Exposition of Psalms 100-150 148.1–150.1

(v. 1) "Praise the Lord from the heavens; praise him in the heights." The people of God, whose citizenship is in heaven and whose hope is in the Lord its God, belonging to the Jerusalem above and already rejoicing in the eternal fellowship of the holy angels, exults in the Spirit of God and kindles the whole creation to the praise of the Creator: not because all things without reason and lacking sense can praise God by their own confession, but because there is nothing in the universe of things, from the highest to the lowest, that does not testify by the fitness of its nature to the power of its author. This whole praise belongs properly to two creatures, namely the angelic and the human, which conceive this affection from considering the whole world, so that the very matter of praise is said to praise God along with those who praise him. Since, then, in this duty the heavenly things hold the first place, rightly it is said first to them that they should glory in the Lord over the excellence of their dignity and beauty. (vv. 2–5) "Praise him, all his angels; praise him, all his hosts. Praise him, sun and moon; praise him, all stars and light. Praise him, heavens of heavens; and let the waters that are above the heavens praise the name of the Lord." There is nothing in the heavenly height that is not beautiful and wonderful; and since all things sing together in the praise of their Creator, it is not said by those below to those as if they were idle, that they should rise up in the confession of divine praise; but so that man, inspired, may show that what they do pleases him, and that he delights by the hope of faith in that to which he too is being carried by the exhortations of God's promises. And since the Lord Jesus Christ is the Word of God, he is in no way distinguished from the praise of the Father, the psalm saying, "For he spoke, and they were made; he commanded, and they were created." For what God says, he says by the Word; and the Word through whom all things were made carries out the command of the one who speaks. (v. 6) "He established them for ever and for ever and ever; he set a precept, and it will not pass away." All things that were created for heavenly blessedness have received this fullness of their office, that they remain in the praise of God; to this work human nature too is joined, for which reason the apostle says, "Set your minds on the things above, not on the things on earth. Seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God." Well, then, does every spiritual man join himself to the devotion of the heavenly beings and praise the craftsman in considering the whole creation, so that according to his small measure he may already do what he will do without end. (vv. 7–8) "Praise the Lord from the earth, you dragons and all depths; fire, hail, snow, ice, stormy wind, which do his word." By the name of earth are called the things near the earth; and whatever in this cloudy air appears either moist in dew or rain, or icy in snow and hail, or turbulent in storms, or fiery in lightnings, is touched upon by the name of earth and depths. None of these is subject to chance movements, and each serves the laws of him who, as he wills, works from all things and in all things according to the causes of hidden reason. (vv. 9–10) "Mountains and all hills, fruitful trees and all cedars; beasts and all cattle, serpents and winged birds." None of these was not made in great wisdom; and so some are touched on, so that the Creator of the universe may be proclaimed in all things. (vv. 11–12) "Kings of the earth and all peoples, princes and all judges of the earth; young men and maidens, old men with younger ones, let them praise the name of the Lord." In the multitude of men there is diversity of ranks, difference of sexes, and unlikeness of merits; but in God's praises there is one matter for every order and age. For the whole church in Christ is one body, and what any portion does rightly, the whole fullness rightly claims for itself. (vv. 13–14) "For his name alone is exalted. His confession is above heaven and earth, and he has exalted the horn of his people." For he is above all things and the maker of all; and whatever is praiseworthy in the universe is the praise of the one author, which the very beauty of things confesses with its manifold adornment. From him, then, is the honour of his saints, and he exalts them, the horn of his people; for he who conferred great things through nature himself gives greater things through grace. "A hymn for all his saints, for the sons of Israel, a people drawing near to him." A hymn is a song by which God is praised, which all his saints and all the sons of Israel use: not those who glory in vain in their carnal descent, but those who, born through that faith by which Abraham pleased God, are true sons of Israel, drawing near to God through him who is the way, the truth, and the life.

