A remembrance of
Yahweh’s remembering
A call to remember and praise Yahweh for His
covenant faithfulness (vv.1-6) |
|
1 Oh give thanks to Yahweh, call upon His name;[2] |
Make known His deeds among the peoples.[3] |
|
2 Sing to Him, sing praises to Him; |
Speak of all His wonders. |
|
3 Glory in His holy name; |
Let the heart of those who seeks (baqash) Yahweh be glad. |
|
4 Seek (darash) Yahweh and His strength; |
Seek (baqash) His face continually. |
|
5 Remember [4] His wonders which He has done, |
His marvels and the judgments uttered by His mouth, |
|
6 O seed of Abraham,[5] His servant, |
O sons of Jacob, His chosen ones! |
A remembrance of Yahweh’s remembering (vv.7-23) |
|
Yahweh’s covenant to give the land
of Canaan to Abraham (vv.7-11) |
|
7 He is Yahweh our God; |
His judgments are in all the earth. |
|
8 He has remembered His covenant forever, |
The word which He commanded to a thousand generations,[6] |
|
9 The covenant which He made with Abraham, (Gen.15:18) |
And His oath to Isaac. (Gen.26:2-5) |
|
10 Then He confirmed it to Jacob for a statute, (Gen.28:10-15) |
To Israel as an everlasting covenant, |
|
11 Saying, “To you I will give the land of Canaan |
As the portion of your inheritance,” |
|
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob’s wandering
(vv.12-15) |
|
12 When they were only a few men in number, |
Very few, and strangers in it. |
|
13 And they wandered about from nation to nation, |
From one kingdom [7] to another people. |
|
14 He permitted no man to oppress them, |
And He reproved kings for their sakes: |
|
15 “Do not touch My anointed ones, |
And do My prophets no harm.” |
|
Famine and enslavement lead Israel
into Egypt (vv.16-23) |
|
16 And He called for a famine upon the land; |
He broke the whole staff of bread. |
|
17 He sent a man before them, |
Joseph, who was sold as a slave. |
|
18 They afflicted his feet with fetters, |
He himself was laid in irons; |
|
19 Until the time that his word came to pass, |
The word of Yahweh tested him. |
|
20 The king sent and released him, |
The ruler of peoples, and set him free. |
|
21 He made him lord of his house |
And ruler over all his possessions, |
|
22 To imprison his princes at will, |
That he might teach his elders wisdom. |
|
23 Israel also came into Egypt; |
Thus Jacob sojourned in the land of Ham. |
Israel in Egypt (vv.24-38) |
|
Israel sojourns to Egypt and is
enslaved (vv.23-25) |
|
24 And He caused His people to be very fruitful, |
And made them stronger than their adversaries. (Ex.1:7,9,20) |
|
25 He turned their heart to hate His people, |
To deal craftily with His servants. |
|
Yahweh sends Moses and Aaron and
plagues (vv.26-38) |
|
26 He sent Moses His servant, |
And Aaron, whom He had chosen. |
|
27 They performed His wondrous acts among them, |
And miracles in the land of Ham. |
|
28 He sent darkness and made it dark; [8] |
And they did not rebel against His words. |
|
29 He turned their waters into blood |
And caused their fish to die. |
|
30 Their land swarmed with frogs |
Even in the chambers of their kings. |
|
31 He spoke, and there came a swarm of flies |
And gnats in all their territory. |
|
32 He gave them hail for rain, |
And flaming fire in their land. |
|
33 He struck down their vines also and their fig trees, |
And shattered the trees of their territory. |
|
34 He spoke, and locusts came, |
And young locusts, even without number, |
|
35 And ate up all vegetation in their land, |
And ate up the fruit of their ground. |
|
36 He also struck down all the firstborn in their land, |
The first fruits of all their vigor. |
|
37 Then He brought them out with silver and gold, |
And among His tribes there was not one who stumbled. |
|
38 Egypt was glad when they departed, |
For the dread of them had fallen upon them. |
Yahweh remembered His word with Abraham (vv.39-45) |
|
Yahweh’s provision in the wilderness
(vv.39-41) |
|
39 He spread a cloud for a covering, |
And fire to illumine by night. |
|
40 They asked, and He brought quail, |
And satisfied them with the bread of heaven. |
|
41 He opened the rock and water flowed out; |
It ran in the dry places like a river. |
|
42 For He remembered His holy word |
With Abraham His servant; |
|
43 And He brought forth His people with joy, |
His chosen ones with a joyful shout. |
|
44 He gave them also the lands of the nations, |
That they might take possession of the fruit of the peoples’ labor, |
|
45 So that they might keep His statutes |
And observe His laws, |
|
Praise Yah! (Hallelujah!) [9] |
|
|
[1]
Psalms 105-106 are like Cliff Notes for Genesis à
Judges. Psalm
105 surveys about 600 years of Israel’s history from Abraham to the Promised
Land. It paints a picture of God as
the faithful covenant making and keeping God.
