The Eschatology of the Psalter

About this book

There are certain editions of the New Testament which by way of appendix contain the Psalter, an arrangement obviously intended to serve the convenience of devotion. It has, however, the curious result of bringing the Apocalypse and the Psalms into immediate proximity. On first thought it might seem that scarcely two more diverse things could be put together. The storm-ridden landscape of the Apocalypse has little enough in common with the green pastures and still waters of which the Psalmist sings. For us the Psalter largely ministers to the needs of the devotional life withdrawn into its privacy with God. Such a life is not usually promotive of the tone and temper characteristic of the eschatological reaction. This will explain why the ear of both reader and interpreter has so often remained closed to strains of a quite different nature in this favorite book.It requires something more strenuous than the even tenor of our devotional life to shake us out of this habit and force us to take a look at the Psalter’s second face. It has happened more than once in the history of the Church, that some great conflict has carried the use of the Psalms out from the prayer-closet into the open places of a tumultuous world. The period of the Reformation affords a striking example of this. We ourselves, who are just emerging from a time of great world-upheaval, have perhaps discovered, that the Psalter adapted itself to still other situations than we were accustomed to imagine. To be sure, these last tremendous years have not detracted in the least from its familiar usefulness as an instrument of devotion. But we have also found that voices from the Psalter accompanied us, when forced into the open to face the world-tempest, and that they sprang to our lips on occasions when otherwise we should have had to remain dumb in the presence of God’s judgments. This experience sufficiently proves that there is material in the Psalms which it requires the large impact of history to bring to our consciousness in its full significance. It goes without saying that what can be prayed and sung now in theatro mundi was never meant for exclusive use in the oratory of the pious soul. This other aspect of the Psalter has not been produced by liturgical accommodation; it was in its very origin a part of the life and prayer and song of the writers themselves.