For it is not an enemy that hath reproached me -- then could I have borne it; neither is it he that hateth me that hath magnified [himself] against me -- then would I have hidden myself from him;
Psalm 55 is the cry of a man trapped in a violent city. His sharpest pain comes not from the enemy outside but from a friend inside, and verse 12 names what he could have borne and what he could not.
The verse works by comparison. You can see an open enemy coming, and you can hide from him. What breaks the sufferer is hostility wearing the face of a friend.
You can expect opposition from an obvious enemy (v. 12) and may be ready to protect yourself from harm. But someone who acts as a companion is different. He walks and talks as a friend. Above all, he professes faith in the living God. You would hardly expect such a man to reverse his whole direction and prove himself a vicious enemy of both God and Israel.
The bond may be a religious one, and held in name only.
The treachery came from those who were associated with Him in name only... A friend or religious associate was the worst, because he was the nearest enemy.
The psalm sets this betrayal in a corrupted city. Danger presses from two directions at once.
Psalm 55 is a distressing picture of wickedness in Jerusalem. The speaker is outside, but he has felt this wickedness in the treachery of his dearest friends... The enemy was outside, the wicked inside. They charged the godly with wickedness and hated them completely. Worst of all was the heartless treachery of those within. These were the people the godly had walked with to the house of God. Still his trust was in God, for where else should he look for help?
Commentators do not tie the traitor to one man. The same words fit David's own history, the treachery Jesus suffered from Judas, and a deceiver still to come. Ahithophel was David's trusted adviser who turned against him. Judas was one of the twelve disciples of Jesus.
Some of it is spoken by the Lord Jesus as He looks at the treachery of Judas and the party that followed him. In the end it is the lawless one, or someone joined with him. The godly remnant in the last days feel his treachery and plead against him. They are deceived by him, as Jesus was by Judas... But this psalm is also David's own words, in his measure. He suffered the craft and treason of Ahithophel, who joined Absalom (see 2 Samuel 15, 16). John 13:21 shows how much the Lord felt what Judas did, as this psalm does. But His relief was in prayer.
This psalm's own words explain what troubled the Lord Jesus at the last supper.
Sin worked among the chosen twelve, and one of them became a tool of Satan to betray his Master. On the night of the last Supper, the Lord spoke to His disciples. He told them He knew the man who would do this shameful thing was there among them. He "was troubled in his spirit, and testified, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, one of you will betray me'" (John 13:21). One of you — one of my familiar friends — one of the holy circle (compare Psalm 41:9; Psalm 55:12-14): this troubled His spirit.
Several writers read verses 12-15 as a portrait of a deceiver still to come. He does what verse 12 names: he taunts the godly and he lifts himself up. Older translations render those two words as "reproached" and "magnified himself."
There follows what appears to be a description of the character of antichrist, a man who abandons the faith. He had professed to be among the godly, as an intimate and familiar friend. He had gone to the house of God in company with the people of God. Now he had turned against the godly, heaping reproaches on them and venting his hatred against them, while seeking to "magnify himself."
When the last trustworthy person fails, the sufferer is pushed off human support entirely — and that is treated as the point of the whole group of psalms.
David had these trials in the case of Absalom and Ahithophel; our Lord far more deeply, through the treachery of Judas. But the Spirit of prophecy links all that is past with the coming hour. Then oppression from outside and apostasy inside bring the sense of evil at its worst on true-hearted Jews. So they look more and more to God, not to man or circumstances. He does not only hold the sufferers up in patience; He brings in deliverance and blessing in power.
- Nearness wounds. You can bear an open enemy, because you see him coming. The wound you cannot guard against comes from the one closest to you.
- Nearness in worship. The traitor is no stranger. He walked with the godly to the house of God, and that is what makes his turn so shocking.
- Nearness betrayed in Christ. What troubled the Lord's spirit was not the plot but that one of His own circle carried it out.
- Nearness counterfeited. Writers see the same pattern ahead: a deceiver poses as one of the faithful, then turns on them.
- Nearness to God remains. Every human support fails. The sufferer falls back on the One who never fails, and finds his relief in prayer.
But it was thou, a man mine equal, mine intimate, my familiar friend. ...
Psalm 55 is the cry of a man hemmed in by violence and treachery. Its sharpest pain is not the open attack. It is the one voice he never expected to hear among his accusers. Who is this equal, this companion? And why do writers hear a far greater grief in the words?
The verse works by contrast. An open enemy is one you can see coming and guard against.
One can expect the opposition of an obvious enemy (v. 12) and may be ready to protect himself from harm. But think of a man who acts as a companion. He walks and talks as a friend, and he even professes faith in the living God (vv. 14-15). You would never expect such a man to reverse his whole direction and prove himself a vicious enemy of both God and Israel!
Commentators hear these words on the lips of Christ. Judas betrayed Him from inside the circle of His own disciples.
Jesus had ways of infinite love before His heart. Yet the devil had already planted in the heart of Judas Iscariot that terrible treachery against his divine Master, which no passing of the ages can erase. So it was with Jesus. The more the love of God showed itself in and through Him, the more the enemy's hatred came out. And how crushing to human pride, that the devil worked through a man and a disciple — the close, personal, honoured follower of the Lord Jesus! "It was you, a man my equal, my guide, and my acquaintance" (Ps. 55:13). In that holy companionship he had toyed with sin — with the greed that always gripped him. Now the devil prompted him to satisfy it by betraying the Son of God.
(Kelly quotes an older translation. Where it says "my guide, and my acquaintance," the ESV reads "my companion, my familiar friend.")
One name stands behind the psalm: Ahithophel, the counsellor who turned against David. Writers draw a rule from him that reaches much further.
Psalm 55 is Messiah's complaint against the Jews. He had expected sympathy and agreement from them… It was the treachery of those who were associated with Him in name only — the Jews joined with hostile power — that gave it this character, as with Ahithophel… There was nothing to be had but God, whose character did not change, even if their prosperity did not change either (v. 19). A friend or religious associate was the worst because he was the nearest enemy. Everyone knows how this came true in the blessed Saviour Himself.
The traitor did not start outside the circle of faith. He started inside it, among the worshippers.
He was once an associate of the godly, moving among the crowd of worshippers in the house of God. Now he has become the persecutor of the righteous, the man who profanes his covenant with God and man. His whole profession turns out to be mere cunning and treacherous wickedness.
The same wound falls on God's servants in every age. Nehemiah rebuilt Jerusalem's wall under attack from enemies outside the city.
Nehemiah was the one obstacle to the enemy's success, and so the target of all his hatred. In a time of general unfaithfulness he stayed faithful, held up in his path by the grace of his God. For that very reason he found the path a lonely one. He knew there were enemies outside. Now he has to discover that professed friends were among his foes. So he followed, however far behind, in the way our blessed Lord walked. On the human side, the Lord's sharpest sorrow was that one of His own disciples betrayed Him.
The psalm does not end in the wound. It ends by telling the betrayed man what to do with his burden.
"Cast your burden on the LORD, and he will sustain you; he will never permit the righteous to be moved. But you, O God, will cast them down into the pit of destruction; men of blood and treachery shall not live out half their days. But I will trust in you." Friends, counsellors, and companions of many years may fail. But Jehovah will sustain His servant, and He is ready to take his burden from him.
- Not an enemy — you can face an open opponent or keep away from him. The grief here is that this attacker came from inside the circle of trust.
- An equal — the betrayer once moved among the worshippers in God's house, beside the man he later turned on.
- A disciple — writers hear the verse fulfilled in Judas. The devil struck the Son of God through a close, honoured follower.
- A pattern — from Ahithophel to Nehemiah's professed friends, the nearest enemy is always the worst.
