Psalm 14 and Psalm 53, the former from the southern tradition, and the latter from the northern tradition, are similar psalms. They are individual laments. It is unusual in that it refers to God in the third person rather than being addressed to God. The psalm has a close connection with prophetic concerns about the corruption of the leading circles of Israel who oppresses the poor. A gloomy psalm ends with confidence that the Lord will restore the fortunes of the people of the Lord.
The superscription is simply To the leader. Of David.
Psalm 14: 1-3 are a lament. We learn the psalm is about 1 Fools (naval[1]) empty, witless, devoid of the intelligent exercise of the awareness of God demonstrated by their lack of wisdom. Such persons) say in their hearts, to keep it private due to the social opprobrium the public infidel would receive, “There is no God.” In suggesting that God does not care, the fool would invalidate two basic assumptions of the Book of Psalms, the ability of God to hear prayers and the ability of God to punish human wrongs that the psalmists lament. The wicked also say inwardly that there is no God (Psalm 10:4). They are practical atheists. The only God worth having in the ancient world — indeed, through most of human history — is an effectual God, that is, one who gets things done. God simply as an idea was of no interest to the writers of the OT or the NT. Thus, the point is not so much theoretical atheism, but that no God exists who will punish or correct. See Zephaniah 1:12: "At that time I [the LORD] will search Jerusalem with lamps, and I will punish the people who ... say in their hearts, 'The LORD will not do good, nor will he do harm.'" This view leads to corruption of morality. They are corrupt, they do abominable (to`evah)[2] deeds. What distinguishes abominable behavior in the OT is less degree and more kind. They engage in the ritual practices of the indigenous and neighboring peoples of Canaan. Some practices to modern (and ancient) sensibilities may have been ethically abhorrent (such as child sacrifice, Deuteronomy 18:10; II Kings 16:3). Other activities in the category of abomination (such as dietary restrictions, Leviticus 7:18, 11:13 ; Isaiah 65:4) or in the same legal context as abominations (such as allowing animal mix-breeding, sowing a field with two kinds of seed, or wearing garments of two kinds of fabric, Leviticus 19:19), have lost their ethical punch (if they ever had any). While the word “abominable” refers to engaging in both ritual and ethical behavior, the emphasis here is on the ethical, reflecting a later wisdom that has broadened from the root meaning of the word.[3] Thus, there is no one who does good. 2 The Lord looks down from heaven on humankind to see if there are any who are wise, who seek after God, or are mindful of God in prayer. The Lord looks for the wise but finds only fools. Yet, it is a powerful reminder that the wise are those who seek after God. 3 They have all gone astray, they are all alike perverse; there is no one who does good, no, not one. God is like the Greek philosopher Diogenes who was carrying a lamp even in the daytime, looking for one honest man. Here is a strong verdict on the person's inability to do right. Although the wisdom tradition in ancient Israel was less parochial and more cosmopolitan than normative Yahwism, it was in no way godless. Wisdom was perceived as the first of God's creative acts (Proverbs 8:22), and piety was regarded as the vestibule of wisdom (Proverbs 9:10). The book of Proverbs, the Bible's most extensive collection of wisdom material, makes clear the inextricability of wisdom and right conduct.
Psalm 14: 4-6 are a threat. 4 Have they no knowledge, all the evildoers who eat up my people as they eat bread, and do not call upon the Lord? 5 There they shall be in great terror, for God is with the company of the righteous. The writer now acts like a prophet. While everything looks bleak in the first verses, due to hyperbole, we now see that there is hope, for the company of the righteous is present as well. God protects this company. Even when things seem hopelessly bad, God is there for the faithful. 6 You would confound the plans of the poor, but the Lord is their refuge. Ruining of fellow citizens reveals their lack of religious and social responsibility. When judgment comes, it will be too late. God is their adversary now.
Psalm 14: 7 is a concluding promise and an appeal for the evildoers to change their ways. Many modern scholars view this verse as a later addition since it does not fit the theme or tone of the psalm. In these ancient times, the easiest way to make additions was at the end of a composition. 7 O that deliverance for Israel would come from Zion! Here is a subtle critique of the political-religious establishment in that city that has failed in its responsibility to create and maintain the "priestly kingdom and holy nation" God created Israel to be (Exodus 19:6). When the Lord restores the fortunes of his people, referring either to personal restoration or to the return from the Babylonian exile, Jacob will rejoice; Israel will be glad. Judgment upon Israel's leaders will not have the final word. Rather, the grace of God will restore Israel. Despite the gloomy tenor of most of this psalm, it concludes on a note of confident hope resting on divine deliverance.
