Psalm 147

Psalms 147:1-2

Praise is called good, pleasant and comely in the same breath, three words for one act, which the older writers take as reason enough without further argument. The Lord doth build up Jerusalem and gathereth together the outcasts of Israel reads best against the return from exile, the city under repair while scattered captives are still arriving home. Henry and Barnes both set the psalm in that late setting, worship and rebuilding named in the same verse.

Psalms 147:3-4

The same voice that heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds also telleth the number of the stars and calleth them all by their names, one skill answering both the smallest grief and the largest catalogue in creation. Spurgeon calls the pairing the psalm's whole argument in two lines, the God who counts galaxies is not too great to count a widow's tears. Delitzsch notes that naming the stars answers Isaiah 40:26, the same claim made there against the same despair.

Psalms 147:5-6

Great is our Lord, and of great power, his understanding infinite, sums up the pairing just made, greatness proved equally in the stars and in the wounded heart. The Lord lifteth up the meek and casteth the wicked down to the ground turns the same power toward moral government, favor for the humbled and reversal for the proud. Gill reads the lifting and the casting down as one continuous act of the same hand.

Psalms 147:7-11

The call to sing with thanksgiving and harp opens onto ordinary providence, clouds covering the heaven, rain prepared for the earth, grass made to grow on the mountains, food given to the beast and to the young ravens that cry. Clarke notes the ravens singled out because their young were said to be left uncared for by the parent bird, so their cry to God is answered when no other help comes. He delighteth not in the strength of the horse nor the legs of a man closes the unit on a deliberate reversal, the Lord's pleasure resting on those that fear him and hope in his mercy rather than on human strength.

Psalms 147:12-14

The city addressed directly, praise thy God, O Zion, receives the psalm's civic blessings in order, strengthened gates, blessed children, peace within her borders, and the finest of the wheat filling her stores. Barnes reads the strengthened bars as the literal rebuilding of gates torn down at the exile, security following worship rather than the reverse. Wesley notes the wheat and the peace named side by side, plenty and quiet the twin marks of a city under blessing.

Psalms 147:15-18

His word runneth very swiftly carries into the winter images that follow, snow given like wool, hoarfrost scattered like ashes, ice cast forth like morsels before a cold none can stand against. Then the same word that sent the cold sends it away, he sendeth out his word and melteth them, he causeth his wind to blow and the waters flow, the thaw as much his command as the frost. Delitzsch reads the run as one demonstration, the word that governs Israel's history governs the weather with the same ease.

Psalms 147:19-20

He sheweth his word unto Jacob, his statutes and his judgments unto Israel turns from the weather that every nation shares to the law that only Israel received, and the psalm names the difference plainly, he hath not dealt so with any nation. Calvin reads this as the psalm's climax, common providence given to all flesh in the verses before and covenant revelation given to one people here. The psalm closes as it opened, Praise ye the Lord, the hallelujah that frames the whole song now answered by a reason large enough to carry it.