Confronting Nihilism: Towards a Political Theory of the Psalms

I.

In contradistinction to the efforts directed towards reviving modernity, several attempts to recover the older understanding of a common moral order, grounded in a disciplined habit of mind, offer much hope. Such a pursuit requires a return to the roots of our understanding of political and societal order. The movement from such despair to an attempted recovery of an “orthodox”[1] faith is prefigured in Psalm 73. Unlike Qoheleth, the author of Psalm 73 believes the Divine Imperative and human will can be assimilated into a coherent, workable whole. In other words, divine revelation can contribute to the life of the individual as well as the regime. Holy teaching as an active element in the manifestation of God replaces the divine mode of silence. Gerhard von Rad has also attempted to present the movement within Psalm 73 as a theological and philosophical periagoge, a “turning around,” or transitional movement towards following God’s plan for a holy life.[2] The argument in this essay will dispute von Rad’s claim regarding Psalm 73 as merely a “propping up” of an order; we will assert that the quest is genuine and one that results in an increased ability to follow God. For Plato, for example, any “turning around” always resulted in improvement over the previous way of life. It allowed for a greater understanding of the good, the true and the beautiful. The most acute problem associated with humankind was just waywardness at the core, or an inability to experience such a turn.[3] The author of the Psalm under consideration has undertaken a journey to experience the transcendental pole of the Divine tension in human life and has rediscovered order amidst the disruptions of the author’s world. In contradistinction to the wicked who loathe the prospect of a theophanic reality, the psalmist approaches a greater understanding of the Divine through a number of means, including his own suffering, but is eventually able to experience a union with the Divine.

II.

One of the most profound difficulties with Psalm 73 centers on the integrity of the text, but more importantly, one must also attempt to answer the question of form. The complexity of the various elements and the question of whether or not they compose a coherent whole are analyzed to an extreme in Hubert Irsigler’s Psalm 73-Monolog eines Weisen.[4] For Irsigler, the Psalms, including 73, are a product of both the “result” of oral transmission as well as written transcription. Such a process inevitably produces textual variations that must be examined. His tome is just such an enterprise; however, beneath the extravagant exegesis, the author has engaged in much speculation that may appear more questionable under closer scrutiny. Hans-Joachim Kraus as well as other scholars suggest that Psalm 73 forms a coherent text.[5] According to Kraus’s commentary, “no major (textual) flaws are to be registered.”[6] In opposition to this view, Claus Westermann argues that the text of Psalm 73 is potentially corrupt. In the case of verse 10, Westermann argues that any effort at recovering the original text is probably impossible.[7] Accordingly, Westermann prefers to accept the tenor of the text and he employs a paradigmatic hermeneutic as the guide for understanding the psalm. Of course, this interpretative decision places particular restrictions upon the reader of the text that Westermann appears unable to accept; namely, the imposition of theological claims for organizing the text. Westermann prefers to place Psalm 73 within an existential context, limiting its applicability for a larger audience. It is an account of the meaning of one life, not the account of a people.

Perhaps more alluring and accurate are the enhanced philosophical and contextually oriented guides offered by Martin Buber and James L. Crenshaw. Buber presents Psalm 73 as the converse of Job. Whereas Job pondered why the good did not flourish, the author of Psalm 73 seeks an answer to the problem of why the wicked always prosper. Buber’s psalmist is a pietist of sorts, preferring a model of personal religious devotion to the more “diletantic” Job.[8] Even though Buber’s essay is devoid of textual criticism, it provides a framework for understanding Psalm 73 as a progression of political and theological insight predicated upon an extensive appreciation of the text and a recognition of the use of contrast by the author of the passage. For Buber the psalm forms a connected literary unit that presents an intense appreciation of the difficulties associated with following God in a confused world. For Buber’s argument to sustain itself, the text must not only be coherent, it must be void of serious flaws. In other words, he assumes it forms a pericope, functioning as an authentic, self-contained unit. He refuses to accept the modern divisions of the text and defines the psalm according to movements within the narrative, rather than following a more arbitrary method. While neither Buber nor Crenshaw is engaged in commentary assessments, both offer illustrative criticisms regarding the integrity of the work. As we turn to Crenshaw, we confront a critique that offers an equally poignant political and theological reading of the psalm as was found in Buber, albeit influenced by the insights of the modern historical-critical study of the Hebrew Bible.

Crenshaw challenges the literary and theological premises of Westermann’s understanding without elucidating an exacting appraisal of the psalm. The problem of spiritual anguish, which could lead to a multitude of textual differences, is the major concern of Crenshaw’s “Standing Near the Flame: Psalm 73.”[9] A consistency exists if for no other reason than the participation by the psalmist in a larger debate over the religious testing. While Crenshaw agrees with Westermann’s defense of the efficacy of individual testimony as a literary device, he asserts that the claims of the one can also be the witness for and of the many. In other words, the particular text can become the ground for a society’s effort to accommodate a political crisis within historical existence. The major tenet of this assessment demands an understanding of the spiritual dimension of the individual as it relates to the nation; the text progresses as a spiritual treatise with a notion of political integrity.

III.

The author of Psalm 73 experiences a great deal of suffering in the process of moving towards God. The writer’s body, especially his heart, will doubtless fail (verse 26). The movement towards greater faithfulness is filled with tremendous, sometimes perplexing, torment. Having offered a psychological veneer, we must attempt to connect, if possible, such sentiment with a larger social movement in a place and time. The Psalms as a whole were viewed by scholars of a previous generation as a collection of poems with statements about various aspects of temple worship, authored at different times by the sons of the major priests, Korah and Asaph and others. The dating of the psalms as a genre was usually placed later than David and many years after the Exile. Harold H. Watts, for example, dated the Psalms between 537 BCE and 100 BCE.[10] Such a movement marked a departure from the earlier view of Davidic authorship, although an effort persists to associate his name with some of the psalms. Contemporary biblical scholarship affirms the limitations of Davidic composition when encountering the historical realities of the Temple and acknowledges its destruction;[11] this analysis concludes that a multiplicity of authors and sources, literary and musical, contributed to the collection that is now in our possession. However, Psalm 73’s position in such an assemblage remains an enigma wrapped in a riddle.

The credit for Psalm 73 is given to Asaph, one of the three leaders of the Levite temple musicians. Mitchell Dahood describes Asaph as the founder of a guild, as listed in I Chronicles 25: 1-2 and 6-9.[12] This depiction may serve as more of a traditional notation than a record of actual authorship. It is part of a number of consecutive psalms that possess the same superscription concerning authorship and the psalms associated with Asaph contribute to one of the major divisions of the general text. M. J. Buss, among others, has argued that the Asaph Psalms have a special connection to the priestly life, especially the Levite priests of the Ephraimite tradition.[13] The author of Psalm 73 obviously considers himself as part of the good, although he experiences an evolving notion of the good and his relation to the concept changes. This becomes clear in verse 13 when the practices of the holy life are perpetuated even when they bear no fruit for the writer. If the source is priestly, it differs from much of biblical literature and other psalmic forms. The author is filled with doubt and despair throughout much of the psalm and perhaps the lifetime of the writer. Little textual evidence is offered regarding the setting except in the pivotal verse 17 and the subsequent theophany that transpires in the sanctuary. A visit to the temple is an epochal event in the life of the author: life can no longer be the same.

Of all the possible concerns regarding Psalm 73, no other has received more attention than that of form. The debate over how to “place” the text has become voluminous with no firm consensus on the matter. The dissonance regarding this psalm suggests the inadequacy of our models of explanation, as well as the troublesome task of defining wisdom literature. However, the confluence of political and theological insight, and the role of theophany, remains useful guides for our understanding. For most students of Psalm 73, and the Psalms in general, deciphering the form(s) of the collection has been a multifaceted challenge. Luyten describes Psalm 73 as being “in search of a genre,” and he proceeds to set the stage for the discussion of the larger context of the Psalms by noting that: “The first impression received when reviewing what has been written about wisdom in the psalms since the work of H. Gunkel is one of chaos.”[14] While the confusion is bewildering for someone outside the field of biblical studies, some semblance of cohesion can be articulated. To simplify matters, Clinton McCann has suggested seven categories or alternatives for describing the forms of the psalms from recent scholarship: wisdom psalm, song of thanksgiving, song of lament, song of confidence, royal psalm, pronouncement of a sanctuary charge and the great psalm of Yahweh.[15] Of these, according to his assessment, the first two are the most dominant. At the heart of the issue lies Roland Murphy’s effort to limit the definition of wisdom psalms to include only a portion of Gunkel’s delineation of the genre. Murphy claimed, according to his new methodology, that Psalm 49 could be included as a wisdom psalm, while 73 could not.[16] Murphy has argued that Psalm 73 assumes the form of a thanksgiving song. If the psalm is presented as a wisdom psalm, it does not fit all that nicely into the appropriate package, and the advocates of the psalm as a thanksgiving psalm must also respond to the inadequacies of their thesis. McCann aptly portrays the conundrum regarding the interpretation in this way:

“Those who identify Psalm 73 as a wisdom psalm generally conclude that it is a Problemgedichte. The psalmist is suffering or is struggling with the problem of why the righteous must suffer. On the other hand, those who identify Psalm 73 as a song of thanksgiving generally conclude either that the psalmist has ceased to suffer and is thanking God for having been delivered, or that the psalmist is thanking God that he has reached a satisfactory solution to the problem of divine retribution.”[17]

While these two major theories have dominated the debate, other more alluring alternatives have been proposed. The most attractive versions of these proposals attempt to assimilate a philosophical insight into the process. Against this rather narrow presentation of the alternatives, Leo Perdue’s endeavor to extract a rapprochement between the previously exclusive worlds of wisdom and cultic influences provides for a more salutary understanding and possible resolution to the dilemma at hand.[18] Perdue suggests that Psalm 73 belongs to a category of proverb poems, as it is composed around several sayings. Following this insight, the discussion is returned to Buber and Crenshaw — and the text as a political and theological witness. The older theories are often confusing, and according to Crenshaw, “run the risk of circular reasoning.”[19] The limitations of the older methods, namely the detailed research devoted to the unfolding of religious thinking and the extensive study of the historical content as epitomized by the American School of William Foxwell Albright and others, do not bring us any closer to the most central concern of our enterprise, and are of limited assistance.[20] At the heart of the critique offered by Perdue, one finds the proposition that Psalm 73 is essentially a theological treatise. The appellation of thanksgiving psalm is too restrictive and theologically sterile for Psalm 73, as it offers a genuine breakthrough to the message of God. The psalmist overcomes the limitations of a theology of retribution as well as the constraints of personal experience to possess an existential consciousness. Such a conception provides us with the needed breakthrough to move to a more political and theological explanation of the form as the guide for understanding the passage’s significance.

The revelatory act in verse 17 is the most prominent example of the continuation of the theophanic reality found in other passages throughout the Old Testament. The relationship with God is renewed and ratified by the sanctuary experience; the combined company of God and author in the spiritual dialogue evolves into the presence of God and his people. The most important consideration is the outburst, which indicates it is not an unintelligible act, but a remnant of the compactness of the older order. The hidden God in the life of the author reveals the connection of God, through historical sources, and the new constitution of being. The people and the divine can no longer be separated and their historical constitution is revived through this event. Regardless of the depictions of the author of Psalm 73 as merely giving an account of a spiritual crisis, we are presented with an authentic Zetema that finds its reward in a renewal of devotion and willingness “to be near God” (verse 28) forever.

The tension between the hidden God and God’s earthly manifestations has been transposed by the sanctuary episode from the form of cosmological myth to revealed presence in history. The author, as the medium for the Divine word, as it was revealed to him, becomes a historical figure and the perpetuity of the sacred text is established. Above all, a certain sense of balance prevails and the continuity advances our understanding of the psalmist. As Moses provided for a new order of the people of God and the revelatory act involving Moses was shared with his people, the psalmist’s struggles are the current crises of the people of Israel, somewhat removed from the worldview shaped by the Mosaic experience.[21] Part of any understanding of this text evolves from the situation in which the author finds himself. Moses, of course, was confronted with numerous obstacles, with little hope of resolution; in this sense, Moses and the Psalmist have much in common. Moses’ confrontation with evil was direct. He frequently criticized ruling elites as evil. The psalmist, on the other hand, changes his view of evil substantially in Psalm 73. They share the reality that the more multifaceted the conflict, the more complicated the existence of people. The Sitz im Leben of the author translates into the actual setting of his people. The psalm speaks for itself, bringing the argument of the theophanic reality as the central concern of the passage to the forefront.

IV. Verses 1-3 — Autobiography

The beginning of the psalm sets the theological and descriptive tone for the remainder of the passage. The confessional quality of the opening “Truly God..” (verse 1) mirrors both the psalmist’s spiritual quest and personal need to find God amidst the chaos of the writer’s current existence. The disclosure is offered as an appreciation of the God’s role in the life of the writer, obviously noting a level of devotion even though the situation may suggest a certain tenuousness concerning the conditions — spiritual and political — that must be encountered by the psalmist. God is the giver of goodness, but as Kraus suggests, the notion of the good at the juncture is not clear and potentially diverse.[22] The psalmist’s doubt — which will soon become painfully clear — is veiled in deceptive language. As this is the opening of the liturgy, such a praiseworthy tone is to be expected. A possible criticism of this view comes when consideration is made of the use of “truly” in verse 1. It suggests a note of assurance and determination that belies any notion of insincerity on the part of the psalmist. Crenshaw suggests a theological “turn” can be evidenced in the names used for the deity in the first three verses and in verses 27-28.[23] In the first two verses the names El and Elohim are utilized. The names Adonai and Yahweh are used by the end of the psalm, suggesting a special message for God’s people that must be shared and transmitted to future generations.

The precarious situation of the psalmist comes into fuller focus in verse two as the author articulates his teetering at the edge of a spiritual abyss and his near demise. The writer was close to losing his faith. This is perhaps the great confession that unifies the subsequent descriptions of the recovery. The reader is given a substantial tool for understanding the remainder of the psalm; the writer has “almost stumbled,” although he does not fall. He has touched the edge of the Nietzschean chasm, but refused to succumb to it. At this early juncture, we have an optimistic, perhaps victorious claim on behalf of the divine and the enveloping power of God in the life of the people of God; and as Buber has argued, the purity of the heart becomes the predominant metaphor for explaining all relationships with the Divine, and the recovery of a humane social order.[24]

In verse 3 the separation of the wicked from the faithful[25] seems rather thoroughgoing. The psalmist appears as a distanced observer. The New Revised Standard Version translates the posture in verse 3 as “saw,” whereas Marvin Tate describes the movement as “watching,” possibly denoting a more covetous understanding of the wicked.[26] As a matter of personal experience, the psalmist has witnessed the material success of the wicked. Buber poignantly describes the situation as premised upon envy:

“Seeing the prosperity of the ‘wicked’ daily and hearing their braggart speech has brought him very near to the abyss of despairing unbelief, of the inability to believe any more in a living God active in life. ‘But I, a little more and my feet had turned aside, a mere nothing and my steps had stumbled.’ He goes so far as to be jealous of the ‘wicked’ for their privileged position.”[27]

This serves as the initial movement before the great illumination that will follow. The psalmist experiences a new perception of God, but the worst is yet to come.

V. Verses 4-16 — Challenge

The psalmist believes the wicked are allowed a privileged existence. While the term harsubbõt can be understood in several ways, the lives of the wicked are certainly not as painful as the psalmist’s perceived reality. The wicked are unquestionably distinct from the psalmist because they are pretentious and enamored with the pleasures of worldly living. They are exempt from the problems others must suffer. At the center of the psalmist’s problem with these people is their disavowal of the divine element in life, although they make passing reference to the Most High as a sneer of sorts with little purpose other than a denigration of the faithful. In one sense, the wicked claim to speak in the voice of heaven (verse 9), sharing their insight with all the earth, while also acquiring a following among the community. The psalmist holds the wicked people’s ability to entice others to their ranks as most disdainful. As Crenshaw suggests, the wicked question whether “religion is really worth the bother.”[28] And the wicked present a profound challenge to the faithful: If God does not have any special knowledge — and if this insight cannot be communicated to the people of God — why should any devotion to the Divine or the community of faith be necessary? The psalmist has also undertaken such a mode of questioning.

