Psalm 83:5
nostalgia is the greatest human weakness, besides the neck
Blessed are they that dwell in thy house, O Lord: they shall praise thee for ever and ever. (Psalm 83:5 DR)
Nostalgia is a funny thing in both its promise and its disappointment. We get nostalgic for something good that we had or experienced in the past, and the memory of that good holds the goodness firmly in our minds, yet generally divorced from the actual goodness of the thing itself. I’ve experienced this many times when there’s a meal at a certain restaurant was really good, but for whatever reason I haven’t had it in a long time. The nostalgia makes me overinflate its goodness, and the memory becomes sweeter than the actual experience.
For when I get the chance to experience it again it invariably is not as good as I remember. The great promise of my memory ends in greater disappointment and disillusionment. There’s this restaurant that I used to eat at in college that I loved that I haven’t been to since, and I just know that if I were ever to go back all my illusions would be shattered.
Much of our nostalgia is trying to keep impermanent things as eternal as we can. We will even retcon our own memories to do this. I think the reason for this is that we understand deep down that all the things of this world are transitory, yet in our pride we want to somehow leap over reality and impose an eternity here and now.
This happens in innocuous ways like nostalgia for a wonderful dish of food, but also manifests itself in less innocuous ways wherein we try and accumulate all we can and store up our treasures on earth. Our Lord of course admonishes the opposite:
Lay not up to yourselves treasures on earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also. (Matthew 6:20 DR)
Even on a purely natural level this makes sense, for we know experientially that nothing in this world lasts, everything is impermanent and falls into decay and ruin eventually. This is true for both possessions and for our own being, for as much as we might care for ourselves we cannot outrun our end.
It is the very impermanence of the things of this world that should prompt us to lay up treasures for ourselves in heaven. In the previous passage our Lord gives practical ways in which to do this such as alms (cf. Matthew 6:1-4), prayer (cf. Matthew 6:5-13), forgiveness (cf. Matthew 6:14-15) and fasting (cf. Matthew 6:16-18). This self-mortification is a means of showing contempt for the things of this world, which helps us to dissolve our attachments to them. It is when we lose these attachments that we can fulfill what comes next, such as serving God rather than money (cf. Matthew 6:24) and not being anxious about life (cf. Matthew 6:25-34).
The Psalmist anticipates our Lord’s sermon on the mount in this passage, for he gets at the heart of the matter, which is where one’s treasure is. He desires to dwell in the house of the Lord, which implies that he is not dwelling in his own house. He does not literally mean to live in the tabernacle or temple, but rather that his entire life is oriented towards God so that the rest of the things of this world are as nothing. He may have his own house, but he lives as if he does not:
If you have your own house, you are poor; if God's, you are rich. In your own house you will fear robbers; of the house of God, He is Himself the wall. Therefore “blessed are those who dwell in Your house.” They possess the heavenly Jerusalem, without constraint, without pressure, without difference and division of boundaries; all have it, and each have all. Great are those riches. Brother crowds not brother: there is no want there. (St. Augustine, Expositions on the Psalms, 83,8.)
This life, after all, is both an exile and a pilgrimage; under both figures the point is that it is not our home country. Thus we must guard against becoming too comfortable with the goodies of this world, lest we become attached to them and begin to think they comprise the totality of our existence. As our Lord warns, you will either serve God or mammon; there is no in between or third option.
The Psalmist thus frames his whole life around the Lord, desiring to be in His presence always. In this life of exile we will not attain this, but we do find these moments of respite where we get a foretaste of our true homeland. Unlike nostalgia, this hope does not disappoint:
He said he found a nest wherein to rest for a while, but being admonished from that very nest, of the superiority of the house of eternity to any temporary rest, he exclaims, “Blessed are they that dwell in thy house, O Lord.” However happy I may be for a brief moment in this little nest of mine, they alone are truly happy, they alone enjoy perfect rest, “who dwell in that house of yours,” where alone are to be found riches, glory, many mansions, and everlasting rest and peace. (St. Robert Bellarmine, A Commentary on the Book of the Psalms, 83, 4.)
This animation was pretty simple. I created a text layer and precomped it and then applied Motion Tile to create additional copies. I then animated the source point to have it move from top to bottom. Next I created a masked gradient layer that would move over the text to reveal it and the colors, which I thought was fun. Finally I duplicated the precomp and matte and distributed them throughout the composition, staggering them in space and in time.
Oh, and that there are (4) ever’s is not accidental!
Enjoy.
Blessed are they that dwell in thy house, O Lord: they shall praise thee for ever and ever.
(Psalm 83:5 DR)
View a higher quality version of this gif here: