This is the psalm that my pop, the preacher, quoted most often in his sermons; and I heard all of them over the last 18 years of his evangelical ministry — well, once I was old enough not to fall asleep in the pew. “Purge me with hyssop,” Dad would declaim, “and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.” He never said what hyssop was or how it was used in a purge.
One learns from any good reference Bible — or from the Rev. Dr. Google — that hyssop was a plant that ancient Israelite priests used in ritual cleansings. According to Leviticus, they’d dip a handful of hyssop sprigs into the blood of a sacrificial animal, then “cleanse” the penitent person with that blood. Also, some sources claim that hyssop had medicinal value, almost like penicillin.
Something else that I don’t remember my old man explaining was that the anguished speaker of this psalm is King David himself, not long after he got caught committing adultery with a bathing beauty named Bathsheba. He also had her husband, a great soldier in David’s own army, killed. YHWH sent an old prophet to scold the king. (Gee, why didn’t YHWH rebuke the king Himself?)
Anyway, a problem I have with this psalm is that it’s called “The Sinner’s Guide” to repentance, according to great old preachers like Charles Spurgeon (who, by the way, was my grandfather’s namesake, which maybe explains why my father liked this psalm so much). “Against You, You only have I sinned,” David prays. But that’s not true — no, not at all — not in this time of MeToo.
David didn’t just sin against his god — in other words, against the conscience of his culture. He also sinned against the powerless woman who had no choice but to have sex with the king. He sinned against her husband, whose death he all but guaranteed. (Why didn’t YHWH intervene?) And he sinned against their lovechild whom YHWH made to grow ill and die to make David cry.
Old King David must have been a real piece of work — a war hero, sure, but also an adulterer, a murderer, an eater of holy bread meant only for priests, and a first-class narcissist to boot. (Cain was cursed for his offering of grain; David was blessed for eating the temple’s shewbread.) Yes, even a self-centered king needs to own up to his evil ways, ask forgiveness, and make amends.