2. Lord, Judge the enemy! (vv. 6-20). Some students try to take the barbs out of David’s prayer by making verses 6-20 the words of the enemy about David, but the approach will not work. Does verse 18 apply to David? And what about verse 20? Years later, the prophet Jeremiah prayed a similar prayer against the enemies who wanted to kill him (Jer. 18:18-23), and the Lord did not rebuke him. It has also been suggested that the tenses of the verbs should read as futures and not as requests: “His days will be few … His children will be beggars,” and so on. Knowing God’s covenant, David was predicting what would happen because of the sins his enemy had committed. (See Lev. 26:14-39.)

David was willing for the court to solve the problem, for that is the image found in verses 6-7. Note that the pronouns shift from they and them to he, him, and his. David focused his prayer on the leader of the evil band that was attacking him, and he asked God to appoint a judge or prosecuting attorney as wicked as the defendant himself! After all, the way we judge others is the way we ourselves will be judged (Matt. 7:1-2). Or perhaps he wanted Satan himself to be there (Zech. 3:1ff.). David expected the Lord to stand at his right hand to defend him (v. 31; 16:8). Our Savior is enthroned at the right hand of God and intercedes for us (110:1; Acts 2:25, 34; Rom. 8:34).

David prayed that God’s judgment would be thorough and would include the family of his enemy (vv. 9-13). Certainly he knew what the law said about this (Deut. 24:16), so the family must have participated in the father’s sins. Every Jewish man wanted many descendants so that his name would be perpetuated, along with much wealth and a long life, but David prayed that none of these blessings would come to his enemy. Even more, he asked that his enemy’s parents’ sins would never be forgiven. (This must have been a very wicked family.) This would mean perpetual judgment on the family until it died out (Ex. 20:5; 34:7; Lev. 26:39). Peter quoted verses 8 and 69:25 in Acts 1:20 when the church elected a new apostle to replace Judas. In verses 16-20, David focused on his enemy’s sins of omission: He did not show kindness to the poor and he did not seek to be a blessing to others (see Ex. 22:22-24; Deut. 10:18; 14:29; 16:11-14; 24:17-21). All of this would come right back on his own head and penetrate his very being, for sinners hurt themselves far more than they hurt their victims.