BackgroundProfound suffering whose imagery (pierced hands, divided garments) the NT applies to the crucifixion (Matthew 27:46, John 19:23-24).
Psalm 22: My God, Why Have You Forsaken Me
To the choirmaster: according to The Doe of the Dawn. A Psalm of David.
By Bea Zalel
Psalm 22
To the choirmaster: according to The Doe of the Dawn. A Psalm of David.
- My God, my God, why have You forsaken me? Why are You so far from saving me, so far from my words of groaning?
- I cry out by day, O my God, but You do not answer, and by night, but I have no rest.
- Yet You are holy, enthroned on the praises of Israel.
- In You our fathers trusted; they trusted and You delivered them.
- They cried out to You and were set free; they trusted in You and were not disappointed.
- But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by men and despised by the people.
- All who see me mock me; they sneer and shake their heads:
- “He trusts in the LORD, let the LORD deliver him; let the LORD rescue him, since He delights in him.”
- Yet You brought me forth from the womb; You made me secure at my mother’s breast.
- From birth I was cast upon You; from my mother’s womb You have been my God.
- Be not far from me, for trouble is near and there is no one to help.
- Many bulls surround me; strong bulls of Bashan encircle me.
- They open their jaws against me like lions that roar and maul.
- I am poured out like water, and all my bones are disjointed. My heart is like wax; it melts away within me.
- My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. You lay me in the dust of death.
- For dogs surround me; a band of evil men encircles me; they have pierced my hands and feet.
- I can count all my bones; they stare and gloat over me.
- They divide my garments among them and cast lots for my clothing.
- But You, O LORD, be not far off; O my Strength, come quickly to help me.
- Deliver my soul from the sword, my precious life from the power of wild dogs.
- Save me from the mouth of the lion; at the horns of the wild oxen You have answered me!
- I will proclaim Your name to my brothers; I will praise You in the assembly.
- You who fear the LORD, praise Him! All descendants of Jacob, honor Him! All offspring of Israel, revere Him!
- For He has not despised or detested the torment of the afflicted. He has not hidden His face from him, but has attended to his cry for help.
- My praise for You resounds in the great assembly; I will fulfill my vows before those who fear You.
- The poor will eat and be satisfied; those who seek the LORD will praise Him. May your hearts live forever!
- All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to the LORD. All the families of the nations will bow down before Him.
- For dominion belongs to the LORD and He rules over the nations.
- All the rich of the earth will feast and worship; all who go down to the dust will kneel before Him— even those unable to preserve their lives.
- Posterity will serve Him; they will declare the Lord to a new generation.
- They will come and proclaim His righteousness to a people yet unborn— all that He has done.
Theme
The superscription points to a tune we no longer have, 'The Doe of the Dawn,' a melody likely as familiar to Israelite worshipers as a hymn tune is to us. The first verse splits the air: 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?' In Hebrew, 'Eli, Eli, lamah azavtani.' The verb 'azav' means to leave, to abandon, to let go of. This is not the language of feeling distant from God; it is the language of a covenant partner who has walked away. For an Israelite singer this was almost unsayable, and the psalmist says it. The first twenty-one verses then move through specific bodily anguish: bones out of joint, heart melted like wax, tongue stuck to the jaws, hands and feet pierced, garments divided by lot.
The cultural setting matters. Ancient Israel had no hospitals, no painkillers beyond wine, no surgeries. Severe illness was endured in a one-room house with the family watching. Public shame, the mocking heads shaking in verse 7, could end a household; in a village economy reputation was credit, and credit was survival. The psalmist describes being surrounded by 'bulls of Bashan' (verse 12), the massive cattle from the rich pasturelands east of the Jordan, and by lions whose roar in verse 13 was a sound real Israelite shepherds heard. These are not metaphors invented at a desk. They are the worst things a Judahite knew, gathered into one prayer.
Christians cannot read this psalm without hearing the cross. Matthew 27:46 records this verse on Jesus's lips: 'Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?' The gospel preserves the Aramaic, which is why bystanders mishear it as a call to Elijah ('Eliyahu'). Verse 16's 'they pierce my hands and feet' and verse 18's 'they divide my garments among them, casting lots for my clothing' are picked up directly in the crucifixion narrative. John 19:23-24 quotes verse 18 explicitly. Crucifixion itself was a Persian and then Roman invention; David never witnessed it. But Hebrew poetry's bodily honesty about extreme suffering gave Jesus a vocabulary for his own.
The psalm does not end at verse 21. From verse 22 onward it pivots into one of the most expansive visions of worldwide worship in the Old Testament: 'All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the LORD, and all the families of the nations shall worship before you.' Jewish tradition has read the whole psalm as Esther's prayer in the Persian court, or as the cry of the suffering righteous in any generation. Christian tradition has heard Jesus speaking the entire psalm from the cross, including this turn. Hebrews 2:12 even places verse 22 on Jesus's lips after the resurrection. Either way, the psalm refuses to leave the reader in the pit. Forsakenness is named in full and then outlasted.
Discussion questions
- What does it mean that the psalm uses the strongest possible word for abandonment, and that scripture preserves that word without softening it?
- How does it change your reading to know 'The Doe of the Dawn' was a tune Israelite worshipers already knew?
- Verse 7 describes mocking heads shaking. In a village where reputation was credit, why was public shame so devastating?
- What images in verses 12 to 18 (bulls, lions, dogs, pierced hands and feet) come from real things ancient Israelites saw and feared?
- How does ancient Israel's lack of hospitals or pain relief shape the way we should hear this psalm's bodily language?
- Why does Matthew preserve the Aramaic 'Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani' instead of translating it?
- What do you make of the fact that David never saw a crucifixion, yet Jesus found his suffering already written in this psalm?
- Where does the psalm turn from lament to praise, and what does that turn cost?
- Hebrews 2:12 places verse 22 on Jesus's lips after the resurrection. How does that reframe the whole psalm?
- When you have prayed your worst sentences honestly to God, has the prayer ever turned the way this psalm turns?
Read this psalm in another translation
The inline text above is the Berean Standard Bible (BSB). Open in a new tab to compare with a modern licensed translation: