_l The book of Psalms has always had an important place in the spiritual life of b oth Jews and Christians. The fourth century Christian leader, Athanasius, sum med up one important reason for this when he said that while most of the Scri pture speaks fo us the Psalms speak for us Down the centuries the people of God have found in the psalms the language of praise and complaint, trust and doubt, petition and thanks, which has nouris hed their relationship with God. Perhaps because individuals found that the ps alms often spoke for them, there was a general assumption that the book of p salms is a collection of religious poems written by individuals especially King D avid, essentially for their personal use. DIFFERENT TYPES OF PSALMS Although there is not universal agreement, the following classification scheme is one that would be widely accepted. 1. Hymns 3. General Praises of God. b. Psalms celebrating Yahweh's kingship c. Songs of Zion 2. Laments L8. Individual Laments b. Communal Laments a. Songs of Thanksgivings a. Individual thanksgiving b. Communal Thanksgiving 4. Royal psalms 5. Minor types: Psalms of confidence, wisdom Psalms, etc HYMNS Characteristically, the General Praises of God have a simple, threefold st ructure * They open with a call to praise God. * The main section gives the grounds for praise, often introduced by th eworld Ai (for) * The psalm closes with a renewed call to praise, which often echoes t he introduction. Psalm 117, the shortest inthe Psalter illustrates this structure, Ot rchers include 113, 150, Some of the General praises centre on the theme of Yahweb's lor dship over creation (ps 8,29, 104). Others celebrate his acts on the history (Ps 104). Although there are a number of references to the temple and Zion in the Psalms, there is a group of six hymns which centre on Zion as their main theme. They praise Yahweh by praising the city that has chosen to be the centre of worship and protection of it. These songs of Zion are: Psalm 46, 48, 76, 84, 87 and 122. They do not h ave the characteristic structure of the General Praises. Another subgroup of the Hymns consists of the psalms that celeb rate Yahweh's kingship (Psalms 47, 93, 96-99, some scholars inclu de Ps. 95). Apart from Psalm 98, they all contain the phrase “The Lord/God is king” or similar. Psalm 97 and 99 share the threefold s tructure of the General Praises.LAMENTS The Laments are the commonest type of psalm. They form about cone third of the psalter. They express the psalmist's response to G od when in a situation of need or affliction. Their structure is flexib le, being made up of a number of elements, not all of which will oc cur in any one psalm, and the order of which varies (Study psalm 5). Below is a list of the mere comman elements. * Invocation of God. Most of them begin with this. * Complaint. This is a description of the distress or it might be regarde das the heart of the lament misfortune that the psalmist of sufferin g. * Petition. The psalmist appeals to God to intervene and delivers. Som etimes grounds are advanced to support this appeal-the nature of G ] ~L od, God's honour, the depth of the psalmist’s need, * Accall for vengeance on the evil-doers who are the cause of the psal mist’s need. * Acall for vengeance on the evil doers who are the cause of the psal mist distress. This may be part of the petition * Confession of sin * Protestation of innocence is an alternative to the confession of sin. * A vow to praise and thank God following deliverance. * Expression of confidence and trust in God * Exclamation of praise and praise and thanksgiving. In individual laments, the psalmist's situation of distress is describ edinvery general terms. Some psalms (Ps 7: 26; 27) seem to be t he plea of someone who feels falsely accused of some crime. Bot [Link] and W. Beyerlin have in different ways made this the starting point from which to argue for some formal procedure of s acred trial in the temple. There may be truth in this since 1Kings 8: 91-32 refers to an accused person coming to swear an oath befor e Ged in the temple. However, the evidence is lacking for the kind of detailed procedures that the two scholars have proposed.L Other psalms seem to refer to illness of some kind (Ps 6; 31; 35; 3 8; 88). Most of these psalms also refer to enemies occasionally ca lled the workers of evil (Ps 6:8) Ina few laments, the enemies appear to be foreigners (Ps 10:151 6, 15:7, 59:5, 8), This suggest that the individual reciting this psal m may be a representative of the nation (this could be a king, a se nior military commander or even the high priest). Where the “I” of a lament is a representative figure, the ament is r eally a Communal Lament. Those laments are clearly communal because they are cast in terms of “we,us”, are less numerous tha nthe Individual Laments. They reflect disasters such as defeat in war (ps 44, 60, 74, 79, 83) or drought and famine (Ps 126, 144).SONGS OF THANKSGIVING The songs of Thanksgiving express thanks and praise to God for s ome specific act of deliverance that the psalmist has experience d. However, their aim is not only to praise God They are also a for m of witness tothe saving works of God, declared before the whol @ congregation. Because they express praise by speaking afout G od, whereas the General Praises express the praise to God Claus Westermann regards these two forms of psalm as related t one ancther, and calls the Thanksgivings “Declarative Psalms of Praise”. He also argues that there is no distinctive word for “thank sin Hebrew and that the verb rodah, which is often translated as to thankis better taken to mean Praise” .