(v. 1) "Sing to the Lord a new song; his praise is in the church of the saints." Those who praise the Lord well sing a new song, living not in the oldness of the flesh but in the newness of the spirit: so that God's praise may be celebrated in the church of the saints, which agrees with itself in faith, conduct, and love; for without this evenness there is no sweetness in the singers, nor is the melody harmonious where faith and life disagree. (v. 2) "Let Israel rejoice in him who made it, and let the sons of Zion exult in their king." Those who are true Israelites are the sons of Zion, or of Jerusalem: for both names belong to one city, which consists of angels and men, tending from a far pilgrimage to the same fellowship through faith, hope, and love. Let him, then, who believes in hope rejoice in hope, because God is the creator, redeemer, and ruler of the new people. (v. 3) "Let them praise his name in the dance; let them sing psalms to him with timbrel and psaltery." By the name of "dance" (chorus) is signified the concord of those who praise, whose voices cannot please unless they are in harmony. So let the rational singing, whose whole melody is in faith and love, disagree neither in conduct nor in confession; but let it make good use of the psaltery and the timbrel, loving God, loving one's neighbour; and on the timbrel and psaltery let the hand sing with the voice, and let what is sung with the mouth be fulfilled in deed. And in the stretching of the timbrel and the strings the crucifying of the flesh is understood, because the more the strings are stretched, the higher they sound. (v. 4) "For the Lord takes pleasure in his people, and he has exalted the meek to salvation." What is so kind as the Lord toward his people, whom he deigns to convert when it has turned away, to take up when it is corrected, to help when it fights, and to crown when it conquers? For he will give exultation to the humble, and the meek are raised by the same thing by which the proud are pressed down. (v. 5) "The saints will exult in glory; they will rejoice on their beds." The exultation of the saints is not in riches, not in honours, nor in any earthly prosperity, but on their beds, that is, in a good conscience, which yet they ascribe not to themselves but to the grace of God; so that they may not be among men pleased with themselves, but among those who glory in Christ. (v. 6) "The exaltations of God in their throats, and two-edged swords in their hands." Giving thanks to God for all their progress, they exalt him and refer to him what they know pleases him, having in their hands the words of God, which is a twice-sharpened sword, effective both to divide carnal affections and to cut away sins. (v. 7) "To execute vengeance on the nations, rebukes on the peoples." The power of the word, by which the hearts of unbelievers are struck, has been given not only to those who preside but to all the disciples of the truth, who can reprove those who err and call back the straying by their rebuke. (v. 8) "To bind their kings in fetters, and their nobles in chains of iron." The mighty of the world, kings and nobles, unless they fear God, whom will they fear? But the gospel of Christ is preached to them, and they are struck with the twice-sharpened sword; judgment is announced to them, and when they hear of the eternal punishments of those on the left they are bound, and from the beginning of love they receive the fetters of wisdom, so that hard precepts may soften the will, and what seemed harsh to those turned away becomes pleasant to the obedient. (v. 9) "To execute on them the judgment that is written: this glory is for all his saints." This is the glory of all the saints: that the whole world be subjected to God and that the divine laws, whose justice is written uniformly everywhere, be served with like observance. For to this end they use the power of the Spirit among all nations, that the new song may be sung everywhere and every tongue confess that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father.

(vv. 1–2) "Praise the Lord in his saints." It belongs to the confession of grace to praise the Lord in his saints, by whose sanctification they have it that they are saints. Hence it is said in another psalm, "God is wonderful in his saints," so that whatever virtues and merits are in them may be wholly referred to God's glory. "Praise him in the firmament of his power. Praise him in his mighty acts; praise him according to the abundance of his greatness." All these instruments of God's praises are the saints themselves, through whom the manifold sound of a harmonious confession is sent forth to God; and so God is praised in all their duties, because every movement of the singers is animated by his Spirit, whom it proclaims. (v. 3) "Let them praise him, then, with the sound of the trumpet": because of the most excellent declaration of the gospel in Christ. For their sound has gone out into all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world. "Let them praise him with psaltery and harp": from the higher things, namely, and from the lower, as the one who made heaven and earth; so that by the psaltery heavenly things, and by the harp earthly things, may be praised: for that hollow wood over which the stretched strings resound is above in the psaltery and below in the harp. (v. 4) "Let them praise him with timbrel and dance": when, like the timbrel, which is made of dry and stretched hide, the senses of the dumb flesh are fitted to the confession of God, and, like a dance, the fellowship of the singers agrees in every melody, so that nothing different is thought about the one to whom they sing. "Praise him with strings and organ": that is, with any musical instrument that can sound by striking or by blowing. (v. 5) "Let them praise him with well-sounding cymbals": when each is honoured by his neighbour, not by himself. And when it is said, "Praise him with cymbals of jubilation," it is clearly shown that by all the musical works are meant not bodily sounds but the affections of the soul; since no reason would allow that there could be jubilation in cymbals unless the cymbals themselves are transferred to the movements of the soul. For when the mind cannot unfold in words the praises of God it has begun, its wonder becomes like jubilation, which marvels in a sound that is comprehended by no articulation of syllables. Let nothing, then, be thought of outside the saints themselves, to whom the praise of God is enjoined, nor anything base be imagined in spiritual duties. And since to be minded according to the flesh is death, let every spirit praise the Lord. Alleluia.