A/N: A school project from last semester. We had to write a psalm, including five sections. We also had a bunch of other ridiculous requirements, so some of the things are kind of weird, but yeah. I thought it was good, so I decided to post it. Ignore the footnotes for the most part, mostly they just point out to my theology teacher where I use the concept of metanoia, etc. There are some symbolic things explained there, but you don't have to read the footnotes. Please R/R!
Psalm Project
Section I – Song of PraisePraise God, the benevolent Creator[1]
Who gave us a life with Him![2]
O earthly people, give God your thanks:
Give Him your praises on the Sabbath[3] in joyful adoration;
Just as Solomon built a glorious temple in His tribute,[4]
Offer to your Maker your prayerful worship.
Allow Him to know your love for Him,
And your elation that He gave you a life on earth,
Where you can live a good and godly life,
Full of love for your Father!
O God in Heaven,
You gave us a true life in the waters of Baptism,[5]
When you cleansed us of the sins of our ancestors,
And the evils we ourselves committed.
Now we trust in You,
We know that no matter how troubled our lives become,
We can turn to our Father and Creator for help.[6]
You gave us rules to live saintly lives,
Giving our existence meaning and guidance.[7]
On the mountain where You gave Moses[8] the tablets,
We give You praises.
On this high and mighty peak,
We feel closer to You.
We see Your glory in the rocks, the pines, and the raging waters.[9]
We feel Your presence and direction in our lives.[10]
And so we give You thanks.
Section II – Song of ThanksgivingWe thank You, O God, for you are the source of our life.[11]
You are like the earth[12], solid and strong,
Yet You are also nurturing and protecting,
Just as the earth nurtures and protects the plants rooted in it.
We feel Your spirit in the garden,[13]
Where life thrives, and trees bear great fruits[14].
It is like our life with You.
With our faith[15] in You,
We thrive and bear fruit.
Without faith, we still exist,
But we are not strong like plants tended in a garden.
You are the Gardener who sows us[16],
And later You are the Gardener who prunes us of our faults,
And strengthens our soul.
You guide us in Your way;
You give us hope[17] of eternal life in Your Kingdom[18],
A paradise where we are transplanted to more fertile soil,
And we bloom from a seedling to a magnificent, strong tree.[19]
We sing our thanks to You,
We sing with the heavenly chorus
Because your Kingdom is forever.
And we have hope of eternal life.
We will see all of the life You have given and nurtured,
Beginning with Adam.[20]
Adam, the man You breathed life into,
The man You gave power over the lands and animals to,
The man who turned against You.
Section III – Song of SupplicationO Father!
We are human,
And we are sinful beings.
Just as our mother Eve[21] deserted you in favor of the serpent's temptations,
We deserted you in favor of easier routes.
We gave in to Delilah's[22] cajoling words,
And broke our promises to You,
Which is why we lost our strength.
When we were on the mountain, we were near you,[23]
But now we have broken the Ten Commandments you once gave us
Which we carried in the Ark, Your presence among us.
But now it is gone.[24]
And we are now stranded in the desert.[25]
Here it is dry without Your life-giving water[26],
The sun scorches our back like flames[27] when you are not here to protect us.
We did not obey Your word,[28]
And now we suffer.
We showed no charity to Your other children.[29]
We strayed from Your protection.
We were not faithful to You.
We were like Gomer, who strayed from her husband Hosea – [30]
We did not respect You and stay faithful to You,
The one true God.
Now punished, we are in exile;
We remain in the desert,
Separated from You and true living.
O Father, One who created us,
Please take mercy on Your people.
We have sinned against you, but we are sorry,
And we wish for life with You again.
We trust that You will save us.[31]
Section IV – Song of RoyaltyWe yearn for our previous life in Your care.
Our separation is so painful.
Will You save us?
Will You restore the world and your people?
Millennia ago, the world was filled with sin,
And only one man alive remembered You.
The world was reborn in the waters You sent,[32]
And only Noah lived.
But even Noah strayed.[33]
You saved him, O Creator,
When you recreated the world in water.
