“The wicked / plot against / the righteous – and gnash / their teeth / upon them. – Yhwh / laughs /
at them – for he has seen / that their time / has come.” The first verse is
something very typical of the psalms we have seen thus far. The ‘plotting of
the wicked’ is a continuous refrain; the ‘gnashing of the teeth’ has not been
as common but has, nonetheless, been a frequently deployed image. What is
interesting for us, though, is the introduction of Yhwh’s laughter. This we
have seen once before. In Psalm 2 the nations congregate to make war against Yhwh
and his anointed. They travel to the great mountain and begin to clamor. There
is a brief pause and then a torrential laughter falls upon their head with a
horrible declaration made soon thereafter. We find, in our verse here, the
exact same laughter. It is saturated with mockery and derision. And,
importantly, as with Psalm 2, it is the first moment in the psalm when it moves
to the perspective of Yhwh himself. This movement is crucial to understanding
this verse and the laughter. Until now the teacher has implored the student not
to pay attention to the wicked for very practical reasons—their (the wicked’s) time
is short. It has been a reasoned exhortation. Here, something else entirely
emerges. No longer are we in the realm of exhortation but the expression of sovereign
power and authority. At this juncture, and from this height, Yhwh does not need
to nor will he engage in a defense of his plans. Most importantly, however, is
the fact that Yhwh himself occupies, utterly, the position that the teacher
believes the student should inhabit: that place where absolutely no credence is
given to the wicked and, in fact, their position is seen to be, literally,
laughable. The purpose, then, is clear:
to move the student into the realm of Yhwh and his laughter.
The source of the laughter is important to recognize as
well. From Yhwh’s vantage point he sees that “their time has come”. In Psalm 2
the laughter rained down because from Yhwh’s perspective the schemes of the
earthly kings were so ridiculous in the light of his overwhelming power over
them. Here, something similar is at work, although it speaks from the vantage
of time (the central theme of the psalm). The wicked obviously do not, and
cannot, see that they have reached the end-point of their success. Their vision
is much too limited. The teacher, on the other hand, has seen the final outcome
o their schemes all along. Here, that perception is something that Yhwh himself
is understood as having. There is an important difference between the teacher
and Yhwh in this regard. The teacher has used his experience and has spoken
from that vantage. He is certain it will happen, even soon, but he is not
certain about when. For Yhwh, things seem different. It is as if he sees the
wicked’s success like a string; and he knows when the string ends. It ‘has come’.
Again, this subtle shift in emphasis lends itself to this overwhelmingly
powerful vision of Yhwh, one that can even erupt into laughter at the schemes
of the wicked.
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