Praise to God’s name and the Psalm form ‘Hallelu-Yah’

Introduction

This is an introductory study about praise to God. In this first instance, I am looking at praise to His name in the Biblical form: ‘Hallelu-Yah’ (or, ‘Halleluia’ in the Greek of Revelation 19).

We can ask: How does Scripture present praise to God’s name? What is the associated language of praise? Or, what contexts or concepts connect with ‘HalleluYah’? When is praise undertaken? These are not academic questions. How we praise our God, what He counts as “acceptable words” to praise Him by, is vital to know and apply.  An obvious exhortational point is that we have to have the mind of Christ on praise. ‘Hallelu-Yah’ comes from the Psalms, so the Psalmist, as a type of Christ, expresses the mind of Christ in psalmodic composition, and what more than in the use of ‘Hallelu-Yah’?

Starting an Investigation

A good starting point, before we look at ‘Hallelu-Yah’, is what Heb 13:15 tells us about praise, set as it is in the context of Christ’s sacrifice in a Letter written as “exhortation” (Heb 13:22).

By him [Jesus] therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips confessing to his name.[1] (Heb 13:15)

‘Confessing’ is not restricted to declaring one’s sins as a prerequisite for God’s forgiveness. Jesus ‘witnessed a good confession’ before Pontius Pilate and Jesus promises to confess the name of a saint who has overcome, before his Father and the angels. ‘Confession’ also has pointed use earlier in the Letter to the Hebrews. Its primary sense in Greek is (from its components) ‘same-word’. ‘Confessing’ is a speech act of ‘same-wording’. In this context, where praise is sacrifice and fruit, ‘confession’ it is the result of a process.  God’s word bears fruit in us, in our hearts by faith, and prepares us to direct praise to His name with our lips. We give back the same word, after its effectual working in us; God’s word has prospered in His/its aim, and not returned to Him void. His praises show forth in us. God is glorified.

Two points (at least) can be taken from Heb 13:15:

  1. God’s word, the language of truth, has to be the basis of our praise. We must praise Him in His language, not ours; spiritual not natural words: For “God is spirit and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth”. Praise requires and relates to sacrifice: Jesus’ and ours – as we bear his reproach (Heb 13:13); the Letter to the Hebrews has already taught us what ‘bearing Christ’s reproach’ is by citing the case of Moses in Heb 11:26.
  2. This Epistle also tells us when praise should be undertaken, it said “continually” or “always”.  It is not something which should cease; it should always occupy us; neither sense – continually or always – leaves an unattended moment. ‘Continually’ is hard to get around! How can we fulfil this as Christ did? Again, in addition to his example, we have his father David’s same-worded position on this. David, the Psalmist of Israel, sets the context in:

Psalm 34:1 [Context: A Psalm of David, when he changed his behaviour before Abimelech; who drove him away, and he departed.] I will bless Yahweh at all times: his praise shall continually be in my mouth.    

The Greek New Testament’s [GNT’s] ‘continually’ corresponds to the Hebrew word used by David, who adds:

Psalm 34:3 O magnify Yahweh[2] with me, and let us exalt his name together.

David’s, or the Psalmist’s, composition of Psalm language is from God. God’s words meaningfully engage with David’s experiences. Praise is on the Psalmist’s lips because the spirit of Yahweh spake in him, and God’s word was upon his tongue (2 Sam. 23:2).  The NT also puts it as David uttering Psalms: “David himself said”. So, there is a coming together, for the purpose of revelatory composition, of God and David. They are one in revelation, or in inspirational (spirit) composition. Praise is a convert’s or a saint’s response to God’s redemptive work; to experienced deliverance from sin & victory over enemies.

Jesus provides the link between ‘praise’ and the ‘victory of salvation’ in Matt 21:16. He could see the end of a good work begun in those who had received his words; those who had become ‘(little) children’. Among these were the blind and the lame (v. 14). He had demonstrated God’s power to save by healing them in the temple.  In response to the animosity of the chief priests and scribes, he re-presents language from Ps 8:2(3), bringing out what David’s words presupposed, applied in this NT context:

And [the chief priests and scribes] said unto him, Hearest thou what these say? And Jesus saith unto them, Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise? Matt 21:16 (KJV)

Psalm 8 prefaces David as the Psalm’s composer. Its theme was to sing about God’s name. It begins and ends with:

Yahweh our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth!

This Psalm is recalled in Hebrews 2 as a prophetic description of Jesus’ nature, sacrificial work and glorification. So, in the words of Heb 13:15 that we started with it was: “by Jesus” (or, the spirit of Christ in the prophet David) that David was able to “offer the sacrifice of praise to God…confessing to his name”.

