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READING THE BOOK OF PSALMS

PART XXIII

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Psalm 30

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Superscriptions in the Book of Psalms are not always accurate.  Aside from the tradition of writing a text then attributing it to a famous dead person–David, for example–some superscriptions are obviously inaccurate.  Consider Psalm 30, O reader:

A psalm of David.  A song for the dedication of the House.

“The house” is the (First) Temple, constructed after David’s death and dedicated by Solomon.

Yet I have more important matters about which to write.

Recall the Hebrew concept of Sheol, O reader:  The dead, in the underworld, could not praise God.  Living people could praise God, however.

The psalmist had been seriously ill; death had seemed probable.  Yet he recovered then praised God.  Between the beginning and the end of the psalm, the psalmist made some important points:

1. Divine judgment and mercy exist in balance.  Divine anger passes quickly–“but a moment.”
2. Spiritual complacency comes easily during good times.  Times of difficulty can be occasions for spiritual growth if one does not turn away from God.
3. Divine judgment is frequently an opportunity for repentance.

The caveat on all this is that Psalm 30 has a human filter.  We read the psalmist’s perceptions, filtered through a theological and cultural context.  We mere mortals have human filters for everything; we cannot change that.  The reality of God exceeds our abilities to perceive God.  None of this means that many human perceptions of God are correct, of course.  They are all partial, however.

As for me, I thought in my quiet days,

“Never will I stumble.”

–Psalm 30:7, Robert Alter

I resemble that remark.  Perhaps you, O reader, resemble it, too.

I also attest that God has turned my dirge into a dance.  I await a repeat performance.  Until then, I am not going anywhere.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

THE FOURTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS

THE FEAST OF THE HOLY INNOCENTS

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How could I stand in God’s way?

Above:  St. Simon Peter

Image in the Public Domain

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The Collect:

Blessed Lord, who caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning:

Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them,

that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of life,

which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ,  who lives and reigns

with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.

—The Book of Common Prayer (1979), page 236

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The Assigned Readings:

Acts 11:1-18

Psalm 30

1 Thessalonians 2:1-8

Luke 24:36-53

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The four assigned readings share the context of an uneasy situation.  We read a prayer of thanksgiving of a person who has recovered from a potentially fatal illness in Psalm 30.  The slime in the pit of Sheol will not praise God, but a living person does.  We also read of St. Simon Peter defending his actions (from Acts 10) to his fellow Jewish Christians, whom he persuades.  We read of past suffering in 1 Thessalonians 2.  And we read of Jesus comforting and empowering frightened Apostles in Luke 24.

My keynote for this post comes from Acts 11:17b:

—The Revised English Bible (1989)

When God refuses to fit into or respect the categories that provide psychological comfort to us and reinforce our defense mechanisms, how do we respond or react?  Do we respond or do we react?  (Yes, those words have different definitions.)  Many of us, regardless of where we fall on the liberal-conservative scale overall and on each issue, identify ourselves as insiders and others as outsiders.  Outsiders exist, of course, but God’s criteria for defining insiders and outsiders differ from ours.  And what if one who imagines oneself to be an insider is actually an outsider?

No devout person tries to stand in God’s way, I suppose.  Yet many do, sometimes.  We humans frequently mistake our standards for those of God.  We may do our best, according to what we know or think we know, but we can and do err.

May we, by grace, never stand in God’s way.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

APRIL 6, 2020 COMMON ERA

MONDAY IN HOLY WEEK

THE FEAST OF SAINT MARCELLINUS OF CARTHAGE, ROMAN CATHOLIC MARTYR, 413

THE FEAST OF BENJAMIN HALL KENNEDY, GREEK AND LATIN SCHOLAR, BIBLE TRANSLATOR, AND ANGLICAN PRIEST

THE FEAST OF DANIEL G. C. WU, CHINESE-AMERICAN EPISCOPAL PRIEST AND MISSIONARY

THE FEAST OF EMIL BRUNNER, SWISS REFORMED THEOLOGIAN

THE FEAST OF MILNER BALL, U.S. PRESBYTERIAN MINISTER, LAW PROFESSOR, WITNESS FOR CIVIL RIGHTS, AND HUMANITARIAN

THE FEAST OF SAINT NOKTER BALBULUS, ROMAN CATHOLIC MONK

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Adapted from this post:

https://lenteaster.wordpress.com/2020/04/06/devotion-for-the-third-sunday-of-easter-year-c-humes/

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Above:  Icon of the Entombment of Jesus

