Let there be none to extend mercy unto him: neither let there be any to favour his fatherless children.
The verse stands in an imprecatory psalm full of fierce denunciations and prayers for the destruction of others. It is part of the difficult material that raises questions about such utterances in Scripture. It belongs to those imprecatory psalms cited as an example of Scripture that some find difficult to reconcile with the Sermon on the Mount. The psalm is a prediction of God's retributive wrath upon evildoers. It foretells tribulation coming upon the enemies of God's church and declares God's retributive justice.
Its curses declare the punishments that come upon those whose evil lives sought to bring such harm on others. They plead for divine justice, asking that those who plot wickedness against the innocent receive the consequences of their own wrongdoing. They call for consequences and punishments corresponding to the harm the wicked sought to bring on others. The psalm is not an expression of David's personal revenge or personal wish for vengeance. It does not urge people to commit cruelty. The plea that there be none to favor his fatherless children does not ask that they be denied food, shelter, or ordinary charity and mercy. It asks that they receive no special favor because of their father or the cause for which he suffered and died.
Judgment on a father can bring suffering to his household, and national sins can burden generations yet unborn. This shows how far-reaching judicial judgments are and restrains people from invoking them lightly. After the American Civil War this means citizens should show ordinary mercy to the children of Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee while refusing to honor their ancestry or their fathers' cause. Such judgment against inherited favor is compatible with mercy rather than personal malice.
The verse stands in an imprecatory psalm full of fierce denunciations and prayers for the destruction of others. It is part of the difficult material that raises questions about such utterances in Scripture. It belongs to those imprecatory psalms cited as an example of Scripture that some find difficult to reconcile with the Sermon on the Mount. The psalm is a prediction of God's retributive wrath upon evildoers. It foretells tribulation coming upon the enemies of God's church and declares God's retributive justice.
Its curses declare the punishments that come upon those whose evil lives sought to bring such harm on others. They plead for divine justice, asking that those who plot wickedness against the innocent receive the consequences of their own wrongdoing. They call for consequences and punishments corresponding to the harm the wicked sought to bring on others. The psalm is not an expression of David's personal revenge or personal wish for vengeance. It does not urge people to commit cruelty. The plea that there be none to favor his fatherless children does not ask that they be denied food, shelter, or ordinary charity and mercy. It asks that they receive no special favor because of their father or the cause for which he suffered and died.
Judgment on a father can bring suffering to his household, and national sins can burden generations yet unborn. This shows how far-reaching judicial judgments are and restrains people from invoking them lightly. After the American Civil War this means citizens should show ordinary mercy to the children of Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee while refusing to honor their ancestry or their fathers' cause. Such judgment against inherited favor is compatible with mercy rather than personal malice.