(An instruction. Of Asaph.) Give ear, O my people, to my law; incline your ears to the words of my mouth.
The psalm opens with a call to listen, and the speaker claims the people as His own. What follows is Israel's history, which raises two questions: who is speaking, and why does a history lesson carry the force of law?
The psalm's heading is the word "Maschil." One commentator explains the kind of learning that word means:
The word Maschil means to become intelligent by receiving instruction. That implies nearness, intimacy and the company of a guide.
Asaph writes the psalm, but the words "my people" belong to a higher speaker. One commentator puts the human author in his place:
It is God who tells His people to give ear to His law and to incline their ears to hear His words — little as they have done so in the past (v. 1). Asaph is His mouthpiece here, and he opens his mouth in a parable. But we look far higher than Asaph for the Source of this parable, which holds dark (or puzzling) truths inside it (v. 2).
By verse 3 the speaker stands among the hearers, who have heard what their fathers told them. Another writer asks who joins the two:
It begins with the right of Jehovah: "Give ear, O my people." But it also stands in the love of the same interests, "which we have heard and known, which our fathers have told us." Who makes this mighty link? It is the Spirit of Christ, who is Jehovah, speaking in the remnant. They recognise His truth among the people, the nation.
Older translations say "law" here where the ESV says "teaching." One commentator weighs the two words:
"Give ear, O my people, to my law." Some would say "instruction," and that is indeed the primary meaning of the word. Yet it is the word regularly used for "law" (torah). We must take it as at least implying the authority that truth always has for the true.
The same writer adds that a word is not less binding because its meaning lies deep:
So it is not only what is clear at first sight that carries authority. Yet how many people excuse themselves from obedience on exactly that ground! "Deep" things are for the deep, they say — for people with the mind for it, or the taste, or the learning, or the leisure, or all of these! But when the psalmist calls these things "deep things" or "parables," is he commending them to us, or the reverse? Does he speak to the many or to the few?
On the face of it, the psalm offers the listener plain national history. One commentator explains why it still counts as a parable:
The psalmist speaks with the authority of one coming from God. He appeals to the people to listen to the testimony of the law. He is about to utter a parable: he gives us, in fact, history. It is history, and history shows us the failure of the people of God. But it is also a parable, teaching the hidden way of God to those who incline their ear to hear. Behind the failure and weakness of the people, such hearers will see the strength of the Lord, the "wonderful works that He has done." So the history of the people turns into "the praises of the Lord."
The hearing asked for here is not meant to stop with the first hearer. One writer points out the place children hold in the psalm:
I notice the teaching of children in it, as the order of blessing. Compare Genesis 18:19; the end of Psalm 22; and Deuteronomy 4:9-10; 6:7; 11:19. It is a distinct feature of that age, and of ordered blessing. It counts greatly on God, and Christianity does not pass it by; see Ephesians 6.
By the end of the psalm, the call to hear the law has led to what law itself could never give:
It sets out the total failure of Israel under God's government. Law can only end in the ruin of sinful man, whatever long-suffering goodness goes with it. Sovereign grace alone avails. The testimony the Lord raised in Jacob was excellent, and the law He set in Israel was holy and good. But what could either do, when the people were what they were? Then He chose Judah, Zion and David, the pledge and security of final blessing and triumph, in the day when the children will indeed learn to profit by their fathers' failure.
- Listen — the heading marks this as a psalm of instruction. That means learning close to a guide, not at a distance.
- Law — the word can be read as "teaching," but it carries the authority truth always has for an honest heart.
- Parable — the psalm hands you history, and under that failure runs the hidden way of God.
- Pass on — teaching the children is the order of blessing, and Christianity keeps that pattern.
- Grace — the history ends where law could not reach. God chose Judah, Zion and David as the security of blessing.
I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter riddles from of old,
Asaph calls his people to listen. He promises a parable and riddles from long ago. Yet what follows is just the story of Israel, from Egypt to David. Two questions follow. Why call plain history a dark saying? And why did Jesus take this line onto His own lips centuries later?
The two phrases in the verse are not two different things. One writer sets the line beside Psalm 49 and draws them together:
What is a parable? In Scripture it is often "a thing darkly or figuratively expressed." So, "I will incline my ear to a proverb; I will solve my riddle to the music of the lyre" (Ps. 49:4)... said the sweet psalmist of Israel, and from his language we gather that a "parable" and a "dark saying" were the same thing.
(The writer's point rests on an older translation of Psalm 49:4, which reads "parable" and "dark saying" where the ESV has "proverb" and "riddle.")
The same Hebrew word appears in other places, and they show its range:
Elsewhere translators give this same Hebrew word as dark speeches (Num. 12:8), riddle (Judges 14:12-19), hard questions (1 Kings 10:1), and dark sentences (Dan. 8:23).
Israel's story was already written down elsewhere. So how does retelling it become a parable?
From beginning to end it is historic — an appeal to facts which we already have in books devoted to the "wonderful works" of the Lord in relation to Israel... But this history, being what it is, is just what is suited to utter divine secrets to the heart that is attentive. It sets God's ways beside these men and their ways... So, since we are men, and the same God is ours and theirs, the history becomes a parable, a comparison. As we set the two side by side, it brings out what we are and what God is to us. The very history becomes a mirror for us, not merely of ourselves, but of ourselves in the light of God.
Calling something a riddle can become an excuse to leave it alone. The same writer answers that dodge:
"Deep" things are for deep people — those who have the mind for it, or the taste, or the learning, or the time, or all of these! Parables, types, prophecies... become nothing but spiritual knick-knacks... But is the psalmist commending these things to us, or the reverse, when he speaks of them as "deep things" or "parables"? Does he address himself to the many or to the few?... There is a spiritual elite, if you like to call it that, but devotedness and diligence of heart define it.
