I re-read this book as a break from reading the intensely analytical translation of the Psalms by Robert Alter. All of Alter's work translating the Hebrew Bible brings the latest and best scholarship and Hebrew source material together to make a translation focused on meaning and clarity.
Lewis reads the Psalms as a lay person (he always denies being a theologian since he had no formal theological training) so he uses the Anglican Prayer Book version of the Psalter with occasional reference to the more recent Moffat translation.
Lewis begins the book with a chapter on "Judgement." The Christian links judgement first to the final judgement of each believer, standing before God. Judgement in the Psalms is in many cases more like the accused standing before a judge declaring her innocence, or in a civil suit saying, "Defend me, I was wronged!"
In Chapter 2 "The Cursings" Lewis deals with how he as a Christian reads passages recommending "snatch up a Babylonian baby and beat its brains out against the pavement." Lewis explains the Christian view, but in explaining how difficult these passages are for him, he makes a case for just how sadly horrible Christian Nationalism really is.
Israel is a nation. Defending the Land of Israel is intrinsic to Judaism. There are many arguments among Jews about how to defend Israel, but Jews prayed for two millennia return to the land and celebrated when Israel became a sovereign nation.
Christianity, to the extent it claims territory and wealth and power, is always wrong. Always. Worse, it is using the Hebrew Bible to justify its claims. Because there is not a word of Jesus that is anything more than tolerant of taking power and riches.
The rest of the book moves through the use of the Psalms. Lewis quotes more than half of the 150 psalms in his exposition. It is a perspective I found nowhere else.
First 27 books of 2022:
The Pope at War: The Secret History of Pius XII, Mussolini, and Hitler by David I. Kertzer
The Last Interview and Other Conversations by Hannah Arendt
Galapagos by Kurt Vonnegut
The Echo of Greece by Edith Hamilton
If This Isn't Nice, What Is? by Kurt Vonnegut
The War That Made the Roman Empire: Antony, Cleopatra, and Octavian at Actium by Barry S. Strauss.
Civil Rights Baby by Nita Wiggins
Lecture's on Kant's Political Philosophy by Hannah Arendt
The Netanyahus by Joshua Cohen
Perelandra by C.S. Lewis
The Federalist Papers by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay
First Principles by Thomas Ricks
Political Tribes by Amy Chua
Book of Mercy by Leonard Cohen
A Brief History of Earth: Four Billion Years in Eight Chapters by Andrew Knoll
Prisoners of Geography by Tim Marshall
Understanding Beliefs by Nils Nilsson
1776 by David McCullough
The Life of the Mind by Hannah Arendt
Civilization: The West and the Rest by Niall Ferguson
How to Fight Anti-Semitism by Bari Weiss
Unflattening by Nick Sousanis
Marie Curie by Agnieszka Biskup (en francais)
The Next Civil War by Stephen Marche
Fritz Haber, Volume 1 by David Vandermeulen
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