Emma Thornett / 3rd April 2006
I thought the chance to hear Paul Barnett might be of interest to our readers. What is the Annual Edersheim Lecture? According to the organisers:
Alfred Edersheim was born into a Jewish family in Vienna in 1825. He was a well-known Jewish Christian scholar who engaged in pastoral and missionary ministry in Scotland, Romania and England. He authored many books, some of which are considered classics and still in print, most notably The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah. We wish to follow in his footsteps, hence the concern of this annual lecture is to examine themes relating to the Jewish people and the Christian faith. This time we hope to learn the lessons for today from the problems of the past.
Speaker: Rev Dr Paul Barnett
Topic: Tensions between Jews and Gentiles within Empire and Church in the First Century AD
Date/Venue:
SYDNEY
7:30pm
Thursday 11 May 2006
Ashfield Presbyterian Church
Cnr Liverpool Rd & Knox St
Ashfield
MELBOURNE
7:30pm
Wednesday 17 May 2006
South Yarra Presbyterian Church
621 Punt Rd
South Yarra
Sponsored by Christian Witness to Israel. For more information, contact Paul Morris by email or phone (02) 9597 2004 or 0431 940 257.
Gordon Cheng / 2nd April 2006
Is there more to the fact that we find order, divisions and subheadings within the Psalms, than just the subtext that subeditors ought to leave well enough alone, and not add subheadings to the Bible where there are already subheadings (See Psalm one said so, part I)?
Well, yes. Turns out that most of the Psalms have some sort of heading supplied by God, which are part of the original text and every bit as divinely inspired as every other bit of the Psalms. Given that this is so, the absence of a subheading in a Psalm is just as interesting as the divinely inspired subheadings elsewhere.
You see, when Psalms have a subheading, they anchor the Psalm somewhere specific; either with a person, or with a particular historical situation, or with a person in a historical situation. Sometimes they tell you other things as well, such as that the Psalm was meant to be sung. If the heading says “To the choirmaster: according to Muth-Labben. A Psalm of David”, then we learn a number of things.
A choirmaster suggests the presence of a choir, indeed a choirmaster would look rather foolish without them, as they say. We don’t really know what a Muth-Labben is; possibly a musical term or the name of a tune. But a “Psalm of David” tells us that, more than likely, the Psalm was written by “the sweet Psalmist of Israel” as David is called in 2 Sam 23:1, and it“s fair to assume that the Psalm expresses his thoughts and feelings, not just as an individual but one who is the King of Israel. “Sing praises to the LORD” is more than just a hopeful wish, it is the command of God’s chosen ruler.
When the Psalm lacks a heading, however—a so-called ‘orphan’ psalm—this means that it is not a psalm that you would tie to a specific time or place, beyond recognizing that it is written before Christ and so, by definition, looks forward to him (as 2 Corinthians 1:20 says). It is not quite a timeless truth, because we must ask ourselves what difference it makes that Christ has come. But there will be things in the Psalm that are just as true today, in every respect, as they were when they were first sung. No wonder that Christians are so willing to take the words of the Psalms and make them their own.
