Download discussion questions: Psalm 42-43
Since we were starting a new Calvary Institute study in Psalms, we began with an overview of poetry and more specifically Hebrew poetry.
Introduction to Psalms
Poetry – What and Why?
When asked to define poetry, the group responded with “rhyme” and “rhythm.” One person mentioned that music is often an expression of poetry with those characteristics. Another comment brought up “modern” poetry that often has neither rhyme nor rhythm.
Then we discussed why someone would write a poem instead of an essay? Poems are easier to memorize and can be more succinct than a detailed descriptive dissertation. Poetry often uses more figurative speech and word pictures to communicate. If a picture is worth a thousand words, maybe a word picture is as well.
Consider three expressions of God’s care for His creatures:
- God the Creator of all things does uphold, direct, dispose, and govern all creatures, actions, and things, from the greatest even to the least, by His most wise and holy providence….” Westminster Confession of Faith
- Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Matthew 6:26
- The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not want. Psalm 23:1
All three express the same truth, from analytical precision to an eloquent analogy to a moving metaphor. Which one is most often quoted by people in need? Poetry communicates in ways other literature does not.
With that substantial benefit, poetry that depends on rhyme and rhythm also has a substantial limitation. The sounds of words and the cadence of a sentence seldom if ever translate clearly into another language. While the analytical content can be translated, the expressive result of rhyme and rhythm literally get “lost in translation.”
Hebrew poetry
In God’s wise providence, He chose a language for the book of Psalms that does not depend on the pronunciation of certain sounds or tempo or inflection. Hebrew poetry uses a different way of achieving the effects of poetry on the reader. The psalmists use a “rhyme” and “rhythm” of ideas instead of sounds. “The fundamental characteristic of this poetry was not its external form or rhythms, but its way of matching or echoing one thought with another.”[1] Psalms are full of repetition, parallel ideas, contrasting thoughts, reversing word order, comparing concepts and other ways of creatively combining words that translate into any language. (For more details, see the article “Bible Study in Psalms” on www.GoodNotSafe.com .)
The more we begin to recognize the structure, often a very intricate structure, in the Psalms, the more we will grow in appreciation of the beauty of God’s Word. That structure itself can be a reminder of God’s care in communicating His truth to us, and the structure shows the devotion and effort of the writers in describing their experience of God. (For additional examples, see “Parallel Structure in Psalm 25” and “Parallel Structure in Psalm 90.”)
Psalm 42-43
In this passage, two psalms are included. Psalm 42 and Psalm 43 have an almost identical refrain (42:5, 11; 43:5). Psalm 42 has a title[2] (along with about 75% of the psalms.) Psalm 43 does not have a title, and it flows from the end of Psalm 42. “Psalm 42 and 43 together constitute a single poem of three stanzas.”[3]
The poem of Psalm 42-43 is clearly a song of lament with the three stanzas ending with “Why are you in despair, O my soul.” Depending on how the psalms are classified (and who is doing the classifying), more than a third of all the psalms deal with lament or suffering. Hopefully, studying some of these particular psalms over the next four weeks will provide practical help when we face difficulties.
Turmoil and Trust
In looking at the passage for positive or hopeful statements and the negative or despairing cries, one of the first observations from our discussion was the alternating pattern between turmoil and trust, between conviction and confusion. That pattern is seen in the repeated refrain, “Why are you in despair, O my soul?…Hope in God…” (42:5, 11; 43:5). Clearly, this psalm is not offering a quick fix. That was not the psalmist’s experience.
One of the repeated complaints sounded particularly contemporary, “They say to me all day long, ‘Where is your God?’” We hear and read that same question in the news. “Where was your God in Las Vegas?” “Where was your God in Parkland, Florida?” We hear it from skeptics who have experienced a personal catastrophe, “Where was your God when…?” Most tragically, we hear it even from the psalmist in different forms, “Why have You forgotten me?” (42:9), “Why have you rejected me?” (43:2). The hypothetical question about God’s goodness and the existence of evil (“theodicy” in philosophical debates) becomes intensely, intimately personal when God has forgotten me, when He has rejected me. One member pointed out a stark contrast. The psalmist repeatedly remembers God (42:4, 6), but he feels that God has forgotten him (42:9).
We talked about the types of trouble the psalmist (and some in our group) might face: oppression (42:9b, 43:2), the mocking and scorn of adversaries (42:10), being surrounded by an ungodly nation (43:1), deceitful and unjust persons (43:1). The phrase “shattering of my bones” (42:10a, NASB) is translated in a Jewish interlinear prayer book as, “a murderous dagger in my bones,”[4] perhaps as our expression, “stabbed in the back” or betrayed by others. Another person commented that, like the psalmist, we often ask God repeatedly for clarity and understanding (“Why?” 42:9b, 43:2b) without a response.
