Psalm 95 is believed to be authored by David and serves as an invitation for worship, blending joy and solemnity in its call to praise God, referred to as the 'rock of our salvation.' The psalm emphasizes communal worship, urging believers to express heartfelt gratitude and reverence towards God, while also warning against neglecting His service. It encapsulates themes of joy, unity in praise, and the need for humility in worship.

1. PSALM 95 COMME TARY
EDITED BY GLE PEASE
I TRODUCTIO
SPURGEO , "This Psalm has no title, and all we know of its authorship is that
Paul quotes it as "in David." (Hebrews 4:7.) It is true that this may merely signify
that it is to be found in the collection known as David's Psalms; but if such were the
Apostle's meaning it would have been more natural for him to have written, "saying
in the Psalms; "we therefore incline to the belief that David was the actual author of
this poem. It is in its original a truly Hebrew song, directed both in its exhortation
and warning to the Jewish people, but we have the warrant of the Holy Spirit in the
epistle to the Hebrews for using its appeals and entreaties when pleading with
Gentile believers. It is a psalm of invitation to worship. It has about it a ring like
that or church bells, and like the bells it sounds both merrily and solemnly, at first
ringing out a lively peal, and then dropping into a funeral knell as if tolling at the
funeral of the generation which perished in the wilderness. We will call it THE
PSALM OF THE PROVOCATIO .
DIVISIO . It would be correct as to the sense to divide this psalm into an invitation
and a warning so as to commence the second part with the last clause of Psalms 95:7
: but upon the whole it may be more convenient to regard Psalms 95:6 as "the
beating heart of the psalm, "as Hengstenberg calls it, and make the division at the
end of Psalms 95:5. Thus it will form (1) an invitation with reasons, and (2) an
invitation with warnings.
1 Come, let us sing for joy to the Lord;
let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation.
BAR ES, "O come, let us sing unto the Lord - The word here rendered come,
means properly “go;” but it is used here, as it often is, as a formula of invitation, in

2. calling on others to share in what is done by the speaker. It is here to be understood as
used by one portion of an assembly convened for worship addressing the other portion,
and calling on them to unite in the praise of God.
Let us make a joyful noise - The word used here means commonly to make a loud
noise, to shout, Job_30:5. It is especially used
(a) of warlike shouts, Jos_6:16; 1Sa_17:20;
(b) of the shout of triumph, Jdg_15:14;
(c) of the sound or clangor of a trumpet, Num_10:9; Joe_2:1.
It may thus be used to denote any shout of joy or praise. In public worship it would
denote praise of the most animated kind.
To the Rock of our salvation - The strong ground of our confidence; the basis of
our hope; our security. See the notes at Psa_18:2.
CLARKE, "O come, let us sing - Let us praise God, not only with the most joyful
accents which can be uttered by the voice; but let us also praise him with hearts tuned to
gratitude, from a full sense of the manifold benefits we have already received.
The rock of our salvation - The strong Fortress in which we have always found
safety, and the Source whence we have always derived help for our souls. In both these
senses the word rock, as applied to God, is used in the Scriptures.
GILL, "O come, let us sing unto the Lord,.... To Jehovah the Messiah, the Lord our
righteousness; setting forth, in songs of praise, the glory of his person, the riches of his
grace, and our thankfulness to him for spiritual mercies by him: Christ is to be the
subject of our spiritual songs, and is the person to whose honour and glory they should
be directed: in the New Testament we are instructed to sing unto the Lord, the Lord
Christ, Eph_5:19, and this is what Pliny (a) tells Trajan, the Roman emperor, the
Christians in his time did; they sung a hymn to Christ, as to a God:
let us make a joyful noise to the Rock of our salvation; to Christ, the Rock, 1Co_
10:4, a Rock, for height, being higher than the saints, than the kings of the earth, than
the angels in heaven, than the heavens themselves; for strength, being the mighty God,
and mighty Saviour; for shelter, being the saints security from avenging justice and
wrath to come: a Rock, on which the church and all believers are built, and which
endures for ever; "the Rock of salvation", being the author of spiritual and eternal
salvation, and the strength and security of it; not only is he strong to do it, but, being
done by him, it is safe in him; wherefore shouts of joy and songs of praise are due unto
him. This shows that vocal singing is meant, singing with an harmonious and musical
voice; and that social singing, or singing in concert together, is intended. The Septuagint
renders it, "to God our Saviour", Luk_1:47.
HE RY, "The psalmist here, as often elsewhere, stirs up himself and others to praise
God; for it is a duty which ought to be performed with the most lively affections, and
which we have great need to be excited to, being very often backward to it and cold in it.
Observe,
I. How God is to be praised. 1. With holy joy and delight in him. The praising song
must be a joyful noise, Psa_95:1 and again Psa_95:2. Spiritual joy is the heart and soul
of thankful praise. It is the will of God (such is the condescension of his grace) that when

3. we give glory to him as a being infinitely perfect and blessed we should, at the same time,
rejoice in him as our Father and King, and a God in covenant with us. 2. With humble
reverence, and a holy awe of him (Psa_95:6): “Let us worship, and bow down, and kneel
before him, as becomes those who know what an infinite distance there is between us
and God, how much we are in danger of his wrath and in need of his mercy.” Though
bodily exercise, alone, profits little, yet certainly it is our duty to glorify God with our
bodies by the outward expressions of reverence, seriousness, and humility, in the duties
of religious worship. 3. We must praise God with our voice; we must speak forth, sing
forth, his praises out of the abundance of a heart filled with love, and joy, and
thankfulness - Sing to the Lord; make a noise, a joyful noise to him, with psalms - as
those who are ourselves much affected with his greatness and goodness, are forward to
own ourselves so, are desirous to be more and more affected therewith, and would
willingly be instrumental to kindle and inflame the same pious and devout affection in
others also. 4. We must praise God in concert, in the solemn assemblies: “Come, let us
sing; let us join in singing to the Lord; not others without me, nor I alone, but others
with me. Let us come together before his presence, in the courts of his house, where his
people are wont to attend him and to expect his manifestations of himself.” Whenever
we come into God's presence we must come with thanksgiving that we are admitted to
such a favour; and, whenever we have thanks to give, we must come before God's
presence, set ourselves before him, and present ourselves to him in the ordinances which
he has appointed.
JAMISO , "Psa_95:1-11. David (Heb_4:7) exhorts men to praise God for His
greatness, and warns them, in God’s words, against neglecting His service.
The terms used to express the highest kind of joy.
rock — a firm basis, giving certainty of salvation (Psa_62:7).
K&D 1-2, "Jahve is called the Rock of our salvation (as in Psa_89:27, cf. Psa_94:22)
as being its firm and sure ground. Visiting the house of God, one comes before God's
face; ‫י‬ֵ‫נ‬ ְ ‫ם‬ ֵ ִ‫,ק‬ praeoccupare faciem, is equivalent to visere (visitare). ‫ה‬ ָ‫ּוד‬ is not confessio
peccati, but laudis. The Beth before ‫תודה‬ is the Beth of accompaniment, as in Mic_6:6;
that before ‫ּות‬‫ר‬ ִ‫מ‬ְ‫ז‬ (according to 2Sa_23:1 a name for psalms, whilst ‫ּר‬‫מ‬ְ‫ז‬ ִ‫מ‬ can only be used
as a technical expression) is the Beth of the medium.
CALVI , "1.Come, let us rejoice before Jehovah. This psalm is suited for the
Sabbath, when we know that the religious assemblies were more particularly
convened for the worship of God. It is not individuals among the godly whom he
exhorts to celebrate the divine praises in private; he enjoins these to be offered up in
the public meeting. By this he showed that the outward worship of God principally
consisted in the sacrifice of praise, and not in dead ceremonies. He enjoins haste
upon them; by which they might testify their alacrity in this service. For the Hebrew
word ‫,קדם‬ kadam, in the second verse, which I have rendered, let us come before,
etc., means to make haste. He calls upon them to speed into the presence of God;
and such an admonition was needed, considering how naturally backward we are
when called by God to the exercise of thanksgiving. This indirect charge of

4. indolence in the exercise, the Psalmist saw it necessary to prefer against God’s
ancient people; and we should be made aware that there is just as much need of a
stimulus in our own case, filled as our hearts are with similar ingratitude. In calling
them to come before God’s face, he uses language which was also well fitted to
increase the ardor of the worshippers; nothing being more agreeable than to offer in
God’s own presence such a sacrifice as he declares that he will accept. He virtually
thus says, in order to prevent their supposing the service vain, that God was present
to witness it. I have shown elsewhere in what sense God was present in the
sanctuary.
SPURGEO , "Ver. 1. O come, let us sing unto the LORD. Other nations sing unto
their gods, let us sing unto Jehovah. We love him, we admire him, we reverence him,
let us express our feelings with the choicest sounds, using our noblest faculty for its
noblest end. It is well thus to urge others to magnify the Lord, but we must be
careful to set a worthy example ourselves, so that we may be able not only to cry
"Come", but also to add "let us sing", because we are singing ourselves. It is to be
feared that very much even of religious singing is not unto the Lord but unto the car
of the congregation: above all things we must in our service of song take care that all
we offer is with the heart's sincerest and most fervent intent directed toward the
Lord himself.
Let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation. With holy enthusiasm let us
sing, making a sound which shall indicate our earnestness; with abounding joy let
us lift up our voices, actuated by that happy and peaceful spirit which trustful love
is sure to foster. As the children of Israel sang for joy when the smitten rock poured
forth its cooling streams, so let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation.
The author of this song had in his mind's eye the rock, the tabernacle, the Red Sea,
and the mountains of Sinai, and he alludes to them all in this first part of his hymn.
God is our abiding, immutable, and mighty rock, and in him we find deliverance
and safety, therefore it becomes us to praise him with heart and with voice from day
to day; and especially should we delight to do this when we assemble as his people
for public worship.
"Come let us to the Lord sing out
With trumpet voice and choral shout."
it becomes us to praise him with heart and with voice from day to day; and
especially should we delight to do this when we assemble as his people for public
worship.
"Come let us to the Lord sing out
With trumpet voice and choral shout."
it becomes us to praise him with heart and with voice from day to day; and
especially should we delight to do this when we assemble as his people for public
worship.
"Come let us to the Lord sing out
With trumpet voice and choral shout."
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Whole Psalm. —These six Psalms 95:1-11; Psalms 96:1-13; Psalms 97:1-12; Psalms
98:1-9; Psalms 99:1-9; Psalms 100:1-5, form, if I mistake not, one entire prophetic

5. poem, cited by St. Paul in the Epistle to the Hebrews, under the title of the
Introduction of the First Born into the world. Each Psalm has its proper subject,
which is some particular branch of the general argument, the establishment of the
Messiah's Kingdom. The 95th Psalm asserts Jehovah's Godhead, and his power over
all nature, and exhorts his people to serve him. In Psalms 96:1-13 th all nations are
exhorted to join in his service, because he cometh to judge all mankind, Jew and
Gentile. In the 97th Psalm, Jehovah reigns over all the world, the idols are deserted,
the Just One is glorified. In the 98th Psalm, Jehovah hath done wonders, and
wrought deliverance for himself: he hath remembered his mercy towards the house
of Israel; he comes to judge the whole world. In the 99th, Jehovah, seated between
the cherubim in Zion, the visible Church, reigns over all the world, to be praised for
the justice of his government. In the 100th Psalm, all the world is called upon to
praise Jehovah the Creator, whose mercy and truth are everlasting. —Samuel
Horsley.
Whole Psalm. —This Psalm is twice quoted in the Epistle to the Hebrews, as a
warning to the Jewish Christians at Jerusalem, in the writer's day, that they should
not falter in the faith, and despise God's promises, as their forefathers had done in
the wilderness, lest they should fail of entering into his rest; see Hebrews 3:7, where
verse 7 of this Psalm is introduced with the words, "As the Holy Ghost saith, Today
if ye will hear his voice, "and see Hebrews 4:7, where it is said, "Again, he limiteth a
certain day, saying in David, Today." It has by some been inferred from these words
that the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews ascribes this Psalm to David. It may be
so. But it seems not improbable that the words "in David" mean simply "the Book
of Psalms, "the whole being named from the greater part; and that if he had meant
that David wrote the Psalm, he would have written, "David spake, "or, "the Holy
Ghost spake by David, "and not as it is written, "as it is said in David." —
Christopher Wordsworth.
Verse 1. —O come, let us sing unto the Lord, etc. The first verse of the Psalm
begins the invitation unto praise and exultation. It is a song of three parts, and every
part (like Jacob's part of the sheep) brings forth twins; each a double string, as it
were, in the music of this praise, finely twisted of two parts into a kind of discordant
concord, falling into a musical close through a differing yet reconciled diapason.
The first couple in this song of praise are multitude and unity, concourse and
concord: "O come", there's multitude and concourse; "let us, "there's unity and
concord. The second twisted pair, are tongue and heart, "let us sing, "there's the
voice and sound; and "heartily rejoice, "there's the heart and soul. The third and
last intertwisted string, or part in the musick, is might and mercy, (rock or) strength
and salvation; God's strength and our salvation: "to the strength (or rock) of our
salvation." —Charles Herle (1598-1659) in a "Sermon before the House of Lords",
entitled, "David's Song of Three Parts".
Ver. 1. —Come. The word "come" contains an exhortation, exciting them to join
heart and lips in praising God; just as the word is used in Genesis, where the people,
exciting and encouraging each other, say, "Come, let us make bricks; "and "Come,
let us make a city and a town; "and, in the same chapter, the Lord says, "Come, let
us go down, and there confound their tongue." —Bellarmine.
Ver. 1. —If it be so that one "come, let us" goes further than twenty times go and
do, how careful should such be whom God hath raised to eminence of place that

6. their examples be Jacob's ladders to help men to heaven, not Jeroboam's stumbling
blocks to lie in their way, and make Israel to sin. —Charles Herle.
Ver. 1. —There is a silent hint here at that human listlessness and distraction of
cares whereby we are more prompt to run after other things than to devote
ourselves seriously to the becoming praises and service of God. Our foot has a
greater proclivity to depart to the field, the oxen, and the new wife, than to come to
the sacred courts, Lu 14:18, seq. See Isaiah 2:3, "Come ye, and let us go up to the
mountain of the Lord." —Martin Geier.
Ver. 1. Joyful noise. The verb eyrh, signifies to make a loud sound of any sort, either
with the voice or with instruments. In the psalms, it generally refers to the mingled
din of voices and various instruments, in the Temple service. This wide sense of the
word cannot be expressed otherwise in the English language than by a periphrasis. â
€”Samuel Horsley.
Ver. 1. The rock of our salvation. Jesus is the Rock of ages, in which is opened a
fountain for sin and uncleanness; the Rock which attends the church in the
wilderness, pouring forth the water of life, for her use and comfort; the Rock which
is our fortress against every enemy, shadowing and refreshing a weary land. —
George Horne.
COFFMA , "Verse 1
PSALM 95
A CALL TO WORSHIP A D A WAR I G AGAI ST U BELIEF
Scholars usually group the six psalms from Psalms 95 through Psalms 100 as
liturgical psalms, designed for use by the Israelites as they gathered for Sabbath day
worship. "This group of psalms seems to have been composed for use in the services
of the second temple."[1] Despite such opinions, there is a genuine possibility that
David is the author, as it is so assigned in the LXX, and besides that, the author of
Hebrews in the ew Testament quoted this psalm, stating that it was "in David."
This is alleged to mean merely that the psalm is "in the Psalter"; nevertheless, we
accept the real possibility that David did indeed write it.
This writer claims no skill in evaluating such conclusions as those suggested by
Yates (above), but they are included here as the convictions of dependable scholars.
I TRODUCTIO TO THESE SIX PSALMS
McCaw stated that the six suggest the possibility of an annual "Enthronement
Festival," but refrained from accepting such an "Enthronement Festival" as any
kind of certainty, declaring rather that, "Their abiding value is to enter into the
riches of Old Testament teaching regarding God, the Creator and King."[2] This
writer cannot find sufficient supporting evidence of anything like "An
Enthronement Festival" in the whole compass of Old Testament worship. If there
was really any such thing, why is it never mentioned in the Old Testament?
Psalms 95 begins with the knowledge of God imparted exclusively to Israel, with the

7. second portion of it providing a warning that Israel should not become unbelievers
as did their ancestors.
In Psalms 96, the exclusiveness of Israel is replaced with a universal call for all
nations and the whole creation to worship God. In this psalm, God appears, not
exclusively as the covenant God of the Hebrews, but as the Creator of the whole
world and the source of all truth and righteousness.
Psalms 97 stresses the knowledge of God as presiding over his whole Creation, and,
"As the faithful One whose goodness and holiness are always being disclosed to all
mankind through Zion."[3]
Psalms 98 is a song of praise, extolling the fact of salvation being known to the ends
of the earth.
Psalms 99 stresses the preeminence of Zion and honors great leaders such as Moses,
Aaron, and Samuel.
In Psalms 100, "We have an appeal for universal adoration of the Lord, Israel's
position as his chosen people, and the enduring quality of the Lord's mercy and
kindness."[4]
Psalms 95:1-3
A I TRODUCTIO TO PSALM 95
"O come, let us sing unto Jehovah;
Let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation.
Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving;
Let us make a joyful noise unto him with psalms.
For Jehovah is a great God,
And a great King above all gods."
Although it is a fact that everyone is "always" in the presence of God in the ultimate
sense, yet there is a special way in which men who are assembling for worship do
indeed "come into God's presence." In this light, these verses are a beautiful and
proper call to worship in churches all over the world even today.
Coming before God with praise and thanksgiving is the very essence of worship.
"A great God ... a great King above all gods" (Psalms 95:3). This is the overriding
fact, the epic truth, that justifies the call to worship God. He is the One and Only

8. Deity, the First Cause, The First and the Last, Jehovah, Rock, Refuge, High Tower,
Salvation, Most High, the Beginning and the Ending, the Creator and Sustainer of
Everything in the Universe. All of the pagan deities of antiquity are as a mere colony
of insects in comparison with the true God of Heaven and Earth.
ELLICOTT, "(1) O come.—The invitation is general, and may be contrasted with
the heathen warning to the uninitiated, procul este profani. This exhortation to
worship God, not with penitence, but with loud thanksgiving, is, as Perowne notes,
the more remarkable considering the strain in which the latter part of the psalm is
written.
Make a joyful noise.—There is no one English expression for the full burst of
instrumental and vocal music which is meant by the Hebrew word here applied to
the Temple service. Vulg., jubilemus.
Rock of our salvation.—As in Psalms 89:26. (Comp. “rock of refuge,” Psalms 94:22.)
WHEDO , "Verse 1-2
1, 2. Let us sing unto the Lord—In Psalms 95:1-2, the language describes the most
jubilant and noisy demonstrations known in the Hebrew worship. Yet it is carefully
chastened with reverence by the designation “to Jehovah,” “to the rock of our
salvation;” also by the quality of the loud shouting, namely, with thanksgiving and
with psalms, which belonged to the regular order of worship. The occasion was not
one of mourning, confession of sin, and penitence, but of triumph, praise, gladness,
which accords naturally with the associations of the feast of tabernacles.
The rock—Christ, to whom the author of Hebrews (Hebrews 3:6) applies the psalm.
The Septuagint reads, “God our Saviour.”
BE SO , "Verses 1-3
Psalms 95:1-3. O come, let us sing, unto the Lord, &c. — Thus the pious Jews, in
ancient times, exhorted and excited each other to employ their voices in honour of
Jehovah, and to celebrate the rock of their salvation — And Christians are now
called upon to stir up each other to the same blessed work, in the same or similar
language. For the Lord is a great God — And therefore is greatly to be praised; and
a great King — A great sovereign, even the universal Lord of all nations and
worlds; above all gods — Above all that are accounted or called gods, whether
angels, earthly potentates, or the false gods of the heathen.
COKE, "THIS psalm was written by David; for the apostle to the Hebrews cites a
passage out of it under his name. See Hebrews 4:7. It seems to have been intended as
a solemn invitation of the people, when they were assembled together on some
public occasion, to praise their God, and to hear instructions out of his law. But it
also plainly relates to the days of Christ, as the Jews themselves acknowledge, and
as the apostle proves fully in the third and fourth chapters of the epistle before
mentioned.

9. EBC, "THIS psalm is obviously divided into two parts, but there is no reason for
seeing in these two originally unconnected fragments. Rather does each part derive
force from the other; and nothing is more natural than that, after the congregation
has spoken its joyful summons to itself to worship, Jehovah should speak warning
words as to the requisite heart preparation, without which worship is vain. The
supposed fragments are fragmentary indeed, if considered apart. Surely a singer
has the liberty of being abrupt and of suddenly changing his tone. Surely he may as
well be credited with discerning the harmony of the change of key as some later
compiler. There could be no more impressive way of teaching the conditions of
acceptable worship than to set side by side a glad call to praise and a solemn
warning against repeating the rebellions of the wilderness. These would be still more
appropriate if this were a post-exilic hymn; for the second return from captivity
would be felt to be the analogue of the first, and the dark story of former hard-
heartedness would fit very close to present circumstances.
The invocation to praise in Psalms 95:1-2, gives a striking picture of the joyful
tumult of the Temple worship. Shrill cries of gladness, loud shouts of praise, songs
with musical accompaniments, rang simultaneously through the courts, and to
Western ears would have sounded as din rather than as music, and as more
exuberant than reverent. The spirit expressed is, alas! almost as strange to many
moderns as the manner of its expression. That swelling joy which throbs in the
summons, that consciousness that jubilation is a conspicuous element in worship,
that effort to rise to a height of joyful emotion, are very foreign to much of our
worship. And their absence, or presence only in minute amount, flattens much
devotion, and robs the Church of one of its chief treasures. o doubt; there must
often be sad strains blended with praise. But it is a part of Christian duty, and
certainly of Christian wisdom, to try to catch that tone of joy in worship which rings
in this psalm.
ISBET, "WORSHIP A D REST
‘O come, let us sing unto the Lord: let us heartily rejoice in the strength of our
salvation.… Let us worship and fall down: and kneel before the Lord our Maker.’
Psalms 95:1; Psalms 95:6 (Prayer Book Version)
Such is the invitation that Sunday by Sunday and day by day we give one another.
We are about to do something joyous, gladsome, and inspiriting, and we wish others
to come along with us and share our happiness. We are to fling ourselves at the feet
of One Whose works proclaim His majesty.
I. Are we to acquiesce in a resting-place no larger than our counting-house or our
office?—Are we never to stretch ourselves beyond the narrow confines of domestic
joys and business interests? Is it that we have lost what Bishop Westcott called ‘the
ennobling faculty of wonder,’ and with it the power of rising above ourselves and
our surroundings? Ah! that is possible. The alarming increase in suicide and lunacy,
in spite of the much higher standard of personal comfort, is a warning that we are
losing something. And what is that? It is worship. Yes, again we are learning that

10. the soul is made for God, and can find its rest only in Him, that no rest we can find
for ourselves is comparable to the rest in worship. We are not indeed accustomed to
put the two things together, we do not naturally associate rest with days of worship
or places of worship. Worship as an obligation, a duty, we understand, but worship
as a refreshment, a recreation, is quite novel. A day of worship we should suppose to
be a dull and heavy day. And yet some can remember one day when the word spelt
something like rest.
II. And afterwards, though they may not have expressed it, the same feeling was
aroused by some sight of nature.—A sunset, a stretch of mountain peaks, a quiet
English pastoral scene, nay, even a flower, as it was with Linnæus, have excited
feelings too deep for tears. Or it has been the procession of an aged sovereign, dear
to the hearts of the people, or of a weather-beaten soldier who has done his country
great service, or some statesman who has given his nation peace. And as they stood
silent, listening to the gathering roar of the people, they have realised for themselves
those old Bible words, ‘They worshipped the Lord and the King.’
III. Alas! alas! My people are gone into captivity to sense for lack of knowledge.—If
only they knew! But why do they not know? Because the Book—the real Wonder-
Book—is often so imperfectly taught. The very wonder it is meant to excite is
sometimes killed in the teaching of it. Instead of the children finding that they are
insensibly drawn away from earth to a spiritual world of unseen beings, to which
they are led by natural instincts, they never leave the class-room, but are confined to
a school of ethics, where angels never minister, God never interferes, and miracles
never happen. The natural faculty of wonder so strong in a child is checked instead
of developed, and we have young people growing up who never wonder.
Yes, we begin our endeavour with those who pass our churches a little too late.
Pleasant Sunday Afternoons, bright musical services, a carefully-arranged ritual,
may attract and help those who can still admire and wonder, and so worship, but
they cannot, except by Divine grace, touch those to whom life is but a paddock, with
very insufficient pasture and very unreasonable competition. Sunday rest certainly
depends on Sunday worship, but Sunday worship depends on that faculty of wonder
which is kept alive by a living and growing Bible knowledge. It is that which we
must strive for if Sunday is to be in the future what it has been in the past.
—Canon Walpole.
PULPIT, "THIS is a liturgical psalm, probably composed for the temple service,
and still used in the synagogue as one of the Friday evening Psalms which introduce
the sabbath. The Western Church has adopted it into its daily "Order for
Prayer"—a position which it continues to occupy in our own Matins. It consists of
two parts (verses 1-7 and verses 7-11), so strongly contrasted, that separatist critics
suggest an accidental combination of two quite unconnected fragments (Professor
Cheyne). But a deeper and more penetrating exegesis sees in the composition two
trains of thought, purposely set over against each other—one joyous, the other
plaintive; one setting forth the "goodness" of God, the other his "severity" (Romans

11. 11:22); one inviting to joy and thankfulness, the other to self-examination and
repentance; one calling to mind God's greatness and loving kindness, the other
bringing into prominence man's weakness and danger.
In the Septuagint the psalm is ascribed to David, and this view seems to have been
taken by the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews (Hebrews 4:7). But modern critics
are generally of opinion that the style is not that of the Davidical psalms.
Psalms 95:1-7
The song of praise. This seems to terminate with the words, "We are the people of
his pasture, and the sheep of his hand."
Psalms 95:1
O come, let us sing unto the Lord. From this opening phrase, which finds an echo in
Psalms 95:2 and Psalms 95:6, this psalm has been called "The Invitatory Psalm." As
it invited the Jews, so it now invites Christian congregations, to join in the worship
of the sanctuary. Let us make a joyful noise to the Rock of our salvation (comp.
Psalms 33:3; Psalms 98:4). Loudness of voice was regarded as indicating earnestness
of heart (see 2 Chronicles 20:19; Ezra 3:13; ehemiah 12:42, etc.). The expression,
"Rock of our salvation" is taken from Deuteronomy 32:15. It is well paraphrased in
our Prayer book Version, "the strength of our salvation."
BI 1-11, "O come, let us sing unto the Lord.
The grandest of creature services
I. It is the most righteous. Adoration rendered to—
1. The greatest Being.
(1) Great in Himself (Psa_95:3).
(2) Great in His possessions (Psa_95:4).
2. The kindest Being.
(1) He made us. Possessing reason, imagination, conscience, freedom, etc.
(2) He supports us—provides for our necessities, watches over us, guides us
through intricacies, and guards us from perils.
(3) He delivers us. “The rock of our salvation.” The strong ground of our
confidence, the foundation on which our safety rests. Who will say then that this
service is not the most righteous,—to adore most the most adorable, to thank
most the supremely kind?
II. It is the most delightful. “Joyful noise.” Worship is the only service that ensures
happiness.
1. It accords with the highest dictates of conscience.
2. It gratifies our highest love.

