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Monday, April 6, 2015

Psalm 119: longest Psalm and longest chapter in Jewish Bible (First Testament)

from the Jewish Study Bible (2004, Oxford University Press) Commentary column in text by Marc Zvi Brettler and Adele Berlin:
Psalm 119 is comprised of an eight-fold alphabetic acrostic; there are eight main words used for T-o-r-a-h (word, law, commandment, rules, decree, precepts, teaching) corresponding to the acrostic.
Approximately 176 of these synonyms are found in the 176 verses of the psalm.  The psalm is postexilic and certainly may know a canonized Torah; on the other hand, it is closely connected to wisdom texts, where T-o-r-a-h often means the teaching of the wise (e.g. Proverbs 28:7). . .The psalm is often seen as anthological / quoting earlier verses (see Psalms 111 - 112), especially from Jeremiah, Isaiah, Proverbs, and Job.  In echoing Torah texts and ideas, it is much closer to Deuteronomy than to the Priestly tradition, yet certain core ideas of Deuteronomy -- centrality of Moses, the Torah as a book, and covenant -- are lacking.  It also shows affinities to the book of wisdom of ben Sira (Apocrypha and Septuagint).

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