Psalm 6:3
the bones of the soul
Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I am weak: heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled. (Psalm 6:3 DR)
In one of the well-known stories from the Gospel of Mark a father comes to Jesus pleading for deliverance for his demon-possessed son. As the father makes the request, he begs Jesus for his compassion. Jesus responds:
If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth. (Mark 9:22 DR)
The father immediately responds with tears:
I do believe, Lord: help my unbelief. (Mark 9:23 DR)
This passage is poignant for it captures the true human condition in which we are often a jumbled mixture of faith and doubt. For we may eagerly desire that which is good but often find it difficult to do or to believe, as St. Paul relates:
For to will, is present with me; but to accomplish that which is good, I find not. For the good which I will, I do not; but the evil which I will not, that I do. (Romans 7:18-19 DR)
The father’s plea for his son is sincere, but doubt sometimes still remains. But the call of Jesus to faith prompts the man to have faith and to confess his weakness, which is in and of itself a tacit plea for greater faith. This comports with our Lord’s response to his disciples’ request for greater faith:
And the Lord said: If you had faith like to a grain of mustard seed, you might say to this mulberry tree, Be thou rooted up, and be thou transplanted into the sea: and it would obey you. (Luke 17:6 DR)
The Psalmist feels the weight in this interior struggle in which faith is perhaps nascent but in need of increase. As he comes before God in confession and in a plea for mercy, he entreats our Lord’s compassion by reminding Him—so to speak—that he is a weak man and that he failures come from weakness. The sins themselves bring greater weakness and misery; the lack of health is thus the result of iniquity which can only be healed by the Most High:
The penitent uses some arguments to move God not to rebuke him in his fury, the first drawn from his own weakness, as if he said, Lord, do not look upon my sins as offenses against yourself; but as my own wretchedness and infirmity; and, therefore, punish me not as a judge, but as a physician heal me. Burn me, cut me, if you will; but with a view to heal me in your mercy, and not to destroy me in your justice. For our sins are real miseries, and the more malice we have in committing them, the greater do they become; while the less knowledge and fear we have of them, the greater is the misery it entails on us. Therefore, says he, “Have mercy on me, for I am weak;” that is to say, look with mercy on my sins, however great and numerous, in the light of so many diseases and infirmities, that make me weak and feeble. (St. Robert Bellarmine, A Commentary on the Book of the Psalms, 6, 2.)
God obviously doesn’t need to be informed of our weaknesses or lack of spiritual health, nor can He be moved by argument as a man would, for God does not engage in discursive reasoning. However, this language that the Psalmist uses is the posture of humility, and the argument the response of the soul to God’s justice and hope for His grace. In the same manner that the father of the possessed son professed faith and begged for greater faith, so the Psalmist begs God for mercy not as if God needs to be convinced to show mercy but rather because on the subjective side of things we must bring our hearts through God’s grace into the posture and orientation in which we can receive mercy. This acknowledgement of weakness is the emptying of pride which stands as a roadblock to God’s grace, for in pride we are incapable and indisposed to cooperate with it and thus receive it. That is why the Scriptures says:
God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble. (James 4:6 DR)
The “bones” which are troubled are the faculties of the soul, weakened by the fall and in need of supernatural grace. The mercy from the first half of the verse is paralleled and expanded with healing in the second half, for God’s mercy not only remits punishment but brings back to health that which is sickly or wounded. Grace brings about an actual transformation in the soul as we participate in Christ and thus in the divine life (cf. 2 Peter 1:4; John 14:23). The bones of the soul thus become strengthened more and more through humility, which is both a recognition of its own weakness and the means by which grace dwells more fully and operates more powerfully within:
My grace is sufficient for thee; for power is made perfect in infirmity. Gladly therefore will I glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may dwell in me. For which cause I please myself in my infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ. For when I am weak, then am I powerful. (2 Corinthians 12:9-10 DR)
I kept this animation pretty simple. I found some jawbones and isolated them in Photoshop and brought them into After Effects, adding some Wiggle Hold to the position and rotation as if they were “troubled.” I added in some background textures and some color correction and it was complete.
Enjoy.
Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I am weak: heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled.
(Psalm 6:3 DR)
View a higher quality version of this gif here: