The Rehabilitation of Am Yisrael – Back to the Torah of Moshe!

Structure & Story of Book IV (90-106) and its opening with Mizmor 90

What can we learn from the placement of Moshe Rabeinu’s prayer as the interface between the destruction described at the end of Book III and the rehabilitation presented in Book IV?

After Book III and the destruction of David’s Kingdom in Mizmor 89, Book IV opens a new chapter of the spiritual restoration and response to the destruction described in Mizmor 89. Book IV consists of three units, all related to the advancement of God’s sovereignty in the world. Mizmor 90, Moshe’s prayer, which introduces Book IV, asks for compassion for the Jewish people and for success in what they do. This mizmor leads the process of rehabilitation; the goal of which is to restore God’s sovereignty to Israel and the nations (95-100), to the renewal of David’s Kingdom (101); these historical changes (102-106) pave the way to the return from the diaspora and ingathering of the exiles (Book V). A historical review of the twin mizmorim 105-106 closes Book IV with a thesis and antithesis, while Mizmor 107, which opens Book V continues with the synthesis of these twin chapters and a message that continues to resonate with us, the generation that has merited to see the return to Zion.