12. 3. It engages our highest powers.
III. It is the most urgent (Psa_95:7-8).
1. The neglect of this service is the hardening of the heart.
2. The hardening of the heart leads to procrastination.
3. This procrastination involves most calamitous results.
(1) It provokes the Almighty (Psa_95:8).
(2) It leads to ruin (Psa_95:11). (Homilist.)
The Venite
I. A call to praise (Psa_95:1-2; Psa_95:6). Our call to praise and thanksgiving leads on,
as we should expect such an one as David to teach us, to prayer. We praise for evidences
of His nature, and such praise must lead us to pray that His attributes may find their
exercise towards us; that He will deal with us as His perfect nature has dealt with other
generations and other people. We offer thanks for the past, and every past mercy is
ground of prayer for future mercies; every received mercy is a ground of hope upon
which we build our prayers for new mercies.
II. The causes which demand our praise.
1. He is not only the Author of oar salvation, but He has made it strong, firm,
immovable, resting upon Him, the Rock of Ages (Psa_95:1-2).
2. We praise God for permitting us to observe His greatness; for the power to know
Him in His works. It is not until we begin to examine the details of Creation—plants,
birds, insects—to use the telescope upon the heavens, or the microscope upon
invisible objects—that every single work, in itself a wonder, helps us to look up
awestruck to the One Mind which made and which sustains all.
3. His individual care for each of us (Psa_95:7).
III. A caution against the loss of the accepted time (Psa_95:7-10). Alas! we have daily
teaching like the men in the wilderness, that the chastened may only harden themselves
against the hand of love which chastens! And poverty and sickness, by which God seeks
to draw His children to Him, and to purify them for Himself, are made the very grounds
for neglecting and disobeying Him!
IV. Rejection could not finally pass unpunished. There was a sentence upon those
despisers (Psa_95:11). God’s truth requires that His promises should be as sure to His
opposers as to His followers and friends; and the sentence will follow. They could not
enter into God’s offered rest, as Paul explains to the Romans, on account of unbelief. (D.
Laing, M.A.)
The genesis of praise
This has been called the Invitatory Psalm. The Temple at Jerusalem had been restored.
Its doors were again open for worship. And the psalmist sought to allure the people to a
worship long neglected in the time of their exile. From the earliest times this psalm has
filled a somewhat similar place in the services of the Western Church. It is the first note

13. of praise in the order for morning prayer.
I. The spontaneity of song. Jehovah did not say: “Sing unto Me,” but men said one to
another: “O come, let us sing unto the Lord!” Men sang because they could not help but
sing. There are some things so natural to men that no Divine command is needed. Song
is one of these. It grows naturally out of the emotions of a godly heart. The deepest
feelings of the race have always found their fullest expression in poetry, and poetry
reaches its highest utterance when wedded to music, on whose wings it soars to heaven.
II. The religious inspiration of song. Love is the great kindler of song, and takes on its
noblest, purest forms as it goes out to God. And hence it will be found that in proportion
to the strength of love in any religion is the place and power of its song. To the
lovelessness of most of the pagan and heathen religions is due the poverty and even
absence of song in their worship. To all intents and purposes the Hebrew and its
successor, the Christian, faith are the only ones in which song prevails. And it will be
found, if you look into the history, that as their conception of God grew in depth and
tenderness, the more lovable He was seen to be, so their song grew in volume and worth.
The theology of each age is reflected in its hymnody.
III. The religious occasion of song. The psalm before us probably sprang out of joy at the
reopened temple at Jerusalem, that the feet of Israel could once more stand within the
gates of Zion. Every lofty hymn has a sacred history. And thus the experience of elect
souls is made to help other souls to higher levels of thought and feeling. They are like
climbers who have reached the mountain summit, and beckon those in the valley to
share with them the grand outlook to which their eye has reached. It is for us to respond
to their call, so that as we sing we may be drawn upwards from the mists of earth to
those. Goethe once advised, “as a means of making life less commonplace, that we
should every day, at least, hear or read a good poem.” Better still would it be if we
allowed no day to pass without joining in a hymn of praise. Marvellous has been the
influence of song in the furtherance of religion in the days that are past. The Arians were
among the first to discover its power. They organized singing processions to propagate
their doctrine. Then the orthodox party followed their example. When Ambrose, the
good Bishop of Milan, was ordered to give up one of his churches for Arian worship, he
refused, and his devoted followers surrounded his house day and night to protect him
from the troops of the Emperor. He arranged for his defenders hymns for every hour of
the day and night. It was a charge against Luther that he was singing the whole German
people into the Reformation doctrine. The Lollards gained their name from their custom
of “lulling”—that is, singing softly. The Methodist Revival owed quite as much to the
hymns of Charles Wesley as to the preaching of her saintly brother. The Oxford
Movement owed its success not only to the “Tracts for the Times” and the sermons of
Newman, but to “The Christian Year” of Keble. Where would the Moody and Sankey
movement have been but for the “Sacred Songs and Solos”? The Salvation Army could
not carry on its work without its rough but inspiring music. And my own conviction is
that holy song will be one means of bringing to the Church a deeper unity. Through it the
heart is permitted to speak, and by means of the heart, rather than the intellect,
Christian people are drawn closer together. Theology has too often proved a dividing
influence. Song usually tends to unity. (W. G. Horder.)
Psalmody
I. The practice of singing. Old Testament saints, as well as New, seem never weary of
celebrating the praises of their Lord and Saviour; because He was made an offering for

14. their sins, dead, risen, and ascended to His throne. And this is still the sweetest subject
in the Church of Christ; for happy are they who have the Lord for their God—yea, thrice
happy they who have “the kingdom of God” set up within them, which “is righteousness,
and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.”
II. The object of singing psalms. The object of singing is, we see distinctly, the praise of
Jesus. It is very important for you to notice that; for as the joy of the believer arises from
his conscious standing in Jesus, so this joy is expressed in celebrating the praises of the
glorious person and redeeming work of Jesus—for “God would have all men to honour
the Son even as they honour the Father.” Singing is the outward expression of inward
joy; and this is no doubt why the Holy Ghost has enjoined it on believers. It shows their
sense of the infinite love of God in Christ Jesus. But at the same time that believers find
joy in singing the praises of Jesus, as they are set forth in the Book of Psalms, they may
also as they sing learn lessons for the practice of daily life. They have an interest not only
in all Jesus was, but also in what Jesus is. Do they see that His trust in God was
unshaken? They trust Him to make theirs steadfast also. Again: was His walk “holy, and
harmless, and undefiled,” so that He could say in truth, “I have set the Lord alway before
me; because He is at my right hand I shall not be moved”? Then they depend upon Him
for strength to tread in His steps. Were His tempers perfectly holy, so that He could say,
“Thou hast proved Mine heart; Thou hast visited Me in the night; Thou hast tried Me,
and shalt find nothing; I am purposed that My mouth shall not transgress”?—when, I
say, they sing of this, they admire His example, and through His Spirit they strive daily
to “put off the old man” and to “put on the new.” Again: was He carried through the
greatest sufferings in perfect resignation, so that He could say, “Not My will, but Thine,
O Lord, be done”? Then may they look up to Him in every trial for His promised
support. Have the “everlasting gates” been opened, and “the King of glory” gone in? It is
promised to them that they shall “see the King in His beauty”—yea, that they shall
partake of that very glory.
III. The spirit in which we are to sing. Two things are necessary—that a man should sing
spiritually, and that he should sing intelligently—that he should know what he has to
thank God for, otherwise he cannot do it intelligently. Have we not mercies to thank God
for? Why not, then, join the Church of Christ in thanking Him for them? The believer
should live as he sings; his life should be in harmony with his principles. (J. W. Reeve,
M.A.)
Praise the outcome of Divine influence
The whole of Glasgow is supplied with water from Loch Katrine. It is brought through
the intervening country, and is distributed in pipes along every street, and from the
palaces above Kelvin Grove to the wretched flats in the Saltmarket it tells, to those who
have ears to hear, sweet stories of lofty peaks, wooded slopes, cataracts, and sparkling
rivulets in its Highland home. Embosomed in the Mountains of Eternity, and reflecting
in its placid sweep the magnificent devices of uncreated wisdom, we see the vast
unfathomable ocean of Divine love. From that ocean a bountiful outflow of holy
influence has come down into the human mind, and been divided into little rills known
as “psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs.” Not to the rich only do they ripple, but also
to the poor; labour forgets its weariness while taking in or giving out their sacred words,
and the widow mingles their sweetness with her scanty food, and even the little child
sends forth a triumph caught from their melody.

15. Inciting one another to praise God
You know how the birds stir up each other to sing. One bird in a cage will excite its
fellow, who looks at him and seems to say, “You shall not outstrip me: I will sing with
you,” till all the little minstrels quiver with an ecstasy of song, and form a choir of
emulating songsters. Hark how the early morning of the spring is rendered musical by
the full orchestra of birds. One songster begins the tune, and the rest hasten to swell the
music. Let us be like the blessed birds. Bless the Lord till you set the fashion, and others
bless Him with you. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The Rock of our salvation.—
Christ the Rock of our salvation
The shipwrecked mariner, hoping for safety on the sea-girt rock; the hunted fugitive,
flying for a refuge to the cliff on the plain; the fainting traveller, throwing himself down
in the shade of rock in the desert; the steep and precipitous hill, with its encircling
stream, forming the site of a mighty fortress: each of these pictures tells us of weakness
finding comfort and aid, each sets forth the value of the redeeming work, and the mighty
mission of Christ our Lord. For the very idea of a rock is that of stability and strength,
that which cannot be moved, that on which we may rest secure. “For us and our
salvation” Christ died, says the noble language of our Creed. He is the great example of
self-sacrifice, and of the One who devoted Himself to death and suffering for the benefit
of “the many.” But how shall we apply to our own selves the benefit of Christ’s work?
How shall we find a refuge in the Rock of our salvation.? By a humble and faithful
realization of what He has done for us. (J. W. Hardman, LL.D.)
2 Let us come before him with thanksgiving
and extol him with music and song.
BAR ES, "Let us come before his presence - Margin, as in Hebrew, “prevent
his face.” The word in Hebrew means literally to come before; to anticipate. It is the
word which is commonly rendered “prevent.” See Job_3:12, note; Psa_17:13, note; Psa_
59:10, note; 1Th_4:15, note. Here it means to come before, in the sense of “in front of.”
Let us stand before his face; that is, in his very presence.
With thanksgiving - Expressing our thanks.
And make a joyful noise unto him - The same word which occurs in Psa_95:1.
With psalms - Songs of praise.

16. CLARKE, "Let us come before his presence - ‫פניו‬ panaiv, his faces, with
thanksgiving, ‫בתודה‬ bethodah, with confession, or with the confession-offering. Praise
him for what he has all ready done, and confess your unworthiness of any of his
blessings. The confession-offering, the great atoning sacrifice, can alone render your
acknowledgment of sin and thanksgiving acceptable to a holy and just God.
GILL, "Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving,.... Come with the
sacrifice of praise, there being no other in the days of the Messiah, all ceremonial
sacrifices being put an end to when his sacrifice was offered up; so Arama observes, that
the offering of thanksgiving shall remain, or be left in the days of the Messiah; come with
this to Christ as a priest, to offer it by him to God his Father, to whom it is acceptable
through him, and with this to himself for the great salvation he has wrought out: "to
come before his presence", or "face" (b), supposes his being come in the flesh, his being
God manifest in it, and also as clear and free from the veil of types and shadows; these
all being gone now he is come, and to be beheld with open face; and likewise his having
done his work as a Saviour, and now upon his throne as a King; into whose presence
chamber saints are admitted to make their acknowledgments to him, and profess their
allegiance and subjection to him, and their gratitude for favours received. It signifies an
attendance on him in his house and ordinances, where he shows his face, and grants his
presence; and intends not merely bodily exercise, or a presentation of our bodies only to
him, but a drawing nigh to him with true hearts, and serving him in a spiritual manner:
and make a joyful noise unto him with psalms; with a melodious voice, and grace
in the heart, with psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs; this belonging to Gospel times
shows that singing of psalms vocally in a musical way is an ordinance of Christ, to be
performed to him under the Gospel dispensation, Eph_5:19.
JAMISO , "come ... presence — literally, “approach,” or, meet Him (Psa_17:13).
SPURGEO , "Ver. 2. Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving. Here is
probably a reference to the peculiar presence of God in the Holy of Holies above the
mercy seat, and also to the glory which shone forth out of the cloud which rested
above the tabernacle. Everywhere God is present, but there is a peculiar presence of
grace and glory into which men should never come without the profoundest
reverence. We may make bold to come before the immediate presence of the Lordâ
€”for the voice of the Holy Ghost in this psalm invites us, and when we do draw
near to him we should remember his great goodness to us and cheerfully confess it.
Our worship should have reference to the past as well as to the future; if we do not
bless the Lord for what we have already received, how can we reasonably look for
more. We are permitted to bring our petitions, and therefore we are in honour
bound to bring our thanksgivings.
And make a joyful noise unto him with psalms. We should shout as exultingly as
those do who triumph in war, and as solemnly as those whose utterance is a psalm.
It is not always easy to unite enthusiasm with reverence, and it is a frequent fault to

17. destroy one of these qualities while straining after the other. The perfection of
singing is that which unites joy with gravity, exultation with humility, fervency with
sobriety. The invitation given in the first verse (Psalms 95:1) is thus repeated in the
second (Psalms 95:2) with the addition of directions, which indicate more fully the
intent of the writer. One can imagine David in earnest tones persuading his people
to go up with him to the worship of Jehovah with sound of harp and hymn, and holy
delight. The happiness of his exhortation is noteworthy, the noise is to be joyful; this
quality he insists upon twice. It is to be feared that this is too much overlooked in
ordinary services, people are so impressed with the idea that they ought to be
serious that they put on the aspect of misery, and quite forget that joy is as much a
characteristic of true worship as solemnity itself.
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 2. Let us come before his presence. Hebrew, prevent his face, be there with the
first. "Let us go speedily ...I will go also", Zechariah 8:21. Let praise wait for God in
Sion, Psalms 65:1. —John Trapp.
Ver. 2. (second clause). Let us chant aloud to him the measured lay. twrmz, I take to
be songs, in measured verse, adjusted to the bars of a chaunt. —S. Horsley.
3 For the Lord is the great God,
the great King above all gods.
BAR ES, "For the Lord is a great God - For Yahweh is a great God. The object is
to exalt Jehovah, the true God, as distinguished from all who were worshipped as gods.
The first idea is that he is “great;” that he is exalted over all the universe; that he rules
over all, and that he is to be worshipped as such.
And a great King above all gods - This does not mean that he is a great ruler of all
other gods, as if they had a real existence, but that he is king or ruler far above all that
were worshipped as gods, or to whom homage was paid. Whoever, or whatever was
worshipped as God, Yahweh was supreme over all things. He occupied the throne; and
all others must be beneath him, and under his dominion. If the sun, the moon, or the
stars were worshipped - if the mountains or the rivers - if angels good or bad - yet
Yahweh was above all these. If imaginary beings were worshipped, yet Yahweh in his
perfections was exalted far above all that was ascribed to them, for He was the true God,
and the Ruler of the universe, while they were beings of the imagination only.
CLARKE, "For the Lord is a great God - Or, “A great God is Jehovah, and a great
King above all gods;” or, “God is a great King over all.” The Supreme Being has three

18. names here: ‫אל‬ El, ‫יהוה‬ Jehovah, ‫אלהים‬ Elohim, and we should apply none of them to
false gods. The first implies his strength; the second his being and essence; the third, his
covenant relation to mankind. In public worship these are the views we should entertain
of the Divine Being.
GILL, "For the Lord is a great God,.... Christ is truly and properly God, wherefore
divine service is to be performed unto him; particularly singing psalms, setting forth
therein his greatness and glory: and he is a great one; great in power, wisdom, justice,
truth, mercy, and grace; greatness is to be ascribed unto him, and worship given him,
because of his greatness, Tit_2:13.
and a great King over all gods; he is King of the whole world; his kingdom ruleth
over all; he is King of kings, and Lord of lords; he is King of saints, the government of the
whole church is upon his shoulders, which he exercises in the most wise, powerful, and
righteous manner imaginable; he is above all that are called gods, all the nominal and
fictitious deities of the Heathens; above all civil magistrates, who are gods by office; and
above the angels, who have this name, 1Pe_3:22. Aben Ezra interprets it of angels.
HE RY 3-6, " Why God is to be praised and what must be the matter of our praise.
We do not want matter; it were well if we did not want a heart. We must praise God,
1. Because he is a great God, and sovereign Lord of all, Psa_95:3. He is great, and
therefore greatly to be praised. He is infinite and immense, and has all perfection in
himself. (1.) He has great power: He is a great King above all gods, above all deputed
deities, all magistrates, to whom he said, You are gods (he manages them all, and serves
his own purposes by them, and to him they are all accountable), above all counterfeit
deities, all pretenders, all usurpers; he can do that which none of them can do; he can,
and will, famish and vanquish them all. (2.) He has great possessions. This lower world
is here particularly specified. We reckon those great men who have large territories,
which they call their own against all the world, which yet are a very inconsiderable part
of the universe: how great then is that God whose the whole earth is, and the fulness
thereof, not only under whose feet it is, as he has an incontestable dominion over all the
creatures and a propriety in them, but in whose hand it is, as he has the actual directing
and disposing of all (Psa_95:4); even the deep places of the earth, which are out of our
sight, subterraneous springs and mines, are in his hand; and the height of the hills
which are out of our reach, whatever grows or feeds upon them, is his also. This may be
taken figuratively: the meanest of the children of men, who are as the low places of the
earth, are not beneath his cognizance; and the greatest, who are as the strength of the
hills, are not above his control. Whatever strength is in any creature it is derived from
God and employed for him (Psa_95:5): The sea is his, and all that is in it (the waves fulfil
his word); it is his, for he made it, gathered its waters and fixed its shores; the dry land,
though given to the children of men, is his too, for he still reserved the property to
himself; it is his, for his hands formed it, when his word made the dry land appear. His
being the Creator of all makes him, without dispute, the owner of all. This being a gospel
psalm, we may very well suppose that it is the Lord Jesus whom we are here taught to
praise. He is a great God; the mighty God is one of his titles, and God over all, blessed
for evermore. As Mediator, he is a great King above all gods; by him kings reign; and
angels, principalities, and powers, are subject to him; by him, as the eternal Word, all
things were made (Joh_1:3), and it was fit he should be the restorer and reconciler of all

19. who was the Creator of all, Col_1:16, Col_1:20. To him all power is given both in heaven
and in earth, and into his hand all things are delivered. It is he that sets one foot on the
sea and the other on the earth, as sovereign Lord of both (Rev_10:2), and therefore to
him we must sing our songs of praise, and before him we must worship and bow down.
JAMISO , "above ... gods — esteemed such by men, though really nothing (Jer_
5:7; Jer_10:10-15).
K&D 3-7, "The adorableness of God receives a threefold confirmation: He is exalted
above all gods as King, above all things as Creator, and above His people as Shepherd
and Leader. ‫ים‬ ִ‫ּה‬‫ל‬ ֱ‫א‬ (gods) here, as in Psa_96:4., Psa_97:7, Psa_97:9, and frequently, are
the powers of the natural world and of the world of men, which the Gentiles deify and
call kings (as Moloch Molech, the deified fire), which, however, all stand under the
lordship of Jahve, who is infinitely exalted above everything that is otherwise called god
(Psa_96:4; Psa_97:9). The supposition that ‫ים‬ ִ‫ר‬ ָ‫ה‬ ‫פוֹת‬ ָ‫ּוע‬ denotes the pit-works (µέταλλα)
of the mountains (Böttcher), is at once improbable, because to all appearance it is
intended to be the antithesis to ‫ץ‬ ֶ‫ר‬ ֶ‫י־א‬ ֵ‫ר‬ ְ‫ק‬ ְ‫ח‬ ֶ‫,מ‬ the shafts of the earth. The derivation from ‫ף‬ ַ‫ע‬ָ‫ו‬
(‫ף‬ ַ‫ע‬ָ‫,)י‬ κάµνειν, κοπιᇰν, also does not suit ‫תועפות‬ in Num_23:22; Num_24:8, for “fatigues”
and “indefatigableness” are notions that lie very wide apart. The ‫ּות‬‫פ‬ ָ‫ּוע‬ ‫ף‬ ֶ‫ס‬ ֶⅴ of Job_22:25
might more readily be explained according to this “silver of fatigues,” i.e., silver that the
fatiguing labour of mining brings to light, and ‫הרים‬ ‫תועפות‬ in the passage before us, with
Gussetius, Geier, and Hengstenberg: cacumina montium quia defatigantur qui eo
ascendunt, prop. ascendings = summits of the mountains, after which ‫תועפות‬ ‫,כסף‬ Job_
22:25, might also signify “silver of the mountain-heights.” But the lxx, which renders
δόξα in the passages in Numbers and τᆭ ᆖψη τራν ᆆρέων in the passage before us, leads
one to a more correct track. The verb ‫ף‬ ַ‫ע‬ָ‫י‬ (‫ף‬ ַ‫ע‬ָ‫,)ו‬ transposed from ‫יפע‬ (‫,)ופע‬ goes back to
the root ‫,יף‬ ‫,וף‬ to stand forth, tower above, to be high, according to which ‫תועפות‬ = ‫תופעות‬
signifies eminentiae, i.e., towerings = summits, or prominences = high (the highest)
perfection (vid., on Job_22:25). In the passage before us it is a synonym of the Arabic
mıfan, mıfâtun, pars terrae eminens (from Arab. wfâ = ‫,יפע‬ prop. instrumentally: a means
of rising above, viz., by climbing), and of the names of eminences derived from Arab. yf'
(after which Hitzig renders: the teeth of the mountains). By reason of the fact that Jahve
is the Owner (cf. 1Sa_2:8), because the Creator of all things, the call to worship, which
concerns no one so nearly as it does Israel, the people, which before other peoples is
Jahve's creation, viz., the creation of His miraculously mighty grace, is repeated. In the
call or invitation, ‫ה‬ָ‫ו‬ ֲ‫ח‬ ַ ְ‫שׁ‬ ִ‫ה‬ signifies to stretch one's self out full length upon the ground, the
proper attitude of adoration; ‫ע‬ ַ‫ר‬ ָⅴ, to curtsey, to totter; and ְ‫ך‬ ַ‫ר‬ ָ , Arabic baraka, starting
from the radical signification flectere, to kneel down, in genua (πρόχνυ, pronum =
procnum) procumbere, 2Ch_6:13 (cf. Hölemann, Bibelstudien, i. 135f.). Beside ‫ּו‬‫ת‬‫י‬ ִ‫ע‬ ְ‫ר‬ ַ‫מ‬ ‫ם‬ ַ‫,ע‬
people of His pasture, ‫ּו‬‫ד‬ָ‫י‬ ‫ּאן‬‫צ‬ is not the flock formed by His creating hand (Augustine:
ipse gratiâ suâ nos oves fecit), but, after Gen_30:35, the flock under His protection, the

