Psalm 9 and 10 - Alphabet Acrostic

To the choirmaster: according to Muth-labben. A Psalm of David. Psalm 9 Aleph 1 All my heart praises you Lord; I will recount all of your wonderful deeds. 2 I will rejoice in you and be glad; I will sing praise to your name, O Most High. Bet 3 Back my enemies went, they stumble and perish before your presence. 4 For you have maintained my just cause; you have sat on the throne, giving righteous judgement. Gimel 5 Clearly you have judged the nations and destroyed the wicked; you have blotted out their name for ever and ever. 6 The enemy came to an end in everlasting ruins; their cities you rooted out; the very memory of them has perished. [Dalet] Missing Hey 7 Evermore the Lord sits enthroned; he has established his throne for justice, 8 and he judges the world with righteousness; he judges the peoples with uprightness. Vav 9 For the Lord is a stronghold for the oppressed, a stronghold in times of trouble. 10 And those who know your name put their trust in you, for you, O Lord, have not forsaken those who seek you. Zayin 11 Go to the Lord with praises, who sits enthroned in Zion! Tell among the peoples his deeds! 12 For he who avenges blood is mindful of them; he does not forget the cry of the afflicted. Chet 13 Have mercy on me, O Lord! See my affliction from those who hate me, O you who lift me up from the gates of death, 14 that I may recount all your praises, that in the gates of the daughter of Zion I may rejoice in your salvation. Tet 15 Into the pit that they dug the nations sunk; in the net that they hid, their own foot has been caught. 16 The Lord has made himself known; he has executed judgement; the wicked are snared in the work of their own hands. Higgaion. Selah Yod 17 Just as the wicked shall go down to Sheol, so shall all the nations that forget God. Kaf 18 Know this: The needy shall not always be forgotten, and the hope of the poor shall not perish for ever. 19 Arise, O Lord! Let not man prevail; let the nations be judged before you! 20 Put them in fear, O Lord! Let the nations know that they are but men! Psalm 10 Lamed 1 Lord, why do you stand so far away? Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble? 2 In arrogance the wicked hotly pursue the poor; Mem May they be caught in the schemes that they have devised. 3 For the wicked boasts of the desires of his soul, and the one greedy for gain curses and renounces the Lord. Nun 4 Not seeking God because of his pride; the wicked thinks , “There is no God.” 5 Their ways always seem prosperous; Samech Out of sight are your judgements; as for all his foes, he puffs at them. 6 He says in his heart, “I shall not be moved; throughout all generations I shall not meet adversity.” Pe * 7 His mouth is filled with cursing and deceit and oppression; under his tongue are mischief and iniquity. 8 He sits in ambush in the villages; in hiding places he murders the innocent. Ayin * His eyes stealthily watch for the helpless; 9 he lurks in ambush like a lion in his thicket; he lurks that he may seize the poor; he seizes the poor when he draws him into his net. Fey [Missing] Tzade 10 The helpless are crushed, sink down, and fall by his might. 11 He says in his heart, “God has forgotten, he has hidden his face, he will never see it.” Kof 12 Rise up, O Lord; O God, lift up your hand; forget not the afflicted. 13 Why does the wicked renounce God and say in his heart, “You will not call to account”? Resh 14 See it all, God, note the mischief and vexation, that you may take it into your hands; to you the helpless commits himself; you have been the helper of the fatherless. Shin 15 The arm of the wicked and evil man ..break it Lord!; call his wickedness to account till you find none. 16 The Lord is king for ever and ever; the nations perish from his land. Tav 17 You hear, O Lord, the desire of the afflicted; you will strengthen their heart; you will incline your ear 18 to do justice to the fatherless and the oppressed, so that man who is of the earth may strike terror no more.

