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Trust and Hope in the Psalms

A call to us to be signposts to the people of the world

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The world today can seem chaotic and out of control, and some grasp for simplistic and unrealistic solutions that only contribute to the havoc. While no single element will set everything right, the solution must involve genuine hope, which we find in the psalms. There, hope does not stand alone but is continually paired with trust.

Trust often appears in the psalms of petition, sometimes called laments. My novice master called them “Trouble Psalms” because these psalmists were “in big trouble,” which they describe in anguished detail as they ask God to rescue them. However, they balance their laments with statements of trust as in Psalm 31:15-16.

The statement of trust: “But I trust in you, Lord; / I say, ‘You are my God.’ / My destiny is in your hands”; and the petition: “Rescue me from my enemies, / from the hands of my pursuers.”

The Hebrew word for “trust,” baṭaḥ, means “to feel safe, to be full of confidence,” and it mirrors our English sense of “trust” as “a firm belief in the reliability, truth, or ability of someone or something” (Oxford English Dictionary). Trust is both personal and relational, and the New Testament captures this reality with the words “faith” and “believe.” Though the Greeks give us the emphasis on faith as intellectual assent, the Hebrew context stresses being faithful and accepting another as trustworthy. The voice in Psalm 31 grounds its trust in a person: “I trust in you. … You are my God.” This is the psalmist’s faith. Because of it, the psalmist can look to the future in peace: “My destiny is in your hands” (v. 16).

These statements of trust appear in many places. Psalm 86:2 pleads, “Save your servant who trusts in you.” Psalm 25:2 is similar, but it raises the possibility of disappointment: “My God, in you I trust; / do not let me be disgraced; / do not let my enemies gloat over me.”

Psalm 71:5-6 links trust to hope: “You are my hope, Lord; / my trust, GOD, from my youth. / On you I have depended since birth; / from my mother’s womb you are my strength; / my hope in you never wavers.”

Here trust finds its ground in the past while hope looks to the future. The Hebrew word for “hope” comes from the verb, qāwah, which means, first of all, “to wait” and, therefore, “to hope.” We see this in the translations of Psalm 31.

NRSV: “Be strong, and let your heart take courage, / all you who wait for the LORD” (31:24).

NABRE: “Be strong and take heart, / all who hope in the LORD” (31:25).

Waiting and Hoping

Here, the Hebrew verb allows for two meanings, but waiting and hoping are not always the same, particularly today.

Mostly, we do not like to wait. It seems like an imposition, a lack of respect. Airports are notorious for making us wait. Restaurants are good when you do not have to wait. At times, we are made to wait without any assurance of fulfillment, and some people come to believe that waiting for almost anything is futile. In Samuel Beckett’s play, “Waiting for Gadot,” two characters wait for Gadot who never shows up. Though Beckett denied that “Gadot” was a reference to God, many people today believe that it is futile to wait for God.

In his little book “On Hope” (Ignatius Press), Josef Pieper distinguishes between psychological depression that overtakes a person and the sin of despair, in which a person holds insistently to the denial of forgiveness and fulfillment.

Psalm 88 shows us something of that as it ends in darkness; its only hope lies in the psalmist continuing to pray. Psalm 39 ends by asking God, “Turn your gaze from me, that I may smile / before I depart to be no more.”

Pieper points to a second type of hopelessness: presumption, which may be either a Pelagian self-assurance or an inordinate trust in God’s mercy. Neither is realistic, and both are self-deceptive. As Pieper also notes, despair is tragic while presumption can be comic. Psalm 73 would have us laugh at the foolish rich man who wears his pride “as a necklace” before sliding to destruction. The psalmist, tempted earlier to despair, ends with a great profession of faith: “As for me, to be near God is my good, / to make the Lord GOD my refuge. / I shall declare all your works / in the gates of daughter Zion” (73:28).

Expectation

Hope is not just waiting. Hope builds on trust and expects to be near God.

In Psalm 42, the soul, like the deer, thirsts for the living God, and asks: “When can I enter and see the face of God?”(v. 3). Expectation is part of hope, and if we are not expecting something, we may well miss it.

This became clear when visiting my sister shortly after the birth of her youngest child. We were half-watching television and carrying on a conversation when suddenly my sister said, “The baby is crying.” I had not heard a thing. Then she said, “It sounds like he’s hungry.” I still hadn’t heard anything. However, she, the mother, was listening for her child, and she not only heard the baby’s cry but was able to interpret it. I worry that many are not expecting to see the face of God, and therefore never see it.

