Psalms 38 to 46

Picking up where we left off w/ psalms last week ..

PSALM 38

This one is called “Prayer of an Afflicted Sinner” and as you might guess, it sure is bleak. OK, there is a tradition of bleak psalms.  In them, the psalmist cries out to the Lord to ease his burdens, to give him hope and salvation.  The psalmist is turning to the Lord because he has no one else to turn to.  He’s at the end of his rope and only the Lord can help him out. 

It’s a powerful theme and these are generally among the most vivid and visceral of psalms.  This time, however, there’s a little wrinkle.  You see, normally the psalmists burdens are caused by his enemies.  Normally, the Lord is his only friend. 

But here?  The Lord is the cause of his misfortune.  Wait, no – hold that a second.  The Lord isn’t literally the cause – the sinner’s sinning is the cause.  But he fells the Lord is angry at him and turned away from him – and that’s why he is suffering so much. 

The language here makes it sound like the psalmist contracted VD.  Maybe not, but you have to admit, it’s a legitimate interpretation of lines like, “My loins burn with fever; there is no wholesomeness in my flesh.” 

At the very end it chickens out a bit.  Now he’s blaming his enemies for his misfortunes, but it reads like the stanza from a different psalm was stuck on this one.  That said, what’s really different about this psalm is the lack of a happy ending.  He gets no resolution – he just suffers and prays to God to be redeemed.

PSALM 39

This one has one of the best starts of any psalm I’ve read so far.  The psalmist starts by pledging to bide his tongue and stay silent and muzzle his mouth and  .. and .. and – he just can’t do it!  “In my sighing, a fire blazes up, and I break into speech.”  Yeah, that gives this guy some credibility.  He sounds like someone who is going to just lay it out there and tell some untold (and perhaps unpleasant) truths – because they have to be said.  Also, it’s a nice narrative effect.  It sucks us in and makes us wonder what will happen next.

What happens next is a fairly standard psalm.  It’s not bad, but it’s the opening lines that stick in the memory. 

PSALM 40

I can see this psalm being popular with Christians.  It fits their imagery pretty well.  Actually, it seems to flatly go against ancient Hebrew beliefs, as the psalmist (again, allegedly David) says, “Sacrifice and offering you do not want; you opened my ears.  Holocaust and sin-offering you do not request.” Well, the Torah makes very clear he does request that and the Israeli priests did sacrifices until the Roman Empire.  So this fits more in with Christianity, which never went for that.

Aside from that, it’s a standard psalm about how the psalmist takes comfort and aide in God.  Again, I can see why the faithful like psalms such as this, as it can provide solace when they are blue. It has some nice imagery, too, as God: “Draws me up from the pit of destruction, out of the muddy clay, Sets my feet upon rock, steadies my steps.”  Yeah, good job by the psalmist with those lines.

The second stanza begins with a bleak start as the psalmist notes that evil surrounds him, his sins overtake him – but of course it’s all about building up to the happy ending where the Lords helps him out.  Here is how it ends: “Though I am afflicted and poor, my Lord keeps me in mind.  You are my help and deliverer; my God, do not delay!” I like the bit of ambiguity there.  Sure he has faith, but he also has doubts and flaws – and he needs God to hurry up already so his pros will overcome his cons.  The exclamation point sure is a nice touch.

PSLAM 41

This reads like two different psalms stuck together oddly as one.  The first stanza is praise for helping the poor, and how those that do so will be repaid by the Lord.  The rest of the poem has nothing to do with that, though.  The rest is standard “Lord, help me versus my accursed enemies” stuff.  (Actually, it reminded me of “Positively Fourth Street” by Bob Dylan as the psalmist recounted how people speak to him without sincerity and gossip behind his back).

How do you reconcile these two halves?  My answer – though this is yet another psalm supposedly written by David, it’s a poor, obscure man and the psalm was later attributed to David.  Yes, I know David began life as a shepherd, but this reads more like someone who lives all life at a lowly rung.  Since he’s lowly and people are treating him bad, he begins his poem by saying how wonderful those are who help the poor.  It’s harder to reconcile the first stanza with the rest if it’s written by the king of all Israel. 

PSALM 42

This begins Book 2 of psalms.  Pretty much everything in Book 1 was attributed to David, but these early ones in Book 2 aren’t.  Why multiple books?  It’s due to printing technology.  Back then, you didn’t have books, but scrolls.  And the most words you could fit on a scroll is essentially the Book of Isaiah.  Well, psalms are a lot longer than that, so I assume it must’ve been on multiple scrolls.  Therefore, I guess Psalm 42 was the first one on the second scroll. Really, they could’ve chopped up psalms into multiple modern books of the Bible, but obviously they didn’t see the point in doing that.

OK, lesson in psalms aside, this is one of the bleaker psalms.  Sure, there is still plenty of talk about how wonderful God is and how he’s the inspiration, but the main theme here is a sense of lacking.  This psalmist wants a closer relationship with God, but isn’t feeling it.  This deep yearning is causing him problems.  He feels downcast.  The psalm ends with him still feeling every bit as blue as at the beginning, but affirming that God will help him.  Eventually.

