THE BOOK OF PSALMS - PSALM 8 (PRAISE ABOUT CREATION AND HUMAN)

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Psalm 8 is a psalm of praise.
  • Starts with praise to God.
  • Praise his creation
  • The heart of the psalm - what is human worth that HE cares for man
Then the inclusio - closing with praise





This psalm contains vocabulary of majestic glory
The triple us of the pronoun is lost in the English translation
at v1, 4, 9




Verse 1
  • Hymns in the psalter usually praise God in the 3rd peron (eg Psalm 19, 24)
  • Hymns in the Psalter usually begin with an imperative call to praise God, e.g. Ps 33; 47.
  • Psalm 8 begins differently — with an exclamation of praise spoken directly to God: “O LORD, our Lord” → Psalm 8 is a poem about God and us and about our relationship with God

Verse 2

When Jesus quoted this psalm in teh NT, he quoted the Septuagint, the Greek bible. not the Hebrew bible.  In the NT, there is the story of the entrance into the holy city.
  • Interpretation 1: Matthew 21:15-16 ESV: But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children crying out in the temple, "Hosanna to the Son of David!" they were indignant, and they said to him, "Do you hear what these are saying?" And Jesus said to them, "Yes; have you never read, "'Out of the mouth of infants and nursing babies you have prepared praise'?" → quotation of Septuagint version of Psalm 8:2
  • Interpretation 2: “the enemy and the avenger” are foes that God overcomes in the process of creation → chaos is the enemy of order → Genesis 1:2 ESV: The earth was without form and void (Hebrew: tohu wabohu - without form and void), and darkness was over the face of the deep.


Verse 3
  • In pagan conception, the heavenly bodies were endowed with awareness, power, and identity. 
  • But here in Psalm 8, they are merely objects that testify to their Creator’s glory. The psalmist even belittles them by calling them “the works of your fingers”. (dont even need his hands, just his fingers to create this immense universe)


Verse 4
  • (Fr Ferdinand Purnomo demonstrated the smallness of man by comparing the earth and moon - distance)
  • Interrogative pronoun is “what” rather than “who”? 
  • The psalm says what is man, not who is man.
  • In the presence of the Lord’s infinite majesty and splendour, human beings are very small and insignificant → almost disdainful

Verses 5-8
  • Stanza 2 provides the answer to the disdainful question in v.4: "what is man"
  • Humans are in fact only “a little lower than the heavenly beings”, but this only because the Lord has made them so.
  • “Made him a little lower” → literally “deprived him a little”
What does it mean that Jesus was a little lower than the angels?
mentioned in Psalm 8:5, Hebrews 2:7
  • God is the subject of all the verbs: 
    • make him a little lower; give him dominion; put under his feet
    • What gives human beings dignity and value is not anything that humans have done for themselves, but rather something that God has done for them. That which God confers upon us determines our status, not that which comes from inside of us.
  • Poetic strategy: - vv.1-6: vertical descent:
  • vv.7-8: horizontal outward movement from human society sheep and oxen → beasts of the field → birds of the heavens → fish of the sea → whatever passes along the paths of the seas
  • v.6: ALL THINGS under his feet
    • The psalm does not answer the question asked in v. 4 by merely telling that God cares for humans. Rather, the psalm shows that God values humans to the extent that God grants them a responsible role in creation. above the heavens


Verse 9
  • Closes identical to opening of v.1 → inclusio → rhetoric effect, not simply delimiter
  • When the psalmist ends this poem with the cry “how majestic is your name”, the audience now understands why the psalmist says that God is majestic. 

Poetic strategy - vertical and horizontal





THE QUESTION OF WHAT IS MAN




Choir piece inspired by Psalm 8
Link to Youtube: 

Aug 11, 2015 First Baptist Church Dallas choir and orchestra,
"The Majesty and Glory of Your Name"




Vv.4-6 are quoted in Hebrews 2:5-9 ESV




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