Psalm 36 Who Are the Wicked?

Psalm 36:1 For the director of music. Of David the servant of the LORD. An oracle is within my heart concerning the sinfulness of the wicked: There is no fear of God before his eyes. 
2 For in his own eyes he flatters himself too much to detect or hate his sin. 
3 The words of his mouth are wicked and deceitful; he has ceased to be wise and to do good. 
4 Even on his bed he plots evil; he commits himself to a sinful course and does not reject what is wrong. 
5 Your love, O LORD, reaches to the heavens, your faithfulness to the skies. 
6 Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains, your justice like the great deep. O LORD, you preserve both man and beast. 
7 How priceless is your unfailing love! Both high and low among men find refuge in the shadow of your wings. 
8 They feast on the abundance of your house; you give them drink from your river of delights. 
9 For with you is the fountain of life; in your light we see light. 
10 Continue your love to those who know you, your righteousness to the upright in heart. 
11 May the foot of the proud not come against me, nor the hand of the wicked drive me away. 
12 See how the evildoers lie fallen-- thrown down, not able to rise!

Psalm 1 introduces the "righteous" and the "wicked" as a major theme of the whole Psalter. Psalm 32 talks about who the righteous are. Psalm 32 also teaches that it is God who gets to decide who is righteous and who is wicked. This is because He is God. As such, He created; He sustains; He will judge, condemn, punish, justify, and reward. It is also by His Spirit that the Bible was written; i.e., God wrote the Bible.

Moving on, Psalm 36 describes the wicked--

1...concerning the sinfulness of the wicked: There is no fear of God before his eyes. 
2 For in his own eyes he flatters himself too much to detect or hate his sin. 
3 The words of his mouth are wicked and deceitful; he has ceased to be wise and to do good. 
4 Even on his bed he plots evil; he commits himself to a sinful course and does not reject what is wrong.

Just as the righteous are defined by their attitude toward God, so are the wicked. Verse 1 says it all--"There is no fear of God before his eyes." The righteous, by way of contrast, "fear" God. They believe He exists; they acknowledge Him. The righteous see God as being all-powerful. They realize that they must one day, perhaps right now, give an account of themselves to God. They recognize that God is their own personal judge. He will indeed judge them. They recognize that God sets the rules. They further submit to God's rule and seek to please Him. They are on God's side. The righteous are blessed of God. He rewards them greatly with His protection, comfort, guidance, salvation, forgiveness, great joy, and peace. All of this is developed in Psalm 32.

The wicked, again, has no fear of God before his eyes. This could mean that the wicked person denies the existence of God at at some level of His being. Paul in Romans 1:18 forward, teaches that all men know innately that God exists. People are hard-wired with this knowledge. But a wicked person has no fear of God before his eyes, in his front-most consciousness, the place where decisions are made and actions are born.

The phrase could also mean that a wicked person does indeed believe that God exists, but just doesn't care. He doesn't fear God, literally. He doesn't fear the punishment that God announces on nearly every page of Scripture. He throws himself against God and opposes Him to His face. Perhaps he feels himself to be more powerful than God. He hates God. Such a one would be Satan.

Verses 2-4 develop the thought introduced in verse 1, that the wicked have no fear of God before their eyes. Verse 2 gives us the reason why this is so--

2 For in his own eyes he flatters himself too much to detect or hate his sin.

The wicked person loves himself! His eyes are on himself! The word "flatter" in scripture always refers to pleasant-sounding speech that is false. Flattery is never true. Satan fell in love with himself. He admired his own beauty more than the beauty of God, and he forgot that it was God who had created him, not he himself. Satan wanted the power and glory of God, and he fell. (Isaiah 14:12-14). He is the model and father of all wickedness. Just as Satan wanted his own way rather than God's way, so does the wicked man. The Bible describes this heart-attitude with the phrase in verse 1, "There is no fear of God before his eyes."

Verses 3-4 continue with a description of what a wicked person says and does, of how he spends his time.

3 The words of his mouth are wicked and deceitful; he has ceased to be wise and to do good. 
4 Even on his bed he plots evil; he commits himself to a sinful course and does not reject what is wrong.

Do these verses mean that a wicked person never does what we would call good? No, because it is the heart attitude that primarily defines wickedness, verse 1. Because a wicked person has no fear, no love, of God, all that he does is wicked. Just as God considers a righteous person to be righteous in His eyes, even when the person sins, so He considers a wicked person to be wicked even when he does what may appear to our eyes to be good.

I find it very interesting that Psalm 32, in its development of who a righteous person is, did not compare the righteous with the wicked. There in that psalm, a righteous person was righteous with respect of God, not by comparison with the wicked. Just so, here in this psalm, the wicked are not wicked with respect to the righteous, but with respect to God. Verses 5-6 tell the character and righteousness of God. It is His righteousness which defines the wickedness of the wicked. 

5 Your love, O LORD, reaches to the heavens, your faithfulness to the skies. 
6 Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains, your justice like the great deep. O LORD, you preserve both man and beast.

Verses 7-9 declare the blessings which God bestows upon the righteous. 

7 How priceless is your unfailing love! Both high and low among men find refuge in the shadow of your wings. 
8 They feast on the abundance of your house; you give them drink from your river of delights. 
9 For with you is the fountain of life; in your light we see light.

Verses 10 and 11 are a prayer uttered by one of the righteous. Verse 12 tells the final outcome of the wicked.   

10 Continue your love to those who know you, your righteousness to the upright in heart. 
11 May the foot of the proud not come against me, nor the hand of the wicked drive me away.
12 See how the evildoers lie fallen-- thrown down, not able to rise!

Application: Nowhere in the Bible do I find any verses that tell me to judge someone else. In fact, I find this in the book of Romans:

Romans 2:1 You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge the other, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things.

Yet, the Bible does teach what a wicked person looks like. How am I to use this knowledge? 1) To examine my own heart, and 2) for discretion. If I see a person who appears to be what the Bible describes as wicked, I should use great discretion that I do not throw in my lot with that person (not to become unequally yoked), nor to believe everything they say.

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Father, thank-You so much for verses 7-9 of this Psalm. Help me, Lord, in my own life, to use all the wisdom Scripture imparts wisely and according to Your will, especially in my dealings with those who do not seem to fear You. In Jesus' name, Amen.

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[* Note: A Pharisee once made the mistake of defining his own righteousness by comparing himself with the seemingly wicked person standing next to him. Jesus really condemned that heart attitude. God does not look at externals, but the "internals" of each person. And what interests God is the person's attitude and relationship towards Himself. A righteous person fears, worships, and obeys God. A wicked person does not.

Luke 18:9 To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable: 10 "Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: 'God, I thank you that I am not like other men-- robbers, evildoers, adulterers-- or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.' 13 "But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, 'God, have mercy on me, a sinner.' 14 "I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."]