“Glorious things are spoken of thee, O city of God. Selah.”
The birthright is universalized: "Among those who know me I mention Rahab and Babylon; Philistia too, and Tyre, with Ethiopia—'This one was born there.'" The enumeration of Israel's historical enemies as well as distant peoples, all claimed as natives of Zion, represents a radical universalization: all peoples, regardless of origin or traditional enmity, can claim citizenship in God's city.
Church Fathers on Psalms 87:3
1. The Psalm which has just been sung is short, if we look to the number of its words, but of deep interest in its thoughts.. ..The subject of song and praise in that Psalm is a city, whose citizens are we, as far as we are Christians: whence we are absent, as long as we are mortal: whither we are tending: through whose approaches, undiscoverable among the brakes and thorns that entangle them, the Sovereign of the city made Himself a path for us to reach it. Walking thus in…
Nicene & Post-Nicene / Ante-Nicene Fathers translations · public domain
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