A verse by verse commentary on Psalm 114 dealing with Israel coming out of Egypt and Judah becoming God's sanctuary.. It is a brief history of God's dealing with Israel.
1. PSALM 114 COMME TARY
EDITED BY GLE PEASE
I TRODUCTIO
SPURGEO , "SUBJECT A D DIVISIO . This sublime SO G OF THE EXODUS
is one and indivisible. True poetry has here reached its climax: no human mind has
ever been able to equal, much less to excel, the grandeur of this Psalm. God is
spoken of as leading forth his people from Egypt to Canaan, and causing the whole
earth to be moved at his coming. Things inanimate are represented as imitating the
actions of living creatures when the Lord passes by. They are apostrophised and
questioned with marvellous force of language, till one seems to look upon the actual
scene. The God of Jacob is exalted as having command over river, sea, and
mountain, and causing all nature to pay homage and tribute before his glorious
majesty.
ELLICOTT, "This psalm is among the most artistic in the whole collection. Though
ending so abruptly as to suggest-that it may be a fragment (the LXX., Syriac, Arabic
versions, and some MSS. capriciously join it to the following psalm) it is in form
perfect. The versification is regular, and the stanzas as complete and finished as in a
modern hymn, consisting each of four lines, and presenting each a perfect example
of synthetic parallelism. (See Introduction, § 5.) But a higher art displays itself here.
The reserve with which the Divine name is withheld, till everything is prepared for
its utterance, and the vivid manner in which each feature of the rapid scene is
flashed upon us by a single word so that a whole history is accurately presented in a
few graphic touches, achieve a dramatic and a lyric triumph of the most remarkable
kind. Besides the historic interest of the psalm as part of the Hallel, and of the hymn
sung with Christ before His passion, it has a new interest from Dante, who makes it
the passage song of. the spirits into Purgatory:—
“Upon the storm stood the celestial pilot;
Beatitude seemed written in his face,
And more than a hundred spirits sat within.
‘In Exitu Israel de Egypto’
They chanted all together in one voice.
With whatso in that psalm is after written.”—
2. Purg. 45 (LO GFELLOW).
1 When Israel came out of Egypt,
Jacob from a people of foreign tongue,
BAR ES, "When Israel went out of Egypt - literally, “In the going out of Israel
from Egypt.” This is not to be confined to the exact act of the exodus, but embraces all
that properly entered into that migration - the whole train of events which resuited in
their being brought into the promised land.
The house of Jacob - The family of Jacob - a name appropriately used here, since it
was the family of Jacob that had gone down into Egypt, and that had increased to these
great numbers.
From a people of strange language - Speaking a foreign or a barbarian tongue.
See the notes at Psa_81:5.
CLARKE, "A people of strange language - This may mean no more than a
barbarous people; a people whom they did not know, and who did not worship their
God. But it is a fact that the language of the Egyptians in the time of Joseph was so
different from that of the Hebrews that they could not understand each other. See Psa_
81:5; Gen_42:23.
The Chaldee has here ברבראי מעמי meammey barbarey, which gives reason to believe
that the word is Chaldee, or more properly Phoenician. See this word fully explained in
the note on Act_28:2 (note). My old Psalter understood the word as referring to the
religious state of the Egyptians: In gangyng of Isrel oute of Egipt, of the house of Jocob
fra hethen folke.
GILL, "When Israel went out of Egypt,.... The people of Israel in a body, publicly,
openly, and not by stealth; freely and willingly, not forced and drove out; though urged
by the Egyptians to go, through the hand of God upon them; and so went out with the
mighty hand and outstretched arm of the Lord, and with great riches, and in health, not
3. one feeble or sick among them.
The house of Jacob from a people of strange language; or barbarous; as every
language was reckoned by the Jews but their own; the Egyptian language they did not
understand; see Psa_81:5, no doubt many of them learned it during their long stay there,
but in general they retained their own language. This was an emblem of the Lord's
people in effectual calling, coming out of bondage into liberty, out of darkness into light,
out of superstition, and idolatry and profaneness, to the service of the true God in
righteousness and true holiness; and from a people of a strange language to those that
speak the language of Canaan, a pure language, in which they can understated one
another when they converse together, either about experience or doctrine; and the
manner of their coming out is much the same, by strength of hand, by the power of
divine grace, yet willingly and cheerfully, with great riches, the riches of grace, and a title
to the riches of glory, and with much spiritual strength; for, though weak in themselves,
yet are strong in Christ.
HE RY 1-2, "The psalmist is here remembering the days of old, the years of the
right hand of the Most High, and the wonders which their fathers told them of (Jdg_
6:13), for time, as it does not wear out the guilt of sin, so it should not wear out the sense
of mercy. Let it never be forgotten,
I. That God brought Israel out of the house of bondage with a high hand and a
stretched-out arm: Israel went out of Egypt, Psa_114:1. They did not steal out
clandestinely, nor were they driven out, but fairly went out, marched out with all the
marks of honour; they went out from a barbarous people, that had used them
barbarously, from a people of a strange language, Psa_81:5. The Israelites, it seems,
preserved their own language pure among them, and cared not for learning the language
of their oppressors. By this distinction from them they kept up an earnest of their
deliverance.
II. That he himself framed their civil and sacred constitution (Psa_114:2): Judah and
Israel were his sanctuary, his dominion. When he delivered them out of the hand of
their oppressors it was that they might serve him both in holiness and in righteousness,
in the duties of religious worship and in obedience to the moral law, in their whole
conversation. Let my people go, that they may serve me. In order to this, 1. He set up his
sanctuary among them, in which he gave them the special tokens of his presence with
them and promised to receive their homage and tribute. Happy are the people that have
God's sanctuary among them (see Exo_25:8, Eze_37:26), much more those that, like
Judah here, are his sanctuaries, his living temples, on whom Holiness to the Lord is
written. 2. He set up his dominion among them, was himself their lawgiver and their
judge, and their government was a theocracy: The Lord was their King. All the world is
God's dominion, but Israel was so in a peculiar manner. What is God's sanctuary must
be his dominion. Those only have the privileges of his house that submit to the laws of it;
and for this end Christ has redeemed us that he might bring us into God's service and
engage us for ever in it.
JAMISO 1-4, "Psa_114:1-8. The writer briefly and beautifully celebrates God’s
former care of His people, to whose benefit nature was miraculously made to contribute.
of strange language — (compare Psa_81:5).
