PSALM 48 COMME�TARYEDITED BY GLE�� PEASE

I�TRODUCTIO�

SPURGEO�, "Title. A Song and Psalm for the Sons of Korah. A song for joyfulness and a Psalm for reverence. Alas! every song is not a Psalm, for poets are not all heaven born, and every Psalm is not a song, for in coming before God we have to utter mournful confessions as well as exulting praises. The Sons of Korah were happy in having so large a selection of song; the worship where such a variety of music was used could not become monotonous, but must have given widest scope for all the sacred passions of gracious souls.Subject and Division. It would be idle dogmatically to attribute this song to any one event of Jewish history. Its author and date are unknown. It records the withdrawal of certain confederate kings from Jerusalem, their courage failing them before striking a blow. The mention of the ships of Tarshish may allow us to conjecture that the Psalm was written in connection with the overthrow of Ammon, Moab, and Edom in the reign of Jehoshaphat; and if the reader will turn to 2 Chronicles 20:1-37, and note especially 2 Chronicles 20:19; 2 Chronicles 20:25; 2 Chronicles 20:36, he will probably accept the suggestion. Psalms 48:1-3, are in honour of the Lord and the city dedicated to his worship. From Psalms 48:4-8 the song records the confusion of Zion's foes, ascribing all the praise to God; Psalms 48:9-11 extolling Zion, and avowing Jehovah to be her God for evermore.

COKE, "Title. קרח לבני מזמור שיר Shiir mizmor libnei korach.— This is a triumphant hymn, the author of which is not known, nor the particular time when it was composed. It appears from the contents of it, that it was made upon some providential deliverance which God had given to the city of Jerusalem, when it was violently attacked, or threatened at least, by some very powerful and confederate enemies. Mudge thinks that it refers to the ineffectual attempt of Rezin, king of Syria, and Pekah, king of Israel: Isaiah 7:1 and that the prophesy of Isaiah, in that and the succeeding chapter, confirms this idea. See also the 4th, 5th, and 6th verses. But an anonymous writer well observes, that mount Sion is the main subject of the poem, which was not much regarded after the ark had been some time removed from thence; whereas, at the time this psalm was made, it was evidently in its highest reputation; whence it is probable, that the psalm is as old as David's time. The LXX, Vulgate, and Arabic, subjoin the words, "on one of their sabbaths," or "on the second sabbath," to the title: by which they would insinuate, that the use of this psalm was to be appropriated to the sabbath: for indeed some of the psalms were peculiar to the service on week-days, and others set apart for the public solemnities, and the sabbath, on which only they were to be used.

HE�RY, "This psalm, as the two former, is a triumphant song some think it was

penned on occasion of Jehoshaphat's victory (2 Chronicles 20:1-30), others of Sennacherib's defeat, when his army laid siege to Jerusalem in Hezekiah's time but, for aught I know, it might be penned by David upon occasion of some eminent victory obtained in his time yet not so calculated for that but that it might serve any other similar occasion in aftertimes, and be applicable also to the glories of the gospel church, of which Jerusalem was a type, especially when it shall come to be a church triumphant, the "heavenly Jerusalem" (Hebrews 12:22), "the Jerusalem which is above," Galatians 4:26. Jerusalem is here praised, I. For its relation to God, Psalm 48:1,2. II. For God's care of it, Psalm 48:3. III. For the terror it strikes upon its enemies, Psalm 48:4-7. IV. For the pleasure it gives to its friends, who delight to think, 1. Of what God has done, does, and will do for it, Psalm 48:3. 2. Of the gracious discoveries he makes of himself in and for that holy city, Psalm 48:9,10. 3. Of the effectual provision which is made for its safety, Psalm 48:11-13. 4. Of the assurance we have of the perpetuity of God's covenant with the children of Zion, Psalm 48:14. In singing this psalm we must be affected with the privilege we have as members of the gospel church, and must express and excite our sincere good-will to all its interests.

PETT, "‘A Song; a Psalm of the sons of Korah.’

For the sons of Korah see introduction to Part 2. Many of the temple singers were sons of Korah.

This psalm continues the theme of the Great King. Its aim is to exalt Him and describe the wonder of the place where He dwells. Israel were well aware that God was so great that even the Heaven of Heavens could not contain Him. In the words of the wise Solomon, ‘Behold Heaven, and the Heaven of Heavens cannot contain you. How much less this house that I have built’ (1 Kings 8:27).

But they also knew that God had been pleased to establish on earth a place where He could be approached, a kind of doorway to Heaven. And that place was the Temple on Mount Zion, on which was centred the worship of the one true God. That was why they gloried in Mount Zion and Jerusalem, because they represented God’s interest revealed on earth towards His people, and they pointed to, and drew men to, God. Today that Temple has been replaced by a greater Temple, the Lord Jesus Christ Himself (compare John 4:24). Thus all that is said here about the Temple and Jerusalem should now be focused on our Lord Jesus Christ Who has replaced the Temple as the centre of people’s worship. It is now to Him that we should point, and to Whom we should give praise and glory.

A song. A psalm of the Sons of Korah.

1 Great is the Lord, and most worthy of praise, in the city of our God, his holy mountain.

BAR�ES, "Great is the Lord - That is, he is high and exalted; he is a Being of great power and glory. He is not weak and feeble, like the idols worshipped by other nations. He is able to defend his people; he has shown his great power in overthrowing the mighty forces that were gathered together against the city where he dwells.

And greatly to be praised -Worthy to be praised. In his own nature, he is worthy of adoration; in interposing to save the city from its foes, he has shown that he is worthy of exalted praise.

In the city of our God - Jerusalem. In the city which he has chosen for his abode, and where his worship is celebrated. See the notes at Psa_46:4. This praise was especially appropriate there:

(a) because it was a place set apart for his worship;

(b) because he had now interposed to save it from threatened ruin.

In the mountain of his holiness - His holy mountain; either Mount Zion, if the psalm was composed before the building of the temple - or more probably here Mount Moriah, on which the temple was reared. The names Zion, and Mount Zion, however, were sometimes given to the entire city. Compare the notes at Isa_2:2-3.

CLARKE, "Great is the Lord - This verse should be joined to the last verse of the preceding Psalm, as it is a continuation of the same subject; and indeed in some of Kennicott’s MSS. it is written as a part of the foregoing. That concluded with He is greatly exalted; this begins with Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised; i.e., He should be praised according to his greatness; no common praise is suited to the nature and dignity of the Supreme God.

In the city of our God - That is, in the temple; or in Jerusalem, where the temple was situated.

The mountain of his holiness -Mount Moriah, on which the temple was built. The ancient city of Jerusalem, which David took from the Jebusites, was on the south of Mount Zion, on which the temple was built, though it might be said to be more properly on Mount Moriah, which is one of the hills of which Mount Zion is composed. The temple therefore was to the north of the city, as the psalmist here states, Psa_48:2 : “Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is Mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King.” But some think that it is the city that is said to be on the north, and Reland contends that the temple was on the south of the city.

GILL, "Great is the Lord,.... The same that in the foregoing psalm is said to be gone,

up to heaven with a shout, to sit on the throne of his holiness, to reign over the Heathen, and to be King over all the earth; who is great, and the Son of the Highest; the great God and our Saviour; great in his person as God-man, God manifest in the flesh, his Father's fellow and equal; and in the perfections of his nature, being of great power, and of great wisdom, and of great faithfulness, and of strict holiness and justice, and of wonderful grace and goodness; great in his works of creation and providence; in his miraculous operations when on earth, and in the work of man's redemption and salvation; great is he in all his offices, a great Prophet risen in Israel, a great High Priest over thee house of God, a Saviour, and a great one, and the great Shepherd of the sheep;

and greatly to be praised in the city of our God; the city of Jerusalem, the city of solemnities, where was the worship of God, and where the tribes went up to worship, and God was present with his people; and where the great Lord of all showed himself to be great; here Christ the great Saviour appeared, even in the temple, when a child, where Simeon and Anna saw him, and spoke great things of him; where he at twelve years of age disputed with the doctors, and showed his great wisdom; here when grown up he wrought many of his great miracles, and taught his doctrines; here he entered in great triumph, attended with the shouts, acclamations, and hosannas of the people; here he ate his last passover with his disciples; and in a garden near it was he taken and brought before the sanhedrim, assembled at the high priest's palace at Jerusalem; and then tried and condemned at the bar of Pilate; when being led a little way out of the city he was crucified on Mount Calvary; and on another mount, the mount of Olives, about a mile from it, he ascended to heaven; and here in this city he poured forth the Spirit in an extraordinary manner on his disciples at the day of Pentecost, as an evidence of his ascension; and from hence his Gospel went forth into all the world; and therefore was greatly to be praised here, as he was by his disciples, church, and people, Act_2:46. Jerusalem is a figure of the Gospel church, which is often compared to a city, Isa_26:1; of which saints are citizens and fellow citizens of each other; this is a city built on Christ the foundation; is full of inhabitants, when together and considered by themselves; is governed by wholesome laws, enacted by Christ its King, who has appointed officers under him to explain and enforce them, and see that they are put in execution; and has many privileges and immunities belonging to it; and this is the city of God, of his building and of his defending, and where he dwells; it is, as in Psa_48:2; "the city of the great King", the King Messiah, and where he displays his greatness; here he appears great and glorious, shows his power and his glory; is seen in the galleries and through the lattices of ordinances, in his beauty and splendour; here he grants his gracious presence, and bestows his favours and blessings; and is therefore greatly to be praised here, as he is by all his people on the above accounts, Even

in the mountain of his holiness; as Mount Zion is called on account of the temple built upon it, and the worship of God in it; and a fit emblem it was of the church of Christ, which, as that is, is chosen and, loved of God, and is his habitation, is impregnable and immovable, and consists of persons sanctified by God the Father, in the Son, and through the Spirit.

HE�RY, "Verses 1-3The Beauty and Strength of Zion.A song and psalm for the sons of Korah.

1 Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the

mountain of his holiness. 2 Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King. 3 God is known in her palaces for a refuge. 4 For, lo, the kings were assembled, they passed by together. 5 They saw it, and so they marvelled they were troubled, and hasted away. 6 Fear took hold upon them there, and pain, as of a woman in travail. 7 Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind.

The psalmist is designing to praise Jerusalem and to set forth the grandeur of that city but he begins with the praises of God and his greatness (Psalm 48:1), and ends with the praises of God and his goodness, Psalm 48:14. For, whatever is the subject of our praises, God must be both the Alpha and Omega of them. And, particularly, whatever is said to the honour of the church must redound to the honour of the church's God.

What is here said to the honour of Jerusalem is,

I. That the King of heaven owns it: it is the city of our God (Psalm 48:1), which he chose out of all the cities of Israel to put his name there. Of Zion he said kinder things than ever he said of place upon earth. This is my rest for ever here will I dwell, for I have desired it, Psalm 132:13,14. It is the city of the great King (Psalm 48:2), the King of all the earth, who is pleased to declare himself in a special manner present there. This our Saviour quotes to prove that to swear by Jerusalem is profanely to swear by God himself (Matthew 5:35), for it is the city of the great King, who has chosen it for the special residence of his grace, as heaven is of his glory. 1. It is enlightened with the knowledge of God. In Judah God is known, and his name is great, but especially in Jerusalem, the head-quarters of the priests, whose lips were to keep this knowledge. In Jerusalem God is great (Psalm 48:1) who in other places was made little of, was made nothing of. Happy the kingdom, the city, the family, the heart, in which God is great, in which he is uppermost, in which he is all. There God is known (Psalm 48:3) and where he is known he will be great none contemn God but those that are ignorant of him. 2. It is devoted to the honour of God. It is therefore called the mountain of his holiness, for holiness to the Lord is written upon it and all the furniture of it, Zechariah 14:20. This is the privilege of the church of Christ, that it is a holy nation, a peculiar people Jerusalem, the type of it, is called the holy city, bad as it was (Matthew 27:53), till that was set up, but never after. 3. It is the place appointed for the solemn service and worship of God there he is greatly praised, and greatly to be praised, Psalm 48:1. �ote, The clearer discoveries are made to us of God and his greatness the more it is expected that we should abound in his praises. Those that from all parts of the country brought their offerings to Jerusalem had reason to be thankful that God would not only permit them thus to attend him, but promise to accept them, and meet them with a blessing, and reckon himself praised and honoured by their services. Herein Jerusalem typified the gospel church for what little tribute of praise God has from this earth arises from that church upon earth, which is therefore his tabernacle among men. 4. It is taken under his special protection (Psalm 48:3): He is known for a refuge that is, he has approved himself such a one, and as such a one he is there applied to by his worshippers. Those that know him will trust in him, and seek to him, Psalm

9:10. God was known, not only in the streets, but even in the palaces of Jerusalem, for a refuge the great men had recourse to God and acquaintance with him. And then religion was likely to flourish in the city when it reigned in the palaces. 5. Upon all these accounts, Jerusalem, and especially Mount Zion, on which the temple was built, were universally beloved and admired--beautiful for situation, and the joy of the whole earth, Psalm 48:2. The situation must needs be every way agreeable, when Infinite Wisdom chose it for the place of the sanctuary and that which made it beautiful was that it was the mountain of holiness, for there is a beauty in holiness. This earth is, by sin, covered with deformity, and therefore justly might that spot of ground which was thus beautified with holiness he called the joy of the whole earth, that is, what the whole earth had reason to rejoice in, that God would thus in very deed dwell with man upon the earth. Mount Zion was on the north side of Jerusalem, and so was a shelter to the city from the cold and bleak winds that blew from that quarter or, if fair weather was expected out of the north, they were thus directed to look Zion-ward for it.

JAMISO�, "Psa_48:1-14. This is a spirited Psalm and song (compare Psa_30:1), having probably been suggested by the same occasion as the foregoing. It sets forth the privileges and blessings of God’s spiritual dominion as the terror of the wicked and joy of the righteous.

to be praised— always: it is an epithet, as in Psa_18:3.

mountain of his holiness— His Church (compare Isa_2:2, Isa_2:3; Isa_25:6, Isa_25:7, Isa_25:10); the sanctuary was erected first on Mount Zion, then (as the temple) on Moriah; hence the figure.

CALVI�,"1.Great is Jehovah, and greatly to be praised. The prophet, before proceeding to make mention of that special example of the favor of God towards them, to which I have adverted, teaches in general that the city of Jerusalem was happy and prosperous, because God had been graciously pleased to take upon him the charge of defending and preserving it. In this way he separates and distinguishes the Church of God from all the rest of the world; and when God selects from amongst the whole human race a small number whom he embraces with his fatherly love, this is an invaluable blessing which he bestows upon them. His wonderful goodness and righteousness shine forth in the government of the whole world, so that there is no part of it void of his praise, but we are everywhere furnished with abundant matter for praising him. Here, however, the inspired poet celebrates the glory of God which is manifested in the protection of the Church. He states, that Jehovah is great, and greatly to be praised in the holy city. But is he not so also in the whole world? Undoubtedly he is. As I have said, there is not a corner so hidden, into which his wisdom, righteousness, and goodness, do not penetrate; but it being his will that they should be manifested chiefly and in a particular manner in his Church, the prophet very properly sets before our eyes this mirror, in which God gives a more clear and vivid representation of his character. By calling Jerusalem the holy mountain, he teaches us in one word, by what right and means it came to be in a peculiar manner the city of God. It was so because the ark of the covenant had

been placed there by divine appointment. The import of the expression is this: If Jerusalem is, as it were, a beautiful and magnificent theater on which God would have the greatness of his majesty to be beheld, it is not owing to any merits of its own, but because the ark of the covenant was established there by the commandment of God as a token or symbol of his peculiar favor.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 1. Great is the Lord. How great Jehovah is essentially none can conceive; but we can all see that he is great in the deliverance of his people, great in their esteem who are delivered, and great in the hearts of those enemies whom he scatters by their own fears. Instead of the mad cry of Ephesus, "Great is Diana, "we bear the reasonable, demonstrable, self evident testimony, "Great is Jehovah." There is none great in the church but the Lord. Jesus is "the great Shepherd, "he is "a Saviour, and a great one, "our great God and Saviour, our great High Priest; his Father has divided him a portion with the great, and his name shall be great unto the ends of the earth. And greatly to be praised. According to his nature should his worship be; it cannot be too constant, too laudatory, too earnest, too reverential, too sublime. In the city of our God. He is great there, and should be greatly praised there. If all the world beside renounced Jehovah's worship, the chosen people in his favoured city should continue to adore him, for in their midst and on their behalf his glorious power has been so manifestly revealed. In the church the Lord is to be extolled though all the nations rage against him. Jerusalem was the peculiar abode of the God of Israel, the seat of the theocratic government, and the centre of prescribed worship, and even thus is the church the place of divine manifestation. In the mountain of his holiness. Where his holy temple, his holy priests, and his holy sacrifices might continually be seen. Zion was a mount, and as it was the most renowned part of the city, it is mentioned as a synonym for the city itself. The church of God is a mount for elevation and for conspicuousness, and it should be adorned with holiness, her sons being partakers of the holiness of God. Only by holy men can the Lord be fittingly praised, and they should be incessantly occupied with his worship.EXPLA�ATORY �OTES A�D QUAI�T SAYI�GSTitle. A Song and Psalm. Wherein both voice and instrument were used; the voice began first and the instrument after: and where the inscription is a Psalm and Song, there likely the instrument began and the voice followed. John Richardson.Whole Psalm. According to Dr. Lightfoot, the constant and ordinary Psalm for the second day of the week was the forty-eighth.Ver. 1. Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, etc. The prophet, being about to praise a certain edifice, commences by praising the architect, and says that in the holy city the wonderful skill and wisdom of God, who built it, is truly displayed. Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised; and so he is, whether we look at his essence, his power, his wisdom, his justice, or his mercy, for all are infinite, everlasting, and incomprehensible; and thus, so much is God greatly to be praised, that all the angels, all men, even all his own works would not suffice thereto; but of all things revealed, there is no one thing can give us a greater idea of his greatness, or for which were should praise and thank him more, than the establishment of his church; and therefore, the prophet adds, in the city of our God, in the mountain of his holiness; that is to say, the greatness of God, and for which he

deserves so much praise, is conspicuous in the foundation and construction of his church. Robert Bellarmine (Cardinal).Ver. 1. Great is the Lord. Greater, Job 33:12. Greatest of all, Psalms 95:3. Greatness itself, Psalms 145:3. A degree he is above the superlative. John Trapp.Ver. 1. Mountain of his holiness. The religion in it holy, the people in it a holy people. William �icholson.

COFFMA�, "THE BEAUTY A�D GLORY OF ZIO�

Here we have taken the title that appears in the ASV, because it uses the word "Zion," as a designation of Jerusalem, having a double application, not merely to the earthly Jerusalem, but to the heavenly Jerusalem which is above, "which is our mother" (Galatians 4:26).

This psalm, along with Psalms 46 and Psalms 47, forms a trilogy. All three seem to reflect the euphoria of Israel following the miraculous deliverance from the army of Sennacherib. "Psalms 46 extolled the deliverance; Psalms 47 extolled the power and majesty of Him who wrought it; and Psalms 48 describes the glory of the city which God has so marvelously preserved."[1]

Two different historical `deliverances' are identified by scholars as possibly the occasion for the psalm. Rawlinson seemed sure that the occasion was that described in 2 Chronicles 20:1-28, "Upon which a confederation of three nations, the Moabites, the Ammonites, and the Edomites attacked Israel during the reign of Jehoshaphat. They advanced as far as Tekoa, from which town Jerusalem is visible; but they quarreled among themselves, began a retreat, and then came to blows against each other, destroying themselves."[2] The mention of a plurality of `kings' in Psalms 48:4, and their turning back in `dismay' (Psalms 48:5) were factors cited by Rawlinson in support of his view.

However, Sennacherib's army was made up of multiple vassal kings (Isaiah 10:8); and the `dismay' of Sennacherib could have referred to his consternation following the destruction of his army! Dummelow, Addis, Baigent and others cling to the view that the deliverance during the reign of Hezekiah in 701 B.C. was the occasion.

Either view seems all right to us, for we certainly do not know which is correct; and, for that matter, as we have often pointed out, `it really doesn't make a lot of difference.'

One thing, however, seems to be dogmatically certain, `This psalm is not a cultic, liturgical celebration of the occasions when pilgrims came to Jerusalem to worship.' Furthermore, it is extremely unlikely that the terminology here is influenced by mythological traditions of pagan peoples surrounding Israel. There is one possible exception to this which we shall notice under Psalms 48:2b.

There is also an eschatalogical implication in the entire psalm. The earthly Jerusalem is most certainly a type of the Church of our Lord; and there are surely

overtones of this poem that speak of the eternal security and glory of the Church.

John �ewton's immortal hymn, Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken,[3] set to the music of the ancient national anthem of Austria by Joseph Haydn, stresses this spiritual meaning of Psalms 48.

If the dominant opinions regarding the occasion are correct, then the date of the Psalm would be shortly after 701 B.C.

The divisions of the psalm are Psalms 48:1-8, concluded with the word "Selah"; and Psalms 48:9-14. Leupold further divided the psalm thus:

I. Zion's glory is the indwelling of the Lord (Psalms 48:1-3).

II. A recent instance of God's protection (Psalms 48:4-8).

III. An exhortation to praise the Lord for his judgments (Psalms 48:9-11).

IV. The glories of Zion to be transmitted to posterity (Psalms 48:12-14).[4]

THE I�DWELLI�G OF THE LORD; ZIO�'S GLORY

Psalms 48:1-3

"Great is Jehovah, and greatly to be praised,

In the city of our God, in his holy mountain.

Beautiful in elevation, the joy of the whole earth.

Is mount Zion on the sides of the north,

The city of the Great King.

God hath made himself known in her palaces for a refuge."

"Great is Jehovah" (Psalms 48:1). The mad frenzy of the Ephesian mob, shouting for hours at a time, "Great is Diana of the Ephesians," was the insane cry of the pagan world; but here the greatness of Jehovah is proclaimed, along with the proof that God is indeed truly `great.'

"In the city of our God ... in his holy mountain" (Psalms 48:1). These expressions are not intended to identify the place where God is praised, but the place where God resides. It is the indwelling of God in his chosen city that glorifies and secures the city as nothing else in heaven or upon earth could accomplish. �ote also that in Psalms 48:3, God is even "in" the palaces of the nobles as "a refuge."

Before leaving this verse, we should remember that Jesus himself referred to Jerusalem as, "The city of the Great King" (Matthew 5:35). This, of course, was not spoken of any Davidic king, but of God in heaven.

We would be amiss not to point out that God also in-dwells the �ew Jerusalem, his holy Church. The Day of Pentecost was the occasion when, "with a rushing sound of a mighty wind, and with cloven tongues of fire," the Spirit of God descended upon the apostles who were the nucleus of God's Messianic kingdom; and every child of God on earth also has his measure of the token indwelling of the Holy Spirit. There is also a vast difference. God's presence in the ancient Jerusalem was confined to the Temple; but now he dwells in the heart of every believer.

"Beautiful in elevation" (Psalms 48:2). The elevation of ancient Jerusalem was literal, as the city was actually built on a mountain; but the "elevation" of God's Church (the �ew Jerusalem, or the �ew Israel) is ethical and spiritual.

"The joy of the whole earth" (Psalms 48:2). It is almost impossible to apply this statement to the earthly Jerusalem; but Interpreter's Bible did their best: "This means that from all lands the pilgrims came up with rejoicing and loud singing."[5]

Of course, the truth about this was bluntly stated by Adam Clarke who wrote, "There is no sense in which literal Jerusalem was ever the joy of the whole earth."[6]

The fulfilment of this in its fullest sense is found only in the joy of Christians worshipping all over the world continually for nearly two thousand years. As Spurgeon stated it, "Jerusalem was the world's star; whatever light there is upon this earth, it comes from the oracles of the Word of God preserved by Israel."[7] This is profoundly true. Christ the Light of the World chose Jerusalem as the place where He would make the atonement for all men. "The Word of God went forth from Jerusalem," as the prophets declared; and, in the sense of the old Israel's providing the nucleus and the original membership of the Messianic Kingdom of God, - in this sense, Jerusalem is indeed "the joy of the whole earth." We might also add, that, `in no other sense whatever could the statement be viewed as the truth.'

"In mount Zion on the sides of the north" (Psalms 48:2). Some scholars maintain that "the sides of the north" are here a reference to the location of the Temple mountain in relation to the rest of the city; but that is disputed. A popular view, current among recent scholars, is that there is here a reflection of the mythological tale locating the abode of certain pagan gods "in the far north." RSV honors that viewpoint by rendering the last phrase here, "Mount Zion, in the far north, the city of the great King." We do not altogether trust the RSV in some renditions wherein they are definitely inferior both to the KJV and the American Standard Version. Addis declared that the text here, "does not even hint at such a rendition."[8]

The mythological claims that lie back of this interpretation were mentioned by Leupold. "The expression `the far north' is an allusion to another mountain, a kind

of Olympus (where the Greeks imagined the gods lived), which was supposed to he the dwelling place of certain near-Eastern gods."[9] Kidner identified one of those near-Eastern gods as, "Baal who was supposed to live on Mount Zaphon (meaning `north'),"[10] Leupold further remarked that, "What the psalmist here implies is that what the fables of the Gentiles imagined, was indeed a reality in Zion, for the true God actually lived there."[11]

Our own conviction with regard to this is that, "If the RSV is indeed correct, then Rhodes' comment is appropriate. He wrote: "The Psalmist throws the pagan mythology out the window, and by the use of the expression states that Jehovah God is the true deity, and that Zion is truly `the far north' where God lives."[12]

TRAPP, "Psalms 48:1 « A Song [and] Psalm for the sons of Korah. » Great [is] the LORD, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, [in] the mountain of his holiness.

A Psalm and Song for the sons of Korah] When and by whom compiled we certainly know not. If by David, probably it was upon occasion of the Philistines coming up to seek him, but were sent away back with shame and loss, 2 Samuel 5:7; 2 Samuel 5:9. If upon the slaughter of Sennacherib’s army by an angel, Isaiah or some other prophet of those times (as there were many) might be the penman. It seemeth to be of the same time and occasion with Psalms 76:1-12

Ver. 1. Great is the Lord] Greater, Job 33:12, greatest of all, Psalms 95:3, greatness itself, Psalms 145:3. A degree he is above the superlative.

And greatly to be praised] �o mean praises can be meet for so great a majesty. It must be modus sine modo (Bern.).

In the city of our God] i.e. In the Church; for others will not, cannot do it to divine acceptation. Galen (lib. 3, de usu part.), amazed at the wonderful frame of man’s body, sang a hymn to the Maker thereof, but yet he lived and died a Pagan.

EBC, "THE situation seems the same as in Psa_46:1-11, with which this psalm has many points of contact. In both we have the same triumph, the same proud affection for the holy city and sanctuary, the same confidence in God’s dwelling there, the same vivid picturing of the mustering of enemies and their rapid dispersion, the same swift movement of style in describing that overthrow, the same thought of the diffusion of God’s praise in the world as its consequence, the same closing summons to look upon the tokens of deliverance, with the difference that, in the former psalm, these are the shattered weapons of the defeated foe, and in this the unharmed battlements and palaces of the delivered city. The emphatic word of the refrain in Psa_46:1-11 also reappears here in Psa_48:3. The psalm falls into three parts, of which the first (Psa_48:1-2) is introductory, celebrating the glory of Zion as the city of God; the second (Psa_48:3-8) recounts in glowing words the deliverance of Zion; and the third tells of the

consequent praise and trust of the inhabitants of Zion (Psa_48:9-14).

LANGE, "Contents and Composition.—The introduction, in which the great God and His glorious city are praised ( Psalm 48:1-2), is followed ( Psalm 48:3-8) by a description of the deliverances of the city from threatened danger, effected by Jehovah, who disperses its terrified enemies. Psalm 48:9-10 contain the expressions of gratitude for this interposition, while in Psalm 48:11-14 the people are exhorted to guard all parts of the city, so that its safety may be manifest to all, and thus the glory of God be revealed to coming generations, to confirm their faith in His guidance. There are many points of resemblance between these verses and Isaiah 22:29–33, but they do not warrant our supposing the Psalm to have been written by that Prophet. Still less can we imagine that the author belonged to the party in opposition (i.e. to the delivered city), and that the occasion of it was the siege of Jerusalem by the allied forces of Israel and Syria, which was frustrated by Tiglath Pileser, (Credner, G. Baur). We are uncertain whether the occasion of it was the siege by Sennacherib, in the time of Hezekiah, (Calvin, De Wette, Hitzig, Ewald, Hupf.), or the victory gained by Jehosaphat over the allied kings named in 2 Chronicles20, (Rosen, Hengst, Del.). The older Christian expositors apply the Psalm to the eternal glory of the spiritual Zion, while the Rabbins take it to be descriptive of Jerusalem in the Messianic times, after the victory over Gog and Magog.

PETT, "Verses 1-3

The Greatness of God And The Beauty Of The Place Which Represents His Dwelling Among Men (Psalms 48:1-3).

Psalms 48:13

‘Great is YHWH, and greatly to be praised,

In the city of our God, in his holy mountain.

Beautiful in elevation, the joy of the whole earth,

Is mount Zion, on the sides of the north,

The city of the great King.

God has made himself known in her palaces for a refuge.’

We should note here that while Mount Zion is being admired, it is not Mount Zion but the Great God Himself Who is being exalted. Mount Zion is only seen as beautiful in that it points towards the living God. It is the great God YHWH Who is to be greatly praised.

The description of Mount Zion should also be noted. It is described in a way that transcends itself. ‘The sides of the north’ indicated the sacred mountains far off from men (see Isaiah 14:13; Ezekiel 38:6; Ezekiel 38:15; Ezekiel 39:2). Here in this psalm God is, as it were, seen to have planted those sacred mountains in Jerusalem as His earthly abode. So as in Isaiah 2:2-4 it represents both the earthly and the heavenly Mount Zion. As men gazed on the earthly they were also to think of the heavenly. Today the earthly has long been done away, and we are to concentrate our thoughts on the heavenly

(Hebrews 12:22; compare Galatians 4:20 ff).

And yet there is still a Temple on earth in which God can be found. It is that Temple which consist of all true believers in Jesus Christ. In them dwells the Holy Spirit of God, and through them the glory of God is to be manifested to the world (see 1 Corinthians 3:16; 1 Corinthians 6:19; 2 Corinthians 6:16-18; Ephesians 2:18-22). That is why we can rightly apply ideas about Mount Zion to His people.

So just as the people of old could gather on Mount Zion and sing His praises, and see it as beautiful because of its exaltation, and as the joy of the whole earth because of what it represented as ‘the city of the Great King’ where God made himself known, so today can we glorify God for His true church in which He dwells, made up of all who truly believe in our Lord Jesus Christ and call on His Name (regardless of denomination) and worship Him in His Temple. His church is beautiful in elevation (compare Galatians 4:26; Ephesians 5:25-27), even though it may dwell here in vessels of clay, for we are the living stones of the Temple of God, built up on the chief Cornerstone, our Lord Jesus Christ (1 Peter 2:4-7), and we are called on to show forth the excellencies of Him Who has called us out of darkness into His most glorious light (1 Peter 2:9).

Thus can we sing:

Glorious things of you are spoken,

Zion city of our God.

He Whose word cannot be broken,

Formed you for His own abode.

On the Rock of Ages founded,

What can shake your sure repose,

With salvation’s walls surrounded,

You can smile at all your foes.

‘God has made himself known in her palaces for a refuge.’ And because God has made Himself known in the palaces of Jerusalem as being a refuge of His people (at that stage Jerusalem had a godly king), Jerusalem can rest secure knowing that she cannot be touched by her enemies. And the same confidence can be enjoyed by God’s people today as He makes Himself known to us in His church.

