Biblion Bible Commentary
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The Voice of Yahweh
Psalms 29:1-11
1 A Psalm by David. Ascribe to Yahweh, you sons of the mighty, ascribe to Yahweh glory and strength. · WEB
A thunderstorm crosses the country from the sea to the desert, and the psalm counts the thunderclaps.
Ascribe to Yahweh, you sons of the mighty, ascribe to Yahweh glory and strength Psalms 29:1.
The psalm is a storm, tracked from one end of the land to the other, and its organizing device is a phrase repeated seven times: Yahweh's voice. Seven thunderclaps, in a poem that never once calls the storm a storm.
It begins over the Mediterranean — Yahweh's voice is on the waters Psalms 29:3 — moves inland to break the cedars of Lebanon in the north Psalms 29:5, makes the mountains skip like calves, and ends by shaking the wilderness of Kadesh in the far south. The geography is a weather front crossing the whole country.
Yahweh's voice breaks the cedars Psalms 29:5. The cedars of Lebanon were the strongest timber known to that world, used for temples and palaces because nothing else lasted; snapping them is the psalm's measure of the force involved.
What makes this more than nature poetry is who else claimed the thunder. Storm gods were the chief deities of Israel's neighbors, and a hymn like this one would ordinarily have been addressed to them. This psalm takes the entire vocabulary and gives it to Yahweh, seven times, leaving nothing over.
Yahweh's voice makes the deer calve, and strips the forests bare. In his temple everything says, "Glory!" Psalms 29:9.
The two halves of that verse sit oddly together and the oddness is the point. Outside, a storm is terrifying animals into early birth and taking the leaves off the trees. Inside the temple, the only response is one word.
Yahweh sat enthroned at the Flood. Yes, Yahweh sits as King forever Psalms 29:10.
The only mention of the flood in the Psalter, and it is used to say that the most destructive water in history had someone sitting above it. The verb is deliberate: not that he stopped it, but that he was enthroned during it.
Yahweh will give strength to his people. Yahweh will bless his people with peace Psalms 29:11.
The last verse is the psalm's surprise. Ten verses of overwhelming force end in a blessing of peace, and the strength that broke the cedars is handed to the people. Nothing in the storm was directed at them.
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