Ps 119 (2; Dynamic of Obedience)

How can a young man

keep his path pure?

Indeed / by complying / with your word.

I have sought you / with my whole heart:

let me not stray / from your commands.

I have hidden your sayings / in my heart

so as not to sin / against you.

You are blessed, / Yhwh:

teach me / your laws.

With my lips / I repeat

all the rulings / from your mouth.

I find as much joy / in the way shown / in your terms

as in all possible wealth.

I want to meditate / on your charges

and keep my eyes / on your paths

I take delight / in your laws

I do not forget / your word.

There is a drama to obedience—to keep one’s path ‘pure’ one must keep his eyes on Yhwh’s path. In order to keep Yhwh’s commands, one must constantly implore Yhwh to teach him His laws. In order to enter into the joy of Yhwh’s ways, one must implant those ways in the secret of one’s heart. In order to keep the ways in your heart, you must repeat them with your lips. And, in order to repeat them with your lips, you must understand them as coming from Yhwh’s mouth. The psalmist and Yhwh stand ‘face to face’, ‘mouth to mouth’, constantly moving back and forth between giving and receiving. And it is this constant dynamic that produces obedience, that enacts Yhwh’s charges, that extends Yhwh’s creative governance over the Cosmos. This the truth the psalmist seeks to implant within the ‘young man’, his son. He tells him—delight in your father’s ways. Let them well up within you so that can be a constant source of living water. Plant them deep within so that they can remain a constant source of abiding life. Let them be the awe outside of you, that compels your heart down the path to the Presence. 

Ps 119 (1: Creation and Torah)

How fortunate / are those / whose way is blameless

whose conduct / is based on Yhwh’s Torah

How fortunate / are those / who observe his terms

and seek him wholeheartedly

Who / moreover / do not practice wrong

but base their conduct / on his ways

You yourself / have commanded / that your charges

be carefully complied with 

Would that my ways / were firmly set

on complying / with your laws

Then I would not suffer humiliation

if i kept my eyes / on your commands

I give you thanks / out of an honest heart

as I learn your just rulings.

I will comply / with your laws

do not completely abandon me

The first part focuses on the fortune of those who “way is blameless”, and whose lives are based on Yhwh’s Torah and instruction. They do not, however, only follow Torah but seek Yhwh with all their heart. They do not practice wrong. For them, their lives are marked by fortune, by success. 

Yhwh takes a keen interest in his charges, his Torah. He commands that they not only be followed but carefully complied with. His people are to give careful attention to them. To regard them as precious. 

The psalmist wants to be like the fortunate ones. While their lives are blameless, his are not as ‘firmly set’. He ‘suffers humiliation’, which is the opposite of the “fortune” experienced by the blameless ones. While their eyes remain fixed, his tend to wander. Nevertheless, just as they seek him “wholeheartedly”, so too his his heart “honest” when it thanks Yhwh. The psalmist ends with a resolve to comply with Torah—as Yhwh has commanded—and with a petition that Yhwh not completely abandon him.

Here, Torah and fortune are wed. For those who live according to Yhwh’s instruction, creation itself responds. In Genesis, some of the first words spoken to Adam by his father are words of command and instruction. They continue the momentum of creation into the realm of his Adam, his son. They are, in other words, part of creation itself, now being completed in Adam’s obedience. It is crucial to see this as part of a continuum, to not see “creation” and then “morality”. Torah, Yhwh’s instruction, is Yhwh’s creative will. We should see it this way—when Yhwh reveals his commands to Adam he invites him into his own sphere of creation. Adam, when he obeys, becomes a co-creator with his Father. He looks at his father, sees what his father is doing, and does the same. 

This is why obedience to Torah and ‘fortune’ are, and must be, wed together. Fortune is the completion of creation because it is Adam’s participation within his Father’s creative act. Creation carries within it a potential, a pregnant ability to become “fortune”, to become prodigal, to become fruitful beyond all measure. It is ‘impregnated’ and actualized by Adam’s obedience. When Adam seeds creation with his obedience, his participation within his Father’s creative act, he unleashes creation’s potential. He makes the Cosmos both more than itself, and he makes it fully itself, because it was made to be more than itself. It was made to be ‘ecstatic’ at man’s obedience. 

This is why Yhwh’s Torah is such a prize, such an object of devotion, a thing to be “wholeheartedly” followed. And it is why, too, when it is not obeyed, it results in “humiliation” and “shame”. Recall how Adam was immediately humiliated and shamed when he did not obey Yhwh, hiding within creation and from his father. This psalmist knows that his life is marked by a constant act of free obedience, of willing into his father’s Torah and instruction or choosing a way that is against the grain of the cosmos and therefore results in Adam-like humiliation. He has two fathers—Yhwh and Adam. He can choose Yhwh and experience “fortune” as his instruction or he can follow Adam’s path of rebellion and experience shame and humiliation. 

This entire dynamic is carried forward in and through Christ, the second Adam, who is the only one to truly “see what the Father is doing”. Throughout his life (death and resurrection), he brings forth this ‘new creation’, because he participates within his Father’s will for creation. Each miracle he performs is the Cosmos response to its Adam, its finding the one in and through whom it can be brought to itself by being brought beyond itself into the divine sphere and activity. And the final vision of Revelation shows this completion. Throughout the book, there is an ambivalence and hostility toward man’s wealth and “fortune”. However, when death and the agents that seek the destruction of the Cosmos are themselves destroyed, then there is unveiled the Cosmos made perfect in the Presence of Christ and his martyrs and witnesses. This is the Cosmos as Fortune, as wealth without shadow, as fortune and wealth as truly representative of the participatory obedience of God’s children within his ongoing act of “creation”, which is now seen as festive, as a wedding, as the  wedding of the lamb to his bride. 

Ps 118 (Building the Cosmos)

Adam was the first messiah-of-God, the king in the Garden-Temple. He was assigned to, like any king, protect the realm and its boundaries from impurity and, likewise, to spread the Garden-Temple outward, participating with Yhwh in this conquering of the chaotic environment—a perpetuating of Yhwh’s act of shaping-into-creation. Adam failed. He allowed the invasion and then he, instead of participating in Yhwh’s acts, joined with the serpent. In effect, he assigned creation over to the serpent, and his mission became fractured.

