Each day here in St Georges Chapel we read or sing the Psalms. They uncover a world of struggle, of hope, of light and darkness. Above all they explore the world of evil.

 

Evil is a mystery, something which cannot be grasped by rational thought, and whose existence and origin no one has been able to explain. But what cannot be comprehended by human reason can in some measure be pictured by the imagination, described in images, understood by the heart and wrestled with in prayer. Poetry and imagery can bring home the reality of evil where rational argument fails.

 Although we cannot hope to explain evil, we can attempt through images and symbols to understand something about it at a deeper level: to gain some insight into its character, to have sense of how it affects people, and to discover how we can be delivered from it and protect against it.

The prayer-poems of Psalter give us a unique means of doing this.