Psalms 99:1

Psa 100:4. The reasons on which this is founded; his own goodness, his everlasting mercy, and his ever-during truth, Psa 100:5. This Psalm is entitled in the Hebrew מזמור לתודה mizmor lethodah, not "A Psalm of Praise," as we have it, but "A Psalm for the confession, or for the confession-offering," very properly translated by the Chaldee: שבחא על קורבן תודתא shibcha al kurban todetha, "Praise for the sacrifice (or offering) of confession." The Vulgate, Septuagint, and Ethiopic have followed this sense. The Arabic attributes it to David. The Syriac has the following prefixed: "Without a name. Concerning Joshua the son of Nun, when he had ended the war with the Ammonites: but in the new covenant it relates to the conversion of the Gentiles to the faith." It is likely that it was composed after the captivity, as a form of thanksgiving to God for that great deliverance, as well as an inducement to the people to consecrate themselves to him, and to be exact in the performance of the acts of public worship. Verse 1 Make a joyful noise - הריעו hariu, exult, triumph, leap for joy. All ye lands - Not only Jews, but Gentiles, for the Lord bestows his benefits on all with a liberal hand. Verse 2 Serve the Lord with gladness - It is your privilege and duty to be happy in your religious worship. The religion of the true God is intended to remove human misery, and to make mankind happy. He whom the religion of Christ has not made happy does not understand that religion, or does not make a proper use of it. Verse 3 Know ye that the Lord he is God - Acknowledge in every possible way, both in public and private, that Jehovah, the uncreated self-existent, and eternal Being, is Elohim, the God who is in covenant with man, to instruct, redeem, love, and make him finally happy. It is he that hath made us - He is our Creator and has consequently the only right in and over us. And not we ourselves - ולא אנחנו velo anachnu. I can never think that this is the true reading, though found in the present Hebrew text, in the Vulgate, Septuagint, Ethiopic, and Syriac. Was there ever a people on earth, however grossly heathenish, that did believe, or could believe, that they had made themselves? In twenty-six of Kennicott's and De Rossi's MSS. we have ולו אנחנו velo anachnu, "and His we are;" לו lo, the pronoun, being put for לא lo, the negative particle. This is the reading of the Targum, or Chaldee paraphrase ודיליה אנחנא vedileyh anachna, "and his we are," and is the reading of the text in the Complutensian Polyglot, of both the Psalters which were printed in 1477, and is the keri, or marginal reading in most Masoretic Bibles. Every person must see, from the nature of the subject that it is the genuine reading. The position is founded on the maxim that what a man invents, constructs out of his own matterials, without assistance in genius, materials or execution from any other person, is His Own and to it, its use, and produce, he has the only right. God made us, therefore we are His: we are his people, and should acknowledge him for our God; we are the sheep of his pasture, and should devote the lives to him constantly which he continually supports. Verse 4 Enter into his gates with thanksgiving - Publicly worship God; and when ye come to the house of prayer, be thankful that you have such a privilege; and when you enter his courts, praise him for the permission. The word בתודה bethodah, which we render with thanksgiving, is properly with the confession-offering or sacrifice. See on Psa 100:1-5 (note). Bless his name - Bless Jehovah, that he is your Elohim; see Psa 100:3. In our liturgic service we say, "Speak good of his name;" we cannot do otherwise; we have nothing but good to speak of our God. Verse 5 For the Lord is good - Goodness the perfect, eternal opposition to all badness and evil, is essential to God. Mercy and compassion are modifications of his goodness; and as his nature is eternal, so his mercy, springing from his goodness, must be everlasting. And as Truth is an essential characteristic of an infinitely intelligent and perfect nature; therefore God's truth must endure from generation to generation. Whatsoever he has promised must be fulfilled, through all the successive generations of men, as long as sun and moon shall last. As this is a very important Psalm, and has long made a part of our public worship, I shall lay it before the reader in the oldest vernacular Versions I have hitherto met with, - the Anglo-Saxon and the Anglo-Scottish, with a literal interlineary translation of the former. The Anglo-Saxon Hundredth Psalm Rhyme ye the Lord all earth, serve the Lord in bliss; Infare in sight his in blithness; Wit ye, for that Lord he is God, he did us ¬ self we; Folk his &sheep leeseway his; fare into gates his in confession, into courts is in hymns confess him. Praise name his, for that winsom is; Lord thro' eternity mildheartedness his, &unto on kindred &kindred sothfastnes his

People - Such as are enemies to God and his people. Sitteth - Upon the ark. He is present with his people. Earth - The people of the earth. Moved - With fear and trembling.