Image in the Public Domain

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For Holy Saturday, Year 1

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Lectionary from A Book of Worship for Free Churches (The General Council of the Congregational Christian Churches in the United States, 1948)

Collect from The Book of Common Prayer (The Episcopal Church, 1928)

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Grant, O Lord, that as we are baptized into the death of thy blessed Son, our Saviour Jesus Christ,

so by continual mortifying our corrupt affectations we may be buried with him;

and that through the grave, and gate of thy death, we may pass to our joyful resurrection;

for his merits, who died, and was buried, and was buried, and rose again for us,

the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

—The Book of Common Prayer (1928),161

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Job 33:23-30

Psalm 30

1 Peter 3:17-22

Mark 15:42-47

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Two interesting notes come to mind before I get to my main point.

1. 1 Peter 3:17-22 is why the Apostles’ Creed contains a reference to Christ’s descent to the dead.  The passage also gives us the Orthodox doctrine of the Harrowing of Hell.
2. Whenever reading from the Book of Job, one should be aware who is speaking.  The speaker in Job 33 is Elihu, a condescending idiot who, in the full context of the chapter, contradicts Job’s claim of innocence, backed up by the first two chapters.  Yet even idiots get some details right, by random change.  To quote a cliché, even a broken clock is right twice a day.

My main point is that this devotion is that we should never rush through Holy Saturday.  Easter will arrive on schedule, as it does every year.  In the gap between the Good Friday service and the Easter Vigil, sunrise service, or main service on Easter Sunday morning, we should allow Jesus to be dead, liturgically.  If we let Holy Saturday sit and have the power it should, Easter will mean more when it arrives.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

APRIL 3, 2020 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF LUTHER D. REED, U.S. LUTHERAN MINISTER AND LITURGIST

THE FEAST OF SAINTS BURGENDOFARA AND SADALBERGA, ROMAN CATHOLIC ABBESSES, AND THEIR RELATIVES

THE FEAST OF MARC SANGNIER, FOUNDER OF THE SILLON MOVEMENT

THE FEAST OF SAINT MARY OF EGYPT, HERMIT AND PENITENT

THE FEAST OF REGINALD HEBER, ANGLICAN BISHOP OF CALCUTTA, AND HYMN WRITER

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Love like Jesus.

Above:  Pentecost Dove

Scanned from a Church Bulletin by Kenneth Randolph Taylor

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FOR PENTECOST SUNDAY, ACCORDING TO A LECTIONARY FOR PUBLIC WORSHIP IN THE BOOK OF WORSHIP FOR CHURCH AND HOME (1965)

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O God, who at this time teaches the heart of your faithful people,

by sending them the light of your Holy Spirit:

Grant us by the same Spirit to have a right judgment in all things

and evermore to rejoice in his holy comfort;

through the merits of Christ Jesus our Savior, who lives and reigns with you,

in the unity of the same Spirit, one God, world without end.  Amen.

–Modernized from The Book of Worship for Church and Home (1965), pages 127-128

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Jeremiah 31:31-34

Psalm 30

Acts 2:1-8, 12-21

John 14:15-17, 25-27

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Robert C. Wright, the Episcopal Bishop of Atlanta, and my bishop, likes to repeat the slogan,

That teaching is consistent with the reading from John 14, in which the test of loving Jesus is obeying his commandments.  May we recall how Jesus loved and lived–sacrificially and unconditionally.  The ethics of Jesus, as we read them in the Gospels, are those of Judaism–love the LORD with all one’s heart, soul, and mind, and one’s neighbor as oneself.  That is certainly the summary of the Torah, according to Rabbi Hillel, who died when Jesus was a boy.

The Holy Spirit is a great leveler.  A recurring theme in varieties of Christianity, from the Quakers to the Arminians, is equality via the Holy Spirit.  This teaching is, according to those who favor spiritual hierarchy, heretical.  Equality via the Holy Spirit cuts through social–gender, economic, racial, ethnic, et cetera–distinctions, much to the discomfort of those invested in those categories as indications of inequality.  God writes the new covenant on hearts metaphorically without regard to social status.  God, who turns mourning into dancing, is no respecter of persons.  God is, according to human standards, subversive.

