Dragoslava Santrac
The Psalms are prayers of the Bible par excellence. Uttered in praise, joy, sorrow, and despair, spoken or sung in privacy and in the public, by lay people, kings, poets, and priests, coming from both the righteous and the repentant sinners, the Psalms have served as both an essential guide to prayer and the prayer book to generations of believers. The universal characteristic of most of the Psalms reveals their intended use in diverse life situations and worship, and makes them relevant to people in all times. The psalmists often refer to their afflictions in broad terms: mourning, sickness, enemies, fear of death, accusers, grave, sackcloth, and others. Yet the precise nature of the problems is obscure. Similarly, the psalmists frequently express their praise and gratitude to God in general terms, without, for example, revealing the exact circumstances of deliverance. It is thus not surprising that believers of all times could, and can identify their experiences in the sentiments of the Psalms. Even the psalms, whose titles relate them to specific historical events, lack explicit details to determine the precise nature of the psalmists’ afflictions or reasons for praise (e.g., Pss 51; 54). This seems not to be the case with some other prayers or psalms in the Bible (e.g., 1 Sam 1:10-11; 2 Sam 1:17-27).
In the ancient Israel, where the Psalms originated, the Psalms were used in public and private worship, and so it is correct to regard the Psalms as the hymnbook of the temple/synagogue and as Israel’s prayer book (1 Chr 16:7, 9; Neh 12:8).1 For example, the “Egyptian Hallel” (Pss 113-118) and the “Great Hallel” (Ps 136), along with the pilgrimage songs (Pss 120-134), were sung at the three major annual festivals (Exod 23:14, 17; Lev 23), including the festivals of the New Moon and the dedication of the temple. The Egyptian Hallel received a significant place in the Passover ceremony. Psalms 113 and 114 were sung at the beginning of the Passover meal, and Pss 115-118 at the end (Matt 26:30; Mark 14:26). The “Daily Hallel” (Pss 145-150) was incorporated into the daily prayers in the synagogue morning services.
In the NT, for example, Jesus sang some psalms at his Last Supper with his disciples (Matt 26:30), and prayed with the words of Ps 22 at the cross (Matt 27:46). Mary’s praise to God is reminiscent of the psalmists’ praise (Luke 1:46-55).2 The Psalms found a significant place in the life of the first church (Eph 5:19; Col 3:16; Jas 5:13). After the destruction of the second temple in AD 70, when the sacrificial ritual could no longer be observed, prayer and the Psalms came to enjoy a special status in Jewish public and private worship.
The Psalms continued to play an important role in the prayer life of Christian communities in church history. The evolution of various practices in Christian liturgies in early centuries is a complex story, but it is beyond doubt that cycles of psalms have marked the liturgical life of most Christian traditions. There emerged two recurrent acts of Christian worship in which the Psalms had a large place: the Eucharistic liturgy, which commemorated Jesus’ Last Supper with his disciples, and the other was what became known as Divine Office, that is, the set prayers at various times through the period of twenty-four hours (e.g., Vigils at night time, Lauds at daybreak, Prime at the “first” hour, or roughly seven o’ clock). The language of the Psalms has shaped the language and ethos of Christian prayers and liturgies. For example, the Greek phrase Kyrie eleison (Lord have mercy) in the Eucharistic liturgy is an adaptation of a recurrent phrase in Septuagint Psalms (e.g., Ps 57:2).3 The famous acclamation “Halleluiah” or “Alleluia” is also adopted from the Psalms (e.g., Pss 111:1; 112:1; 113:1).
By the fourth century there is evidence that, when the Psalms were used in liturgy, they were sung responsively: a cantor would sing successive parts of the psalm, to which the congregation would respond with a refrain. In his Confessions, Augustine remarks about the emotional effect of the Psalms on his spiritual life. Very early in church history certain Psalms were assigned for the readings/prayers on the important occasions of the church year—Christmas, Holy Week and Easter, and Pentecost. This practice was established in both western and eastern Christian churches.4 By the seventh century, seven penitential psalms were selected to lead supplicants through confession of sin to forgiveness, and renewed commitment to God (Pss 6, 32, 38, 51, 102, 130, and 143).