The challenge for the psalmist is related to the corresponding modern challenge: in the face of near insurmountable obstacles to the faith and the possibility of limited returns — why not turn away from God. He is given the opportunity to divorce himself from the deity, or as Loren Fisher describes the transition, he could have “washed his hands,” which is connected to acts of ceremonial cleansing in numerous Ancient Near Eastern texts.[29] The possibility of liberation from divine rule presented itself to the author with the imposition of such an activity. He cannot make such a move because it would deny the salvific nature of God. The psalmist continues to pursue God, in part out of devotion to the “circle of children” (verse 15) or fellow communicants that are near him. The community nurtures him in this time of confusion and searching and ultimately provides the impetus for his overcoming the crisis of disbelief. The challenge has been met.

VI. Verse 17 — Theophany

Many scholars agree that Verse 17 is the turning point in the psalm. The psalmist honestly seeks God even in his turmoil, guided by the community. Because the psalmist is holy he can know God. Buber argues that the psalmist is not led into the temple because of his doubt of the Divine, but because of the psalmist’s purity of heart.[30] One can easily dismiss the psalmist as slow or not perceptive; however, the intellectualization of his faith has been shattered and the directness of the Divine becomes manifested into his life. For Buber the “presence” of God has acted as guide, bringing the psalmist out of his self-imposed confinement, and he must now encounter the world as a new man.[31] The author as sufferer experiences a transformation and finds a “truth that breaks through all the disguises and contradictions of life and history.”[32]

VII. Verses 18-20 — Life Among the Ruins

The limits of the wicked are now clear to the psalmist. Their existence, now exposed in all of its confinement, is predicated upon a deformed notion of social and political order. The wicked live in a world of dreams filled with partial truth that cannot be sustained. The “deception” has been exposed by the psalmist’s experience of the theophany. At the end of the day, it is the wicked who must fall, not the children of God. The role of the Divine now changes: God no longer has to answer the questions presented by the wicked, as God can speak to God’s people in due course and in the appropriate manner. God can also handle the wicked, and as Crenshaw points out, the Divine is now addressed personally by the psalmist.[33] God has spoken to the writer and people of Israel in an unambiguous fashion.

VIII. Verses 21-24 — The Movement Towards Faith

Verse 21 renews the confessional habit of mind of the earlier portion of Psalm 73. There is again mention of the psalmist’s anguish, but he is no longer the recalcitrant figure we experienced earlier in the psalm. These four verses stress the assurance of the individual, even when the memory of the intrinsic anguish remains vivid in the mind of the writer. This pericope serves as the second long dark night of the psalmist’s faith pilgrimage. The wicked are merely second-rate mystics, mystiques manques, who did not fulfill the spiritual requirements necessary to follow God — although God comes to the rescue. The People of God can still assimilate the new divine wisdom. Verse 23 suggests the possibility of an eternal connection to the Divine, where the communicant is received with “honor” according to Crenshaw,[34] although Tate translates the word as “glory.”[35] Can glory be heaven and the promise of eternal life with God? Our exegesis cannot fully answer such a question, even though it is one of the troublesome problems in this text. The assumption into heaven must remain a possibility.

IX. Verses 25-28 — Autobiography of a People

The final part of the passage is a rememoration of the first three verses, aided by the theophanic reality and the implantation of a new consciousness of existence. The ordering of the psalmist’s world becomes a movement towards the transcendent. As Kraus suggests, there is a movement beyond the immanentization of the life with God and the new relationship with the Divine also abrogates the limits of one’s current existence.[36] Closeness to God is a sure sign of salvation (Verse 28). These verses contain the advancement envisioned in verse 17. The God who spoke in the sanctuary now becomes the psalmist’s “Lord” (verse 28) and nearness of the divine presence is undeniable.

The psalmist is not the historian of Israelite existence, but the writer is a political and spiritual reformer who offers an erudite refutation of nihilism — although not the founder of a religion or any new variation of faith. The psalmist serves as a participant in a “terse” formula: Yahweh brought Israel, through Moses, up from Egypt, and others must explain the difficulties of the heart to successive generations. Most profoundly, the psalmist serves as the model, the person in whose heart and mind the “leap of being” occurs. The Psalmist is no longer a messenger of the divine reality, but an actual participant. The psalmist is the stimulus for the ennobling of the divine as the unifying source of the political and social order of the people in the present with the rhythm of existence.