Yhwh began to mold the pieces back together—creating, and re-creating the Adamic image through the covenants. And the covenant partner perpetuated Adam’s primal and immediate failure—whether Noah or the people at the base of Sinai. Once they received their new creation or their new command, they immediately tainted it and disobeyed it. And the pattern continued.

But in David something new emerges (and something old). Yhwh’s covenant with David was wed to the building of the Temple. They were both caught up in the same moment and momentum. Yhwh would covenant and promise to “build David’s house” and David would, in turn, build Yhwh’s house. Kingship and Temple—Adam and the Garden. And, importantly, this covenant was made after David had, for the most part, brought peace to the land by driving out the enemies. He was doing what Adam was commanded to do—establishing a protected realm and borders and, thereby, creating the possibility of a sacred place for the Temple. It cannot be emphasized enough that the Temple and the Kingship rise and fall together, the Temple-Builder and the Temple.

An important insight here is that the Temple, for the King in particular, is a type of ‘home’. It is, as Psalm 2 emphasize, his “father’s house”. He draws the source of his authority and his blessing from the Temple—quite literally because the covenant power that maintains him and in line in the Forever of Yhwh is the same covenant power that undergirds the Temple. These are the “human” and the “divine” realms, a type of earth and heaven, coming together. When the King is in the Temple, we see the Adam in the Garden. The Cosmos is (re)obtaining its goal.

But more deeply still is the fact that when the King is in the Temple he is there in liturgy. He is there to offer to Yhwh—to either petition or to praise. It is an iconic image—and explosive one—of this Adam standing in the Presence. This Adam-becoming-Adam because he is Adam-with-his-Father giving his Father glory.

In this psalm we enter into one of the more important aspects of the King relationship with his Father—that of his Father giving him the Adam victory of maintaining the integrity of the Land and the safety of His house, the Temple. The king is surrounded. He is pressed in, hemmed in, and confined by his enemies. There is no way to break through and no escape. The nations, as agents of chaos, are swarming him, like bees, bent not simply on his destruction but on his and his nation’s defilement. 

From within this sphere of confinement, though, the king calls upon the Name. In this situation—when the son-King, the Adam-of-God—is near defeat and the nation in him and represented by him is about to be overtaken, in that situation the Name is a weapon. It comes into the sphere of confinement, the Father stands next to his son, and within his Father’s presence he is given “spacious freedom”. The Name “wards off” the agents of chaos. He begins to create a boundary, an ever expanding boundary, around the King. For the forces of chaos and entropy, that were beginning to overcome his Image-son, are pushed back and creation begins to reassert itself. But it is not simply the creation of space and warding. It is also a flame—from the king, the Name-Presence consumes the nations around him. The swarm of bees are like thorns-bushes, instantly consumed. The sense here is not so much of battle as a type of atomic explosion beginning with the King, but an explosion of creation against the forces of death. 

And as this explosion spreads, the king’s camps are made righteous. They are brought within this ever-expanding sphere of the Father. The victory makes them the righteous ones. From the king to the camps, righteousness spreads.

After the Victory, the king turns his face toward the Father’s home and heads to Jerusalem. He knows that his help ultimately came from the Temple. That is where help always comes from. The Temple is, in a very real sense, the Help and the Victory of Yhwh. It is the Place that makes every other place creation and cosmos. If Eden was to expand outward, edenizing the cosmos, the Temple is the same. And so the king makes his way there, to offer thanksgiving, to offer the todah sacrifice of thanks. 

And as he approaches the Temple gates, as is always the case, only the righteous can enter. Here, the Victory has made the king, and his entourage, righteous. They are allowed in, allowed into the Presence that was present to them on the battlefield. 

What happens within the Temple, though, is startling. The Adam-king recounts to Yhwh that he was a stone, rejected by the builders, but that Yhwh selected him and made him the cornerstone. From there, he moves into imagery of a “day” made by Yhwh and then speaks of Yhwh giving them “light.” Recall, the King is the Temple builder, but here Yhwh takes the ‘rejected’ king and builds him into a building. This ‘new building’ is then wed to the image of a new “day” and “light”. It is deeply significant: the Cosmos is beginning again, from the King’s rejection and “rebuilding”. Eden is being ‘rebuilt’, the primal “light” of the new and first day is again dawning—and it begins in and from the Victory. And it is being built in and through the Adam-son of Yhwh. (It is perhaps significant here that Yhwh “built” Eve from Adam’s side, in a way analogous to this new building being built from the King.) But we have to see the profound point here—unlike the first creation which originated from Yhwh’s will alone, without any sign of struggle, this new creation, temple and day comes from the King’s rejection. In other words, the King’s near defeat becomes the vehicle for the new creation, it’s engine.

The explosion of the Victory that emanates out from the King is therefore also understood as the explosion of a new Creation—it is a new building, a new day and a new light. And it is this newness that spreads the righteousness necessary to enter the Temple itself. The entire dynamic is profound—the same explosion that gives victory is the same one that makes righteous—the Presence makes righteous those who can then come to the Temple-Presence.

At this it is almost impossible to fully see Christ’s face shining through the psalm. Christ is the Second Adam, the one who gathers into himself all of the previous messiah’s Yhwh victories and unleashes them throughout his lifetime, culminating in his death, resurrection and ascension to the heavenly temple. He is the one rejected by the builders and yet given victory through his death—is given spacious freedom—and then made into the cornerstone of the rebuilt Temple. He is the one from whom the Father’s victory explodes outward, covering the Cosmos and making all righteous such that they can, after him, enter the heavenly Temple where he resides offering todah, thanksgiving sacrifices. He is the one from whom the new creation explodes outward—his rejection being used as the engine for its recreation. He is the one who begins the new, eighth day, the one that both completes the old creation in a Sabbath fulfillment and becomes the first day of the new creation. He is the one that the primal creation light now shines out from such that in the new creation there will be no need for lamps because he will be the radiant glory-face of God.

