Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 148:3
Praise ye him, sun and moon: praise him, all ye stars of light.
3. all ye stars of light ] So the Heb. text. P.B.V. stars and light follows the LXX (Vulg.).
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Praise ye him, sun and moon – The most conspicuous and glorious objects in the heavens, as apparent to the eyes of people.
Praise him, all ye stars of light – A poetical expression to denote bright or shining stars. The phrase embraces all the stars as they strike the eyes of people. Each one has something special to it for which to praise God: and the entire groups – the immense multitudes, as such – should join in one chorus of praise.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Psa 148:3
Praise Him, all ye stars of light.
Lessons of the stars
1. One of the most impressive lessons we learn from a study of the stars is the immensity of creation. As they crowd the sky on a clear, bright night we see the beauty and force of the words employed of old to express the increase of Israel–God hath made thee as the stars of heaven for multitude. The distance between the furthest planet and the nearest star is twenty-one billions of miles. If we could travel as fast as light travels, we should go round the world four hundred and eighty times a minute; and yet, travelling at the same rate, it would take us three years and seven months to get to that nearest star. The distance of Sirius is so great that it would require a journey of twenty-one years to reach it. There is another star, visible by the naked eye, so far away that we could not cover the distance in less than seventy-two years. Travelling at the same rate, it would take seven hundred thousand years to visit the group, remote and cloudlike, which Sir William Herschell discovered with his telescope.
2. We learn from the stars the existence of abiding law and order in creation. The celestial bodies perform their revolutions in fixed periods; and though some seem an exception to this rule, yet they only exemplify it the more strikingly, for their irregularities, occurring at stated times, have as much method as their uniform movements. Byron sings of–
A pathless comet and a curse,
The menace of the universe.
But now it is known of some, and may be inferred of all, that they are as obedient to law as the planets themselves. Another illustration of law we have in the elliptic movements of the planetary bodies. We owe to Kepler the discovery of the fact that they all move in elliptic orbits–that if you draw a line from the planet to the sun, the areas described by that line in its motion round the sun are proportional to the times employed in the motion, and that the squares of the periodic times are as the cubes of the distance. The first of these is a law of forms, the other two are laws of numbers. By their mutual attractions the planets sometimes produce disturbance among themselves. Through observing the irregular movements of Uranus the astronomers discovered Neptune; yet even at such times order reigns. The primal law of gravitation, discovered by Sir Isaac Newton–that law which keeps all the stars in their places and regulates the descent of a snowflake–abides for ever. Law and order are seen in the motions of the double stars. In many parts of the heavens two or more stars are seen, apparently near each other, and mutually connected as part of a system. In some cases these companion stars revolve round each other; in other cases two or more revolve round a common centre. They are at a much greater distance from each other than the furthest planet of our system is from the sun. The period of their revolution varies from thirty to upward of seven hundred years. Yet they all travel according to fixed law. And this reign of law is observable in the most remote part of the heavens as much as in the nearer. Every fresh discovery reveals its existence and operation.
3. The stars remind us of the beauty and grandeur of creation. In the spheroid shape of the planets and their satellites we have beauty of form. Then we have degrees of magnitude and brightness. It requires the light of a hundred stars of the sixth magnitude to make that of one of the first magnitude. One star differeth from another star in glory. There is a variety of colour as well as of size and lustre. Through the clear, transparent atmosphere of a Syrian night, without any optical aid whatever, one star is seen to shine like an emerald, another like a ruby, a third like a sapphire, and a fourth like a topaz–the whole nocturnal heavens appearing to sparkle with a blaze of jewels. There are individual stars, each shining in a splendour all its own. There are starry clusters which hang in the heavens like fruit in the tree. Some are extremely irregular in shape, while others show regular forms of a round, spiral, or other tendency. The Great Bear is a grand and striking constellation. Pleiades glitters and quivers with radiance like a breastplate of jewels. Orion, with his brazen girdle, is not only the most glorious constellation in the heavens–he is also one of the few visible in all parts of the habitable globe.
4. The stars witness for God. An atheistic leader of the French Revolution said one day to a Christian villager: We are going to pull your church-tower down, so that you may have nothing left to remind you of God, or religion. You will not only have to pull down the church-tower, said the man, you will also have to blot out the stars before you can destroy all that reminds us of God. They speak to us of Him.
(1) They speak of His living, all-pervading presence; and so illustrate Christs words, My Father worketh hitherto. He upholds them by the constant acting of His power.
