The Excellence of Brotherly Love

Psalm 133: An Exhortation to Brotherhood, by Bill Pursley
Delivered before William J. Reese Chapter 148, Allied Masonic Degrees April 29, 2009, and preached with some modifications at St. John's Episcopal Church on June 21st of that same year.

The excellence of brotherly love is one of the first lessons exemplified in Freemasonry. Psalm 133 is brief and direct:

A Song of degrees of David

Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!

It is like the precious ointment upon the head, that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron’s beard: that went down to the skirts of his garments;

As the dew of Hermon, and as the dew that descended upon the mountains of Zion: for there the Lord commanded the blessing, even life forevermore.

The lessons taught in this Psalm are obvious, but a deeper examination of the history and use of this Psalm in Hebrew devotion provides a rich insight which often eludes the casual reader.
The heading to Psalm 133 tells us that this is a Psalm of David, the King of the unified Jewish Kingdom from 1011 to 971 B.C.[1] It was a turbulent time, chronicled in the Books of First and Second Samuel. David had been anointed the nation’s future king by the prophet Samuel quite unexpectedly when he was still a young man, if not an adolescent boy. During Israel’s wars against the Philistines, he had come to the attention of King Saul when he fought and defeated the Philistine champion Goliath in single combat. As David’s popularity grew with the people, Saul sank deeper and deeper into paranoia that sometimes led to instability and violence. David was driven from the royal court and lived in the wilderness with followers until the death of Saul. After a brief and bitter civil war, he returned to the capital and “all Israel rallied to him” (2 Samuel 5:1-19). He reigned from Jerusalem, or Mount Zion, until he was expelled from the city when his son Absalom rebelled against his authority and attempted to seize the throne. The king’s restoration was accomplished at the cost of his son’s life. In contrast to the joy and apparent unity of that day when he entered the Holy City as Israel’s king, much of his reign was characterized by war, palace intrigue, and family discord.
Some scholars maintain that Psalm 133 was written by King David during the celebrations of his enthronement after Saul’s death. The theme of fraternal love and God’s blessing would certainly fit this contention. Others argue that the Psalm is written later in David’s reign, when an older and wiser man, who has lived through so much heartache and difficulty, yearns for that brotherly affection and peace which could have, and should have characterized the city during his kingship; “for there the Lord commanded the blessing…” Derek Kidner, in his commentary on the Psalms, notes the irony of such a situation. David, who began his reign with the support of Israel’s tribes and with God’s blessing, found his capital to be a place of discord and family rebellion (2 Samuel 11:1).[2] Perhaps the contrast between the ideal of a kingdom of brotherhood and blessing, and the reality of how human beings so often fail to get along, contributed to the regular use of this Psalm (a Psalm of Degrees, or Song of Ascents) by Jewish pilgrims on the way to Jerusalem.
Throughout Jewish history, and especially after the Babylonian captivity, which lasted from 605 B.C. to 538 B.C.[3], Jerusalem was viewed as not only a political capital, but as the place on earth where God chose to dwell among his people. It was seen as a holy place, blessed as the chosen site for the great temple which had been built by King Solomon between 966 and 959 B.C.[4] and rebuilt after the Persian king Cyrus had allowed Zerubbabel to lead the people back to their promised land in 538 B.C.[5] It became customary for the Jews to travel back to Jerusalem for the great feasts of the religious year. All roads literally led “up” to the city of Jerusalem, which was built on Mount Zion. Hence the songs that pilgrims sang along the way were known as “Songs of Ascents”, or “Psalms of Degrees”. These 15 songs are found in Israel’s hymnbook, the Book of Psalms, and are Psalms 120 through 134. The arrangement of these Psalms of Ascent seems to be very intentional, and nowhere is this sense of purpose more evident than in Psalms 132, 133, and 134.[6] In all probability, these were the last three Psalms sung upon the approach to the Temple mount. Psalm 132 recounts King David’s burning desire to build a temple where the Ark of the Covenant might rest in fitting splendor. Psalm 133 proclaims the earthly reign of peace and brotherhood which ought to accompany the enthronement of God himself in his chosen city. Psalm 134 describes the worship of God, led by the priests he has anointed, in the Temple that was built at his command. Thus the pilgrims, whose lives, like David’s and like our own, so often fall far short of the ideal, proclaim what ought to be. In the traditions of their ascent to the Temple they acknowledge what by God’s blessing can be, as they approach the very mercy seat of God for the great festival.
The details of Psalm 133 develop and enrich this picture of ‘brethren dwelling together in unity.’ The blessings of brotherhood are first compared to the holy anointing of the high priest Aaron, recorded in Exodus 29. The elaborate ceremony of installation underlined the sacred and important nature of the priest being set apart for God’s use. The anointing oil is particularly vivid in this context. The oil described in Exodus 30:23-24, was made of myrrh, sweet cinnamon, sweet calamus, cassia lignea, and olive oil. “The odor of this must have been very agreeable, and serves here as a metaphor to point out the exquisite excellence of brotherly love.”[7] As the beautiful aroma of the oil washes over the priests head and limbs in profusion, filling the air with beauty, so fraternal love and harmony demonstrate God’s blessing among his people.
The second image of blessing is that of the life giving “dew of Hermon.” The heavy dews of the area of Hermon were proverbial well into modern times. In his notes upon Calvin’s commentary on the Psalms, the Rev’d James Anderson quotes Maundrell’s “Journey”. “We were sufficiently instructed by experience what the Psalmist means by the dew of Hermon, our tents being as wet with it as if it had rained all night.”[8] The image is clearly one of brotherhood, which gives life every bit as real as that given by regular and heavy watering in an arid and stony locale.
The final, and perhaps most significant image to be examined in this paper, is stated directly in the Psalm, and underlined by the grammatical structure and vocabulary of the passage. It is the Lord who commands the blessing of fraternal cooperation and bliss, and it is the Lord who grants it. In the examples of the anointing of Aaron, and of the falling dew, the word translated “ran down”, “went down”, or “descended”, occurs three times. Each time the initiator of the action, or blessing, is not the recipient, but one who is beyond and above the recipient.[9] In short, it is God who gives the anointing, it is God who sends the dew, and it is God who imputes brotherhood, with all of its blessings, into our common life. Fraternity, like all true blessings, comes ultimately not from our efforts, flawed and imperfect as they are, but from the Great Architect of the Universe.

And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
Speak unto Aaron and unto his sons, saying, On this wise ye shall bless the children of Israel, saying unto them,
The Lord bless thee and keep thee:
The Lord make his face shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee:
The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace.
And they shall put my name upon the children of Israel, and I will bless them.
Numbers 6:22-27

May we, and all regular masons be so blessed. AMEN.

[1] R.K. Harrison, Old Testament Times, 191.
[2] Derek Kidner, Psalms 73-150, in the Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries, D.J. Wiseman ed., 453.
[3] Nelson’s Bible Dictionary, 275.
[4] Nelson, 1231.
[5] Nelson, 653.
[6] Adam Clark, Commentary on Ps 134. 530.
[7] Ibid.
[8] Calvin 163
[9] Kidner 453