Verses 4-10 "They have said, Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation ... for they have consulted together with one consent: they are confederate against thee: .. Edom ... the Ishmaelites ... Moab ... the Hagarenes ... Gebal, and Ammon" etc. etc. The conspiracy has for its aim nothing short of blotting out the national existence and the very name of Israel. It is therefore high-handed opposition to God's counsel, and the confederacy is against Him. The true antagonists are, not Israel and the world, but God and the world. Calmness courage and confidence spring in the heart with such thoughts. They who can feel that they are hid in God may look out, as from a safe islet on the wildest seas and fear nothing. And all who will may hide in him.
The enumeration of the confederates in verses 6-8 groups together peoples who probably were never really united for any common end. Hatred is a very potent cement and the most discordant elements may be fused together in the fire of a common animosity. What a motley assemblage is here! What could bring together in one company Ishmaelites and Tyrians, Moab and Asshur? The first seven names in the list of allies had their seats in the east and south-east of Palestine. Edom, Moab, Ammon, etc. etc. Then the psalmist turns to the west, to Philistia, Tyre etc.
The confederacy is formidable, but the psalmist does not enumerate its members merely in order to emphasise Israel's danger. He is contrasting this miscellaneous conglomeration of many people with the Almighty One, against whom they are vainly banded. Faith can look without a tremor on serried battalions of enemies, knowing that one poor man, with God at his back outnumbers them all. Let them come from east and west, south and north and close round Israel; God alone is mightier than they.
So, after a pause marked by "Selah" (in verse 8) in which there is time to let the thought of the multitudinous enemies sink into the soul, the psalm passes into prayer, which throbs with confident assurance and anticipatory triumph. The singer recalls ancient victories, and prays for their repetition. To him, as to every devout man, today's necessities are as sure of Divine help as any of yesterday's were, and what God has already done is pledge a specimen of what He is doing and will do.
Verse 5. "For they have consulted together with one consent: they are confederate against thee." Though there may fall out a private grudge between such as are wicked, yet they will all agree and unite against the saints. If two greyhounds are snarling at a bone, yet put up a hare between them, and they will soon leave the bone and follow the hare.
Verse 6. "The tabernacles of Edom, and Ishmaelites; of Moab, and the Hagarenes ..." etc. The prophet, having put in his complaint in a general way, now comes to the particulars, and tells God, as it were, who has done this. God might say, Who are these that conspire against me, and against my people, and hidden ones? Lord, saith the prophet, I will tell thee who they are ... and he names some ten nations that joined together against one poor Israel. It is a thing you should observe, that when the people of God are conspired against, God rests not in general complaints, but he will know who they are. As I told you, He is the Lord of Hosts, the great General. When there is a mutiny, the general asks what officer, or what corporal, or what sergeant, or who, began the mutiny. And it is a fearful thing when the poor persecuted saints shall bring thy name as a persecutor before the God of heaven. Therefore, I remember a blessed woman that is reported of in the Book of Martyrs, that when the wicked abused her, and reproached her, and oppressed her, she would say no more than this - I will go home and tell my Father about it." Give over, or else I will bring your names before my God, for I know that a man may better bear a pound of dirt on his feet, than a grain of dirt in his eye, and the saints are "the apple of God's eye."
Verse 12. "Who said, Let us take to ourselves the houses of God in possession." Viewing the Temple, and also the house of the Tribes, as all belonging to God, these greedy plunderers determined to push out the inhabitants, slay them, and become themselves landlords and tenants of the whole. These were large words and dark designs; but God could bring them all to nothing. It is in vain for men to say "Let us take" if God does not give. He who robs God's house will find that he has a property reeking with a curse. "Will a man rob God?" Let him try it, and he will find it hot and heavy work.
Verse 18. "That men may know that thou, whose name alone is JEHOVAH, art the most high over all the earth." The knowledge of the glory of the Lord is the end and completion of all things.