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

Chapter 6: Composition of Psalms 3-8David’s conflicts with Saul. Admittedly, it is not difficult to fit each of Psalms 3-8 into this era of David’s life. The content of the psalms is of a sufficientlygeneral nature that they might easily represent David’s thoughts at differentmoments in his conflict with Saul. 139 Yet by the same reasoning one mightequally propose that they are a cantata about Joseph’s life or Moses’experiences during the exodus conflicts.There is no positive evidence in the text itself to suggest that these psalmswere arranged with the intent that they would tell a sequential story. In fact,based on my exegetical analysis of the individual psalms, I believe there isevidence to suggest they do not follow a sequential pattern. For example,Psalm 3 seems to be set in the heat of military conflict while Psalm 4 implies apolitical crisis. In Psalm 6, the author accepts that his own sins have broughtabout his crisis (seemingly illness) and appeals for mercy (see Althan 1999),whereas in Psalm 7 he denies any guilt whatsoever and seeks divine justice.Even Walton (1991:24) himself recognised that treated holistically the psalmswould not fit neatly into his cantata. He proposed that the redactors based139 It is equally possible to argue that they all fit into the conflict between David and Absalomrecording in 2 Samuel 15-19, as Blaiklock (1970), Motyer (1994), Wilcock (2001) and Lane(2006) do.285