Psalm 149

Psalms 149:1-3

A new song answers a fresh mercy, and the congregation of saints is named as the place it belongs, worship that is corporate rather than solitary. Let Israel rejoice in him that made him sets creation and covenant together, the nation's Maker is also its King, and the children of Zion are told to be joyful in him. The praise moves into the body, the dance, the timbrel and the harp, worship engaging the whole person rather than words alone.

Psalms 149:4-5

The Lord taketh pleasure in his people and will beautify the meek with salvation answers the vengeance language that follows before it arrives, so that whatever comes next is read under this stated pleasure rather than apart from it. Let the saints be joyful in glory, let them sing aloud upon their beds moves the praise into private rest, the same joy that fills the congregation continuing into the quiet of the night. Gill notes the beds as the ordinary place of a household, praise carried past the sanctuary into daily life.

Psalms 149:6-7

The high praises of God in their mouth and a twoedged sword in their hand stand together in one verse, and the readings differ on how literally to take the pairing. Some of the bench, and later Jewish use of the psalm in seasons of national conflict including the Maccabean period, read the sword as an actual weapon carried alongside worship, praise and battle both offered to the same King. Others, especially among the older Christian writers, read the sword as Ephesians 6:17's sword of the Spirit, the word of God wielded rather than steel, and Henry sets execute vengeance upon the heathen and punishments upon the people under that spiritual reading without denying the plainer one.

Psalms 149:8-9

To bind their kings with chains: To bind their kings with chains and their nobles with fetters of iron continues the same double reading, a literal subjugation of hostile rulers on one hand and a picture of every high thing brought into obedience to Christ on the other, the language 2 Corinthians 10:5 later reuses of a different battle. To execute upon them the judgment written closes the psalm on a judgment already recorded rather than newly invented. This honour have all his saints names the whole action as glory given to the saints, agents of a verdict already declared rather than avengers acting on private grievance.