Arthur Drews

“ All they that see me laugh me to scorn; they shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying, He trusted on the Lord that he would deliver him; let him deliver him, seeing he delighted in him.” Thus also it is said of the scoffing “wicked”: “They gaze on me, and show their pleasure in me.” ”

“ The vesture of Orion is the heavens, which are often conceived as a starry mantle,” and seem to be divided among the various constellations. Or we may take the Milky Way as his garment, the “seamless robe,” because it runs continuously across the sky, which is divided at the Twins into two halves by the passage of the sun.
We are now in a position to understand the real meaning of the psalm. The constellation Orion is in astral mythology an astral representative both of the sun and the moon. ”

“ Behind Orion are the “wild oxen,” the herd of re'ems, which on the celestial globe take the form of the Unicorn, which seems about to pierce the hanging figure with its horn. In harmony with this are the words of the psalm: “Many bulls have compassed me: strong bulls of Bashan have beset me round” (verse 12) .
“I am poured out like water,” says the sufferer. ”

“ But I am a worm, and no man.” Orion, the most human-looking of all the constellations, is the sun, which in the winter-time, pale and despised, creeps over the earth like a worm. [6] “A reproach of men and despised of the people. ”

“ In point of fact, they look down on Orion from the higher point of the ecliptic. [7]
Why should not the Twins at the highest point of the ecliptic “mock” the sun, as it moves heavy and dull on the lowest stretch of its annual path? Compare also Psalm lxix, 7-16. [8] Now it crosses the equator, and rises higher and higher. The situation changes. God has heard the cry of the abandoned. The better season begins: “The meek shall eat and be satisfied.” ”

“ Does not the river Eridanus flow beneath the feet of Orion? It seems to flow from his raised left foot; and the Milky Way also may be taken as water. See also Psalm lxix, 2 and 15.
“Dogs have compassed me” (Sirius and Procyon) .
“The assembly of the wicked have inclosed me”—the Bulls, the Dogs, the Hare, the Heavenly Twins, who are described as “wicked” (criminals, robbers) in the astral myth. (Cf. Gen. xlix, where they are related to the twins Simeon and Levi and are called “bull-slayers,” because they drive the Zodiacal bull before them and push him out of the heavens.) ”