The anxieties of human existence are the backbone of the Book of Psalms. That’s why it’s still so wildly popular in so many religious circles. The fear of isolation and betrayal, the terror from battles waged by enemies, the shadow of exile and death -- these are at the root of the prayers for divine support, alongside the hymns of praise and joy. While these were written in a Jewish context and offer a glimpse of specific Jewish traumas - the human narrative of loss and longing is at this text’s core.
And yet, these awful days of ongoing combat and cruelty, we can't help but hear how these words have impacted generational trauma of Jewish experience, sometimes dormant for centuries now fully awake with grave consequences.
Between the verses of different human feelings - the sword shows up, again and again.
Today’s Psalm 149 is almost the closing chord of this collection. Like the rest of this book it is a fusion of faith and fury, song and sword:
יַעְלְז֣וּ חֲסִידִ֣ים בְּכָב֑וֹד יְ֝רַנְּנ֗וּ עַל־מִשְׁכְּבוֹתָֽם׃ רוֹמְמ֣וֹת אֵ֭ל בִּגְרוֹנָ֑ם וְחֶ֖רֶב פִּיפִיּ֣וֹת בְּיָדָֽם׃ לַעֲשׂ֣וֹת נְ֭קָמָה בַּגּוֹיִ֑ם תּ֝וֹכֵח֗וֹת בַּלְאֻמִּֽים׃
Let the faithful exult in glory;
let them sing for joy upon their beds,
with praises to God in their throats
and two-edged swords in their hands,
to impose retribution upon the nations,
punishment upon the peoples,
Ps.149:5-7
It is a subtle but profound shift - from the joy of victory and the relief of release -- to vicious vengeance.
How do we move so fast and far from celebrating our survival to lifting up weapons for revenge? How can we curb this bloodthirsty enthusiasm?? Where does our moral voice overrule the base human drive that lifts swords instead of speaking words to handle conflict?
There is a hint of this tragic human trait in the way this weapon is named here. The Hebrew for ‘two edged sword’ is ‘Herev Pipiyot’ which is literally “a sword of two mouths.”
Whatever this ancient weapon was about - for us it is about the threat of words becoming wars and moral injury blowing up into blood baths of violence. It even shows up in the New Testament:
"For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword."
The energy of this shift from victory to vengeful violence is terrifying. We are living it right now.
And it’s on us who care enough to protest and to protect our highest virtues to pay attention to these tropes in our tradition, to our complicated moral messaging, to the tropes still found in our history, our songs, and our laws.
Moshe Sokolow reflects on this rough passage:
“Our psalm praises God for His assistance to Israel in vanquishing and subjugating its enemies. In passing, it summons “the faithful” to “exult in glory” and “to impose retribution upon the nations”
Is retribution—another name for vengeance —desirable? Does not the Torah enjoin: “You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against your countrymen” (Lev. 19:18)?
After reviewing a number of significant biblical texts that bear on the subject, Yehudah Eisenberg drew the distinction between vengeance exacted by an individual and retribution that was meted out on a collective level.
Can we crystalize from all this a conclusion regarding the Bible’s attitude towards retribution? Can we affirm, from these texts, the instinctive feeling that it is revolting and repulsive?
It appears that we may distinguish between vengeance on an individual level, which the Bible rejects and subsumes under the imperative of “You shall not take vengeance,” and retribution in the sense of exacting a rightful recompense from the enemies of Israel. That retribution is mentioned in the Bible as an expression of the punishment exacted from a wicked nation; a punishment that comes to atone for its sins, and for the harm it caused to Israel and its God.”
I’m not sure that I agree with the views quoted here -- and even if in theory this reading of collective revenge has validity -- in practice we are seeing that it is cruel and immoral, leading to more carnage and hatred - not to solutions that promote peace and security. What may have worked before will not get us to where we want and need to be.
This is the double edged sword that we inherited -- found in these psalms, in our sacred texts, in our tradition.
We are heirs of noble truths and tribal terror and many more conflicting complex narratives.
Somehow we have to live with this complex legacy. And I think we have to ask ourselves, honestly, how to better handle and transform these deeply harmed and harmful sentiments?
How do we talk back to these chapters so that we don’t validate and glorify them as blueprints and next steps?
Can we leave this text as history and poetry -- but not as practical instructions for an endless war?
Hallelujah, ends this psalm - leading us into the final one that’s coming up tomorrow, starting with the same word and the same hope.
Beyond our human limits we have yearning, hopes and prayers, sometimes sung and sometimes whispered -- we want so much more than what we’ve got and we want forces greater than us to provide justice and heal our broken hearts and broken Hallelujahs.
Maybe this is how the healing begins.
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You've asked great questions-- "how to better handle and transform these deeply harmed and harmful sentiments? " and "How do we talk back to these chapters so that we don’t validate and glorify them as blueprints and next steps?"
There are so many offensive and egregious texts in the Tanakh. I've come to dub them as the "Don't-do-it-like-this" Torah, the Torah of Negative Lessons, the "I'm-sharing-a-bad-model-of-relationship/ action/ vow/ rule." Rarely do we read the texts at face value. Maybe each text is like this, a double edged sword... may we recognize that which is not to be emulated, and that which is to be lifted up.