Ps. 102.2-3 (the Face)

Do not hide / your face / from me
now that I am / in trouble
Turn your ear / toward me
answer me quickly / now that I call. 

There are depths to the ‘face of Yhwh’ in this psalm that are, perhaps, too difficult to fully explore. On a primary level we should not that the Face is not merely a metaphor for Yhwh’s presence; it is not something that can be anticipated. Rather, it refers to a free ‘turning’ on Yhwh’s part, a choice, to ‘face’ his people. In other words, the ‘face of Yhwh’ is the radiance of Yhwh’s personal turning toward his people. One would/could/can, I wager, sense this (not just ‘spiritually or interiorly’; but through one’s total being), in a similar fashion that one would experience the ‘face of king’ who now turns to look at his subject. One is in the presence of an “I”. We can see this by the simple fact that the psalmist is imploring Yhwh to not ‘hide your face’ and ‘turn your ear’ and ‘answer me quickly’. One might suppose that, for the psalmist, this simply means ‘health’ and that when he is made healthy again that ‘health’ is the ‘living in the face of Yhwh’. This is certainly true but not enough. This is because, as we will see, Yhwh is ‘more than life’. Heaven and earth are like a garment to him that wears out, while he remains perpetually. He dwells in the ‘forever’ of himself. In other words, equating the ‘face’ with ‘life’ and/or ‘health’ is wholly inadequate. To be ‘looked upon by Yhwh’s face’ is to be standing in the radiance of a light that is at once the source of all life and that which infinitely exceeds it. ‘All of life’, even in its most joyous and profound sense, does not equal ‘the face of Yhwh’; all of that is ‘mere garments’ compared to him. 

This, then, places in a different context what it means to experience Yhwh’s face when it is ‘turned away’. One is not, at that point, merely ‘sick’, or even dying. Rather, one experiences Yhwh’s ‘turning away’, of being ‘picked up and thrown away’ (vs. 10), and of one’s life entering into a night more profound than that experienced at the end of day (vs. 11). The ‘darkness of Yhwh’s turned face’ is not simply death, although death results from it. It is, rather, more like ‘hell’—the perpetual experience of living in the face of Yhwh’s rejection. Similar to the turned-toward-face, the darkness of every worldly darkness does not equal the turned-away-face. All of creation (heaven and earth) could not ‘make up for’ this. 

All of this is key to understand when we move to a second level of meaning—that the ‘face of Yhwh’ often refers to the Presence of Yhwh in the Temple. It refers to something specific rather than general. As we have seen in many other psalms, the presence of Yhwh in the Temple is the ‘sacrament of the Old Testament’. It is both the source and sustaining power of Creation. It is, therefore, crucially important that the psalmist, in part 2 of the psalms, contemplates the rebuilding of Zion—the place of Yhwh’s face. Of course, the Temple is not equated with Yhwh; if the Temple is destroyed, Yhwh is not destroyed. However, as a ‘sacrament’ it is the place whereby Yhwh and the world meet. Without it, Israel (and the world) threaten to fall into chaos. Here is the point—what the psalmist contemplates in a personal fashion in part 1, is contemplated for all of Zion (and, hence, all the nations) in part 2. His life, in a sense, mimics, anticipates, and mirrors the ‘life of Zion’ and the world. However Yhwh redeems him (resurrects him) will be in a way analogous to the way he redeems (resurrects) Zion. Furthermore, what we see, then, is that the ‘face’ will then be personal, to the psalmist, but also something that will shine on all of Israel and, then, the world through Zion’s rebuilding. Everything will enter into this ‘transcending’ Face-of-Yhwh, and it all will then be leavened by that which enable the ‘garments of heaven and earth’ to enter into the perpetuity of Yhwh; this is life entering into Life (the New Testament and Christian tradition will call this the process of ‘theosis’, of coming to dwell in the uncreated light of Genesis and, then, of Christ’s Transfiguration). 

Finally, what we see in this is that Yhwh’s ‘Face’ is not something purely personal—the psalmist, in the way he has constructed the psalm, envisions his redemption as intimately associated with the redemption of all of Israel and the nations. One is tempted, at this point, to see the psalmist as the king given the intimately association of the ‘health of the psalmist’ with the ‘health of Zion’ and the nations. That may be the case. Regardless, it has been recited by kings, messiahs and the King and Messiah. As we will explore in further reflections, the depth of the psalm in this context is truly too far reaching: the ‘Face’, the King, the Temple, the Body, the Cross, the Tearing-of-the-Veil, the Resurrection, Pentecost, the theosis of all creation in Revelation (at the minimum).