"GOD, HAVE MERCY!" - LAST HOPE IN PSALMS, DEMONSTRATED ON PSALM 57

This article proposes to understand the Hebrew term "have mercy on me/have mercy on us" as the expression of last hope in the book of Psalms. It briefly surveys the situations and their causes in which this term is used, concluding that most of them are lethal and caused by the psalmist's enemies. Because the enemies are frequently the object of the psalmist's imprecations, this article also attempts to reconcile "mercy on me" with "doom on them" petitions for a contemporary Christian reader. In the second part, Psalm 57 is analyzed as a pars pro toto example of how the last hope of the psalmist is expressed and how it is based on God's essential characteristics, his former deeds and his created order.