Ps. 72.4 (..and he shall crush his head)

May he vindicate / the poor / of the people
deliver / the children / of the needy
and crush / the oppressor. 

The king, perhaps in his adoption-coronation, is given God’s righteousness and justice. He then turns to God’s people and administers it, providing a framework of justice. From there, the earth is now unleashed in its blessing-potential and, itself, begins to push forth well-being and righteousness. Now, with the ‘body’ of the people secured against themselves (in justice), and the earth producing its bounty, the king turns his attention to liberation and the destruction of enemies. As in his first movement, the king turns to the ‘poor’ and vindicates them. The difference though is important. In the first instance, the king enacted justice for them. Here, he reaches out to them. He is not merely providing a framework but actively going after the poor. Further, now the ‘children of the needy’ are brought within this act of ‘seeking out’ and deliverance. The point is rather profound one: that the king mediates God’s concern for the lowly. This is not simply ‘David’—this is the enactment of that primal handing over of God’s justice and righteousness. This is, in other words, David who is “after God’s own heart”. This is what it looks like to be a ‘son of God’ (Ps. 2), an ‘image of God’. The king is not merely an establisher, but he is also a healer, a seeker of the lowly. Perhaps more to the point—he enters into and fills the space opened up by tragedy (the poor and needy children). He becomes the father-protector and kinsman to those who have none. In this way, God’s “people” become the king’s people, as he becomes their representative father. This marks his ‘internal’ mode of compassion. His external mode of compassion is in his crushing of the oppressor. We must wonder whether this is not partaking of the primal promise to Eve that a child of her womb would “crush the head” of the snake (the oppressor). Are we to see in this king, a new Adam? One who protects the Garden, by establishing justice. One who liberates it from its curse, and makes it grow righteousness. And one who guards the Garden, by crushing the head of the oppressor. This 'crushing' is the act of a king. The point to make in this is that the ‘external’ mode and the ‘internal’ are part of the same dynamic of compassion for the poor and the ‘children of the needy’. We do not have one without the other. The vindication and their liberation are part and parcel to the crushing of the oppressor. If we are to hear in this the crushing of the head of the snake, we must make the further conclusion that is probably warranted given the previous verses: that the crushing will be complete; the oppressor will be destroyed. Just as explosive and absolute as the blessing of the land is, will be the destruction of the enemy. (…and within his destruction, so too will the ‘fatherhood’ of God, through the king, now be fully established…).