Psalms 55:12

PARENTHETICAL MENTION OF A TREACHEROUS FRIEND

"For it was not an enemy which reproached me;

Then I could have borne it:

Neither was it he that hated me that did magnify himself against me;

Then would I have hid myself from him:

But it was thou, a man mine equal, my companion, and my familiar friend,

We took sweet counsel together;

We walked in the house of God with the throng."

Leupold referred to this paragraph as "a parenthesis,"[13] inserted here for the purpose of explaining that among the enemies was a very important personal friend, comrade, fellow-worshipper, and mutual counselor. There are many Bible scholars who point to Ahithophel as such a person in the life of David.

Some have attempted to avoid the personal nature of this psalm by applying it to some abstract situation, or to the nation of Israel, or nearly anything else; but as Delitzsch wrote: "How could the faithless bosom friend, mentioned here with special sadness, be a mere abstract person; since it has in the person of Judas Iscariot its historical living antitype in the life and Passion of the Second David?"[14] Halley's Bible Handbook states that, "Psalms 55:12-14 refer specifically to Ahithophel, a foregleam of Judas."[15]

Opposed to this view one may find all kinds of `information' about what men do not know and may only guess at. Since all alike, the learned and the unlearned as well, are reduced to `guessing' in this matter, we unhesitatingly choose the guesses we have adopted here. When a better one comes along, we shall be happy to take it!