The Dominion of God. 1 The Lord reigneth; let the people tremble: he sitteth between the cherubims; let the earth be moved. 2 The Lord is great in Zion; and he is high above all the people. 3 Let them praise thy great and terrible name; for it is holy. 4 The king's strength also loveth judgment; thou dost establish equity, thou executest judgment and righteousness in Jacob. 5 Exalt ye the Lord our God, and worship at his footstool; for he is holy. The foundation of all religion is laid in this truth, That the Lord reigns. God governs the world by his providence, governs the church by his grace, and both by his Son. We are to believe not only that the Lord lives, but that the Lord reigns. This is the triumph of the Christian church, and here it was the triumph of the Jewish church, that Jehovah was their King; and hence it is inferred, Let the people tremble, that is, 1. Let even the subjects of this kingdom tremble; for the Old-Testament dispensation had much of terror in it. At Mount Sinai Israel, and even Moses himself, did exceedingly fear and quake; and then God was terrible in his holy places. Even when he appeared in his people's behalf, he did terrible things. But we are not now come to that mount that burned with fire, Heb. xii. 18 . Now that the Lord reigns let the earth rejoice. Then he ruled more by the power of holy fear; now he rules by the power of holy love. 2. Much more let the enemies of this kingdom tremble; for he will either bring them into obedience to his golden sceptre or crush them with his iron rod. The Lord reigns, though the people be stirred with indignation at it; though they fret away all their spirits, their rage is all in vain. He will set his King upon his holy hill of Zion in spite of them ( Ps. ii. 1-6 ); first, or last, he will make them tremble, Rev. vi. 15 , &c. The Lord reigns, let the earth be moved. Those that submit to him shall be established, and not moved ( Ps. xcvi. 10 ); but those that oppose him will be moved. Heaven and earth shall be shaken, and all nations; but the kingdom of Christ is what cannot be moved; the things which cannot be shaken shall remain, Heb. xii. 27 . In these is continuance, Isa. lxiv. 5 . God's kingdom, set up in Israel, is here made the subject of the psalmist's praise. I. Two things the psalmist affirms:—1. God presided in the affairs of religion: He sitteth between the cherubim ( v. 1 ), as on his throne, to give law by the oracles thence delivered—as on the mercy-seat, to receive petitions. This was the honour of Israel, that they had among them the Shechinah, or special presence of God, attended by the holy angels; the temple was the royal palace, and the Holy of holies was the presence-chamber. The Lord is great in Zion ( v. 2 ); there he is known and praised ( Ps. lxxvi. 1, 2 ); there he is served as great, more than any where else. He is high there above all people; as that which is high is exposed to view, and looked up to, so in Zion the perfections of the divine nature appear more conspicuous and more illustrious than any where else. Therefore let those that dwell in Zion, and worship there, praise thy great and terrible name, and give thee the glory due unto it, for it is holy. The holiness of God's name makes it truly great to his friends and terrible to his enemies, v. 3 . This is that which those above adore— Holy, holy, holy. 2. He was all in all in their civil government, v. 4 . As in Jerusalem was the testimony of Israel, whither the tribes went up, so there were set thrones of judgment, Ps. cxxii. 4, 5 . Their government was a theocracy. God raised up David to rule over them (and some think this psalm was penned upon occasion of his quiet and happy settlement in the throne) and he is the king whose strength loves judgment. He is strong; all his strength he has from God; and his strength is not abused for the support of any wrong, as the power of great princes often is, but it loves judgment. He does justice with his power, and does it with delight; and herein he was a type of Christ, to whom God would give the throne of his father David, to do judgment and justice. He has power to crush, but his strength loves judgment; he does not rule with rigour, but with moderation, with wisdom, and with tenderness. The people of Israel had a good king; but they are here taught to look up to God as he by whom their king reigns: Thou dost establish equity (that is, God gave them those excellent laws by which they were governed), and thou executest judgment and righteousness in Jacob; he not only by his immediate providences often executed and enforced his own laws, but took care for the administration of justice among them by civil magistrates, who reigned by him and by him did decree justice. Their judges judged for God, and their judgment was his, 2 Chron. xix. 6 . II. Putting these two things together, we see what was the happiness of Israel above any other people, as Moses had described it ( Deut. iv. 7, 8 ), that they had God so nigh unto them, sitting between the cherubim, and that they had statutes and judgments so righteous, by which equity was established, and God himself ruled in Jacob, from which he infers this command to that happy people ( v. 5 ): " Exalt you the Lord our God, and worship at his footstool; give him the glory of the good government you are under, as it is now established, both in church and state." Note, 1. The greater the public mercies are which we have a share in the more we are obliged to bear a part in the public homage paid to God: the setting up of the kingdom of Christ, especially, ought to be the matter of our praise. 2. When we draw night to God, to worship him, our hearts must be filled with high thoughts of him, and he must be exalted in our souls. 3. The more we abase ourselves, and the more prostrate we are before God, the more we exalt him. We must worship at his footstool, at his ark, which was as the footstool to the mercy-seat between the cherubim; or we must cast ourselves down upon the pavement of his courts; and good reason we have to be thus reverent, for he is holy, and his holiness should strike an awe upon us, as it does on the angels themselves, Isa. vi. 2, 3 .