“The fellow-pupil can help more than the master because he knows less. The difficulty we want him to explain is one he has recently met.”

Lewis goes on to justify his writing the book on the grounds that, as a nonspecialist, he is well placed to help ordinary readers with their problems in understanding the Psalms. Lewis implies that a sympathetic understanding of a reader’s difficulties with a text is often just as important as scholarly knowledge.

“Most emphatically the Psalms must be read as poems; as lyrics, with all the licences [sic] and all the formalities, the hyperboles, the emotional rather than logical connections, which are proper to lyric poetry.”

In one of the key underlying principles of the book, Lewis declares that the Psalms are poetry first and foremost and should be understood poetically. This emphasizes the theme of Metaphor and Imagery as Vehicles of Faith and will prevent interpretations of the Psalms that are overly literal or fail to take into account metaphorical meanings and literary conventions. The poetic focus aligns with Lewis’s own scholarly emphasis on literature as a source of moral values and spiritual meaning.

“For poetry too is a little incarnation, giving body to what had been before invisible and inaudible.”

Lewis connects the poetic nature of the Psalms with the Christian doctrine of the Incarnation, or God entering human nature in Jesus. Lewis’s analogy implies that God, as Creator and imaginative force in the universe, appropriately expresses himself in poetic language. This expression is analogous to God taking on human nature in the Incarnation.

“A man can’t be always defending the truth; there must be a time to feed on it.”

Much of Lewis’s previous work was apologetic, or concerned with defending the truth of Christianity. This book is instead about savoring and exploring that truth. Aimed at Christian believers and others interested in the Psalms, it takes the truth of Christian theism for granted while delving into the richness of scripture from a partly secular perspective. The quote also connects with the themes of enjoying the beauty of God in Chapters 5 and 6.

“Judgement is apparently an occasion of universal rejoicing.”

This was a fact that Lewis discovered when first studying the Psalms. It was surprising because it goes against Christian custom, in which God’s judgment is something to fear. This is owing to the different ancient Jewish and modern Christian mental pictures of God’s judgment, which Lewis outlines in the chapter.

“Christians cry to God for mercy instead of justice; they cried to God for justice instead of injustice.”

In Chapter 2, Lewis discusses the theme of justice in the Psalms and how God’s “judgment” relates to human beings. To resolve The Tension Between Divine Judgment and Human Vengeance, Lewis concludes that the Psalmists saw themselves as innocent victims seeking vindication instead of as guilty persons hoping for mercy. This perspective leads to an emphasis on God’s justice, including a significant desire of vengeance for wrongdoing.

“Their hatreds are the reaction to something.”

Lewis seeks to put the “cursing” Psalms into a historical and moral context, as a natural reaction to suffering and cruelty. Thus, the Christian reader’s reaction to these psalms should not stop at “horror at the uncharity of the poets” (25) but should also include sympathy for them.

“The higher, the more in danger.”

This principle governs Lewis’s interpretation of the “cursing” and self-righteousness in the Psalms. It implies that when the stakes are higher, there is more danger of moral lapses. Thus, the greatest sins sometimes come about as a result of sincere religious conviction, and those with deep moral awareness can be prone to the sin of spiritual pride.

“If the Jews cursed more bitterly than the Pagans this was, I think, at least in part because they took right and wrong more seriously.”

Using his knowledge of ancient literature, Lewis compares the Jewish and the “pagan” (Greco-Roman) attitudes toward vengeance. Lewis justifies and gives context to the “cursing” psalms as being the result of a more evolved and sensitive morality.

“If the Divine call does not make us better, it will make us very much worse. Of all bad men religious bad men are the worst.”

As a corollary to the last quote, having a higher moral sensibility will put one in danger of spiritual pride and self-righteousness, the beginnings of which can be seen in some of the Psalms. This is owing to the principle that the higher the stakes, the more latitude for moral failure (see Quote #8).

“The individual, as such, seems to have been less aware of himself, much less separated from others, in those ancient times.”

Lewis is pointing to the holistic nature of ancient cultures, and in particular the ancient Jewish culture. Human beings saw themselves as part of a larger society and as a link in a chain of past, present, and future. This view affects the Psalms’ emphasis on earthly prosperity, which was not self-centered but connected with the welfare of the people as a whole, including one’s descendants. This raises the possibility that the speaker in many psalms is “Israel itself” rather than an individual.

