“Religion” and “Politics” in Psalm 146
Photo by The Maker Jess on Unsplash
This sermon was initially preached in the Goodson Chapel at Duke Divinity School, on October 22, 2020. Church Anew had the incredible honor of hosting Rev. Dr. Walter Brueggemann as our featured columnist from our launch in 2020 through his passing in 2025. We have invited colleagues and students of Dr. Brueggemann to contribute to the Church Anew blog to celebrate and continue his legacy.
These days, everything seems, or rather is, deeply political. And religious too. Now, as you probably know, it is often held to be impolite to talk about religion and politics, especially at the dinner table. Then again, as you probably also know, religion and politics are about the only things worth talking about! And if we who are Christians don’t talk about these two topics, and, more to the point, talk about them together, who will? Well, a lot of people actually. But they might not talk about these two together as well or as carefully—they might do it dangerously, causing much damage.1 Or so it seems to me. Or so it seems today. Or so it seems on social media…but I digress.
Whatever the case, we have to admit that talking about religion and politics is dicey. Quite dicey, in fact, especially these days including, if not especially, among Christians. Let me personalize things a minute: what, really, do I know about the complexities of foreign or domestic policy, international markets, peacekeeping efforts in our country and across the globe, immigration policy, etc., etc., etc.? Well, precious little, to be honest. Listening to National Public Radio on your commute does not you a politico make. Or me a politico make—to personalize things once more. One must be careful that is, not to presume to speak authoritatively where one doesn’t know much at all authoritatively. That could be dangerous, even damaging.2 Or so it seems to me. Or so it seems today. Or so it seems on social media…but there I go digressing again.
Religion, Part 1
So, what to do? Especially as a theologian? That is, after all, what my job title purports me to be, or at least what I hope to be—and it is what we are, it is what we who are here are studying to be. Not political scientists, sociologists, economists, policy-makers, or some other such thing. To be sure, some of us have skills in those areas, don’t get me wrong—and theology certainly bears on all those subjects, and those subjects indubitably bear on theology—but right now, in this moment, in this worship service, our primary identity is that of Christians, not something else. We Christians are gathered together here because our faith seeks understanding, which is to say we are theologians studying, pursuing, and living theology.
The psalmist explains why leaders offer no real help. It is because in the end these types of people—actually all types of people of the genus Homo and the species sapiens—are finite.
It’d be easy at that point to call it a day and shift our attention exclusively to matters of religion or spirituality, and not mix in other things, especially not—I mean especially not—politics for heaven’s sake. I mean, really, what do we know about any of that as theologians? We opine, sure, but that’s not the same as knowing.
We might be tempted, therefore, to join our voices with the psalmist of Psalm 146 reciting blissfully, if not also a wee bit naively, the first verses of that poem:
Praise the LORD!
Praise the LORD, O my soul!
I will praise the LORD as long as I live;
I will sing praises to my God all my life long. (Ps 146:1-2)
Beautiful! And apropos to boot—we are in a worship service, after all—and also not likely to get you in much trouble: with your family, your friends, your enemies, or your frenemies—all of whom likely populate your church if not also your church board. So we are tempted to stop, right there, at the end of the second verse of Psalm 146 and call it quits. Religion is okay. Politics, not okay. Religion-and/with-politics, most certainly, most definitely not okay. God forbid!
Politics Part 1
But evidently God does not forbid because the psalmist is just getting started. The psalm is far from complete. Here’s the very next verse:
Do not put your trust in princes,
in mortals, in whom there is no help. (Ps 146:3)
Well, there goes the religion-is-best-without-politics theory! Out. The. Window! The psalmist refuses to speak of religion only and is quite clear in verse 3 that political types are not to be trusted. Still further, they are absolutely helpless, in the sense of unhelpful. Now we know that Israel didn’t have a constitutional democracy full of people we call politicians; Israel was, instead, a kind of theocratic monarchy. “Princes” belong to that kind of system but the actual Hebrew word that is used here, nədȋbȋm, is not the normal one for “princes,” and so that particular translation might be a bit misleading. The word nədȋbȋm comes from a verbal root (n-d-b) that has to do with being willing to do something—to volunteer even. In the noun form it appears to refer to people who distribute according to their will or largesse, and hence a person of means—a noble, a kind of prince or princess (see NRSV), or, more simply, an important or “great” person (see TNK).3 Another translation renders the word as “leaders”: “Don’t trust leaders” (CEB).
That translation makes better sense than “prince” in our own political system, but the same was actually true for them back then too. Again, nədȋbȋm just isn’t the normal Hebrew word for royal offspring. It refers to something less specific, more general and generalizable, and actually even more political: “don’t put your trust in the people in charge,” the psalmist says, who has most certainly left off with religion and is now getting rather deeply into politics. “Don’t trust any of them,” the poet adds, just to make sure we are paying attention. Writing in 2018, theologian Jason Byassee observed that this must be “one of scripture’s least followed directives.”4 In the present political climate in the United States, one suspects the “obedience quotient” has deteriorated even further.
The psalmist is undeterred and drills the point home further in the very next line: “Don’t trust mortals,” it says. Here, too, the phrasing is intriguing: don’t trust “a son of man” is how the old RSV woodenly renders the Hebrew.5 That way of putting things is generic with this specific type of construction often used in Hebrew as a category descriptor. In this case, the phrase designates anyone of the genus Homo, of the species sapiens. These types—human beings, that is—just aren’t trustworthy, according to the psalmist, who is starting to sound less political than misanthropic.
But the psalmist isn’t a misanthrope; the psalmist is a saint and the psalmist has reasons for this lack of trust—several actually.
First, there is no help to be found in leaders. Well, first, that strikes us as a bit harsh, doesn’t it? And second, wait what? Don’t we have leaders and don’t we elect leaders and don’t some of us want to be leaders because leaders help? Well, yes, sometimes, but, well, no, sometimes not. Sometimes people want to lead (or elect others to lead) not to help but to hurt—to hurt others, even if only inadvertently, by helping some people (usually themselves and their group) but not others. So, sure, the psalmist’s comment might sting a bit but we need to be honest about leaders who hurt, whether by design or accident. And that means we should be honest about sin, which is rampant, everywhere, even where we would hope it was otherwise.
The psalmist speaks here of a particular type of help, “saving help” in the CEB. The Hebrew word is tĕšȗʿâ, which comes from the root y-š-ʿ, “to save,” from which derive names like Isaiah (Yӗšaʿyāhû) and Joshua (Yӗhôšūaʿ) and, yes, even Jesus (Yĕšȗaʿ). This is important help, therefore: salvation, victory, and the like. Here again we raise questions to the psalmist: can’t that type of help be found in leaders, specifically, or human beings, more generally? Nope. Not according to Psalm 146. If you are looking to those people—to any people—for the most important type of help, you’re looking in the wrong place. And that’s an odd thing to say, isn’t it? Because that’s exactly what we typically look for and want from our leaders, politicians, and the like.
The psalmist explains why leaders offer no real help. It is because in the end these types of people—actually all types of people of the genus Homo and the species sapiens—are finite. They die. And so, as the psalmist points out:
When their breath (rûaḥ) departs, they return to the earth;
on that very day their plans perish. (Ps 146:4)6
Religion, Part 2
There ends the politics—at least for a moment—because the psalmist returns to religion in the next two verses:
Happy are those whose help is the God of Jacob,
whose hope is in the LORD their God,
who made heaven and earth,
the sea, and all that is in them;
who keeps faith forever. (Ps 146:5-6)
Looked at from one angle, these verses seem to return to where the psalm began. It’s as if the psalmist ventured into politics but was sternly reprimanded by the chair of the staff parish relations committee or by the wealthiest tither in the church. “Stay in your lane, Preacher!” And so here comes the Happiology to keep the parishioners coming: “Happy are those who trust in God, who hope in the LORD. Amen! Pass the offering plate! And by the way, did I mention how much the LORD does for us? God is a Big Giver God! God made everything and as if that wasn’t quite yet nice enough, God also keeps faith and does so forever!” Listen to that litany of positivity again: help, hope, faith—forever! Sounds like this poet is about to pack out a sports arena.7
Politics, Part 2
There is still something more to say, however, lest we overdo the religion side of things and thus come across naïve or quietist—neither of which will do in a time like now or in a country like ours as politicized as it is.
But the poet is only halfway through the poem. This second section on “religion” is just a set up or feint. It functions to introduce the marked contrast between the helpless politicians and the faithful Lord.8 And so the poet segues immediately to a second section on politics that dominates the rest of the psalm: Happy are those who hope in the LORD, the psalmist writes,
who executes justice for the oppressed;
who gives food to the hungry.
The LORD sets the prisoners free;
the LORD opens the eyes of the blind.
The LORD lifts up those who are bowed down;
the LORD loves the righteous.
