What good are the Psalms?
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_Anonymous
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What good are the Psalms?
I am a Bible college student, and I do not know how to take Psalms. Since much of them are anynomously written and they are in poetic form, I do not see the validity like I see it for the remainder of the books. For example, if Paul wrote "God put the stars in the sky and knows them by name" is much different than David composing a song of praise in which he claims this. I think it is possible that it could be hyperbole. I do not find Psalms to carry the same kinda weight that rest of the cannon projects. I do not know how literally to take Psalms because it does not seem to demand the same kind of accuracy.
Last edited by Guest on Wed Dec 31, 1969 7:00 pm, edited 0 times in total.
Reason:
Reason:
I remember, when I was your age, telling people that I got very little out of the Psalms. It was true, too. However, Psalms has become one of my favorite books of the Bible now, and I read them almost exclusively (and with great profit!) in the year after my wife left. The difference between my appreciation level thirty years ago and now is simply a matter of experience. Until you have been totally put through the meat-grinder, you do not readily relate with most of the Psalms. They are the most honest expression of emotion by a suffering man of faith to be found in the Bible, I think. If they don't resonate with you completely at this point in your life, I believe they will someday (sorry to say!).
As for their accuracy, of course, the Psalms are poetry, not prose. As such, they use impressionistic language, rather than clinically precise scientific language. They are, so far as I can tell, as "accurate" as is the rest of the Bible in what they actually affirm. But poets do not (and are not expected to) describe things in wooden literalism. For example, we have (I believe) a prosaic description of the creation in Genesis one. We have a more poetic description of some of the same events, for example, in some of the Psalms. In Psalm 95:5 it says, "His hands formed the dry land," and in Psalm 102:25, it says, "the heavens are the work of your hands," though Genesis says He created these things by merely speaking. When the modern poet Shelley puts the following words into the mouth of a cloud:
I bind the sun's throne with a burning zone
And the moon's with a girdle of pearl...
no modern reader accuses the poet of "inaccuracy," simply because none of us believes that the sun has a throne or that the moon wears a girdle of pearl, nor that the sun and moon are "bound" by clouds! I have never understood why the biblical poets are held to literary limits that we do not place upon other poets of other ages.
The value of the Psalms is not to found in their historical or scientific contents, but in their emotional content. It is possible for us to be so cerebral in our "religion" that we no longer have any heart in it. Poetry is useful to kind of take us out of our clinical selves and express appropriate emotion--whether exuberance, angst or awe.
That the Psalms have relevance to Christianity (and, more specifically, to Christ) is seen in the fact that Jesus and the apostles quoted from them to establish their points more frequently than they cited any other Old Testament book. Jesus seemed to believe in their inspiration, since, in introducing a line from Psalm 110, He said, "for David himself said by the Holy Spirit..." (Mark 12:36).
I think that a proper appreciation of the Psalms grows, along with personal maturity and experience.
As for their accuracy, of course, the Psalms are poetry, not prose. As such, they use impressionistic language, rather than clinically precise scientific language. They are, so far as I can tell, as "accurate" as is the rest of the Bible in what they actually affirm. But poets do not (and are not expected to) describe things in wooden literalism. For example, we have (I believe) a prosaic description of the creation in Genesis one. We have a more poetic description of some of the same events, for example, in some of the Psalms. In Psalm 95:5 it says, "His hands formed the dry land," and in Psalm 102:25, it says, "the heavens are the work of your hands," though Genesis says He created these things by merely speaking. When the modern poet Shelley puts the following words into the mouth of a cloud:
I bind the sun's throne with a burning zone
And the moon's with a girdle of pearl...
no modern reader accuses the poet of "inaccuracy," simply because none of us believes that the sun has a throne or that the moon wears a girdle of pearl, nor that the sun and moon are "bound" by clouds! I have never understood why the biblical poets are held to literary limits that we do not place upon other poets of other ages.
The value of the Psalms is not to found in their historical or scientific contents, but in their emotional content. It is possible for us to be so cerebral in our "religion" that we no longer have any heart in it. Poetry is useful to kind of take us out of our clinical selves and express appropriate emotion--whether exuberance, angst or awe.
That the Psalms have relevance to Christianity (and, more specifically, to Christ) is seen in the fact that Jesus and the apostles quoted from them to establish their points more frequently than they cited any other Old Testament book. Jesus seemed to believe in their inspiration, since, in introducing a line from Psalm 110, He said, "for David himself said by the Holy Spirit..." (Mark 12:36).
I think that a proper appreciation of the Psalms grows, along with personal maturity and experience.
Last edited by Guest on Wed Dec 31, 1969 7:00 pm, edited 0 times in total.
Reason:
Reason:
In Jesus,
Steve
Steve
Let me add a few more things to consider. First of all, did you know that many of the Old Testament prophets had schools (2 Ki. 2:3,5,7, 22:14; etc.) and disciples (Isa. 8:16)? Furthermore, did you know that music was one of the subjects taught at these schools (1 Sam. 10:5, 19:20; 1 Chr. 25:1)?
Asaph, one of the singers whom King David appointed, was called a seer in 2 Chr. 29:30. Many of the Psalms were written by Asaph, meaning that they potentially include prophetic content.
Just so you know.
Damon
Asaph, one of the singers whom King David appointed, was called a seer in 2 Chr. 29:30. Many of the Psalms were written by Asaph, meaning that they potentially include prophetic content.
Just so you know.
Damon
Last edited by Guest on Wed Dec 31, 1969 7:00 pm, edited 0 times in total.
Reason:
Reason: