Ps. 49.20 (Christ entering death)

“Man / in his worthiness / does not understand – he is like / the beasts / that are cut off.” We alluded to the fact that this refrain is slightly altered that its previous manifestation in verse 12. There, it is “man in his worthiness does not survive”. Here, by contrast, man in his worthiness suffers a form of blindness to the wisdom being revealed by the psalmist. This is an important point because the entire psalm has been prefaced as the “exposing of an enigma” (vs. 4). Why the change? What does it add to the psalm? The first refrain operates more like an statement of the objective nature of things (whether or not man ‘understands’ his worthiness will not prolong his life). Here, by contrast, the effect of his worthiness is more ‘subjective’, it looks at how man’s worthiness infects man’s inner disposition and his ability to perceive the nature of the world around him. This also changes the  nature of the second line. In the first refrain, being compared to the ‘beasts that are cut off’ is a description of how, in death, man is no different than an animal; nothing can ward off death for man and beast alike. Here, by contrast, being compared to a ‘beast’ is, again, a more subjective description: man in his worthiness is as ignorant as the beasts. This emphasis picks up on that other disturbing image in verse 14 where man is like “sheep shipped to Sheol”, as insensitive to his situation as a foolish sheep. It seems, then, we might say the following: man’s ‘worthiness’ tends to blind him to the dramatic nature of death we have outlined throughout these reflections. It would tend to see in death simply a ‘transition’, rather than a massive overturning and stripping of all forms of early authority and glory, a ‘lessening’ perhaps but not a shattering. Death brings us outside the spectrum of life; it is not a part of it. Indeed, if death is, as we argued before, the manifestation of covenantal destruction, it does not fall along any quantitative analogy to life; it is, rather, of a qualitatively different order (it is darkness whereas life is light; it is curse, whereas life is blessing). And it is this ‘enigma’ that man, in his worthiness, is unable to comprehend. And, it is into this ‘enigma’ that Christ descends, becoming the ‘curse’ of the covenant. This is of paramount importance to grasp. Everything that this psalm says about death can be affirmed. It does not need to be modified by way of Christ. Indeed, it is precisely by and through his entering into this utter and total stripping that he becomes clothed in the ‘worthiness’ of the name of God. When man dies, he does not die into any reality other than this one, save that he dies in Christ. And, if he dies in Christ, he is and will be raised with and in him. Christ does not place us in the category of the fool in this psalm. Rather, in his stripping we now participate within this death, his death. In reality, this psalm becomes more pressing, not less, save that we are dying in Christ. And, furthermore, what we see is that the ‘new covenant’ is forged precisely in this death to and in the old. It is by dying, in Christ, to and in the old that it is ‘broken’ and (re)forged. This opens up a reality I had never understood: that the old covenant is not ‘superseded’, it is brought into the grave and, there, is it remade. By passing through the vision outlined in this psalm, it does not simply become ‘replaced’, but broken and remade. But, it has to move through the reality that strips man of all worthiness, as God’s covenantal partner must be utterly consumed so as to be utterly reborn. The covenant has to be ‘stripped’ so as to be ‘clothed’.