Psalm 48:2

The psalm begins with who God is. The word for great, gâdôwl, is the ordinary adjective for greatness in size, age, standing or intensity, and here it is said of the LORD himself. “Greatly” stands for a separate Hebrew word, mᵉʼôd, meaning very or exceedingly, so the line says that the LORD is great and is to be praised exceedingly. The two English words echo each other, and the thought is that our praise should answer to the greatness of the one we praise.

The verb for praise, hâlal, is the root from which “Hallelujah”, praise the LORD, comes. It is a word for praising aloud and gladly, and in some of its uses it carries the sense of shining, or of boasting in something good. God’s greatness calls for a full and joyful answer from his people.

Two other psalms praise him in the same line. “For the LORD is great, and greatly to be praised: he is to be feared above all gods” (Psalm 96:4), and “Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised; and his greatness is unsearchable” (Psalm 145:3). The God praised here is the God of all creation, and in this verse his praise is sung in one particular place. The LORD who is over everything chose to dwell among his people, and the psalm holds the two together: his majesty over all, and his nearness to Israel in the city he calls his own.

“The city of our God” is Jerusalem, and “the mountain of his holiness” is Mount Zion, the hill of the temple. The two phrases name the same place in parallel, first as a city and then as a holy mountain, as Hebrew poetry often does. “Our God” is the language of the covenant. The city belongs to him, and he belongs to the people who sing.

David took the stronghold of Zion and made it his city (2 Samuel 5:6–9). Solomon built the temple, and at its dedication the ark of the covenant was brought up out of the city of David, which is Zion, and set in the most holy place (1 Kings 8:1–6). The temple stood on Mount Moriah, and the name Zion came to cover the temple hill as well. From then on the temple was the place where the LORD dwelt among his people, as he had told Moses at the tabernacle: “And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them” (Exodus 25:8). On this hill God set his king: “Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion” (Psalm 2:6).

Holiness, qôdesh, means being set apart for God and belonging to him. Said of God himself, it speaks of his purity and of his standing far above all that is common. Said of a mountain, it means the place has been set apart by his presence and his purpose, and so it was approached with reverence. Zion’s holiness came from the LORD who chose it and lived there.

Zion is the joy of the whole earth because the God who dwelt there is the God of the whole earth, and the blessing of his presence was meant to reach every nation. The word for joy, mâsôws, means joy, delight or rejoicing. Isaiah saw the day when “the mountain of the LORD’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains,” and many people would say, “Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem” (Isaiah 2:2–4). God’s Servant is given “for a light to the Gentiles,” to be his salvation “unto the end of the earth” (Isaiah 49:6), and Paul and Barnabas took those words as the Lord’s command to them when they turned to the Gentiles (Acts 13:47).

“Beautiful for situation” means beautiful in its setting. The word yâpheh means beautiful or fair, an appearance that is pleasing to the eye. Zion stood high, and its height made it lovely to look at and strong to defend. It was the place God had chosen for himself, and its beauty reflected the glory of the one who lived there.

The phrase, yarkete tsaphon in Hebrew, most likely means the northern slopes of the temple hill, the highest part of Jerusalem. The north was also the side from which the city was most open to attack, so the part of Zion that looked weakest was the very place where God dwelt and which he kept safe.

The words also answer a boast. The nations around Israel spoke of their gods living on a mountain in the north, and Isaiah puts the same phrase in the mouth of the king of Babylon: “I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north” (Isaiah 14:13). The psalm sets the true God in his true place. The mountain where the great King really dwells is Zion, a real hill in a real city, where his presence could be known.

Verse 2 ends by naming Jerusalem “the city of the great King.” The word for king is melek, a ruler, and “great” here is rab, an adjective meaning much, many or great. It is a different word from the gâdôwl of verse 1, and the two share the English “great”. The King of this city is the LORD himself, and the title sets him above every earthly monarch and every false god. Psalm 47, just before this psalm, calls him “a great King over all the earth”, and Psalm 48 turns from his rule over the earth to the city where he lives. Jesus used this very title for Jerusalem when he taught his disciples not to swear by it, “for it is the city of the great King” (Matthew 5:35).

The city is royal because its King lives there, and its strength and glory come from him. Other psalms speak of his love for it: “The LORD loveth the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob. Glorious things are spoken of thee, O city of God” (Psalm 87:2–3), and “In Judah is God known: his name is great in Israel” (Psalm 76:1). Zechariah carries the same hope forward: “Thus saith the LORD; I am returned unto Zion, and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem: and Jerusalem shall be called a city of truth; and the mountain of the LORD of hosts the holy mountain” (Zechariah 8:3).

Verse 3 gives the reason Zion is safe. The verb is yâdaʻ, to know, in a passive form: God “is known”, he has made himself known. He is known in Zion by what he has done there, and his care for the city is plain to its people and to its enemies alike. The verses that follow show how. The kings assembled against the city, and “they saw it, and so they marvelled; they were troubled, and hasted away” (Psalm 48:4–8).

“Her palaces” translates ʼarmôwn, a citadel, fortress or palace, a fortified building named from its height. These were the strong buildings at the heart of Jerusalem, royal and public, the places where a city’s strength and authority were gathered. God was known as a refuge right there, at the centre of the city’s life and defence.

“Refuge” is misgâb, a high place, a stronghold, a secure retreat. The picture is of a height that lifts people above danger, where no enemy can reach them, and the psalm says that God himself is that stronghold for his people. Scripture speaks of him this way again and again: “The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms” (Deuteronomy 33:27). “I will say of the LORD, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust” (Psalm 91:2). “The name of the LORD is a strong tower: the righteous runneth into it, and is safe” (Proverbs 18:10). Psalm 46 opens, “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble” (Psalm 46:1). Most of these verses share the English word “refuge” with this one, and all of them place the safety of God’s people in God.

The temple on Zion was where God dwelt among his people, and it pointed forward to the Son, in whom God came to dwell with us in person. “The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us” (John 1:14), and “in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily” (Colossians 2:9). Jesus spoke of his own body as the temple: “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up” (John 2:19–21). The greatness of the LORD praised in verse 1 is shown most fully in him, in his sinless life, his death for the sin of the world, his resurrection and his ascension. He is the great King, and in him God’s people find the refuge Jerusalem knew in its palaces.

Through Christ, believers are built together into a holy temple, “an habitation of God through the Spirit” (Ephesians 2:19–22), and Paul asks, “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?” (1 Corinthians 3:16). The letter to the Hebrews tells believers that they “are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem” (Hebrews 12:22–24). In this way the joy of the whole earth reaches people of every nation who come to God through Christ.

Scripture ends with a city. John sees “the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven,” and hears that “the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them” (Revelation 21:1–4). That city “had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof” (Revelation 21:23). There the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be, his servants shall see his face, and they shall reign for ever and ever (Revelation 22:3–5).

These three verses give us a God who is great beyond measure and who chose to live among his people. His greatness is the reason for praise, and his presence is what made a hill holy, a city beautiful and a fortress safe. Zion was the joy of the whole earth because the King of all the earth was in her.

The same God has drawn near to us in Christ and dwells by his Spirit among his people, and the heavenly Jerusalem is the home he is preparing. He is still known as he was in Zion’s palaces, as a refuge high above every danger. The psalm’s own last word is the confidence of all who belong to him: “this God is our God for ever and ever.”