When was Psalms written?
The Psalms are not one book written on one day. They are a collection gathered from many hands across many centuries, and the question of when they were written quickly becomes several questions: when each song was composed, when the collection was assembled, and why the finished book ignores the calendar altogether.
A Span of Roughly a Thousand Years
The book stretches from the wilderness generation to the return from exile. One writer sets out the two ends of the range and names the whole period:
Walter ScottWhoever were the authors — and they are numerous (David, of course, principally) — the composition of the whole extended through a period of about a thousand years, beginning with Moses (Psalm 90) and ending with the return from Babylon (Psalm 137).
Between those two ends lies the peak period, when singing was organised for the temple:
Arend RemmersPsalm 90 is probably the oldest psalm: "A prayer of Moses the man of God". Moses lived in the 15th century BC. Most of the Psalms, however, were written in the time of David, who introduced the singing in the temple (1 Chron. 25)… The last Psalms were written in the days of Ezra (5th century BC). Psalm 137 clearly refers to the Babylonian captivity.
The Names Attached to the Songs
The headings themselves supply much of the dating evidence, because they name writers who lived generations apart:
Arend RemmersDavid wrote 73 Psalms… Twelve Psalms bear the name of Asaph… Ten Psalms are written by the sons of Korah (Ps. 42; 44-49; 84; 85; 87), two by Solomon (Ps. 72 and 127), one each by Moses (Ps. 90), Ethan (Ps. 89) and Heman (Ps. 88). The remaining 50 Psalms bear no author's name.
Yet the whole book is still called David's, and one writer explains why that habit is fair:
J. G. BellettThe Psalms are commonly spoken of as David's, and rightly so, because although Moses, Ezra, and others may have written some of them, David was principally used in them… He knew all the sorrows of righteousness and of sin, the trial of a martyr and of a penitent. He knew, too, the varieties of humiliation and of honour. His changeful life gave the Spirit the largest occasion to exercise his soul.
Who Gathered Them Into One Book
Composition is one date; compilation is another. Commentators differ here. Some point to a long-standing tradition:
Walter ScottJewish and Christian tradition alike ascribes the compiling of the Psalms to Ezra on his return to Palestine after the Babylonian captivity.
Others decline to name anyone, on the ground that Scripture does not:
Arno Clemens GaebeleinWho did this valuable collecting and arranging of these Psalms we do not know, for it is not revealed. But this we can say with certainty: the Hebrew saint who did it was called to do it by the Spirit of God, and the very arrangement of these Psalms in the book as we have it now is the perfect work of the Holy Spirit.
Why the Order Is Not the Order of Dates
Anyone reading the Psalms as a timeline will be baffled at once, and the oddities are easy to point out:
C. E. StuartThe arrangement is far from chronological, for the only Psalm ascribed to Moses (Ps. 90) appears at the start of the fourth book of the Psalter; and in the fifth book, just after Ps. 137, which refers to the Babylonian captivity under Nebuchadnezzar, we meet eight Psalms (138–145) all ascribed to the pen of David, who had died more than four hundred years earlier.
The same writer answers the obvious objection: the book is ordered, just not by date. Another puts the reason plainly — the sequence follows subject, not sequence of time:
G. V. WigramWhoever arranged the Psalms, we know they were ordered in divine wisdom, not according to time, but in reference to their subjects. A psalm of Moses follows one of David, and those written later are placed earlier, and the early ones late.
Written Then, Aimed Far Beyond Then
The date of writing does not fix the date of use. The Psalter was finished long before the coming of Christ, and the writers were serving readers they would never meet:
C. E. StuartThe sacred writers, whoever they were (for the author's name has in several cases been withheld from us), sang not only to comfort their own souls or the souls of their contemporaries, but they sang also for saints in other ages and for saints still unknown.
Summary
- Span. Composition ran about a thousand years, from Moses (Psalm 90) at the earliest to the Babylonian exile (Psalm 137) at the latest.
- Centre. The bulk belongs to David's reign, when temple singing was organised; David wrote 73, with Asaph, the sons of Korah, Solomon, Ethan, Heman and fifty anonymous psalms filling out the rest.
- Compiler. Some name Ezra by tradition; others say the collector is simply not revealed. Both agree the assembling was Spirit-directed.
- Order. The finished book ignores chronology on purpose — psalms are grouped by subject, so Moses opens Book Four and David follows the exile.
- Reach. Written across centuries, the Psalms were aimed past their own century — at readers the writers never knew.