The LORD watches over the strangers;
he upholds the orphan and the widow,
but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin. (146:7-9)9
A good bit of that impressive list of divine actions sounds familiar if you’ve been around “Bibleland” a bit—though familiarity can breed contempt, or at least lack of attention. It pays to think again, therefore, and carefully, about this listing of praiseworthy things about the Lord.
First up, God is Justice-Provider. Impressive, to be sure, but this isn’t provision of justice in the abstract or for just anyone: it is specifically justice for the oppressed. Next up, God is Food-Giver. Fantastic, but again, not to just anyone: specifically, for the hungry. Next: Freedom-Dispenser for prisoners. Then Eye-Opener for the blind.10 Lifter-upper for those brought low. Lover of righteous people. Protector of immigrants. Upholder of the destitute without family and without means.11 The Lord does all of that, says the psalm, and no one else—definitely not politicians: we already know there’s no help in them.
This survey of divine actions comprises a religious claim about the Lord—there can be no doubt about that. It is what makes God praiseworthy according to the psalmist and why those who trust in this God are truly happy or blessed (ʾašrê, v. 5), and why they sing out in praise (vv. 1-2).
But make no mistake about it: this listing is also and equally a profoundly political statement about the Lord. The psalmist says it is God who does these things and no other. Certainly not leaders. Don’t trust them. They execute justice for the oppressed, at best, only occasionally. Food for the hungry? Maybe. Pardon for prisoners? Well, usually only if it is politically expedient. Care for immigrants and the destitute? Here, as in all of the other categories, their track record is decidedly mixed. And that is true of both sides of the aisle and of all human leaders, elected or otherwise. It’s better not to trust in them. It’s better not to praise them. It’s better not to buy into their plans, which are as finite as they are, nor trust in their speeches, which are as fragile as their lungs. Both are just one heartbeat from ending. Forever.
And good riddance, too, because there is only One, according to Psalm 146, who has saving help. There is only One who is worth hoping in and hoping for. There is only One who is worthy of our praise. Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord, O my soul!
Religion-Politics Mash-Up
That’s how the psalm begins and ends, by praising our praiseworthy Lord. The psalmist moved from religion to politics to religion to politics and then, at the end, back to the beginning with religion. At the end of the day, does that reflect a triumph of religion over politics? I myself wouldn’t object to such a victory—especially eschatologically—but we mustn’t be naïve about that here and now. Not in our day and age, as politicized and “religified” as it is. More to the point, Psalm 146 will permit no anesthetized religion without politics. Instead, Psalm 146 is, from beginning to end, a religion-politics mash-up.
There are, after all, many other lords besides the Lord God of Israel. There were, in the ancient world, plenty of other gods that Israel (or the church) might have worshipped (cf. 1 Cor 8:5). The same holds true today. In antiquity these rival lords, these other gods, were often known to do things—or at least their worshippers hoped as much. They had their special areas of expertise, if you will. But whatever these other gods did is now claimed by the psalmist as the sole work of the one Lord God of Israel and no other. It isn’t the god Shamash who executes justice. No. It’s the Lord! It isn’t the goddess Gula who heals the blind. No. It’s the Lord! It isn’t the god Marduk who made the world. No. It’s the Lord!
But make no mistake about it, the list of God’s praiseworthy religio-political attributes is yet still more: it is equally also a list of standards, a compendium of ethical responsibilities. Another psalm, Psalm 82, makes that abundantly clear. Psalm 82 is an odd little psalm that depicts God calling all the junior godlings in for a board meeting of the heavenly council and then condemning them all to die like mortals and to fall like princes (Ps 82:7). Why? Not because they didn’t have divine juice in their veins: the psalm notes God’s own assertion that these junior deities were divine children of the Most High (v. 6). No, it’s because they failed to do what they were supposed to do—what deities are supposed to do: judge justly; refuse to show partiality, especially to the wicked; rescue the weak and needy; deliver them from the wicked; give justice and maintain the rights of the lowly, the poor, those without family and without means (vv. 2-4).
But the junior gods have failed to do all that and so their little cabal is adjourned, permanently and forever. “Rise up, O God, judge the earth,” the psalmist prays at the end of Psalm 82, hoping for the same heavenly verdict to be rendered down here. “Let your kingdom come…on earth as it is in heaven”—we might echo, employing words of a slightly later vintage (Matt 6:10; cf. Luke 11:2).