K&D 1-4, "Egypt is called ז ֵּעל ם ַע (from ז ַע ָ,ל cogn. ג ַע ָ,ל ה ָע ָ,)ל because the people spoke a
4. language unintelligible to Israel (Psa_81:6), and as it were a stammering language. The
lxx, and just so the Targum, renders ᅚκ λαοሞ βαρβάρου (from the Sanscrit barbaras, just as
onomatopoetic as balbus, cf. Fleischer in Levy's Chaldäisches Wörterbuch, i. 420). The
redeemed nation is called Judah, inasmuch as God made it His sanctuary (שׁ ֶּדק) by
setting up His sanctuary (שׁ ָ ְק ִ,מ Exo_15:17) in the midst of it, for Jerusalem (el ᐡuds) as
Benjamitish Judaean, and from the time of David was accounted directly as Judaean. In
so far, however, as He made this people His kingdom (יו ָּותל ְשׁ ְמ ַ,מ an amplificative plural
with Mem pathachatum), by placing Himself in the relation of King (Deu_33:5) to the
people of possession which by a revealed law He established characteristically as His
own, it is called Israel. 1 The predicate takes the form י ִה ְ ַ,ו for peoples together with
country and city are represented as feminine (cf. Jer_8:5). The foundation of that new
beginning in connection with the history of redemption was laid amidst majestic
wonders, inasmuch as nature was brought into service, co-operating and sympathizing
in the work (cf. Psa_77:15.). The dividing of the sea opens, and the dividing of the
Jordan closes, the journey through the desert to Canaan. The sea stood aside, Jordan
halted and was dammed up on the north in order that the redeemed people might pass
through. And in the middle, between these great wonders of the exodus from Egypt and
the entrance into Canaan, arises the not less mighty wonder of the giving of the Law: the
skipping of the mountains like rams, of the ills like ּאןצי־ַנ ְ , i.e., lambs (Wisd. 19:9),
depicts the quaking of Sinai and its environs (Exo_19:18, cf. supra Psa_68:9, and on the
figure Psa_29:6).
CALVI , "1When Israel went out from Egypt That exodus being a remarkable
pledge and symbol of God’s love for the children of Abraham, it is not surprising
that it should be so frequently called to remembrance. In the beginning of the psalm,
the prophet informs us that the people whom God purchased at so great a price are
no more their own. The opinion of certain expositors, that at that time the tribe of
Judah was consecrated to the service of God, according to what is said in Exodus
19:6, and 1 Peter 2:9, appears to me foreign to the prophet’s design. All doubt about
the matter is removed by what is immediately subjoined, God’s taking Israel under
his rule, which is simply a repetition of the same sentiment in other words. Judah
being the most powerful and numerous of all the tribes, and occupying the chief
place among them, here takes the precedency of the rest of the people. At the same
time, it is very evident that the honor which is in a peculiar manner ascribed to
them, belongs equally to the whole body of the people. (359) When God is said to be
sanctified, it must be understood that the prophet is speaking after the manner of
men, because, in himself, God is incapable of increase or diminution. Judeah is
called his holiness, (360) and Israel his dominion, (361) because his holy majesty,
which hitherto had been little known, secured the veneration of all who had
witnessed the displays of his incredible power. In delivering his people, God erected
a kingdom for himself and procured respect for his sacred name; if then they do not
constantly reflect upon such a remarkable instance of his kindness, their
insensibility is totally inexcusable.
5. SPURGEO , "Ver. 1. When Israel went out of Egypt. The song begins with a burst,
as if the poetic fury could not be restrained, but overleaped all bounds. The soul
elevated and filled with a sense of divine glory cannot wait to fashion a preface, but
springs at once into the middle of its theme. Israel emphatically came out of Egypt,
out of the population among whom they had been scattered, from under the yoke of
bondage, and from under the personal grasp of the king who had made the people
into national slaves. Israel came out with a high hand and a stretched out arm,
defying all the power of the empire, and making the whole of Egypt to travail with
sore anguish, as the chosen nation was as it were born out of its midst.
The house of Jacob from a people of strange language. They had gone down into
Egypt as a single family—"the house of Jacob"; and, though they had multiplied
greatly, they were still so united, and were so fully regarded by God as a single unit,
that they are rightly spoken of as the house of Jacob. They were as one man in their
willingness to leave Goshen; numerous as they were, not a single individual stayed
behind. Unanimity is a pleasing token of the divine presence, and one of its sweetest
fruits. One of their inconveniences in Egypt was the difference of languages, which
was very great. The Israelites appear to have regarded the Egyptians as stammerers
and babblers, since they could not understand them, and they very naturally
considered the Egyptians to be barbarians, as they would no doubt often beat them
because they did not comprehend their orders. The language of foreign taskmasters
is never musical in an exile's ear. How sweet it is to a Christian who has been
compelled to hear the filthy conversation of the wicked, when at last he is brought
out from their midst to dwell among his own people!
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Whole Psalm. The 114th psalm appears to me to be an admirable ode, and I began
to turn it into our own language. As I was describing the journey of Israel from
Egypt, and added the Divine Presence amongst them, I perceived a beauty in this
psalm, which was entirely new to me, and which I was going to lose; and that is, that
the poet utterly conceals the presence of God in the beginning of it, and rather lets a
possessive pronoun go without a substantive, than he will so much as mention
anything of divinity there. "Judah was his sanctuary, and Israel his dominion" or
kingdom. The reason now seems evident, and this conduct necessary; for, if God
had appeared before, there could be no wonder why the mountains should leap and
the sea retire; therefore, that this convulsion of nature may be brought in with due
surprise, his name is not mentioned till afterwards; and then with a very agreeable
turn of thought, God is introduced at once in all his majesty. This is what I have
attempted to imitate in a translation without paraphrase, and to preserve what I
could of the spirit of the sacred author.
When Israel, freed from Pharaoh's hand,
Left the proud tyrant and his land,
The tribes with cheerful homage own
Their King, and Judah was his throne.
Across the deep their journey lay,
The deep divides to make them way;
The streams of Jordan saw, and fled
With backward current to their head.
The mountains shook like frightened sheep,
6. Like lambs the little hillocks leap;
ot Sinai on her base could stand,
Conscious of sovereign power at hand.
What power could make the deep divide?
Make Jordan backward roll his tide?
Why did ye leap, ye little hills?
And whence the fright that Sinai feels?
Let every mountain, and every flood,
Retire, and know the approaching God,
The King of Israel! see him here:
Tremble, thou earth, adore and fear.
He thunders—and all nature mourns;
The rock to standing pools he turns;
Flints spring with fountains at his word,
And fires and seas confess their Lord.
—Isaac Watts, in "The Spectator, "1712.