Ps. 117 (Beyond the Boundary)

Praise Yhwh / all nations

laud him / all you peoples,

because his loyal love / has towered / over us

and Yhwh’s faithfulness / is everlasting

The psalmist’s scope is international. He implores the nations and “all peoples” to praise Yhwh. The fact that he uses the Name, rather than the name generally ascribed to him by the nations is important. The psalmist sees the nations as, in a sense, being incorporated into Israel’s covenant with Yhwh such that they could call him by his proper name. This is confirmed by the psalmist’s reasoning for their praise—Yhwh’s “loyal love” the everlasting nature of his “faithfulness”. These are all covenantal descriptions of Yhwh. In other words, the nations and the peoples are to praise Yhwh not so much because of what Yhwh has done for them but because they recognize what Yhwh has done for Israel, his covenant partner. Israel has thus become a “light to the nations” a “city set on a hill”, a signal flare sent up, and calling all nations to Zion in order to bend their knee before Yhwh.

More deeply still is the fact that the psalmist sees Israel’s role as an ingathering. Yhwh’s covenantal fidelity to Israel will unify all people. Yhwh desires this and here we see this as the desire of the psalmist as well. Rather than seeing Israel as a type of prized possession or the covenant as way to horde Yhwh’s favor and righteousness, the psalmist sees Israel as becoming a magnet, a drawing together of all nations. Paired with certain other sections of Scripture, this dynamic power of unification is deeply significant. The nations are often portrayed not simply as hostile to Israel but as agents of chaos, as under the thrall of demonic forces. They are understood as filthy and defiled. They are immoral and stupid. They want Israel’s destruction and her king. And their liturgy is foul, a detestable thing, that worships dead idols and therefore worships Death itself. And yet here, all of that is reversed. The psalmist here wants the nations to be part of the Nation. It wants the nations to enter into the Liturgy to Yhwh. It sees the nations as being pure, holy and cleansed—able to ritually enter into praise to Yhwh. How that comes about—through some universal Day of Atonement or through some other means—is not stated. The only thing stated is the desire. Something of the Adamic desire for all of creation to be a Temple to Yhwh is here preserved, to see before or after the fratricide and the familial murders and betrayals—and to see the nations returning to Israel and saying “in you I see the face of God”. To see all of Adam’s children reunited under the Adam-of-God—Israel.

One final comment. The psalmist international scope—the fact that he sees all people coming to Yhwh—is matched by a similar scope—Yhwh’s acts of covenantal love and faithfulness. For the psalmist, Yhwh’s loyal love is beyond compare. Like some ziggurat it “towers over us”. Israel is completely dwarfed but also completely within its shade. His faithfulness, likewise, extends before and beyond Israel. It is ‘everlasting’. In both of these we see Yhwh’s Forever for Israel. And when they drink that in, they are also expanded beyond their own horizons. They are taken ‘beyond themselves’, in an ecstatic movement outward toward all the nations. In this, they are becoming like David—they are obtaining a heart “after Yhwh’s heart”. The expansion of the heart to the boundary of all nations is Israel’s heart being poured out for all the nations as it participates within Yhwh’s own desire.

Ps 116 (Seeing the Christ: The death of Death)

Death is a the hunter of Sheol. It casts its cords around the earth, seeking to drag man down into Sheol, and away from the Presence and Name of Yhwh. Within this psalm there is a type of battle being waged with the victor obtaining the life of the psalmist. 

The location of this battle is the land of the living. And the reason for the battle is liturgy—praise of Yhwh. Sheol is where the liturgy ceases, where Yhwh’s name cannot be pronounced; where it cannot be liturgically ‘remembered.’ And Sheol wants Silence. It wants to purge the land of living, to create a type holocaust of liturgy, to spray the earth with a liturgical acid. And it does so by sending forth Death to hunt the land for prisoners. 

Yhwh has, however, established a beachhead in this battle, a place where Death cannot come near—the Temple in Jerusalem. Yhwh’s priests cannot be contaminated with Death. They cannot touch a dead thing and serve the Presence. The Temple is the place of Life. But the Temple is not simply this zone of Life. It is, more fundamentally, the place of Liturgy, the place where Heaven and Earth come together and where the abundance, festivity and prodigality that earth is intended to live within, are realized. If Sheol seeks Silence, then the Temple is the place, not of noise, but of Music, of Liturgy. This is Life—man living, abiding, dwelling within the Presence. 

In this battle, the value of Yhwh’s servants is immeasurable. For Sheol, because Silence is what it seeks, the servant’s life is actually valueless. It’s ‘value’ is its destruction. To Yhwh, however, the servant’s life is “too costly” to abandon. To Yhwh, his servant’s ability to enter into Liturgy, means that when called upon He will pay the price for his life. Yhwh will “come forth” in order to confront Death and destroy the cords that have ensnared his servant, that are steadily dragging him into Sheol. He will “benefit” him. He will “show affection”. He will be the King of Heaven who will still stoop down to the lowest of his servants in order to ward off Death’s advances. 

The battle itself begins with the invocation of Yhwh’s name. What is clear is that the servant’s pronouncement of the Name makes Yhwh’s Presence present. There is something like magic happening here. The psalmist clearly does not have the ability, on his own, to fight off Death. He is being dragged to Sheol. His help can only come from the divine realm—from Yhwh himself. Note, though, that there is no description of a battle. It is as if Yhwh’s Presence itself frees the servant and defeats Death’s advances. Like the story of Creation, there may have been some type of battle story in the background, some type of story known about gods battling with Death over a servant—but here, the battle is completely gone. Death is not a real opponent of Yhwh. He does not put up a real struggle. Instead, Yhwh’s Name-Presence is understood to be its own victory. Where Yhwh is, there is victory. Where Yhwh is, there is Life. Where Yhwh is, Death is not. The psalmist may experience panic at Death’s capturing him. It may cause him to realize that no man can save him. But for Yhwh, there is no indication of hesitation. No sense of Him ‘risking’ anything to save his servant. His Presence accomplishes His will. It “presences” his will for his people. 

