Psalm 65 (1928 BCP)

Psalm 65 (1928 BCP) is Te decet hymnus in the Psalter of the American Book of Common Prayer (1928). In the monthly order printed with the Psalter, it is appointed at Evening Prayer on the twelfth day of the month. Its movement is distinctive: the congregation comes to the God who hears prayer, confesses that sin exceeds its own power, and gives thanks for the Creator's peace-making and fruitful care of the earth.

Prayer Book text

The opening joins praise, a vow fulfilled, and access to God. “All flesh” expands worship beyond a merely private or local devotion; nevertheless, the speaker does not approach by ignoring sin.

THOU, O God, art praised in Sion; * and unto thee shall the vow be performed in Jerusalem.
2 Thou that hearest the prayer, * unto thee shall all flesh come.
3 My misdeeds prevail against me: * O be thou merciful unto our sins.
4 Blessed is the man whom thou choosest, and receivest unto thee: * he shall dwell in thy court, and shall be satisfied with the pleasures of thy house, even of thy holy temple.

The next verses name God's saving righteousness before they portray his cosmic rule. The God who receives worship from Zion is “the hope of all the ends of the earth”; his strength establishes mountains and his rule quiets not only waves but “the madness of the peoples.” The Psalm therefore holds creation and the nations together before one Creator and Judge.

5 Thou shalt show us wonderful things in thy righteousness, O God of our salvation; * thou that art the hope of all the ends of the earth, and of them that remain in the broad sea.
6 Who in his strength setteth fast the mountains, * and is girded about with power.
7 Who stilleth the raging of the sea, * and the noise of his waves, and the madness of the peoples.
8 They also that dwell in the uttermost parts of the earth shall be afraid at thy tokens, * thou that makest the outgoings of the morning and evening to praise thee.

The praise becomes deliberately material without becoming merely possessive. Rain, furrows, valleys, and grain are received as God's visitation and blessing. The Prayer Book's “river of God” is not a denial of ordinary means—water and cultivation remain visible in the poem—but a confession that fertility is gift, not an achievement owned by its recipients.

9 Thou visitest the earth, and blessest it; * thou makest it very plenteous.
10 The river of God is full of water: * thou preparest their corn, for so thou providest for the earth.
11 Thou waterest her furrows; thou sendest rain into the little valleys thereof; * thou makest it soft with the drops of rain, and blessest the increase of it.

The final image gathers the entire year into thanksgiving. The clouds “drop fatness,” the pasture receives it, and sheep and grain together make the landscape a chorus. It offers the Church language for harvest gratitude that recognizes both human need and the goodness of creation.

12 Thou crownest the year with thy goodness; * and thy clouds drop fatness.
13 They shall drop upon the dwellings of the wilderness; * and the little hills shall rejoice on every side.
14 The folds shall be full of sheep; * the valleys also shall stand so thick with corn, that they shall laugh and sing.

Sin, mercy, and prayer

The singular “My misdeeds” becomes the plural “our sins.” That grammatical turn prevents a congregation's thanksgiving from becoming self-congratulation: the worshipper owns personal fault while asking for divine mercy with and for the whole body. The prayer accords with Christ's teaching that the forgiven servant must forgive (Matthew 6:12, 14–15), but Psalm 65 first names the source of cleansing as God's act.

Alexander MacLaren's exposition stays close to this turn in verse 3. He takes the juxtaposition of human powerlessness and God's cleansing as the theological center of the verse, rather than as an excuse for moral passivity:

Despair of self is the mother of confidence in God; and no man has learned the blessedness and the sweetness of God’s power to cleanse, who has not learned the impotence of his own feeble attempts to overcome his transgression.

That is a Christian interpretation of the Psalm, not a replacement for its literal prayer. It draws the worshipper from confession toward confidence that God's mercy can make genuine worship possible; it does not permit the worshipper to call evil good or to delegate repentance to someone else.

Begin with ‘too strong for me,’ and the impotent ‘me’ leads on to the almighty ‘Thou.’

Zion, all flesh, and the Church

Augustine reads the Psalm's Zion and Jerusalem through the Christian hope of the heavenly city. His fourth-century exposition should be distinguished from the historical sense of Israel's worship; it is a patristic Christian reading of how the Psalm trains the Church's longing and praise.

Already in longing we are there, already hope into that land, as it were an anchor, we have sent before, lest in this sea being tossed we suffer shipwreck.

On “unto thee shall all flesh come,” Augustine hears neither an erasure of Israel nor a claim that every individual response is automatic. He reads it as the gathering of people of every kind and nation to Christ, which fits the Psalm's own widening horizon from Zion to “the ends of the earth.”

By “every flesh” he hath signified, “flesh of every kind:” out of every kind of flesh they shall come to Thee.

Liturgical use

The 1928 Psalter prints Psalm 65 at Twelfth-Day Evening Prayer, after Psalm 64 and before Psalms 66 and 67. Its evening appointment lets praise carry the day toward rest: God hears prayer, forgives sins, establishes what is firm, quiets what rages, and gives the earth its increase. It may also be used devotionally at harvest or in thanksgiving, provided its account of abundance remains joined to its earlier confession of mercy and its universal horizon of prayer.

See Also

• The Psalter (1928 BCP)
• Daily Office (1928 BCP)
• Evening Prayer (1928 BCP)
• Psalm 64 (1928 BCP)
• Psalm 66 (1928 BCP)

External Links

• The 1928 U. S. Book of Common Prayer: The Psalter
• MacLaren, “Sin Overcoming and Overcome”
• Augustine, Exposition on Psalm LXV