otcanon
Psalms 131
A psalm of descent — the singer declares that his heart has ceased straining after things beyond his measure, comparing the soul's achieved stillness to a weaned child no longer reaching for the breast but resting quietly against the mother. That image marks a particular posture: not ignorance, but the disciplined quieting of ambition and self-assertion. From that stillness, the psalm pivots outward — Israel is called to anchor its hope in Jehovah without time limit. The inner condition of the servant (quieted, humbled, at rest) is the ground from which covenant hope for the gathered remnant can be sustained.
1
LORD, my heart is not haughty, nor mine eyes lofty: neither do I exercise myself in great matters, or in things too high for me.
2
Surely I have behaved and quieted myself, as a child that is weaned of his mother: my soul is even as a weaned child.
3
Let Israel hope in the LORD from henceforth and for ever.
