Psalms 68:1

1. Let God arise The form of words pronounced by Moses upon the breaking up of the camp of Israel. Numbers 10:35. The previous psalm began with the form of blessing which Aaron and his sons were to use. See on Psalms 67:1. Thus the judgment upon Jehovah’s enemies and his benediction upon his people stand in contrast. The future of the verb denotes the scattering of God’s enemies to be an event yet to come, but we are not to suppose a state of war now existing, or a battle impending, but to construe the prayer, or prediction, as general. The Church is always surrounded by enemies, and her march should be always victorious. It was for chanting this psalm by the noble Christian matron, Publia, with her virgins, in the city of Antioch in Syria, in the summer of A.D. 362, during the apostate Emperor Julian’s stay there and while he was passing her door, that the enraged monarch ordered her to be buffeted on either side of her face. Julian was engaged in restoring the heathen rites, but unsuccessfully, in that early seat of Christianity. Acts 11:22-26. ( Theod., book iii, chap. xix, quoted by Milner.)