HHMI Newsgroup Archives

From: 	 heb_roots_chr@mail.geocities.com
Sent: 	 Friday, July 04, 1997 2:38 AM
To: 	 Hebraic Heritage Newsgroup
Subject: Re: Help: 23rd Psalm


To:            "Hebraic Roots (E-mail)" <heb_roots_chr@geocities.com>
From:          "Kenneth Williams" 
Subject:       Re: Help: 23rd Psalm


> 
> From:          Eva J Reeves 
> Subject:       23rd Psalm
> To:            hebrew roots <heb_roots_chr@geocities.com>
> 
> Does anyone have any Hebraic reference on the 23rd Psalm? I need Hebrew info on this for a class on the 23rd Psalm.   
> 
> Thanks, Havah
>


Hi Eva:

I hope this will help. I ran this piece a few months ago in my magazine
called "The Old Christian-Press." It was originally written in 1903 by
William Allen Knight. I ran it under the title "The Shepherd's Song." 

Hebrews 13:20&21,
Ken
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Faduel Moghabghad," said our Syrian guest as he coached two little maids
in the pronunciation of his name. " Accent the U and drop those Gs .

He was a man of winsome mind, and the spirituality of his culture was as
marked as the refinement of his manners. We shall long remember him for the
tales told that evening of his home in Ainzehalta on the slope of the
Syrian mountains, but longest of all for what he said out of the memories
of his youth about a shepherd song.

"It was out of the shepherd life of my country," he remarked, "that there
came long ago that sweetest song ever written--the Twenty-third Psalm."

"Ah, so many things familiar to us are strange to you of America," he said.
 Then he smiled and said, "So many things in the life of my people were
woven into the words of the Bible and into the conceptions of religious
ideas as expressed there; you of the Western world, not knowing these
things as they are, often misunderstand what is written, or at least fail
to get a correct impression from it."

After mentioning several instances, he went on: "And there is the shepherd
psalm: I find that it is taken among you as having two parts, the first
under the figure of a shepherd life, the second turning to the figure of a
banquet with the host and the guest. It actually runs through from first
word to last around the shepherd life."

He quoted: "'The Lord is my shepherd: I shall not want.' There is the
opening strain of its music; in that chord is sounded the keynote which is
never lost till the plaintive melody dies away at the song's end. All that
follows is that thought put in varying light."

He talked of how the varied needs of the sheep and the many-sided care of
the shepherd are pictured with masterly touch in the short sentences of the
psalm. "Each is distinct and adds something too precious to be merged and
lost." He went on to say.

"`He maketh me to lie down in green pastures,'--nourishment, rest. `He
leadeth me beside the still waters,'--- the scene changes and so does the
meaning. You think here of quietly flowing streams; so you get one more
picture of rest; but you miss one of the finest scenes in shepherd life and
one of the rarest blessings of the soul that is led of God. All through the
day's roaming the shepherd keeps one thing in mind. He must lead his flock
to a drinking-place. The refreshment of good water makes the coveted hour
of all the day; the spot where it is found amid the rough, waterless hills
and plains is the crowning token of the shepherd's unfailing
thoughtfulness. When at last the sheep are led `beside the still waters,'
how good it is, after the dust and heat of the sheep-walks! 

"Would you get the shepherd meaning here? Then remember that streams are
few in the shepherd country of Bible lands. The shepherds do not rely on
them. Even where streams are found, their beds and banks are usually broken
and their flow rough. Sheep are timid and fear a current of water, as they
well may, for they are easily carried down stream because of their wool. If
the shepherd did not see to it that they be watered, the sheep would have a
hard time finding water to drink. How would we get the refreshment we need
in the rough world, if the Shepherd did not see to that? But He does, He
does!

"There are wells and fountains all through the vast regions where the
flocks roam, and in some parts there are cisterns, though the sheep like
the living water best. The shepherds know where these drinking-places are
all through the treeless country where streams are few. It is a fine sight
to see the shepherds bring their flocks `beside the still waters' at some
well or fountain, while the wide, silent country over which they and many
other sheep have wandered, spread all around them, and the full expanse of
the sky arches over them. 

"The shepherd makes a certain sound: all his sheep lie down and are quiet.
Then he fills the drinking-troughs. The bubbling of the fountain, or the
current, if it be by a stream, is no longer there to trouble the sheep.
They can drink now undisturbed. This is the delicate meaning of that word
`still.' as the Hebrew words put it, `He leadeth beside the waters of
quietness.'

"Then the waiting sheep hear a whistle or a call. They never misunderstand;
they know their shepherd's voice and never respond to the wrong shepherd if
several flocks have come up together. And strangest of all, the sheep come
up by groups; the shepherd makes them understand. So in groups he leads
them until they stand `besides the still waters.' And, oh, how they drink,
with the shepherd standing near!

After a pause, with a far-off look in his eyes, he said, "It is a beautiful
scene, so beautiful that St. John has used it in picturing heaven. `The
Lamb that is in the midst of the throne shall be their shepherd, and shall
guide them unto fountains of waters of life.'"

"But I must tell you one more scene that comes to my memory whenever I read
the words, `He leadeth me beside the still waters.' It would make a
beautiful picture if some one would paint it.

"Up in the mountainsides of Lebanon, where my kinsmen have long been
shepherds, often there are no regular drinking-places, such as the wells
and fountains on the plains. But as the shepherd leads his sheep over the
rough slopes he finds many a spring and sees it rivulet noisily running
down a crevice. His sheep need water. They cannot drink from the leaping
little stream. What does he do? He finds a suitable turn or nook in its
course; he walls it up with a little dam and so holds the water till it
forms a quiet pool. Then, right there on the open hills, he leads his sheep
`beside the still waters.' I know of nothing more fit to picture the
Shepherd's care of souls that trust Him than that scene up there on the
mountainside.

"`He restoreth my soul.' You know," he said, "that soul means the life or
one's self in the Hebrew writings. There are perilous places for the sheep
on all sides, and they seem never to learn to avoid them. The shepherd must
ever be on the watch. And there are private fields and sometimes gardens
and vineyards here and there in the shepherd country; if the sheep stray
into them and be caught there it is forfeited to the owner of the land. So
`He restoreth my soul' means, `The shepherd brings me back and rescues me
from fatal and forbidden places.'"

"`Restores me when wandering,' is the way it is put in one of our hymns," I
interposed.

"Ah, sir, that is it exactly," he answered, "`Restores me when wandering!'"

"`He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.' Often
have I  roamed through the shepherd country in my youth and seen how hard
it is to choose the right path for the sheep; one leads to a precipice,
another to a place where the sheep cannot find the way back; and the
shepherd was always going ahead, `leading' them in the right paths, proud
of his good name as a shepherd.

"Some paths that are right paths still lead through places that have deadly
perils. `Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,' is
the way the psalm touches this fact in shepherd life. This way of naming
the valley is very true to our country. I remember one near my home called
`the valley of robbers,' and another, `the ravine of the raven.' You see
`the valley of the shadow of death' is a name drawn from my country's old
custom.

"`For thou art with me.' Ah, how could more be put into few words! With the
sheep, it matters not what the surroundings are, nor how great the perils
and hardships; if only the shepherd is with them, they are content. There
is no finer picture of the way of peace for the troubled in the world.

"To show how much the presence of the shepherd counts for the welfare of
the sheep I can think of nothing better than the strange thing I now tell
you. It is quite beyond the usual, daily care on which the flock depends so
fondly. But I have seen it more than once.

"Sometimes, in spite of all the care of the shepherd and his dogs, a wolf
will get into the very midst of the flock, the sheep are wild with fright.
They run and leap and make it impossible to get at the foe in their midst,
who at that very moment may be fastening his teeth in the throat of a
helpless member of the flock. But the shepherd is with them, he knows what
to do even at such a time. He leaps to a rock or hillock that he may be
seen and heard. Then he lifts his voice in a long call, something like a
wolf's cry: `Ooh! ooh!'"

"On hearing this, the sheep remember the shepherd; they heed his voice;
and, strange to tell, the poor, timid creatures, which were helpless with
terror before, instantly rush with all their strength into a solid mass.
The pressure is irresistible; the wolf is overcome; frequently he is
crushed to death, while the shepherd stands there on a rock crying, `Ooh!
ooh!' `I will fear no evil, for thou art with me.'"

"Yes," I said at last, "`in all these things we are more than conquerors
through him that loved us.'" He bowed his satisfaction in silence.

"`Thy rod and thy staff'-- this also is true to life; the double expression
covers the whole round of protecting and care. For the shepherds carry a
crook for guiding the sheep and a weapon suitable for defending them, the
rod and the staff; one for aiding them in places of need along peaceful
ways, the other for defense in perils of robbers and wild beast. this
saying describes with the ease of mastery how much those words mean, `Thou
art with me.'"

