The book of Psalms.
Counted among the writings.
Attributed author(s).
Anonymous, David, Solomon, the sons of Korah, Asaph, Ethan, Heman, Moses.
Text(s) available.
None on site.
CCEL: Psalms (Hebrew only).
Swete LXX (Greek only).
Bible
Gateway (English only).
Humanities Text Initiative:
Psalm 151 (English only).
HTML Bible: Psalm (Hebrew and English).
HTML Bible: Psalm
(Latin Vulgate only).
HTML Bible: Psalm (LXX)
(Latin Vulgate only).
Zhubert (Greek and English).
Kata Pi BHS: Psalm (Hebrew and English).
Kata Pi LXX: Psalm (Greek and English).
Sacred Texts: Psalm (polyglot).
Useful links.
Psalms at the OT Gateway.
Psalms in the Jewish Encyclopedia.
EJW (Peter Kirby).
Psalms at Kata Pi (Oesterly and Robinson).
Psalms from the Plymouth Brethren.
Introduction to Psalms (David Malick).
Outline of Psalms (David Malick).
Psalm Titles in the Hebrew.
Psalm Titles in the LXX.
Psalms and Possible Genres (S. Wiggins).
Individuals Listed in Psalm Titles (S. Wiggins).
Hebrew Poetry: Schematic Model of Parallelism
(S. Wiggins).
The Book of Psalms, Where Men Are Men
(David J. A. Clines).
The Psalms and the King (Sheffield Academic Press).
Teaching and Learning the Psalms, Inductively.
Homilies on the Psalms (Hilary of Poitiers).
Conceptions of Davidic Hope in the Greek Psalter and Apocrypha
(Greg Herrick).
Anti-Jewish Interpretations of Psalm 1 in Luther
and in Modern German Protestantism (Uwe F. W. Bauer).
Psalm 1 (J. Hampton Keathley, III).
Erasmus' Commentary on Psalm 2 (Allan K. Jenkins).
Universal Dominion in Psalm 2
(Sheffield Academic Press).
Conceptions of Davidic Hope in Psalms 2, 45, and 72
(Greg Herrick).
Human Beings in Psalm 8 (Carl Schultz).
Who Is Who In Psalm 12 (Helmut Richter).
Psalm 19 (Hampton Keathley, IV).
The Tree of Knowledge and the Law of Yahweh in Psalm 19
(Sheffield Academic Press).
Dissertation on Psalm 22 and the New Testament
(Mark George Vitalis Hoffman).
Psalm 23 (Greg Herrick).
Psalm 30 (Greg Herrick).
Psalm 51 and the Language of Transformation
(Dennis Bratcher).
Conceptions of Davidic Hope in Psalms 89, 110, and 132
(Greg Herrick).
Praying Ashrei (Psalm 145).
Types of Psalms: Classifying the Psalms by Genre
(Dennis Bratcher).
Patterns for Life: Structure, Genre, and Theology in Psalms
(Dennis Bratcher).
The Treasury of David (Charles H. Spurgeon).
Aquinas Translation Project (Commentary on the Psalms).
Psalm numeration.
The book of Psalms ranks among the writings in the Jewish scriptures.
The book was originally written in Hebrew, but the ancient Greek
translation known as the Septuagint
(abbreviated LXX) is also a very important witness to the text. The
numeration of the psalms differs
between the Masoretic (Hebrew) and the LXX (Greek), and the LXX also
has Psalm 151, not extant in the Masoretic.
One of my favorite psalms is Psalm 131 (130 LXX):
יהוה
לא־גבה
לבי
ולא־רמו
עיני
ולא־הלכתי
בגדלות
ובנפלאות
ממני׃
אם־לא
שויתי
ודוממתי
נפשי
כגמל
עלי
אמו
כגמל
עלי
נפשי׃
יחל
ישראל
אל־יהוה
מעתה
ועד־עולם׃
Ωιδη
των
αναβαθμων
τω
Δαυιδ.
Κυριε,
ουχ
υψωθη
μου
η
καρδια,
ουδε
εμετεωρισθησαν
οι
οφθαλμοι
μου,
ουδε
επορευθην
εν
μεγαλοις,
ουδε
εν
θαυμασιοις
υπερ
εμε.
Ει
μη
εταπεινοφρονουν,
αλλα
υψωσα
την
ψυχην
μου,
ως
το
απογεγαλακτισμενον
επι
την
μητερα
αυτου,
ως
ανταποδοσις
επι
την
ψυχην
μου.
Ελπισατω
Ισραηλ
επι
τον
κυριον
απο
του
νυν
και
εως
του
αιωνος.
A song of ascents, of David.
Lord,
my heart is not proud,
nor are my eyes haughty;
nor do I journey in great matters,
nor in wonders beyond me.
Surely I have composed
and quieted my soul
like a weaned child rests against his mother.
My soul is like a weaned child within me.
Let Israel hope upon the
Lord
from now on and unto the age.
Peter Kirby (Early Jewish Writings).
