Psalm 115:4

Their idols are silver and gold, the work of men's hands.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(4-8) This passage cannot compare with the magnificent irony of Isaiah 44:9-20, but there is still a noticeable vein of sarcasm running through it, visible even more in the original than in the English. (Comp. Psalm 135:15-18.)

Benson Commentary

Psalm 115:4-7. Their idols — The objects of their idolatrous worship, are silver and gold — That is, images made of silver and gold, dug out of the earth. Their gods are so far from being the makers of all things, or of any thing, that they themselves are the work of those that adore them. As the matter of them is wholly from the earth, so they have their form and figure from the art of man; and therefore they ought rather, if it were possible, to worship man, as their Creator and Lord, than be worshipped by him. They have mouths, &c. — The painter, the carver, the statuary performed their parts: they gave them the figure and appearance of mouths and eyes, ears and noses, hands and feet. But they could not put life into them, nor therefore any sense. They speak not in answer to those that consult them. They see not the prostrations of their worshippers before them, much less their distresses or wants. They hear not their prayers, how loud soever; they smell not their incense, however strong or sweet; they handle not the gifts presented to them, much less have they any gifts to bestow on their worshippers, or are able to stretch out their hands to the needy. They walk not; nor can they stir a step for the relief of those that apply to them for help. Nay, they do not so much as breathe through their throat, nor have they the least sign or symptom of life or motion: but are things as perfectly dead after the priest has pretended to consecrate them, and call a deity into them, as they were before. Here then we have a most striking and “beautiful contrast between the God of Israel and the heathen idols. He made every thing, they are themselves made by men; he is in heaven, they are upon earth; he doth whatsoever he pleaseth, they can do nothing; he seeth the distresses, heareth and answereth the prayers, accepteth the offerings, cometh to the assistance, and effecteth the salvation of his servants; they are blind, deaf, and dumb, senseless, motionless, and impotent.” And observe well, reader, “equally slow to hear, equally impotent to save, in time of greatest need, will every worldly idol prove, on which men have set their affections, and to which they, in effect, say, Thou art my God.” — Horne.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

115:1-8 Let no opinion of our own merits have any place in our prayers or in our praises. All the good we do, is done by the power of his grace; and all the good we have, is the gift of his mere mercy, and he must have all the praise. Are we in pursuit of any mercy, and wrestling with God for it, we must take encouragement in prayer from God only. Lord, do so for us; not that we may have the credit and comfort of it, but that they mercy and truth may have the glory of it. The heathen gods are senseless things. They are the works of men's hands: the painter, the carver, the statuary, can put no life into them, therefore no sense. The psalmist hence shows the folly of the worshippers of idols.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Their idols - Their gods - the gods which they worship, as contrasted with the God whom we adore. The design of this description Psalm 115:4-8 is to show the utter vanity of trusting in such gods, and to lead the people of Israel to put their trust in the true God - in Yahweh.

Are silver and gold - Made of silver and gold, and they must have, therefore, the properties of silver and gold. They can be of value only as silver and gold. They cannot do the work of mind; they cannot do the work of God. The psalmist was not disposed to depreciate the real value of these idols, or to throw contempt on them which they did not deserve. He was disposed to treat them fairly. They were silver and gold; they had an intrinsic value as such; they showed in the value of the material how much the pagan were disposed to honor their objects of worship; and they were not held up to contempt as shapeless blocks of wood or stone. The psalmist might have said that most of them were made of wood or stone, and were mere shapeless blocks; but it is always best to do justice to an adversary, and not to attempt to underrate what he values. The argument of an infidel on the subject of religion may be utterly worthless as an argument for infidelity, but it may evince ability, learning, subtilty, clearness of reasoning, and even candor; and it is best to admit this, if it is so, and to give to it all the credit which it deserves as a specimen of reasoning, or as stating a real difficulty which ought to be solved by somebody - to call it "silver and gold" if it is so, and not to characterize it as worthless, weak, stupid - the result of ignorance and folly. He has great advantage in an argument who owns the real force of what an opponent says; he gains nothing who charges it as the offspring of stupidity, ignorance, and folly - unless he can show that it is so.

The work of men's hands - Shaped and fashioned by people's hands. They cannot, therefore, be superior to those who made them; they cannot answer the purpose of a God.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

4-7. (Compare Isa 40:18-20; 44:9-20).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Thus glorious and powerful is our God, O ye heathens, of whom you so boldly ask who and where he is; but as for your gods or idols, they have no power nor worth in them but what is taken from their materials. As their matter is wholly from the earth, so their form or figure they have from the art of man; and therefore they should rather, if it were possible, worship man, as their creator and lord, than be worshipped by him.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Their idols are silver and gold,.... The idols of the Gentiles; so the Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, Syriac, Arabic, and Ethiopic versions. The gods they serve and worship are not in the heavens; but the matter of which they are made is dug out of the earth: and this is the greatest excellency and value that there is in them; and such as are made of these are of the greatest worth, and yet only for the matter of them, otherwise useless and inanimate statues; such are the idols of the Papists, Revelation 9:20.

