Psalm 115:7

They have hands, but they handle not: feet have they, but they walk not: neither speak they through their throat.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(7) Neither speak they.—The Hebrew implies not only the want of articulate speech, but of utterance at all.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

115:1-8 Let no opinion of our own merits have any place in our prayers or in our praises. All the good we do, is done by the power of his grace; and all the good we have, is the gift of his mere mercy, and he must have all the praise. Are we in pursuit of any mercy, and wrestling with God for it, we must take encouragement in prayer from God only. Lord, do so for us; not that we may have the credit and comfort of it, but that they mercy and truth may have the glory of it. The heathen gods are senseless things. They are the works of men's hands: the painter, the carver, the statuary, can put no life into them, therefore no sense. The psalmist hence shows the folly of the worshippers of idols.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

They have mouths ... - They are shaped like people, but have none of the attributes of intelligent beings.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

7. speak … throat—literally, "mutter," not even utter articulate sounds.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Speak, or mutter, or make a noise, as this word signifies, Isaiah 10:14. They are so far from speaking with their throat and other instruments of speech as men do, that they cannot make such an inarticulate and senseless sound with them as the beasts do.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

They have hands, but they handle not,.... So as to feel any thing that is put into their hands; they cannot make use of their hands to stretch them out, and receive anything from their worshippers; nor can they give anything to them: but our God receives and accepts the sacrifices of his people, their prayers and their praises; and opens his hand, and liberally supplies their wants, both in providence and grace.

Feet have they, but they walk not; cannot stir from the place where they are, to the assistance of those that call unto them, Isaiah 46:7 but our God walks upon the wings of the wind, and is a present help in times of trouble; a God at hand and afar off, and makes haste to the relief of his people in distress.

Neither speak they through their throat; or make a mournful voice as a dove, as the word is used in Isaiah 38:14 or chirp as a bird, or chatter as a crane; or warble out any note through the throat, as birds do; and much less form any articulate sound, or utter any proper word, that may be understood.

Geneva Study Bible

They have {e} hands, but they handle not: feet have they, but they walk not: neither speak they through their throat.

(e) He shows what great vanity it is to ask help from them who not only have no help in them, but lack sense and reason.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Psalm 115:7

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The poet, with "And our God," in the name of Israel opposes the scornful question of the heathen by the believingly joyous confession of the exaltation of Jahve above the false gods. Israel's God is in the heavens, and is therefore supramundane in nature and life, and the absolutely unlimited One, who is able to do all things with a freedom that is conditioned only by Himself: quod vult, valet (Psalm 115:3 equals Psalm 135:6, Wisd. 12:18, and frequently). The carved gods (עצב, from עצב, cogn. חצב, קצב) of the heathen, on the contrary, are dead images, which are devoid of all life, even of the sensuous life the outward organs of which are imagined upon them. It cannot be proved with Ecclesiastes 5:16 that ידיהם and רגליחם are equivalent to ידים להם, רגלים. They are either subjects which the Waw apodosis cf. Genesis 22:24; Proverbs 23:24; Habakkuk 2:5) renders prominent, or casus absoluti (Ges. ֗145, 2), since both verbs have the idols themselves as their subjects less on account of their gender (יד and רגל are feminine, but the Hebrew usage of genders is very free and not carried out uniformly) as in respect of Psalm 115:7: with reference to their hands, etc. ימישׁוּן is the energetic future form, which goes over from משׁשׁ into מוּשׁ, for ימשּׁוּ. It is said once again in Psalm 115:7 that speech is wanting to them; for the other negations only deny life to them, this at the same time denies all personality. The author might know from his own experience how little was the distinction made by the heathen worship between the symbol and the thing symbolized. Accordingly the worship of idols seems to him, as to the later prophets, to be the extreme of self-stupefaction and of the destruction of human consciousness; and the final destiny of the worshippers of false gods, as he says in Psalm 115:8, is, that they become like to their idols, that is to say, being deprived of their consciousness, life, and existence, they come to nothing, like those their nothingnesses (Isaiah 44:9). This whole section of the Psalm is repeated in Psalm 135 (Psalm 115:6, Psalm 115:15).