Psalms 48 KJV
The Glory of Zion
About This Psalm
A tour of Jerusalem - beautiful, fortified, God's city. When you see something magnificent and know God is behind it.
1reat is the LORD, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the mountain of his holiness.
2 Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King.
3 God is known in her palaces for a refuge.
4 For, lo, the kings were assembled, they passed by together.
5 They saw it, and so they marvelled; they were troubled, and hasted away.
6 Fear took hold upon them there, and pain, as of a woman in travail.
7 Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind.
8 As we have heard, so have we seen in the city of the LORD of hosts, in the city of our God: God will establish it for ever. Selah.
9 We have thought of thy lovingkindness, O God, in the midst of thy temple.
10 According to thy name, O God, so is thy praise unto the ends of the earth: thy right hand is full of righteousness.
11 Let mount Zion rejoice, let the daughters of Judah be glad, because of thy judgments.
12 Walk about Zion, and go round about her: tell the towers thereof.
13 Mark ye well her bulwarks, consider her palaces; that ye may tell it to the generation following.
14 For this God is our God for ever and ever: he will be our guide even unto death.
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Did You Know?
The psalm appropriates the Canaanite name Zaphon ("sides of the north") for Mount Zion, transferring Baal's mythic mountain seat to Yahweh and asserting his supremacy over rival deities.
Verses 4-7 portray defeated kings in labor-like panic, echoing ancient Near Eastern treaty-curse motifs where invading coalitions suffer divine terror rather than military engagement.
The instruction to "walk about Zion" and count its towers reflects a possible post-victory liturgical procession, akin to ancient city-inspection rites that combined thanksgiving with boundary affirmation.
Together with Psalms 46 and 47, this forms a Korahite trilogy celebrating Yahweh's kingship, moving from cosmic upheaval (46) through enthronement (47) to Zion's inviolability (48).
The final phrase "our guide even unto death" reorients the psalm's focus from the city's physical walls to God's personal, lifelong guidance, subverting expectations of a purely nationalistic victory hymn.