It is key to see that the way victory is accomplished is largely the same as the result of victory—Yhwh’s Presence. For the servant, to be freed from Death’s cords is to “walk in Yhwh’s Presence through the region of living.” Life here is communion with Yhwh, a being with Yhwh, a being in Yhwh’s sphere of divine Presence. It is being an Adam that “walks with Yhwh”. That the psalm ends in the Temple means that this is to be taken quite literally—that the psalmist is walking with Yhwh in this new creation—this Temple that weds heaven and earth. 

Now that Death has been banished, the psalmist can properly enter and dwell in the Temple. He is no longer on the verge of becoming unclean. He has been cleansed, and made ritually able to stand in Yhwh’s Presence. 

It is so important to keep this in mind and not to see this ritual need for purity as a relic of the Old Testament. Jesus came to destroy Death, to make us ritually able to stand in the Forevoer Presence. His conquering of Death and his Resurrection is therefore an affirmation of this Old Testament insistence on the Presence being Life. When Christ returns and when we are “clothed in immortality” we will become, perpetually, what this psalmist-servant experiences—the ability to be in Yhwh’s Presence. In Revelation, the earth and heaven stand somewhat apart throughout. In the end, though—what the entire book is moving toward—is the time when Death is destroyed, the earth cleansed, and a new heaven descending shaped like the holy of holies. It is then, when there is no longer any remnant of Death, when Sheol and its Hunter haven been utterly destroyed, that man is able to be bodily in God’s Presence. That is what Christ’s Death and Resurrection accomplish—he purchases for us bodies that will no longer be hunted by Death and therefore able to be in God’s Presence forever. 

What we see in this psalm is how the Presence does save from death—but it is not until the battle waged by Christ against Death that it is finalized, or “accomplished”. These are stagings on the way to the final battle. In Christ, God, through Christ, takes the Presence into Death and, further, into Sheol itself. By taking the Presence fully into enemy territory, Christ takes the Presence—that which is Victory and Life—to the final holdout, the seat of the enemy. Christ,  in a sense, is the payload, the delivery of the Presence into Sheol. No servant could do that prior to Christ because no servant was the Incarnate Son, taking, in his body, the Presence itself. Prior to Christ, to go to Sheol meant to go somewhere where Yhwh’s name could not be pronounced. Therefore, no servant could ‘deliver’ the payload, they could not “call upon the Name” as the psalmist does here while still alive. But, because Christ is the Incarnate Son, his death is able to cross the boundary because he IS the Presence. In other words, it is Christ’s death that destroys Death. 

In a way we can see Lazarus’ death as the next step beyond the almost-death of this psalmist. As in this psalm, Jesus’ presence brings Life to Lazarus. But Lazarus cannot take the Name into Sheol. That boundary he cannot cross. But he is brought back to Life by the one who is Life incarnate. Lazarus thus stands on the threshold between life in the old covenant and life in the new covenant. On the one hand he dies a death that cannot cross the boundary but he is brought back from death by the one who will destroy Death by entering into it. Lazarus is therefore like the water that is turned into wine, transformed from death into Life, but also pointing forward to the Hour when Death will be defeated.

Life After Death

This benefit assumes a response, a type of repayment. And, although the servant’s life has itself been redeemed, and thus the servant cannot offer more than that, the sacrifice of thanksgiving is still regarded by him and Yhwh as a form of repayment, a completion of the transaction. 

This thanksgiving sacrifice was the todah sacrifice—a sacrifice of bread and wine—and one that the rabbis understood as the only sacrifice that would continue in the Age. This is the Eucharist—the sacrifice of thanksgiving that, while does not repay God for the sacrifice of the Son, is the appropriate form of response to such a Gift. Thus, when we partake of the Eucharist, we are completing and entering into this psalm. And, more importantly still, we are fulfilling this psalm and Christ’s sacrifice. Recall that the point of Yhwh’s Presence redeeming the servant is so that he can enter the Temple and offer sacrifice—so that he can enter Liturgy. The battle is waged for the Victory. And, here, that Victory is expressed through the thanksgiving sacrifice, a sacrifice that speaks to the Presence redeeming his servants from Death and into Life. 

Ps 115 (Jesus as the True Idol)

Ephesians speaks of a very similar dynamic to what we see above. We saw how Israel was a type of island within the Cosmos. That image, though, doesn’t fully capture it. It is more as if Israel is the only sun within a dark universe—it alone burns with the divine and prodigal intensity of Yhwh’s blessing, his loyal-love and his faithfulness. Not necessarily because Israel is Yhwh’s exclusive possession, but more so because the nations have turned to dead idols and themselves become dead, become part of the silent Sheol of the universe. 

Another way of putting this is that only in Israel is the burning holiness of Yhwh made present. Paul speaks of this too when he says that those ‘in Christ’ were chosen ‘before the foundations of the world to be “holy and immaculate” before him in love. And the goal of this ‘chosenness’ is, as in this psalm, so that we could be “for the praise of his glory”. For Paul, Christ becomes the locus, the place, wherein we dwell. He is the Glory-place. It is “in him” that we are made into the glory-givers. In a sense, he is the “proper idol”, the one in whom, and through whom, glory can be given to the Father such that it results in the life spoken of in this psalm, rather than death. And because he is the locus of this “glory giving” he is also the locus, the place, “of blessing.” We give glory “in him” and we receive all heavenly blessings “in him.” Christ is, in the context of this psalm and Ephesians, the Cosmos of Giving and Receiving. He is both a type of true idol and Temple and also the Cosmos that receives divine blessing. 

This is what the sacraments are. But, more importantly, this is what they do. They put us in the Sun. They put us in this Place of blazing glory-giving and this Place of torrential heavenly blessing. In other words, Christ is, quite literally, this Psalm. It occurs “in him”, he occurs “in it”, and we occur in both. 

