TheBibleNet: Psalm 1

Psalms:

Bk 1: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41

Bk 2: 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72

Bk 3: 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89

Bk 4: 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106

Bk 5: 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119a 119b 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132
133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150

Additional Psalms: 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 Samuel Chronicles

Essays: Intro - Music - Form & Language

Psalms 1 and 2 are anonymous, and generally regarded as prefatory to the collection.

1:1 ASHREY HA ISH ASHER LO HALACH BA ATSAT RESHA'IM U VE DERECH CHATA'IM LO AMAD U VE MOSHAV LETSIM LO YASHAV

אַשְׁרֵי הָאִישׁ אֲשֶׁר לֹא הָלַךְ בַּעֲצַת רְשָׁעִים וּבְדֶרֶךְ חַטָּאִים לֹא עָמָד וּבְמוֹשַׁב לֵצִים לֹא יָשָׁב

KJ (King James translation): Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.

BN (BibleNet traditional translation): Happy is the man who has not followed the advice of the wicked, {N} nor walked the road of the sinners, nor sat in the seat of the scornful.

What does {N} signify? In the Masoretic texts letters in arched brackets are used to indicate breaks in the text.

According to one group of scholars (click here for an example), the {S} in English stands for the letter Samech in Yehudit, while {P} stands for the letter Pey, the initial letter of Petuchah or "opening" - which is to say a gap in the narrative or song. What the Samech initialises is not included in this explanation, and neither is the Nun explained.

According to another group of scholars, the Samech is the initial letter of Sedra, and the Peh the initial letter of Pareshah, the latter being the weekly reading of the Torah (click here), the former its division each week into seven sedrot or sub-sections. This likewise leaves out the Nun or {N}, and likewise fails to explain how the explanation fits other books of the Tanach.

In fact, both are correct - the problem arises because the Peh and Samech are used for both, but are obviously different in each context. And now see my note at Psalm 18:31, which adds the Nun to the first of the scholar-explanations here, though the Nun too should be found among the texts of the second group.

ASHREY HA ISH: Happy is the man. Why happy? Happiness in the sense of fortunate stems from Asherah, the goddess of fortune (closely connected with Gad, who is the god of fortune). He is happy because he has honoured her and been rewarded. The phrase tells us that this was a Kena'ani (Canaanite) hymn to the fertility goddess, presumably adapted later as a liturgical hymn for YHVH. And the same is true of all the Ashrey hymns, of which there are many (see my chapter on Ashrey in "A Myrtle Among Reeds".)

So really this should be translated as

BN (BibleNet revised translation): Beloved of Asherah is the man who has not followed the advice of the wicked, {N} nor walked the road of the sinners, nor sat in the seat of the scornful.

BA ATSAT RESHA'IM: in one sense "noisy woods", but clearly the intention is "the counsel of the wicked". The play on words is rather meaningless in English, whereas to an Asherah worshipper, who is accustomed to visiting the peaceful gardens filled with carefully husbanded trees that were her sacred space...

U VE DERECH CHATA'IM: "Derech" echoes "Halach", "Chata'im" echoes "Resha'im" - we will quickly become familiar with this as a standard technique of the Psalms.

LO AMAD: which doubles the echo of "Lo halach".

U VE MOSHAV LETSIM LO YASHAV: "Lo yashav" triples the echo; "U ve moshav" echoes "U ve derech"; "Leytsim" completes the trinity with "Resha'im/chata'im" - I should like to hear the music for this libretto.

CHATA'IM = "sinner"; LEYTSIM = "mockers", but the root is לוץ = LUTS = "to speak in a foreign tongue". Given the closeness of pronunciation of Zayin and Tsade - to the extent that most scholars transliterate the Tsade as a Z with a dot below it - can we assume that there is also an obscure allusion to one of Asherah's most famous sacred groves, the almond orchard adjacent to the meteoric rock of Beit-El, and known as Luz?

1:2 KI IM BE TORAT YHVH CHEPHTSO U VE TORATO YEHEGEH YOMAM VA LAILAH

כִּי אִם בְּתוֹרַת יְהוָה חֶפְצוֹ וּבְתוֹרָתוֹ יֶהְגֶּה יוֹמָם וָלָיְלָה

KJ: But his delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night.

BN: But his delight is in the Torah of YHVH; and he behaves according to that Torah both day and night.

KI IM BE TORAT YHVH CHEPHTSO: the verb suggests "bending the will", i.e. dedication: the didactic purpose of the book is thus established: this psalm is not chronologically first, but placed here first because it preludes the ideology.

U VE TORATO YEHEGEH YOMAM VA LAILAH: the notion of "minhag" is Talmudic, though clearly this predates the Talmud by at least a half a millennium - and if I only say half rather than the full millennium that you might expect (David belongs to c 1000 BCE, the Talmud to 70CE+), that is because "Ki im" and "yomam" are late grammatical constructions, and the concept of a Table of Values predominating over the rites of sacrifice is attributed to Shemu-El in his book (1 Samuel 15:22), but really belongs to the start of the Metaphysical Age, the epoch of the Prophets, which is the 7th century BCE.

The Minchah service in synagogue includes a variation of the same phrase in the prayer "ahavat olam".

