To celebrate the 400th anniversary of the publication of the King James Bible, and the work of those earlier translators like John Rogers, Myles Coverdale and William Tyndale, whose scholarship and musicality paved the way, I've turned to the Book of Psalms for this week's poem. No apologies for picking that old favourite – since it so thoroughly earns its popularity – Psalm 23. But is it poetry? you'll ask. I'd have to say well, in the broader sense, I think it probably is.
The Hebrew psalms are songs, designed to be sung with harp accompaniment. In the Book of Psalms, their structure in numbered verses resembles the structure found throughout the Bible, but there are differences. They are only minimally narrative: expressions of raw emotion, from the howl of despair to the ecstatic eulogy, they are often addressed directly to God. They are even attributed to a single author – King David. Not, admittedly, poems in conception, they are nevertheless intensely poetic in terms of rhythm, imagery, intensity and brevity. Like a lyric poem or a prayer, psalms belong to the emotional moment. And, of course, they have had an enormous influence on poetry in the English language.
When we say, vaguely, that the Bible influenced poets like Walt Whitman, we're probably thinking mostly of the hypnotic rhythms and the parallelism found in the Book of Psalms. Christopher Smart's Jubilate Agno was directly modelled on the psalm, and, much later, DH Lawrence wrote free verse that bears faintly the same imprint. But the line of inheritance seems stronger in American poetry. Besides Whitman, it leads to Stephen Crane, Herman Melville, Carl Sandburg, Jean Toomer, and arguably takes us, eventually, to Pound and Eliot. We could say that The Book of Psalms is the English great-grandmother of American free verse.
Many poets and hymn-writers reworked the 23rd Psalm in metre and rhyme. One of the most successful attempts is by Thomas Sternhold, who produced a Psaltery intended to encourage the court of Henry VIII to sing more devotional songs and fewer love-lyrics. The poem is neatly arranged in 14-syllable couplets, and has some graceful touches. I particularly like the phrase "he setteth me to feed". "Set" was the verb favoured by pre-Authorised Version translators. A gentler, less coercive verb that "make" in English, associated with "settle" and "sit", it helps the reader picture the scene. There's nothing wrong with Sternhold's poem – and yet, compared with the biblical verses, his tripping rhythms lack dignity and force.
George Herbert's compact stanzas have more sinew, and some memorability: "The God of love my shepherd is, /And he that does me feed./ While He is mine, and I am His,/ What can I want or need?" This has Herbert's characteristic tone in all its intimacy and sweetness. The image, in verse five, of wining and dining with God is a Herbert favourite: it might possibly have originated from Psalm 23. Its most beautiful realisation is not here, though, but in "Love (III)". There's an almost witty little rhetorical flourish in the last 2 lines: "Surely, your sweet and wondrous love/ Shall measure all my days,/ And, as it never shall remove,/ So neither shall my praise." But not even Herbert can match the power of the biblical text: in fact, he doesn't try to.
Not all prose versions of Psalm 23 are as vivid as those of the King James Bible. The earlier Wycliffe version seems at times a little wordy, though perhaps it's just that the additionally figurative language needs getting used to ("Thou hast made fat mine head with oil; and my cup, that runneth greatly, is full clear.") Of the modern translations, that of the Message Bible, by Pastor Eugene M Peterson, is by far the most vivid. "God, my shepherd! I don't need a thing./ You have bedded me down in lush meadows,/ you find me quiet pools to drink from. " Verse five becomes: "You serve me a six-course dinner/ right in front of my enemies." This is imitation rather than translation, of course, but, by daring to be truly idiomatic, Peterson gives the wan modern English of recent translations a hearty blood transfusion.
Re-reading Psalm 23 in the Authorised Version, I've been as struck by its wonderful punctuation as by its imagery and rhythm. When, as a child, I first heard it sung (in a rather syrupy popular setting, probably Crimond) I was very puzzled by the logic of the line: "The lord is my shepherd I shall not want." The singers had forgotten to include that vital semi-colon.
As elsewhere in the Bible, each verse of the psalm is a self-contained unit, often consisting of a single sentence, and the careful differentiation of comma, semi-colon and colon informs both sound and sense. These punctuation marks denote the length of a pause between utterances. They organise the thought itself, and enable the segments to work dramatically, rather like the lines of a poem.
Psalm 23's metaphorical language has produced many interpretations. One of the most ingenious I've come across claims that the whole is a pastoral metaphor: the "table" refers to the raised boards where fodder was spread for the sheep, the anointing alludes to the shepherd's use of oil to heal the animals' wounds. Rather more convincing is the reading that allows for two dominant metaphors. The pastoral one concludes in verse four, when the speaker is conducted through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, helped by the shepherd's rod and staff. After that, imperial and somewhat militaristic symbolism replaces pastoral. The shepherd becomes the King – describing the course of David's own career – and the concerns are no longer earthly and pastoral but eschatological. Notice the abrupt change from third person "he" to vocative "thou" in the middle of verse four, the point at which the speaker is most in need of comfort. In the slow-gathering crescendo of that verse, the double possessive ("the valley of the shadow of…"), normally so clumsy-sounding in English, plays a major role. The stroke of genius, though, is in four words: "my cup runneth over". As for verse six, perhaps the Tyndale version is more artistically satisfying, as well as more heart-felt: by giving us "thy loving-kindness and mercy" for a generalised "goodness and mercy," the pastoral imagery of the opening, in all its quiet tenderness, is evoked once more.
Psalm 23 (King James Authorised Version, 1611)
1 The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.
2 He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.
3 He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.
4 Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
5 Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.
6 Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life; and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.
Psalm 23 (Matthew-Tyndale Bible, 1537)
The LORDE is my shepherde, I can wante nothinge. 2 He fedeth me in a grene pasture, and ledeth me to a fresh water. 3 He quickeneth my soule, & bringeth me forth in the waye of rightuousnes for his names sake. 4 Though I shulde walke now in the valley of the shadowe of death, yet I feare no euell, for thou art with me: thy staffe & thy shepehoke comforte me. 5 Thou preparest a table before me agaynst mine enemies: thou anoyntest my heade with oyle, & fyllest my cuppe full. 6 Oh let thy louynge kyndnes & mercy folowe me all the dayes off my life, that I maye dwell in the house off the LORDE for euer.
Psalm 23 (Metrical Version by Thomas Sternhold, 1549)
1 My Shepherd is the living Lord, nothing therefore I need:
In pastures fair, near pleasant streams, he setteth me to feed.
2 He shall convert and glad my soul, and bring my mind in frame
To walk in paths of righteousness for his most holy Name.
3 Yea, though I walk in vale of death, yet will I fear no ill:
Thy rod and staff do comfort me, and thou art with me still.
4 And in the presence of my foes My table thou shalt spread
Thou wilt fill full my cup, and thou anointed hast my head.
5 Through all my life thy favour is so frankly showed to me
That in thy house for evermore my dwelling place shall be.