20. flock led and defended by His skilful, powerful hand. Böttcher renders: flock of His
charge; but ‫ד‬ָ‫י‬ in this sense (Jer_6:3) signifies only a place, and “flock of His place”
would be poetry and prose in one figure.
CALVI , "3.For Jehovah is a great God. By these words the Psalmist reminds us
what abundant grounds we have for praising God, and how far we are from needing
to employ the lying panegyric with which rhetoricians flatter earthly princes. First,
he extols the greatness of God, drawing a tacit contrast between him and such false
gods as men have invented for themselves. We know that there has always been a
host of gods in the world, as Paul says,
“There are many on the earth who are called gods,”
(1 Corinthians 8:5.)
We are to notice the opposition stated between the God of Israel and all others
which man has formed in the exercise of an unlicensed imagination. Should any
object, that “an idol is nothing in the world,” (1 Corinthians 8:4,) it is enough to
reply, that the Psalmist aims at denouncing the vain delusions of men who have
framed gods after their own foolish device. I admit, however, that under this term
he may have comprehended the angels, asserting God to be possessed of such
excellence as exalted him far above all heavenly glory, and whatever might be
considered Divine, as well as above the feigned deities of earth. (45) Angels are not
indeed gods, but the name admits of an improper application to them on account of
their being next to God, and still more, on account of their being accounted no less
than gods by men who inordinately and superstitiously extol them. If the heavenly
angels themselves must yield before the majesty of the one God, it were the height of
indignity to compare him with gods who are the mere fictions of the brain. In proof
of his greatness, he bids us look to his formation of the world, which he declares to
be the work of God’s hands, and subject to his power. This is one general ground
why God is to be praised, that he has clearly shown forth his glory in the creation of
the world, and will have us daily recognize him in the government of it. When it is
said, that the depths of the earth are in his hand, the meaning is, that it is ruled by
his providence, and subject to his power. Some read, the bounds of the earth, but
the word means abysses or depths, as opposed to the heights of the mountains. The
Hebrew word properly signifies searching.
SPURGEO , "Ver. 3. For the LORD is a great God, and a great King above all
gods. o doubt the surrounding nations imagined Jehovah to be a merely local
deity, the god of a small nation, and therefore one of the inferior deities; the
psalmist utterly repudiates such an idea. Idolaters tolerated gods many and lords
many, giving to each a certain measure of respect; the monotheism of the Jews was
not content with this concession, it rightly claimed for Jehovah the chief place, and
the supreme power. He is great, for he is all in all; he is a great King above all other
powers and dignitaries, whether angels or princes, for they owe their existence to
him; as for the idol gods, they are not worthy to be mentioned. This verse and the

21. following supply some of the reasons for worship, drawn from the being, greatness,
and sovereign dominion of the Lord.
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 3. He that hath a mind to praise God, shall not want matter of praise, as they
who come before princes do, who for want of true grounds of praise in them, do give
them flattering words; for the Lord is a great God, for power and preeminence, for
strength and continuance. —David Dickson.
Ver. 3. The Supreme Being has three names here: la El, hwhy Jehovah, Myhla
Elohim, and we should apply none of them to false gods. The first implies his
strength; the second, his being and essence; the third, his covenant relation to
mankind. In public worship these are the views we should entertain of the Divine
Being. —Adam Clarke.
Ver. 3. Above all gods. When He is called a great God and King above all gods, we
may justly imagine that the reference is to the angels who are wont to be introduced
absolutely under this name, and to the supreme Judeges in the land, who also wear
this title, as we have it in Psalms 82:1-8. —Venema.
ELLICOTT, "(3) Above all gods.— ot here angelic beings, but the gods of
surrounding tribes, as accurately explained in Psalms 96:4-5. (Comp. Exodus 15:11;
Exodus 18:11.) Commentators vex themselves with the difficulty of the ascription of
a real existence to these tribal deities in the expression,” King above all gods.” But
how else was Israel constantly falling into the sin of worshipping them? It was in the
inspired rejection of them as possessing any sovereign power, and in the recognition
of Jehovah’s supremacy shown by the psalmists and prophets, that the preservation
of Israel’s religion consisted.
WHEDO , "3. For the Lord is a great God—This is the theme of Psalms 95:3-5,
and the reason for this call for abundant and loud praise.
Above all gods—Above all the “gods” of the nations. But the title “gods” is also
sometimes given to princes, judges, and rulers, (Psalms 8:6; Psalms 82:6; Psalms
96:4-5,) to whom it better applies here.
EBC, "The three following verses (Psalms 95:3-5) give Jehovah’s creative and
sustaining power, and His consequent ownership of this fair world, as the reasons
for worship. He is King by right of creation. Surely it is forcing unnatural meanings
on words to maintain that the psalmist believed in the real existence of the "gods"
whom he disparagingly contrasts with Jehovah. The fact that these were
worshipped sufficiently warrants the comparison. To treat it as in any degree
inconsistent with Monotheism is unnecessary, and would scarcely have occurred to a
reader but for the exigencies of a theory. The repeated reference to the "hand" of
Jehovah is striking. In it are held the deeps: it is a plastic hand. "forming" the land,
as a potter fashioning his clay: it is a shepherd’s hand. protecting and feeding his
flock (Psalms 95:7). The same power created and sustains the physical universe, and
guides and guards Israel. The psalmist has no time for details; he can only single out
extremes, and leave us to infer that what is true of these is true of all that is enclosed
between them. The depths and the heights are Jehovah’s. The word rendered

22. "peaks" is doubtful. Etymologically it should mean "fatigue," but it is not found in
that sense in any of the places where it occurs. The parallelism requires the meaning
of heights to contrast with depths, and this rendering is found in the LXX, and is
adopted by most moderns. The word is then taken to come from a root meaning "to
be high." Some of those who adopt the translation summits attempt to get that
meaning out of the root meaning fatigue, by supposing that the labour of getting to
the top of the mountain is alluded to in the name. Thus Kay renders "the
mountains’ toilsome heights," and so also Hengstenberg. But it is simpler to trace
the word to the other root, to be high. The ownerless sea is owned by Him; He made
both its watery waste and the solid earth.
But that all-creating Hand has put forth more wondrous energies than those of
which heights and depths, sea and land, witness. Therefore, the summons is again
addressed to Israel to bow before "Jehovah our Maker."
The creation of a people to serve Him is the work of His grace, and is a nobler effect
of His power than material things. It is remarkable that the call to glad praise
should be associated with thoughts of His greatness as shown in creation, while
lowly reverence is enforced by remembrance of His special relation to Israel. We
should have expected the converse. The revelation of God’s love, in His work of
creating a people for Himself, is most fittingly adored by spirits prostrate before
Him. Another instance of apparent transposition of thoughts occurs in Psalms 95:7
b, where we might have expected "people of His hand and sheep of His pasture."
Hupfeld proposes to correct accordingly, and Cheyne follows him. But the
correction buys prosaic accuracy at the cost of losing the forcible incorrectness
which blends figure and fact. and by keeping sight of both enhances each. "The
sheep of His hand" suggests not merely the creative but the sustaining and
protecting power of God. It is hallowed forever by our Lord’s words, which may be
an echo of it: " o man is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand."
The sudden turn from jubilant praise and recognition of Israel’s prerogative as its
occasion to grave warning is made more impressive by its occurring in the middle of
a verse. God’s voice breaks in upon the joyful acclamations with solemn effect. The
shouts of the adoring multitude die on the poet’s trembling ear, as that deeper Voice
is heard. We cannot persuade ourselves that this magnificent transition, so weighty
with instruction, so fine in poetic effect, is due to the after thought of a compiler.
Such a one would surely have stitched his fragments more neatly together than to
make the seam run through the centre of a verse-an irregularity which would seem
small to a singer in the heat of his inspiration. Psalms 95:7 c may be either a wish or
the protasis to the apodosis in Psalms 95:8. "If ye would but listen to His voice!" is
an exclamation, made more forcible by the omission of what would happen then.
But it is not necessary to regard the clause as optative. The conditional meaning,
which connects it with what follows, is probably preferable, and is not set aside by
the expression "His voice" instead of "My voice"; for "similar change of persons is
very common in utterances of Jehovah, especially in the Prophets" (Hupfeld).
"Today" stands first with strong emphasis, to enforce the critical character of the
present moment. It may be the last opportunity. At all events, it is an opportunity,

23. and therefore to be grasped and used. A doleful history of unthankfulness lay
behind; but still the Divine voice sounds, and still the fleeting moments offer space
for softening of heart and docile hearkening. The madness of delay when time is
hurrying on, and the long-suffering patience of God, are wonderfully proclaimed in
that one word, which the Epistle to the Hebrews lays hold of, with so deep insight, as
all-important.
The warning points Israel back to ancestral sins, the tempting of God in the second
year of the Exodus, by the demand for water. [Exodus 17:1-7] The scene of that
murmuring received both names, Massah (temptation) and Meribah (strife). It is
difficult to decide the exact force of Psalms 95:9 b. "Saw My work" is most
naturally taken as referring to the Divine acts of deliverance and protection seen by
Israel in the desert, which aggravated the guilt of their faithlessness. But the word
rendered "and" will, in that case, have to be taken as meaning "although"-a sense
which cannot be established. It seems better, therefore, to take "work" in the
unusual meaning of acts of judgment-His "strange work." Israel’s tempting of God
was the more indicative of hardheartedness that it was persisted in, in spite of
chastisements. Possibly both thoughts are to be combined, and the whole varied
stream of blessings and punishments is referred to in the wide expression. Both
forms of God’s work should have touched these hard hearts. It mattered not
whether He blessed or punished. They were impervious to both. The awful issue of
this obstinate rebellion is set forth in terrible words. The sensation of physical
loathing followed by sickness is daringly ascribed to God. We cannot but remember
what John heard in Patmos from the lips into which grace was poured: "I will spue
thee out of My mouth."
PULPIT, "For the Lord is a great God. Thanks and praise are due to God, in the
first place, because of his greatness (see Psalm cf. 2). "Who is so great a god as our
God?" (Psalms 77:13); "His greatness is unsearchable" (Psalms 145:3). And a great
King above all gods; i.e. "a goat King above all other so called gods"—above the
great of the earth (Psalms 82:1, Psalms 82:6), above angels (Deuteronomy 10:17),
above the imaginary gods of the heathen (Exodus 12:12, etc.)
4 In his hand are the depths of the earth,
and the mountain peaks belong to him.
BAR ES, "In his hand - In his power, or under his control as his own. That is, he

24. so possesses all things that they can be claimed by no other. His right over them is
absolute and entire.
Are the deep places of the earth - The word used here - ‫מחקר‬ mechqâr - means the
interior, the inmost depth; that which is “searched out,” from - ‫חקר‬ châqar - to search,
search out, explore. The primary idea is that of searching by boring or digging; and the
allusion here is to the parts of the earth which could be explored only by digging - as in
mining, or sinking shafts in the earth. The meaning is, that all those places which lie
beyond the ordinary power of observation in man are in the hand of God. He knows
them as clearly as those which are most plain to human view; he possesses or owns them
as his own as really as he does those which are on the surface of the ground.
The strength of the hills is his also - Margin, “The heights of the hills are his.”
The word rendered “strength” - ‫תועפות‬ tô‛âphôth - means properly swiftness or speed in
running; then, weariness, wearisome labor; and hence, wealth obtained by labor;
“treasures.” Here the expression means “treasures of the mountains;” that is, treasures
obtained out of the mountains, the precious metals, etc. Compare the notes at Job_
22:25, where the same word occurs. All this belongs to God. As he is the Maker of these
hills, and of all that they contain, the absolute proprietorship is in him.
CLARKE, "In his hand are the deep places of the earth - The greatest deeps
are fathomed by him.
The strength of the hills is his also - And to him the greatest heights are
accessible,
GILL, "In his hand are the deep places of the earth,.... The "penetrals" (c) of it;
not only what are penetrated by men, the minerals that are in it; but what are of such
deep recess as to be penetrated only by the Lord himself; these are in the hands and
power of Christ, which he can search into, discover, and dispose of; these are the
foundations of the earth, which cannot be searched out beneath by men, Jer_31:37,
the strength of the hills is his also; or, "the wearinesses" (d) of them, the tops (e) of
them, which make a man weary to go up unto, they are so high; the Targum is,
"the strengths of the height of the hills;''
which takes in both ideas, both the height and strength of them. The hills, that are both
high and strong, are set fast by his power, and are at his command; and bow and tremble
before him, whom men ought to worship.
JAMISO , "The terms used describe the world in its whole extent, subject to God.
SPURGEO , "Ver. 4. In his hand are the deep places of the earth. He is the God of
the valleys and the hills, the caverns, and the peaks. Far down where the miners
sink their shafts, deeper yet where lie the secret oceans by which springs are fed,
and deepest of all in the unknown abyss where rage and flame the huge central fires
of earth, there Jehovah's power is felt, and all things are under the dominion of his

25. hand. As princes hold the mimic globe in their hands, so does the Lord in very deed
hold the earth. When Israel drank of the crystal fount which welled up from the
great deep, below the smitten rock, the people knew that in the Lord's hands were
the deep places of the earth.
The strength of the hills is his also. When Sinai was altogether on a smoke the tribes
learned that Jehovah was God of the hills as well as of the valleys. Everywhere and
at all times is this true; the Lord rules upon the high places of the earth in lonely
majesty. The vast foundations, the gigantic spurs, the incalculable masses, the
untrodden heights of the mountains are all the Lord's. These are his fastnesses and
treasure houses, where he stores the tempest and the rain; whence also he pours the
ice torrents and looses the avalanches. The granite peaks and adamantine aiguilles
are his, and his the precipices and the beetling crags. Strength is the main thought
which strikes the mind when gazing on those vast ramparts of cliff which front the
raging sea, or peer into the azure sky, piercing the clouds, but it is to the devout
mind the strength of God; hints of Omnipotence are given by those stern rocks
which brave the fury of the elements, and like walls of brass defy the assaults of
nature in her wildest rage.
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 4. In his hand. The dominion of God is founded upon his preservation of
things. "The Lord is a great King above all gods." Why?
In his hand are the deep places of the earth. While his hand holds, his hand hath a
dominion over them. He that holds a stone in the air exerciseth a dominion over its
natural inclination in hindering it from falling. The creature depends wholly upon
God in its preservation; as soon as that divine hand which sustains everything were
withdrawn, a languishment and swooning would be the next turn in the creature.
He is called Lord, Adonai, in regard of his sustentation of all things by his continual
influx, the word coming of wa, which signifies a basis or pillar that supports a
building. God is the Lord of all, as he is the sustainer of all by his power, as well as
the Creator of all by his word. —Stephen Charnock.
Ver. 4.
"In whose hand are the recesses of the earth
And the treasures of the mountains are his."
—Thomas J. Conant's Translation.
Ver. 4. In his hand are the deep places of the earth. This affords consolation to
those; who for the glory of the divine name are cast into prisons and subterraneous
caves; because they know, that even there it is not possible to be the least separated
from the presence of Christ. Wherefore He preserved Joseph when hurled by his
brethren into the old pit, and when thrust by his shameless mistress into prison;
Jeremiah also when sent down into the dungeon; Daniel among the lions, and his
companions in the furnace. So all who cleave to Him with a firm faith, he
wonderfully keeps and delivers to this day. —Solomon Gesner, 1559-1605.
Ver. 4. In his hand are the deep places of the earth. As an illustration of the working
and presence of the Lord in the mines amid the bowels of the earth we have selected
the following: "The natural disposition of coal in detached portions", says the
author of an excellent article in the Edinburgh Review, "is not simply a
phenomenon of geology, but it also bears upon natural considerations. It is
remarkable that this natural disposition is that which renders the fuel most

26. accessible and most easily mined. Were the coal situated at its normal geological
depth, that is, supposing the strata to be all horizontal and undisturbed or
upheaved, it would be far below human reach. Were it deposited continuously in
one even superficial layer, it would have been too readily, and therefore too quickly,
mined, and therefore all the superior qualities would be wrought out, and only the
inferior left; but as it now lies it is broken up by geological disturbances into
separate portions, each defined and limited in area, each sufficiently accessible to
bring it within man's reach and labour, each manageable by mechanical
arrangements, and each capable of gradual excavation without being subject to
sudden exhaustion. Selfish plundering is partly prevented by natural barriers, and
we are warned against reckless waste by the comparative thinness of coal seams, as
well as by the ever augmenting difficulty of working them at increased depths. By
the separation of seams one from another, and by varied intervals of waste
sandstones and shales, such a measured rate of winning is necessitated as precludes
us from entirely robbing posterity of the most valuable mineral fuel, while the fuel
itself is preserved from those extended fractures and crumblings and falls, which
would certainly be the consequence of largely mining the best bituminous coal, were
it aggregated into one vast mass. In fact, by an evident exercise of forethought and
benevolence in the Great Author of all our blessings, our invaluable fuel has been
stored up for us in deposits the most compendious, the most accessible, yet the least
exhaustible, and has been locally distributed into the most convenient situations.
Our coal fields are so many Bituminous Banks, in which there is abundance for an
adequate currency, but against any sudden run upon them nature has interposed
numerous checks; whole reserves of the precious fuel are always locked up in the
bank cellar under the invincible protection of ponderous stone beds. It is a striking
fact, that in this nineteenth century, after so long an inhabitation of the earth by
man, if we take the quantities in the broad view of the whole known coal fields, so
little coal has been excavated, and that there remains an abundance for a very
remote posterity, even though our own best coal fields may be then worked out."
But it is not only in these inexhaustible supplies of mineral fuel that we find proofs
of divine foresight, all the other treasures of the earth rind equally convince us of
the intimate harmony between its structure and the wants of man. Composed of a
wonderful variety of earths and ores, it contains an inexhaustible abundance of all
the substances he requires for the attainment of a higher grade of civilisation. It is
for his use that iron, copper, lead, silver, tin, marble, gypsum, sulphur, rock salt,
and a variety of other minerals and metals, have been deposited in the veins and
crevices, or in the mines and quarries, of the subterranean world. It is for his benefit
that, from the decomposition of the solid rocks results that mixture of earths and
alkalies, of marl, lime, sand, or chalk, which is most favourable to agriculture.
It is for him, finally, that, filtering through the entrails of the earth, and dissolving
salutary substances on their way, the thermal springs gush forth laden with
treasures more inestimable than those the miner toils for. Supposing man had never
been destined to live, we well may ask wily all those gifts of nature useless to all
living beings but to him why those vast coal fields, those beds of iron ore, those
deposits of sulphur, those hygeian fountains, should ever have been created?
Without him there is no design, no purpose, in their existence; with him they are
wonderful sources of health or necessary instruments of civilisation and

27. improvement. Thus the geological revolutions of the earth rind harmoniously point
to man as to its future lord; thus, in the life of our planet and that of its inhabitants,
we everywhere find proofs of a gigantic unity of plan, embracing unnumbered ages
in its development and progress. —G. Hartwig, in "The Harmonies of ature",
1866.
Ver. 4. —The deep places of the earth, penetralia terrae, which are opposed to the
heights of the hills, and plainly mean the deepest and most letired parts of the
terraqueous globe, which are explorable by the eye of God, and by his only. —
Richard Mant.
Ver. 4. —The strength of the hills. The word translated "strength" is plural in
Hebrew, and seems properly to mean fatiguing exertions, from which some derive
the idea of strength, others that of extreme height, which can only be reached by
exhausting effort. —J.A. Alexander.
Ver. 4. —The strength of the hills is his also. The reference may be to the wealth of
the hills, obtained only by labour Gesenius, corresponding to the former—"the
deep places of the earth", explained as referring to the mines Mendelssohn. Go
where man may, with all his toil and searching in the heights or in the depths of the
earth, he cannot find a place beyond the range of God's dominion. —A.R. Faussett.
Ver. 4. —Hills, The Sea, the dry land. The relation of areas of land to areas of
water exercises a great and essential influence on the distribution of heat, variations
of atmospheric pressure, directions of the winds, and that condition of the air with
respect to moisture, which is so necessary for the health of vegetation. early three
fourths of the earth's surface is covered with water, but neither the exact height of
the atmosphere nor the depth of the ocean are fully determined. Still we know that
with every addition to or subtraction from the present bulk of the waters of the
ocean, the consequent variation in the form and magnitude of the land would be
such, that if the change was considerable, many of the existing harmonies of things
would cease. Hence, the inference is, that the magnitude of the sea is one of the
conditions to which the structure of all organised creatures is adapted, and on which
indeed they depend for wellbeing. The proportions between land and water are
exactly what the world as constituted requires; and the whole mass of earth, sea,
and air, must have been balanced with the greatest nicety before even a crocus could
stand erect. Or a snowdrop or a daffodil bend their heads to the ground. The
proportions of land and sea are adjusted to their reciprocal functions. othing
deduced from modern science is more certain than this. —Edwin Sidney, in
"Conversations on the Bible and Science."
COFFMA , "Verse 4
"In his hand are the deep places of the earth;
The heights of the mountains are his also."
Ocean caves and mighty mountain peaks alike are God's. The mighty palm trees of
the desert as well as the tiniest flowers that grow at the snow-line are God's; He
made them all, protects them all and uses them all. The evidence and unmistakable
witness of God's limitless intelligence and glory are seen alike in the sub-microscopic
wonders of the tiny atom and in the measureless light-year distances of the universe,

28. so large and limitless that even the imagination of men cannot reach to the farthest
edge of it.
ELLICOTT, "(4) Deep places.—From a root meaning “to search,” perhaps by
digging. Hence either “mines” or “mineral wealth.”
Strength of the hills.—The Hebrew word rendered “strength” is rare, found only
here and umbers 23:22; umbers 24:8 (“strength of an unicorn”), and Job 22:25
(“plenty of silver;” margin, “silver of strength”). The root to which the word is
usually assigned means “to be weary,” from which the idea of strength can only be
derived on the lucus a non lucendo principle. Keeping the usual derivation, we may,
with many critics, give the word the sense of “mines” or “treasures,” because of the
labours of extracting metal from the earth. This suits Job 22:25, and makes a good
parallelism. But the LXX. and Vulg. have “heights,” and by another derivation the
Hebrew may mean shining, and so “sunny summit.” With this agrees the rendering
of the LXX. in umbers 23:22; umbers 24:8, and the rhythm is preserved by an
antithetic parallelism, as in next verse.
WHEDO , "4. Deep places—The Hebrew word signifies that which is known only
by searching; but these inmost recesses of the earth were unsearchable. See
Jeremiah 31:37. To the ancients the interior of the earth was a fathomless mystery,
which modern science has only hypothetically dispelled. Here the ancients located
sheol, or hades—the region of departed spirits. They had no conception either of the
absolute or relative dimensions of the earth.
Strength of the hills—The heights of the mountains. The opposite of “deep places of
the earth.” To the former, as the word indicates, we attain by wearisome labour; the
latter are unsearchable, but God knows, governs, and possesses them all. What
language of modern science can more beautifully and impressively exalt our
conceptions of God?
BE SO , "Verse 4-5
Psalms 95:4-5. In his hand — Under his government, and in his possession; are the
deep places of the earth — With all the treasures they contain; even those parts
which are far out of men’s sight and reach. The strength of the hills — Which, with
majestic pride, tower above, and lift up their heads to heaven; is his also — Even the
highest and strongest mountains are under his feet, and at his disposal. The sea is
his — With its unnumbered waves, which roll in perpetual motion round the world;
and all the millions of living creatures, of all forms and sizes, that inhabit its
fathomless depths and immeasurable waters. And his hands formed the dry land —
With all its rich and variegated produce, when, by his word, he commanded it to
appear, and it was so; and he crowned it with verdure and beauty. And though he
hath given it to the children of men, it is, nevertheless, still his, for he reserved the
property to himself. His being the Creator of all, makes him, without dispute, the
Owner and Lord of all.

29. 5 The sea is his, for he made it,
and his hands formed the dry land.
BAR ES, "The sea is his - Margin, as in Hebrew, “Whose the sea is.” That is, The
sea belongs to him, with all which it contains.
And he made it - It is his, “because” he made it. The creation of anything gives the
highest possible right over it.
And his hands formed the dry land - He has a claim, therefore, that it should be
recognized as his, and that all who dwell upon it, and derive their support from it, should
acknowledge him as its great Owner and Lord.
CLARKE, "The sea is his - The sea and the dry land are equally his, for he has
formed them both, and they are his property. He governs and disposes of them as he
sees good. He is the absolute Master of universal nature. Therefore there is no other
object of worship nor of confidence.
GILL, "The sea is his, and he made it,.... He made it, and therefore it is, and all
creatures in it; he sets bounds to it, and its waves, and restrains the raging of it at his
pleasure, Mat_8:26,
and his hands formed the dry land; the whole world, all besides the sea, the vast
continent; he is the Maker of it, and all creatures in it; without him was nothing made
that is made; and, being the Creator of all things, is the proper object of worship, Joh_
1:2, as follows.
SPURGEO , "Ver. 5. The sea is his. This was seen to be true at the Red Sea when
the waters saw their God, and obediently stood aside to open a pathway for his
people. It was not Edom's sea though it was red, nor Egypt's sea though it washed
her shores. The Lord on high reigned supreme over the flood, as King far ever and
ever. So is it with the broad ocean, whether known as Atlantic or Pacific,
Mediterranean or Arctic; no man can map it out and say "It is mine"; the
illimitable acreage of waters knows no other lord but God alone. Jehovah rules the
waves. Far down in vast abysses, where no eye of man has gazed, or foot of diver has
descended, he is sole proprietor; every rolling billow and foaming wave owns him
for monarch; eptune is but a phantom, the Lord is God of ocean.

