Proper 25 Year B (RCL) Psalm 126 notes

[Psalm 126]

--> Post-Exilic?
- v. 1: "restored the fortunes" (NRSV) might also read "brought back the captives" (as in NIV); so with v. 4.
- This psalm seems to be a song of joy and amazement at the Return from Exile.

-->Seeming tension b/n vv. 1-3 & 4-6:

1-3 joyful song: the Lord has already restored our captives/fortunes
4-6 supplication looking forward to how the Lord will restore our captives/fortunes in the future

(some disagreement over how to translate the verbs in 1-3; see JPS TNK translation, which renders the entire psalm in future tense)

--> tension b/n past & present; joy & weeping
-God has done (or will do?) a wondrous, joyful thing
-But there is still weeping and "sowing with tears" now
From the NIB vol. IV; Psalm commentary by J. Clinton McCann, Jr.:

Historically speaking, the tension between vv. 1-3 and 4-6 makes very good sense in the post-exilic era... This glorious pilgrimage ran up against hard historical realities. The vision of Isaiah 40-55 did not materialize, and soon the disillusioned people found themselves again in need of restoration (see the books of Ezra; Nehemiah; Haggai; and Zechariah)... It is easy to imagine how the return of the captives from Babylon would have been like a dream come true (v. 1b).

Now, in the present, things again seem in need of restoration and renewal. Verse 4a ("Restore our fortunes, O Lord") echoes verse 1a ("When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion"); this echo both contrasts the present need with God's past deed, and suggests that hope for the present can be found in memory of what God has already done.

Return, renewal, and rebirth are hard. The exuberant exhilaration of the initial experience of return may fade into a realization that things are still not all perfect, that there is still unanswered suffering and difficulty. Perhaps the optimistic sensation that the returning exiles were being swept along effortlessly towards a perfect future is fading, slowly becoming replaced by a sense of doubt and despair as the ruins do not sit up and rebuild themselves, as the economy takes more time than they anticipated recovering, as the fields continue to require hard work and be subject to the same vagaries of drought and harvest-yield as all ancient agriculture.

But past experience of God's power fuels the present hope of God's renewal. As the people were formerly swept away with a dream-like sense of wonder that caused spontaneous laughter to well up in their mouths, they pray that God would again send a torrent of life-giving water into their lives. The stream-beds of the Negeb are, like the ruts and arroyos in Santa Fe where I went to college, usually dry, dusty beds, but with the few seasonal rains can be transformed into raging, rushing torrents. The dryness of the present is not the last word; God's aid can gush into the watercourses of our lives and sweep us off our feet again, as it has done in the past. Today's tears can yield to future joys.

But in the meantime, the Psalmist looks honestly into the face of today's hardships. There are tears to be sown today, perhaps, or a sense dryness, or weeping at our labor. To admit that is not to somehow betray the renewal that God has already worked among us, or be untrue to it, or erase it. To hold up today's difficulties honestly next to the memory of God's past help is to invite God's further help. It is to face today honestly and with hope. As the returning Exiles experienced their restoration as a mixed blessing, with hardship as well as joy, the Psalm invites us to face our lives honestly, to lift up whatever we really feel before God: laughter and Songs of Joy when we are joyful, cries of supplication when are in need.

God who restored our fortunes yesterday will continue to restore them tomorrow. Alleluia!