He Will Speak Peace

I wonder how many of you, when you’re reading a book, take time to examine the copyright page or read through the backflap or the author’s bio. I have to admit that as often as not I am one of those people. When I’m reading a book I can often find it helpful to know a little bit about who wrote it and his or her life and ideas. But I admit that I have never really carried that principle into my reading of the psalms. Perhaps you’ve scarcely noticed that a great many of the psalms are preceded by little introductory notes. Generally they are fewer than a dozen words. And they are usually printed in a different font from the psalm itself. So we just skip over them as though they didn’t really matter.

By and large that is totally understandable. Because nearly half of the psalms, and many of the most familiar and beloved, feature the name of King David: “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name!” (Psalm 103) “O Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!” (Psalm 8) “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’” (Psalm 14) “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.” (Psalm 19). And if there were a psalm hit list, the one that would come at the top: “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.” (Psalm 23)

In addition to naming the author or composer, many of the psalms are also preceded by what are called superscriptions: “For the memorial offering” (Psalm 38), “A Song for the Sabbath” (Psalm 92), or “A Prayer of Moses, the man of God” (Psalm 90). Some offer us a little bit of their context or an event underlying their composition: “A song at the dedication of the Temple”(Psalm 30), “A prayer of one afflicted, when faint and pleading before the Lord” (Psalm 102), or “A Psalm of David, when he fled from his son Absalom” (Psalm 3). Still others suggest a tune or other musical instruction: “For the flutes” (Psalm 5), “With stringed instruments” (Psalm 4), and one of my favourites, “According to the Dove on Far-off Terebinths” (Psalm 56).

By and large we just ignore those little introductions. It’s almost as if they didn’t exist. But in doing so we run the risk of missing out on some potentially valuable insights. And this morning’s psalm is a case in point. It begins: “To the choirmaster. A Psalm of the Sons of Korah”. And it is one of a dozen psalms that are preceded by this attribution.

A song of peace

So I find myself asking, who were the sons of Korah? For an answer to that question we need to turn to the book of Numbers. There we find a man named Korah assembling a gang of 250 powerful men to challenge the leadership and authority Moses. “You’ve gone too far!” he shouted at him. “Why do you act like you’re running the whole show? What right do you have to act as though you’re greater than anyone else?”

Korah’s attempt to overthrow God’s appointed leader very quickly proved disastrous, as the next day the judgement of God fell upon him and his co-conspirators. Suddenly the ground underneath their tents began to shake violently, until it split apart into a chasm and they all plunged to their doom, never to be seen or heard from again.[1]

Indeed for the next two hundred fifty years or so the Bible makes no mention of the family of Korah. But then suddenly they turn up during the reign of King David—not as contemptuous rebels this time, but as faithful leaders of the instrumental and choral music of the tabernacle. They were also the composers of eleven of the most beautiful psalms in the Bible.

A number of them you will recognize in some of the popular hymns and songs we sing in the church today, three thousand years later: “As the deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God.” (Psalm 42) “My heart overflows with a pleasing theme… my tongue is like the pen of a ready writer.” (Psalm 45) “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” (Psalm 46) “Clap your hands, all peoples! Shout to God with songs of joy!” (Psalm 47) “Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised in the city of our God!” (Psalm 48)

Far from any evidence of arrogance or rebellion, their songs express a deep devotion to God and a humble longing for his presence. And that is exactly what we find in this morning’s psalm.

No one is entirely sure when Psalm 85 was composed or what the events were that lay behind it. Could it have been the response to a series of disastrous crop failures? Could it have followed the invasion and subsequent withdrawal by an enemy army? It might very well have been either or both of these things—or something else altogether—that caused the sons of Korah to compose this psalm, as Judah’s history by and large was a continuous series of ups and downs.