Bernard P. Robinson, «Form and Meaning in Psalm 131», Vol. 79 (1998) 180-197
Psalm 131 displays a subtle play on words. The psalmist has silenced and calmed down his soul/breast (he has put an end to its loud complaints). The two verbs used express or suggest the idea of assimilation (I have transformed it into something silent and something calm), which leads up to the material image which follows. In 2b gamul means a child that has been weaned or is happy (and has stopped crying loudly); instead of kaggamul one should read tiggmol, you have been nice to me. Although the psalm has an unusual form, it has the same structure as Psalm 130. It probably constitutes a literary unit. It may by royal psalm.
particularly since the Targum, the Lucianic recension of LXX, and Jeromes Psalterium Juxta Hebraeos lack the phrase in this Psalm. The need, however, for kings to be humble is a favourite theme of the "Davidic" Psalms: cf 18,28 [EVV18,27] ("You deliver a humble people, but the haughty eyes you bring down"), 34,7 [EVV 34,6] ("This poor man cried..."), and 101,5 ("A haughty look and an arrogant heart I will not tolerate"). There are other connections too with the monarchy. As noted by de Boer, in 2 Chr 32,25 several of the terms found in our Psalm are used of Hezekiah. Being a proud man (
wbl hbg), he was not grateful for the good done to him (wyl( lmg), that is, his recovery from illness10. We shall say more of this text later, but at the moment it is sufficient to note that a royal reading of the Psalm has a certain plausibility. We may add that Ps 62, with which it has affinities (especially with vv. 2.6 [EVV1.5]]: y#$pn hymwd Myhl)-l) K) and y#$pn ymwd Myhl)l K)), is confidently identified by Eaton 11 as a Royal Psalm. These considerations favour the retention in 131,1a of dwdl.
V. 1b.
hwhy. The Psalm begins with an address to the deity, but ends (v. 3) with a call to Israel to trust in God. If v. 3 is integral to the Psalm, rather than a liturgical addition, it is quite possible that the initial invocation to Yhwh is redactional and that the addressee throughout is Israel. In which case, the Psalm could originally have been more in the nature of a personal reflection than a prayer to God. We shall return in due course to the question of the Psalms unity.V. 1b. The Psalmist here, as Beyerlin notes, employs the figure synecdoche, the part (heart; eyes) standing for the whole person. The part mentioned, however, as he shows, is not chosen at random: the Psalmist is speaking of his whole self, but with special reference to his heart and his eyes. He is not haughty in his heart that is, probably, in his thinking; he is not lifted up in respect of his eyes that is, probably, in his way of looking at things. The two expressions thus add up to a single thought, the renunciation of arrogance 12.