30. And he made it. Hence his right and sovereignty. He scooped the unfathomed
channel and poured forth the overflowing flood; seas were not fashioned by chance,
nor their shores marked out by the imaginary finger of fate; God made the main,
and every creek, and bay, and current, and far sounding tide owns the great
Maker's hand. All hail, Creator and Controller of the sea, let those who fly in the
swift ships across the wonder realm of waters worship thee alone!
And his hands formed the dry land. Whether fertile field or sandy waste, he made
all that men called terra firma, lifting it from the floods and fencing it from the
overflowing waters. "The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof." He bade the
isles upraise their heads, he levelled the vast plains, upreared the table lands, cast up
the undulating hills, and piled the massive Alps. As the potter moulds his clay, so
did Jehovah with his hands fashion the habitable parts of the earth. Come ye, then,
who dwell on this fair world, and worship him who is conspicuous wherever ye
tread! Count it all as the floor of a temple where the footprints of the present Deity
are visible before your eyes if ye do but care to see. The argument is overpowering if
the heart be right; the command to adore is alike the inference of reason and the
impulse of faith.
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 5. —The sea is his. When God himself makes an oration in defence of his
sovereignty, Job 38:1 his chief arguments are drawn from creation: "The Lord is a
great King above all gods. The sea is his, and he made it." And so the apostle in his
sermon to the Athenians. As he "made the world, and all things therein, "he is
styled "Lord of heaven and earth, "Acts 17:24. His dominion also of property stands
upon this basis: Psalms 84:11, "The heavens are thine, the earth also is thine: as for
the world and the fulness thereof, thou hast founded them." Upon this title of
forming Israel as a creature, or rather as a church, he demands their services to him
as their Sovereign. "O jacob and Israel, thou art my servant: I have formed thee;
thou art my servant, O Israel, "Is 44:21. The sovereignty of God naturally ariseth
from the relation of all things to himself as their entire creator, and their natural
and inseparable dependence upon him in regard of their being and wellbeing. —
Stephen Charrwick.
Ver. 5. —He made it.
The Earth was formed, but in the womb as yet
Of waters, embryon immature involved,
Appeared not: over all the face of Earth
in ocean flowed, not idle; but, with warm
Prolific humour softening all her globe,
Fermented the great mother to conceive,
Satiate with genial moisture; when God said,
Be gathered now, ye waters under Heaven
unto one place and let dry land appear.
Immediately the mountains huge appear
Emergent, and their broad bare backs upheave
unto the clouds; their tops ascend the sky:
So high as heaved the tumid hills, so low
own sunk a hollow bottom broad and deep,
Capacious bed of waters. —John Milton.

31. COFFMA , "Verse 5
"The sea is his, and he made it;
And his hands formed the dry land."
When Jonah was confronted by his fellow ship-mates who demanded to know who
he was, he replied, "I am a Hebrew, and I fear Jehovah the God of heaven and
earth, who made the sea and the dry land" (Jonah 1:9). These words of God's praise
were often used in Israel.
BE SO , "Psalms 95:6. O come, let us worship and bow down — Let us not be
backward, then, to comply with this invitation; but let us all, with the lowest
prostrations, devoutly adore this great and glorious Being. Let us kneel before the
Lord our Maker — With humble reverence, and a holy awe of him; as becomes
those who know what an infinite distance there is between us and him, how much
we are in danger of his wrath, and in how great need we stand of his mercy. The
posture of our bodies, indeed, by itself, profits little; yet certainly it is meet and right
they should bear a part in God’s service, and that internal worship should be
accompanied and signified by that which is external, or that the reverence,
seriousness and humility of our minds, should be manifested by our falling down on
our knees before that great Jehovah, who gave us our being, and on whom we are
continually dependant for the continuance of it, and for all our blessing
EXPOSITOR'S DICTIO ARY, "Psalm 95
This Psalm , the Venite exultemus Domino, "O come, let us sing unto the Lord," was
the chant of the Templars, the Knights of the Red Cross, when during the Crusades
they entered into battle with the Saracens for the conquest of Jerusalem.
In a different spirit the great missionary, Christian Schwartz, took the6th verse, and
put it over the entrance of his new church in Tranquebar: "O come, let us worship
and bow down: let us kneel before the Lord our Maker". He called the church
Bethlehem, as his predecessor, Ziegenbalg, had built one with the name Jerusalem,
which was filled with native converts.
A Seaside Sermon
Psalm 95:5
When we remember that the extent of the sea may be roughly estimated at146 ,000
,000 English square miles, or nearly three-fourths of the whole surface of the globe,
and when we recall the fact that the Bible abounds in illustrations from nature, we
might well be astonished if there were no reference to this sublime portion of
creation. Until recently, little was known of the physical aspects of the sea, and
therefore the allusions to the ocean in the Word of God are such as would occur to
any thoughtful observer entirely ignorant of modern science. For example, the silent

32. but mighty force of evaporation is one of the chief features of the sea system, and the
wise man thus refers to it: "Unto the place from whence the rivers come thither they
return". Again, the Psalmist says, "He layeth up the deep as in a treasure-house".
Consider the ocean as emblematic of three things: (1) of the unrest and instability of
human life; (2) of national anarchy and revolution; (3) of mystery.
I. The sea, in the Bible, is a symbol of the unrest and instability of human life. This
feature of the ocean has been the natural thought of men in all ages. It is true that
there is no mention of the tides in the Bible, as is natural. The Mediterranean is not
a tidal sea.
This unrest of the ocean surface caused by the tides, the winds, the influence of
rivers, the mighty currents which are ever exchanging the heavier and colder waters
of the polar seas for the lighter and warmer waters of the tropical ocean, and again
reversing the action, cause the sea to be "ever restless". There need no words of
mine to speak of the constant changes of "our life"s wild restless sea". The
experience is universal. As unconscious infants received "into Christ"s holy
Church," the prayer went up for us that "being steadfast in faith, joyful through
hope, and rooted in charity," we might so "pass the waves of this troublesome world
that finally" we might "come to the land of everlasting life"; and in that service
which will be read over each one of us, unless the Lord come first, to which the
heart of every mourner will respond, will be heard words that speak of the
recurring changes of human life: "Man that is born of a woman hath but a short
time to live, and is full of misery. He cometh up, and is cut down, like a flower; he
fleeth as it were a shadow, and never continueth in one stay." This unrest of the sea
is more than superficial. It is not only outward but inward. There is a constant
oceanic circulation necessary to its salubrity. The silent action of the sun, ever
absorbing and ever increasing the specific gravity of the surface waters, causes a
vertical action. The heavier waters above are ever sinking below, and the lighter
waters below are ever rising above. Again, many of the sea currents influence the
lower waters—the Gulf Stream, e.g, is more than300 feet deep as it crosses the
Atlantic. Besides this, every single mollusc or coralline secretes solid matter for its
cell which the sea holds in solution; and that very act of secretion destroys the
equilibrium of the ocean, because the specific gravity of that portion of the water
from which the coralline abstracts the solid matter is altered. In the remembrance of
such facts as these, how true and forcible are the words of Isaiah: "The wicked are
like the troubled sea when it cannot rest". "There is no peace, saith my God, for the
wicked." If the surface disturbance of the ocean pictures the changing nature of our
outward life, the hidden and unseen restlessness of the sea, even when its surface
seems most calm, portrays the inquietude of hearts which have not found rest in
Christ. "The wicked are (1) outwardly restless, and (2) their souls are ever ejecting
ungodly and unlovely thoughts."
II. The unrest of the sea is used in the Bible as a striking emblem of national
anarchy and revolution rising beyond the control of established governments.
III. The sea is the one object in nature which is most emblematic of mystery. I

33. cannot recall a single instance of any well-known writer on the ocean who does not
refer to this aspect of its being Schleiden has drawn a charming but imaginary
picture of the ocean depths from a number of individual objects brought up, but this
description is a "fancy sketch of the unknown"—"fiction founded on fact". Deeply
interesting as are the records of deepsea soundings, each product which adheres to
the tallow "arming" of the sounding lead Isaiah , for the most part, to use the figure
of Mr. Gosse, "like the brick which the Greek fool carried about as a sample of the
house he had to let". The sea, like a thick curtain, hides the secrets of nature from
the ken of man.
The sea is a striking emblem of the mysteries which must ever meet and surround
the finite in contemplation of the infinite. The student of nature is brought face to
face with mystery at every turn. The profoundest men of science have confessed
that, in proportion to their acquisition of knowledge, they have discovered a never-
ending area of mystery—as in the night, the further a light extends, the wider the
surrounding sphere of darkness appears.
The Divine Being retires within Himself. He "holdeth back the face of His throne,
and spreadeth His cloud upon it". He "leadeth the blind by a way that they know
not". The operations of an Infinite Being must of necessity be as a "great deep" to
our limited apprehensions.
And this very mysteriousness, this making darkness His secret place, this
inscrutability of counsel, is calculated to call forth a degree of reverence, and to
develop in His people a childlike trust and confidence, which could be evoked in no
other way. The danger of the theology of the present day is the seeking to eliminate
all mystery from God. An Egyptian who, carrying something in a napkin, being
asked what it was, answered that it was covered that no man should see it. We may
well pray with good Bishop Hall, "O Lord, let me be blessed with the knowledge of
what Thou hast revealed; let me content myself to adore Thy Divine wisdom in what
Thou hast not revealed. Song of Solomon , let me enjoy Thy light that I may avoid
Thy fire." "What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter." In
heaven "there shall be no more sea"—no more dark and painful mysteries, no
obscurity, no misconception. There difficulties will be solved and parables will be
interpreted. " ow we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face; now I know
in part, but then shall I know even as also I am known." If, with reference to the
mysteries of Providence, we acknowledge with the Psalmist that "clouds and
darkness are round about Him," the more we study Revelation the more we realize
that God is a Being who covereth Himself "with light as with a garment".
—J. W. Bardsley, Many Mansions, p128.

34. 6 Come, let us bow down in worship,
let us kneel before the Lord our Maker;
BAR ES, "O come, let us worship and bow down - Let us worship him by
bowing down; by prostrating ourselves before him. The word here rendered “come” is
not the same which is used in Psa_95:1. Its literal meaning is “come,” and it is an earnest
exhortation to come and worship. It is not a particle merely calling attention to a subject,
but it is an exhortation to approach - to enter - to engage in a thing. The word rendered
“worship,” means properly to bow down; to incline oneself; and then, to bow or
prostrate oneself before anyone in order to do him homage, or reverence. Then it means
to bow down before God in the attitude of worship. It would most naturally refer to an
entire “prostration” on the ground, which was a common mode of worship; but it would
also express adoration in any form. The word rendered “bow down,” means properly to
bend, to bow, spoken usually of the knees. Isa_45:23 : “every knee shall bow.” Compare
Jdg_7:5-6; 1Ki_8:54; 2Ki_1:13. The word might be applied, like the former word, to
those who bow down with the whole person, or prostrate themselves on the ground.
2Ch_7:3.
Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker - The usual attitude of prayer in the
Scriptures. See the notes at Dan_6:10; compare 2Ch_6:13; Luk_22:41; Act_7:60; Act_
9:40; Act_20:36; Act_21:5. All the expressions here employed denote a posture of
profound reverence in worship, and the passage is a standing rebuke of all irreverent
postures in prayer; of such habits as often prevail in public worship where no change of
posture is made in prayer, and where a congregation irreverently sit in the act of
professedly worshipping God. People show to their fellowmen the respect indicated by
rising up before them: much more should they show respect to God - respect in a
posture which will indicate profound reverence, and a deep sense of his presence and
majesty. Reverently kneeling or standing “will” indicate this; sitting does not indicate it.
CLARKE, "O come, let us worship - Three distinct words are used here to
express three different acts of adoration:
1. Let us worship, ‫נשתחוה‬ nishtachaveh, let us prostrate ourselves; the highest act of
adoration by which the supremacy of God is acknowledged.
2. Let us bow down, ‫נכרעה‬ nichraah, let us crouch or cower down, bending the legs
under, as a dog in the presence of his master, which solicitously waits to receive his
commands.
3. Let us kneel, ‫נברכה‬ nibrachah, let us put our knees to the ground, and thus put
ourselves in the posture of those who supplicate.
And let us consider that all this should be done in the presence of Him who is Jehovah
our Creator.

35. GILL, "O come, let us worship and bow down,.... Before him who is the Rock of
our salvation, the great God and great King, the Creator of the ends of the earth, the
proper object of all religious worship and adoration: Christ is to be worshipped with
every part of external worship under the New Testament dispensation; psalms and songs
of praise are to be sung unto him; prayer is to be made unto him; the Gospel is to be
preached, and ordinances to be administered, in his name; and likewise with all internal
worship, in the exercise of every grace on him, as faith, hope, and love: see Psa_45:11,
let us kneel before the Lord our Maker; both in a natural and spiritual sense:
Christ is the Maker of us as creatures, of our souls and bodies; we have our natural being
from him, and are supported in it by him; and he is the Maker of us as new creatures; we
are his workmanship, created in him, and by him; and therefore he should be
worshipped by us, Eph_2:10. Kimchi distinguishes these several gestures, expressed by
the different words here used; the first, we render worship, signifies, according to him,
the prostration of the whole body on the ground, with the hands and legs stretched out;
the second, a bowing of the head, with part of the body; and the third, a bending of the
knees on the ground; but though each of these postures and gestures have been, and
may be, used in religious worship, yet they seem not so much to design them themselves,
and the particular use of them, as worship itself, which is in general intended by them.
JAMISO , "come — or, “enter,” with solemn forms, as well as hearts.
SBC, "This Psalm suggests a great many subjects of interest, but the point to which the
text directs our attention is the import and bearing of its invitation to worship.
I. In the strictness of the word, adoration is the expression, by an outward, but much
more by an inward, act, of man’s sincere conviction that his first duty to Almighty God is
submission; and thus it is distinct from many other acts of the soul which are sometimes
apt to be mistaken for it. (1) Contrast it, for example, with admiration. As admirers, we
take it for granted that we are so far on a level with the object admired as to do Him
justice; as admirers, we presuppose and exercise, although favourably, our rights as
critics. In adoration we abandon all such pretensions as profane, as grotesque; we have
no thought but that of God’s solitary and awful greatness, and of our own utter
insignificance before Him. (2) Thanksgiving, praise, and prayer for blessings all three
differ from adoration in this, that in each of them the soul is less prostrate, more able to
bear the thought of self, than in pure and simple adoration. Pure adoration has no heart
for self; it lies silent at the foot of the throne, conscious only of two things: the
insignificance of self, the greatness of God.
II. Notice some of the leading benefits of worship, which explain the importance which
is assigned to it by the Church of Christ. (1) It places us, both as individuals and as a
body of men, in our true place before God our Creator. (2) Worship obliges us to think
what we are ourselves. (3) Worship is a stimulus to action when, and only when, it is
sincere. If it be true that to work is to pray, it is no less true that to pray is to work.
Prayer, in fact, is work, since it makes a large demand upon the energies of the will.
Contact with the highest reality cannot but brace us, and we find in all ages that the
noblest resolves to act or to suffer have again and again been formed as though in
obedience to what seems a sudden overpowering flash of light during worship.

36. H. P. Liddon, Family Churchman, Aug. 18th, 1886 (see also Christian World Pulpit, vol.
xxx., p. 104).
The goodness, the power, the wisdom, the providence, the presence, of God are
abundantly shown and manifested to us in all the works of the Creator. There is nothing
in all these works that looks, as it were, the work of chance; all bear marks of care, and
design, and adaptation of means to the end; all seem to say to the hearing ear, "The hand
that made us is Divine." And it is to the worship of this Divine Head, it is to the
acknowledgment of God as our Creator, that the text calls us. The contemplation of
God’s works is calculated: (1) to fill our souls with noble and worthy thoughts about
God; and (2) to make us humble in our estimate of ourselves, as forming a small part in
these mighty works. These two things help to make accepted worship.
R. D. B. Rawnsley, Village Sermons, 3rd series, p. 176.
CALVI , "6.Come ye, let us worship ow that the Psalmist exhorts God’s chosen
people to gratitude, for that pre-eminency among the nations which he had
conferred upon them in the exercise of his free favor, his language grows more
vehement. God supplies us with ample grounds of praise when he invests us with
spiritual distinction, and advances us to a pre-eminency above the rest of mankind
which rests upon no merits of our own. In three successive terms he expresses the
one duty incumbent upon the children of Abraham, that of an entire devotement of
themselves to God. The worship of God, which the Psalmist here speaks of, is
assuredly a matter of such importance as to demand our whole strength; but we are
to notice, that he particularly condescends upon one point, the paternal favor of
God, evidenced in his exclusive adoption of the posterity of Abraham unto the hope
of eternal life. We are also to observe, that mention is made not only of inward
gratitude, but the necessity of an outward profession of godliness. The three words
which are used imply that, to discharge their duty properly, the Lord’s people must
present themselves a sacrifice to him publicly, with kneeling, and other marks of
devotion. The face of the Lord is an expression to be understood in the sense I
referred to above, — that the people should prostrate themselves before the Ark of
the Covenant, for the reference is to the mode of worship under the Law. This
remark, however, must be taken with one reservation, that the worshippers were to
lift their eyes to heaven, and serve God in a spiritual manner. (47)
SPURGEO , "Ver. 6. Here the exhortation to worship is renewed and backed with
a motive which, to Israel of old and to Christians now, is especially powerful; for
both the Israel after the flesh and the Israel of faith may be described as the people
of his pasture, and by both he is called "our God."
O come, let us worship and bow down. The adoration is to be humble. The "joyful
noise" is to be accompanied with lowliest reverence. We are to worship in such style
that the bowing down shall indicate that we count ourselves to be as nothing in the
presence of the all glorious Lord.
Let us kneel before the Lord our maker. As suppliants must we come; joyful, but
not presumptuous; familiar as children before a father, yet reverential as creatures
before their maker. Posture is not everything, yet is it something; prayer is heard
when knees cannot bend, but it is seemly that an adoring heart should show its awe
by prostrating the body, and bending the knee.

37. EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 6. —You hold it a good rule in worldly business, not to say to your servants,
"O come", arise ye, go ye; but, Let us come, let us go, let us arise. ow shall the
children of this world be wiser in their generation than the children of light? Do we
commend this course in mundane affairs, and neglect it in religious offices?
Assuredly, if our zeal were as great to religion, as our love is towards the world,
masters would not come to church (as many do) without their servants, and servants
without their masters; parents without their children, and children without their
parents: husbands without their wives, and wives without their husbands; but all of
us would call one to another, as Esau prophesied (chap. 2:3): "Come ye, and let us
go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will
teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths, "and as David here practised. â
€”John Boys.
Ver. 6. —Let us worship and bow down. To fall upon the ground is a gesture of
worship, not only when the worshipper mourns, but when the worshipper rejoiceth.
It is said (Matthew 2:10-11) that the wise men when they found Christ, "rejoiced
with exceeding great joy", and presently, "they fell down, and worshipped him".
either is this posture peculiar to worship in times or upon occasions of
extraordinary joy and sorrow; for the ordinary invitation was, "O come, let us
worship and bow down: let us kneel before the Lord our maker". —Joseph Caryl.
Ver. 6. —"Let us worship and bow down: let us kneel before the Lord our maker."
ot before a crucifix, not before a rotten image, not before a fair picture of a foul
saint: these are not our makers; we made them, they made not us. Our God, unto
whom we must sing, in whom we must rejoice, before whom we must worship, is a
great "King above all gods": he is no god of lead, no god of bread, no brazen god,
no wooden god; we must not fall down and worship our Lady, but our Lord; not
any martyr, but our Maker not any saint, but our Saviour: "O come, let us sing
unto the Lord: let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation." Wherewith:
with voice, "Let us sing; "with soul, "Let us heartily rejoice"; with hands and
knees, "Let us worship and bow down: let us kneel"; with all that is within us, with
all that is without us; he that made all, must be worshipped with all, especially when
we "come before his presence". —John Boys.
Ver. 6. —Bow down. That is, so as to touch the floor with the forehead, while the
worshipper is prostrate on his hands and knees. See 2 Chronicles 7:3. —John Fry,
1842.
Ver. 6. —Worship, bow down, kneel. Kimchi distinguishes the several gestures
expressed by the different words here used. The first we render, worship, signifies,
according to him, the prostration of the whole body on the ground, with the hands
and legs stretched out. The second a bowing of the head, with part of the body; and
the third a be drag of the knees on the ground. —Samuel Burder.
COFFMA , "Verse 6
"Oh come, let us worship and bow down;
Let us kneel before Jehovah our Maker:
For he is our God,

38. And we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand.
Today, oh that ye would hear his voice."
"Oh come" (Psalms 95:6) in the Latin is Venite, adopted as the opening word of the
chorus in the famed Latin hymn, Adeste Fideles, "Oh Come All Ye Faithful,"[5] in
which hymn the line, Venite Adoremus, is repeated three times.
"The people of his pasture" (Psalms 95:7). We might have expected "sheep of his
pasture" here, since it is sheep and not people who need pasture. However, such
mixed metaphors are very common in scripture. Moreover, in this arrangement, the
metaphor of the Lord himself as "The Good Shepherd" automatically comes to
mind.
"Today, oh that ye would hear his voice" (Psalms 95:7). These words form the
opening line in Hebrews 3:7, where this passage is used as the background of what
is written there, Psalms 95:11, being quoted directly. "The passage in Hebrews 3:7-
4:13, expounding this psalm, forbids us to confine its thrust to Israel. "The `Today'
of which it speaks is this very moment; the `ye' is none other than ourselves, and the
promised `rest' is not Canaan, but salvation."[6]
One of the most important revelations in the ew Testament turns upon this very
passage. Hebrews 4:4 ties the "rest" mentioned in Psalms 95:11 with God's "rest"
on the seventh day of creation, demanding that the present time, "this very
moment," as Kidner expressed it, be identified with God's resting "on the seventh
day." The meaning of this is profound. H. Cotterill, the bishop of Edinburgh,
declared that from this passage in Hebrews (Hebrews 7:3-4:13), "We must conclude
that the seventh day of God's rest which followed the six days of creation is not yet
completed."
WHEDO , "6. Worship… bow down… kneel—Three different words, expressive of
the humblest form of bodily prostration before a superior, and repeated for
intensity.
Kneel before the Lord—Literally, Kneel to the face of Jehovah; in his immediate
presence—a spiritual anticipation of Hebrews 10:22. The outward homage must
arise from, and sincerely express, the inward feeling and desire. “In the shell of the
kneeling there must be contained the kernel of unreserved surrender, which
manifests itself in willing obedience.”—Hengstenberg.
EXPOSITOR'S DICTIO ARY, "Psalm 95:6
These words contain a spirit-stirring call to sing God"s praise.
I. Who that has any true piety in his heart will not in his first moments of waking
bethink him of the great Power who has watched over him, and kept him alive, and

39. desire to make some acknowledgment of His goodness?
II. The contemplation of God"s works seen in the creation is calculated to fill our
souls with noble and worthy thoughts about God. It is calculated to make us humble
in our estimate of ourselves, as forming a small part in the mighty whole.
III. And these two things—high reverence for the Holy God, coupled with a sense of
our own unworthiness, help to make accepted worship.
IV. When we come to present ourselves before God, let us remember the amazing
difference and distance between ourselves and the object of our worship.
—R. D. B. Rawnsley, Village Sermons (3Series), p176.
SIMEO , "DEVOTIO TO GOD RECOMME DED A D E FORCED
Psalms 95:6-11. O come, let us worship and bow down: let us kneel before the Lord
our Maker. For he is our God; and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of
his hand. To-day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your heart, as in the
provocation, and as in the day of temptation in the wilderness; when your fathers
tempted me, proved me, and saw my work. Forty years long was I grieved with this
generation, and said, It is a people that do err in their heart, and they have not
known my ways; unto whom I sware in my wrath, that they should not enter into
my rest.
I the former part of this psalm, the Jewish people, for whom it was composed,
mutually exhorted each other: in the latter part, God himself is the speaker: and the
manner in which this latter part is cited in the Epistle to the Hebrews, shews, that
the whole psalm is as proper for the use of the Christian, as it was of the Jewish,
Church. The peculiar circumstance of its consisting of a mutual exhortation is there
expressly noticed: and noticed with particular approbation: “Exhort one another
daily, while it is called To-day [ ote: Hebrews 3:13.].” This hint the Compilers of
our Liturgy attended to, when they appointed this psalm to be read constantly in the
Morning Service, as introductory to the other psalms that should come in rotation:
and, as being so appointed, it deserves from us a more than ordinary attention.
In discoursing upon it, we shall notice,
I. The exhortation—
[The proper object of our worship is here described. As addressed to the Jews, the
terms here used would fix their attention on Jehovah, as contra-distinguished from
all false gods: but, as addressed to Christians, they lead our minds to the Lord Jesus
Christ, who is “God with us,” even “God over all, blessed for evermore.” He is our
Maker; for “by him were all things created, both which are in heaven and in earth
[ ote: John 1:3.].” He is “the good Shepherd, who laid down his life for his sheep,”
and who watches over them, and preserves them day and night [ ote: John 10:11.