Asaph says "my mouth." But who stands behind that mouth?
Asaph is God's mouthpiece here, who opens his mouth in a parable, but we look far higher than Asaph for the Source of this parable... They had heard something of these things from their fathers. So Asaph was not telling them something new. He was pressing home what the history of Israel means. We often lose the meaning of things we already know.
Asaph speaks the riddle so that it reaches the next generation. One writer sees the same order carried on into Christianity:
I notice the teaching of children as the order of blessing in it... It is not left out even in Christianity: see Ephesians 6:4.
The puzzle is that a people so favoured could fail so completely — and the answer lies outside them:
It sets out the total failure of Israel under God's government. Law can only end in the ruin of sinful man, however much patient goodness comes with it. Sovereign grace alone avails... Do what He would in nature or law, Israel brought Him only shame, with misery on themselves. Then He chose Judah, Zion, and David, the pledge and security of ultimate blessing.
The Gospel record shows this word fulfilled in Jesus. One writer marks both the likeness and the advance:
With this the parables spoken to the crowd end, and He did not speak to them except in parables. The prophet's word was being fulfilled in Him (Ps. 78:2). He was taking the place of another Asaph, to speak of things hidden even deeper than the things Asaph spoke of. So the psalmist's words are quoted freely, not word for word. His deep things lay in a past history, and he was given its meaning to utter. Christ's deep things lay in a history of things still to come. Sadly, its general lesson reflects that older story of another people.
- Riddle. "Parable" and "dark saying" mean one thing: a truth put in figures. Elsewhere the same Hebrew word becomes riddle, hard questions, or dark speeches.
- Mirror. Old history becomes a parable because the same God deals with people like us. It shows us ourselves in His light.
- Open. The psalmist speaks the deep things to the whole people, not to a learned few. The one qualification is devotedness and diligence of heart.
- Handed on. Asaph speaks the riddle so it reaches the children. Teaching children is the order of blessing in this psalm, and Christianity keeps it.
- Answered. Sovereign grace answers the puzzle of total failure under law. The same mouth opens again in Christ, telling a history still to come.
Which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us
Asaph calls his message a parable, but verse 3 says where the material came from: an earlier generation handed it down. So why repeat an old national story, and what should happen to it next?
Where did this material come from? One writer notes that it is already on record in Israel's books:
From beginning to end it is historic — an appeal to facts which we already have in books devoted to the "wonderful works" of the Lord in relation to Israel. For God never left such things to tradition alone. What would tradition be in the hands of people whose incompetence this very history shows so plainly? ... Since we are men, and the same God is ours and theirs, the history becomes a parable, a comparison. As we set things side by side, it brings out what we are and what God is to us. So the very history becomes a mirror for us — not just of ourselves, but of ourselves in the light of God.
The psalmist calls his account a parable, yet what follows is plain national history. One commentator shows how that same story ends in song:
He is about to utter a parable: he gives us, in fact, history. It is history, and it shows us the failure of the people of God. But it is also a parable, teaching the hidden way of God to those who listen. Such listeners will see, behind the failure and weakness of the people, the strength of the Lord — the "wonderful works that He has done." So the history of the people turns into "the praises of the Lord."
One writer describes what happens when our own story and the older one meet:
Then our own history and the history of God's people in every age become one glorious whole. That whole fills the soul with light and blessing. "Things that we have heard and known" and what "our fathers have told us" come into the most instructive agreement. Our lives no longer look like broken, disjointed, meaningless fragments. They are lifted into significance and power. The actors in all this human history become friends and counsellors.
Asaph is not announcing a discovery. His hearers already had the facts — and that is why he had to speak:
They had already heard some of this from their fathers. So Asaph was not telling them something new. He was pressing home the significance of Israel's history. Even though we know such things well, their significance is often lost on us.
One writer gathers the passages that show why God wanted the story told at all:
These passages are enough to make it plain. God placed on the Jewish parent the responsibility of teaching his children His word, His work, and His ways, so that the children's hope might also be in God. They were to teach with the confident expectation of God's blessing on their work. They knew it was not His will that one of their little ones should perish.
Another writer carries the same duty over to Christian homes, and says what to teach:
And well indeed may Christians recount to their children what God has done. We should ground our little ones in the great truths of God's word. Plant the facts of redemption, resurrection, and ascension in their minds and memories.
Being told by your fathers is where faith starts, not where it ends. One commentator looks at three generations of a single family:
It is beautiful to see sincere faith living on in one generation after another of the same family: the grandmother Lois, the mother Eunice, and the child Timothy. But it is beautiful also to read, in the third of those generations, the tears and the affections that show full assurance. Their religion was not copied, not merely taught, not the mere catching of a family influence. It was the precious inward power of a kingdom which God Himself has set up in the soul.
- Received — Asaph's material was not new. The facts were already told and written down, for God never left them to memory alone.
- Recognised — read with care, the same old history becomes a parable and a mirror. It shows us ourselves in the light of God.
- Recounted — God gave parents the task of passing it on. Christian parents too should ground their children in redemption, resurrection and ascension.
- Rooted — handed-down faith must become personal. Not copied from the family, but God's own work in the soul.
- Result — every retelling aims at one thing: the next generation setting their hope in God. Even a record of failure ends in His praise.
We will not hide [them] from their sons, shewing forth to the generation to come the praises of Jehovah, and his strength, and his marvellous works which he hath done.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.