Keith Bodner. The Psalms

The Oxford University Press Essentials of Biblical Studies series seeks to provide a textbook-like introduction focusing on the Bible’s contents, its ancient contexts, its interpretative methods and history, and its themes and figures (p. xii). Bodner’s installment, The Psalms, is a well-written, accessible, scholarly survey of the Psalter that emphasizes his interpretative views.Chapter 1 includes a review of some basic features of Hebrew poetry and a brief background of the history of Israel that focuses on the themes and theology connected with the Psalms. Using this background, Bodner begins to argue for what he considers the overall literary shape and structure of the Psalms. Following several scholars, Bodner argues that the Psalms are organized into five books that are chronologically linked to the history and theology of Israel. Bodner’s thesis is that understanding the five books of the Psalter is critical to identifying the setting and purpose of each psalm. This interpretative emphasis is elaborated on and expanded in each of the following chapters. Chapter 2 provides a short, selective discussion of the relationship between ANE poetry and the Hebrew Psalms. The idea is to orientate the reader to the understanding of the world behind the Psalms and explain how Israel borrowed and shaped its neighbors’ poetry into their worldview. Chapter 3 covers some of the main categories of psalms identified by scholars, including royal, creation, lament (individual and corporate), trust, and wisdom. Bodner provides an interpretative understanding of selected psalms in these categories based on what he has covered in chapters 1 through 3, emphasizing how each psalm maps to his five-book framework. Chapter 4 covers, what Bodner terms, the historical psalms focusing on literary techniques, each psalm’s overall message in context to Israel’s story, and their setting in the exilic and postexilic time periods. Chapter 5 analyzes the superscriptions that introduce many psalms along with groupings including the Asaph, Korah, Song of Ascents, and Davidic collections. The book closes with chapter 6, which Bodner titles, “The Fivefold Symphony of the Psalter.” After explaining how Pss 1 and 2 are the gateway to the Psalter, Bodner provides a detailed explanation of why he believes the five-book framework is correct. He covers some markers for each of the five books, especially how the word “amen” is used in the transition between books. For Bodner, the interpretative key to the Psalms is to understand Israel’s history as reflected in Book I (early monarchy), Book II (David, Solomon, and the Northern Kingdom), Book III (divided kingdom, failure, collapse), Book IV (exile and call to covenant), and Book V (restoration).The highlights of this work include Bodner’s engaging writing style, the modeling of how to apply interpretative techniques for selected psalms, and a good deal of insight into how psalms map to Israel’s history and theology. Along the way, Bodner creatively interprets individual psalms. For example, he explains the historical psalms in context to their “special effects” (pp. 86–91) emphasizing structure, intertextual adjustments, and poetic techniques. While Bodner’s exposition, for the most part, is balanced and considers alternative views of debated topics, it can be, at times, imbalanced, piecing together scholarly views without critique and basing interpretations on unique Hebrew translations. For example, for Ps 114:1, Bodner prefers, without critique, the Septuagint translation for the qal participle, ‎lōʿēz, as “barbaric-tongued people” (pp. 75–77). This translation is contrasted with the more widely accepted, less intense sense of “foreign language.” The more graphic “barbaric-tongued people” is favored by Bodner because, as he asserts, it fits with the psalm’s placement in Book V. Thus, for Bodner, Ps 114 is not an early psalm written to celebrate God’s deliverance of Israel from Egypt but, rather, is a late psalm that reimagines the exodus in context to Israel’s exile and restoration from Babylon (a “barbaric-tongued people”). Another example is Ps 72 that describes Solomon in the context of royal succession (p. 151). For Bodner, given its placement at the end of Book II, this psalm’s setting cannot be in the time-period of Solomon but is set at the end of the monarchy and “provides a glimpse of what might have been” and is “an indictment for a train of leaders who did not live up to their calling” (p. 152).The reader will need to decide whether Bodner has made his case for the five-book literary shape and structure of the Psalter. Perhaps, a mediating position should be considered that finds some historical alignment in the Psalms sequencing without force-fitting individual psalms into a single historical framework. Overall, the book is thorough, covers main interpretative topics well, and can be insightful (see, for example, Bodner’s balanced authorship discussion of the Davidic psalms, pp. 105–6). Considering its many strengths, with some balancing instruction, The Psalms would make an excellent classroom resource.