This is wonderful news to ponder on any day, but especially on Pentecost, the last day of the Easter season and the birthday of the Church.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

DECEMBER 19, 2017 COMMON ERA

THE SEVENTEENTH DAY OF ADVENT

THE FEAST OF RAOUL WALLENBERG, RIGHTEOUS GENTILE

THE FEAST OF CHICO MENDES, “GANDHI OF THE AMAZON”

THE FEAST OF ROBERT CAMPBELL, SCOTTISH EPISCOPALIAN THEN ROMAN CATHOLIC SOCIAL ADVOCATE AND HYMN WRITER

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This is post #1800 of BLOGA THEOLOGICA.

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Book One: Psalms 1-41

Scan by Kenneth Randolph Taylor

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The psalter of the Septuagint contains 151 psalms.

I have written based on all of them, in numerical order.  I have retained the Hebrew numbering system, not that of the Septuagint.

Although I have no theological reticence to venture into textual territory that, according the United Methodism of my youth, is apocryphal, I do have limits.  They reside in the realm of Orthodoxy, with its range of scriptural canons.  Beyond that one finds the Pseudipigrapha.  Psalm 151 concludes the Book of Psalms in The Orthodox Study Bible (2008); so be it.

The Hebrew psalter concludes with Psalm 150.  In other psalters, however, the count is higher.  In certain editions of the Septuagint, for example, Psalm 151 is an appendix to the Book of Psalms.  In other editions of the Septuagint, however, Psalm 151 is an integrated part of the psalter.  There is also the matter of the Syraic psalter, which goes as high as Psalm 155.  I have no immediate plans to ponder Psalms 152-155, however.  Neither do I plan to read and write about Psalms 156-160 any time soon, if ever.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

AUGUST 23, 2017 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF SAINTS MARTIN DE PORRES AND JUAN MACIAS, HUMANITARIANS AND DOMINICAN LAY BROTHERS; SAINT ROSE OF LIMA, HUMANITARIAN AND DOMINICAN SISTER; AND SAINT TURIBIUS OF MOGROVEJO, ROMAN CATHOLIC ARCHBISHOP OF LIMA

THE FEAST OF WILLIAM JOHN COPELAND, ANGLICAN PRIEST AND HYMN TRANSLATOR

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Book Five:  Psalms 107-150

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119:1-32

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Also in the Greek:  Psalm 151

151

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No man is an island, Entire of itself, Every man is a piece of the continent, A part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less. As well as if a promontory were. As well as if a manor of thy friend’s Or of thine own were: Any man’s death diminishes me, Because I am involved in mankind, And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee.

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POST XI OF LX

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The Book of Common Prayer (1979) includes a plan for reading the Book of Psalms in morning and evening installments for 30 days.  I am therefore blogging through the Psalms in 60 posts.

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Blessed Lord, who caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning:

Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them,

that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life,

which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ;

who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.

—The Book of Common Prayer (1979), page 226

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The theme of calling out to God amidst severe illness unites these two texts.  The author of Psalm 30 fears that he might be near death, actually.  Psalm 31 indicates a human, external source of the affliction in question in that prayer.  In each case the author concludes by blessing God.  In Psalm 30 yet not in Psalm 31 is a superscription noting the dedication of the Temple and reinterpreting the text to indicate national sickness and recovery from it.  Traditions point to the rebuilding of the Temple (520-516 B.C.E.; see Ezra 6:15-18) and the rededication of the Second Temple in 164 B.C.E. (see 1 Maccabees 4:36-59).  Thus Psalm 30 is a reading for Hanukkah.

The link between the individual and the collective interests me.  My North American culture, with its emphasis on rugged individualism, does not handle matters of the collective as well as it should.  Furthermore, rugged individualism is incompatible with the ethics of Judaism and Christianity.  We all depend on God and each other.  As John Donne expressed so eloquently,

Whatever we do, we affect the lives of others.  We are responsible to and for each other.

We let each other down routinely, but we can trust in the fidelity of God.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

AUGUST 8, 2017 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF SAINT MARY MACKILLOP, FOUNDER OF THE SISTERS OF SAINT JOSEPH OF THE SACRED HEART

THE FEAST OF SAINT DOMINIC, FOUNDER OF THE ORDER OF PREACHERS

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Above:   The Apostle Paul, by Rembrandt van Rijn

Image in the Public Domain

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The Collect:

Compassionate God, you have assured the human family of eternal life through Jesus Christ.

Deliver us from the death of sin, and raise us to new life,

in your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.  Amen.

