Sunday, August 19, 2012

Rejoicing in the Resurrection: Psalm 62



In the Benedictine Office Psalm 62 is given a festal connotation, used at Lauds on Sundays (and major feasts).

In the Old Roman Office by contrast it was used every day at Lauds, presumably because it seems so suitable for the hour of the day when we celebrate the Resurrection, with its opening line on watching for God at the break of day.

Waiting for the Resurrection

Why does St Benedict drop the repetition?

Perhaps St Benedict wanted to emphasize the special character of Sundays as the day of the Resurrection, the day we wait especially at dawn, longing for the rising of the Son/sun after our mini-Easter Vigil each week?

I suggested that St Benedict's Office makes each Saturday a remembrance of Holy Saturday, a day when the tomb is empty and mass is not celebrated: a 'desert day' that helps sharpens our longing for Christ, the living water that our soul and flesh longs for (v.2).

Patrick Reardon, in Christ in the Psalms suggests that the psalm as a whole can be seen as a longing for communion (p124), and the psalm as a whole a preparation for its reception, particularly with its phrases such as 'Let my soul be filled as with marrow and fatness' (verse 6).

A prayer of the Church?

The psalm can also be seen though, as a prayer of the Church as a whole, as she assembles to worship on this special day of worship. Certainly St Benedict's contemporary Cassiodorus saw it as the prayer of the Church Militant, that dwells in the desert of this world, under the protection of God, and waiting for his mercy:

“So the words of the Church, who is to be the spokeswoman, are rightly set forth as referring to the Lord Saviour. So she dwells in The Desert of Edom, that is, in the aridity of this world, where she thirsts and feels longing, where she seeks the Lord's mercy eagerly until she can deserve to attain that eternal glory… the Church at daybreak keeps vigil before the Lord, praying that she may not be enmeshed in the errors of this world. That spiritual bride, who embodies the limbs of the Lord Saviour, says in the first part that she is taken up with insatiable longing to be able to behold the Lord's power.”

Above all though, this is surely a song of the triumph of Christ:

But they have fought my soul in vain, they shall go into the lower parts of the earth.. But the king shall rejoice in God, all they shall be praised that swear by him."(vv11-12)

Psalm 62

A psalm of David while he was in the desert of Edom.
O God my God, to you do I watch at break of day.
For you my soul has thirsted; for you my flesh, O how many ways!
3 In a desert land, and where there is no way, and no water: so in the sanctuary have I come before you, to see your power and your glory.
4 For your mercy is better than lives: you my lips will praise.
5 Thus will I bless you all my life long: and in your name I will lift up my hands.
6 Let my soul be filled as with marrow and fatness: and my mouth shall praise you with joyful lips.
7 If I have remembered you upon my bed, I will meditate on you in the morning:
8 Because you have been my helper. And I will rejoice under the covert of your wings:
9 My soul has stuck close to you: your right hand has received me.
10 But they have fought my soul in vain, they shall go into the lower parts of the earth:
11 They shall be delivered into the hands of the sword, they shall be the portions of foxes.
12 But the king shall rejoice in God, all they shall be praised that swear by him: because the mouth is stopped of them that speak wicked things.


1 Psalmus David, cum esset in deserto Idumææ.
2 Deus, Deus meus, ad te de luce vigilo. Sitivit in te anima mea; quam multipliciter tibi caro mea!
3 In terra deserta, et invia, et inaquosa, sic in sancto apparui tibi, ut viderem virtutem tuam et gloriam tuam.
4 Quoniam melior est misericordia tua super vitas, labia mea laudabunt te.
5 Sic benedicam te in vita mea, et in nomine tuo levabo manus meas.
6 Sicut adipe et pinguedine repleatur anima mea, et labiis exsultationis laudabit os meum.
7 Si memor fui tui super stratum meum, in matutinis meditabor in te.
8 Quia fuisti adjutor meus, et in velamento alarum tuarum exsultabo.
9 Adhæsit anima mea post te; me suscepit dextera tua.
10 Ipsi vero in vanum quæsierunt animam meam : introibunt in inferiora terræ;
11 tradentur in manus gladii : partes vulpium erunt.
12 Rex vero lætabitur in Deo; laudabuntur omnes qui jurant in eo: quia obstructum est os loquentium iniqua.

Saturday, August 18, 2012

The canticle for the Sabbath that God dictated? Deuteronomy 32/1



Saturday in the Benedictine Office, I have suggested previously, calls us to remember Holy Saturday, when the tomb is empty and the Mass is not celebrated, because Christ is preaching to those in Sheol.

It is a day when we can meditate on God's wonderful faithfulness and care of us, set against our constant rejection of him through sin.

In St Benedict’s ordering of the Office, Saturday has but one psalm, Psalm 142.

The reason for this is no doubt in part that the Canticle he set for the day, from Deuteronomy 32, is extremely long (65 verses when arranged for liturgical use). Today I want to look briefly provide something of an introduction to it.

Importance of the Canticle

Before looking at the text itself, it is worth noting that this is an extremely important canticle.

Whereas in the case of the other Lauds canticles St Benedict simply says, in his Rule, to use the Roman ones, he specifically mentions Deuteronomy for Saturday. In this he was carrying over a Jewish tradition that this canticle be recited each Sabbath in the synagogues, a tradition alluded to by St James in Acts 15:21.

