BackgroundTemple courts; a liturgical mosaic likely composed in the post-exilic Second Temple period, stitched from earlier psalms (113, 115, 134, 136) and from the prose of Exodus, Deuteronomy, and Jeremiah
Psalm 135: Praise the Name of the LORD
By Bea Zalel
Psalm 135
- Hallelujah! Praise the name of the LORD. Give praise, O servants of the LORD,
- who stand in the house of the LORD, in the courts of the house of our God.
- Hallelujah, for the LORD is good; sing praises to His name, for it is lovely.
- For the LORD has chosen Jacob as His own, Israel as His treasured possession.
- For I know that the LORD is great; our Lord is above all gods.
- The LORD does all that pleases Him in the heavens and on the earth, in the seas and in all their depths.
- He causes the clouds to rise from the ends of the earth. He generates the lightning with the rain and brings forth the wind from His storehouses.
- He struck down the firstborn of Egypt, of both man and beast.
- He sent signs and wonders into your midst, O Egypt, against Pharaoh and all his servants.
- He struck down many nations and slaughtered mighty kings:
- Sihon king of the Amorites, Og king of Bashan, and all the kings of Canaan.
- He gave their land as an inheritance, as a heritage to His people Israel.
- Your name, O LORD, endures forever, Your renown, O LORD, through all generations.
- For the LORD will vindicate His people and will have compassion on His servants.
- The idols of the nations are silver and gold, made by the hands of men.
- They have mouths, but cannot speak; they have eyes, but cannot see;
- they have ears, but cannot hear; nor is there breath in their mouths.
- Those who make them become like them, as do all who trust in them.
- O house of Israel, bless the LORD; O house of Aaron, bless the LORD;
- O house of Levi, bless the LORD; you who fear the LORD, bless the LORD!
- Blessed be the LORD from Zion— He who dwells in Jerusalem. Hallelujah!
Theme
Psalm 135 opens almost as a continuation of Psalm 134. The closing line of 134 calls on the night-watch priests to bless the LORD from Zion and 135 picks up that summons by name. "Praise the LORD" frames the psalm at its head and "Bless the LORD" frames it at its foot. In between sits a hymn that almost no scholar treats as original composition. Verse 7 quotes Jeremiah 10:13 nearly word for word. Verses 8-12 retell Exodus and the conquest of Sihon and Og in the cadence we will meet again in Psalm 136. Verses 15-18 reproduce the idol-polemic of Psalm 115:4-8 with only minor variation. The psalm is a deliberate anthology, a curated act of remembering by a community that no longer takes the temple for granted.
Three names for the worshipping people stack up in vv19-20: house of Israel, house of Aaron, house of Levi, and "those who fear the LORD." That fourth category is the wider circle, the God-fearers who stand outside the priestly lineages but inside the covenant by attachment. The psalmist refuses to let praise belong only to the professionals. Election is the engine of the psalm. "The LORD has chosen Jacob for himself, Israel as his treasured possession." The Hebrew word is "segullah," the same term Exodus 19:5 uses at Sinai. To sing this psalm is to rehearse the unearned fact of being chosen, and then to widen the circle until anyone who fears the Name can join the chorus.
The idol-polemic in the middle is sharper than English usually conveys. Idols have mouths and do not speak, eyes and do not see, ears and do not hear, and there is no breath, no "ruach," in their mouths. Then the hammer falls in v18: "those who make them become like them, and so do all who trust in them." Worship is formative. We become what we behold. The post-exilic community knew this from the inside. They had watched a generation grow mute and blind by serving mute and blind gods, and they had watched Babylon's vast pantheon prove powerless when the LORD raised up Cyrus. The polemic is not triumphalism. It is testimony from people who paid the price of misdirected worship and came home determined to keep their eyes on the living God.
And yet the psalm closes not with a curse on the nations but with a benediction from Zion. "Blessed be the LORD from Zion, he who dwells in Jerusalem." The same Name that scattered Egypt and felled the Amorite kings is the Name that is now blessed by ordinary Levites at midnight. Sovereignty and tenderness are the same divine attribute seen from two sides. Psalm 135 trains us to hold them together: the God who does whatever he pleases in heaven and earth is also the God who keeps watch over our houses while we sleep.
Discussion questions
- Psalm 135 is woven almost entirely from older psalms and prophetic texts. What does it teach you that a community in renewal would deliberately quote rather than invent?
- The psalm names four groups of worshipers including "those who fear the LORD." Who counts as a God-fearer in your context, and how does your worshiping community signal that they are welcome?
- Verse 4 calls Israel God's "segullah," his treasured possession. How does the language of being chosen differ from the language of deserving, and why does the difference matter?
- The psalm rehearses the plagues, the Exodus, and the conquest in just five verses. What is gained and what is lost when a long story is compressed into a creed?
- Verses 15-18 argue that idolaters become like their idols. What are the idols of your moment, and what mute or blind traits are their worshipers acquiring?
- The psalm draws no line between God's power over weather (v7) and his power over empires (vv8-12). How does that integration challenge a privatized faith that confines God to the soul?
- What does it mean that the psalm ends with a blessing pronounced "from Zion" rather than from heaven? Why does location matter to praise?
- Psalm 134 ends with the night-watch and Psalm 135 picks up the call. Where in your week is your equivalent of the night-watch, the unseen vigil that nobody applauds?
- The psalmist insists that the LORD does "whatever he pleases" in heaven and on earth. Where does this confession comfort you, and where does it discomfort you?
- How would your worship change if you treated every gathering as part of an ongoing anthology, a public act of remembering rather than a fresh experience to be staged?
Read this psalm in another translation
The inline text above is the Berean Standard Bible (BSB). Open in a new tab to compare with a modern licensed translation: