Psalm 135

Psalms 135:1-4

The opening triple call, Praise ye the Lord, Praise ye the name of the Lord, praise him, is addressed to the servants that stand in the house of the Lord, the same priestly picture that closes Psalm 134 just before it. The ground given is election, not merely power: the Lord hath chosen Jacob unto himself, and Israel for his peculiar treasure, the covenant word also used at Exodus 19:5 and Deuteronomy 7:6 for Israel set apart among the nations. Henry notes the psalm opens where worship should always begin, at what God has done in choosing a people, before turning to what he has done in creation and history.

Psalms 135:5-7

our Lord is above all gods: The claim that our Lord is above all gods is not abstract monotheism argued from first principles but a worshipper's confidence stated plainly, followed by the widest possible reach of that Lord's freedom: whatsoever the Lord pleased, that did he in heaven, and in earth, in the seas, and all deep places. The weather catalogue, vapours, lightnings for the rain, wind out of his treasuries, echoes Jeremiah 10:13 and 51:16 almost word for word, a shared liturgical stock the two books draw on alike. Spurgeon reads the list as deliberately complete, sky, earth, and sea named so that no province of nature is left outside the Lord's pleasure.

Psalms 135:8-12

The recital proper begins at the exodus's hardest act, who smote the firstborn of Egypt, both of man and beast, and moves through the tokens and wonders against Pharaoh to the same two conquest exhibits Psalm 136 and Deuteronomy return to, Sihon king of the Amorites and Og king of Bashan, their land given for an heritage unto Israel his people. The selection is a liturgical shorthand, the same two kings standing for a whole campaign because the singers already knew the fuller history from the Torah and from the recital psalms sung beside this one. Gill notes the compression is deliberate, not an incomplete memory: the psalm names what proves the pattern, mighty kings falling before the Lord who chose Jacob.

Psalms 135:13-14

Thy name, O Lord, endureth for ever answers the roll call of dead kings with the one name that outlasts every empire, and for the Lord will judge his people, and he will repent himself concerning his servants borrows Deuteronomy 32:36 almost verbatim, the Song of Moses reappearing inside a later hymn. The word rendered repent himself is compassion changing a course of dealing, not a change of mind about who God is, the distinction the older commentators are careful to draw wherever it occurs of the Lord in Scripture.

Psalms 135:15-18

The idol satire, the idols of the heathen are silver and gold, the work of men's hands, reproduces Psalm 115:4-8 with only small variation, the same mouths that speak not, eyes that see not, ears that hear not. They that make them are like unto them: so is every one that trusteth in them presses the point past mockery into warning: an idol cannot hear its worshipper, and the worshipper who trusts a thing that cannot hear becomes just as unresponsive to the living God. Delitzsch treats the repetition from Psalm 115 as intentional, a refrain the temple congregation already knew being redeployed inside this later recital.

Psalms 135:19-21

The closing call sorts the whole worshipping community by rank, the house of Israel, the house of Aaron the priests, the house of Levi their assistants, and finally ye that fear the Lord, a category wide enough to gather in any Gentile proselyte standing among the tribes. The psalm ends where 134 ended, blessed be the Lord out of Zion, which dwelleth at Jerusalem, the Lord's chosen dwelling place answering the Lord's chosen people from the opening verses. Praise ye the Lord closes the psalm with the same word that opened it, the frame shut.