Ps. 78.8 (faithfulness and family)

not becoming / like their fathers
a rebellious / and defiant / generation
a generation / that did not / keep its heart steady
and whose spirit / was not faithful / to God. 

This verse becomes the first of the many jarring notes in the psalm. Up to this point the transfer of the story of God’s wonders and commandments has not been only seamless but it has been contemplated within the span of several generations. As we have seen, the story itself is the life of the generations. It is what binds the generations into a single family, uniting them to the primal events related. The focus has steadfastly communal/familial. Here, however, the first intra-family disruption occurs. It is clearly a profoundly disturbing event. While the generations are supposed to conform themselves ever-more deeply to the wonders and Torah of God, these ‘fathers’ they are to ‘not become like’. They represent therefore the antithesis of wonders and Torah. Indeed their incorporation into the story signals them as, contra God’s wonders, an anti-sign. They are, in the words used here, its rebellion. Importantly, this rebellion against God also transforms them into a familial disruption. We do well to pause on this for a moment: for here we find that the family is not itself the mode of authority and example. It is, rather, the story that now supplants the role one would expect the family to inhabit. By castigating the ‘fathers’ the story ‘laicizes’ them, removing them from their (ultimate) seat of authority and revealing that faithfulness and family do not coincide. (“Who are my brothers and sisters…?”) As to the content of their actions, they are marked by two actions and two non-actions. Their two actions are rebellion and defiance. Their non-actions are “not keeping a steady heart” and non-faithfulness to God. What is important to note is that they are not simply passive. They are full of activity contrary to God. (This will become more important as we proceed.) For their failure is not merely a type of passive weakness. Rather, their failure is also an intentional, willing activity.