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

Chapter 6: Composition of Psalms 3-8Two proposals regarding the overall shaping of the Psalter have potentialrelevance for my investigation, namely, those by John Walton (1991; cf.Malick 2005) and Walter Brueggemann (1991a). I shall begin with a briefsynopsis of each of these works. Then I shall present and analyse tablesabout recurring themes in Psalms 3-8.6.3.1 Walton’s cantata hypothesisIn an article entitled “Psalms: a Cantata about the Davidic Covenant”, Walton(1991) sought to answer this question:Can it be demonstrated that there is an editorial rationale for theplacement of each psalm (or at least the placement of therecognized collections of psalms) that is tied to something in thecontent of the psalm rather than being a function of What isconveyed in the title (e.g. author or genre)? (Walton 1991:23)In answer to his question, he tentatively proposed a hypothesis which “viewsthe Psalms as a cantata around the theme of the Davidic covenant” (Walton1991:24). Walton explained the appeal of using a cantata analogy as follows:The cantata analogy is helpful for it carries with it the idea thatmany of the pieces may not have been composed specificallyfor the cantata. Rather, compositions created for other reasons270