Ver. 1. When Israel went out of Egypt. Out of the midst of that nation, that is, out of
the bowels of the Egyptians, who had, as it were, devoured them; thus the Jew
doctors gloss upon this text. —John Trapp.
Ver. 1. Israel went out of Egypt. This was an emblem of the Lord's people in
effectual vocation, coming out of bondage into liberty, out of darkness into light, out
of superstition, and idolatry, and profaneness, to the service of the true God in
righteousness and true holiness; and
from a people of strange language to those that speak the language of Canaan, a
pure language, in which they can understand one another when they converse
together, either about experience or doctrine; and the manner of their coming out is
much the same, by strength of hand, by the power of divine grace, yet willingly and
cheerfully, with great riches, the riches of grace, and a title to the riches of glory,
and with much spiritual strength; for though weak in themselves, yet they are
strong in Christ. —John Gill.
Ver. 1. The house of Jacob. The Israelites though they were a great number when
they went forth from Egypt, nevertheless formed one house or family; thus the
church at the present time dispersed throughout the whole world is called one
house: 1 Timothy 3:15, Hebrews 3:6; 1 Peter 2:5 : and that because of one faith, one
God, one Father, one baptism, Ephesians 4:5. —Marloratus.
Ver. 1. A people of strange language. When we find in verse 1, as in Psalms 81:5,
Egypt spoken of as a land where the people were of a "strange tongue, "it seems
likely that the reference is to their being a people who could not speak of God, as
Israel could; even as Zephaniah 3:9 tells of the "pure lip, "viz., the lip that calls on
the name of the Lord. —Andrew A. Bonar.
Ver. 1. A people of strange tongue. Mant translates this "tyrant land, "and has the
following note: The Hebrew word here rendered "tyrant, "has been supposed to
signify "barbarous"; that is, "using a barbarous or foreign language or
pronunciation." But, says Parkhurst, the word seems rather to refer to the
"violence" of the Egyptians towards the Israelites, or "the barbarity of their
behaviour, "which was more to the Psalmist's purpose than "the barbarity of their
language"; even supposing the reality of the latter in the time of Moses. The epithet
7. "barbarous" would leave the same ambiguity as Parkhurst supposes to belong to
the text. Bishop Horsley renders "a tyrannical people."
Ver. 1. A people of strange language. The strange language is evidently an
annoyance. Israel could not feel at home in Egypt. —Justus Olshausen.
PULPIT, "A PSALM of reminiscence, designed to encourage the exiles on their
return from Babylon, during their "day of small things" (Zechariah 4:10; comp.
Ezra 3:12). If God had done so much for them when he brought them out of Egypt,
if such glorious prodigies had marked that epoch, might they not be sure that his
hand would be stretched out for them now? Formally, the psalm is more like a
modern poem than most. It divides into four stanzas of four lines each, very evenly
balanced, and perfect in its metrical arrangement. "The psalm is evidently by a
skilled artist" (Cheyne).
Psalms 114:1
When Israel went out of Egypt; literally, at the going forth of Israel from Egypt; ἐν
ἐξόδῳ ἰσράηλ, LXX. The "going forth from Egypt" was the only thing parallel in
Israelitish history to the going forth from Babylon. The nation should learn what to
expect in the future by what occurred in the past. The house of Jacob (compare the
more common "house of Israel," Psalms 98:3; Psalms 115:12; Psalms 135:19) from a
people of strange language; literally, from a stammering people; but a people of
foreign speech is no doubt meant.
WHEDO , ". Strange language—A foreign and unintelligible language. See Psalms
81:5. The word occurs nowhere else in the Old Testament, and the suggestion is,
that there could be no natural bond between Israel and a people of a strange dialect;
and this barbarity of language not unfrequently became an occasion of enmity. It
was plain enough that it was out of the divine order that Israel should dwell among
such a people, (see Deuteronomy 28:49; Isaiah 28:11; Isaiah 33:19,) except for
punishment.
Jeremiah 5:15. On the strangeness of the dialect of Egypt to the Hebrews see
Genesis 42:23
COFFMA , "Verse 1
PSALM 114
PRAISI G GOD FOR ISRAEL'S DELIVERA CE FROM EGYPT
This is one of the Hallel Psalms, being the second hymn always sung by the Jews at
the beginning of various solemn feasts. (See the discussion of this in the previous
chapter.) The theme here is God's deliverance of the children of Israel from slavery
in Egypt. Considering the brevity of the psalm, quite a number of the features of
that deliverance are included.
8. "It is possible that in this psalm Israel, returned from Babylon, is looking back to
the earlier exodus, and thrilling with the great thought that the old past lives again
in the present. Such a historical parallel would have ministered courage and hope to
Israel."[1]
The very fact that the bondage of the Hebrew Children in Egypt is recognized in the
ew Testament as an eloquent type of sin, and that their deliverance from that
slavery is seen as a type of how men, even today, are saved, endows this psalm with
unusual interest.
The purpose of the psalm, stated by Leupold, was, "To encourage the downhearted
people who had come back home and were encountering nothing except difficulties
and disappointments."[2]
Psalms 114:1-8
The Text of the Psalm
"When Israel went forth out of Egypt,
The house of Jacob from a people of strange language;
Judah became his sanctuary,
Israel his dominion.
The sea saw it and fled;
The Jordan was driven back.
The mountains skipped like rams,
The little hills like lambs.
What ailest thee, O thou sea, that thou fleest?
Thou Jordan that thou turnest back?
Ye mountains that ye skip like rams;
Ye little hills like lambs?
Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord,
At the presence of the God of Jacob,
Who turned the rock into a pool of water,
9. The flint into a fountain of waters."
"Israel went forth out of Egypt ... Jacob from a people of strange language" (Psalms
114:1). ote here that the name "Jacob" here is used as the name of all of Israel.
COKE, "Verse 1
Psalms 114.
An exhortation, by the example of the dumb creatures, to fear God in his church.
BISHOP PATRICK supposes, that as the foregoing psalm recites some instances of
divine providence to particular people, so this makes a brief narration of some
miraculous works of that providence, which respected the whole Jewish nation, and
which are very elegantly expressed.
Psalms 114:1. From a people of strange language— Or, according to the original, a
barbarous people; such as the Jews esteemed all other nations: though the original
word properly signifies only a stranger, or alien.
CO STABLE, "Verses 1-4
When God brought the Israelites out of Egypt, He dwelt among them and ruled over
them. The names Judah and Israel are in poetic parallelism here and refer to the
same group, namely, the nation of Israel. Judah was its leading tribe.
