The Bible TI251 Fall 2020

The psalms were written by King David and his contemporaries throughout Israel as God continues to interact with the ancient Judean people. They are constructed with meter to be sung and chanted, and they are written with poetic form. Many are incredibly prophetic of the New Testament, others are great repetitive prayers, and some were written with praise of God as its purpose. Psalm 50 in the Septuagint is of particular importance to the Orthodox Church as it is the only psalm which is recited in its entirety during the Divine Liturgy. It is recited by the priest during the Cherubic Hymn as he prepares for the holy oblation, this is prior to the Epiclesis in which the priest blesses the gifts for them to become the body and blood of Christ. This psalm was written by David after his encounter with Bathsheba whom he had and affair with, he asks the lord for forgiveness repeatedly for the sake of repentance.

Psalm 137 stood out to me out of the other psalms we had to read for today’s class. Line 9 of psalm 137 is rather barbaric and cruel for a song in the Bible. The context of psalm 137 is the writer sings about the ones who plundered them mocking him to sing a song of their land. The song is very vengeful, the writer speaks about wanting to kill the children of his enemy and how it will be a joyous occasion.

The Melodians song, “Rivers of Babylon,” is an adaptation of psalm 137, and has a very different tone than reading the text without any music. The Melodians version has a somber and depressing tone to it while psalm 137 reads as a very aggressive and hateful passage. It’s ok for the Melodians to adapt and edit out parts of a psalm to make it their own, that’s part of their creative freedom.

In class today, we talked about the importance of music in the Bible in the book of Psalms, and we even listened to some songs by artists that used a few verses from certain Psalms. I have always known that this book of the Bible were actually songs, which has always made me wonder what they would have sounded like when they were originally written. It was interesting to listen to the songs that used a Psalm, while the band was also using their own style and really made this song their own. What is interesting and something that I have never thought about is whether this is their own interpretation of this Psalm, or have they taken complete possession over the song they made and just added a few verses from a Psalm? It is fascinating how U2 used these verses, which have always meant to be music but are written in a book as text, and combining them with their own style and genre of music.

Something else that I was brought to my attention was how books and texts are not as subject to change in interpretation as music can be. In music, you can use lyrics as a base and really apply any genre or style of music or variance of pitch you want. In books and other texts, there is one less dimension, lacking the ability to change the sound or pitch like music can. I have never thought of music in this way, but it now makes sense why music can be so powerful: because it has this extra dimension that can be subject to change.

I thought the reading for today was very interesting. As a non-religious person but someone who did grow up occasionally attending church, I never really thought about how much religion was a part of our American culture in a way much greater than just religion being an aspect of culture. The idea that the Bible is the best-selling book ever I thought was fascinating, especially compared to the fact that many Americans could not name the 4 gospels, the 10 commandments, or even the first book in the Bible. On the other hand, like we saw in class today, you have religion being portrayed constantly in popular culture like in song. I find it pretty interesting and quite powerful spreading the message in the Bible in different forms of culture and make it relatable, but I wonder if people who are very religious would disagree and why.

It is interesting how many psalms I have heard of before. I did not grow up reading psalms, but I am familiar with some of the lines in parts of different psalms. For example, Psalm 23 starts with “The Lord is my shepherd”. I have heard this line before although I cannot place where I heard it. It is interesting dissecting the psalms and looking for the deeper meanings behind them. When comparing translations, it is odd that there are so many different interpretations of the psalms.

I think it’s interesting that we don’t really know what the music of the Psalms sounded like. The research into ancient instruments reminds me of the excavation of the house that showed Israelites in Israel, something else I find interesting. I especially find it cool how there may be a back and forth in the rehearsal of the Psalms in ancient times. It’s be cool to know as it may reveal new meaning in the Psalms.

In regards to the question in class regarding music and if a “cover” is the same as the original, I think as long as there is a noticeable amount of deliberate change to the song then it is a different song.

I found the dive into pop culture interesting, as someone that likes to know random facts about pop culture these were nice additions to my repertoire. This is something I’d like to see in class more, but I understand the class agenda goes outside of pop culture.

“The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not want.” When I think of Psalms, The Divine Shepherd is the one that usually pops into my head. The reason for this goes all the way back to when I was in fourth grade Sunday School. Our teacher was an older man who promised to give any of us who memorized this Psalm a two dollar bill. Obviously all of us forth graders were to preoccupied with the idea of getting the bill to understand why he was incentivizing us to memorize this Psalm. This Psalm is one of the most popular Psalms, and one of the most important in my mind. It tells us the importance of God, and how God will always protect us and lead us in life. This is very different than the Psalm before it, Plea for Deliverance from Suffering and Hostility.  This Psalm is from the perspective of a person in suffering, and someone who is asking God for help. These two Psalms work well together to show God’s way, for in the end of Psalm 22, the suffering person thanks God for everything he has done. This leads into Psalm 23, which shows us God in all his might and how he will always lead us. These two Psalms show us the work of God. First, you suffer and you cry out for God to help, and he does. Because of this, you follow him because he is your shepherd and will always help you to find your way.

In class on Thursday, we talked about proverbs and the story of Job. God put forth awful things on Job’s life to prove to Satan that he will still worship and love him. We thought about how God and Satan were basically making bets with each other on Job, which feels weird to me, but I also think that it’s just to help get the message across and help tell the story. Dr. McGrath called it a “philosophical thought experiment” which I think describes it very well. In the end even with bad wisdom from his friends, Job chooses to continue to worship God. In class we questioned if good things only happen to good people and vise versa. Obviously we know from our everyday lives that this isn’t the case, but why? Why do bad things happen to good people? It is more complex than what we think. Personally, I think the story of Job is trying to convey that we might have to struggle a bit in order to prove ourselves to God.

I’m a part of the United Methodist Student Movement at Butler and Wednesday night when we met we talked about the first 5 chapters of Ecclesiastes just as we did in class. We assessed how it goes back and forth between suggesting life is meaningless to the stance that there is meaning in life. When you see the Bible saying that everything is meaningless whether the goal is to convey that everything is meaningless or not the message is not reassuring. I’m interested as my Methodist group dives more into it how our analysis compares to the mostly secular analysis we did in class. The poetic nature of Ecclesiastes is extra confusing when you’re trying to decipher the real goal of the scripture. The poetic nature does add an extra element of beauty to the writings, and it’s interesting to think of what the true meaning of this style is. There is really nothing that comes to my mind but I’m sure there have been twenty thesis papers about it.

We talked about the different proverbs in languages and then connected these to how Job was speaking about his troubles. Proverbs are little sayings that are based on observation rather than much knowledge of something. These usually connect with real life and have a deeper meaning. Some of these even remind me of little ‘life hacks.’ For example, honesty is the best policy, actions speak louder than words, and a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. It highlights an obvious action and offers the audience to learn from it to create a better community where they find themselves in society. I see this in the book of Job. He speaks of his tragedies in poetic form and is speaking to God in the questions that he poses, especially in the last verses of the book. However, these questions can be viewed from the reader as questions for themselves to answer. Specifically, in chapter 38:31-35, the questions point towards what you can do and ask impossible actions from a human. Then he answers by asking questions from chapter 38:36-38 about who can do these impossible actions. It is by that point that readers try and think of someone or something that could possibly do what is being posed. Which turns the reader to God; he can do all these things. This is where Christians find their hope and faith. They know who can form everything, so they believe in God with greater faith. The emphasis of the poetic verse gets the reader believing in God so that they will turn to him in troubled times. Therefore, the reader uses God as an answer to their questions in life. Like a proverb, in real life, people will experience hardship, and when they are posed to act, they turn to God to help them through their trials.