(2) They bear witness to Gods condescension and care. While they speak of His majesty and power, they speak at the same time of our littleness. Yet the power that made and upholds the stars made and upholds man. (W, Walters.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 3. Praise ye him, sun and moon] The meaning of this address and all others to inanimate nature, is this: Every work of God’s hand partakes so much of his perfections, that it requires only to be studied and known, in order to show forth the manifold wisdom, power, and goodness of the Creator.
Stars of light] The brightest and most luminous stars: probably the planets may be especially intended.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Sun and moon; you which are adored by the blind heathens for gods, you are but his creatures, and therefore were obliged, if you were capable, to worship and praise him for your glorious light and powerful influences.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
Praise ye him, sun and moon,…. The sun praises the Lord, the Creator of it, by doing the work constantly it is appointed to do; to rule by day, and give light and heat to the earth, and the inhabitants of it; and so is the cause of man’s praising the Lord for the benefits they receive from it; for its enlightening, warming, and refreshing rays; and for the precious fruits brought forth by it and so the moon likewise doing its office, ruling by night, and reflecting the light of the sun upon the earth, and producing precious fruits, also praises its Maker, and is the occasion, of others praising him; see Ps 136:1;
praise him, all ye stars of light; which are very beneficial in the night season, especially to mariners and travellers, and shed their benign influences upon the earth and things in it; which are a means of praising the Lord, and in their way they do it, Ps 136:1. The Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, Syriac, Arabic, and Ethiopic versions, read it, “stars and light”, wrongly; the stars are luminous bodies, and shine in their own light c, though the moon with a borrowed light from the sun.
c Macrob. in Somn. Scipion. l. 1. c. 19, 20.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
3. Praise him, ye sun and moon This passage gives no countenance to the dream of Plato, that the stars excel in sense and intelligence. Nor does the Psalmist give them the same place as he had just assigned to angels, but merely intimates that the glory of God is everywhere to be seen, as if they sang his praises with an audible voice. And here he tacitly reproves the ingratitude of man; for all would hear this symphony, were they at all attent upon considering the works of God. For doth not the sun by his light, and heat, and other marvelous effects, praise his Maker? The stars when they run their course, and at once adorn the heavens and give light to the earth, do they not sound the praises of God? but as we are deaf and insensible, the Psalmist calls upon them as witnesses to reprove our indolence. By the heavens of heavens he no doubt means the spheres. Eclipses, and other things which we observe, plainly show both that the fixed stars are above the planets, and that the planets themselves are placed in different orbits. (297) The excellency of this contrivance the Psalmist justly commends, speaking expressly of the heavens of heavens; not as if there were really more heavens than one, but to extol the matchless wisdom which God has shown in creating the heavens; for the sun, moon, and stars are not confusedly mixed together, but each has its own position and station assigned to it, and their manifold courses are all regulated. As under the name of the heavens he comprehends the air, or at least all the space from the middle region of the air upwards, he calls rains, the waters above the heavens There is no foundation for the conjecture which some have made, that there are waters deposited above the four elements; and when the Psalmist speaks of these waters as being above, he clearly points at the descent of the rain. It is adhering too strictly to the letter of the words employed, to conceive as if there were some sea up in the heavens, where the waters were permanently deposited; for we know that Moses and the Prophets ordinarily speak in a popular style, suited to the lowest apprehension. It would be absurd, then, to seek to reduce what they say to the rules of philosophy; as, for example, in the passage before us, the Psalmist notes the marvelous fact that God holds the waters suspended in the air, because it seems contrary to nature that they should mount aloft, and also, that though fluid they should hang in vacant space. Accordingly it is said elsewhere, that they are held there as enclosed in bottles. (Psa 33:7.) The Psalmist has borrowed the form of expression from Moses, who says — “that the waters were divided from the waters.” (Gen 1:6.)
(297) “ Que les estoilles sont plus haut que les planetes, et qu’icelles planetes sont situees en divers cercles ou spheres.” — Fr.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
3. Having spoken of the highest heaven, with its celestial dignitaries, the author descends to the region of the visible heavens.