This in fact reflects a Scriptural injunction: in Deuteronomy 31 God tells Moses that he is going to die soon, and calls him and Joshua before him within the tabernacle. Appearing as a pillar of cloud, Scripture records that God then dictated the canticle and instructed Moses to make the children of Israel learn it by heart so they would have no excuses as to what the law required, and could not say that they did not know the consequences of not following it.

Modern (and modernist?) commentaries (yes, even the Navarre) tend to reject the idea that it was composed all at once, or dictated in quite so dramatic a fashion, Scripture notwithstanding.  Still, regardless of how literally you interpret the story of its composition, the inclusion of this explanation clearly signals its importance.

The canticle is effectively a summary of all of Deuteronomy, and its mix of rejoicing over God’s care and creation of us, testimony to God’s care of us and man’s infidelity and continuing rejection of him, together with warnings over the consequences of sin.  Its themes are also reflected in many of the psalms of Matins today in the Benedictine Office.

And its references to a perverse generation and should sound very familiar from the New Testament.

Liturgical wreckovation?

Despite all this, the full text of the canticle is likely to be relatively unfamiliar to those who say the 1962 Benedictine Office using the Monastic Diurnal or Breviary (as opposed to the Antiphonale Monasticum) for several reasons.

First, on many Saturdays during the year, the rubrics suggest that it be replaced by the festal canticle, as part of the Saturday Office of Our Lady.

But secondly, even where it is retained (such as during Lent and Advent), the 1962 breviary actually cuts out more than half of it, ending it at verse 27, before even the division point of the original version! Indeed, the Monastic Diurnal for some reason inserts a division into Psalm 142 rather than the canticle as St Benedict actually specified, perhaps by way of a protest?  The result is that the canticle seems to end on a rather odd note, condemning the people who had forgotten God who created them.

Soft soaping?

I can only speculate on the reasons for this bit of liturgical butchery.

Were the verses condemning homosexuality perhaps ones the reformers didn’t want to have modern monks confronted with on a regular basis?

Or was it perhaps the references to God’s judgment?

Or worse still from a liberal perspective, the references to God’s vengeance, that actually conclude the canticle?

Unsurprisingly, the modern Liturgy of the Hours goes even further, slashing the canticle to but twelve verses, and thus transforming it from some hard sayings coupled with a tough warning to a ‘joyful hymn to the Lord who lovingly protects and cares for his people amid the daylong dangers and difficulties’ (Pope John Paul II, in a General Audience on it in 2002).

Can one legitimately add those excluded verses back into the 1962 Office? Given that many monasteries continue to use the older version of the Antiphonale Monasticum which includes the full text of this canticle, I actually do think this is legitimate and even desirable.

Deuteronomy 32

Here is the canticle with the different divisio and endpoints identified:

Canticum Moysis [4]
32:1 Audíte, cæli, quæ loquor: * áudiat terra verba oris mei.
32:2 Concréscat ut plúvia doctrína mea, * fluat ut ros elóquium meum.
32:3 Quasi imber super herbam, et quasi stillæ super grámina. * Quia nomen Dómini invocábo.
32:4 Date magnificéntiam Deo nostro. * Dei perfécta sunt ópera, et omnes viæ ejus judícia:
32:5 Deus fidélis, et absque ulla iniquitáte, justus et rectus. * Peccavérunt ei, et non fílii ejus in sórdibus:
32:6 Generátio prava atque pervérsa. * Hǽccine reddis Dómino, pópule stulte et insípiens?
32:7 Numquid non ipse est pater tuus, * qui possédit te, et fecit, et creávit te?

[1962 divisio point]
32:8 Meménto diérum antiquórum, * cógita generatiónes síngulas:
32:9 Intérroga patrem tuum, et annuntiábit tibi: * majóres tuos, et dicent tibi.
32:10 Quando dividébat Altíssimus gentes: * quando separábat fílios Adam.
32:11 Constítuit términos populórum * juxta númerum filiórum Israël.
32:12 Pars autem Dómini, pópulus ejus: * Jacob funículus hereditátis ejus.
32:13 Invénit eum in terra desérta, * in loco horróris et vastæ solitúdinis:
32:14 Circumdúxit eum, et dócuit: * et custodívit quasi pupíllam óculi sui.
32:15 Sicut áquila próvocans ad volándum pullos suos, * et super eos vólitans,
32:16 Expándit alas suas, et assúmpsit eum, * atque portávit in húmeris suis.
32:17 Dóminus solus dux ejus fuit: * et non erat cum eo deus aliénus.
32:18 Constítuit eum super excélsam terram: * ut coméderet fructus agrórum,
32:19 Ut súgeret mel de petra, * oleúmque de saxo duríssimo.
32:20 Butýrum de arménto, et lac de óvibus * cum ádipe agnórum, et aríetum filiórum Basan:
32:21 Et hircos cum medúlla trítici, * et sánguinem uvæ bíberet meracíssimum.
32:22 Incrassátus est diléctus, et recalcitrávit: * incrassátus, impinguátus, dilatátus,
32:23 Derelíquit Deum, factórem suum, * et recéssit a Deo, salutári suo.
32:24 Provocavérunt eum in diis aliénis, * et in abominatiónibus ad iracúndiam concitavérunt.
32:25 Immolavérunt dæmóniis, et non Deo, * diis, quos ignorábant:
32:26 Novi recentésque venérunt, * quos non coluérunt patres eórum.
32:27 Deum qui te génuit dereliquísti, * et oblítus es Dómini, creatóris tui.
[1962 endpoint]
32:28 Vidit Dóminus, et ad iracúndiam concitátus est: * quia provocavérunt eum fílii sui et fíliæ.
32:29 Et ait: Abscóndam fáciem meam ab eis, * et considerábo novíssima eórum:
32:30 Generátio enim pervérsa est, * et infidéles fílii.
32:31 Ipsi me provocavérunt in eo, qui non erat Deus, * et irritavérunt in vanitátibus suis:

