The Book of Psalms

In short

150 poems – from many different centuries – compiled in the third biggest book of the Bible*.

Why it is important

Believe it or not, these poems actually teach us a lot about points of doctrine and contain prophecies of Jesus. And, of course, they are also some amazing expressions of praise to God and even complaints in time of distress.

Main characters

None, really, but David did write at least 75 of them (see the lesson from March 23), and he writes many of them from a very personal place.

What is in this book

Five smaller books. You’ll see the divisions in your Bible. (Refer to the picture also.)

There is actually a ton of organization to the Psalms – it’s not a completely random grab bag of poems. The division into five books is apparently part of the original manuscripts.

This brings up another point – headings.

So, you are probably used to headings in your Bible like “The Prodigal Son” (Lk 15:11-32) or “Daniel and the Lions’ Den” (Dan 6). But there are headings in the book of Psalms that are actually part of the Hebrew text, like “A Psalm of David. A song at the dedication of the temple” (Ps 30). This is Scripture, not something added by a corporation.

Theology and doctrine

“Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord” (Colossians 3:16, KJV).

Footnote

* Sure, it’s the biggest book of OUR printed Bibles, as far as pages go. But in number of words (real length), Jeremiah is the longest (hence the English word “jeremiad”) then Genesis, and then Psalms. Yep, I was surprised, too.