There is a long-standing line of interpretation that sees the godlings of Psalm 82 as not really gods but, instead, as judges, people with power, leaders—politicians, if you will. And at that point we are right back at Psalm 146, aren’t we? Don’t trust them! They cannot be trusted with the important work of God—only God can be trusted to do that. But according to Psalm 146, our trust in God is well-placed.
There is still something more to say, however, lest we overdo the religion side of things and thus come across naïve or quietist—neither of which will do in a time like now or in a country like ours as politicized as it is. So here goes nothing: my own religion-politics mash up, inspired by Psalm 146.
On the one hand, it would be wrong—according to the psalm—to believe that God has “no hands but ours.” We say that kind of thing a lot but the psalmist wouldn’t like that assertion at all.12 It is the Lord who does these things—and no other, certainly no leader, whether good or awful. And yet, on the other hand, it would be equally wrong to think that human beings cannot help, or hinder, God’s good work in the world. The junior deities of Psalm 82 found out the hard way that hindering God’s good work—or at least failing to do it—won them the worst of rewards. Psalm 146 knows this too, in two small phrases found in v. 2: “I will praise the LORD as long as I live,” it says, and “all my life long,” it asserts. That could be translated slightly differently, and equally well, by “I will praise the LORD with my life…as long as I live.”13 The praiseworthy Lord, who is praiseworthy precisely because of these attributes that are also ethical standards, can be and must be praised in one’s life, with one’s life, as long as one has a life.14 Which means, of course, that the one who praises the justice-providing, food-giving, freedom-dispensing, eye-opening, back-straightening, righteous-loving, immigrant-protecting, destitute-upholding God had better—if one is going to praise that God with one’s life—had better start getting after the good work of providing justice, giving food, dispensing freedom, opening eyes, straightening backs, loving righteousness, protecting immigrants, and assisting the destitute.
Does that sound political to you? Good, because it is. It’s God’s politics for the pious and for the polis.15 And that means it’s politics and religion all mashed up and intermixed and inextricable all the way down because that’s the way it is with this Lord who will brook no rivals, suffer no competitors, answer to no president or congress, and who loves righteousness and justice equally and always. Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord, O my soul!
Trusting the Son of Man
One final thought, evoked by the language of Ps 146:3: There is one son of man that we can trust—the Son of Man! The Human One, Jesus Christ, who is trustworthy because he is not only son of man but also Son of God. And he has been thoroughly vetted and approved. Luke 9:28-36 is St. Luke’s account of the Transfiguration. There, on the top of the mountain, Jesus appears in heavenly glory accompanied by two heavyweight leaders of the most impressive, trustworthy kind: Moses and Elijah (v. 30). When Peter, James, and John enter the cloud with these three they hear God’s voice speaking: “This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!” (Luke 9:34-35). Here, then, in Jesus is a leader of leaders, a prince of princes—the Prince of Peace—who may be trusted and who must be listened to, which is to say, of course, obeyed.
Yet even Jesus, no less than any other human leaders, isn’t long for this earth.16 Unique to Luke’s account of the Transfiguration is how, when Moses and Elijah show up to converse with Christ, they speak “of his departure, which he was about to accomplish in Jerusalem” (9:31). That means, of course, that they were speaking about Jesus’ death, but it is here described as a departure—exodos in Greek: nothing less than an exodus! A way out. The way out. Not just for him, but for all those prisoners he released and took with him, following “in his train,” leading captivity captive, giving gifts to his people (Eph 4:8; cf. Ps 68:18). Which sounds exactly like Psalm 146!17 This leader’s plans did not perish on the day his breath departed because this leader is none other than the justice-providing, food-giving, freedom-dispensing, eye-opening, back-straightening, righteous-loving, immigrant-protecting, destitute-upholding Son of the Living God.
Praise the Lord! Or, slightly updated for us, here and now, whether in an election year or otherwise—in fact, in every year: Jesus for President! Let those with ears to hear, listen.
The LORD will rule forever!18
…God from one generation to the next!
Praise the LORD! (Ps 146:10; CEB).
Praise the Lord, indeed—and no other! Amen.
1 An instructive essay, showing that some of these issues are not entirely new, is C. S. Lewis, “Learning in War-Time,” in The Weight of Glory: And Other Addresses, repr. ed. (New York: HarperOne, 2001), 47-63, esp. 58-59, where Lewis speaks of how “intimate knowledge of the past” makes one “in some degree immune from the great cataract of nonsense that pours from the press and the microphone”—and, we might add, the social media accounts—“of [our] own age.”