KJ translates YEHEGEH as "meditate", and that does not surprise me, because it is a Christian translation. LINHOG means "to behave" and is an active verb; today, in Ivrit, it is used for driving a car. This is about actually doing it, not just thinking about doing it.

1:3 VE HAYAH KE EYTS SHATUL AL PALGEY MAYIM ASHER PIRYO YITEN BE I'TO VE ALEHU LO YIBOL VE CHOL ASHER YA'ASEH YATSLIYACH

וְהָיָה כְּעֵץ שָׁתוּל עַל פַּלְגֵי מָיִם אֲשֶׁר פִּרְיוֹ יִתֵּן בְּעִתּוֹ וְעָלֵהוּ לֹא יִבּוֹל וְכֹל אֲשֶׁר יַעֲשֶׂה יַצְלִיחַ

KJ: And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.

BN: And he shall be like a tree planted beside streams of water, {N} which produces its fruit in its season, and whose leaf never withers; in whatever he does he shall prosper.

VE HAYAH KE EYTS SHATUL AL PALGEY MAYIM: Biblical style again: this is the surviving original, as is the next.

ASHER PIRYO...: figuratively it is fertility that is evoked, linking prosperity to happiness by way of good fortune. Yah, not Yahweh.

LO YIBOL: So an evergreen tree, of which a large number are known from the Tanach, amongst them the Cypress, Oak (including the Holm oak, the Weeping oak and the Hemlock oak), Cedar, Juniper, Ivy, Fir, Myrtle, Bay and Box. Click here for their occurrences.

The phrasing at the beginning of this verse, in the KJ translation, is used for the 1960s protest song, "We Shall Not Be Moved", though there is a much earlier black-slave protest song (click here for more background on this), and the source may have been Jeremiah 17:8-9 rather than the Psalm. However, note that the Yirme-Yah uses BARUCH rather than ASHREY as its opening keyword, which is the standard Jewish mode of offering a blessing: most likely he was quoting the Psalm, or the original Kena'ani hymn, but was uncomfortable saying Ashrey because he understood its inference, and so altered it to BARUCH.

1:4 LO CHEN HA RESHA'IM KI IM KA MOTS ASHER TIDPHENU RU'ACH

לֹא כֵן הָרְשָׁעִים כִּי אִם כַּמֹּץ אֲשֶׁר תִּדְּפֶנּוּ רוּחַ

KJ: The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away.

BN: Not so the wicked; for they are like the chaff which the wind drives away.

LO CHEN: used here in precursal of AL KEN immediately afterwards; more than a hint of recognition that "cause leads to effect" is not a modern discovery.

RU'ACH: is indeed wind, but in Genesis 1:2 (and elsewhere, but see my notes there) it is the Ru'ach Elohim, the "spirit" of the gods themselves, so there is another metaphysical play-on-ideas taking place here.

1:5 AL KEN LO YAKUMU RESH'AIM BA MISHPAT VE CHATA'IM BA ADAT TSADIKIM

עַל כֵּן לֹא יָקֻמוּ רְשָׁעִים בַּמִּשְׁפָּט וְחַטָּאִים בַּעֲדַת צַדִּיקִים

KJ: Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.

BN (version 1): Therefore the wicked shall not be resurrected on the Day of Judgment, nor shall sinners stand in the congregation of the righteous.

BN (version 2): Therefore those who have criminal records shall not be permitted to stand as witnesses in the courts of justice, any more than known sinners may join the congregation at prayer.

Of which I believe the second is more likely to be the correct translation, in the Jewish world, though the former may well be preferred in the Christian.

AL KEN: the notion of the wicked being excluded from judicial procedure is nonetheless alarming. Those who have been found guilty of one offense may not stand in judgement over the offenses of others. Was this why Jesus invited those without sin to cast the first stone?

VE CHATA'IM: again Talmudic concepts - click here.

1:6 KI YODE'A YHVH DERECH TSADIYKIM VE DERECH RESHA'IM TO'VED

כִּי יוֹדֵעַ יְהוָה דֶּרֶךְ צַדִּיקִים וְדֶרֶךְ רְשָׁעִים תֹּאבֵד

KJ: For the LORD knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish.

BN: For YHVH knows which is the way of the righteous; but the way of the wicked shall perish.

KI YODE'A: the self-justification of those who take authority upon themselves. We are now in charge, and here is a Law we have passed "confirming" that YHVH affirms us. The difference between Torah and Talmud, between Perushi (Pharisaic) and Tsadoki (Sadducaic) Judaism: in Torah, YHVH determines what is good and bad, right and wrong, and humans follow obediently; in Talmud, humans decide, and take responsibility for acting according to the determined outcomes. So, again, we can date this Psalm (this revised version of a much older Psalm) well into the Metaphysical Age, probably later even than Yirme-Yah (Jeremiah).

VE DERECH RESHA'IM TO'VED: you who oppose are of the party of ha-Satan. Obey Halachah or be refused entry into Paradise.

So the first Psalm sets the old ideology aside, asserts the new one, and affirms the government.

So the first Psalm is an act, not simply of prayer, but of revolution.

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Psalms:

Bk 1: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41