Canter Bridge

Psalm 103 insists that we live in a world in which clear vision leads to gratitude.

Blessedness is reality. The failure to see this means that someone has gone blind, perhaps even succumbed to a lie.

Yet gratitude requires a choice—and even that ongoing choice which becomes a discipline—because for some unnamed reason we are liable to forget. Blessing is a fact on the ground, yet gratitude seldom occurs in nature. It requires practice, discipline, even culture, lest blessing go unanswered by thanksgiving.

This is why the psalmist employs the odd figure of exhorting his own ‘soul’ to bless the Lord. It is not that YHWH’s blessings are difficult to see, just that they are easy to miss. They are easier still to forget.

Bless the Lord, O my soul
and do not forget all His bounties.
He forgives all your sins,
heals all your diseases.
He redeems your life from the Pit,
surrounds you with steadfast love and mercy.
He satisfies you with good things in the prime of life,
so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.
The Lord executes righteous acts
and judgments for all who are wronged.
He made known His ways to Moses,
His deeds to the children of Israel. (Psalm 103:2–7 JPS, emphasis added)

It is more often than not the last recourse of scoundrel interpreters to insist that ‘the original language speaks truths that do not come across in translation’. Yet in this case it is partly true.

The italicized words are Hebrew participles. In classical Hebrew the sense of this is usually ongoing activity. Though that cannot be the case with the last of this chain of participles—YHWH made known his ways to Moses only in the past—the preponderance of evidence suggests that we are to bless the Lord here precisely as the One who habitually acts in this way. It is his nature, his divine habit, the easy work of his right hand.

It would tax the language, but it would make perfect sense to translate these with the English definite article plus a gerund: the One who is forgiving … the One who is healing … the One who is redeeming … the One who is surrounding … the One who is satisfying …

Simply put, this is what YHWH is like. You can contrast him with other lords, if you like, and give thanks that you have fallen under the care of this one.

When we see clearly, in a world governed as this psalm insists that ours is ruled, we bless its Ruler. We give thanks. We become grateful.

We are not asked here to overcome reality with psychological exertions. We are asked to see things as they are.

It would be the strangest thing to do otherwise, like the stumblings of a blind man, the baseless pleasures of the conspiracy junkie, the woman who has entirely strayed from reality.

Listen up, soul!