Psa 135:15-18 | TDavid | STEP | EXPOSITION Verse 15 . The idols of the heathen are silver and gold, the work of men's hands. Their essential material is dead metal, their attributes are but the qualities of senseless substances, and what of form and fashion they exhibit they derive from the skill and labour of those who worship them. It is the height of insanity to worship metallic manufactures. Though silver and gold are useful to us when we rightly employ them, there is nothing about them which can entitle them to reverence and worship. If we did not know the sorrowful fact to be indisputable, it would seem to be impossible that intelligent beings could bow down before substances which they must themselves refine from the ore, and fashion into form. One would think it less absurd to worship one's own hands than to adore that which those hands have made. What great works can these mock deities perform for man when they are themselves the works of man? Idols are fitter to be played with, like dolls by babes, than to be adored by grown up men. Hands are better used in breaking than in making objects which can be put to such an idiotic use. Yet the heathen love their abominable deities better than silver and gold: it were well if we could say that some professed believers in the Lord had as much love for him. Verse 15 . The work of men's hands. Therefore they should rather, if it were possible, worship man, as their creator and lord, than be worshipped by him. --Matthew Pool, 1624-1679. Verse 15-17 . The Rev. John Thomas, a missionary in India, was one day travelling alone through the country, when he saw a great number of people waiting near an idol temple. He went up to them, and as soon as the doors were opened, he walked into the temple. Seeing an idol raised above the people, he walked boldly up to it, held up his hand, and asked for silence. He then put his fingers on its eyes, and said, "It has eyes, but it cannot see! It has ears, but it cannot hear! It has a nose, but it cannot smell! It has hands, but it cannot handle! It has a mouth, but it cannot speak! Neither is there any breath in it!" Instead of doing injury to him for affronting their god and themselves, the natives were all surprised; and an old Brahmin was so convinced of his folly by what Mr. Thomas said, that he also cried out, "It has feet, but cannot run away!" The people raised a shout, and being ashamed of their stupidity, they left the temple, and went to their homes. -- From "The New Cyclopcedia of Illustrative Anecdote", 1875. HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS Verse 15 . Silver and gold. These are idols in our own land, among worldlings, and with some professors. Show the folly and wickedness of loving riches, and the evils which come of it.

Psalms 135:15-18

EXPOSITION

Verse 15. The idols of the heathen are silver and gold, the work of men's hands. Their essential material is dead metal, their attributes are but the qualities of senseless substances, and what of form and fashion they exhibit they derive from the skill and labour of those who worship them. It is the height of insanity to worship metallic manufactures. Though silver and gold are useful to us when we rightly employ them, there is nothing about them which can entitle them to reverence and worship. If we did not know the sorrowful fact to be indisputable, it would seem to be impossible that intelligent beings could bow down before substances which they must themselves refine from the ore, and fashion into form. One would think it less absurd to worship one's own hands than to adore that which those hands have made. What great works can these mock deities perform for man when they are themselves the works of man? Idols are fitter to be played with, like dolls by babes, than to be adored by grown up men. Hands are better used in breaking than in making objects which can be put to such an idiotic use. Yet the heathen love their abominable deities better than silver and gold: it were well if we could say that some professed believers in the Lord had as much love for him.

Verse 15. The work of men's hands. Therefore they should rather, if it were possible, worship man, as their creator and lord, than be worshipped by him. --Matthew Pool, 1624-1679.

Verse 15-17. The Rev. John Thomas, a missionary in India, was one day travelling alone through the country, when he saw a great number of people waiting near an idol temple. He went up to them, and as soon as the doors were opened, he walked into the temple. Seeing an idol raised above the people, he walked boldly up to it, held up his hand, and asked for silence. He then put his fingers on its eyes, and said, "It has eyes, but it cannot see! It has ears, but it cannot hear! It has a nose, but it cannot smell! It has hands, but it cannot handle! It has a mouth, but it cannot speak! Neither is there any breath in it!" Instead of doing injury to him for affronting their god and themselves, the natives were all surprised; and an old Brahmin was so convinced of his folly by what Mr. Thomas said, that he also cried out, "It has feet, but cannot run away!" The people raised a shout, and being ashamed of their stupidity, they left the temple, and went to their homes. -- From "The New Cyclopcedia of Illustrative Anecdote", 1875.

HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS

Verse 15. Silver and gold. These are idols in our own land, among worldlings, and with some professors. Show the folly and wickedness of loving riches, and the evils which come of it.

EXPOSITION

Verse 16. They have mouths. For their makers fashioned them like themselves. An opening is made where the mouth should be, and yet it is no mouth, for they eat not, they speak not. They cannot communicate with their worshippers; they are dumb as death. If they cannot even speak, they are not even so worthy of worship as our children at school. Jehovah speaks, and it is done: but these images utter never a word. Surely, if they could speak, they would rebuke their votaries. Is not their silence a still more powerful rebuke? When our philosophical teachers deny that God has made any verbal revelation of himself they also confess that their god is dumb.

