Psalms 136
Psalm 136 is known as the Great Hallel - the “great song of praise” - and it is unlike anything else in the Psalter. Every one of its twenty-six verses ends with the identical line: for his mercy endureth for ever. It was made to be sung antiphonally: a leader, perhaps a Levite, chanted the first half of each verse, and the whole assembly answered, again and again, with the one refrain. The effect is not monotony but saturation. The psalm is not interested in saying many things once; it is interested in saying one thing until it cannot be forgotten. And the one thing is this: behind every work of God, from the making of the stars to the parting of a sea, stands a single, unfailing motive - mercy that does not run out.3
The half-lines that the leader sang carry the reader through the whole sweep of God's acts. First the call to give thanks to the highest of all - the God of gods… the Lord of lords (vv. 2-3). Then creation: To him that by wisdom made the heavens… that made great lights… the sun to rule by day… the moon and stars to rule by night (vv. 5-9). Then the great rescue: To him that smote Egypt in their firstborn… And brought out Israel from among them… To him which divided the Red sea into parts (vv. 10-13). Then the years in the wilderness and the gift of the land (vv. 16-22). And finally, the turn that gives the whole psalm its warmth: Who remembered us in our low estate… And hath redeemed us from our enemies… Who giveth food to all flesh (vv. 23-25). Cosmos and history and the daily bread on the table, all of it answered by the same refrain.
What makes the refrain more than a chorus is its placement. It does not come at the end of the psalm, or at the end of each stanza; it comes at the end of every line, so that no single act of God is ever stated without mercy attached to it. The making of light - for his mercy endureth for ever. The overthrow of an empire - for his mercy endureth for ever. The food set before every living thing - for his mercy endureth for ever. The psalm refuses to let the reader admire God's power apart from God's kindness. By the time the assembly has answered for the twenty-sixth time, the lesson is in the bone: the One who is great enough to make the heavens is good enough to remember a people in their low estate, and the love that moves Him is the same yesterday and for ever.2
Tap any highlighted phrase to jump to the commentary that unpacks it.

Psalm 136:1-9O Give Thanks Unto the LORD; for He Is Good
1O give thanks unto the LORD; for he is good: for his mercy endureth for ever. 2O give thanks unto the God of gods: for his mercy endureth for ever. 3O give thanks to the Lord of lords: for his mercy endureth for ever. 4To him who alone doeth great wonders: for his mercy endureth for ever. 5To him that by wisdom made the heavens: for his mercy endureth for ever. 6To him that stretched out the earth above the waters: for his mercy endureth for ever. 7To him that made great lights: for his mercy endureth for ever: 8The sun to rule by day: for his mercy endureth for ever: 9The moon and stars to rule by night: for his mercy endureth for ever.
The psalm opens with the line that everything else hangs on: O give thanks unto the LORD; for he is good: for his mercy endureth for ever. Two reasons are given for the thanks, and they are really one. God is to be thanked because he is good - good not in what He gives but in what He is, good at the root. And that goodness has a name and a duration: his mercy endureth for ever. This is the thesis the whole psalm will defend, and it defends it in the most patient way imaginable - not by argument but by recital, walking through act after act of God and answering each one with the same refrain. Notice that the call is not feel grateful but give thanks: thanksgiving here is something done, said aloud, offered. And it is the first move of a soul that has understood what God is like. Before the psalm asks for anything, before it even remembers anything, it gives thanks - because the most accurate thing that can be said about the Maker of all things is that He is good, and His goodness will not wear out.
The thanks rises at once to the highest possible address: O give thanks unto the God of gods… O give thanks to the Lord of lords (vv. 2-3). These titles deliberately stack superlatives. Whatever powers the ancient world bowed to - whatever it called a “god” or a “lord” - the One being praised here stands over all of them, supreme and unrivalled. The phrasing echoes the words of Moses: the LORD your God is God of gods, and Lord of lords, a great God, a mighty (Deut. 10:17). The psalm is not conceding that the other gods are real rivals; it is using the language of the highest rank to say that this God answers to no one, that there is no court above His. And here is the quiet wonder of the psalm's logic: the very next breath after God of gods is the same refrain as every other line - for his mercy endureth for ever. The One at the top of all things is merciful. Supreme power and steadfast love are not in tension in Him; the highest authority in existence is also the kindest. That is precisely what the rest of the psalm sets out to show.
Verses 7 to 9 walk straight through the fourth day of the creation account: To him that made great lights… The sun to rule by day… The moon and stars to rule by night. The wording is almost a quotation of Genesis, and the psalmist clearly wants the reader to hear the echo. But he adds something Genesis leaves implicit. After each piece of the heavens - the great lights, the sun, the moon and stars - comes the refrain: for his mercy endureth for ever. The sun is not merely a fact of physics; it is an act of kindness, set to rule by day so that the world has warmth and light and a rhythm to live by. The moon and stars are mercy too, given to rule by night so that even the darkness is governed and marked and not left formless. There is a striking gentleness in the verb rule. The lights do not merely shine; they govern, they order, they keep the day and the night in their bounds - and that ordering is itself a gift. We so easily take the sky for granted, the dependable turning of day into night and back again. The psalm will not let us. It teaches the worshipper to look up at the most ordinary thing in the world - the sun coming up again - and read it as mercy that has not run out overnight.
Psalm 136:10-16Brought Out with a Strong Hand
10To him that smote Egypt in their firstborn: for his mercy endureth for ever: 11And brought out Israel from among them: for his mercy endureth for ever: 12With a strong hand, and with a stretched out arm: for his mercy endureth for ever. 13To him which divided the Red sea into parts: for his mercy endureth for ever: 14And made Israel to pass through the midst of it: for his mercy endureth for ever: 15But overthrew Pharaoh and his host in the Red sea: for his mercy endureth for ever. 16To him which led his people through the wilderness: for his mercy endureth for ever.
The psalm now turns from creation to history, from the making of the world to the making of a people, and the first act it names is severe: To him that smote Egypt in their firstborn (v. 10). It is worth pausing over the fact that the psalm calls even this mercy. The same refrain that crowned the gift of sunlight crowns the night of the Passover. How? Because mercy toward the oppressed and judgement on the oppressor are, in this story, the same act seen from two sides. For four hundred years a people had been enslaved, their infants drowned by royal decree, their cries rising up unanswered - until they were not unanswered. The blow that fell on Egypt was the breaking of a chain that human power would not break on its own. The psalm does not gloat over Egypt; it gives thanks that mercy was strong enough to act. There is a sober comfort in this for anyone who has wondered whether God sees injustice and does nothing. The God of this psalm is not indifferent to the trampled. His mercy is not only tender; it is also a force that finally moves against everything that holds His people down.
The deliverance is described with two phrases that became almost a fixed signature of the Exodus: With a strong hand, and with a stretched out arm (v. 12). This is how God Himself had announced what He would do - I will redeem you with a stretched out arm, and with great judgments (Exod. 6:6). The images are bodily and vivid: a hand strong enough to grip and to wrench free, an arm stretched out to its full reach, straining toward the rescue. The point of the language is that the deliverance was God's own doing, not Israel's. They did not fight their way out of Egypt; they were brought out, carried by a strength entirely outside themselves. And the verb the psalm has just used is worth holding onto: He brought out Israel from among them (v. 11). To be brought out is the most passive thing in the world - it is something done to you, not by you. The whole later memory of Israel rests on this: they were a redeemed people before they were anything else, hauled out of bondage by an arm not their own. The refrain insists on the reason: for his mercy endureth for ever. The strong hand was a merciful hand.
Psalm 136:17-22And Gave Their Land for an Heritage
17To him which smote great kings: for his mercy endureth for ever: 18And slew famous kings: for his mercy endureth for ever: 19Sihon king of the Amorites: for his mercy endureth for ever: 20And Og the king of Bashan: for his mercy endureth for ever: 21And gave their land for an heritage: for his mercy endureth for ever: 22Even an heritage unto Israel his servant: for his mercy endureth for ever.
The recital moves from the wilderness to its destination: the land that lay on the far side, guarded by kings who would not let Israel pass. To him which smote great kings… And slew famous kings (vv. 17-18). The psalm calls them great and famous - not to flatter them, but to measure the rescue. These were no minor obstacles; they were the recognised powers of the region, names that carried weight, kings whose reputations went before them. And against the people who had nothing - no standing army, no fortified cities, no record of conquest - the difference was not Israel's strength but Israel's God. The same hand that broke Egypt's grip now cleared the road into the inheritance. It is the consistent witness of this whole section: at every point where Israel met a power too great for it, the story does not turn on Israel rising to the occasion but on God acting on their behalf. The refrain keeps the motive in view. Even the toppling of great kings is not raw conquest; it is mercy clearing a path for a homeless people to come home.
Two of the kings are named - Sihon king of the Amorites… And Og the king of Bashan (vv. 19-20) - the rulers Israel faced on the approach to the land, remembered ever after as the first victories on the threshold of the promise. And then comes the goal toward which the whole psalm has been moving since the Exodus began: And gave their land for an heritage… Even an heritage unto Israel his servant (vv. 21-22). The word heritage is tender and important. The land is not described as plunder seized by force; it is a gift given, an inheritance handed down to a people called God's servant. An inheritance is something received, not earned - you do not work for what is left to you; you are simply given it because of a relationship. And there is a deliberate arc here. The same people who were slaves with nothing in verse 11 are landholders with an inheritance by verse 22. The God who brought them out of bondage brought them in to a home. Mercy does not stop at rescue; it does not merely break the chain and leave the freed person standing in an empty field. It settles them, gives them a place, makes the homeless an heir. That is the shape of this enduring love - out of slavery, through the sea and the wilderness, and at last into a land to call their own.
Psalm 136:23-26Who Remembered Us in Our Low Estate
23Who remembered us in our low estate: for his mercy endureth for ever: 24And hath redeemed us from our enemies: for his mercy endureth for ever. 25Who giveth food to all flesh: for his mercy endureth for ever. 26O give thanks unto the God of heaven: for his mercy endureth for ever.