There is a long tradition of praying the Psalms as part of personal or private devotion. In his Letter to Marcellinus, Athanasius (ca. 295-383), the bishop of Alexandria, tells of how various psalms can fit the spiritual need of a Christian.
The other psalms he recognizes as being his own words. And the one who hears is deeply moved, as though he himself were speaking, and is affected by the words of the song, as if they were his own songs… And it seems to me that these words become like a mirror to the person singing them, so that he might perceive himself and the emotions of his soul, and this affected, he might recite them. And if you see your acquaintances turning against you, do not be alarmed, but turn your mind to the future and sing Psalm 30 [that is, Psalm 31].5
Martin Luther’s lectures on the Psalms traced the path for the Reformation in the sixteenth century. Luther poignantly speaks of the Psalms as prayers.
Where can one find nobler words to express joy than in the Psalms of praise and gratitude? In them you can see into the hearts of all the saints as if you were looking at a lovely pleasure-garden, or were gazing into heaven… Or where can one find more profound, more penitent, more sorrowful words in which to express grief than in the Psalms of lamentations? In these, you can see into the hearts of all the saints as if you were looking at death or gazing into hell, so dark and obscure is the scene rendered by the changing shadows of the wrath of God. It is therefore easy to understand why the Book of Psalms is the favourite book of all the saints. For every man on every occasion can find in it Psalms which fit his needs, which he feels to be as appropriate as if they had been set there just for his sake. In no other book can he find the words to equal them, nor better words. Nor does he wish. And follows from this a further excellence that when some such a word has come home and is felt to answer his need, he receives assurance that he is in the company of the saints, and that all that has happened to the saints is happening to him, because all of them join in singing a little song with him, since he can use their words to talk with God as they did. All this is reserved to faith, for an ungodly man has no idea what the words mean.6
When John Calvin was invited to superintend the Reformation in Geneva in 1537, he saw the Psalms as the remedy for the poor conduct of worship in that city:
Furthermore it is a thing most expedient for the edification of the church to sing some psalms in the form of public prayers by which one prays to God so that the hearts of all may be aroused and stimulated to make similar prayers and to render similar praises and thanks to God with a common love. Certainly at present the prayers of the faithful are so cold that we should be greatly ashamed and confused. The psalms can stimulate us to raise our hearts to God and arouse us to an ardor in invoking as well as in exalting with praises the glory of His name.7
The Reformers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries sought to restore the Psalms to the congregation by setting them to the well-known tunes of the day. In the eighteenth-century psalm paraphrases became increasingly acceptable, because they permitted greater beauty of musical expression. The book The Bay Psalter was the first published book in the New World, testimony to the importance of the Psalms in the lives of newcomers to America.8
Ellen G. White describes David’s penitent psalms as the language of his soul and prayers which illustrate the nature of true sorrow for sin (Pss 31:1, 2; 51:1-14).9 She encourages believers to memorize texts from the Psalms as the means of fostering the sense of God’s presence in their lives, and highlights Jesus’ practice of lifting his voice in the psalm when met with temptation and oppressive fear.10 Ellen G. White also remarks, “The history of the songs of the Bible is full of suggestion as to the uses and benefits of music and song… It is one of the most effective means of impressing the heart with spiritual truth… Indeed, many a song is prayer.”11
Dietrich Bonhoeffer makes a profound remark in regard to praying the historical psalms (e.g., Pss 78, 105, 106), which can be applied to praying all psalms.
We pray these Psalms when we regard all that God does once for his people as done for us, when we confess our guilt and God’s grace, when we hold God true to his promises on the basis of his former benefits and request their fulfillment, and when we finally see the entire history of God with his people fulfilled in Jesus Christ, through whom we have been helped and will be helped. For the sake of Jesus Christ we bring God thanksgiving, petition, and confession.12
With the rise of spiritual songs and other hymnody of the nineteenth and especially twentieth centuries, the congregational singing of the Psalms declined in many churches (although certain Christian traditions such as the Reformed tradition maintained the singing of the Psalms in worship). Fortunately, during the last several decades of the twentieth century, there has been a revival in the use of the Psalms in worship, as evidenced in practices of revising a number of Christian prayer books and hymnals to include wider selections of the Psalms.13
Church history abounds in remarkable examples of the use of the Psalms as prayers, which cannot be highlighted here, but these examples seem to suffice the purpose of demonstrating the Psalms’ role as the backbone of prayer life of both Jewish and Christian traditions in history. Generations of believers in the past and present have experienced the Psalms as both God’s Word to His people, which opens the treasury of His grace to them, and the word which God wants to hear from His people, which enables them to receive Him as their sovereign Lord and Savior.
