Reading the Book of Psalms through the Lens of Humanity's Often Marginalized and Unheard Voices

“… America when questions of gender-orientation/class/ethnicity/social location are at the fore and are increasingly dividing worshiping communities. ”

Team Members/Contributors

Nancy deClaisse-Walford McAfee School of Theology Contact Me

About this sabbatical grant for researchers

I am under contract with Liturgical Press to write a commentary on Psalms 90-150, one volume (no. 22) in a larger project that will provide a "widely feminist" commentary on all of the books of the Christian Bible. Liturgical Press has decided to take a unique approach to the commentary series. I am to write 75% of the commentary, offering my own feminist reading and interpretation of each of the psalms; then other, marginalized and less-heard, voices are to contribute the other 25%. I have enlisted contributions from various "marginalized voices" in North America, but after traveling a number of times to South Africa and witnessing first-hand the post-apartheid situation in that country, I would also like to incorporate into the commentary the voices of South Africans who are struggling on a daily basis to find their place within God's good creation. I propose to spend six weeks of my sabbatical leave in the Spring of 2018 in South Africa, interviewing, recording, and incorporating marginalized voices there in response to my own feminist interpretations of Psalms 90-150. The voices would include women and men of all ages from social/ethnic/class situations that are often marginalized in biblical studies. Such an undertaking would, first, broaden the appeal of the commentary series, but, second, and more importantly, it would, hopefully, give "first world" readers of the biblical text an insight into the understandings of the Bible by those who live in the "two-thirds world" and perhaps open avenues of dialogue. Thus, I am asking for modest funds to travel to South Africa—to Pretoria and Stellenbosch, specifically—for six weeks during my sabbatical in the Spring of 2018 to incorporate a variety of important, but often marginalized, voices into my commentary on the Psalms.

Image Title Year Type Contributor(s) Other Info
Psalms, Books 4–5 (Volume 22) (Wisdom Commentary Series) 2020 Book Nancy deClaisse-Walford