A Brief Introduction to Hebrew Poetics in Psalm 1.

 

The message of the First Psalm overlaid on a painting by Floyd County Artisit Winnie Carthel which hangs on the wall of my bedroom.

[Teaching notes by K Cummings Pipes, SouthwestCentralHouston, ZOOM class

This is the first of a series of 2. I link the November 19 post with Part 2 Hebrew Poetics: Concantentaionhttp://the-life-i-read.blogspot.com/2020/11/hebrew-poetics-concantenation-through.html]

"Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the wicked, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful."  Psalm 1:1  KJV

Blessed!

How blessed! Happy! How happy!

It's not a statement of fact. Not a teaching or code of law.

Blessed!

It's a proclamation, a shout, an assertion of deep fulfillment, a state of harmony with the world, with others, and with oneself

It's a bold and joyous celebration of unity and peace with the God whose name we know, the God whose name we whisper.

Blessed! ‘ashrei in Hebrew a strong, masculine interjection

So begins the first Psalm.

The word “bless” in its various Hebrew forms is the most commonly used word in the Psalms. Over 100 times.

The idea of blessing is the over-arching theme of the Psalms.

What does it mean to be blessed?

Who is blessed?

How do we see blessing in times of fear, pain, loss, doubt, oppression, separation, death?

How do we recover our balance?

How do we find “the level place” [that idea is one of the meanings of the word “bless”] that level place where we can walk in safety and security?

Where is the “straight path, the open way” to promised blessing? [those, too, are meanings in the word “bless”]

When I’m lost, when I’ve stumbled, when I don’t know the way, how do I find the way back?

What is the “next step”? [yet another meaning of “bless”]

 A Hebrew scholar notes the possibility that “Blessing!”  ’ashrei may be an sound-alike  pun on ‘ashurim “steps” and this idea reinforces the walking metaphor of the first Psalm. 

[Robert Alter citing Nahum Sarna]

In the handouts for this lesson, I provided a copy of Psalm 1 from one of the most recent translations of Hebrew scripture into English.  Robert Alter’s highly annotated translation is excellent and belongs in the library of any serious student of the Bible.

I took the liberty of changing Alter’s v. 1 “Happy” to “Blessed” and added 2 “!” to make visible the strong masculine interjection of the Hebrew.

Psalm 1 (Robert Alter’s translation.)

1    Blessed! 

“the man who has not walked in the wicked’s counsel, 

nor stood in the way of offenders has stood, 

nor in the session of scoffers sat.

2    But the LORD’s teaching is his desire,                    

And His teaching he murmurs day and night.

3    And he shall be like a tree planted by streams of water  

that bears its fruit in its season,

and its leaf does not wither—

and in all that he does he prospers.

4    Not so! the wicked,  but like chaff that the wind drives away.

5    Therefore, the wicked will not stand up in judgment,  

nor offenders in the band of the righteous.

6    For the LORD embraces the way of the righteous,    

And the way of the wicked is lost.”

Today I’m charged with presenting a brief introduction to some aspects of Hebrew poetics applied to the First Psalm. Some of those basic principles are:

1.    Word choice not only definitions but hidden meanings and the “sounds” of alliteration, rhyme, puns, play on words, shadings of meaning.

2.  Metaphor and Imagery 

3.  Structure which in Psalms is usually defined by key word repetition and parallelism of phrases.

Imagery and metaphor are the language of poetry, where a simple picture of something quite common and ordinary is elevated into something greater, more complex, more powerful, more beautiful, more eternal:

"all the world’s a stage, 

love is a red red rose, 

hope is the thing with feathers, 

conscience is a man’s compass, 

let justice flow down like a river, 

shall we gather at the river, 

I am the light of the world, 

I am the good Shepherd…"

 

Throughout Hebrew scripture, one of the primary identities of God is the One Who Speaks. God speaks in Creation, God speaks to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; God speaks from a burning bush, from Mount Sinai and the giving of the Ten Words; God speaks to kings, and by prophets etc.

As the writer of the New Testament book of Hebrews reminds us:

“Long ago God spoke… in many and various ways… but in these last days God has spoken to us by a Son.”

The Apostle John asserts that Jesus is the Word, from Alpha to Omega, from beginning to end, the final word. 

There can be a lot of meaning wrapped up in a single word.

Nowhere is that more evident than in Hebrew scripture.

Biblical Hebrew has fewer than 9,000 words (8,198 attested) formed from 2,099 roots.  

Modern Hebrew has 6 times that many words. 

English may have many as ¾ of a million. 

William Shakespeare (approx. contemporaneous with the KJV) used 31,534 unique words, more than 3 times the number of words in all of Biblical Hebrew.

So, we begin to see the translators’ dilemma:

every Hebrew word has layer after layer after layer of meaning.

