The dead praise not Jah, neither any that go down into silence;
The psalm answers the nations' taunt, "Where is their God?", by pointing to the God in the heavens above idols that have mouths but cannot speak. Verse 17 is the sharp turn near the end: praise needs living voices, and the dead supply none.
The verse sets two groups apart: those alive to enjoy God's blessing, and the dead who cannot. One writer notes what the psalm leaves untouched:
But the dead know nothing of such blessings, and so they do not praise the Lord (v. 17). Those who share in the resurrection of the just will have infinitely greater blessing in the presence of the Lord. But this psalm, like the Old Testament as a whole, does not take up that great subject. That must wait for the New Testament.
The blessing this psalm sings about has a boundary, and that boundary is earth:
The closing verses show the result of being blessed by the Creator. The heavens are the Lord's, but He has given the earth to the children of men, to hold for His praise. If we are "blessed of the Lord", it is so that we may "Bless the Lord" (vv. 15-16). The psalm does not look beyond death: the blessing it speaks of is not heavenly, as the Christian's is.
So the verse is not gloom but argument — the reply this people can give to those who do not know God:
They speak of the dead as people apart from themselves. The hope they have embraced is being kept alive on earth, not resurrection… What an answer they can give to the nations who do not know God! Jehovah will bless His people, and they will be alive for evermore and will praise Him. For them there is no death.
What does death silence? One writer answers by setting out what a godly Israelite lived for:
A godly Israelite's ambition was to swell that great hallelujah chorus which the last five psalms give us, in the scene those psalms look forward to. Every thought he had of Jehovah's praise was tied to these things: celebrating His praises on earth, training up children for the service of His sanctuary, going up to that temple where the glory of Jehovah could be seen. You see it in that last quotation from Isaiah: "the father to the children shall make known Your truth." Death would cut that declaration short, and make those praises cease.
The same writer places the psalm in a coming day, and says who the dead in view are:
The 115th psalm is prophetic of a future day — a day when a judgment will purify the earth and destroy sinners out of it. Those sinners, I have little doubt, are the ones these passages speak of.
Elsewhere in the Psalms this reasoning becomes a prayer — a ground for asking God to hold back death:
Jesus here pleads (see also Ps. 6:5, Ps. 30:9, Ps. 115:17) for deliverance from death, on the ground that the dead could not praise God, and the grave could not declare Him. For God is not the God of the dead but of the living. "The living, the living, he shall praise You," says King Hezekiah… And so Jesus cries for deliverance on this most blessed plea: God is known in life, not in death. "I shall not die but live, and declare the works of the Lord."
Christians read this verse from the other side of the resurrection. Their hope runs the opposite way:
Heaven was His, and He had given the earth to men. This shows clearly that the earthly blessing is the scene before us. He has not given us the earth, but the cross in it — and heaven, and what is there, as our own things… So, in an even stronger way, the dead do not praise Jehovah. But we (says the Spirit in them) will praise Him from this time, the time of their final deliverance, for evermore. We say, "to depart and to be with Christ is far better."
- Living voices. The dead do not praise; the psalm hands the work of praise to those still alive on earth.
- Living sphere. God kept the heavens and gave the earth to people. The blessing sung here is earthly, and it stops at death's door.
- Living witness. "Silence" ends what the singer lived for: praise at the temple, and passing God's truth on to his children.
- Living God. "Let me live to praise You" is a plea, and Christ Himself took it up. God is known in life, not death.
- Living forever. The New Testament adds what this psalm could not: resurrection, and a departure to be with Christ that is far better.
But *we* will bless Jah from this time forth and for evermore. Hallelujah!
Psalm 115 ends with a vow. It has set the living God against idols, and promised that He will bless His people. Now comes the answer of the blessed — praise without end, sealed with "Praise the LORD!"
The last verse is the outcome of the ones before it. What is being blessed by God for?
The closing verses present the result of being blessed by the Creator. The heavens are the Lord's, but He has given the earth to the children of men, to hold it for His praise. If we are "blessed of the Lord", it is so that we may "Bless the Lord."
The verse says people bless God. What can a person give to a God who needs nothing?
This does not mean that mere man can bless God in the sense of imparting something to Him who is all-sufficient. In the Old Testament as well as the New, the word "blessed" means that He is worthy "to be praised, to celebrate with praises…". So we acknowledge His goodness, and we want to glorify Him.
The verse just before this one says the dead give no praise. The speakers put themselves among the living, and they expect to stay there.
They speak of the dead as people apart from them. The hope they have embraced is preservation on earth, not resurrection. "The dead do not praise the LORD, nor do any who go down into silence. But we will bless the LORD from this time forth and forevermore. Praise the LORD!" What an answer they can give to the nations that do not know God! The LORD will bless His people, and they, alive for evermore, will praise Him. For them there is no death.
So the nations that do not know God get an answer: a people who go on praising Him without end.
Does "forevermore" here mean heaven? The psalm has already handed the earth to the children of men. That sets this hope apart from the Christian's.
This shows how clearly the blessing here is an earthly one. He has not given us the earth, but the cross in it — and heaven, and what is there, as our own. We seek the things which are above, not the things which are on the earth. In an even stronger way, the dead do not praise Jehovah. But we (says the Spirit in them) will praise from this time on — the time of their final deliverance — and for evermore. We say, "to depart and to be with Christ is far better."
How far ahead does the psalmist look?
The psalm does not look beyond death: the blessing of which it speaks is not heavenly as with the Christian. It is the millennial life of blessing that the psalmist has in view. He says, "We will bless the LORD from this time forth and forevermore." Of the heavenly life beyond death he knows nothing.
The psalm's last word, "Hallelujah", follows a pattern across the book of Psalms.
Other Psalms in this book end in the same way — that is, Ps. 115:18, 116:19, 117:2, 135:21, 146:10, 147:20, 148:14, 149:9, 150:6… But this word "Hallelujah" does not appear in the Psalter until the Lord Jesus is seen as having returned to Zion. Psalms 104:35, 105:45, 106:1 and 48 are the only other places in the whole collection where it appears. We may look in vain elsewhere in the Old Testament for that word now so familiar to Christians.
"From this time forth" means praise starts today. The song that fills eternity has to begin somewhere.
Do you praise Him now? Oh let us give praise to our Lord! He has redeemed us by His own blood. He will soon gather us home, to be like Him and forever with Him. Let us sing our hallelujahs now, songs of praise in the night, while we wait for the break of day, the Morning Star. And the end of all for earth and heaven will be the hallelujah chorus, a praise which will never die in all eternity. Hallelujah!
- Blessed → bless. God blesses His people first; their praise is the return, not the payment. The verse is the result of the whole psalm, not a fresh idea.
- Bless means praise. No one adds anything to God. To bless Him is to acknowledge His goodness and call Him worthy.
- Living voices only. The dead go down into silence. God's answer to the nations is a people kept alive and praising.
- Earth, then heaven. Here the "forevermore" is set on earth. The Christian's better portion is to depart and be with Christ.
- Hallelujah last. In the Psalms this word waits for the Lord's return to Zion — and this psalm hands it on to eternity. Start singing it now.