YOU SEARCHED ME AND KNOWN ME

“YOU SEARCHED ME AND KNOWN ME”
Psalm 139
17 July 2005

1. In so many ways we are confronted by the question “why is God so powerful that even my inmost thoughts he knew?” For sure it’s not good to be scrutinized all the time by someone who is not even human, a God who is spirit and it looks like there is no escape from God’s confronting presence in our lives. Alam ko na nakakatakot ang ganitong sitwasyon na walang kang mapagtagu-an sa pagsusuri ng Diyos.

2. Psalm 139 gives a vivid description of God’s omnipresence in our lives and that whatever we do and will do God knows. This Psalm has body imagery and that it is one of the Old Testament meaningful presentations of the human body as one coherent and interrelated body. In having this, it is important that we should miss the prerequisite theological understanding, namely to understand the body as a psychosomatic unit, can help to qualify the sometimes dualistic concept of humankind in the Christian tradition. It can thus counteract a devaluation and disdain of the body on the one hand, and its spiritless fragmentation on the other hand.

3. In so many ways the human body is described in the Bible both the OT and NT as a weaker part of the human being. The soul/spirit is the higher part that animates the body. This kind of dualism is very prevalent in the NT especially in St. Paul’s theology. But this body imagery in our text shows that our human body is an integrated one and thus it is a total whole in relation to God. Thus, the Psalmist believes that God searches and knows every human being not just as spirit or soul but as a psycho—mind and soma-body unit. God is well acquainted with our mind, heart, body. That makes God’s concern overwhelming and God’s care and love empowering. On other hand many people would tremble at the though that ever second of the day, he/she is being judged by God and that an act of disobedience or the thing we call sin is absolutely known by God.

4. Cristl Maier a woman German theologian has this to say about 1-5 of Psalm 139:

Up to the present, verses 1-5 have been interpreted in two opposite ways. Does the close relation­ship between the person praying and God express a feeling of security and divine protection? Or is it proof of a fundamental despair of God which provokes thoughts of escape? Due to the parallel with Deuteronomy 6 and the use of the adjective “wonderful” in verse 6, the psalm is very often interpreted as a hymn celebrating God’s closeness. However, the evaluation of a life which is completely open to God’s scrutiny is negative from the point of view of the person praying: the phrase “you hemmed me” used in verse 5 is normally only used for warlike surrounding and besieging, the “behind and before” makes it impossible for the psalmist to move horizontally, renders him incapable of going on, to go on his way, and to rest as he sees fit. The laying on of hands in this context is not a gesture conveying blessing, but prevents the psalmist’s movement in vertical direction: YHWH’s hand rests heavily on him, even presses him down. Human as well as divine actions are concentrated in the hands.

They can be creative and destructive, powerful and violent. In the Old Testament the hand is thus very often a symbol for power and its literally shattering effect is clearly emphasised in verse 5.
It thus becomes inevitable that we think that God’s hand is always here with us.


3. Moreover, Psalm 139 shows that it is not just the body as such that matters, but that relationships are described with the help of physical phenomena. On the one hand, a person is determined by his or her situation in place and time. Our human existence can be very significant because of the place we occupy and the kind of life we live. Relatively speaking those who are acclaimed leaders and “stars” both in the context of cinema and politics have gained their prominence because of the physical existence.

On the other hand, one’s bodily existence is defined by a person’s relationship with God and with fellow human beings. In the relationship with God, one’s physical, sensible and sensitive side cannot be excluded, for how else can we praise God but with a body and reference to our affections? We cannot separate our physical body from what we do in worship. Our emotions and physical movement such the clapping of hands, swaying in praises to God and other meaningful movements are in concrete relationship with the one we worship—God. Perhaps I am saying this self-critically as a person who grew up with much formality in Protestant attitude which, due to its stress on listening to God and the intellectual debate about God, is in danger of neglecting essential dimensions of human existence. Meaning there is a tendency that we intellectualize our faith rather than live as integrated human beings.


3. Finally, body imagery can be an intermediary with regard to the concept of God. In the psalm, God is presented – with the help of physical aspects – as a living force, and at the same time as an acting personality and the dynamism in this concept of God cannot be overestimated. By stressing God’s omnipresence, Psalm 139 also shows that speaking of God in relation to human activity has its limitations. We know that God in relations to us human beings maintain God’s unique qualities in contrast to human beings. God’s mind is not like our mind, God’s thoughts are unreachable.

Verses 13-17 of Psalm 139 gives us a clearer picture of the Psalmist belief that even when we were still in our mothers’ wombs God has already known us and even knitted our bodies as they are.

13 For it was you who formed my kidneys,
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works; that I myself know very well.
15 My bones were not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes beheld my unformed substance.
In your book were written all the days that were formed for me,
when none of them as yet existed.
17 How weighty to me are your thoughts, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!

Cristl Maeir has this explanation:
By verse 13 at the latest we notice a change of mood: mentioning the kidneys of all organs – which to us today seems very strange and which is unique in the Old Testament – makes sense if we look at the relational function of this organ. The kidneys, whose existence as a pair was familiar from the slaughter of animals are the seat of affections (Psalm 73:21; Proverbs 23:16) and of conscience (Psalm 16:7; Jeremiah 12:2). This association is based on the experience that the area around the kidneys is particularly sensitive to heat and cold. As the creator of the kidneys, God is described in verse 13 metaphorically as the one who makes his people’s affections and their ability to relate with one another possible. The idea often found in other prayers, namely that God tests hearts and kidneys (Psalm 26:2; Jeremiah 11:20; 20:11; Revelation 2:23) – most translations speak of “heart and mind”, omitting the concrete organ – shows that the relationship between those praying and the deity is being comprehensively tested.

Psalm 139 combines the formation of a human body in the womb, which can be physically experienced, with the theological tradition of God’s primeval creation known from Genesis 1-2. The divine creation of an individual here is defined metaphorically as weaving; the parallel metaphor of being woven in the depths of the earth (verse 15) contributes a variant of this idea that has a cosmological and even mythical background. The verbs “creating” and “weaving” also denote divine actions in the primeval creation of Lady Wisdom in Proverbs 8. The reference to the psalmist’s bones (Mc() again links the mythical concept with the individual’s body.

Through its communication structure Psalm 139 expresses the close relationship between the psalmist and God and this is emphasized by its body-related language. The body imagery stresses the fact that the psalmist is a creature, i.e. created by somebody else and in this respect the prayer is related to many other psalms. The emphasis on the individual, on the other hand, is un-typical since the majority of Old Testament texts stressed the social integration of the individual. However, physicality, being a created body, is a prerequisite for social relationships even in Old Testament thinking and in a biblical context the relationship with God is part of this.
We are integrated human beings and that our being creatures of God, we are endowed with great possibilities of wholesome life lived in peace. The very consciousness of God’s omnipresence assists us in our faith and action towards a renewed understanding of total existence under the reign of God in Jesus Christ.