‘Yah’ and ‘Hallelu-Yah’

What have we seen so far?  That God is known by His revealed name and it is the focus of praise. Many Psalms present praise to Yahweh by that name. However, over forty use ‘Yah’ instead of ‘Yahweh’, but most of our English versions do not help us to read either name because they just put ‘Lord’ for both (exceptions to this are the JB and NJB which print ‘Yahweh’). So, we have to get back to the original Hebrew.

What of ‘Hallelu-Yah’ and ‘Yah’ – the shortened alternative name form of ‘Yahweh’? In the OT, the composite form ‘Hallelu-Yah’, an injunction meaning ‘Praise you [plural] Yah’, only occurs in the Psalms and does so 24 times in 15 Psalms, beginning in Psalm 104 and ending in the last Psalm (Psalm 150).[3] Psalm 68:4 is the sole case where KJV translators put ‘Yah’ (they used a ‘J’ instead of a ‘Y’), the shortened form of ‘Yahweh’ into English letters:

Sing unto God, sing praises to his name: extol him that rides upon the heavens by his name JAH, and rejoice before him. Ps 68:4 (KJV)

There is no linguistic or religious reason why all 48 instances of ‘Yah’ in the Hebrew Bible should not appear in English letters this (same) way. Should we be concerned about the use of ‘Yah’ in praise? The NT offers a lead on this point. In Rev 19:1-6 we read,

v1 And after these things I heard a great voice of much people in heaven, saying, Halleluia; Salvation, and glory, and honour, and power, unto the Lord our God:
v2 For true and righteous are his judgments: for he hath judged the great whore, which did corrupt the earth with her fornication, and hath avenged the blood of his servants at her hand.
v3 And again they said, Halleluia. And her smoke rose up for ever and ever.
v4 And the four and twenty elders and the four beasts fell down and worshipped God that sat on the throne, saying, Amen; Halleluia.
v5 And a voice came out of the throne, saying, Praise our God, all ye his servants, and ye that fear him, both small and great.
v6 And I heard as it were the voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying, Halleluia: for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.

The GNT represents the saints in the future praising God with the Hebrew form (Graecised in the NT) ‘Halleluia’ that is derived solely from the Psalms. This permits us, at the very least, to read ‘Hallelu-Yah’ as exhortation about our future, when we read the 15 Hallelu-Yah Psalms. Following the GNT we can read the transliterated form ‘Hallelu-Yah’ (GNT’s ‘Halleluia’) – instead of ‘Praise you the Lord’ – or express it in translation as ‘Praise you Yah’ with this future victory-praising in mind.

Psalm 102:18 states,

This shall be written for the generation to come: and the people which shall be created shall praise the LORD Yah [Hebrew: Hy”)-lL,h;y].

This word for ‘praise’ here is not ‘hallelu’ but a related future form: ‘yühallel’. So it is ‘yühallel-yäh’.  The future tenses here tell us that there is a generation of people in the future that will praise Yah; in effect, they will use: ‘Hallelu-Yah’.

There is another link here with Revelation 19, because the phrase ‘to come’ in ‘generation to come’ is usually rendered ‘the last’. In Isa 44:6, God says, “I am the first, and I am the last”. ‘The last (one)’ in God’s use is the same form as in Ps 102:18. (The Hebrew for ‘last’ is related to the Hebrew for ‘afterward’ or ‘latter’, as in ‘latter days’). Thus, this created people, God’s people, are of the last generation, the kingdom time. They will have praised Yah in their lives anticipating what is to come, just as Jesus did in Matt 21:16. Ultimately, in the world to come, as part of the multitude celebrating God’s victory, they/we will praise ‘Yah’ using that name!

In Rev 15:1- 4 we read,

  1. 1 And I saw another sign in heaven, great and marvellous, seven angels having the seven last plagues; for in them is filled up the wrath of God.
  2. 2 And I saw as it were a sea of glass mingled with fire: and them that had gotten the victory over the beast, and over his image, and over his mark, and over the number of his name, stand on the sea of glass, having the harps of God.
  3. 3 And they sing the song of Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty; just and true are thy ways, thou King of saints.
  4. 4 Who shall not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name? for thou only art holy: for all nations shall come and worship before thee; for thy judgments are made manifest.

Moses uttered a victory song of praise in Exod 15:2. It was typical of what is to come. This is the first time ‘Yah’ occurs in the Bible. (Moses uses it again in Exod 17:16, after the victory over Amalek. Its next use, in our order of books, is in Ps 102:18.) Moses sings,

Yah is my strength and song, and he is become my salvation:[4] he is my God, and I will prepare him an habitation; my father’s God, and I will exalt him.