Ps 115 (The Descent of Blessing)

Heaven is Yhwh’s heaven 

but the earth / he has entrusted to mankind

The dead / cannot praise Yah

nor any / who go down to Silence

But we / will bless Yhwh

from now on / and for evermore.

Heaven, earth, under the earth. Heaven is Yhwh’s, the earth is man’s, under the earth is the dead’s. Heaven is under the authority of Yhwh. Earth has been placed under the authority of man. Sheol, interestingly, is not a place of authority—there is no ‘king’ or ‘magistrate’ that is described here. It is a place of absence in that regard.

Heaven is the place where all glory and praise is received. Earth is the place where all praise and glory is given. Sheol is the place where no praise or glory can be given. 

There are other hierarchies as well. Heaven is the place of Life. Earth is the place of life-lived. Sheol is the place of Death. Heaven is the place of Liturgy. Earth is the place of Praise. Sheol is the place of Silence. 

The concluding lines show that the Earth is the place where a perpetual praise to Yhwh can be given. Whereas before Yhwh is the one who ‘blesses” Israel, Aaron and those who revere Yhwh, now “we” will bless Yhwh in the same that “we” did not retain glory but consigned it all over to Yhwh. This ‘handing over’ and ‘blessing’ is what it means to have earth ‘entrusted to mankind’. The nations pervert this, however. They ‘bless’ idols, making themselves into unworthy rulers and images of Yhwh. Only in Israel is blessing and glory given to Yhwh. Only in Israel is the earth property lifted up to heaven. And only in Israel is the bond between Heaven and Earth made perpetual because only in Israel is the covenant opened to them such that they can abide within the Forever of Yhwh. Their “from now and forevermore” is but a participation within the Forevermore that is Yhwh. 

Ps 115 (Creating the Cosmos)

Yhwh has remembered / he will bless 

He will bless / the house of Israel

He will bless / the house of Aaron

He will bless / those who revere Yhwh

Young / and old alike.

May Yhwh / add to you

To you / and to your children

May you be blessed / by Yhwh

Maker of heaven and earth

It is here where we see how the original “giving glory” to Yhwh and “not to us” results in a prodigal outpouring from Yhwh. Again, to consign all glory to Yhwh is not to belittle the earth, nor is it to see a type of negative duality between creation, or “us”, and Yhwh. For Israel, to consign all glory to Yhwh is bring everything into Yhwh’s authority, to bring everything in Yhwh’s sphere. We might say, to retain any glory “for us” would be foolish in the extreme because “we” cannot be the source of divine blessing in the same way that the idols, made from the earth, cannot. 

This strikes me as a rather profound point—the psalmist’s rejection of glory so that it can all be given to Yhwh is similar to his rejection of idols. “We” cannot be proper receptacles of glory in the same way that the, the idols, cannot. For both, to retain any glory would be an eclipsing of Yhwh. But this is not simply neutral. To retain glory is to retain death. All glory not given to Yhwh becomes a type of curse, it “does not meet its purpose”; it is misused. Given to Yhwh, or ‘in Yhwh’, it turns into blessing but in “us” or in idols, it tuns into death and the beginning of the great Silence. “We”—Adam-like—can be our own idols in so far as we attempt to retain glory for ourselves. And if so, “we” would become like those who worship idols—we would not become like Yhwh, but we would caught within a vicious cycle with ourselves. This is it—glory given to Yhwh enters us into the cycle of glory-given, blessing-received, but glory retained or given to idols enters us into a closed circle with the earth and/or with demons, a closed circle of death. 

Note here what is not stated but implied—if idolaters become like the idols (silent like Sheol), then the trusters-of-Yhwh will also become like him. They would be his images. They will be brought within his sphere, not of silence and Death, but prodigal, divine blessing. 

So here we see how the more “glory” given exclusively to Yhwh results in Yhwh remembering and blessing the entire realm of those who trust in Him. Glory and blessing—that is the circular dynamic we spoke about above. There is an added layer here, though, that we can begin to grasp. The ‘blessing’ of Yhwh is a type of creation, a type of prodigal fruitfulness. Yhwh “adds to you”, “to you and to your children”. From the divine, he empowers them, as a community to fruitfulness. 

So a deeper connection can be made—that this cycle of glory-given and blessing participates in and reflections creation itself. All of creation—not simply the historical reception of blessing—is an act of this Yhwh-blessing, this “adding to”. And that is why the psalmist concludes with Yhwh being described as the “maker of heaven and earth”. To be a people-blessed, is to be brought within the creative action of Yhwh and, indeed, to be brought within the original, primal act of Creation itself.

That said we are also given a vision of the wonder of Creation—because it came not from a primal glory-given, but, rather, it came from Yhwh’s own why-less blessing. Nothing “seeded” Yhwh’s heaven to bring forth the Cosmos. The Cosmos, in all its glory, came, without cause, from Yhwh’s own abyss. And by bestowing glory on the Cosmos (there has to be ‘glory’ there in order for it to be given to Yhwh), he created the possibility of creation returning that glory to Him so that he could perpetuate the act of Creation throughout time. This ‘dialogue’ between Israel and Yhwh—this given of glory and blessing—begins in the ‘monologue’ of Yhwh’s act of creation, this act of opening up a space within himself for his creation to dwell. 

Ps 115 (The Silence of the Idols)

Why should nations ask

                “Where / pray / is their god?”

In fact / our God / is in heaven

                He does anything / he pleases

Their idols / are silver and gold

                Made by / human hands

They have mouths / but cannot speak

They have eyes / but cannot see

They have ears / but cannot hear

They have noses / but cannot smell

Their hands / they cannot feel with them

Their feet / they cannot walk with them

They cannot produce sounds / in their throats

Like them / their makers become

anyone who trusts in them.

The psalmist opened with glory being given to Yhwh’s name. Here, we begin to grasp ‘where’ Yhwh is—where that praise ‘goes’ when it is given to Yhwh.