2 Harry G. Frankfurt has noted that “the widespread conviction that it is the responsibility of a citizen in a democracy to have opinions about everything, or at least everything that pertains to the conduct of his country’s affairs,” despite the obvious fact that most will be preposterously uninformed about most of said matters, directly contributes to what he calls “bullshit,” a laissez faire attitude toward truth and truthfulness (see On Bullshit [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005], esp. 63-64).
3 See the standard Hebrew lexica: BDB 621-22 and HALOT 2:671, 673-74. Cf. Midrash Tehillim 2:1702-3, on how the nadȋb (the singular form) is “not an ordinary man, but a rare, noble soul endowed with exceptional…generosity.” In this light, it is even great leaders that mustn’t be trusted.
4 Jason Byassee, Psalms 101-150 (Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2018), 229.
5 Chales Augustus Briggs and Emilie Grace Briggs, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Book of Psalms, ICC, 2 vols. (New York: C. Scribner’s Sons, 1914-1917), 2:530-32, think the princes are “the nobles,” with the “son of man” being “their sovereign.”
6 See Walter Brueggemann, “The God of the Second Wind,” online here, which contrasts this princely ruach with the true ruach of God. This essay also appears in Walter Brueggemann, The Peculiar Dialect of Faith: And Other Essays (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2023), 28-35.
7 For a critique of Christian “happiology,” especially as represented in Joel Osteen’s writings, see Brent A. Strawn, The Old Testament Is Dying: A Diagnosis and Recommended Treatment (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2017), 131-55. An extended discussion may be found in Kate Bowler, Blessed: A History of the American Prosperity Gospel (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013).
8 Cf. Walter Brueggemann and William H. Bellinger, Jr., Psalms, NCBC (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015), 607: “only a ploy.”
9 See Brueggemann and Bellinger, Psalms, 607, on the shift “from the stability of creation to the social reality of economic development….The psalm does not link verse 7 to verse 6 in any specific way, but we may conclude that economic disparity is a violation of the ordering of creation, so the creator God intervenes in the economy to make it right.”
10 John Goldingay thinks these are not physically blind, but blinded by coming out of the darkness of prison (Psalms, 3 vols., BCOTWP [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006-2008], 3:712). So also Briggs and Briggs, Psalms, 2:531, but I see no compelling reason for this line of interpretation, which strikes me as mostly imaginative.
11 For the destitute, see John Calvin, Commentary on the Book of Psalms, 3 vols., repr. ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1979), 3:290; and note also J. J. Stewart Perowne, The Book of Psalms: A New Translation with Explanatory Notes for English Readers (London: George Bell and Sons, 1889), 474, on the triad of stranger, orphan, and widow: “three great examples of natural defenselessness” in ancient Israel.
12 Cf. e.g., Goldingay, Psalms, 3:714 “Paradoxically, it is usually through people who are willing to be involved in politics, or leadership, but who do it as God’s servants or agents.”
13 Cf. Ps 104:33 and J. A. Alexander, The Psalms: Translated and Explained (New York: Scribner, 1850), 436, 564.
14 Cf. F. Delitzsch in C. F. Keil and F. Delitzsch, Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 5: Psalms, trans. Francis Bolton, repr. ed. (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2011), 843: “his continued life is also a continued praising.”
15 See, among many other resources, Patrick D. Miller, The God You Have: Politics and the First Commandment (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2004); Jim Wallis, God’s Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn’t Get It (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2005); and any number of volumes by Walter Brueggemann, for example: Real World Faith (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2023); In God We Do Not Trust (Elizabethtown, PA: Santos Books, 2024); The Emancipation of God: Postmarks on Cultural Prophecy (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2024).
16 Cf. Byassee, Psalms 101-150, 230: “he turned out to be as impermanent as the rest.”
17 Byassee, Psalms 101-150, 230, deems the list of God’s actions in Psalm 146 as “almost a policy platform for the kingdom of God that Jesus would inaugurate.” Cf. A. F. Kirkpatrick, ed., The Book of Psalms, repr. ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1951), 819; and also Hans-Joachim Kraus, Psalms 60-150: A Continental Commentary, trans. Hilton C. Oswald, 2 vols. (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993), 553: “Psalm 146 has decisive things to say about the future βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ [kingdom of God] proclaimed in the NT.”
18 This line could also be rendered, “The LORD is king forever,” which might even more obviously political than it already is.
