John Calvin Commentary Psalms 47

Clap your hands, all you peoples. As the Psalmist requires the nations to clap their hands as a sign of their joy and thanksgiving to God—or rather, as he exhorts them to a more than ordinary joy, the vehemence of which breaks forth and manifests itself by external expressions—it is certain that he is here speaking of the deliverance God had worked for them.

If God had established among the Gentiles some formidable kingdom, this would rather have deprived all of their courage and overwhelmed them with despair, than given them reason to sing and leap for joy. Besides, the inspired writer does not here discuss some common or ordinary blessings of God, but such blessings as will fill the whole world with incredible joy and stir up all people to celebrate the praises of God.

What he adds a little later, that all nations were brought into subjection to Israel, must, therefore, necessarily be understood not of slavish subjection, but of a subjection that is more excellent and more desirable than all the kingdoms of the world. It would be unnatural for those who are subdued and brought to submit by force and fear to leap for joy. Many nations were tributary to David and to his son Solomon; but while they were so, they did not cease, at the same time, to murmur and impatiently bore the yoke imposed upon them; they were so far from giving thanks to God with joyful and cheerful hearts.

Since, then, no servitude is happy and desirable except that by which God subdues and brings under the standard and authority of Christ his Son those who before were rebels, it follows that this language is applicable only to the kingdom of Christ, who is called a high and terrible King (Psalms 47:2)—not because he makes the wretched beings over whom he reigns tremble by the tyranny and violence of his rule, but because his majesty, which before had been held in contempt, will be sufficient to quell the rebellion of the whole world.

It should be observed that the design of the Holy Spirit here is to teach that, as the Jews had long been treated with contempt, oppressed with wrongs, and afflicted from time to time with various calamities, the goodness and liberality of God towards them was now all the more illustrious when the kingdom of David had subdued the neighboring nations on every side and had attained such a height of glory.

We may, however, easily gather from the context the truth of what I have suggested: that when God is called a terrible and great King over all the earth, this prophecy applies to the kingdom of Christ. There is, therefore, no doubt that God’s grace was celebrated by these titles to strengthen the hearts of the godly during the intervening period until the advent of Christ. During this time, not only had the triumphant state of the people of Israel fallen into decay, but the people, oppressed with the most bitter contempt, could also have no taste of God’s favor and no consolation from it, except by relying on God’s promises alone.

We know that there was a long interruption of the splendor of the kingdom of God’s ancient people, which continued from the death of Solomon to the coming of Christ. This interval formed, as it were, a gulf or chasm, which would have swallowed up the minds of the godly if they had not been supported and upheld by the Word of God.

Therefore, since God exhibited in the person of David a type of the kingdom of Christ, which is extolled here—even though a sad and almost shameful diminution of the glory of David’s kingdom followed shortly after, then the most grievous calamities, and finally, the captivity and a most miserable dispersion, which differed little from total destruction—the Holy Spirit has exhorted the faithful to continue clapping their hands for joy until the advent of the promised Redeemer.

He has set in order the people under us. Some translate the verb he has subjected; and this agrees with the translation I have given. Others translate it he has led, which is somewhat more remote from the meaning. But to understand the verb ידבר, yadebber, as meaning to destroy, as others do, is altogether at variance with the mind of the prophet, for it is doubtless an advantageous, joyful, and desirable subjection that is meant here.

In Hebrew, the verb is in the future tense, he will set in order; and if any prefer to retain it in this tense, I have no great objection. However, since it is certain that the grace of God to come is celebrated here under the figure of the kingdom of David, I have readily adopted the rendering preferred by other interpreters.

Besides, although in this verse the prophet especially exhorts his own countrymen to gratitude to God because, through his favor, they ruled over all people, it is certain that he also means that those who were subdued are associated with the Jews in this joy. The body does not differ more from the shadow than the feigned expressions of joy with which the Gentile nations honored David long ago differ from those with which the faithful throughout the whole world receive Christ; for the latter flow from the willing obedience of the heart.

And assuredly, if after the ark was brought to the temple, there had not appeared hidden under this figure something far higher, which formed the substance of it, it would have been, as it were, a childish joy to assign to God his dwelling there and to shut him up within such narrow limits.

But when the majesty of God which had dwelt in the tabernacle was manifested to the whole world, and when all nations were brought into subjection to his authority, this prerogative of the offspring of Abraham was then illustriously manifested. The prophet, then, when he declares that the Gentiles will be subdued, so that they will not refuse to obey the chosen people, is describing the kingdom of which he had previously spoken.

We are not to suppose that he here treats of that secret providence by which God governs the whole world, but of the special power which he exercises by means of his word; and, therefore, in order that he may be properly called a King, his own people must necessarily acknowledge him as such.

It may, however, be asked, “Since Christ has brought the Church under his own authority and celestial power, in what sense can it be said that the nations are subject to the Jews, seeing we know that the order of the Church cannot be settled properly, and as it ought to be, unless Christ the only head stands out prominently above all, and all the faithful, from the greatest to the least, keep themselves in the humble rank of members?”

Nay, more, “when Christ established his dominion throughout the whole world, the adoption, which had previously been the peculiar privilege of one people, began to be the common privilege of all nations; and by this means liberty was granted to all together, that, being united to one another by the ties of true brotherhood, they should aspire to the celestial inheritance.” The answer to this is easy: When the yoke of the law was imposed upon the Gentiles, the Jews then obtained sovereignty over them, just as by the word the pastors of the Church exercise the jurisdiction of the Holy Spirit.

