Psalms · Chapter 67

Verse 1. God be merciful unto us] Show the Jewish people thy mercy, bless them in their bodies and souls and give a full evidence of thy approbation. This is nearly the same form of blessing as that used Numbers 6:25, where see the notes. See Clarke “Numbers 6:25”.

Verses 1, 2. God be merciful to us — Thy people Israel. And cause his face to shine upon us — As thou hast hid thy face, or withdrawn the tokens of thy favour from us, so do thou now manifest them to us. That thy way may be known upon earth — The way wherein thou requirest men to walk, the way of thy precepts, the way of truth, or the true religion; that by the peculiar and distinguishing tokens of thy favour to us, the heathen world may be convinced of the truth and importance of our religion, may be induced to renounce their idols and their vices, to believe in thee the only living and true God, and embrace thy worship and service, expecting no good but from thee. Thy saving health — Hebrew, Ët[wvy, thy salvation, termed, God’s way, in the preceding clause, and both expressions, taken together, signify the way of salvation, which the psalmist desires may be known among all nations. This the ancient and godly Jews expected would be the case at the coming of the Messiah, who is called God’s salvation, and also the way, the truth, and the life, Luke 2:30; John 14:6. And so the sense of the passage is, Deal thus graciously with thy people Israel, that the Gentile world may at last be allured to unite themselves to them, to become proselytes to their religion, and receive their Messiah for their King and Saviour, when he shall be manifested, saying, We will go with you, for we have heard that God is with you, Zechariah 8:23.

1. God be merciful unto us—An invocation, repeated in verses 6, 7, and founded on the form of blessing by the high priest, Numbers 6:23-26.

V. 2. Thy way-The way of truth, or the true religion; the same which in the next clause is called his saving health, and both together signify the way of salvation; deal so graciously with thy people, that thereby the Gentile-world may at last be allured to join with them.

Verse 2. That thy way may be known] That thy will, thy gracious designs towards the children of men, thy way of reconciling them to thyself, of justifying the ungodly, and sanctifying the unholy, may be known to all the nations upon the earth! God’s way is God’s religion; what he walks in before men; and in which men must walk before him. A man’s religion is his way of worshipping God, and going to heaven. The whole Gospel is called this way, Acts 19:9.

Thy saving health] Ëישועת yeshuathecha, “thy salvation.” The great work which is performed in God’s way, in destroying the power, pardoning the guilt, cleansing from the infection, of all sin; and filling the soul with holiness, with the mind that was in Christ. Let all nations-the whole Gentile world, know that way, and this salvation!

Verses 1, 2. God be merciful to us — Thy people Israel. And cause his face to shine upon us — As thou hast hid thy face, or withdrawn the tokens of thy favour from us, so do thou now manifest them to us. That thy way may be known upon earth — The way wherein thou requirest men to walk, the way of thy precepts, the way of truth, or the true religion; that by the peculiar and distinguishing tokens of thy favour to us, the heathen world may be convinced of the truth and importance of our religion, may be induced to renounce their idols and their vices, to believe in thee the only living and true God, and embrace thy worship and service, expecting no good but from thee. Thy saving health — Hebrew, Ët[wvy, thy salvation, termed, God’s way, in the preceding clause, and both expressions, taken together, signify the way of salvation, which the psalmist desires may be known among all nations. This the ancient and godly Jews expected would be the case at the coming of the Messiah, who is called God’s salvation, and also the way, the truth, and the life, Luke 2:30; John 14:6. And so the sense of the passage is, Deal thus graciously with thy people Israel, that the Gentile world may at last be allured to unite themselves to them, to become proselytes to their religion, and receive their Messiah for their King and Saviour, when he shall be manifested, saying, We will go with you, for we have heard that God is with you, Zechariah 8:23.

2. That thy way may be known—Literally, for the knowing thy way. The telic use of the preposition denotes the end or object for which the blessing (verse 1) is invoked upon the Church, namely, to the end that the ways of God may be made known in the earth. Thus, in all ages, through his Church, the world is to learn his ways with men. Thy way—Thy method, particularly thy plan of grace. “Way,” here, is the parallel word to salvation in the next line of the verse. Saving health—Hebrew, simply, salvation. “Health” has nothing to answer to it in the original. The fuller form occurs Psalm 28:8, where “saving strength,” is literally strength of salvations. All nations—All Gentile nations. The word usually bears this sense.

