Abstract
This article investigates the form and purpose of Psalm 101 from two perspectives: As a unique composition from the late Persian or early Hellenistic period, and in terms of its function within the context of Book IV of the Psalter. It is suggested that it was designed by exponents of wisdom and Torah piety to serve as a ‘royal psalm’ at exactly this location in the Psalter. It was meant to offer support to faithful Yahwists by criticising the apostate Judean aristocracy of its time of origin and serve as a prayer with which Yahweh could be beseeched to establish his righteous rule by judging evildoers and thus vindicating the faithful.
Highlights
This article has a dual purpose: On the one hand, it offers an investigation of the form and function of Psalm 101 as a text on its own, but it proposes to describe the probable role that was assigned, by its editors, to this composition in Book IV of the Psalter
It will initially be investigated from an intratextual perspective and afterwards defined in terms of intertextual relations: correspondence with other, similar psalms and possible seminal sources that played a role in its composition, and its integration into Book IV of the Psalter
In terms of Gattung, it was classified by Hermann Gunkel as a ‘royal psalm’ and this classification is still accepted by the majority of investigators, Gunkel’s views are almost always modified to some extent
Summary
This article has a dual purpose: On the one hand, it offers an investigation of the form and function of Psalm 101 as a text on its own, but it proposes to describe the probable role that was assigned, by its editors, to this composition in Book IV of the Psalter. The solutions to many of the research questions listed above are most probably interrelated: Psalm 101 seems to have been designed and composed in the late post-exilic age to serve at this particular junction in the Psalter as a ‘royal psalm’ It displays features commonly found in other psalms composed or edited by exponents of wisdom and Torah piety, inter alia, its homogenous parallelistic form. This the poet achieved through emphasis on the intimate relationship between Yahweh and his royal representative
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