Book I of the Psalter · Psalms 1 to 41 · 41 psalms

The book of David

Almost every psalm in this book carries David's name, and the two that open it carry no name at all. Psalms 1 and 2 stand as the gate of the whole Psalter, and the Davidic prayers that follow are mostly the prayers of one man in trouble, asking to be heard.

Sealed by: Psalm 41:13
Where it stands in the argument: The book sets the terms the rest of the Psalter works out: two ways to live, a king the LORD has anointed, and a God who hears a man in the pit.
Who the headings name: David in the headings of Psalms 3 to 9, 11 to 32 and 34 to 41; Psalms 1, 2, 10 and 33 carry no heading.

Every psalm in Book I

41 doors, coloured by the kind of psalm

Penitential 3
Imprecatory 1
Royal 4
Wisdom and Torah 4
Thanksgiving 4
Lament and trust 21
Praise 4

The colour is the psalm's primary kind, following the form-critical categories of Hermann Gunkel (Einleitung in die Psalmen, 1933) as set out in C. Hassell Bullock, Encountering the Book of Psalms (2001). A psalm that carries more than one kind is filed under one of them, and each kind this book holds is explained below.

Penitential: The prayers of a man confessing sin and asking to be forgiven. The church has read seven of them together since Cassiodorus in the sixth century, and the seventh, Psalm 130, stands under the ascents above.
Imprecatory: Prayers that ask God to judge the wicked, in words that shock a modern reader. They hand the case to God rather than to the one praying, and Psalm 137 is the hardest of them.
Royal: Psalms about the king the LORD anoints, set at the seams of the book. The New Testament reads Psalms 2, 45 and 110 of Christ, and Psalm 132 stands under the ascents.
Wisdom and Torah: Psalms that teach rather than petition: the two ways, the law as delight, the prosperity of the wicked, and the shortness of a life. Psalms 127 and 128 teach in the same way and stand under the ascents.
Thanksgiving: The song of a man who asked and was answered, telling the congregation what happened. The Hebrew word is todah, the thank offering put into words.
Lament and trust: The largest kind: prayer out of trouble, spoken to God in the second person by someone who expects an answer, together with the psalms of quiet confidence that grow out of it, among them Psalms 16, 23, 27 and 62.
Praise: The hymn: God praised for who He is and what He made, including the enthronement psalms that say the LORD reigns and the songs of Zion.

The collections inside it

2 gathered groups, in the order they stand

The gatePsalms 1 to 2
Two psalms without headings, set at the door: the two ways and the anointed King.
The first Davidic collectionPsalms 3 to 41
Psalms of David, thirteen of them tied by their headings to events in 1 and 2 Samuel.

The name of God in this book

The LORD, the covenant name, stands throughout: it is used far more often here than Elohim.

What the kinds of psalm come to here

Penitential 3
Imprecatory 1
Royal 4
Wisdom and Torah 4
Thanksgiving 4
Lament and trust 21
Praise 4

The same nine kinds colour every psalm on this page and on the four other books of the Psalter.

The doxology that seals it

Psalm 41:13, Berean Standard Bible

13Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, from everlasting to everlasting. Amen and Amen.
Psalm 41:13, the closing blessing that marks the seam of the book.

Why the seam is marked

The doxology belongs to the collection rather than to the psalm it closes, which is how the five books can be seen in the text itself. The first four seams stand at Psalms 41:13, 72:18-19, 89:52 and 106:48, and the five psalms from 146 to 150, each opening and closing with Hallelujah, close the Psalter.