The two ways and the anointed King: the gateway to the Psalms

The book of Psalms is a collection of 150 prayers and songs, divided into five books (Psalms 1-41, 42-72, 73-89, 90-106, 107-150). Many are attributed to David, and others to Asaph, the sons of Korah, Solomon and Moses. The collection was gathered over centuries and reached its present shape after the exile. Psalm 1 has no heading and no named author. It reads as a preface chosen for the whole book. Psalm 2 also has no heading in Hebrew, but Acts 4:25 attributes it to David, who spoke by the Holy Spirit.

The date of Psalm 1 is unknown, and most scholars place it late in the process of collecting the Psalter. The date of Psalm 2 is also debated. Hermann Gunkel classed it as a royal psalm, a song that deals with the king of Israel, and many scholars see it as used when a king of David's line was crowned. Its themes of a king ruling from Zion and vassal nations trying to throw off his rule fit the monarchy, and the promise of 2 Samuel 7:14 stands behind it. Others place it later, as a hope for a future king after the monarchy had ended. Scholars working on the shape of the Psalter, such as Brevard Childs and Gerald Wilson, note that Psalms 1 and 2 introduce the two great themes of the book: the Law and the Davidic king.

There is also ancient evidence that the two psalms were read as one. Jewish tradition in the Talmud (Berakhot 9b-10a) counts them as a single psalm, and some manuscripts of Acts 13:33 refer to 'the first psalm' where most say 'the second'. They are joined by a frame: Psalm 1 begins with 'Blessed' and Psalm 2 ends with 'Blessed'.

Hebrew poetry works through parallelism, where the second line repeats, contrasts or builds on the first, and through vivid pictures. The psalms are poems, not arguments. Psalm 1 is a wisdom psalm, built on contrast like the book of Proverbs. It uses a simple picture of two ways and two ends. This is a general truth about how God's moral order works, not a promise that each righteous person in each moment will flourish. The Psalter itself includes laments (Psalms 22, 73, 88) that wrestle with cases where the pattern does not appear to hold, and Psalm 1 should be read with them.

Psalm 2 is a royal psalm. Its voices change four times, and each of its four stanzas has three verses. The narrator describes the nations (verses 1-3). The LORD answers (verses 4-6). The King speaks (verses 7-9). The narrator again addresses the rulers (verses 10-12). The principle for royal psalms is to read first for the human king in his own day, since the poem speaks of a king who sits in Jerusalem, and then to notice that its language of worldwide rule goes beyond what any Judean king achieved. The class reads Psalm 2 in that order.

Several links tie the two psalms. Psalm 1 opens and Psalm 2 closes with 'blessed'. The Hebrew verb 'meditates' in 1:2 is the same verb as 'plot' in 2:1: one person murmurs the Law day and night, and the nations murmur empty plans. And both end with the word 'perish' applied to the way of those who refuse the LORD (1:6; 2:12). The two psalms present one decision about whether to live under God's Word and his King.

1:1. The psalm opens with 'Blessed' (ashrei), a word for the happiness of those who are right with God. It is plural, 'oh the blessings'. The verbs show a progression: the blessed person does not walk with the wicked, stand in the way of sinners or sit with mockers. Walking, standing and sitting move from passing influence to settled company. The three groups, the wicked, sinners and mockers, move from those who are wrong to those who scorn what is right.

1:2-3. 'But his delight is in the Law of the LORD.' The word 'delight' (chefets) is a love, not a duty. 'Law' (torah) means instruction, the teaching of God. The man 'meditates' (hagah) on it day and night, murmuring it aloud as in Joshua 1:8. The picture in verse 3 is a tree planted by streams. The word for streams refers to irrigation channels, so the tree is planted on purpose and watered constantly. It yields fruit in season and its leaf does not wither. The same image is found in Jeremiah 17:7-8, where the person who trusts the LORD is likened to a tree by water, and it is echoed in Ezekiel 47:12.

1:4-6. 'Not so the wicked!' Their picture is chaff (motz), the light husk that wind blows from the threshing floor. They have no weight and no root. The wicked will not 'stand' in the judgment, nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous. This refers to God's verdict, whether now or at the end. Verse 6 gives the reason. The BSB says the LORD 'guards' the path of the righteous, but the Hebrew word is 'knows' (yode'a). To know a path in Hebrew is to care for it and be committed to it. The way of the wicked, in contrast, will perish.