40. Hebrews 13:20. Ezekiel 34:11-16.]. — — — Him then we must worship with all
humility of mind, “bowing down, and kneeling before him.” At his hands must we
seek for mercy, even through his all-atoning sacrifice — — — and from him, as our
living Head, must we look for all necessary supplies of grace and peace — — —
O come, let us thus approach him! let us do it not merely in the public services of
our Church, but in our secret chambers; and not occasionally only, but constantly;
having all our dependence upon him, and all our expectations from him.]
That this exhortation may not be in vain, we entreat you to consider,
II. The warning with which it is enforced—
[The Jews who, in the wilderness, disobeyed the heavenly call, were never suffered
to enter into the land of Canaan. In the judgments inflicted upon them, they are
held forth as a warning to us [ ote: 1 Corinthians 10:1-11.]. Like them, we have
seen all the wonders of God’s love, in delivering us from a far sorer than Egyptian
bondage. Like them, we have had spiritual food administered to us in rich
abundance in the Gospel of Christ. And if, like them, we harden our hearts, and
rebel against our God, like them, we must be excluded from the heavenly Canaan.
They by their obstinacy provoked God to exclude them with an oath: O that we may
never provoke him to “swear that we also shall never enter into his rest!” That we
are in danger of bringing this awful judgment on ourselves is evident from the
intimation given us by the Apostle Jude [ ote: ver. 5.], and yet more plainly from
the warnings which St. Paul founds on this very passage [ ote: Hebrews 3:7-19;
Hebrews 4:1.] — — — Let us then “hear the voice” of our good Shepherd, ere it be
too late. Let us “grieve him” no longer — — — but let us turn to him with our
whole hearts — — — Caleb and Joshua were admitted into Canaan, because “they
followed the Lord fully:” let us follow him fully, and we shall certainly attain the
promised rest.]
After the example of St. Paul, we would with all earnestness caution you against,
1. Unbelief—
[The Jews believed neither the promises nor the threatenings of God, and therefore
they perished. Let us beware lest we fall after the same example of unbelief [ ote:
Hebrews 4:12.]. If we will not believe that we stand in need of mercy to the extent
that God has declared, or that the service of God is so reasonable and blessed as he
has represented it to be, or that the judgments of God shall infallibly come on all
who refuse to serve him, there is no hope: we must perish, notwithstanding all the
offers of mercy that are sent to us: for “the word preached cannot profit us, if it be
not mixed with faith in them that hear it [ ote: Hebrews 4:2.].”]
2. Hardness of heart—
[As Israel hardened themselves against God when his messages were sent them by

41. Moses, so do many now harden themselves against the word preached by the
ministers of Christ. They “puff at” all the judgments denounced against them [ ote:
Psalms 10:4-5.]. But “who ever hardened himself against God, and prospered?” O!
“will your hearts be stout in the day that he shall deal with you? and will you
thunder with a voice like his?” Be persuaded: humble yourselves before him, yea,
“bow down and kneel before him,” and never cease to cry for mercy, till he has
turned away his anger, and spoken peace to your souls.]
3. Delay—
[“To-day,” says the Psalmist: “To-day, while it is called To-day,”says the Apostle
Paul: and “To-day,” would I say: yes, Brethren, “to-day” “harden not your hearts;”
for you know not what a day may bring forth. Before another day, you may be
taken into the eternal world; or, if not, you may provoke God to swear in his wrath,
that you shall never enter into his rest; and then your remaining days will answer no
other end, than to fill up the measure of your iniquities. But surely you have grieved
him long enough already; some of you twenty, some thirty, some perhaps even
“forty years.” Let there be an end of this rebellion against your Maker and your
Redeemer; and let this, which is with him the day of grace, be to you “the day of
salvation.”]
PULPIT, "O come, let us worship and bow down: let us kneel. The outward and
visible worship of the body is required of man, no less than the inward and spiritual
worship of the soul. Before the Lord our Maker; i.e. "who has made us what we
are—created us, redeemed us, taken us to be his people" (comp. Deuteronomy 32:6;
Psalms 100:3; Psalms 102:18; Psalms 149:2; Isaiah 29:23; Isaiah 43:21; Isaiah 44:2,
etc.).
7 for he is our God
and we are the people of his pasture,
the flock under his care.
Today, if only you would hear his voice,
BAR ES, "For he is our God - Not only the God whom we worship as the true
God, but One who has revealed himself to us as our God. We worship him as God - as

42. entitled to praise and adoration because he is the true God; we worship him also as
sustaining the relation of God to us, or because we recognize him as our God, and
because he has manifested himself as ours.
And we are the people of his pasture - whom he has recognized as his flock; to
whom he sustains the relation of shepherd; who feeds and protects us as the shepherd
does his flock. See the notes at Psa_79:13; compare Psa_23:1-3.
And the sheep of his hand - The flock that is guided and fed by his hand.
To day if ye will hear his voice - His voice calling you; commanding you; inviting
you; encouraging you. See this passage explained in the notes at Heb_3:7-11. The word
“today” here means “the present time;” now. The idea is, that the purpose to obey should
not be deferred until tomorrow; should not be put off to the future. The commands of
God should be obeyed at once; the purpose should be executed immediately. All God’s
commands relate to the present. He gives us none for the future; and a true purpose to
obey God exists only where there is a willingness to obey “now,” “today;” and can exist
only then. A purpose to repent at some future time, to give up the world at some future
time, to embrace the Gospel at some future time, is “no obedience,” for there is no such
command addressed to us. A resolution to put off repentance and faith, to defer
attention to religion until some future time, is real disobedience - and often the worst
form of disobedience - for it is directly in the face of the command of God. “If ye will
hear.” That is, If there is a disposition or willingness to obey his voice at all; or, to listen
to his commands. See the notes at Heb_3:7.
CLARKE, "For he is our God - Here is the reason for this service. He has
condescended to enter into a covenant with us, and he has taken us for his own;
therefore: -
We are the people of his pasture - Or, rather, as the Chaldee, Syriac, Vulgate, and
Ethiopic read, “We are his people, and the sheep of the pasture of his hand.” We are his
own; he feeds and governs us, and his powerful hand protects us.
To-day if ye will hear his voice - To-day-you have no time to lose; to-morrow may
be too late. God calls to-day; to-morrow he may be silent. This should commence the
eighth verse, as it begins what is supposed to be the part of the priest or prophet who
now exhorts the people; as if he had said: Seeing you are in so good a spirit, do not forget
your own resolutions, and harden not your hearts, “as your fathers did in Meribah and
Massah, in the wilderness;” the same fact and the same names as are mentioned Exo_
17:7; when the people murmured at Rephidim, because they had no water; hence it was
called Meribah, contention or provocation, and Massah, temptation.
GILL, "For he is our God,.... God over all, blessed for ever, truly and properly God,
and therefore to be worshipped: "our God"; in whom we have interest, who became our
head and surety in covenant; took upon him our nature, is our "Immanuel", God with as,
which increases the obligation to worship him; these are the words of New Testament
saints:
and we are the people of his pasture; for whom he has provided a good pasture;
whom he leads into it, and feeds in it, even by the ministry of the word and ordinances:

43. and the sheep of his hand; made and fashioned by his hand, both in a natural and
spiritual sense; led and guided by his hand, as a flock by the hand of the shepherd; are in
his hand, being put there for safety by his Father; and upheld by it, and preserved in it,
and from whence none can pluck them; see Deu_33:3 receiving such favours from him,
he ought to be worshipped by them. The Heathens had a deity they called Pan, whom
they make to be a keeper of sheep (e); and some Christian writers have thought that
Christ the chief Shepherd is meant; since, when the Heathen oracles ceased, after the
coming and death of Christ, a voice is (f) said to be heard at a certain place, "the great
Pan is dead: today, if ye will hear his voice"; the voice of the Shepherd, the voice of God,
says Aben Ezra, his Word, as the Targum; the voice of the Messiah, both his perceptive
voice, his commands and ordinances, which ought to be hearkened to and obeyed; and
the voice of his Gospel, and the doctrines of it; which is to be heard not only externally,
but internally: when it is heard as to be understood, to be approved of and believed, and
to be distinguished; so as to have a spiritual and experimental knowledge of it; to feel the
power and efficacy of it, and practically attend to it; it is an evidence of being the sheep
of Christ; see Joh_10:4, where the sheep are said to know the voice of the shepherd, and
not that of a stranger; of which Polybius (g) gives a remarkable instance in the goats of
the island of Cyrnon, who will flee from strangers, but, as soon as the keeper sounds his
trumpet, they will run to him: though the words may be connected with what follows, as
they are in Heb_3:7, where they are said to be the words of the Holy Ghost, and are
applied to times, and are interpreted of the voice of the Son of God in his house; for
though it may refer to some certain day in David's time, as the seventh day sabbath, in
which the voice of God might be heard, the word of God read and explained; and in
Gospel times, as the Lord's day, in which Christ speaks by his ministers; and to the
whole time of a man's life, which is called "while it is today", Heb_3:13, yet it chiefly
respects the whole day of the Gospel, the whole Gospel dispensation, 2Co_6:2.
HE RY, " Because he is our God, not only has a dominion over us, as he has over all
the creatures, but stands in special relation to us (Psa_95:7): He is our God, and
therefore it is expected we should praise him; who will, if we do not? What else did he
make us for but that we should be to him for a name and a praise? (1.) He is our
Creator, and the author of our being; we must kneel before the Lord our Maker, Psa_
95:6. Idolaters kneel before gods which they themselves made; we kneel before a God
who made us and all the world and who is therefore our rightful proprietor; for his we
are, and not our own. (2.) He is our Saviour, and the author of our blessedness. He is
here called the rock of our salvation (Psa_95:1), not only the founder, but the very
foundation, of that work of wonder, on whom it is built. That rock is Christ; to him
therefore we must sing our songs of praises, to him that sits upon the throne and to the
Lamb. (3.) We are therefore his, under all possible obligations: We are the people of his
pasture and the sheep of his hand. All the children of men are so; they are fed and led by
his Providence, which cares for them, and conducts them, as the shepherd the sheep. We
must praise him, not only because he made us, but because he preserves and maintains
us, and our breath and ways are in his hand. All the church's children are in a special
manner so; Israel are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand; and therefore
he demands their homage in a special manner. The gospel church is his flock. Christ is
the great and good Shepherd of it. We, as Christians, are led by his hand into the green
pastures, by him we are protected and well provided for, to his honour and service we
are entirely devoted as a peculiar people, and therefore to him must be glory in the
churches (whether it be in the world or no) throughout all ages, Eph_3:21.

44. Psalms 95:7-11
The latter part of this psalm, which begins in the middle of a verse, is an exhortation
to those who sing gospel psalms to live gospel lives, and to hear the voice of God's
word; otherwise, how can they expect that he should hear the voice of their prayers
and praises? Observe,
I. The duty required of all those that are the people of Christ's pasture and the sheep
of his hand. He expects that they hear his voice, for he has said, My sheep hear my
voice, Joh_10:27. We are his people, say they. Are you so? Then hear his voice. If you
call him Master, or Lord, then do the things which he says, and be his willing obedient
people. Hear the voice of his doctrine, of his law, and, in both, of his Spirit; hear and
heed; hear and yield. Hear his voice, and not the voice of a stranger. If you will hear his
voice; some take it as a wish, O that you would hear his voice! that you would be so
wise, and do so well for yourselves; like that, If thou hadst known (Luk_19:42), that is, O
that thou hadst known! Christ's voice must be heard today; this the apostle lays much
stress upon, applying it to the gospel day. While he is speaking to you see that you attend
to him, for this day of your opportunities will not last always; improve it, therefore,
while it is called today, Heb_3:13, Heb_3:15. Hearing the voice of Christ is the same
with believing. Today, if by faith you accept the gospel offer, well and good, but
tomorrow it may be too late. In a matter of such vast importance nothing is more
dangerous than delay.
II. The sin they are warned against, as inconsistent with the believing obedient ear
required, and that is hardness of heart. If you will hear his voice, and profit by what you
hear, then do not harden your hearts; for the seed sown on the rock never brought any
fruit to perfection. The Jews therefore believed not the gospel of Christ because their
hearts were hardened; they were not convinced of the evil of sin, and of their danger by
reason of sin, and therefore they regarded not the offer of salvation; they would not bend
to the yoke of Christ, nor yield to his demands; and, if the sinner's heart be hardened, it
is his own act and deed (he hardening it himself) and he alone shall bear the blame for
ever.
JAMISO , "This relation illustrates our entire dependence (compare Psa_23:3; Psa_
74:1). The last clause is united by Paul (Heb_3:7) to the following (compare Psa_81:8),
CALVI , "7Because he is our God While it is true that all men were created to
praise God, there are reasons why the Church is specially said to have been formed
for that end, (Isaiah 61:3.) The Psalmist was entitled to require this service more
particularly from the hands of his chosen people. This is the reason why he
impresses upon the children of Abraham the invaluable privilege which God had
conferred upon them in taking them under his protection. God may indeed be said
in a sense to have done so much for all mankind. But when asserted to be the
Shepherd of the Church, more is meant than that he favors her with the common
nourishment, support, and government which he extends promiscuously to the
whole human family; he is so called because he separates her from the rest of the
world, and cherishes her with a peculiar and fatherly regard. His people are here

45. spoken of accordingly as the people of his pastures, whom he watches over with
peculiar care, and loads with blessings of every kind. The passage might have run
more clearly had the Psalmist called them the flock of his pastures, and the people of
his hand; (48) or, had he added merely — and his flock (49) — the figure might
have been brought out more consistently and plainly. But his object was less
elegancy of expression than pressing upon the people a sense of the inestimable
favor conferred upon them in their adoption, by virtue of which they were called to
live under the faithful guardianship of God, and to the enjoyment of every species of
blessings. They are called the flock of his hand, not so much because formed by his
hand as because governed by it, or, to use a French expression, le Troupeau de sa
conduite. (50) The point which some have given to the expression, as if it intimated
how intent God was upon feeding his people, doing it himself, and not employing
hired shepherds, may scarcely perhaps be borne out by the words in their genuine
meaning; but it cannot be doubted that the Psalmist would express the very gracious
and familiar kind of guidance which was enjoyed by this one nation at that time.
ot that God dispensed with human agency, intrusting the care of the people as he
did to priests, prophets, and judges, and latterly to kings. o more is meant than
that in discharging the office of shepherd to this people, he exercised a
superintendence over them different from that common providence which extends
to the rest of the world.
To-day, if you will hear his voice (51) According to the Hebrew expositors, this is a
conditional clause standing connected with the preceding sentence; by which
interpretation the Psalmist must be considered as warning the people that they
would only retain possession of their privilege and distinction so long as they
continued to obey God. (52) The Greek version joins it with the verse that follows —
to-day, if ye will hear his voice harden not your hearts, and it reads well in this
connection. Should we adopt the distribution of the Hebrew expositors, the Psalmist
seems to say that the posterity of Abraham were the flock of God’s hand, inasmuch
as he had placed his Law in the midst of them, which was, as it were, his crook, and
had thus showed himself to be their shepherd. The Hebrew particle ‫,אם‬ im, which
has been rendered if, would in that case be rather expositive than conditional, and
might be rendered when, (53) the words denoting it to be the great distinction
between the Jews and the surrounding nations, that God had directed his voice to
the former, as it is frequently noticed he had not done to the latter, (Psalms 147:20;
Deuteronomy 4:6.) Moses had declared this to constitute the ground of their
superiority to other people, saying, “What nation is there under heaven which hath
its gods so nigh unto it?” The inspired writers borrow frequently from Moses, as is
well known, and the Psalmist, by the expression to-day, intimates how emphatically
the Jews, in hearing God’s voice, were his people, for the proof was not far off, it
consisted in something which was present and before their eyes. He bids them
recognize God as their shepherd, inasmuch as they heard his voice; and it was an
instance of his singular grace that he had addressed them in such a condescending
and familiar manner. Some take the adverb to be one of exhortation, and read, I
would that they would hear my voice, but this does violence to the words. The
passage runs well taken in the other meaning we have assigned to it. Since they had
a constant opportunity of hearing the voice of God — since he gave them not only

46. one proof of the care he had over them as shepherd, or yearly proof of it, but a
continual exemplification of it, there could be no doubt that the Jews were chosen to
be his flock.
SPURGEO , "Ver. 7. For he is our God. Here is the master reason for worship.
Jehovah has entered into covenant with us, and from all the world beside has chosen
us to be his own elect. If others refuse him homage, we at least will render it
cheerfully. He is ours, and our God; ours, therefore will we love him; our God,
therefore will we worship him. Happy is that man who can sincerely believe that this
sentence is true in reference to himself.
And we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. As he belongs to us,
so do we belong to him. "My Beloved is mine, and I am his." And we are his as the
people whom he daily feeds and protects. Our pastures are not ours, but his; we
draw all our supplies from his stores. We are his, even as sheep belong to the
shepherd, and his hand is our rule, our guidance, our government, our succour, our
source of supply. Israel was led through the desert, and we are led through this life
by "that great Shepherd of the sheep." The hand which cleft the sea and brought
water from the rock is still with us, working equal wonders. Can we refuse to
"worship and bow down" when we clearly see that "this God is our God for ever
and ever, and will be our guide, even unto death"?
But what is this warning which follows? Alas, it was sorrowfully needed by the
Lord's ancient people, and is not one whir the less required by ourselves. The
favoured nation grew deaf to their Lord's command, and proved not to be truly his
sheep, of whom it is written, "My sheep hear my voice": will this turn out to be our
character also? God forbid.
To day if ye will hear his voice. Dreadful "if." Many would not hear, they put off
the claims of love, and provoked their God." Today, "in the hour of grace, in the
day of mercy, we are tried as to whether we have an ear for the voice of our Creator.
othing is said of tomorrow, "he limiteth a certain day, "he presses for immediate
attention, for our own sakes he asks instantaneous obedience. Shall we yield it? The
Holy Ghost saith "Today, "will we grieve him by delay?
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 7. We are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. See how
elegantly he hath transposed the order of the words, and as it were not given its own
attribute to each word; that we may understand these very same to be "the sheep",
who are also "the people." He said not, the sheep of his pasture, and the people of
his hand; which might be thought more congruous, since the sheep belong to the
pasture; but he said, "the people of his pasture": the people themselves are sheep.
But again, since we have sheep which we buy, not which we create; and he had said
above, "Let us fall down before our Maker"; it is rightly said, "the sheep of his
hand." o man maketh for himself sheep, he may buy them, they may be given, he
may find them, he may collect them, lastly he may steal them; make them he cannot.
But our Lord made us; therefore "the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his
hand", are the very sheep which he hath deigned by his grace to create unto himself.
—Augustine.
Ver. 7. The sheep of his hand, is a fit though figurative expression, the shepherd that
feeds, and rules, and leads the sheep, doing it by his hand, which manages the rod

47. and staff (Psalms 23:4), by which they are administered. The Jewish Arabs read, the
people of his feeding or, flock, and the sheep of his guidance. —H. Hammond.
Ver. 7. For we are his people whom he feeds in his pastures, and his sheep whom he
leads as by his hand. (French Version.) Here is a reason to constrain us to praise
God; it is this, —that not only has he created us, but that he also directs us by
special providence, as a shepherd governs his flock. Jesus Christ, Divine Shepherd
of our souls, who not only feeds us in his pastures, but himself leads us with his
hand, as intelligent sheep. Loving Shepherd, who feeds us not only from the
pastures of Holy Wilt, but even with his own flesh. What subjects of ceaseless
adoration for a soul penetrated by these great verities! What a fountain of tears of
joy at the sight of such prodigious mercy! —Quesnel.
Ver. 7. Today if ye will hear his voice. If we put of repentance another day, we have
a day more to repent of, and a day less to repent in. —W. Mason.
Ver. 7. He that hath promised pardon on our repentance hath not promised to
preserve our lives till we repent. —Francis Quarles.
Ver. 7. You cannot repent too soon, because you do not know how soon it may be
too late. —Thomas Fuller.
Ver. 7. If ye will hear his voice. Oh! what an if is here! what a reproach is here to
those that hear him not! "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they
follow me"; "but ye will not come to me that ye might have life." And yet there is
mercy, there is still salvation, if ye will hear that voice. Israel heard it among the
thunders of Sinai, "which voice they that heard it entreated that the word should
not be spoken to them any more"; so terrible was the sight and sound that even
Moses said, "I exceedingly quake and fear": and yet they heard too the Lord's still
voice of love in the noiseless manna that fell around their tents, and in the gushing
waters of the rock that followed them through every march for forty years. Yet the
record of Israel's ingratitude runs side by side with the record of God's merciesâ
€”"My people would not hearken to my voice, and Israel would none of me." —
Barton Bouchier.
Ver. 7. If ye will hear his voice. And yet, as S. Bernard tells us, there is no difficulty
at all in hearing it; on the contrary, the difficulty is to stop our ears effectually
against it, so clear is it in enunciation, so constant in appeal. Yet there are many who
do not hear, from divers causes; because they are far off; because they are deaf;
because they sleep; because they turn their heads aside; because they stop their ears;
because they hurry away to avoid hearing; because they are dead; all of them topics
of various forms and degrees of unbelief. —Bernard and Hugo Cardinalis, in eale
and Littledale.
Ver. 7. If ye will hear his voice. These words seem to allude to the preceding words,
in which we are represented as the sheep of God's pasture, and are to be considered
as an affectionate call of our heavenly Shepherd to follow and obey him. —From
"Lectures on the Liturgy, from the Commentary of Peter Waldo", 1821.
Ver. 7-8. —It will be as difficult, nay, more difficult, to come to Christ tomorrow,
than it is today: therefore today hear his voice, and harden not your heart. Break
the ice now, and by faith venture upon your present duty, wherever it lies; do what
you are now called to. You will never know how easy the yoke of Christ is, till it is
bound about your necks, nor how light his burden is, till you have taken it up. While
you judge of holiness at a distance, as a thing without you and contrary to you, you

48. will never like it. Come a little nearer to it; do but take it in, actually engage in it,
and you will find religion carries meat in its mouth; it is of a reviving, nourishing,
strengthening nature. It brings that along with it, that enables the soul cheerfully to
go through with it. —Thomas Cole (1627-1697) in the "Morning Exercises."
ELLICOTT, "Verse 7
(7) To-day if . . .—In joining this clause with Psalms 95:8-9 the Authorised Version
follows the LXX. The Masoretic text connects it with the preceding part of the verse,
and there seems no good reason for departing from that arrangement. Indeed, the
change from the third person, “his voice,” to the first, “tempted me,” in the same
sentence is intolerable even in Hebrew poetry. or is there any necessity to suppose
the loss of a line. Render: “For He is our God, and we are the people of his pasture,
the sheep of his hand. Today would that ye would hearken to his voice.” The
Oriental custom of leading flocks by the voice is doubtless alluded to, as in John
10:4. otice the resemblance in Psalms 95:6-7 to Psalms 100:3-4.
WHEDO , "7. For he is our God—The reasons for this lively, willing, and
unreserved devotion were, in Psalms 95:3-5, drawn from the greatness of God as
creator and governor of the world. In Psalms 95:6-7 the motives appeal more
directly to the heart and the moral feelings. He is “our God,” “our Maker,” and we
are his “people,” his “sheep.”
Sheep of his hand—That is, we are guided, cared for, and protected by “his hand,”
his personal attention. Psalm 77:21; Psalms 100:3; Psalms 23:3-4.
Today—The “to-day,” or this day, indicates that a decisive moment, a crisis, had
come. So the apostle applies it (Hebrews 3:7-11) to the Jews of his day, who stood,
with reference to the gospel, as the Hebrews at Kadesh did in reference to Canaan.
Thus it applies to every sinner each moment of his probation. “Hereby is meant the
whole time by which Christ speaketh by his gospel.”—Ainsworth.
If ye will hear his voice—Taking the conjunction here in its conditional sense, the
apodosis, or concluding clause, seems obscure. Hengstenberg supplies it by reading:
“‘If ye will hear his voice,’ he will bless you, his people.” This accords with the
passage (Exodus 23:22,) “If thou shalt indeed obey his voice, and do all that I speak,
then I will be an enemy unto thine enemies, and an adversary unto thine
adversaries.” But it equally answers the grammatical and doctrinal demand to
supply, as the sense implies, ‫,אן‬ (then, on this account,) after “voice,” and read: “To
day, if ye will hear his voice, [then] harden not your hearts.” The hearing implies
heeding— hearing with a view to obeying—which is impossible while unbelief
hardens the heart and perverts the will. The conditioning protasis does not
anticipate a promissory apodosis, but a caution; not the blessings which flow upon
hearing, but the moral preparation implied in obedient hearing.
BE SO ,"Psalms 95:7. For he is our God — He not only has dominion over us, as
he has over all the creatures, but stands in a special relation to us. He is our God in
a peculiar sense, and therefore it would be most unreasonable and wicked if we

49. should forsake him, when even the Gentiles shall submit to his law. And we are the
people of his pasture — Whom he feeds in his church, with his word and by his
ordinances, and defends by his watchful providence. And the sheep of his hand —
Under his special care and government. To-day — That is, forthwith, or presently,
as this word is often used. Or the expression may mean this solemn day of grace, or
of the gospel, which the psalmist speaks of as present, according to the manner of
the prophets; if ye will hear his voice — If ye will hearken to his call, and obey his
further commands, which may be added as a necessary caution and admonition to
the Israelites, that they might understand and consider that God’s presence and
favour were not absolutely, necessarily, and everlastingly fixed to them, as they were
very apt to believe, but were suspended upon the condition of their continued
obedience, which, if they violated, they should be rejected, and the Gentiles,
performing it, should be received for his people. And this clause may be connected
with the preceding, and considered as expressing the condition of their interest in
God as their God, thus: “He is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, &c., if
ye will hear his voice;” that is, if ye will be his obedient people he will continue to be
your God. Or else the word ‫,אם‬ im, translated if, may be rendered in the optative
form, O that you would hear his voice to-day, saying unto you, Harden not your
hearts. “However this be,” says Dr. Horne, “what follows, to the end of the Psalm, is
undoubtedly spoken in the person of God himself, who may be considered as
addressing us, in these latter days, by the gospel of his Son; for so the apostle
teaches us to apply the whole passage, Hebrews 3:4 . The Israelites, when they came
out of Egypt, had a day of probation, and a promised rest to succeed it; but by
unbelief and disobedience, they to whom it was promised, that is, the generation of
those who came out of Egypt, fell short of it, and died in the wilderness. The gospel,
in like manner, offers, both to Jew and Gentile, another day of probation in this
world, and another promised rest to succeed it, which remaineth for the people of
God in heaven. All whom it concerns are, therefore, exhorted to beware, lest they
forfeit the second rest, as murmuring and rebellious Israel came short of the first.”
COKE, "Psalms 95:7. To-day if ye will hear his voice— The people having said, We
are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand, God is introduced, saying,
"Since then you are so, from this day be not like your fathers; behave like my sheep,
and harden not your hearts." It is plain, therefore, that the voice of God must begin
here; accordingly, this sentence should begin the 8th verse, and be rendered thus:
From this day, if you will hear my voice, harden not your heart as at Meribah, as in
the day of Massah in the wilderness; Psalms 95:9. When your fathers put me to the
proof, tried me, even at the same time that they saw my glorious doing. Mudge. We
would just observe, that the word rendered pasture, in the original, signifies also
dominion. According to this sense of the word, the other phrase, sheep of his hand,
will here be a more fit, though figurative expression: the shepherd who rules the
sheep, doing it with his hand, which manages the rod and staff by which they are
ruled. See Psalms 23:4.
CO STABLE, "Verses 7-11
2. Exhortation to believe the sovereign Lord95:7b-11