When I studied Hebrew with Rabbi Samuel Karff, he suggested that, when translating a passage from Hebrew to English, one should look carefully at all the possible meanings of a Hebrew word and all the possible meanings of that word’s root. The words chosen to translate are strongly dependent on context. Especially in the wisdom writings which include the Psalms, one should “hold in one’s mind, all the meanings” and look carefully at the repetitions of those words within the psalm. “When in doubt, include more not fewer meanings and look at them in the context of all scripture.” The Rabbi laughed and  told me, “don’t bother with the Greek just bring your reading, your understanding of Hebrew scripture into your understanding of Messiah in your Christian text."

Now returning to Psalm 1.

I’ve already noted the “walking metaphors” hidden in the root meanings of the word “bless.”

We might even say that, at its most basic level, to be blessed is to be walking in the way of the LORD.

[It is worth noting the Hebrew words used to refer to God. The Hebrew Elohim is translated “God.” The Hebrew Adonai is translated “Lord” and emphasizes God’s authority. That word may also be used for a man in authority. 

Here in this first Psalm and elsewhere, particularly in the older Psalms 3-72 which are offered in the context David’s life—as man and as God’s anointed King—the Hebrew word is the personal name of God, too holy to be spoken aloud. Thus, the word in text would be written “Yah-weh” or “Y-h W-h” but is always spoken as “the LORD” to distinguish from “Adonai.” 

Some newer translations omit the all caps, but the distinction between these words is important to preserve. We bow to the Lord; we have an intimate personal relationship, a spiritual relationship, a breath-to-breath relationship with the LORD whose name we know and whisper.]

Similar layers of meanings are also hidden in the words  “the way” and “the law”

The Hebrew word “the way” derek and its primitive root darak are used over 800 times in Hebrew scripture, 80 times in the Psalms.

phrase “walking the way” means

a road as it is walked one step at a time, 

a pathway, a journey, a course of life, 

a mode of action, custom or habit, 

conversation, 

direction.

Eugene Peterson titled  his book about the Psalms of Ascent (120-134) using the apt phrase: “a long obedience in the same direction.”

I should also note that the root word darak can mean treading the harvest, threshing the grain from the chaff which is blown away with the wind. This layer of meaning in the word "darak" is a powerful reinforcement of the shortened metaphor in v. 4

The Hebrew word “the law” is Torah and its primitive root is “yarah” yaw-raw are frequently associated with “walking the way.”

We usually think of Torah almost as a legal term, meaning precept or statute but the derivation and related words expand our idea of Torah to  include 

“teaching” the word Robert Alter chose for his translation, to instruct, to inform, to direct.

There are other images hidden in the idea of The Law, the Word of the Lord:

flowing as water (or falling as rain) – a blessing image,

to point out as if by aiming a finger, to indicate direction,

a boundary, a hedgerow that marks the path, a turning in the road. [which became the dominant understanding of the word in 19^th and 20^th Centuries commentaries.]

Also hidden deep in the layers of the word yarah are words for “turtle dove” and “bullock” the sacrificial animals for the poor and the rich. I wept with joy when I first noticed this hidden meaning. The primary purpose of Torah, the Law of the LORD, is not legalism but chesed, the Hebrew word that can be translated as grace, unfailing love, the steadfast love of the Lord. 

The Torah of Hebrew scripture and the Gospel’s new commandment of love both point to reconciliation with God, with our selves, and with others.

It is no surprise, then, that within the structure of many Psalms, Torah, the Law of the Lord, is often associated with words for salvation and blessing.

Finally, both Hebrew words or their roots, Torah the law of the LORD and darak the pathways of righteousness, include archery images: setting the arrow, bending the bow, and shooting the arrow on a straight course to the target.

Which is why I often pray a short prayer I wrote many years ago while on retreat with our Youth Group at Rockcleft:

Lord God, shoot us like arrows along your chosen course.

Let us fly straight and true as you direct us.

Let us hit the target.

          Let us not miss the mark.

Psalm 1 is rich in other metaphors:

“A tree planted by the water” which the Apostle Paul echoes in Ephesians with “rooted and grounded in faith”

“by rivers of water” “living water” which in Hebrew imagery evoke a reminder of God’s Spirit on the face of the waters teeming with life and of God’s provision of springs in a desert.

Let’s pause to visualize these images of the growing tree with roots nourished in living water. Recall all the times in the Bible where rivers are the setting, where water is mentioned:

Creation, Jacob’s Well, the Red Sea and the Jordan river where the  foreign leper Naaman found healing, the waters of Babylon where the people hung their harps because they could no longer sing the psalms of Zion, baptisms 

[both Hebrew Scripture and the New Testament offer examples. The Hebrew word is "mikvah" a pool of living water for immersion and purification which brings one into the presence of God.]

The tree that is planted is living water is a rich, rich metaphor.

This broadening understanding of Hebrew scripture brings a new perspective to Jesus changing water into wine and speaking to the Samaritan woman at the well and proclaiming that the those who receive his “living water will never thirst”…

What the tree and the water and the blessed man of Psalm 1 have in common is growth and movement. Living things grow. The one who is blessed is walking, moving toward God. Note that the verbs used in v. 1 of this Psalm are those used in the beloved 23^rd Psalm

v. 3 offers a rich and verbose description of that blessed growth: fruit abundant in season, leaves that don’t wither.

Blessed!

A tree can withstand a drought without withering when it drinks living water. It is fruitful and prospers. 

It is worth noting here that a tree that bears fruit often requires pruning, its growth is not only nourished by the living water but shaped by the will of One who tends tree.

The word "prosper" yatsliah is a masculine verb, more likely to be used to refer to a man than a tree. Its use here makes clear that this image of a fruitful tree is a metaphor of the blessed man, the godly man who is walking the way.

This metaphor of the fruitful tree and the prospering man (blessed!) pushes us back up to the descriptors in v. 1

This poetic device--word choice and metaphor reinforced by the structure of the poem--reminds us that there is a man who made other choices. There is a man who chose to walk in the counsel of the ungodly and to stand in the way of sinners and to sit down with the scornful.  That man moved in the wrong direction and stopped moving.

Then in verse 4, the interjection: “Not so! the wicked”

Usually KJV does a better job than many more recent translations at catching the rhythms of the Hebrew but here it fails.

“Not so!” punches in forceful opposition to the “Blessed!” of v. 1

The verse that follows that “Not so!” is so very short in comparison to the blessed abundance of v. 3

v. 4 is short and abrupt and very sharp and serves as a verbal “cutting off” a perishing, if you will. The structure of the psalm implies "Torah" but there is no "Torah" in any of its many layers in the ungodly man who is not fruitful and is blown away in the wind as chaff from the threshing floor.

v. 5  because they would not walk in the way of the Lord, because they “stood in the way of sinners” they will not stand up in the judgement.

Here the psalmist is using two different words for "stand" but playing with the images. Because they stood where they should not have stood and sat down, the wicked now cannot stand up. They do not have a leg to stand on in the congregation of the righteous.

["the congregation of the righteous" is an image of judgement and is a thematic idea which we will revisit at the end of this study when we look at Psalm 150.]

Finally, there is a metaphor in v. 6 although it is hidden in our English translations.

“The LORD knoweth the way of the righteous” could be more rightly translated using a visually evocative metaphor:

“The LORD shepherds the way of the righteous.” 

Robert Alter translated this phrase: “… the LORD embraces the way of the righteous” and noted that the “The Hebrew-- literally “knows” -- is a verb often used for intimate connection, the sexual union of man and wife.

I like Alter’s  translation, because it calls to mind the 85^th Psalm which also speaks to the idea of judgement;

“Gracious love and faithful truth are joined together; righteousness and peace embrace and kiss.”  (my translation)

I close with a quote from my favorite Old Testament theologian, Walter Brueggmann (Israel’s Praise):

“Psalms are not only responses to the reality of relationship with the biblical God but also expressions that help reshape that relationship with God.  That is, psalms not only reflect reality but also shift reality." 

We stopped here for a short Q&A before continuing with a very quick look at the structure of Psalm 1. 

           

Psalm 1 has two interlocking structures: (1)  two lines in parallel, repeated which is the structure of the oldest Hebrew poetry and (2) the chiastic/nested or ring structures of newer, [post Captivity] writings.

      

Structure: linear through time, A & B offer contrasting rather than similar parallel lines:

present:         A         1-3      Blessed 

not walking, standing,  or sitting with the wicked

B         4-5      the wicked

                        not standing with the assembly of righteous

future:            A         6          Blessed

walk the way God watches over

B         6          the wicked

walk the way that perishes

And a chiastic structure: 

[think of this kind of structure as Russian dolls, go in and then back out. 

The key point is usually in the middle and I’ve seen a few examples that go all the way into a G or even an I point. 

Psalm 1 presents one of the less common structures where there is no middle point, which shifts the emphasis to A and A’.  

In this case, the interior point D has been moved to the end, probably to support the linear, parallel structure ABAB of the older Hebrew poems. 

It is very unusual for a Psalm to have such a complex structure.]

            A                                 1          The blessed walk/stand/sit not with wicked…

                        B                     2                      their way (Torah)

                                    C          3                                  Comparison:  like tree/water

                                                                                    fruitful, useful

                                    C’         4                                  Comparison:  like chaff/wind

                                                                                    not nourishing, trash

                        B’                                            "not so" (their way implied:  not Torah)

A’                                5          The wicked do not stand with righteous

powerful & authoritative:   D         6          God shepherds the way of the righteous

the way of the wicked perishes

Taken together the structure of this Psalm underline the primary message of this psalm:

To be blessed is to walk the way that God knows, watches over, shepherds.  

