The Good and Evil Serpent (108 page)

This Ugaritic text serves to guide us in restoring Psalm 68:23(22). It is possible, perhaps probable, that this section of Psalm 68 (now vv. 23–24[22–23]) once read:

The Lord spoke:

“From [the den of] the dragon-snake I will bring [them] back,

I will bring [them] back from the depths of the sea,

So that your foot might crush [them] in blood,

And the tongues of your dogs [may have] their portion from [your] enemies.”

This rendering restores, within brackets, an original
.
⁵²
The original 3 + 3 meter is also restored; thus, the bicolon has a harmonious rhythm of 3 + 3 followed by 3 + 3.
⁵³
Experts may have overlooked the missing beat in the first colon since they may have not observed that “
that begins what we call verse 23(22) is outside the meter of the first colon and was intended to introduce the bicolon.

What is the date of Psalm 68? Many scholars date it early; that is, long before the exilic period. A very early date for the traditions in Psalm 68 seems demanded since God is associated with the mountains of Bashan.
⁵⁴
Note S. Terrien’s translation of 68:16,

The mount of Bashan would be the mount of God,

Mount of a thousand hills, the mount of Bashan.
⁵⁵

The text continues to stress that this “mount of Bashan” is where God desires to dwell, and that he will “dwell [in it] forever” (
; Ps 68:16–17[15–16]).
⁵⁶
Such an affirmation is impossible in Israel and Judea after the sixth century
BCE
. That is the period either of the sixth-century
BCE
editor known as “the Deuteronomist” (Dtr), advocated by M. Noth,
⁵⁷
or of the slightly earlier Deuteronomistic school, espoused by E. W. Nicholson and M. Weinfeld.
⁵⁸
This school, among other tendencies, emphasized that Jerusalem, and only Jerusalem, was the abode of
YHWH
. Thus, the celebration of Bashan as God’s abode antedated by a considerable margin the Deuteronomic affirmation that became authoritative in Judaism.

The emphasis on Jerusalem as
YHWH’S
home clearly antedates the sixth century
BCE
. As recorded in 1 Kings 11:36 and 15:4 and 2 Kings 8:19, God gave David, and his descendants, a lamp in Jerusalem.
⁵⁹
The Zion tradition definitively shapes Psalms 78:68 and 132:13, and as J. J. M. Roberts states: “[I]ts crystallization point must still be sought in the Davidic-Solomonic era.”
⁶⁰
Perhaps Psalm 68 is as early as Albright suggested: in the Solomonic period. Anderson offers a viable suggestion that the
Sitz im Leben
is the autumnal festival when
YHWH’S
kingship was celebrated and his mighty deeds acclaimed.
⁶¹
Surely, the traditions we have isolated in Psalm 68, especially verse 16, must antedate the Zion tradition that in the tenth century
BCE
began to be dogma. Note Roberts’ words: “The fundamental point necessary for the formation of the Zion tradition was the belief that Yahweh had chosen Jerusalem as his permanent abode. That dogma could not date much later than David’s decision to move the ark to Jerusalem, and certainly not later than the decision to build the temple there.”
⁶²

Verse 16(15), “the mountain of Elohim [is] the mountain of Bashan,” clashes with verse 30(29) (“your Temple at Jerusalem”), which refers to Solomon’s Temple.
⁶³
It seems prima facie evidence that verses 16(15) and 23(22) preserve traditions that both antedate the monarchy and reflect the popular Canaanite myth about Baal and how he defeated Bashan.

Is not some restoration needed in Psalm 68:23(22)? Something in the first colon needs to parallel “the depths of” in the second colon. On the basis of the poetic meter and syntax, and in light of the Ugaritic phrase, which was perhaps a cliché, the meaning of Psalm 68:23(22) may be restored. The context implies the word “them,” which is to be understood as a reference to “God’s enemies” mentioned in the preceding verse (68:22[21]). The “God of our salvation” will bring back “his enemies” from far distant regions: “the [den of] the snake” and “the depths of the sea.” It seems that the God of salvation, the one to whom belongs “escape from death,” is bringing into judgment his enemies, those still alive (68:22[21]) and those who are in the den of the dragon-snake or in the depths of the sea; that is, all who have died, either on land or on sea. Thus, it is not necessary to emend the texts, which is always a precarious act, to obtain, as Gunkel did, a translation that is appealing: “From the furnace of fire I will bring them back.”
⁶⁴

M. Dahood, who wisely employed Ugaritic to shine light on dark passages in the Psalms, has provided a different understanding of Psalm 68:23(22). What is important is that he perceives that Bashan in this verse refers to a dragon-snake or serpent:

The Lord said:

    “I stifled the Serpent,

     muzzled the Deep Sea.”
⁶⁵

In his notes, Dahood points out that
bdtdn
“is another name for Leviathan, as appears from UT 67.I.12.”
⁶⁶
The translators of the NEB also opted to bring out a reference to a snake in Psalm 68:23(22): “from the Dragon.”

