About the Psalm
To begin: there is probably no trace of any “positivity” in this psalm. If you read this psalm once through in 5 minutes, all the 5 minutes will feel like doom, despite the opening declaration in the first half of verse 1. What’s going on?
There are several disturbing issues in here. In each, we need to acknowledge their seriousness; and we should also contemplate the potential positive aspects: remote, but they are there.
Firstly, while this should be the second point, it could be the more urgent one to address. The language of the text, the metaphor and experience, navigating across the line of reality and figurative, might give some resemblance to language similarly used in abusive incidents. Wow, and before we go too far, the resemblance is not total. What is to note here is that the description of negative experience and thoughts has similarities; the quantifying point is that that similarities don’t go that far. How far they go, this is reader’s conviction.
It might be worthwhile to alert ourselves to what looks like a delineation between (a) what has happened to the psalmist, (b) what God has done to him, and (c) who God is as portrayed in this writing. Lest that my words here take you on the wrong path; it is important to note “evidence” in this psalm of the three aspects, a, b and c.
Were any accusations were deliberated, (a) and (b) might arrive at a summary that either (d) God thinks that the psalmist “deserves” the treatment the latter received, or that (e) the psalmist had caused upon himself the negative experience, which might or might not be intended by God. Given how the nature of “reality” and how human “think”, lest take d and e apart, when there could be much convergence between the two.
Fundamentally, what was wrong with God, what legal aspects has he caused injury to another, or, perhaps more to the point, what aspects of God being God that had ceased that led to the experience the psalmist experieced? These, if relevant, are not clear. We could say that the power relation means that the subordinate did not feel “liberated” to say whatever they wanted to say; however, what he did say in the psalm appears to have been from one who is well “liberated” to say whatever.
The second point concerns what’s the point of this psalm in the first place. History could inform us the likely context from which this psalm came about. In doom and gloom, we find exactly that. But why is this psalm here for us to use today, in other words, could it be relevant to any age, time and place?
I can’t fully answer that! However, I start on the premise that the psalm is here, and I want to find a hint on why it remains here. One thing to note, and a very powerful one, is that we can complain to God, and do that where the complaint is about God himself. More so, the complaint drives us to the ends of our being. This can come across as what we speaks in extreme terms, such as rethorical questions about whether the dead can praise the name of God, and more personally, God has caused all my friends and loved ones to desert me.
The irony that the psalm did not finish in something “positive” (nor did it start that way) adds to evidence that, in the Bible, there are many things and situations that can remain bad, stay gloom, and with maximum doom.
To faith enquirers that say why God causes or allows wars and wonton destruction of all kinds (political, social, environmental etc.), whether satisfactory answers are found, they will also challenge the fact that not all live’s outcome end in bright and positive ways. For enquirers who are “in the know” (perhaps having had faith experience or conviction), they might also say that once our life becomes easy, happy with lots of rewards, we will begin to “let God go”: in that way, the reason we worship God is we need “help” – no more help needed, God is no longer needed.
To some extent, this psalm plays a dark side that “answers” these enquirers. Believing in God can mean experiencing a long period of great and terrible experience including losing all that you have. That’s it. That is faith. We don’t have a “but” (turn a chapter, happy ending…). It is that. That’s the point of this psalm.
About the new composition
I started this new music on a sunday afternoon, back from church and felt physically really, really tired. Looking at the text of this psalm, it caught my attention (for reasons above). It took me about an hour to reflect on the spirit of the text, and what music that plays a part for the purpose of the text. Then, I considered the structure of the music (verses), and what could be done, if any, to “balance” the negativity in the text with “positives”.
Different to other psalms, I decided to compose for the English lyrics. When there are requests for other languages, I will then do that.
Between dinner time and 1100pm, I had completed the text setting and the music. The music is ABA, where A is twice as long as B: A is text from roughly 2 verses, and B is 1. Each verse begins with a shifting fragment of verses 1 and 2. As I come to the final verse, I felt it was appropriate to recall some of the wordings in verses 1 and 2 and make this as a “Coda”. Doing this should not deviate from the spirit and purpose of the text. The music for the Coda is a repeat of the music already in the verses. It does not gloss with a change to posititivity. It works to assert the text: for one reading this psalm to find God, the opening verses would recall their attention.
Within the tired hours where 4 hours were at maximum “engagement” with the composition, the piece was completed. The next step is to adjust the score for publishing and audio and visual materials for the website.
A paraphrase
My God, you can save me.
Day and night, I cry to you.
Now I got your ear, listen to my plea.
My cries for your help.
Why, my life is laden with troubles,
hardships, I can even smell death.
That smell of death comes from me.
Like a hugest tree, no strength left, it crumbles.
I have been left among the dead.
I am sure I am a living corpse.
I am not counted among the living one.
I am forgotten by you.
Dead, imagined or otherwise,
I am cut off from your care.
I find myself in the lowest pit.
You have subjected me to the doomest of the darkest places.
Your anger, whether real or as I imagined,
feels like a rock that pulls me further down;
waves that push me to the depths.
Friends and loved ones alienate me.
You have made me acting in wild manners to them.
Be good, be better, be bad, be worse,
I am in this trap with no way to run away.
Every second I beg with tears that blind my sight
that God you have mercy:
turn to me when I am alive.
The dead cannot rise up to praise you about your wonderful deeds.
Your unfailing love is what I declare,
but the dead cannot do that.
Your faithfulness is what I proclaim,
those with destructive spirits cannot do that.
Where I am, I can touch and breathe darkness.
Darkness and your wonderful grace don’t compute.
Your righteousness is a non-concept, a non-word,
in a world of forgetfulness, they forget you, God.
God, I cry to you for help day by day.
Knock knock, you turn your face away.
You reject me. Why?
Long I have depended on you my God for help
I have been sick and close to death since youth.
I have reached the end of understanding.
Your anger and terror overwhelms my senses:
my sight and my mind becomes a whirwind
where everything jumbles up.
Cannot see, cannot think. Nothing is straight.
Even my closest companions and loved ones
You have caused them to leave me.