Ps. 39.10-11(subjected to vanity)

“Turn / your stroke away / from me; - I have been destroyed / by the hostility / of your hand; - you / have disciplined man / with reproofs / because of wickedness – and / you make his desires / melt away / like moth – all mankind / is merely vapor.” It seems incumbent upon me to point out that my interpretation of this psalm is one at odds with several commentators. Many see in the psalmists a progression in the two sections of the psalm (vs. 1-8 and vs. 9-13). I, however, am approaching it more like a recapitulation than a progression. The implications are most important not for verses 1-8 but for what we are now focusing on. The reason is that if they recapitulate then they are, in many ways, saying the same thing as verses 1-8 but from a different perspective; if it is a progression, on the other hand, one would find the psalmist surmounting his perspective in verses 1-8. For example, I see in vs. 9 a return to silence as in verses 1-3 whereby the psalmist will not become silent, again, and describe his ordeal now through a direct address to Yhwh and from the perspective of his ‘hostility’. This becomes especially important to note in interpreting today’s verses. Are we to hear in this a recapitulation of verses 5-6? If so (and this is my interpretation), then the vaporous vanity of those verses are now understood to be the ‘strokes’ of Yhwh, the ‘hostility of his hand’ and the disciplining of man with reproofs. Seeing these lines as recapitulation is confirmed by his concluding observation (judgment?) that “all mankind is merely vapor” which closely mirrors vs. 5 and 6. Why is this so important? The reason is because here we see that the vanity alluded to in verses 5 and 6 is, here, understood to be the result of Yhwh’s frustration and anger. This supports our previous reflection that what we find in verses 5 and 6 was, although not explicitly alluding to Genesis, a deep meditation on the curse leveled against creation after the expulsion from the garden (as Paul would later say, “all of creation being subjected to futility.”). There are other important similarities between the two sections: in verses 4-6 there is a movement from the individual and persona to the entirety of mankind (“you have made my days mere handbreaths…the totality of mankind…is merely vapor”). Here, the same progression follows (“turn your stroke from me, I have been destroyed…you have disciplined man…all mankind is merely vapor.”). What this reveals is that as personal and individual as the pain and sense of transgression is it is universalized when the psalmist looks out over the entirety of the created order. In a way he is like an Adam—he sees in himself the entirety of every human. And just as he is subject to this torturous vanity, so too is it the lot of every man. In other words, as personal as he sees his subjection to vanity and wickedness, he does not see it merely as personal but as the instance of a total form of vanity and wickedness. There is also, as there was in potentiality, a (hidden) note of hope. In verse 6 we pointed out how the vanity of the world left man in an almost impossible situation—understanding the vanity of the world yet also knowing that Yhwh (in some unpredictable manner) was the source of hope (and healing?). Here, in verse 11, something similar emerges: all of Yhwh’s anger is really but “discipline” and “reproof”. It is the “melting of covetousness”. What are we to make of this? The answer seems, at least, two-fold. On the one hand, the vanity of the world is a form of discipline and can have the effect of ‘melting covetousness’. This is in line with Genesis—the limitation of mankind is in order to prevent him from becoming a monster (just as the destruction of Babel was an act of mercy in limiting man’s potential for massive idolatry). In other words, the death imposed upon mankind (which is the central and driving concern of this psalm), is, in light of man’s sin, a form of discipline (and mercy). Death cuts off man’s attempt to “heap up wealth” (vs. 6) and is the destructive “moth” to his immortal aspirations (vs. 11). And death is but the archetype of the word’s vanity; all of the world’s vanity is but a consequence and expression of death. Second, this leaves man, however, in a situation where the ‘remedy’ for vanity is beyond every horizon. Although the psalmist can seemingly come to understand the nature of vanity, he cannot come to peace with it. The fire ignited in verses 1-3 has not been extinguished (although, perhaps, slightly contained). And this, too, is like Genesis and the promise that there would come a time when a child of the woman would crush the serpent’s head (probably David?). For the psalmist though, as we will see, all he has is prayer to Yhwh and his request that he who has subjected him to vanity “turn from him” so that he can be happy. It is a terrible dialectic.