Psalm 116:13

I will take the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of the LORD.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(13) I will take.—Or, lift up.

Cup of salvation.—The drink offering or oblation which accompanied festival celebrations (Numbers 29:19, &c). Others think of the Passover cup mentioned Matthew 26:27, when this psalm as part of the Hallel was sung. Others, again, take the figurative sense of cup—i.e., portion, lot, as in Psalm 16:5.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

116:10-19 When troubled, we do best to hold our peace, for we are apt to speak unadvisedly. Yet there may be true faith where there are workings of unbelief; but then faith will prevail; and being humbled for our distrust of God's word, we shall experience his faithfulness to it. What can the pardoned sinner, or what can those who have been delivered from trouble or distress, render to the Lord for his benefits? We cannot in any way profit him. Our best is unworthy of his acceptance; yet we ought to devote ourselves and all we have to his service. I will take the cup of salvation; I will offer the drink-offerings appointed by the law, in token of thankfulness to God, and rejoice in God's goodness to me. I will receive the cup of affliction; that cup, that bitter cup, which is sanctified to the saints, so that to them it is a cup of salvation; it is a means of spiritual health. The cup of consolation; I will receive the benefits God bestows upon me, as from his hand, and taste his love in them, as the portion not only of mine inheritance in the other world, but of my cup in this. Let others serve what masters they will, truly I am thy servant. Two ways men came to be servants. By birth. Lord, I was born in thy house; I am the son of thine handmaid, and therefore thine. It is a great mercy to be children of godly parents. By redemption. Lord, thou hast loosed my bonds, thou hast discharged me from them, therefore I am thy servant. The bonds thou hast loosed shall tie me faster unto thee. Doing good is sacrifice, with which God is well pleased; and this must accompany giving thanks to his name. Why should we offer that to the Lord which cost us nothing? The psalmist will pay his vows now; he will not delay the payment: publicly, not to make a boast, but to show he is not ashamed of God's service, and to invite others to join him. Such are true saints of God, in whose lives and deaths he will be glorified.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

I will take the cup of salvation - Compare the notes at Psalm 11:6. The "cup of salvation" means the cup by which his sense of the greatness of the salvation might be expressed - the cup of thanksgiving. Compare the notes at 1 Corinthians 10:16. The reference seems to be to a custom in festivals of drinking a cup of wine as a special expression of thanks or of obligation. The act would be more solemn, and the truth more deeply impressed on the mind, when accompanied by some religious rite - some ceremonial, as in the Lord's Supper, expressly designed to call the mercy of God to remembrance.

And call upon the name of the Lord - Engage in a solemn act of devotion; make it a matter of special ceremony or observance to call the mercy of God to remembrance. This was one way of rendering to the Lord a return for the benefits received at his hands; as it is now. Christians do this at the table of the Lord - in the observance of the Lord's Supper.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

13. the cup of salvation—the drink offering which was part of the thank offering (Nu 15:3-5).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

I will take the cup of salvation; I will offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving to God, as this phrase seems to be explained below, Psalm 116:17, where the latter clause of the verse is the same with that which here follows. The phrase is taken from the common practice of the Jews in their thank-offerings, in which a feast was made of the remainders of the sacrifices, and the offerers, together with the priests, did eat and drink before the Lord, and, amongst other rites, the master of the feast took a cup of wine into his hand, and solemnly blessed God for it, and for the mercy which was then acknowledged, and then gave it to all the guests, who drunk successively of it; see 1 Chronicles 16:2,3; to which custom it is supposed that our blessed Saviour alludes in the institution of the cup, which also is called the cup of blessing, 1 Corinthians 10:16, which is in effect the same with the cup of salvation. This metaphor of a cup is used both of afflictions, as Psalm 11:6 75:8, and of comforts, as Psalm 23:5 Jeremiah 16:7.

Call upon the name of the Lord; or, publish or preach in or of the name of the Lord, i.e. his gracious nature, and the great things which he hath done for me. For he speaks of praise rather than of prayer, as appears both from the former clause, and by comparing Psalm 116:17.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

I will take the cup of salvation,.... Or "salvations" (n); not the eucharistic cup, or the cup in the Lord's supper, which the apostle calls "the cup of blessing", 1 Corinthians 10:16; though some so think, and that the psalmist represents the saints under the Gospel dispensation; nor the cup of afflictions or martyrdom for the sake of Christ; being willing, under a sense of mercies received, to bear or suffer anything for his sake he should call him to; as knowing it would be a token to him of salvation, and work for his good: but rather an offering of praise for temporal salvation, and for spiritual and eternal salvation; in allusion to a master of a family, who at the close of a feast or meal, used to take up a cup in his hands, and give thanks; see Matthew 26:27;

and call upon the name of the Lord; invocation of the name of the Lord takes in all worship and service of him, public and private, external and internal; and particularly prayer, which is calling upon the Lord in the name of Christ, with faith and fervency, in sincerity and truth: and the sense of the psalmist is, that he would not only give thanks for the mercies he had received, but continue to pray to God for more; and this was all the return he was capable of making.

