"Psalm" Van twee woorden will ik eten = Psalm (On Two Words), 1967 - 1980

Psalm - The Impossible Dream? What are the two words? Love and Peace. But what are the additional two? Distant and dearest, two adjectives which seem to be mutually exclusive. Bob Albright explained that on two words, may be an allusion to Proverbs Chapter 30, verses: 15, 16, 18, 21, 24-31. Where the author appears to oscillate between three and four, Oosterhuis simply claimse two, their adjectives making up the four. Reference also appear in Ezekiel, chapters 2 and 3, where God instructs Ezekiel to eat the scroll. And through the wisdom teachings of Jesus that we learn that he is the bread of peace, come from afar and is yet so close to us.

Verses 2-3 provide clues to the backdrop of this song, written in the mid-1960s. War is a constant comfort to line the pockets of the armaments industrial complex. The Korean War would give way to conflict in Vietnam. For the Dutch, surrounded by the great nations of Europe and now protected by a mutual alliance, no country lived in isolation from any other, despite the fact that the United States tends to think so.

Verse 4. The Dutch have always been a seafaring nation, once hemmed in on three sides by ocean and inland waters, with a history of victory over the Spanish armada. Across the centuries, draining these lakes and swamps, they are building their own country from the sea floor up. Today, the flourishing Europoort of Rotterdam offers a main gateway for all of Western Europe to the oceans of the world, and to global trade.

Verse 5 resonates with echoes of the Song to Jesus Christ [JM 392], the one crucified and hanging on tatters, torn on the tree, shredded so as to be shared by the world. The Word made flesh, born of this world, gave his flesh and blood not aa a droplet in time but as a stream of living waters, entangled through the Resurrection in all flesh, in the very fabric of the Universe.

Verse 6 acknowledges the frailty and apparent futility of human existence throughout the time-warp of history. Might things ever change, given that the world is controlled by patriarchs at the reins of industry and government? They who perpetuate their ancient patterns of conduct to ensure that societies prosper at the expense of the more vulnerable? . Verse 7 laments the naked truth. We live in a saccharin, Hallmark Society of greetings cards, and we superficially confuse genuine expressions of love with ostentatious displays of glamorous expressions spoon-fed us by consumerism. So, the poet asks, how then may we know that love survives?

Verses 8-9 evoke the image of Jesus in the Gospels feeding the 5,000 and instructing the disciples to gather up all the crumbs afterwards. Let nothing be wasted, then no one will be wasted, discarded. At the heart of John’s institution of the Eucharist, this story is about the Only One who chose to die so as to bring life to the world. None other had proved equal to this!

Verse 11 has an immediate historic context. The reference to the Chinese is not merely symbolic but very real. By proxy, The Netherlands feared invasion pf Indonesia by the Chinese/ In 1603, Indonesia became a Dutch trading partner with the foundation of the Dutch East India Company. In 1800, the country became a nationalized colony under Dutch protection. The Netherlands is still dependent on the many islands for trade commodities, especially coffee and tobacco. With the outbreak of the Chinese Revolution in 1940 until the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989, Indonesia lived in constant fear of invasion by the Chinese, a fear which featured strongly in Indonesian literature. The country is in China's backyard, and shares the same insecurity as Taiwan.

Verse 12 is an eternal vision of peace, planted in humanity since time began. We each long for kindred spirits with whom to share life’s journey. We need one another to perfect us, bring us to completion. In human relationships, two complementary psyches wrest each another from isolation. We need the entire human family to come face to face with the Risen Jesus.

Verse 13, completing the meditation, seeks both distant love and dearest peace. These are the only twocertainties in life, yet the two most elusive. - Tony Barr