Psalm 14: Refusal to be silenced by those who deny God’s justice
As in Psalm 1, the line, “there is no God,” means something more like, “God can’t/won’t help us.”
Of course, I read it to mean ‘fools say God is dead,’ which probably isn’t a wrong way to interpret it, since poems should be able to take on new (but similar) meaning as time goes on.
(Actually, feel free to disagree with me on that one– I know this is the Bible and maybe it shouldn’t be taking on any new meaning. I don’t know.)
The God-is-dead argument is the one I encounter most often where I am. I have met people who think it’s absolutely ridiculous that I believe what I do. Thing is– and probably the reason I’m honestly having a bit of trouble writing this one– I don’t share the psalmist’s despairing take on people who deny God.
It might help if I could find some context or something, but even after extending my deadline on this post and looking through ebooks and stuff, I’m really not sure how I feel about this psalm. Sorry I’m not a Biblical scholar…
But fear not! One thing I did learn is that Psalm 53 is a near duplicate of this psalm, so we’ll get a chance to think about this one and revisit it in a couple weeks.
What does that first line make you think of? “Fools say in their hearts, ‘There is no God.'”
Should we share the outrage of this psalmist? How do we respond (or not respond) to our reaction to people who deny God?
“They have all gone astray, they are all alike perverse; there is no one who does good, no, not one.”
The rest of the psalm reminds me of things I hear elderly people say sometimes about our generation– Actually, people in our generation say stuff like this too.
Personally, I don’t think we’re special enough to be distinguished from other generations in many ways at all. What makes us any worse than everyone before us?*
…But that has no practical application to anything significant.
You know what, I’m going to ask a couple someones who know something about the Bible about this psalm before it comes up again and I’ll have something more hopeful to say next time.
Or maybe, it’s simple. I mean, it has all the psalm-y themes: Wicked (fools) vs. wise (righteous), God as judge of the evildoers, God as the refuge to the poor, a cry for deliverance of Israel (probably a hot topic for Jews then).
Maybe this psalm is just rubbing me the wrong way, for no reason. Não sei.
How strong is your faith from 1-10? Why do you think?
What do you think of this psalm? Let me know.
*I met an older woman once who was actually convinced our generation is better than any of the ones before us. She claimed the sex and drugs and self-interest has been a problem of pretty much the same degree since she’s been alive– attention spans may be shorter now, she gave us that one– but we’re more empowered than those before us. We pursue careers that are consistent with our passions, not just what makes money or what our parents may have, women have more rights, racism (at least seems) to be less and less tolerated as a whole. And we’re not afraid to start up job for ourselves, be our own boss.
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