The writer personified the Red Sea as seeing the Israelites coming and fleeing from
them by parting its waters. Later when the Israelites entered the Promised Land,
the Jordan River backed up as far as the town of Adam, farther north in the Jordan
Valley, to let them cross. The mountains around Sinai quaked when God came down
on Mt. Horeb to meet with His people.
PULPIT, "Psalms 114:1-8
God with us.
This psalm, which is so full of fine poetry, is also charged with spiritual
suggestiveness. In the few verses of which it is composed, it brings before us the
nearness of God to us, and the power he is exerting on us. We have—
I. HIS DWELLI G-PLACE I US. "Judah was his sanctuary" (Psalms 114:2). God
dwelt in Judah in a sense in which he dwelt nowhere else. There was his manifested
presence, and thither the tribes came up when they wanted to offer sacrifice, to
make supplication, to hold high and happy fellowship. It was the place of his abode.
ow God dwells not merely with, but in, his people. We are "the habitation of God
through the Spirit." Our human hearts are his earthly home. To the pure, obedient,
believing heart that seeks his presence (see Luke 11:13) God will come, and in that
heart he will abide. "If any man love me … we will come unto him, and make our
10. abode with him" (John 14:23).
II. HIS I HERITA CE I US. "Israel was his dominion" (Psalms 114:2). The
kingdom of Israel, i.e. the people who dwelt within it, were God's inheritance (see
Psalms 94:5; Jeremiah 2:7). If God "rejoices in his works," in those things which he
made and "pronounced good," much more does he rejoice in his own children—in
those who know, who worship, who trust, who love, who serve, him. More precious
than all fruitful fields, than "all the cedars of Lebanon," is one human heart that,
redeemed by his Son and renewed by his Spirit, reciprocates his Fatherly affection,
is gladly subject to his will, and labors heartily in his cause. How great, then, is his
inheritance in all his people, in all those of every age and beneath every sky who
have returned to him, and who are rejoicing in him! Are we such, in spirit, in
conversation, in life, that our God can find a part of his Divine heritage in us.
III. HIS E ERGIZI G PRESE CE. (Psalms 114:3-7.) What was it that moved the
mountains, that rolled back the river that made the waters of the sea to stand up
like a wall? It was the operative presence of Cod himself; it was the working of the
unseen hand. What is it now that makes the tides of the ocean to keep their time, the
streams and the rivers to fertilize the soil through which they flow, the seed to
germinate in the soil, the corn and the fruit to ripen in the sun? When we have
reached the ultimate physical cause, we have not obtained the explanation that we
seek. We come finally to the great fact of God's presence, of the energizing power
which he supplies, without which there could be no life, no growth, no motion, no
result. What the psalmist says in fine poetic language, our intelligent piety confirms;
the answer to our questions How? and Whence? is this—The presence of the Lord,
"without whom nothing can be made that is made." "The Lord of hosts is with us;"
"My Father worketh."
IV. HIS CO VERTI G POWER. (Psalms 114:8.) The "turning of the rock into
standing water" was a Divine, a wonderful action. But the spiritual and the
supernatural are as Divine as the miraculous. Equally wonderful as, and more
gracious and more benignant than, such physical transformation is the changing of
the flinty heart into the water of penitence, into the fountain of piety and purity.
God is doing daily, through his people, in his Churches, that which "calls for loudest
songs of praise." But this, his greatest work, is not on rock, or soil, or sea, or river: it
is on the hard tablet of the human heart, and on the sinful habits of the human life.
BI 1-8, "When Israel went out of Egypt.
The workings of the Eternal will
God has a will. He doeth all things after the “counsel of His own will.” The universe is
but His will in form and action. It is the primordial, the propelling and presiding force of
all forces and motions. The psalm leads us to look at this Eternal will in two aspects—
I. As acting on moral mind. In the deliverance of the Jews from Egyptian bondage, it
11. acted both on the Egyptian mind and on the Hebrew mind.
1. This will acted on the Egyptian mind disastrously. Whose fault was this? Not
God’s.
(1) Man can resist the Divine will. Herein is his distinguishing power. This binds
him to moral government, and renders him accountable for his conduct.
(2) His resistance is his ruin. To go against the Eternal will is to go against the
laws of nature, the current of the universe, the eternal conditions of well-being.
Acquiescence to the Divine will is heaven, resistance to the Divine will is hell.
2. This will acted on the Hebrew mind remedially.
(1) It brought Israel out of Egypt,
(2) Into blessed relationship with God.
II. As acting on material nature.
1. Its action on matter is always effective. God has only to will a material
phenomenon, and it occurs. “He spake, and it was done.” Nothing in material nature
comes between His will and the result purposed. Not so in moral mind.
2. Its action on matter is philosophically exciting (verses 5, 6). The motions of
matter are constantly exciting the philosophic inquiry. Would that philosophy would
not pause in its inquiries until it traced all the forms and motions of matter to the
Eternal will! It was that will that.was now working in the mountains, in the hills, and
the rocks.
3. Its action on matter is sometimes terrific (verse 7). (Homilist.)
BENSON, "Verse 1-2
Psalms 114:1-2. When Israel went out of Egypt — That is, were brought
out by mighty signs and wonders wrought by the power of God; from a
people of a strange language — From a barbarous people, as some
render it: though it is not improbable that the Israelites, though they
stayed so long in Egypt, yet, having little converse or society with the
Egyptians, knew little or nothing of their language. Judah was his
sanctuary — The tribe of Judah is here put for the Jews in general,
because Judah was their principal tribe. And they are said to have
been his sanctuary and his dominion, because he appointed that a
tabernacle should be placed for himself among them, promised to
receive their homage and service, granted them a glorious token of his
presence, and became their Lawgiver, King, and Governor, in a
peculiar sense.
ELLICOTT, "Verse 1
(1) When Israel went out.—LXX., in “the Exodus of Israel.”
A people of strange language.—LXX., rightly, “a barbarous people.”
12. Since the Hebrew word, like the Greek, implies a certain scorn or
ridicule, which ancient races generally had for those speaking another
language. To this day the Russians call the Germans “dumb.”
EBC, "It is possible that in this psalm Israel, restored from Babylon, is looking back
to the earlier Exodus, and shrilling with the great thought that that old past lives
again in the present. Such a historical parallel would minister courage and hope.
But the eyes of psalmists were ever turning to the great days when a nation was
born, and there are no data in this psalm which connect it with a special period,
except certain peculiarities in the form of the words "turns" and "fountain" in
Psalms 114:8, both of which have a vowel appended (i in the former, o in the latter
word), which is probably an archaism, used by a late poet for ornament’s sake. The
same peculiarity is found in Psalms 113:5-9, where it occurs five times.