Verse 3. Let the people praise thee] When this is done, the people-the Gentiles, will praise thee; all will give thanks to God for his unspeakable gift.

Verses 3-5. Let all the people praise thee — O hasten that time when the Gentiles shall forsake their dumb idols, and serve and praise thee, the living God, as they have abundant cause to do. O let the nations be glad — For thy great mercy to them in rescuing them from the idolatries and superstitions, the errors and vices of their fathers, and in bringing them to the knowledge of thyself, the true God, and of eternal life. For thou shall judge the people — Shalt rule them, as it is explained in the next clause; righteously — Which is the great commendation of any government, and the greatest argument and encouragement to the Gentiles to put themselves under the government of God; and the rather, because they had found by experience the misery of living under the unrighteous and tyrannical government of Satan, and of their idolatrous and heathen rulers. And govern the nations — Hebrew, µjnt, tanchem, shall lead them, namely, gently, as a shepherd doth his sheep, or a general his soldiers, and not rule them with rigour, as other lords have done. “Thou shall hereafter govern them by righteous and good laws, who were before under the government of the prince of this world, and had nothing to guide them but some few laws and tendencies of nature, or some precepts of an old tradition, which are now almost obliterated.”

3. Let all the people praise thee—Hebrew, the peoples, or nations, shall give thee thanks, all of them. A beautiful refrain, repeated in verse 5, and in musical performance sung as a responsive chorus.

V. 4. Judge-Rule them. Govern-Heb. lead; gently, as a shepherd doth his sheep; and not rule them with rigour, as other lords had done.

Verse 4. Glad and sing for joy] They shall be made happy in thy salvation. Even their political state shall be greatly meliorated; for God will be acknowledged the supreme Judge; their laws shall be founded on his word; and the nations of the earth shall be governed according to judgment, justice, and equity,

Selah.] This is true. There are innumerable facts to confirm it. All the nations who have received the Gospel of Christ have been benefited politically, as well as spiritually, by it.

Verses 3-5. Let all the people praise thee — O hasten that time when the Gentiles shall forsake their dumb idols, and serve and praise thee, the living God, as they have abundant cause to do. O let the nations be glad — For thy great mercy to them in rescuing them from the idolatries and superstitions, the errors and vices of their fathers, and in bringing them to the knowledge of thyself, the true God, and of eternal life. For thou shall judge the people — Shalt rule them, as it is explained in the next clause; righteously — Which is the great commendation of any government, and the greatest argument and encouragement to the Gentiles to put themselves under the government of God; and the rather, because they had found by experience the misery of living under the unrighteous and tyrannical government of Satan, and of their idolatrous and heathen rulers. And govern the nations — Hebrew, µjnt, tanchem, shall lead them, namely, gently, as a shepherd doth his sheep, or a general his soldiers, and not rule them with rigour, as other lords have done. “Thou shall hereafter govern them by righteous and good laws, who were before under the government of the prince of this world, and had nothing to guide them but some few laws and tendencies of nature, or some precepts of an old tradition, which are now almost obliterated.”

4. Oh let the nations—The word µym[, (ammeem,) peoples, occurs in the plural seven times in this short psalm; µywg, (goyeem,) nations, Gentiles, once; and xra, (ahretz,) earth, the world, four times, always in connexion with the universal knowledge of God, and the happy effect of the universal acknowledgment of him. The verbs which, in our English version, are rendered optatively as expressing a wish, as, “Let all the people praise thee,” etc., should be read as predictions in the declarative future, “All the people shall praise thee,” etc. The psalm is a glorious anticipation of the universal spread of the gospel, and the conversion of the Gentile nations. Judge… govern—The latter word signifies to lead, as in Psalm 22:3, and 77:20, and is the office of a shepherd. As a ruler, God will judge righteously; as a shepherd, he will lead gently; and when he shall be accepted in these offices by the nations, “Truth shall spring out of the earth, and righteousness shall look down from heaven.” Psalm 85:11.

Verse 5. Let the people praise thee] Seeing the abundance of the blessings which the Gentiles were to receive, he calls again and again upon them to magnify God for such mercies.

