Read Psalm 1 at Bible Gateway.
Blessed is the man whose delight is in the law (torah, “teaching, instruction”) of Yehovah! Man has his ungodly counsel, his sinful path, and his mocking seat in which he walks, stands, and sits. In contrast, YHVH has His counsel, path, and seat which He has revealed to us in His torah. True to His name of Elohiym, the One in whose hand is the Shepherd’s staff, He instructs and guides us into His way of walking, standing, and sitting — which provides for our blessing, our happiness, our prosperity, and our fruitfulness in our every endeavor in this life.
Update (added from notes written in 2008):
In Gen 1-2 there is the introduction of two trees, Gen 2:9, 2:16-17: the Tree of Life, whose fruit can be eaten, and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, whose fruit cannot be eaten, or it will cause the opposite of Life, which is death.
Notice that the Tree whose fruit, if ingested, causes death, is the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, not the Tree of Good and Evil. The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. It is as if knowing what is good and what is evil, and thus having to choose between them, brings about death, because in our flesh we end up choosing evil.
In Psalm 1 there is the introduction of two ways, the way of the righteous (Psa 1:6) and the way of the wicked (Psa 1:1). This psalm is an instruction on choosing life and not death. We choose life when: 1) we do not walk in the way that the ungodly, or wicked, walk; we do not do the things they do; 2) we do not stand in the path the sinners are standing in; 3) we do not sit in the seat that the scornful sit in.
But instead, we delight ourselves in God’s law (Hebrew torah, meaning God’s path, God’s way, God’s instruction in right and wrong), and meditate in God’s torah day and night. Delighting and meditating in God’s torah, His word, His ways, not just daily, but every day and every night (i.e. when we greet the day upon arising and when we greet the night upon retiring) is a guardrail, a safeguard which keeps us from sitting, walking, and standing in the way of the wicked.
Yeshua is the Living Torah, the Word of God made flesh (Joh 1:1, 14).
psalm 2 –>
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