Ps. 57.1 (the shadow of wings)

Have mercy / on me / O God / have mercy / on me
for / I have sought / refuge with you
in the shadow / of your wings / I take refuge
until Destruction / passes by.

The formal layout of this introductory verse is very much that of the entire psalm: plea for mercy – location within/underneath God’s protection – destruction. There are several ways of approaching this dynamic. One is by looking at the geographical reference: seeking refuge in the shadow of God’s wings. It is from this location that the plea for mercy originates. The psalmist has already made a trek to this place in order to, from that location, attempt to compel God to send forth his mercy and protect and deliver him from the troubles that surround him. In other words, he has moved himself, literally and geographically, from one surrounding force (Destruction) to another (God’s wings). The location is clearly the Temple, where the arc of covenant is and over which the ‘wings of the cherubim’ are extended. Understood as a type of throne of God, to take protection within the sphere of these ‘wings’ is to position oneself at the feet of the Great King. From this position he asks for the extension of mercy—that help a stronger party is to extend to a weaker party when in trouble. And, furthermore, we must recall that the Temple is where (the power of) heaven and earth coincide, where God dwells. To move into the Temple is to therefore not only move underneath God’s throne established on earth but to, simultaneously (or, therefore), move underneath God’s heavenly throne. When we (literally) place the psalmist, it accounts for something we will notice in the remainder of the psalm—that, although this is clearly a petition for help, the psalmist expresses a very firm conviction and sense of stability in the face of ‘Destruction’. The angst that we detect in many other psalms is simply absent. The psalmist seems very comfortable where he is. (A speculative thought: when Moses was afforded a vision of God, God hid him in a rock so that he could pass by without Moses dying. He then, also, covered him with his hand and the only thing that Moses actually saw was God’s ‘back’. All of this took place within the context of God moving into the camp of Israel and, specifically, into the tabernacle. That structure operated in much the same fashion as the cleft and hand of God: to protect Israel from the overpowering (and potentially deadly) presence of God. The tabernacle then, under David/Solomon, was moved into the Temple. Here, the psalmist seeks refuge in the Temple so that Destruction can ‘pass by’. Are we to hear in this the way in which the Temple operates as a refuge for God’s people (either from Destruction or from Presence)?)  A final point: regardless of the security there is clearly a danger that needs to be rectified, a gap that needs closing and a darkness that needs banishing. What will become clear later is that the geographical location of the psalmist is to be closely understood in relation to the time of the psalm: night to daybreak. Here, at the opening, although not obvious now, we find the psalmist entering the Temple at night (perhaps in some type of incubation whereby he would be giving a prophetic word of deliverance in the morning?). As the psalm progresses it will move toward the Dawn. In this way we will come to see how the Temple will come function as the ‘portal’ through which heaven will descend and the ‘light of day’ (in psalm 56, “light of life”) will spread out over the entire earth, much like the rising sun. In this Destruction will “pass by” as the night passes into day.