Good Morning Yamon Ki Yesepar and Nevim Arith Hayomim:
Psalms 25:1: “A Psalm of David, Unto thee, O’Lord, do I lift up my soul.”
“My word fly up, my thoughts remain below. Words without thoughts, never to heaven go.” King Claudius, Hamlet, Act 3, Scene 3.
Shakespeare raises a very interesting issue here. King Claudius has killed his brother and is showing no remorse. His son, Hamlet stages a play, “The Mouse Trap” which mimics King Claudius’s act of murder and strikes the conscience of the King. He is sending Hamlet away with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern effectively banishing him from the kingdom and thus eliminating the only threat he believes to prevent this scandal from breaking out. In a curious act, when the King feels he is alone, he tries to pray, but as he is unrepentant for his crime, he feels God will not forgive him.
What is curious is why would King Claudius seek forgiveness from God if he were unrepentant. Years ago, I took a Shakespeare course in a secular college and I remember asking my professor this question. My professor simply replied: “Well, he may have been unrepentant for his crime, but he didn’t want to go to hell as a result of that crime.” The good professor’s answer has haunted me ever since.
Being an evangelical, a Baptist evangelical at that, I was always taught that we need to really preach about hell to scare some people into becoming a Christian. I just wonder if Shakespeare did not hit on a flaw in this reasoning. The idea is that a person will be so scared of going to hell, that he will be sorry for his sins that will send him to hell so he will surely repent. The Bible clearly teaches that repentance plays a key role in the forgiveness of sins Acts 3:19. II Corinthians 7:10 tells us that Godly sorrow works repentance.
George and I had a discussion about this. He pointed out that the Greek word for repentance is matanoes. It is formed from the word Mata which means “mind” and hence matanoes is to change one’s mind. Sorrow is not repentance. King Claudius felt sorrow for his crime only because of the consequences of the crime, but not for the crime itself. Sorrow, Godly sorrow will lead one to repentance.
Curious that David prays: “Unto you O Lord, do I lift up my soul.” If God is living inside of us, why lift up our soul to Him. He and our soul and spirit are all in the same place. We don’t need to lift our soul up to heaven or to the sky.
You know, David and his soul never really got along too well. Check out Psalms 103:1 “Bless the Lord O my soul.” This is in a piel imperative form. He is literally picking his soul up by the collar, slamming it against wall and screaming at it: “Soul, I am sick and tired of you and you whining. Now get with the program and start blessing the Lord.”
David knew all about repentance and his soul gave him all sorts of trouble over this matter. His spirit was ready to repent but his soul just would not co-operate. I believe this is the dilemma that Shakespeare put King Claudius under. King Claudius’s spirit did want to repent, that is why he tried to pray. But his soul kept interfering with such things like: “If you do, true repentance means you change your mind and therefore you can no longer cover up your little scandal. You will have to go public with your crime and you know what that means?”
David faced a similar dilemma and everything in his soul cried out: “Cover up your scandal, don’t let anyone know about your adultery and your murderous crime to cover up the scandal.” His spirit was ready and willing to repent, but his soul was not. His soul usually won, but fortunately, King David, unlike King Claudius, fed his spirit and fought with his soul. Now I don’t know if Psalms 25 refers to his crime with Bathsheba and her husband, but I do now that David, like me and probably like you, struggled with that old soul talking you out of coming clean over past sins and preventing you from true repentance. A repentance with both spirit and soul in agreement.
When David said he would “lift up” his soul, he was making a play on words. The word used in the Hebrew is “’ase‘” which could and most likely comes from the root word “nasa. (lift up)” By dropping the Nun and putting in an Aleph this verb becomes a Qal imperfect single in the first person. This is the way the Masoretic text points it up. However, considering David’s style of writing, I have to question why he put it in a Qal form and not a Piel form, unless he was making a play on the word “ish” which could be another possible root word. Nasa means to lift up or to offer up. David is offering up his soul to God. But, by not putting this in a Piel form which he would normally do, he is also saying that he is offering up his soul as a burnt offering, a true sacrifice.
Have you ever offered up your soul as a burnt offer, and sacrifice to God? Have you ever prayed: “Heavenly Father, in my heart, in my spirit I want to truly repent, and have a change of mind for my sin(s) but my soul keeps reminding me that if I come clean I have some pretty serious consequences to pay (back taxes, apologies, returning a stolen item like a pen etc.) and my soul is blocking me from true repentance. So Father, here it is, I am “lifting up” my soul to you. I am giving it to you as a burnt offering.
I don’t know about you, but like David, my soul and I do not always get along and I think the time has come for me to pick up my soul by the collar and say; “Guess what soul, I’m going to give my Heavenly Father a burnt offering, and you’re it.”
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