Ps. 78.1 (hearing, perceiving and the family)

Give ear / O my people / to my teaching
bend your ear / to the words / of my mouth. 

It may be the case that this opening verse is the real heart of the psalm. We will see in the following verse that the ‘words’ to be delivered are described as a ‘riddle’. The remainder of the psalm will go on to detail, among other things, the strangely persistent rebellion of God’s people, not just per se, but directly in the midst of overpowering and overwhelming blessing. The ‘thread of faithfulness’ becomes severed, and God’s people begin to move according to their own steam and desires. That ‘severing’ consists, almost entirely in this psalm by way of ‘forgetting’. Faithfulness withers when memory lapses. This is the ‘riddle’ that will haunt the psalm. And it is why this opening verse calls the listeners not to simply ‘hear’ what he is saying but to actively comprehend what he is about to discourse about. To simply hear is to forget. He wants them to perceive, to enter into the mystery of God’s blessing and man’s rebellion against it. This is why he is emphasizing this need to perceive, over and above simply ‘hearing’. “Give ear”, “bend your ear”. The words he is about to deliver are like memory-food. They are being given so as to restore and/or maintain that thread of faithfulness. This latter point also directs us to a theme that will be crucial in the upcoming verses: memory and generations. The ‘thread of faithfulness’ is not individualistic; its severing is a generational problem, not as much an individual one. When memory lapses, in this psalm, it is a communal, familial problem. This is why the passing on of the ‘riddle’ is so crucial—it must be communally, and publically proclaimed, delivered and perceived. “Memory” is more familial (or, covenantal) here than personal or individual. Its reality and life-giving force is maintained (or lost) in the family.