“Life was one.”

A more succinct statement of the holistic and integrated nature of the Psalmists’ culture, here viewed in the context of the unity of the ritual and spiritual. Ancient Jews did not separate the experience of the divine from the outward forms and rituals in which it was expressed; the two were tied intimately together, as can be seen in many of the Psalms which speak of experiencing God’s presence “at the festival” in the Temple.

“The Order of the Divine mind, embodied in the Divine Law, is beautiful. What should a man do but try to reproduce it, so far as possible, in his daily life?”

Lewis seeks to justify the painstaking attention to fulfilling the details of the Mosaic Law on the part of the ancient Jews, a process that is reflected in a number of the Psalms. This attitude, which may look like “fussiness” to an outsider, is in fact a form of devotion and “delight in Order” (59).

“But we must not be Pharisaical even to the Pharisees.”

An example of Lewis’s sympathetic and many-sided approach to the cultural context of the Psalms. Lewis cautions readers against judging the unfamiliar attitudes of the Psalmists without seeing them in context and understanding the often still-relevant problems implied in them.

“How ought we to behave in the presence of very bad people?”

A basic statement of the problem of “connivance,” the subject of Chapter 7. Lewis seeks to bring this Psalm theme forward to the present day, giving practical advice on how to react in the face of morally questionable conversation. He advises a flexible approach, including either protest, rational discussion, or silent nonparticipation as the case requires.

“I take this to be the greatest poem in the Psalter and one of the greatest lyrics in the world.”

Lewis says this of Psalm 19, which combines insights about creation and the Law with supplication for personal moral purity. The greatness of this psalm, for Lewis, is rooted in its subtle transitions of thought that join together different subjects into an intimate unity, its classic expression of Jewish culture and sentiment, and its absence of self-righteousness.

“[T]he highest does not stand without the lowest.”

Another of Lewis’s axioms or general principles. This one serves his argument that the “pure monotheism” of Akhenaten, while a necessary step in religious evolution, has to be supported by the more richly particularized religion of mature Judaism. The “highest” can be interpreted here as the philosophically abstract nature of Akhenaten’s religion, and the “lowest” as the homely real-world details of Judaism and Christianity.

“I think we delight to praise what we enjoy because the praise not merely expresses but completes the enjoyment; it is its appointed consummation.”

Lewis justifies praise and injunctions to praise, found frequently in the Psalms, as being a natural and logical, and not an arbitrary or authoritarian, activity. This highlights the theme of Praise as a Natural Response to Divine Glory. Lewis’s object is thus apologetic, to defend the Psalms as serving natural human needs.

“We are not riders but pupils in the riding school.”

Lewis likens humans’ experience of worship in this life to a training for the perfectly realized worship that will exist in the future life. This relates to his discussion of the theme of praise in the Psalms as characterizing humanity’s state of being humble and joyous before God.

“In commanding us to glorify Him, God is inviting us to enjoy Him.”

Building on the previous quote, Lewis connects enjoyment and praise of earthly things with the praise and worship of God. Just as with the things of earthly creation, enjoyment and praise of God—the source of all creation—comes naturally. Here again, Lewis’s aim is to justify a potentially misunderstood aspect of the Psalms.

“But the duty exists for the delight.”

Related to the previous quotes, Lewis connects the duty of praise and worship as serving a higher goal, namely delight and enjoyment of God’s presence. Lewis places the “hard work” of religious worship in a richer context, serving his larger goal of presenting the Psalms in a humanly positive way.

“There is a Pagan, savage heart in me somewhere.”

Lewis sees the Judeo-Christian system of belief as superseding pantheism; however, some elements of pantheism—representing humanity in a fallen, unevolved state—still survive in modern consciousness. These include the superstitious tendency to “bargain” with God, which is still present in religion and may even have traces in the Psalms.

“No net less wide than a man’s whole heart, nor less fine of mesh than love, will hold the sacred Fish.”

In uncharacteristically poetic language, Lewis ends the chapter by commenting on the contrast between the “letter” and “spirit” in scripture: the first denotes the literal meaning, the second, the “secondary” or prophetic meaning. For Lewis, Jesus transcends both categories, being wiser and more complex than any interpretation can capture.