A Reflection on the Book of Psalms as a Whole

I want you to imagine the entire Psalter as a single narrative, divided into 150 chapters.

It is the story of a human life. Maybe not any human life, but a particular life, a life in tune with the peculiar contradictions of life with God.

It is a life dominated by petition early, by request, by neediness. There are more psalms of petition and of lament in the first half of the Psalter than in the second half.

Throughout life, there is the rhythm of complaint and thanksgiving, the beat, in Charlie Rich's words, "of life's little ups and downs." Throughout the Psalter, the beat alternates between sentences of praise or thanksgiving, on the one hand, and of lament and petition, on the other hand.

There are big moments in the Psalter and in a human life: the breakdown of Psalm 51 ("For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me"), the crisis you brought on yourself; the wedding of Psalm 45 (bride: "You are the most handsome of men"; bridegroom: "[You are] bedecked . . . with gold-woven robes . . . with joy and gladness"); the bitter collapse that you didn't bring on from Psalm 137 ("By the rivers of Babylon, we sat and wept").

Somewhere in life there is room for the joy of Torah, expressed in Psalm 119, but it takes a while to get there, and it takes the Psalter one hundred and eighteen poems to get there, to realize the joy of instruction, of a script, of the disciplines and structures that enable us to live in harmony, of the wise restraints that make us free.

Throughout there are moments of paranoia, as in so many of the psalms that express paralyzing fears of some enemy.

But how does the Psalter end? In the same way that we hope and pray our lives will end, in delight and praise, in, as Walter Brueggemann says, an affirmation, a "yes" to God that goes beyond thanks for services rendered.

The Psalter ends in a crescendo (Psalms 146-150). Some say that it is false, hyped, over-the-top, over-compensating. But I do not think that it is merely hollow musical dramatics, tinkling brass and clanging cymbals. You do not get to all the praise of these final psalms until you've lived through all passion and agony of the previous 145 psalms. It is the praise and delight and joy of those acquainted with grief, an autumnal, reflective, bittersweet joy and praise, a sober, clear-eyed, anything-but-naive "Yes" to life.

Gregory Mobley
Associate Professor of Old Testament