Sunday 8 September 2013

Psalm 139

I found Psalm 139 interesting as I thought that the idea of an 'inescapable God' is not a nice one as it seems  intimidating and unnerving. I think that the idea of a God whom all our actions and thoughts are open to and I thought that there were times in the Psalm in which the psalmist felt the same however they also seemed to be wondrously in love with God and describe how God loves us in return.

I looked at some of the context around Psalm 139 and  found that some had named it the 'crown of the Psalms' as no other one describes the awesome power of God so explicitly. The Psalm is thought to be set to music which makes sense (I think) as it is transcribed by David who was said to write beautiful songs.

The Psalm emphasises the omnipotence and omniscience of God as it describes how he knows our thoughts and even in the womb "your eyes beheld my unformed substance".

The Psalmist has a very strong attachment to God as he talks of how he hates those who hate God. He wished God to know how purely he loves him and lead him to a place where he can always be with him.

1 comment:

  1. Interesting ideas! There's a tradition in Jewish and Christian theology of writing about the divine (whether it's explicitly God or not) as a lover. One interpretation of the Song of Songs (Hebrew Bible/Old Testament) is understood to be a mystical poem about the relationship between God and the divine and it's fairly explicit in places! There's also some beautiful poetry written by Sephardi Jews in medieval Spain that speaks of a longing or yearning for God and for the lost land of Israel. Might be worth looking into!

    ReplyDelete