Psalm 44: O God,Why Do You Hide Your Face?

Abstract

The Old Testament, especially the book of Psalms, contains powerful models of prayer for twenty-first-century communities of faith. In our on-going quest to learn how to pray, how to approach the throne of God, we are well-advised to study these models of prayer. But the models have been passed down to us in the form of words—words on a page. How do we understand the words, the movement from one phrase, one sentence, one thought to another. How do the words constitute prayer? A study of the use of words in a text is called rhetorical criticism. In this discipline, we ask the question, how did the writers or speakers use words to get their meaning across, to persuade their listeners, to achieve their ends? This article undertakes a study of the rhetoric of Psalm 44, a heartfelt community lament in which the people cry out to God, proclaiming their innocence and calling God to account for what is happening to them and act in their behalf. The article will conclude that the words of Psalm 44 are a model for how communities of faith can maintain their faithfulness: in situations of suffering people can and must approach God, can and must cry out to God, and can and must expect God to answer and act.