Sun, moon stars The Hebrews were not acquainted with the relative distances of the heavenly bodies; and had they been, it were impossible to give a better classification, for our sun is but a star, and the stars are but suns. The language is comprehensive of all planetary and stellar worlds. Still descending toward our earth, he calls upon the waters that be above the heavens. These, according to the Hebrew meteorology, were above the lower heavens, that is, above the , ( rakia,) “firmament,” (Gen 1:6-8,) in the superior region of the atmosphere. Here ends the enumeration of strictly celestial existences. They are called upon to praise God as their Creator.
For he commanded, and they were created The instantaneousness of the act of creation was a cause of wonder, adoration, and praise. It is the sublimest conception of power that ever entered the human mind. See on Genesis 1, and Psa 33:6; Psa 33:9
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Psa 148:3. Praise ye him, sun and moon The Psalmist proceeds to call upon the inanimate part of the creation, as well as upon all living creatures, to praise the Lord; who hath set forth his most transcendent wisdom, power, and magnificence, in such a variety of stupendous works, that there is not the smallest of them but ministers such matter of praise and admiration to those who attentively consider them, that they cannot but wish, with the Psalmist here, that every one of them were able to tell us how much skill he hath shewn in their contrivance; or that we were able to find it out and fully comprehend it. Thus the Psalmist is to be understood, when he calls upon all creatures to praise the Lord. By the expression of heavens of heavens, in the next verse, is not meant, as usually, the highest heaven, the place of God’s throne; but here, after the sun, moon, and stars of light, by which the whole body and sphere of the heavens are signified, follow next the heavens of heavens, and the waters above the heavens; where, as, in all reason, heavens of heavens, are but the highest of those heavens, above some part of which the waters are to be placed; so, in case the waters be no higher than that region of air where the clouds are, the uppermost regions of the body of air must be resolved to be what is here meant by the heavens of heavens.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Psa 148:3 Praise ye him, sun and moon: praise him, all ye stars of light.
Ver. 3. Praise ye him, sun and moon ] These do, after a sort, declare the glory of God, Psa 19:1-2 Hab 3:3 ; not with mind and affection, as if they were understanding creatures (as Plato held, In Epimenide), but by their light influences, admirable motions, and obedience, whereby quasi mutis vocibus, by a dumb kind of eloquence, saith Nazianzen, they give praise to God, and bid check to us for our dulness and disorders.
Praise him, all ye stars of light
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
stars of light. Genitive of Origin (App-17.) = stars that give light = lightbearers, as in Gen 1:14-16.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
sun: Psa 8:1-3, Psa 19:1-6, Psa 89:36, Psa 89:37, Psa 136:7-9, Gen 1:14-16, Gen 8:22, Deu 4:19, Jer 33:20
Reciprocal: Gen 1:16 – to rule Exo 35:14 – candlestick Jos 10:12 – Sun Jos 10:13 – So the sun 1Ki 18:15 – of hosts liveth Job 38:12 – commanded Psa 8:3 – moon Psa 33:6 – the host Psa 65:8 – rejoice Psa 103:22 – all his works Psa 136:8 – The sun Psa 147:4 – He Isa 40:26 – who hath 1Co 15:41 – General
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Psa 148:3-4. Praise him, sun and moon, &c. You were adored by the blind heathen for gods; you are but his creatures, and therefore would be obliged, if you were capable of it, to worship and praise him for your glorious light and powerful influences. The material heavens, through their various regions, says Dr. Horne, with the luminaries placed in them, and the waters sustained by them, though they have neither speech nor language, and want the tongue of men, yet, by their splendour and magnificence, their motions and their influences, all regulated and exerted according to the ordinance of their Maker, do, in a very intelligible and striking manner, declare the glory of God; they call upon us to translate their actions into our language, and copy their obedience in our lives; that so we may, both by word and deed, glorify, with them, the Creator and Redeemer of the universe. Praise him, all ye stars of light Which bespangle the firmament, and constantly burn and shine to his glory, attracting, night after night, and from age to age, the attention, and exciting the admiration of every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people. Praise him, ye heavens of heavens Ye highest and most glorious heavens, the place of Gods throne, and glorious presence, as this expression seems to mean, Deu 10:14; 1Ki 8:27 : or, rather, the starry heavens, which also may be so called, because they are above the air, which is often called heaven in the Scriptures. And ye waters Ye clouds, that be above the heavens Above a part of them, above the aerial heavens: of which see note on Gen 1:7.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
148:3 Praise ye him, {b} sun and moon: praise him, all ye stars of light.
(b) In that God’s glory shines in these insensible creatures, this their beauty is as a continual praising of God.