A familiar theme is treated here with singular force and lyric fervour. The singer
does not heap details together but grasps one great thought. To him there are but
two outstanding characteristics of the Exodus: one, its place and purpose as the
beginning of Israel’s prerogative, and another, its apocalypse of the Majesty of
Jehovah, the Ruler of ature in its mightiest forms. These he hymns, and then
leaves them to make their own impression. He has no word of "moral," no
application, counsel, warning, or encouragement to give. Whoso will can draw these.
Enough for him to lift his soaring song, and to check it into silence in the midst of its
full music. He would be a consummate artist, if he were not something much better.
The limpid clearness, the eloquent brevity of the psalm are not more obvious than
its masterly structure. Its four pairs of verses, each laden with one thought, the
dramatic vividness of the sudden questions in the third pair, the skilful suppression
of the Divine name till the close, where it is pealed out in full tones of triumph, make
this little psalm a gem.
In Psalms 114:1-2 the slighting glance at the land left by the ransomed people is
striking. The Egyptians are to this singer "a stammering people," talking a
language which sounded to him barely articulate. The word carries a similar
contempt to that in the Greek "barbarian," which imitates the unmeaning babble of
a foreign tongue. To such insignificance in the psalmist’s mind had the once dreaded
oppressors sunk! The great fact about the Exodus was that it was the birthday of
the ation, the beginning of its entrance on its high prerogatives. If the consecration
of Judah as "His sanctuary" took place when Israel went forth from Egypt, there
can be no reference to the later erection of the material sanctuary in Jerusalem, and
the names of Judah and Israel must both apply to the people, not to the land, which
it would be an anachronism to introduce here. That deliverance from Egypt was in
order to God’s dwelling in Israel, and thereby sanctifying or setting it apart to
Himself, "a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." Dwelling in the midst of them,
He wrought wonders for them, as the psalm goes on to hymn; but this is the grand
foundation fact, that Israel was brought out of bondage to be God’s temple and
13. kingdom. The higher deliverance of which that Exodus is a foreshadowing is, in like
manner, intended to effect a still more wonderful and intimate indwelling of God, in
His Church. Redeemed humanity is meant to be God’s temple and realm.
2 Judah became God’s sanctuary,
Israel his dominion.
BAR ES, "Judah was his sanctuary - His home; his abode; his sacred dwelling-
place. Judah was the principal or leading tribe, recognized as the tribe where power was
to be concentrated, and from which the Messiah was to proceed Gen_49:8-12; and
hence, the name was early used to denote the entire people, and ultimately, as modified
in the word Jews, became the common name of the nation.
And Israel his dominion - The nation that he ruled; the nation that had his law;
the nation that he governed by his presence - or, of which he was the recognized king.
There can be no doubt that the reference here is to God, but it is remarkable that the
name “God” is not used. Perhaps the reason may be that this psalm was designed to be
employed in connection with the preceding one, and as that consists entirely of the
praises of God, it was not necessary to repeat the name when his praise was to be
continued under another form, and in connection with another line of thought.
CLARKE, "Judah was his sanctuary - He set up his true worship among the
Jews, and took them for his peculiar people.
And Israel his dominion - These words are a proof, were there none other, that
this Psalm was composed after the days of David, and after the division of the tribes, for
then the distinction of Israel and Judah took place.
GILL, "Judah was his sanctuary,.... Meaning not the tribe of Judah only, though
that in many things had the preeminence; the kingdom belonging to it, the chief ruler
being out of it, especially the Messiah; its standard was pitched and moved first; it
offered first to the service of the Lord; and the Jews have a tradition, mentioned by
Jarchi and Kimchi, that this tribe, with its prince at the head of it, went into the Red sea
14. first; the others fearing, but afterwards followed, encouraged by their example: but
rather all the tribes are meant, the whole body of the people; for this is not to be
understood of the tabernacle or temple in the tribe of Judah, sometimes called a
sanctuary; for neither of these were in being when Israel came out of Egypt; but it may
be rendered, "Judah was his holiness" (u), or was holiness to the Lord, the Lord's holy
people; see Jer_2:2, not all internally holy; for there were many that came out of Egypt
that were unholy, rebellious, and disobedient, and whose carcasses fell in the wilderness;
but externally, when brought out of Egypt they were separated from all other people, and
in this sense sanctified, and became a holy and special people, chosen by the Lord to be
so; with whom, he made a covenant, and to whom he gave holy laws and righteous
statutes: and in this they were typical of those who are effectually called by grace with an
holy calling, and unto holiness; have principles of grace and holiness wrought in them,
and have Holiness to the Lord written upon them; they have the sanctification of the
Spirit, and Christ is made sanctification to them; and they are the Lord's sanctuary, in
which he dwells.
And Israel his dominion: for, though all the world is his kingdom and his
government, yet the people of Israel were in a very particular and remarkable manner
his dominion; from the time of their coming out of Egypt to their having a king, their
government was properly a theocracy; God was their King, and by him they were
immediately ruled and governed, and had a body of laws given them from him, and were
under his immediate care and protection, Exo_19:5. In this they were typical of the
saints called by grace, who are then translated from the power of Satan into the kingdom
of Christ; whom they acknowledge to be their Lord and King, and whose laws,
commands, and ordinances, they willingly observe; the people of God are often
represented as a kingdom, and Christ as King of saints; the Targum is
"the congregation of the house of Judah was united to his holiness, and Israel to his
power.''
