Smith DTh Thesis (final).pdf - South African Theological Seminary

Chapter 4: Analysis of Psalms 3-8Humanity’s privileged relationship to Yahweh forms a subordinate theme toYahweh’s majesty. 95 In spite of humanity’s insignificance in comparison toYahweh’s magnificence, the Lord cares about human beings (v. 5) and givesstrength to the helpless (v. 4). He created humans only a little lower than(v. 6a), crowned them with glory and honour (v. 6b) and gave them אֱ‏ ‏ֹלהִ‏ יםauthority over the earth and the animal kingdom (vv. 7-9).Terrien (2003) believes the psalm’s structure is carefully choreographed tolink these themes. He sees the opening and closing refrains indicating themain theme, “a symphony of delight upon the unfolding of the theology of thename” (p. 126), while the chiastic body situates “humanity in their fragility andgreatness between the majesty of God and the abundance of animal food forthe survival of human beings” (p. 126).According to the psalmist’s view it is in the human royal rule that the majesty of Yahweh ispresent in all the earth” (pp. 1133-34, emphasis in original).95 Leonard Maré interprets the prominence of the two emphases in reverse. He argues thatthe primary question the psalm answers is, “What is man?” However, he says this question isnecessarily asked and answered in relation to another question, namely, “Who is God?”According to Maré (2006:929), “Yahweh’s majesty forms the boundaries in which humanityfinds its place of glory through its God-appointed position of rulership. Therefore the question‘what is man’ cannot be separated from the question ‘who is God’”.178