It now becomes clearer that in biblical Hebrew “Bashan” can denote a mythical snake: a dragon-snake. With this lexical insight and a restored text and meter, we can now appreciate the synonymous
parallelismus membrorum
. It is between “from the den of the dragon-snake”
and “from the depths of the sea” (
).
⁶⁷

Is Psalm 68 fundamentally a catalogue of early Hebrew poems as Albright argued long ago? Most scholars have not been persuaded by his attempt to solve the seeming disjunctions that define this psalm. Many experts have followed Mowinckel, mutatis mutandis, in seeing Psalm 68 with some unity and as a processional psalm for the Jerusalem cult. Thus, it is helpful to quote Mowinckel’s conclusion. He grouped Psalms 24, 68, 118, and 132 as festal procession psalms. Of them he wrote:

They can only be understood in connexion with a vision of the procession itself and its different acts and scenes. The interpreter has to use both the descriptions of such cultic processions and the allusions to them in other Old Testament texts, and his own imagination, to recall a picture of the definite situation from which such a psalm cannot be separated. Only thus it is possible to find the inner connexion between the apparently incoherent stanzas of, e.g., Ps 68.
⁶⁸

This interpretation gives pride of place to verse 25 in Psalm 68; it follows the verse in focus now, verse 23(22). Note Mowinckel’s translation (vol. 1, p. 11):

We are seeing thy processions, O God,

The procession of my God and my King in the sanctuary,

Singers in front, musicians behind,

Between them girls with tambourines. [Ps 68:25–26]

Mowinckel read Psalm 68 in its present (corrupt) form and with an eye on 68:25. There is far more discontinuity than he allows,
⁶⁹
even when we try to imagine the procession toward the enthronement of
YHWH
. One should admit that there is nothing in verses 25–26 that suggests, let alone demands, that one think about Jerusalem and its Temple. It may originally reflect a procession at Bethel, Shiloh, Dan, or even a Canaanite sanctuary as at Megiddo or on Mount Bashan. Yet in their present setting, verses 25–26 are followed by verse 30(29), which refers to “your Temple in Jerusalem.” Thus, Mowinckel’s emphasis on unity in Psalm 68 lies behind the following reflections concerning echoes and connections within Psalm 68 (in the previous paragraphs, I was more influenced by Albright and the echoes from Canaanite cults and myths).

If Psalm 68 is not a catalogue of early Hebrew poems as Albright concluded,
⁷⁰
or if it is a catalogue of
incipits
but there is in some passages a remnant of an original extremely early poem or extended selections from an early poem,
⁷¹
or a later compiler (the Elohistic editor) placed similar thoughts sometimes contiguously, or if the Psalm obtains its unity from the procession within the Temple cult (as I deem likely), then one should seek to understand 68:23(22) within its immediate context. With contextual insight is surely the way generations subsequent to its editing would have read Psalm 68.

Terrien indicates that Psalm 68 “reveals a rather spectacular structure of eleven strophes.” One of them is our focal point: verses 23–26 that Terrien concludes reflect an editor’s fascination with temple music.
⁷²
As Roberts perceived, Albright’s thesis of
incipits
is “unconvincing” and while parts of Psalm 68 lack clarity, “there are large blocks where there are more logical connections than one would expect in a random collection of incipits.”
⁷³
Roberts sees verses 22–24 as “connected;” they “may lead into the description of the processional in vv. 25–28.”
⁷⁴
Roberts, and many others, are influenced by Mowinckel’s position. He saw Psalm 68 as devoid of meaning until we comprehend it within its edited context: a cultic processional psalm for the enthronement of
YHWH
in Jerusalem, perhaps during the new year festival and the festival of lights at Tabernacles.
⁷⁵
We should not judge the ideas in Psalm 68 in terms of the logical progression of post-Enlightenment poems; there is hardly a logical progression in Ugaritic and Mesopotamian hymns (let alone in some sections of the
Hodayot
or
Odes of Solomon).
⁷⁶
Even today, those who live in the West tend to appreciate logic, while those in the East often find it annoying and misrepresentative of life.