Commentary on Psalm 1

Psalm 1 is a wisdom psalm that serves as the preface to the Psalter, sharing literary and theological relationship with the Torah.¹

Torah—the first five books of the Hebrew Bible—is traditionally translated as the “law” but may be more accurately read as “instruction” or “guidance.” Torah is God’s guidance for God’s creation about how best to live both individually and communally. So it is fitting that the Psalms—this collection of praise—begin with some guidance about the possibilities of life. The author offers two ways, most often understood as the “good way” and the “wicked way.”

The good way

Psalm 1 begins with happiness. But this concept of happiness is commonly misunderstood in contemporary contexts. Our understandings of happiness are often warm, fuzzy, and without complication. In contrast, in Hebrew, “happy” is ‘ashre, which derives from the verb ‘shr, meaning “to go straight” or “to advance.”² Such an understanding of the emotion evoked by the psalmist suggests that following the instruction of God allows the individual to move forward, to develop, to grow in life.  The “good way” is not devoid of problems, anxieties, or heartache. However, this way in relationship with God grants us the freedom to evolve as human beings.

Further, the author suggests that the imperative for God’s faithful is to “delight in the instruction … and meditate [on it] day and night.” Historically, Christians have read this command as God’s requirement for blind obedience and acquiescence to God’s word. However, here, rather than “meditate,” the Hebrew word hgh can be translated as “to groan, utter, speak, or plot.”³

The spiritual practice outlined by Psalm 1 has commonly been read as a kind of silent, solitary practice of meditation. However, for this to be true of the author’s context, it would presume that the author’s audience had someone else tending to their basic needs for survival. Such readings create a classism around the text and around God. Very few people in the ancient world—or today—have the luxury of sitting in solitude with Torah all day.

However, reading hgh as “plotting, moaning, and speaking” suggests that rather than passive reception of God’s word, our call is to act meaningfully and intentionally toward God’s guidance. In this context, our relationship with torah, or instruction, should be to read, question, discuss, and engage the text in ways that impact our daily living. Meditation then becomes active participation in the world in ways that demonstrate God’s presence in the world.

The result of such nuanced reading of God’s instruction should be a reality in which we are not so easily moved and not devoid of spiritual life. Here, the author describes fruit-bearing trees with deep roots that have a constant water source. Ancient Israel was a largely agrarian society that understood prosperity in terms of agricultural production and weather.

Water is commonly understood as a biblical metaphor. In various texts (Psalm 32, 69, Lamentations 3), water is understood as a source of trouble visited upon human beings. In Exodus 14, water is a barrier to freedom that is removed by God for the Hebrews coming out of Egypt, before consuming God’s enemies—the army of Pharaoh. In Proverbs 18 and 20, water symbolizes depth and purpose for humanity. Here, water is a constant source of nourishment for the tree, which symbolizes humanity and life. It is important to note that the water never consumes or moves the tree, but instead enables the tree to establish roots and bear fruit.

The wicked way

In contrast to the stability established in Psalm 1:1–3, here the psalmist compares the wicked to chaff. Chaff is the unusable material separated from wheat during the threshing process. Again, the author uses the agricultural context of ancient Israel to establish a metaphor. Threshing floors were spaces often on the periphery of a community where farmers would create a circular space in which to gather recently harvested grain. Here they would beat the grain against the ground with a winnowing fork, and the light chaff would be carried away by the wind while the grain would fall to the ground and remain on the threshing floor. Thus, metaphorically, threshing floors often mark a point of transition for biblical characters who encounter them. They are spaces where people are separated from the chaff of their life.

In this text, the author establishes the wicked as those who are without substance or weightiness. They are the people from whom the primary “good group” should be separated. The author’s language is somewhat ambiguous about who constitutes the wicked. Wickedness is not defined in direct correlation with goodness. Thus, we should be careful to not define the wicked as those who have different theologies, opinions, or lifestyles than others.

Instead, the wicked “will not stand in the judgment … nor … in the congregation of the righteous” (verse 5). We might connect the depiction of the wicked in verse 5 with the author’s description in verse 1 of those who “sit in the seat of scoffers.”  Unlike the righteous who are advancing, the wicked are stagnant. They are the ones with no opinion, no belief, nothing for which they are willing to live, grow, evolve, or fight. The wicked are those who live outside of community and/or accountability. Wickedness here may be equated to stagnation.

Conclusion

The Psalms include a variety of forms to encapsulate the range of human experiences and emotions. The wisdom from which this body of work begins should not focus on establishing an invisible enemy so much as it should remind us of our capacity to be skeptics who scoff at the desire for meaning in life. The author offers an alternative path that propels us down a path of discovery alongside God.

Notes

1. Commentary previously published on this website for September 8, 2019.
2. Francis Brown, S. R. Driver, and Charles Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (Clarendon, 1907), 80.
3. Brown-Driver-Briggs, 211.