[traditional divisio point]
32:32 Et ego provocábo eos in eo, qui non est pópulus, * et in gente stulta irritábo illos.
32:33 Ignis succénsus est in furóre meo, * et ardébit usque ad inférni novíssima:
32:34 Devorabítque terram cum gérmine suo, * et móntium fundaménta combúret.
32:35 Congregábo super eos mala, * et sagíttas meas complébo in eis.
32:36 Consuméntur fame, * et devorábunt eos aves morsu amaríssimo:
32:37 Dentes bestiárum immíttam in eos, * cum furóre trahéntium super terram, atque serpéntium.
32:38 Foris vastábit eos gládius, et intus pavor, * júvenem simul ac vírginem, lactántem cum hómine sene.
32:39 Dixi: Ubinam sunt? * cessáre fáciam ex homínibus memóriam eórum.
32:40 Sed propter iram inimicórum dístuli: * ne forte superbírent hostes eórum,
32:41 Et dícerent: Manus nostra excélsa, et non Dóminus, * fecit hæc ómnia.
32:42 Gens absque consílio est, et sine prudéntia. * Utinam sáperent, et intellégerent, ac novíssima providérent.
32:43 Quómodo persequátur unus mille, * et duo fugent decem míllia?
32:44 Nonne ídeo, quia Deus suus véndidit eos, * et Dóminus conclúsit illos?
32:45 Non enim est Deus noster ut dii eórum: * et inimíci nostri sunt júdices.
32:46 De vínea Sodomórum vínea eórum, * et de suburbánis Gomórrhæ:
32:47 Uva eórum uva fellis, * et botri amaríssimi.
32:48 Fel dracónum vinum eórum, * et venénum áspidum insanábile.
32:49 Nonne hæc cóndita sunt apud me, * et signáta in thesáuris meis?
32:50 Mea est últio, et ego retríbuam in témpore, * ut labátur pes eórum:
32:51 Juxta est dies perditiónis, * et adésse festínant témpora.
32:52 Judicábit Dóminus pópulum suum, * et in servis suis miserébitur:
32:53 Vidébit quod infirmáta sit manus, * et clausi quoque defecérunt, residuíque consúmpti sunt.
32:54 Et dicet: Ubi sunt dii eórum, * in quibus habébant fidúciam?
32:55 De quorum víctimis comedébant ádipes, * et bibébant vinum libáminum:
32:56 Surgant, et opituléntur vobis, * et in necessitáte vos prótegant.
32:57 Vidéte quod ego sim solus, * et non sit álius Deus præter me:
32:58 Ego occídam, et ego vívere fáciam: percútiam, et ego sanábo, * et non est qui de manu mea possit erúere.
32:59 Levábo ad cælum manum meam, et dicam: * Vivo ego in ætérnum.
32:60 Si acúero ut fulgur gládium meum, * et arripúerit judícium manus mea:
32:61 Reddam ultiónem hóstibus meis, * et his qui odérunt me retríbuam.
32:62 Inebriábo sagíttas meas sánguine, * et gládius meus devorábit carnes,
32:63 De cruóre occisórum, * et de captivitáte, nudáti inimicórum cápitis.
32:64 Laudáte, gentes, pópulum ejus, * quia sánguinem servórum suórum ulciscétur:
32:65 Et vindíctam retríbuet in hostes eórum, * et propítius erit terræ pópuli sui.

