Biblion Bible Commentary
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The Psalm David Delivered
1 Chronicles 16:7-36
7 Then on that day David first ordained giving of thanks to Yahweh by the hand of Asaph and his brothers. · WEB
The song moves from a covenant remembered to the whole earth summoned, and ends on a plea to be gathered home.
The song is given as a document handed over: on that day David first ordained giving of thanks by the hand of Asaph and his brothers 1 Chronicles 16:7. What follows is a text placed into the keeping of a choir.
Its three parts also stand elsewhere in Scripture as parts of three separate psalms Psalms 105:1–15 Psalms 96:1–13 Psalms 106:1 Psalms 106:47–48. Sacred song was evidently reused, recombined and refitted, and the practice is recorded without embarrassment. A psalm was a possession of the congregation rather than of its author.
The first movement is memory. Remember his covenant forever 1 Chronicles 16:15 — made with Abraham, sworn to Isaac, confirmed to Jacob, and concerning a land.
The detail the song chooses to dwell on is the size of the party that received the promise. They were but a few men in number, yes, very few, and foreigners in it 1 Chronicles 16:19, wandering between kingdoms, and God reproved kings for their sakes: don't touch my anointed ones 1 Chronicles 16:21–22. The protection is recalled at the moment of maximum weakness, which is the whole reason the stanza is here.
The second movement turns outward and gets much larger. Sing to Yahweh, all the earth 1 Chronicles 16:23; declare his glory among the nations 1 Chronicles 16:24. A national festival for a national ark produces a song addressed to everyone.
At its center is a single line of argument, and it is an argument from creation. All the gods of the peoples are idols, but Yahweh made the heavens 1 Chronicles 16:26. The claim is not that Israel's God is stronger than the others. It is that the others did not make anything, and the difference between a maker and a made thing is the entire case.
Then the created world answers. Sea, field and forest are called to roar and exult, and the trees sing for he comes to judge the earth 1 Chronicles 16:33. Judgment arrives here as the reason for the gladness rather than as a threat held against it — the setting right of a world is good news to everything in it that was not the wrongdoer.
The song ends on its only request, and it is not what the occasion would suggest. Save us, God of our salvation! Gather us together and deliver us from the nations 1 Chronicles 16:35. Sung on the day the ark came home, that is a prayer with nothing to answer. Read by people who had come back from Babylon to a scattered remnant, it is the sentence in the book they had least need to have explained.
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