Psalms 147:1, “Praise ye the LORD: for it is good to sing praises unto our God; for it is pleasant; and praise is comely.”
As one linguist once said, “Every English translation of the Bible is at best a paraphrase.” This is why you have so many different versions, none are mistranslations, just a different way to explain ancient Hebrew words which often do not have a one to one English equivalent. The word zamarah is one such word. It is often rendered as sing praises unto God. I mean that works if you are giving the short version, yet this word has no direct English equivalent. The word must be explained more than just translated. Tracing this word to it’s Semitic root you find the root word zamar originated with the idea of pruning a tree. The emphasis on this word is not the idea of pruning but the way pruning took place, there was a form of cadence or rhythm to the cutting and would make a musical sound when branches were cut away. Yet, the word also has the idea of pruning itself which is cutting away the old and dead branches which are hindering the tree from producing the best fruit.
David is saying in this verse that it is good to bring about this pruning process. The word good is tov in Hebrew and means to be in harmony with something. To get to the Semitic root of this verse we can only paraphrase it and this is how I would read this verse and I believe the way David intended for this verse to be read, “Songs of pruning will bring you in harmony with God.”
The Talmud explains it this way, when a king goes off to war he will dress like any other soldier for if the king is killed in battle, the battle is ended and his army loses. Yet, being dress like any other soldier it is hard to figure out who is the king. Yet, you can figure it out because he will be surrounded by his best soldiers as body guards. The only way to kill the king would be to break your way through all those body guards. This is how the game of chess originated. The most important piece on the board, the one piece you are trying to get to is the king. Yet it is the king that is the weakest participant. He can only move one space in any direction.
So too in our quest to be in harmony with God. God is surrounded by a strong army of our personal fleshly desires, thoughts, longings. These personal desires of the flesh are very strong keeping us away from God. It is very difficult to determine which desire is of God and which is not, they are very strong, yet the one of least resistance is the King himself or God. Once we have torn away all those fleshly desires we find our King who is there to receive us with open arms.
David is giving us a clue in how to overcome these fleshly body guards which is using zamar music or pruning music, music which will prune away our fleshly desires and leave only the desires of God’s heart which we learn are our true desires. This verse goes on to explain this pruning music. The remaining verse says, “For it is pleasant and praise is comely.” Actually the word for is rendered from the Hebrew word ki which in most Semitic languages is often rendered as because. The word pleasant is na’im and the word comely is ne’vah. Both words mean beautiful but na’im is a beauty which comes when everything is in harmony with each other. It is the word for the name Naomi. A Naomi was a person who got along with everyone and was a very agreeable person. Thus, these pruning songs brings us into harmony with God and bring us into agreement with His will and His heart’s desires. His heart’s desires become our heart’s desires. Not only that these pruning songs are comely or ne’vah. This word comes from a Semitic root meaning to inhabit or dwell in a beautiful place. This word is rendered as pastures in Psalms 23 as pastures represented to David the most beautiful and place on earth, devoid of any of man’s creations. All you see is God and His creation in a pasture. Thus, these pruning songs bring us into harmony with God such that it causes us to enter a place where all we see is God and his desires.
Now, here is the key word for accomplishing a pruning song. The word for praise that is used here when the verse says, praise is comely is the word telillah. Note the double L’s or Lameds in this verse they indicate uplifted hands. But telillah in its Semitic root has the idea of creating music. This is not the song in your hymnal or the song that flashed on a screen in church where you read the words. This is your own invention, a song from your heart.
I witnessed such a song yesterday in a service where two young people for over two hours played an instrument and sung from their hearts. Sometimes it was just music, sometimes it was an expression of the heart, but what it did was to gradually draw the speaker and the congregation closer to God. It was music put to a battle to destroy or prune ourselves of all the fleshly desires of not only the speaker but the congregation as well and after almost two hours of this telillah (created music) we began to ne’yah and na’im, enter into the oneness with God’s heart and desires. All our fleshly desires were gradually defeated as we and the speaker made our way to our King and His desires. The service ended with a sort of celebration of this oneness with God. God had earlier forbidden me to participate in this celebration as He wanted me to observe and learn.
I observed and did learn that we often can not enter into that presence of God without a period of doing battle with those fleshly desires, attitudes, bias, and needs. David laid it out for us in an ancient tongue in how we can do this battle, it is with music we create from our hearts, it is zamar and telillah, music that we create which prunes away all those fleshly wants and desires.
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