The psalm turns, in its final movement, from them to us. All through the recital God has acted upon ancestors, nations, the figures of the old story; now the pronoun shifts and the worshipper is drawn personally inside the mercy: Who remembered us in our low estate… And hath redeemed us from our enemies (vv. 23-24). The God of the great deeds is not finished; the same mercy that split the sea long ago is the mercy that reached the people now singing. The word remembered carries more weight in Scripture than it does in ordinary speech. To say God remembered is never to suggest He had forgotten; it means He turned His attention into action, that He moved on behalf of those He had in mind. God's remembering is His helping. And notice where He remembered them: in our low estate - not after they had climbed back up, not once they had made themselves presentable, but at the bottom, in the place of weakness and defeat. This is the consistent direction of the whole psalm's mercy. It runs downhill, toward need. The God of gods, the maker of the heavens, the breaker of empires, bends His attention to a people at their lowest - and that bending is the same enduring love as everything that came before.
Further study
- The Hebrew text of Psalm 136 with Rashi, Ibn Ezra, and other classical commentators side by side - useful for chesed (the refrain word, “mercy,” in all twenty-six verses), for hodu (vv. 1-3, 26, “O give thanks”), and for the titles God of gods and Lord of lords in verses 2-3.
- Psalm 136 ↔ Genesis 1 · Exodus 14 · Luke 1 · John 6Intertextual BibleTraces the threads tying Psalm 136 to the rest of Scripture - the creation account it sings back (Gen. 1 in vv. 5-9), the Red Sea deliverance (Exod. 14 in vv. 13-15), the “low estate” remembered that Mary takes up in her song (Luke 1:48 echoing v. 23), and the One who feeds all flesh (v. 25) named the bread of life (John 6).
- Psalm 136 - Translators' NotesNET BibleThe NET Bible's detailed footnotes on Psalm 136 - its antiphonal, responsive structure as the Great Hallel, the force of the refrain word behind “mercy” (chesed, steadfast covenant love), and the historical references behind the kings Sihon and Og in verses 19-20.
Where this echoes in Scripture
O Give Thanks Unto the LORD; for He Is Good
- Psalm 107:1O give thanks unto the LORD, for he is good: for his mercy endureth for ever.The same opening line and refrain (v. 1) - a thanksgiving formula sung across the Psalter.
- Deuteronomy 10:17the LORD your God is God of gods, and Lord of lords, a great God, a mighty.The source of the titles in verses 2-3 - the One supreme over every power.
- John 1:1-3All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.The creating “wisdom” of verse 5, given a name in the New Testament.
- Colossians 1:16For by him were all things created... all things were created by him, and for him.The making of the heavens (vv. 5-9) attributed to the One through whom God made all.
- Genesis 1:16And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night.The fourth-day account that verses 7-9 sing back, now answered with “his mercy endureth for ever.”
Brought Out with a Strong Hand
- Exodus 14:21-22and the LORD caused the sea to go back... and the waters were divided. And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon the dry ground.The deliverance verses 13-15 are singing - the road God opened through the sea.
- Exodus 6:6I will redeem you with a stretched out arm, and with great judgments.God’s own promise behind the language of verse 12 - redemption by His outstretched arm.
- 1 Corinthians 10:1-2all passed through the sea; and were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea.The passage through the sea (vv. 13-14) read as a picture of being brought through to new life.
- Isaiah 63:11-12that led them by the right hand of Moses with his glorious arm, dividing the water before them.The same Exodus memory - God’s glorious arm dividing the water, recalled as Israel’s deliverance.
And Gave Their Land for an Heritage
- Numbers 21:33-34And they went up... and Og the king of Bashan went out against them... And the LORD said unto Moses, Fear him not; for I have delivered him into thy hand.The defeat of Og (v. 20) - one of the threshold victories the psalm recalls.
- Deuteronomy 4:38To bring thee in, to give thee their land for an inheritance, as it is this day.The promise behind verses 21-22 - the land given as an inheritance, not seized.
- Joshua 21:43And the LORD gave unto Israel all the land which he sware to give unto their fathers; and they possessed it, and dwelt therein.The inheritance of verses 21-22 fulfilled - the homeless people brought home.
- Acts 13:19And when he had destroyed seven nations in the land of Chanaan, he divided their land to them by lot.Paul rehearsing the same mercy - the kings overthrown (vv. 17-20) and the land given.
Who Remembered Us in Our Low Estate
- Luke 1:48-54For he hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden... He hath holpen his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy.Verse 23 taken up by Mary - the God who remembers the low estate, come at last in mercy.
- Romans 5:8God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.The enduring mercy of the refrain shown at its furthest reach - the love that stooped to a cross.
- Psalm 145:15-16The eyes of all wait upon thee... Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing.The same mercy as verse 25 - the God who gives food to all flesh, satisfying every living thing.
- John 6:35I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger.The One who feeds all flesh (v. 25) offering Himself as the bread that satisfies for ever.