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

Chapter 2: History of Psalms StudiesThe influence that Gerald Wilson has exerted on the psalms studies since themid 1980s is difficult to overstate. His work largely settled the question ofwhether or not the Psalter was purposefully arranged. 6 The previouslyprevailing view, which held that the Psalter is a loose collection of individualpsalms, is now scarcely tenable. David Howard (1999:329) describes thedifference as follows:Psalms studies at the end of the twentieth century are verydifferent from what they were in 1970. There has been aparadigm shift in biblical studies, whereby texts are now read astexts, that is, as literary entities and canonical wholes. This hasmanifested in Psalms studies in several ways, the mostimportant of which is the attention to the Psalter as a book, as acoherent whole. It is also manifested in many literary andstructural approaches.David Mitchell asserted that “[t]he Psalter may be regarded as a book, ratherthan an ad hoc collection, if it bears evidence of careful arrangement”(1997:15). Wilson presented compelling reasons for accepting that the Psalter6 The only major work I am aware of that argues against reading the Book of Psalms as abook is Reading the Psalms as a Book (Whybray 1996).30