Ps. 96.2-3 (transgressing the boundary)

Sing to Yhwh / bless his name
proclaim his salvation / day after day.
Declare his glory / among the nations
his wondrous deeds / among the peoples. 

It is easy to overlook an important point in this verse. The word “proclaim” carries with it connotations of ‘good news’ and is often something that occurs to announce a victory. In most other uses, the ‘proclamation’ is made to Israel that Yhwh (or his king) has conquered one of Israel’s foes or that Yhwh has raised up a deliverer for Israel. It is an ‘internal’ proclamation, within Israel. Here, by contrast, when the ‘catholicity’ (the universality) of creation is in view, the ‘proclamation’ turns toward all of creation. It is external and flows out from Israel. Essentially, what we find here is that the extent of Yhwh’s kingship provides the ‘boundary’ of this proclamation. And, since he is not simply the ‘king of Israel’ but the king who has come to judge the entire world, the ‘proclamation’ of that kingship expands accordingly. In other words, the ‘proclamation’ will transgress Israel’s borders when Yhwh’s reign is firmly established beyond those borders. That ‘transgression’ will be the event in the future that becomes the source of the ‘new song’ of verse 1. 

This ‘transgression’ into the world, universal, will carry with it the proclamation of his ‘glory’—that visible sense of authority and gravity that emanates from a person of authority. It ‘clothes’ the person and envelopes those around him. It is the ‘gravity’ of the person. Those who do not have ‘glory’ are susceptible to exploitation because they lack this emanating sense of power. Later in the psalm Yhwh’s ‘glory’ will make all the earth “writhe” before him. Yhwh’s glory is terrifying because it actively conveys, viscerally, his absolute mastery over everything. This is the glory of the Most High King. It is precisely that ‘kingly glory’ that now begins to be proclaimed to the ‘nations’ and to flood across Israel’s boundary. In other words, all of creation will now be enveloped within the glory of Yhwh.