50. Israel, however, had been a wayward flock in the past. This led the writer to warn
the people to avoid the sins that had resulted in the wilderness wanderings, "the
world"s longest funeral march." [ ote: Wiersbe, The . . . Wisdom . . ., p265.] At
Meribah (lit. strife; Exodus 17:1-7; umbers 20:2-13) and Massah (lit. testing;
Exodus 17:1-7) Israel tested God by demanding that He provide for them on their
terms. They should have simply continued to trust and obey God. Perhaps the
writer mentioned these rebellions and not others because they so clearly reveal the
ingratitude and willfulness that finally resulted in God sentencing that generation to
die in the wilderness. Their actions betrayed the fact that they had not learned
God"s ways, specifically, that He would do what was best for them in His own time
and way. That generation could have entered into rest in the land of milk and
honey. Likewise, believers who fail to follow their Good Shepherd faithfully can
look forward to a life of hardship and limited blessing. In view of the urgency of this
exhortation, the writer began it by calling for action "today."
The writer to the Hebrews quoted Psalm 95:7-11 in order to urge Christians to
believe God and move ahead in faith. ot obtaining rest, for the Christian, means
failing to enter into all the blessings that could have been his (or hers) if he (or she)
had faithfully trusted and obeyed God.
This psalm is a sober reminder that praise needs to connect with trust and
obedience. It also anticipates the time when those who follow the Shepherd
faithfully will reign with Him in His beneficent rule over the earth (cf. Psalm 2; 2
Timothy 2:12 a; Revelation 3:21; et al.).
PULPIT, "For he is our God. A second, and a more urgent, reason for worshipping
God. ot only is he a "great God" (Psalms 95:3), but he is also "our God"—our
own God—brought into the closest personal relationship with us. And we are the
people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand (comp. Psalms 74:1; Psalms 79:13;
Psalms 80:1, etc.). We are led by him, tended by him, fed by him, folded by him. We
owe everything to his shepherding.
K&D , "Psalms 95:7-11
The second decastich begins in the midst of the Masoretic Psa_95:7. Up to this point
the church stirs itself up to a worshipping appearing before its God; now the voice of
God (Heb_4:7), earnestly admonishing, meets it, resounding from out of the sanctuary.
Since ְ ‫ע‬ ַ‫מ‬ ָ‫שׁ‬ signifies not merely to hear, but to hear obediently, Psa_95:7 cannot be a
conditioning protasis to what follows. Hengstenberg wishes to supply the apodosis:
“then will He bless you, His people;” but ‫ם‬ ִ‫א‬ in other instances too (Psa_81:9; Psa_
139:19; Pro_24:11), like ‫,לוּ‬ has an optative signification, which it certainly has gained by
a suppression of a promissory apodosis, but yet without the genius of the language
having any such in mind in every instance. The word ‫ּום‬ ַ‫ה‬ placed first gives prominence
to the present, in which this call to obedience goes forth, as a decisive turning-point. The
divine voice warningly calls to mind the self-hardening of Israel, which came to light at
Merîbah, on the day of Massah. What is referred to, as also in Psa_81:8, is the tempting

51. of God in the second year of the Exodus on account of the failing of water in the
neighbourhood of Horeb, at the place which is for this reason called Massah u-Merıbah
(Exo_17:1-7); from which is to be distinguished the tempting of God in the fortieth year
of the Exodus at Merıbah, viz., at the waters of contention near Kadesh (written fully Mê-
Merıbah Kadesh, or more briefly Mê-Merıbah), Num_20:2-13 (cf. on Psa_78:20). Strictly
‫כמריבה‬ signifies nothing but instar Meribae, as in Psa_83:10 instar Midianitarum; but
according to the sense, ְⅴ is equivalent to ‫ל‬ ַ‫ע‬ ְⅴ. Psa_106:32, just as ‫ּום‬‫י‬ ְⅴ is equivalent to
‫ּום‬‫י‬ ְ‫ב‬ ִⅴ. On ‫ר‬ ֶ‫שׁ‬ ֲ‫,א‬ quum, cf. Deu_11:6. The meaning of ‫י‬ ִ‫ל‬ ֳ‫ֽע‬ ָ‫פ‬ ‫אוּ‬ ָ‫ם־ר‬ַ is not they also (‫גם‬ as in
Psa_52:7) saw His work; for the reference to the giving of water out of the rock would
give a thought that is devoid of purpose here, and the assertion is too indefinite for it to
be understood of the judgment upon those who tempted God (Hupfeld and Hitzig). It is
therefore rather to be rendered: notwithstanding (ho'moos, Ew. §354, a) they had (=
although they had, cf. ‫גם‬ in Isa_49:15) seen His work (His wondrous guiding and
governing), and might therefore be sure that He would not suffer them to be destroyed.
The verb ‫קוּט‬ coincides with κοτέω, κότος. ‫ּור‬ ְ.‫ען‬ , for which the lxx has τሀ γενεᇱ ᅚκείνη, is
anarthrous in order that the notion may be conceived of more qualitatively than
relatively: with a (whole) generation. With ‫ר‬ ַ‫מ‬ ִ‫א‬ָ‫ו‬ Jahve calls to mind the repeated
declarations of His vexation concerning their heart, which was always inclined towards
error which leads to destruction - declarations, however, which bore no fruit. Just this
ineffectiveness of His indignation had as its result that (‫ר‬ ֶ‫שׁ‬ ֲ‫,א‬ not ᆋτι but ᆢστε, as in Gen_
13:16; Deu_28:27, Deu_28:51; 2Ki_9:37, and frequently) He sware, etc. (‫ם‬ ִ‫א‬ = verily not,
Gesen. §155, 2, f, with the emphatic future form in ûn which follows). It is the oath in
Num_14:27. that is meant. The older generation died in the desert, and therefore lost the
entering into the rest of God, by reason of their disobedience. If now, many centuries
after Moses, they are invited in the Davidic Psalter to submissive adoration of Jahve,
with the significant call: “To-day if ye will hearken to His voice!” and with a reference to
the warning example of the fathers, the obedience of faith, now as formerly, has
therefore to look forward to the gracious reward of entering into God's rest, which the
disobedient at that time lost; and the taking possession of Canaan was, therefore, not as
yet the final ‫ה‬ ָ‫נוּח‬ ְ‫מ‬ (Deu_12:9). This is the connection of the wider train of thought which
to the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews Heb_3:1, Heb_4:1, follows from this text of
the Psalm.
8 “Do not harden your hearts as you did at
Meribah,[a]
as you did that day at Massah[b] in the
wilderness,

52. BAR ES, "Harden not your heart - See this verse explained in the notes at Heb_
3:8.
As in the provocation ... - Margin, “contention.” The original is “Meribah.” See
Exo_17:7, where the original words Meribah, rendered here “provocation,” and
“Massah,” rendered here “temptation,” are retained in the translation.
GILL, "Harden not your hearts,.... Against Christ, against his Gospel, against all the
light and evidence of it. There is a natural hardness of the heart, owing to the corruption
of nature; and an habitual hardness, acquired by a constant continuance and long
custom in sinning; and there is a judicial hardness, which God gives men up unto. There
is a hardness of heart, which sometimes attends God's own people, through the
deceitfulness of sin gaining upon them; of which, when sensible, they complain, and do
well to guard against. Respect seems to be had here to the hardness of heart in the Jews
in the times of Christ and his apostles, which the Holy Ghost foresaw, and here dehorts
from; who, notwithstanding the clear evidence of Jesus being the Messiah, from
prophecy, from miracles, from doctrines, from the gifts of the Spirit, &c. yet hardened
their hearts against him, rebelled against light, and would not receive, but reject him:
as in the provocation; or "as at Meribah" (h); a place so called from the contention
and striving of the people of Israel with the Lord and his servants; and when they
provoked not only the meek man Moses to speak unadvisedly with his lips; but also the
Lord himself by their murmurings, Exo_17:7 though this may respect their provocations
in general in the wilderness; for they often provoked him by their unbelief, ingratitude,
and idolatry; see Deu_9:8,
and as in the day of temptation in the wilderness; or "as in the day of Massah"
(i); the time when they tempted him at Massah, so called from their tempting him by
distrusting his power and presence among them, by disobeying his commands, and
limiting the Holy One of Israel to time and means of deliverance; see Exo_17:7 and this
being in the wilderness was an aggravation of their sin; they being just brought out of
Egypt, and having had such a wonderful appearance of God for them, there and at the
Red sea; and besides being in a place where their whole dependence must be upon God,
where they could have nothing but what they had from him immediately, it was
egregious folly as well as wickedness to provoke and tempt him.
HE RY, " The example they are warned by, which is that of the Israelites in the
wilderness.
1. “Take heed of sinning as they did, lest you be shut out of the everlasting rest as they
were out of Canaan.” Be not, as your fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation,
Psa_78:8. Thus here, Harden not your heart as you did (that is, your ancestors) in the
provocation, or in Meribah, the place where they quarrelled with God and Moses (Exo_
17:2-7), and in the day of temptation in the wilderness, Psa_95:8. So often did they
provoke God by their distrusts and murmurings that the whole time of their continuance

53. in the wilderness might be called a day of temptation, or Massah, the other name given
to that place (Exo_17:7), because they tempted the Lord, saying, Is the Lord among us
or is he not? This was in the wilderness, where they could not help themselves, but lay at
God's mercy, and where God wonderfully helped them and gave them such sensible
proofs of his power and tokens of his favour as never any people had before or since.
Note, (1.) Days of temptation are days of provocation. Nothing is more offensive to God
than disbelief of his promise and despair of the performance of it because of some
difficulties that seem to lie in the way. (2.) The more experience we have had of the
power and goodness of God the greater is our sin if we distrust him. What, to tempt him
in the wilderness, where we live upon him! This is as ungrateful as it is absurd and
unreasonable. (3.) Hardness of heart is at the bottom of all our distrusts of God and
quarrels with him. That is a hard heart which receives not the impressions of divine
discoveries and conforms not to the intentions of the divine will, which will not melt,
which will not bend. (4.) The sins of others ought to be warnings to us not to tread in
their steps. The murmurings of Israel were written for our admonition, 1Co_10:11.
2. Now here observe,
CALVI , "8.Harden not your heart, as in Meribah The Psalmist, having extolled
and commended the kindness of God their Shepherd, takes occasion, as they were
stiffnecked and disobedient, to remind them of their duty, as his flock, which was to
yield a pliable and meek submission; and the more to impress their minds, he
upbraids them with the obstinacy of their fathers. The term ‫מריבה‬ , Meribah, may be
used appellatively to mean strife or contention; but as the Psalmist evidently refers
to the history contained in Exodus 17:2, (58) I have preferred understanding it of
the place — and so of ‫מסה‬ , Massah. (59) In the second clause, however, the place
where the temptation happened may be thought sufficiently described under the
term wilderness, and should any read, according to the day of temptation (instead of
Massah)in the wilderness, there can be no objection. Some would have it, that
Massah and Meribah were two distinct places, but I see no ground to think so; and,
in a matter of so little importance, we should not be too nice or curious. He enlarges
in several expressions upon the hardness of heart evinced by the people, and, to
produce the greater effect, introduces God himself as speaking. (60) By hardness of
heart, he no doubt means, any kind of contempt shown to the word of God, though
there are many different kinds of it. We find that when proclaimed, it is heard by
some in a cold and slighting manner; that some fastidiously put it away from them
after they had received it; that others proudly reject it; while again there are men
who openly vent their rage against it with despite and blasphemy. (61) The Psalmist,
in the one term which he has employed, comprehends all these defaulters, the
careless — the fastidious — such as deride the word, and such as are actuated in
their opposition to it by frenzy and passion. Before the heart can be judged soft and
pliable to the hearing of God’s word, it is necessary that we receive it with
reverence, and with a disposition to obey it. If it carry no authority and weight with
it, we show that we regard him as no more than a mere man like ourselves; and here
lies the hardness of our hearts, whatever may be the cause of it, whether simply
carelessness, or pride, or rebellion. He has intentionally singled out the odious term
here employed, to let us know what an execrable thing contempt of God’s word is;
as, in the Law, adultery is used to denote all kinds of fornication and uncleanness,
and murder all kinds of violence, and injury, hatreds, and enmities. Accordingly,

54. the man who simply treats the word of God with neglect, and fails to obey it, is said
here to have a hard and stony heart, although he may not be an open despiser. The
attempt is ridiculous which the Papists have made to found upon this passage their
favorite doctrine of the liberty of the will. We are to notice, in the first place, that all
men’s hearts are naturally hard and stony; for Scripture does not speak of this as a
disease peculiar to a few, but characteristic in general of all mankind, (Ezekiel
36:26.) It is an inbred pravity; still it is voluntary; we are not insensible in the same
manner that stones are, (62) and the man who will not suffer himself to be ruled by
God’s word, makes that heart, which was hard before, harder still, and is convinced
as to his own sense and feeling of obstinacy. The consequence by no means follows
from this, that softness of heart — a heart flexible indifferently in either direction, is
at our command. (63) The will of man, through natural corruption, is wholly bent to
evil; or, to speak more properly, is carried headlong into the commission of it. And
yet every man, who disobeys God therein, hardens himself; for the blame of his
wrong doing rests with none but himself.
SPURGEO , "Ver. 8. Harden not your heart. If ye will hear, learn to fear also. The
sea and the land obey him, do not prove more obstinate than they!
"Yield to his love who round you now
The bands of a man would east."
We cannot soften our hearts, but we can harden them, and the consequences will be
fatal. Today is too good a day to be profaned by the hardening of our hearts against
our own mercies. While mercy reigns let not obduracy rebel. "As in the
provocations, and as in the day of temptation in the wilderness" (or, "like Meribah,
like the day of Massah in the wilderness"). Be not wilfully, wantonly, repeatedly,
obstinately rebellious. Let the example of that unhappy generation serve as a beacon
to you; do not repeat the offences which have already more than enough provoked
the Lord. God remembers men's sins, and the more memorably so when they are
committed by a favoured people, against frequent warnings, in defiance of terrible
judgments, and in the midst of superlative mercies; such sins write their record in
marble. Reader, this verse is for you, for you even if you can say, "He is our God,
and we are the people of his pasture." Do not seek to turn aside the edge of the
warning; thou hast good need of it, give good heed to it.
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 8. Harden not your hearts. An old man, one day taking a child on his knee,
entreated him to seek God now —to pray to him, and to love him; when the child,
looking up at him, asked, "But why do not you seek God?" The old man, deeply
affected, answered, "I would, child; but my heart is hard —my heart is hard." —
Arvine's Anecdotes.
Ver. 8. Harden not your heart. —Heart is ascribed to reasonable creatures, to
signify sometimes the whole soul, and sometimes the several faculties appertaining
to the soul.
1. It is frequently put for the whole soul, and that for the most part when it is set
alone; as where it is said, "Serve the Lord with all your heart", 1Sa 7:20.
2. For that principal part of the soul which is called the mind or understanding. "I
gave my heart to know wisdom", Ecclesiastes 1:17. In this respect darkness and
blindness are attributed to the heart, Ephesians 6:18, Romans 1:21.

55. 3. For the will: as when heart and soul are joined together, the two essential faculties
of the soul are meant, namely, the mind and will: soul put for the mind, heart for the
will "Serve the Lord with all your heart and with all your soul", De 6:13.
4. For the memory. "I have hid thy word in my heart", saith the prophet, Psalms
119:11. The memory is that faculty wherein matters are laid up and hid.
5. For the conscience. It is said that "David's heart smote him", that is, his
conscience, 1 Samuel 24:5, 2 Samuel 24:10. Thus is heart taken, 1 John 3:20-21.
6. For the affections: as where it is said, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all
thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind", Matthew 22:37. By the mind
is meant the understanding faculty; by the soul, the will; by the heart, the affections.
Here in this text the heart is put for the whole soul, even for mind, will, and
affections. For blindness of mind, stubbornness of will, and stupidity of affections go
together. —William Gouge.
Ver. 8. In Massah—in Meribah. Our translators say, in the provocation, in the day
of temptation. But the places were denominated by names taken from the
transactions that occurred in them; and the introduction of those names gives more
liveliness to the allusion. See to the same effect Psalms 81:7; where the Bible
translation retains the proper name. —Richard Mant.
Ver. 8. Let us not fail to notice, that while it is the flock who speak in Psalms 95:1-7,
it is the Shepherd who takes up their expostulating words, and urges them home
himself at Psalms 95:8, to the end, using the argument which by the Holy Ghost is
addressed to us also in Hebrews 3:7-19. There is something very powerful in this
expostulation, when connected with the circumstances that give rise to it. In
themselves, the burst of adoring love, and the full out pouring of affection in Psalms
95:1-7 are irresistibly persuasive; but when (Psalms 95:8) the voice of the Lord
himself is heard (such a voice, using terms of vehement entreaty!) we cannot imagine
expostulation carried further. Unbelief alone could resist this voice; blind,
malignant unbelief alone could repel The flock, and then the Shepherd, inviting men
now to enter the fold. —Andrew A. Bonar.
COFFMA , "Verse 8
"Harden not your hearts, as at Meribah,
As in the day of Massah in the wilderness."
"Massah and Meribah" (Psalms 95:8). These two names are applied to only one
place in Exodus 17:7; and in the passage here, as in Deuteronomy 33:8, they are
used as parallel statements. Ewing referred to them as, "Double names for the same
place."[8]
The unfaithfulness of Israel was principally that of their complaining and
murmuring against God, a behavior that was actually due to their unbelief.
ELLICOTT, "Verse 8
(8) The mention of the guiding voice suggests to the poet to make God Himself
address His people, and with this verse the Divine warning begins.

56. Provocation . . . temptation.—It is better to keep here the proper names Meribah
and Massah (Exodus 17:1-7; umbers 20:13 : comp. Deuteronomy 33:8).
WHEDO , "8. As in the provocation… as in the day of temptation—It is better to
take “provocation” and “temptation” as proper names. The Hebrew simply reads:
As Meribah, as the day of Massah, in the wilderness. The allusion is to Exodus 17:7.
“And he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah”—Temptation and
Rebellion. The name “Meribah” was also afterward given to Kadesh, ( umbers
20:13; umbers 27:14,) written fully, “Meribah-Kadesh,” Deuteronomy 32:51.
These were noted instances of rebellion through unbelief, and are advanced here
only as specimens of the disobedience of their forefathers in the desert, against
which the people are here warned.
BE SO , "Verse 8-9
Psalms 95:8-9. Harden not your heart — As if he had said, If ye will hear his voice,
and profit by what you hear, then do not harden your hearts by obstinate unbelief
and wilful disobedience, rebelling against the light, and resisting the Holy Ghost,
and the clear discoveries which he makes of the truth of the gospel; as in the
provocation — As you did in that bold and wicked contest in the wilderness.
Hebrew, ‫,כמריבה‬ chimeribah, as in Meribah, which was the proper name of the place
where this happened, and which was also called Massah, as appears from Exodus
17:7, and Deuteronomy 33:8 . As in the day of temptation — In the day when you
tempted me. Or, as in the day of Massah, that is, when you were at Massah. When
— Or, in which place, namely, in Meribah, or Massah, or the wilderness last
mentioned, your fathers tempted me — Doubting of my power, and demanding new
proofs of my presence among them, Exodus 17:7, though they had had such
extraordinary proofs of my presence and favour in their late deliverance at the Red
sea, in my making the bitter waters sweet, and in sending them bread from heaven;
and saw my works — Both my works of mercy, which gave them abundant cause to
trust me, and my works of justice, for which they had reason to fear and stand in
awe of me. Hebrew, my work, namely, that great and stupendous work of bringing
my people out of Egypt with a strong hand; of conducting them safely through the
Red sea into the wilderness, and of destroying the Egyptians.
9 where your ancestors tested me;
they tried me, though they had seen what I did.
BAR ES, "When your fathers - Your ancestors. See this verse explained in the

57. notes on Heb_3:9.
Tempted me - Tried me; tried my patience, to see how much I would bear. This does
not mean, as it commonly does now with us, to place inducements before one to lead
him into sin, but to try one - to put his patience to the test. This they did, in the case
referred to, by their obduracy and evil conduct.
Proved me - See the notes at Heb_3:9. “And saw my work.” Though they constantly
saw my work; saw my gracious interpositions; saw what I was doing for their own good.
CLARKE, "When your fathers tempted me - Tried me, by their insolence,
unbelief, and blasphemy. They proved me - they had full proof of my power to save and
to destroy. There they saw my works - they saw that nothing was too hard for God.
GILL, "When your fathers tempted me,.... Or, "where" (i); that is, in the
wilderness, particularly at Meribah and Massah; it was Christ they tempted, as appears
from 1Co_10:9.
proved me: had proof of his power, goodness, and mercy, in providing for them, and in
the preservation of them: or "tried" (k) him, his patience, longsuffering, and
forbearance, by their repeated provocations of him:
and saw my work; his work of judgment upon their enemies the Egyptians, by
inflicting plagues upon them, and by the destruction of Pharaoh and his host at the Red
sea; and his work of goodness to them, in bringing them out of bondage, leading them
through the Red sea safely, raining manna about their tents, and giving them water out
of the rock; or particularly his work in consuming them in the wilderness, as he swore he
would, and which they saw with their eyes, and was near forty years a doing. The Syriac
version joins the "forty years" at the beginning of the next verse to this; the phrase
standing in such a situation as to be connected with both, and is true of each; so the
apostle uses it both ways, Heb_3:9.
HE RY, "(1.) The charge drawn up, in God's name, against the unbelieving
Israelites, Psa_95:9, Psa_95:10. God here, many ages after, complains of their ill
conduct towards him, with the expressions of high resentment. [1.] Their sin was
unbelief: they tempted God and proved him; they questioned whether they might take
his word, and insisted upon further security before they would go forward to Canaan, by
sending spies; and, when those discouraged them, they protested against the sufficiency
of the divine power and promise, and would make a captain and return into Egypt,
Num_14:3, Num_14:4. This is called rebellion, Deu_1:26, Deu_1:32. [2.] The
aggravation of this sin was that they saw God's work; they saw what he had done for
them in bringing them out of Egypt, nay, what he was now doing for them every day, this
day, in the bread he rained from heaven for them and the water out of the rock that
followed them, than which they could not have more unquestionable evidences of God's
presence with them. With them even seeing was not believing, because they hardened
their hearts, though they had seen what Pharaoh got by hardening his heart. [3.] The
causes of their sin. See what God imputed it to: It is a people that do err in their hearts,
and they have not known my ways. Men's unbelief and distrust of God, their

58. murmurings and quarrels with him, are the effect of their ignorance and mistake. First,
Of their ignorance: They have not known my ways. They saw his work (Psa_95:9) and
he made known his acts to them (Psa_103:7); and yet they did not know his ways, the
ways of his providence, in which he walked towards them, or the ways of his
commandments, in which he would have them to walk towards him: they did not know,
they did not rightly understand and therefore did not approve of these. Note, The reason
why people slight and forsake the ways of God is because they do not know them.
Secondly, Of their mistake: They do err in their heart; they wander out of the way; in
heart they turn back. Note, Sins are errors, practical errors, errors in heart; such there
are, and as fatal as errors in the head. When the corrupt affections pervert the judgment,
and so lead the soul out of the ways of duty and obedience, there is an error of the heart.
[4.] God's resentment of their sin: Forty years long was I grieved with this generation.
Not, The sins of God's professing people do not only anger him, but grieve him,
especially their distrust of him; and God keeps an account how often (Num_14:22) and
how long they grieve him. See the patience of God towards provoking sinners; he was
grieved with them forty years, and yet those years ended in a triumphant entrance into
Canaan made by the next generation. If our sins have grieved God, surely they should
grieve us, and nothing in sin should grieve us so much as that.
JAMISO 8-11, "warning against neglect; and this is sustained by citing the
melancholy fate of their rebellious ancestors, whose provoking insolence is described by
quoting the language of God’s complaint (Num_14:11) of their conduct at Meribah and
Massah, names given (Exo_17:7) to commemorate their strife and contention with Him
(Psa_78:18, Psa_78:41).
CALVI , "9When your fathers tempted me, they proved me The Psalmist
insinuates, as I have already remarked, that the Jews had been from the first of a
perverse and almost intractable spirit. And there were two reasons which made it
highly useful to remind the children of the guilt chargeable upon their fathers. We
know how apt men are to follow the example of their predecessors; custom begets a
sanction; what is ancient becomes venerable, and such is the blinding influence of
home example, that whatever may have been done by our forefathers passes for a
virtue without examination. We have an instance in Popedom, of the audacity with
which the authority of the fathers is opposed to God’s word. The Jews were of all
others most liable to be deceived upon this side, ever accustomed as they were to
boast of their fathers. The Psalmist accordingly would detach them from the fathers,
by taking notice of the monstrous ingratitude with which they had been chargeable.
A second reason, and one to which I have already adverted, is, that he would show
them the necessity in which they stood of being warned upon the present subject.
Had their fathers not manifested a rebellions spirit, they might have retorted by
asking the question, Upon what ground he warned them against hardness of heart,
their nation having hitherto maintained a character for docility and tractableness?
The fact being otherwise — their fathers having from the first been perverse and
stubborn, the Psalmist had a plain reason for insisting upon the correction of this
particular vice.
There are two ways of interpreting the words which follow. As tempting God is

