Reflections on the Psalms

The Book of Psalms is a collection of 150 religious poems forming part of the Hebrew Bible and Christian Old Testament. The Psalms are grouped with the Wisdom Books (Hebrew Ketuvim or “Writings”) of the Bible. Originating in the royal court of the kings of Israel, the Psalms were originally set to music and sung during public worship. Emblematic of the thought and spirituality of ancient Judaism, the Psalms continue to be “the basic prayerbook for Jews and Christians alike” (Encyclopedia Britannica).

The Psalms (Tehillīm in Hebrew) were central to the religious life of Judaism in the Second Temple period (516 B.C.E.–70 C.E.), prayed regularly at the Temple itself, in local synagogues, and in private devotion. Jesus Christ quoted or alluded to the Psalms frequently in his preaching and sang them with his disciples. The earliest believers in Jesus, who were themselves Jewish, continued to make use of the Psalms, now interpreted in terms of Jesus’s life and mission.

From its origins, the Christian church used the Psalms in liturgical worship and private and communal prayer. Psalms were chanted or recited as part of the Eucharistic service (Divine Liturgy or Mass), the Divine Office or cycle of daily prayers recited by clergy, and the prayer routine in monastic orders. Antiphonal and responsorial chanting, in which a leader or priest sings a verse and the congregation or choir responds, became a common way of chanting the Psalms. Early Christians read and prayed the Psalms in Middle Eastern languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, Syriac), in Greek, and eventually in Latin. In the modern era, translations of the Psalms into modern Western and non-Western languages were produced, and thus extended this biblical book’s reach.