Psalms

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Psalm 146

Alleluia!

My soul, give praise to the Lord;
I will praise the Lord all my days,
make music to my God while I live.

Put no trust in princes,
in mortal men in whom there is no help.
Take their breath, they return to clay
and their plans that come to nothing.

He is happy who is helped by Jacob’s God,
whose hope is in the Lord his God,
who alone made heaven and earth,
the seas and all they contain.

It is he who keeps faith for ever,
who is just to those who are oppressed.
It is he who gives bread to the hungry,
the Lord, who sets prisoners free,

the Lord who gives sight to the blind,
who raises up those who are bowed down,
the Lord, who protects the stranger
and upholds the widow and orphan.

It is the Lord who loves the just
but thwarts the path of the wicked.
The Lord will reign for ever,
Sion’s God from age to age.

Alleluia!

Commentary

Five joyous psalms of praise, each of them beginning and ending with Halleluia, bring the Psalter to a close. They form the happy ending to the song book of the Lord, which made men search for truth and righteousness amid the darkness of this world, with its violence and evil, and helped them listen to the cries of distress and the prayers for vindication from the innocent who suffered at the hands of the wicked. Likewise it made us search the darkness of our own souls, and admit the sinfulness that was there, so that we too would cry out for deliverance. It showed us the weary journey to new life and hope that we had to take if we really wanted inner freedom, and warned us that we would suffer both from the scorn of the unbelievers and the doubts that arise so strongly from inside of ourselves.

The journey is completed now and, full of joy and happiness, safe from the onslaughts of the enemy, we can rest confident in our union with the Lord, and join the choirs of angels and saints in heaven, as well as the voices of all creation, in the everlasting praise of God, which will be our happy work for all eternity, where we shall rest from our labours but not from our praise. These psalms remind us of the promise that God would wipe away the tears from every cheek, when there would be no more death or sorrow or pain, for all the former things would have passed away, and paradise would be regained. There would remain only a redeemed people full of joy, celebrating the goodness of God in their continual praise (see Isaiah 25:6-10).

There have been other psalms which showed the sunshine side of our relationship with God, where the people laughed, sang, danced and clapped their hands in joyful praise and thanksgiving, but we always had to return to the weariness of the everyday struggles. It is only in the grand finale to the Psalter that we have an almost cloudless sky, and utter stillness in the earth, when the storms of life are over. These five psalms form a pentad of praise, a fitting finish to the five-part work of the Psalter which, according to ancient authorities, is a commentary on the Pentateuch, the five-part work of the Torah (the Law). The Midrash (commentary) on Psalm 1:1 says: “Moses gave to the Israelites the five Books of the Law; and corresponding with these David gave them the five Books of the Psalter.”

Alleluia!

My soul, give praise to the Lord;
I will praise the Lord all my days,
make music to my God while I live.

Put no trust in princes,
in mortal men in whom there is no help.
Take their breath, they return to clay
and their plans that come to nothing.

He is happy who is helped by Jacob’s God,
whose hope is in the Lord his God,
who alone made heaven and earth,
the seas and all they contain.

It is he who keeps faith for ever,
who is just to those who are oppressed.
It is he who gives bread to the hungry,
the Lord, who sets prisoners free,

the Lord who gives sight to the blind,
who raises up those who are bowed down,
the Lord, who protects the stranger
and upholds the widow and orphan.

It is the Lord who loves the just
but thwarts the path of the wicked.
The Lord will reign for ever,
Sion’s God from age to age.

Alleluia!
                                 (vv. 1-10).

This psalm opens with a general call to praise God in the Halleluia, which means “Praise ye the Lord”, but is quickly followed by the psalmist calling upon himself to enter fully into the general praise, and his intention is to do so all his life, not just on this one occasion. He has learned from the experiences of life not to put his trust in frail mortal man, no matter how important the person may be on the social scale. Once the breath of life is taken from the mighty even they return to the dust from which they came, and all their pomp and pageantry disappear like the morning mist. They are hardly buried before they are forgotten; this holds true for both paupers and potentates! God alone, our creator and redeemer, is everlasting. We can safely put our trust in Him, especially since he revealed His loving-kindness to us in redemption (vv. 1-6).

