FROM SILENCE TO SONG

The Davidic Liturgical Revolution

Peter J. Leithart

Canon Press Moscow

Peter J. Leithart, From Silence to Song: The Davidic Liturgical Revolution

© 2003 by Peter Leithart

Published by Canon Press, P.O. Box 8741, Moscow, ID 83843

800-488-2034 / www.canonpress.org

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise, without prior permission of the author, except as provided by USA copyright law.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Leithart, Peter J.

From silence to song: the Davidic liturgical revolution / by Peter Leithart.

p. cm.

Includes index.

ISBN 1-59128-001-X (pbk.)

1. Public worship in the Bible. 2. Bible. O.T. Samuel, 2nd, VI—Criticism, interpretation, etc. 3. Bible. O.T. Chronicles, 1st, XIII–XVI—Criticism, interpretation, etc. 4. David, King of Israel. 5. Tablernacle. 6. Public worship—Biblical teaching. 7. Reformed Church—Liturgy. I. Title.

BS1325.6.P93 .L45 2002

264—dc21

2002006519

Contents

Preface

1. The Problem of Davidic Worship

2. According to the Pattern

3. Some for Priests and Levites

4. Sacrifices of Praise

5. The Booth of David

6. The Ends of Song

Scripture Index

Preface

I have taught on the tabernacle of David in several venues during the past few years, and each time I have returned to it, it has grown bigger in my absence. The last time, I prefaced my lectures by saying that I was reporting on a work in progress. I have always felt that a great deal was still eluding me. Every now and then I have had the sense that, after huffing and puffing through the texts yet again, I was finally about to reach the peak, where I expected to gaze out vertiginously at a vast new undiscovered territory spreading out before me to the horizon—a fruitful land and green.

Alas. It is still getting bigger, and I still feel that the peak is a ways ahead, somewhere up there through the fog. And that means that this book is also a “report on a work in progress” rather than a definitive treatment of the subject. There are large holes in this book. Occasionally, I have set a fence around my open pits, dutifully attaching florescent orange warning signs. Other times, I have left it to the reader to discover the gaps in the argument. In other cases, I have left no warning signs because I do not even know where all the danger spots are. Caveat lector, lest he tumble in unawares, never to be heard from again.

Why is it such a big deal? Maybe it is not, as a skeptical (and cruel) friend once said.

Undaunted, I insist it is a big deal. It is big because the tabernacle of David was Yahweh’s first dwelling in Jerusalem, which came to be called the city of the great King. It is big because David’s tent was the only sanctuary ever established on Mount Zion, and because Zion is one of the main symbols in Scripture. It is big because David is arguably the central character of the Old ...