The Echoes of the Thirteen Midot (Exod 34:6) in the Holistic Design of the Psalter

Psalm 145 is very important in relation to its position and content in the Book of Psalms as a whole: it concludes the last Davidic collection, and introduces the concluding Hallel (Ps 146–150). As such it is often taken to function as a special seam, a hinge between the body of the Psalter and its concluding doxology. In v. 8 Psalm 145 quotes the ‘Divine Attribute Formula’ from Ex 34:6. It seems that is not by chance that Psalm 145 cites this fundamental article of faith; the result is that it establishes an intertextual dialogue between the Psalm and Exodus 32–34. The hermeneutical effect is that the theological perspective underlying the golden calf narrative is recovered: Yhwh is a God whose gracious and compassionate love is capable of offering the hope of a new future to a stiff-necked people and also to all the peoples of the earth, calling them to share the covenantal love of the compassionate God of Israel. However, Psalm 145 is a Davidic Psalm, so here it is David and not Moses who is recalling the divine attributes revealed at Sinai. Indeed, all three Psalms in the Psalter which explicitly quote Ex 34:6 (Ps 86; 103; 145) are Davidic. My proposal is that Ex 34:6 functions to bind the Psalter into a canonical unity: the role of the Davidic king is to establish the kingdom of Yhwh on the earth, confident in His gracious character.