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1 Many indications point to this direction. For example, King David, whose name appears in the superscription of most psalms in the present Psalter, was active in organizing the liturgy of Israel’s worship (1 Chr 13-29). Numerous psalms were attributed to the famous temple musicians: for example, Pss 50, 73-83 to Asaph (1 Chr 25:1, 2), Pss 42; 44-47; 49; 84-85, and 88 to the sons of Korah (1 Chr 6:31-38; 2 Chr 20:19), Ps 88 to Heman the Ezrahite (1Chr 25:5, 6), and Ps 89 to Ethan the Ezrahite (1 Chr 15:17, 19). Psalm 105:1-15 comprise the first part of the festal song (1 Chr 16:8-22) that David handed over to Asaph and his musicians at the setting down of the Ark of the Covenant in Jerusalem (1 Chr 16:7). The second part of David’s festal hymn in 1 Chr 16:8-36 consists of Ps 96, and is closed by Ps 106:1, 47, 48. Some psalm titles link the Psalms with communal worship (e.g., “A Song at the dedication of the house of David,” Ps 30; “A Song for the Sabbath day,” Ps 92; “A Song of Ascents,” Pss 120-134). The editorial note at the end of Ps 72 suggests that the Psalms were viewed as prayers (Heb. תְּפלִּהָ) (Ps 72:20). Numerous psalms mention specific acts of worship in the sanctuary, especially prayer (e.g., Pss 5:2; 54:2; 55:1; 63:2, 3; 66:13, 14; 84:8; 86:6; 95:2; 118:25; 119:108; 143:1).
2 The following are some of the common motives and phrases: “my heart greatly rejoices” (Ps 28:7; Luke 1:47), God remembers His servants in their lowly state (Ps 136:23; Luke 1:48), the Lord has done great things (Pss 71:19; 126:2-3; Luke 1:49), God’s name is holy (Pss 103:1; 106:47; Luke 1:49), God’s mercy extends to those who fear Him from generation to generation (Pss 103:17; 118:4; Luke 1:50), God’s mighty arm (Pss 98:1; 136:12; Luke 1:51), God defeats the mighty ones (Ps 135:10; Luke 1:52), God fills the hungry with good things (Pss 107:9; 146:7; Luke 1:53), and has helped Israel in remembrance of His mercy (Pss 78; 98:3; 124; Luke 1:54).
3 William L. Holladay, The Psalms through Three Thousand Years: Prayer-book of a Cloud of Witnesses (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996), 166, 175-178.
4 Ibid., 166-68, 179-184.
5 William A. Clebsch, “Preface,” to Athanasius, The Life of Antony and the Letter to Marcellinus (New York: Paulist, 1980), 116, quoted in Holladay, The Psalms through Three Thousand Years, 165.
6 Martin Luther, Martin Luther: Selections from His Writings, ed. John Dillenberger (New York: Anchor, 1962), 39-40.
7 John Calvin, in Ioannis Calvini Opera Selecta, ed. Peter Barth et al. (Munich, 1926-36), 1.369; translation in Garside, Calvin’s Theology of Music, 7-8, quoted in Holladay, The Psalms through Three Thousand Years, 199.
8 J. Clinton McCann Jr., A Theological Introduction to the Book of Psalms: The Psalms as Torah (Nashville: Abingdon, 1993), 177.
9 Ellen G. White, Steps to Christ (Mountain View, CA: Pacific Press, 1956), 24-25.
10 Ellen G. White, Education (Mountain View, CA: Pacific Press, 1952), 166, 255.
11 Ibid., 167-168.
12 Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Psalms: The Prayer Book of the Bible (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1970), 35.
13 McCann, The Book of Psalms, 14-15, 177.