SPURGEO , "Ver. 2. Judah was his sanctuary, and Israel his dominion. The
pronoun "his" comes in where we should have looked for the name of God; but the
poet is so full of thought concerning the Lord that he forgets to mention his name,
like the spouse in the Song, who begins, "Let him kiss me, "or Magdalene when she
cried, "Tell me where thou hast laid him." From the mention of Judah and Israel
certain critics have inferred that this Psalm must have been written after the
division of the two kingdoms; but this is only another instance of the extremely
slender basis upon which an hypothesis is often built up. Before the formation of the
two kingdoms David had said, "Go number Israel and Judah, "and this was
common parlance, for Uriah the Hittite said, "The ark, and Israel and Judah abide
in tents"; so that nothing can be inferred from the use of the two names. o division
into two kingdoms can have been intended here, for the poet is speaking of the
coming out of Egypt when the people were so united that he has just before called
them "the house of Jacob." It would be quite as fair to prove from the first verse
that the Psalm was written when the people were in union as to prove from the
second that its authorship dates from their separation. Judah was the tribe which
led the way in the wilderness march, and it was foreseen in prophecy to be the royal
tribe, hence its poetical mention in this place. The meaning of the passage is that the
15. whole people at the coming out of Egypt were separated unto the Lord to be a
peculiar people, a nation of priests whose motto should be, "Holiness unto the
Lord." Judah was the Lord's "holy thing, "set apart for his special use. The nation
was peculiarly Jehovah's dominion, for it was governed by a theocracy in which
God alone was King. It was his domain in a sense in which the rest of the world was
outside his kingdom. These were the young days of Israel, the time of her espousals,
when she went after the Lord into the wilderness, her God leading the way with
signs and miracles. The whole people were the shrine of Deity, and their camp was
one great temple. What a change there must have been for the godly amongst them
from the idolatries and blasphemies of the Egyptians to the holy worship and
righteous rule of the great King in Jeshurun. They lived in a world of wonders,
where God was seen in the wondrous bread they ate and in the water they drank, as
well as in the solemn worship of his holy place. When the Lord is manifestly present
in a church, and his gracious rule obediently owned, what a golden age has come,
and what honourable privileges his people enjoy! May it be so among us.
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 2. Judah was his sanctuary, and Israel his dominion. These people were God's
sanctification and dominion, that is, witnesses of his holy majesty in adopting them,
and of his mighty power in delivering them: or, his sanctification, as having his holy
priests to govern them in the points of piety; and dominion, as having godly
magistrates ordained from above to rule them in matters of policy: or, his
sanctuary, both actually, because sanctifying him; and passively, because sanctified
of him...This one verse expounds and exemplifies two prime petitions of the Lord's
Prayer. "Hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come": for Judeah was God's
sanctuary, because hallowing his name;and Israel his dominion, as desiring his
kingdom to come. Let every man examine himself by this pattern, whether he be
truly the servant of Jesus his Saviour, or the vassal of Satan the destroyer. If any
man submit himself willingly to the domineering of the devil, and suffer sin to reign
in his mortal members, obeying the lusts thereof, and working all uncleanness even
with greediness; assuredly that man is yet a chapel of Satan, and a slave to sin. On
the contrary, whosoever unfeignedly desires that God's kingdom may come, being
ever ready to be ruled according to his holy word, acknowledging it a lantern to his
feet, and a guide to his paths; admitting obediently his laws, and submitting himself
alway to the same; what is he, but a citizen of heaven, a subject of God, a saint, a
sanctuary? —John Boys.
Ver. 2. Judah was his sanctuary, etc. Reader, do not fail to remark, when Israel was
brought out of Egypt the Lord set up his tabernacle among them, and manifested
his presence to them. And what is it now, when the Lord Jesus brings out his people
from the Egypt of the world? Doth he not fulfil that sweet promise, "Lo, I am with
you alway, even unto the end of the world"? Is it not the privilege of his people, to
live to him, to live with him, and to live upon him? Doth he not in every act declare,
"I will say, it is my people; and they shall say, the Lord is my God"? Matthew
28:20; Zechariah 13:9. —Robert Hawker.
Ver. 2. Judah was his sanctuary. Meaning not the tribe of Judah only, though they
in many things had the preeminence; the kingdom belonged to it, the chief ruler
being out of it, especially the Messiah; its standard was pitched and moved first; it
offered first to the service of the Lord; and the Jews have a tradition, mentioned by
16. Jarchi and Kimchi, that this tribe with its prince at the head of it, went into the Red
Sea first: the others fearing, but afterwards followed, encouraged by their example.
In this place all the tribes are meant, the whole body of the people. —John Gill.
Ver. 2. One peculiarity of the second verse requires attention. It twice uses the word
"his", without naming any one. There are two theories to account for this
circumstance. One is that Psalms 114:1-8 was always sung in immediate connection
with 113, in which the name of God occurs no less than six times, so that the
continuance of the train of thought made a fresh repetition of it here unnecessary.
But this view, to be fully consistent with itself, must assume that the two Psalms are
really one, with a merely arbitrary division, which does not, on the face of the
matter, seem by any means probable, as the scope of thought in the two is perfectly
distinct. The other, which is more satisfactory, regards the omission of the Holy
ame in this part of the Psalm as a practical artifice to heighten the effect of the
answer to the sudden apostrophe in verses five and six. There would be nothing
marvellous in the agitation of the sea, and river, and mountains in the presence of
God, but it may well appear wonderful till that potent cause is revealed, as it is most
forcibly in the dignified words of the seventh verse. —Ewald and Perowne, in
eale and Littledale.
WHEDO , "2. Judah was his sanctuary—That is, after the departure of Israel from
Egypt, “Judah” became “his sanctuary.” The author certainly belonged to a late
period, when the rivalry of Ephraim had yielded to the power of Judah; and
Jerusalem, then belonging to the kingdom of Judah, became, in the eyes of the
nation, the holy city. The pronoun “his” refers to God, though the name is
suppressed till Psalms 114:7—a peculiarity of the psalm.
COFFMA , ""Judah ... Israel" (Psalms 114:2). "Judah and Israel here do not refer
to the two parts of the divided kingdom; after the return, Judah was regarded as the
outstanding tribe; and Israel was still the common name for the whole nation."[3]
"Judah became his sanctuary ... Israel his dominion" (Psalms 114:2). It is incorrect
to make the word "when" in Psalms 114:1 mean that the nation of Israel became
God's sanctuary and dominion at a point in time, "when" they came out of Egypt.
Some have made that very mistake. The chosen people, as God's sanctuary and
dominion, date back to the patriarchs, as the very names "Judah," and "Israel"
most certainly indicate.
COKE, "Psalms 114:2. Judeah was his sanctuary— The tribe of Judah is here put
for the Jews in general, because Judah was the principal tribe. See umbers 2:3;
um_7:12; um_10:14. A correspondent of Sir Richard Steele's (Spectator, o.
461.) has translated this psalm into English verse; and in doing it he perceived a
beauty, which was entirely new to him, and which, he says, he was going to lose; and
that is, that the poet utterly conceals the presence of God in the beginning of it, and
rather lets the possessive pronoun go without a substantive, than he will so much as
mention any thing of the divinity there. Judeah was his sanctuary, and Israel his
dominion. The reason now seems evident, and this conduct necessary; for if GOD
had appeared before, there could be no wonder why the mountains should leap, and
17. the sea retire; therefore, that this convulsion of nature may be brought in with due
surprise, his name is not mentioned till afterward; and then, with a very agreeable
turn of thought, God is introduced at once in all his majesty. Mr. Cowley, in his
Davideis, makes David perform this ode before Saul, when he relieved him from his
melancholy; and it was a pretty thought of his, for the subject of it is very well
calculated for such a purpose: but from this verse it appears as if it was written
after the division of the ten tribes from the kingdom of Judah. So that it was,
probably, not composed by David, but by some other person, as a paschal hymn.