K&D 1-8, "(Heb.: 48:2-9) Viewed as to the nature of its subject-matter, the Psalm divides itself

into three parts. We begin by considering the three strophes of the first part. The middle strophe presents an instance of the rising and falling caesural schema. Because Jahve has most marvellously delivered Jerusalem, the poet begins with the praise of the great

King and of His Holy City. Great and praised according to His due (מה�ל as in Psa_18:4) is He in her, is He upon His holy mountain, which there is His habitation. Next follow, in

Psa_48:3, two predicates of a threefold, or fundamentally only twofold, subject; for יר�תי�

in whatever way ,צפון it may be understood, is in apposition to הר־צ�ון. The predicates

consequently refer to Zion-Jerusalem; for קרית�מלך�רב is not a name for Zion, but,

inasmuch as the transition is from the holy mountain to the Holy City (just as the

reverse is the case in Psa_48:2), Jerusalem; �τι�πόλις�"στ$�το&�µεγάλου�βασιλέως, Mat_

5:35. Of Zion-Jerusalem it is therefore said, it is beautiful in prominence or ,יפה�נוף

elevation (נוף from נוף, Arabic nâfa, nauf, root נף, the stronger force of Arab. nb, to raise ,נב

one's self, to mount, to come sensibly forward; just as יפה also goes back to a root יף,

Arab. yf, wf, which signifies “to rise, to be high,” and is transferred in the Hebrew toeminence, perfection, beauty of form), a beautifully rising terrace-like height;

(Note: Luther with Jerome (departing from the lxx and Vulgate) renders it:

“Mount Zion is like a beautiful branch,” after the Mishna-Talmudic נוף, a branch, Maccoth 12a, which is compared also by Saadia and Dunash. The latter renders it “beautiful in branches,” and refers it to the Mount of Olives.)

and, in the second place, it is the joy (משוש) of the whole earth. It is deserving of being such, as the people who dwell there are themselves convinced (Lam_2:15); and it is appointed to become such, it is indeed such even now in hope, - hope which is, as it

were, being anticipatorily verified. but in what sense does the appositional יר�תי�צפון

follow immediately upon הר־צ�ון? Hitzig, Ewald, Hengstenberg, Caspari (Micha, p. 359),

and others, are of opinion that the hill of Zion is called the extreme north with reference to the old Asiatic conception of the mountain of the gods - old Persic Ar-bur'g (Al-

bur'g), and also called absolutely hara or haraiti,

(Note: Vid., Spiegel, Erân, S. 287f.)

old Indian Kailâsa and Mêru

(Note: Vide Lassen, Indische Alterthumskunde, ii. 847.)

- forming the connecting link between heaven and earth, which lay in the inaccessible, holy distance and concealment of the extreme north. But the poet in no way betrays the idea that he applies this designation to Zion in an ideal sense only, as being not inferior to the extreme north (Bertheau, Lage des Paradieses, S. 50, and so also S. D. Luzzatto on Isa_14:13), or as having taken the place of it (Hitzig). That notion is found, it is true, in Isa_14:13, in the mouth of the king of the Chaldeans; but, with the exception of the passage before us, we have no trace of the Israelitish mind having blended this foreign mythological style of speech with its own. We therefore take the expression “sides of the north” to be a topographical designation, and intended literally. Mount Zion is thereby more definitely designated as the Temple-hill; for the Temple-hill, or Zion in the narrower sense, formed in reality the north-eastern angle or corner of ancient Jerusalem. It is not necessarily the extreme north (Eze_38:6; Eze_39:2), which is called

,are the two sides, then the angle in which the two side lines meet יר�תים for ;ירכתי�צפון

and just such a northern angle was Mount Moriah by its position in relation to the city of David and the lower city.

Psa_48:3

(Heb.: 48:4) Psa_48:3, where the pointing is rightly נודע, not נודע, shows that the praise sung by the poet is based upon an event in contemporary history. Elohim has made Himself known by the loftily built parts

(Note: lxx: "ν�ταKς�βάρεσιν�αMτNς, on which Gregory of Nyssa remarks (Opera, Ed.

Paris, t. i. p. 333): βάρεις�λέγει�τάς�τOν�οPκοδοµηµάτων�περιγραφε$ς�"ν�τετραγώνV�τW�

σχήµατι.)

of Jerusalem (Psa_122:7) בZלמש (the ל� that is customary with verbs of becoming and

making), i.e., as an inaccessible fortress, making them secure against any hostile attack.

The fact by which He has thus made Himself known now immediately follows. ה]לכיםpoints to a definite number of kings known to the poet; it therefore speaks in favour of the time of peril and war in the reign of Jehoshaphat and against that in the reign of

Hezekiah. נועד is reciprocal: to appoint themselves a place of meeting, and meet together

there. עבר, as in Jdg_11:29; 2Ki_8:21, of crossing the frontier and invasion (Hitzig), not

of perishing and destruction, as in Psa_37:36, Nah_1:12 (De Wette); for נועדו requires further progress, and the declaration respecting their sudden downfall does not follow till later on. The allies encamped in the desert to Tekoa, about three hours distant from Jerusalem. The extensive view at that point extends even to Jerusalem: as soon as they saw it they were amazed, i.e., the seeing and astonishment, panic and confused flight, occurred all together; there went forth upon them from the Holy City, because Elohim

dwells therein, a חר[ת�אלהים (1Sa_14:15), or as we should say, a panic or a panic-striking

terror. Concerning ן� as expressive of simultaneousness, vid., on Hab_3:10. אשר� in the correlative protasis is omitted, as in Hos_11:2, and frequently; cf. on Isa_55:9.

Trembling seized upon them there (שם, as in Psa_14:5), pangs as of a woman in travail.

In Psa_48:8, the description passes over emotionally into the form of address. It moulds itself according to the remembrance of a recent event of the poet's own time, viz., the destruction of the merchant fleet fitted out by Jehoshaphat in conjunction with Ahaziah, king of Israel (1Ki_22:49; 2Ch_20:36.). The general meaning of Psa_48:8 is, that God's omnipotence is irresistible. Concerning the “wind of the east quarter,” which here, as in Eze_27:26, causes shipwreck, vid., on Job_27:21. The “ships of Tarshish,” as is clear from the context both before and after, are not meant literally, but used as a figure of the worldly powers; Isaiah (Isa 33) also compares Assyria to a gallant ship. Thus, then, the church can say that in the case of Jerusalem it has, as an eye-witness, experienced that

which it has hitherto only heard from the tradition of a past age (הaר and שמע as in Job_42:5), viz., that God holds it erect, establishes it, for ever. Hengstenberg observes here, “The Jerusalem that has been laid in ruins is not that which the psalmist means; it is only its outward form which it has put off” [lit. its broken and deserted pupa]. It is true that, according to its inner and spiritual nature, Jerusalem continues its existence in the New Testament church; but it is not less true that its being trodden under foot for a season in the kairoi' ethnoo'n no more annuls the promise of God than Israel's temporary rejection annuls Israel's election. The Holy City does not fall without again rising up.

MACLAREN 1-14, "A SONG OF DELIVERANCE

The enthusiastic triumph which throbs in this psalm, and the specific details of a great act of deliverance from a great peril which it contains, sufficiently indicate that it must have had some historical event as its basis. Can we identify the fact which is here embalmed?

The psalm gives these points-a formidable muster before Jerusalem of hostile people under confederate kings, with the purpose of laying siege to the city; some mysterious check which arrests them before a sword is drawn, as if some panic fear had shot from its towers and shaken their hearts; and a flight in wild confusion from the impregnable dwelling-place of the Lord of hosts. The occasion of the terror is vaguely hinted at, as if some solemn mystery brooded over it. All that is clear about it is that it was purely the work of the divine hand-’Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind’; and that in this deliverance, in their own time, the Levite minstrels recognised the working of the same protecting grace which, from of old, had ‘commanded deliverances for Jacob.’

Now there is one event, and only one, in Jewish history, which corresponds, point for point, to these details-the crushing destruction of the Assyrian army under Sennacherib. There, there was the same mustering of various nations, compelled by the conqueror to march in his train, and headed by their tributary kings. There, there was the same arrest before an arrow had been shot, or a mound raised against the city. There, there was the same purely divine agency coming in to destroy the invading army.

I think, then, that from the correspondence of the history with the requirements of the psalm, as well as from several similarities of expression and allusion between the latter and the prophecies of Isaiah, who has recorded that destruction of the invader, we may, with considerable probability, regard this psalm as the hymn of triumph over the baffled Assyrian, and the marvellous deliverance of Israel by the arm of God.

Whatever may be thought, however, of that allocation of it to a place in the history, the great truths that it contains depend upon no such identification. They are truths for all time; gladness and consolation for all generations. Let us read it over together now, if, perchance, some echo of the confidence and praise that is found in it may be called forth from our hearts! If you will look at your Bibles you will find that it falls into three portions. There is the glory of Zion, the deliverance of Zion, and the consequent grateful praise and glad trust of Zion.

I. There is the glory of Zion.

Hearken with what triumph the Psalmist breaks out: ‘Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the mountain of His holiness. Beautiful for situation (or rather elevation), the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King.’ Now these words are something more than mere patriotic feeling. The Jew’s glory in Jerusalem was a different thing altogether from the Roman’s pride in Rome. To the devout men amongst them, of whom the writer of this psalm was one, there was one thing, and one only, that made Zion glorious. It was beautiful indeed in its elevation, lifted high upon its rocky mountain. It was safe indeed, isolated from the invader by the precipitous ravines which enclosed and guarded the angle of the mountain plateau on which it stood; but the one thing that gave it glory was that in itGod abode. The name even of that earthly Zion was ‘Jehovah-Shammah, the Lord is there.’ And the emphasis of these words is entirely pointed in that direction. What they celebrate concerning Him is not merely the general thought that the Lord is great, but that the Lord is great in Zion. What they celebrate concerning it is that it is His city, the mountain of His holiness, where He dwells, where He manifests Himself. Because there is His self-manifestation, therefore He is there greatly to be praised. And because the

clear voice of His praise rings out from Zion, therefore is she ‘the joy of the whole earth.’ The glory of Zion, then, is that it is the dwelling-place of God.

Now, remember, that when the Old Testament Scripture speaks about God abiding in Jerusalem, it means no heathenish or material localising of the Deity, nor does it imply any depriving of the rest of the earth of the sanctity of His presence. The very psalm which most distinctly embodies the thought of God’s abode protests against that narrowness, for it begins, ‘The earth is the Lord’s and the fulness thereof: the world and they that dwell therein.’ The very ark which was the symbol of His presence, protests by its name against all such localising, for the name of it was ‘the ark of the covenant of the God of the whole earth.’ When the Bible speaks of Zion as the dwelling-place of God, it is but the expression of the fact that there, between the cherubim, was the visible sign of His presence-that there, in the Temple, as from the centre of the whole land, He ruled, and ‘out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God shone.’

We are, then, not ‘spiritualising,’ or forcing a New Testament meaning into these words, when we see in them an Eternal Truth. We are but following in the steps of history and prophecy, and of Christ and His Apostles, and of that last vision of the Apocalypse. We are but distinguishing between an idea and the fact which more or less perfectly embodies it. An idea may have many garments, may transmigrate into many different material forms. The idea of the dwelling of God with men had its less perfect embodiment, has its more perfect embodiment, will have its absolutely perfect embodiment. It had its less perfect in that ancient time. It has its real but partial embodiment in this present time, when, in the midst of the whole community of believing and loving souls, which stretches wider than any society that calls itself a Church, the living God abides and energises by His Spirit and by His Son in the souls of them that believe upon Him. ‘Ye are come unto Mount Zion and unto the city of the living God.’ And we wait for the time when, filling all the air with its light, there shall come down from God a perfect and permanent form of that dwelling; and that great city, the New Jerusalem, ‘having the glory of God,’ shall appear, and He will dwell with men and be their God.

But in all these stages of the embodiment of that great truth the glory of Zion rests in this, that in it God abides, that from it He flames in the greatness of His manifestations, which are ‘His praise in all the earth.’ It is that presence which makes her fair, as it is that presence which keeps her safe. It is that light shining within her palaces-not their own opaque darkness, which streams out far into the waste night with ruddy glow of hospitable invitation. It is God in her, not anything of her own, that constitutes her ‘the joy of the whole earth.’ ‘Thy beauty was perfect, through My comeliness, which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord.’ Zion is where hearts love and trust and follow Christ. The ‘city of the great King’ is a permanent reality in a partial form upon earth-and that partial form is itself a prophecy of the perfection of the heavens.

II. Still further, there is a second portion of this psalm which, passing beyond these introductory thoughts of the glory of Zion, recounts with wonderful power and vigour the process of the deliverance of Zion.

It extends from the fourth to the eighth verses. Mark the dramatic vigour of the description of the deliverance. There is, first, the mustering of the armies-’The kings were assembled.’ Some light is thrown upon that phrase by the proud boast which the prophet Isaiah puts into the lips of the Assyrian invader, ‘Are not my princes altogether kings?’ The subject-monarchs of the subdued nationalities that were gathered round the tyrant’s standard were used, with the wicked craft of conquerors in all ages, to bring still other lands under the same iron dominion. ‘The kings were assembled’-we see them

gathering their far-reaching and motley army, mustered from all corners of that gigantic empire. They advance together against the rocky fortress that towers above its girdling valleys. ‘They saw it, they marvelled’-in wonder, perhaps, at its beauty, as they first catch sight of its glittering whiteness from some hill crest on their march; or, perhaps, stricken by some strange amazement, as if, basilisk-like, its beauty were deadly, and a beam from the Shechinah had shot a nameless awe into their souls-’they were troubled, they hasted away.’

I need not dilate on the power of this description, nor do more than notice how the abruptness of the language, huddled together, as it were, without connecting particles, conveys the impression of hurry and confusion, culminating in the rush of fugitives fleeing under the influence of panic-terror. They are like the well-known words, ‘I came, I saw, I conquered,’ only that here we have to do with swift defeat-they came, they saw, they were conquered. They are, in regard to vivid picturesqueness, arising from the broken construction, singularly like other words which refer to the same event in the forty-sixth psalm, ‘The heathen raged, the kingdoms were moved; He uttered His voice, the earth melted.’ In their scornful emphasis of triumph they remind us of Isaiah’s description of the end of the same invasion-’So Sennacherib, king of Assyria, departed, and went and returned, and dwelt at Nineveh.’

Mark, still further, the eloquent silence as to the cause of the panic and the flight. There is no appearance of armed resistance. This is no ‘battle of the warrior with garments rolled in blood,’ and the shock of contending hosts. But an unseen Hand smites once-’and when the morning dawned they were all dead corpses.’ The impression of terror produced by such a blow is increased by the veiled allusion to it here. The silence magnifies the deliverance. If we might apply the grand words of Milton to that night of fear-

‘The trumpet spake not to the armed throng,

But kings sat still, with awful eye,

As if they surely knew their sovereign Lord was by.’

The process of the deliverance is not told here, as there was no need it should be in a hymn which is not history, but the lyrical echo of what is told in history; one image explains it all-’Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind.’ The metaphor-one that does not need expansion here-is that of a ship like a great unwieldy galleon, caught in a tempest. However strong for fight, it is not fit for sailing. It is like some of those turret ships of ours, if they venture out from the coast and get into a storm, their very strength is their destruction, their armour wherein they trusted ensures that they shall sink. And so, this huge assailant of Israel, this great ‘galley with oars,’ washing about there in the trough of the sea, as it were-God broke it in two with the tempest, which is His breath. You remember how on the medal that commemorated the destruction of the Spanish Armada-our English deliverance-there were written the words of Scripture: ‘God blew upon them and they were scattered.’ What was there true, literally, is here true in figure. The Psalmist is not thinking of any actual scattering of hostile fleets-from which Jerusalem was never in danger; but is using the shipwreck of ‘the ship of Tarshish’ as a picture of the utter, swift, God-inflicted destruction which ground that invading army to pieces, as the savage rocks and wild seas will do the strongest craft that is mangled between them.

And then, mark how from this dramatic description there rises a loftier thought still. The deliverance thus described links the present with the past. ‘As we have heard so have we seen in the city of the Lord of hosts, in the city of our God.’ Yes, brethren! God’s merciful

manifestation for ourselves, as for those Israelitish people of old, has this blessed effect, that it changes hearsay and tradition into living experience;-this blessed effect, that it teaches us, or ought to teach us, the inexhaustibleness of the divine power, the constant repetition in every age of the same works of love. Taught by it, we learn that all these old narratives of His grace and help are ever new, not past and gone, but ready to be reproduced in their essential characteristics in our lives too. ‘We have heard with our ears, O Lord, our fathers have told us what work Thou didst in their days.’ But is the record only a melancholy contrast with our own experience? Nay, truly. ‘As we have heard so have we seen.’ We are ever tempted to think of the present as commonplace. The sky right above our heads is always farthest from earth. It is at the horizon behind and the horizon in front, where earth and heaven seem to blend. We think of miracles in the past, we think of a manifest presence of God in the future, but the present ever seems to our sense-bound understandings as beggared and empty of Him, devoid of His light. But this verse suggests to us how, if we mark the daily dealings of that loving Hand with us, we have every occasion to say, Thy loving-kindness of old lives still. Still, as of old, the hosts of the Lord encamp round about them that fear Him to deliver them. Still, as of old, the voice of guidance comes from between the cherubim. Still, as of old, the pillar of cloud and fire moves before us. Still, as of old, angels walk with men. Still, as of old, His hand is stretched forth, to bless, to feed, to guard. Nothing in the past of God’s dealings with men has passed away. The eternal present embraces what we call the past, present, and future. They that went before do not prevent us on whom the ends of the ages are come. The table that was spread for them is as fully furnished for the latest guests. The light, which was so magical and lustrous in the morning beauty, for us has not faded away into the light of common day. The river which flowed in these past ages has not been drunk up by the thirsty sands. The fire that once blazed so clear has not died down into grey ashes. ‘The God of Jacob is our refuge.’ ‘As we have heard so have we seen.’

And then, still further, the deliverance here is suggested as not only linking most blessedly the present with the past, but also linking it for our confidence with all the future. ‘God will establish it for ever.’

‘Old experience doth attain

To something of prophetic strain.’

In the strength of what that moment had taught of God and His power, the singer looks onward, and whatever may be the future he knows that the divine arm will be outstretched. God will establish Zion; or, as the word might be translated, God will hold it erect, as if with a strong hand grasping some pole or banner-staff that else would totter and fall-He will keep it up, standing there firm and steadfast.

It would lead us too far to discuss the bearing of such a prophecy upon the future history and restoration of Israel, but the bearing of it upon the security and perpetuity of the Church is unquestionable. The city is immortal because God dwells in it. For the individual and for the community, for the great society and for each of the single souls that make it up, the history of the past may seal the pledge which He gives for the future. If it had been possible to destroy the Church of the living God, it had been gone long, long ago. Its own weakness and sin, the ever-new corruptions of its belief and paring of its creed, the imperfections of its life and the worldliness of its heart, the abounding evils that lie around it and the actual hostility of many that look upon it and say, Raze it, even to the ground, would have smitten it to the dust long since. It lives, it has lived in spite of all, and therefore it shall live. ‘God will establish it for ever.’

In almost every land there is some fortress or other, which the pride of the inhabitants

calls ‘the maiden fortress,’ and whereof the legend is, that it has never been taken, and is inexpugnable by any foe. It is true about the tower of the flock, the stronghold of the daughter of Zion. The grand words of Isaiah about this very Assyrian invader are our answer to all fears within and foes without: ‘Say unto him, the virgin, the daughter of Zion, hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn; the daughter of Jerusalem hath shaken her head at thee. . . . I will defend this city to save it for My own sake, and for My servant David’s sake.’ ‘God will establish it for ever,’ and the pledges of that eternal stability are the deliverances of the past and of the present.

III. Then, finally, there is still another section of this psalm to be looked at for a moment, which deals with the consequent grateful praise and glad trust of Zion.

I must condense what few things I have to say about these closing verses. The deliverance, first of all, deepens the glad meditation on God’s favour and defence. ‘We have thought,’ say the ransomed people, as with a sigh of rejoicing, ‘we have thought of Thy loving-kindness in the midst of Thy temple.’ The scene of the manifestation of His power is the scene of their thankfulness, and the first issue of His mercy is His servants’ praise.

Then, the deliverance spreads His fame throughout the world. ‘According to Thy name, O God! so is Thy praise unto the ends of the earth. Thy right hand is full of righteousness.’ The name of God is God’s own making known of His character, and the thought of these words is double. They most beautifully express the profoundest trust in that blessed name that it only needs to be known in order to be loved. There is nothing wanted but His manifestation of Himself for His praise and glory to spread. Why is the Psalmist so sure that according to the revelation of His character will be the revenue of His praise? Because the Psalmist is so sure that that character is purely, perfectly, simply good-nothing else but good and blessing-and that He cannot act but in such a way as to magnify Himself. That great sea will cast up nothing on the shores of the world but pearls and precious things. He is all ‘light, and in Him is no darkness at all.’ There needs but the shining forth in order that the light of His character shall bring gladness and joy, and the song of birds, and opening flowers wheresoever it falls.

Still further, there is the other truth in the words, that we misapprehend the purpose of our own deliverances, and the purpose of God’s mercy to Zion, if we confine these to any personal objects or lose sight of the loftier end of them all-that men may learn to know and love Him. Brethren! we neither rightly thank Him for His gifts to us nor rightly apprehend the meaning of His dealings, unless the sweetest thought to us, even in the midst of our own personal joy for deliverance, is not ‘we are saved,’ but ‘God is exalted.’

And then, beyond that, the deliverance produces in Zion, the mother city and her daughter villages, a triumph of rapture and gladness. ‘Let mount Zion rejoice, let the daughters of Judah be glad because of Thy judgments.’ Yes, even though an hundred and four score and five thousand dead men lay there, they were to be glad. Solemn and awful as is the baring of His righteous sword, it is an occasion for praise. It is right to be glad when men and systems that hinder and fight against God are swept away as with the besom of destruction. ‘When the wicked perish there is shouting,’ and the fitting epitaph for the oppressors to whom the surges of the Red Sea are shroud and gravestone is, ‘Sing ye to the Lord, for He hath triumphed gloriously.’

The last verses set forth, more fully than even the preceding ones, the height and perfectness of the confidence which the manifold mercies of God ought to produce in men’s hearts. The citizens who have been cooped up during the invasion, and who, in the

temple, as we have seen, have been rendering the tribute of their meditation and thankful gratitude to God for His loving-kindness, are now called upon to come forth from the enclosure of the besieged city, and free from all fear of the invading army, to ‘walk about Zion, and go round about her and tell the towers,’ and ‘mark her bulwarks and palaces.’

They look first at the defences, on which no trace of assault appears, and then at the palaces guarded by them, that stand shining and unharmed. The deliverance has been so complete that there is not a sign of the peril or the danger left. It is not like a city besieged, and the siege raised when the thing over which contending hosts have been quarrelling has become a ruin, but not one stone has been smitten from the walls, nor one agate chipped in the windows of the palaces. It is unharmed as well as uncaptured.

Thus, we may say, no matter what tempests assail us, the wind will but sweep the rotten branches out of the tree. Though war should arise, nothing will be touched that belongs to Thee. We have a city which cannot be moved; and the removal of the things which can be shaken but makes more manifest its impregnable security, its inexpugnable peace. As in war they will clear away the houses and the flower gardens that have been allowed to come and cluster about the walls and fill up the moat, yet the walls will stand; so in all the conflicts that befall God’s church and God’s truth, the calming thought ought to be ours that if anything perishes it is a sign that it is not His, but man’s excrescence on His building. Whatever is His will stand for ever.

And then, with wonderful tenderness and beauty, the psalm in its last words drops, as one might say, in one aspect, and in another, rises from its contemplations of the immortal city and the community to the thought of the individuals that make it up: ‘For this God is our God for ever and ever; He will be our guide even unto death.’ Prosaic commentators have often said that these last two words are an interpolation, that they do not fit into the strain of the psalm, and have troubled themselves to find out what meaning to attach to them, because it seemed to them so unlikely that, in a hymn that had only to do with the community, we should find this expression of individual confidence in anticipation of that most purely personal of all evils. That seems to me the very reason for holding fast by the words as being a genuine part of the psalm, because they express a truth, without which the confident hope of the psalm, grand as it is, is but poor consolation for each heart. It is not enough for passing, perishing men to say, ‘Never mind your own individual fate: the society, the community, will stand fast and firm.’

I want something more than to know that God will establish Zion for ever. What about me, my own individual self? And these last words answer that question. Not merely the city abides, but ‘He will be our guide even unto death.’ And surely, if so-if His loving hand will lead the citizens of His eternal kingdom even to the edge of that great darkness-He will not lose them even in its gloom. Surely there is here the veiled hope that if the city be eternal and the gates of the grave cannot prevail against it, the community cannot be eternal unless the individuals be immortal.

Such a hope is vindicated by the blessed words of a newer revelation: ‘God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He hath prepared for them a city.’

Dear brethren! remember the last words, or all but the last words of Scripture which, in their true text and reading, tell us how, instead of aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, we may become fellow-citizens with the saints. ‘Blessed are they that wash their robes that they may have a right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gate into the city!’

SBC, "There is one event, and only one, in Jewish history which corresponds point for point to the details of this Psalm—the crushing destruction of the Assyrian army under Sennacherib. We may, with considerable probability, regard it as the hymn of triumph over the baffled Assyrian and the marvellous deliverance of Israel by the arm of God. The Psalm falls into three portions. There is the glory of Zion, the deliverance of Zion, and the consequent grateful praise and glad trust of Zion.

I. The glory of Zion. The Jew’s pride in Jerusalem was a different thing altogether from the Roman’s pride in Rome. The one thing that gave it glory was that in it God abode. The name even of the earthly Zion was "Jehovah-Shammah"—"The Lord is there." We are not spiritualising or forcing a New Testament meaning into these words when we see in them an eternal truth. Zion is where hearts love, and trust, and follow Christ. The "city of the great King" is a permanent reality in a partial form upon earth, and that partial form is itself a prophecy of the perfection of the heavens.

II. The deliverance of Zion. (1) Mark the dramatic vigour of the description of the deliverance. The abruptness of the language, huddled together, as it were, without connecting particles, conveys the impression of hurry and confusion, culminating in the rush of fugitives fleeing under the influence of panic terror. (2) Mark the eloquent silence as to the cause of the panic and the flight. There is no appearance of armed resistance. An unseen hand smites once; and when the morning dawned, "they were all dead corpses." The impression of terror produced by such a blow is increased by the veiled allusion to it here. The silence magnifies the deliverance. (3) Mark how from this dramatic description there rises a loftier thought still. The deliverance thus described links the present with the past. "As we have heard, so have we seen in the city of the Lord of hosts, in the city of our God." (4) The deliverance also links the present for our confidence with all the future. "God will establish it for ever."

III. The grateful praise and glad trust of Zion. (1) The deliverance deepens the glad meditation on God’s favour and defence. (2) It spreads His fame throughout the world. (3) It produces in Zion, the mother city, and her daughter villages, a triumph of rapture and gladness. The last verses set forth the height and perfectness of the confidence which the manifold mercies of God ought to produce in men’s hearts.

A. Maclaren, Sermons Preached in Manchester, 3rd series, p. 163.

BI 1-14, "Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised.

A song of deliverance

The psalm has manifestly some historical basis. What is it? The psalm gives these points—a formidable muster before Jerusalem of hostile people under confederate kings with the purpose of laying siege to the city—some mysterious cheek which arrests them before a sword is drawn, as if some panic fear had shot from its towers and shaken their hearts—and a flight in wild confusion from the impregnable dwelling-place of the Lord of hosts. Now, there is only one event in Jewish history which corresponds, point for point, to these details—the crushing destruction of the Assyrian army under Sennacherib. The psalm falls into three portions.

I. There is the glory of Zion (Psa_48:1-2). Those words are something more than merely patriotic feeling. The Jew’s glory in Jerusalem was a different thing altogether from the Roman’s pride in Rome. For, to the devout Jew, there was one thing, and one thing only,

that made Zion glorious—that in it God abode. The name even of that earthly Zion was “Jehovah-Shammah, the Lord is there.” They celebrate concerning it that it is His city, the mountain of His holiness. This is its glory. And it is no spiritualizing or forcing a New Testament meaning into these words when we see in them the eternal truth, that the living God abides, and energizes by His Spirit and by His Son in the souls of them that believe upon Him. It is that presence which makes His Church fair as it is, that presence which keeps her safe. It is God in her, not anything of her own, that constitutes her “the joy of the whole earth.”

II. The deliverance of Zion. The psalm recounts with wonderful power and vigour the process of this deliverance (Psa_48:4-8). Mark the dramatic vigour of the description of the deliverance. There is, first, the mustering of the armies. “The kings were assembled”—we see them gathering their far-reaching and motley army, mustered from all corners of that gigantic empire. They advance together against the rocky fortress that towers above its girdling valleys. “They saw it, they marvelled”—in wonder, perhaps, at its beauty, as they first catch sight of its glittering whiteness from some hill crest on their march—or, perhaps, stricken by some strange amazement, as if, basilisk-like, its beauty were deadly, and a beam from the Shechinah had shot a nameless awe into their souls—“they were troubled, they hasted away.” The abruptness of the language in this powerful description reminds us of the well-known words, “I came, I saw, I conquered,” only that here we have to do with swift defeat—they came, they saw, they were conquered. In their scornful emphasis of triumph they are like Isaiah’s description of the end of Sennacherib’s invasion, “So Sennacherib, King of Assyria, departed, and went and returned, and dwelt at Nineveh.”

“The trumpet spake not the armed throng,

But kings sat still, with awful eye,

As if they surely knew their sovereign Lord was by.”

One image is all that is given to explain the whole process of the deliverance, “Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind.” The metaphor is that of a ship like a great unwieldy galleon caught in a tempest—compare the destruction of the Spanish Armada. However strong for fight, it is not fit for sailing. And so this huge assailant of Israel, this great “galley with oars,” washing about there in the trough of the sea, as it were—God broke it in two with the tempest which is His breath. You remember how on the medal that commemorated the destruction of the Spanish Armada—our English deliverance—there were written the words of Scripture: “God blew upon them and they were scattered.” What was there true, literally, is here true in figure. And then mark how from this drastic description there rises a loftier thought still. The deliverance thus described links the present with the past. “As we have heard, so have we seen in the city of the Lord of hosts, in the city of our God.” And with all the future—“God will establish it for ever.” God will establish Zion; or, as the word might be translated, God will hold it erect, as if with a strong hand grasping some pole or banner-staff that else would totter and fall—He will keep it up, standing there firm and stedfast. If it had been possible to destroy the Church of the living God it had been gone long, long ago. Its own weakness and sin, the ever-new corruptions of its belief and paring of its creed, the imperfections of its life and the worldliness of its heart, the abounding evils that lie around it and the actual hostility of many that look upon it and say, Raze it, even to the ground, would have smitten it to the dust long since. It lives, it has lived in spite of all, and therefore it shall live. “God will establish it for ever.” In almost every land there is some fortress or other which the pride of the inhabitants calls “the maiden fortress,” and whereof the legend is that it has never been taken, and is inexpugnable by any foe. It is true about the

tower of the flock, the stronghold of the daughter of Zion. The grand words of Isaiah about this very Assyrian invader are our answer to all fears within and foes without, “Say unto him, the virgin, the daughter of Zion, hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn.”