"And what shall I say of the next words, `Thy rod and thy staff they
comfort me'? Ah, you should see the sheep cuddle near the shepherd to
understand that word, `they comfort me.' The shepherd's call `Ta-a-a-a,
ho-o-o,' and the answering patter of feet as the sheep hurry to him, are
fit sounds to be chosen out of the noisy world to show what comfort God
gives souls that heed His voice; and those sounds have been heard in my
country this day as they were the day this shepherd psalm was written!"
He sat in silence a moment musing as if the sound were in his ear.

With quiet animation he lifted his thin hand and continued: "Now here is
where you drop the shepherd figure and put in a banquet and lose the fine
climax of completeness in the shepherd's care."

"`Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies.'" In
the same hushed voice in which he quoted these words he added: "Ah, to
think that the shepherd's highest skill and heroism should be lost from
view as the psalm begins to sing of it, and only an indoor banquet thought
of!" Again he sat a little time in quiet. Then he said:

"The word for table here means simply `something spread out' and so a
prepared meal, however it is set forth. There is no higher task of the
shepherd in my country than to go from time to time to study places and
examine the grass and find a good and safe feeding-place for his sheep. All
his skill and often great heroism are called for. There are many poisonous
plants in the grass and the shepherd must find and avoid them. The sheep
will not eat certain poisonous things, but there are some which they will
eat, one kind of poisonous grass in particular. A cousin of mine once lost
three hundred sheep by a mistake in this hard task.

"Then there are snake holes in some kinds of ground, and if they be not
driven away, the snakes bite the noses of the sheep. The shepherd sometimes
burns the fat of  hogs along the ground to do this. Sometimes the shepherd
finds ground where moles have worked their holes just under the surface.
Snakes lie in these holes with their heads sticking up ready to bite the
grazing sheep. The shepherds know how to drive them away as they go ahead
of the sheep.

"And around the feeding-ground which the shepherd thus prepares, in holes
and caves in the hillsides there are jackals, wolves, hyenas, and panthers,
too, and the bravery and skill of the shepherd are at the highest point in
closing up these dens with stones or slaying the wild beast with his sharp
long-bladed knife. Of nothing do you hear shepherds boasting more proudly
than that of their achievement in this part of their care of flocks.
"And now," he exclaimed with beaming countenance and suppressed feeling, as
if pleading for recognition of the lone shepherd's bravest act of devotion
to his sheep, "and now do you not see the shepherds figure in that line,
`Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies'?"

"Yes," I answered; "and I see that God's care of man out in the world is a
grander thought than that of seating him at an indoor banquet-table."

"But what about the head with oil and the cup running over? Go on, my
friend."

"Oh, there begins the beautiful picture at the end of the day. The psalm
has sung of the whole round of the day's wandering, all the needs of the
sheep, all the care of the shepherd. Now the psalm closes with the last
scene of the day. At the door of the sheepfold the shepherd stands and `the
rodding of the sheep' takes place. The shepherd stands turning his body to
let the sheep pass; he is the door, as Christ said of Himself. With his rod
he holds back the sheep while he inspects them one by one as they pass into
the fold. He has the horn filled with olive-oil and he has cedar-tar, and
he anoints a knee bruised on the rocks or a side scratched by thorns. And
here comes one that is not bruised but simply worn and exhausted; he bathes
its face and head with the refreshing olive-oil and he takes the large
two-handled cup and dips it brimming full from the vessel of water provided
for that purpose, and he lets the weary sheep drink.

"There is nothing finer in the psalm than this. God's care is not for the
wounded only, but for the worn and weary also. `Thou anointest my head with
oil; my cup runneth over.'"

"And then, when the day is done and the sheep are snug within the fold,
what contentment, what rest under the starry sky! Then comes the thought of
deep repose and comfort; "`Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all
the days of my life," as they have through all wanderings of the day now
ended. 

"The song fades away as the heart that God has watched and tended breathes
this grateful vow before the roaming of the day is forgotten in sleep: `I
will'--not shall, but will; for it is a decision, a settled purpose, a holy
vow-- `I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.' And the song ends,
and the sheep are at rest, safe in the good shepherd's fold."

***************************************************************************

Return to Newsgroup Archives Main Page

Return to our Main Webpage


2011 Hebraic Heritage Ministries International. Designed by
Web Design by JB.






1