Editor’s Note: For the month of October, in the Spirituality & Practice of Faith section we will be enjoying meditations from Fr. Richard Peers SMMS on Psalm 119. We encourage you to read Psalm 119 throughout the month alongside this study.

Which is your favourite psalm?

A group of writers contributing to a collection of essays on psalms scholarship in 2005 chose: 104, 91, 1, 63, 73, 85, 113, 103, 90, 131,98, 57, 113 (again), 103 (again), and 73 (again). (Johnston and Firth, 2005, opening pages).

No one chose Psalm 119.

Yet for most of the first two millennia of the Christian era Psalm 119 nurtured the prayer of those who prayed the Divine Office, providing in its daily recitation a fixed anchor, a place of safety, a true refuge to return to from the rigours of daily ministry in whatever situation Christians found themselves.

Psalm 119 is, I believe, a prayer of contemplation and obedience.  It develops a simple dependence on God in every moment of life.  Unlike other more popular psalms, this psalm does not catch our emotions or grab our enthusiasm. It is familiarity that will develop fondness and recognition of depth.  A depth which Saint Augustine of Hippo described as a “profundity, which few can fathom” (Boulding 2003, p.342).

Describing the effect of plainsong hymns, the editors of a collection of hymns for the Daily Office write, “The contents are unlikely to transform minds and ears on first acquaintance. They are intended to grow in strength and meaning through regular use.” (Harper, 1996 p. x). The same might equally be said of Psalm 119. I encourage readers to not simply to make the acquaintance of this, the longest psalm, but to make of it a deep and dear friend, a companion for every day.

Psalm 119 uses eight synonyms for tora; this table shows the Hebrew in the left hand column and the translation of these by John Eaton on the right:

Every verse of the psalm except 122 contains one of these. Although this verse contains the word, tov, good which itself encompasses tora for the pious (see Davis, 2001 p.336 in footnote). Some scholars believe that an original version of the psalm had these synonyms circulating in an ordered pattern within the alphabetical sections. Accordingly they make the (22) changes to the text necessary to re-construct this. It may certainly be the case that scribal error has led to the loss of such a pattern. It is also true that such a pattern would add to the sense of order and the contemplative, rhythmic pattern of the psalm. However, poetry often breaks the ‘form’ which has been adopted, although this is normally done purposefully and it is not immediately obvious what the disrupted pattern tells us.

It seems to be futile to try and identify a forensic distinction of meaning in the eight tora synonyms. Rather they suggest, like the acrostic nature of the poem, a sense of wholeness in God’s tora; all law, all teaching comes from God. It is particularly important as Christians reading this psalm to escape a stereotyped view of tora as a set of laws or regulations. Tora here and generally has a far richer meaning. In many ways this can be reached by identifying Jesus as the divinely revealed tora, the living Word or logos. Brueggemann describes the Psalter’s commitment to tora as: “the acceptance of Yahweh as the horizon of life is a matter of joy, comfort, and well-being” (Brueggemann 1997 p.445). 

Eaton is even more explicit in this, writing,“the remarkable fact remains that none of these psalms (1, 19 and 119) gives a specification or an example of such Scripture [Deuteronomy or the Pentateuch]. No document is mentioned, no command is cited. The centre of interest thus remains the Lord himself, and the relation to him. The warm devotion centres in the fact that he  teaches, guides, commands and promises, and thereby in mercy and faithfulness bestows life. The form of the revelation remains open, ‘exceeding broad’ (119:96).” (Eaton, 1995, p.52).