Ps. 117 (Beyond the Boundary)

Praise Yhwh / all nations

laud him / all you peoples,

because his loyal love / has towered / over us

and Yhwh’s faithfulness / is everlasting

The psalmist’s scope is international. He implores the nations and “all peoples” to praise Yhwh. The fact that he uses the Name, rather than the name generally ascribed to him by the nations is important. The psalmist sees the nations as, in a sense, being incorporated into Israel’s covenant with Yhwh such that they could call him by his proper name. This is confirmed by the psalmist’s reasoning for their praise—Yhwh’s “loyal love” the everlasting nature of his “faithfulness”. These are all covenantal descriptions of Yhwh. In other words, the nations and the peoples are to praise Yhwh not so much because of what Yhwh has done for them but because they recognize what Yhwh has done for Israel, his covenant partner. Israel has thus become a “light to the nations” a “city set on a hill”, a signal flare sent up, and calling all nations to Zion in order to bend their knee before Yhwh.

More deeply still is the fact that the psalmist sees Israel’s role as an ingathering. Yhwh’s covenantal fidelity to Israel will unify all people. Yhwh desires this and here we see this as the desire of the psalmist as well. Rather than seeing Israel as a type of prized possession or the covenant as way to horde Yhwh’s favor and righteousness, the psalmist sees Israel as becoming a magnet, a drawing together of all nations. Paired with certain other sections of Scripture, this dynamic power of unification is deeply significant. The nations are often portrayed not simply as hostile to Israel but as agents of chaos, as under the thrall of demonic forces. They are understood as filthy and defiled. They are immoral and stupid. They want Israel’s destruction and her king. And their liturgy is foul, a detestable thing, that worships dead idols and therefore worships Death itself. And yet here, all of that is reversed. The psalmist here wants the nations to be part of the Nation. It wants the nations to enter into the Liturgy to Yhwh. It sees the nations as being pure, holy and cleansed—able to ritually enter into praise to Yhwh. How that comes about—through some universal Day of Atonement or through some other means—is not stated. The only thing stated is the desire. Something of the Adamic desire for all of creation to be a Temple to Yhwh is here preserved, to see before or after the fratricide and the familial murders and betrayals—and to see the nations returning to Israel and saying “in you I see the face of God”. To see all of Adam’s children reunited under the Adam-of-God—Israel.

One final comment. The psalmist international scope—the fact that he sees all people coming to Yhwh—is matched by a similar scope—Yhwh’s acts of covenantal love and faithfulness. For the psalmist, Yhwh’s loyal love is beyond compare. Like some ziggurat it “towers over us”. Israel is completely dwarfed but also completely within its shade. His faithfulness, likewise, extends before and beyond Israel. It is ‘everlasting’. In both of these we see Yhwh’s Forever for Israel. And when they drink that in, they are also expanded beyond their own horizons. They are taken ‘beyond themselves’, in an ecstatic movement outward toward all the nations. In this, they are becoming like David—they are obtaining a heart “after Yhwh’s heart”. The expansion of the heart to the boundary of all nations is Israel’s heart being poured out for all the nations as it participates within Yhwh’s own desire.