The reader will observe how exactly the alternate lines correspond with those
preceding them throughout the psalm.
ELLICOTT, "(2) Judah was.—Better, became. The feminine verb shows that the
country is intended, and not the tribe, and the parallelism directs us to think not of
the territory of the tribe of Judah alone, but of the whole country. otice the art
with which the name of God is reserved, and the simple pronoun, His, used. (Comp.
Exodus 19:6.)
3 The sea looked and fled,
the Jordan turned back
BAR ES, "The sea saw it - The word it is supplied, not very properly, by our
translators. It would be more expressive to say, “The sea saw:” that is, The sea - (the Red
Sea) - saw the mighty movement - the marshalled hosts - the moving masses - the cattle
- the pursuing enemies - the commotion - the agitation - on its usually quiet shores. We
are to conceive of the usual calmness of the desert - the waste and lonely solitudes on the
banks of the Red Sea - and then all this suddenly broken in upon by vast hosts of men,
women, children, and cattle, fleeing in consternation, followed by the embattled strength
of Egypt - all rolling on tumultuously to the shore. No wonder that the sea is represented
as astonished at this unusual spectacle, and as fleeing in dismay.
And fled - As if affrighted at the approach of such an host, coming so suddenly upon
its shores.
Jordan was driven back - Referring to the dividing of the waters of the Jordan
when the children of Israel passed over to the promised land. Jos_3:13-17. They also
seemed astonished at the approach of the Hebrews, and retired to make a way for them
18. to pass over.
CLARKE, "The sea saw it, and fled - Mr. Addison has properly observed (see
Spect. No. 461) that the author of this Psalm designedly works for effect, in pointing out
the miraculous driving back the Red Sea and the river Jordan, and the commotion of the
hills and mountains, without mentioning any agent. At last, when the reader sees the sea
rapidly retiring from the shore, Jordan retreating to its source, and the mountains and
hills running away like a flock of affrighted sheep, that the passage of the Israelites might
be every where uninterrupted; then the cause of all is suddenly introduced, and the
presence of God in his grandeur solves every difficulty.
GILL, "The sea saw it, and fled,.... When the Word of the Lord appeared at it, as the
Targum in the king's Bible; the Red sea, to which the Israelites came when they went out
of Egypt; this saw that Judah was the Lord's holy and peculiar people, and that Israel
were the subjects of his kingdom; it saw the presence of the Lord among them; it saw
him in the glory of his perfections, and felt his power; see Psa_77:16, at which its waters
fled and parted, and stood up as a wall to make way for Israel to pass through as on dry
land, Exo_14:21. This was typical of the nations of the Gentile world, comparable to the
sea, Dan_7:2, who saw the work of God going on among them under the ministry of the
Gospel in the first times of it, whereby multitudes were turned from idols to serve the
living God; this they saw and trembled at, and they and their kings fled for fear; see Isa_
41:5, and of the stop put to the ocean of sin in a man's heart, and to the torrent of
wickedness that breaks out from thence, by powerful and efficacious grace, much more
abounding where sin has abounded.
Jordan was driven back; this was done not at the time of the departure of the
Israelites from Egypt, but just before their entrance into the land of Canaan, and in order
to it; and being an event similar to the former is here mentioned, and done by the power
and presence of God; for as soon as the feet of the priests who bore the ark of the Lord,
the symbol of the divine Presence, were dipped in the brim of the waters, the waters
below were cut off from those above, and stood up on an heap, and all the Israelites
passed through on dry ground, Jos_3:13, this was an emblem of death, through which
the saints pass to glory, which is abolished by Christ, its sting and curse taken away;
which when the saints come to, they find it like Jordan driven back, and have an easy
and abundant passage through it; and when on the brink of it, and even in the midst of
it, sing, "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" 1Co_15:55.
HE RY, " That the Red Sea was divided before them at their coming out of Egypt,
both for their rescue and the ruin of their enemies; and the river Jordan, when they
entered into Canaan, for their honour, and the confusion and terror of their enemies
(Psa_114:3): The sea saw it, saw there that Judah was God's sanctuary, and Israel his
dominion, and therefore fled; for nothing could be more awful. It was this that drove
Jordan back, and was an invincible dam to his streams; God was at the head of that
people, and therefore they must give way to them, must make room for them, they must
retire, contrary to their nature, when God speaks the word. To illustrate this the psalmist
asks, in a poetical strain (Psa_114:5), What ailed thee, O thou sea! that thou fleddest?
And furnishes the sea with an answer (Psa_114:7); it was at the presence of the Lord.
19. This is designed to express, 1. The reality of the miracle, that it was not by any power of
nature, or from any natural cause, but it was at the presence of the Lord, who gave the
word. 2. The mercy of the miracle: What ailed thee? Was it in a frolic? Was it only to
amuse men? No; it was at the presence of the God of Jacob; it was in kindness to the
Israel of God, for the salvation of that chosen people, that God was thus displeased
against the rivers, and his wrath was against the sea, as the prophet speaks, Hab_3:8-
13; Isa_51:10; Isa_63:11, etc. 3. The wonder and surprise of the miracle. Who would
have thought of such a thing? Shall the course of nature be changed, and its fundamental
laws dispensed with, to serve a turn for God's Israel? Well may the dukes of Edom be
amazed and the mighty men of Moab tremble, Exo_15:15. 4. The honour hereby put
upon Israel, who are taught to triumph over the sea, and Jordan, as unable to stand
before them. Note, There is no sea, no Jordan, so deep, so broad, but, when God's time
shall come for the redemption of his people, it shall be divided and driven back if it stand
in their way. Apply this, (1.) To the planting of the Christian church in the world. What
ailed Satan and the powers of darkness, that they trembled and truckled as they did?
Mar_1:34. What ailed the heathen oracles, that they were silenced, struck dumb, struck
dead? What ailed their idolatries and witchcrafts, that they died away before the gospel,
and melted like snow before the sun? What ailed the persecutors and opposers of the
gospel, that they gave up their cause, hid their guilty heads, and called to rocks and
mountains for shelter? Rev_6:15. It was at the presence of the Lord, and that power
which went along with the gospel. (2.) To the work of grace in the heart. What turns the
stream in a regenerate soul? What ails the lusts and corruptions, that they fly back, that
the prejudices are removed and the whole man has become new? It is at the presence of
God's Spirit that imaginations are cast down, 2Co_10:5.
