We have heard with our ears - That is, it has been handed down by tradition.
Our fathers have told us - Our ancestors. They have delivered it down from generation to generation. The word rendered “told” means properly to grave, or to insculp on a stone; and thence, to write. Then it comes to mean to number, to count, to recount, to tell, to declare. The word would be applicable to any method of making the thing known, either by hieroglyphic figures in sculpture, by writing, or by oral tradition, though it seems probable that the latter mode is particularly referred to here. Compare Exodus 10:2; Exodus 12:26-27.
What work thou didst in their days - The great work which thou didst accomplish for them; or, how thou didst interpose in their behalf. The reference is to what God accomplished for them in delivering them from Egyptian bondage, and bringing them into the land of Canaan.
In the times of old - In ancient times; in the beginning of our history. The idea here is, that we may properly appeal to the past - to what God has done in former ages - as an argument for his interposition in similar circumstances now, for,
(a) His former interposition showed his power to save;
(b) it was such an illustration of his character that we may appeal to that as a reason for asking him to interpose again.