Notes

[1] This essay does not attempt to define orthodoxy or defend a particular modern proposition; it merely seeks to affirm a belief that has sustained a particular community, or group amidst the exigencies of their everyday existence.

[2] Gerhard von Rad, Wisdom in Israel, (Valley Forge, Pennsylvania: Trinity Press International, 1993).

[3] See H. Lee Cheek, Jr., “A Note on the Platonic and Aristotelian Critique of Democratic Man,” International Social Science Review, 66, 2, (Spring 1991).

[4] Hubert Irsigler, Psalm 73-Monolog eines Weisen, (St. Ottilien: EOS Verlag, 1984).

[5] Hans-Joachim Kraus, Psalms 60-150, (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1989), 84.

[6] Hans-Joachim Kraus, Psalms 60-150, (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1989), 84.

[7] Claus Westermann, The Living Psalms, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmams, 1989), 134.

[8] Martin Buber, “The Heart Determines,” in On the Bible, (New York: Schocken Books, 1968), 205.

[9] James Crenshaw, A Whirlpool of Torment: Israelite Traditions of God as an Oppressive Presence, (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1984), 93-109.

[10] Harold H. Watts, The Modern Reader’s Guide to the Bible, New York: Harper and Row, 1949), 209.

[11] James Crenshaw, Old Testament Story and Faith, (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1992), 292-303.

[12] Mitchell Dahood, S.J., The Anchor Bible, Psalms II: 51-100, (Garden City, New York: Doubleday and Company, 1968), 188.

[13] M. J. Buss, “The Psalms of Asaph and Korah,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 82 (1963), 383-92.

[14] J. Luyten, “Psalm 73 and Wisdom,” La Sagesse de l’ Ancien Testament Par M. Gilbert, (Leuven: University Press, 1979), 59-81.

[15] J. Clinton McCann, Jr., “Psalm 73: A Microcosm of Old Testament Theology,” in The Listening Heart: Essays in Wisdom and Psalms in Honor of Roland E. Murphy, O. Carm, (Sheffield, England: Journal for the Study of the Old Testament, 1987), 247-57.

[16] Roland Murphy, “A Consideration of the Classification of ‘Wisdom Psalms,’“ Vetus Testamentum, Supplement IX, (1963), 160.

[17] McCann, “Psalm 73: A Microcosm of Old Testament Theology.”

[18] Leo G. Perdue, Wisdom and Cult: A Critical Analysis of the Views of the Cults in the Wisdom Literatures of Israel and the Ancient Near East, (Missoula, Montana: Society of Biblical Literature Dissertation Series, 1977).

[19] Crenshaw, A Whirlpool of Torment, 95.

[20] Crenshaw, A Whirlpool of Torment, 97, n. 7.

[21] See Crenshaw, “Introduction: The Shift from Theodicy to Anthropodicy,” in Theodicy in the Old Testament, (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1983), 7.

[22] Kraus, Psalms 60-150, 86.

[23] Crenshaw, A Whirlpool of Torment, 99.

[24] Buber, “The Heart Determines,” 201.

[25] Westermann, The Living Psalms, 136. This essay borrows freely from Westermann in the use of this term.

[26] Marvin Tate, Word Biblical Commentary, Volume 20: Psalms 51-100. (Dallas: Word Books, 1990), 228.

[27] Buber, “The Heart Determines,” 201.

[28] Crenshaw, A Whirlpool of Torment, 102.

[29] As quoted in Dahood, The Anchor Bible, 191.

[30] Buber, “The Heart Determines,” 205.

[31] Ibid, 206.

[32] Kraus, Psalms 60-150, 89.

[33] Crenshaw, A Whirlpool of Torment, 106.

[34] Crenshaw, A Whirlpool of Torment, 106.

[35] Tate, Word Biblical Commentary, 230.

[36] Kraus, Psalms 60-150, 91.

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