Psalm 119

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Latin Psalm 119:22 (reverse glass image). The text reads: aufer a me obprobrium et contemptum quia testimonia tua exquisivi - take from me shame and contempt! / Because what you prescribe, I obey.

Psalm 119 (Hebrew counting, Greek counting : Psalm 118) is the longest psalm in the Old Testament and with its 176 verses at the same time the longest chapter of the Bible , even the only chapter of the Bible with a three-digit number of verses . In the Luther Bible , the psalm is entitled The Joy of God's Law (Das Güldene ABC) , in the standard translation it is called Life-long walk in the Lord's direction .

construction

Psalm 119 has a special structure that sets it apart from others in terms of its structure: The psalm is divided into 22 sections, corresponding to the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet . The sections are numbered according to the Hebrew alphabet; in each section, each of the eight verses in the original Hebrew text begins with the same letter (so-called Abecedarius / acrostic ). Since a translation into German would not make sense while maintaining this peculiarity, the Hebrew alphabet is typically reproduced in German texts as section headings: Alef , Bet , Gimel , ...

content

The psalm is shaped by trust in God's word . Many verses are about how the divine word gives life and refreshes; in every verse (except for verse 122) there is also a synonym for this divine word: “The Lord's instructions”, “his rules”, “your laws”. The original Hebrew text uses ten different words for the "law", with perhaps only eight corresponding words in the original text, but in each of the verses.

In addition, the following aspects stand out:

  • An ideal and young (verse 9 + 99) praying self is sketched, which is characterized by a special Torah love and praises those who do good.
  • Torah is the revealed will of God and remains a living quantity despite being written down.
  • God is and remains the teacher of the Torah. Man cannot possibly understand the laws of the Torah and act accordingly on his own. Hence the ego prays for instruction in the Torah. The verses of "Teach me!" and "Teach me!" are the logical prerequisite for the right understanding of divine commandments and thus protection against wrongdoing.
  • The unconditional submission to divine commands, rights, commandments, laws etc. are repeatedly combined with the request for reward, protection from greed, lies, violence and authorities - piety is lived as quid pro quo, as a form of seeking advantage in a chaotic appearing world.
  • The Lamed stanza (vv. 89–96) is particularly striking because it reveals the cosmic dimension of God's word. This contains a kind of forerunner of the Logos philosophy, as it was later developed in Philo of Alexandria, for example, and of the theology of the Word of God.

literature

  • Karin Finsterbusch : Multiperspectivity as a program. The praying self and the Torah in Psalm 119. In: Michaela Bauks et al. (Ed.): What is man that you think of him? (Psalm 8: 5). Aspects of a theological anthropology. Festschrift for Bernd Janowski on his 65th birthday. Neukirchener Verlag, Neukirchen-Vluyn 2008, pp. 93-104.

reception

  • In 1602, Cornelius Becker created the post-poetry Well for those who walk there , which Heinrich Schütz set to music in 1661.
  • Verse 19 formed the basis for Paul Gerhardt's song in 1667 : I am a guest on earth ; Echoes of this can be found in Georg Thurmair's song We are only guests on earth
  • In 1671 Heinrich Schütz set the entire psalm to music in eleven double-choir motets, which he put together with a motet on Psalm 100 and the German Magnificat , which he is said to have referred to friends and colleagues as his "swan song". The original music books were found for the first time in 1900 in the general inventory of the parish archive of Guben and in the mid-1970s in the archive of the Saxon State Library in Dresden for the second time; Unfortunately, two of the eight voices (upper part and tenor of the second choir) have been lost to this day.
  • Under the title Open Thou Mine Eyes, John Rutter set a paraphrase by Lancelot Andrewes to the psalm from Preces Privatae or Private Prayers (ed. 1896 by Alexander Whyte )

Web links

Commons : Psalm 119  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Roland E. Murphy: The Gift of the Psalms . Hendrickson, 2000, ISBN 1-56563-474-8 .
  2. ↑ Carola Jäggi, Jörn Staecker (Hrsg.): Archeology of the Reformation - Studies on the effects of the change of denomination on the material culture . Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-11-019513-2 , p. 221 ( excerpt from Google book search).
  3. ↑ Nic. H. Ridderbos: The Psalms - Stylistic procedures and structure with special consideration of Ps 1–41 . de Gruyter, Berlin 1972, ISBN 3-11-001834-9 , p. 112 ( reading sample in the Google book search - translated from the Dutch by Karl E. Mittring).