Improving Your Prayer Life through a Study of the Psalter

Randall C. Bailey

• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN:
  9781666715620
  9781666715637
• eBook ISBN:
  9781666715644
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

How should we pray? Do we believe God answers our prayers? Is it acceptable to complain to God? Should we bargain with him to receive the response we desire? Why do we praise God? Does our praise make him any more "God"? John Calvin argued basically that the purpose of prayer is to realign the petitioner's feelings and beliefs with God's. Many today seem to have adopted this idea. One says, "Why pray at all. God knows everything so my prayers cannot change his mind. I must pray to discover God's will for my life. I must realign my will with God's will for my life." In contrast, the psalmists assumed a reciprocal process. They believed they could bring pressures on God to answer their requests. They would bargain with God and promise him certain things if he would only grant their petitions. Indeed, this was part of the process. They would obligate themselves to praise God if he would grant their desires. Such bargaining was the foundation of their prayers. Comparisons of Calvin's views with the psalmists' allows the reader to investigate the nature of his or her prayer life and make improvements where necessary.

1

Introduction to the Psalter

The Names of the Psalter

The words “psalms” and “psalter” are anglicized forms of the Latin psalmi and psalterium, which themselves derive from the Greek psalmoi and psalterion. Psalterion, originally referred to a stringed instrument, but later came to mean a “collection of songs.” These terms apparently translated the Hebrew term mizmȏr, which indicated a religious song accompanied by stringed instrument(s). In the Hebrew Bible, the book’s title is sepher tĕhillîm (book of praises).1 The Psalter was by no means unique in the ancient Near East or in the religious realm today. The various cultures of the ancient Near East possessed a similar body of literature. Christendom in general has similar material, expressed in their hymnals. The Psalter was Israel’s hymnal. This fact has great implications for us in terms of our prayer life and worship. Because the Psalter is a hymnal, we should always cite the individual psalms by their numbers, “Psalm 1,” “Psalm 2,” and the like. We should not cite individual psalms as “chapters.”

Place of the Psalms in the Old Testament

The Hebrew Bible divides into three parts: law, prophets, and writings. Note Luke’s record of Jesus’ words in Luke 24:44, “Then he said to them, ‘These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you—that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled’” (NRSV). The Hebrew Bible divides into three main sections: law, prophets, and writings. The Psalms occur first in the Writings. English Bibles do not follow this organization. Rather the Psalms come right after the book of Job, which itself follows the books of history (Joshua–Esther).

Organization and Interesting Facts about the Psalms

Though we often refer to the “Psalms of David,” as if he wrote all of them, several different authors wrote the psalms. Several psalms appear to be nearly identical. These include: (1) 14 and 53; (2) 40:13–17 and 70:1–5; (3) 108 and 57:7–11. Psalm 72:20 states, “The prayers of David, the son of Jesse, are ended” (NRSV) yet there are other psalms with “of David” in the title, such as 108–10.

Some psalms favor the name “YHWH,” while other parts favor the term “God.” Book 1 uses YHWH (Yahweh, Jehovah) over Elohim (God) in a ratio of 272 to 15. Book 2 uses Elohim over YHWH in a ratio of 162 to 30. According to Leupold, “the use of the divine names as well as other factors indicate that at the time” of the subscription of 72:20, “two distinct books were already in existence, and presumably of the same scope and compass that they now have.”2

The Psalter is a collection of five different books: book 1 = 1–41; book 2 = 42–72; book 3 = 73–89; book 4 = 90–106; book 5 = 107–50. These five books evolved within three broad periods.3 (1) Preexilic psalms show affinities with the Ugaritic poetic material.4 These psalms deal with the king and kingship; some scholars label these “royal psalms,” while other scholars designate these “messianic psalms,” and apply them to Jesus. (2) Psalms whose contents reveal a time in the exile are exilic. (3) Psalms whose contents reveal a period after the exile are postexilic. Evidently, the ongoing enlargement of the Psalter continued during these three periods until it took its present form. Interestingly, each of these books closes with a doxology (praise), while Psalm 150 constitutes “an appropriate doxology to the Psalter as a whole.”5 If we regard Psalm 1 as the introduction to the Psalter then the entire book reveals a structure that moves from an introduction (Ps 1) through the various psalms of lament and praise, to praise (Ps 150). Some have suggested that this fivefold division is an imitation of the five books of the Law of Moses.6 This final compilation probably occurred about the third century BCE. Interestingly, the Septuagint and the He...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Foreword
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: Introduction to the Psalter
• Chapter 2: The Dynamics of Prayer Life
• Chapter 3: The Impact of the Social Reality, Piety, and I/Thou of the Psalter versus That of John Calvin on the Christian’s Prayer Life
• Chapter 4: A Better Understanding of God Equals Improvement in Social Reality, Piety, and Prayer
• Chapter 5: Individual Lament
• Chapter 6: Communal Lament
• Chapter 7: Proper Social Reality, Piety, and Lament Illustrate . . .
• Chapter 8: Individual Praise
• Chapter 9: Communal Praise
• Chapter 10: Social Reality, Piety, Lament/Praise, and Their Relationship
• Chapter 11: Summary and Conclusions
• Bibliography