascent toward the elevated city of Zion. Some scholars have also suggested the term refers to a "step" pattern in the poetry itself, where lines build on each other in a rising, staircase structure. As a collection, Psalms 120–134 move from distress in a far country (Psalm 120) toward celebration at the Temple in Jerusalem (Psalm 134), mapping the pilgrim's inner journey as well as the physical one.

Psalm 120 itself is a short but intense lament. The psalmist finds himself living among people characterized by deception and belligerence — his words of peace are met with aggression. He identifies his situation using two place names, Meshech and Kedar, that likely function as bywords for the most remote and hostile territories possible. Meshech was a people located in the far north (associated with the region of modern Turkey or the Caucasus; cf. Genesis 10:2, Ezekiel 38:2), and Kedar was a nomadic Arab tribe in the southern desert (Genesis 25:13, Isaiah 21:16-17). That the psalmist says he dwells among both — geographically opposite peoples — suggests he is speaking figuratively: he is surrounded by foreigners and enemies on every side. This is a psalm for anyone who has felt like a stranger in a hostile land, longing for a community of peace.

A Cry Answered: Appeal to God Against Lying Lips (vv. 1–2)

Notes

The psalm opens with a brief testimony before plunging into petition. Verse 1 is striking: אֶל יְהוָה בַּצָּרָתָה לִּי קָרָאתִי וַיַּעֲנֵנִי — "To the LORD in my distress I cried, and he answered me." The word צָרָה ("distress, tightness") is the same word used across the Psalter for a situation of crushing pressure — a tightening of circumstances from which there is no human exit (cf. Psalm 18:6, Psalm 86:7). The fact that the verse opens with this remembered distress and then immediately reports divine response creates a foundation for the petition that follows: the psalmist prays again because he has been answered before.

The petition of verse 2 specifies the threat: שְׂפַת שֶׁקֶר — "lying lips" — and לָשׁוֹן רְמִיָּה — "a deceitful tongue." The word שֶׁקֶר ("falsehood, lie") is among the most commonly condemned vices in both Proverbs and the prophets (Proverbs 12:17-19, Proverbs 19:5). The word רְמִיָּה carries connotations of slackness and treachery — a tongue that is loose in its promises and slack in its commitments, a tongue one cannot trust. These two phrases in parallelism describe the same reality from two angles: speech that is false in content (שֶׁקֶר) and false in character (רְמִיָּה).

The prayer asks God to הַצִּילָה — "deliver, rescue" — the psalmist's נֶפֶשׁ (often rendered "soul," but more fully meaning "life, whole person") from this toxic speech environment. In the ancient world, lying words could destroy a person's reputation, relationships, and even life; the tongue was genuinely dangerous (cf. Proverbs 18:21, James 3:5-6).

The Punishment Fits the Crime: The Lying Tongue's Fate (vv. 3–4)

Notes

These two verses form a rhetorical unit: verse 3 poses an ominous question, and verse 4 answers it. The question of verse 3 — מַה יִּתֵּן לְךָ וּמַה יֹּסִיף לָךְ לָשׁוֹן רְמִיָּה — follows the common oath formula "may God do to you thus and more also" (cf. 1 Samuel 3:17, Ruth 1:17). The psalmist directly addresses the lying tongue itself — a bold and dramatic turn — as if putting the tongue itself on trial and pronouncing sentence.

Verse 4 delivers the verdict in two vivid images. First, חִצֵּי גִבּוֹר שְׁנוּנִים — "sharp arrows of a warrior." The same metaphor of a tongue as arrows appears in Psalm 57:4 and Psalm 64:3 — the lying tongue is itself likened to a weapon, and so it is met with weapons. But here the punishment mirrors the crime: what the lying tongue has inflicted on others (sharp, piercing words) will return upon it.

Second, גַּחֲלֵי רְתָמִים — "coals of the broom tree" (also called juniper or white broom, Retama raetam). The broom tree was famous in the ancient Near East for producing extraordinarily long-burning coals — Bedouin traditions speak of coals from this shrub remaining hot for an entire day. The image thus conveys not just immediate destruction but a slow, enduring judgment. The lying tongue will not merely be punished briefly; the consequences will persist. The pairing of piercing arrows and long-burning coals creates a portrait of complete and irreversible divine justice.

Exile Among the Hostile: Meshech and Kedar (vv. 5–7)

Notes

The final section pivots from the prayer against the lying tongue to a lament over the psalmist's situation. The exclamation אוֹיָה לִי — "woe to me" — is a cry of grief and helplessness (the same root as אוֹי, a common lament particle). The psalmist is not merely complaining; he is expressing genuine suffering at his circumstances.

