Psalm 117
2 verses · BSBPsalms book hub →
Speaks with:Revelation 15×1Romans 15×1Psalms 67×1Isaiah 25×1Psalms 103×1Psalms 100×1
Summary
Chapter summary
The shortest chapter in the Bible, and one of the widest: 'O praise Jehovah, all ye nations; laud him, all ye peoples. For his lovingkindness is great toward us; and the truth of Jehovah endureth for ever. Praise ye Jehovah.' Two verses that summon every Gentile on earth to the praise of Israel's God: Paul quotes it in Romans 15:11 as proof the nations were always in view.
Context
Poetry · David, Asaph, Sons of Korah, others — Psalms overview
The world behind this chapter
Psalms 117The history
Two verses. It is the shortest chapter in the Bible, and its brevity is the design: a summons, a reason, and a shout. Short liturgical pieces like this worked as responses that a whole crowd could sing back without rehearsal.
The two words holding it up are the pair Israel used for God's covenant character — his loyal, promise-keeping love, and his truth or reliability. Those are the same two words God spoke about himself to Moses after the golden calf, so a hearer knew the whole story standing behind them.
What makes it startling is the address. It does not call Israel to praise; it calls the nations and all the peoples. In a world where each nation had its own gods and stayed with them, telling foreigners to praise Israel's God was a claim about who owned them.
It sits in the middle of the Hallel, between a thanksgiving for personal rescue and the great processional psalm that follows, so it was sung by families at the Passover table every year.
What it meant to them
Israel was a small nation between empires. This song has it summoning the world, on the grounds that God's faithfulness to Israel is the world's good news too.
Sung at Passover, it meant the rescue from Egypt was never intended to stay a family story.
Sources cited
- Charles H. Spurgeon, The Treasury of David on Psalm 117
- Keil and Delitzsch, Commentary on the Old Testament , Psalms
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Psalms 117. Where this site has examined a place the manuscripts differ, the examination is in the manuscripts room. Every place this site examines →
This page draws on Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Calvin, Commentaries; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.