Ps. 42.3 (the plea and the taunt)

“My tears / were my food / by day and night – when they said to me / all day long ‘Where is your God?’” We have seen this taunt before, the claim that their god is missing and therefore incapable of acting. Perhaps it is a war-taunt, something an enemy army would shout prior to battle; perhaps it is something the psalmist derives from “their” actions. Regardless, it has become for the psalmist a mock-meal as it causes the psalmist to weep. It is not coincidental that verse 1 focuses on the deer searching for water, whereas here ‘water’/tears is provided as ‘food’. There is something instructive in this regard. Verse 1 focused on the psalmist praying to God and his desire to return to God’s Temple. Here, the psalmist’s enemies level a taunt at the psalmist focusing, however, on the ability of God to protect His own. The psalmist does not doubt God’s ability; however, without a Temple to worship him in, such a distinction proves very difficult maintain. The plea of verse 1 and the taunt of verse 3 point to a division that will come to be embodied within the psalmist himself (throughout the psalm, the psalmist will speak to his soul asking why it is cast down and urge it to hope in the future restoration). In other words, the plea and the taunt cannot be easily divided off and separated. There is, within the psalmist, a conviction that “they” are not correct; however, he cannot formulate an adequate response. Or, rather, the only adequate response would be deliverance. In other words, the tension created by the plea and the taunt cannot be resolved theoretically. As Ezekiel will later affirm, it will require a ‘resurrection’/restoration and a rebuilding of the Temple. “Destroy this temple, and in three days…”