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Today was the last day for our medieval church history course. I turned in a paper detailing what psalms are dictated for what monastic hours in the Rule of St. Benedict. Once you nail down just what was said when you can look at the psalms themselves and find some interesting motivations for why they were assigned where they were. There's also the question of why Benedict bothered to make such a detailed schedule when the Rule of the Master, on which he based his own rule, simply indicated that the psalter be sung "in order." It was most likely a reaction to laxity in psalmody, since Benedict wasn't nearly as insistent about details (read: anal retentive) as the Master. Perhaps this is more fascinating to a theology student than it is to the general public...I'm even finding that it was more interesting at 2am than it is now. Oh, well. Praying the psalms is one of my favourite parts of church. There's something awe-inspiring knowing that you're using Christ's own prayer book, a set of prayers that have been a part of worship for thousands of years. They're part of a tradition that extends back through the Jewish exile in Babylon, through the history of the Jewish people and even into pre-history. When you speak these words you join a timeless conversation of prayer, yet there is immediate currency in their lines. Lamentation, joy, praise, complaint, anger, wonder...a full spectrum of human emotions power the psalms. |