I invite you to reflect with me for a few moments on atheism today.
The lawsuits from militant atheists just keep coming about "One nation under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance and "In God We Trust" on the currency. January 2016 brought a new legal challenge from Michael Newdow, an attorney in Sacramento. He filed a federal lawsuit alleging that the phrase "In God We Trust" on U.S. money is unconstitutional and violates the separation of church and state. Newdow previously -- and unsuccessfully -- sued the government to stop schoolchildren from pledging allegiance to "one nation under God." David Silverman, president of American Atheists, has attracted notoriety by staffing an exhibit-area booth at the Conservative Political Action Conference's annual convention. CPAC, of course -- while not a religious organization -- is a magnet for religious-right activists, many of whom advocate the teaching of Creationism in public schools. Organizers yanked Silverman's exhibitor permit just prior to the 2014 gathering. In 2015, they reluctantly let him back in. At the 2016 convention, he was photographed holding a photo of the U.S. Capitol with an arrow pointing to it, saying "This is not a church."
Is America a Christian nation? The constitution does not refer to God. The constitution does not establish any religion as the national religion. Yet, when one goes behind the founding documents, many of the first settlers along the east coast came to America to escape persecution of their religious beliefs. Many of the founders were devout Christians. Even a surface reading of inaugural addresses of presidents and other major speeches demonstrate the depth of regard for the Bible and Christianity. The abolitionist movement against slavery had deeply Christian roots. The same would be true of the Civil Rights movement of 1950-68. Many other efforts at reform of the nation, including concern for alcoholism, prison reform, women’s right to vote, and so on, had a strong religious motivation. The aggressive secularism we see today is contrary to American history of allowing people of faith to have a vital place in the public square.
The most sustained challenge from atheists comes not by political activists like Newdow and Silverman, but by intellectuals like biologist Richard Dawkins (author of 2006's The God Delusion) and bad-boy journalist Christopher Hitchens (who wrote the 2009 bestseller, God Is Not Great). Before his death from esophageal cancer in 2011, Hitchens relentlessly criticized all religions -- and particularly Christianity -- as outmoded attempts to explain the intricacies of the natural world. He jeers, "Thanks to the telescope and the microscope, [religion] no longer offers an explanation of anything important."
Is it really the purpose of religious faith to explain how the natural world works? In response to Hitchens' point about the telescope and the microscope, British critic Terry Eagleton volleys back that "Christianity was never meant to be an explanation of anything in the first place. It's rather like saying that thanks to the electric toaster we can forget about Chekhov." Rather, says Eagleton, "where science and religion come closest for the Christian is not in what they say about the world, but in the act of creative imagination which both projects involve -- a creative act in which the believer finds the source in the Holy Spirit. Scientists like Heisenberg and Schrödinger are supreme imaginative artists, who, when it comes to the universe, are aware that the elegant and beautiful are more likely to be true than the ugly and misshapen." "God the Creator," Eagleton continues, "is not a celestial engineer at work on a superbly rational design that will impress his research grant body [to] no end, but an artist, and an aesthete to boot, who made the world with no functional end in view but simply for the love and delight of it."
Such a response to the atheist critique is more sophisticated than the blunt-force counterattack of those who dig for the remains of Noah's Ark on Mount Ararat or surmise that God buried dinosaur bones in certain rock strata solely to test 21st-century human faith. Such responses merely buy into the atheists' assertion that truth begins and ends with scientific evidence. There are, in fact, various kinds of truth -- or, more accurately, different facets of truth. There is head-truth and heart-truth, which science and religion illuminate in parallel, complementary ways.
Cultured despisers of religion like Dawkins and Hitchens proudly imagine themselves at the helm of new intellectual battleships, but they are sailing the same waters as the ancient Polynesians in their outrigger canoes. Whose feats of navigation are greater: those who rely on GPS signals bounced off a satellite, or those who -- lacking both compass and sextant -- can somehow sense the right course by studying the shapes of the waves? These are distinct types of knowledge, and their practitioners do far better when they respect one another's gifts.