Psalm 106 traces Israel’s unfaithfulness beginning with their
redemption from Egypt to the period of the Judges and perhaps all the way to
the exile (vv.41-43). Psalm 106
emphasizes God’s faithfulness to His covenant despite Israel’s
unfaithfulness. |
|
[2] Psalm 105:1-15 parallels 1 Chronicles
16:8-22. |
|
[3] It was this verse that was inscribed upon
the pulpit at Kidderminster, once occupied by Richard Baxter (1615-92). Rowland Prothero described Baxter as “one
of the first and greatest of Nonconformist divines, the eloquent preacher,
the voluminous theological writer, patient alike under the lifelong pains of
disease and thirty years of almost incessant persecution. A man whose personal holiness was never
disputed by his bitterest opponents, and a model parish priest, he so
transformed Kidderminster, that “on the Lord’s day there was no disorder to
be seen in the streets; that you might hear a hundred families singing psalms,
and repeating sermons as you passed through them” (The Psalms in Human
Life, 291). |
|
[4] There are ten imperatives in vv.1-5: give
thanks (v.1); call (v.1); make known (v.1); sing to Him (v.2); sing praises
to Him (v.2); speak/meditate (v.2); glory (v.3); seek (v.4 [2x]), remember
(v.5). The only other imperative in
the psalm is in v.45, “Hallelujah!” |
|
[5] Abraham is mentioned three times in this
Psalm (vv.6,9,42). His name is
mentioned one other time in the Psalms (47:9). |
|
[6] Verses 8-9 are echoed in the events surrounding the birth of Jesus (Luke 1:67-73; see also Ex.2:24; Lev.26:42; Ezek.16:60). |
|
[7] Leslie Allen notes that the repetition of the root for “reign/king” conveys “a message of powerlessness and domination” (Word Biblical Commentary: Psalms 101-150 [Revised], 56. |
|
[8] Darkness was the ninth plague. It may be mentioned first here to echo the
darkness over the earth in Genesis 1:1-2.
Perhaps a parallel is intended with God’s first act in the wilderness
to lead them by a pillar of could by day and a pillar of fire by night
(v.39). Eight of the ten plagues are mentioned. Omitted are the fifth and
sixth plagues (Exodus 9:1-17). The
first plague is mentioned in v.29 (Ex.7:14ff.); second (v.30; Ex.8:1ff.);
fourth and third (v.31; Ex.8:20ff., 16ff.); seventh (32-33; Ex.9:13ff.);
eighth (vv.34-35; Ex.10:1ff.); and tenth (v.36; Ex.11-12). In a similar manner, Psalm 78 condenses the ten plagues into six
omitting the third, fifth, sixth and ninth plagues. |
|
[9] YAH, a contracted form of Yahweh, occurs 50x in the Hebrew Scriptures, 43 of which are in the Psalms. 26 of the 43 occurrences of “YAH” in the Psalms are in connection with the Hebrew word for praise – Hallelujah! Hallelujah occurs only in the Psalms and only at the beginning and/or end of a Psalm (see also Revelation 19:1,3,4,6). It typically occurs in Psalm units: 104-106 [concluding Psalms of Book IV]; 111-118; 120-136; 146-150. These units are sometimes referred to as Hallel (Hebrew for praise) Psalms. |