59. nothing else than yielding to a diseased and unwarrantable craving after proof of
his power, (64) we may consider the verse as connected throughout, and read, They
tempted me and proved me, although they had already seen my work God very
justly complains, that they should insist upon new proof, after his power had been
already amply testified by undeniable evidences. There is another meaning,
however, that may be given to the term proved, — according to which, the meaning
of the passage would run as follows: — Your fathers tempted me in asking where
God was, notwithstanding all the benefits I had done them; and they proved me,
that is, they had actual experience of what I am, inasmuch as I did not cease to give
them open proofs of my presence, and consequently they saw my work. Whatever
sense we adopt, the Psalmist’s design is plainly to show how inexcusable the Jews
were in desiring a discovery of God’s power, just as if it had been hidden, and had
not been taught them by the most incontestable proofs. (65) Granting that they had
received no foregoing demonstration of it, they would have evinced an unbecoming
spirit in demanding of God why he had failed to provide them with meat and drink;
but to doubt his presence after he had brought them from Egypt with an
outstretched hand, and evidenced his nearness to them by most convincing
testimonies, — to doubt his presence in the same manner as if it had never been
revealed, was a degree of perverse forgetfulness which aggravated their guilt. Upon
the whole, I consider the following to be the sense of the passage — Your fathers
tempted me, although they had abundantly proved — perceived by clear and
undeniable evidences, that I was their God — nay, although my works had been
clearly set before them. The lesson is one which is equally applicable to ourselves;
for the more abundant testimonies we may have had of the power and loving-
kindness of the Lord, the greater will our sin be, if we insist upon receiving
additional proofs of them. How many do we find in our own day demanding
miracles, while others murmur against God because he does not indulge their
wishes? Some may ask why the Psalmist singles out the particular case of Meribah,
when there were many other instances which he might have adduced. They never
ceased to provoke God from the moment of their passing the Red Sea; and in
bringing this one charge only against them, he might seem by his silence on other
points to justify their conduct. But the figure synecdoche is common in Scripture,
and it would be natural enough to suppose that one case is selected for many. At the
same time, another reason for the specification may have been, that, as plainly
appears from Moses, the ingratitude and rebellion of the people reached its greatest
height on this occasion, when they murmured for water. I am aware that
interpreters differ upon this. Such, however, was the fact. They then crowned their
former impiety; nor was it until this outcry was made, as the consummating act of
all their preceding wickedness, that they gave open proof of their obstinacy being
incurable. (66)
SPURGEO , "Ver. 9. When your fathers tempted me. As far as they could do so
they tempted God to change his usual way, and to do their sinful bidding, and
though he cannot be tempted of evil, and will never yield to wicked requests, yet
their intent was the same, and their guilt was none the less. God's way is perfect,
and when we would have him alter it to please us, we are guilty of tempting him;

60. and the fact that we do so in vain, while it magnifies the Lord's holiness, by no
means excuses our guilt. We are in most danger of tills sin in times of need, for then
it is that we are apt to fall into unbelief, and to demand a change in those
arrangements of providence which are the transcript of perfect holiness and infinite
wisdom. ot to acquiesce in the will of God is virtually to tempt him to alter his
plans to suit our imperfect views of how the universe should be governed.
Proved me. They put the Lord to needless tests, demanding new miracles, fresh
interpositions, and renewed tokens of his presence. Do not we also peevishly require
frequent signs of the Lord's love other than those which every hour supplies? Are
we not prone to demand specialities, with the alternative secretly offered in our
hearts, that if they do not come at our bidding we will disbelieve? True, the Lord is
very condescending, and frequently grants us marvellous evidences of his power,
but we ought not to require them. Steady faith is due to one who is so constantly
kind. After so many proofs of his love, we are ungrateful to wish to prove him again,
unless it be in those ways of his own appointing, in which he has said, "Prove me
now." If we were for ever testing the love of our wife or husband, and remained
unconvinced after years of faithfulness, we should wear out the utmost human
patience. Friendship only flourishes in the atmosphere of confidence, suspicion is
deadly to it: shall the Lord God, true and immutable, be day after day suspected by
his own people? Will not this provoke him to anger?
And saw my work. They tested him again and again, through out forty years,
though each time his work was conclusive evidence of his faithfulness. othing
could convince them for long.
"They saw his wonders wrought,
And then his praise they sung;
But soon his works of power forgot,
And murmured with their tongue."
" ow they believe his word,
While rocks with rivers flow;
ow with their lusts provoke the Lord,
And he reduced them low."
Fickleness is bound up in the heart of man, unbelief is our besetting sin; we must for
ever be seeing, or we waver in our believing. This is no mean offence, and will bring
with it no small punishment.
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 9. Your fathers tempted me. Though God cannot be tempted with evil he may
justly be said to be tempted whenever men, by being dissatisfied with his dealings,
virtually ask that he will alter those dealings, and proceed in a way more congenial
to their feelings. If you reflect a little, you will hardly fail to perceive, that in a very
strict sense, this and the like may be called tempting God. Suppose a man to be
discontented with the appointments of providence, suppose him to murmur and to
repine at what the Almighty allots him to do or to bear; is he not to be charged with
the asking God to change his purposes? And what is this if it is not tempting God,
and striving to induce him to swerve from his plans, though every one of those plans
has been settled by Infinite Wisdom?
Or again, if any one of us, notwithstanding the multiplied proofs of Divine
lovingkindness, doubt or question whether or not God do indeed love him, of what is

61. he guilty, if not of tempting the Lord, seeing that he solicits God to the giving
additional evidence, as though there was a deficiency, and challenges him to a fresh
demonstration of what he has already abundantly displayed? This would be called
tempting amongst men. If a child were to show by his actions that he doubted or
disbelieved the affection of his parents, he would be considered as striving to extract
from them new proofs, by asking them to evince their love more, though they may
already have done as much as in wisdom and in justice they ought to do. And this is
clearly tempting them, and that too in the ordinary sense of the term. In short,
unbelief of every kind and every degree may be said to tempt God. For not to believe
upon the evidence which he has seen fit to give, is to provoke him to give more,
offering our possible assent if proof were increased as an inducement to him to go
beyond what his wisdom has prescribed. And if in this, and the like sense, God may
be tempted, what can be more truly said of the Israelites, than that they tempted
God in Massah? ...We are perhaps not accustomed to think of unbelief or
murmuring as nothing less than a tempting God, and therefore, we do not attach to
what is so common, its just degree of heinousness. It is so natural to us to be
discontented whenever God's dealings are not just what we like, to forget what has
been done for us as soon as our wishes seem thwarted, to be impatient and fretful
under every new cross, that we are scarcely conscious of committing a sin, and much
less one more than usually aggravated. Yet we cannot be dissatisfied with God's
dealings, and not be virtually guilty of tempting God. It may seem a harsh definition
of a slight and scarcely avoidable fault, but nevertheless it is a true definition. You
cannot mistrust God, and not accuse him of want either of power or of goodness.
You cannot repine, no, not even in thought, without virtually telling him that his
plans are not the best, nor his dispensations the wisest which he might have
appointed in respect of yourselves. So that your fear, or your despondency, or your
anxiety, in circumstances of perplexity, or peril, are nothing less than the calling
upon God to depart from his fixed course—a suspicion, or rather an assertion that
he might proceed in a manner more worthy of himself, and therefore, a challenge to
him to alter his dealings if he would prove that he possesses the attributes which he
claims. You may not intend thus to accuse or to provoke God whenever you
murmur, but your murmuring does all this, and cannot fail to do it. You cannot be
dissatisfied without virtually saying that God might order things better; you cannot
say that he might order things better without virtually demanding that he change
his course of acting, and give other proofs of his Infinite perfections. —Henry
Melvill.
Ver. 9. Your fathers tempted me. There are two ways of interpreting the words
which follow. As tempting God is nothing else than yielding to a diseased and
unwarrantable craving after proof of his power, we may consider the verse as
connected throughout, and read, They tempted me and proved me, although they
had already seen my work. God very justly complains, that they should insist upon
new proof, after his power had been already amply testified by undeniable
evidences. There is another meaning, however, that may be given to the term
"proved", —according to which, the meaning of the passage would run as follows:
—Your fathers tempted me in asking where God was, notwithstanding all the
benefits I had done them; and they proved me, that is, they had actual experience of
what I am, inasmuch as I did not cease to give them open proofs of my presence, and

62. consequently they saw my work. —John Calvin.
Ver. 9. Proved me, put me to the proof of my existence, presence, and power, by
requiring me to work, i.e. to act in an extraordinary manner. And this desire,
unreasonable as it was, I gratified. They not only demanded, but they war-Mg
likewise saw my work, i.e. what I could do. —J.A. Alexander.
Ver. 9. Forty years. To understand this passage we must bear in mind the event
referred to. The same year in which the people of Israel came forth from Egypt, they
were distressed for water at Rephidim, (Exodus 17:1); and the place had two names
given to it, Massah and Meribah, because the people tempted God and chided with
Moses. The Lord did not swear then that they should not enter into the land of
Canaan; but this was in the following year, after the return of the spies. ( umbers
14:20-38.) And God said then that they had tempted him "ten times"; that is, during
the short time since their deliverance from Egypt. It was after ten temptations that
God deprived them of the promised land.
Bearing in mind these facts, we shall be able to see the full force of the passage. The
"provocation" or contention, and "temptation" refer clearly to the latter instance,
as recorded in umbers 14:1-45 because it was then that God swore that the people
should not enter into his rest. The people's conduct was alike in both instances.
To connect "forty years" with grieved, was the work of the Punctuists, and this
mistake the Apostle corrected; and it is to be observed that he did not follow in this
instance the Septuagint, in which the words are arranged as divided by the
Masorites. Such a rendering as would correspond with the Hebrew is as follows, —
"Today when ye hear his voice,
8. Harden not your hearts us in the provocation, In the day of temptation in the
wilderness.
9. When your fathers tempted me, they proved me And saw my works forty years:
10. I was therefore offended with that generation and said, Always do they go astray
in heart, And they have not known my ways;
11. So that I swore in my wrath, `They shall by no means enter into my rest.'"
The meaning of the ninth verse is, that when the children of Israel tempted God,
they proved him, i.e., found out by bitter experience how great his displeasure was,
and saw his works or his dealings with them forty years. He retained them in the
wilderness during that period until the death of all who disbelieved his word at the
return of the spies; he gave them this proof of his displeasure. —John Owen, of
Thrussington, 1853.
COFFMA , "Verse 9
"When your fathers tempted me,
Proved me, and saw my work."
"When your fathers tempted me" (Psalms 95:9). This tempting of God was their
complaining against God in the words, "Is God among us, or not?" (Exodus 17:8);
and the "work of God" which the people saw was the miraculous gushing of the
water from the rock which, at God's command, Moses had smitten in the presence
of the multitude, especially the elders of the people.

63. ELLICOTT, "Verse 9
(9) Proved me.—Properly, of trying metals. This term is used of man’s attitude
towards Providence, both in a good and bad sense (Malachi 3:10; Malachi 3:15).
And saw my work.—Better (as in Isaiah 49:15), Yea, they saw my works, watched,
that is, God’s dealings with ever the same readiness to murmur and repine, and try
the Divine patience.
WHEDO , "9. When your fathers tempted me—Where “your fathers tempted.”
The pronoun here refers to place— “the wilderness.”
Tempted—Required proof by visible tests. See on Psalms 78:18. The temptations by
Israel had been great: at the Red Sea, (Exodus 14:11-12;) at Marah, (Exodus 15:23-
24;) at the Desert of Sin, (Exodus 16:1-3;) at Rephidim, (Exodus 17:1-3;) at Sinai,
(Exodus 43;) in the matter of adab and Abihu, (Leviticus 10;) in their clamour for
meat to eat, ( umbers 11:4-6;) in the matter of Aaron and Miriam, ( umbers 12;) of
the spies, ( umbers 13, 14;) of Korah and his company, ( umbers 16;) at Kadesh,
( umbers 20:1-5;) near Mount Hor, ( umbers 21:4-6;) in the matter of Baal-peor,
( umbers 25.)
Proved me—Put me to the proof of my power and faithfulness.
Saw my work—The “work” of God, here referred to, was not the punishment which
followed their sin, but the whole series of miracles in Egypt and the wilderness. The
apostle uses the plural, “works,” Hebrews 3:9. The idea is one of astonishment, that,
after having seen these miracles, they should yet fall into the sin of unbelief and
disobedience. The particle ‫,גם‬ (gam,) translated and, here, as in some other
instances, takes the adversative sense of yet, although— “Where your fathers
tempted me, proved me, although they saw [equal to had seen] my work.”
10 For forty years I was angry with that
generation;
I said, ‘They are a people whose hearts go
astray,
and they have not known my ways.’

64. BAR ES, "Forty years long - All the time that they were in the wilderness. During
this long period their conduct was such as to try my patience and forbearance.
Was I grieved - The word used here - ‫קוט‬ qûᑛ - means properly to loathe, to
nauseate, to be disgusted with. It is translated “loathe” in Eze_6:9; Eze_20:43; Eze_
36:31; and grieved in Psa_119:158; Psa_139:21. It is here expressive of the strong
abhorrence which God had of their conduct. Compare Rev_3:16.
With this generation - With the entire generation that came out of Egypt. They
were all cut off in the wilderness, except Caleb and Joshua.
And said, It is a people - It is a characteristic of the entire people, that they are
disposed to wander from God.
That do err in their heart - In the Epistle to the Hebrews Heb_3:10 where this is
quoted, it is, “They do always err in their heart.” The sense is substantially the same. See
the notes at that place.
And they have not known my ways - See the notes at Heb_3:10.
CLARKE, "Forty years long - They did nothing but murmur, disbelieve, and rebel,
from the time they began their journey at the Red Sea till they passed over Jordan, a
period of forty years. During all this time God was grieved by that generation; yet he
seldom showed forth that judgment which they most righteously had deserved.
It is a people that do err in their heart - Or, according to the Chaldee, These are
a people whose idols are in their hearts. At any rate they had not God there.
They have not known my ways - The verb ‫ידע‬ yada, to know, is used here, as in
many other parts of Scripture, to express approbation. They knew God’s ways well
enough; but they did not like them; and would not walk in them. “These wretched men,”
says the old Psalter, “were gifnen to the lufe of this lyfe: knewe noght my ways of
mekenes, and charlte: for thi in my wreth I sware to thaim; that es, I sett stabely that if
that sall entre in till my rest;” that is, they shall not enter into my rest.
This ungrateful people did not approve of God’s ways - they did not enter into his
designs - they did not conform to his commands - they paid no attention to his miracles -
and did not acknowledge the benefits which they received from his hands; therefore God
determined that they should not enter into the rest which he had promised to them on
condition that, if they were obedient, they should inherit the promised land. So none of
those who came out of Egypt, except Joshua and Caleb, entered into Canaan; all the rest
died in the wilderness, wherein, because of their disobedience, God caused them to
wander forty years.
It is well known that the land of Canaan was a type of heaven, where, after all his toils,
the good and faithful servant is to enter into the joy of his Lord. And as those Israelites
in the wilderness were not permitted to enter into the land of Canaan because of their
unbelief, their distrust of God’s providence, and consequent disobedience, St. Paul hence
takes occasion to exhort the Jews, Heb_4:2-11, to accept readily the terms offered to
them by the Gospel. He shows that the words of the present Psalm are applicable to the
state of Christianity; and intimates to them that, if they persisted in obstinate refusal of
those gracious offers, they likewise would fall according to the same example of unbelief
- Dodd.

65. GILL, "Forty years long was I grieved with this generation,.... The generation
of the wilderness, as the Jews commonly call them; and which was a stubborn and a
rebellious one, whose heart and spirit were not right with God, Psa_78:8, wherefore,
speaking after the manner of men, God was grieved with them, as he was with the old
world, Gen_6:6, or he was "weary" of them, and "loathed" them as the word (l)
sometimes signifies; wherefore, after the affair of the spies, to which Aben Ezra thinks
this had reference, they did not hear from the mouth of the Lord, there was no prophecy
sent them by the hand of Moses, as the same writer observes; nor any history or account
of them, from that time till they came to the border of Canaan; so greatly was their
conduct and behaviour resented: and it was much such a term of time that was between
the beginning of the ministry of John the Baptist and of Christ, and the destruction of
Jerusalem; during which time the Jews tempted Christ, tried his patience, saw his
works, and grieved his Spirit, which brought at last ruin upon them:
and said, it is a people that do err in their heart; he was not only inwardly
grieved with them, but, speaking after the same human manner, he gave his grief vent,
he spoke and gave this just character of them. The apostle adds "alway", Heb_3:10 and
so does the Arabic version here, and which is implied in the words "do err"; they not
only had erred, but they continued to do so; and their errors were not merely through
weakness, ignorance, and mistake, but were voluntary, and with their whole hearts; they
sprung from their hearts, which were desperately wicked; they erred willingly and
wilfully; and this the Lord, the searcher of hearts, knew and took notice of:
and they have not known my ways; they had his law, his statutes, and his
judgments, and so must know the ways he prescribed them to walk in; but they did not
practically observe them: or his ways of providence; which they did not take that notice
of as they ought to have done; they did not consider them as they should, nor improve
them in the manner as became them; they were not thankful for their mercies as they
ought; nor did the goodness of God lead them to repentance.
JAMISO , "err in their heart — Their wanderings in the desert were but types of
their innate ignorance and perverseness.
that they should not — literally, “if they,” etc., part of the form of swearing
(compare Num_14:30; Psa_89:35).
CALVI , "10.Forty years I strove with this generation (67) The Psalmist brings it
forward as an aggravation of their perverse obstinacy, that God strove with them
for so long a time without effect. Occasionally it will happen that there is a violent
manifestation of perversity which soon subsides; but God complains that he had
constant grounds of contention with his people, throughout the whole forty years.
And this proves to us the incurable waywardness of that people. The word
generation is used with the same view. The word ‫,דור‬ dor, signifies an age, or the
allotted term of human life; and it is here applied to the men of an age, as if the
Psalmist had said, that the Israelites whom God had delivered were incorrigible,
during the whole period of their lives. The verb ‫,אקוט‬ akut, which I have rendered I
strove, is, by some, translated contemned, and in the Septuagint it reads,

66. προσωχθισα, (68) I was incensed, or enraged; but Hebrew interpreters retain the
genuine meaning, That God strove with them in a continual course of contention.
This was a remarkable proof of their extreme obstinacy; and God is introduced in
the verse as formally pronouncing judgment upon them, to intimate, that after
having shown their ungodliness in so many different ways, there could be no doubt
regarding their infatuation. Erring in heart, is an expression intended not to
extenuate their conduct, but to stamp it with folly and madness, as if he had said,
that he had to do with beasts, rather than men endued with sense and intelligence.
The reason is subjoined, that they would not attend to the many works of God
brought under their eyes, and more than all, to his word; for the Hebrew term ‫,דרך‬
derech, which I have rendered ways, comprehends his law and repeated
admonitions, as well as his miracles done before them. It argued amazing
infatuation that when God had condescended to dwell in such a familiar manner
amongst them, and had made such illustrious displays of himself, both in word and
works, they should have shut their eyes and overlooked all that had been done. This
is the reason why the Psalmist, considering that they wandered in error under so
much light as they enjoyed, speaks of their stupidity as amounting to madness.
SPURGEO , "Ver. 10. Forty years long was I grieved with this generation. The
impression upon the divine mind is most vivid; he sees them before him now, and
calls them "this generation." He does not leave his prophets to upbraid the sin, but
himself utters the complaint and declares that he was grieved, nauseated, and
disgusted. It is no small thing which can grieve our long suffering God to the extent
which the Hebrew word here indicates, and if we reflect a moment we shall see the
abundant provocation given; for no one who values his veracity can endure to be
suspected, mistrusted, and belied, when there is no ground for it, but on the
contrary the most overwhelming reason for confidence. To such base treatment was
the tender Shepherd of Israel exposed, not for a day or a month, but for forty years
at a stretch, and that not by here and there an unbeliever, but by a whole nation, in
which only two men were found so thoroughly believing as to be exempted from the
doom which at last was pronounced upon all the rest. Which shall we most wonder
at, the cruel insolence of man, or the tender patience of the Lord? Which shall leave
the deepest impression on our minds, the sin or the punishment? unbelief, or the
barring of the gates of Jehovah's rest against the unbelievers?
And said, It is a people that do err in their heart, and they have not known my ways.
Their heart was obstinately and constantly at fault; it was not their head which
erred, but their very heart was perverse: love, which appealed to their affections,
could not convert them. The heart is the main spring of the man, and if it be not in
order, the entire nature is thrown out of gear. If sin were only skin deep, it might be
a slight matter; but since it has defiled the soul, the case is bad indeed. Taught as
they were by Jehovah himself in lessons illustrated by miracles, which came to them
daily in the manual from heaven, and the water from the flinty rock, they ought to
have learned something, and it was a foul shame that they remained obstinately
ignorant, and would not know the ways of God. Wanderers in body, they were also
wanderers in heart, and the plain providential goodness of their God remained to
their blinded minds as great a maze as those twisting paths by which he led them
through the wilderness. Are we better than they? Are we not quite as apt to

67. misinterpret the dealings of the Lord? Have we suffered and enjoyed so many things
in vain? With many it is even so. Forty years of providential wisdom, yea, and even
a longer period of experience, have failed to teach them serenity of assurance, and
firmness of reliance. There is ground for much searching of heart concerning this.
Many treat unbelief as a minor fault, they even regard it rather as an infirmity than
a crime, but the Lord thinketh not so. Faith is Jehovah's due, especially from those
who claim to be the people of his pasture, and yet more emphatically from those
whose long life has been crowded with evidences of his goodness: unbelief insults
one of the dearest attributes of Deity, it does so needlessly and without the slightest
ground and in defiance of all sufficient arguments, weighty with the eloquence of
love. Let us in reading this psalm examine ourselves, and lay these things to heart.
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 10. O the desperate presumption of man, that he should offend his Maker forty
years! O the patience and longsuffering of his Maker, that he should allow him forty
years to offend in! Sin begins in the heart, by its desires wandering and going astray
after forbidden objects; whence follows inattention to the ways of God, to his
dispensations, and our own duty. Lust in the heart, like vapour in the stomach, soon
affects the head, and clouds the understanding. —George Horne.
Ver. 10. Forty Years. It is curious to know that the ancient Jews believed that "the
days of the Messiah were to be forty years." Thus Tanchuma, F. 79, 4. "Quamdiu
durant anni Messiae? R. Akiba dixit, 40 annos, quemadmodum Israelitae per tot
annos in deserto fuerunt." It is remarkable, that in forty years after the ascension,
the whole Jewish nation were cut off equally as they who fell in the wilderness. —
John Brown, in "An Exposition of the Epistle to the Hebrews." 1862.
Ver. 10. Was I grieved. The word is a strong wold, expressive of loathing and
disgust. —J.J.S. Perowne.
Ver. 10. This generation. The word rwd, dor, signifies an age, or the allotted term of
human life; and it is here applied to the men of an age, as if the psalmist had said,
that the Israelites whom God had delivered were incorrigible, during the whole
period of their lives. —John Calvin.
Ver. 10. It is a people that do err in their heart. We may observe here, that he does
not simply say, This people errs. What mortal is there that does not err? Or where is
there a multitude of mortals, exposed to no errors? But he adds, "In their heart."
Every error therefore is not blamed here, but the error of their heart is fastened
upon. It is to be noted, therefore, that there is a twofold kind of error:
1. One is of the intellect, by which we go astray through ignorance. In this kind of
erring Paul erred when he persecuted the Church of Christ; the Sadducees erred,
not knowing the Scriptures, Matthew 22:29; and to this day many in the Church go
astray, endowed with zeal for God, but destitute of a true knowledge of Him.
2. The other kind of erring is of the heart and affections, by which men go astray,
not through ignorance, but through corruption and perversity of heart. This error
of heart is a mind averse to God, and alienated from the will and way of God, which
is elsewhere thus described in the case of this very people: "And their heart was not
right with Him." —Musculus.
Ver. 10. It is a people that do err in their heart. In err in heart may mean either to
err in judgment, or in disposition, intention: for the Hebrew bbl, and after it the
Greek kardia, means either animus, judicium, or, mens, cogitatio, desiderium. I

