(7) So shall.--This clause is also in the optative: "let the communities of peoples be gathered round thee."

For their sakes.--Rather, over or above it, as in LXX. The poet has a vision of judgment. Jehovah summons the nations, arranges them at His tribunal, and then returns to His high throne to preside. This explanation is more consonant with the context (see next verse) than to suppose the judgment to have taken place between the two causes of the verse, and the departure of God into the height "as a victor after battle" (Delitzsch), or "in proof of His supremacy as judge" (Ewald). This picture of arraigned nations is certainly in favour of the view which makes the psalm the expression of the feelings of the community rather than of an individual.

Verse 7. - So shall the congregation of the people compass thee about. Titan, if thou wilt show thyself in judgment, the congregation of the peoples - not, apparently, Israel only - will crowd around thee, in acknowledgment of thy majesty, and recognize in thee the righteous Judge of all the earth. For their sakes therefore return thou on high; rather, and above it (or, above them; i.e. above the congregation of the peoples) return thou on high. After coming down to earth, and executing judgment, then go back to thy throne in heaven.

7:1-9 David flees to God for succour. But Christ alone could call on Heaven to attest his uprightness in all things. All His works were wrought in righteousness; and the prince of this world found nothing whereof justly to accuse him. Yet for our sakes, submitting to be charged as guilty, he suffered all evils, but, being innocent, he triumphed over them all. The plea is, For the righteous God trieth the hearts and the reins. He knows the secret wickedness of the wicked, and how to bring it to an end; he is witness to the secret sincerity of the just, and has ways of establishing it. When a man has made peace with God about all his sins, upon the terms of grace and mercy, through the sacrifice of the Mediator, he may, in comparison with his enemies, appeal to God's justice to decide.So shall the congregation of the people compass thee about,.... By "the congregation of the people" are meant the nation of the Jews, the twelve tribes of Israel, called an assembly of people, and a company of nations, Genesis 28:3; and this is to be understood not of their gathering together in an hostile manner about David to take him, which might be interpreted compassing God himself about, David being as dear to him as the apple of his eye, which is the sense of several Jewish commentators (b); but rather of their encompassing and surrounding the altar of God with songs of deliverance, upon David's being rid of his enemies and advanced to the throne of the kingdom; see Psalm 26:6; unless it should have regard to the pure worship of God by David, which was greatly neglected in Saul's time; and then the sense is, that the psalmist prays that he might be established in his kingdom, as God had appointed and commanded, when he would fetch up the ark of God, and encourage the worship of God, and rectify all disorders in it; that so the several tribes might come up to Jerusalem and encompass the ark, the symbol of the divine Presence, and worship in his holy mountain;

for their sakes therefore return thou on high; take, the throne of justice, high and lifted up, vindicate the cause of the oppressed, deliver me from all my troubles, put me into the peaceable possession of my kingdom; if not for my, sake, yet for the sake of thy church and people, and for the sake of thy worship and thy glory; the Targum paraphrases it, "return thou to the house of thy Shechinah".

(b) Kimchi & Aben Ezra in loc.