Psalm 145 is the 145th

psalm The Book of Psalms ( , ; ; ; ; , in Islam also called Zabur, ), also known as the Psalter, is the first book of the third section of the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) called ('Writings'), and a book of the Old Testament. The book is an anthology of H ...

of the Book of Psalms, generally known in English by its first verse, in the

King James Version The King James Version (KJV), also the King James Bible (KJB) and the Authorized Version (AV), is an Early Modern English Bible translations, Early Modern English translation of the Christianity, Christian Bible for the Church of England, wh ...

, "I will extol thee, my God, O king; and I will bless thy name for ever and ever". In Latin, it is known as "Exaltabo te Deus meus rex". It is the last psalm in the final Davidic collection of psalms, comprising Psalms 138 to 145, which are specifically attributed to

David David (; , "beloved one") was a king of ancient Israel and Judah and the third king of the United Monarchy, according to the Hebrew Bible and Old Testament. The Tel Dan stele, an Aramaic-inscribed stone erected by a king of Aram-Dam ...

in their opening verses. In the slightly different numbering system used in the Greek

Septuagint The Septuagint ( ), sometimes referred to as the Greek Old Testament or The Translation of the Seventy (), and abbreviated as LXX, is the earliest extant Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible from the original Biblical Hebrew. The full Greek ...

version of the Bible, and in the Latin

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, this psalm is Psalm 144. The psalm is a hymn psalm. The psalm forms a regular part of

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and other Protestant liturgies. It has often been set to music, notably by Antonín Dvořák who set several verses in Czech in his '' Biblical Songs''.

Background and themes

This is the only psalm which identifies itself as a תְּהִלָה (''tehillah'') – as a ''

'' (namely, a hymn of praise). The version in the

Dead Sea Scrolls The Dead Sea Scrolls, also called the Qumran Caves Scrolls, are a set of List of Hebrew Bible manuscripts, ancient Jewish manuscripts from the Second Temple period (516 BCE – 70 CE). They were discovered over a period of ten years, between ...

instead describes itself as a "prayer" although it does not contain any request. Psalm 145 is an alphabetic

acrostic An acrostic is a poem or other word composition in which the ''first'' letter (or syllable, or word) of each new line (or paragraph, or other recurring feature in the text) spells out a word, message or the alphabet. The term comes from the Fre ...

, the initial letter of each verse being the Hebrew alphabet in sequence. For this purpose, the usual Hebrew numbering of verse 1, which begins with the title, "A Psalm of David", is ignored in favor of the non-Hebrew numbering which treats verse 1 as beginning ארוממך (''Aromimkha'', "I will exalt You"). The Dead Sea Scrolls version also ends each verse with the recurring (non-canonical) refrain, "Blessed be YHVH and blessed be His name forever and ever" and adds at the end of the Psalm the tag, "This is for a memorial". The Dead Sea Scrolls version also preserves a line beginning with the letter '' nun''. Psalm 145 is the last Psalm attributed explicitly to David, and also the last of the nine acrostic Psalms in its placement in the Book of Psalms (the acrostic Psalms being Psalms 9, 10, 25, 34, 37, 111, 112, 119 and 145).

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writer Joseph Benson notes that the king (David) praises "his king", "termed so by way of eminence: the King of kings, the God by whom kings reign". O Palmer Roberton writes "The last Psalm has been set in place in preparation for the final crescendo of Praise in the Psalter.", which would be Psalms 146-150.

Uses

Judaism

* The majority of the prayer Ashrei that is recited thrice daily is Psalm 145 (see the entry for Ashrei for further details on its use in Jewish liturgy). * Verse 13 is found in the repetition to the

Amidah The ''Amidah'' (, ''Tefilat HaAmidah'', 'The Standing Prayer'), also called the ''Shemoneh Esreh'' ( 'eighteen'), is the central prayer of Jewish liturgy. Observant Jews recite the ''Amidah'' during each of the three services prayed on week ...

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. * Verse 16 is found in the final paragraph of

Birkat Hamazon Birkat Hamazon ( "The Blessing of the Food"), known in English as the Grace After Meals ( "to bless", Yinglish: Bentsching), is a set of Hebrew language, Hebrew blessings that Halakha, Jewish law prescribes following a meal that includes at le ...

. It is also recited while donning the tefillin a after the head tefillin is securely in place. * Verse 21 is recited by some following

Psalm 126 Psalm 126 is the 126th psalm of the Book of Psalms, beginning in English in the King James Version: "When the Lord turned again the captivity of Zion, we were like them that dream". In Latin, it is known as ''In convertendo Dominus''. It is one ...

(Shir Hama'alot) preceding

Book of Common Prayer

In the

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's ''

Book of Common Prayer The ''Book of Common Prayer'' (BCP) is the title given to a number of related prayer books used in the Anglican Communion and by other Christianity, Christian churches historically related to Anglicanism. The Book of Common Prayer (1549), fi ...

'', this psalm is appointed to be read on the morning of the thirtieth day of the month, as well as at Evensong on Whitsunday.

Musical settings

Czech composer Antonín Dvořák set verses 1–3, 5 and 6 (together with Psalm 144 verse 9) to music in No. 5 of his '' Biblical Songs'' (1894). Brian Shamash has recorded one of the most common traditional Jewish melodies for chanting Ashrei. Giovanni Bernardone, better known as

Francis of Assisi Giovanni di Pietro di Bernardone ( 1181 – 3 October 1226), known as Francis of Assisi, was an Italians, Italian Mysticism, mystic, poet and Friar, Catholic friar who founded the religious order of the Franciscans. Inspired to lead a Chris ...

, wrote a poem towards the end of his life, in 1225, based on Psalm 145 which Draper adapted to the song " All Creatures of Our God and King" in 1919.

