psalmy

Psalmy is the plural form of psalm in several languages, notably Polish, where the Book of Psalms is referred to as Księga Psalmów and the individual pieces as psalmy. In English usage, the form psalms is standard, but psalmy appears in multilingual contexts and scholarly writing to refer to the psalms as a corpus. The Psalms are a collection of 150 religious poems and songs found in the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. They express a range of themes: lament, gratitude, praise, wisdom, penitence, and royal authority. The books of the Psalter traditionally are divided into five sections, corresponding to five scrolls.

Authorship is diverse: many psalms are linked to King David in tradition, but modern scholarship attributes most to various authors or anonymous communities spanning centuries, from the 10th to 5th centuries BCE. The original language is Hebrew, with some Aramaic lines. The Psalms were translated into Greek in the Septuagint and into Latin in the Vulgate, and have since been rendered into countless languages.

In religious practice, psalms are central to Jewish and Christian worship. They are recited, chanted, or sung as part of daily prayers, liturgies, and private devotion. The term psalmody refers to their musical setting, which has shaped sacred and secular music across history.