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From the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020, life in the United States fractured over political and social unrest. The fracturing spilled into churches in the United States and caused grief over the loss of members, friendships, and community. Churches and their members often lack the language to process the experienced trauma and grief. This project seeks to equip church communities with the language needed to name and process their grief by introducing lament into the regular rhythms of the church year through experiential participation in the practices of lament. By reclaiming practices and language of lament, persons, and congregations may find healing through renewed connection with God, with ourselves, and with each other.

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The psalms of the Hodayot tradition (the Thanksgiving Psalms from Qumran) have been customarily divided into two categories: the “Teacher Hymns” written by a leader of the sect at Qumran, and the “Community Hymns” associated with the ordinary members of the sect. These categories are considered problematic because of well-recognized problems pertaining to authorship and to the poor fit of many of the psalms in the categories. I propose a new set of categories for the Hodayot that classify the psalms on the basis of genre. It is my contention that genre offers a better frame of reference because it defines the psalms against the backdrop of the genres of early Jewish psalms and not solely in terms of the sectarian community. To propose new generic categories, I employ John Swales’s rhetorical moves analysis to classify the psalms on the basis of how their formal structures (what he calls “rhetorical moves”) work together to achieve common rhetorical objectives. Swales defines a composition’s genre primarily by its rhetorical objectives rather than a definitional checklist of features. I use rhetorical moves analysis to describe where the Hodayot psalms fall along the spectrum of descriptive and declarative praise in Claus Westermann’s schema for the genres of the biblical psalms. I conclude that there are two interlocking generic categories in the Hodayot: eschatological psalms of thanksgiving and psalms of hymnic confession. These generic categories have overlapping rhetorical strategies consisting of rhetorical moves that work closely together to achieve the primary communicative purpose of praising God descriptively and declaratively. In this respect, they serve the Maskil’s secondary rhetorical objective of instructing the audience in the sectarian discourses of praise and supplication, making the Hodayot tradition a part of the Maskil’s programme of instructing sectarians and evaluating their insight into the divine plan. / Dissertation / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / In this thesis I study the Thanksgiving Psalms from Qumran (1QHodayot a ), a collection of Jewish psalms from the Dead Sea Scrolls. The collection is typically divided into two categories: the “Teacher Hymns” written by a leader of a sect, and the “Community Hymns” that are associated with his followers. Scholars agree that these categories are inadequate, but no alternatives have been offered. I propose to use a more flexible approach that can classify all of the psalms by genre. The psalms are classified on a spectrum between two modes of praise by their objectives and strategies of persuasion. I argue that the psalms participate in two interlocking genres (the eschatological psalms of thanksgiving and the psalms of hymnic confession) and that all the psalms enable the speaker (the Maskil/Instructor) to achieve the two objectives of praising God and instructing his audience how to do the same.

The prose translation of the fifty first psalms in the Paris Psalter is quite unique as an early medieval scriptural translation (O’Neill 2016 p. x). There have been several studies made on the Paris Psalter recently, most notably by Patrick O’Neill. One focus of several of these studies has been whether or not the Prose translation is connected to Alfred the Great. However, there is still much left in this translation that has not yet been studied. Something that can be noticed when studying the prose psalms is that throughout the translation the translator made several additions and changes to the psalms. There are several different kinds of additions in the prose psalms, the most common of these is the þæt ys/þæt synt (‘that is’/‘those are’) type. This study focuses on these additions, and it will be suggested that the translator has made additions and changes to the psalms to describe metaphors and concepts that an Anglo-Saxon reader might not have been able to understand without these additions.

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Thesis (DTh)--University of Stellenbosch, 1998. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study is concerned with integrated spirituality. Spirituality is understood as a life orientation that presents itself both in worship and in a re-ordering of the elements of a person's life to a growing correspondence with the reality presented in worship. It finds expression in a web of relationships between God, the particular individual, the other and creation. Integrated spirituality is spirituality that is equally serious about God and our life in the material world, and it refuses to separate these two passions. God is the constitutive reality of Christian spirituality. He is the source of perspective and energy for Christian spirituality. However, the shape of spirituality is co-determined by factors from material existence, such as context, confessional tradition, narratives (both personal narratives and narratives of one's community) and the personal make-up of an individual. Any congregational strategy that aims at facilitating integrated spirituality, needs to incorporate both these aspects of spirituality. Nonetheless, it will have to give priority to the focus on God, but in such a way that the focus on material life retains full attention. The spirituality that we encounter in the Psalter is a clear example of integrated spirituality. Both the subject-matter and the editorial structure of the Psalter exhibit a passion for God and full attention to the concrete realities of daily life. As such, they present us with a valuable tool for facilitating integrated spirituality. We contend that the strategy of using the Psalms as prayers in congregations will have a distinct impact on the kind of spirituality that will evolve in these congregations. The Psalms can be used as prayers in liturgical and pastoral contexts, as well as in the private devotions of members of congregations. Praying the Psalms in these contexts will lead to integrated spirituality. However, this will depend on a number of prerequisites: The Psalms should be prayed from a proper understanding of their meaning and inner dynamics. Additionally, the whole spectrum of meaning found in the Psalms should become part of the prayer life of a congregation. If a congregation attains this, the result will be growth in integrated spirituality. Our exploration into the dynamics of spirituality as well as our overview of the Psalter's dual focus on God and life in the material world, forms the basis for this conviction. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Hierdie navorsing handel oor geintegreerde spiritualiteit. Spiritualiteit word verstaan as 'n lewensorientasie wat uitdrukking vind in beide aanbidding en in die herrangskikking van die elemente van 'n persoon se lewe tot 'n groeiende ooreenkoms met die werklikheid wat in aanbidding voorgehou word. Dit kom tot uitdrukking in 'n web van verhoudinge tussen God, die betrokke individu, die ander en die skepping. Geintegreerde spiritualiteit is spiritualiteit met ewe veel erns oor God en oor die lewe in die materiele wereld, en wat weier om hierdie twee belange te skei. God is die grondliggende werklikheid van Christelike spiritualiteit. Hy is die bron van perspektief en energie vir Christelike spiritualiteit. Die gestalte van spiritualiteit word egter medebepaal deur faktore uit die materiele lewe, soos konteks, konfessionele tradisie, narratiewe (beide persoonlike narratiewe en die narratiewe van iemand se gemeenskap) en die persoonlikheidstruktuur van 'n individu. Enige gemeentelike strategie wat geintegreerde spiritualiteit wil fasiliteer, moet beide hierdie aspekte van spiritualiteit insluit. Dit sal egter aan die fokus op God prioriteit moet gee, maar op so 'n wyse dat die fokus op die konkrete aardse lewe volle aandag bly geniet. Die spiritualiteit wat ons in die Psalms aantref, is 'n duidelike voorbeeld van geintegreerde spiritualiteit. Beide die inhoud en die redaksionele struktuur van die Psalms vertoon 'n passie vir God en 'n totale ingesteldheid op die konkrete werklikhede van die alledaagse lewe. As sodanig bied hulle vir ons 'n waardevolle instrument waarmee ons geintegreerde spiritualiteit kan fasiliteer. Ons voer aan dat die strategie om die Psalms as gebede in gemeentes te gebruik 'n merkbare impak sal he op die tipe spiritualiteit wat in hierdie gemeentes sal groei. Die Psalms kan gebruik word as gebede in liturgiese en pastorale kontekste, en ook in die persoonlike gebedstye van gemeentelede. Die bid van die Psalms in hierdie kontekste sal lei tot geintegreerde spiritualiteit. Dit sal egter van 'n aantal vereistes afhang: Die Psalms moet gebid word vanuit 'n behoorlike begrip vir hulle betekenis en innerlike dinamika. Verder moet die hele betekenisspektrum van die Psalms deel word van die gebedslewe van die gemeente. As'n gemeente hieraan voldoen, sal daar groei in geintegreerde spiritualiteit wees. Die grondslag van hierdie oortuiging word gevorm deur ons verkenning van die dinamika van spiritualiteit, sowel as ons oorsig oor die Psalms se dubbele fokus op God en lewe in die materiele wereld.