It’s easy to verify the 22 letters of the Hebrew Alphabet in the Psalms. There are at least 9 Palms that are written as acrostics. These are alphabetically ordered verses and each first word commencing with each Hebrew letter of the alphabet in turn, from one to twenty two. You don’t see this in many of the Psalms in the English translations, but Psalm 119 is a famous example that most English translations catch. It contains 8 verses for each of the 22 letters, beginning with Aleph and ending with Tau. The other acrostics are Psalm 9, 10, 25, 34, 37, 111, 112, and 145.

As early as the first and second centuries B.C. the Jews noted that 22 was significant in not just being the number of letters in the Hebrew Aleph bet, but also the number of generations from Adam to Jacob (Israel), the number of works of creation, and the number of books in the Jewish canon of the bible.

Psalm 111 is an interesting acrostic because it begins with the Hebrew word everyone knows, Hallelujah (Praise YHWH or praise the LORD) and then proceeds to list 22 reasons why we should praise the Lord. Each of the reasons consists of about half of a verse and begins with the next letter of the Hebrew Aleph bet, in order from Aleph to Tau, or A to Z! We should praise the Lord for his works, his majesty, his wonder, his kindness, his provision, his wisdom, his glory, his honor, his protection, his guidance, etc., etc.. We should praise God from Aleph to Tau, from A to Z, and from Alpha to Omega.

But most of all we should praise the Lord for Jesus. When Jesus said he was the Alpha and Omega, the first and last letters of the Greek Alphabet, he was saying he’s the all comprehensive. He is the beginning and the End of it all. Not only the first and the last, but everyone else in between as well.

Chuck
“ Rescue me because you are so faithful and good. For I am poor and needy, and my heart is full of pain.” (Psalm 109:21-22)