III. Zion’s consequent grateful praise and glad trust. The deliverance deepens their glad meditation on God’s favour and defence. “We have thought of Thy lovingkindness in the midst of Thy temple.” And it spreads God’s fame throughout the world (verse 10). (A. Maclaren, D. D.)

2 Beautiful in its loftiness, the joy of the whole earth,like the heights of Zaphon[b] is Mount Zion, the city of the Great King.

BAR�ES, "Beautiful for situation - The word rendered “situation” - nôph נוף -means properly “elevation, height,” (Ges. Lexicon); and the idea here is, that the mountain referred to is “beautiful for elevation;” that is, it rises gracefully. The allusion here is to Jerusalem as it would appear to one approaching it, and especially as it appeared to the “kings” Psa_48:4 who came to invest it, and who were so impressed with its marvelous beauty and strength, that they were afraid to attack it, and turned away Psa_48:5.

The joy of the whole earth - Either the whole “land” of Palestine, or the whole world. Most probably the former is the meaning; and the idea is that, as a place of beauty and strength, and as a place where the worship of God was celebrated, and where the people of the land were accustomed to assemble, it was a source of national joy.

Is Mount Zion - The term used here would seem to denote the whole city, Jerusalem, as it often does. Mount Zion was the most conspicuous object in the city, the residence of the king, and for a long time, until the temple was built, the place where the ark reposed, and where the worship of God was celebrated, and hence, the term came to be used to denote the whole city.

On the sides of the north - That is, probably, the houses, the palaces, on the north sides of the Mount Zion. These were eminently beautiful; they struck one in approaching the city from that quarter, as impressive and grand. The natural and usual approach to

the city was from the north, or the northwest. On the west was the valley of Gihon, on the south the valley of Hinnom; and on the east the valley of Jehoshaphat and of the brook Kidron; and it was only as the city was approached from the north that there would be a complete view of it; or, that was the only quarter from which it could be assailed. The “kings,” therefore Psa_48:8, may be supposed to have approached it from that quarter; and thus approaching it, they would have a clear and impressive view of its beauty, and of the sources of its strength - of the walls, towers, and bulwarks which defended it, and of the magnificence of the buildings on Mount Zion. Dr. Thomson (Land and the Book, vol. ii., p. 476), says of the situation of Mount Zion, “What is there or was there about Zion to justify the high eulogium of David: “Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is Mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King?” The situation is indeed eminently adapted to be the platform of a magnificent citadel.

Rising high above the deep valley of Gihon and Hinnom on the west and south, and the scarcely less deep one of the Cheesemongers on the east, it could only be assailed from the northwest; and then “on the sides of the north” it was magnificently beautiful, and fortified by walls, towers, and bulwarks, the wonder and terror of the nations: “For the kings were assembled; they passed by together. They saw it, and so they marveled; they were troubled, and hasted away.” At the thought of it the royal psalmist again bursts forth in triumph: “Walk about Zion, and go round about her; tell the towers thereof; mark ye well her bulwarks; consider her palaces, that ye may tell it to the generation following.” Alas! her towers have long since fallen to the ground, her bulwarks have been overthrown, her palaces have crumbled to dust, and we who now walk about Zion can tell no other story than this to the generation following.” It was actually on the northern side of Mount Zion that most of the edifices of the city were erected. (Reland, Pales., p. 847.)

The city of the great King - That is, of God; the place where he has taken up his abode. Compare the notes at Psa_46:4.

CLARKE, "The joy of the whole earth - Commentators have been greatly puzzled to show in what sense Zion, or the temple, could be said to be the joy of the whole earth. If we take the earth here for the habitable globe, there is no sense in which it ever was

the joy of the whole earth; but If we take כל�הארץ col�haarets, as signifying the whole of this land, (and it has no other meaning), the assertion is plain and easy to be understood, for the temple was considered the ornament and glory of the whole land of Judea.

GILL, "Beautiful for situation,.... This, and what follows, are said of the city of God, the city of Jerusalem, which was delightfully situated on an eminence, in a wholesome air; the brook Kidron gliding by it, the water of Siloah running through it or at least through some parts of it; fields and gardens adjoining to it, and mountains all around it: and so the church of Christ is built upon him, the Rock; the river of divine love runs by it, the streams whereof make it glad; the green pastures of the word and ordinances are in it; and salvation is as walls and bulwarks about it; and so healthful is it, that the inhabitants have no reason to say they are sick, since the people that dwell therein have their iniquities forgiven, Isa_33:24;

the joy of the whole earth: that is, the city of Jerusalem, Lam_2:15; especially it was so when Christ, whose birth near it was matter of great joy to all people; when he who is the desire of all nations was in it; and when the Gospel went out from it unto the whole earth, and caused joy wherever it came in power, and with the Holy Ghost: and the church of Christ, particularly in the latter day, will be an eternal excellency, and a joy of many generations, Isa_60:15; and even now the whole world has reason to rejoice and be glad, because of the church of Christ in it, who are the light of the world and the salt of the earth, and on whose account the world continues, and the men of it enjoy the blessings they do;

is Mount Zion; or "by Mount Zion": Jerusalem was near it, and beautifully situated by it;

on the sides of the north; Jerusalem was north of Zion, as Zion was south of Jerusalem; likewise the temple was on the north part of Mount Zion, Isa_14:13; the altar and altar gate were on the north side at the temple, and there were the tables on which the sacrifices were slain, Eze_8:5; and on the north side of the altar was the creature to be offered killed, Lev_1:11; and perhaps some reference is here had to the church of Christ in the latter day, which for many years past has been chiefly in our northern part of the world: hence the Protestant doctrine is by the Papists called the Northern Heresy; and it will be "tidings out of the north" that shall trouble the man of sin, or some agent of his, to come forth with fury, and plant the tabernacles of his palace between the seas, in the glorious holy mountain, Dan_11:44;

the city of the great King; of Christ the King of kings; See Gill on Psa_47:2; and See Gill on Psa_48:1.

JAMISO�, "situation— literally, “elevation.”

joy of, etc.— source of joy.

sides of the north— poetically for eminent, lofty, distinguished, as the ancients believed the north to be the highest part of the earth (compare Isa_14:13).

CALVI�,"2.Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion For the confirmation of the statement made in the preceding sentence, the prophet celebrates the excellencies for which mount Zion was at that time renowned; and in them was to be seen the glory of God, of which I have just now spoken. The beauty of its situation, which he mentions in the first place, was indeed natural; but by it he gives us to understand, that from the very commencement the agreeable appearance of the city had engraven upon it marks of the favor of God, so that the sight of it alone showed that God had in a special manner adorned and enriched that place, with the view of its being, at some future period, consecrated to sacred purposes. I do not, however, think that the situation is called beautiful and pleasant, merely because it was unequalled in the country of Judea; for there were other cities, as is well known, which were in no respect inferior to Jerusalem, either as to fertility or pleasantness of situation, and other advantages. In my opinion, along with the situation of the city, the Psalmist comprehends the glory which it derived from another source — from the circumstance that the temple of God was built there.

When, therefore, we hear the beauty of the city here celebrated, let us call to our remembrance that spiritual beauty which was added to the natural beauty of the place, after the prophecy was given forth that the ark would there abide for ever. With respect to the word נופ,noph, which I have translated situation, commentators are not agreed. Some understand it as meaning height or elevation, as if it had been said that Jerusalem was situated on high and elevated ground. Others render itclimate (190) because the Jews metaphorically call climates branches, (191) on account of the extent to which they are spread out. In a matter like this, which is of no great consequence, I am not disposed to be so very critical. Only I have selected that translation which seemed to me the most probable, namely, that the country in its appearance was pre-eminently pleasant and delightful. When the Psalmist speaks of mount Zion being on the sides of the north, it is doubtful whether he lays it down as a commendation of mount Zion, that it lay or looked towards the north; or whether we should explain the sentence thus: Although mount Zion looks towards the north, that does not in any degree diminish its beauty. The former interpretation, however, seems to me to give the more natural meaning. We find the prophet Isaiah, with the view also of touching upon the excellence of this mountain, applying to it the very expression which is here employed. In the 14th chapter of his Prophecies, at the 13th verse, he represents Sennacherib as speaking thus: “I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north.”

The Psalmist, in the next place, calls mount Zion the joy of the whole earth And he thus describes it, not only because, as the Jews foolishly talk, that country was healthy on account of the mildness of the climate; or because it produced sweet and excellent fruits, which might gratify ard yield delight to foreign nations — for this also is a cold and unsatisfactory speculation; — but because from thence salvation was to issue forth to the whole world, even as all nations have borrowed from thence the light of life, and the testimony of heavenly grace. If the joy which men experience and cherish is without God, the issue of their joy at length will be destruction, and their laughter will be turned into gnashing of teeth. But Christ appeared with his Gospel out of Zion, to fill the world with true joy and everlasting felicity. In the time of the prophet, the knowledge of the Gospel, it is true, had not yet reached foreign nations; but he makes use of this manner of expression with the highest propriety, to teach the Jews that true blessedness was to be sought for only from the gracious covenant of God, which was deposited in that holy place. At the same time also, he has foretold that which was at length fulfilled in the last time by the coming of Christ. From this we may learn, that to cause the hearts of the godly to rejoice, the favor of God alone abundantly suffices; as, on the contrary, when it is withdrawn, all men must inevitably be thrown into a state of wretchedness and sorrow. What is added immediately after, concerning the city of the great King, is intended to show, that mount Zion was not only holy itself, but that this high prerogative had been conferred upon it to render sacred the whole city, where God had chosen his seat, that he might rule over all people.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 2. Beautiful for situation. Jerusalem was so naturally, she was styled the Queen of the East; the church is so spiritually, being placed near God's

heart, within the mountain of his power, upon the hills of his faithfulness, in the centre of providential operations. The elevation of the church is her beauty. The more she is above the world the fairer she is. The joy of the whole earth is Mount Zion. Jerusalem was the world's star; whatever light lingered on earth was borrowed from the oracles preserved by Israel. An ardent Israelite would esteem the holy city as the eye of the nations, the most precious pearl of all lands. Certainly the church of God, though despised of men, is the true joy and hope of the world. On the sides of the north, the city of the great King. Either meaning that Jerusalem was in the northern extremity of Judah, or it may denote that part of the city that lay to the north of Mount Zion. It was the glory of Jerusalem to be God's city, the place of his regal dwelling, and it is the joy of the church that God is in her midst. The great God is the great King of the church, and for her sake he rules all the nations. The people among whom the Lord deigns to dwell are privileged above all others; the lines have fallen unto them in pleasant places, and they have a goodly heritage. We who dwell in Great Britain in the sides of the north, have this for our chief glory, that the Lord is known in our land, and the abode of his love is among us.EXPLA�ATORY �OTES A�D QUAI�T SAYI�GSVer. 2. Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King. What is there, or was there, about Zion to justify the high eulogium of David? The situation is indeed eminently adapted to be the platform of a magnificent citadel. Rising high above the deep valley of Gihon and Hinnom, on the west and south, and the scarcely less deep one of the Cheesemongers on the east, it could only be assailed from the northwest; and then on the sides of the north it was magnificently beautiful, and fortified by walls, towers, and bulwarks, the wonder and terror of the nations: "For the kings were assembled, they passed by together. They saw it, and so they marvelled; they were troubled, and hasted away." At the thought of it the royal psalmist again bursts forth in triumph: "Walk about Zion, and go round about her: tell the towers thereof. Mark ye well her bulwarks, consider her palaces; that ye may tell it to the generation following." Alas! her towers have long since fallen to the ground, her bulwarks have been overthrown, her palaces have crumbled to dust, and we who now walk about Zion can tell no other story than this to the generation following. There is another Zion, however, whose towers are still more glorious, and shall never be overthrown. "God is known in her palaces for a refuge." And "this God is our God for ever and ever." How often is this name synonymous with the church of the living God! and no other spot but one can divide with it the affection of his people—no other name but one can awaken such joyful hopes in the Christian's heart. The temporal Zion is now in the dust, but the true Zion is rising and shaking herself from it, and putting on her beautiful garments to welcome her King when he comes to reign over the whole earth. W. M. Thompson, D.D.Ver. 2. When I stood that morning on the brow of Olivet, and looked down on the city, crowning those battlemented heights, encircled by those deep and dark ravines, I involuntarily exclaimed, Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King. And as I gazed, the red rays of the rising sun shed a halo round the top of the castle of David; then they tipped with gold each tapering minaret, and gilded each dome of mosque and church, and at length, bathed in one flood of ruddy light the terraced roofs of the

city, and the grass and foliage, the cupolas, pavements, and colossal walls of the Haram. �o human being could be disappointed who first saw Jerusalem from Olivet. J. L. Porter.Ver. 2. (first clause). Beautiful in climate, that is, Mount Zion is situated in a fair and lovely climate. This is the view taken by Montanus and Ainsworth. Bate and Parkhurst read, "Beautiful in extension, i.e., in the prospect which it extends to the eye." Editorial �ote to Calvin in loc.Ver. 2. Beautiful for situation. This earth is, by sin, covered with deformity, and therefore justly might that spot of ground, which was thus beautified with holiness, be called the joy of the whole earth, i.e., what the whole earth had reason to rejoice in, because God would thus in very deed dwell with man upon the earth. Matthew Henry.Ver. 2. Beautiful for situation.—Fair JerusalemThe holy city, lifted high her towers,And higher yet the glorious temple rearedHer pile, far off appearing like a mountOf alabaster, topped with golden spires.John Milton in "Paradise Regained."Ver. 2. On the sides of the north. Jerusalem, that is the upper and best part of it, was built on the north side of Mount Zion. Hadrian Reland, 1676-1718.Ver. 2. Jerusalem lay to the north of Sion, and this circumstance is mentioned as a proof of Mount Zion's greatest security, for it was almost inaccessible on any other side except the north, and there is was defended by Jerusalem, which was very strong. Samuel Burder.Ver. 2. The great King. God is named the great King in opposition to the kings in Psalms 48:4. E. W. Hengstenberg.

TRAPP, "Psalms 48:2 Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, [is] mount Zion, [on] the sides of the north, the city of the great King.

Ver. 2. Beautiful for situation] A beautiful nymph, so R. Solomon. Or, beautiful for the branch that droppeth balsam, saith Moller; Pulcher surculo, beautiful branch, that is, for the ark there seated. Or, for the tract and climate, as Joshua 12:23, situated on the north side of Jerusalem, as Isaiah 14:13, in a cold, dry, and clear air, as Job 37:22. Sanantur illi, qui illic infirmi conveniunt, saith Kimchi, they which come thither weak are made well.

The joy of the whole earth] �ot only of the whole land, because thither three times a year the tribes went up, the tribes of the Lord unto the testimony of Israel, to give thanks unto the name of the Lord, Psalms 122:4, not only of the East, whereof Jerusalem was held and called the queen, Urbium totius Orientis clarissima, saith Pliny, see Lamentations 1:1, but also of the whole earth, Sumen totius orbis, as one calleth it, and Rabshakeh himself (in that more ingenuous than Strabo) confesseth Judea to be a land of grain and wine, of bread and vineyards, Isaiah 36:17. Hence it is called the excellency of Jacob, Psalms 47:4, the goodness of the Lord for wheat

and for wine, and for oil, and for the young of the flock and of the herd; for all which men should come to sing in the height of Zion; but especially for spiritual blessings, that their souls might be as watered gardens, and they not sorrow any more at all, Jeremiah 31:12; but come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads, Isaiah 35:10, for the grace of God, that bringeth salvation to all men, therehence appearing, Titus 2:11, Isaiah 2:3-4. If Plutarch could say of Rome in �uma’s time, that the neighbour villages, sucking in the air of that city, breathed righteousness; how much better might the same be said of this city of the great King, where God himself was resiant, and his sincere service was established! Psalms 132:13.

BE�SO�, "Psalms 48:2. Beautiful for situation is mount Zion — A beautiful place it is, which he hath chosen for his habitation; and that which especially renders it beautiful is, that it is the mountain of God’s holiness, the place where, in infinite wisdom, he hath fixed his sanctuary. The joy of the whole earth — For the law was to go forth out of Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem; the joyful doctrine of the gospel, the glad tidings of salvation, were to go out from thence unto all nations. The words however may be rendered, The joy of the, or this, whole land: for God’s sanctuary, the solemn feasts kept there, and the vast multitudes of people who from time to time assembled at them, rendered it a most desirable place. On the sides of the north — It lies on the north side of Jerusalem; the city of the great King — Of Jehovah, the King of heaven and earth. Zion, however, is thought by some to have been situated on the south side of the mountain; but the temple stood on the north side of it, and was its peculiar honour and distinction.

COKE, "Psalms 48:2. Beautiful for situation, &c.— The expression of mount Sion's being the joy of the whole earth, seems to allude to the promise made to the patriarch, that in his seed all the nations of the earth should be blessed. And the law, the Christian law, may be said literally to have gone out from mount Zion into all lands. On the sides of the north, or north side [lies] the city of the great king, means the city of Jerusalem. It may be asked, why this circumstance is mentioned as an encomium upon the hill of Sion, that Jerusalem lay on the north of it: The answer is, that it is mentioned as a proof of its greater security; for the hill of Sion was almost inaccessible on any other side, than towards the north; and here it was defended by Jerusalem, which was exceedingly strong: But though the psalmist mentions this as a material circumstance, he shews that it was not in the strength of it that he confided, but in the presence and protection of God; God is known in her palaces for a refuge.

EBC, "The general sense of the first part is plain, but Psa_48:2 is difficult. "Mount Zion" is obviously subject, and "lovely in loftiness" and "joy of all the earth" predicates; but the grammatical connection of the two last clauses is obscure. Further, the meaning of "the sides of the north" has not been satisfactorily ascertained. The supposition that there is an allusion in the phrase to the mythological mountain of the gods, with which Zion is compared, is surely most unnatural. Would a Hebrew psalmist be likely to introduce such a parallel, even in order to assert the superiority of Zion? Nor is the grammatical objection to the supposition less serious. It requires a good deal. of stretching and inserting to twist the two words "the sides of the north" into a

comparison. It is more probable that the clause is topographical, describing some part of the city, but what part is far from clear. The accents make all the verse after "earth" the subject of the two preceding predicates, and place a minor division at "north," implying that "the sides of the north" is more closely connected with "Mount Zion" than with the "city of the great King," or than that last clause is.

Following these indications, Stier renders "Mount Zion [and] the northern side (i.e., the lower city, on the north of Zion), which together make the city," etc. Others see here "the Holy City regarded from three points of view"-viz., "the Mount Zion" (the city of David), "the sides of the north" (Mount Moriah and the Temple), "the city of the great King" (Jerusalem proper). So Perowne and others. Delitzsch takes Zion to be the Temple hill, and "the sides of the north" to be in apposition. "The Temple hill, or Zion, in the narrower sense, actually formed the northeastern corner of ancient Jerusalem," says he, and thus regards the subject of the whole sentence as really twofold, not threefold, as appears at first-Zion on the north, which is the palace temple, and Jerusalem at its feet, which is "the city of the great King." But it must be admitted that no interpretation runs quite smoothly, though the summary ejection of the troublesome words "the sides of the north" from the text is too violent a remedy.

But the main thought of this first part is independent of such minute difficulties. It is that the one thing which made Zion-Jerusalem glorious was God’s presence in it. It was beautiful in its elevation; it was safely isolated from invaders by precipitous ravines, inclosing the angle of the plateau on which it stood. But it was because God dwelt there and manifested Himself there that it was "a joy for all the earth." The name by which even the earthly Zion is called is "Jehovah-Shammah, The Lord is there." We are not forcing New Testament ideas into Old Testament words when we see in the psalm an eternal truth. An idea is one thing; the fact which more or less perfectly embodies it is another. The idea of God’s dwelling with men had its less perfect embodiment in the presence of the Shechinah in the Temple, its more perfect in the dwelling of God in the Church, and will have its complete when the city "having the glory of God" shall appear, and He will dwell with men and be their God. God in her, not anything of her own, makes Zion lovely and gladdening. "Thy beauty was perfect through My comeliness which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord."

LANGE, "Psalm 48:2-3. Beautiful for situation (in elevation.) The terms “perfection of beauty,” “the joy of the whole earth,” are taken as a single cumulative one in Lamentations 2:15, perhaps with reference to this passage, and Psalm 50:2; Isaiah 60:15; Ezekiel 16:14; Ezekiel 24:25. The word נוף was misunderstood by the ancients, and is wrongly rendered by Luther, (after the Chald. and Jerome), “Zweiglein”=little branch. That it has the sense of “elevation” is established by a comparison with the Arabic. That a geographical elevation is not meant is obvious from Psalm 68:17, where the high hills of Bashan are said to envy the hill of Zion on account of its superior loftiness. (Comp. also Isaiah 2:2; Ezekiel 40:2; Revelation 21:10). So too “the sides of the north,” translated by Hitzig “the corner of the north,” and by Hengstenberg and Hupfeld “the extreme north,” must be understood not in a topographic but a religious sense; as in Isaiah 14:13, where the mountain of God lies on the sides of the north. This mythologic idea in the last named passage comes from the lips of the Chaldean king, and cannot be at once transferred to the Biblical writers. Nor does Ezekiel 5:5 accord with it, for here Jerusalem is placed in the midst of the nations and countries round about her. So in Ezekiel 38:6; Ezekiel 38:15; Ezekiel 39:2 the extreme north is the residence of Gog and Magog. Now Mount Zion is not here compared to the supposed mountain homes of the gods of the Asiatic nations in the far north, nor is it presented as realizing that of which the heathen dreamed, (Hengst, Ewald,

Hitzig and others). Both the phrase and the context suggest a definite locality. It cannot, however, be the “north side of the city,” (Aben Ezra, Kimchi, Calvin, etc.), since Mount Zion is its most southerly hill; nor can the meaning be “on the north side lies the city,” (Luther, Rosen, etc.), for this does not agree with the order of the words. These are in opposition, not with “joy,” as if Zion were the joy of the remote north, i.e. the most distant nations (Gesen, De Wette), but with “Zion.” The temple hill is thus designated as being the northeastern corner, or northern angle (Delitzsch, Schegg,) of Mount Zion, and so giving a reason for the name of the city itself. This explanation is plainer than that of “in the extreme north the city of the Great King,” (Hupfeld). Since Zion is thus contrasted with another mountain in the south, on which God appeared, viz, Sinai, to strike out the words that are obscure, as Olshausen proposes, is not admissible.

[Stanley:Beautiful in elevation. To the traveller approaching Jerusalem from the west or east, it must have always presented the appearance, beyond any other capital of the then known world—we may add, beyond any important city that has ever existed on the earth—of a mountain city; breathing, as compared with the sultry plains of the Jordan or of the coast, a mountain air; enthroned, as compared with Jericho, or Damascus, Gaza or Tyre, on a mountain fastness.—Perowne:The sides of the north. The question is to what particular part of it the words refer. (1) Now Jerusalem itself did not lie on the north, but on the south side of the elevated table land. But the Temple did lie north, i.e, northeast of the city; and as the Temple was, in a peculiar sense, the dwelling-place of God, the Psalmist may have designated this when he spoke of the “sides of the north,” the expression being sufficiently accurate for the purpose of poetry. Hence we have the Holy City regarded from three different points of view, viz.: “the Mount Zion,” (the city of David), “the sides of the north,” (Mount Moriah and the Temple), “the city of the Great King,” (Jerusalem proper). Compare Matthew 5:35. (2) If, however, Zion be the peak now leveled on the north of the Temple mount, as Furguson and Thrupp suppose, “the Mount Zion (on) the sides of the north” may be the true rendering here. And this, too, might peculiarly be called “beautiful for situation,” as it was the highest point of the whole plateau, and that which would most readily strike the eye. (3) Another reason may be suggested why the north should be especially mentioned, because an enemy approaching like the Assyrians, would obtain their first view of the city on that side.—J. F.]

BI 2-3, 'Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth is Mount Zion.

Spiritual nationality

I. A rehearsal of Jewish history. This is necessary in order to understand the inner meaning of this psalm. Israel’s history begins with Abraham. His life nomadic, wandering, a wilderness life. And so with Israel for centuries it was a forced desert experience.

II. The divine philosophy of it. It was to make up the longing for rest, for a settled habitation and a national life. They had learned enough to know that cities enable men to unite, to concentrate for great material purposes. Cities not only symbolized but secured possession, fixity, safety, growth, nationality. Hence their joy in Jerusalem of which this psalm is an utterance.

III. And to all this the christian life correspends. God’s call separates, but ultimately unites. Let us anticipate our future in “the city of habitation.” (J. McDougall.)

The charm of Zion

(with Psa_12:1-8):—There is comfort for us in the thought that Zion’s beauty was spiritual; there is also warning. Wanting spiritual power, certain churches would have something left, a remaining charm. Their architectural monuments, their imposing ceremonies would still command a measure of deference and support, But wanting spiritual power, we are destitute indeed. Our Churches consist of persons who have made deliberate profession of faith in Christ; faith whereby they enter into spiritual union with Him. He is their Head, they are His members.

I. Charm in our church life must therefore ever be dependent, first, upon the actualizing of this relation, by real communion with Christ. The unreal has no charm for God, and He purposes that it should have none for man. The Bible makes this clear, and experience echoes Bible teaching. Real communion with Christ is not sentiment. It is the surrender and reinforcement of the will. It is obedience, love, self-sacrifice supernaturally sustained. It is sharing the spirit and life of Jesus.

II. Another essential to charm in the Church is sympathy. The New Testament incites to brotherly love, bearing one another’s burdens, looking on the things of others, and such like. In the first age, before the art of sublimating precepts into metaphors was discovered, these incitements found response; love was patent, sympathy flowed freely. The stream of sympathy flows still, but its course is often blocked by boulder-like conventionalities; and, where communion with Christ is defective, it fails at the spring. The social meeting, not unknown among us, merits study and development: the meeting in which our members get to know one another, discover that Christian fellowship is compatible with social friendship, and find opportunity for quiet natural speech upon the things of God.

III. This brings me to another matter which must contribute charm to our Church life, namely, the disclosure of joy in God. Our recoil from cant has silenced the sincere. Yet, doubtless, every Christian should reveal, in look and word, the wealth of joy he has discovered in the Gospel. Of course, it is “bad form” to be demonstrative; to advertise one’s emotions. It may be. But the stony immobility that never calls attention with enthusiasm to marvels of nature or miracles of grace is insulting to God; a fraudulent witholding of His due praise.

IV. Something should be added about aggressive activity. If the Church is to maintain and increase her charm she must make it clear that she holds no truce with the giant wrongs under which men suffer. In warring against these the Church has done, and is doing, nobly. We claim, too, that she has supplied inspiration for’ humanitarian enterprise effected under other auspices. When our best men take their seats in Town Council, the Church is present in their persons, and is a good councillor. Yet her watchword must be “Forward.” The dullest scorner must be left without excuse for echoing the stupid libel that our churches are Pullman cars for heaven, the passengers caring only for their travelling comforts and safe arrival. (G. Hawker.)

The beauty of Christ’s Church

The situation (of Mount Zion) is, indeed, eminently adapted to be the platform of a magnificent citadel. Rising high above the deep Valley of Gihon and Hinnom on the West and South, and the scarcely less deep one of the Cheesemongers on the East, it could only be assailed from the Northwest; and then “on the side of the North” it was magnificently beautiful, and fortified by walls, towers and bulwarks, the wonder and

terror of the nations. Alas her towers have long since fallen to the ground, her bulwarks have been overthrown, her palaces have crumbled to the dust, and we who now walk about Zion can tell no other story than this to the generation following. There is another Zion, however, whose towers are still more glorious and shall never be overthrown. (W. M. Thomson, D. D.)

3 God is in her citadels; he has shown himself to be her fortress.

BAR�ES, "God is known in her palaces - The word rendered “palaces” here

means properly a fortress, castle, or palace, so called from its height, from a verb, ארם

'âram, meaning to elevate, to lift up. It may be applied to any fortified place, and would

be particularly applicable to a royal residence, as a castle or stronghold. The word “known” here means that it was well understood, or that the point had been fully tested and determined that God had chosen those abodes as his special residence - as the place where he might be found.

For a refuge - See the notes at Psa_46:1. That is, there was safety or security in the God who had chosen Jerusalem as his special abode.

CLARKE, "God is known in her palaces for a refuge - All those who worship there in spirit and truth, find God for their refuge. But the words may be understood: God is known for the defense of her palaces; and with this view of the subject agree the three following verses.

GILL, "God is known in her palaces for a refuge. As there were palaces in Jerusalem; see Psa_48:13; so there are in the church of Christ; every place in it is a palace fit for a king; and everyone that has truly a name and a place there are kings and priests unto God: and here God is a "refuge" both for saints and sinners to fly unto; See Gill on Psa_46:1; and is "known" to be so; the ministers of the Gospel being here appointed to direct and encourage souls to flee to Christ for refuge, who is the hope set before them in the everlasting Gospel, preached by them to lay hold upon; and all that do flee to him know, by experience, that he is a refuge for them; and as all the people of God do in every time of distress, and when all refuge fails them elsewhere.

JAMISO�, "palaces— literally, “citadels.”

refuge— (Psa_9:10; Psa_18:3). He was so known in them because they enjoyed His presence.

SBC, "I. God. The first germ of religion is the conception of God. God is a Spirit, and only spiritual natures can worship. Even false worship argues a constitutional capacity for the true. The beasts that perish never fall into idolatry.

II. God is. This is the first proposition in the inspired confession of faith, "He that cometh to God must believe that He is" (Heb_11:6). This is the pillar and ground of truth. Our idea of God depends on His existence, not His existence on our idea.

III. God is known. God is, and He may be, known, for He puts Himself in our way at every turn of our path. Not only out of his own mouth, but out of his own frame, the atheist will be condemned. In the organisation of his body, and the capacity of his mind, and the things of his conscience he might have known God if he would.

IV. God is known in her. "God is known" may be taken as the motto of natural, "God is known in her" as the motto of revealed, religion. Jerusalem occupied the very centre of God’s work and ways. In her the word was deposited that from her it might spread; in her God was known that by her He might be made known to the nations of the earth.

V. God is known in her palaces. The Psalm commemorates a revival in high places. With God there is no respect of persons. The rich are as precious in His sight as the poor, and no more.

VI. God is known in her palaces for a refuge. On this last point all that has gone before absolutely depends. The idea, the existence, the knowledge, of God, whether among rich or poor, become for us all or nothing according as we recognise Him as our refuge or fear Him as our foe. Whether they flee from God or to Him is the article of a standing or a falling Church, a living or a dying soul. They who do not know God as a refuge do not know Him at all.

W. Arnot, The Anchor of the Soul, and Other Sermons, p. 138.

CALVI�,"3.God in her palaces is known for a defense Here the sacred poet again brings forward, for the purpose of setting forth the dignity of the city of Jerusalem, the protection which God afforded it; as we have seen in Psalms 46:5,

“God is in the midst of her: she shall not be moved: God shall help her, and that right early.”

He expressly makes mention of palaces for the sake of contrast — to teach the Jews, that although the holy city was fortified by strong towers, and had within it magnificent houses, and such as resembled fortresses, yet its continued safety was owing to the power and aid of God alone. By these words, the people of God are taught, that although they dwell in strongholds and palaces, they must, nevertheless, be carefully on their guard, that this magnificence or loftiness may not shroud or conceal from their view the power of God; and that they be not like worldly men, who, resting satisfied with riches and earthly means of help, set no value whatever upon having God for their guardian and protector. Worldly wealth, from our natural perverseness, tends to dazzle our eyes, and to make us forget God, and,

therefore, we ought to meditate with special attention upon this doctrine, That whatever we possess, which seems worthy of being prized, must not be permitted to obscure the knowledge of the power and grace of God; but that, on the contrary, the glory of God ought always clearly to shine forth in all the gifts with which he may be pleased to bless and adorn us; so that we may account ourselves rich and happy in him, and no where else.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 3. God is known in her palaces for a refuge. We worship no unknown God. We know him as our refuge in distress, we delight in him as such, and run to him in every time of need. We know nothing else as our refuge. Though we are made kings, and our houses are palaces, yet we have no confidence in ourselves, but trust in the Lord Protector, whose well known power is our bulwark.

