A Song Large Enough for Israel and the Nations

Burnt offerings were burned whole on the altar. Peace offerings, shelamim, were mostly eaten by the worshippers, with the fat burned and portions given to the priest (Leviticus 3 and 7:11–15). The food handed out in verse 3 comes from these sacrifices. 2 Samuel 6:17 says the ark was set “in his place”; Chronicles says “in the midst of the tent”.

Blessing the people in the name of the LORD is the charge given to Aaron and his sons in Numbers 6:23–27. The king does it here, as Solomon will at the dedication of the temple, standing to bless “all the congregation of Israel” (1 Kings 8:14 and 55).

“A good piece of flesh” translates eshpar, a word found only here and in 2 Samuel 6:19, whose meaning is uncertain; it may be a portion of meat or a date cake. “A flagon of wine” is ashishah, now generally understood as a cake of pressed raisins, the “flagons” of Song of Solomon 2:5 and Hosea 3:1.

The three verbs are lehazkir, to record or bring to remembrance, lehodot, to give thanks, and lehallel, to praise. The first is the heading of Psalms 38 and 70, “to bring to remembrance”, and the other two run through the Psalter. The Levites’ duties are named with the vocabulary of the psalm titles.

Only Asaph of the three chief singers is left in Jerusalem. Heman and Ethan, here called Jeduthun, are sent with the priests to Gibeon (verses 41–42). Most of the names repeat the second-rank players of 15:18–21, and Jeiel appears twice in the same verse.

Numbers 10:2 ordered Moses to make two silver trumpets, and here two priests blow them. “Continually” is tamid, the word used for the daily offering, the tamid of morning and evening. Before the ark in Jerusalem there was no altar, but there was a standing sound.

The Hebrew can be read as “on that day David first appointed that thanks be given to the LORD by the hand of Asaph”, establishing a practice more than handing over a finished text. “First” marks it as the beginning, the day Chronicles gives as the start of thanksgiving by appointed singers.

The same line opens Psalm 105 and appears word for word in Isaiah 12:4, a sign that it was a stock call to praise. “The people” is plural, ammim, the peoples, so Israel is told from the first line to tell other nations what God has done.

“Sing psalms” is zammeru, to sing with instruments, the verb behind mizmor, a psalm. “Talk ye” is siach, which covers both talking and musing, meditation spoken half aloud. The wonders are to be both played and thought about.

“Glory ye” is hithallelu, “boast yourselves”, the reflexive form of hallel, praise, the root of hallelujah. The people are told to boast, but the boast is in the name. “Them that seek” uses biqqesh, a second verb for seeking beside darash, which follows in the next verse.

“His strength” can refer to the ark itself: Psalm 78:61 says God “delivered his strength into captivity” when the Philistines took it. Sung on the day the ark came into Jerusalem, “seek the LORD and his strength” had a physical object in view. “His face” is his presence.

“Wonders” is mophetim, the word for the signs Moses performed before Pharaoh (Exodus 7:3). “The judgments of his mouth” are the verdicts God pronounced, the plagues announced before they struck. The call to remember points back to the exodus.

Psalm 105:6 reads “O ye seed of Abraham his servant”. Chronicles has “seed of Israel”, which puts Jacob, the father of the twelve tribes, in Abraham’s place. Chronicles consistently calls the patriarch Israel, and so the whole assembly hears itself addressed by the name of its father.

“The LORD our God” is covenant language, the God of one people; “in all the earth” claims the whole world as the field of his verdicts. The line holds both together without comment. Israel’s own God is presented as the judge of every nation.

Psalm 105:8 reads “He hath remembered his covenant for ever”. Chronicles has “Be ye mindful”, a command to the people, so God’s remembering has become Israel’s duty. “A thousand generations” is Moses’ figure in Deuteronomy 7:9 for how long God keeps covenant with those who love him.

The covenant with Abraham was cut in Genesis 15:18, and the oath was repeated to Isaac: “I will perform the oath which I sware unto Abraham thy father” (Genesis 26:3). Chronicles spells Isaac’s name with the usual letters, where Psalm 105:9 has a rarer spelling of it.

“A law” is choq, a statute, the word for a fixed decree. A promise is called a statute, something binding on the one who made it. The promise was confirmed to Jacob at Bethel, where God gave him the land he was sleeping on (Genesis 28:13).

“The lot” is chevel, a measuring cord, the surveyor’s line that marked out a plot, as in Psalm 16:6, “The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places.” The verse moves from “thee” to “your”, from one patriarch to all his descendants, in a single breath.

Psalm 105:12 says “when they were but a few men”. Chronicles reads “when ye were”, putting the singers’ audience into their ancestors’ place. Jacob himself had complained, “I being few in number” (Genesis 34:30), afraid his household would be destroyed.

Abraham moved from Ur to Haran, to Canaan, down to Egypt and to Gerar; Jacob went to Haran and back, and ended his life in Egypt. “From one kingdom to another people” covers their movement through Egypt, Philistine Gerar and the Canaanite city-states.

Pharaoh was struck “with great plagues” because he had taken Sarai (Genesis 12:17). “He suffered no man to do them wrong” describes the whole of the patriarchs’ wandering: foreign rulers held power over them, and God held power over those rulers.

