Leupold on Psalm 97

Today I was privileged to preach in chapel here at Union, and I preached on Psalm 97 which is a wonderful exhortation to rejoice in the sovereignty of God. I may post some thoughts from the Psalm in the future, but here I will simply post a few quotes from H. C. Leupold’s Exposition of The Psalms. I did not quote these in the sermon, but I appreciated them in the preparation. I was also pleased to ‘discover’ Leupold. I have not really heard much of his work, though I have seen it around. I picked up this volume second hand and have been pleased with it. I am always on the look out for good material on the Psalms. Leupold is older now, but he engages the text seriously, commenting on the Hebrew text while also commenting theologically for the church today.

vv. 2-3- “Clouds and thick darkness are all around him; righteousness and justice are the foundation of his throne. Fire goes before him, and burns up his adversaries all around.” (ESV)
Leupold comments: “This brief description is blinding in its brilliance, but such a God is our Lord.” (688)

On v. 3- “There is no good reason for changing ‘His adversaries’ to ‘His steps’ in the Hebrew text and giving another meaning to the verb. It would appear to be a part of the trend of modern thinking to remove every possible trace of divine wrath from the concept of the deity.” (690)

On v. 10- “O you who love the LORD, hate evil!” (ESV)
Leupold comments: “Those interpreters who believe that an exhortation to hate all evil is out of place at this point will alter the text to arrive at the result: ‘The Lord loves those who hate evil’ (RSV). In place of the forceful statement of the Hebrew text a mild platitude is obtained by such a change.” (691)