TRAPP, "Psalms 48:3 God is known in her palaces for a refuge.

Ver. 3. God is known in her palaces for a refuge] As the city was an ornament to the whole country, so was God to the city, as being a common refuge to both; and as having his holy temple there, not a professed sanctuary for impiety, as Florus spitefully styled it, but far better deserving than �uma’s new temple in Rome did, to be called πιστοως και ειρηνης ιερον, the sacrary of faith and peace, where the true God was truly worshipped, and found to be a very present help in trouble, the best bulwark.

BE�SO�, "Psalms 48:3. God is known — To his people, by sensible and long experience; in her palaces — In the habitations of the city, and not only in the cottages, or meaner dwellings, but in the palaces: the princes and great men have recourse to God, and seek help from him. Possibly he may point at the king’s palace and the temple, which was the palace of the King of heaven; which two palaces God did in a singular manner protect, and, by protecting them, protected the whole city and people. For a refuge — Under whose shadow his people are more safe and secure than other cities are with their great rivers and impregnable fortifications. “Thus the great Founder of the church is also her protector and defender. The dependance of the new Jerusalem, like that of the old, is not in man, or in the arm of flesh, but in God, who resideth in the midst of her. For, surely, unless he kept the city, the watchmen in the towers would wake but in vain.” — Horne.

EBC, "The second part pictures Zion’s deliverance with picturesque vigour (Psa_48:3-8). Psa_48:3 sums up the whole as the act of God, by which He has made Himself known as that which the refrain of Psa_46:1-11 declared Him to be-a refuge, or, literally, a high tower. Then follows the muster of the hosts. "The kings were assembled." That phrase need not be called exaggeration, nor throw doubt on the reference to Sennacherib’s army, if we remember the policy of Eastern conquerors in raising their armies from their conquests, and the boast which Isaiah puts into the mouth of the Assyrian: "Are not my princes altogether kings?" They advance against the city. "They saw,"-no need to say what. Immediately they "were amazed." The sight of the city broke on them from some hillcrest on their march. Basilisk-like, its beauty was paralysing, and shot a nameless awe into their hearts. "They were terror-struck: they fled." As in Psa_46:6, the clauses, piled up without cement of connecting particles convey an impression

of hurry, culminating in the rush of panic-struck fugitives. As has been often noticed, they recall Caesar’s Veni, vidi, vici; but these kings came, saw, were conquered. No cause for the rout is named. No weapons were drawn in the city. An unseen hand "smites once, and smites no more"; for once is enough. The process of deliverance is not told; for a hymn of victory is not a chronicle. One image explains it all, and signalises the Divine breath as the sole agent. "Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind" is not history, but metaphor. The unwieldy, huge vessel, however strong for fight, is unfit for storms, and, caught in a gale, rolls heavily in the trough of the sea, and is driven on a lee shore and ground to pieces on its rocks. "God blew upon them, and they were scattered," as the medal struck on the defeat of the Armada had it. In the companion psalm God’s uttered voice did all. Here the breath of the tempest, which is the breath of His lips, is the sole agent.

The past, of which the nation had heard from its fathers, lives again in their own history; and that verification of traditional belief by experience is to a devout soul the chief blessing of its deliverances. There is rapture in the thought that "As we have heard, so have we seen." The present ever seems commonplace. The sky is farthest from earth right overhead, but touches the ground on the horizon behind and before. Miracles were in the past; God will be manifestly in the far-off future, but the present is apt to seem empty of Him. But if we rightly mark His dealings with us, we shall learn that nothing in His past has so passed that it is not present. As the companion psalm says, The God of Jacob is our refuge," this exclaims, "As we have heard, so have we seen."

But not only does the deliverance link the present with the past, but it flings a steady light into the future. "God shall establish her forever." The city is truly "the eternal city," because God dwells in it. The psalmist was thinking of the duration of the actual Jerusalem, the imperfect embodiment of a great idea. But whatever may be its fate, the heart of his confidence is no false vision; for God’s city will outlast the world. Like the "maiden fortresses," of which there is one in almost every land, fondly believed never to have been taken by enemies, that city is inexpugnable, and the confident answer to every threatening assailant is, "The virgin, the daughter of Zion, hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn; the daughter of Jerusalem hath shaken her head at thee." "God will establish her forever." The pledges of that stability are the deliverances of the past and present.

BI, "God is known in her palaces for a refuge.

The secret of national greatness

It is not the nation makes the people, but the people make the nation. On the rulers depends the nation’s prosperity. When God is honoured in the palace He will be worshipped in the cottage. When Atheists make laws, sedition will be the offspring.

I. Influence always descends. It is like the rain and dew. The less follow the great. Great power, great wealthy, great minds always lead.

II. The great affect the great. The kings of the earth saw and were troubled. Palace religion is more displayed than that of the cottage. God has His own work for the insignificant, but the great have also their higher sphere.

III. National religion is national preservation. The kings hasted away. Their hostility was vain in the presence of Him who was the Refuge of the palace. (Homilist.)

God known as a refuge

Even false worship argues a constitutional capacity for the true.

I. The conception of God is the greatest thing in man. In proportion as it is lost or distorted, human dignity decays, and the race sinks nearer the level of inferior creatures. The mould on which he was made is the cause of man’s original greatness; but when he ceases to lay himself habitually back upon his origin, his being shrinks down again into the dimensions of a lower species.

II. God is. This is the first proposition in the inspired confession of faith (Heb_11:6). An atheist may reason against the existence of God, and a worldly man may keep God out of all his thoughts, but neither the one nor the other can blot God out of being. Although we practically banish God out of our little spot of time, He will meet us when we enter His great eternity.

III. God is known. Observe Paul’s method in reasoning with the Athenians regarding the altar which they had dedicated to the unknown God, and the cognate argument which he addressed to the idolaters at Lystra (Act_14:15-17; Act_17:22-29). This is an inspired recognition of natural religion. The revelation which has been imprinted on earth and sky does not go far enough for the necessities of the fallen; but it is true as far as it goes. Men ought both to perceive its meaning and trust in its truth.

IV. God is known in her. “God is known,” may be taken as the motto of natural, “God is known in her,” as the motto of revealed religion. Wherever Christ is admitted King into a believing heart, there are the thrones of the house of David, there the temple stands, and thence sweet incense rises morning and evening to Heaven. Wherever many such believers are congregated, there is the city of the great King; wherever there are believing men and women, there is a peopled Jerusalem; and of that city it is the distinction still that God is known in her.

V. God is known in her palaces. The psalm commemorates a revival in high places (2Ch_17:1-19; 2Ch_18:1-34; 2Ch_19:1-11; 2Ch_20:1-37.). When grace was poured into the heart of the king, all ranks felt the benefit. The human skull, where the material organ of thought resides, has been called the palace of the soul. The princely spirit that dwells beneath that stately dome counts and keeps the whole world its tributary. In a princely way this king of the creatures has caught and tamed the powers of nature, and yoked them to his chariot. At the door of that regal residence a Stranger stands and knocks. Hear His voice, “If any man open, I will come in.” This is God our Saviour. When He is admitted, God will be known in that palace; for, “He that hath seen Me, hath seen the Father.” Not Christ in heaven, but Christ in you, is the hope of glory.

VI. God is known in her palaces for a refuge. The idea, the existence, the knowledge of God, whether among rich or poor, become for us all or nothing, according as we recognize Him as our refuge, or fear Him as our foe. For poor, blind, guilty, dying creatures, such as we are, there are only two ways open—we must either flee from God, or flee to Him. To those no good can happen, to these no evil. One thing is needful; and this is the meaning of a Gospel ministry, “Be ye reconciled to God.” Make Him your refuge, and you will find the way is open, the welcome prepared; all things will work together for your good. (W. Arnot.)

4 When the kings joined forces, when they advanced together,

BAR�ES, "For, lo, the kings were assembled - There is evidently allusion here to some fact that had occurred; some gathering together of kings and their armies, with a view to besiege or attack Jerusalem. The kings referred to, if the allusion here is, as is supposed, to the time of Jehoshaphat, were the kings of Ammon and of Moab, and of Mount Seir, and perhaps others, not particularly mentioned, who came up against Jehoshaphat, 2Ch_20:1, 2Ch_20:10.

They passed by together - That is, they were smitten with consternation; they were so impressed with the beauty, the majesty, the strength of the city, that they passed along without venturing to attack it. Or, perhaps, the meaning may be, that they were discomfited and overthrown as suddenly “as if” the mere sight of the city had filled their minds with dread, and had made them desist from their intended assault. Compare 2Ch_20:22-25.

CLARKE, "For, lo, the kings were assembled -Many of the neighboring potentates, at different times, envied the prosperity of the Jewish nation, and coveted the riches of the temple; but they had no power against it till the cup of Jewish transgression was full. In vain did they assemble - confederate, and invade the land. Saw it - reconnoitered the place; marvelled at its excellence and strength, for they were troubled - struck with fear; hasted away for fear of destruction, for fear took hold on them as pains seize on a woman to travail. Those who came to destroy were glad to make their own escape.

GILL, "For, lo, the kings were assembled,.... As the princes of the Philistines to seek for David, when in the strong hold of Zion, 2Sa_5:17; as the Ethiopians in the time of Asa, 2Ch_14:9; and the Moabites and Ammonites in the times of Jehoshaphat, 2Ch_20:1; and the kings of Syria and Israel in the times of Ahaz, Isa_7:1; and Sennacherib with his princes, who, in his esteem, were kings, in the times of Hezekiah, 2Ki_18:17; which are instances of the kings, of the nations' gathering together against Zion, the city of Jerusalem, and people of the Jews, who were typical of the church of Christ; and that without success, and to their own confusion and destruction; though this seems to refer to the latter day of the Gospel dispensation, when all the kings of the earth, Pagan, Papal, and Mahometan, will be gathered together at the instigation of Satan, to the battle of the great day of the Lord God Almighty, in a place called Armageddon, where they will

be defeated by Christ the King of kings, Rev_16:13. Jarchi and Kimchi interpret the passage of Gog and Magog gathering together to fight against Jerusalem, with which compare Rev_20:8;

they passed by together; either to the battle, as Jarchi explains it; or they passed by Jerusalem, the city of our God, the church, without entering into it, or doing it any harm.

HE�RY, "II. That the kings of the earth were afraid of it. That God was known in their palaces for a refuge they had had a late instance, and a very remarkable one. Whatever it was, 1. They had had but too much occasion to fear their enemies for the kings were assembled, Psalm 48:4. The neighbouring princes were confederate against Jerusalem their heads and horns, their policies and powers, were combined for its ruin they were assembled with all their forces they passed, advanced, and marched on together, not doubting but they should soon make themselves masters of that city which should have been the joy, but was the envy of the whole earth. 2. God made their enemies to fear them. The very sight of Jerusalem struck them into a consternation and gave check to their fury, as the sight of the tents of Jacob frightened Balaam from his purpose to curse Israel (�umbers 24:2): They saw it and marvelled, and hasted away, Psalm 48:5. �ot Veni, vidi, vici--I came, I saw, I conquered but, on the contrary, Veni vidi victus sum--I came, I saw, I was defeated. �ot that there was any thing to be seen in Jerusalem that was so very formidable but the sight of it brought to mind what they had heard concerning the special presence of God in that city and the divine protection it was under, and God impressed such terrors on their minds thereby as made them retire with precipitation. Though they were kings, though they were many in confederacy, yet they knew themselves an unequal match for Omnipotence, and therefore fear came upon them, and pain, Psalm 48:6. �ote, God can dispirit the stoutest of his church's enemies, and soon put those in pain that live at ease. The fright they were in upon the sight of Jerusalem is here compared to the throes of a woman in travail, which are sharp and grievous, which sometimes come suddenly (1 Thessalonians 5:3), which cannot be avoided, and which are effects of sin and the curse. The defeat hereby given to their designs upon Jerusalem is compared to the dreadful work made with a fleet of ships by a violent storm, when some are split, others shattered, all dispersed (Psalm 48:7): Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind effects at sea lie thus exposed. The terrors of God are compared to an east wind (Job 27:20,21) these shall put them into confusion, and break all their measures. Who knows the power of God's anger?

JAMISO�, "For— The reason is given. Though the kings (perhaps of Moab and Ammon, compare Psa_83:3-5) combined, a conviction of God’s presence with His people, evinced by the unusual courage with which the prophets (compare 2Ch_20:12-20) had inspired them, seized on their minds, and smitten with sudden and intense alarm, they fled astonished.

CALVI�,"4For, behold! the kings assembled Here that special deliverance of which I have spoken is touched upon. The prophet relates how, when the kings were

assembled together to destroy Jerusalem, their efforts passed away without producing any effect, even as clouds in the atmosphere vanish away; yea, he tells us, that by a simple look at the city, they were defeated and undone, and that not after an ordinary manner, but like a woman who, when the hour of child-birth has come upon her, finds herself suddenly afflicted with pain and sorrow. We cannot affirm with certainty what particular part of Jewish history the prophet here speaks of; but the statements made suit very well both the time of Ahaz, and that of Hezekiah or Asa. It was indeed a wonderful work of God, when two very powerful kings —the king of Syria and the king of Israel, accompanied with an immense army — had smitten the city with such terror, that the king and his people were brought to the brink of despair, to see this formidable host suddenly routed and disappointed of the certain expectation which they entertained of making themselves masters of the city. Hence the prophet Isaiah 7:4 ironically calls them “smoking firebrands,” because they were, so to speak, burning torches to kindle and consume by fire the whole country of Judea. �or was the destruction of the countless host of Sennacherib in one night by an angel, without the intervention of man’s agency, a less stupendous miracle, (2 Kings 19:35; Isaiah 37:36.) In like manner, when the king of Ethiopia gathered together an army of ten hundred thousand men, and came to besiege Jerusalem, the overthrow of so great a host was a memorable instance of the power of God, (2 Chronicles 14:9.) But whatever was the occasion on which this psalm was composed, the sacred writer informs us that the Jews found from manifest experience that God was the guardian and protector of the holy city, when he opposed himself to the invincible power of their enemies. He first declares that the kings assembled By these words he intimates that they had confederated and conspired together to destroy the Church. The expression, passed away together, may be explained in two ways; either as meaning that the armies when they had gathered themselves together were reduced to nothing, or that they undertook together, and with one consent, the expedition, as it were marshalled in battle array.

This second sense seems to me the most suitable to the scope of the passage; for it follows immediately after in the fifth verse, that they stood stricken with astonishment whenever they saw the city; and yet there will be no impropriety in understanding this verse as added by way of amplification. But as it affects very little the substance of the passage which of these two interpretations is adopted, I leave the reader to choose that which he considers the most appropriate. When the Psalmist says that upon beholding the city they marvelled — were frightened — fled precipitately — and were seized with sorrow, like the pangs of a woman in travail — he heaps together as many and varied expressions as possible, in order to set forth the greatness of the miracle which God had wrought in the overthrow of such a vast and formidable host. The language should be resolved thus: As soon as they saw the city they marvelled. It is related of Caesar in ancient times, that when speaking of the ease with which he subdued Egypt, he made use of the laconic saying, “I came, I saw, I conquered;” but the prophet here states, on the contrary, that the ungodly were struck with amazement at the mere sight of the city, as if God had dazzled their eyes with the splendor of his glory. The particle כן, ken, so, is put as it were to show the thing by pointing to it with the finger. In the verse which immediately follows, the adverb שם, sham, there, is used in the same sense. The

comparison of a woman in travail is intended to express the sudden change which came upon the enemies of Israel. It afforded a more bright and illustrious manifestation of the grace of God, that they were seized with a fear which they had not anticipated, lost their courage all at once, and from the height of secure and presumptuous pride, instantly fell into such a state of terror, and were so confounded, that they precipitately betook themselves to flight. (193) From this passage we are taught that it is no uncommon thing, if in our day the Church is assailed by powerful adversaries, and has to sustain dreadful assaults; for it has been God’s usual way from the beginning thus to humble his own people, in order to give more irrefragable and striking proofs of his wonderful power. At the same time, let us remember that a nod alone on the part of God is sufficient to deliver us; and that, although our enemies may be ready to fall upon us on every side to overwhelm us, it is in his power, whenever he pleases, to strike them with amazement of spirit, and thus to make their hearts fail in a moment in the very midst of their efforts against us. Let this reflection serve as a bridle to keep our minds from being drawn away, to look in all directions for human aid.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 4. The kings were assembled, they passed by together. They came and they went. �o sooner together than scattered. They came one way and fled twenty ways. Boastful the gathering hosts with their royal leaders, despairing the fugitive bands with their astonished captains. They came like foam on the angry sea, like foam they melted away. This was so remarkable that the psalmist puts in a note of exclamation, Lo! What! have they so suddenly fled! Even thus shall the haters of the church vanish from the field. Papists, Ritualists, Arians, Sceptics, they shall each have their day, and shall pass on to the limbo of forgetfulness.EXPLA�ATORY �OTES A�D QUAI�T SAYI�GSVer. 4. They were many and powerful: kings and a plurality of them. They were confederate kings. The kings were assembled. Forces united are the more powerful. But all the endeavours of these confederate kings came to nothing. They passed by together — together they came, and together they vanished. William �icholson.

COFFMA�, "Verse 4A RECE�T EXAMPLE OF GOD'S PROTECTIO�

"For, lo, the kings assembled themselves,

They passed by altogether.

They saw it, then they were amazed;

They were dismayed, they hasted away.

Trembling took hold of them there.

Pain, as of a woman in travail.

With the east wind

Thou breakfast the ships of Tarshish.

�ow have we heard, so have we seen

In the city of Jehovah of hosts, in the city of our God:

God will establish it forever.

(Selah)"

For comment on the first three verses here, see the chapter introduction.

"With the east wind thou breakest the ships of Tarshish" (Psalms 48:6). This is in all probability merely a figurative expression emphasizing God's power. There never was a campaign in which a great navy was available to aid the cause of Israel's adversary. The impossibility of fitting this verse into the supposed occasion for the psalm, whether the reign of Jehoshaphat or of Hezekiah, has caused some interpreters to refer the whole psalm to the eschatalogical conflict of the days of Gog and Magog. The idea of some kind of a proverbial expression of God's power appeals to us as the best solution.

"God will establish it forever" (Psalms 48:8). �o doubt ancient Israel made some deductions from this that were totally unfounded. First, it was not an unconditional promise, as far as the literal Jerusalem was concerned. Israel's rejection of Messiah resulted in the most terrible destruction the city ever experienced; and yet in the sense of its eternal continuity as "The �ew Jerusalem," the promise was absolutely and unconditionally fulfilled. We must, of necessity, find overtones of that ultimate fulfilment in the text of this psalm.

ELLICOTT, "Verse 4(4) The kings.—With the striking picture of the advance and sudden collapse of a hostile expedition that follows, comp. Isaiah 10:28-34; possibly of the very same event.

The kings.—Evidently known to the writer, but, alas! matter of merest conjecture to us. Some suppose the kings of Ammon, Moab, and Edom, who attacked Jehoshaphat (2 Chronicles 20:25); others, the tributary princes of Sennacherib. In his annals, as lately deciphered, this monarch speaks of setting up tributary kings or viceroys in Chaldæa, Phoenicia, and Philistia, after conquering these countries. (See Assyrian Discoveries, by George Smith, p. 303.) Others again, referring the psalm to the time of Ahaz, understand Pekah and Rezin (2 Kings 15:37). The touches, vivid as they are, of the picture, are not so historically defined as to allow a settlement of the question.

Assembled.—Used of the muster of confederate forces (Joshua 11:5).

Passed by—i.e., marched by. So, according to the time reading, the LXX. A frequent military term (Judges 11:29; 2 Kings 8:21; Isaiah 8:8). Others, “passed away,” but it is doubtful if the verb can have this meaning.

Together.—�otice the parallelism, they came together, they passed by together.

TRAPP, "Psalms 48:4 For, lo, the kings were assembled, they passed by together.

Ver. 4. For, lo, the kings were assembled] The princes of the Philistines, 2 Samuel 5:5. Or, Sennacherib’s princes, which were all kings, Isaiah 10:8. Oecolampadius, upon Isaiah 13:19, saith, that there were twenty and two kingdoms in Assyria; these all came with combined forces to lay Jerusalem desolate, but could not effect it.

They passed by together] They could do this city (dear to God, and secured by him, the Athenians boasted that they were θεοφιλεις, beloved of God, the Hierosolymitans were surely so) no more harm than as if they had been so many wayfaring men that had passed by it with their staves in their hands.

BE�SO�, "Psalms 48:4-6. For lo, the kings were assembled — The neighbouring princes confederate against Jerusalem: see the contents. They passed by — In their march toward Jerusalem. They advanced, and marched on, not doubting but they should presently make themselves masters of the city. Or, they passed away together — Departed without the success which they desired and expected. They saw it —They only looked upon it, but did not enter it, nor shoot an arrow there, nor cast a bank against it, as was said upon this or the like occasion, 2 Kings 19:32. They marvelled — �ot so much at the structure or strength of the city, as at the wonderful works wrought by God on its behalf. They were troubled, and hasted away — God impressed such terrors upon their minds as made them retire with precipitation. If he refer to the invasion by Sennacherib, he may allude to the fear he and his army were put into by tidings of Tirhakah’s coming against them; or to that terrible slaughter of them, mentioned 2 Kings 19:35. Thus “the potentates of the world saw the miracles of the apostles, the courage and constancy of the martyrs, and the daily increase of the church, notwithstanding all their persecutions; they beheld, with astonishment, the rapid progress of the faith through the Roman empire; they called upon their gods, but their gods could not help themselves. Idolatry expired at the foot of the victorious cross, and the power which supported it became Christian.” — Horne.

LA�GE, "Psalm 48:4-8. They passed by together.—The enemies, designated by the article as the well-known kings who had assembled according to agreement at a certain place (comp. Joshua 11:5; Psalm 83:4) passed by all at once, over the boundary, Judges 11:29; 2 Kings 8:21; Isaiah 8:9, (Ancient Versions, Rabbins, Köster, Ewald, Hitzig, Del.). It is grammatically admissible to take עבר in the sense of disappear, (Calvin, Rosen, De Wette, Hengst, Hupf.), but this rendering presents, instead of a fitting picture, immediately the result of an unsuccessful enterprise, the details of which are then given. If the reference be to the attack in the time of

Jehosaphat, we must suppose that the allies were encamped about three miles from Jerusalem, in the desert of Tekoah, whence they had a view of the holy city, and where God caused a great terror to fall upon them ( 1 Samuel 14:15). The annihilation in Psalm 48:8 is not alarm (Rosen.), nor flight (De Wette), but the figure expressing it must have been suggested by the remembrance of the foundering of the commercial fleet sent out by Jehosaphat in union with Ahaz, ( 1 Kings 22:49; 2 Chronicles 20:36). But it is by no means necessary to adopt this view, for ships are elsewhere used as symbols of worldly powers. The ships of Tarshish, as the largest and strongest of their class, are figures of mighty powers, Isaiah 33:21; Isaiah 33:23. The east wind ( Job 27:21) illustrates the power of God in overthrowing His enemies ( Jeremiah 18:17), because it so frequently scattered the strongest ships, ( Isaiah 27:8; Ezekiel 27:26; Amos 4:9; Jonah 4:5). Hence there seems to be no special reason for supposing that there is an allusion to the destruction of an actual hostile fleet (Köster, Hitzig), but only that there is here a well-known illustration of the omnipotence of God. As the sentence is not joined to the preceding one by a particle of comparison, we need not take the verb as a third person feminine=“like as by an east wind which destroys,” (Kimchi, Rosen, De Wette). It is better to regard it as a second person masculine, making God the subject of it, (the Ancient Versions, Calvin, Geier, and most others). In this case it would be proper to place here the beginning of a strophe, which, comprising all that has been thus far said, would make, in contents and structure, a good transition to the section in which God is directly addressed.

PETT, "Verses 4-7The �ations Quail Before The Power of God In His Holy Hill (Psalms 48:4-7).

The glory of the dwellingplace of the Great God is such that the nations quail before Him. Though they may assemble themselves against His people and approach them with hostile purpose, once they recognise what they are fighting against they quail before it and fade away. This had proved true of Sennacherib and his forces. It would always prove true for whoever came against Jerusalem, because God was with them.

Psalms 48:4-7

‘For, lo, the kings assembled themselves,They passed over together.They saw it, then were they amazed,They were dismayed, they hastened away.Trembling took hold of them there,Pain, as of a woman in travail.With the east wind you break,The ships of Tarshish.’The kings of the nations had gathered themselves together against God’s people. They had passed over together and approached the city of God. But then, when they actually saw it they stopped in amazement. They were dismayed at what they saw and hastened away. Indeed so great was its impact that they trembled and were

filled with the equivalent of labour pains. And God’s powerful and feared east wind blew among them, and the proud Tyreans and their associates fell before it. The ships of Tarshish sailed regularly from Tyre, and indeed from other ports, around the world, and here they indicate what is strong and invulnerable. The mighty ships of Tarshish. Or at least they are until the East wind blows. Perhaps it also represents the powerful Tyrean contingent in Sennacherib’s army. But we are not to limit it to Tyre. Tyre’s glory and Sennacherib’s glory could not stand in the face of God’s holy mountain, the place that God had chosen as His earthly abode. God’s East Wind would see to that.

In the same way we can be sure today that all who begin to plot against the people of God will find themselves ashamed and dismayed. They may appear to be a great threat, but in the end their threat will collapse.

5 they saw her and were astounded; they fled in terror.

BAR�ES, "They saw it - That is, they looked on it; they contemplated it; they were struck with its beauty and strength, and fled.

And so they marveled - It surpassed their expectations of its strength, and they saw with wonder that any attempt to conquer it was hopeless.

They were troubled - They were filled with anxiety and confusion. They even began to have apprehensions about their own safety. They saw that their preparations had been made in vain, and that all hopes of success must be abandoned.

And hasted away - They fled in confusion. The idea in the whole verse is that of a “panic,” leading to a disorderly flight. This “may” have occurred in the time of Jehoshaphat, 2 Chr. 20, when the kings of Moab, Edom, and others, came up to attack Jerusalem, though the immediate cause of their overthrow was a conflict among themselves 2Ch_20:22-25. It may have been, however, that they approached the city, and were dismayed by its strength, so that they turned away before the internal conflict occurred which ended in their ruin. But it is not “necessary” to adjust these accounts one to another, or even to suppose that this was the event referred to in the psalm, though the general ideas in it accord well with all which occurred on that occasion.

GILL, "They saw it,.... Either the city or the power of God, as Aben Ezra; or, as Jarchi, God himself going forth to fight against the nations. This refers to the power Christ will take to himself, and show forth, by reigning in his church, and protecting it, which will not only be visible to the saints, but to the nations of the world; and to the brightness of Christ's coming in his spiritual reign, with the lustre of which antichrist will be destroyed, Rev_11:17; and to the glorious state of the church, signified by the rising of the witnesses, and their standing on their feet, and ascending to heaven, which will be seen by their enemies, Rev_11:11; and to the destruction of Rome, the smoke of whose burning, the kings of the earth, that have committed fornication with her, will see and lament, Rev_18:8;

and so their marvelled: at the glory of the church, the security of it, the power of Christ in it and over it, and at the destruction of mystical Babylon; see Isa_52:14;

they were troubled: as Herod and all Jerusalem were, upon hearing of the birth of Christ, Mat_2:3; so these kings will be, upon seeing the coming and power of Christ in the latter day, the invincibleness of his church, and their own immediate and utter ruin: this will be the time or the howling of the shepherds, both civil and ecclesiastical, when all hands will be faint, and every man's heart will melt, Zec_11:2;

and hasted away: fled for fear of the great King at the head of his armies, in the defence of his church and people: and as the kings of the earth also at the destruction of Rome will flee and stand afar off, for fear of her torment, Rev_18:10.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 5. They saw it, and so they marvelled. They came, they saw, but they did not conquer. There was no veni, vidi, vici for them. �o sooner did they perceive that the Lord was in the Holy City, than they took to their heels. Before the Lord came to blows with them, they were faint hearted, and beat a retreat. They were troubled and hasted away. The troublers were troubled. Their haste in coming was nothing to their hurry in going. Panic seized them, horses were not fleet enough; they would have borrowed the wings of the wind. They fled ignominiously, like children in a fright. Glory be to God, it shall be even thus with the foes of his church; when the Lord cometh to our help, our enemies shall be as nothing. Could they foresee their ignominious defeat, they would not advance to the attack.EXPLA�ATORY �OTES A�D QUAI�T SAYI�GSVer. 5-6. The potentates of the world saw the miracles of the apostles, the courage and constancy of the martyrs, and the daily increase of the church, notwithstanding all their persecutions; they beheld with astonishment the rapid progress of the faith through the Roman empire; they called upon their gods, but their gods could not help themselves; idolatry expired at the foot of the victorious cross. George Horne.

TRAPP, "Psalms 48:5 They saw [it, and] so they marvelled; they were troubled, [and] hasted away.

Ver. 5. They saw it, and so they marvelled] �one of them could say, as Caesar, Veni, vidi, vici, I came, I saw, I conquored, but the contrary; they no sooner saw this heaven guarded city, but their hearts misgave them; and they were ready to say, as that duke of Saxony did, who intending to make war upon the bishop of

Magdeburg, and understanding that he made no great preparation for defence of himself and his territories, but sought help from heaven by fasting and prayer, Insaniat alius, said he, God bless me from such a madness as to meddle with a man who confideth in God, and committeth himself wholly to his protection.

They were troubled and hasted away] Heb. They fled with a hasty or headlong flight, being smitten with a sudden terror, such as was that of the Egyptians, when their chariot-wheels were taken off; of the Philistines, when for haste they left their gods behind them, 2 Samuel 5:20-21; of the Syrians, 2 Kings 7:6-7, when they left all and ran for their lives; of the Assyrians, when the angel had slain a hundred eighty-five thousand in their camp, &c.

6 Trembling seized them there, pain like that of a woman in labor.

BAR�ES, "Fear took hold upon them there - Trembling seized them; they were filled with sudden consternation. That is, as soon as they saw the city, or had a distinct view of it, they became alarmed.

And pain - Distress; anguish. The distress arising from disappointed hopes, and perhaps from the apprehension of their own safety. They were filled with dismay.

As of a woman in travail - This comparison is often used in the Scriptures to denote the severest kind of pain. Compare Jer_4:31; Jer_6:24; Jer_13:21; Jer_22:23; Jer_30:6; Jer_49:24; Mic_4:9-10; Isa_53:11.

GILL, "Fear took hold upon them there,.... That is, either when they came up to the city, and passed by it, and saw what they did; or, as Kimchi observes, in the place where they thought to have made a great slaughter; that is, in Armageddon, Rev_16:16; so upon the slaughter of the seven thousand names of men, or men of name and renown, such as the kings here assembled, the remnant will be frightened, Rev_11:13;

and pain, as of a woman in travail; this figure is made use of elsewhere, when the destruction of Babylon and the coming of Christ are spoken of; see Isa_13:8.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 6. Fear took hold upon them there. They were in Giant Despair's grip. Where they hoped to triumph, there they quivered with dismay.

They did not take the city, but fear took hold on them. And pain, as of a woman in travail. They were as much overcome as a woman whose fright causes premature delivery; or, as full of pain as a poor mother in her pangs—a strong expression, commonly employed by Orientals to set forth the extremity of anguish. When the Lord arises for the help of his church, the proudest of his foes shall be as trembling women, and their dismay shall be but the beginning of eternal defeat.EXPLA�ATORY �OTES A�D QUAI�T SAYI�GSVer. 5-6. See Psalms on "Psalms 48:5" for further information.Ver. 6. Fear took hold upon them there, and pain, as of a woman in travail. �othing is more unaccountable than panic. �o man, no body of men can adequately guard against such terror. He who made the ears can easily make them to tingle. He who holds the winds in his fist, can easily make them whisper alarm, or roar dismay. This is specially to be expected when men so act as to have their own conscience against them. Job 15:21. But God can at any time so forsake men as that they shall be unmanned, and play the fool exceedingly. Leviticus 26:36. Men have fought bravely several battles, and then played the coward. William S. Plumer.

TRAPP, "Psalms 48:6 Fear took hold upon them there, [and] pain, as of a woman in travail.

Ver. 6. Fear took hold upon them there] By "so" in the former verse, and "there" in this, the shameful flight of these enemies is lively deciphered, and, as it were, pointed at with the finger. So Psalms 14:5, "There were they in great fear: for God is in the generation of the righteous."

And pain as of a woman in travail] Their grief was no less than their fear; and it came upon them, Certo, cito, subito, suddenly, sorely, irresistibly, inevitably.

7 You destroyed them like ships of Tarshish shattered by an east wind.

BAR�ES, "Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish - On the ships of Tarshish, see the notes on Isa_2:16. The allusion to these ships here may have been to illustrate the power of God; the ease with which he destroys that which man has made. The ships so strong -the ships made to navigate distant seas, and to encounter waves and storms - are broken to pieces with infinite ease when God causes the wind to sweep over the ocean. With so much ease God overthrows the most mighty armies, and scatters them. His power in the

one case is strikingly illustrated by the other. It is not necessary, therefore, to suppose that there was any actual occurrence of this kind particularly in the eye of the psalmist; but it is an interesting fact that such a disaster did befall the navy of Jehoshaphat himself, 1Ki_22:48 : “Jehoshaphat made “ships of Tarshish” to go to Ophir for gold; but they went not: “for the ships were broken” at Ezion-geber.” Compare 2Ch_20:36-37. This coincidence would seem to render it not improbable that the discomfiture of the enemies of Jehoshaphat was particularly referred to in this psalm, and that the overthrow of his enemies when Jerusalem was threatened called to remembrance an important event in his own history, when the power of God was illustrated in a manner not less unexpected and remarkable. If this was the allusion, may not the reference to the “breaking of the ships of Tarshish” have been designed to show to Jehoshaphat, and to the dwellers in Zion, that they should not be proud and self-confident, by reminding them of the ease with which God had scattered and broken their own mighty navy, and by showing them that what he had done to their enemies he could do to them also, notwithstanding the strength of their city, and that their “real” defense was not in walls and bulwarks reared by human hand, anymore than it could be in the natural strength of their position only, but in God.

CLARKE, "Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish - Calmet thinks this may refer to the discomfiture of Cambyses, who came to destroy the land of Judea. “This is apparently,” says he, “the same tempest which struck dismay into the land-forces of Cambyses, and wrecked his fleet which was on the coasts of the Mediterranean sea, opposite to his army near the port of Acco, or the Ptolemais; for Cambyses had his quarters at Ecbatana, at the foot of Mount Carmel; and his army was encamped in the valley of Jezreel.” Ships of Tarshish he conjectures to have been large stout vessels, capable of making the voyage of Tarsus, in Cilicia.

GILL, "Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with east wind. This is either another simile, expressing the greatness of the dread and fear that shall now seize the kings of the earth; which will be, as Kimchi observes, as if they were smitten with a strong east wind, which breaks the ships of Tarshish; and to the same purpose is the note of Aben Ezra; who says, the psalmist compares the pain that shall take hold upon them to an east wind in the sea, which breaks the ships; for by Tarshish is meant, not Tartessus in Spain, nor Tarsus in Cilicia, or the port to which the Prophet Jonah went and took shipping; but the sea in general: or else this phrase denotes the manner in which the antichristian kings, and antichristian states, wilt be destroyed; just as ships upon the ocean are dashed to pieces with a strong east wind: or it may design the loss of all their riches and substance brought to them in ships; hence the lamentations of merchants, and sailors, and ship masters, Rev_18:15.

JAMISO�, "ships of Tarshish— as engaged in a distant and lucrative trade, the most valuable. The phrase may illustrate God’s control over all material agencies, whether their literal destruction be meant or not.

CALVI�,"7.By the east wind (194) thou breakest in pieces the ships of Tarshish Commentators are divided in their view of this passage. (195) But let us rest

contented with the natural sense, which is simply this, that the enemies of the Church were overthrown and plunged into destruction, just as God by suddenly raising storms sinks the ships of Cilicia to the bottom of the sea. The Psalmist celebrates the power which God is accustomed to display in great and violent storms; and his language implies that it is not to be wondered at if God, who breaks by the violence of the winds the strongest ships, had also overthrown his enemies, who were inflated with the presumptuous confidence which they reposed in their own strength. By the sea of Tarshish the Hebrews mean the Mediterranean Sea, because of the country of Cilicia, which in ancient times was called Tarshish, as Josephus informs us, although in process of time this name came to be restricted to one city of the country. But as the chief part of the naval traffic of the Jews was with Cilicia, there is here attributed to that country by synecdoche what was common to other countries which were at a greater distance and less known.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 7. Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind. As easily as vessels are driven to shipwreck, dost thou overturn the most powerful adversaries; or it may mean the strength of some nations lies in their ships, whose wooden walls are soon broken; but our strength is in our God, and therefore, it fails not; or there may be another meaning, though thou art our defence, yet thou takest vengeance on our inventions, and while thou dost preserve us, yet our ships, our comforts, our earthly ambitions, are taken from us that we may look alone to thee. God is seen at sea, but he is equally present on land. Speculative heresies, pretending to bring us wealth from afar, are constantly assailing the church, but the breath of the Lord soon drives them to destruction. The church too often relies on the wisdom of men, and these human helps are soon shipwrecked; yet the church itself is safe beneath the care of her God and King.EXPLA�ATORY �OTES A�D QUAI�T SAYI�GSVer. 7. Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind. It is only by her Lord that the church gained "the true riches; "when she enters into traffick with the world, she takes the means of the world for her resources; and when she trusts in her wealth, in her political power, in earthly cunning, to make merchandise, the instruments she adopts come to nothing in her hands, and leave her helpless and poor. From "A Plain Commentary on the Book of Psalms (The Prayer Book Version), chiefly founded on the Fathers, "1859.Ver. 7. With an east wind, which, in Judea, is a very violent and destructive wind. Kennicot renders the verse thus, As the east wind dasheth in pieces the ships of Tarshish; founding his conjecture upon the similarity in form of two Hebrew letters, signifying the one in, and the other as. Daniel Cresswell.

TRAPP, "Psalms 48:7 Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind.

Ver. 7. Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish] i.e. Of the ocean, or of the Mediterranean Sea, Isaiah 2:16; Isaiah 23:1; Isaiah 23:6; Isaiah 23:10; Isaiah 23:14. The meaning is, Like as thou, O God, with thine east wind, that Euroclydon especially, which Pliny calleth �avigantium pestem (the mariner’s mischief), art wont to dash and drown the tallest ships at thy pleasure; so thou both canst and wilt deal by thy Church’s enemies. To whom, therefore, this text should be as those

knuckles of a man’s hand were to Belshazzar, to write them their destiny; or as Daniel was to him, to read it unto them.

COKE, "Psalms 48:7. Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish, &c.— Or, like the east wind, which in a moment dasheth in pieces the ships of Tarshish. Green. I have added, says he, in a moment, because the east wind in those parts is remarkably violent, (comp. Job 27:21. Jeremiah 18:17. Isaiah 27:8. Habakkuk 1:9.) and because it more easily conveys to the reader in what point of comparison it lies; namely, in the suddenness of the king's being seized with trembling and fear.

8 As we have heard, so we have seenin the city of the Lord Almighty, in the city of our God:God makes her secure forever.[c]

BAR�ES, "As we have heard, so have we seen - That is, What has been told us, or handed down by tradition, in regard to the strength and safety of the city - what our fathers have told us respecting its sacredness and its being under the protection of God -we have found to be true. It has been shown that God is its protector; that he dwells in the midst of it; that it is safe from the assaults of man; that it is permanent and abiding. All that had ever been said of the city in this respect had been found, in this trial when the kings assembled against it, to be true.

In the city of the Lord of hosts - The city where the Lord of hosts has taken up his abode, or which he has chosen for his dwelling-place on earth. See the notes at Isa_1:24; notes at Psa_24:10.

In the city of our God - Of Him who has shown himself to be our God; the God of our nation.

God will establish it for ever - That is, this had been told them; this is what they had heard from their fathers; this they now saw to be verified in the divine interposition in the time of danger. They had seen that these combined armies could not take the city; that God had mercifully interposed to scatter their forces; and they inferred that it could be taken by no human power, and that God intended that it should be permanent and abiding. What is here said of Jerusalem is true in a sense more strict and absolute of the Church - that nothing can prevail against it, but that it will endure to the end of the

world. See the notes at Mat_16:18.

CLARKE, "As we have heard, so have we seen - Our fathers have declared what mighty works thou didst in their time; and we have seen the same. God has often interposed and afforded us a most miraculous defense. So it was when they were invaded by the Assyrians, Syrians, Egyptians, Babylonians, Persians and the Greeks under Alexander.

The city of the Lord of hosts - His hosts defended the city, and it was known to be the City of the great King.

God will establish it for ever - This must refer to the true temple, the Christian Church, of which the Jewish Church was a type. The type perished, but the antitype remained, and will remain till time shall be no more.

Selah - So be it; and so it will be for evermore.

GILL, "As we have heard, so have we seen,.... These are the words of the people of God making their observations on the above things; and so Aben Ezra and Kimchi understand them of the people of Israel; and the former, referring them to the war of Gog and Magog, paraphrases them thus:

"the Israelites shall say in that day, as we have heard the prophets, who prophesied of the fall of Gog and Magog, so have we seen in the city of the Lord of hosts.''

The words may be understood, either of facts which have been reported and heard to have been done in time past, to which others will correspond, and will be seen to do to in the latter day; as, for instance, as it has been heard that God inflicted plagues upon Egypt; so it will be seen that he will pour out the vials of his wrath upon the great city, which is spiritually called Egypt and Sodom: as it has been heard that God brought his people Israel out of Egypt with a mighty hand; so it will be seen that he will deliver his people from the captivity and tyranny of the man of sin, and will call them out from Babylon a little before the destruction of it: as it has been heard that Pharaoh and his host were drowned in the Red sea; so it will be seen that Babylon shall be thrown down like a mill stone cast into the sea, and be found no more: as it has been heard that, literal Babylon is destroyed; so it will be seen that mystical Babylon will be destroyed also: and as it has been heard that the kings of the nations, at several times, have gathered themselves together against Jerusalem, without effect; so it will be seen treat the kings of the earth will assemble together against the church of Christ; but, as soon as they shall come up to her, and look upon her, they shall be astonished and flee with the utmost consternation, fear, and dread, and be utterly ruined: or else the sense is, as it has been heard, from the promises and prophecies delivered out from time to time, that God will grant his presence to his church and people, and will be the protection of them, and will destroy all his and their enemies; so it has been seen that these have been fulfilled, more or less, in all ages; in the latter day their accomplishment will be full and manifest, even

in the city of the Lord of hosts; of the hosts of heaven and earth, of all armies above and below; and therefore the church must be safe under his protection;

in the city of our God: the covenant God of his people; wherefore, as the former title

declares his power, this shows his love and affection, and both together secure the happiness of the saints: wherefore it follows,

God will establish it for ever. Not only particular believers, of which the church consists, are established on the foundation, Christ; but the church itself is built on him, the Rock against which the gates of hell cannot prevail; yet as they are not always in a settled and constant condition, so neither is that, being sometimes tossed with the tempests of afflictions and persecutions, and sometimes in one place, and sometimes in another; but in the latter day it will be established on the top of the mountains; and which is a desirable thing by all the saints, and what they should, as many do, earnestly pray for; and which God will do in his own time; and then it shall be established for ever, and be a tabernacle that shall not be taken down; not one of its stakes shall be removed, nor any of its cords broken, Isa_2:2, Isa_33:20.

Selah; on this word; see Gill on Psa_3:2.

HE�RY, "We have here the good use and improvement which the people of God are taught to make of his late glorious and gracious appearances for them against their enemies, that they might work for their good.

I. Let our faith in the word of God be hereby confirmed. If we compare what God has done with what he has spoken, we shall find that, as we have heard, so have we seen(Psa_48:8), and what we have seen obliges us to believe what we have heard. 1. “As we have heard done in former providences, in the days of old, so have we seen done in our own days.” Note, God's latter appearances for his people against his and their enemies are consonant to his former appearances, and should put us in mind of them. 2. “As we have heard in the promise and prediction, so have we seen in the performance and accomplishment. We have heard that God is the Lord of hosts, and that Jerusalem is the city of our God, is dear to him, is his particular care; and now we have seen it; we have seen the power of our God; we have seen his goodness; we have seen his care and concern for us, that he is a wall of fire round about Jerusalem and the glory in the midst of her.” Note, In the great things that God has done, and is doing, for his church, it is good to take notice of the fulfilling of the scriptures; and this would help us the better to understand both the providence itself and the scripture that is fulfilled in it.

II. Let our hope of the stability and perpetuity of the church be hereby encouraged. “From what we have seen, compared with what we have heard, in the city of our God, we may conclude that God will establish it for ever.” This was not fulfilled in Jerusalem (that city was long since destroyed, and all its glory laid in the dust), but has its accomplishment in the gospel church. We are sure that that shall be established for ever; it is built upon a rock, and the gates of hell cannot prevail against it, Mat_16:18. God himself has undertaken the establishment of it; it is the Lord that has founded Zion, Isa_14:32. And what we have seen, compared with what we have heard, may encourage us to hope in that promise of God upon which the church is built.

JAMISO�, "This present experience assures of that perpetual care which God extends to His Church.

SBC, "These words of the prophet and psalmist seem to contain a short and plain account of the temper and behaviour of the friends and Apostles of our Lord during those days of hope and patience which came to an end on the morning of the first Whit-

Sunday.

I. They waited patiently for the Lord. They had taken it on His word, however unaccountable it might sound, that it was expedient for them His going away; and they were prepared to trust Him still further and to abide in faith and quietness any length of time during which the Comforter might delay His coming.

II. Observe the place where they waited. The prophecy had described God’s people as waiting in the Temple. Our Lord ordered His Apostles to tarry in the city of Jerusalem, and they were continually in the Temple.

III. This teaches, first, that patient waiting is the strength of God’s people, that they greatly err if they pretend to fix His times or to take His matters into their own hands; and, secondly, that they are to take things as they find them and set out on God’s work in their social callings from the present moment and the present state of things, whenever and whatever it be.

IV. There can be no such encouragement to serious repentance, to serious improvement, to patient continuance in welldoing, as the answer which God gave to those prayers in which our Lord’s disciples and His mother continued during the ten days from His ascension to Pentecost. The return of these prayers was the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, Jesus Christ coming by His Spirit to save us one by one from the power of sin for the future, as He had before come in His own person to offer Himself an all-sufficient sacrifice for us, and save us one and all from the punishment of sins past.

V. If the disciples were to wait for the Comforter in Jerusalem, in or near the visible Temple, much more ought we to take care how we wander in any way, even in thought, beyond the bounds of the spiritual temple, the Church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth. Let us so long and strive for these mercies, as never to forget the sort of persons to whom they are promised.

Plain Sermons by Contributors to "Tracts for the Times" vol. vii., p. 127.

CALVI�,"8.As we have heard, so have we seen. There are two senses in which this passage may be understood, either of which is suitable. The first is, that the sacred writer, speaking in the name of true believers, declares that the same power which God in the days of old had displayed in delivering their fathers, he now exercised towards their posterity. They had heard from the mouth of their fathers, and had learned from sacred history, how God in his great mercy and fatherly goodness had succoured his Church; but now they affirm that they can bear testimony to this not only from their having heard it spoken about, but also from having seen it, (196) inasmuch as they had actually experienced the same mercy exercised by God towards themselves. The amount of what is stated then is, that the faithful not only had a record of the goodness and power of God in histories, but that they also felt by actual experience, yea, even saw with their eyes, what they knew before by hearsay, and the report of their fathers; and that therefore God continues unchangeably the same, confirming as he does, age after age, the examples of his grace exhibited in ancient times, by renewed and ever-recurring experiences. The other sense is somewhat more refined; and yet it is very suitable, namely, That God actually performed what he had promised to his people; as if the faithful had said, that what they had before only heard of was now exhibited before their eyes. As long as we have only the bare promises of God, his grace and salvation are as yet hidden in

hope; but when these promises are actually performed, his grace and salvation are clearly manifested. If this interpretation is admitted, it contains the rich doctrine, that God does not disappoint the hope which he produces in our minds by means of his word, and that it is not His way to be more liberal in promising than faithful in performing what he has promised. When it is said, in the city, the letter ב,beth, is taken for מ, mem, or ל, lamed; that is to say, for of, or as to, or with respect to the city. The prophet does not mean to say that in Jerusalem the faithful were informed that God would succor his servants, although this was no doubt true, but that God from the beginning had been the gracious and faithful guardian of his own city, and would continue always to be so. Mention is expressly made of the city of God, because he has not promised to extend the same protecting care to all indiscriminately, but only to his chosen and peculiar people. The name Jehovah of armies is employed to express the power of God; but immediately after the faithful add, that he is their God, for the purpose of pointing to their adoption, that thus they may be emboldened to trust in him, and thus to betake themselves freely and familiarly to him. In the second Council of �ice, the good fathers who sat there wrested this passage to prove that it is not enough to teach divine truth in churches, unless there are at the same time pictures and images for confirming it. This was a piece of silliness very shameful, and unworthy of being mentioned, were it not that it is profitable for us to understand that those who purposed to infect the Church of God with such a corruption, were horribly stricken with a spirit of giddiness and stupidity.

The concluding clause of the verse distinguishes Jerusalem from all the other cities of the world, which are subject to vicissitudes, and flourish only for a time. As Jerusalem was founded by God, it continued steadfast and unmoved amidst the varied commotions and revolutions which took place in the world; and it is not to be wondered at, if he continued through successive ages to maintain the city of which he made choice, and in which it was his will that his name should be called upon for ever. It may, however, be objected, that this city was once destroyed, and the people carried into captivity. But this does not militate against the statement here made; for, before that event happened, the restoration of the city was foretold by Jeremiah 27:22; and, therefore, when it took place, God truly, and in a special manner, showed how steadfast his work was. And now, since Christ by his coming has renewed the world, whatever was spoken of that city in old time belongs to the spiritual Jerusalem, which is dispersed through all the countries of the world. Whenever, therefore, our minds are agitated and perplexed, we should call to remembrance the truth, that, whatever dangers and apprehensions may threaten us, the safety of the Church which God has established, although it may be sorely shaken, can never, however powerfully assaulted, be so weakened as to fall and be involved in ruin. The verb, which is in the future tense, will establish, may be resolved into the past tense, has established; but this will make no difference as to the sense.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 8. As we have heard, so have we seen in the city of the Lord of hosts, in the city of our God. Our father's stories are reproduced before our very

eyes. We heard the promise, and we have seen the fulfilment. The records of Zion, wonderful as they are, are proved to be truthful, because present facts are in perfect harmony therewith. �ote how the Lord is first spoken of as Lord of hosts, a name of power and sovereignty, and then as our God, a name of covenant relation and condescension. �o wonder that since the Lord bears both titles, we find him dealing with us after the precedents of his lovingkindness, and the faithfulness of his promises. God will establish it for ever. The true church can never be disestablished. That which kings establish can last for time only, that which God establishes endures to all eternity. Selah. Here is a fit place to pause, viewing the past with admiration, and the future with confidence.EXPLA�ATORY �OTES A�D QUAI�T SAYI�GS�one.HI�TS TO THE VILLAGE PREACHERVer. 8.1. God has ever been to his people what he now is; the same heard as seen.2. He is now what he ever has been: the same seen as heard.3. He will ever be what he now is. "Will establish it for ever."

TRAPP, "Psalms 48:8 As we have heard, so have we seen in the city of the LORD of hosts, in the city of our God: God will establish it for ever. Selah.

Ver. 8. As we have heard] viz. By the relation of our forefathers, Psalms 44:1, or rather by the promises contained in the Holy Scriptures, which now we see verified and exemplified in our signal deliverances. Jerusalem’s constant protection then is here assevered and assured, per comparationem promissionis et experientim simul, et similiter eam contestantium. See the like Job 42:5. {See Trapp on "Job 42:5"}

In the city of our God] The Church is the city of the living God, Hebrews 12:22, a city that breedeth men, yea, conquerors, as Herodotus (Clio) saith of Ecbatana, the metropolis of the Medes, and as Pindarus (�emeis, Od. 2) of another place,

Yρεφαι φωτα µαχαταν δυνατος, &c.

God will establish it for ever] There shall be a Church till the world’s end, opposing all her enemies.

BE�SO�, "Verse 8-9Psalms 48:8-9. As we have heard, so have we seen — The predictions of the prophets have been verified by the events. Or, we have had late and fresh experience of such wonderful works of God, as before we only heard of by the report of our fathers. God will establish it for ever — God will defend her in all succeeding ages. And so God would have done, if Jerusalem had not forsaken him, and forfeited his protection. We have thought of thy loving-kindness — It hath been the matter of our serious and deep meditation, when we have been worshipping in thy temple. For

when the priests were offering incense, or sacrifices, the religious people were wont to exercise themselves in holy meditation and secret prayer to God, Luke 1:10. Or, we have silently, or patiently waited for thy loving- kindness, as דמינו חסד�, dim-minu chasdecha, more properly signifies, and some ancient and other interpreters render it. A consideration of the wondrous works which God has wrought for us tends to produce faith in his promises, and resignation to his will: “and he,” says Dr. Horne, “that with these dispositions waits for God’s mercies, in God’s house, shall not wait in vain.”

�ISBET, "THE CITY OF OUR GOD‘As we have heard, so have we seen in the city of the Lord of hosts, in the city of our God: God will establish it for ever.’

Psalms 48:8I. First, ‘we have heard’ of the honour of the Church as included in that testimony of Jesus which is the spirit of prophecy, the very groundwork of the Psalter.—We hear our Lord’s own predictions about His Church, His accomplishment of His own prophetic psalms—those psalms in which ages beforehand He prepared men to realise what the Church of Christ should be, and how it should fill up His sufferings and share His glory.

II. ‘Like as we have heard, so have we seen.’—This frequent teaching about the Church is not a thrice-told tale, not only a prophetic vision or an Apostolic instruction. It is something for us to realise ourselves. The ‘fair place’ is our heritage. The Kingdom of God is within us. The Divine presence is granted to us if we will but open the eyes of our mind, the temple our hearts, every day.

III. The past and the present alike cheer us on in our hopes for the future of the Church of Christ.—In this present time we see, and not only with the eye of faith, the fulfilment of those ancient promises and predictions in the marvellous preservation and enlargement of the Church.

IV. �otice one or two reflections as to our own duty in the Church into which we have been baptized.—(1) Take on trust the doctrine of the Church’s life, even if you can only hear of it at present. (2) Abide in the Church. We must not try to stand outside the Church or above it, but where Christ is, in it. (3) Though faith tarry, wait for it. Fullness of conviction, like consummate knowledge, can only gradually be won. Study, then, humbly the holy doctrines delivered unto you, and most of all that priceless word which proves them.

V. Let us all remember that holiness is the great mark of the Church—the holiness which is God’s gift of mercy through the merits of His Son, granted to the lowliest and most degraded if truly penitent and faithful.

—Canon Jelf.Illustrations

(1) ‘God protects not only His people, but the city in which they dwell. He guards the very house in which they call upon Him. But He means that they should recognise this, should trust His watchfulness and power, should be grateful for His help and goodness to them, and by proclaiming what He has done, induce others, especially their descendants, to exercise a like faith. For God is the same, yesterday, to-day, and forever. This God is our God.’

(2) ‘Three psalms, the forty-sixth, forty-seventh, and forty-eighth, bound together by the golden clasp of the forty-fifth, are the great hymns of the City of God.’

(3) ‘From the beginning, God’s works have made known His name and His praise over all the earth, but Zion is the place where His glory has been specially manifested. This is the central point of His historical revelations. And from this spot the triumphal proclamation of His name shall go forth throughout the world; so that not only in the Promised Land but to the ends of the earth, the latest generation shall praise that God who hears prayer, who exercises justice to the joy of His people, who is their guide, helper, and protector.’

LA�GE, "[Perowne:As we have heard, Psalm 48:8.—This marvellous deliverance is but a fresh proof, in our own experience, of that wonder-working Love, which in the days of old had so often manifested itself in Israel. The things which our fathers have told us, we have now witnessed with our own eyes, (compare Psalm 44:1). And therefore, also, the present is regarded as a pledge of the future.—J. F.]

PETT, "Verse 8God’s People Rejoice In The Security Of The City Of God �ow Evidenced �ot Just By Hearsay But Also By What They Had Themselves Seen (Psalms 48:8).

Psalms 48:8

‘As we have heard, so have we seen,In the city of YHWH of hosts,In the city of our God,God will establish it for ever. [SelahThe deliverance having taken place, and the enemy having faded away, God’s people triumphantly declare that they have now seen with their own eyes the delivering power of God revealed on behalf of His people. They had from their past heard many stories of His delivering power, but now they had seen it for themselves. It was thus clear to them that the city of YHWH of hosts, the city of their God, would be established by Him for ever.

And while they were faithful to Him that was, of course, true. But what they later forgot was that their security depended on faithfulness to the covenant. The truth was that God’s promises were only secure to an obedient people. That is why Jerusalem would end up a ruin, not once but a number of times (under �ebuchadnezzar, under Antiochus Epiphanes and under the Romans). However, in all that it was not that God had forgotten His true people. While unbelieving Israel

suffered and perished, His true people, the remnant who expanded into the church, were preserved through all the tribulations that would come, as part of the whole people of God who will rise again at the last day (Isaiah 26:19). Their names were recorded in Heaven. Thus God’s cause was secure. It is the outward trimmings that suffer, as they would later also for the churches in Asia Minor to whom John sent his letters (Revelation 1-3), when their lamp became but a dim glow through the rise of Islam. But the inner heart of His true people will burn on for ever.

‘Selah.’ This once again indicates a musical break and a pause for thought.

9 Within your temple, O God, we meditate on your unfailing love.

BAR�ES, "We have thought of thy loving-kindness, O God -We have reflected on, or meditated on. The word used here literally means “to compare, to liken;” and this idea is perhaps always implied when it is used in the sense of thinking on, or meditating on. Perhaps the meaning here is, that they had “compared” in their own minds what they had heard from their fathers with what they had now seen; they had called all these things up to their remembrance, and had compared the one with the other.

In the midst of thy temple - See the notes at Psa_5:7. The allusion here most probably is to the “temple,” properly so called, as these transactions are supposed to have occurred after the building of the temple by Solomon. The expression here also would make it probable that the psalm was composed after the defeat and overthrow of the armies referred to, in order that it might be used in the temple in celebrating the deliverance.

CLARKE, "We have thought of thy loving-kindness -We went to thy temple to worship thee; we meditated on thy goodness; we waited for a display of it; and the panic that in the first instance struck us, was transferred to our enemies; and fear took hold upon them, they marvelled, were troubled, and hasted away.

GILL, "We have thought of thy lovingkindness, O God,.... Jarchi interprets it, "we have waited for thy lovingkindness"; to see thy salvation; and some, as Ben Melech

observes, explain it of hope and expectation; as if the sense was, "we have hoped for thy lovingkindness"; so the Syriac version renders it, and the word used has the signification of tarrying, 1Sa_14:9. God has his set time to favour his Zion, and till that time comes it is right in them to be hoping, expecting, and waiting for it. The Chaldee paraphrase is, "we have esteemed thy goodness"; it being very excellent, exceeding valuable, and better than life itself; but other Jewish writers, as Menachem, Aben Ezra, Kimchi, and Ben Melech, render it as we do, "we have thought", &c. The lovingkindness of God towards his people in Christ is a very delightful and profitable subject to dwell in meditation upon, to consider the objects, instances, cause, and nature of it; and serves greatly to encourage faith and hope, to draw out love to God, and engage to a ready and cheerful obedience to his will; and this is sometimes done in public, as well as in private conversation, and in the closet; as follows;

in the midst of thy temple; the church of Christ, which is of his building, where he dwells, and grants his presence, and is often called the temple of God in the New Testament, in allusion to Solomon's temple; see 1Co_3:16; here the word of God is preached, his ordinances administered, and his presence granted; which are instances of his lovingkindness, and lead his people to think of it; and particularly when the faithful ministers of the Gospel make mention of it, and the ordinance of the supper is administering, which is intended to bring to remembrance the love of God and Christ: moreover, in the latter day, to which this psalm belongs, the temple of God will be opened, Rev_11:19; that is, the true worship of God will be restored, and pure and undefiled religion freely exercised; the Gospel will be clearly and fully preached; and the ordinances administered as they were first delivered, which will lead the saints to think of the lovingkindness of God unto them; and particularly when they shall see the angels with the seven vials the executioners of God's wrath on the antichristian states, go forth from the temple to pour them out upon them, Rev_15:6.

HE�RY, " Let our minds be hereby filled with good thoughts of God. “From what we have heard, and seen, and hope for, we may take occasion to think much of God's loving-kindness, whenever we meet in the midst of his temple,” Psa_48:9. All the streams of mercy that flow down to us must be traced up to the fountain of God's lovingkindness. It is not owing to any merit of ours, but purely to his mercy, and the peculiar favour he bears to his people. This therefore we must think of with delight, think of frequently and fixedly. What subject can we dwell upon more noble, more pleasant, more profitable? We must have God's lovingkindness always before our eyes (Psa_26:3), especially when we attend upon him in his temple. When we enjoy the benefit of public ordinances undisturbed, when we meet in his temple and there is none to make us afraid, we should take occasion thence to think of his lovingkindness.

JAMISO�, "thought of— literally, “compared,” or considered, in respect of former dealings.

in the ... temple— in acts of solemn worship (compare 2Ch_20:28).