Text

The following table shows the Hebrew text of the Psalm with vowels, alongside the

Koine Greek Koine Greek (, ), also variously known as Hellenistic Greek, common Attic, the Alexandrian dialect, Biblical Greek, Septuagint Greek or New Testament Greek, was the koiné language, common supra-regional form of Greek language, Greek spoken and ...

text in the

and the English translation from the

. Note that the meaning can slightly differ between these versions, as the Septuagint and the

Masoretic text The Masoretic Text (MT or 𝕸; ) is the authoritative Hebrew and Aramaic text of the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible (''Tanakh'') in Rabbinic Judaism. The Masoretic Text defines the Jewish canon and its precise letter-text, with its vocaliz ...

come from different textual traditions.A 1917 translation directly from Hebrew to English by the

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can be foun
here
o
here
and an 1844 translation directly from the Septuagint by L. C. L. Brenton can be foun
here
Both translations are in the

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. In the Septuagint, this psalm is numbered Psalm 144.

The "missing verse"

Being an alphabetic

psalm, the initial letter of each verse in Psalm 145 should be the Hebrew alphabet in sequence, but in the

Masoretic Text The Masoretic Text (MT or 𝕸; ) is the authoritative Hebrew and Aramaic text of the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible (''Tanakh'') in Rabbinic Judaism. The Masoretic Text defines the Jewish canon and its precise letter-text, with its vocaliz ...

there is no verse beginning with the letter ''nun'' (), which would come between verses 13 and 14. A very common supposition is that there had been such a verse but it was omitted by a copyist's error. If so, that error must have occurred very early. By the 3rd century C.E., Rabbi Johanan Ha-Nappah is quoted in the

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('' Berakhot'' 4b) as asking why is there no verse in Psalm 145 beginning with ''nun'', and the explanation is given (presumably by the same Rabbi Johanan) that the word "fallen" (נפלה, ''nawfla'') begins with ''nun'', as in the verse of ("Fallen is the Maiden of Israel, she shall arise nevermore"), and thus it is incompatible with the uplifting and universal theme of the Psalm. Since verse 14, the ''samech'' verse, contains the word "נֹּפְלִ֑ים" (the fallen), the Talmud conjectures that King David foresaw the destruction ("fall") of Israel and omitted a verse starting with ''nun'', while nevertheless hinting to it in the next verse (cf. the pattern of verse 12, ending with "מַלְכוּתֽוֹ" (His kingship), and verse 13, starting with "מַֽלְכוּתְךָ֗" (Your kingship)). The explanation may not satisfy modern readers (it did not satisfy Rabbi David Kimhi of the 13th century), but it demonstrates that the absence of a verse beginning with that letter was noticed and was undisputed even in antiquity. However, the

, the Latin

(which is largely based on the Septuagint), the Syriac

Peshitta The Peshitta ( ''or'' ') is the standard Syriac edition of the Bible for Syriac Christian churches and traditions that follow the liturgies of the Syriac Rites. The Peshitta is originally and traditionally written in the Classical Syriac d ...

, and the

(11QPs-ɑ; which shows some affinity with the Septuagint, e.g., the inclusion of a 151st Psalm) all provide a verse at this point which commences (in Hebrew) with ''nun''—נֶאֱמָן : ''"Faithful is God in His sayings, and Honest in all His works"'' : . New Revised Standard Version : ''Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom'', :: ''and your dominion endures throughout all generations''. : ''The Lord is faithful in all his words'', :: ''and gracious in all his deeds''. This verse is now inserted at the end of verse 13 (sometimes numbered "verse 13b") in several Christian versions of the Bible including the New Revised Standard, the New American, the Today's English Version, the Moffat, and others. However, not everyone is convinced that this ''nun'' verse is authentic. It is, except for the first word, identical to verse 17 (צ) ("''Righteous'' is YHVH in all His ways…"), and thus, as Kimmelman argues, may have been a post-facto attempt to "cure" the apparent deficiency. These ancient versions all have other departures from the traditional Hebrew text which make them imperfect evidence of the original text; for example, the Dead Sea Scrolls version ends ''every'' verse in Psalm 145 with "Blessed be YHVH and blessed is His name forever and ever". And no such ''nun'' verse is found in other important ancient translations from the Hebrew — the Aramaic Targum, the Greek versions of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion — nor is such a verse quoted anywhere in the Talmud. Additionally, there are other alphabetic acrostics in the Book of Psalms — specifically Psalms 25 and 34 — that also imperfectly follow the alphabet. It is plausible that a ''nun'' verse was not part of the original text.See, e.g., Benun, Ronald, '' Journal of Hebrew Scriptures'', vol. 6, art. 5 ; Jacobson, Bernhard S., ''The Weekday Siddur'' (2nd Engl. ed., 1978, Tel-Aviv, Sinai) p. 94. The Dead Sea version also contains, in that one verse, a reference to God as ''Elohim'', which is not used anywhere else in Psalm 145. Lieberman, Abraham A., Again: The Words of Gad the Seer, ''Journal of Biblical Literature'', vol 111, nr. 2 (Summer 1992) p. 314.

Notes

References

External links

* in Hebrew and English - Mechon-mamre * * * Text of Psalm 145 according to th
1928 Psalter

I will extol you, my God and king.
text and footnotes, usccb.org United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
Psalm 145 – Praising God for Who He Is and What He Does
text and detailed commentary, enduringword.com

introduction and text, biblestudytools.com
Psalm 145 / Refrain: Great is the Lord and highly to be praised.

Psalm 145
at biblegateway.com * Hymnary.org
Hymns for Psalm 145
{{authority control Texts assigned to David 145