The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1903-03-23
DR. J. H. PENNYMAN
ON BIBLE POETS
He Says the Psalms Are Liter
airy Masterpieces
DETAILED ANALYSIS MADE
1o4th Psalm Is Great Philosophical
Treatise and 13oth Is by Student
of PsychoIoey-Large Num-
Der Hear the Address.

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Of the University of Pennsylvania. gave
a masterful exposition of the literary ex-
cellence of the poetry of the Old Testa-
rnent mt the First Baptist church last
! night to a cultured audience. While he
chung to the doctrine of the religious sig
nifcance of the Psalms he devoted most
Of his attention to showing by detailed
analysis that the poems of the Old Tes-
lament are equal, II not superior, from
| a literary point OF view, to anything ever
written during the history of man.
Dr. Pennyman began by saying that it
was always a pleasure to have an oppor-
tunlty to talk about the Bible, the great
est book in the world, for it is not only
the word of God, but is the word of man.
1t is the basis of the Christian religion,
he said, and the Christian religion is the
basis of civilization.
Old Testament Poetry.
Concerning Old Testament poetry, he
said in part:
THE Psalms are literary, spiritual and
prophetic and 1t is an injustice to con-
cider the writer's as puppets. Many of
and cultured men, and they came down
from a comparatively late period in mans
history and were written during a period
Of great literary activity.
"rhe preservation of the Psalms Is
/ largely due to Ezra and Nehemiah. Only
/ seventy-three or seventy-four of them
are attributed to David. Asaph Is the au-
| thor of the musical psalms; Korah wrote
some, showing the most remarkable lit
erary technique. and the Goth psalm is a
/ prayer of Moses.
Zone of the most remarkable things
about the Psalms is their prophetic ma
ture in spite of the fact that they were
simply a record of contemporary events.
1t is a great mistake to think of them as
| nothing more than a uniform method of
praise of God They are just as varied
as any other poems and some of them are
as different from others as Shakespeare
Is different from Tennyson.
lin reading the Bible we should first
try to get a comprehension of the liter
ary, significance of what we are reading
when VIC read Shakespeare we must get
an idea of his literary style In order to
| comprehend his full meaning. We are
the Bible simply with our eyes instead
| of our minds. God has taken special
pains to make the book appeal to us.
He has devoted special attention to nature
and the things In which we are most
| interested
Literary Masterpieces.
80 positive am 1 in my belief in the
| Psalms as literary masterpieces that L
believe course in literature in the uni
yersties should include the POEMS"
DR.. Pennyman read several of the
! Psalms to illustrate and bring out the
literary features in them After read
! ing the forty-second and forty-third
Psalms which he said were really the
same. and bringing out the poetical re-
frain which occurred three times In the
reading, why art thou cast down, oh my
| soul, and why art thou disquieted within
me-" he continued:
Here is case where literary interpre-
tston will help us to appreciate the re-
ligious truth. We should read these
poems with the same amount of mental
energy as in reading Shakespeare. We
are too apt to read them In formal way
and by piecemeal and get no idea of the
| significance of the connected whole
I'm the Psalms we find the whole
gamut of human emotions. They are as
deep and incisive and portray human ma
ture as wildly as any novelist or dram
| atists that has ever written"
DIR. Pennyman at this point gave atten-
ton to some of the individual chapters.
The 10th. ne said, is profoundly philo-
sophie. Humboldt has said that 1t pre-
sents the whole cosmos. The 139th Is a
wonderful treatise on psychology and is a
work of great intellectual power.
He showed what careful attention Is re-
quired In reading the 91st psalm 1t rep
resents two men conversing, he said, and
God Is represented anthropomorphically
because we can only think of Him in
comparison with things we know. God
speaks beginning with the 14th verse and
II we did not know this the significance
of the poem is lost. DR.. Pennyman con-
tinued:
I'VE must read the Bible carefully and
analyze everything we read. Anything
that adds to our knowledge of the Bible
adds to our appreciation of the work.
The book that has stood the test OF CEN
turtles cannot suffer from any increased
knowledge we may gain of it,
A large audience gathered to hear
the discourse in spite of the Indictment
weather
Dr. Pennyman will remain in the city
today and will give a talk at the High
school at O'Clock this morning, and will
deliver lecture at the, High school to-
night on the college boy and his work.
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