Psalm 87

The Joy of Living in Zion

Of the Korahites. A Psalm. A Song.

The Last Days of Jacob

²⁷ Thus Israel settled in the land of Egypt, in the region of Goshen, and they gained possessions in it and were fruitful and multiplied exceedingly.^(A)

²⁹ When the time of Israel’s death drew near, he called his son Joseph and said to him, “If I have found favor with you, put your hand under my thigh and promise to deal loyally and truly with me. Do not bury me in Egypt.^{(A) 30} When I lie down with my ancestors, carry me out of Egypt and bury me in their burial place.” He answered, “I will do as you have said.”^(B)

Warnings from Israel’s History

10 I do not want you to be ignorant, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea,^{(A) 2} and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, ³ and all ate the same spiritual food,^{(B) 4} and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ.^(C)

The Tradition of the Elders

7 Now when the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around him, ² they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them. ³ (For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they wash their hands,^[a] thus observing the tradition of the elders,^{(A) 4} and they do not eat anything from the market unless they wash,^[b] and there are also many other traditions that they observe: the washing of cups and pots and bronze kettles and beds.^[c])^{(B) 5} So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders but eat with defiled hands?”^{(C) 6} He said to them, “Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written,

⁸ “You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.”^(E)

⁹ Then he said to them, “You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition!^{(F) 10} For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘Whoever speaks evil of father or mother must surely die.’^{(G) 11} But you say that if anyone tells father or mother, ‘Whatever support you might have had from me is Corban’ (that is, an offering to God^[d]),^{(H) 12} then you no longer permit doing anything for a father or mother,

Psalm 136

God’s Work in Creation and in History