How to Read the Psalms for First Timers
The Book of Psalms is a collection of Israelite poetry written from 1440 BC to 586 BC. The psalms were most likely read as part of the temple worship.
A psalm is a poetic literary form, which seems to be unique to the ancient Israelites. Other local cultures had similar styles, but not exactly the same.
Academics are unsure whether there are meters within the Psalms but do know that they had musical accompaniment. Some of the Psalms are written with musical instructions.
I believe every Psalm points to Jesus in some way. For example, Psalm 1 talks about the righteous man, who is Jesus.
Psalms use several literary methods, especially parallelisms. The three main parallelisms are synonymous, antithetical and synthetic.
Synonymous is where the second line of the couplet restates the first line, but in a slightly different way. A good example is the first verse of the Book of Psalms.
Psalm 1 v 1
Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked,
nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers;
The second parallelism is antithetical. This is where the second line is the opposite of the first. An example would be Psalm 1 v 6.
For the LORD watches over the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked leads to destruction.
The third most common parallelism is called synthetic. This is where the second line of the couplet develops the idea of the first. Again Psalm 1 provides an example in verse 2.
But his delight is in the Law of the LORD,
and on His law he meditates day and night.
Other parallelisms have been found, but feel free to research those if you wish.
So as Christians, how do we use psalms. We should use it as a fundamental part of our worship to God. This is what they were designed for.
We can use them as part of our meditation on God too.
And also, we can use it to learn more about who Jesus is. After all, every psalm points to Jesus.