Psalms & Clouds, HALLELUJAH!

The full moon was beautiful, both rising last evening and setting this morning, and, clouds participating and even hogging the show, will show the same glory tonight and tomorrow. But I think that, more than the moon, I love the clouds in this magical place where we live. When I look at the most overwhelming clouds - - which the photo above does not capture, I'm learning that in photography, with clouds there's an optimal split second of cloud and sun posing together that, when I rush inside to grab the camera and rush back out on 7H porch to snap it, it's passed! - - I think of Carlos Eire and his lifelong anguished longing for the Cuban clouds of his childhood.

I know exactly what Eire remembers. I've been to Cuba, and I remember Ensign Weller going topside that first January 1959 morning that USS Corry was in Guantanamo Bay for RefTra and, having just sailed from Norfolk, Virginia in bitter cold, sleet and snow, marveling, "Oh thank God, I'm home, it's the same as Panama City!”

PC friends will know the above wasn't snapped from 7H but from my car windshield at the intersection of 6th Street and W. Beach Drive, looking at the old Railway Express building and what is currently a barbecue place. A black-owned and run business, the barbecue is good, I like the rack of ribs, Linda likes the pulled pork. Sadly, the location has been a doomed disaster for every restaurant that's been there.

Enough! It's Wednesday, so I get to muse and post some bible thoughts this morning. Scrolling through the Lectionary Propers for next Sunday, I find myself still worrying over Psalm 149, so I'm going there and beyond. The psalm is printed below.

Closing the Book with a negative feeling is not uncommon in the Old Testament, the Hebrew bible. But when it happens, it's often because we are not Jews, Hebrews, the ancient Israelites counting on y'Vah to keep covenant by protecting us from our enemies, those who hate us; and more than simply protecting us, stirring our glee unto joyful celebration by leading us to glorious victory in which we get to chop every blasted one of them to bits! If you are horrified by the OT book of Joshua, for example, don't be, because, once again, it's Heilsgeschichte, holy history, our sacred stories of how much God loves us his chosen people. And it's not only by giving us a glorious, bloody victory, it's also that God grieves with us when we are down, and God joins us in seething hatred and determination for sure and certain vengeance against our enemies. It's POV, a point of view.

I'm going to stir some examples in here. I'm thinking of Psalm 137 that so agonizes about being in Babylonian captivity, in exile away from Jerusalem and God's Country. Look at it, desolation as prisoners, the anamnesis against the Edomites, our own brothers through Esau, who celebrated our fall, and the, appalling to us but not to Israel, bitter hatred of Babylon that closes it, verse 9. For Israel, it's truly "The Word of the Lord"!!

Psalm 137

Lament over the Destruction of Jerusalem

1 By the rivers of Babylon— there we sat down and there we wept when we remembered Zion.

2 On the willows there we hung up our harps.

3 For there our captors asked us for songs, and our tormentors asked for mirth, saying, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”

4 How could we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?

5 If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand wither!

6 Let my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth, if I do not remember you, if I do not set Jerusalem above my highest joy.

7 Remember, O Lord, against the Edomites the day of Jerusalem’s fall, how they said, “Tear it down! Tear it down! Down to its foundations!”

8 O daughter Babylon, you devastator! Happy shall they be who pay you back for what you have done to us!

9 Happy shall they be who take your little ones and dash them against the rock!

Horrifying? Yes, but only to you, 21st Century Person! I’ll try not to make this too long (it already is) but I'm going to remember a couple more things about shocking bible passages.

One is the A+ the professor graded my final exam term paper for Old Testament at Lutheran Theological Seminary, Gettysburg, PA back in the 1980s, half my lifetime ago. We got to select our own passage to write about, and seeing that it was December and we were coming up to Christmas when in church we would be reading from Micah 5, I chose that beautiful passage about the coming of Messiah, the Christ, from Bethlehem. Because the way we piously read it, it's incomplete, we only read part of the story, the "good news" part that we like!

Along with Matthew and his cut-and-paste proof-texting from the LXX for messianic passages (here to prophesy the Messiah's being born in Bethlehem), we cut it off in mid-verse and ignore the rest, what Micah really means, where we rub our hands in vicious anticipation of how when those filthy, stinking Assyrians come onto our land we're going to slash them to bloody bits and stomp them into the ground. It's below, have a look, for Micah and the Jews it's not about Jesus, it's part of our holy story of how God who loves us and saves us will give us the victory over the Assyrians!

One of my comments in my term paper was, "It doesn't sound like Good News to me". The professor wrote in the margin, "It may not sound like good news to you, Tom Weller, but it sure as Hell is good news for Israel!!" Here it is:

The Ruler from Bethlehem

2 But you, O Bethlehem Eph′rathah, who are little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose origin is from of old, from ancient days.

3 Therefore he shall give them up until the time when she who is in travail has brought forth; then the rest of his brethren shall return to the people of Israel.

4 And he shall stand and feed his flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God. And they shall dwell secure, for now he shall be great to the ends of the earth.

5 And this shall be peace, when the Assyrian comes into our land and treads upon our soil, that we will raise against him seven shepherds and eight princes of men;

6 they shall rule the land of Assyria with the sword, and the land of Nimrod with the drawn sword; and they shall deliver us from the Assyrian when he comes into our land and treads within our border.

My other memory this morning is that the summer of 2012 (I think it was), when our rector was away on sabbatical and I served HNEC as Summer Priest, I changed our Sunday worship to what I called "summer liturgy", which was abbreviated (actually to about what we are doing now to shorten worship during covid19). Also, in standard Catholic tradition, I had us sing, every Sunday, an Alleluia song before and after the reading of the Gospel, in place of our protestant "sequence hymn". From one of our General Convention approved supplemental hymnals, it went

Hallelujah, hallelujah!

Hal-le-lu-jah, hal-le-lu-jah!

Unfortunately, one Sunday our gospel was that distressing story of king Herod having John the Baptist beheaded, and his head delivered to Herodias on a silver platter. Dutifully, when I concluded "The Gospel of the Lord!" the congregation responded singing,

Hallelujah, hallelujah!

Hal-le-lu-jah, hal-le-lu-jah!

These things happen. Just remember. Because of our shortened "covid liturgy" we will not be reading the psalm in church this Sunday, but it will be printed in the bulletin. If you read it, remember that you may not like it, but it's sure as Hell victory and peace for Israel. Hallelujah.

Psalms 146-150 begin and end with the Hebrew word, or joined words הַֽלְלוּ־יָֽהּ , which some English translations render "Praise the Lord" but is literally hallelu-YAH. The YAH being the first two letters of the sacred tetragrammaton יְהוָה֙

Psalm 149

1 Hallelujah! Sing to the Lord a new song; *sing his praise in the congregation of the faithful.

2 Let Israel rejoice in his Maker; *let the children of Zion be joyful in their King.

3 Let them praise his Name in the dance; * let them sing praise to him with timbrel and harp.

4 For the Lord takes pleasure in his people * and adorns the poor with victory.

5 Let the faithful rejoice in triumph; * let them be joyful on their beds.

6 Let the praises of God be in their throat *and a two-edged sword in their hand;

7 To wreak vengeance on the nations *and punishment on the peoples;

8 To bind their kings in chains *and their nobles with links of iron;

9 To inflict on them the judgment decreed; *this is glory for all his faithful people.

Hallelujah!