Psalms Chapter 117

“O praise the Lord, all ye nations, etc.] The Lord having chosen, and Christ having redeemed, some out of every kindred, tongue, people, and nation; and the Gospel being sent and preached to all nations, and some of each being called and converted by the Spirit of God; they are excited to praise the Lord, Jehovah, Father, Son and Spirit, for their several acts of divine grace and kindness towards them, in choosing, redeeming, and sanctifying them; and in favouring them with the Gospel, and the ordinances of it, and with his gracious presence in them; and in supplying them with his grace, and giving them a right…”

“ALEPH. (Psa 119:1-8). This celebrated Psalm has several peculiarities. It is divided into twenty-two parts or stanzas, denoted by the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Each stanza contains eight verses, and the first letter of each verse is that which gives name to the stanza. Its contents are mainly praises of God's Word, exhortations to its perusal, and reverence for it, prayers for its proper influence, and complaints of the wicked for despising it. There are but two verses (Psa 119:122, Psa 119:132) which do not contain some term or description of God's Word. These terms are of various derivations,…”

“O praise the Lord, all ye nations - The idea is that God has a claim to universal worship, and that all the nations of the earth are under obligations to adore him as the true God. He is not the God of the Hebrew people only, but of all people; his praise should be celebrated not merely by one nation, but by all. This is one of the passages in the Old Testament, anticipating what is more fully disclosed in the New Testament, in which the sacred writer extends his vision beyond the narrow boundaries of Judea, and looks to the world, the whole world, as the theater on which the true religion was to be displayed,…”

“Ps 117 This psalm, the shortest in the Psalter, invites all . . . people of the earth to praise the Lord because of his unfailing love and enduring faithfulness. 117:1 Paul quotes this verse to show that Gentiles would eventually praise the God of Israel (Rom 15:11).”

“(Title), This Psalm, the shortest in the whole collection, is written as a part of the preceding in thirty-two manuscripts. It celebrates the deliverance from the Babylonian captivity, the grand type of the redemption of the world by the Messiah. O praise: Psa 66:1, Psa 66:4, Psa 67:3, Psa 86:9; Isa 24:15, Isa 24:16, Isa 42:10-12; Rom 15:11; Rev 15:4 praise him: Psa 148:11-14, Psa 150:6; Rev 5:9, Rev 7:9, Rev 7:10 Psalms 117:2”

“The thanksgiving Psalm ending in Hallelujah is followed by this shortest of all the Psalms, a Hallelujah addressed to the heathen world. In its very brevity it is one of the grandest witnesses of the might with which, in the midst of the Old Testament, the world-wide mission of the religion of revelation struck against or undermined the national limitation. It is stamped by the apostle in Rom 15:11 as a locus classicus for the fore-ordained (gnadenrathschlussmssig) participation of the heathen in the promised salvation of Israel. Even this shortest Psalm has its peculiarities in point of language. אמּים (Aramaic…”