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Psalm 110 as found in the KJV
Ps 110:1-4 1 The L-RD said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool. 2 The L-RD shall send the rod of thy strength out of Zion: rule thou in the midst of thine enemies. 3 Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power, in the beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning: thou hast the dew of thy youth. 4 The L-RD hath sworn, and will not repent, Thou art a priest for ever (KJV)
Psalm 110 as found in the Jewish Tanakh
1 ¶ A Psalm of David. The L-RD saith unto my lord: 'Sit thou at My right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool.' 2 The rod of Thy strength the L-RD will send out of Zion: 'Rule thou in the midst of thine enemies.' 3 Thy people offer themselves willingly in the day of thy warfare; in adornments of holiness, from the womb of the dawn, thine is the dew of thy youth. 4 The L-RD hath sworn, and will not repent: 'Thou art a priest for ever after the manner of Melchizedek.'
Answer for yourself: Did you notice that the "second lord" is capitalized in the Christian Bible but not in the Hebrew and Jewish Bible? Why is that when the Hebrew texts from which this verse is translated has no capital letters? Well by now you should be fully aware that "theological agendas" are being written into our Christian Bibles by the KJV redactors and others. The intent here is to make the "second lord" more than a man and since the Council of Nicea in 325 A.D. made Jesus "G-d" then texts like these have been altered by monks and redactors to make these Old Testament verses and their New Testament references point to Jesus as if he is G-d.
Christendom has both believed and taught for centuries that this passage proves that Jesus sits at G-d's right side, that Jesus should be called "Lord" as denoted with capital letters, and that he is a Lord or G-d ("The LORD said unto my Lord").
Understand that the first "lord" used in Psalm 110 is the Hebrew word for Jehovah:
Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew Lexicon states:
3068 Yehovah- Jehovah (Yahweh) "the existing One"; the proper name of the one true G-d; unpronounced except with the vowel pointings of 0136
Yet the second word translated "lord" is not Yahweh as we saw before but "adown":
113 'adown (aw-done'); or (shortened) 'adon (aw-done'); from an unused root (meaning to rule); sovereign, i.e. controller (human or divine): KJV-- lord, master, owner. Compare also names beginning with "Adoni-".
We see very plainly that if the writer intended the second "lord" to refer to anything Divine then he knew quite well to use another word to convey such a meaning but instead chose to use a word that denotes "rulership, sovereignty" like a King or Priest or one of a general superiority as this word can refer to all of these functions.
Answer for yourself: Does Jesus really set on G-d's right hand side? Is Jesus to be considered a "Lord" or a "G-d'?
Once again, this interpretation rests on a mistranslation. In the original Hebrew, it reads that G-d said "l'adonee"-i.e., "to my master." Listen please to this next statement.
If we have a different meaning imposed upon a Hebrew word other than what it actually says then WE ARE WRONG IN OUR UNDERSTANDING OF THE VERSE REGARDLESS OF WHAT OTHERS MIGHT PREACH OR WHAT THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION MAY SAY!
In addition, the passage begins with the words, "A Psalm to David" which the King James Bible has in very tiny print, separated from the main passage, which the Hebrew original does not do. Thus, the passage begins: a Psalm to David...G-d said to my master.. .(note that in the original Hebrew as well as in the King James Bible, it reads, "said" in the past tense.). This is a psalm written about someone in the past when this psalm was written in the first place. We cannot neglect the tense of the words and make them "future" tense when they are not. This is a song; a psalm written about and to the memory of David by the Levites and sung on the Temple steps. The levites sang about G-d speaking to King David....their master and "lord"...small letters.
But that is not the only meaning that this Psalm could have. Often passages can be applied to more than one person as a "type" of fulfillment. Notice again that not only are we speaking of the "past" as seen in the tense of the verbs ["said"] but the context of the psalm dates the events of the psalm by the mentioning of Melchizedek.
Therefore, the Talmud says it refers to Abraham, our forefather, and the Psalm refers to the anxious time before Abraham had to fight the four kings, in Genesis 14. G-d is telling Abraham not to worry, sit, so to speak, at my side, until I take care of your enemies. A proof of this explanation seems to be from the reference to Melchizedek, who is mentioned in only one other place in the Bible, and that is also in Genesis 14 (verse 18), and it describes him there in terms of a priest also. So it is clear that the verse does not point to Jesus at all. Moreover, it does seem to point directly to someone else, namely, Abraham, who was a master, in some way, to David, and who had a relationship to Melchizedek.
Above we saw that "adown" can refer to either a King or a Priest or one of general superiority as in a "father" as the Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew Lexicon also states. That being so we see that the Levites took a Psalm referring most likely to G-d speaking to Abraham [our father] and used it and applied it to David for we know that like Abraham G-d spoke to David and make him victorious against the enemies of G-d's people in wars just like Abraham. This psalm was never intended to refer to Jesus.
Shalom.
Bennoah1@verizon.net