Ps. 37.28-29 (for the righteous, a home, for the wicked, a curse)

“The unjust / are destroyed / forever – and the posterity / of the wicked / is cut off. – The righteous / shall inherit / the land – and shall dwell / in it / forever.” These lines seem acrostic: A. The unjust are destroyed forever B. and the posterity of the wicked is cut off. B1. The righteous shall inherit the land A1. and shall dwell in it forever. Notice how A and A1 both employ the word ‘forever’, the first to signify the unredeemable destruction that will come upon the unjust while the second signifies the perpetual and secure dwelling of the righteous in their inheritance (“the land”). The emphasis on ‘forever’ points to the totality and absolute nature of the land’s relationship with those who dwell in it. For the righteous, it becomes a home; for the wicked, it becomes a source of constant anxiety and, in the end, complete alienation (and even death). In effect, the land becomes the stage upon which either blessing or curse is enacted. (One is reminded of Jesus in the gospel of John: “I did not come to bring judgment, but for those who do not believe, they are already judged.” In like manner, the land itself is to be a blessing, but it is a potent force that enacts this absolute judgment on those who profane it. Similarly, the land is there to ‘be a blessing’, as in our psalm where it says Yhwh “loves justice”.) Likewise, whereas the wicked are “cut off” from the land, the righteous shall “inherit the land”. This section is, importantly, neither in the time of the wicked nor is it in the time of the righteous. The wicked “are destroyed”; the righteous “shall inherit”. Both of these are certain to occur but neither of them are happening now. Rather, we see, again, the fact that the psalm speaks to the ‘time of the hiatus’—that ‘in between time’ just short of Yhwh’s full deliverance. All one must do, therefore, as the psalm repeatedly insists, is “wait” and “trust in Yhwh”.