2:1-3. The questions of verse 1 express astonishment: why do nations rage and plot in vain? The 'Anointed One' (mashiach) is the king, anointed with oil as David was (1 Samuel 16:13). The kings take their stand against the LORD and his Anointed together. Their cry is to break the chains and throw off the cords, the bonds of vassalage. A change of king often tempted subject nations to stop paying tribute. The rebellion is against the LORD as much as the king.

2:4-6. The scene moves to heaven. The One enthroned in heaven laughs and taunts, not from cruelty but because human rebellion against him is absurd. He speaks in anger and says that he has installed his King on Zion, his holy mountain. Zion is Jerusalem, the city of David and the place of the temple. The king rules there because God put him there.

2:7-9. Now the King speaks and quotes the LORD's decree. 'You are My Son; today I have become Your Father.' In Israel the LORD adopts David's heir and gives him a share in his rule. In 2 Samuel 7:14 the LORD had promised to be a father to David's son, and Psalm 89:26-27 says the same. 'Today' is the day of the king's enthronement. The King need only 'ask', and the nations will be his inheritance. The promise runs back to the promise to Abraham that all nations would be blessed. The iron scepter and the pottery that is shattered picture the king's power to put down rebellion.

2:10-12. The poem turns to the rulers. They are told to be wise, to serve the LORD with fear, and to rejoice with trembling. 'Kiss the Son' is a sign of homage (compare 1 Samuel 10:1). The Hebrew word for 'son' here (bar) is Aramaic rather than the usual Hebrew word (ben), and the line is hard. Ancient translators and modern ones render it in different ways, such as 'kiss his feet', 'do homage purely' or 'embrace discipline'. The BSB reading is possible, but the message is the same: submit to the LORD's King before his wrath comes. The last line, 'Blessed are all who take refuge in him', answers the first word of Psalm 1.

Psalm 1 teaches that blessing belongs to the person who is shaped by God's Word. Delight in the Torah is the root, and fruit is the result. This is not self-righteousness, since Psalm 119 and Deuteronomy 30:11-14 present the Law as a gift. The psalm also shows the final reality of a moral world. Judgment is real, and the wicked cannot stand in it.

Psalm 2 teaches that God rules the world through his appointed King, and that no human power can overturn his reign. The theme of an anointed king over the nations stretches from God's promise to David (2 Samuel 7) to the visions of the prophets (Isaiah 9:6-7; 11:1-10; Daniel 7:13-14). Together the two psalms make the book's opening claim: those who live under God's Word and in his King's rule are blessed, and those who set themselves against either will perish.

In the canon, the placement of these psalms at the head of the Psalter makes the whole book a response to Torah and to the Davidic promise. Later books show the tension. The Davidic kings fail, and Psalm 89 laments that the covenant seems broken. The hope of Psalm 2 is not lost but reaches forward to a king who will fully carry out God's rule.

The Christological links here are many, and the New Testament makes them itself. For Psalm 2 the connection is promise and fulfillment, with the Davidic king as a type. In Acts 4:25-28 the early church prays Psalm 2:1-2 and applies the raging nations and plotting rulers to Herod, Pilate, the Gentiles and the people of Israel gathered against Jesus. In Acts 13:33 Paul says God has fulfilled the promise by raising Jesus, citing 'You are My Son' (Psalm 2:7). Romans 1:4 says Jesus was declared Son of God with power by the resurrection. Hebrews 1:5 and 5:5 use the same verse to show that the Son is greater than angels and appointed by the Father. Revelation takes up the iron scepter for the one who rules the nations (Revelation 12:5; 19:15), and promises that the overcomer will share in it (Revelation 2:26-27). At Jesus' baptism the voice from heaven echoes the words, 'You are my Son' (Mark 1:11).

Psalm 1 is mainly an echo and a type. The one who delights fully in the Law of the LORD and bears fruit in its season fits Jesus alone without flaw. Jesus' Beatitudes begin with the same word, 'blessed' (Matthew 5:3-12). John the Baptist uses the winnowing picture of chaff when he says the coming one will gather the wheat and burn the chaff (Matthew 3:12). The tree by the water finds an echo in Jesus' image of the vine, in which those who remain in him bear much fruit (John 15:5-8), and in the tree of life whose leaves are for the healing of the nations (Revelation 22:2).