Commentaries:
Barnes' Notes
He shall choose our inheritance for us - He has chosen or selected the land which we inherit. Of all the countries which compose the world, he has chosen "this" to be the inheritance of his own people, or the place where they should dwell. The thought in this verse is based on the idea so common in the writings of the Hebrews, that their country was the glory of all lands - the place of all on earth most desirable to dwell in. It is in view of this fact that they are here called on to praise God, and to rejoice in him.
The excellency of Jacob - literally, "the pride - gâ'ôn - of Jacob." Septuagint, "beauty" - ̀ kallonēn . So the Vulgate, "speciem." The meaning is, that it was a land of which Jacob, the ancestor of the people, might be proud, or which he did boast of. It was ever regarded as an honor among the Jews that they dwelt in a land which had been the abode of the prophets; and especially was anything regarded as of value that could be traced to Jacob; that bad been once in his possession; or that could be regarded as his gift. Compare John 4:12.
Whom he loved - As one of the patriarchs. Perhaps special allusion is here made to "Jacob" rather than to Abraham and Isaac, because the land came actually into the possession of the Hebrew people in the time of Jacob' s sons. It was divided among the descendants of his sons, the twelve tribes, bearing their names; and thus Jacob was most naturally referred to as having been in possession of the land. Abraham and Isaac dwelt in the land as strangers and pilgrims Hebrews 11:9-10, Hebrews 11:13, having no possession there, not even of a burying-place except as they purchased it (compare Genesis 23:12-16); and the land actually came into the possession of the nation only in the family of Jacob.
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