02_VanWieringen_179_197 15/07/14 12:15 Pagina 180 180 A.L.H.M. VAN WIERINGEN I. The plot of Psalm 65 Psalm 65 offers a complex communicative whole, which con- sists of two main units: verses 2-9 and 10-14 2. I will go through the text in order to outline the plot in which the communicative as- pects of this psalm appear. In verses 2-3, the psalm begins with ad- dressing God. This God is located in Zion. The text-internal author does not speak about himself ― the word “I” is not used. He makes it clear that this address has a universal import: “all flesh comes to you”. The word rfb means “all mankind”, from the perspective of mankind’s fragility and mortality 3. Mankind does not create his own world; he is limited. Within his limitedness, the psalmist enters into the relationship with the “Hearer of prayers”. Verse 4 is very remarkable: it is the only “I”-verse. After having addressed God and having located everybody in relation to God, the psalmist takes up his own position: an “I”-form is used. The psalmist does so by creating two tensions. The first tension has to do with the distinction between past and present. The psalmist brackets himself and the transgressions together; however he does this using a past perspective (qāṭal-form), looking back in time: “Words of misdeeds were stronger (wrbg) than me” (v. 4a). The transgressions, therefore, appear to belong to the past. The now- moment (yiqṭol-form) is different: “You forgive them (~rpkt)” (v. 4b). In the now-moment of the prayer, forgiveness rather than sinfulness is at issue 4. The second tension is the distinction between the “I” and the “we”. The singular “I” is responsible for the transgressions. One cannot blame someone else for one’s own sins. The “I” must be connected to the transgressions. The forgiveness, however, is for- mulated in the first person plural: “our transgressions, you forgive them” (v. 4b). Whereas the misdeeds are individual, the forgiveness is collective. In the forgiveness, the community arises, a “we”. 2 Pace F.-L. HOSSFELD – E. ZENGER, Psalmen 51-100 (HTKAT; Freiburg 2000), who read three units on page 212-213, but suggest two units on page 218. 3 See G. GERLEMAN, “rf'B' bāśār Fleisch”, ThHAT 1 (1978) 379. 4 The verbal tenses indicate the textual perspective towards the event de- scribed; see especially W. SCHNEIDER, Grammatik des Biblischen Hebräisch (München 92001) §§ 48.3.1-48.3.2; E. TALSTRA, “Text Grammar and Hebrew Bible I: Elements of a Theory”, BiOr 35 (1978) 170-172. These ideas are based on H. WEINRICH, Tempus. Besprochene und erzählte Welt (Stuttgart 21971).