As you can see from the title of this post, in this post we will be analysing Bob Hartman’s favourite psalm; 78. Unlike last weeks post, this poem is written by a man called Asaph. Asaph was a Levite in the court of King David. “A member of the Hebrew tribe of Levi, especially of that part of it which provided assistants to the priests in the worship in the Jewish temple.” – Levite Dictionary Definition. This is a very long Psalm which records the history of Gods people from Egypt until the time of King David. Join us and read more, as we uncover new facts about this widely unknown psalm and understand more at the complicated message behind the poem.
Read Psalm 78 here.
As this psalm is much longer than other psalms in this series, we are not able to analyse each verse individually, feel free to contact us and we will sent you links to other Christian sites that have content on psalm 78 or we can upload a second post on this psalm in the future, containing more information. We accept all comments and views and look forward to hearing from you.
Despite stating that Asaph wrote this psalm, we don’t actually know the author, it could have been Isaiah after the fall of Ephraim, around 720 years before Jesus was born. The reason it might have not been Asaph is because he was around at the time of King David and this psalm provide history up until this time. So if he was the true writer, then he would have had to collect knowledge from other people including his father for this psalm. This is because he wasn’t around when Gods people where in Egypt.
Verse ten of this poem is one we can relate to today. It says that Gods people “did not keep the covenant of God” and “they refused to obey his laws”. Just like many of us today, they did what they wanted, not what God wanted. A covenant is when two people or groups of people agree on what they are going to do. Usually, this is when one group says they will do something to the other group, as long as they do something back.
To be continued next week. Like this post and follow us for more.
RCG 