How will You save us?
We know You will send one to save Your people,
A messiah.[34]
With his sacrifice of love,[35]
We will be able to join back into life with You.
We cannot wait to be with You again.[36]
Section V – Song of WisdomA revelation!
A shining vision of wonder and light![37]
Your image is powerful, pure, and good,
Yet I feel unworthy.
The sight burns my eyes,
And flames consume me.[38]
But when I emerge, I am not hurt –
I have been burned clean.[39]
At last we can return to a relationship of love and fealty with our Father,
And our happiness and life are restored.
But the bond is different.[40]
We realize now the importance of life with faith, hope, and love in You.
We are pure and faithful.
We now can enter into hésed with You, the Creator[41]
Because we love You.
Our new life with You is a tent[42],
Inside it, we are intimate with You and Your word.
Your teachings to us are crystal-clear,
And Your power evident like lightning.[43]
Our new knowledge of Life with You is this:
Life with our God makes us strong;
Without Him we wither and die.[44]
The Creator loves us,
He always provides and cherishes us.
Though we stray from Him,
He guides us back like a good shepherd leading his lost sheep.[45] [46]
You love us, O Lord,
And we love you.
We thank you for all you have given us,
Deserved or otherwise.
Our life brings us great joy.
[1] From the very beginning of the psalm, I issue an image of God, the maker of mankind, and give him a name: the Creator.
[2] God's gift to His people is a life full of love with Him.
[3] In the typical pattern of a hymn, the psalm begins with an invitation to praise God, especially on the Sabbath, the holy day. For the rest of the song of praise, the pattern of the hymn is followed.
[4] The reign of Solomon was the Golden Age of the Israelite kingdom. In building the first temple, Solomon reached the epitome of worship, throwing all his resources into God's house. He is an ideal model of one of God's children to follow because of that.
[5] Water, symbolizing birth and cleansing, represents birth into true living, which only happens when one knows and loves God.
[6] Because God gave us life, we believe that He will extend it into eternity in Paradise; we trust that He will do that for us no matter what happens in life. The three lines dealing with trust in God echo Psalm 46, the psalm that this one is loosely based upon, in the speaker understands that God will save them regardless of what happens.
[7] This line alludes to the Ten Commandments, God's laws for life.
[8] This extends the metaphor of the previous line, bringing Moses, the receiver of the laws, into the picture and painting the scene of a mountain. On the mountain, the speaker is close to the sky, the traditional domain of God. Because of this, symbolically, the speaker is closer to God.
[9] All the pieces of Creation show God's hand.
[10] This once again returns to the idea of the Ten Commandments on the mountain, for they are God's voice on earth and tell His people the way to live.
[11] To make the transition, the speaker ended the song of praise by giving thanks to God, and began the song of thanksgiving by giving the reason that we thank God.
[12] An elemental symbolism, comparing God to the earth reveals a few key truths in His nature: He is larger than anybody on the planet, yet He gives them all a place in His heart. He also gives metaphorical nutrients to each person's souls that are rooted in the ground. The comparison conjures images of Mother Earth, nurturing and protecting her inhabitants, just like God does.
[13] Continuing the earthy, nature-based images of the previous lines, the environment of a garden shows all of God's work and the life He has created, making it a worthy place to worship Him. The plants become symbolic of His people, and the gardener becomes symbolic of God Himself.
[14] This image echoes many passages in the Bible, especially those in the New Testament, where somebody compares men who walk with God to fruitful plants.
[15] Faith is hearing, believing, and obeying God's call. Faith is not necessary for the survival of the body, but the soul cannot flourish without it.
[16] This image once again returns to the original vision of God as a Creator.
[17] Hope is one of the key virtues because without it, humans become miserable, knowing that they are destined to die and cannot make free choices. The hope in God's eternal kingdom brings joy because death on earth is not an end; rather, it is a beginning.
[18] God's kingdom is not an earthly one that has faults and will eventually fall, but instead an eternal paradise.
[19] This line reflects Jesus' teachings about the mustard seed in Matthew 13:31.
