How do I think of psalms such as this one? God gets involved in the battles of the earth, and (naturally) is victorious. I read psalms like this and think of days like the Crusades, when priests would carry a large golden cross (supposedly containing a piece of the cross of Jesus) into battle and expect the cross to provide victory. After all, God is the warrior here and wins battles. I tremble at the image.
Compare this image to the image of Ba'al and Asherah, chief god and goddess in the Canaanite world (and the most popular idols in Israel). Ba'al gets involved in wars just for the sake of it, and meets his consort Asherah while she is washing off the blood of her conquests. They destroy village after village, and there is no end to the violence and destruction.
I compare that image to Psalm 76, and I see some major discrepancies. For one, God is not the one with the sword. God is the one who speaks. God disposes of "the weapons of war" (verse 3). God's true home is not the battlefield, but Salem. Salem is a pre-Hebrew word that relates to "Shalom" in Hebrew and "Salaam" in Arabic. It means peace. God dwells in peace. God's battles are not for the sake of being the warrior, but on behalf of the afflicted. God's battles are to restrain the powerful from oppressing the powerless. May God's name be known as great in all the world.
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