This is a psalm for David, dealing with the glorification and resurrection of our Lord, which took place early in the morning on the first day of the week, now called the Lord’s day.

The first day of the week denotes the Lord’s Day, the first day after the Sabbath, the day on which the Lord rose from the dead. It is properly called the Lord’s Day because of the superiority of the miracle or because he established the world on it; for by the Lord’s rising from the dead on that day, he is known to have helped this world, since it is made known that he also made it. Since the whole psalm is sung after the resurrection, this heading has been placed at its head to teach the hearts of the faithful with the appropriate indication.

In this psalm he preaches about the ascension of our Lord and teaches the Gentiles how they may become worthy of the heavenly tabernacles.

The foolish person counts as his own possession that which never actually belongs to him, seemingly ignorant in his greed that the earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof, for God is king of all the earth. It is the passion of having that gives people a false title of lordship over that which can never belong to them. The earth, says the wise preacher, abides forever,^[1] ministering to every generation, first one, then another, that is born on it. But people, though they are so little even their own masters that they are brought into life without knowing it by their Maker’s will, and before they wish are withdrawn from it, nevertheless in their excessive vanity think that they are its lords; that they, now born, now dying, rule that which remains continually.

He is Lord of the whole world. He is its Lord, however, not by wresting authority or by depriving anyone else of lordship but by personally creating it and leading it from nonbeing into being.

This is true, for the Lord, now glorified, is preached to all nations to bring them to faith, and the whole world thus becomes his church.

This verse teaches about God’s kingdom to come, in which he will reign over all. And in order to make known that as maker and natural Lord he will reign over it, he said [in the next verse], He is its foundations.

After he taught briefly that everything which the Lord created belongs to him, he now embarks on the second section with a question; he answers by telling what sort of people they ought to be who desire to say that they are his.

Who will ascend to the towering heights of the Lord’s righteousness?

Where should you stand, you who seek sanctification from God? The writer says, You have established my feet on the rock. Christ was the rock. Let us learn about the one who follows these promises.

Who, then, will climb up there and stay there? Only a person innocent in action and pure in thought. One who has not received his soul in vain, that is, a person who has not consigned his or her soul to the things that pass away but realizes that it is immortal and longs for a settled and changeless eternity. Or sworn deceitfully to a neighbor: such a person’s dealings with others are free from deceit, just as the things of eternity are simple and straightforward.

It is appropriate, he is saying, for him who desires to ascend that mountain both to purify his soul of idle thoughts and to keep his hands away from such pursuits. He put hands in place of pursuits, and by heart he implied desires: with the latter we form our intentions, and by the former we put them into action.

Truly Judas ascended onto the mountain of the Lord, but he did not stand in his holy place. He was not innocent in hands or pure in heart, but a thief who was taking the money.

Truthful swearing is certainly not forbidden in the Old Testament, but since the cause of perjury often arises for human nature from the weakness of the mind, in the New Testament it states that it is more beneficial not to swear oaths at all. . . . One who is going to do something other than promised swears deceitfully, not believing that it is perjury to wickedly manipulate someone who makes the mistake of trusting him. ^[1] WEIGH YOUR WORDS. ^[1]

Now, it was quite appropriate for him to associate mercy with blessing: even what are thought rewards are given to human beings only on account of divine lovingkindness. I mean, all the righteousness of human beings is not nearly sufficient for gifts bestowed by God and certainly not for those yet to come, which even surpass human imagining.

The one who will judge is the very one who blesses; the one who could have issued a sentence of incommutable damnation declares innocence. Therefore he wanted the value of the kindness to be acknowledged because of the worthiness of the one who overlooks offenses. . . . The blessing of acquittal follows mercy so that this blessing might be perceived to have come not through merits, but through the Lord’s kindness. For there is no one who does not have need to be shown mercy. Transgressions are forgiven so that a crown may come, just as freedom will not be able to be granted until slavery has first been removed. Our savior is the Lord Christ by whom blessedness is bestowed and sins are loosened. What he said earlier should not disturb us: He will receive blessing from the Lord; later he added, And mercy from God his savior, while in the order of things he pardons our sins first, and afterwards the gifts of his blessings follow. You often find that the order is varied so that mercy is placed first. . . . This figure is called anastrophe or an inversion, when we express a thought in a reversed order.

No one seeking the face of God will see his face and live, . . . unless he or she has been changed.

It speaks of them as a generation because those who seek him are born like this. Of those who seek the face of the God of Jacob. They are seeking the face of the God who gave first place to the one born later.

Solomon was not the Lord of hosts. But, when our Christ arose from the dead and ascended into heaven, the heavenly princes chosen by God were ordered to open the gates of heaven that the King of glory might enter and sit at the right hand of the Father until he makes his enemies his footstool.^[1] Now, when these heavenly princes saw that he was in appearance without beauty, honor or glory, and not recognizing him, they asked, Who is this King of glory? And the Holy Spirit, either in his own name or in the Father’s, answered, The Lord of hosts. He is the King of glory. But I am sure that everyone will admit that none of the gatekeepers of the temple at Jerusalem ever said of Solomon (though he was ever so glorious a king) or of the ark of testimony, Who is this King of glory?

