Tehillim 94 | “Take heed, you most brutish people”

If we were to read only the first section of Psalm 94, we might think it fits much better with the third book of Tehillim. Like the psalms we encountered there, Psalm 94 places on the table the question of the wicked’s success: “For how long, Lord, for how long shall the wicked triumph?” (v. 3), and it describes the atrocities they commit in the world—acts born from their smug belief that God takes no interest in their deeds.

In verse 8, everything changes. At that point, a significant turning point occurs in the psalm: the speaker stops addressing God and turns to the people: “Take heed, you most brutish people; you fools, when will you grow wise?” Whereas earlier the problem was that the wicked did not acknowledge God — and so the poet turned to God, asking Him to reveal Himself and compel recognition — now the poet turns to another path. Instead of asking God to fix the problem, the poet understands that it is his own responsibility: he now calls upon people and tries to make them see that God hears and sees: “Will He who implants the ear fail to hear? Will He who forms the eye fail to see?” (v. 9).

This shift in perspective — from viewing the problem as a static reality for God to resolve, to recognizing it as a situation where he himself must act and spread God's name in the world—also alters the poet’s experience of present difficulty. Later in the psalm, he thanks God for supporting and caring for him even amid hardship: “Had the Lord not been my help, I would soon have dwelt in death's silence” (v. 17). Suddenly, the poet becomes aware that even during affliction, God has been caring for him—and without that help, he would have been lost entirely.