Psalms 68:17

The chariots of God [are] twenty thousand,.... By which are meant the angels, as the following clause shows; called "chariots", because they have appeared in such a form, 2 Kings 2:11; and because,

The hill of God is as the hill of Bashan; an high hill as the hill of Bashan. -God has chosen Zion whereon to dwell forever, with His countless chariots, in spite of all the resistance of the pagan.

The chariots of God, i.e. the hosts or armies (whereof chariots were a great and eminent part in those times and places) which attend upon God to do his pleasure, and to fight for him and for his people. Twenty thousand, i.e. an innumerable company; a certain number being put for an uncertain, as 91:7, and in many other places. The Lord is among them; here is not only the presence of the angels, but of the great and blessed God himself. And here the psalmist seems to be transported by the prophetical spirit, from the narration of those external successes and victories of which he had been speaking in the former part of the Psalm, unto the prediction of higher and more glorious things, even of the coming of the Messiah, and of the happy and transcendent privileges and blessings accruing to mankind by it, described in the next verse. And the connexion of this new matter with the former is sufficiently evident. For having preferred Zion before other hills, ,16, he now proves its excellency by an invincible argument, because this is the place to which the Lord of hosts himself, the Messiah, God manifested in the flesh, was to come, as is manifest from 90:2 28:16, compared with , compared with , and many other places of Scripture. And when he did come into the world, he was attended with a multitude of holy angels, which celebrated his birth, ,14. As in Sinai, in the holy place; God is no less gloriously, though less terribly, present here than he was in Sinai, when the great God, attended with thousands of his angels, solemnly appeared there to deliver the law. Heb. Sinai is in the sanctuary, or holy place; which is a poetical and a very emphatical expression, and very pertinent to this place. For having advanced Zion above all other hills, he now equals it to that venerable hill of Sinai, which the Divine Majesty honoured with his glorious presence. Here, saith he, you have in some sort Mount Sinai itself, to wit, all the glories and privileges of it, the presence of Jehovah attended with his angels, and the same law and covenant, yea, and a greater privilege than Sinai had, to wit, the Lord Jehovah descending from heaven into a human body, as appears by his ascending thither again, which the next verse describes, and visibly coming into his own temple, as it was prophesied concerning him, .

Psalms 68:17 The chariots of God [are] twenty thousand, [even] thousands of angels: the Lord [is] among them, [as in] Sinai, in the holy [place].Ver. 17. The chariots of God are twenty thousand] Heb. The chariot, to note the joint service of all the angels, who are here called Shinan, of their changeableness now taken away by Christ, say some; of their pre-excelleney above other creatures, say others, as being second or next unto God, the chief princes, the nobles of that court, as Daniel 10:13, Michael one of the chief princes. The Seventy render it ευθυμουντων, the cheerful ones such as are in joy and tranquillity, freely serving God in all his wars, carrying the elect, and marching about them. The Lord is among them, as in Sinai] i.e. The angels make Sion as dreadful to all her enemies as those angels made Sinai at the delivery of the Law. See Hebrews 12:22. In the holy place] Holy for the time while God appeared there, so 2 Peter 1:18, Tabor is called the holy mount.

(17) The chariots.—As the text stands, this verse can only be brought into harmony with the context by a certain violence to grammar. Its literal reading is, God’s chariots, two myriads of thousands, and again myriads of thousands (literally, of repetition), the Lord among them, Sinai in holiness; which, by strict rule, must mean: “God’s chariots are innumerable, and the Lord rides in them to Sinai, into the holy place.” But this rendering is quite against the whole tenor of the passage, which is descriptive of a march from, not to, Sinai. Hence some suggest the rendering, “The Lord is among them—a Sinai in holiness,” meaning that Zion has become Sinai, a common enough figure in poetry (comp. In medio Tibure Sardinia est—Mart. 4:60), but only discovered here by a roundabout process. There can hardly be a question as to the propriety of the emendation suggested by Dr. Perowne, The Lord is with them; He has come from Sinai into the holy place. (Comp. Deuteronomy 32:2, which was undoubtedly in the poet’s mind.) Of angels.—This rendering arose from a confusion of the word which means repetition with a word which means shining. LXX., “of flourishing ones”; Vulg., “of rejoicing ones.” But the mistake is a happy one, and Milton’s sonorous lines have well caught the feeling and music of the Hebrew:— “About His chariots numberless were poured Cherub and seraph, potentates and thrones, And virtues, winged spirits and chariots winged, From the armoury of God, where stand of old Myriads.” Paradise Lost, vii. 196.

Verse 17. The chariots of God are twenty thousand] רבתים אלפי שנאן ribbothayim alpey shinan, "two myriads of thousands doubled." Does not this mean simply forty thousand? A myriad Isaiah 10,000; two myriads, 20,000; these doubled, 40,000. Or thus: 10,000 + 10,000 + 20,000 = 40,000. The Targum says, "The chariots of God are two myriads; two thousand angels draw them; the majesty of God rests upon them in holiness on Mount Sinai." But what does this mean? We must die to know.

17. The chariots of God are in myriads, yea thousands upon thousands. God is represented as entering Zion in triumph with a vast retinue of the heavenly hosts. His chariots are not simply ‘twice ten thousand’ but ‘counted by tens of thousands’ (this is the idiomatic force of the dual termination), explained further as ‘thousands of repetition,’ i.e. thousands upon thousands. Cp. Daniel 7:10. The A.V. angels is traceable ultimately to the paraphrase of the Targ., suggested by such passages as Deuteronomy 33:2, but resting on no philological basis. The LXX χιλιάδεςεὐθηνούντων, Vulg. millia laetantium, ‘thousands of joyous ones,’ presumes a slightly different reading, but was probably intended to give the same meaning. the Lord is among them, as in Sinai, in the holy place] Or, in the sanctuary (R.V.); or in holiness. But as the words as in are not in the text, the rendering Sinai is in the sanctuary (R.V. marg.), or, It is Sinai in holiness, is preferable. With either rendering the sense will be substantially the same. The glory and majesty which were revealed at Sinai are now transferred to God’s new abode. He comes surrounded as it were by an environment of holiness. Cp. Deuteronomy 33:2. For the use of the name of a place to convey all the associations of the place cp. Micah 6:5, where “remember from Shittim unto Gilgal” means “remember all that happened there and in the interval.” Many commentators adopt a slight emendation of the text, and read The Lord is come from Sinai into the sanctuary (or, in holiness), a reminiscence of Deu 33:2. From Sinai, the scene of His first great self-revelation to Israel, He comes to Zion, which He has chosen for His permanent abode. But the corruption of the text if it is faulty must be anterior to all existing versions: and the proposed reading has a somewhat prosaic ring.

The chariots of God - The meaning of this verse is, that God is abundantly able to maintain his position on Mount Zion; to defend the place which he had selected as his abode.

17. Chariots of God—War chariots. The verse contains a strong anthropomorphism, as Habakkuk 3:8-15, and here represents the triumphal march of God to Zion as exceeding in grandeur all displays of earthly power.