What Does Psalm 115:1 Mean?
Not to us, O LORD, not to us, but clothe your nature in weight, for your faithful love and for the sake of your truth.
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
Not unto us, O LORD, not unto us, but unto thy name give glory, for thy mercy, and for thy truth’s sake.THE KEY
The repeated “not unto us” shifts the weight of honor toward the LORD’s name, toward the faithful love and truth that reveal its nature.
THE MEANING
The verse places honor in the LORD’s nature: faithful love and truth. That nature is present and gives weight to the name the verse calls upon.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that honor rests on human credit; here, the reason for giving glory is the LORD’s faithful love and truth.
THE ROOT
כָּבוֹד
kavod
GROWS FROM
כבד
k-b-d
To be heavy or weighty.
“clothe your nature in weight” in this verse is kavod. English “glory” can sound like radiance alone, but כָּבוֹד carries the sense of weight. The verse gives weight to the LORD’s name, whose nature is shown in faithful love and truth.
ALSO GROWS
kaved: Heavy, weighty.
כָּבֵד
It shares the root’s sense of weight and helps show the concrete image beneath “glory.”
kibbed: To honor or treat as weighty.
כִּבֵּד
This verb makes the link between weight and giving honor explicit.
חַסְדְּךָ
chasdekha
GROWS FROM
חסד
ḥ-s-d
Faithful, loyal love.
The verse grounds the honor given to the name in faithful love. This is not a passing feeling: it is love expressed as steadfast commitment.
ALSO GROWS
chasid: A faithful or devoted person.
חָסִיד
The related word describes someone marked by the quality named in חֶסֶד.
chasadim: Acts of faithful love.
חֲסָדִים
The plural shows that this love is made visible in deeds, giving substance to the name’s nature.
אֲמִתֶּךָ
amitekha
GROWS FROM
אמן
ʾ-m-n
To be firm, steady, or reliable.
“your truth” in this verse is amitekha. Truth here belongs to the language of what holds firm. Paired with faithful love, it shows a nature that is both committed and dependable.
ALSO GROWS
amen: Firmly, truly; so be it.
אָמֵן
The word affirms that what is spoken is reliable and can be trusted.
ne'eman: Trustworthy, steady.
נֶאֱמָן
This branch describes the dependable character that the verse associates with the LORD’s truth.
THE PATTERN
The name’s weight is shown through faithful love and truth, shifting honor away from human credit and toward the LORD’s nature.
Give to the LORD the weight of his name; bow down to the LORD in set-apart splendor.And the word became flesh and pitched a tent among us, and we beheld his weight, the weight as of the only-born from the Father, full of favor and truth.So whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the end that God is given weight.THE THREAD
And the LORD passed by before his face, and called out, The LORD, The LORD God, compassionate and full of favor, slow to flare, abounding in faithful love and truth,Psalm 115 names faithful love (חֶסֶד, chesed) and truth (אֱמֶת, emet) as the reason glory is given to the LORD’s name. Exodus 34:6 proclaims that same nature through goodness and truth, showing what gives the name its weight.
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