Many bulls have encompassed me; Bashan's strong ones have beset me round.
The verse pictures a ring of animals closing in on the Sufferer. He names His enemies as bulls, and commentators agree that this belongs to what Christ suffered at the hands of men — not yet to the darkness of being forsaken by God.
This verse opens a section on what men did to Christ. One writer counts the verses, then warns that even this is not the psalm's deepest agony.
We now have, in seven verses, the full extent of His suffering at the hands of man. We may go over it and list the items one by one. But who can measure what it was for Him? No one ever matched Him in capacity for sorrow, or in understanding all that can be in the human heart. Yet even this was not part of the special agony that marks this psalm of atonement.
The psalm's animal images work as a set. Each names a different enemy, and the bull stands for a will that does as it pleases.
In Psalms 20, 21, we see human enemies, and judgment, but in Psalm 22 divine wrath and perfect grace. In verse 12, bulls, that is, violent men, who do their own will; in verse 16, dogs, that is shameless ones. In verse 21, the lion's mouth, that is, Satan's power over death.
The Hebrew word behind "strong bulls" points the same way:
In Psalm 22:12 the word behind "strong [bulls]" is abbir, meaning "mighty one." It is translated "bulls" in Psalm 50:13; Psalm 68:30; Isaiah 34:7; Jeremiah 50:11.
Bashan had rich grazing land. Cattle fattened there picture men swollen with self-importance.
First we must realize the strength of these enemies. They are bulls, with lowered horns and a reckless charge — strong beasts fattened on the rich pastures of Bashan, men whom "fullness of bread" had filled with pride and insolence. Caiaphas the Sadducee was one of them. He prophesied without knowing it, moved only by the instinct of self-preservation, with eyes as blind to eternity as they were sharp about present things. He was a picture of many more like him.
The same figure appears elsewhere in Scripture for the same kind of men, and God has an answer for them:
BULLS OF BASHAN are figurative of strong ruthless enemies, Amos 4:1, whom God in the coming judgement on Gog will crush, and will call for the fowls and the beasts to come and feed upon their flesh and their blood, Ezek. 39:18.
Commentators name these enemies as the nation's religious leaders. They also trace the shift to a lion in the next verse back to Satan.
Then in verses 12 and 13 we have the persecution of the Jews. The leaders of that people attacked Him with the strength and ferocity of bulls. The militant Pharisees were like strong bulls of Bashan, and because they were Satan's special agents in this, they shared his character. He bears the character of "a roaring lion."
He was surrounded on every side, and He did not answer that pressure with force of His own.
Violence, with no restraint and full of rage, surrounded Him — bulls of Bashan, savage and roaring lions. No proud human strength met this. He had to meet it and feel it in the meekness of His nature, and to know the weakness of human nature, though never its sin, except in bearing it… But here He does not stop, and He could not stop, at second causes… The point here is His state, the dust of death. Yet He looks at the real source of it all: the thoughts and purposes of Jehovah. This is perfection in this respect. He feels fully what these enemies are and sees their character clearly, and they are only the instruments of our suffering; yet through it all He looks to the ways and wisdom and will of God.
after
The cruelty of men was real. One writer sets it beside something heavier still.
Here is Christ forsaken by God. He is despised by the people too: strong bulls of Bashan surrounded Him, dogs closed in on Him, the assembly of the wicked shut Him in. He felt all this as no one but Christ could feel it. Yet what was it beside the awful reality of Christ suffering from the hand of God — of Christ suffering for sin? It is a sad but useful picture, this side of man. It is all the same nature; we were like that. But turn it round: what is the other side? Christ has shown what God is, and He is love, even when it is a question of our sins.
- Man's side — Seven verses now describe all that Christ suffered from men. This is not yet the psalm's deepest agony.
- Bulls — Violent men doing their own will. The Hebrew word for "strong" means "mighty one."
- Bashan — Rich pasture land, picturing well-fed men, proud and insolent, like Caiaphas.
- Behind them — The nation's leaders acted as Satan's agents, so the picture shifts from bull to roaring lion.