The verb גַּרְתִּי in verse 5 ("I sojourn, I dwell as a stranger") is from גּוּר — to live as a resident alien, without full rights of belonging. It is the same verb used of Abraham sojourning in Canaan (Genesis 17:8) and of Israel living as foreigners in Egypt (Genesis 15:13). The psalmist does not simply live somewhere uncomfortable; he lives as a גֵּר — an outsider, someone without community protection, perpetually vulnerable.

Meshech and Kedar represent the extremes of the known world: Meshech (or Moshech) was located in the remote north, associated with peoples in the Black Sea region (Genesis 10:2, Ezekiel 32:26), while Kedar was an Arab nomadic confederation in the southern desert (Isaiah 42:11, Jeremiah 49:28). North and south, civilized and nomadic — the pairing suggests that no matter where the psalmist turns, he finds hostility. Most scholars take this as rhetorical hyperbole: the psalmist is not literally in two places at once but is expressing that he might as well be among the most foreign peoples imaginable.

Verse 6 identifies the quality of these people that most torments the psalmist: they שׂוֹנֵא שָׁלוֹם — "hate peace." The word שָׁלוֹם encompasses far more than the absence of conflict. It is the full, flourishing wholeness of right relationships — welfare, completeness, well-being. To hate shalom is to be fundamentally oriented against the good of others and the fabric of community.

Verse 7 brings the psalm to its poignant conclusion with a striking antithesis: אֲנִי שָׁלוֹם וְכִי אֲדַבֵּר הֵמָּה לַמִּלְחָמָה — "I am peace, and when I speak, they are for war." The construction is terse and powerful: literally "I peace / but when I speak / they war." The psalmist does not merely want peace — he is shalom, he embodies it. Yet his very act of speaking — even words of peace — provokes warfare in his hearers. This is the ultimate form of the deceit that has been in view throughout the psalm: people who cannot hear truth, who cannot receive peace, who interpret every gesture of goodwill as an opportunity for aggression.

The psalm ends without resolution. There is no closing declaration of confidence, no vow of praise, no certainty of deliverance. The psalmist is still among his enemies, still offering peace that is rejected. This open ending is true to the experience of many pilgrims: the journey toward Jerusalem (toward peace, toward the presence of God) begins precisely in the midst of unresolved hostility. The very act of beginning to walk — the first "Song of Ascents" — is already an act of hope.

Interpretations

• The Songs of Ascents as a pilgrim collection: The traditional view, attested in the Mishnah (Middot 2:5) and the Talmud, connects these psalms to the fifteen steps leading up from the Court of Women to the Court of Israel in the Jerusalem Temple, with the Levites singing one psalm on each step. This interpretation grounds the collection firmly in Temple liturgy. Many modern scholars prefer to see them as road songs sung by pilgrims traveling to Jerusalem for the festivals, as implied in Psalm 122:1 ("I rejoiced when they said to me, 'Let us go to the house of the LORD'"). These views are not mutually exclusive — the psalms may have functioned both as pilgrimage songs and as part of Temple worship.

• The identity of Meshech and Kedar: Some commentators, noting the geographical impossibility of living among both peoples simultaneously, have proposed that the names are purely figurative for any hostile foreign environment. Others have suggested that "Kedar" in particular could refer to Arabized communities within Judah in the post-exilic period, making Psalm 120 the lament of a returned exile still feeling like a stranger in the land. The Talmudic tradition (Bereishit Rabbah) at times interprets these names as representing different aspects of Gentile (pagan) society. What is agreed across traditions is that the psalm articulates the spiritual experience of a person of peace who is surrounded by those who are oriented toward conflict — an experience that resonates across all eras of Jewish and Christian history.

• "I am peace" and Christian readings: The final verse's self-identification ("I am peace") has attracted christological readings in the patristic and medieval church, where the peaceful speaker rejected by war-seekers was taken as a figure of Christ himself, who came preaching εἰρήνη (peace) and was met with hostility (John 14:27, Ephesians 2:14). While this typological reading goes beyond the psalm's original horizon, it does connect to the New Testament's broader pattern of the righteous sufferer as a type of the suffering Messiah. Protestant exegetes have generally treated this more cautiously, preferring to read the psalm as the experience of any faithful person living in a hostile world while looking for the heavenly city (Hebrews 11:13-16).