Friday, October 2, 2009

Human wickedness and divine goodness

Psalms 35 and 36. The editors of this study Bible employed some parallelism of their own with the title for Psalm 36, which is the title of this posting. This individual lament in the wisdom genre sets up the dichotomy between God and humans in only a few short verses: humans are wicked, deceitful, foolish, and ultimately seek out evil; God is faithful, righteous wise, and the saviour of both animals and humans. Then the psalmist becomes personal, asking for those qualities to be extended in his/her direction and employing some specific imagery in that prayer. I especially like the following plea: "Do not let the foot of the arrogant tread on me, or the hand of the wicked drive me away." (v. 11). Interesting that we would see these requests today as metaphorical, and not literal but being trampled or pushed away would have (could have?) been real physical dangers for people in the time of the psalmist.
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2 comments:

  1. AnonymousOctober 3, 2009 at 5:32 AM

    Psalm 36 has a couple of amazing statements: "you save humans and animals alike" and in very next verse God has wings!AWJ

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  2. AnonymousOctober 31, 2009 at 9:12 PM

    The only reference in the Bible to the "quiet in the land" is in Psalm 35. Given that this expression occurs in the context of non-resistance and leaving vengenace to God, it seems particularly appropriate that this expression has been applied to Mennonites.
    IPF

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Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

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