Messianic Psalms

There are fifteen psalms that are explicitly messianic and quoted in the New Testament.

One of the major types of messianic psalms refers to the anointed king. Kings, priests, and sometimes prophets were anointed in the Old Testament. The Hebrew word, masiah, means to smear or pour oil on someone or something for the sake of consecrating it for God’s use. From the word masiah comes the word Messiah, or Anointed One. The Septuagint either transliterates the word as messias or translates it as christos, from which we get the title Christ, the Anointed One.

The king was anointed at his coronation and thus became the masiah of God. David was keenly aware of his typical role as God’s Anointed representative on the throne and when the psalms speak of the king reigning over the whole earth, it indicates that the earthly king is a type of the heavenly king, who reigns in the heavens over the whole world.

Anointing implies consecration, giving the one anointed a high status (making him sacred so that to do violence to him would be a sacrilege) as well as empowering him to fulfill that sacred duty. The outward ritual was symbolic of the anointed one receiving the gift of God’s Spirit, whose presence made the anointed sacred and empowered.

David clearly saw that the nation’s fortunes were tied up with him, so that what happened to him would affect the entire nation. He also understood that any violence done to him was in effect violence done towards God and his people. David’s experiences, then, become typological of the Messiah’s experiences.

As king, the people could see something of God’s glory in him. He was their shield, as was God. He was God’s son and co-regent with God. However, the king’s failures and shortcomings left the people looking for the One who was to come and be the perfect king, the Messiah.

Psalm 2:7 is one of the verses in the Old Testament quoted most frequently in the New Testament. God promised David that his son Solomon would be the next king, and that He would be his Father and he would be God’s son (2 Samuel 7:14). This sonship is also referred to in Psalm 110, and this psalm is quoted by Jesus to show that David realized that even though the king enjoyed a special status as God’s son, there was another Son, higher than he, sitting at God’s right hand. Hebrews 1:13 draws a further contrast by showing that not even the angels have ever received the privilege to sit at God’s right hand, but only to stand before him. Paul, in Romans 1:4 states that Christ was demonstrated to be this Son when he was resurrected from the dead by the power of God. Paul builds on this image in Ephesians 4:8-11 where he quotes Psalm 68:18 to show that Christ ascended into heaven leading a host of captives and giving the gifts of the Spirit to his church. Psalm 45:6 clearly calls this figure on the throne God, indicating that the Messiah is a divine figure, as Hebrews 1:8 points out.

Another Messianic title in the psalms is “my servant,” used by David while in distress (69:17; 86:2, 4, 16) but also in the headings of several psalms to designate himself (18, 36). Most of the quotations from the psalms in the New Testament concerning Christ’s suffering and death come from psalms using this title for the Messiah (22, 35, 40, 41, 109, 118).

Other titles allude to the Messiah and are picked up by the New Testament as well. The high status of “man” is typological of Messiah, as is the high priest after the order of Melchizedek (Genesis 14:18ff; Psalm 110; Hebrews 8-10). Jesus is also called the “stone the builders rejected” (118:22) who has become the chief corner stone.

While there are fifteen psalms that explicitly refer to the Messiah, it is clear from the New Testament that Christ is seen in many more psalms implicitly. The fact that the New Testament writers don’t take the time to explain, let alone prove, that the psalms they are quoting refer to Jesus, implies that there was a wide spread acceptance of this idea already in the early church. This is most likely due to the fact of Jesus’ teaching after his resurrection (cf. Luke 24) where he explains how the whole Old Testament refers to him.



Much of this material was adapted from Derek Kidner’s commentary, Psalms: An Introduction and Commentary, vol. 1, pages 18-24.