For this very reason the Church is called a Queen, and the Mother of all the godly (Galatians 4:26), because divine truth, which is like a scepter to subdue us all, has been committed to her keeping. Although at that time the Jews, when the kingdom of Christ emerged into light, were in a state of wretched and ignominious servitude to Gentile nations and had been, as it were, their slaves, yet sovereignty is truly and justly attributed to them.

This is because God sent the rod of his strength out of Zion (Psalms 110:2); and since they were entrusted with the keeping of the law, their office was to restrain and subdue the Gentiles by its authority.

The only way by which the rest of the world has been brought into subjection to God is that men, being renewed by the Spirit of God, have willingly yielded themselves, docile and tractable, to the Jews and suffered themselves to be under their dominion, as it is said in another passage:

In those days it shall come to pass, that ten men shall take hold out of all languages of the nations, even shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying, We will go with you; for we have heard that God is with you (Zechariah 8:23).

He hath chosen our inheritance for us. The inspired poet here celebrates more distinctly the special grace that God, in his goodness, had conferred on the chosen and holy seed of Abraham. As he passed by all the rest of the world and adopted as his own a people who were few in number and insignificant, so it was fitting that such a clear pledge of his fatherly love should be distinguished from his general goodness, which is extended to all humanity without distinction.

The word chosen is therefore particularly emphatic, implying that God had not dealt with the children of Abraham as he had customarily dealt with other nations without distinction; but that he had conferred on them, so to speak, by hereditary right, a special dignity by which they surpassed all others.

The same thing is expressed immediately afterward by the word glory. Thus the prophet calls for thanksgiving to God for having exalted, in Jacob, his chosen people to the highest degree of honor, so that they might boast that their condition was distinct from that of all other nations.

He shows, at the same time, that this was entirely due to the free and unmerited favor of God. The relative pronoun whom is used instead of a causal conjunction like for or because, as if the Psalmist attributed to God himself the cause of this privilege by which they were distinguished.

Whenever God's favor toward the Jews is praised because he loved their fathers, this principle should always be remembered: that by this, all human merits are nullified. If all the excellence or glory of the holy patriarch depended purely and simply on God's good pleasure, who then can dare to claim anything for himself as uniquely his own?

If God then has given us anything more than others, and so to speak, by special privilege, let us learn to attribute the whole to the fatherly love that he has for us, since he has chosen us to be his flock. We also learn from this passage that the grace that God shows to his chosen is not extended to all people equally, but is a privilege by which he distinguishes a few from the great mass of humanity.

God is gone up with triumph. There is an allusion here to the ancient ceremony observed under the Law. As the sound of trumpets was typically used in solemnizing the holy assemblies, the prophet says that God goes up, when the trumpets encourage and stir up the people to magnify and extol his power.

When this ceremony was performed in ancient times, it was just as if a king, making his entrance among his subjects, presented himself to them in magnificent attire and great splendor, by which he gained their admiration and reverence.

At the same time, the sacred writer, under that ceremony which served as a shadow, doubtless intended to lead us to consider another kind of going up more triumphant—that of Christ when he ascended up far above all heavens (Ephesians 4:10), obtained the empire of the whole world, and, armed with his celestial power, subdued all pride and loftiness.

You must remember what I have mentioned before: that the name Jehovah is here applied to the ark. For although the essence or majesty of God was not confined within it, nor his power and operation fixed to it, yet it was not a vain and idle symbol of his presence.

God had promised that he would dwell among the people as long as the Jews worshipped him according to the rule which he had prescribed in the Law; and he actually showed that he was truly present with them, and that it was not in vain that he was called upon among them.

What is stated here, however, applies more properly to the manifestation of the glory which eventually shone forth in the person of Christ.

In short, the meaning of the Psalmist’s language is this: When the trumpets sounded among the Jews according to the appointment of the Law, that was not a mere empty sound which vanished into the air. For God, who intended the ark of the covenant to be a pledge and sign of his presence, truly presided in that assembly.

From this, the prophet draws an argument for urging upon the faithful the duty of singing praises to God. He argues that by engaging in this exercise, they will not be acting blindly or at random, as the superstitious do, who, having no certainty in their false systems of religion, lament and howl in vain before their idols.

He shows that the faithful have just ground for celebrating with their mouths and with a cheerful heart the praises of God, since they certainly know that he is as present with them as if he had visibly established his royal throne among them.

For God is King of all the earth. The Psalmist, having called God at the end of the preceding verse King of the chosen people, now calls him King of all the earth; and thus, while he claims for the Jews the right and honor of primogeniture, he at the same time joins to them the Gentiles as associates and partakers with them of the same blessing.

By these words he indicates that the kingdom of God would be much more magnificent and glorious at the coming of the Messiah than it was under the shadowy dispensation of the Law, since it would be extended to the utmost boundaries of the earth. To show the greater earnestness in his exhortation, he repeats the words, Sing praises to God, five times.

The word מםכיל, maskil, is used in the singular instead of the plural, for he invites to this exercise all who are skillful in singing. He, no doubt, refers to knowledge in the art of music.

But he requires, at the same time, that the worshippers of God sing the praises of God intelligently, so that there is not the mere sound of tongues, as we know to be the case among the Papists. Knowledge of what is sung is required to engage properly in singing psalms, so that the name of God may not be profaned—as it certainly would be, if there were nothing more than the voice, which melts away or is dissolved in the air.