It is not without good reason that the negative warning about putting our trust in mortal man precedes the positive praise concerning our right trust in God. Only when man realizes the transitory nature of human supports will real trust in God become possible. As long as we have any other prospect of help we do not have unreserved confidence in God, but when all ephemeral support has been removed we are free to throw ourselves fully upon God’s infinite goodness, and discover for ourselves how great He is.

It is interesting that God is referred to here as “Jacob’s God”, and not the God of Abraham. Jacob is closer to most of us than the heroic Abraham. He was a man of guileful, grasping disposition, who lived an ordinary life of commonplace experience; a man who needed a real conversion in his life before God could use him. Yet he wrestled with God in prayer and was changed to “Israel”, the father of the Chosen People. The aspect of God that we feel most comfortable with is Our Lord, the One who is the covenant God, who entered into relationship with us disregarding our sinfulness, and who continuously finds a way out for us when we fall from grace. Our Lord also loves us so much that He is willing to work with us to transform our lives, as He did for our father, Jacob.

The rest of the psalm details some of the redemptive actions of our Lord and God, and justifies the earlier exhortation to trust in God. It provides an eloquent picture of how the Old Testament believer perceived the value of the divine loving-kindness on which he based his life. All the incidents prove the same point by showing that the efficacy of the divine help is seen most clearly in the very things where human help fails. All those whom society rejects will find their help, their hope and their healing in God – the oppressed, the hungry, the prisoners (with no judgement as to whether they are guilty or innocent), the blind, those who are bowed down, the stranger, the widow and the orphan. The princes of the earth may have no time for these poor suffering people, yet the king of the universe gives them His full time and attention; yet another example of how different God’s ways are from ours. Here the psalmist is saying that God’s power is made perfect in weakness (see 2 Corinthians 12:9). It is only
when we recognize our own weakness and powerlessness that we can open up to His working in us, which is inhibited by our self-sufficiency and independence. The poor person who trusts in God knows that he is completely safe, and need have no fear of the wicked, for God is on his side, and He is the ruler of the universe from everlasting to everlasting. The wicked pale into the insignificance which they really deserve, while the poor are given the confidence that they should really have (vv. 6-10).

The vision of God given in these verses not only applies to the Father, but equally to the Son, for Jesus claimed that “My Father goes on working, and so do I” (see John 5:17). The attributes of God illustrated here were demonstrated by Jesus in His life and healing ministry. The Father’s compassion toward the under-privileged and the down-trodden was shown in His giving sight to the blind, releasing captives, and supporting the widow and the orphan. When Jesus announced His ministry in Nazareth for the first time, His mission statement contained the same words. He said: “The spirit of the Lord has been given to me, for He has anointed me. He has sent me to bring good news to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives, and to the blind new sight, to set the down-trodden free, to proclaim the Lord’s year of favour” (see Isaiah 61:1-2, J.B.). The coming of the Son of God to earth in the incarnation was to release the power of God into all those situations that needed redemption.

Reading this psalm in its New Testament perspective we can say that God has remained faithful to His people beyond their greatest expectations (see Ephesians 3:21), for He continues, throughout every generation, to give justice to those who are denied it. He continues to feed the hungry, whether the hunger is spiritual or temporal (see Matthew 5:6). He releases the spiritual and temporal captives, and gives healing to both the spiritually and materially blind. He cares for the widows and orphans of every age, and takes care of His friends. He did this in its most spectacular way through Jesus, His Son, but continues to do it through the mystical body of Christ throughout the world. The Church can be seen to be the true body of Christ when it continues His mission to the poor and the needy of this world.

Let us join the psalmist in his praise for all eternity, and for the same motives: that of glorifying and praising God for His goodness to us, His undeserving children.

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