This Psalm is according to Muth-labben.  Although the precise meaning is uncertain, it probably indicates what motivated the Psalm.  Common translations are "the death of Labben",  "the death of a son" or "the death of a fool". In which case, judging by where it sits in the sequence it probably refers to the death of King David's son Absalom, who was a bit of a fool. Despite knowing that David was God's chosen leader he set about a plan to steal the throne from him. Bad mouthing his father and tricking the people into thinking he would be a better leader for them.  2 Samuel 15:1-6. Eventually, he went to Hebron and announced himself King and then rode into Jerusalem against his father David. But 'You can make many plans, but the LORD's purpose will prevail.' Proverbs 19:21 And Absalom is killed when his hair gets caught in the branches of a terebinth (a type of Oak) tree and his mule carries on going. Commander Joab finds him hanging and thrusts 3 spears through his heart.  2 Samuel 18:9-14 In an interesting twist, it was in the Valley of Elah (Terebinth) that David defeated Goliath. 1 Samuel 17:19 What is an Acrostic? a poem, word puzzle, or other composition in which certain letters in each line form a word or words. THINK before you speak Acrostic T - is it True H - is it Helpful I - is it Inspiring N - is it Necessary K - is it Kind Psalm 9 and 10 together form an Acrostic where each new stanza starts with the next letter of the Hebrew Alphabet.  The Hebrew alphabet has 22 letters, though 5 letters have 2 forms a hard and a soft. There are other acrostic poems in the Bible Psalms 25, 34, 37, 111, 112, 119, 145 and also Proverbs 31 The wife of Noble Character. Psalm 119 is perhaps the most elaborate of them all, but more of that in 109 days! These 2 Psalms are not perfect acrostics - a couple of verses are missing and 2 Pe and Ayin are in reversed order.  Each stanza is roughly 2 verses long.  I have attempted to restore the idea of the acrostic in the english translation by re-ordering some of the words to get an english alphabet acrostic. The Aleph stanza starts with a verb progression. My heart praises - inside I think how cool you are Lord. I recount your deeds - I start tell all the good things you have done.  This leads me to rejoice. Then I sing praises. All my heart praises you Lord; I will recount all of your wonderful deeds. I will rejoice in you and be glad; I will sing praise to your name, O Most High The stanza begins and ends with a me and you theme. All my heart represents who I am, all I am. Your name  represents all God is. God has many different names and titles that explain who he is and what he is like, the very essence of who he is. All my heart praises you Lord; I will sing praise to your name, O Most High When Moses met God at the burning bush he asked, "Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is his name?' Then what shall I tell them?"  Exodus 3:13.   Names often have special importance in the Bible, they tell us the essence of someones character. In Exodus 31, 2 men were set apart by God and filled with the Spirit of God and given knowledge, skill and ability in all kinds of crafts and the ability to teach those skills to others; Bezalel, son of Uri, of the tribe of Judah and Oholiab, son of Ahisamach of the tribe of Dan.   Oholiab means Father’s Tent, so one of the people who built our Heavenly Father’s tent was named after his calling to build Our Father’s tent. Bezalel means “in the shadow of God”. In rabbinical literature there is a story of how the candlestick of the sanctuary was so complicated in design that Moses could not understand it, although God showed him a heavenly model twice; but when Moses described it to Bezalel, he understood it’s design immediately, and made it at once; Moses expressed his admiration for Bezalel’s wisdom, saying that he must have been "in the shadow of God" when the heavenly models were shown him. The name theme continues as a thread throughout. I will sing praise to your name, O Most High. you have blotted out their name for ever and ever. And those who know your name put their trust in you, One of the biggest disgraces in the bible is to be insignificant, to be forgotten, to have your name blotted out for ever and ever. And conversely, one of the biggest blessings is to have your name remembered for ever and ever.  One of God's promises to David is to 'make your name like the names of the greatest men on earth.' 1 Chronicles 17:8.  So it stands to reason that forgetting God is not going to make Him very happy. Just as the wicked shall go down to Sheol, so shall all the nations that forget God. Not seeking God because of his pride; the wicked thinks , “There is no God.” The helpless are crushed because they think God has forgotten them.  David calls on God to forget them not. 10 The helpless are crushed, sink down, and fall by his might. 11 He says in his heart, “God has forgotten, 12 Rise up, O Lord; O God, lift up your hand; forget not the afflicted. God's justice for the wicked on earth is a bit of 'what goes around comes around' or as Jesus put it in Matthew 26:52, live by the sword, die by the sword. As the blessed man is 'like a tree planted by streams of water who bears his fruit in season', the fate of the wicked is a natural consequence of how they live. They will sink into the pit they dug. They will be caught in the net they hid. They will be snared in their own work. Into the pit that they dug the nations sunk; in the net that they hid, their own foot has been caught. the wicked are snared in the work of their own hands. In conclusion, David calls on God to bring the wickedness to account and God does indeed hear and bring justice to the afflicted: 5 The arm of the wicked and evil man ..break it Lord!; call his wickedness to account till you find none. 17 You hear, O Lord, the desire of the afflicted; you will strengthen their heart;  you will incline your ear 18 [you will] do justice to the fatherless and the oppressed, so that man who is of the earth may strike terror no more.