Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Psalms · About this commentary
The Idols Are Silver and Gold
Psalms 135:1-21
1 Praise Yah! Praise Yahweh’s name! Praise him, you servants of Yahweh, · WEB
A psalm assembled from other psalms, contrasting a God who does whatever he pleases with gods that cannot breathe.
Praise Yah! Praise Yahweh's name! Praise him, you servants of Yahweh, you who stand in Yahweh's house Psalms 135:1–2.
The psalm picks up the night watch of the psalm before it and speaks to the same men. Much of what follows is quoted from elsewhere in the collection and from the law, which is what a late hymn assembled for temple use looks like.
Whatever Yahweh pleased, that he has done, in heaven and in earth, in the seas and in all deeps Psalms 135:6.
The claim that the rest of the psalm illustrates, and the four locations cover everywhere there is.
He causes the clouds to rise from the ends of the earth. He makes lightnings with the rain. He brings the wind out of his treasuries Psalms 135:7.
Weather described as inventory. The wind is kept in storehouses and issued.
He struck the firstborn of Egypt... He struck many nations, and killed mighty kings — Sihon king of the Amorites, Og king of Bashan Psalms 135:8–11.
The national history in four verses, and the two kings named are the first victories east of the Jordan. They are named again in the psalm that follows, and the pairing was evidently a fixed formula.
The idols of the nations are silver and gold, the work of men's hands. They have mouths, but they can't speak Psalms 135:15–16.
The inventory of the hundred and fifteenth psalm, repeated almost word for word, with one phrase added: neither is there any breath in their mouths Psalms 135:17.
That addition is the sharpest thing in the psalm. What the idol lacks is not merely function but breath — the thing that made a human being a living soul Genesis 2:7. The maker has more of it than the made.
Those who make them will be like them, yes, everyone who trusts in them Psalms 135:18.
The rule about worship stated again without alteration.
House of Israel, praise Yahweh! House of Aaron, praise Yahweh! House of Levi, praise Yahweh! You who fear Yahweh, praise Yahweh! Psalms 135:19–20.
Four groups this time rather than three — the earlier psalms named the nation, the priests and the God-fearers, and this one adds the Levites. The list works outward from the congregation to the foreigners attached to it, and everyone gets the same instruction.
settled What this mark means