This is a type of future “kingdom” praise. Another “last days” use of ‘Hallelu-Yah’ is in Ps 104:35,

Let the sinners be consumed out of the earth, and let the wicked be no more. Bless thou the LORD Yahweh, O my soul. Praise ye the LORD Hallelu-Yah.

Given that setting and outcome, Hallelu-Yah, again, is clearly to do with the last things and the establishment of the kingdom. It is depicted in Revelation 19 as the last or ultimate utterance of praise to God that there is to utter. This victory refrain follows Amen. So, not even ‘Amen’ is the last word; in Rev 19:4 it was ‘Amen. Hallelu-Yah’.

Christadelphian Hymn Book

Applying scripture to the composition of hymns today can be more or less harmonious. In the Christadelphian Hymn Book, no. 83, we might want to contemplate the relevance of God’s order in Revelation 19 and contrast it with Hymn 83, which has “Hallelujah! Yea, Amen”. It ends with ‘Amen’!? But ‘Hallelu-Yah’ surpasses, or goes beyond ‘Amen’ in Scripture. Indeed, the last Psalm, Psalm 150, does not end with ‘Amen’, a form that occurs often in the Psalms, but ends, with: Hallelu-Yah!

Revelation 19:4, with the order ‘amen’ first, then the praise form ‘Hallelu-Yah’ after it, has its precedent in Ps 106:48:

Blessed be Yahweh God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting: and let all the people say, Amen. Hallelu-Yah.

This order also occurs in 1 Chron. 16:36, but not with ‘Hallelu-Yah’, instead, God’s full name-form follows ‘amen’:

Blessed be Yahweh God of Israel for ever and ever. And all the people said, Amen, and praised [Heb: hallel] (to) Yahweh.

Another example in the Christadelphian hymn book is no. 75 which ends the Psalms section, and it is based on Psalm 150. However, this hymn contains no use of ‘Yah’ or ‘Hallelu-Yah’. Instead, it repeats ‘O praise ye the Lord’. It should be borne in mind that in the Hebrew Bible, there are no ‘Lord’ forms ´adon, or ´adoni, in combination with ‘Hallelu’, which would give rise to ‘Hallelu-´adon(i)’!   ‘Hallelu- __’, or ‘Praise ye’ is always ascribed to (and combined with) God’s name ‘Yah’.  So, ‘O praise ye the Lord/´adon’ is not scriptural for this Old Testament expression; it just does not exist.

Conclusion

I conclude with a re-reading of Psalm 150, as I have given it below, with hindsight of this brief study. It facilitates the pronunciation of the text’s ‘Yah’ and two instances of ‘Hallelu-Yah’:

Psalm 150

v1 Hallelu-Yah. Praise God in his sanctuary: praise him in the firmament of his power.
v2 Praise him for his mighty acts: praise him according to his excellent greatness.
v3 Praise him with the sound of the trumpet: praise him with the psaltery and harp.
v4 Praise him with the timbrel and dance: praise him with stringed instruments and organs.
v5 Praise him upon the loud cymbals: praise him upon the high sounding cymbals.
v6 Let every thing that hath breath praise Yah. Hallelu-Yah.

So, in the language of Eph 5:19, “Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord” – we should combine ‘speaking’ (exposition) and ‘song’ that includes use of the Psalms. This will fulfil in us, or enable us to fulfil, what is “the sacrifice of praise”, by him. Use of God’s given words also point to our part in God’s victory through the Lamb.

[1] The KJV has ‘giving thanks’ and not, as other English versions correctly have: ‘confessing to his name’. Yet, throughout Hebrews the KJV renders this Greek term homologountōn – or its cognates built from homo + logos – by: ‘profess(ion)’ in Heb 3:1; 4:14; 10:23; or ‘confess(ed) in Heb. 11:13.  Homo + logos  is ‘confess’ in: 1 Jo. 1:9; 4:2, 3, 15; 2 Jo. 1:17; Rev. 3:5. For ‘giving thanks…’ eucharistountes would be expected.

[2] ‘Yahweh’ is God’s name in its full form; ‘Yah’ – as in ‘Hallelu-Yah’ – is its shorter form.

[3] All 23 instances of the Hebrew hyphenated (or ‘maqqēp) form ‘Hallelu-Yah’: Ps 104:35; 105:45; 106:48; 111:1; 112:1; 113:1, 9; 115:18; 116:19; 117:2; 135:1, 3, 21; 146:1, 10; 147:1, 20; 148:1, 14; 149:1, 9; 150:1, 6. Note: In Psa. 106:1 there is a single instance of ‘HalleluYah’ written without a hyphen/maqqēp.

[4] It would be an interesting digression, but I resist doing so here, to link-in Jesus’ name, which is built from ‘Yah’ and ‘salvation’, as seen in its Hebrew form: ‘Yehoshua’.