Psalm Superscriptions: Part I. Scribal additions or an “important key which unlocks” a “world of understanding”?

[Reading Time: 11 minutes]

The initial question (and those that follow)

Are the superscriptions in the Psalms inspired?

That is to say, should we evaluate them in the same way we evaluate Scripture? (i.e. study them, derive insight and spiritual direction from them…?).

Or should we, rather, see them as later scribal additions, the truth and validity of which remains in question?

But beyond that…most likely…most probably…based on our rigorous, modern methodology…David was not even the author of the Psalms. And to make such claims of Davidic authorship is simply "pious fictions," or "honorary" titles, or, in point of fact, “historically worthless” (Gunkel, The Psalms: A Form-Critical Introduction, p. 5).

The Psalms were not actually derived from the personal, flesh-and-blood experiences of the Psalmist. Rather, they are the communal ‘we’ of post-exilic Israel:

“The 'I' of the Psalms is not the individual David, but the personified community of Israel in the post-exilic age.” (Wellhausen, The Book of Psalms: A New English Translation, p. 21).

Wellhausen, so that we are aware, developed the Documentary Hypothesis, which held that the "Priestly" source of the Psalms was the most "advanced" of the post-exilic era, and therefore, the Psalms stood as essentially the "hymn-book of the Second Temple" (p. )

Well, ok.

Is this what the claim of the original rabbinic in the first century?

Or, as we’re not in a modern rabbinical school, is that what the text of the NT says? And what Jesus, based on the Gospel witness, seemed to believe?

Superscriptions in the Davidic Psalms: An overview

In the Psalms there are 13 historical superscriptions that refer to David’s life:

Psalms 3, 7, 18, 34, 51, 52, 54, 56, 57, 59, 60, 63 & 142.

If these superscriptions are considered a part of the inspired, Hebrew Bible, then our response to them would be the same as to the corpus of Scripture.

If they are not, however, such that they are nothing more than scribal additions and rabbinic interpolations made over the centuries, we should make a note of their questionable historicity then quickly pass over them to the body of the Psalm itself. Or much more…we should actually reject their authenticity altogether and insert into the text our own modern theories, be they derived from a form-critical approach, documentary hypothesis approach (as above), a cult-functional approach, social-scientific criticism, etc., etc.).

If, however, there is, at the very least, a possibility of divine inspiration (as for example could be argued from the fact that the title of Psalm 18 is found in II Sam 22:1, the Davidic authorship of Psalm 110 is confirmed by Jesus Himself in Lk 20:42, etc. [more on this below]), then these superscriptions can add critical insights to our understanding of the historical dimensions of these Davidic Psalms.

The historicity of the Psalms

And if we then move into the question of the historicity of the Psalms themselves, we may point to James Anderson, who writes in his Translator’s Preface to the fifth volume of Calvin’s Commentary on the Psalms,

“The reader will perceive how completely the inspiration of the Psalms is established by New Testament authority, and how highly they were appreciated by Christ and His Apostles, there being no portion of Old Testament Scripture from which they so frequently quoted.”

But maybe that’s just preaching to the choir of a modern Reformed audience.

Possibly.

If so, then we need to go back to earlier sources…

For a full analysis, see Part II:

Psalm Superscriptions: Part II. The Historicity of the Psalms: Ps 110 and Ps 22—the “Fifth Gospel—through Rabbinic interpretation into the Church Fathers

Historical and Anatomical; A Doorway and a Key

All of this history and historical interpretation to say, if the Psalms and their Superscriptions are indeed genuine, their words emerge out of the lived concrete of flesh-and-blood realities of life.

They are not simply abstract theological poetry; they are Scriptural truths embodied in the life of the Psalmist.

And as he internalizes these Fourth-Dimensional truths and applies them into every dark crevice of the Third Dimensions of his life, the Psalmist shows the Jewish people…and us Gentiles, living millennia later, how to turn our own experiences—be they of joy and praise, on the one hand, or chaos, confusion and betrayal, on the other—into Fourth-Dimensional prayers to our Living God.

In this regard, Calvin even went so far as to declare of his Commentary on the Psalms,

"I have been accustomed to call this book, I think not inappropriately,

'An Anatomy of all the Parts of the Soul';

For there is not an emotion of which any one can be conscious that is not here represented as in a mirror.

Or rather, the Holy Spirit has here drawn to the life all the griefs, sorrows, fears, doubts, hopes, cares, perplexities—in short, all the distracting emotions with which the minds of men are wont to be agitated" (p. 19-20).

In this way, the Superscriptions are, we might say, the doorway into the Psalms; but what is even more, they can then offer us

“an important key which unlocks a world of understanding in the Psalter and of the days of its composition.”

As is always the case, much, much more could be written on the debates over the historicity of the superscriptions. For the purposes of our word studies on the Psalms, however, we will hold to this latter position of their historical veracity, walking through their doorway and unlocking through this key a portal into a world of Fourth-Dimensional understanding.

Through the dark “lurking places” into the Light

To refer back to Calvin’s Preface for one final note, he writes that while other books of the Bible contain God’s words “to us,” the Psalms contain the prophets' words “to God.”

With their words, the human heart is laid open before the Divine.

And through the Psalmist’s own struggle with doubt, anger and fear, we are "drawn” by these deep emotions “to the examination” of ourselves, where we allow our "lurking places" to be discovered and our hearts to be brought into the light.

“The other parts of Scripture contain the commandments which God enjoined his servants to announce to us.

But here the prophets themselves, seeing they are exhibited to us as speaking to God, and laying open all their inmost thoughts and affections, call, or rather draw, each of us to the examination of himself in particulars in order that none of the many infirmities to which we are subject, and of the many vices with which we abound, may remain concealed” (p. 20).

That is to say, the Psalms, borne out of the hardships and trials of life’s experiences (ex-peirázō), not only reveal our own sicknesses and infirmities, but lead our heart beyond them—or, more accurately, through them!—to its cure.

But How?

For this, we will conclude with a final writing.