6Canticle of Moses
32:1 Hear, O ye heavens, the things I speak, * let the earth give ear to the words of my mouth.
32:2 Let my doctrine gather as the rain, * let my speech distill as the dew,
32:3 As a shower upon the herb, and as drops upon the grass. * Because I will invoke the name of the Lord:
32:4 Give ye magnificence to our God. * The works of God are perfect, and all his ways are judgments:
32:5 God is faithful and without any iniquity, he is just and right. * They have sinned against him, and are none of his children in their filth:
32:6 They are a wicked and perverse generation. * Is this the return thou makest to the Lord, O foolish and senseless people?
32:7 Is not he thy father, * that hath possessed thee, and made thee, and created thee?
[1962 divisio]
32:8 Remember the days of old, * think upon every generation:
32:9 Ask thy father, and he will declare to thee: * thy elders and they will tell thee.
32:10 When the Most High divided the nations: * when he separated the sons of Adam,
32:11 He appointed the bounds of people * according to the number of the children of Israel.
32:12 But the Lord’s portion is his people: * Jacob the lot of his inheritance.
32:13 He found him in a desert land, * in a place of horror, and of vast wilderness:
32:14 He led him about, and taught him: * and he kept him as the apple of his eye.
32:15 As the eagle enticing her young to fly, * and hovering over them,
32:16 He spread his wings, and hath taken him * and carried him on his shoulders.
32:17 The Lord alone was his leader: * and there was no strange god with him.
32:18 He set him upon high land: * that he might eat the fruits of the fields,
32:19 That he might suck honey out of the rock, * and oil out of the hardest stone,
32:20 Butter of the herd, and milk of the sheep * with the fat of lambs, and of the rams of the breed of Basan:
32:21 And goats with the marrow of wheat, * and might drink the purest blood of the grape.
32:22 The beloved grew fat, and kicked: * he grew fat, and thick and gross,
32:23 He forsook God who made him, * and departed from God his saviour.
32:24 They provoked him by strange gods, * and stirred him up to anger, with their abominations.
32:25 They sacrificed to devils and not to God: * to gods whom they knew not:
32:26 That were newly come up, * whom their fathers worshipped not.
32:27 Thou hast forsaken the God that beget * and hast forgotten the Lord that created thee.
[1962 end]
32:28 The Lord saw, and was moved to wrath: * because his own sons and daughters provoked him.
[divisio]
32:29 And he said: I will hide my face from them, * and will consider what their last end shall be:
32:30 For it is a perverse generation, * and unfaithful children.
32:31 They have provoked me with that which was no god, * and have angered me with their vanities:
32:32 And I will provoke them with that which is no people, * and will vex them with a foolish nation.
32:33 A fire is kindled in my wrath, * and shall burn even to the lowest hell:
32:34 And shall devour the earth with her increase, * and shall burn the foundations of the mountains.
32:35 I will heap evils upon them, * and will spend my arrows among them.
32:36 They shall be consumed with famine, * and birds shall devour them with a most bitter bite:
32:37 I will send the teeth of beasts upon them, * with the fury of creatures that trail upon the ground, and of serpents.
32:38 Without, the sword shall lay them waste, and terror within, * both the young man and the virgin, the sucking child with the man in years.
32:39 I said: Where are they? * I will make the memory of them to cease from among men.
32:40 But for the wrath of the enemies * I have deferred it: lest perhaps their enemies might be proud,
32:41 And should say: Our mighty hand, and not the Lord, * hath done all these things.
32:42 They are a nation without counsel, and without wisdom * O that they would be wise and would understand, and would provide for their last end.
32:43 How should one pursue after a thousand, * and two chase ten thousand?
32:44 Was it not, because their God had sold them, * and the Lord had shut them up?
32:45 For our God is not as their gods: * our enemies themselves are judges.
32:46 Their vines are of the vineyard of Sodom, * and of the suburbs of Gomorrha:
32:47 Their grapes are grapes of gall, * and their clusters most bitter.
32:48 Their wine is the gall of dragons, * and the venom of asps, which is incurable.
32:49 Are not these things stored up with me, * and sealed up in my treasures?
32:50 Revenge is mine, and I will repay them in due time, * that their foot may slide:
32:51 The day of destruction is at hand, * and the time makes haste to come.
32:52 The Lord will judge his people, * and will have mercy on his servants:
32:53 He shall see that their hand is weakened, * and that they who were shut up have also failed, and they that remained are consumed.
32:54 And he shall say: Where are their gods, * in whom they trusted?
32:55 Of whose victims they ate the fat, * and drank the wine of their drink offerings:
32:56 Let them arise and help you, * and protect you in your distress.
32:57 See ye that I alone am, * and there is no other God besides me:
32:58 I will kill and I will make to live: I will strike, and I will heal, * and there is none that can deliver out of my hand.
32:59 I will lift up my hand to heaven, * and I will say: I live for ever.
32:60 If I shall whet my sword as the lightning, * and my hand take hold on judgment:
32:61 I will render vengeance to my enemies, * and repay them that hate me.
32:62 I will make my arrows drunk with blood, * and my sword shall devour flesh,
32:63 Of the blood of the slain * and of the captivity, of the bare head of the enemies.
32:64 Praise his people, ye nations, * for he will revenge the blood of his servants:
32:65 And will render vengeance to their enemies, * and he will be merciful to the land of his people.



Friday, August 17, 2012

Psalm 91: our anti-Jewish roots?!



In my commentary on the other Psalm of Friday Lauds in the traditional Benedictine Office, Psalm 75 (76), I suggested that its selection reflected its clear allusion to the events of Good Friday, particularly the reference to the earthquake that occurred at the hour of Our Lord's death on the Cross.

I have to say though that for a long time I was fairly puzzled about the reasons for the inclusion of Psalm 91(92) on Friday.  It certainly contains allusions to the Crucifixion, but overall it is a rather joyous hymn; indeed its title suggests that in the Jewish tradition it was said on the sabbath (ie Saturday), and indeed the Old Roman Office retained that position for it.

Christ's sacrifice replaces those of the Temple

Eminent Orthodox scholar Patrick Reardon, in his book Christ in the Psalms, however, has provided an elegant and plausible solution to this puzzle, for he notes that as well as the Sabbath, Jewish commentaries state that it was sung daily as an accompaniment to the daily morning sacrifice of a lamb.  Reardon, accordingly, sees the shift of the psalm to Friday Lauds as a testimony to the idea that Friday is "our true the true Pascha and Atonement Day, on which the Lamb of God took away the sins of the world."

He sees Psalm 91 as a reminder that the Old Covenant, which merely foreshadowed what was to come, has ended, and the New has replaced it:

"Prayed on Friday mornings, as the ancient Western monastic rule prescribed, this psalm reminds the Church why it is no longer necessary to make the daily offering of lambs in the temple, for those sacrifices had only "a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things" (Heb. 10:1). With respect to those quotidian lambs offered of old, we are told that "every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins" (10:11). But, with respect to the Lamb in the midst of the Throne, we are told that "this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God . . . For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified" (10:12-14). This is the true Lamb to whom we chant: "You are worthy to take the scroll, / And to open its seals; / For You were slain, / And have redeemed us to God by Your blood" (Rev. 5:9)." (p181)

St Benedict on the Old Covenant

Is it plausible that St Benedict was aware of the Jewish tradition?   Sociologist Rodney Stark has drawn attention, in a number of his books on the early Church, on the close relationship and competition between Jewish and Christian communities in the early Church.  Certainly there is a large volume of Patristic literature which St Benedict would have had access to, directed against the Jews that is plausibly explained by the problem of relapsing/Judaizing Christians.  And there was also a lot of other material on Jewish culture available at the time: Cassiodorus attests, for example, that Josephus' Antiquities for example was available in Latin at this time.   The idea that St Benedict would deliberately shift this psalm out of Saturday as something of a statement on the Old Covenant is also supported, I think, by two other instances in the design of his Office where I think St Benedict may be having a subtle poke at the Jews.    One instance concerns Psalm 118, which the traditional Roman Office gets through in a day, but St Benedict spreads over Sunday and Monday. St Benedict ends Sunday, the eighth day's, segments of the psalm with the psalmist claiming to have outshone his teachers and those of old in his understanding.

The second case also has to do with the Sunday Office: on Sundays he sets Psalm 117 at Lauds and ends Vespers with Psalm 112.  These are the last and first respectively of the Hallel psalms, songs of praise used on Jewish festivals.  A kind of coded allusion to the promise of their eventual conversion in that the first shall be last and the last first?

The scandal of the Cross  

In any case, if the overall theme of the day is Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross, in this psalm, I think we are called on to contemplate the deep mystery of God’s plan (vs 5). The fool, the psalmist states in verse 6, fails to understand: to him, St Paul points out, the Cross is a scandal.   Yet the Cross enables all of us to be reconciled to God through Christ. Indeed, the Fathers interpreted verse 10, talking about the exaltation of the horn of the unicorn, as a direct reference to Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection. Horned animals were sacrificed to God, as Our Lord became the Lamb of God on the Cross.

St Benedict's overall take on Good Friday though, is a relatively upbeat one, I think, focused on the promise of the Resurrection rather than dwelling unduly on the Cross.

And if his move of this psalm from the Jewish Sabbath to Friday is something of a statement, it is one with a note of hope in it as well, for St Benedict was surely aware that St Paul (Rom 11:33) quotes verse 6 of the psalm immediately after his prophesy of the ultimate reconciliation of the Jewish people to Christ.

Psalm 91

Psalm 91 (92): Bonum est confiteri Dominum

Vulgate
Douay-Rheims
Psalmus cantici, in die sabbati.
A psalm of a canticle on the sabbath day.
1 Bonum est confitéri dómino: * et psállere nómini tuo, altíssime.
It is good to give praise to the Lord: and to sing to your name, O most High.
2  Ad annuntiándum mane misericórdiam tuam: * et veritátem tuam per noctem
3 To show forth your mercy in the morning, and your truth in the night:
3  In decachórdo, psaltério: * cum cántico, in cíthara.
4 Upon an instrument of ten strings, upon the psaltery: with a canticle upon the harp.
4. Quia delectásti me, Dómine, in factúra tua: * et in opéribus mánuum tuárum exsultábo.
5 For you have given me, O Lord, a delight in your doings: and in the works of your hands I shall rejoice.
5  Quam magnificáta sunt ópera tua, Dómine! * nimis profúndæ factæ sunt cogitatiónes tuæ
6 O Lord, how great are your works! your thoughts are exceeding deep.
6  Vir insípiens non cognóscet: * et stultus non intélliget hæc.
7 The senseless man shall not know: nor will the fool understand these things.
7  Cum exórti fúerint peccatóres sicut fœnum: * et apparúerint omnes, qui operántur iniquitátem.
8 When the wicked shall spring up as grass: and all the workers of iniquity shall appear:
8  Ut intéreant in sæculum sæculi: * tu autem Altíssimus in ætérnum, Dómine.
That they may perish for ever and ever: 9 But you, O Lord, are most high for evermore.
9  Quóniam ecce inimíci tui, Dómine, quóniam ecce inimíci tui períbunt: * et dispergéntur omnes, qui operántur iniquitátem.
10 For behold your enemies, O lord, for behold your enemies shall perish: and all the workers of iniquity shall be scattered.
10. Et exaltábitur sicut unicórnis cornu meum: * et senéctus mea in misericórdia úberi.
11 But my horn shall be exalted like that of the unicorn: and my old age in plentiful mercy.
11  Et despéxit óculus meus inimícos meos: * et in insurgéntibus in me malignántibus áudiet auris mea.
12 My eye also has looked down upon my enemies: and my ear shall hear of the downfall of the malignant that rise up against me.
12  Justus, ut palma florébit: * sicut cedrus Líbani multiplicábitur.
13 The just shall flourish like the palm tree: he shall grow up like the cedar of Libanus.
13  Plantáti in domo Dómini, *  in átriis domus Dei nostri florébunt.
14 They that are planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of the house of our God.
14  Adhuc multiplicabúntur in senécta úberi: * et bene patiéntes erunt,  ut annúntient:
15 They shall still increase in a fruitful old age: and shall be well treated, 16 that they may show, 
15  Quóniam rectus Dóminus, Deus noster: * et non est iníquitas in eo.
That the Lord our God is righteous, and there is no iniquity in him.

Thursday, August 16, 2012

Introduction to Psalm 89: The humanity and divinity of Christ


William Blake:
Moses and the Brazen Serpent

In my notes on Psalm 87, the other psalm of Thursday at Lauds, I suggested that Thursday represents the start of a mini-Triduum in the Office, and that darkest of psalms alludes to Christ’s dark moments at Gethsemane as he contemplated his coming Passion.

The connection of this second psalm of Lauds, Psalm 89, which St Benedict took over from the old Roman Office for the day, to the mini-Triduum idea, however is rather less obvious to me at least on the face of it.

Yet this psalm is also assigned to Tenebrae on Maundy Thursday, which suggests that there surely is a thematic link! Accordingly, I’ll sketch out the possibilities that I see here…

A response to Psalm 87?

In the context of the Benedictine Office the first point to note is that it provides something of a response to the unresolved ending of Psalm 87 that precedes it.

Psalm 87 is a prayer of unrelieved gloom on the part of a man about to die, perhaps a prayer from the humanity of Christ, eventually resolved after the agony of Gethsemane. This psalm, by contrast points first to the divinity of Christ, reminding us that: “Before the mountains were made, or the earth and the world was formed; from eternity and to eternity you are God.” (v2) Thus, we are reminded of the two natures of Christ, so critical to the events to come.

Secondly, the next verse, at least in the Septuagint/Vulgate version, is a plea to God not to abandon man: Turn not man away to be brought low (v3), thus fits neatly indeed with the Gethsemane theme (note however that the Hebrew Masoretic Text version, followed by the Monastic Diurnal in this case, actually turns this verse around saying ‘Thou turnest man again to dust’).

Certainly the Fathers saw the  plea for God to have pity and convert men, and v.15’s ‘Return, O Lord, how long? And be entreated in favour of your servants’, and the discussion on the shortness of man’s life, in verses 6-11, as allusions to the consequences of Adam’s sin: we too would be immortal but for it.

The consequences of Original Sin

Thirdly, perhaps one can also take the discussion on the shortness of man’s life in contrast to the eternity of God (vv 2, 4&5) as part of a kind of dialogue between the human and divine natures of the Saviour, pointing to the shortness of Christ’s life on earth, a time that he was obviously reluctant to cut short, the divine plan notwithstanding.  Some of the commentaries also interpret these verses as the prayer of a man facing death wondering whether he has made a real difference, again nicely linking to the Gethsemane theme.

Fourthly, one could perhaps see the psalm as recapitulating the purpose of the Passion and Resurrection, for there is a progression in what the psalmist is asking for here: first for God to relent in his punishment of mankind (v3-12); secondly, to reveal his power and teach us wisdom (v14); and finally to fill his people with grace and blessings (v14-17).

A song of Moses

Finally, Psalm 89 is the only psalm attributed to Moses in the psalter, and he is also the author of the (ferial) canticle that St Benedict set for the day. Perhaps the allusion is to Moses himself, who stands in a sense at the crossover point between the Old and New Testaments.

Some interpret this psalm as having been written at the end of Moses’ life, gazing into the Promised Land, yet not allowed to enter it himself, and begging for God to have mercy on the remnant that still survived of those who came out of Egypt. Thus Moses stands on our behalf, begging Christ to save us through his Passion.