—Evangelical Lutheran Worship (2006), page 39

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The Assigned Readings:

2 Samuel 14:1-11 (Thursday)

2 Samuel 14:12-24 (Friday)

2 Samuel 14:25-33 (Saturday)

Psalm 30 (All Days)

Acts 22:6-21 (Thursday)

Acts 26:1-11 (Friday)

Matthew 9:2-8 (Saturday)

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To you, Yahweh, I call,

to my God I cry for mercy.

–Psalm 30:8, The New Jerusalem Bible (1985)

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We read of forgiveness in the lections from the New Testament.  Saul of Tarsus receives forgiveness and a new mandate from God.  (Grace is free yet not cheap.)  Jesus forgives a man’s sins during a healing in Matthew 9.  Critics who are present think that our Lord and Savior is committing blasphemy, for their orthodoxy makes no room for Jesus.  The healed man becomes a former paralytic, but Christ’s critics suffer from spiritual paralysis.

The language of 2 Samuel 14 indicates that King David has not reconciled with his son Absalom, who had killed his (Absalom’s) half-brother, Amnon, who had raped his (Absalom’s) sister, Tamar, in the previous chapter before he (Absalom) had gone into exile.  The entire incident of pseudo-reconciliation had been for the benefit of Joab.  The false reconciliation proved to be as useless as false grace, for Absalom, back from exile, was plotting a rebellion, which he launched in the next chapter.

The juxtaposition of Saul of Tarsus/St. Paul the Apostle, the paralyzed man, and Absalom is interesting and helpful.  Both Saul/Paul and Absalom had egos, but the former struggled with his self-image as he made a pilgrimage with Jesus.  Absalom, in contrast, did not strive to contain his ego.  No, he permitted it to control him.  We know little about the paralyzed man, but we may assume safely that a runaway ego was not among his problems.

If we are to walk humbly with God, we must contextualize ourselves relative to God.  We are, in comparison, but dust, and God is the proper grounding for human identity.  Proper actions will flow from appropriate attitudes.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

MARCH 4, 2016 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF PAUL CUFFEE, U.S. PRESBYTERIAN MISSIONARY TO THE SHINNECOCK NATION

THE FEAST OF SAINT CASIMIR OF POLAND, PRINCE

THE FEAST OF EMANUEL CRONENWETT, U.S. LUTHERAN MINISTER, HYMN WRITER, AND HYMN TRANSLATOR

THE FEAST OF SAINTS MARINUS OF CAESAREA, ROMAN SOLDIER AND CHRISTIAN MARTYR, AND ASTERIUS, ROMAN SENATOR AND CHRISTIAN MARTYR

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Adapted from this post:

https://ordinarytimedevotions.wordpress.com/2016/03/04/devotion-for-thursday-friday-and-saturday-before-proper-5-year-c-elca-daily-lectionary/

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Above:  The Prophet Isaiah, by Gustave Dore

Image in the Public Domain

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The Collect:

Eternal and all-merciful God,

with all the angels and all the saints we laud your majesty and might.

By the resurrection of your Son, show yourself to us

and inspire us to follow Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord,

who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,

one God, now and forever.  Amen.

–Evangelical Lutheran Worship (2006), page 33

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The Assigned Readings:

Genesis 18:1-8

Psalm 30

Luke 14:12-14

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Genesis 18:1-8 and Luke 14:12-14 offer lessons regarding hospitality and the spirituality thereof.

Hospitality often defined the difference between life and death in Biblical times, as it continues to do.  Extending hospitality was a moral duty, according to Old Testament authors and Jesus.  It was, for them, part of the Law of Love and the web of obligations binding members of society together in mutual responsibility and in interdependence.

In the rural U.S. South in the 1800s it was commonplace for a farmhouse to have a guest room which opened onto the front porch and not into any room.  A traveling stranger might need to spend the night.  That type of accommodation saved the lives of many people.

The two examples of hospitality in the main readings for this day differ from each other.  In Genesis 18 Abraham lavishes hospitality on three men, presumably God and two angels.  We learn that they are present to announce Sarah’s upcoming and most improbable pregnancy.  One might project words from Psalm 30 backward in time and place them into the mouth of Sarah, once she stopped laughing:

You have turned my wailing into dancing;

you have put off my sackcloth and clothed me with joy.

Therefore my heart sings to you without ceasing;

O LORD my God, I will give you thanks for ever.

