Psalm 78

“An enlightening psalm” is a guess. The original Hebrew word is maskil (mass-KEEL). Scholars say they aren’t sure what it means. They say they don’t even know if the word refers to the lyrics or the music. Maskil sounds a bit like another Hebrew word, askilkha, which means “let me enlighten you.” Some scholars associate maskil with a root word, sakal, which generates a lot of words with various meanings such as: thoughtful, instructive, wise, and proper. One theory is that the word relates to both lyrics and music. It could, for example, describe the lyrics as “thoughtful” and the music as a harmony fit for that theme.

The subtitle wasn’t part of the original psalm. And the possible byline “of Asaph,” isn’t necessarily a byline. The vague phrase could mean the song was written by Asaph, about Asaph, or was inspired by Asaph. Asaph led a musical family in the tribe of Levi, one of the 12 tribes that made up the original nation of Israel. Levite families worked as priests and worship leaders and worship assistants for the Jewish nation. Asaph was a leader of worship music during the time of King David (1 Chronicles 16:5). His family carried on the musical tradition, showing up five centuries later, when a Jewish man named Nehemiah, in the 500s BC, helped rebuild Jerusalem after  Babylonian invaders from what is now Iraq leveled Jerusalem in 586 BC.

There’s nothing in history about this, so far. Some Bible experts speculate that it could be a parable-like metaphor, which the writer used as a springboard for what comes in the next few verses. If so, the songwriter may have uninvited himself from the next Ephraimite harvest festival dance and fig cake exchange.

Zoan was an Egyptian city in the lush fields of the Nile River Delta, where the Hebrews settled when Jacob moved his family there to escape a long, regional drought.

The Hebrew word describing the water can mean piling up like a tidal wave. It can also mean a mound, hill, wall, or dam. An early Jewish translation into Greek, before the time of Christ, (the Septuagint) called it a leather bag used as wine skin. Hard to imagine that. But at least it’s the idea of something that will hold water. Perhaps easier to imagine is a tsunami in this earthquake-prone rift valley. As the growing wave pulls water from the shore, fleeing Hebrew refugees might have rushed through the shallows before the giant wave rolled back in to crush the Egyptian chariot corps chasing them. It’s all speculation.

There are aquifers throughout the region were Moses and the Exodus Hebrews traveled between Egypt and what are now Israel and Palestinian Territories. In the Sinai Peninsula, there are eight major aquifers containing underground water, at most recent report.

See verses 29-30.

Nothing personal. It doesn’t mean God was upset with the ancestor of the 12 tribes of Israel. “Jacob” was one of many names, like “Israel,” for the Hebrew people who were ancestors of today’s Jews.

The east wind blows toward the west, and the south wind toward the north. This may have blown off course migrating quail. They leave their winter home in Africa in the springtime, and they fly north to Europe for the summer.

Literally, “God got angry.” It’s a presumption that they provoked him. An educated guess, but a fair bet many would say.

The songwriter was probably talking about the agreement God made with ancestors of the Jewish people, through Abraham. Many rules of the agreement were spelled out through the laws the Bible says God gave the Jewish nation through Moses. When Jewish people talk about the covenant, they are often talking about laws preserved in the first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. The covenant, or contract, between God and the Jewish people was a two-way street. The Jews obey God’s rules, and God protects them and blesses their work with prosperity. Benefits for obedience and the consequences for breaking the contract were detailed by Moses in a speech shortly before he died (Deuteronomy 27—28).

Egyptians reportedly descended from Ham (Genesis 10:6).

The Israelite ancestors of the people later known as Jews, pitched the tent worship center known as the Tabernacle in Shiloh. Bible writers never report what happened to it. Many scholars say the Philistines probably destroyed it after overrunning the Israelite army and capturing the Ark of the Covenant, a gold-covered chest that held the Ten Commandments. Soldiers had brought to the battlefront this chest, Israel’s most sacred object, to pump up the courage of the army. It worked only temporarily (1 Samuel 4).

Joseph’s sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, each had tribes named after them. This reference to them may be a reference to what became the northern Jewish nation of Israel, where both tribes were located.

The temple Solomon would eventually build would be located in the lands of the tribe of Judah, on Mount Zion, more commonly known as the ridgetop city of Jerusalem. This was the capital of the Jewish nation when they were unified, and later the capital of the nation of Judah after the Jewish nation split in two.