The wicked (ungodly) follow a way that is cut off (from God) and that way is not "the way" and  perishes. 

PSL: Prayer as a Second Language

On Thursday I was honored to teach the final class of the year for the Ladies Bible Class at my church. During this fall semester, my dear friend Andrea has been leading the class in a study entitled "Praying to God in God's Own Words." She explored The Lord's Prayer and several other New Testament prayers. Early last summer she asked me if I would be willing to teach the concluding lesson on praying the Psalms.

As it has every Thursday, the class began with the recitation of the Lord's Prayer followed by the old Sunday School standard "Whisper a prayer... to keep your heart in tune."

For the lesson I presented, I am deeply indebted to a wonderful book examining Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians:

Eugene H. Peterson: Practice Resurrection. A Conversation on Growing Up in Christ. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2010.

"Why are people so ready to appoint a representative to do their praying for them? Why is there so much more talk about prayer than actual praying? Why are so many more doubts expressed and questions raised about this form of language than any other?

…observe the way language is used when we are not on our knees…. Listen… the primary use of language is impersonal… to name things, describe actions, provide information, command specific behaviors, tell the truth, tell lies, curse, bless. Language is incredibly and endlessly versatile. But in our heavily technologized and consumerized world, most of the words said and heard in most ordinary days have little or no relational or personal depth to them. They deal with a world of things and activities, machines and ideas....

Language objectifies both the world before us and the people around us…. "

The poet William Wordsworth in his 1806 poem  laments:
"The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
...
For this, for everything, we are out of tune..."

Wordsworth's use of the phrase "out of tune" as did the little song with which we began the class suggests that the reason one should "whisper a prayer" is to "keep your heart in tune." 
One of the illustrations I often use when teaching the Psalms is a pair of tuning forks, each tuned to the same note but an octave apart. When one fork is struck and begins to vibrate and the second is brought near to the first, the second will also begin to vibrate. They are "in tune" and they resonate together. So it is when one reads a Psalm and finds in the words an echo, a perfect expression, of one's own joy or pain.

Indeed, in the world around us, in our everyday encounters, most of our language is used... “getting and spending.” Too often, we bring this use of language into our prayers.

Quoting Peterson again:
"But language at its core and its best reveals. Using words, I can speak myself into relationship with another."
{I inserted examples of how our speaking had created relationships with people in the class.}

Prayer works in the same way. When we learn the language of prayer, it can speak us into a relationship with God.

"...prayer is personal language or it is nothing. God is personal, emphatically personal… When we use impersonal language in this most personal of all relations, the language doesn’t work… when we listen in Scripture and in silence to what the personal God has to say to us in our unique person hood, anticipating information or answers and not hearing anything remotely like that, we don’t know what to make of it. We may walk away saying or thinking, “God doesn’t speak to me… He never listens to me.”

The practice of prayer, if it is going to amount to anything more than wish lists and complaints, requires a recovery of personal, relational, revelational language in both our listening and our speaking."

We are blessed to have Caleb McDaniel teaching the Open Door Class and I greatly appreciate the historical perspective he brings to our class and to my study. Currently we are looking at the creeds of Christendom, beginning with some creeds or creed-like sections of the New Testament and then looking at other very early creeds, The Apostles' Creed, The Nicene Creed in its several revisions, and several others in coming weeks. Last Sunday, he noted that looking at changes from creed to creed gives us glimpses of what was happening in the culture of that time but that looking at those things which are “continuous and consistent” throughout the centuries can help us see what is really the core of  Christian belief.

When the church and its members begin to learn prayer as a second language what is "continuous and consistent" is the use of the Psalms. For example, lectionaries and the Daily Office include daily Psalms. Almost all published editions of the New Testament (such as those distributed by the Gideons) include the Psalms. Almost all books of daily devotions will reference the Psalms. Some Christians (not I!) may dismiss the stories and prophecies of the Old Testament as fulfilled and irrelevant to the practice of Christianity but, through the millennia, the "classic text book for recovering the personal language of prayer is the Psalms. A thorough immersion in the Psalms is the primary way that Christians acquire fluency in the personal, intimate, honest, earthy, language of prayer and take our place in the great company of our praying ancestors."
Those praying ancestors are part of  that “great cloud of witnesses" about which Caleb preached form the pulpit last Sunday and when we pray the same words of scripture which they prayed we are with them and they are with us.

