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

Chapter 2: History of Psalms Studiesarrangement. During the periods dominated by historical criticism (ca. 1820-1920) and form criticism (ca. 1920-1980), interest was limited to individualpsalms and their historical origin and function. Today, however, there is arenewed conviction that there are purposeful literary relationships betweenpsalms and the Psalter itself is a purposefully edited collection.Unprecedented effort is being exerted to discover the editorial agendaunderlying the Psalter and the literary relationships between psalms.In addition to several major studies attempting to uncover the overall purposeand message of the Book of Psalms, many more detailed studies have beenconducted on homogenous groups of psalms. Corpi that have been the objectof specialised studies include Psalms 1-2 (the introductory psalms), Psalms15-24, the Korahite Psalms (Psalms 42-49, 84-85, 87-88), the AsaphitePsalms (Psalms 50, 73-83), the Prayers of David (Psalms 51-72), the RoyalPsalms (scattered throughout the Psalter), the Wisdom Psalms (scatteredthroughout the Psalter), Psalms 107-118, the Songs of Ascents (Psalms 120-134), the whole of Book V and, most of all, Book IV (Psalms 90-106)containing the Kingship of Yahweh Psalms (ca. Psalms 93-100).From the above summary, it is apparent that there are many importantgroupings of psalms that have not yet been analysed in detail with respect tothe literary relationships between them. The first group of Davidic Psalms,64