Dive In: Beginning

“What are the first words of the 23^rd Psalm?” asked our Old Testament professor one day.

This sounded like a trick question and we were slow to bite. He had us open our Bibles and take a look, where we found he was using a little trickery. The first words are: “A Psalm of David.” Now, your translation may have something like “A Davidic Psalm” but you get the idea. It’s not “The Lord is my shepherd” like we assume.

As we dive into the design of Bible passages, we have to look at the beginning. In the case of the 23^rd Psalm, we learn the genre: a Psalm (also known as a song or a poem. The book of Psalms was the hymnbook for the Jews.)

We need to know the genre. It makes a difference in our understanding if we realize we’re reading a poem or a genealogy, a narrative or law. There are many kinds of genre in the Bible and we analyze the text differently depending on the genre.

A quick note: a book is not necessarily only one genre. Look at Ruth, which is mostly a narrative with a genealogy at the end. (Some suggest that the genealogy was added later but I would suggest that it is vital to the meaning of the book. I will discuss that with you at some point.)

But let us return to Psalm 23. Because we know this writing is a poem rather than a genealogy, we analyze the design of the material in that light. We want to look for repeated words, phrases, images because Hebrew poems used those extensively.

You might want to print out a copy of the Psalm, so that you can underline and mark it.

• Underline all the first person pronouns: me/my/I, etc.
• Now circle “Lord” and “he.”
• Now draw a box around the second person pronouns: “you.”

We want to notice the location of these repetitions in the Psalm. Do you see how the “self” pronouns are scattered throughout the Psalm while “Lord” and “he” are in the first part only? “You” is used in the second half of the Psalm.

We quickly see a transition from referring to God as “he” to addressing God personally: “you.”

We learn that through the repetition of the pronouns, noticing what kind of pronouns they are. David writes about God in the first half of the Psalm and writes to God in the second half.

Is that important?

I’m going to go through this quickly for now – although it deserves a much richer study at some point. In the first half of the Psalm, notice that the imagery is of shepherds, fields, grass, valleys. There’s a strong agricultural motif to those verses.

Hospitality is more of the theme in the last half of Psalm. We see a table, anointing, a cup, a house. Our scene has moved from the field to the home.

That may imply a change in relationship, moving into closer intimacy as we move from an outside scene to one inside the home.

Notice the very middle line of the Psalm. Count the lines (don’t count “A Psalm by David”) and you’ll see there are 19 lines. In Hebrew writing, often the very middle of a text is very significant. For example, if you look at the exact middle of Exodus, you’ll find the 10 commandments.

Here, the very middle is the point of the Psalm: “for you are with me…”

That’s the point of the 23^rd Psalm: God, you are with me. You protect me and comfort me because you are with me.

This week, I would like you to begin to examine the design of a poem or a song. Psalms is a good place or you might look at other songs, such as Miriam’s song or Hannah’s song. There are many.

We’ve studied three steps so far and I want you to experiment with them on your text, to see if that opens some meaning.

The steps of design we studied today:

1. Start at the beginning. Read carefully. What can you learn from the beginning?

2. Search for repetition. Do you see an image, a word, a pronoun repeated? Do you see a motif – like the pasture setting in Psalm 23?

3. Check the very middle of the text. Is there anything significant there?

If you choose to share your findings on your own blog, please enter the specific blog post below so that others can share. We’ll look more at design next time.