Psalm 89

Oratio Moysi, hominis Dei.
Domine, refugium factus es nobis a generatione in generationem.
2 Priusquam montes fierent, aut formaretur terra et orbis, a sæculo et usque in sæculum tu es, Deus.
3 Ne avertas hominem in humilitatem : et dixisti : Convertimini, filii hominum.
4 Quoniam mille anni ante oculos tuos tamquam dies hesterna quæ præteriit: et custodia in nocte
5 quæ pro nihilo habentur, eorum anni erunt.
6 Mane sicut herba transeat; mane floreat, et transeat; vespere decidat, induret, et arescat.
7 Quia defecimus in ira tua, et in furore tuo turbati sumus.
8 Posuisti iniquitates nostras in conspectu tuo; sæculum nostrum in illuminatione vultus tui.
9 Quoniam omnes dies nostri defecerunt, et in ira tua defecimus. Anni nostri sicut aranea meditabuntur; 10 dies annorum nostrorum in ipsis septuaginta anni. Si autem in potentatibus octoginta anni, et amplius eorum labor et dolor; quoniam supervenit mansuetudo, et corripiemur.
11 Quis novit potestatem iræ tuæ, et præ timore tuo iram tuam
12 dinumerare? Dexteram tuam sic notam fac, et eruditos corde in sapientia.
13 Convertere, Domine; usquequo? et deprecabilis esto super servos tuos.
14 Repleti sumus mane misericordia tua; et exsultavimus, et delectati sumus omnibus diebus nostris.
15 Lætati sumus pro diebus quibus nos humiliasti; annis quibus vidimus mala.
16 Respice in servos tuos et in opera tua, et dirige filios eorum.
17 Et sit splendor Domini Dei nostri super nos, et opera manuum nostrarum dirige super nos, et opus manuum nostrarum dirige.

A prayer of Moses the man of God.
Lord, you have been our refuge from generation to generation.
2 Before the mountains were made, or the earth and the world was formed; from eternity and to eternity you are God.
3 Turn not man away to be brought low: and you have said: Be converted, O you sons of men.
4 For a thousand years in your sight are as yesterday, which is past. And as a watch in the night, 5 things that are counted nothing, shall their years be.
6 In the morning man shall grow up like grass; in the morning he shall flourish and pass away: in the evening he shall fall, grow dry, and wither.
7 For in your wrath we have fainted away: and are troubled in your indignation.
8 You have set our iniquities before your eyes: our life in the light of your countenance.
9 For all our days are spent; and in your wrath we have fainted away. Our years shall be considered as a spider:
10 The days of our years in them are threescore and ten years. But if in the strong they be fourscore years: and what is more of them is labour and sorrow. For mildness has come upon us: and we shall be corrected.
11 Who knows the power of your anger, and for your fear
12 can number your wrath? So make your right hand known: and men learned in heart, in wisdom. 13 Return, O Lord, how long? And be entreated in favour of your servants.
14 We are filled in the morning with your mercy: and we have rejoiced, and are delighted all our days. 15 We have rejoiced for the days in which you have humbled us: for the years in which we have seen evils.
16 Look upon your servants and upon their works: and direct their children.
17 And let the brightness of the Lord our God be upon us: and direct the works of our hands over us; yea, the work of our hands do you direct.

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Psalm 92: The organic development of the Office?



Since today is the feast of the Assumption, I thought I’d interrupt my consideration of St Benedict’s weekly psalm cycle and focus instead on one of the festal psalms of the day, Psalm 92.

It also provides an opportunity to reflect a little on what constitutes legitimate liturgical development and what doesn’t!

The Benedictine Office and feasts

St Benedict’s Rule prescribes that on the feasts of saints and festivals, the Office should be performed as on Sundays (so three Nocturns at matins for example) except that the psalms of the particular day are to be said.

Somewhere along the way, the Benedictine Office instead adopted the practice of using the actual Sunday psalms, at Lauds and Vespers, and special sets of psalms at Matins instead. Moreover, the ‘Sunday’ psalms used at Lauds on major feasts are not the standard Sunday psalms of the Benedictine Office (Psalms 117&62), but rather those of the Roman Office, Psalms 92 &99.

This elaboration of the liturgy was not, of course, restricted to the Benedictines: as time went on the Church sought to give greater honour to God and his saints in many ways, including through the liturgy.

And just as the traditional version of the Mass has what Catherine Pickstock in After Writing calls liturgical stuttering - stops and restarts, circling and around and returns to things, repetitions that do not flow in a neatly linear way - so too our weekly cycle of worship is interrupted by the injection of feasts. Perhaps they serve in part as a reminder that God stands outside time and space, and can jolt us, just a little, out of our time bound, linear logical conceptions of Him?

The Kingship of God

Certainly Psalm 92 draws our attention to the eternality of God and his Christ: “My throne is prepared from of old: you are from everlasting” (v3).

In the context of Our Lady’s Assumption into heaven though, it is perhaps the stress on the kingship of God that is most relevant for us to focus on today: Psalm 92 is actually the first of a group of psalms (to Psalm 99) that proclaims the kingship of God, and looks forward to the establishment of his dominion over the earth.

Opinions differ on its age, and whether the Septuagint/Vulgate ascription to David should be accepted or not, but the current consensus seems to be that because of the style of its language, it is in fact fairly ancient, from the early period of the monarchy.

St Benedict himself gave this psalm no special prominence, taking it out of Sunday Lauds and consigning it instead to Friday Matins. Its return to the Benedictine Office in the form of festal Lauds and Sunday Lauds during Christmas and Eastertide perhaps suggests that this one change he made to the Office that did not entirely stand the test of time, but rather proved to be inorganic!

Still this in itself tells us something about what is and isn’t legitimate change to the liturgy. St Benedict certainly reshaped his Office quite substantially, importing elements from other rites (such as hymns from the Ambrosian) and adjusting which psalms were said when.