Eyes have they, but they see not. Who would adore a blind man -- how can the heathen be so mad as to bow themselves before a blind image? The eyes of idols have frequently been very costly; diamonds have been used for that purpose; but of what avail is the expense, since they see nothing? If they cannot even see us, how can they know our wants, appreciate our sacrifices, or spy out for us the means of help! What a wretched thing, that a man who can see should bow down before an image which is blind! The worshipper is certainly physically in advance of his god, and yet mentally he is on a level with it; for assuredly his foolish heart is darkened, or he would not so absurdly play the feel.

EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS

Verse 16-17. Mouths, eyes, ears. So many members as the images have, serving to represent perfections ascribed to them, so many are the lies. --David Dickson.

Verse 16-17. They can neither speak in answer to your prayers and inquiries, nor see what you do or what you want, nor hear your petitions, nor smell your incenses and sacrifices, nor use their hands either to take anything from you, or to give anything to you; nor so much as mutter, nor give the least sign of apprehending your condition or concerns. --Matthew Pool.

Verse 16-17. Mouths, but they speak not: ears, but they hear not. A heated fancy or imagination

May be mistaken for an inspiration.

True; but is this conclusion fair to make --

That inspiration must be all mistake?

A pebble stone is not a diamond: true;

But must a diamond be a pebble too?

To own a God who does not speak to men,

Is first to own, and then disown again;

Of all idolatry the total sum

lase having gods that are both deaf and dumb. --John Byron, 1691-1763.

HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS

Verse 16-17. The Portrait of many,

EXPOSITION

Verse 17. They have ears, and very large ones, too, if we remember certain of the Hindu idols. But they hear not. Useless are their ears; in fact, they are mere counterfeits and deceits. Ears which men make are always deaf: the secret of hearing is wrapped up with the mystery of life, and both are in the unsearchable mind of the Lord. It seems that these heathen gods are dumb, and blind, and deaf -- a pretty bundle of infirmities to be found in a deity! Neither is there any breath in their mouths; they are dead, no sign of life is perceptible; and breathing, which is of the essence of animal life, they never knew. Shall a man waste his breath in crying to an idol which has no breath? Shall life offer up petitions to death? Verily, this is a turning of things upside down.

EXPOSITION

Verse 18. They that make them are like unto them. they are as blockish, as senseless, as stupid as the gods they have made, and, like them they are the objects of divine abhorrence, and shall be broken in pieces in due time. So is every one that trusteth in them. The idol worshippers are as bad as the idol makers; for if there were none to worship, there would be no market for the degrading manufacture. Idolaters are spiritually dead, they are the mere images of men, their best being is gone, they are not what they seem. Their mouths do not really pray, their eyes see not the truth, their ears hear not the voice of the Lord, and the life of God is not in them. Those who believe in their own inventions in religion betray great folly, and an utter absence of the quickening Spirit. Gracious men can see the absurdity of forsaking the true God and setting up rivals in his place; but those who perpetrate this crime think not so: on the contrary, they pride themselves upon their great wisdom, and boast of "advanced thought" and "modern culture." Others there are who believe in a baptismal regeneration which does not renew the nature, and they make members of Christ and children of God who have none of the spirit of Christ, or the signs of adoption. May we be saved from such mimicry of divine work lest we also become like our idols.

EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS

Verse 18. Like them shall be those making them, every one who (is) trusting in them. If the meaning had been simply, those who make them are like them, Hebrew usage would have required the verb to be suppressed. Its insertion, therefore, in the future form (wyhy) requires it to be rendered strictly shall be, i.e., in fate as well as character. Idolaters shall perish with their perishable idols. See Isaiah 1:31. --Joseph Addison Alexander.

Verse 18. People never rise above the level of their gods, which are to them their better nature. --Andrew Robert Faussett.

Verse 18. They that make them are like unto them. Idolatry is a benumbing sin, which bereaveth the idolater of the right use of his senses. --David Dickson.

Verse 18. They that make them, etc. Teacheth us, that the idol, the idol maker, and all such also as serve idols, are not only beastly and blockish before men, but shall before God, in good time, come to shame and confusion. --Thomas Wilcocks, 1549-1608.

Verse 18. Like unto them. A singular phenomenon, known as the Spectre of the Brocken, is seen on a certain mountain in Germany. The traveller who at dawn stands on the topmost ridge beholds a colossal shadowy spectre. But in fact it is only his own shadow projected upon the morning mists by the rising sun; and it imitates, of course, every movement of its creator. So heathen nations have mistaken their own image for Deity. Their gods display human frailties and passions and scanty virtues, projected and magnified upon the heavens, just as the small figures on the slide of a magic lantern are projected, magnified, and illuminated upon a white sheet. --From Elan Foster's New Cyclopoedia of Illustrations, 1870.

Verse 18. Like unto them. How many are like idol images, when they have eyes, ears, and mouths as though they had none: that is, when they do not use them when and how they should! --Christoph Starke.

HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS

Verse 18.