It's Already Week Two... Psalm down...

So... this week in OOTLE (I don't know if I ever clarified what that means.... Open Old Testament Learning Environment... now you know why I use #ootle15 in my Tweets and the label "ootle" in my blog posts) we went a'discoverin' in the Psalms. I'll break down a bit of what I learned from each portion of this week's work, and then will talk about a specific Psalm.

Lecture: From this week's lecture episodes (Psalms Part A, Psalms Part B), a couple of points that stood out to me include:

• Five Basic Types of Psalms (the Psalms themselves do not actually contain labels... rather, we simply see how Psalms can fit into these types); we see 
• Individual Complaint/Lament: these are from individual people asking for God's intercession
• Communal Complaint/Lament: like individual complaints or laments, but from a group rather than any one person
• Individual Thanksgiving: from an individual, thanking God for already intervening
• Communal Thanksgiving: again, like an individual Psalm of Thanksgiving, but from a group thanking God for prior intervention
• Hymn of Praise: these Psalms praise the nature of God as one who intervenes regularly
• The Psalms are written as Poetry
• Pseudepigrapha: the Psalms were written and then attributed to a revered figure in the past in order to be considered authoritative; the book of Daniel is an example of this
• Superscripts: these are the little "blurbs" at the start of a Psalm that set up the verses (On a cool side note: we were talking about Ash Wednesday in middle and high school youth group this week where I am the Director of Youth Ministries, and in reading a couple Psalms, I was able to share this new vocabulary word with my youth!)

Bandstra Reading: In this week's reading of Bandstra's Part 3: Writings, Prologue to the Writings (Part 3), I wrote down a few notes about the Writings that were interesting points to me:

• "Together the books of the Writings represent an important stage in the history of Israel and the development of its religion and society" (Bandstra 369).
• I am more and more realizing that the Tanak, specifically the writings, can be seen as a crucial part of the way that the nation of Israel was formed and functioned
• The individual books that are considered Writings drew upon the Torah (aka: 5 books of Moses, Pentateuch, Law) and the Prophets. Within the Writings, we often see quotes from earlier books, which is a way of remembering traditions or prophecies in order to either affirm God's faithfulness and/or call people to return to being faithful (Bandstra 370)

Edward Hirsch's "How to Read a Poem" Reading: In this reading ("How to Read a Poem"), I was reminded of my days of teaching high school English (which was my career for 6 years before becoming the Director of Youth Ministries) and trying to teach kids how to read poetry. I am wishing I had discovered this article sooner and could have used it to teach about poetry! Anyhow, there are several tips Hirsch gives regarding taking a stab at poetry; these tips work well with reading the Psalms, as the Psalms are poetry!

• Embrace Prior Assumptions: One of the most important things I urged my students to remember when reading literature and especially poetry is the fact that each reader of poetry or literature comes to the piece with a differing set of experiences, backgrounds, and lifestyles. 
• Read a Poem Aloud: This may take several tries!
• Decipher the Line: Working through the grammatical structure of a piece can be challenging, but is important to understanding the content of the poem
• Start a Conversation: Although the contents may be personal, answering questions raised, reshaping, and clarifying the meaning is important. 
• Talk Back to the Poem: Ask questions or authorship, situations, audience, tone, etc. to help better understanding
• Conquer the Context: Realizing and embracing the contexts of a poem will help the reader to relate to the poem 
• Embrace Ambiguity: Being okay with not understanding all parts of the poem's meaning on the first try will be helpful to the reader.  It may take several attempts at reading, or even an amount of time passing to gather experience and knowledge to finally make sense of a poem.

And now.... for the Main Event!  Let's talk about a Psalm! After all, it is Psalm Week (Disclaimer: this is nothing like Shark Week). In this section, I will take a look at Psalm 44 (CEB), and will answer the questions raised by Hirsch in his section called "Talking Back to the Poem":

• Who is the speaker? The speaker of this poem is a group of Korahites.
• What circumstances gave rise to the poem? The Korahites, a group of worshippers in the community of Israel, are lamenting, wondering where God is. They have recently been/felt defeated, as can be seen starting in verse 9.  
• What situation is presented? The situation, as I understand it, is that the Korahites have previously been successful in battle (with God's help), but now have been recently defeated and feel rejected and abandoned by God. 
• Who or what is the audience? The audience of this Psalm is God. The Korahites were disappointed with God. 
• What is the tone? The tone starts off in a way of praise. The Korahites praise God for their past victories, but then change to a tone of lament and disappointment in their recent defeat. 
• What form, if any, does the poem take? This Psalm does not take any specific grammatical form, but can be viewed as Praise - Lament. 
• How is form related to content? I do not believe that the form is related to content. 
• Is sound an important, active element of the poem? When reading this Psalm aloud, the letter sounds are not as important as the sound of anger (the tone) that is portrayed when hearing the words. 
• Does the poem spring from an identifiable historical moment? This poem does not spring from an identifiable historical moment, specifically, but rather is a response to a recent defeat of the people speaking. This historical moment can be transferred to any defeat -- personal, economic, in the workplace, etc. - of the people to read it at any time. 
• Does the poem speak from a specific culture? This Psalm speaks from the point of view of the Korahites, but is easily translatable to people of any culture. 
• Does the poem have its own vernacular? I do not believe this Psalm uses its own vernacular.  Instead, I feel that the language used is that which people of all stations of life can relate to. 
• Does the poem use imagery to achieve a particular effect? This Psalm uses imagery that creates real pictures for the reader. The images are that of real-life, relational situations: ie - sheep ready for slaughter, sheep to be butchered.  These images are some that people of the time the Psalm was written would understand and relate to. 
• What kind of figurative language, if any, does the poem use? One of the most apparent uses of figurative language in this Psalm is that of God sleeping or hiding from the people.  In verses 23 - 26, the people cry out "Wake up! Why are you sleeping, Lord? Get up! Don't reject us forever! Why are you hiding your face, forgetting our suffering and oppression? Look: we're going down to the dust; our stomachs are flat on the ground! Stand up! Help us! Save us for the sake of your faithful love." In these verses, we see the people lamenting, crying out for help and guidance through the use of figurative language about what God is doing (or not doing). 
• If the poem is a question, what is the answer? I don't believe this poem is a question, but rather asks the question "where the heck are you, God!?
• Does the poem use unusual words or use words in an unusual way? This poem does not use any especially unusual words, but rather uses words that are common to the people of the time it was written. 

Psalm 44 can be considered a Psalm of Lament, as the people are wondering why God has rejected and abandoned them. Despite this lament, the people praise God, giving thanks for all that God has already seen them through. The use of language is not done in a way that excludes readers from relating to and using this plea.  Rather, the language allows readers of all experiences and backgrounds to relate to the desperation in the plea of the people. 

Can you apply Hirsch's tips to other Psalms? 

T-OOTLE-oo!

Melissa