Quoting Peterson:
"For while prayer is always personal, it is never individual. At prayer we are part of a great congregation whether we see them or not. Praying the Psalms gets us used to being in a praying congregation… We are never less alone than when we pray, even when there is no one else in the room. We are praying for others who don’t know we are praying for them. Others are praying for us although we don’t know it…. When we pray we are not self-enclosed. Praying the Psalms keeps us in a school of prayer that maintains wakefulness and an open ear, alertness and an articulate tongue, both to the word of God and to the voices of praise and pain of God’s people."
We see that in the New Testament prayers that Andrea has led us through this Fall. Today I want to recall the lesson she taught a couple of weeks ago on the Apostle Paul’s great prayer from his letter to the Ephesians.

Ephesians 1:16 – 19; 3:14 – 21
I make mention of you in my prayers: 17 that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, 18 the eyes of your understanding[a] being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, 19 and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power .

14 For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,[a] 15 from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, 16 that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, 17 that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height— 19 to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. 20 Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, 21 to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen

Note that Paul’s prayer begins with God's great work of salvation, the riches of his glory, which leads to exultant act of worship. Peterson reminds us that "…prayers of intercession flow out of the plenitude of God. The plenitude of God, not the penury of the human condition…"

Too often in our prayers we bring the language of our need, of human poverty, into our prayers, failing to see the "riches of his glory" which are abundantly more that our need. The Psalms encourage lament, the full recognition of human need and pain but they also encourage thanksgiving and trust, the "steadfast love of the Lord" which never ceases.

In chapter four of Ephesians Paul quotes the 68th Psalm. Peterson argues that the 68th Psalm offers "a structure that gives literary and theological shape to what he writes: first a thorough meditative immersion in the action and word of God (chapters 1-3), which then takes form in a worship-generated life of believing obedience (chapters 4-6)."

The first 23 verses of the Psalm present a documentary of God in saving action. At midpoint the Psalm shifts to a comprehensive act of worship in the sanctuary. Peterson:

"All that God is and does—riding the clouds, transforming the wilderness, commanding the prophetic proclamation of good news, taking charge once and for all by ascending the “high mount”—is brought together in a worshiping procession of singers and musicians into the sanctuary, bringing gifts, acclaiming blessings.

Sanctuary is a set-apart places consecrated for worship, paying reverent attention to who God reveals himself to be and how he reveals himself in our history…. Psalm 68 worship is a listening attentiveness to God in word and action, which develops into glad participation in that word and action.”

Sanctuary is what we create for ourselves, as individuals and as a community, when we pray.

Look more closely at Paul's quotation in Ephesians 4 of the 68th Psalm:
Ephesians 4: 7-8 reads:
"7 But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ’s gift. 8 Therefore He says:
“When He ascended on high, He led captivity captive, And gave gifts to men.”

Psalm 68:18 reads:
"You have ascended on high, You have led captivity captive; You have received gifts among men,
Even from the rebellious, That the LORD God might dwell there."

Note that Paul changes the quote from the triumphant King who receives gifts to the Messiah who gives gifts. It is not because Saul, the rabbinic student of the great Gamaliel, does not know the scripture. Paul, the Apostle, changes it because Jesus does indeed change everything. Such a simple fact which I never noticed until I began to prepare this lessons: Jesus, the Messiah, the anointed of God gives us gifts from "the riches of God's glory" and that changes, or perhaps it is better to say fulfills, the scripture in a way that is surprising.

So here in the 68th Psalm, as in so many others, we find a model not only for the language of prayer but also for the day-to-day practice of Christian life.

The class then moved from my talking about prayer to the practice of prayer. When one learns a second  language, one must go to the language lab; one must begin to speak the language.

Deep breath and exhale to prepare for prayer.
The class then sang a few songs and read selections from the Psalm. We attempted to read it not as text to be studied but as prayer—personal, relational, communal prayer. We each read aloud but made no attempt to read in unison. We wanted to pray as individuals but to be aware of the "murmur" of the "cloud of witnesses" around us.
I suggested that we pray the 68th Psalm as intercession for the persecuted church.

Song #794 Unto Thee, O Lord

Song 55: I will bless Thee, O Lord

Psalm 68:1-10
68 Let God arise,
Let His enemies be scattered;
Let those also who hate Him flee before Him.
2 As smoke is driven away,
So drive them away;
As wax melts before the fire,
So let the wicked perish at the presence of God.
3 But let the righteous be glad;
Let them rejoice before God;
Yes, let them rejoice exceedingly.
4 Sing to God, sing praises to His name;
Extol Him who rides on the clouds,
By His name YAH,
And rejoice before Him.
5 A father of the fatherless, a defender of widows,
Is God in His holy habitation.
6 God sets the solitary in families;
He brings out those who are bound into prosperity;
But the rebellious dwell in a dry land.
7 O God, when You went out before Your people,
When You marched through the wilderness, Selah
8 The earth shook;
The heavens also dropped rain at the presence of God;
Sinai itself was moved at the presence of God, the God of Israel.
9 You, O God, sent a plentiful rain,
Whereby You confirmed Your inheritance,
When it was weary.
10 Your congregation dwelt in it;
You, O God, provided from Your goodness for the poor.

