If God feeds all creatures, why is there famine? Study Psalm 145 with context, apologetic analysis, and cross-references.
Dr. Lucas D. Shallua Commentary · PSALM 145 — GREAT IS THE LORD AND KIND TO ALL HE HAS MADE
The psalm identifies God as the giver and creation's dependence on him. Scripture also identifies drought, a disordered world, war, greed, and hoarding as causes of hunger and commands humans to share. Providence is confessed without denying secondary causes or human guilt.
Reverent desire is being conformed to God, and “save” defines the promise's redemptive end. Faithful people may still receive a wiser answer, wait, suffer, or die while trusting final resurrection.
The traditional Hebrew text moves from mem to samekh. Some ancient witnesses include a plausible nun line. This small textual question is openly documented and affects no doctrine; both readings affirm truths stated elsewhere in the psalm.
Compassion provides patience, provision, and invitation, while justice prevents unrepentant evil from victimizing creation forever. Moral love must finally say no to what destroys its objects.
Psalm 145 is David's final psalm and the only one titled “A Praise of David.” It is an alphabetic acrostic: successive verses begin with Hebrew letters, though the Masoretic Text lacks a line for nun between verses 13 and 14; one ancient Hebrew manuscript and several early versions preserve a line resembling “The LORD is faithful in all his words and gracious in all his works.” The canonical Hebrew form still presents a complete theology of praise. This psalm opens the crescendo into Psalms 146–150, each framed by hallelujah.
Psalm 145 offers a comprehensive vision of divine kingship: immeasurable yet communicable, eternal yet near, morally righteous yet tender, attentive to prayer and to animal hunger, patient with sinners yet committed to evil's end. Its textual history is transparent rather than hidden, and its central claims do not depend on the disputed line.
This study preserves the hard questions, explanations, context, apologetic note, and references from Dr. Shallua's Commentary.