(n) "salutum", Pagninus, Montanus, Vatablus, Gejerus, Michaelis; "salvationum", Musculus.

Geneva Study Bible

I will {h} take the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of the LORD.

(h) In the Law they used to make a banquet when they gave solemn thanks to God, and to take the cup and drink in sign of thanksgiving.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

13. the cup of salvation] Lit. salvations; the cup to be drunk as a part of the sacrifice of thanksgiving (Psalm 116:14) for great and manifold deliverance. Cp. ‘the cup of blessing’ in the service of the Passover (Matthew 26:27).

call upon] Rather, proclaim the name of Jehovah, acknowledging that to Him alone is my gratitude due.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 13. - I will take the cup of salvation. It has been usual to explain this of actual participation in the contents of a cup offered at a sacrificial meal, and then passed round to the worshippers. But there is no clear evidence of any such usage, except in connection with the Passover, which cannot here be in question. Hengstenberg there fore proposes to regard the phrase as a mere metaphor, like the "cup of trembling" (Isaiah 51:17, 22), and understands the psalmist to mean that he will gladly and thankfully receive God's mercy vouchsafed to him, and thus show his gratitude for it. And call upon the Name of the Lord (comp. vers. 4 and 17). Psalm 116:13

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Since כּי אדבּר does not introduce anything that could become an object of belief, האמין is absolute here: to have faith, just as in Job 24:22; Job 29:24, with לא it signifies "to be without faith, i.e., to despair." But how does it now proceed? The lxx renders ἐπίστευσα, διὸ ἐλάλησα, which the apostle makes use of in 2 Corinthians 4:13, without our being therefore obliged with Luther to render: I believe, therefore I speak; כי does not signify διὸ. Nevertheless כי might according to the sense be used for לכן, if it had to be rendered with Hengstenberg: "I believed, therefore I spake,hy but I was very much plagued." But this assertion does not suit this connection, and has, moreover, no support in the syntax. It might more readily be rendered: "I have believed that I should yet speak, i.e., that I should once more have a deliverance of God to celebrate;" but the connection of the parallel members, which is then only lax, is opposed to this. Hitzig's attempted interpretation, "I trust, when (כּי as in Jeremiah 12:1) I should speak: I am greatly afflicted," i.e., "I have henceforth confidence, so that I shall not suffer myself to be drawn away into the expression of despondency," does not commend itself, since Psalm 116:10 is a complaining, but not therefore as yet a desponding assertion of the reality. Assuming that האמנתּי and אמרתּי in Psalm 116:11 stand on the same line in point of time, it seems that it must be interpreted I had faith, for I spake (was obliged to speak); but אדבר, separated from האמנתי by כי, is opposed to the colouring relating to the contemporaneous past. Thus Psalm 116:10 will consequently contain the issue of that which has been hitherto experienced: I have gathered up faith and believe henceforth, when I speak (have to speak, must speak): I am deeply afflicted (ענה as in Psalm 119:67, cf. Arab. ‛nâ, to be bowed down, more particularly in captivity, whence Arab. 'l-‛nât, those who are bowed down). On the other hand, Psalm 116:11 is manifestly a retrospect. He believes now, for he is thoroughly weaned from putting trust in men: I said in my despair (taken from Psalm 31:23), the result of my deeply bowed down condition: All men are liars (πᾶς ἄνθρωπος ψεύστης, Romans 3:4). Forsaken by all the men from whom he expected succour and help, he experienced the truth and faithfulness of God. Striding away over this thought, he asks in Psalm 116:12 how he is to give thanks to God for all His benefits. מה is an adverbial accusative for בּמּה, as in Genesis 44:16, and the substantive תּגּמוּל, in itself a later formation, has besides the Chaldaic plural suffix ôhi, which is without example elsewhere in Hebrew. The poet says in Psalm 116:13 how alone he can and will give thanks to his Deliverer, by using a figure taken from the Passover (Matthew 26:27), the memorial repast in celebration of the redemption out of Egypt. The cup of salvation is that which is raised aloft and drunk amidst thanksgiving for the manifold and abundant salvation (ישׁוּעות) experienced. קרא בשׁם ה is the usual expression for a solemn and public calling upon and proclamation of the Name of God. In Psalm 116:14 this thanksgiving is more minutely designated as שׁלמי נדר, which the poet now discharges. A common and joyous eating and drinking in the presence of God was associated with the shelamim. נא (vid., Psalm 115:2) in the freest application gives a more animated tone to the word with which it stands. Because he is impelled frankly and freely to give thanks before the whole congregation, נא stands beside נגד, and נגד, moreover, has the intentional ah.