Psalm 68:17-2
17 The chariots of God are twenty thousand,
Even thousands of thousands;
The Lord is among them as in Sinai, in the Holy Place.
18 You have ascended on high,
You have led captivity captive;
You have received gifts among men,
Even from the rebellious,
That the LORD God might dwell there.
19 Blessed be the Lord,
Who daily loads us with benefits,
The God of our salvation! Selah
20 Our God is the God of salvation;
And to GOD the Lord belong escapes from death.

Song 193: Crown Him with many Crowns

Psalm 68:24-26
24 They have seen Your procession, O God,
The procession of my God, my King, into the sanctuary.
25 The singers went before, the players on instruments followed after;
Among them were the maidens playing timbrels.
26 Bless God in the congregations,
The Lord, from the fountain of Israel.


Psalm 68:32-35
32 Sing to God, you kingdoms of the earth;
Oh, sing praises to the Lord, Selah
33 To Him who rides on the heaven of heavens, which were of old!
Indeed, He sends out His voice, a mighty voice.
34 Ascribe strength to God;
His excellence is over Israel,
And His strength is in the clouds.
35 O God, You are more awesome than Your holy places.
The God of Israel is He who gives strength and power to His people.
Blessed be God!

Song 108: The Lord is in His Holy Temple

We kept a time of silence and concluded with a song:
"I love you, Lord,
And I lift up my voice,
To worship you… Oh, my soul, rejoice!
Take joy, my king, in what you hear:
May it be a sweet, sweet sound
In your ear."

Serendipity: Although we were reading/praying individually, the phrasing of the psalm seemed to move us increasingly toward unity. We found that we were reading in unison; we could in fact not read in unison. I had not anticipated this lesson on one of the functions of prayer. We pray to create unity. Praying the Psalms is not only the great school of prayer but a source of our unity with God, with our best selves, with one another, and with Christians in all places and in all times.

The hymns were from Songs of Faith and Praise.
The scripture readings were from NKJV.

What I'm reading...

In a recent post, I said that I don't read mysteries but anyone looking over my reading list would see that I do.   Previous posts have included books by

• Mark Schweizer (my blogs) 
• William J. Palmer (my blog)
• Jasper Fforde (my blog)
• C. J. Sansom (my blog)

I  read mysteries if they have been recommended by someone who knows what I like to read (usually DMP) and I'll read a second by an author who appeals to my sense of humor or offers me a view into  history or who feeds me literary tidbits.  Since DMP must go to Murder by the Book, now celebrating their 30th anniversary, at least twice a month, I come across such books rather frequently.  I've indulged in a fiction binge of several mysteries:

Maron, Margaret:  Rituals of the Season. New York:  Warner, 2005.  This is one of the later books in the series which began with The Bootlegger's Daughter and DMP thought I'd enjoy the chapter heading quotations from Florence Hartley's The Ladies Book of Etiquette, 1873, which may be read on-line at the Open Library.  Two quotes:  "Many believe that politeness is but a mask worn in the world to conceal bad passions and impulses, and to make a show of possessing virtues not really existing in the heart; thus, that politeness is merely hypocrisy and dissimulation.  Do not believe this; be certain that those who profess such a doctrine are themselves practising the deceit they condemn so much...  True politeness is the language of a good heart."  "Among well-bred persons, every conversation is considered in a measure confidential...."    DMP's timing was great since I'd just read a Hartley quote in the Ph.D. thesis of Sonya Sawyer Fritz.  A bit of Maron's humor from p. 36:  "So what is the difference between a spinster and a old maid?" "Well, as Doris would've said if Herman hadn't stopped her, a spinster ain't never been married.  But an old maid ain't never been married ner nothing." DMP was correct; I did enjoy Maron's mystery and may have the chance  to read her again (I'll certainly scan her chapter headings) since he acquired most of the out-of-print earlier books by asking me to find them for him.  I used abebooks.com, one of my favorite sources, and was able to order from two vendors that I have used frequently:  owl books and seashellbooks.com.

