You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
Man is the only animal who is self-conscious and seemingly aware of something, Creation, transcending himself. The Psalm we are considering gives consummate expression to this. It is put into the mouth of a dumb creature … “the Lord is my Shepherd”. What makes this the near-perfect thing it is? Only four similar instances where silent creation manifests with human speech, occur in the Bible (Eden's serpent, Balaam's ass, Moses' well and Jotham's forest). What gives this Psalm, (perhaps the highest flight of poetic genius), its supreme inspiration and appeal today?
Brief, as Life itself, Psalm XXIII is the apotheosis of living, the contemplation of dying. It conveys its perfect apprehension in guise of a parable. “the valley of the shadow of death”. The Old Testament is sparing of parable. It employs here a majestic metaphor and perfect phrasing, noble music and moving imagery, extreme economy of word, of rhyme, of means. Perhaps this explains and constitutes the universality of its appeal, its inevitable rightness for all occasion and the charm of its evocative powers.
Psychology, in addressing itself to the Psalm's thematic presentation finds its appeal to lie in its simple symbolic equation. This formula, perhaps typical of the martyr race, represents the unquestioning acceptance of, and masochistic return to, the pre-genital mother. All its evocative symbolism is oral nutritional, and tells of oral dependency. It is incredulous of wrong, in passive submission to the pastor, preaches a sheep-like readiness for sacrifice, the bowing to the