From my pursuers keep me safe

No version of this ‘highly coloured’ Psalm (Donald Coggan) was included in either BP or the earlier Psalm Praise (1973), but two of Michael Perry’s freer paraphrases were published in 1990. The difficulty of aiming at literal versions which are then regarded as ‘inspired’ texts is seen in the revised The Book of Praise: Anglo-Genevan Psalter (Winnipeg, 1984/98) which for Psalm 7 offers, ‘For barbed with fire are all his arrows/ when he in ire the wicked harrows … With evil pregnant he will hound me;/ he brings forth falsehood to confound me.’ David Preston’s approach was written in June 1998 for the present book, where it appears for the first time. Like many more, the original uses great boldness in its Godward language. ‘There is no less just zeal in God, to defend his own oppressed people, than there is malice in the wicked, to wrong them’ (Dickson). If Cush, unknown apart from the title, was the immediate cause of the Psalm as a slanderer of David in Saul’s ears, it also takes a much wider focus; behind one persecutor many others often lurk. The tune HALIFAX is an adaptation from Handel’s song in his 1748 oratorio Susanna, ‘Ask if yon damask rose be sweet’ (cf 3, note) arranged in 1941 by Charles W Douglas, whose name was initially omitted from the Index of Composers. The hymn tune’s opening follows Handel exactly. The tune-name may come from a Halifax in the USA, where there are several, rather than from Yorks. The arrangement comes from Erik Routley’s posthumous (1985) Rejoice in the Lord, where it is set to Eternal God, whose power upholds.

b London 1939. d 2020. Archbishop Tenison’s Grammar School, Kennington, London; Keble College Oxford (MA Mod Langs.) He worked as a French Teacher, including 11 years at Ahmadu Bello Univ, Nigeria, and gained a PhD on the French Christian poet Pierre Emmanuel (1916 84). A member of Carey Baptist Ch, Reading, for many years, he later moved to Alweston, nr Sherborne, Dorset. He compiled The Book of Praises (Carey Publications, Liverpool) in 1987, with versions of 71 Psalms; these include modified texts of Watts and a few other classic paraphrasers, but most are by contemporary writers including himself. 60 of his metrical Psalm versions are so far published, including one each in Sing Glory (2000), the Scottish Church Hymnary 4th Edn (2005) and Sing Praise (2010), and 3 in the 2004 edn of CH; also 10 tunes. His writing and composing has taken place in Leicester, Reading, Nigeria and his present home; he was a member of the editorial board throughout the preparation of Praise! and had a major share in the choice of music for the Psalm texts (1-150). His convictions about the Psalms, as expressed in the Introduction to BP, are that ‘There is nothing to compare with their blend of the subjective and the objective, the inner life and practical goodness, the knowledge of one’s own rebellious heart and the knowledge of God…Today’s general neglect of congregational Psalm singing is a symptom of the spiritual malaise of our churches. When the preaching of the Gospel has prospered, bringing into being churches vibrant with spiritual life, men and women have taken great delight in praising their Maker and Redeemer through these scriptural hymns’. 15 of his own, self-selected, feature as his share of ‘contemporary hymns’ in the 2009 Come Celebrate; he has also served as a meticulous proof-reader. Nos.1, 2A, 5*, 6, 7, 11, 15, 16, 17, 19A, 24A, 27A, 30B, 32*, 33*, 38, 40, 42, 43, 47, 51*, 52, 55, 57*, 64, 66, 74, 76, 77, 84, 90, 91A, 96*, 97, 99, 100B, 101, 114*, 120, 126, 132, 139, 142*, 143, 145A, 147*, 824*, 830*, 963*.