Learn what our temple is, if you would know;

It is one that no artisan has built,

A structure not of riven fir or pine,

Nor reared with blocks of quarried marble fair.

Its massive weight no columns high support

Beneath the arches of a gilded vault.

By God’s Word it was formed, not by his voice,

But by the everlasting Word, the Word made flesh.^[1]

This temple is eternal, without end,

This you attacked with scourge and cross and gall.

This temple was destroyed by bitter pains.^[2]

Its form was fragile from the Mother’s womb,

But when brief death the Mother’s part dissolved,

The Father’s might restored it in three days.

You have beheld my saving temple rise

On high, surrounded by an angel throng.^[3]

The everlasting gates uphold its roof;

Through lofty towers the glorious stairs arise,

And at the top appears a shining path. THE ^[1]

He comes to the heavenly gates: angels accompany him, and the gates of heaven were closed. For he has not yet ascended into heaven. Now first does he appear to the powers of heaven as flesh ascending. Therefore to these powers it is said by the angels, who are the couriers of the Savior and Lord, Lift up your gates, you princes; and be lifted up, you everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall come in.

Let no one wonder, I ask you, on hearing of the ignorance of the invisible powers: they have neither advance knowledge nor complete knowledge—only the divine nature has that knowledge. Angels and archangels, however, and the other companies of the invisible powers know as much as they are taught, for which reason the divine apostle also, speaking of them, said, So that to the principalities and authorities in the heavenly places the wisdom of God in its rich variety might now be made known through the church.^[1] Now, if they came to learn the divine wisdom more precisely through the life of the church, there is nothing out of order for the powers on high to be ignorant even of the mystery of Christ’s ascension when they see the human nature and do not perceive the divinity concealed in it. . . . No human being had ever passed through [the eternal gates]; but when God the Word became human and took up our first fruits, he both led the way up to heaven and took his place at the right hand of majesty in the highest places, above every principality, authority, dominion and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the age to come.

God spared not his own Son for you,^[1] letting him become a curse for us; for cursed is he who hangs on a tree;^[2] . . . that he might redeem us from our sins. The sun was darkened on the day of our redemption;^[3] hell lost its right to us, and we were enrolled for heaven. The eternal gates were lifted up that the King of glory, the Lord of might, might enter in, and humankind, born of the earth, destined for hell, was purchased for heaven.

It was not the Word himself that needed an opening of the gates, being Lord of all; nor were any of his works closed to their maker; but we it was that needed it, whom he carried up by his own body. For as he offered it to death on behalf of all, so by it he once more made ready the way up into the heavens.

The Word, being the image of the Father and immortal, took the form of a servant, and as man he underwent death for us in his flesh, that thereby he might offer himself for us through death to the Father. Likewise also, as man, he is said because of us and for us to be highly exalted, that as by his death we all died in Christ, so again in Christ himself we might be highly exalted, being raised from the dead and ascending into heaven, where the forerunner Jesus has entered for us, not into the figures of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us.^[1] But if no Christ has entered into heaven itself for us, even though he was previously and always Lord and Framer of the heavens, then it is for us, therefore, that the present exaltation is written. And as he himself, who sanctifies all, also says that he sanctifies himself to the Father for our sakes, not that the Word may become holy but that he himself may in himself sanctify all of us, in like manner we must take the present phrase, He highly exalted him—not that he himself needed to be exalted, for he is already the highest, but that he may become righteousness for us, and that we may be exalted in him and may enter the gates of heaven, which he has also opened for us, the forerunners saying, Lift up your gates, O you rulers, and be lifted up, you everlasting doors, and the King of glory shall come in. For here also the gates were not shut on him who is the Lord and Maker of all, but because of us this too is written, to whom the door of paradise was shut. And therefore in a human relation, because of the flesh that he bore, it is said of him, Lift up your gates, and shall come in, as if a man were entering; but in a divine relation on the other hand it is said of him, since the Word was God, that he is the Lord and the King of glory. Such our exaltation the Spirit foreannounced in the eighty-ninth psalm, saying, And in your righteousness shall they be exalted, for you are the glory of their strength.^[2] And if the Son is Righteousness, then he is not exalted because he himself was in need, but it is we who are exalted in that Righteousness, which is he.^[3]

If he ascend up into heaven, ascend with him. Be one of those angels who escort him or one of those who receive him. Bid the gates be lifted up, or be made higher, that they may receive him, exalted after his passion. Answer to those who are in doubt because he bears up with him his body and the tokens of his passion, which he did not have when he came down, and who therefore, inquire, Who is the King of glory? that it is the Lord strong and mighty, as in all things that he has done from time to time and does, so now in his battle and triumph for the sake of humankind. And give to the those who doubt the question the twofold answer. And if they marvel and say as in Isaiah’s drama who is this that comes from Edom and from the things of earth? Or how are the garments red of him that is without blood or body, as of one that treads in the full winepress?^[1] Set forth the beauty of the array of the body that suffered, adorned by the passion and made splendid by the Godhead, than which nothing can be more lovely or more beautiful.

As our Lord ascends to the Father in triumph, he issues commands to the angels saying, Open to me the gates of justice; I will enter them and give thanks to the Lord.^[1] These are the gates of which in the twenty-fourth psalm the angels were speaking while they were preparing for the entrance of the Lord: Lift up, O gates, your lintels; reach up, you ancient portals, that the King of glory may come in! Aptly are the gates commanded to lift up high and raise aloft their portals, since, in accordance with the dispensation and mystery of the flesh and in conformity with the victory of the cross, he reenters heaven mightier than he had come down on earth. This gate is the Lord’s; the just shall enter it.^[2] Through this gate, Peter has entered, and Paul, and all the apostles and martyrs, and today the saints continue to go in; through this gate, the thief was the first to pass with the Lord. Have faith, therefore, and be hopeful for your own entrance.

Now it is said to that one: Open the gates for your leaders. Cast away the example of Adam who is your leader according to the flesh, and lift up the eternal doors holding the powerful and mighty king of glory, powerful in battle, overcoming faults and their offsprings, worthless of spirit. Therefore, lift up the gates for your leaders. Just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so shall we bear the likeness of the heavenly man.^[1]

Lord of Sabaoth is translated Lord of powers. And he is the captain of the powers of the Lord, whom also the divine powers salute as Lord of Sabaoth in Psalm 24, foretelling his return from earth to heaven. . . . In the Hebrew he is here again called Lord of Sabaoth. And since he is the King of glory, and by his sojourn here the whole earth would be filled with his glory, both in the psalm and in the prophecy the fulfillment is rightly placed in the present: in the prophecy in the words, The whole earth is full of his glory, in the psalm at the beginning where it says, The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, the world and all that dwell therein.

Christ must be understood to be an exterminator of spiritual foes, who wields spiritual arms and fights in spiritual strife. . . . It is of such a war as this that the psalm may evidently have spoken: The Lord is strong, the Lord is mighty in battle. For with the last enemy death did he fight, and through the trophy of the cross he triumphed.

But after he had destroyed his enemies through his passion, the Lord, who is mighty in battle and strong, . . . goes, bearing victory and trophies, with the body that arose from the dead. . . . Certain powers say, Who is this that is coming from Edom, with scarlet garments from Bosra, so beautiful? And those escorting him say to those stationed at the gates of heaven, Lift up your gates, and the King of glory will come in.

The way lies open now from earth to heaven. Let the prophet’s trumpet sound again: get rid of your gates, yes, even you heavenly princes, you who have erected gates in the minds of people who worship the host of heaven. But you, everlasting gates, lift yourselves up, gates of everlasting righteousness, love and purity, through which a soul loves the one true God and refuses to prostitute itself to many so-called gods. And the King of glory will enter. The King of glory will make his way in, to interced for us at the Father’s right hand.

Now this is said twice in one and the same psalm . . . in a way that might be thought superfluous and unnecessary. But in the repetition of the same words pay attention to how they end, and notice why it is said twice. It is as if, you see, to the one who rises again once and ascends once, gates are opened twice, both those of hell and those of heaven. It is a new thing, after all, God present in hell; it is a new thing, a man taken up into heaven. At each moment, at each point, princes are terrified: Who is this King of glory? How can we tell this? Listen to the reply given to each. The first questioners are told, The Lord, the valiant and mighty, the Lord mighty in war. What sort of war? Undergoing death for mortals, suffering alone for all, the Almighty not resisting and yet conquering death in dying. Great indeed, then, is the King of glory, even in the netherworld. This is also repeated to the heavenly powers. . . . But because he lifts up a man also with him to heaven, it is as if he is not recognized there either, and they ask, Who is this king of glory? But there, because he is no longer a contender but the winner, because he is not fighting but celebrating his triumph, the reply here is not The Lord mighty in war, but The Lord of hosts, he is the King of glory.

With the report of his resurrection, already accomplished, going ahead of him, the Lord of hosts and the King of glory himself at length appeared and made clear with what great might he had overcome the death he had temporarily tasted.

Who is the King of glory? Christ, the Son of God, he is the King of glory, casting off the prince of shame. He lifts high the eternal gates of the holy universal church, having cast down the temple of idols just as the gates of their prince the devil. If you should ask, Who is that King of glory? the apostle will answer, The King of all for their salvation, Christ, Son of God, who rules forever.

He is the king of glory who makes glorious those who glorify him, as it is said by the Lord: Those who glorify me, I will glorify. He allots power and strength and other gifts to each one as he desires.