America's atheists are aggressively pushing forward from the margins of American life to stake out a position closer to the center. What -- if anything -- should Christians do about it? What can Christians do about it?
First, we can adapt or change our own thinking about divine revelation. (Review Eagleton's position recounted above.) Let us stop thinking that God gave Scripture as a witness to revelation to provide answers to all things scientific, whether it is paleontology or cosmology. God was not trying to help us understand fossils when God mediated the divine Word to human authors. We need not get frustrated when scientific research is at odds with the written Word. Divine revelation relates to our desire to participate in what is true, good, and beautiful. This desire is what makes human beings who they are. Revelation addresses that need. As important as logic, math, and science are in our quest to understand the universe in which we live, they are not everything. In fact, we cannot reduce some of the most critical areas of human individual and corporate life to the scientific. To put it bluntly, anyone who would reduce to scientific explanation Plato, Aristotle, Shakespeare, poetry, novels, religious sensibility, witness to divine revelation, and so on, is going down a path that will lead to a dead end.
In his famous 1896 lecture, The Will to Believe, American philosopher and pioneer psychologist William James defends the adoption of certain beliefs that are, by nature, incapable of empirical proof. Within this category, he includes religious belief. James summarizes his argument by saying that our passion, will, intuition, are valid ways in which to make decisions when logic or science does not provide the tools to make the decisions. We can do so without risk of losing our concern for truth.[4] James says that the scientific method is of tremendous value, but when it comes to weighty matters of the heart, there are certain propositions that can only remain as hypotheses. There is no way to prove such hypotheses, but there is likewise no way to disprove them. In the absence of such empirical proof, there is a recognition we experience as we encounter faith-propositions: "Of some things we feel that we are certain: we know, and we know that we do know. There is something that gives a click inside of us, a bell that strikes twelve, when the hands of our mental clock have swept the dial and meet over the meridian hour" (13). It would be absurd, in committed human relationships like marriage, to base our participation solely on empirical evidence. No one would ever make it to the wedding chapel on that basis! Because faith is about having a personal relationship with God, James continues, a similar dynamic pertains: "The universe is no longer a mere It to us, but a Thou, if we are religious; and any relation that may be possible from person to person might be possible here" (27-28).
The human faculty that allows us to make faith-commitments is the will. People of faith can admit that matters of faith involve us in a different type of reasoning than one finds in science. Yet, science often makes advances that arise out of intuition (Michael Polanyi). Even the scientists must rely upon a sense of where the answer may lay. Decision-making is not a matter of strict logic or a scientific formula. It will involve our will to believe.
Second, let us be willing to share our faith journeys, doubts and all. Let us do so in a humble and honest way -- not with the goal of gaining a convert but gaining a conversation.
Third, let us remember that the "fools" of Psalm 14 will always be among us, even -- gasp! -- in the pews. Thus, we should not be surprised, as though the presence of those who deny the existence of God is a new thing.
Fourth, let us recommit our lives to Jesus Christ, and not live as though "God is not here." God's name is Immanuel. God is here. God is with us. Let us live as though it is true. Because it is.
[1] (plural in NRSV), (pronounced, probably, "nah-VAHL"), is an adjective functioning as a noun. The same root, n-v-l, elsewhere means an empty vessel (such as a water jug or skin-bottle) or a hollow musical instrument. ("witless," as JPS translates a different phrase in verse 4)
[2] “Abominations" has come to connote in common parlance not simply bad deeds, but rather really, really bad deeds. In the English-thinking mind, abominable acts are at the far end of wickedness. There is some biblical support for this understanding of the Hebrew word (and its derived verbal forms, one of which is used here), but not much.
[3] This reflects a later wisdom broadening of the sense of the root from the specific to the general (much in the same way that some contemporary brand names, such as Coke or Kleenex or Google, have expanded beyond their original specific referent).
[4] "Our passional nature not only lawfully may, but must, decide an option between propositions, whenever it is a genuine option that cannot by its nature be decided on intellectual grounds; for to say, under such circumstances, 'Do not decide, but leave the question open,' is itself a passional decision, -- just like deciding yes or no, -- and is attended with the same risk of losing the truth" (11).
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