[20] Adam is symbolic of all people here. Heaven reveals to us God's glory in all of its magnificence in that we can see all of the life ever in the world going all the way back to Adam. As the first man, he was the first person God gave life to, yet he was also one of the first to betray God, as all people do because we are weak and give in to temptations. This leads into the next section, when the people lose sight of their gift of life with God.
[21] The first woman, Eve was Adam's wife, and so she ties into the theme of the first sinners. She was the one who introduced sin into the world when she listened to the serpent and ate from the Tree of Knowledge.
[22] Continuing on the theme of sinful women, the speaker mentions Delilah, wife of Samson, who wheedled him into telling the secret of his strength so that she could betray him. In the psalm, Delilah is symbolic of temptations in the world, Samson is symbolic of us, and Samson's strength is symbolic of life with God.
[23] This returns to the earlier image of praising God on Mount Sinai when Moses received the tablets.
[24] The Ark, just like God's presence among the people, disappeared. However, if we know where to look, the Ark and His love are still waiting for us.
[25] The desert, a new environment, is nothing but a barren wasteland, symbolic of life without God. It also alludes to the Israelites' exile from Egypt.
[26] The water once again symbolizes His love washing away sin, therefore allowing the sinner to be reborn into a life of goodness.
[27] The flames evoke images of hell and its fire.
[28] God the Mighty laid out the way for His followers to live in the Ten Commandments, but we did not follow His rules, a grave sin.
[29] In Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, he gives the Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. For this reason, we are required to give charity to all people of the world.
[30] The story of Gomer and Hosea directly parallels that of the relationship between Israel and God. Once again, the woman, Israel, sins and strays from God by worshipping other gods, almost a form of adultery.
[31] The song of lament uses the typical format of a supplication, first calling on God's name, then describing the need, asking for help, giving God motivation, and finally announcing trust that God will save the speaker.
[32] The symbolic waters of birth return again.
[33] When God saved the sinful world, cleaning it of all sin and leaving only Noah and his family, He gave an example that He was willing to cleanse dirty objects and/or people to make them worthy of life with Him, even if He knew that the person would later return to a sinful life, like Noah.
[34] The speaker expresses his faith that God will save the world, and the person authorized to do so would be the savior, the messiah.
[35] Though the speaker does not know for sure, he expects that there will be a sacrifice alongside the messiah, just as God sacrificed the lives of hundreds of people during the Flood so that the world could be a better place.
[36] The speaker shows their eager expectation.
[37] God reveals Himself to the speaker in a theophany, giving the speaker forgiveness and allowing him to know his Creator much better. Additionally, the light and purity in this passage allude to the transformation of Christ.
[38] Still a sinner, the speaker cannot look upon God without feeling shame and physical pain.
[39] However, because of the sacrifice, the speaker is saved, and fire burns away all the sin. Fire, an elemental symbol, is at first painful, but the cleanliness brought after it has burned away the impurities is cleaner than any other way because now the speaker knows the value of the cleanliness and purity.
[40] Lack of sin radically changes the relationship between the speaker and God because the speaker no longer wishes to sin. At last the stage is set for God and the people to truly love each other.
[41] The speaker realizes the perfection of this new relationship and recognizes that it is an ideal example of hésed, though the example is not perfect because humanity is imperfect.
[42] The intimacy inside the tent of the covenant, a shelter filled with holy objects, displays the respect, honor, and love between the people and God. Inside the tent of the covenant, the teachings of God are kept, allowing the people to also know and live by His word.
[43] This sentence refers to the scientific theory that perhaps the Ark of the Covenant was an early battery or other type of electrical device.
[44] The word "wither" once again conjures up images of plants and gardens. The nature-based style is like that of Psalm 46.
[45] Referring to God as a shepherd alludes to Jesus.
[46] Finally able to fully understand God's wishes for our lives, we list our new knowledge in a series of short proverb-like sentences. The first uses antithetical parallelism, the second uses synonymous parallelism, and the third uses synthetic parallelism.