Ps 37.35-36 (grace abounding)

“I have seen / the ruthlessly wicked – flourishing / like a luxuriant / native tree. – But / I passed over / and – lo! - / he is no more, - and I sought him / but he could not / be found.” If we compare the final line of the last section and the first line here we see this: “and you will see the wicked cut off” – “I have seen the ruthlessly wicked flourishing…” The point is obvious and is found in the verb tense and the condition of the wicked: you will see the wicked cut off; I have seen the wicked flourish. We might be tempted to say that appearances are deceiving, and there is an element to that. However, it is precisely in the act of ‘seeing’ that Yhwh’s faithfulness is demonstrated (when wicked are cut off). It is this aspect of ‘seeing’ that I want to focus on here. What the teacher saw: the wicked flourishing like a luxuriant native tree. There are several important elements to this metaphor. First, ‘flourishing’ and ‘luxuriant’ are obvious terms of wealth, opulence and virility. These wicked are not just healthy, they are prospering, reaching their hidden and fruitful potential. And, they are manifestly beautiful. Second, they are compared to ‘native’ trees. Their prosperity is one that seems utterly natural and stable. They are not ‘transplanted’, but completely at home ‘in the land’ and ‘the soil’. We should pause over this for a moment: for the wicked to be compared to what is native to ‘the land’ would be incredibly troubling for anyone who sees them as corrupt. They seem to have all the ‘blessings’ that were to be provided by Yhwh in his covenant, and they seem to ‘represent’ the land itself through their being nourished by it.  This leads into another important insight: that those looking upon this ‘native tree’ would feel, themselves, to be alien to the land. If everything was working in favor of this tree than those who stood in opposition to it would, in a sense, stand in opposition to the land itself (and, even, to Yhwh who seems to bless the wicked). This pinnacle of prosperity (and (apparent) blessing) would then become a great source of anxiety and discomfort to those at odds with it. A last point as to the tree imagery: the psalm began by comparing the wicked to vegetation. The first section described them as “grass” and “green sprouts”. There, however, as we saw, those images were associated with the ephemeral nature of the wicked, that they could easily be destroyed. By contrast, here the wicked are compared to an incredibly solid tree, which is the strongest form of vegetation. Again, this would induce anxiety (very much unlike the comparison of them to grass). They appear utterly secure and dominant as the highest and strongest from of vegetation “in the land”. It seems, though, that once all of this is established, at the very point at which the wicked have cast their spell over the land, they are, in secret, destroyed. It is important to note that the teacher does not witness the destruction. Rather, it almost seems to happen in the middle of the night (we might say “like a thief in the night…”). And not only is it accomplished in secret but it is total and absolute. As secure as they appeared in the first section is as utter their destruction in the second. The fact that their destruction occurs ‘off stage’ is indicative of a central theme of the psalm: although not stated, the destruction of the wicked occurs as a pure act of grace. Furthermore, as with many of the psalms, when this grace occurs (whether through healing or victory) it always ‘abounds’ and leaps a gap that man could never predict. In this way, it always carries with it its own witness as to who accomplished it: only Yhwh could so irrevocably and utterly destroy what was so patently strong and secure. One cannot help but be reminded of the original reconnaissance of the land: those sent came back reporting that those who ‘inhabited the land’ (we might say, the “native trees”) were like giants (we might say, “luxuriant”); for those who trusted in Yhwh, however, the success during the actual invasion was in many ways as remarkable as what we see here.  At no point could the Israelites have attributed to their own ‘grasping’ the success they had while entering the land. Furthermore, the idea of Yhwh ‘clearing the land’ is present everywhere in the histories (and the prophets). It is Yhwh who actually removes the native trees and (trans)plants his own vegetation into the land. It is Yhwh who makes the “land secure” and who gives to the Israelites “cities you did not build”. This ‘sudden reversal’ of the wicked also signals the reversal of anxiety for the righteous—the teacher, in order to assure himself of the wicked’s demise actually seeks them out. He is not willing to take at face value their absence but must be assured that they are not in hiding and able to return. And what he hoped for was true: they “could not be found”. The righteous can now leave behind their tentative steps into the homes of the rich and become the true ‘residents of the land’, in security and perpetuity.