Psalms 99: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

This psalm declares that the LORD reigns as king, seated above the cherubim, great in Zion and lifted high above all peoples. It calls people to praise his holy name and to worship at his footstool, and says the king's strength loves justice, and that he has carried out fairness and right judgment in Jacob. It then recalls Moses, Aaron, and Samuel, who called on the LORD and were answered from the pillar of cloud, and says God both forgave them and punished their wrong deeds. It closes by repeating the call to worship at his holy mountain.

Claim by Claim

1. 99:1
   • The LORD reigns as king.
   • Let the peoples tremble.
   • The LORD sits enthroned on the cherubim.
   • Let the earth quake.
2. 99:2
   • The LORD is great in Zion.
   • He is exalted above all the peoples.
3. 99:3
   • Let them praise your name.
   • Your name is great and awesome.
   • He is holy (the King James reads that the name is holy).
4. 99:4
   • The strength of the king loves justice (the Hebrew may mean either that the king's strength loves justice or that the mighty king loves justice).
   • You have established equity.
   • You have carried out justice and righteousness in Jacob.
5. 99:5
   • Exalt the LORD our God.
   • Bow down at the footstool of his feet.
   • He is holy.
6. 99:6
   • Moses and Aaron were among his priests.
   • Samuel was among those who called on his name.
   • They called to the LORD.
   • He answered them.
7. 99:7
   • He spoke to them in a pillar of cloud.
   • They kept his testimonies.
   • They kept the statute he gave them.
8. 99:8
   • You answered them, O LORD our God.
   • You were a forgiving God to them.
   • You took vengeance on their deeds.
9. 99:9
   • Exalt the LORD our God.
   • Bow down at his holy mountain.
   • The LORD our God is holy.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

99:1

"The LORD" in capitals stands in for the personal name of Israel's God, four Hebrew consonants usually written YHWH. Ancient Jewish readers said "Lord" aloud instead of pronouncing it, and English Bibles have kept that substitution ever since. The "winged creatures" (KJV "cherubims") are the two gold figures whose outstretched wings covered the lid of the ark of the covenant in the sanctuary; the space above and between them was pictured as the seat of an invisible throne. They are not the plump babies of later European art. KJV "let the people tremble" means the peoples, the foreign nations, not the congregation. And "let the earth be moved" does not mean displaced or removed: the Hebrew verb is a shaking or quaking, the ground itself shuddering.

99:2

Zion was originally the fortified ridge David captured in Jerusalem; by the time this psalm was written the name covers the temple hill and, by extension, the city as a whole.

99:3

KJV "terrible" has shifted sense since 1611. It meant awe-inducing, the sort of thing that makes people go quiet, not awful or of poor quality. "Holy" in Hebrew carries the idea of being set apart, belonging to a separate order from ordinary things, rather than the modern sense of morally good.

99:4

The Hebrew of the first line is compressed and can be read two ways: "the strength of the king loves justice," that is, a mighty king who loves justice, or "the king is strong, and he loves justice", his strength consists in his love of justice. Translators divide over it. KJV "judgment" here means justice, the right settling of cases, not condemnation. "Equity" means even-handed fairness, treating parties without favor. "Jacob" is used as a name for the whole nation descended from him, as "Israel" is elsewhere.

99:5

A footstool belongs to the picture of a throne begun in verse 1: if God is enthroned above the winged creatures, the ark itself, or the sanctuary, or the earth, is the stool beneath his feet. Worshipers came to that spot rather than to the throne itself. KJV "exalt" means to lift up or raise high, here in speech and praise, declaring someone's greatness publicly.

99:6

Moses led Israel out of Egypt and received the law; Aaron was his brother and the first head of the priesthood; Samuel was the last of the leaders called judges and the prophet who anointed Israel's first kings. All three are remembered as men who spoke to God on behalf of the nation and got an answer. Strictly, only Aaron was a priest by descent; the psalm groups Moses and Samuel with him because they too performed priestly acts and interceded.

99:7

The "pillar of cloud" is the tall column of cloud that, in the exodus stories, went ahead of Israel in the wilderness and stood at the entrance of the tent of meeting when God spoke with Moses. KJV "testimonies" and "ordinance" are both terms for the binding terms of the covenant, the stipulations laid down and the fixed rulings given with them, not for witness statements in court or for a religious ceremony.

99:8

KJV "inventions" does not mean clever devices. In 1611 the word could mean simply what people came up with and did, their practices or schemes, and here it means their wrongdoing. "Tookest vengeance of" is old legal-sounding English for exacting a penalty from someone, closer to "punished" than to a personal grudge.

99:9

The "holy hill" is the temple mount in Jerusalem, the same Zion named in verse 2. Repeating the call of verse 5 with "hill" in place of "footstool" rounds the psalm off, and "for he is holy" closes each of its three sections.