Psalm 113

Psalm 113—Hallelujah!, that is Praise Yah.— 1 Praise, O servants of Yahweh, praise the name of Yahweh! 2 Blessed be the name of Yahweh from this time forth and forevermore! 3 From the rising of the sun to its going down Yahweh’s name is to be praised. 4 Yahweh is high above all nations, His glory above the heavens. 5 Who is like Yahweh our God, who dwells on high, 6 Who humbles Himself to behold the things that are in the heavens and in the earth? 7 He raises the poor out of the dust, and lifts the needy out of the ash heap, 8 that He may seat him with princes— with the princes of His people. 9 He grants the barren woman a home, like a joyful mother of children. Praise Yah! At the Passover, in Jesus' day, they drank from four cups of wine. In modern Seder meals for Passover, this Third Hallel is sung along with the next— Psalm 114 —“before the emptying of the second festal cup." (Delitzsch)— representing plagues or death. In Exod 6:6-7, God says, "Therefore say to the children of Israel: 'I am the LORD; I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, I will rescue you from their bondage (Kiddush Cup -Sanctification), and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great judgments.(Cup of Plagues or death) 'I will take you as My people, and I will be your God. (Cup of Redemption) Then you shall know that I am the LORD your God who brings you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians." (Cup of Adoption) And today, an ornate book called the Haggadah contains the prayers and order of events for the feast. It was compiled in the 13th century A.D. from much earlier fragments. The events are centered on an enameled, brass dish called the Seder Plate which contains a place for other symbolic foods that help re-tell the story of the Exodus from Egypt: the shank bone of a lamb, a hard-boiled egg roasted brown, and a sweet mixture. Praise Jesus— the antitype of all of the symbols. Yah is Salvation. “’Praise, O servants,’ etc. Probably an address to the Levites [symbolic of the people]. The Anglo-Saxon has praise the Lord, ye knaves. Knave signified among our ancestors a servant.” (Clarke) “You who profess to serve and obey Him; who acknowledge Him as your God.” (Barnes) “‘Blessed be the name of Yahweh from this time forth and forevermore!’ From what time? Death- I think St. John gives us a clue to the very hour and moment of which the Psalmist, perhaps unconsciously, spake. He tells us, that when the traitor Judas had received the sop, he immediately went out; and that when he was gone out to clench as it were and ratify his treacherous purpose, Jesus said, ‘Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in Him.’ (John 13:31) From that time forth, when by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, the Son of Man was about to be delivered into the hands of wicked men, and crucified and slain… 'A few more hours and the covenant will be sealed in My own blood; the compact ratified, when I hang upon the cross.’ And how must the Saviour's heart have rejoiced even in the contemplation of those sufferings that awaited Him, as he [in the liturgy] uttered this prediction, ‘From the rising of the sun unto the going down of the same the LORD'S name is to be praised’ (v. 3)! ‘That which thou sowest is not quickened except it die’ (1 Cor 15:36) and thus from that hour to the present the Lord hath added daily to the church those whom in every age and in every clime He hath chosen unto salvation, till, in His own appointed fulness of time, from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south, all nations shall do Him service” (Barton Bouchier) “”Yahweh is high above all nations, His glory above the heavens. who is like Yahweh our God, who dwells on high, who humbles Himself to behold the things that are in the heavens and in the earth?’ Jesus “cannot look above Himself, as having no superiors; nor about Himself, as having no equals; He beholds such as are below Him; and therefore the lower a man is, the nearer unto God; He resists the proud, and gives grace to the humble, 1 Peter 5:5. He pulls down the mighty from their seat, and exalteth them of low degree. The Most High hath special eye to such as are most humble; for, as it followeth in our text, ‘he taketh up the simple out of the dust, and lifteth the poor out of the dirt.’” (John Boys) He formed man from the dust of the earth and breathed into his nostrils the breathe of life and he became a living soul. And He sustains the abased. And He redeems that soul, as symbolized the next cup and verse. “What Hannah so beautifully uttered in her song of Praise [1 Samuel 2] has come [to fulness]. ‘He raises up the poor out of the dust, and lifts the needy out of the dunghill; that He may set him with princes, even with the Princes of His people’(1 Samuel 2:8).” (Arno Gaebelien) “The transition to the ‘people’ is all the more natural, as Hannah, considering herself at the conclusion as the type of the church, with which every individual among the Israelites felt himself much more closely entwined than can easily be the case among ourselves, draws out of the salvation imparted to herself joyful prospects for the future.” (E. W. Hengstenberg) Listen son of man, Jesus regards you. “Though you are poor and mean, and men overlook you; though your brethren hate you, and your friends go far from you, yet hear! God looketh down from His majestic throne upon you. Amidst the infinite variety of His works, you are not overlooked. Amidst the nobler services of ten thousand times ten thousand saints and angels, not one of your fervent prayers or humble groans escapes His ear.” (Job Orton) “‘He grants the barren woman a home, like a joyful mother of children.’ The instances of Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel, the mother of Sampson, Hannah, the woman of Shunem, and Elizabeth, who were long barren, but were at length made joyful mothers, by the special blessing of God, are supposed to have been emblems of the calling of the Gentiles.’” (Thomas Scott) "The barren woman is the poor, forsaken, distressed Christian church, whom the false church oppresses, defies, and persecutes, and regards as useless, miserable, barren, because she herself is greater and more populous, the greatest part of the world.” (Joshua Arndt) “Praise Yah!’ again resounds. "The very hearing of the comfortable changes which the Lord can make and doth make the afflicted to find, is a matter of refreshment to all, and of praise to God from all.” (Dickson)