Tie David's Life to Psalm He Wrote

Stephen Darnielle · 2025-06-05T15:50:23+00:00

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Is there a way to tie events in David's life to the Psalm he wrote at that time? I have looked at the Psalms Explorer tool and can filter those David wrote but don't see how to connect any of them to a time in David's life.

I realize some of this might not be known 100% but as I study David's life chronologically, I'd like to read the accompanying Psalm Davod wrote at that time (to the best of our knowledge).

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Justin Gatlin

The Tyndale Handbook of Bible Charts and Maps has a lovely table that connect the psalms to the events associated with them.

https://ref.ly/logosres/ws-97b4ae9a8a1241e1855dc38d25e63023?ref=Bible.Ps3&off=213

Stephen Darnielle

Justin, thank you! I actually have this resource so nothing new to buy. I'm trying to figure out if this book has a complete list or not, or if there is another tool built in to Logos that I can use.

But this type of format and the information is exactly what I am looking for!

Simon’s Brother

Based on the titles attributed to each Psalm as I understand there are up to 14 Psalms that are generally accepted as being able to be directly linked to events in David's life.

The resource on the left is An Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament | Logos Bible Software by Samuel Driver.

I don't own this following resource but from AI Search I can it is one that suggests 14 Psalms can be linked to specific events in David's life:

A slightly re-worded smart search once again suggests 14 psalms is the number.

The CSB Bible Study Notes suggests the 14 Psalms are ( but doesn't link them to the specific events)

This is one of fourteen psalms (3; 7; 18; 30; 34; 51–52; 54; 56; 57; 59; 60; 63; 142) that are linked directly, by virtue of their titles, with specific events in the life of David.

Warstler, K.R. (2017) “Psalms,” in Blum, E.A. and Wax, T. (eds.) CSB Study Bible: Notes. Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers, p. 819.

Stephen Darnielle

Simon's Brother, thank you - more great suggestions! I have temporary license to the Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament due to my subscription level and will check that out. Using the titles to the Psalms is an avenue of research I hadn't considered, either.

Justin Gatlin

A slightly artificial (since I had to adjust it based on psalms I knew should come up) precise search is (when OR "which he" OR "on the day") NEAR David in the Psalms.

Another idea is to create a passage list of all of the titles of the Psalms and search that for David. I made one here, but got the idea from Mark Futato's course Preaching the Psalms (CM328) : https://flshare.net/z36po2

Stephen Darnielle

Hi Justin, thank you. That is a nifty idea and will be helpful!

I have used passage lists quite a bit but didn't know you could limit them to something like the title. Can you explain how you were able to create that type of passage list?

Justin Gatlin

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1371276#Comment_1371276

Unfortunately, there is no way to do it directly in Logos. But you can create a list of the numbers 1-150 and concat it with ":title" in Excel. Thankfully, it only shows up in Psalms, so if you have that list I shared you can always use it.

Roger Pitot

Many bibles have. in the heading of each Psalm attempts to do this. For example:

3 A psalm of David at his fleeing from the presence of Absalom, his son.

34 Of David, when he ⌊pretended to be crazy⌋ in front of Abimelech

52 A maskil of David. When Doeg the Edomite came and informed Saul

54 A maskil of David, when the Ziphites went and said to Saul, “Is not David hiding himself among us?”

60 A miktam of David. To teach. When he fought Mesopotamia and Aram Zobah, and Joab returned and struck Edom in the Valley of Salt, twelve thousand persons.

This at least gives a starting point to search for the events.