מזמור כז: ביטחון, חשש ותקווה

Psalm 27 consists of two main parts of which the first one appears to be a thanksgiving psalm while the second one can be described as an individual lamentation. Many scholars hold the opinion that this psalm was composed out of two originally different psalms. Still others maintain that in spite of the indisputable differences between its two parts this psalm always was one single entity and try to prove their claim in different ways. The purpose of the present article is to point out parallels in content and language between the two parts of the psalm which strengthen the hypothesis of the psalm's original unity (the fact that there are such parallels was already mentioned in some previous articles but never systematically examined). Psalm 27 can be attributed to the genre of individual lamentation psalms although the components of the lamentation appear in it in a rather untypical order. The linguistic parallels between the two parts of the psalm as well as its extraordinary structure seem to indicate that the author of this psalm wants to express a recurring pattern and not a one time event: the transition from a strong feeling of trust in God and of experiencing His nearness to the fear of being abandoned by God is an ever recurring experience in the life of the believer.