I'm planning to read and re-read the non-fiction books by one of my favorite authors, Carolyn G. Heilbrun, and thought that I'd start with three of the Kate Fansler mysteries which were first published under the pseudonym of Amanda Cross:

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  In the Last Analysis.  New York:  Fawcett Books, 1964.  "I didn't say I objected to Freud... I said I objected to what Joyce called freudful errors--all those nonsensical conclusions leaped to by people with no reticence and less mind." p. 1 "She had learned as a college teacher that if one simplified what one wished to say, one falsified it.  It was  possible only to say what one meant, as clearly as possible." p. 8  "...there's only one test for discovering what you really want:  it consists in what you have."  p. 159  "He probably thought I was writing a novel and he answered my question in the most long-winded and technical way possible.  But then doctors are always indulging either in incoherence or oversimplification--if you want my opinion, I don't think they even understand each other."  p. 209
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  Poetic Justice.  New York: Fawcett Books, 1970.  Filled with delicious W.H. Auden quotations and an excellent depiction of university life during my undergraduate years and some feminist issues.  "unready to die... but already at the stage when one starts to dislike the young."  p. 3  "I have nothing against young people--apart from the fact that they are arrogant, spoiled, discourteous, incapable of compromise, and unaware of the cost of everything they want to destroy....  I prefer those whom life has had time to season."  p. 41    Kate to Reed:  "You... are my greatest accomplishment.  I have achieved the apotheosis of womanhood.  To have earned a Ph.D., taught reasonably well, written books, traveled, been a friend and a lover--these are mere evasions of my appointed role in life:  to lead a man to the altar.  You are my sacrifice to the goddess of middle-class morality..." p. 107  "It may serve, in these frantic days of relevance, to remind you of the importance of the useless."  p. 110  "When formality went from life, meaning went too.  People always yowl about form without meaning, but what turns out to be impossible is meaning without form.  Which is why I'm a teacher of literature and keep ranting on about structure."  p. 133  "...'the only earthly joys are those we are free to choose--like solitude, your college, certain marriages.'  'And what about unearthly joys?' 'Ah, those, if we are fortunate, choose us.  Like grace.  Like talent.'" p. 135
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  The Theban Mysteries.  New York: Avon Books, 1971. Antigone, dodging the draft, and an  up-scale New York girls' school.  "No one pretends anything any more, which I suppose is a good thing, although I can't help sometimes feeling that the constant expression of emotion in itself becomes the cause of the emotion which is expressed."  p. 12  "What is troubling... is that he is rude, unwashed, inconsiderate, filled to the brim with slogans, and outrageously simplistic.  Alas, he also right."  p. 25   "Nothing ages more quickly than the absolutely up-to-date....  the latest in everything, age[s] like a woman who has had her face lifted:  there is not even character to set off the ravages of time." p. 27  "There is nothing so uncomfortable as seeing both sides of the question."  p. 89  "For myself, I've discovered that when I ask myself what I should do I always tumble into confusion.  The only clear question is to ask oneself what one wants to do.... It sounds like [self-indulgence] certainly, but oddly enough, it isn't.  The 'should' people are really indulging themselves by never finding out what they want.  It has taken me many years to learn that discovering what one wants if the true beginning of a spiritual journey."  p. 125

The Auden quotes in Poetic Justice are probably what inspired me to grab my well-worn Pocket Book of Modern Verse, edited by Oscar Williams, for bedside reading, all 628 pages.  I have a few favorites but, by and large, I am out of sympathy with Moderns:  "Terrence, this is stupid stuff..."  A.E. Houseman.  Found a smile and an apt description of the Parliament (Rice's NCAA Bulletin Board):  "...owls raving--Solemnities not easy to withstand... The owls trilled with tongues of nightingale.  These were all lies, though they matched the time..."   Robert Graves.  My final reading for this paperback with it's yellowed, brittle pages--some falling out--and it's broken spine. I kept it far longer than necessary for sentimental reasons:  Larry McMurtry taught my section of English 100 at Rice and this little book is where I met and got to know:  Auden, Thomas Hardy as a poet rather than a novelist, Houseman, Dylan Thomas, William Butler Yeats, and Gerard Manley Hopkins.  I'm considering a replacement. 

I'm finally returning Peterson, Eugene H.: A Long Obedience in the Same Direction. Discipleship in an Instant Society. 2nd edition. Downers Grover IL: Intervarsity Press, 2000, to my Psalms study shelf.  This a very rich book offering commentary on the Psalms of Ascent, Psalms 120-134.  Many quotes from this book will one day be added to my Psalms notes but this one is worthy of mention here:  "Those who parade the rhetoric of liberation but scorn the wisdom of service do not lead people into the glorious liberty of the children of God but into a cramped and covetous squalor."

SEASONS:

David Eagleman:   Sum: Forty tales from the Afterlives.  New York:  Vintage Books, 2009.  The author majored in British and American literature at Rice before  earning a Ph.D. in neuroscience.  A funny, thoughtful delight which is less about Afterlives than about our perceptions of life.  A couple of quotations:  "She was always leery of apostates, those who rejected the particulars of their religion in search of something that seemed more truthful.   She disliked them because they seemed the most likely to float a correct guess."  "...your memory has spent a lifetime manufacturing small myths to keep your life story consistent with who you thought you were.  You have committed to a coherent narrative, misremembering little details and decisions and sequences of events....  you are battered and bruised in the collisions between reminiscence and reality."

So many books; so little time.

What I'm Reading...

