Strength in Numbers

The arrogant utterly deride me, yet I do not turn aside from Your Law. Psalm 119:51  NASB

Utterly deride – How do you handle insults?  How do you react to blame?  What does it feel like when someone shows contempt toward you?  What happens when someone mocks you?

All of these questions seem to be front and center in the divisive, reprehensible politics of the modern world.  There is just lack of respect for any other opinion or person that it seems as if the world is suffering from some mental disease.  As Brené Brown says, reasonable dialogue has descended into anger and blame.  The substitute for wholeheartedness is contempt.

Apparently (but not surprisingly) this is not a new phenomenon.  The psalmist experienced the same human emotional cavalcade of scorn more than 3000 years ago (I guess human nature hasn’t really changed).  He puts it as forcefully as possible, employing the Hebrew adverb mĕʾōd.  As you recall, this is the Hebrew for “exceedingly,” found in its paradigmatic occurrence in Deuteronomy 6:5.  The psalmist tells us that the “arrogant,” that is, those whose pride is the yardstick of their lives, cast continuous and unremitting scorn on him.  To put it colloquially, they hate his guts.  No reason given.  They are deranged over him.  Their self-importance has calcified any godly attribute.  The air they breathe is polluted with exactly the opposite of God’s self-description in Exodus 34.  Without compassion, absent mercy, denying forgiveness, always angry, hating what isn’t like them, desiring to punish all opponents, wicked without remorse—they spew violence.  And furthermore, they love the company of themselves.  Their strength does not come from the truth.  It comes from the crowd.  Douglas Murray brings the psalm to the immediate present:

From Michel Foucault these thinkers absorbed their idea of society not as an infinitely complex system of trust and traditions that have evolved over time, but always in the unforgiving light cast when everything is viewed solely through the prism of ‘power.’  Viewing all human interactions in this light distorts, rather than clarifies, presenting a dishonest interpretation of our lives.  Of course power exists as a force in the world, but do so charity, forgiveness and love. . . Nevertheless for a certain type of person who is intent on finding blame rather than forgiveness in the world, Foucault helps explain everything.  And what Foucault and his admirers seek to explain in personal relations they also attempt to explain on a grand political level.  For them absolutely everything in life is a political choice and a political act.[1]

What is the psalmist’s answer to these baleful souls?  He sticks with God’s Torah.  He doesn’t say that he has been vindicated.  The circumstances of insults, scorn, and blame haven’t changed, but his commitment to God doesn’t waiver.  Note the syntax in Hebrew, literally “from Your Torah I do not turn aside.”  The emphasis is not on his action but on God’s instruction.  And the verb (“to turn aside”) is nāṭâ which perhaps needs some amplification.

The 215 occurrences of this verb, excluding derivatives, are translated some thirty-five different ways in the KJV alone. The ASV and RSV add other renderings to this wide range of English expressions.

The root meaning of “extend,” “stretch out,” is especially common in the Qal stem. Exodus records that Moses “stretched out” his hand (usually his rod is also mentioned) over the waters of Egypt (Ex 7:19), over the land of Egypt (Ex 10:13), toward heaven (Ex 9:23; 10:21–22) and over the Red Sea (Ex 14:16, 21, 26–27).^[2]

Once more we’re reminded of Moses.  And why not?  Torah came to Israel through the great leader and prophet. Examples of this verb are found throughout his life.  Perhaps we need to bear this in mind when we read the truncated English “turn aside.”  Perhaps we should read this “from Your Torah I do not stretch,” that is, I don’t add anything at all.  It is enough.  I don’t push the envelope.  It is enough.  My answer to arrogance is submission to God.  It is enough.

Topical Index: arrogance, scorn, blame, nāṭâ, turn aside, stretch, extend, Psalm 119:51

[1] Douglas Murray, The Madness of Crowds: Gender, Race and Identity (Bloomsbury, 2019), p. 53.

^[2] Wilson, M. R. (1999). 1352 נָטָה. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament(electronic ed., p. 573). Moody Press.