–Verses 12 and 13, The Book of Common Prayer (1979)

The reading from Luke 14 is part of a scene.  Jesus is dining at the home of a leader of the Pharisees on the Sabbath.  Our Lord and Savior heals a man with dropsy in verses 1-6.  Already Christ’s host and the other guests are hostile, for they watch him closely.  Dropsy, aside from being a physical condition, functions as a metaphor for greed, for, although the affected man’s body retained too much fluid, he was thirsty for more.  Jesus heals the sick man–on the Sabbath, in the presence of critics, no less, and symbolically criticizes his greedy host and other guests while restoring the man to wholeness.  Then our Lord and Savior notices how the other guests choose the positions of honor in contrast to Proverbs 25:6-7a:

Do not exalt yourselves in the king’s presence;

Do not stand in the place of nobles.

For it is better to be told, “Stop up here,”

Than to be degraded in the presence of the great.

—TANAKH:  The Holy Scriptures (1985)

This is a story from the Gospel of Luke, with a theme of reversal of fortune, so the incident fits the Gospel well.

Jesus sounds much like the subsequent James 2:1-13.  Sit in the lowest place, he advises; do not exalt oneself.

For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted?

–Luke 14:11, The New Revised Standard Version (1989)

Likewise, Jesus continues, invite and honor the poor, the lame, the blind, and the crippled with table fellowship.  This ethos of the Kingdom of God’s priorities being at odds with those of the dominant perspectives of the world is consistent with the Beatitudes (Matthew 5:1-11) and the Beatitudes and Woes (Luke 6:20-26).

Give to those who can never repay, Jesus commands us.  And why not?  Has not God given us so much that we can never repay God?  The demand of grace upon us is in this case is to do likewise to others–to do unto others as God has done unto us, to give without expectation of repayment.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

DECEMBER 20, 2015 COMMON ERA

THE FOURTH SUNDAY OF ADVENT, YEAR C

THE FEAST OF SAINT DOMINIC OF SILOS, ROMAN CATHOLIC ABBOT

THE FEAST OF SAINT PETER CANISIUS, ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIEST

THE FEAST OF WILLIAM JOHN BLEW, ENGLISH PRIEST AND HYMN WRITER

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Adapted from this post:

https://lenteaster.wordpress.com/2015/12/20/devotion-for-saturday-before-the-third-sunday-of-easter-year-c-elca-daily-lectionary/

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Above:  The Prophet Isaiah, by Gustave Dore

Image in the Public Domain

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The Collect:

Eternal and all-merciful God,

with all the angels and all the saints we laud your majesty and might.

By the resurrection of your Son, show yourself to us

and inspire us to follow Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord,

who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,

one God, now and forever.  Amen.

–Evangelical Lutheran Worship (2006), page 33

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The Assigned Readings:

Isaiah 5:11-17 (Thursday)

Isaiah 6:1-4 (Friday)

Psalm 30 (Both Days)

Revelation 3:14-22 (Thursday)

Revelation 4:1-11 (Friday)

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Sing to the LORD, you servants of his;

give thanks for the remembrance of his holiness.

For his wrath endures but the twinkling of an eye,

his favor for a lifetime.

Weeping may spend the night,

but joy comes in the morning.

–Psalm 30:4-6, The Book of Common Prayer (1979)

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The author of Psalm 30 was certainly a supporter of God.  That characterization did not apply to the drunks in Isaiah 5 on the indecisive church at Laodicea.

In contrast to those examples stand Isaiah 6 and Revelation 4, visions of divine glory.  The proper response to that glory is utter humility which praises God and asks how best to glorify God in one’s life.  That is, to use the language of Revelation 3:14-22, being hot for God.

The Larger Westminster Catechism begins:

Q:  What is the chief and highest end of man?

A:  Man’s chief and highest end is to glorify God, and fully to enjoy him forever.

–Quoted in The Constitution of The United Presbyterian Church in the United States of America, 1963-64, page 49

That is a fine statement of principle, but how does it properly translate into actions?  The answer to that question depends on who one is, where one is, and when one is.  May each of us, regardless of our circumstances, glorify God as effectively as possible in them.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

DECEMBER 20, 2015 COMMON ERA

THE FOURTH SUNDAY OF ADVENT, YEAR C

THE FEAST OF SAINT DOMINIC OF SILOS, ROMAN CATHOLIC ABBOT

THE FEAST OF SAINT PETER CANISIUS, ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIEST

THE FEAST OF WILLIAM JOHN BLEW, ENGLISH PRIEST AND HYMN WRITER

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Adapted from this post:

https://lenteaster.wordpress.com/2015/12/20/devotion-for-thursday-and-friday-before-the-third-sunday-of-easter-year-c-elca-daily-lectionary/

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