I can see the appeal of this psalm to the faithful.  Everyone has doubts.  Everyone has their moments of crisis.  And everyone has moments where they feel low.  Part of the appeal of religion is that it can give comfort, knowing that there is this higher power out there that you can turn to for help.  But, sense you always have doubts, what if you feel cut off from that higher power?  Then where can you turn to?  Well, then you turn to Psalm 42 and realize that even in the Bible people feel the same way you do.

No wonder Psalms are among the more popular parts of the Bible.  This is a far more personal book, one which helps people get over their dark moods and get past their crises in their faith and personal life.  The psalms themselves can help people persevere. 

This also explains why I don’t get as much out of it.  I ain’t a believer, so it’s just a purely academic exercise for me, not a personal or spiritual one.

PSALM 43

This is a short psalm – just five verses – that covers much of the same ground as the previous one. The psalmist is sad because while he believes in God, he feels God is spurning him.  His soul is downcast and groans within him, but he still has hopes God will help him eventually.

Hey wait a second – both Psalm 42 and Psalm 43 have the exact same end line!  (looks further).  Actually, the last two lines are the same, word-for-word: “Why are you downcast, my soul, why do you groan within me?  Wait for God, for I shall again praise him, my savior and my God.” 

Well, clearly these psalms are by the same author going through a personal crisis.  In fact, I have wonder if they were originally meant to be just one poem, with a common refrain. 

PSALM 44

This is a weird psalm in that it combines two themes that aren’t typically combined.  First, there is a sense of longing, a feeling of being abandoned by God.  You get that often – like in the psalms immediately before this one.  Aye, but this isn’t a peaceful psalm.  Not at all.  Instead, the second theme here is blood and guts.  It’s not nearly as violent as Psalm 18, but the psalm longs for the days when, well, when God would kill all his enemies.

The first stanza fondly recalls how God, “rooted out nations to plant them, crushed peoples and expelled them.”   Ah, the Good Old Days.  But now those days are gone, and the Hebrew are forced to retreat.  Their enemies advance, and they feel completely rejected.

It’s interesting, because we think of God as being so much vaster and above things than the old fashioned pagan gods of the ancient Near East.  In those places, a city or empire would have a god it prayed to for help and victory in war.  Their gods were more like local patron saints than what we’d now think of as god.  But here?  God is every bit as parochial as any run of the mill Near East deity.  He just happens to be the all-powerful God (though I’m sure the Philistines and others felt that about their gods, too).  The Hebrew prays to him because he can give them glory and success in war.  The Hebrew take on gods began out of the Near East context, they just broadened him to make him THE God, not just their god.  But here, he’s still just their god.

What’s interesting is how the third stanza makes clear that the Hebrew don’t deserve this.  The psalmist clearly states that they’ve kept their covenant and not forgotten him – yet they’ve been forgotten anyway.  That’s not normally how Jewish theology works.  The Babylonian Captivity was explained as punishment for their transgressions, not punishment despite a lack of transgressions. 

Also, there are some nice lines here.  In discussing their misfortunes, the psalmist psalms: “You make us a byword among nations.”  Bummer.  They’re the Cliff Clavin of the ancient Near East.  Later on, he writes: “For you we are slain al the day long, considered only as sheep to be slaughtered.”  Sheep to be slaughtered – that’s a line with a future in front of it.

PSALM 45

This one is called a Song for a Royal Wedding, and it’s not quite what I expected.  It’s not really about a wedding.  The first half is apparently for the king: “You are the most handsome of men,” it says.  Gee, buttering the monarch up, I see.  But it talks about success in battle and how God is on his side.  And how God also loves justice.  Really, though, I’m a bit confused if the pronouns refer to the king or God. 

The second half is advice for the woman getting married.  The main advice is to, “Forget your people and your father’s house.”  You belong to your husband now. This is quite a bit more than just changing last names back then. 

PSALM 46

This is a fairly standard psalm in praise of God.  It’s pretty much all about God, rather than the psalmist’s relationship to him, and as such I don’t have too much to say about it.

Well, with one notable exception, that is.  Some of the imagery is rather striking.  In fact, it reminded me of a movie – a movie about the Lord’s tabernacle, in fact.  Yup, this psalm is a nice accompaniment for Raiders of the Lost Ark. 

Just check out these lines: “Though nations rage and kingdoms totter, he utters his voice and the earth melts.”  Hey – in Raiders a guy melted when the Tabernacle was opened up!  Later it says, “Who stops wars to the ends of the earth, breaks the bow, splinters the spear, and burns the shields with fire: `Be still and know that I am God!’”  That’s a nice Big Time line to end on.  That said, burning with fire and destroying everything that comes in his path – yup, that still sounds like Raiders of the Lost Ark.

EDITED to add: here is the next batch of psalms