For those who want a change from the Gospel

Lent 2 – Psalm 22

Far be it from me to claim to be a real OT scholar, but when I read my usual commentary on this Psalm I found myself disagreeing with most of the suggestions which were given as to its origins and meaning. Part of the problem is that it falls into two very contrasting halves (only the second of which is set in our lectionary). So first of all there is the inevitable suggestion that two different Psalms, a lament and a song of praise, have at some stage been bunged together into one. While some psalms show evidence that this might have happened, I’m not convinced that this one does. In fact, even though the first 21 verses appear to form a song of lament, they are interspersed with verses of great hope and confidence, for example v.3, 9 and 14. In fact the whole thing seems to oscillate between terror and confidence.

This has led to another suggestion, that the Psalm is in fact a Psalm of thanksgiving, but that some verses are inserted to recall just what it was that God had delivered the psalmist from. If that is the case, I’m not sure the first two verses set the scene very effectively, or do justice to the overall mood of the Psalm. The way the suffering is described seems all too real and present to me. Another suggestion is that this was a liturgy used for a ceremony of ritual humiliation for the king, perhaps a bit like King Charles being stripped down to his undershirt at his coronation. But we have no evidence that such a ceremony was ever performed, or was part of any royal liturgy. In any case the Psalm describes something a bit worse than mere humiliation. And of course there are inevitably those who can’t see beyond the NT use of the Psalm by Jesus on  the cross, and see it as nothing more than a prophecy of the crucifixion. Readers will know by now what I think of that view, although it is easy to see why these no doubt well-known words sprang to Jesus’ lips as he died in agony.

So I’ll stick to my own interpretation of the Psalm, convincingly suggested to me many years ago by a friend who is a proper OT scholar, and then I’ll reflect on our own experiences in the light of that interpretation. I think it describes a city under siege, and the reactions of the people caught between hope and despair. The people fell themselves abandoned by God (v.2), they are mocked by their enemies, including verbally (we know this happened from 2 Kings 18). They feel surrounded and hemmed in (v.12-13, 16) and the famine caused by the siege is having its effects on people’s bodies (v.14-17). The attacking army is treating the situation as though they have already won (v.18), and are already planning the plunder which under Assyrian Law they are entitled to if they capture someone. Whether this is the siege of Jerusalem by Assyrian King Sennacherib in 710 BC we can’t be certain, but I’m convinced that the evidence fits this event.

So why the oscillation between lament and praise? I think what we have here is a Psalmist struggling to hold onto his faith and beliefs in the face of the trouble he was undergoing. He feels forsaken and abandoned (v.1-2), yet God is enthroned (v.3). He feels like a subhuman worm by the way his oppressors are treating him (v.6-8) and yet God brought him to birth and nurtured his beginnings. He is starving, frightened and desperately sick, yet God is not far from him (v.19) or so he prays. And then he breaks through this backwards and forwards and spends the rest of the Psalm reminding himself of what he knows to be true about God and his presence, his provision and his deliverance. Above all, he knows that in the end all the earth, including presumably those who are being so dreadful now, will turn and bow before him. A friend (a different one – I do have more than one) once said that there is a difference between the ‘true’ and the ‘real’. There are things we believe to be true, but they are not always real for us now. That doesn’t make them not true; it just means that at times we have to hold on to what we believe about God even if that doesn’t match our present experience. This Psalm, it seems to me, is a masterpiece of that kind of wrestling, that teeth-gritted determination to stick to the belief that God is good even when our experience says he’s evil, or worse, absent altogether. This Psalm validates our own wrestling and doubts. We may not believe that a lighthouse will appear and miraculously carry us  to shore if we follow it, but we do believe that God is good and will one day will win. O Lord, help our unbelief.