Christ is in our Midst
Psalm 65 can be an example of the thickets and complications that ensue when history and theology mix. Traditionally, Christians have solved such problems by insisting on the absolute historic (and sometimes) scientific accuracy of the Bible. Many modern Christians, on the other hand, have swung to the opposite extreme, insisting that those passages in the Bible that seem to contradict modern knowledge are little better than superstition and are to be completely rejected. Psalm 65, however, offers a third methodology for interpretation between the two ideas of absolute inerrancy and pious legend.
The introductory note to my Septuagint version of this psalm, (in fact, Psalm 64 in this ancient Greek translation of the Old Testament) calls this Davidic hymn a “song sung by Jeremiah and Ezekiel and the captive people, when they were about to depart.” The reference here is to two prophets who predicted the downfall of Judah, and who, according to the psalm’s subtitle, are preparing to return with the captive Hebrews to Judah after the fall of Babylon. Historically, there seems to be little chance that this ever happened; most historians seem to think that Jeremiah died in Egypt sometime after the capture of Jerusalem (586 B.C.); Ezekiel’s dates are even more problematic. The odds that they somehow led the former captives in song as they departed Babylon (538 B.C.) would seem rather long. So how might we approach our reading and understanding of Psalm 65? Does this allusion to events that probably never happened somehow render the text invalid or unworthy of our prayer and study?
The Orthodox Church insists that the central fact of our relationship with God is that He is an Infinite Being Whose nature is utterly unfathomable to us. Humans, the Church Fathers insist, can come to a knowledge of the existence of God through experience and human reason, but they can know absolutely nothing about Him except for what He reveals to us about Himself---for the simple reason that God’s infinite nature is quite simply above and beyond all human understanding. The Bible, in this sense, is a major piece of this revelation. It is not, therefore, a book of science, or history,… or myth. It is a record of what God wants human beings to know about Himself.
So whether or not Jeremiah and Ezekiel led the people in singing Psalm 65 as they left Babylon, whether or not the people even sang this psalm at all, is not the point. The compiler of the psalms, writing most of us profess under divine inspiration, wrote that this song was sung by the Hebrews as they left captivity for their homeland. We can use this knowledge, our understanding of Jeremiah and Ezekiel, prophets who warned of God’s impending judgment on Judah and urged a return to His commandments as “facts” of the psalm’s setting, to meditate and pray David’s words three thousand years after their writing.
Many modern commentaries claim that the psalm is a “harvest song”: fair enough. We can certainly meditate on God’s abundant goodness, especially as our own national day of Thanksgiving is but a week away. But the compiler’s depiction of the prophets leading a “return” to God adds an additional dimension to such a meditation. For read in this light, Psalm 65 goes far beyond a simple thanksgiving for the fruits of the harvest. It reminds us that God is indeed the God of history, that He is in charge of human destiny, that everything that happens only occurs at His permissive will, and that in the end He will use human history to work out the economy of salvation. “The nations shall be troubled; they also that dwell in the uttermost parts shall be afraid at Thy signs…,” David reminds us. Even those who find themselves, or deliberately place themselves far from God, shall come to know His presence and power. We, above all peoples, need to contemplate the warnings of Jeremiah and Ezekiel. They indeed need to lead us in a song of “return.”
Our task, this psalm seems to insist, is to “return,” from our selfishness, our shortsightedness, from our prodigal’s pigsty; to realize that God really is in charge, so that we “arise, and go to [our] Father, and … say to Him, ‘Father I have sinned against heaven and before Thee, and am no more worthy to be called Thy son. Make me one of Thy hired servants.’” And just as in the father’s abundant rejoicing in the parable of the Prodigal Son, the psalmist in the Old Testament insists that we will find “the river of God… full of waters”; that God will “bless the crown of the year with [His] goodness, and [His] plains filled with fatness.”
As we prepare for Thanksgiving, the first step is to gather, to return to our homes and families. Psalm 65 reminds that this is the identical step we need to take with our God: to return, to acknowledge His sovereignty and boundless goodness. On Thanksgiving Day, on every day, we shall find Him as the Prodigal did, as the Hebrews did twenty-five hundred years ago: our Infinite God scanning the horizon like an anxious Father, longing for the return of his prodigal sons and daughters---from Babylon, from Barnesville, and from every point in between.
Gary
Forefeast of the Entry of the Most Holy Theotokos into the Temple; feast of St. Gregory Decapolite; feast of St. Proclus, Archbishop of Constantinople
Psalm 65
For the director of music. A psalm of David. A song.
Praise awaits You, O God, in Zion;
to You our vows will be fulfilled.
O You who hear prayer,
to You all men will come.
When we were overwhelmed by sins,
You forgave our transgressions.
Blessed are those You choose
and bring near to live in Your courts!
We are filled with the good things of Your house,
of Your holy temple.
You answer us with awesome deeds of righteousness,
O God our Savior,
the hope of all the ends of the earth
and of the farthest seas,
who formed the mountains by Your power,
having armed Yourself with strength,
who stilled the roaring of the seas,
the roaring of their waves,
and the turmoil of the nations.
Those living far away fear Your wonders;
where morning dawns and evening fades
You call forth songs of joy.
You care for the land and water it;
You enrich it abundantly.
The streams of God are filled with water
to provide the people with grain,
for so You have ordained it.
You drench its furrows
and level its ridges;
You soften it with showers
and bless its crops.
You crown the year with Your bounty,
and Your carts overflow with abundance.
The grasslands of the desert overflow;
the hills are clothed with gladness.
The meadows are covered with flocks
and the valleys are mantled with grain;
they shout for joy and sing.
Comments