Haredi educator Tziporah Heller referred to it as perhaps the best-known of the psalms due to "its universal message of trust in God, and its simplicity".

For example, King Hammurabi, in the conclusion to his famous legal code, wrote: "I am the shepherd who brings well-being and abundant prosperity; my rule is just.... so that the strong might not oppress the weak, and that even the orphan and the widow might be treated with justice.

MacMillan also notes that verse 6 ("Goodness and mercy shall follow me") reminds him of two loyal sheepdogs coming behind the flock.

[11]: 82 The header or first verse of the Psalm ascribes authorship to King David, said in the Hebrew Scriptures to have been a field shepherd himself as a youth.

The Reformation inspired widespread efforts in western Europe to make biblical texts available in vernacular languages.

The most widely recognized version of the psalm in English today is undoubtedly the one drawn from the King James Bible (1611).

In the Church of England's Book of Common Prayer, it is appointed to be read on the evening of the fourth day of the month.

Many phrases in the English translation of the psalm have become individually popular in their own right, in particular, “the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want”, much of verse 4, and “my cup runneth over”.

[20] One of the best known metrical versions of Psalm 23 is the Christian hymn, "The Lord's My Shepherd", a translation first published in the 1650 Scottish Psalter.

[21] Although widely attributed to the English Parliamentarian Francis Rous, the text was the result of significant editing by a translating committee in the 1640s before publication.