Ps. 80.18 (the drama, the turn and the liturgy)

Then / we will never turn / from you
Give us life, / and we will invoke / your name.

The drama. When the psalmist moves into petition toward God he makes three requests: 1) “turn again”; 2) “inspect this vine”; 3) “let your hand be upon” the king. If the agricultural image is maintained then we witness God ‘turning’ toward the Vine, inspecting it and then—and this is the key—placing his ‘hand’ upon the king. The king, in other words, becomes the Vine-embodied. To strengthen him, his “son”, is the first act of the Gardener. Once his hand is ‘upon him’, “then we will never turn from you…”. This progression through the king is something we have seen before, specifically in Psalm 78 where the litany of Israel’s rebellion is only rectified by and through the establishment of the king. It is a progression, furthermore, that adheres to the historical books ending with the Samuel(s). A point to this is that restoration does not ‘fall generally’ but rather begins in and through the king (as the embodiment of the Vine). It seems rather pertinent to note in this regard that Jesus, during the final discourse in John, says “I am the Vine, you are the branches…”. Here, all the images of Vine, Son and Kingship are united such that Christ’s giving over (and restoration) initiates the ‘life’ given to the (re)constituted Vine. It becomes the premise to their faithfulness (their ‘not turning’) and their liturgy (invoking your Name). 

The turn. The psalmist implored God to “turn” toward the Vine. It was, in fact, the initial petition. Here, once life is given to the king, the people will “never turn from you”. They will, within the imagery of the psalm, be standing ‘face-to-face’. One thing to note about this is that faithfulness is contained within this covenantal ‘face-to-face’. In other words, it is a relational reality beginning with the primal ‘turn’ of the stronger party (here, God to king). The king, in this dynamic, is the ‘hinge’, that which ‘turns’ the people toward God by and through his restoration. 

The liturgy. Set in almost a type of parallelism, the ‘faithfulness’ of 18a is matched by the liturgical ‘invocation of the Name’ of 18b. It is, of course, important to note that the liturgical celebration of Yhwh is either of the same ‘value’ as faithfulness, participates in it, or, in fact, is the culmination of it. Just as the king’s restoration by God provides the basis for the Vine’s faithfulness so too it is now seen as providing the liturgical basis for the Vine as well. It is not a minor point: it would appear that prior to their restoration and ‘turning’ they could not ‘invoke the Name’. However this is understood, it does appear that this means that in their current state they had no liturgical center that would enable them to do so. It is not, of course, that they ‘couldn’t pray’. Rather, it was that they couldn’t ‘invoke the Name’. There is in this, I think, something of the celebratory liturgy of the Name—the real goal toward which all exodus-liberation events are aimed. Liturgy is both the ‘source and summit’ of deliverance. Here, it is the health-of-the-king that provides the necessary foundation for that invocation. We have explored in other psalms the fact that the Davidic kingship and the Temple are given their genesis at the same time and why: the king, in many ways, provides the necessary ‘shalom’ to the Land that enables the Temple to be built. They operate like twin stars, orbiting around each other; each made (covenanted) for the health of the other