Remembering When…
Early in the psalm there seems to be a source of hope, remembering better times, remembering when God’s presence was perceptible in His people (42:4) or His familiar blessings of home (42:6b). Our group agreed that there is great value in remembering. We need each other to remind ourselves of God’s faithfulness and presence and action in the past. Keeping a journal can be a way of being reminded of better times. We need to remember what God has done and what He can do, that He is unchanging. But the memories have limitations. Even as we are reminded, like the psalmist, the difficulties are still present, the pain still hurts. As positive as the memories are, we may still feel like we are overwhelmed by one deep water after another, waterfalls and breakers and waves covering us (42:7).
A person in our group pointed out another potential danger in focusing only on the memory of better times. We may be drawn into further despair by the thought, “What did I do wrong? Why has God taken away the blessings I was experiencing?” However, another suggestion in our discussion was that God uses difficulties to increase our reliance on Him. This may be the conclusion the psalmist came to.
Joy in the Presence
The psalm began with longing for God, specifically to “appear before God” (42:1-3). That last phrase might also be “see the face of God” (NASB, mg.). With either reading, the desire is for God’s presence in the psalmist’s life. The conclusion he came to reaffirms that desire for God’s holy hill and His dwelling places (43:3), to be at the altar (43:4), the place where a sinful man can meet the holy God. The writer recognized that only by the action of God Himself can a person experience that presence: “Send out your light and your truth, let them lead me” (43:3a). That “sending” is at God’s initiative. Our part can be to know Him better through seeing that light and truth in Scripture, in fellowship with others who are also seeking that light and truth, and in our worship that displays Him more clearly to us.
The psalmist’s ultimate motivation, the driving desire for God’s presence, is joy: “exceeding joy” (ESV, KJV, NASB), “greatest joy” (CSB), “joy and delight” (NIV), “the joy of my rejoicing” (YLT). The writer concludes that the presence of God is “the joy of my rejoicing.” Too often we can adopt the unconscious attitude that the source of joy is the elimination of a certain painful circumstance in life or the achievement of a particular goal.
God wants us (along with the psalmist) to know that He alone is the joy of our rejoicing, the core, the essence of joy. Other legitimate blessings (health, family, ministry, work, reputation) certainly are channels of joy that He graciously provides. However, they are only channels. He is the source. If our joy or satisfaction or identity or significance depend on those blessings, we are missing the essence. Blessings are to be enjoyed and gratefully received.
God’s blessings are of great value to us. “Idols aren’t made of bad things.”[5] Idols are made of valuable things, like gold or silver, or health or family. But they are still idols. There may be times when our difficulties are signals to us that we are expecting (even demanding) joy and satisfaction and identity and fulfillment from people or things or circumstances. Joy and satisfaction and identity and fulfillment are only found in knowing God more deeply as “the joy of our rejoicing.” Listening to those signals doesn’t remove the pain or the discomfort. Responding to the signals turns our attention to the only true source of joy. The blessings we desire may not come. The circumstances we want to escape may continue. The struggles do not end for us or for the psalmist. Notice how he ends the psalm with the third repetition of the refrain, “Why are you in despair, O my soul?” (43:5).
Perhaps there is a subtle change in tone in this final instance of the refrain. This third repetition is in the context of the joy of his rejoicing, the anticipation of the joy of knowing God more intimately. That anticipation enabled the psalmist to face the enemies and oppression and deceit and injustice. Likewise, the anticipation of returning to the Father enabled Jesus to face death by torture: “who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”
May that anticipation enable our endurance as well.
[1] Derek Kidner, Psalms 1-72 (London: Inter-Varsity Press, 1973), 2.
[2] Editorial notes that were added later than the psalms themselves. The titles were considered trustworthy by Jesus (Mark 12:35-37), and by Peter (Acts 2:25-35), and Paul (Acts 13:35-37) who all used the titles from psalms to ascribe authorship to David.
cf. Derek Kidner, Psalms 1-72 (London: Inter-Varsity Press, 1973), 33.
[3] Robert Alden, Psalms, Volume 1 – Songs of Devotion (Chicago: Moody Press, 1974), 104.
[4] Rabbi Menachem Davis, ed., Tehillim, The Book of Psalms with and Interlinear Translation (Brooklyn, New York: Mesorah Publications, Ltd., 2014), 114.
[5] Brant Hansen, Unoffendable (Nashville, Tennessee: W Publishing Group, 2015), 119.