For the nations, Yhwh is nowhere because he has no idol in his temple. For them, a Temple without an idol is simply a building. It holds no sacred Presence or power. It is just part of the mundane world. For them, Israel’s worship of Yhwh is absurd; it makes no sense. While they may not equate their gods with them idols, they cannot conceive of a god receiving praise who does not have an idol. For the nations, the idols were this bond between heaven and earth. The idols “made present” this heavenly and divine realm.

For the psalmist, though, Yhwh is “somewhere” and, more importantly, in some mysterious way, his lack of an idol highlights his ever-greater power than the other gods. He is in heaven, and, because that is his ‘realm’ it means that he dwells in supreme power. This is important to pause over. For the psalmist heaven is not simply the place where the divine dwells (as if it was just ‘stacked on top’ of earth in a two-story building). It is the place of authority and power. The ‘higher’ one ascends toward heaven, the closer one moves into a sphere that controls the earth. In other words, being in ‘heaven’ is not being ‘far from earth’. It’s the other way around. Being in heaven means being more intimately and profoundly in control of earth. We saw this dynamic above—the more that is ‘given’ to heaven, the more is poured out onto the earth. We could think of it as if the ‘soil’ of earth’s power, vitality and life is not actually beneath our feet but above our heads. And the more we “seed” heaven with our praise and devotion, the more “fruit” it produces.

For the psalmist, the idols invert this in some fashion. They are made “from man” and “from the earth”. Although they have all the senses generally necessary to perceive and control the world, they cannot use them. They are ‘entirely earthly’ and therefore without power. The nations begin with earth and then move to heaven. In a way, they see their gods as “part of earth”, both in their idols and literally in their being contained within the cosmos. Israel begins with Yhwh above the heavens, and understands heaven and earth within Him.

Just as “we” should not receive glory (in verse 1), but Yhwh should, so too are idols not proper receivers of glory because they are not divine but created things of the cosmos. The closing line, though, points to the profound effect of improper glory-giving. If the nations give glory to impotent, created things, then they will have cut themselves off from heaven. And to be cut off from heaven, is to be cut off from power to such an extent that their senses will deaden. As we will see later, the dead cannot praise Yhwh and they enter Silence. It is profoundly important—the nations are, on earth, living in a Sheol existence of Silence, becoming like their dead and silent idols.

Ps 115 (Yhwh Is Not A Slot Machine)

Not to us / Yhwh / not to us

                But to your name / give glory

                For the sake / of your loyal love / your faithfulness.

The openings lines, as seemingly straightforward as they are, summarize the entire psalm. The psalmist wants glory to go “to Yhwh’s name”, and “not to us”. He wants Yhwh’s name to be the exclusive, gravitational pull for glory. “Us” or “we” are not to be given any. And yet, Yhwh’s name is to be “given glory” “for the sake of” Yhwh’s “loyal-love” and “faithfulness”. So, in the first line, all glory is to go “up” to Yhwh and yet the reason is because of Yhwh’s “downward” “loya-love” and “faithfulness”. There is a type of circular movement here. As the “earth” sends all glory up to Yhwh, who is above the heavens, Yhwh responds with “loyal-love” and “faithfulness”.

This dynamic is crucial to grasp—that Yhwh’s exclusive receipt of “glory” does not mean that the earth is somehow understood as lacking. Quite the opposite. The more glory is given to Yhwh, the more Yhwh pours down to the earth. That is why the psalmist says “not to us”—they actually receive more from Yhwh the more they exclusively give glory to Yhwh. And the cycle continues. The more they receive from Yhwh, the more glory they give to him, and the more they, in turn, receive, and then the more they give. The reason this dynamic can be circular is because Yhwh is an infinite source of being and life. His receipt of glory does not “add to it” for the same reason that his giving of “loyal love” and “faithfulness” does not deplete him. There is nothing ‘competitive’ between Yhwh and “us”. He is not like a divine slot-machine that one puts in the glory-coin in the hopes of receiving a payment. As pithy as that is, it is the way many divine beings are ultimately understood as operating (either with sacrifices, with life, or with praise). Yhwh is the ever-new and infinite fountain of being and existence and loyal-love and faithfulness. When Yhwh ‘draws from himself’ he does not draw from a limited warehouse. He draws from his own Infinite.

This is why a psalm that is asking for Yhwh’s aide actually begins not with an asking but a giving.

Ps 114 (The Temple, the People, and the Incarnation)

The psalmist of psalm 48 asks those with him to look at the Temple, to lovingly examine its every detail, and to understand that when one gazes at the Temple in this manner one is “seeing Yhwh”. For him, it is not that the Temple represents Yhwh or that the Temple is a metaphor for Yhwh and his glory. Instead, it is that when one looks at the Temple one is looking at Yhwh. He has become incarnate in some fashion, truly, within the stones and structure of the Temple. It is a deeply significant point. The Presence has stitched itself into the stones.

In this psalm we see something similar but now the psalmist sees Yhwh as stitched into Israel. Instead of the Temple or the sanctuary, the people themselves have, Moses-like, become irradiated with Yhwh’s glory to such an extent that they partake in his staggering and tremendous authority. The cosmos looks upon them the same way the psalmist of Psalm 48 directs us to look at the Temple—it sees Yhwh-in-Israel.

Israel and the Temple—they are rungs on the ladder toward Incarnation, when the Word becomes flesh. In Jesus we are given the “point of the story”. The Temple could have the Presence taken from it. The People could be in danger as well. As much as Yhwh identified with either the Temple or the People, they could, for that very reason, also become objects of a curse, of abandonment. That does not mean that Yhwh’s covenant with them was abrogated or done away with—they were under a curse precisely because that is what the covenant calls for. What it does mean, though, is that they were never perfect vessels because they did not maintain the Presence in perpetuity. In Jesus, though, we see a life that maintains the Presence to the end. He becomes the perfect Israel (as in this psalm) and the perfect Temple (as in Psalm 48). And, because he does so he becomes the one into whom the Cosmos is baptized. The Cosmos and the Bride now have a vessel into which they can be grafted that will be for them what we see in this psalm—a deified humanity that is a perfect image of God to the Cosmos. God became man, so that man might become God. And, in so far as the Cosmos and the Bride live “in Christ”, they also die, not into Death, but “into Christ”. But that is for another reflection. The point here is that in Christ we see the fulfilment of this Psalm—the perfect and perpetual deified humanity. Jesus is the Chariot Throne. He is the “son called out of Egypt” called to “the sanctuary” and called to his Father’s “royal dominion”. That is what the gospels, Paul and Revelation all describe. And in Acts (and Paul) we see what it is like for this ‘new Israel’ to be baptized into this Presence Throne—it is to become a “royal priesthood”.  