Verses 3-5. Let all the people praise thee — O hasten that time when the Gentiles shall forsake their dumb idols, and serve and praise thee, the living God, as they have abundant cause to do. O let the nations be glad — For thy great mercy to them in rescuing them from the idolatries and superstitions, the errors and vices of their fathers, and in bringing them to the knowledge of thyself, the true God, and of eternal life. For thou shall judge the people — Shalt rule them, as it is explained in the next clause; righteously — Which is the great commendation of any government, and the greatest argument and encouragement to the Gentiles to put themselves under the government of God; and the rather, because they had found by experience the misery of living under the unrighteous and tyrannical government of Satan, and of their idolatrous and heathen rulers. And govern the nations — Hebrew, µjnt, tanchem, shall lead them, namely, gently, as a shepherd doth his sheep, or a general his soldiers, and not rule them with rigour, as other lords have done. “Thou shall hereafter govern them by righteous and good laws, who were before under the government of the prince of this world, and had nothing to guide them but some few laws and tendencies of nature, or some precepts of an old tradition, which are now almost obliterated.”

V. 6. Them-When the people of the earth shall be converted to God, God will cause it to yield them abundance of all sorts of fruits. Under which one blessing, all other blessings both temporal and spiritual are comprehended. Our own-He who is Israel’s God in a peculiar manner.

Verse 6. The earth yield her increase] As the ground was cursed for the sin of man, and the curse was to be removed by Jesus Christ, the fertility of the ground should be influenced by the preaching of the Gospel; for as the people’s minds would become enlightened by the truth, they would, in consequence, become capable of making the most beneficial discoveries in arts and sciences, and there should be an especial blessing on the toil of the pious husbandman. Whenever true religion prevails, every thing partakes of its beneficent influence.

Verses 6, 7. Then shall the earth yield her increase — When the inhabitants of the earth shall be converted to the worship and service of the true God, he will take away his curse from the earth, and cause it to yield them abundance of all sorts of fruits. Under which one blessing all other blessings, both temporal and spiritual, are comprehended. And God, even our own God — Who is Israel’s God, in a peculiar manner, by that covenant which he hath made with us; shall bless us — Confer still further and greater blessings upon us at the coming of the Messiah, when all the ends of the earth shall fear him — Shall remember and turn unto the Lord, and worship before him, Psalm 22:27.

Ver. 6. God, the Elohim, even our own God, the Messiah, shall bless us; so the ancients interpret these words.

6. Then shall the earth yield her increase—Which shows that godliness has “promise of the life that now is.” 1 Timothy 4:8; Psalm 85:12. The Hebrew prophets always associated the complete dominion of God in the earth with righteousness, peace, and plenty to all mankind; and that such a state would obtain in Messiah’s reign was their expectation. Isaiah 2:1-5; Psalm 72, and 96:10-13. But the verb is in the perfect tense, “The earth has yielded her increase,” as if in acknowledgment of a recent, abundant harvest, which the author accepts as a pledge of universal blessing yet to come.

Verse 7. God shall bless us] He shall ever be speaking good to us, and ever showering down good things upon us.

The last clause of the sixth verse should be joined to the seventh, as it is in several of the Versions, and should be in all. Many of the fathers, and several commentators, have thought that there is a reference to the Holy Trinity in the triple repetition of the word GOD: “God, our God, shall bless us; God shall bless us;” thus paraphrased in the old Psalter: “Blis us God the Fader: and our God the sone: and blis us and multipli us God the Hali Gast; that swa drede him God, all the endis of erth; for he wil comme to deme rightwysly that unrightwysly was demed. He that kan drede him, he cesses noght to lufe him.”

When or by whom this Psalm was written cannot be ascertained. It seems to be simply a prophecy concerning the calling of the Gentiles, the preaching of the apostles, and the diffusion and influence of Christianity in the world. It is a fine piece of devotion; and it would be nearly impossible to read or repeat it with a cold and unaffected heart.

Verses 6, 7. Then shall the earth yield her increase — When the inhabitants of the earth shall be converted to the worship and service of the true God, he will take away his curse from the earth, and cause it to yield them abundance of all sorts of fruits. Under which one blessing all other blessings, both temporal and spiritual, are comprehended. And God, even our own God — Who is Israel’s God, in a peculiar manner, by that covenant which he hath made with us; shall bless us — Confer still further and greater blessings upon us at the coming of the Messiah, when all the ends of the earth shall fear him — Shall remember and turn unto the Lord, and worship before him, Psalm 22:27.

7. And all the ends of the earth shall fear him—This is the ultimate moral end of all gracious dispensation. Universal piety is here, as everywhere in the prophets, held forth as the guaranty of universal gladness and prosperity, (ver. 2,) and God will cause the world to see it, “for a witness unto all nations,” (Matthew 24:14,) whether they accept the gospel or not.