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Go Deeper with These Resources

Pope Francis, “On Hope” (Loyola Press, $12.95)

Pope Benedict XVI, Spe Salvi (online at vatican.va)

Susan E. Gillingham, “The Poems and Psalms of the Hebrew Bible” (Oxford University Press, $79)

Daniel J. Harrington, “Why Do We Hope? Images in the Psalms” (Liturgical Press, $19.95)

Josef Pieper, “On Hope,” translated by Mary Frances McCarthy (Ignatius Press)

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Susan Gillingham, a British theologian, building on the German Herman Gunkel’s work, identifies a group of psalms that ask nothing of God but center on statements of trust. We hear individual voices in Psalms 4, 11, 16, 23, 27, 62, 84, 91, 121, 131, and communal voices in Psalms 115, 125, 129, 133.

Psalm 4, familiar from compline, builds toward this confidence expressed in its last two verses: “But you have given my heart more joy / than they have when grain and wine abound. / In peace I will lie down and fall asleep, / for you alone, Lord, make me secure.”

Psalm 62, easily overlooked, gives us a gentle and trusting voice that begins: “My soul rests in God alone, / from whom comes my salvation. / God alone is my rock and salvation, / my fortress; I shall never fall” (vv. 2-3).

Rather than asking God for help, the voice confronts those who are against him before turning and speaking confidently to the self: “My soul, be at rest in God alone, / from whom comes my hope. / God alone is my rock and my salvation, / my fortress; I shall not fall” (vv. 6-7).

Salvation

The word “salvation,” appearing now for a third time, means focus on help, prosperity, salvation. It comes from the same Hebrew root as the name of Jesus and names the object of “my hope.” Finally, the voice turns again and addresses the community: “Trust God at all times, my people! / Pour out your hearts to God our refuge!” (62:9).

The imagery of rock, fortress and refuge pervade these psalms, as in Psalm 91, also familiar from compline. “You who dwell in the shelter of the Most High, / who abide in the shade of the Almighty, / Say to the LORD, “My refuge and fortress, / my God in whom I trust” (vv. 1-2).

The Romanesque churches, built after the invasion of the barbarians and then Norsemen, were great fortresses with massive pillars and walls. They make concrete the divine fortress that can withstand any attack by whatever enemy. After exploring these images amid the battle, the psalm ends with God announcing deliverance for the psalmist “because he clings to me” (91:14).

The little Psalm 131 also has a humble and trusting voice that begins: “LORD, my heart is not proud; / nor are my eyes haughty” (v. 1).

The image of the weaned child is central here, and the NABRE gives us this translation: “Rather, I have stilled my soul, / Like a weaned child to its mother, / weaned is my soul” (v. 2).

A weaned child no longer sees its mother as just a source of food. The weaned child can rest in its mother’s care and love. The Hebrew word for “soul” also means “self” and “being.” The translation suggests that the voice claims for my whole being a quiet rest in God like that of the weaned child with its mother. Importantly, the last line turns from the self and makes a prayer for the community: “Israel, hope in the LORD, / now and forever” (v. 3).

We could also translate that line: “Israel, wait for the Lord.” This would pick up a theme from the previous psalm that begins its famous cry from the depths and ends with this confident statement.

“I wait for the LORD, / my soul waits / and I hope for his word. / My soul looks for the Lord / more than sentinels for daybreak. / More than sentinels for daybreak, / let Israel hope in the LORD, / For with the LORD is mercy, / with him is plenteous redemption, / And he will redeem Israel / from all its sins” (Ps 130:5-8).

The Long Watch

The long watch through the night causes the desire for the dawn to grow. Though it may seem never to come, the coming of dawn is sure. The voice here waits and watches with a fullness of hope. In the end, it too turns outward to call the community to “hope in the Lord.” “My” hope must be “our” hope.

There is more to explore, and Daniel J. Harrington, SJ, does that in his little book on the psalms: “Why Do We Hope?” (Liturgical Press, $19.95). Both Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis address the question of hope in the world today and speak of hope as a journey toward a reality that has already taken place in Christ. We, who are priests acting in persona Christi, must become signposts of hope for those on this journey. We must call the people of the world to hope.

FATHER HARRY HAGAN, OSB, is an associate professor of Scripture at Saint Meinrad Seminary in Saint Meinrad, Indiana.

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