Kierkegaard to the Rescue
My tongue also will tell of Your righteousness all day long; for they are put to shame, for they are humiliated who seek my harm. Psalm 71:24 NASB
Put to same/ humiliated – Ah, we’re back at the beginning, a great place to end. What is the result of being “redeemed,” that is, becoming a soldier in another king’s army? The result is the defeat of the enemies, in particular, the social disgrace of those who thought they could overcome a servant of the Lord. In the end, this lyrical composition is about winning a victory here and seeing the enemy humiliated now.
You’ll remember the two crucial words: bôš (shame) and kālam (dishonor, humiliation). They’re not about my inner feelings. They’re about my public persona. In this verse, the poet proclaims that what his enemies intended for him has become their punishment. The snake turned and bit them on the ass.
This end-around reminds me of Soren Kierkegaard’s Concluding Unscientific Postscript to the Philosophical Fragments. In that work, Kierkegaard strikes against the philosophy of Hegel who claimed that all life was deterministic, written into the natural order of the universe and its laws. Kierkegaard’s famous dictum, Subjectivity is Truth, asserted that choice is essentially free simply because it means we are not bound by inexorable reason or inviolable laws. Those who claim determinism must also claim that their very statements are prescribed before they make them and truth becomes whatever happens. In fact, if determinism is absolutely true, then there really isn’t any actual notion of “true” at all since there can be no notion of “false.” What is, is, and that’s the end of it.
The poet sides with Kierkegaard. God decides with him. It is not the case that God decides, and the poet simply plays out a divinely authored role. Divine and human conspire to bring about history, and in this sense, the plea of the poet makes a difference. Without the poem, the poet cannot enlist the help of the divine. The words themselves alter the trajectory of the universe.
Have you thought of your prayers, your conversations with God, in this way? If you don’t speak them, one branch of the continuing story becomes reality. If you do speak them, another branch becomes reality. The tree grows as it does because of your decision. The roots might have been planted by God millennia ago, but that doesn’t determine the shape of the tree. Only you and I (with God) can determine which branches are pruned and which are nourished. This poem ends as it does because the words of the poet prune the wicked. Unless he speaks them, something else will happen.
Now, go pray. Plead. Petition. And participate in the great unfolding of the future.
Topical Index: bôš, shame, kālam, dishonor, humiliation, decision, future, Psalm 71:24