The work of men's hands; the matter of them is gold and silver, which they owe to the earth as their original; the form of them they owe to men, and therefore can not be God, Hosea 8:6. If it is idolatry to worship what God has made, the sun, moon, and stars, it must be gross idolatry, and great stupidity, to worship what man has made: if it is sinful to worship the creature besides the Creator, or more than him, it must be still more so to worship the creature of a creature.

Geneva Study Bible

Their idols are {d} silver and gold, the work of men's hands.

(d) Seeing that neither the matter nor the form can commend their idols it follows that there is no reason that they should be esteemed.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

4. Their idols] i.e. the idols of the nations, as Psalm 135:15, and the LXX and Jerome here, read.

4–8. Do the heathen taunt us with the impotence of our God? What are their own gods? Nothing but their own handiwork, destitute of ordinary human senses, though represented with organs of sense. For similar sarcastic descriptions of idols and the contrast between them and the living God, see Isaiah 44:9-20; Jeremiah 10:1-16 Deuteronomy 4:28; Isaiah 2:20; Habakkuk 2:18-19; Wis 15:15. The passage recurs in Psalm 135:15-18. Observe how completely the Psalmist identifies the god with the image: it has no separate existence.

Pulpit Commentary

Verses 4-8. - The scorn of the heathen is retaliated. They scoff at the God of Israel. What, then, are their own gods? Silver and gold indeed (ver. 4), but the work of human hands. Fashioned into a human shape, as if they were sentient being - but absolutely devoid of all sense and intelligence. The satire is somewhat roughly worked out (vers. 5-7), but idolatry provokes rough speaking; and the tone here adopted is imitated in Psalm 135:15-18, and echoed in Isaiah 44:9-20. The inspired writers seem to have felt, that, when idolatry came under consideration, the criticism should be brief and trenchant. Verse 4. - Their idols are silver and gold. At the best - often mere wood and stone (Deuteronomy 4:28); but the idols of the Babylonians were mostly of the more precious materials (Herod., 1:183; Daniel 3:1; Ep. Jeremiah 1:4, 11, etc.). The work of men's hands (Psalm 135:15; Isaiah 44:12-17). To avoid this reproach, some images were said to have fallen down from heaven (Acts 19:35). Psalm 115:4

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The poet, with "And our God," in the name of Israel opposes the scornful question of the heathen by the believingly joyous confession of the exaltation of Jahve above the false gods. Israel's God is in the heavens, and is therefore supramundane in nature and life, and the absolutely unlimited One, who is able to do all things with a freedom that is conditioned only by Himself: quod vult, valet (Psalm 115:3 equals Psalm 135:6, Wisd. 12:18, and frequently). The carved gods (עצב, from עצב, cogn. חצב, קצב) of the heathen, on the contrary, are dead images, which are devoid of all life, even of the sensuous life the outward organs of which are imagined upon them. It cannot be proved with Ecclesiastes 5:16 that ידיהם and רגליחם are equivalent to ידים להם, רגלים. They are either subjects which the Waw apodosis cf. Genesis 22:24; Proverbs 23:24; Habakkuk 2:5) renders prominent, or casus absoluti (Ges. ֗145, 2), since both verbs have the idols themselves as their subjects less on account of their gender (יד and רגל are feminine, but the Hebrew usage of genders is very free and not carried out uniformly) as in respect of Psalm 115:7: with reference to their hands, etc. ימישׁוּן is the energetic future form, which goes over from משׁשׁ into מוּשׁ, for ימשּׁוּ. It is said once again in Psalm 115:7 that speech is wanting to them; for the other negations only deny life to them, this at the same time denies all personality. The author might know from his own experience how little was the distinction made by the heathen worship between the symbol and the thing symbolized. Accordingly the worship of idols seems to him, as to the later prophets, to be the extreme of self-stupefaction and of the destruction of human consciousness; and the final destiny of the worshippers of false gods, as he says in Psalm 115:8, is, that they become like to their idols, that is to say, being deprived of their consciousness, life, and existence, they come to nothing, like those their nothingnesses (Isaiah 44:9). This whole section of the Psalm is repeated in Psalm 135 (Psalm 115:6, Psalm 115:15).