Peter Kirby surveys scholars writing on the book of Psalms:
Carroll Stuhlmueller writes:
Book One (Pss. 1-41) consists almost exclusively of 'Psalms of David' (except
Pss. 1-2, 10, and 33) and is dominated by laments. Book One reflects the decadent
or, at best, the despondent state of religion after the return from exile,
as seen in Haggai and Isa. 56:9-57:13; 63:7-64:11. The fact that the royal
Davidic psalms are scattered and that the titles refer to David's shared humanity,
not to his royal status, reflects the demise of the dynasty.
Book Two (Pss. 42-72) gives new attention to Jerusalem's Temple liturgy in
the psalms of Korah (Ps. 42-49) and Asaph (Ps. 50). These may date from the
time of the religious reform of Ezra in the latter part of the fifth century
B.C. (Ezra 7-10; Neh. 8-9) and the composition of the two books of Chronicles.
Book Three (Pss. 73-89) belongs almost exclusively to Asaph and Korah, while
the slams in Book Four (Pss. 90-106) are almost completely untitled. Psalms
96-99 enhance the Temple liturgy as prefiguring the final or eschatological
age. These books were added as the momentum of Ezra's reform continued.
Book Five (Pss. 107-150) is the most liturgical of all, with attention to
Jews in the Diaspora on pilgrimage to Jerusalem, a situation possibly reflecting
international stability and communication effected by the conquests of Alexander
the Great. Psalms 120-134 constitute a booklet for pilgrims; Psalms 113-118,
for the three major pilgrimage festivals. In Books Four and Five, composition
of psalms has definitely passed from the control of the guilds under the names
of David, Korah, and Asaph, to a wider group of worship leaders.
J. Alberto Soggin writes: "While the Hebrew and Christian tradition tended
to attribute the greater part of the Psalter to the pen of David, critical Introduction
from the end of the last century and the first decades of this has taken the
opposite course: in his commentary, B. Duhm argued that it was no longer a question
of asking whether there were any psalms from the Maccabaean period, but rather
of asking whether there were any earlier than this period, and the authority
which his opinion enjoyed is amply demonstrated by the support given to it by
R. H. Pfieffer's Introduction and by the indecision of that of A. Lods.
However, we have already seen that it is impossible to put the question in these
terms, not only because of the recent discoveries from Qumran but also because
of the studies made in the 1920s by S. Mowinckel, H. Gunkel and H. Schmidt.
The second in particular advanced a more moderate argument, pointing out the
absence of any convincing proof for such a late date and at the same time that
there could be no question of 'dating' pure and simple or of the 'origin' of
a given psalm. The task was, rather, to establish in as exact a form as possible
the literary genre of each composition, and within the field of the literary
genre, the use which was made of it." (Introduction to the Old Testament,
p. 369)
Samuel Sandmel writes: "At Ugarit, twelve miles north of Latakia in north
Syria, at a mound called Ras Shamra, many material remains were uncovered in
the late 1920's and early 1930's, revealing remarkably close parallels to the
Psalms in content and in a language kindred to the Hebrew. The Ras Shamra tablets
come from the sixteenth-fourteenth pre-Christian centuries. Therefore, the view
that the Psalms must necessarily be late was proven untenable. The attempt to
date the Psalms reverted to the scrutinizing of each psalm, and the 'late dating'
was properly abandoned or at least used with discretion." (The Hebrew
Scriptures, p. 241)
Jay G. Williams writes: "Just when the psalms were written is a matter
of great dispute. Some scholars argue that nearly all of them are post-exilic
in origin, while others maintain that many came from the pre-exilic period.
Some would even argue for a pre-Davidic date for several of the psalms. Although
it is impossible to reach any absolute certainty concerning the matter, it is
becoming more and more evident that those who argue for a post-exilic date for
the origin of all the psalms are having an increasingly difficult time defending
their position. Surely, the Israelites must have had some sort of psalmic tradition
even during the time of the judges, for virtually every ancient religion employed
hymns of one sort or another to praise the gods or God. Furthermore, discoveries
at Ugarit have shown quite conclusively that Israelite and Canaanite hymnody
have many literary similarities. This means that the Israelite psalmic tradition
must have originated when Canaanite influence was still strong. The mention
of kings in various psalms (20:9; 21:1, 7; 45:1, 11, 14, 15, for instance) also
seems to imply a date when kings still ruled Israel. All of this points to a
pre-exilic date for many of the psalms." (Understanding the Old Testament,
p. 277)
James King West writes: "Study of the Psalter has undergone significant
changes during the present century, not the least of which is an altogether
different approach to the question of the date and occasion of individual psalms.
In years past interest centered on efforts to determine the specific occasion
for which each psalm was composed, and the prevailing tendency was toward late
dating. Most, if not all, psalms were assigned to the post-Exilic period, and
it was not uncommon to date some as late as the Maccabean era (second and first
centuries B.C.). The present trend is toward earlier dating, allowing for a
considerable number of pre-Exilic psalms, but with a reluctance to fix precise
dates. It now appears that there are few, if any, psalms for which the specific
historical occasion is beyond doubt. Following the path-finding studies of Hermann
Gunkel, the major aim of psalms scholarship has become the discovery of the
peculiar functions served by the psalms in their separate settings (Sitzen
im Leben). Since the Psalter found its primary use in cultic worship, this
approach (form criticism) is concerned especially with liturgical forms."
(Introduction to the Old Testament, p. 385)
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