This month has been yet another slow reading month.  There have been busy distractions but I think a need for new glasses may be the root of the problem. 

DMP and I have also been making full use of our NetFlix Subscription which means 2 movies of week, which means 2 fewer evenings for reading.  Movies:  Paint Your Wagon, Chronicles of Narnia:  Prince Caspian, The High and the Mighty, High Noon, The Sun Also Rises, Rio Bravo, The Philadelphia Story, Master & Commander.

I have done a couple of "quick and dirty" medical literature reviews:

• macular degeneration for a private client
• Vitamin D
• is there an assoication between urinary tract problems/sugery and myasthenia gravis?

I've skimmed, clipped, filed, and recycled a 2 1/2 foot stack of periodicals.

I've begun transcribing my recipes.

I've been entering books into the church library catalog.

A couple of ideas have grabbed my attention in my lectionary reading and I'm starting to explore these biblical ideas, mostly in Hebrew Scripture:

• staff, the meaning of Aaron's staff in Numbers and it's implications in other passages
• robe, Elijah/Elisha is the source of my current curiosity but it is a recurrent motif

What I'm reading (I include picture links to Amazon where you can browse the book):

Brueggemann, Walter: The Prophetic Imagination. 2nd edition. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2001.  There is hardly a page on which I didn't highlight something.  An extraordinary book!  "The riddle and insight of biblical faith is the awareness that only anguish leads to life, only grieving leads to joy, and only embraced endings permit new beginnings."  p. 56  There is commentary on Psalm 137 p. 62.  "Speech about hope cannt be explanatory and scientifically argumentative; rather it must be lyrical..."  p. 65 "I believe that, rightly embraced, no more subversive or phrophetic idiom can be uttered than the practice of doxology, which sets before us the reality of God, of God right at the center of a scene from which we presumed he had fled." p. 66  "...exile is first of all where our speech has been silenced and God's speech has been banished." p. 69  "Compassion constitutes a radical form of criticism." p. 88  "That tradition of radical criticism is about the self-giving emptiness of Jesus...  The emptying is not related to self-negating meditation, for it is a thoroughly political image concerned with the willing surrender of power..." p. 98  "Without the cross, prophetic imagination will likely be as strident and as destructive as that which it criticizes.... Prophetic criticism aims to creat an alternative consciousness with its own rhetoric and field of perception....  This kind of prophetic criticism does not lightly offer alternatives, does not mouth reassurances, and does not provide redemptive social policy.  It knows that only those who mourn can be comforted, and so it first asks about how to mourn seriously and faithfully..." p. 99  "...all functions of the church can and should be prophetic voices that serve to criticize the dominant culture while energizing the faithful....  Thus, the essential question for the church is whether or not its prophetic voice has been co-opted into the culture of the day." p. 125

Peterson, Eugene H.:  A Long Obedience in the Same Direction.  Discipleship in an Instant Society.  2nd edition.  Downers Grover IL:  Intervarsity Press, 2000.  I'm fairly certain I at least scanned the first edition, 1980.  A devotional reading of the Psalms of Ascent, Psalms 120-134.

Fiction: 
Schweizer, Mark:  The Organist Wore Pumps, a liturgical mystery.  SJMP Books, 2010.  Funny!  "It's tradition... when society started, women were not thought of as 'literary'... That's true.  Well, if you don't count Emily Dickinson, Christina Rosetti, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Dorothy Parker, or the Bronte sisters."  See previous posts for more detailed descriptions of these books (Organist is the 8th in the series) which DMP and I both find hilarious.  I include the Amazon links for those who may want to browse but we buy our mysteries at Murder by the Book in Houston. link: Murder by the Book
This is a real bookstore with staff who knows their books and get to know their readers.  I love the $1 shelf at the back where I find treasure.  Unlike DMP, I don't read mysteries, except for the couple of authors who make me laugh.


Poetry:
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett: Sonnets from the Portuguese and other love poems. Illustrated by Adolf Hallman. Garden City, NY: Hanover House, 1954. My friend, Konny, gave me this book and I've greatly enjoyed reading these poems.   The illustrations are particularly lovely in this gift book edition.  Adolf Hallman, 1893-1968, is a Swedish illustrator; his drawings for this book have the sparse look and muted colors of much Scandinavian art.  I usually look for vintage books like this one at estate sales and used book stores. When I must have it now I use  IOBA   or biblio.com  or abebooks.com or alibris.com   or, yes, Amazon.  When a book is in the public domain (as most books first published prior to 1923 are), it's a good time to read it digitally and this is my favorite starting point:  onlinebooks at U Penn and read EBB now at the poetry foundation.  "We walked beside the sea, After a day which perished silently, Of its own glory..."  "I thank all who have loved me in their hearts, With thanks and love from mine.  Deep thanks to all...  Love that endures, from Life that disappears."