- His answer — He never stopped at the men, who were only instruments. He looked through them to the will of God, and there showed what God is: love, even about our sins.
They gape upon me with their mouth, [as] a ravening and a roaring lion.
On the cross the Sufferer describes His enemies as animals. He sees mouths stretched wide, and behind them He hears the roar of a lion. Psalm 22 places this among the sufferings Christ received from men. So who are these enemies, and who roars through them?
Each animal in this Psalm names a different kind of enemy.
In Psalms 20 and 21 we see human enemies and judgment, but in Psalm 22 divine wrath and perfect grace. In verse 12, bulls — that is, violent men who do their own will; in verse 16, dogs — that is, shameless ones. In verse 21, the lion's mouth — that is, Satan's power over death.
The gaping mouths belonged to real people. They roar like a lion because they served one.
Then in verses 12 and 13 we have the persecution of the Jews. The leaders of that people attacked Him with the strength and ferocity of bulls. The militant Pharisees were like strong bulls of Bashan. They were Satan's special agents in this matter, so they took on his character. Satan bears the character of "a roaring lion."
A lion's open mouth threatens before it bites. That noise had a purpose against Christ, and it has the same purpose against His people.
Satan not only presents himself as a serpent, but also as a roaring lion. It was in this character that the Lord Jesus met him in Gethsemane and at the cross. Nothing is more terrifying than the roar of the lion. Satan wanted to frighten the holy soul of Christ, to make Him abandon the divine path that led down to the sacrifice… At the cross he opened his mouth against Christ "like a ravening and roaring lion" (Ps. 22:13). There the Lord, in "the weakness of God," overcame "the strong man," and through death He nullified his power (Heb. 2:14). Satan comes to the children of God in the same form. "Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour" (1 Peter 5:8). If he cannot deceive us, he tries to frighten us.
What men did to Him and what God did to Him are not the same. This verse stands on the first side.
Notice the essential difference between the sufferings Christ received from man and from God. The first were for righteousness. The second were for sin. The consequence of the first (Psalm 21) is that He will make His enemies as a fiery oven in the day of His wrath. In the second He was bearing wrath. Its fruit is pure blessing, and nothing else. (See Psalm 22:11-23.)
The same rage broke out again after the cross. Stephen, one of the first Christian preachers, told Israel's leaders the truth. God has an answer for such teeth.
"You have broken the teeth of the ungodly." Of course this is a figure for breaking their power to devour those they considered enemies. Psalm 22:13 shows it… and so does Acts 7:54. There the religious leaders of Israel had arrested Stephen. He had told them the truth about their whole history of refusing the testimony of God, which ended in their rejecting and crucifying the Lord of Glory. They bitterly resented that he had exposed them as actual enemies of God, and "gnashed at him with their teeth."
The Psalm does not leave Him inside the lion's jaws. Later the cry changes, and the answer comes. The commentator below quotes verse 21 from an older translation.
He says, "Save me from the lion's mouth: for You have heard me from the horns of the wild oxen" (Ps. 22:21). In that awful hour the enemy spends his full fury against Him, and He cries, "Save me from the lion's mouth." He had borne the full penalty of our guilt. He had entered into the judgment of God and exhausted it. The concentrated power of the forces of darkness, and all the evil of man, came against Jesus, and He sustained it all. When all has been borne He can say with triumph, "You have heard Me."
- Bulls — the open mouths belong to violent men who do their own will. These leaders attacked Him with a bull's strength and ferocity.
- Lion — behind those men stands Satan, whose character they took on. He opens his mouth against Christ, and his weapon is terror.
- Roar — the noise was meant to frighten Him off the road to the sacrifice. Satan still uses it on believers he cannot deceive.
- Divide — here Christ suffers from man, for righteousness. The wrath He bore for sin is separate, and its fruit is pure blessing.
- Silenced — the cry "Save me from the lion's mouth" gets its answer: "You have heard Me." Through death He nullified the strong man's power; teeth that gnash are teeth God breaks.