Ps 114 (Rock to Water)

At the coming / of the Lord / tremble / O land

At the coming / of the God of Jacob

Who turned the rock / into a pool of water

Flintstone / into a spring of water

In the previous section water was a barrier to Israel—the Red Sea kept them from leaving Egypt and the Jordan kept them from entering the Land. And yet, when Israel is indwelt by Yhwh, both become passageways, they “turn back” instead of preventing them from moving forward. They are transformed. The same thing with the mountains—they would also have been barriers to crossing. When the exiles return from Babylon, the prophet declares that the mountains will be ‘made low’. Something similar happens here. The mountains and hills “jump” like rams, presumably away from Israel to “make their paths straight through the dessert.”

Here, in this passage water and rock are again made to transform themselves in order to make Yhwh-in-Israel’s passage to the Land easier. Whereas before water was a barrier, here it becomes sustenance. Whereas before the mountain rock was a hindrance, here it becomes a source of blessing. It is a deeply significant point—the cosmos is made subservient to Yhwh-in-Israel during this time of their pilgrimage to the Land. During their pilgrimage the “coming of the Lord-in-Israel” will bend the cosmos to Israel’s needs, and this ‘bending’ and ‘transformation’ makes the cosmos stand in dread of the Yhwh who so loves his people that he will mold the cosmos for their needs.

Recall what we said earlier too, about how the reaction to Yhwh itself reveals Yhwh—here, the reaction of the cosmos to the coming of Yhwh-in-Israel shows us a depth to Yhwh’s heart and concern for Israel that would otherwise remain hidden from us. And that is this—that the Cosmos itself stands in reverence to Yhwh-in-Israel and Yhwh’s single-minded devotion and concern for Israel. More to the point—the Cosmos understands Israel to be above the Cosmos because Yhwh will bend it in order to provide for Israel. And even deeper still—while Israel might be created like the Cosmos, Israel cannot be fully understood as simply part of the Cosmos. Israel can only be fully understood, ultimately, in Yhwh’s light and glory. And this is so precisely because the Cosmos itself “trembles” at Israel’s presence.

A final reflection calls for us to ponder what the Land’s reaction to Israel would be. This psalm considers the cosmos’ reaction to Israel as it is in pilgrimage. As such, it is the Cosmos in pilgrimage as well. It is the Cosmos in anticipation of the Land. And, with this in mind, what about the Land? Perhaps we are to see here a cosmos that does not need to be ‘transformed’ in order to provide for Yhwh-in-Israel because it would, of itself, provide the bounty necessary for Israel? Perhaps we are to envision the Land as putting up no barriers to Yhwh-in-Israel as the Red Sea and the Jordan did?

The book of Revelation may provide an answer. Throughout Revelation the cosmos functions in a somewhat analogous way to the psalm—Yhwh will bend it towards his people’s protection. At the end, however, when the earth has been cleansed of death and the reign of Satan, a new heaven descends upon the earth. We see here the cosmos becoming Land, of the cosmos being a place that can now be a realm of perpetuity and safety and, more importantly, it can become, itself, a vessel for Yhwh and his Bride. There, we see a Cosmos that shimmers with Yhwh’s Presence, a Cosmos transformed, but no longer bent for the sake of provision but rather transformed into a liturgical cosmos, filled without remainder with the Presence.

Ps 114 (Combative Dread)

The sea looked / and ran away

The Jordan / turned back

The mountains / jumped like rams

The hills / like lambs

What is the matter with you / sea / that you ran away

And Jordan / that you turned back

Mountains / that you jump like rams

Hills / like lambs?

When Yhwh appears to the cosmos, it often results in a ‘melting’, or a ‘running away’, a ‘rolling up’. The cosmos reacts in a way similar to an army that is overwhelmed and retreats from a threatening enemy. Creation itself trembles in the Presence. We must see something important here—that to “see” Yhwh in his appearing is also to see how he affects the cosmos. In other words, the reaction of the cosmos to Yhwh’s unveiling is itself a part of his unveiling. We see more of who Yhwh is, when we see the effect his Presence has on those around him.

Here, the psalmist does something rather profound—what causes the cosmos to retreat is when it sees not Yhwh but Yhwh-In-Israel. Israel here moves, literally, within the sphere of Yhwh’s appearing, within the sphere of his divine Unveiling, within the sphere of his Presence. And they, they themselves, become an object of dread, authority and majesty and they inhabit this realm. Yhwh is stitching himself into Israel in a way that he will later stitch himself into the stones of the Temple (and, ultimately, in Jesus’ flesh and then the Bride). In Christ, God became man that man might become God. Here, we are witnessing one of the initial steps down that stairway—and, simultaneously, a step for man up the stairway to becoming God. We see this throughout Scripture—the Presence makes things around into the Presence. Moses’ face literally shines with radiated, divine Glory. The Church will later view the “unveiled” face of God in Christ.

There is something else to this—while the cosmos runs, Israel becomes the new burning bush. They are consumed, but not destroyed. They are enflamed but not destroyed. They are the burning bush travelling through the dessert. So, while the cosmos turns in terror, within the flame of Yhwh’s Presence, Israel moves in peace and security, as “with a third”. The cosmos runs. Israel abides.