“Touch not” uses the verb of Abimelech’s decree over Isaac in Genesis 26:11: “He that toucheth this man or his wife shall surely be put to death.” “Mine anointed” is plural, meshichai, one of the rare places the word is used of the patriarchs instead of a king or priest.

The song moves on to Psalm 96, but it leaves out that psalm’s first line, “O sing unto the LORD a new song”. What remains opens directly with “all the earth”. “Shew forth” is the verb for announcing good news, applied to salvation, told “from day to day”.

“The heathen” is goyim, the nations. In 1611 “heathen” was the ordinary word for nations outside Israel, not yet chiefly an insult. The command to declare his glory among them goes out on the same day that the ark arrives in a Jerusalem tent.

“Feared above all gods” recalls the Song of the Sea: “Who is like unto thee, O LORD, among the gods?” (Exodus 15:11). “Greatly to be praised” is one of the formulas of the Psalms, repeated in Psalm 48:1 and 145:3.

“Idols” is elilim, which means nothings, worthless things, and sounds like elohim, gods. The pun makes the gods into nothings in the very word used for them. The contrast rests on one clause: they are nothing, but the LORD made the heavens.

Psalm 96:6 reads “strength and beauty are in his sanctuary”. Chronicles has “strength and gladness are in his place”, perhaps because there was not yet any sanctuary, only a tent. Chedvah, gladness, is a late word found elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible only in Nehemiah 8:10, “the joy of the LORD is your strength”.

“Give” is havu, ascribe, repeated three times as in Psalm 29:1–2, where the call goes to the heavenly beings. Here it goes to “the kindreds of the people”, mishpechot ammim, the families of the peoples, the phrase of God’s promise that in Abraham “all families of the earth” would be blessed (Genesis 12:3).

Psalm 96:8 says “come into his courts”; Chronicles has “come before him”, since there were no courts yet. “The beauty of holiness” may mean holy attire, the splendid dress worn for worship. Jehoshaphat’s singers “praise the beauty of holiness” as they march ahead of the army (2 Chronicles 20:21).

“Fear before him” is chilu, to tremble or writhe, the verb for a woman in labour. “That it be not moved” is bal timmot, “it shall not totter”. The earth shakes before God, but the world he set in place does not give way.

“The LORD reigneth”, YHWH malakh, is the cry that opens Psalms 93, 97 and 99. Psalm 96:10 has it before the line about the world being established; Chronicles moves it after the call for the heavens and earth to rejoice, so the nations speak it last.

“Roar” is ra’am, to thunder. In Hebrew poetry the sea is often the power God subdues, and here it is invited to thunder in praise instead of rage. “The fulness thereof” means everything that fills it, every creature in it.

Psalm 96:13 has “he cometh” twice, then adds “he shall judge the world with righteousness, and the people with his truth”. Chronicles says it once and ends there. The trees “sing out” in the Hebrew, ranan, a ringing shout of joy.

The line opens Psalms 106, 107, 118 and 136. “Mercy” is chesed, steadfast love, the loyalty that keeps a covenant. The refrain is so fixed that Jeremiah 33:11 foresees it sung again in the ruined streets of Jerusalem, by “them that shall say, Praise the LORD of hosts: for the LORD is good.”

Psalm 106:47 reads “Save us, O LORD our God”; Chronicles adds “And say ye”, making the prayer an instruction to the singers, and calls God “God of our salvation”. “Gather us together” has the scattered in view, although the ark has just been brought in with Israel gathered.

This is the doxology that closes the fourth book of the Psalms (Psalm 106:48), where it ends with a command: “let all the people say, Amen.” Chronicles reports it as done: “all the people said, Amen, and praised the LORD.” The command is shown being obeyed.

“As every day’s work required” is literally “the matter of a day in its day”, the idiom used of the manna, gathered “a certain rate every day” (Exodus 16:4). Worship before the ark was portioned out by the day, each day’s duty done on its day.

Sixty eight brethren with Obed-edom. “Obed-edom also the son of Jeduthun” may be the same man identified by his father or a second Obed-edom; the text does not say. Hosah is the Merarite gatekeeper whose lot fell to the west in 26:10–16.

“The high place” is bamah, a word the books of Kings use mostly for forbidden shrines, but here it is the lawful sanctuary where Moses’ tabernacle stood. Solomon went there to sacrifice, and 1 Kings 3:4 calls it “the great high place”. Zadok served there, away from the ark.

The morning and evening burnt offering is the tamid of Exodus 29:38–42, one lamb at dawn and one at dusk, every day. “According to all that is written” is a Chronicles formula: the book keeps pointing to the written law as the standard for sacrifice.

“Because his mercy endureth for ever” becomes the words these singers were chosen to sing. At the dedication of Solomon’s temple the same line is sung, and the house fills with the cloud (2 Chronicles 5:13). “Chosen” means picked out by name for the post.

“Musical instruments of God” may mean instruments set apart for God’s service. 2 Chronicles 7:6 speaks of “instruments of musick of the LORD, which David the king had made”, and Amos 6:5 mocks those who “invent to themselves instruments of musick, like David”. The king had a name as a maker of instruments.

David has now blessed twice in one day, the people in verse 2 and his own household here, with the same verb. Everyone goes home. The next chapter opens with David at home looking at his own house of cedar.