- A refuge — friends and counsellors of many years may fail. The psalm's answer: cast the burden on the LORD. He sustains, and He never lets the righteous be moved.
We who held sweet intercourse together. To the house of God we walked amid the throng.
Psalm 55 is the cry of a man in deep trouble. His sharpest pain is not an open enemy, but a friend who once shared his worship and then turned on him. This verse looks back on that friendship, and it raises a question many readers face: what do you do when the betrayal comes from inside the circle of faith?
The words describe two ties at once — a shared life and a shared worship — and both were snapped by the same act.
Now we come to the apostate. He had not been an open enemy — in that case it would have been easy to turn away from him as such. But he had been admitted to terms of equality, an associate, an intimate; and not only that, but professedly also among the godly, and among the crowds who went regularly to the house of God. So we see what bonds had been broken through — Godward as well as manward.
Commentators read the psalm on more than one level: David's own history, the Lord's betrayal by Judas, and a crisis still to come.
These psalms (Psalms 55-58) go on expressing, in various forms, the feelings produced by Christ's Spirit. The circumstances look on to the last crisis, when the godly Jews suffer from Antichrist and his supporters, above all in Jerusalem and the land. David went through these trials with Absalom and Ahithophel. Our Lord went through far worse in the treachery of Judas. But the Spirit of prophecy links all that is past with the coming hour. Then outward oppression and inward apostasy will bring the sense of evil at its worst on the true-hearted Jews.
Judas had walked in that company. He was not an outsider who broke in. He was a disciple, and the betrayal came through the closeness this verse describes.
If Jesus had ways of infinite love before His heart, the devil had already planted in the heart of Judas Iscariot the awful treachery against his Divine Master, which no passing of the ages can erase. So it was with Jesus: the enemy's hate came out most as the love of God showed itself in and by Him. But how crushing to all human pretension that the devil worked through a man and a disciple, the close, personal, honoured follower of the Lord Jesus!
You can keep your distance from an open enemy. You cannot keep your distance from a friend who worships beside you. That is why this wound is the worst, and why God alone is left as a refuge.
There was nothing to be had but God, whose character did not change, even if the prosperity did not. A friend or religious associate was the worst, because he was the nearest enemy. Everyone knows how this was fulfilled in the blessed Saviour Himself. But it reaches on to that whole solemn scene of the last days. Then the faithful must follow that faithful One and Guide, who leads them outside the camp.
Writers see the same method used again by the coming Antichrist. He copies the friendship of this verse to climb into a position of power.
He will use the godly remnant of Israel to help him gain a place of authority. Psalm 55:12-14 shows how. He keeps company with them as one of them, takes sweet counsel with them, and goes to the house of God with them. Like Judas, he will deceive the godly into thinking he is one of them. Then, once he has risen to a place of prominence among them, he will cruelly turn against them. He will persecute the people who had befriended him.
The verse can also describe your own past. Sweet counsel is often given up step by step, with no dramatic act of betrayal.
Perhaps you are a backslider. You have lost the assurance of your interest in Christ. You were once happy in the Lord, and happy with His people. You took sweet counsel together, and found His ways to be ways of pleasantness and peace. But you grew careless. You neglected private prayer. You stopped reading the Scriptures each day. Little by little you gave up the company of God's children, in public and in private.
- Nearness — The verse describes shared talk and shared worship. That closeness is what makes the later betrayal the psalm's deepest wound.
- Two bonds — The traitor was a trusted equal, and also one of the crowd at God's house. So the ties he broke were "Godward as well as manward."
- Nearest is worst — You can avoid an open enemy. But "a friend or religious associate was the worst, because he was the nearest enemy."
- Repeated — The same pattern runs through David and Ahithophel, and through Christ and Judas. It returns in a coming deceiver who joins the godly to gain power, then turns on them.
- Refuge — When friendship fails, "there was nothing to be had but God, whose character did not change." He is the one friend who never turns.