What Does Psalm 113:5 Mean?
Who is like the LORD our God, who settles on high,
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Who is like unto the LORD our God, who dwelleth on high,THE KEY
The Hebrew pictures the incomparable LORD as the one raised high to dwell, joining elevation with settled presence.
THE MEANING
The LORD your God is beyond comparison, pictured as raised high to dwell. Height and dwelling appear together: the LORD is exalted, yet present. The line holds unmatched stature and abiding in one image.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the idea that the LORD is merely one power among others, measurable on the same scale.
THE ROOT
הַמַּגְבִּיהִי
hamagbihi
GROWS FROM
גבה
To be high or rise up; in this form, to raise or exalt.
“on high” in this verse is hamagbihi. The Hebrew names elevation with an active form: the LORD is the one raised high to dwell. English gives us the image of a location, while the root also carries the act of exaltation.
ALSO GROWS
gavoah: High, lofty
גָּבֹהַּ
It shares the root’s sense of height and shows the quality named in the verse.
higbiah: Raised, lifted up
הִגְבִּיהַּ
This verbal form makes explicit the movement upward that English’s “on high” can leave in the background.
לָשָׁבֶת
lashavet
GROWS FROM
ישב
To sit, remain, or dwell.
“settles” in this verse is lashavet. The Hebrew pairs being raised high with sitting or dwelling. The image is not only of height, but of a presence established there.
ALSO GROWS
yashab: To sit or dwell
יָשַׁב
This is the root verb behind the verse’s word for dwelling.
moshav: Dwelling place or seat
מוֹשָׁב
This related word carries the same root’s sense of an established place to sit or dwell.
THE PATTERN
Scripture places the LORD’s highness beside regard for the lowly, so divine height does not mean distance from them.
Though the LORD is lifted high, he sees the low ones, and the lofty he perceives from afar.For thus says the high and lifted one, who dwells in the ages, whose nature is set apart. I dwell in the high and set-apart place, and with the crushed and the low of breath, to revive the breath of the low, and to revive the heart of the crushed ones.He has pulled the mighty down from their seats, and lifted up the low.THE THREAD
who stoops to see in the heavens and on the earth?The next line places the one who dwells high in the act of lowering himself to look upon heaven and earth. Together, the lines hold exaltation and attention in the same picture.
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