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Salmos 58

ARC · Chapter 58/150

1Acaso fallaes vós devéras, ó congregação, a justiça? Julgaes realmente, ó filhos dos homens

2Antes no coração obraes perversidades: sobre a terra pesaes a violencia das vossas mãos.

3Alienam-se os impios desde a madre; andam errados desde que nasceram, fallando mentiras.

4O seu veneno é similhante ao veneno da serpente; são como a vibora surda que tapa os ouvidos,

5Para não ouvir a voz dos encantadores, do encantador sabio em encantamentos.

6Ó Deus, quebra-lhes os dentes nas suas boccas; arranca, Senhor, os dentes queixaes aos filhos dos leões.

7Escorram como aguas que correm constantemente; quando elle armar as suas frechas, fiquem feitos em pedaços.

8Como a lesma se derrete, assim se vá cada um d'elles, como o aborto d'uma mulher, que nunca viu o sol.

9Antes que as vossas panellas sintam os espinhos, elle os arrebatará na sua indignação como com um redemoinho.

10O justo se alegrará quando vir a vingança; lavará os seus pés no sangue do impio.

11Então dirá o homem: Devéras ha uma recompensa para o justo; devéras ha um Deus que julga na terra.

📖 Chapter study

Summary

David denounces corrupt judges who have practiced violence from birth and likens their wickedness to serpent venom, asking God to break their power so that justice will finally be recognized on earth.

Explanation

This is another imprecatory psalm directed specifically against corrupt judicial authorities ('O congregation,' probably referring to judges or leaders who should uphold justice but do the opposite). The comparison to the 'deaf adder that stoppeth her ear' so as not to hear the charmers refers to real snake-charming practices known in the ancient world, used here as a metaphor for moral corruption that refuses to hear any correction. The psalm's conclusion ('there is a God that judgeth in the earth') affirms that, despite the appearance of impunity, there is a final justice that corrects what human systems fail to correct.

Fun facts

  • Snake charming, mentioned in verse 5, is a practice documented since ancient Egypt, typically using cobras, which actually respond more to the visual movement of the instrument than to sound, contrary to popular belief — but at the time it was believed they responded to music.
  • This psalm is one of the most frequently cited biblical texts in discussions about corruption in the judicial system, used by social reform movements throughout history as a basis for calling for structural justice.

Verse-by-verse explanation

  1. Salmos 58:1The word translated "congregation" comes from a difficult Hebrew term, which other versions render as "rulers" or even "gods" — perhaps an ironic way of addressing human judges who were supposed to represent divine justice but fail at it.
  2. Salmos 58:2"Ye weigh the violence" uses the image of the marketplace scale: it suggests these judges calculate injustice the way someone measures out goods, a premeditated violence, not a passing fit of rage.
  3. Salmos 58:3"From the womb" is Hebrew poetic exaggeration, not a literal statement about newborn babies. The idea is that the tendency toward evil in certain people seems so deeply rooted that it sounds as if it had been there since birth.
  4. Salmos 58:4Comparing the speech of the wicked to serpent's venom turns words into something physically lethal: just as venom kills by degrees, the wickedness of these people works unseen, yet destroys all the same.
  5. Salmos 58:5The image of the snake charmer was a well-known practice in the ancient Near East, attempting to calm snakes with music. Comparing the enemies to a viper that stops its ears is saying they are deaf to any appeal to reason, no matter how skillful.
  6. Salmos 58:6"Break their teeth" is an imprecation, a direct plea for punishment against enemies. The image comes from wild animals: pulling a lion's teeth leaves it unable to do harm, so the request is for the enemies to lose their power to wound.
  7. Salmos 58:7Asking for enemies to "melt away as waters" is wishing they vanish without a trace, the way water disappears into dry ground. Arrows broken in pieces are the image of an enemy already disarmed.
  8. Salmos 58:8"That they may not see the sun" is one of the harshest images in the Psalter, comparing the enemies to something that never actually came to exist. It belongs to the same genre of shocking imprecation found in other laments — the outcry of someone suffering injustice, not a model prayer to imitate literally.
  9. Salmos 58:9This is one of the hardest verses in the Psalter to translate: the image seems to be a pot set over thorns that haven't even caught fire yet — a way of saying the punishment will arrive fast, before their plans have time to "cook."
  10. Salmos 58:10It is a hyperbolic image of total victory over evil, common in the war poetry of the ancient Near East, not a literal instruction about washing one's feet in "the blood of the wicked." The point of the psalm is to affirm that there is a justice finally vindicated, after so much apparent impunity.
  11. Salmos 58:11The psalm closes with the conclusion anyone would draw upon seeing the wicked punished: the certainty that there really is justice and a God who judges what happens on earth, not an indifferent world.

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