Adam Clarke's Bible Commentary Verse 2. The joy of the whole earth ] Commentators have been greatly puzzled to show in what sense Zion, or the temple, could be said to be the joy of the whole earth. If we take the earth here for the habitable globe, there is no sense in which it ever was the joy of the whole earth; but If we take Årah lk col haarets, as signifying the whole of this land, (and it has no other meaning,) the assertion is plain and easy to be understood, for the temple was considered the ornament and glory of the whole land of Judea.
Matthew Henry Commentary
Verses 1-7 - Jerusalem is the city of our God: none on earth render him due honou except the citizens of the spiritual Jerusalem. Happy the kingdom, the city, the family, the heart, in which God is great, in which he is all There God is known. The clearer discoveries are made to us of the Lor and his greatness, the more it is expected that we should abound in his praises. The earth is, by sin, covered with deformity, therefore justl might that spot of ground, which was beautified with holiness, be called the joy of the whole earth; that which the whole earth ha reason to rejoice in, that God would thus in very deed dwell with ma upon the earth. The kings of the earth were afraid of it. Nothing in nature can more fitly represent the overthrow of heathenism by the Spirit of the gospel, than the wreck of a fleet in a storm. Both are by the mighty power of the Lord.
Original Hebrew יפה3303 נוף5131 משׂושׂ4885 כל3605 הארץ776 הר2022 ציון6726 ירכתי3411 צפון6828 קרית7151 מלך4428 רב׃7227