Lastly, this is a cosmos in dread as the people come out of Egypt—the “sea” looked and ran away—and as they enter the Land—the Jordan turned back (the Sea was the beginning, the Jordan, the end). What we should glimpse here is that this the reaction of the cosmos as Yhwh’s people are in transit, or pilgrimage to, the Land that will be His, and their, resting place. When they enter the Land, this “time of combative dread” will cease. Yhwh and Israel will be home. And they will, from the Land, begin to remake the cosmos. Everything the prophets envision regarding the divine life that will flood the cosmos, begins in Zion and rushes out the Temple. Paul will look out the cosmos from this vantage point and, in Romans 8, will say that the entire cosmos is groaning as if in child birthing pains—but it will be doing because of something that is arriving—the “revelation of the children of God”. Revelation will envision this as heaven descending to Earth. For both Paul and John, this ‘time of the Bride’ is a time of ‘combative dread’—from the top down—and it is a time when the Glory of God has become almost infinitely wed to his people such that they become the Light, the City, the Temple, the Bride and the Chariot Throne of God, on its way to the Land.

Ps 114 (Israel the Vessel)

When Israel / came out of Egypt

The community of Jacob / from a people of incoherent speech

Judah / became his sanctuary

Israel / his royal dominion

Adam was both a priest of Eden and king. He was both a cultic being and royal image of God. In his removal from Eden, what was united him became scattered. And through Yhwh’s dealing with Israel he begins to stitch together the fabric that was torn. Here, we are given a vision of Israel moving into this Unity. Israel, here, is not “freed” from Egypt so much as he is “made” into Yhwh—for this psalmist, that is the point of the exodus. It is not freedom. It is Israel’s becoming the sacred vessel of Yhwh and exercising his royal dominion over the cosmos.

Israel “comes out” to “become”. He comes out of Egypt, the place of degradation and slavery, in order to become the opposite—Yhwh’s sanctuary and “royal dominion”. This is not the psalmist’s way of saying the same thing twice. To be Yhwh’s sanctuary is to be the place of his Presence. To be Yhwh’s vehicle, his ‘rolling chariot’, across the wilderness as it moves toward the Land. As Yhwh incarnates himself within their camp, he thereby brings them up into his sacred sphere, making them sacred, liturgical objects. Note, that in this psalm Yhwh does not move into the sanctuary building. Judah, the people themselves, are Yhwh’s sanctuary-Presence. They are a divine glory-people, irradiated with Yhwh’s Presence. In Egypt, they were the opposite. A people without Presence, without Glory, without Authority, without heavenly Power. They were, therefore, easily exploited because they did not really exist. This is Yhwh’s “lifting up the lowly” and his “seating them in power”. This imagery does bleed over into that of Israel being Yhwh’s “royal dominion”. While Judah being his sanctuary portrays them as sacred liturgical objects—as they sacred object—the psalmist also sees them as inhabiting Yhwh’s authority as Sovereign. They exhibit, they display, they show forth not a type of worldly power and dominion, but one that has its roots in heavenly authority and dominion. Not a place, but a people—that is Yhwh’s “royal dominion”.

This relocation of ‘sanctuary’ and ‘dominion’ into Judah and Israel is significant. They are not in the Land yet, where the Temple will be made permanent and the Kingdom will begin to grow. When they come out of Egypt, Judah and Israel become, themselves, what the Land will make permanent. In this way, they show how Yhwh is bound, first, to a people, and then to a place. Where they go, Yhwh goes. It is terribly important for several reasons. First, when and if they ever leave the Land, it does not mean that Yhwh leaves them. He first inhabited them as a people so he can take his Presence with and to them, even when they are not in the Land. Ezekiel will have a vision of the thundering mobility of Yhwh as he comes to Israel in Babylon. Second, the life of the people, lived in Torah, is what makes them a ‘fitting receptacle’ for Yhwh. The people themselves, in the Adam-like obedience to Yhwh, are a type of Land, an Eden where Yhwh can “walk about”. This places a tremendous importance on obedience, not for the sake of obedience, but for the sake of Presence.

Ps 113 (Time Becoming Sabbath)

Hallelujah

Praise / Yhwh’s servants

                Praise Yhwh’s name

Let Yhwh’s name / be blessed

                From now on / and for evermore

From the sun’s rising / to its setting

                Let Yhwh’s name / be praised

In the first stanza the psalmist contemplates the praise of Yhwh’s name encompassing all of time. It occurs now, but it stretches into the Forever. It is not merely the speaking of Yhwh’s name, however. By praising Yhwh’s name, Yhwh is made present. The psalmist is therefore calling for a sanctification of time itself, for Yhwh’s very presence to saturate time and make it holy. There is, however, an important exception to this—the psalmist only calls upon Yhwh’s name to sanctify—to be in the midst of—the daytime. He calls for Yhwh to be praised from the sun’s rising to its setting—but not during the night. Genesis takes a similar view of the night. During creation, and the separation of light from darkness, only the light is called “good”, not the night. There is a sense here that Yhwh’s presence is not to enter the “time of darkness”, that that arena is not to be blessed, but is instead a profane time. We will return, later, to how the psalmist points toward a time when the night will not be sanctified but removed, when “all will be light”, when there will be no darkness or shadow.

What is important to stress here too is that Yhwh’s sanctifying of time through his presence occurs in and through the act of praise and blessing. The heart of Yhwh’s people is itself a revelation of Yhwh. Their praise of Yhwh, their blessing of Yhwh, expresses the way in which Yhwh’s presence would come into time itself. It would come in as an act of praise and of blessing. It is a festival, a banquet. This is absolutely crucial to keep in mind. When Yhwh comes to Time, he comes through Praise and Blessing. They are the gateways, so to speak, the doors of time through which Yhwh will pass.

And when Yhwh passes through time’s gateway, and he remains into the Forever, he co-exists in the Forever through his servant’s forever-praise and forever-blessing. In other words, praise and blessing are not a gateway through which Yhwh passes and then leaves behind. They are the vehicle of his forever Presence. This is an astonishing vision—one in which time itself, when it is impregnated with Yhwh’s presence, becomes praise and blessing. Time becomes Glory. His presence becomes stitched into time itself. Time becomes Sabbath.