68. understand kardia here, as used according to the Hebrew idiom (in which it is often
pleonastic, at least it seems so to us,)so that the phrase imports simply, They always
err, i.e. they are continually departing from the right way. —Moses Stuart.
Ver. 10. Err in their heart. He had called them sheep, and now he notes their
wandering propensity, and their incapacity for being led; for the footsteps of their
Shepherd they did not know, much less follow. —C.H.S.
Ver. 10. They have not known my ways; that is, they have not regarded my ways,
have not allowed of them, or loved them; for otherwise they were not ignorant of
them; they heard his words, and saw his works. —David Dickson.
Ver. 10. They have not known my ways. This ungrateful people did not approve of
God's ways—they did not enter into his designs— they did not conform to his
commands—they paid no attention to his miracles—and did not acknowledge the
benefits which they received from his hands. —Adam Clarke.
Ver. 10. A people that do err in their heart, & c. These words are not to be found in
umbers 14:1-45; but the inspired Psalmist expresses the sense of what Jehovah
said on that occasion. "They do always err in their heart", (Hebrews 3:10). They are
radically and habitually evil. They have not known my ways. God's "ways" may
mean either his dispensations or his precepts. The Israelites did not rightly
understand the former, and they obstinately refused to acquire a practical
knowledge—the only truly valuable species of knowledge—of the latter. The
reference is probably to God's mode of dealing: Romans 11:33 De 4:32, 8:2, 29:2-4.
Such a people deserved severe punishment, and they received it. So I sware in my
wrath, They shall not enter into my rest. The original words in the Hebrew are, "If
they shall enter into my rest." This elliptical mode of expressing oaths is common in
the Old Testament: De 1:35, 1 Samuel 3:14, Psalms 89:35, Isaiah 62:8. This awful
oath is recorded in umbers 14:21-29 : "But as truly as I live, all the earth shall be
filled with the glory of the Lord. Because all those men which have seen my glory,
and my miracles, which I did in Egypt, and in the wilderness, and have tempted me
now these ten times, and have not hearkened to my voice; surely they shall not see
the land which I sware unto their fathers, neither shall any of them that provoked
me see it: but my servant Caleb, because he had another spirit with him, and hath
followed me fully, him will I bring into the land whereinto he went; and his seed
shall possess it. ( ow the Amalekites and the Canaanites dwelt in the valley.)
Tomorrow turn you, and get you into the wilderness by the way of the Red Sea. And
the Lord spoke unto Moses and unto Aaron, saying, How long shall I bear with this
evil congregation, which murmur against me? I have heard the murmurings of the
children of Israel which they murmur against me. Say unto them, As truly as I live,
saith the LORD, as ye have spoken in mine ears, so will I do to you: your carcases
shall fall in this wilderness; and all that were numbered of you, according to your
whole number, from twenty years old and upward, which have murmured against
me." The words of the oath seem here borrowed from the account in De 1:35. There
are many threatenings of God which have a tacit condition implied in them; but
when God interposes his oath, the sentence is irreversible.
The curse was not causeless, and it did come. We have an account of its actual
fulfilment, umbers 26:64-65. The "rest" from which they were excluded was the
land of Canaan. Their lives were spent in wandering. It is termed "God's rest", as
there he was to finish his work of bringing Israel into the land promised to their

69. fathers, and fix the symbol of his presence in the midst of them, —dwelling in that
land in which his people were to rest from their wanderings, and to dwell in safety
under his protection. It is His rest, as of His preparing, De 12:9. It is His rest—rest
like His, rest along with Him. We are by no means warranted to conclude that all
who died in the wilderness came short of everlasting happiness. It is to be feared
many of them, most of them, did; but the curse denounced on them went only to
their exclusion from the earthly Canaan. —John Brown.
Ver. 10-11. And said. Mark the gradation, first grief or disgust with those who erred
made him say; then anger felt more heavily against those who did not believe made
him swear. The people had been called sheep in Psalms 95:7, to sheep the highest
good is rest, but into this rest they were never to come, for they had not known or
delighted in the ways in which the good Shepherd desired to lead them. —John
Albert Bengel.
COFFMA , "Verse 10
"Forty years long was I grieved with that nation,
And said, It is a people that do err in their heart,
And they have not known my ways."
Alas, the tragic story of the wilderness sojourn of Israel is prophetic of the church of
Christ itself. The current dispensation of God's grace corresponds in many ways to
the probationary journey of Israel from the Red Sea to the Jordan, typical, as they
are, of the Christian's journey from the waters of his baptism to the Jordan of
death.
Only two exceptions survived the death of that generation, namely, Caleb and
Joshua, and these two symbolize the "few" that shall be saved among the legions of
alleged believers in Christ. Christians, in ordering their walk before God, should
ever remember that, " arrow is the gate, and straitened the way, that leadeth unto
life; and few there be that find it" (Matthew 7:14).
Those scholars who like to dwell on the liturgical use of this psalm, generally assign
it to the great Jewish Festival of Tabernacles. At Psalms 95:7, above, a priest is
supposed to have interrupted the singing with the blunt warning of Psalms 95:7-11,
recounting the disaster that came to Israel in the wilderness, resulting in the loss of
an entire generation of them.
Kidner pointed out the appropriateness of this warning to such an occasion as the
Feast of Tabernacles. That great Jewish feast commemorated the stirring events of
the Wilderness Wanderings; and the people, recalling those days of the
homelessness of the people, re-lived those eventful times by constructing brash
arbors (as we would call them) and living in those make-shift residences during the
week of the festival.
Kidner noted that, "If Israel, in holiday mood, remembering the history of the

70. Wilderness, and perhaps romanticizing it (as all of us are tempted to do for `the
good old days'), actually received this warning at the Feast of Tabernacles, it would
have been a cold douche of realism."[9] It would have starkly reminded the whole
nation of how utterly displeased was the Heavenly Father with that first generation
that he led out of Egyptian slavery. Let it be noted that this psalm's being identified
with the feast of Tabernacles cannot exclude its Davidic authorship.
WHEDO , "10. Forty years long was I grieved—That is, disgusted, made to loathe,
as the word imports. This not only illustrates the long suffering of God, but the
incurable malignity of their sin. After all their bitter experience and rejection at
Kadesh, the remaining thirty-eight years of wandering in the desert offered nothing
pleasing to God, and effected no radical change in their manners. othing is
recorded of those years of wandering except the names of their principal
encampments. See on Psalms 90:9.
Generation—To be understood qualitatively and not quantitatively; of the nature or
kind of people, rather than the simple, aggregate body of those who perished in the
wilderness. See note on Psalms 22:30.
Err in their heart—The evil lay deep in the moral nature, as at enmity with God.
“Err,” here, means confused, wandering; descriptive of one who has lost his way,
and who fails in all his efforts to regain it. This was because of the state of their
heart, which made them inapt to learn God’s ways.
BE SO , "Psalms 95:10. Forty years long, &c. — or did they cease their
discontented murmurings and distrust of me; but persisted in their stubborn
infidelity and disobedience for the space of forty years; was I grieved with this
generation — Or rather, with that generation, which then lived, who were your
ancestors; and said, It is a people that do err in their heart — They not only sin
through infirmity, and the violence and surprise of temptation, but their hearts are
insincere and inconstant, and given to backsliding, and therefore there is no hope of
their amendment. And they have not known — Or, they do not know, namely, with
a practical and useful knowledge; they do not rightly understand, nor duly consider,
nor seriously lay to heart, my ways — That is, either, 1st, My laws, or statutes,
which are frequently called God’s ways; or, rather, 2d, My works, as it is explained
Psalms 95:9, which also are often so called. They do not know nor consider those
great things which I wrought for them and among them.
PULPIT, "Forty years long was I grieved with this generation; rather, with that
generation—the generation that tempted God in the wilderness (see the Revised
Version). And said, It is a people that do err in their heart; literally, a people of
wanderers in heart are these; i.e. "not only are they a people whose feet wander
(Psalms 107:4), but their hearts also have wandered and gone astray from my
paths." And they have not known my ways. "My ways—the ways of my
commandments—are unknown to them, untrodden by them."

71. EXPOSITOR'S DICTIO ARY, "Wrong in the Heart
Psalm 95:10
We must get at the notion that people, including ourselves first and foremost, are in
the sight of God wrong at the heart. It is there that revivals take place. A revival is
not a reformation; a true spiritual revival is not a universal washing of face and
hands. There are many who have doubts and hesitations about what theologians are
disposed to call the Fall; I will not discuss that question; my business is not with the
Fall, but with the fallen, the living fact, the putrid humanity that is about me and in
me.
I. So many people would make the inner life a mere question, as it were, one among
a thousand. It is in reality a fact by itself; it is without parallel, it is a solemn
loneliness; it is the soul face to face with its own immortality. In the text we seem to
have gotten down upon the very rock of this whole question. We must have done
Song of Solomon , because the text is an utterance of the Divine lips. The text Isaiah
, "It is a people that do err in their hearts," in their very soul, in their very blood.
II. Many persons look upon society as if it were merely cutaneously affected,
something the matter with the skin, with the surface of things, but the Great Healer,
who hails from Gilead and brings balm with Him, says, Stand aside: this is not a
question of the skin, but of the heart, of the very source of the blood stream; this is a
case of blood-poisoning, life-poisoning.
Whatever the application Isaiah , it must be fundamental, internal, spiritual,
complete. Where do you find that remedy? Only in one place. "The blood of Jesus
Christ cleanseth from all sin."
III. There again and again and evermore we are thrown back upon the Divine and
the eternal. This is a great tribute to the majesty of man. He never is anywhere so
eulogized, if the expression may be allowed, as in the Bible; never is he so
humiliated, never is he so recognized and praised, as in the Bible. How great must
he be who can be cured only by God! We start at our humiliations, and thence we
proceed by the help of the Holy Ghost to see how besotted and befooled we are, and
then we are led to the fountain opened in the house of David for sin and for
uncleanliness.
—Joseph Parker, City Temple Pulpit, vol. v. p222.
EBC, "But before He cast Israel out, He pled with them, as Psalms 95:10 b goes on
to tell: "He said, ‘A people going astray in heart are they."’ He said so, by many a
prophet and many a judgment, in order that they might come back to the true path.
The desert wanderings were but a symbol, as they were a consequence, of their
wanderings in heart. They did not know His ways; therefore they chose their own.
They strayed in heart; therefore they had an ever-increasing ignorance of the right
road. For the averted heart and the blind understanding produce each other.

72. The issue of the long-protracted departure from the path which God had marked
was, as it ever is, condemnation to continue in the pathless wilderness, and exclusion
from the land of rest which God had promised them, and in which He Himself had
said that He would make His resting place in their midst. But what befell Israel in
outward fact was symbolical of universal spiritual truth. The hearts that love
devious ways can never be restful. The path which leads to calm is traced by God,
and only those who tread it with softened hearts, earnestly listening to His voice, will
find repose even on the road, and come at last to the land of peace. For others, they
have chosen the desert, and in it they will wander wearily, "forever roaming with a
hungry heart."
The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews is laying hold of the very kernel of the
psalm, when he adduces the fact that, so many centuries after Moses, the warning
was still addressed to Israel, and the possibility of entering the Rest of God, and the
danger of missing it, still urged, as showing that the Rest of God remained to be won
by later generations, and proclaiming the eternal truth that "we which have
believed do enter into rest."
11 So I declared on oath in my anger,
‘They shall never enter my rest.’”
BAR ES, "Unto whom I sware in my wrath - See the notes at Heb_3:11.
That they should not enter into my rest - Margin, as in Hebrew, “If they enter
into my rest.” The “rest” here referred to was the land of Canaan. They were not
permitted to enter there as a place of “rest” after their long and weary wanderings, but
died in the wilderness. The meaning is not that none of them were saved (for we must
hope that very many of them were brought to the heavenly Canaan), but that they did
not come to the promised land. Unbelief shut them out; and this fact is properly made
use of here, and in Heb. 3, as furnishing a solemn warning to all not to be unbelieving
and rebellious, since the consequence of unbelief and rebellion must be to exclude us
from the kingdom of heaven, the true place of “rest.”
GILL, "Unto whom I sware in my wrath,.... Being angry with them, he sware for
the confirmation of what he said; the form of the oath was, "as truly as I live"; he sware
by himself, for he could swear by no greater; see Num_14:21.
that they should not enter into my rest; the land of Canaan, or Israel, as Kimchi;
which the Lord provided, promised, and gave to the Israelites, as their rest; the land of

73. Israel and Jerusalem, as Jarchi; or the house of the sanctuary, the temple, as the
Targum; which Jehovah chose for his rest, and took it up in it, and where he promised
the Messiah, the Prince of peace, who gives to his people spiritual and eternal rest.
Canaan was typical of the rest which remains for the people of God; the use that
believing Jews, and all Christians under the Gospel dispensation, are to make of this, see
in Heb_3:18.
HE RY, " The sentence passed upon them for their sin (Psa_95:11): “Unto whom I
swore in my wrath, If they shall enter into my rest, then say I am changeable and
untrue:” see the sentence at large, Num_14:21, etc. Observe, [1.] Whence this sentence
came - from the wrath of God. He swore solemnly in his wrath, his just and holy wrath;
but let not men therefore swear profanely in their wrath, their sinful brutish wrath. God
is not subject to such passions as we are; but he is said to be angry, very angry, at sin and
sinners, to show the malignity of sin and the justice of God's government. That is
certainly an evil thing which deserves such a recompence of revenge as may be expected
from a provoked Deity. [2.] What it was: That they should not enter into his rest, the rest
which he had prepared and designed for them, a settlement for them and theirs, that
none of those who were enrolled when they came out of Egypt should be found written
in the roll of the living at their entering into Canaan, but Caleb and Joshua. [3.] How it
was ratified: I swore it. It was not only a purpose, but a decree; the oath showed the
immutability of his counsel; the Lord swore, and will not repent. It cut off the thought
of any reserve of mercy. God's threatenings are as sure as his promises.
Now this case of Israel may be applied to those of their posterity that lived in David's
time, when this psalm was penned; let them hear God's voice, and not harden their
hearts as their fathers did, lest, if they were stiffnecked like them, God should be
provoked to forbid them the privileges of his temple at Jerusalem, of which he had said,
This is my rest. But it must be applied to us Christians, because so the apostle applies it.
There is a spiritual and eternal rest set before us, and promised to us, of which Canaan
was a type; we are all (in profession, at least) bound for this rest; yet many that seem to
be so come short and shall never enter into it. And what is it that puts a bar in their
door? It is sin; it is unbelief, that sin against the remedy, against our appeal. Those that,
like Israel, distrust God, and his power and goodness, and prefer the garlick and onions
of Egypt before the milk and honey of Canaan, will justly be shut out from his rest: so
shall their doom be; they themselves have decided it. Let us therefore fear, Heb_4:1.
CALVI , "11.Wherefore I have sworn in my wrath I see no objection to the relative
‫,אשר‬ asher, being understood in its proper sense and reading — To whom I have
sworn. The Greek version, taking it for a mark of similitude, reads, As I have sworn
But I think that it may be properly considered as expressing an inference or
conclusion; not as if they were then at last deprived of the promised inheritance
when they tempted God, but the Psalmist, having spoken, in the name of God, of
that obstinacy which they displayed, takes occasion to draw the inference that there
was good reason for their being prohibited, with an oath, from entering the land.
Proportionally as they multiplied their provocations, it became the more evident
that, being incorrigible, they had been justly cut off from God’s rest. (69) The
meaning would be more clear by reading in the pluperfect tense — I had sworn; for
God had already shut them out from the promised inheritance, having foreseen
their misconduct; before he thus strove with them. I have elsewhere adverted to the
explanation which is to be given of the elliptical form in which the oath runs. (70)

74. The land of Canaan is called God’s rest in reference to the promise. Abraham and
his posterity had been wanderers in it until the full time came for entering upon the
possession of it. Egypt had been a temporary asylum, and, as it were, a place of
exile. In preparing to plant the Jews, agreeably to his promise, in their rightful
patrimony of Canaan, God might very properly call it his rest. The word must be
taken, however, in the active sense; this being the great benefit which God bestowed,
that the Jews were to dwell there, as in their native soil, and in a quiet habitation.
We might stop a moment here to compare what the Apostle states in the third and
fourth chapters of his Epistle to the Hebrews, with the passage now before us. That
the Apostle follows the Greek version, need occasion no surprise. (71) either is he
to be considered as undertaking professedly to treat this passage. He only insists
upon the adverb To-day, and upon the word Rest And first, he states that the
expression to-day, is not to be confined to the time when the Law was given, but
properly applies to the Gospel, when God began to speak more openly. The fuller
and more perfect declaration of doctrine demanded the greater share of attention.
God has not ceased to speak: he has revealed his Son, and is daily inviting us to
come unto him; and, undoubtedly, it is our incumbent duty, under such an
opportunity, to obey his voice. The Apostle next reasons from the rest, to an extent
which we are not to suppose that the words of the Psalmist themselves warrant. (72)
He takes it up as a first position, that since there was an implied promise in the
punishment here denounced, there must have been some better rest promised to the
people of God than the land of Canaan. For, when the Jews had entered the land,
God held out to his people the prospect of another rest, which is defined by the
Apostle to consist in that renouncing of ourselves, whereby we rest from our own
works while God worketh in us. From this, he takes occasion to compare the old
Sabbath, or rest, under the Law, which was figurative, with the newness of spiritual
life. (73) When his said that he swore in his wrath, this intimates that he was in a
manner freed to inflict this punishment, that the provocation was of no common or
slight kind, but that their awful obstinacy inflamed his anger, and drew from him
this oath.
SPURGEO , "Ver. 11. Unto whom I sware in my wrath that they should not enter
into my rest. There can be no rest to an unbelieving heart. If manna and miracles
could not satisfy Israel, neither would they have been content with the land which
flowed with milk and honey. Canaan was to be the typical resting place of God,
where his ark should abide, and the ordinances of religion should be established;
the Lord had for forty years borne with the ill manners of the generation which
came out of Egypt, and it was but right that he should resolve to have no more of
them. Was it not enough that they had revolted all along that marvellous wilderness
march? Should they be allowed to make new Messahs and Meribahs in the
Promised Land itself? Jehovah would not have it so. He not only said but swore that
into his rest they should not come, and that oath excluded every one of them; their
carcases fell in the wilderness. Solemn warning this to all who leave the way of faith
for paths of petulant murmuring and mistrust. The rebels of old could not enter in
because of unbelief, "let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering
into his rest, any of us should even seem to come short of it." One blessed inference
from this psalm must not be forgotten. It is clear that there is a rest of God, and that

75. some must enter into it: but "they to whom it was first preached entered not in
because of unbelief, there remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God." The
unbelievers could not enter, but "we which have believed do enter into rest." Let us
enjoy it, and praise the Lord for it for ever. Ours is the true Sabbatic rest, it is ours
to rest from out own works as God did from his. While we do so, let us "come into
his presence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful noise unto him with psalms."
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 11. The word swearing is very significant, and seems to import these two
things. First, the certainty of the sentence here pronounced. Every word of God both
is, and must be truth; but ratified by an oath, it is truth with an advantage. It is
signed irrevocable. This fixes it like the laws of the Medes and Persians, beyond all
possibility of alteration and makes God's word, like his very nature, unchangeable.
Secondly, it imports the terror of the sentence. If the children of Israel could say,
"Let not God speak to us, lest we die, what would they have said had God then
sworn against them?" It is terrible to hear an oath from the mouth but of a poor
mortal, but from the mouth of an omnipotent God, it does not only terrify, but
confound. An oath from God is truth delivered in anger; truth, as I may so speak,
with a vengeance. When God speaks, it is the creature's duty to hear; but when he
swears, to tremble. —Robert South.
Ver. 11. That they should not enter into my rest. There is something unusual and
abrupt in the conclusion of this psalm, without any cheering prospect to relieve the
threatening. This may be best explained by assuming, that it was not meant to stand
alone, but to form one of a series. —J.A. Alexander.
COFFMA , "Verse 11
"Wherefore I sware in my wrath,
That they should not enter into my rest."
THE REST OF GOD
This is no mere reference to the land of Canaan; It refers to the Great Salvation
which God has provided for all mankind. Hebrews 4 exhorts all of us to take care
that we should enter into that glorious rest. The author of Hebrews' tying this rest
in with the "God's resting on the seventh day of creation" is one of the most
instructive revelations in Holy Writ. The rest of God on the seventh day of creation
is a reference to the entire dispensation of God's dealings with the Adamic race; it
also reveals that God's "principal business" of that whole era is the salvation of
people. The implication is that all of the wonderful works of God's creation (from
which he is now resting) are, in some sense, held in abeyance until the sum total of
the redeemed from Adam's race has been achieved.
There remaineth therefore a sabbath rest for the people of God ... Let us therefore
give diligence to enter into that rest, that no man fall after the same example of
(Israel's) disobedience (Hebrews 4:9,11).
ELLICOTT, "(11) I sware.— umbers 14:21-27.

76. Rest.—This is, of course, the Promised Land, as the context unmistakably shows.
The freedom taken with the passage by the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, in
order to make the psalm point us to a “future” rest, was such as Jewish doctors
ordinarily used, and of which other instances occur in the ew Testament—notably
St. Paul’s argument in Galatians 3:16.
WHEDO , "11. I sware in my wrath—A most solemn transaction. The form of the
oath is given umbers 14:21; umbers 14:28-34.
My rest—That is, the land of Canaan, which was the “rest” which God had
prepared for his people from the hardships of their bondage life in Egypt, the
nomad life of their forefathers, (see Hebrews 11:9; Hebrews 11:14,) and their
pilgrim life in the desert. The apostle applies it spiritually to the “rest” of faith
attained in Christ, (Hebrews 4:3; Hebrews 4:8-10,) which also is forfeited by
unbelief.
BE SO , "Psalms 95:11. Unto whom I sware in my wrath, &c. — In my just
displeasure, I passed an irreversible sentence upon them, and confirmed it by an
oath: that they should not enter into my rest — Into the promised land, so called
Deuteronomy 12:9; 1 Chronicles 23:25, of which sentence, see umbers 14. ow this
case of the Israelites, who were prohibited from entering Canaan, is here applied by
the psalmist. 1st, To those of their posterity who lived when this Psalm was
composed, and they are cautioned not to harden their heart, as their forefathers did,
lest, if they were stubborn and disobedient, God should be provoked to prohibit
them from enjoying the privileges of his temple at Jerusalem, of which he had said,
Psalms 132:14, This is my rest. But it was intended also, 2d, For the instruction of all
after ages, as has been observed on Psalms 95:7, and particularly of those Israelites
who should live in the times of the Messiah, that they might take heed of falling after
the same example of unbelief, as the apostle observes from this place, Hebrews 4:11,
where see the notes.
PULPIT, "Unto whom I sware in my wrath; rather, so that that I sware in my
wrath, or "wherefore I sware in my wrath" (for the oath itself, see umbers 14:21-
23; and comp. Deuteronomy 1:34, Deuteronomy 1:35). That they should not enter
into my rest. The "rest" originally intended was that of Canaan, when "the Lord
gave rest unto Israel from all their enemies round about" (Joshua 23:1). But
Canaan was a type of the heavenly rest; and the warning given to the Israel of his
day by the present psalmist is to be regarded as a warning that, if they followed in
the steps of their forefathers, they might miss of that final and crowning "rest,"
which, after the wilderness of this world is traversed, still "remaineth for the people
of God" (see Hebrews 3:7-19; Hebrews 4:1-9).
COKE, "Psalms 95:11. Unto whom I sware— Wherefore I sware, &c. It is well
known, that the land of Canaan was a type of heaven, where, after all his toils, the
good and faithful servant is to enter into the joy of his Lord; and as those Israelites
in the wilderness were not permitted to enter into the land of Canaan, because of

77. their unbelief, their distrust in God's providence, and consequent disobedience; St.
Paul hence takes occasion to exhort the Jews, Hebrews 2:1-4 to accept readily the
terms offered to them by the gospel: and in the subsequent chapter he shews that
the words of the present Psalm are applicable to the state of Christianity; and
intimates to them, that if they persisted in an obstinate refusal of those gracious
offers, they likewise would fall through unbelief.
REFLECTIO S.—1st, The Psalmist opens with a warm exhortation to all around
him, to unite in the delightful work of praise to the great God and Saviour.
1. He directs how they should draw near to him with a joyful noise, not only making
melody in their hearts, but speaking forth his praise in psalms and hymns, and
spiritual songs, with thanksgiving for all his boundless mercies; with humble
reverence and lowly adoration kneeling before him; the posture of their body
expressing the deep abasement of their souls in his presence.
2. He points out abundant matter for their praises.
(1.) He is the rock of our salvation, hath obtained it for his faithful people; and all
who are perseveringly built upon him, are secure from all wrath, and safe from all
enemies.
(2.) He is a great God, partaking of all the essential attributes of Deity; eternal,
omnipotent, omniscient.
(3.) His dominion is universal: He is a great king above all gods; by him all earthly
princes reign, to him all magistrates are accountable, and before him the fictitious
gods of the heathen perish: he is King of kings, and Lord of lords. His dominion is
wide, extending from pole to pole; both land and sea acknowledge his sovereignty:
the deepest recesses of the earth he searches, and the highest mountains are fixed by
his power, and upheld by his providence. ote; If all the world be thus in the hands
of our Jesus, how can his faithful people want any manner of thing that is good?
(4.) He is the maker of all, and therefore justly the owner; by him and in him we live
and move and have our being: he bade the dry land appear, and bound up the great
deep in swaddling-bands. These are thy works, O God; and justly therefore does he
deserve to be praised; of whom are all things, and for whom are all things.
(5.) He stands in a peculiar relation to his believing people, and demands their
grateful tribute of thanksgiving. For he is our God and Saviour, who became
incarnate for us, our substitute and surety; and we are the people of his pasture, and
the sheep of his hand; not merely fed by his providence, but formed for himself by
grace, to be a peculiar people, led by his word and Spirit, and protected by his
power. Well, therefore, may we say in this view, O come, let us sing unto the Lord,
who is so worthy to be praised, and to be had in everlasting remembrance.
2nd, The tribute of our lips is but a vain oblation, unless our lives also shew forth

78. the Saviour's praise; therefore we are called upon,
1. To hear his voice: this is our great duty as the sheep of his hand, who must know
the shepherd's voice, and follow it. ote; If Christ be our Saviour and King, justly
does he expect that we should be obedient subjects: to none but these is he the
author of eternal salvation.
2. This must be done immediately, to-day, while it is called to-day; delays are
dangerous. By nothing are souls more frequently undone than by procrastination;
they put off the concerns of eternity to a more convenient season, and perish ere it
arrives.
3. We are warned of our danger. Harden not your heart against Christ and his
gospel, as the Jews did, who rejected the true Messiah; and as their fathers before
them had done in the wilderness, their whole conduct being one continued scene of
rebellions and provocations against him. ote; (1.) However slightly men pass over
their sins, in God's sight they are highly provoking. (2.) Disbelief of God's promises
is among the greatest insults that we can shew him, yet a crime that we are very apt
to disregard and make light of. (3.) That heart is hardened indeed, which the great
and precious promises of the gospel cannot affect. (4.) It is wise to be warned by
others misfortunes, lest we fall after the same example of unbelief.