Ps. 34. 14-15 (tongue of evil; seekers of peace)

“Keep your tongue / from evil – and your lips / from speaking deceit. – Turn from evil / and do good – seek peace / and pursue it.” The mouth has again taken center stage. The psalm opened with “praise constantly in my mouth”. Presumably the remaining portion of the opening is that of vocal ‘praise and exultation’. Importantly, this idea is picked up again in that rather astonishing phrase: “taste and see how good Yhwh is.” Without these verses, this admonition is very ‘generic’ and can be found peppered throughout the wisdom literature; arguably, the wisdom literature’s primary concern is how to ‘train the tongue’ in both silence and praise. Here, though, with our background, these few verses take on an added depth. First, we must remember that this admonition is being offered so as to be able to “see goodness” and the ‘love of days”. This desire is what initiates the instruction—this is the reason for the ‘discipline’ now being offered. The same pattern is seen when Yhwh instructs Israel prior to entering the land: “today I place before you life and death; choose life so that you may live long in the land.” The instructions are not simply directives issued without a purpose; they have an origin and a goal. As to this specific instruction: we have seen throughout the psalms that in order to dwell in Yhwh’s protective gaze one must engage in to simultaneous dynamics: avoiding evil and pursuing the good. That type of generalization is found in the second part of the verse (“turn from evil and do good”). As to the first, though, the psalmist is more specific: “keep your tongue from evil, and your lips from speaking deceit.” I believe we are to hear here the fact that the ‘constant praise’ alluded to in the first verse cannot coexist with a mouth of ‘evil’ and ‘lips of deceit’. And, this is very important in the context of this psalm because, following the logic, to be able to experience the ‘patient assurance’ one must be able to attune oneself to this ‘constant praise’. In essence, to have a mouth of evil and tongue of deceit will not enable one to: “seek Yhwh”, “look at him and be radiant”, “call upon Yhwh”, see his “encamped” angel, “taste and see how good Yhwh is” or be fed by this “father of wisdom”. All of this has been summarized as “seeing goodness”. The ‘mouth’ then affects the sight (“taste and see”). To have a ‘mouth of evil’ is to be ‘blind to Yhwh’s face’ and ‘goodness’. The senses work in a unified fashion—one cannot ‘see’ how good Yhwh is while one has a ‘mouth’ of evil and deceit. How can one have praise “in the mouth” while evil is there? Or, how can one “call out” to Yhwh when one is speaking wickedness? The mouth is the organ of man’s deliverance. It must, therefore, be unified. Here, we see why the ‘fear of Yhwh’ must be something almost chewed upon. It must create, within the mouth, this empty and clean space whereby man can speak to and praise Yhwh. In the same way that the angel is ‘encamped’ around the righteous, so too must they “keep” their tongue from evil by a similar vigilance. The second directive is in regards to the “peacemakers”. Whereas the first action is more defensive (“keep your tongue from evil..”), this one is much more active (“seek peace…”). These actions are, however, related. The ‘tongue of evil’ and ‘lips of deceit’ create division. Deceit, by definition, creates a state of antagonism (hidden, but always potentially unleashed) by its self-serving nature. The injunction to ‘peace’ is then not random but an active movement towards the root of the problem of pure self-interest. Whereas deceit is often a purely private exercise, seeking peace is, by definition, an exercise oriented to the community. The command, then, to “turn from evil and do good” closely matched to “seek peace and pursuit it” must be referring tot his dynamic of individual deceit and self-interest, as pushed back by this communal searching for peace.