CALVI�,"9O God! we have waited for thy mercy This verse teaches us that the faithful were preserved by the power of God; for, when all things were in a state of the greatest confusion, they continued tranquil and patient until God at length, having pity upon them, brought them help. The Hebrew word, דמם,damam, which

we have rendered to wait, properly signifies to be silent, and is here used to denote tranquillity of mind. From this we conclude, that the people of God were so harassed with dangers, that, had they listened to the judgment of carnal sense and reason, they would have been overwhelmed with terror; even as we know that men are in a state of continual uneasiness, and are driven hither and thither by contrary waves, until faith tranquillise their minds, and settle them in true patience. The amount of what the Psalmist says is, that the faithful, although severely afflicted, were not driven from their purpose, and prevented from relying upon the aid of God; but that, on the contrary, by their patience and hope, they opened the gate of his grace. It served to magnify and illustrate the greatness of the grace of God, that their expectations of assistance from him were not disappointed. From this we may also deduce the profitable warning, that if the aid of God is withdrawn from us, it is because we distrust his promises, and, by our impatience, prevent his grace, which is laid up for those who wait in patience, from flowing upon us. But what is meant by the expression, In the midst of the temple? Is it that the people of God maintained their faith only in that place, and that each of them ceased to hope as soon as he returned to his own dwelling? �o; on the contrary, it is certain that they carried home with them the hope which they had entertained in the temple, that they might continue steadfastly to abide by it. But God having promised that this place, in which he would be called upon, would be the seat and dwelling-place of his power and grace, his people here affirm, that, relying upon this heavenly promise, they were persuaded beyond all doubt that God would show himself merciful and gracious towards them, since they had a real and sure pledge of his presence. We must not conceive, merely because our own fancy suggests it, that God will be our deliverer. We are to believe that he will be so only in so far as he freely and willingly offers himself to us in this character. �ow, if this symbol or pledge of the presence of God, which was only a shadow, ought to have had such influence upon the minds of true believers under the former dispensation, as to make them hope for life in the midst of death, surely when Christ has now descended amongst us, to unite us much more closely to his Father, we have sufficient ground for continuing in a state of undisturbed tranquillity, although the world should be embroiled in confusion and turned upside down. Only it must be our endeavor that the service of God may flourish pure and entire amongst us, and that thus the glory of his temple may shine forth in the midst of us.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 9. We have thought. Holy men are thoughtful men; they do not suffer God's wonders to pass before their eyes and melt into forgetfulness, but they meditate deeply upon them. Of thy lovingkindness, O God. What a delightful subject! Devout minds never tire of so divine a theme. It is well to think of past lovingkindness in times of trial, and equally profitable to remember it in seasons of prosperity. Grateful memories sweeten sorrows and sober joys. In the midst of thy temple. Fit place for so devout a meditation. Where God is most seen he is best loved. The assembled saints constitute a living temple, and our deepest musings when so gathered together should have regard to the lovingkindness of the Lord, exhibited in the varied experiences of each of the living stones. Memories of mercy should be associated with continuance of praise. Hard by the table of show bread

commemorating his bounty, should stand the altar of incense denoting our praise.EXPLA�ATORY �OTES A�D QUAI�T SAYI�GSVer. 9. We have thought. The Hebrew (Mwd) and (Mmd) and (hmd) belong all to the same signification, of quiet, rest, silence, patient expecting, thinking, considering, and must be determined to any of these senses by the context. And here that of expecting or patient waiting, with affiance in him, and without all distrust or repining at his delays, seems to be most proper for it. For coming to the sanctuary to pray for mercy, it is most agreeable to say we wait for it there, as in the place where he hath promised to afford it, in return to prayers. Henry Hammond.HI�TS TO THE VILLAGE PREACHERVer. 9.1. What are the lovingkindnesses of God? Pity to the wretched, pardon to the penitent, help to the prayerful, comfort to the afflicted, etc.2. Where are they to be found? "In the midst of, "etc.1. Here they are revealed.2. Here they are dispensed.3. Here they are sought.4. Here they are enjoyed.

K&D 9-11, "(Heb.: 48:10-12) Now follows grateful praise to God, who hears prayer

and executes justice, to the joy of His city and of His people. By ינו[] the poet refers back to the service held in the temple before the army set out, as narrated in 2 Chr. 20, to the prayers offered in the time of their impending danger, and to the remembrance of the favour hitherto shown towards Jerusalem, from which source they drew the comfort of

hope for the present time. ה[], to compare, to hold one thing over against another, in

this instance by causing the history of the past to pass before one's mind. To God's mighty deeds of old is now added a new one. The Name of God, i.e., the sum of His self-

attestations hitherto, was the subject of the דמינו in the temple, and more particularly of

the Korahitic songs (2Ch_20:19); and this name has gloriously verified itself by a new deed of righteousness. His fame extends even to the ends of the earth (2Ch_20:29). He has proved Himself to be One whose right hand is full of righteousness, and who practises righteousness or justice where it is necessary. Let, then, the Holy City, let the country cities of Judah (Isa_40:9, cf. Psa_16:2) rejoice. The whole inheritance of Israel was threatened. Now it is most gloriously delivered.

COFFMA�, "Verse 9EXHORTATIO� TO PRAISE GOD FOR HIS JUDGME�TS

"We have thought on thy lovingkindness, O God,

In the midst of thy temple.

As is thy name, O God,

So is thy praise unto the ends of the earth:

Thy right hand is full of righteousness.

Let mount Zion be glad,

Let the daughters of Jerusalem rejoice,

Because of thy righteousness."

The cultic notion as applied to this psalm finds here some kind of a drama performed in the temple, ending in a procession around the city. As we have repeatedly noted, there is no solid evidence whatever that such an imaginary tale could be the truth.

"Thy praise unto the ends of the earth" (Psalms 48:10). As Adam Clarke noted, "These verses outline the duty of God's people to praise and honor him for his judgments."[13]

"Thy right hand is full of righteousness" (Psalms 48:10). This righteousness was of a double variety. Favor and blessing were given to God's people, but judgment and destruction came upon the enemy.

"Let the daughters of Judah rejoice" (Psalms 48:11). "These were the outlying villages and cities in the area of Jerusalem."[14]

"Because of thy judgments" (Psalms 48:11). "This means, `Because thou hast vindicated thy people and executed judgment upon their enemies.'"[15]

TRAPP, "Psalms 48:9 We have thought of thy lovingkindness, O God, in the midst of thy temple.

Ver. 9. We have thought upon thy lovingkindness] Heb. We have silently mused or minded, as being amazed, or rather amazed, thereat, not able to speak for a while, we were so transported when we met in thy temple for the purpose to praise thee, as for thy lovingkindness towards us, so for thy power and justice exercised on our enemies.

EXPOSITORS DICTIO�ARY OF TEXTS, "The Subject of Meditation (A Communion Sermon)

Psalm 48:9

This Psalm is a song of triumph, when Jerusalem was saved from some impending danger. The theme is that God is the safety of Zion, the impregnable city, made such by the loving care of God.

I. Into the temple the joyful people surge to give vent to their feelings of gratitude

and triumph. Where else can they go with such fitness but to the sanctuary which stands to them as the very heart of their religion? And what is more fitting than that they should before all else give thanks to God? Such deliverance drives the pious heart to God, to think sweetly of His lovingkindness. They go up to the temple to think of it, lovingly, gratefully, humbly, prayerfully. Shallow souls let even great events pass without real thought, without notice, without making them an occasion for going deeper into life, deeper into the mystery and wonder of God"s providence, and deeper into their own hearts. They do not consider the true inward significance of what yet strikes them as marvellous.

II. Here in this Psalm , after the great deliverance, the Psalmist feels that the first thing to do, the first thing to think, is praise, grateful thanksgiving. And what fitter theme could there be for us as we come to take in our hands the symbols of God"s love in Christ Jesus? Let us make our Communion season one grateful meditation on this grandest of all themes. There can be no better preparation beforehand, and no more appropriate frame of mind during the act than this. We come to meditate on God"s loving kindness. That sums up everything, all we would like to do, all we would like to feel. In the light of the deathless love which shines through the simple form of this memorial rite, should not complete trust fill our hearts now and confidence for the future illumine our path?

III. Whether we look back or forward, within or without, is not thanksgiving our appropriate state? What can we think of in the presence of the tokens of love but of Him and His lovingkindness? Let the breaking of the bread and the pouring out of the wine stand to us as they should for all that Christ has brought us, the forgiveness of sins, peace with God, reconciliation, hope of glory, all the rich and glorious elements of Divine love. When we come to the table, we will think of Thy lovingkindness, O God, in the midst of Thy temple. From the burning heart of love, shown to us there, we see love everywhere. We see that life is surrounded by God, that we are engirded, enswathed, encompassed by the love of God, beset behind and before. On that love we will meditate: on it we will feed: we will seek to get from it comfort and peace and hope and strength for new obedience. We have but one thought, in the midst of the temple, amid the sacred mysteries of the temple: namely, His lovingkindness.

—Hugh Black, Christ"s Service of Love, p254.

EBC 9-14, "The third part (Psa_48:9-14) deals with the praise and trust of the inhabitants of Zion. Deliverance leads to thankful meditation on the lovingkindness which it so signally displayed, and the ransomed people first gather in the Temple, which was the scene of God’s manifestation of His grace, and therefore is the fitting place for them to ponder it. The world wide consequences of the great act of lovingkindness almost shut out of sight for the moment its bearing on the worshippers. It is a lofty height to which the song climbs, when it regards national deliverance chiefly as an occasion for wider diffusion of God’s praise. His "name" is the manifestation of His character in act. The psalmist is sure that wherever that character is declared praise will follow, because he is sure that that character is perfectly and purely good, and that God cannot act but in such a way as to magnify Himself. That great sea will cast up nothing

but pearls. The words carry also a lesson for recipients of Divine lovingkindness, teaching them that they misapprehend the purpose of their blessings, if they confine these to their own well-being and lose sight of the higher object-that men may learn to know and love Him. But the deliverance not only produces grateful meditation and widespread praise; it sets the mother city and her daughter villages astir, like Miriam and her maidens, with timbrel and dance, and ringing songs which celebrate "Thy judgments," terrible as they were. That dead host was an awful sight, and hymns of praise seem heartless for its dirge. But it is not savage glee nor fierce hatred which underlies the psalmist’s summons, and still less is it selfish joy. "Thy judgments" are to be hymned when they smite some giant evil; and when systems and their upholders that array themselves against God are drowned in some Red Sea, it is fitting that on its banks should echo, "Sing ye to Jehovah, for He hath triumphed gloriously."

The close of this part may be slightly separated from Psa_48:9-11. The citizens who have been cooped up by the siege are bidden to come forth, and, free from fear, to compass the city without and pass between its palaces within, and so see how untouched they are. The towers and bulwark or rampart remain unharmed, with not a Stone smitten from its place. Within, the palaces stand without a trace of damage to their beauty. Whatever perishes in any assaults, that which is of God will abide; and, after all musterings of the enemy, the uncaptured walls will rise in undiminished strength, and the fair palaces which they guard glitter in untarnished splendour. And this complete exemption from harm is to be told to the generation following, that they may learn what a God this God is, and how safely and well He will guide all generations.

The last word in the Hebrew text, which the A.V. and R.V. render "even unto death," can scarcely have that meaning. Many attempts have been made to find a signification appropriate to the close of such a triumphal hymn as this, but the simplest and most probable course is to regard the words as a musical note, which is either attached abnormally to the close of the psalm, or has strayed hither from the superscription of Psa_49:1-20. It is found in the superscription of Psa_9:1-20 ("Al-Muth") as a musical direction, and has in all likelihood the same meaning here. If it is removed, the psalm ends abruptly, but a slight transposition of words and change of the main division of the verse remove that difficulty by bringing "forever and aye" from the first half. The change improves both halves, laying the stress of the first exclusively on the thought that this God is such a God (or, by another rendering, "is here," i.e., in the city), without bringing in reference to the eternity of His protection, and completing the second half worthily, with the thought of His eternal guidance of the people among whom He dwells.

LANGE, "Psalm 48:9-14. We have thought.—The idea here is that of contemplation, reflecting, and comparing, rather than that of hopeful expectation, (Sept, Syr, Sym, Jerome). The Rabbins are divided on this point. The Temple is named as being the place in which God had revealed His grace (Calvin, Hupfeld), or rather, as the place in which the Church commemorated that grace, by songs of praise (Hengst. Ewald), or by the solemn services which preceded the marching forth to battle, mentioned in 2 Chronicles20. The “daughters of Judah” are not virgins who take part in the festive dance (De Wette, Ols.), but other outlying cities and villages, ( Psalm 69:36; Joshua 15:45; Isaiah 40:9). The exhortation carefully to consider and look about the city, which has remained inviolate, is not addressed ironically to the enemies (Geier, Sachs, Hitz.), but seriously to the inhabitants. The reading לחילה (on the bulwarks), found in many old editions, ancient versions, and in18 Codd. of De Rossi, also occurs in Zechariah 9:4. If Mappik be omitted, we must insert a softened suffix, (Ewald, Gram. § 247). There is no proof that פסג has

the sense of “to elevate,” (Luther, following Jewish tradition); nor is it quite certain that its meaning is “to regard a thing part by part, to consider attentively,” (De Wette, Hengst, Ewald, Hitz.). The sense “to walk through,” derived from that of “to intersect,” (viz.: a vineyard in which there is no way), is based on a passage in the Talmud. The demonstrative pronoun is occasionally though rarely placed before the noun, (Ewald, Gram. § 293). It is not necessary, therefore, to translate Psalm 48:14 “that here is God” (Hupf.); nor “for this is God,” (De Wette, Ols, Bött, Ewald, Hitz.). In this case “this” must be taken in the sense of “such,” since the allusion was not to God, but to the city (Camp.). The concluding phrase, על־מות, might be rendered “the point of death” (Ges, Hengst.); or “until death” (Hupfeld, Kimchi, and most others). But the latter expression would be unusual, and is liable to misconception, whilst the former would be more appropriate. For the reference is not to persons, but a community, and the allusion is not to dying, but the deliverance of the city, and the joy caused by it to the whole earth, as well as the renewed trust in the Divine guidance. We should look for something to indicate the duration of that guidance, which forever secured the stability of the people. The rendering, therefore, should not be “beyond death,” (Syriac, Mendelssohn, Stier), which would give the idea of personal immortality—αθανασία (Aquila), but away past death, i.e. destruction (Campb.). It cannot be denied, however, that the idea which Hengstenberg finds here, viz.: that God delivers from the danger of death ( Habakkuk 1:12; Psalm 49:16; Psalm 68:21; Psalm 85:7), and saves His people from destruction, would be unusual and obscure. The same may be said of the rendering “in the eternities,” (Sept, Chald, Symm, Aben Ezra, J. H. Mich, Ewald). This sense would suit, but it supposes the reading to be למות -which occurs only in later and non ,(.Cod. Kenn ו found in) ,עbiblical Hebrew. It Isaiah, however, not impossible that this form of the word may stand in place of עולמים. But Luther’s version, derived from the Chald, “like the youth,” or “like the virgins,” or “in youthfulness,” is objectionable, partly because it is foreign to the context, and partly because it would require the particle כ or ב to be supplied. The reading עלמזת, found in many ancient Codd. and early editions, must be very old, because most of the earliest versions, in the main, express the same idea. Under these circumstances we may suppose that these words, like those in Psalm 9. are a mark (Hitzig) to indicate the kind of music to be used, here as in Habakkuk 3:19 placed exceptionally at the end instead of the beginning of the hymn (Del.); or as indicating the sort of verse (Böttcher). The rythm implies that nothing (Hitzig), rather than that something (Del.) has been omitted.

PETT, "Verses 9-11

Having Meditated On What Has Happened, God’s People Now Declare Their Confidence in God (Psalms 48:9-11).

Psalms 48:9-11

‘We have thought on your covenant love, O God,

In the midst of your temple.

As is your name, O God,

So is your praise to the ends of the earth,

Your right hand is full of righteousness,

Let mount Zion be glad,

Let the daughters of Judah rejoice,

Because of your judgments.

What they have seen has turned their thoughts towards God’s lovingkindness (His covenant love), as they come to worship in His Temple, and they acknowledge gladly that what His Name (His nature and activity) means to them, has also become known to other nations so that they also praise Him. Many nations had in fact cause to be grateful for the humiliating of Assyria, and would give praise to Israel’s God for His deliverance.

For they recognise that God has acted in righteous deliverance by the might of His right hand, and will therefore, they are sure, continue to do so. Thus Mount Zion herself could rejoice, and so could all the neighbouring towns (her ‘daughters’ - compare Numbers 21:25; Joshua 17:11; Joshua 17:16) who had suffered so terribly under the Assyrian invasion. All could now rest secure in the judgments and decisions of their mighty God.

What they later forgot was that His righteous deliverance was only for the righteous. Thus once they had virtually forsaken Him (in the time of Jeremiah Jerusalem was almost totally unfaithful to YHWH - Jeremiah 5:1 ff.), His protection no longer applied. The promise of His protection applies to all who are faithful to God, but only if they are looking to Him and trusting in Him. When they are they can ever be sure that His right hand will finally vindicate them, and that His judgments will be carried out on their behalf.

10 Like your name, O God, your praise reaches to the ends of the earth; your right hand is filled with righteousness.

BAR�ES, "According to thy name, O God, so is thy praise - That is, as far as thy name is known, it will be praised; or, the effect of knowing it will be to inspire praise. A just view of thy character and doings will lead people to praise thee as far as thy name is known. This seems to have been said in view of what had occurred. Events so remarkable, and so suited to show that God was a just, a powerful, and a merciful Being, would claim universal praise and adoration.

Unto the ends of the earth - In every part of the world. The earth is frequently represented in the Scriptures as an extended plain, having ends, corners, or limits. See the notes at Isa_11:12; Rev_7:1.

Thy right hand is full of righteousness - The right hand is the instrument by which we accomplish anything. The idea here is, that in what God had done it seemed as if his hand - the instrument by which this bad been accomplished - had been “filled” with justice. All that had been manifested had been righteousness, and that had been in

abundance.

CLARKE, "According to thy name - As far as thou art known, so far art thou praised; and where thou art known, thou wilt have praise to the end of the earth. And why? “Thy right hand is full of righteousness.” Thou art continually dispensing thy blessings to the children of men.

GILL, "According to thy name, O God, so is thy praise unto the ends of the earth,.... That is, as he himself is in the perfections of his nature, which are displayed in the works of his bands, throughout the whole creation; so is or ought his praise to be: or rather, as in the latter day his name will be great in all the earth, Mal_1:11; so will his praise be; and as his name will be One, Zec_14:9; he will be one Lord, there will be one faith and one baptism; his worship, word, and ordinances, will be uniformly observed and attended to; so will be his praise: all the saints will unite together in giving glory to him: he, and he alone, shall be exalted. Moreover, his Gospel is his name, Act_9:15; and that in the latter day will be preached to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people, Rev_14:6; and multitudes, both of Jews and Gentiles, will be convert ed, and from the uttermost parts of the earth will be heard songs of praise and glory unto him, Isa_24:15;

thy right hand is full of righteousness: of all spiritual blessings for his people; and particularly of the righteousness of Christ, which God accepts of, imputes unto, and liberally bestows upon them: and it is also full of punitive justice, which he inflicts on his and their enemies; his right hand teaches him terrible things, and these terrible things he does in righteousness; all his works are in righteousness, which the right hand, being the instrument of action, is a token of. Moreover, Christ is the right hand of God; he is the man of his right hand, and as dear to him as his right hand; he is the right hand of his righteousness, by which he upholds his people; and this right hand of his is full of righteousness; he does nothing else but righteousness; he is the author and donor of it to his people, and will execute righteousness upon his enemies; in righteousness he will make war with them, Rev_19:11; and which is greatly the sense of

HE�RY, "Let us give to God the glory of the great things which he has done for us, and mention them to his honour (Psa_48:10): “According to thy name, O God! so is thy praise, not only in Jerusalem, but to the ends of the earth.” By the late signal deliverance of Jerusalem God had made himself a name; that is, he had gloriously discovered his wisdom, power, and goodness, and made all the nations about sensible of it; and so was his praise; that is, some in all parts would be found giving glory to him accordingly. As far as his name goes his praise will go, at least it should go, and, at length, it shall go, when all the ends of the world shall praise him, Psa_22:27; Rev_11:15. Some, by his name, understand especially that glorious name of his, the Lord of hosts; according to that name, so is his praise; for all the creatures, even to the ends of the earth, are under his command. But his people must, in a special manner, acknowledge his justice in all he does for them. “Righteousness fills thy right hand;” that is, all the operations of thy power are consonant to the eternal rules of equity.

JAMISO�, "According ... praise— that is, As Thy perfections manifested (compare Psa_8:1; Psa_20:1-7), demand praise, it shall be given, everywhere.

thy right hand, etc.— Thy righteous government is displayed by Thy power.

CALVI�,"10.As is thy name, O God! so is thy praise Some connect this verse with the preceding sentence, as if it had been said, Lord, it is not in vain that thou hast enjoined upon us the duty of celebrating thy name; for thou furnishest at the same time matter of praise. Thus the sense will be, that the name of God is magnified and extolled with effect, or that along with his promises his power is at the same time manifested. Others give this exposition, which is somewhat more refined, That the works of God correspond with his name; for in Hebrew he is called, אל, El, (197) from his power, and he shows in very deed that this name is not applied to him in vain, but that the praise which is ascribed to him by it is right and what is due to him. The former exposition, as it is less forced, so it comes nearer to the words and mind of the sacred writer, namely, that God bore testimony by his works that it was not in vain that he was acknowledged and worshipped by the Jews as the true and only God. Yet when I come to consider the words which follow immediately after, Unto the ends of the earth, I think that the prophet meant something else, — that he intended to show, that wherever the fame of the name of God may be spread, men will know that he is worthy of the highest praise. The words contain a tacit contrast. At that time, the names of idols, it is well known, were very common, and had sway through the whole world; and yet, whatever fame these counterfeit gods had acquired, we know that praise in no respect belonged to them, since no sign of divinity whatever could be discovered about them. But here the prophet, on the contrary, declares, Lord, in whatever part of the world thy name is heard, it will always be accompanied with solid and rightful praise, or it will ever carry along with it matter of praise, since the whole world will understand how thou hast dealt with thy chosen people. What is added immediately after is to the same purpose, Thy right hand is full of righteousness, teaching us, that God, in succouring his own people, clearly manifests his righteousness, as if he stretched forth his arm to us that we might touch his righteousness with the finger; and that he shows not only one specimen or two of his righteousness, but in every thing and every where exhibits to us a complete proof of it. We ought to bear in mind what we have stated elsewhere, that the righteousness of God is to be understood of his faithfulness which he observes in maintaining and defending his own people. From this there accrues to us the inestimable comfort, that the work in which God especially desires to be acknowledged as righteous consists in providing what belongs to our welfare and to our maintenance in safety. (198) We now see that the meaning of the inspired poet is, That the names of false gods prevailed, and were renowned among men, although they had done nothing to furnish matter of true praise; but that it was altogether different with respect to the God of Israel: for wherever the report of him was carried, all would understand that he was the deliverer of his people, and that he did not disappoint their hope and desires, nor forsake them in danger.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 10. According to thy name, O God, so is thy praise unto the ends of the earth. Great fame is due to his great name. The glory of Jehovah's exploits overleaps the boundaries of earth; angels behold with wonder, and from

every star delighted intelligences proclaim his fame beyond the ends of the earth. What if men are silent, yet the woods, and seas, and mountains, with all their countless tribes, and all the unseen spirits that walk them, are full of the divine praise. As in a shell we listen to the murmurs of the sea, so in the convolutions of creation we hear the praises of God. Thy right hand is full of righteousness. Thy sceptre and thy sword, thy government and thy vengeance, are altogether just. Thy hand is never empty, but full of energy, of bounty, and of equity. �either saint nor sinner shall find the Lord to be an empty handed God; he will in both cases deal out righteousness to the full: to the one, through Jesus, he will be just to forgive, to the other just to condemn.EXPLA�ATORY �OTES A�D QUAI�T SAYI�GS�one.HI�TS TO THE VILLAGE PREACHERVer. 10. As the name of God, so his praises are—1. Supreme.2. Unqualified.3. Universal.4. Everlasting.Ver. 10. Thy right hand, etc.1. The justice of omnipotence.2. Omnipotence controlled by justice.3. The omnipotence of justice.

TRAPP, "Psalms 48:10 According to thy name, O God, so [is] thy praise unto the ends of the earth: thy right hand is full of righteousness.

Ver. 10. According to thy name, O God, so is thy praise] i.e. It is infinite and inexpressible, Psalms 148:1; Psalms 145:3. God’s name is exalted above all blessing and praise, as those holy Levites acknowledge, �ehemiah 9:5. The distance between God and us is infinite, and we should labour to fill up that distance, if possible, with our praises.

Thy right hand is full of righteousness] i.e. Of noble acts, which thou hast done for us, according to thy promise, Psalms 25:10.

BE�SO�, "Psalms 48:10. According to thy name, so is thy praise — Thou art acknowledged, and evidently proved, to be such a one as thou hast affirmed thyself to be in thy word, God Almighty, or All-sufficient, the Lord of hosts, the King of thy church and people, a strong tower to all that trust in thee; and whatever else thou art said to be in Scripture. �one of thy names are empty titles, but all of them are fully answered by honourable and praiseworthy works. Thy right hand is full of righteousness — That is, of righteous actions, by which thou discoverest thy truth, justice, and holiness, in destroying the wicked and incorrigible enemies of thy people, and in fulfilling thy promises made to thy church.

11 Mount Zion rejoices, the villages of Judah are glad because of your judgments.

BAR�ES, "Let mount Zion rejoice - Let Jerusalem, the holy city, rejoice or be glad. Mount Zion is evidently used here to designate the city; and the idea is, that the city of God - the holy city - had occasion for joy and gladness in view of the manifestation of the divine favor.

Let the daughters of Judah be glad - The phrase “daughters of Judah” “may” denote the smaller cities in the tribe of Judah, that surrounded Jerusalem as the “mother” city - in accordance with an usage quite common in the Hebrew Scriptures. See the notes at Isa_1:8. Perhaps, however, the more obvious interpretation is the correct one, as meaning that the women of Judah had special occasion to rejoice on account of their deliverance from so great danger, and from the horrors which usually attended the siege or the conquest of the city - the atrocities which commonly befall the female sex when a city is captured in war. The “daughters of Judah” are those descended from Judah, or connected with the tribe of Judah. Jerusalem was in the bounds of that tribe, and the name Judah was given to all those that remained after the removal of the ten tribes.

Because of thy judgments - Thy righteous interposition in delivering the city and people.

CLARKE, "Let Mount Zion rejoice - The temple is restored in majesty, which was threatened with total destruction; it is again repaired.

Let the daughters of Judah be glad - That thou hast turned her captivity, and poured out thy judgments upon her oppressors.

GILL, "Let Mount Zion rejoice,.... The church in general; see Psa_48:1;

let the daughters of Judah be glad; particular churches; and so the Targum renders it, "the congregations of the house of Judah"; or particular believers; such as are called the daughters of Jerusalem, and the daughters of Zion, Son_3:10; these are exhorted to joy and gladness, at the loving kindness of God, at the spread of his name and glory to the ends of the earth, and at his righteousness his right hand is full of; and as it follows,

because of thy judgments; executed on the antichristian kings, Psa_48:4; and on all the antichristian states, and on the whore of Babylon, and those who have committed fornication with her; see Rev_19:1.

HE�RY, "Let all the members of the church in particular take to themselves the comfort of what God does for his church in general (Psa_48:11): “Let Mount Zion rejoice, the priests and Levites that attend the sanctuary, and then let all the daughters of Judah, the country towns, and the inhabitants of them, be glad: let the women in their songs and dances, as usual on occasion of public joys, celebrate with thankfulness the great salvation which God has wrought for us.” Note, When we have given God the praise we may then take the pleasure of the extraordinary deliverances of the church, and be glad because of God's judgments (that is, the operations of his providence), all which we may see wrought in wisdom (therefore called judgments) and working for the good of his church.

JAMISO�, "the daughters, etc.— the small towns, or the people, with the chief city, or rulers of the Church.

judgments— decisions and acts of right government.

SBC 11-13, "I. There are times when heart and brain fail and are weary beneath the weight of the years that have been and the thought of those that are yet to be, times when the whole being sinks back overwhelmed by the endless range of life and creation, appalled at the springing up and dying away of creatures innumerable, and we amongst them, generation after generation rising, living, dying, passing out of sight, whether they be man, the seeming lord of this earth, or the worm, his seeming subject. Then this soul of man, with its strong, active life-power, refuses to believe that this short perishing of its seventy or eighty years is its boundary, determines to grasp a greater inheritance, will hold fast and make the ages its own, and by abiding works, by deeds that live, conquer the coming years and bid them do its commands. It is part of our immortality to feel this.

II. It was needful in the childhood of the world to have a strong city and a glorious temple as the rallying place and visible fortress of the people of God. The strong walls and the glorious temple, telling as they did of many a past year of holy trial and holy victory, and speaking in their strength of years unnumbered yet to come, satisfied the craving for an enduring record, and became a home that could be seen of national honour, a home to Israel for Israel’s God upon earth.

E. Thring, Uppingham Sermons, vol. i., p. 86. Three thoughts are most conspicuous in the verses of the text.

I. Loyal, patriotic pride.

II. Consideration for posterity: "that ye may tell them that come after."

III. An ascription of all past blessings to God and a resolution to remain faithful to Him for ever.

H. M. Butler, Harrow Sermons, 1st series, p. 133.

Reference: Psa_48:13.—H. M. Butler, Harrow Sermons, 2nd series, p. 176.

CALVI�,"11Mount Zion shall rejoice The Psalmist now concludes his exhortation

to rejoicing, telling us that Jerusalem and the other cities of Judea shall have cause to commend the righteousness of God, (202) because they had found from undoubted experience that he was the protector of their welfare. He here makes use of the word judgment, because God, who undertook the cause of his Church, openly showed that he was the enemy of her oppressors, and that he would repress their presumption and audacity.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 11. Let mount Zion rejoice. As the first of the cities of Judah, and the main object of the enemies' attack, let her lead the song. Let the daughters of Judah be glad, let the smaller towns join the chorus, for they join in the common victory. Let the women, who fare worst in the havoc of war, be among the gladdest of the glad, now that the spoilers have fled. All the church, and each individual member, should rejoice in the Lord, and magnify his name. Because of thy judgments. The righteous acts of the Lord are legitimate subjects for joyful praise. However it may appear on earth, yet in heaven the eternal ruin of the wicked will be the theme of adoring song. Revelation 19:1; Revelation 19:3 : "Alleluia; salvation, and glory, and honour, and power, unto the Lord our God. For true and righteous are his judgments; for he hath judged the great whore which did corrupt the earth with her fornication, and hath avenged the blood of his servants at her hand. And again they said, Alleluia, and her smoke rose up for ever and ever." Justice which to our poor optics now seems severe, will then be perceived to be perfectly consistent with God's name of love, and to be one of the brightest jewels of his crown.EXPLA�ATORY �OTES A�D QUAI�T SAYI�GS�one.HI�TS TO THE VILLAGE PREACHERVer. 11.1. The subjects of his peoples' joy. �ot mercies merely, but judgments2. Reasons:1. Because they are holy—needful to the purity of moral government2. Just—needful to vindicate law.3. Good—needful for the greatest amount of good.

BE�SO�, "Psalms 48:11. Let mount Zion rejoice — That is, Jerusalem; let the daughters of Judah — The other lesser cities, towns, and villages; be glad, because of thy judgments — Upon thy and their enemies. Let the mother city give an example of joy and thankfulness to all the smaller places, and to the whole kingdom, and let them unanimously join together, with the greatest gladness, to express how sensible they are of thy power and goodness in the wonderful deliverance granted them. Just so, “the church and all her children ought to rejoice with joy unspeakable, on account of the manifestation of divine power on her behalf against her enemies. Thus, at the fall of mystic Babylon, it is said, Rejoice over her, thou heaven, and ye holy apostles and prophets, for God hath avenged you on her, Revelation 18:20.” — Horne.

