The international conference “Psalms in Rituals from Antiquity to the Present,” held on October 24–26, 2018, at the Max-Weber Kolleg in the University of Erfurt, Germany, aimed to showcase and also to build upon recent developments in what has become a very exciting field, bringing to it the distinctive perspective of the Research Centre “Dynamics of Jewish Ritual Practices in Pluralistic Contexts from Antiquity to the Present,” which hosted the event. The Research Centre, which was funded from 2015 to 2020 by the Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF), investigated the dynamic relationship of rituals in pluralistic contexts and specifically in Jewish and Christian religious traditions. While religious institutions often focus on tradition, invariability, and rootedness in history, the Research Centre has found and studied numerous examples of innovation and change in regard to religious ritual practices.
This landmark conference approached the subject of the Psalms as a dynamic part of Jewish liturgy, ritual, and community formation from a broad perspective. Its purpose followed the Centre’s scholarly trajectory. “Dynamic” was understood as referring to the ability of these literary texts to be adapted to changing contexts and circumstances throughout history as Jewish ritual agents and institutions use them to express religious beliefs. It also refers to the fact that, in the case of the Psalms, text became ritual and thus part of lived ancient and modern religion. “Pluralistic” focused on the fact that the Psalms were and are part of religious practices that take place in diverse cultural and religious environments. Throughout time, they were claimed as ritual texts by different communities, Christian and Jewish alike, and used by religious institutions, movements, and individuals to express their differing identities through text and ritual. At most times, but especially during the Middle Ages, Jewish and Christian religious communities were more or less aware of each other’s religious practices, and they sometimes shaped their liturgy (and their use of the Psalms within that liturgy) in order to distinguish themselves from “the other,” to create and protect their own identity. In modern times, liturgies have also served to find common ground between the religions.
The timing of the conference was felicitous, and we were able to bring together prominent scholars from around the globe who had already made notable contributions to the discussion of the early reception of the Psalms. All the speakers and the topics in the original conference have informed this final product. These were: Erhard Gerstenberger, Angela Kim Harkins, Beate Ego, Mika S. Pajunen (within the section “The Psalms in the Hebrew Bible and the Second Temple Period”), Günter Stemberger, Clemens Leonhard, A. J. Berkovitz, Ophir Münz-Manor (within the section “The Psalms in Early Rabbinic Literature”), Esther Menn, Isaac Kalimi, Alan Cooper, Ruth Langer, Rebecca Ullrich (within the section “Psalms in Jewish Liturgy, Commentary, and Poetry”), Jürgen Bärsch, Harald Buchinger (within the section “Psalms in Christian Liturgy”), Andreas Haug, Bill Rebiger, Susanne Talbardon, and Benedikt Kranemann (within the section “Psalms and Performance”). Vered Raziel Kretzmer, Tina Betz and Maik Patzelt participated in the conference as Junior Researchers.
This volume contains a selection of the papers delivered at that conference together with two additional papers, those of James Aitken and Laura S. Lieber, that were written specially for the volume. The selection here for the most part focuses on studying dynamic aspects of the internal Jewish development in particular contexts, rather than directly tackling questions about interactions with the non-Jewish world. To understand the role of the Psalms in the lives of Jews is already a huge undertaking. As will have emerged from this preface, we include here fundamental studies by leading voices in the field that both set the scene and bring new research to bear on key themes. Some authors are explicitly attentive to relationships or contrasts with Christianity. But all have been mindful that the dynamics of the Psalms within Judaism were conditioned by the broader context in which Jews operated and responsive to the project’s multi-cultural perspective.
Claudia D. Bergmann
Tessa Rajak
September 2023