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Psalms and Song of Songs

  1. Lesson One
    Overview of Poetry
    31 Activities
    |
    1 Assessment
  2. Lesson Two
    Poetic Structures
    22 Activities
    |
    1 Assessment
  3. Lesson Three
    Praise and Lament
    24 Activities
    |
    2 Assessments
  4. Lesson Four
    The Diversity of Psalms
    28 Activities
  5. Lesson Five
    Song of Songs
    20 Activities
  6. Course Wrap-Up
    Course Completion
    1 Activity
    |
    1 Assessment

Participants 24

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Psalms and Song of Songs Overview of Poetry In Front | Athanasius on the Psalms
Lesson 1, Activity 28

In Front | Athanasius on the Psalms

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The book of Psalms was beloved by early church communities. Its ability to resonate with people on a personal and emotional level has endeared it to both lay people and theologians. One of the more interesting examples of this in early Christian history is that of Athanasius of Alexandria, a fourth century Egyptian bishop. On learning that a younger Christian was attempting to learn the meaning of all 150 Psalms, Athanasius sent him an enthusiastic letter of encouragement: 

“I too have a great fondness for [Psalms]—just as I have for all the Scripture. Indeed, it so happens that I had a conversation with a learned old man, and I wish to write you about those things that old master of the Psalter told me about it. For there is a certain grace and persuasiveness combined with the reasonable statement. He said this:”

“All Scripture of ours, my son—both ancient and new—is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, as it is written. But the Book of Psalms possesses a certain winning exactitude for those who are prayerful. Each sacred book supplies and announces its own promise . . . Yet the Book of Psalms is like a garden containing things of all these kinds, and it sets them to music, but also exhibits things of its own that it gives in song along with them.

 

“It sings the events of Genesis in Psalm 18 . . . The themes of Exodus and Numbers and Deuteronomy it chants beautifully in Psalms 77 and 113 . . . The things concerning Joshua and the judges it manifests somehow in the 106th . . . The pronouncements of the Prophets are declared in nearly every psalm . . . [This book] knew Christ Himself as the Coming One and indeed it especially speaks concerning Him in the forty-fourth psalm, (the 86th, 82nd, 68th, 22nd etc.)

 

“[But] in addition to the other things in which it enjoys an affinity and fellowship with the other books, it possesses, beyond that, this marvel of its own—namely, that it contains even the emotions of each soul . . . Therefore anyone who wishes boundlessly to receive and understand from it, so as to mold himself, it is written there. 

 

“[In] the Book of Psalms, the one who hears, in addition to [what he learns] . . . also comprehends and is taught it in the emotions of the soul.”

Source: Athanasius: The Life of Antony and The Letter to Marcellinus, Trans. Robert C. Gregg, 1980, pp. 101-104, 108.