The dead do not praise the LORD, nor do any who go down into silence.
This psalm was written when God's people lay under heavy affliction, and they cry out to Him not for their own honor but for His name's sake, lest the heathen mock Him and say, Where is their God? From their distress they take courage and boast in the madness of idol-worship, magnifying their own blessedness in being chosen by God.
AI summary
Commenting on Psalm 115:1-18
The dead praise not the Lord —So far as this world is concerned. They cannot unite in the Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with which the church delights to adore her Lord. The preacher cannot magnify the Lord from his coffin, nor the Christian worker further manifest the power of divine grace by daily activity while he lies in the grave. Neither any that go down into silence.
In these verses, I. We are earnestly exhorted, all of us, to repose our confidence in God, and not suffer our confidence in him to be shaken by the heathens' insulting over us upon the account of our present distresses.
Commenting on Psalm 115:9-18