COKE, "Psalms 48:11-13. Let mount Zion rejoice, &c.— Dr. Delaney thinks that

these verses allude to the great improvements made at Jerusalem, the temple on mount Moriah, Millo, the house of the forest of Lebanon, the palace of Pharaoh's daughter, and that of Solomon, &c. See b. ii. c. 8. Green renders Psalms 48:11, When the daughter of Sion heard, she rejoiced; the daughters of Judah were transported with joy because of thy judgments. Mudge thinks that the three first verses of this psalm were insultingly thrown out upon the kings who had come up against Jerusalem, and had gone round her to reconnoitre her strength, in order to take her, but were now fled away; calling upon them to return and go round her again, and see how entire her fortifications were; and bidding them tell the next generation, that it would be in vain to attempt any thing against her, while she had Jehovah for her protector. "Tell the next generation that this God is our God; He will be our guide for ever and ever:" For Bishop Hare seems to have proved, beyond doubt, that מות על al mut, rendered unto death, should be rendered one word, and make part of the title of the following psalm, being the same word which is rendered alamoth in the title of Psalms 46. Fenwick, however, thinks that there is no need of any correction, the sacred writer meaning, "God will lead us as conquerors, and enable us to triumph over death."

REFLECTIO�S.—1st, The work of heaven will be everlasting praise; it is good to antedate the joy.

1. Great is the Lord, who in his mediatorial glory is so highly exalted, and greatly to be praised for all his wonderous works of power, grace, and love, manifested in all ages to his faithful people: and this his glory is to be set forth,

2. In the city of our God, in Jerusalem, the mountain of his holiness, in Zion, where, in his temple, his sacred presence dwelt between the cherubims: Beautiful for situation, eminent to view, and the country around it like the garden of Eden: the joy of the whole earth is mount Zion, being the favoured residence of the God of the whole earth, on the sides of the north, turned from the sultry beam of day, the city of the great King, where most eminently he fixes his throne, and manifests his glory. God is known in her palaces for a refuge, having protected it from every foe; and all who come to worship there find safety under his wings. Thus glorious was the earthly Jerusalem, but how much in glory does the spiritual Zion exceed her. In his church the great Redeemer is pleased to dwell now; bright in holiness she shines, and filled with inhabitants as a city: In beauty excellent, watered with the streams of grace, which flow from the fountain of blessedness, adorned with living palaces, the residence of the eternal Spirit: here a sure refuge is found in the arms of Jesus from guilt and sin, known by the word of his gospel, and proved by the experience of every faithful soul.

3. All attempts of foes to hurt are fruitless, where God is thus known and praised. This Jerusalem had experienced. The assembled kings passed by, they saw Almighty Power engaged to protect her, and with astonishment fled; a panic fear seized them, they were dashed in pieces by the stormy wind: and such will be the issue of the war against the church of God carried on by the antichristian foes, Revelation 19:19-21. They will fall before the power of Jesus, be overthrown with perpetual desolations,

and sink as a stone in the mighty waters of God's wrath, and never rise up again.

2nd, We have the church of God declaring by experience the truth of what the Psalmist had asserted. As we have heard, either in former ages when God vouchsafed such mighty aid, or in the word of promise, so have we seen the accomplishment of the promise, and the like protection, in the city of the Lord of hosts, in the city of our God; Jerusalem bore testimony to God's faithfulness and care then, and in like manner may the people of God in every age increase the number of witnesses. God will establish it for ever; the gates of hell shall never prevail over the faithful children of God; but finally they shall triumph over all their enemies. We have thought of thy loving kindness, O God, from whence all his rich mercy springs, or waited for it, when dangers seemed to threaten, in the midst of thy temple, thy church, where in prayer we called upon thee, and with praises celebrated thy faithfulness. According to thy name, thy boundless perfections, so is thy praise unto the ends of the earth, whither the glorious gospel has carried the discovery of that blessed name, the Lord our Redeemer and Saviour. Thy right hand is full of righteousness, every decision of his is equitable; and especially what seems here intended, the doom reserved for the opposers of God's truth and kingdom is altogether righteous. And herein let mount Zion rejoice, let the daughters of Judah be glad; all true believers, because of thy judgments, which shall be executed on the powers of Antichrist in the great day of retribution. And in the mean time, walk about Zion, and go round about her: tell the towers thereof. Jerusalem was regarded as an impregnable fortress; but stronger towers of angelic guards keep safe the spiritual Zion. Mark well her bulwarks, built on Christ, the rock of ages, defended by the arm of Omnipotence; consider her palaces, such as are the prophets, apostles, confessors, and faithful in every age, that ye may tell it to the generation following, for the support of their faith and hope in every exigence. For this God is our God for ever and ever, the same powerful protector, the same gracious and loving Saviour to all who trust in him. He will be our guide, the guide of the faithful, safely to preserve them from all the dangers of life; in death, to keep them from all fear or failing; and after death, to bring them to the eternal enjoyment of his blessed self. May we prove him such by happy experience!

12 Walk about Zion, go around her, count her towers,

BAR�ES, "Walk about Zion - This is a call on all persons to go round the city; to take a survey of it; to see how beautiful and how strong it was - how it had escaped all

danger, and was uninjured by the attempt to destroy it - how capable it was of resisting an attack. The word “walk” here means simply to go around or surround. The other word used has a more direct reference to a solemn procession.

And go round about her - The word used here - from נקף nâqaph - to fasten together, to join together, means to move round in a circle, as if persons joined together (see the notes at Job_1:5), and would refer here properly to a solemn procession moving round the city, and taking a deliberate survey of its entire circuit.

Tell the towers thereof - That is, Take the number of the towers. See how numerous they are; how firm they remain; what a defense and protection they constitute. Cities, surrounded by walls, had always “towers” or elevated portions as posts of observation, or as places from which missiles might be discharged with advantage on those who should attempt to scale the walls. Compare Gen_11:4-5; 2Ch_26:9-10; Isa_2:15.

CLARKE, "Walk about Zion - Consider the beauty and magnificence of the temple, count the towers by which it is fortified.

GILL, "Walk about Zion, and go round about her,.... These words are either an address to the enemies of the church, sarcastically delivered; calling upon them to come, and surround, and besiege Zion, and see what the issue and consequence of it will he, even the same as that of the kings, Psa_48:4; or to the builders of Zion, as Jarchi observes, to come and take a survey of it, and see what repairs were necessary; or rather to the saints, to the daughters of Judah before mentioned, to take a view of the strength and defence of the church, for their own comfort and encouragement, and to report the same to others for theirs also; for by walking around it may be observed the foundation, the rock and eminence on which it is built, Christ Jesus; the wall of it, the Lord himself, a wall of fire; the entrance into it, Christ the gate of righteousness; the fortress and strong hold of it the same; and the guards about it, the watch men on its walls, the ministers of the Gospel, and an innumerable company of angels, that in a circle surround both ministers and people; see Rev_7:11;

tell the towers thereof; see 2Ch_26:9; the Lord himself is the tower of his people, high and strong, which secures and defends them from all their enemies, Psa_18:2; the ministers of the Gospel, who are immovable, and are set for the defence of it, Jer_6:27; the Scriptures of truth, which are like a tower built for an armoury, out of which the saints are furnished and provided with proper armour, whereby they are able to engage with false teachers, and to overcome the evil one, Son_4:4; and the ordinances of the Gospel, the church's two breasts, said to be as towers, Son_8:10; some render the words, "tell in the towers" (i); publish on the house tops, declare in the high places of the city, in the most public manner, the great things of the Gospel, which relate to the glory of Christ and his church.

HE�RY 12-13, " Let us diligently observe the instances and evidences of the church's beauty, strength, and safety, and faithfully transmit our observations to those that shall come after us (Psa_48:12, Psa_48:13): Walk about Zion. Some think this refers to the

ceremony of the triumph; let those who are employed in that solemnity walk round the walls (as they did, Neh_12:31), singing and praising God. In doing this let them tell the towers and mark well the bulwarks, 1. That they might magnify the late wonderful deliverance God had wrought for them. Let them observe, with wonder, that the towers and bulwarks are all in their full strength and none of them damaged, the palaces in their beauty and none of them blemished; there is not the least damage done to the city by the kings that were assembled against it (Psa_48:4): Tell this to the generation following, as a wonderful instance of God's care of his holy city, that the enemies should not only not ruin or destroy it, but not so much as hurt or deface it. 2. That they might fortify themselves against the fear of the like threatening danger another time. And so, (1.) We may understand it literally of Jerusalem, and the strong-hold of Zion. Let the daughters of Judah see the towers and bulwarks of Zion, with a pleasure equal to the terror with which the kings their enemies saw them, Psa_48:5. Jerusalem was generally looked upon as an impregnable place, as appears, Lam_4:12. All the inhabitants of the world would not have believed that an enemy should enter the gates of Jerusalem; nor could they have entered if the inhabitants had not sinned away their defence. Set your heart to her bulwarks. This intimates that the principal bulwarks of Zion were not the objects of sense, which they might set their eye upon, but the objects of faith, which they must set their hearts upon. It was well enough fortified indeed both by nature and art; but its bulwarks that were mostly to be relied upon were the special presence of God in it, the beauty of holiness he had put upon it, and the promises he had made concerning it. “Consider Jerusalem's strength, and tell it to the generations to come, that they may do nothing to weaken it, and that, if at any time it be in distress, they may not basely surrender it to the enemy as not tenable.” Calvin observes here that when they are directed to transmit to posterity a particular account of the towers, and bulwarks, and palaces of Jerusalem, it is intimated that in process of time they would all be destroyed and remain no longer to be seen; for, otherwise, what need was thee to preserve the description and history of them? When the disciples were admiring the buildings of the temple their Master told them that in a little time one stone of it should not be left upon another, Mat_24:1, Mat_24:2. Therefore, (2.) This must certainly be applied to the gospel church, that Mount Zion, Heb_12:22. “Consider the towers, and bulwarks, and palaces of that, that you may be invited and encouraged to join yourselves to it and embark in it. See it founded on Christ, the rock fortified by the divine power, guarded by him that neither slumbers nor sleeps. See what precious ordinances are its palaces, what precious promises are its bulwarks; tell this to the generation following, that they may with purpose of heart espouse its interests and cleave to it.”

JAMISO�, "The call to survey Zion, or the Church, as a fortified city, is designed to suggest “how

well our God secures His fold.” This security is perpetual, and its pledge is His guidance through this life.

CALVI�,"12and 13Encompass Zion, etc. Here the prophet again commends the situation and beauty of Jerusalem, intimating that the city was strongly fortified and impregnable; and he does this, because in these external things the blessing of God in some respect shone forth. We must always bear in mind what he stated in a preceding verse, that “God in her palaces is known for a fortress.” In making mention here of her towers and walls, we are not to suppose that he would have the minds of the faithful to rest in these things. He rather sets them before us as a

mirror in which the character of God may be seen. He therefore says, Encompass Zion that is, look upon it carefully and attentively on every side; — number her towers, and apply your mind to consider her walls; that is, estimate her palaces as they deserve, and thus it will be manifest beyond all doubt that this is a city chosen of God, seeing it far surpasses all other cities. In insisting upon these points, his whole drift is to make manifest the character with which the Lord had invested Jerusalem in making it a sacred place, in which he himself might take up his abode, and in erecting it as a dwelling-place for his people. It seems, moreover, that the prophet, in stating that the object of his exhortation was, that the beauty and magnificence of the holy city might be reported to the succeeding generation, tacitly gives us to understand, that the time would at length come when that city would be no longer seen. What need would there be for making this report if it could be seen and were always before the eyes of the world? Although, then, he has said a little before that Jerusalem is established for ever, yet he now teaches us, by way of correction, what kind of perpetuity it will be — that it will endure only till the time of the renovation of the Church. We belong to that generation to come, to whom it is said these things will be reported; for we are sharers in all the benefits which God, in the days of old, bestowed upon his ancient people. The outward splendor for which Jerusalem was admired does not, indeed, stand forth conspicuous amongst us at the present day; but since the coming of Christ into our world, the Church has been no less richly and magnificently adorned with spiritual gifts than Jerusalem, under the shadows of the Law, was in old time surrounded and fortified with strong walls and towers. I have translated the word פסגו, pasgu, exalt, referring it to the value which ought to be put upon the towers of the city because of their excellence. To explain it, as is done by some, fortify or strengthen, seems to be less suitable. If any are inclined rather to follow the interpretation of those who render it look upon or behold, I have no great objection to it.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 12. Walk about Zion; often beat her bounds, even as Israel marched around Jericho. With leisurely and careful inspection survey her. And go round about her. Encircle her again and again with loving perambulations. We cannot too frequently or too deeply consider the origin, privileges, history, security, and glory of the church. Some subjects deserve but a passing thought; this is worthy of the most patient consideration. Tell the towers thereof. See if any of them have crumbled, or have been demolished. Is the church of God what she was in doctrine, in strength and in beauty? Her foes counted her towers in envy first, and then in terror, let us count them with sacred exultation. The city of Lucerne, encircled by its ancient walls, adorned with a succession of towers, is a visible illustration of this figure; and as we have gone around it, and paused at each picturesque tower, we have realised the loving lingering inspection which the metaphor implies.EXPLA�ATORY �OTES A�D QUAI�T SAYI�GSVer. 12-13. In a spiritual sense the towers and bulwarks of Sion are those doctrines of the true faith, which are the strength and glory of the church, which are to be maintained in their soundness and stability against the assaults of heretical teachers, so that they may be transmitted unimpaired to following generations. Origen and Theodoret, quoted by Wordsworth.HI�TS TO THE VILLAGE PREACHER

Ver. 12.1. What is to be understood by the preservation and protection of the church?2. What is meant by searching into, and considering of, these causes and means of the church's preservation?3. What are those causes and means of the church's preservation, those towers and bulwarks which will not fail?4. What reason is there why we should thus search into and consider these causes of the church's preservation and protection?5. What is the testimony which we have to give concerning this matter to the ensuing generation? John Owen's Sermon.

COFFMA�, "Verse 12GOD'S GLORY TO BE MADE K�OW� TO POSTERITY

"Walk about Zion, and go round about her;

�umber the towers thereof;

Mark ye well her bulwarks;

Consider her palaces:

That ye may tell it to the generation following.

For this God is our God forever and ever:

He will be our guide even unto death."

"�umber the towers ... mark her bulwarks" (Psalms 48:12-13). The pride of the psalmist in the strength of Jerusalem was fully justified. When Vespasian and Titus finally destroyed the city, Titus stated that "Only God had enabled him to conquer it." In fact it was the moral collapse of the city within itself that activated their final overthrow.

"He will be our guide even unto death" (Psalms 48:14). The RSV is superior here, rendering the last words as, "He will be our guide for ever." Of course the passage is disputed; and there are charges that the "text is damaged here,"[16] that "the words should be omitted,"[17] or that "the true ending has been lost."[18] However, we believe that the correct rendition of this place is that in the LXX, which has, "For this is our God forever and ever; he will be our guide forevermore."[19]

Our preference for the Septuagint (LXX) here is founded upon the evident fact that the �ew Testament here sheds light upon the Old Testament. The Old Israel is a type of the �ew; and when Christ said to the �ew Israel, "Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world, Amen!" he gave us the true meaning of this place. It is not that God will be with his people only until they die, but eternally, even unto the end of the world.

Leupold rendered this disputed phrase, "in spite of death," declaring that this meaning, "deserves to be retained."[20] Dummelow rendered the passage: "For such is Jehovah our God; He it is that shall guide us forever and ever."[21]

Ash stated that, "Many manuscripts support the emendation that gives us `forever' in the RSV."[22] The RSV is indeed superior to some other versions; but there is even a better one, namely, the LXX. This is proved by McCaw's statement below.

McCaw stated that, "Our guide `forever' (as in ASV) arises from one emendation in the Hebrew text; but a much lesser change gives us `unto, against, or beyond death' and that is preferable even to the RSV."[23] This, of course, also supports the LXX rendition.

TRAPP, "Psalms 48:12 Walk about Zion, and go round about her: tell the towers thereof.

Ver. 12. Walk about Sion, and tell the towers thereof] q.d. Are they not still the same and as many as they were before the approach of the enemy? is anything diminished or defaced by the late stage or assault? "Therefore thus saith the Lord concerning the king of Assyria, He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow there," &c., Isaiah 37:33.

BE�SO�, "Psalms 48:12-13. Walk about Zion, &c. — He speaks probably to the people of the city and kingdom, who had been eye-witnesses of the glorious work God had wrought for their deliverance. Bishop Patrick thus paraphrases the words: “Make a solemn procession, and go round about the city, blessing and praising God, with thankful hearts, who hath preserved you from being begirt by the enemy. Tell all the towers as you go along, and see if there be so much as one wanting, or the least hurt done to any of them.” Some commentators, however, think that he speaks to the hostile kings and their armies, who had come up against Jerusalem, and had gone round her to reconnoitre her strength, in order to take her, but who were now fled away; and that he calls upon them to return, and go round her again, and see how entire her fortifications were; and bids them tell the next generation, that it would be in vain to attempt any thing against her while she had Jehovah for her protector.

EXPOSITORS DICTIO�ARY OF TEXTS, "Towers of Zion

Psalm 48:12

This is a Psalm full of the most joyful spirit and expressed in the very best way. We do not know what great deliverance was thus splendidly celebrated; it may have been the deliverance in the days of Jehoshaphat, which was very signal and very marked; it may have been that in the days of Hezekiah, which was more signal and more marked still. The two points are that God is a sure refuge to His people when they seek His grace and power; and that it is more distinctly connected with

Jerusalem, the central city of the kingdom and the people.

"Let Mount Zion rejoice," sings the Psalmist, "let the daughters of Judah be glad, because of Thy judgments". And Song of Solomon , he continues, "let us walk about Zion, let us go round about her, let us tell the towers thereof".

But to come to our own times. What are the towers of our own Zion, of our own Church? What are the bulwarks of our religion? There is a great deal, of course, that is common to the whole Church of God throughout the world.

I. There is the Presence of God Himself.—The Lord is there. It is His presence which makes it His Church; it is His presence which makes it His holy Church.

II. There is the Faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, clearly understood and fully grasped and held. A very important matter. It may not always be expressed in exactly the same words, but it has the same life, the same power, and the same salvation.

III. There are the Holy Scriptures.—Whatever may be said now of the form and manner in which they were delivered and have come down to us, they are the fount of knowledge of God. It is from these words, blessed and illumined by the Holy Spirit, that we gain the further knowledge of salvation and grace and hope. There are parts of the Holy Scriptures of which we may read verse after verse which seem to convey very little to us, and then suddenly there is one illuminated with the grace and power of God. which seems to strike the very inward conscience and experience of the heart.

IV. There are the Means of Grace.—How very important it is to us that we should really use them not merely as Christian duties to be performed, but that we should use them as an approach unto the very presence of God, from which we are to learn and by which we are to be strengthened.

V. There are the Examples of Christian People.—How very delightful they are. We see what men and women may be who are of like passions with ourselves; we see their self-denial, their devotion, their unworldliness, their unselfishness; we see their readiness to think and plan what shall be for the best advantage of others, and what shall most conduce to the glory of God. How delightful it is that we have this long stream of saints and Christians behind us, not merely painted in windows or standing before us as statues, as memorials of the past, but those whom we ourselves know, perhaps in the ordinary and humble walks of life. There is no walk of life in which the grace of God is more clearly seen than when persons of little education and little position are truly inspired with the love and the grace of our Blessed Lord; it makes them often shame those who have more privileges and who perhaps have a clearer understanding of the theories and the facts of redemption.

Psalms 46PsalmsPsalms 49

SIMEO�, "THE CHURCH’S SECURITY I� GOD

Psalms 48:12-14. Walk about Zion, and go round about her: tell the towers thereof: mark ye well her bulwarks; consider her palaces; that ye may tell it to the generation following. For this God is our God for ever and ever: He will be our guide even unto death.

ME� read the Bible in order that they may know what they are to do; and this is well: but they should read the Bible also in order that they may know what they are to expect: for that blessed book is no less a record of their privileges, than of their duties. It is of privileges that our text speaks. The psalm evidently celebrates some triumph over confederate kings [�ote: ver. 4.]: and it was probably written on the occasion of Jehoshaphat’s deliverance from the confederate armies of Ammon, Moab, and Mount Seir; who, through the special providence of God, turned their arms against each other, and left Jehoshaphat nothing to do but to collect the spoil [�ote: 2 Chronicles 20:22-25.]. That, as might be expected, was a season of very exalted joy to all Judah: and the circumstances altogether correspond very exactly with the intimations given in this psalm. The security of Zion under Divine protection is that which is particularly specified in the text: and we are called to notice it for the benefit of future generations.

Let us consider,

I. The survey proposed—

Whatever strength might be in the fortifications of Jerusalem, the writer of this psalm evidently looked beyond them to God, who alone is the security of his people. Moreover, Zion was a type of the Church of God, which is indeed “the mountain of his holiness, beautiful for situation, and the joy of the whole earth; and in whose palaces he is well known for a refuge [�ote: ver. 1–3.].” Let us then “walk about her, and tell her towers, and mark well her bulwarks.” Let us mark the bulwarks,

1. Of the Jewish Church—

[This was founded on the purposes, the perfections, and the promises of God; and from them were derived her strength and her security.

In a season of great alarm and terror, the prophet being asked, “What shall we answer the messengers of the nation,” who come to apprise us of the approach of the Philistine armies? His answer was, “Tell them that the Lord hath founded Zion, and that the poor of his people shall trust in it [�ote: Isaiah 14:32.].” To this St. Paul adds, “The foundation of the Lord standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his [�ote: 2 Timothy 2:19.].” God had determined from all eternity that he would have a Church and people in the world: and hence it was that neither Pharaoh in Egypt could prevent, nor all the nations of Canaan could

obstruct, the establishment of Mount Zion: for “God’s counsel must stand; and he will do all his will [�ote: Isaiah 46:10.].”

For the preservation of his Church, every perfection of the Deity was pledged. Whilst his wisdom was engaged to disconcert, and his power to defeat, all her enemies, his truth and faithfulness formed a barrier that could not be broken through: so that, till by the iniquities of his people he was constrained to depart from them, he was “a wall of fire round about them, and the glory in the midst of them [�ote: Zechariah 2:5.]:” and every attribute of his was “a chamber in which they might lie down in perfect peace [�ote: Isaiah 26:20.].”

Often it appeared as if his promise in relation to them would fail: but not a jot or tittle of his word ever did fail: for “he was not a man that he could lie, or the son of man that he could repent.” And, after the people had been forty years established in the land of Canaan, Joshua appealed to them, that “not one good thing had failed of all that God had spoken concerning them, but that every thing had come to pass according to his promise [�ote: Joshua 23:14.].”]

2. Of the Christian Church—

[Our Zion also has “her towers and her bulwarks,” even the finished work of Christ, and the office of the Holy Spirit, and the economy of Redemption from first to last.

The Lord Jesus undertook to purchase unto himself a peculiar people, even with the inestimable price of his own blood: and never did he cease from his work, till he could say, “It is finished [�ote: John 19:30.].” Every thing that was necessary to expiate our guilt, every thing that was necessary to work out a righteousness for his redeemed people, every thing that was necessary to satisfy the demanda of law and justice, all he completed perfectly: and having fulfilled his covenant-engagements with the Father, it cannot be but that “he should see of the travail of his soul, and be satisfied,” even in the promised seed, who should prolong their days, whilst “the pleasure of the Lord should prosper in his hands [�ote: Isaiah 53:10-11.].”

True it is, that in vain would Christ have died for his Church and people, if the Holy Spirit had not undertaken to apply to their souls the redemption which he has wrought out for them. But from the day of Pentecost to this very hour, he has not failed “to glorify Christ, by taking of the things that are his, and shewing them unto men [�ote: John 16:14.].” He finds men dead indeed; but he quickens them to a new and heavenly life: he gives them eyes, to see; and ears, to hear; and hearts to feel the truths which he has revealed to them: and “where he has begun a work of grace, he fails not to carry it on, and to perfect it until the day of Christ [�ote: Philippians 1:6].” And hence it is that all the powers of hell have never been able to prevail against them.

Were the Church to be destroyed, the whole plan of Redemption, as devised by the Father, executed by the Son, and applied by the Spirit, would fail; and the Lord

Jesus Christ himself would be robbed of all his recompence and all his glory. But, whoever surveys “these towers,” will know assuredly, that “Mount Zion cannot be moved, but abideth for ever [�ote: Psalms 125:1.].” Yes, “God’s righteousness shall be for ever, and his salvation from generation to generation [�ote: Isaiah 51:8.].”]

3. Of the Church of which we are members—

[As against the world, the Church of England has no other security than what is common to every true Church of Christ: but as against her professed members, who would despoil her of her glory and her excellency, and would sap her very foundations by the introduction of false doctrines into her community. we have towers, and bulwarks, in which we glory, and which we desire you all attentively to survey. “Come, and let us walk round our Zion, and mark well her defences!” See there her Articles; how plain, how strong, how scriptural! there is no truth that is not there established: and though she has many false sons who would surrender them up to the enemy, there is not one which they have ever been able to impair, nor one in which her faithful people do not feel complete security.

�ext, behold her Homilies, formed by men of God who knew what assaults would be made against her. There are not wanting men who complain, that these are antiquated, and need repair. But they are as firm and immovable as at the first hour they were constructed: and they defy all the assaults, whether of traitorous friends, or open foes.

Then view her Liturgy.—�ext to the Bible, it stands the wonder of the world. �ever was there such a composition for the use of those who would worship God in spirit and in truth: and, whilst piety shall continue to characterize the Children of Zion, this will be their joy, their glory, their defence. They may be derided, as too holy, and too precise: but, whilst they can point to her expressions both of prayer and praise, they will feel that they are vindicated against the whole world, and are in a bulwark that is absolutely impregnable.]

The end of this survey is, “that we may tell it to the generation following:” which shews, that, both for their sakes and our own, we should contemplate,

II. The consolation arising from it—

What was written so many centuries ago, belongs no less to us than it did to those for whose instruction it was originally composed. It calls our attention to the God of Zion, and reminds us of,

1. Our interest in him—

[“This God is our God for ever and ever.” He is the same in himself; and bears the same relation to us; and feels the same concern for us as he did for his Church of old.

“He changeth not:” “he is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever.” “With him is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.” And is he not our Father, our Friend, our Redeemer, our God? When did he cease to sustain these relations to his Church and people? Or when did he cease to be mindful of the offices which these relations imply? If it be said, He has ceased to work miracles; we grant it: but has he therefore withdrawn himself from the Church and from the world, so as to shut up his loving-kindness from us, and to be gracious to us no more? Were we indeed to believe the infidel and ungodly world, we should say with them, that “God has forsaken the earth:” but we know the contrary: we know, that if God’s presence and agency be less visible than formerly, they are not a whit less real; and that he feels for his people at this hour, as much as ever he did at any period of the world. “He knows their sorrows [�ote: Exodus 3:7],” and “in all their afflictions is afflicted [�ote: Isaiah 63:9.]:” nor can an enemy touch so much as one of them, without touching “the apple of his eye [�ote: Zechariah 2:8.].”

Take this then into your consideration, in connexion with the foregoing survey. The same God as watched so tenderly over his people of old, is your God; and watches over you, with the same care as he did over them. His purposes have as much respect to you as to them: his perfections are all engaged as much for you, as for them: his promises are made no less to you, than to them. For you the work of Christ, the office of the Spirit, and the whole economy of Redemption, have secured blessings, as well as for them. And the same Spirit who was poured forth in such abundant measure upon our Reformers, and endued them with such consummate wisdom and grace, is ready to “work upon your hearts,” and to “fulfil in you also all the good pleasure of God’s goodness, and the work of faith with power; so that the name of the Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ [�ote: 2 Thessalonians 1:11-12.].” I say then, Know from the records of the Church of old what a God you have to go to, and that “this God is your God for ever and ever.”]

2. Our expectations from him—

[“He will be our guide even unto death.” See how remarkably he guided Jehoshaphat on the occasion which we suppose to be more particularly referred to: he told Jehoshaphat where his enemies were, at what precise spot he should find them, and when he should go against them: twice was it repeated, “To-morrow go out against them [�ote: 2 Chronicles 20:16.].” So he knows exactly where our enemies are, and what they design against us, and how they are to be met: and though he will not vanquish them without our fighting, yet, if we go forth against them in dependence on him, “he will be with us,” and will subdue them before us. Suppose our most formidable enemies now in array against us; and see in what way he will interpose in our behalf: “Like as a lion,” says he, “and the young lion roaring on his prey, when a multitude of shepherds is called forth against him, he will not be afraid of their voice, nor abase himself for the noise of them: so shall the Lord of Hosts come down to fight for Mount Zion, and for the hill thereof. As birds flying, so will the Lord of Hosts defend Jerusalem: defending also, he will deliver it: and passing over, he will preserve it [�ote: Isaiah 31:4-5.].” Here are no less than

three figures, rising in a climax one above the other, to illustrate the zeal and efficacy with which he will interpose for us. The first is that of a lion, who, when devouring his prey, will not be intimidated by the noise of shepherds, how numerous soever they may be: (This marks the determination with which Jehovah will prosecute our caused.) The next is that of a parent bird, who, when she sees a bird of prey hovering over her young, and ready to dart upon them, will fly with the utmost rapidity to intercept the devourer’s assault, even at the peril of her own life: (This shews the tender interest which Jehovah will take in our welfare, and the efforts he will make in our behalf.) The last is that of the attendant Angel (the Angel of the Covenant), who accompanied the destroying angel through the whole land of Egypt, and stepped forward, wherever he saw a blood-besprinkled door, to prevent him from executing his commission there: and so effectually constrained him to “pass over” the houses of the Israelites, that, whilst in every house in Egypt the first-born of man and beast was slain, not one of either was slain in any house belonging to the Children of Israel: (This shews the efficacy with which Jehovah will espouse our cause.) �ow then what have we to fear with such a Protector? Let men or devils combine against us, we need not give ourselves one moment’s concern. Under all such circumstances, the Psalmist’s language should be ours: “God is our refuge and strength; a very present help in trouble: therefore we will not fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea. There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God; the holy place of the tabernacles of the Most High: God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved: God shall help her, and that right early [�ote: Psalms 46:1-5.].” In a word, we may “cast all our care on Him who careth for us [�ote: 1 Peter 5:7.];” assured, that, “if we only make God our refuge and habitation, no evil shall befall us [�ote: Psalms 91:9-10.].”]

Application—

1. Search then into your privileges, that you may have the true enjoyment of them—

[Think of people in a besieged city: with what delight would they view the towers and bulwarks which they had reason to believe no enemy could destroy! And will not you, who have the Lord himself for your defence? Consider the representation which he gives of himself, as a broad river, so broad that it cannot be passed but in boats; yet so tempestuous, that no small vessel can live upon it; and so full of rocks and shoals, that no large vessel can navigate it [�ote: Isaiah 33:20-22.]; which consequently, being impassable, secures to you, under all circumstances, the most perfect tranquillity, consider this, I say, and tell me, whether you ought not to be ever rejoicing in your God? I would that all of you should be fully acquainted with your privileges; and that you should be frequently “walking about Zion, and telling her towers, and marking well her bulwarks, and considering attentively her palaces” in which you are lodged and feasted from day to day; that so you may be happy in your own souls, and “God may dwell in you, whilst you thus dwell in him!” For, if you thus “know in Whom you have believed, and that He is able to keep that which you have committed to him [�ote: 2 Timothy 1:12.],” you cannot but be

happy: since he has expressly said, “I will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is staid on me, because he trusteth in me [�ote: Isaiah 26:3.].”]

2. Search into them, that you may make them known to the rising generation—

[We should not be contented to be happy alone, but should desire as far as possible to diffuse happiness all around us. To the rising generation in particular we are bound to transmit the benefits which we have received. The knowledge of salvation is a sacred deposit committed to us for that very end [�ote: Psalms 78:5-7.] — — —It is scarcely to be conceived how much more profitable to young people the preached Gospel would be, if they were well instructed at home. We teach our children what shall conduce to the advancement of their worldly interests; and shall we neglect the welfare of their souls [�ote: If this were the subject of a Sermon for a Charity School, or Sunday School, this idea should be considerably enlarged.]? —— — In particular, let us endeavour to impress their minds with the knowledge of God, and his perfections; of Christ, and his offices; of the Holy Spirit, and his operations; that so they also may have God for their God, and their guide, and their portion, for ever and ever.]

PETT, "Verses 12-14The Triumphant Inspection (Psalms 48:12-14).

This may well originally have indicated a celebratory inspection of the walls carried out in triumphal procession in order to give thanksgiving to God, and it may even have been one that continued to be celebrated annually.

Psalms 48:12

‘Walk about Zion,And go round about her,�umber her towers,Mark well her bulwarks,Consider her palaces,That you may tell it to the generation following.For this God is our God for ever and ever,He will be our guide even to death.We must not misunderstand the Psalmist here. He is not boasting about the strength of Jerusalem He is rather praising God for the fact that it is all still there. He is basically saying, ‘look, because of what God has done you are now free to walk around the outside of the city. And as you do so you will note that nothing is missing. Her towers are still intact, her bulwarks (defensive walls) are in place, her palaces are still unmarked. And this in spite of the threats of the King of Assyria.’ This then was final evidence of how fully God has delivered them, and they will therefore be able to tell ensuing generations, how God preserved it for them, and delivered them without any real harm coming to Jerusalem. And this, he reminds them, is due solely to their God, the God Who is theirs for ever and ever, and will be

the guide of each one of them until death.

�ote the contrast between their counting the towers, and the fact that the Assyrians had previously counted the towers with very different intent (Isaiah 33:18). The Assyrians had intended to destroy them. Thus God has by His deliverance altered the whole situation.

‘He will be our guide even to death.’ Some suggest that this fits oddly in the context because it is too personally applied in a national Psalm, but it is not really so. It can rather be seen as a practical final comment applying the situation of the whole to each individual. Having sung generally of the greatness of God, they are being brought to recognise that for each one of them that greatness is applicable throughout their lives.

K&D 12-14, "(Heb.: 48:13-15) The call is addressed not to the enemies of Jerusalem - for it would

be absurd to invite such to look round about upon Jerusalem with joy and gladness - but to the people of Jerusalem itself. From the time of the going forth of the army to the arrival of the news of victory, they have remained behind the walls of the city in anxious

expectation. Now they are to make the circuit of the city (יףkה, still more definite than

Jos_6:3) outside the walls, and examine them and see that its towers are all ,סבב

standing, its bulwark is intact, its palaces are resplendent as formerly. לחילה, “upon its

bulwark,” = mלחיל (Zec_9:4), with softened suffix as in Isa_23:17; Psa_45:6, and

frequently; Ew. §247, d. גop (according to another reading, הפסיג) signifies, in B. Baba

kamma 81b, to cut through (a vineyard in a part where there is no way leading through it); the signification “to take to pieces and examine, to contemplate piece by piece,” has no support in the usage of the language, and the signification “to extol” (erhöhen, Luther

following Jewish tradition) rests upon a false deduction from the name הZסp. Louis de Dieu correctly renders it: Dividite palatia, h. e. obambulate inter palatia ejus, secando omnes palatiorum vias, quo omnia possitis commode intueri. They are to convince themselves by all possible means of the uninjured state of the Holy City, in order that

they may be able to tell to posterity, that זה, such an one, such a marvellous helper as is

now manifest to them, is Elohim our God. He will also in the future guide us.... Here the

Psalm closes; for, although נהג is wont to be construed with ע� in the signification rγειν�

"π$ (Psa_23:2; Isa_49:10), still “at death” [lit. dying], i.e., when it comes to dying

(Hengstenberg), or “even unto (על as in Psa_48:11, Psa_19:7) death” [lit. dying] (Hupfeld), forms no suitable close to this thoroughly national song, having reference to a

people of whom the son of Sirach says (Psa_37:25): ζωt�uνδρvς�"ν�uριθµW�xµερOν�κα$�αy�

xµέραι�το&�zσραήλ�uναρίθµητοι. The rendering of Mendelssohn, Stier, and others, “over

death” i.e., beyond death (Syriac), would be better; more accurately: beyond dying = destruction (Bunsen, Bibelwerk, Th. i. S. clxi.). but the expression does not admit of this extension, and the thought comes upon one unexpectedly and as a surprise in this Psalm belonging to the time before the Exile. The Jerusalem Talmud, Megilla, ch. ii. (fol. 73,

col. b, ed. Venet.), present a choice of the following interpretations: (1) עלימות = עלמות}, in youthfulness, adopting which, but somewhat differently applied, the Targum renders,

“in the days of youth;” (2) כעילין�עלמות, like virgins, with which Luther's rendering

coincides: like youth (wie die Jugent); (3) according to the reading עלמות, which the lxx also reproduces: in this and the future world, noting at the same time that Akilas

(Aquila) translates the word by uθανασία: “in a world where there is no death.” But in

connection with this last rendering one would rather expect to find אל־מות (Pro_12:28)

instead of עלמות .על־מות, however, as equivalent to αPOνες is Mishnic, not Biblical; and a

Hebrew word עלמות cannot be justified ע�ימ~� in the sense of the Aramaic (עלימות)

elsewhere. We see from the wavering of the MSS, some of which give על־מות, and others

and from the wavering of expositors, what little success is likely to follow any ,עלמות

attempt to gain for על־מות, as a substantial part of the Psalm, any sense that is secure and

in accordance both with the genius of the language and with the context. Probably it is a

marginal note of the melody, an abbreviation for על־מות�ל{ן, Psa_9:1. And either this note,

as in Hab_3:19 stands in an exceptional manner at the end instead of the ,למנ�ח�{נגינותי

beginning (Hitzig, Reggio), or it belongs to the למנצח of the following Psalm, and is to be

inserted there (Böttcher, De inferis, §371). If, however, על־מות does not belong to the Psalm itself, then it must be assumed that the proper closing words are lost. The original close was probably more full-toned, and somewhat like Isa_33:22.

13 consider well her ramparts, view her citadels,that you may tell of them to the next generation.

BAR�ES, "Mark ye well her bulwarks -Margin, as in Hebrew, “Set your heart to her bulwarks.” That is, Pay close attention to them; make the investigation with care, not as one does whose heart is not in the thing, and who does it negligently. The word

rendered “bulwarks” - chêyl חיל - means, properly, a host or army, and then a

fortification or entrenchment, especially the “ditch” or “trench,” with the low wall or breastwork which surrounds it: 2Sa_20:15; Isa_26:1. (Gesenius, Lexicon) The

Septuagint translates it here: δύναµις dunamis, power; the Vulgate, “virtus,” courage; Luther, “Mauern” - walls.

Consider her palaces - The word “palaces” here refers to the royal residences; and, as these were usually fortified and guarded, the expression here is equivalent to this: “Consider the “strength” of the city; its power to defend itself; its safety from the danger

of being taken.” The word rendered “consider” - pasegû - is rendered in the margin פסגו

“raise up.” The word occurs nowhere else in the Bible. According to Gesenius (Lexicon), it means to “divide up;” that is, to walk through and survey them; or, to consider them accurately, or in detail, one by one. The Vulgate renders it “distribute;” the Septuagint, “take a distinct view of (Thompson);” Luther, “lift up.” The idea is, “examine attentively” or “carefully.”

That ye may tell it to the generation following - That you may be able to give a correct account of it to the next age. The “object” of this is to inspire the next generation with a belief that God is the protector of the city; that it is so strong that it cannot be vanquished; that there is safety in such a city as that. As applied to the church now, or at any time, it means that we are to take such views of its being a true church of God; of its being fixed on firm foundations; of its being so able to resist all the assaults of Satan, and of its being so directly under the divine protection, that it has nothing to fear. It will and must stand to all coming time, a place of absolute safety to all who seek protection and safety within it. The following remarks of Dr. Thomson (Land and the Book, vol. ii., 474, 475), may furnish an illustration of what the ancient defenses in the city may have been, and especially of the word “towers” in this passage in the Psalms: “The only castle of any particular importance is that at the Jaffa Gate, commonly called the Tower of David. The lower part of it is built of huge stones, roughly cut, and with a deep “bevel” round the edges.

They are undoubtedly ancient, but the interspersed patch-work proves that they are not in their original positions. I have been within it, and carefully explored all parts of it that are now accessible, but found nothing which could cast any light upon its history. It is believed by many to be the Hippicus of Josephus, and to this idea it owes its chief importance, for the historian makes that the point of departure in laying down the line of the ancient walls of Jerusalem. Volumes have been written in our day for and against the correctness of this identification, and the contest is still undecided; but, interesting as may be the result, we may safely leave it with those who are now conducting the controversy, and turn to matters more in unison with our particular inquiries. Everything that can be said about this grand old tower will be found in the voluminous works of Williams, Robinson, Schultz, Wilson, Fergusson, and other able writers on the topography of the Holy City.”

CLARKE, "Mark ye well her bulwarks - See the redoubts by which she is defended.

Consider her palaces - See her courts, chambers, altars, etc., etc.; make an exact register of the whole, that ye may have to tell to your children how Jerusalem was built in troublesome times; how God restored you; and how he put it into the hearts of the heathen to assist to build, beautify, and adorn the temple of our God.

GILL, "Psalms 48:13Mark ye well her bulwarks,.... Such as the free favour of God in Christ; which is not only as a shield, but as a bulwark to the church; his everlasting love, electing grace, the covenant of grace, with its blessings and promises, all which are more immovable than rocks and mountains; and especially the power of God, which surrounds his church, as the mountains did Jerusalem; and by which they are kept and preserved as in a garrison, Psa_125:2. Also salvation by Christ; his righteousness, sacrifice, and satisfaction, which God has appointed for walls and bulwarks, and which make the city, the church, a strong and impregnable one, Isa_26:1. Likewise the Spirit of God, and his operations and influences, which are a standard against the enemy's flood of opposition and persecution; and who being in his church and people, is greater than he that is in the world, Isa_59:19, 1Jo_4:4. Some render the words, set "your hearts on her strength", as the Vulgate Latin version; that is, on Christ, who is the strength of the poor and needy in their distress; the strength of their hearts, of their lives, and of their salvation, and the security of the church. Others readier them, "set your hearts on her armies"; as the Targum is; her volunteers, her soldiers, who endure hardness as good soldiers of Christ, fight the Lord's battles, and are more than conquerors through him; and a lovely sight it is to behold them, with Christ at the head of them; see Rev_19:14;

consider her palaces; for Jehovah, Father, Son, and Spirit, have their dwelling places in Zion; and here, besides apostles, prophets, evangelists, and ordinary ministers of the word, who are rulers and officers set in the first place, every saint is a prince and a king; and has a place and a name here, better than that of sons and daughters of the greatest potentate on earth; every dwelling place in Mount Zion is a palace.

that ye may tell it to the generation following: that is, the beauty and glory, strength and safety of the church; and even all that is spoken of her in this psalm, as well as what follows: this is the end proposed by taking a circuit round Zion, and making the above observations on it.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 13. Mark ye well her bulwarks. Consider most attentively how strong are her ramparts, how safely her inhabitants are entrenched behind successive lines of defence. The security of the people of God is not a doctrine to be kept in the background, it may be safely taught, and frequently pondered; only to base hearts will that glorious truth prove harmful; the sons of perdition make a stumbling stone even of the Lord Jesus himself, it is little wonder that they pervert the truth of God concerning the final perseverance of the saints. We are not to turn away from inspecting Zion's ramparts, because idlers skulk behind them. Consider her palaces. Examine with care the fair dwellings of the city. Let the royal promises which afford quiet resting places for believers be attentively inspected. See how sound are the defences, and how fair are the pleasaunces of "that ancient citie, "of which you are citizens. A man should be best acquainted with his own home; and the church is our dear and blest abode. Would to God professors were more considerate of the condition of the church; so far from telling the towers, some of them scarcely know what or where they are; they are too busy counting their money, and considering their ledgers. Freehold and copyhold, and leasehold, men

measure to an inch, but heaven hold and grace hold are too often taken at peradventure, and neglected in sheer heedlessness. That ye may tell it to the generation following. An excellent reason for studious observation. We have received and we must transmit. We must be students that we may be teachers. The debt we owe to the past we must endeavour to repay by handing down the truth to the future.EXPLA�ATORY �OTES A�D QUAI�T SAYI�GSVer. 12-13. See Psalms on "Psalms 48:13" for further information.Ver. 13. Mark ye well her bulwarks. Margin as in the Hebrew, "Set your heart to her bulwarks." That is, pay close attention to them; make the investigation with care, not as one does whose heart is not in the thing, and who does it negligently. The word rendered bulwarks, (lyx), khail —means properly, a host or army, and then a fortification or entrenchment, especially the ditch or trench, with the low wall or breastwork which surrounds it. 2 Samuel 20:15, Isaiah 26:1. (Gesenius, Lex.) —Albert Barnes.Ver. 13. Mark ye well: set your heart, mind earnestly, set your affections on. Henry Ainsworth.Ver. 13. Her bulwarks.1. The designation and constitution of Jesus Christ to be King of the church, King of Zion, is the great bulwark of Zion.2. The second bulwark of Zion is the promises of God, which are innumerable.3. The watchful providence of God over the church.4. Another bulwark is God's special presence. God is in a special manner present in his church.5. The last bulwark unto which all others may be reduced, is the covenant of God: "For this God is our God." John Owen.

TRAPP, "Psalms 48:13 Mark ye well her bulwarks, consider her palaces; that ye may tell [it] to the generation following.

Ver. 13. Mark ye well her bulwarks] �ot at all impaired. The Great Turk could never have gotten the Rhodes but by treachery, notwithstanding his long and mighty batteries made upon that place day and night. How he raged at the last assault of Scodra, and blasphemed, see Turk. Hist. p. 423. Geneva is environed with enemies, French, Spanish, Savoy, Pope, and barred out from all aid of neighbour cities and Churches; yet is upheld, as it were, by an immediate hand of heaven, as Beza hath set forth in an elegant emblem, Hanc urbem non nisi miraculose stetisse et stare per multos annos res ipsa clamat.

14 For this God is our God for ever and ever;

he will be our guide even to the end.

BAR�ES, "For this God is our God forever and ever - The God who has thus made his abode in the city, and who has manifested himself as its prorector. It is our comfort to reflect that such a God is “our” God; that he has manifested himself as our friend; that we may habitually feel that he is our own. And he is not only our God now, but he will be such for ever and ever. A feeling that the true God is “our” God - that he is ours and that we are his - always carries with it the idea that this is to be “forever;” that what is true now in this respect, will be true to all eternity. He is not a God for the present only, but for all time to come; not merely for this world, but for that unending duration which awaits us beyond the tomb.

He will be our guide even unto death - The Septuagint and the Vulgate render

this “he will rule or govern ποιµανεK poimanei - reget) forever.” The more correct

rendering, however, is that in our version, which is a literal translation of the Hebrew.

Some have translated it upon death, על־מות ‛al-mûth; others, beyond death; but the true idea is that he will be our guide, or will conduct us all along through life; that he will never forsake us until the close has come; that he will accompany us faithfully to the end. The thought does not, of course, “exclude” the idea that he will be our guide - our protector - our friend - beyond death; but it is simply that as long as we live on the earth, we may have the assurance that he will lead and guide us. This he will do in behalf of those who put their trust in him

(a) by the counsels of His word;

(b) by the influences of His Spirit;

(c) by His providential interpositions;

(d) by special help in special trials;

(e) by shedding light upon our path when in perplexity and doubt; and

(f) by support and direction when we tread that dark and to us unknown way which conducts to the grave.

Man needs nothing more for this life than the confident assurance that he has the Eternal God for his guide, and that he will never be left or forsaken by Him in any possible situation in which he may be placed. If God, by His own hand, will conduct me through this world, and lead me safely through the dark valley - that valley which lies at the end of every traveler’s path - I have nothing to fear beyond.

CLARKE, "For this God -Who did all these wonderful things: -

Is our God - He is our portion, and he has taken us for his people.

He will be our guide - Through all the snares and difficulties of life: -

Even unto death - He will never leave us; and we, by his grace, will never abandon him. He is just such a God as we need; infinite in mercy, goodness, and truth. He is our

Father, and we are the sons and daughters of God Almighty. Even unto and in death, he will be our portion.

GILL, "For this God is our God for ever and ever,.... Who is spoken of throughout the whole psalm as greatly to be praised, as well as is known in Zion, as the stability, security, and protection of her. This is said as pointing unto him as if visible, as Christ is God manifest in the flesh, now in Gospel times, to which this psalm belongs; as distinguishing him from all others, from the gods of the Gentiles, rejected by the people of God; as claiming an interest in him as their covenant God; as exulting in the view of such relation to him; as suggesting how happy they were on this account; and especially since this relation will always continue, being founded in an everlasting covenant, and arising from the unchangeable love of God;

he will be our guide, even unto death; the Lord orders the steps of the righteous, holds them by the right hand, and guides them with his counsel and in judgment: Christ, the great Shepherd of the flock, feeds them, as the antitype of David, according to the integrity of his heart, and guides them by the skilfulness of his hands; he guides their feet in the ways of peace, life, and salvation, by himself; he leads them into green pastures, beside the still waters, and unto fountains of living waters: the Spirit of the Lord leads them to the fulness of Christ; guides them into all truth, as it is in him; directs them into his and his Father's love, and leads them on to the land of uprightness. And this guide is an everlasting one; "even unto death", or "in death", or "above death" (k); so as not to be hurt of the second death. He guides not only to the brink of Jordan's river, but through the deep waters of it, and never leaves till he has landed them safe on

the shores of eternity: and some, as Aben Ezra, render the word as if it was עולמית, "for ever"; and others, as Abendana observes, render it "secretly"; the Lord sometimes leading his people in ways dark and hidden to them: and others give the sense of it, "as in the days of youth"; that is, God is the guide of his people in old age as in youth; he is always their guide, and ever will be: to which sense incline R. Moses in Aben Ezra, others in Kimchi and Abendana, and as also Jarchi and the Chaldee paraphrase; but Kimchi and Ben Melech render it as we do, "unto death", or "unto our death".

HE�RY, ". Let us triumph in God, and in the assurances we have of his everlasting lovingkindness, Psa_48:14. Tell this to the generation following; transmit this truth as a sacred deposit to your posterity, That this God, who has now done such great things for us, is our God for ever and ever; he is constant and unchangeable in his love to us and care for us. 1. If God be our God, he is ours for ever, not only through all the ages of time, but to eternity; for it is the everlasting blessedness of glorified saints that God himself will be with them and will be their God, Rev_21:3. 2. If he be our God, he will be our guide, our faithful constant guide, to show us our way and to lead us in it; he will be so, even unto death, which will be the period of our way, and will bring us to our rest. He will lead and keep us even to the last. He will be our guide above death (so some); he will so guide us as to set us above the reach of death, so that it shall not be able to do us any real hurt. He will be our guide beyond death (so others); he will conduct us safely to a happiness on the other side death, to a life in which there shall be no more death. If we take the Lord for our God, he will conduct and convey us safely to death, through death, and beyond death - down to death and up again to glory.

CALVI�,"14.For this God is our God for ever and ever From these words it appears still more clearly, that when the prophet spake of the palaces of Jerusalem, it was not that the godly should keep their eyes fixed upon them, but that by the aid of these outward things they should elevate their minds to the contemplation of the glory of God. God would have them to behold, as it were, the marks of his grace engraven wherever they turned themselves, or rather, to recognize him as present in these marks. From this we conclude, that whatever dignity or excellence shines forth in the Church, we are not to consider it otherwise than as the means of presenting God to our view, that we may magnify and praise him in his gifts. The demonstrative pronoun זה, zeh, this, is not superfluous; it is put to distinguish the only true God, of whose existence and character the faithful were fully persuaded, from all the false gods which men have set themselves to invent. The unbelieving may boldly speak of the name of God, and prate about religion; but however much they may do this, when they are more closely questioned, it will be found that they have nothing certain or settled on the subject. Yea, the vain imaginations and inventions of those who are not grounded in the true faith must necessarily come to nothing. It is, then, the property of faith to set before us not a confused but a distinct knowledge of God, and such as may not leave us wavering, as superstition leaves its votaries, which, we know, is always introducing some new counterfeit deities and in countless numbers. We ought, therefore, so much the more to mark the emphatic demonstrative pronoun this, which is here used. We meet with an almost similar passage in the prophecies of Isaiah,

“Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the Lord; we have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation:”— Isaiah 25:9

as if the faithful had protested and declared, We have not an uncertain God, or a God of whom we have only a confused and an indistinct apprehension, but one of whom we have a true and solid knowledge. When the faithful here declare that God will continue unchangeably steadfast to his purpose in maintaining his Church, their object is to encourage and strengthen themselves to persevere in a continued course of faith. What follows immediately after, He will be our guide even unto death, seems to be added by way of exposition. In making this statement, the people of God assure themselves that he will be their guide and keeper for ever. They are not to be understood as meaning that they will be safe under the government and conduct of God in this life only, and that he will abandon them in the midst of death; but they express generally, and according to the common people’s way of speaking, (203) what I have stated, that God will take care of all who rely upon him even to the end. What we translate, Even unto death, consists of two words in the Hebrew text, אל מות, al muth; but some read in one word, אלמות,almuth, and take it for age or eternity (204) The sense, however, will be the same whether we read the one way or the other. Others translate it childhood, (205) in this sense, As God has from the beginning carefully preserved and maintained his Church, even as a father brings up his children from their infancy, so he will continue to act in the same manner. The first sense, however, in my opinion, is the more appropriate. Others translate it in secret or hidden, (206) which seems equally remote from the meaning of the prophet; unless, perhaps, we should understand him as intending expressly to

say, that God’s way of exercising his government is hidden, that we may not measure or judge of it by carnal reason, but by faith.

SPURGEO�, "Ver. 14. For this God is our God for ever and ever. A good reason for preserving a record of all that he has wrought. Israel will not change her God so as to wish to forget, nor will the Lord change so as to make the past mere history. He will be the covenant God of his people world without end. There is no other God, we wish for no other, we would have no other even if there were. There are some who are so ready to comfort the wicked, that for the sake of ending their punishment they weaken the force of language, and make for ever and ever mean but a time; nevertheless, despite their interpretations we exult in the hope of an eternity of bliss, and to us "everlasting, " and "for ever and ever" mean what they say. He will be our guide even unto death. Throughout life, and to our dying couch, he will graciously conduct us, and even after death he will lead us to the living fountains of waters. We look to him for resurrection and eternal life. This consolation is clearly derivable from what has gone before; hitherto our foes have been scattered, and our bulwarks have defied attack, for God has been in our midst, therefore all possible assaults in the future shall be equally futile."The church has all her foes defiedAnd laughed to scorn their rage;Even thus for aye she shall abideSecure from age to age."Farewell, fear. Come hither, gratitude and faith, and sing right joyously.EXPLA�ATORY �OTES A�D QUAI�T SAYI�GSVer. 14. This God is our God for ever and ever. What a portion then is that of the believer! The landlord cannot say of his fields, these are mine for ever and ever. The king cannot say of his crown, this is mine for ever and ever. These possessions shall soon change masters; these possessors shall soon mingle with the dust, and even the graves they shall occupy may not long be theirs; but it is the singular, the supreme happiness of every Christian to say, or have a right to say, "This glorious God with all his divine perfections is my God, for ever and ever, and even death itself shall not separate me from his love." George Burder.Ver. 14. This God is our God. The people of God are sometime represented as so taken with this apprehension of their peculiar relation to God, that they cannot be content to know, but they proclaim it; nor was it enough the present age should know, but they must have it told the following generation: "Let Mount Zion rejoice, " etc. Mark, "That ye may tell the generation following, "For this is our God. See their ostentation of him! This God; q.d., Behold what a God have we! view him well, and take notice how glorious a God he is. And as they glory in the greatness of the God to whom they were related, so they do in the eternity of the relation. "This God is our God for ever and ever." John Howe.Ver. 14. God is not only a satisfying portion, filling every crevice of thy soul with the light of joy and comfort; and a sanctifying portion, elevating thy soul to its primitive and original perfection; and a universal portion; not health, or wealth, or friends, or honours, or liberty, or life, or house, or wife, or child, or pardon, or peace, or grace, or glory, or earth, or heaven, but all these, and infinitely more, but also he is an eternal portion. This God would be thy God for ever and ever. Oh, sweet word ever!

thou art the crown of the saints' crown, and the glory of their glory. Their portion is so full that they desire no more; they enjoy variety and plenty of delights above what they are able to ask or think, and want nothing but to have it fixed. May they but possess it in peace without interruption or cessation, they will trample all kingdoms of the earth as dirt under their feet; and lo! thou art the welcome dove to bring this olive branch in thy mouth. This God is our God for ever and ever. All the arithmetical figures of days, and months, and years, and ages, are nothing to this infinite cipher ever, which, though it stand for nothing in the vulgar account, yet contains all our millions; yea, our millions and millions of millions are less than drops in this ocean ever. George Swinnock.Ver. 14. Some expositors have strangely found a difficulty in the last verse, deeming such a profession of personal faith as inappropriate termination for a national song. Even Dr. Delitzch, a wise and devout interpreter, shares in this notion; going, indeed, so far as to throw out the surmise, that some word must have been lost from the Hebrew text. To me it seems that the verse, as it stands, is admirably in harmony with the song, and is its crowning beauty. When the Lord does great things for church or nation, he means that all the faithful, however humble their station, should take courage from it, should repose in him fresh confidence, and cling to him with a firmer hope, and say, This God shall be our God for ever; he will guide us even unto death. William Binnie.Ver. 14. Unto death, or as some explain it, at death, i.e., he will save us from it; others, over death, beyond it. But the most obvious explanation, and the one most agreeable to usage, is that which makes the phrase mean even to the end of life, or as long as we live. The idea of a future state, though not expressed, is not excluded. J. A. Alexander.Ver. 14. (last clause). The last clause is much misunderstood. It is not, "Our guide unto death, "for the words are, (twm-le wnghny), "shall lead us over death." Surely it means, "It is he who leads over death to resurrection" —over Jordan to Canaan. The (Heb.) is used in Leviticus 15:25, for "beyond, "in regard to time, and is not this the sense here? "Beyond the time of death"? Till death is to us over? Till we have stood upon the grace of death? Yes; he it is who leads us on to this last victory; he swallows up death in victory, and leads us to trample on death. And so viewed, we easily discern the beautiful link of thought that joins this Psalm to that which follows. Such is the celebration of The Mighty One become the glory of Jerusalem. Andrew A. Bonar.HI�TS TO THE VILLAGE PREACHERVer. 14. (first clause). This is the language of a proprietary in God: 1. Of an assured proprietary—"This God is our God." 2. Of a permanent proprietary—for ever and ever. 3. Of an exulting proprietary. W. Jay.Ver. 14.1. The language of discrimination. This God. This God in Christ, in the church.2. The language of Faith—our God.3. Of Hope—For ever and ever.4. Of Resignation—He will be our guide, etc.

TRAPP, "Psalms 48:14 For this God [is] our God for ever and ever: he will be our guide [even] unto death.

Ver. 14. For this God is our God] To draw them up to this consideration it was, that the prophet so calls upon people to view Zion, &c., and to take notice that she might well have written upon her gates (as that city Hippocrates writeth of had) Intacta manet, the daughter of Zion is a maid still, through the prowess of her champion.

Even unto death] And after too; for this is not to be taken exclusive. He will never leave us, nor forsake us.

BE�SO�, "Psalms 48:14. This God, &c. — Who hath done this great work for us; is our God — Who alone can protect us, and will be our defender, if we depend upon him, for ever and ever. He will be our guide even unto death — While we have a being. He will not content himself with having delivered and preserved us once; but will be our conductor, and will exercise a most tender care over us, such as a shepherd doth over his sheep, all the days of our life. Birth and life, and the several ages of life and death, are often ascribed to churches and commonwealths, both in the Scriptures and in other authors. This promise was made to the old and earthly Jerusalem, upon condition of their obedience, in which, as they grossly failed, they lost the benefit of it; but it is absolutely made good to the new and heavenly Jerusalem, the church of Christ, and all the true members thereof. Observe, reader, if Jehovah be our God, he will be our guide, our faithful, constant guide, to show us our way to true happiness here and hereafter, and to lead us in it; he will be so even unto death, which will be the period of our way, and will bring us to our rest. He will conduct us safe to felicity and immortality on the other side of death, to a life most blessed, in which there shall be no more death nor suffering. If we take the Lord for our God, he will convey us safe to death, through death, and beyond death; down to death, and up again to glory.

SBC, "I. We believe, first, in God the Father, who made us and all mankind, who created all things, and for whose pleasure they are and were created. God has not left Himself without witness among us. In volume after volume He has spoken to us. In voice after voice He has made known His will—by His works which are all around us in the universe wherein we live; by His word which He inspired into holy men of old; by that conscience which is the lamp lit by the Spirit in every soul of man; by history, which is the record of His dealing with nations; by His experience, which is the pattern woven by His own hand in the web of our little lives. By these we all may know Him. They teach us that He is perfect, awful, holy; that He is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity. But when we think of God only as the Creator, there is something in this thought which inevitably appals us. Thank God, His revelations of Himself do not stop here.

II. When, in our utter littleness, we feel ourselves annihilated by the supreme and infinite completeness of God, then, pointing us to Christ, our elder Brother in the great family of man, God reveals to us the mystery of our redemption, and teaches us that we are greater than we know. For us there is no longer a God in the rushing fire, or destroying earthquake, or

roaring wind; but the Divine temple of God was the human body of His Son, and even for rebels and for sinners "God is in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them."

III. There is the third, the last and highest, stage of God’s revelation of Himself. Christ told His disciples, and He tells us, that it is good for us that He should go away. The spiritual presence of the Comforter was nearer, more powerful, more blessed, than even the physical presence. God had been with them, but it was better for them that He should be in them. The Father, who made, the Son, who redeemed, the Holy Ghost, who sanctified and who liveth in the temple of our hearts—"this God is our God for ever and ever; He shall be our Guide unto death."

F. W. Farrar, Penny Pulpit, No. 1042

Piety is not unfavourable to patriotism; rather does it enlarge and hallow it. In this Psalm you have the most fervent piety in combination with the most fervid patriotism. Two chief thoughts are presented to us in this verse.

I. Who is this God that is emphatically designated and claimed as our God? (1) He is a known God. We are not left to frame a God for ourselves; we have revealed to us in the Bible, and especially in the person and work of Jesus Christ, God, not only as our Creator, but as our loving Father and our Saviour and Sanctifier. (2) Our God is a covenant God. This was peculiarly true of Jehovah in relation to His ancient people. We live under a new and better covenant. The two great provisions of this covenant are: (a) that God will write His laws in our hearts, and that He will put them within us; (b) "Your sins and iniquities will I remember no more." (3) This God, called "our God," is a tried God. During all the ages of the world’s and the Church’s history, He has been put to the test by countless multitudes of those who have trusted in Him, and not one of them has ever been confounded.

II. God is called our Guide. (1) He is our Guide into the truth. "When the Spirit of truth is come, He shall guide you into all the truth." And if you ask in one word what is meant by "the truth," Christ Himself answers, "I am the Truth." (2) God is our Guide in making our way clear before our face. Seek His blessing, and He will guide you even unto that hour to which this text refers you—the last. "Thou shalt guide me with Thy counsel and afterward receive me to glory."

J. C. Miller, Penny Pulpit, No. 980