All the same, it survived in its essentials for over a millennium in part surely because he respected things such as the existing tradition about which psalms were said in the morning, which in the evening.  And in giving his Office a more thematic approach than that the Old Roman Office he took as his template, he did not attempt to impose a simple linear, logical progression of ideas and events, but rather allowed his Office to move back and forwards between ideas, providing a meditation for us rather than a logically sequenced piece of closely argued theology.

St Benedict’s approach to creating a distinctively Benedictine Office - one that for centuries shaped a distinctively Benedictine spirituality -  provides no justification whatsoever, I would suggest, despite the claims to the contrary, for the decidedly inorganic revisions of the Divine Office adopted by most modern Benedictine monasteries.

Our Lady pray for us.

Psalm 92

Dóminus regnávit, decórem indútus est: * indútus est Dóminus fortitúdinem, et præcínxit se.
2 Etenim firmávit orbem terræ, * qui non commovébitur.
3 Paráta sedes tua ex tunc: * a sæculo tu es.
4 Elevavérunt flúmina, Dómine: * elevavérunt flúmina vocem suam.
5 Elevavérunt flúmina fluctus suos, * a vócibus aquárum multárum.
6 Mirábiles elatiónes maris: * mirábilis in altis Dóminus.
7 Testimónia tua credibília facta sunt nimis: * domum tuam decet sanctitúdo, Dómine, in longitúdinem diérum.

The Lord has reigned, he is clothed with beauty: the Lord is clothed with strength, and has girded himself.
For he has established the world which shall not be moved.
2 My throne is prepared from of old: you are from everlasting.
3 The floods have lifted up, O Lord: the floods have lifted up their voice.
The floods have lifted up their waves, 4 with the noise of many waters.
Wonderful are the surges of the sea: wonderful is the Lord on high.
5 Your testimonies have become exceedingly credible: holiness becomes your house, O Lord, unto length of days.

Tuesday, August 14, 2012

Psalm 42: Are we truly ready to enter the Temple?


Tuesday in the Benedictine Office, I suggested in a previous post, focuses on the earthly ministry of Christ, starting with his statement that he himself is the Temple.

The use of Psalm 42 for Lauds on Tuesday was something St Benedict carried over from the old Roman Office, but it certainly fits very neatly indeed with the thematic approach to the Office I am arguing that the saint adopted.

The temptation in the desert

On Monday, I suggested, the Office focuses on Christ’s life from the Incarnation to his baptism.

St Augustine suggested that this psalm is being sung by one cast down by a fast, while the unjust and deceitful man of verse 2 is identified with the devil by Cassiodorus. Accordingly, the opening verses could be seen as an allusion to Our Lord’s forty days in the desert, and temptation by the devil.

Our spiritual progress?

The key feature of the psalm though, is the sense of a gradual progression.  After that downcast opening we reach, in verse 3, the holy hill (Jerusalem); then the tabernacle, or dwelling place of God; and finally, the psalmist prepares to go into the altar (v4).

Could this progress perhaps be taken as suggesting our progression in the spiritual life as we imitate Christ and gradually absorb his teaching?  For, I would suggest, just as Christ taught the Apostles and prepared them for their ministry over those three years of his earthly ministry, so too, he prepares us.

Christ's earthly ministry as a preparation

We are most familiar with this psalm, of course, in the context of the prayers at the foot of the altar in the traditional form of the Mass, where they become a dialogue between server and priest.

Western piety has also often seen verse 4 as a particularly appropriate prayer as preparation for communion, where our bodies become the altar in which Christ’s sacrifice is received.

But in the psalm itself the speaker does not actually enter: this is the prayer of those and for those whose fervour has been rekindled, but who are still agitated, still not fully there yet, as verse 5 makes clear.

This is the prayer of those still waiting in hope for God to send out ‘his light and his truth’ to save us (verse 6 and 3).

It is a prayer of and for the Apostles who have yet to be ordained and yet to be given the graces necessary to stand the assaults to come; a prayer for the grace necessary to make the spiritual ascent to heaven.

Psalm 42 (43)   A psalm for David.

Judge me, O God, and distinguish my cause from the nation that is not holy: deliver me from the unjust and deceitful man.
2 For you are God my strength: why have you cast me off? And why do I go sorrowful whilst the enemy afflicts me?
3 Send forth your light and your truth: they have conducted me, and brought me unto your holy hill, and into your tabernacles.
4 And I will go in to the altar of God: to God who gives joy to my youth.
5 To you, O God my God, I will give praise upon the harp: why are you sad, O my soul? And why do you disquiet me?
6 Hope in God, for I will still give praise to him: the salvation of my countenance, and my God.

Psalmus David.
Judica me, Deus, et discerne causam meam de gente non sancta : ab homine iniquo et doloso erue me.
2 Quia tu es, Deus, fortitudo mea : quare me repulisti? et quare tristis incedo, dum affligit me inimicus? 3 Emitte lucem tuam et veritatem tuam : ipsa me deduxerunt, et adduxerunt in montem sanctum tuum, et in tabernacula tua.
4 Et introibo ad altare Dei, ad Deum qui lætificat juventutem meam.
5 Confitebor tibi in cithara, Deus, Deus meus. Quare tristis es, anima mea? et quare conturbas me?
6 Spera in Deo, quoniam adhuc confitebor illi, salutare vultus mei, et Deus meus.