CALVI , "3The sea saw, and fled He does not enumerate in succession all the
miracles which were wrought at that time, but briefly alludes to the sea, which,
though a lifeless and senseless element, is yet struck with terror at the power of God.
Jordan did the same, and the very mountains shook. It is in a poetical strain that the
Psalmist describes the receding of the sea and of the Jordan. The description,
however, does not exceed the facts of the case. The sea, in rendering such obedience
to its Creator, sanctified his name; and Jordan, by its submission, put honor upon
his power; and the mountains, by their quaking, proclaimed how they were
overawed at the presence of his dreadful majesty. By these examples it is not meant
to celebrate God’s power more than the fatherly care and desire which he manifests
for the preservation of the Church; and, accordingly, Israel is very properly
distinguished from the sea, the Jordan, and the mountains — there being a very
marked difference between the chosen people and the insensate elements.
SPURGEO , "Ver. 3. The sea saw it, and fled; or rather, "The sea saw and fled" â
€”it saw God and all his people following his lead, and it was struck with awe and
fled away. A bold figure! The Red Sea mirrored the hosts which had come down to
its shore, and reflected the cloud which towered high over all, as the symbol of the
presence of the Lord: never had such a scene been imaged upon the surface of the
Red Sea, or any other sea, before. It could not endure the unusual and astounding
sight, and fleeing to the right and to the left, opened a passage for the elect people. A
like miracle happened at the end of the great march of Israel, for "Jordan, was
20. driven back." This was a swiftly flowing river, pouring itself down a steep decline,
and it was not merely divided, but its current was driven back so that the rapid
torrent, contrary to nature, flowed uphill. This was God's work: the poet does not
sing of the suspension of natural laws, or of a singular phenomenon not readily to be
explained; but to him the presence of God with his people is everything, and in his
lofty song he tells how the river was driven back because the Lord was there. In this
case poetry is nothing but the literal fact, and the fiction lies on the side of the
atheistic critics who will suggest any explanation of the miracle rather than admit
that the Lord made bare his holy arm in the eyes of all his people. The division of
the sea and the drying up of the river are placed together though forty years
intervened, because they were the opening and closing scenes of one great event. We
may thus unite by faith our new birth and our departure out of the world into the
promised inheritance, for the God who led us out of the Egypt of our bondage under
sin will also conduct us through the Jordan of death out of our wilderness
wanderings in the desert of this tried and changeful life. It is all one and the same
deliverance, and the beginning ensures the end.
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 3. The sea saw it: to wit this glorious work of God in bringing his people out of
Egypt. —Matthew Pool.
Ver. 3. The sea saw it. Saw there that "Judah" was "God's sanctuary, ""and Israel
his dominion, "and therefore "fled"; for nothing could be more awful. It was this
that drove Jordan back, and was an invincible dam to his streams; God was at the
head of that people, and therefore they must give way to them, must make room for
them, they must retire, contrary to their nature, when God speaks the word. —
Matthew Henry.
Ver. 3. The sea saw it, and fled.
The waves on either side
Unloose their close embraces, and divide,
And backwards press, as in some solemn show
The crowding people do,
(Though just before no space was seen,)
To let the admired triumph pass between.
The wondering army saw on either hand,
The no less wondering waves like rocks of crystal
stand.
They marched betwixt, and boldly trod
The secret paths of God. Abraham Cowley, 1618-1667.
Ver. 3. Jordan was driven back. And now the glorious day was come when, by a
stupendous miracle, Jehovah had determined to show how able he was to remove
every obstacle in the way of his people, and to subdue every enemy before their face.
By his appointment, the host, amounting probably to two millions and a half of
persons (about the same number as had crossed the Red Sea on foot), had removed
to the banks of the river three days before, and now in marching array awaited the
signal to cross the stream. At any time the passage of the river by such a multitude,
with their women and children, their flocks and herds, and all their baggage, would
have presented formidable difficulties; but now the channel was filled with a deep
and impetuous torrent, which overflowed its banks and spread widely on each side,
21. probably extending nearly a mile in width; while in the very sight of the scene were
the Canaanitish hosts, who might be expected to pour out from their gates, and
exterminate the invading multitude before they could reach the shore. Yet these
difficulties were nothing to Almighty power, and only served to heighten the effect
of the stupendous miracle about to be wrought.
By the command of Jehovah, the priests, bearing the ark of the covenant, the sacred
symbol of the Divine presence, marched more than half a mile in front of the people,
who were forbidden to come any nearer to it. Thus it was manifest that Jehovah
needed not protection from Israel, but was their guard and guide, since the
unarmed priests feared not to separate themselves from the host, and to venture
with the ark into the river in the face of their enemies. And thus the army, standing
aloof, had a better opportunity of seeing the wondrous results, and of admiring the
mighty power of God exerted on their behalf; for no sooner had the feet of the
priests touched the brim of the overflowing river, than the swelling waters receded
from them; and not only the broad lower valley, but even the deep bed of the stream
was presently emptied of water, and its pebbly bottom became dry. The waters
which had been in the channel speedily ran off, and were lost in the Dead Sea;
whilst those which would naturally have replaced them from above, were
miraculously suspended, and accumulated in a glassy heap far above the city Adam,
that is beside Zaretan. These places are supposed to have been at least forty miles
above the Dead Sea, and may possibly have been much more; so that nearly the
whole channel of the Lower Jordan, from a little below the Lake of Tiberias to the
Dead Sea, was dry...What a glorious termination of the long pilgrimage of Israel was
this! and how worthy of the power, wisdom, and goodness of their Divine Protector!
"The passage of this deep and rapid river, " remarks Dr. Hales, "at the most
unfavourable season, was more manifestly miraculous, if possible, than that of the
Red Sea; because here was no natural agency whatever employed; no mighty wind
to sweep a passage, as in the former case; no reflux of the tide, on which minute
philosophers might fasten to depreciate the miracle. It seems, therefore, to have
been providentially designed to silence cavils respecting the former; and it was done
at noonday, in the face of the sun, and in the presence, we may be sure, of the
neighbouring inhabitants, and struck terror into the kings of the Canaanites and
Amorites westward of the river." —Philip Henry Gosse, in "Sacred Streams,
"1877.
Ver. 3. Jordan was driven back. The waters know their Maker: that Jordan which
flowed with full streams when Christ went into it to be baptized, now gives way
when the same God must pass through it in state: then there was use of his water,
now of his sand. I hear no more news of any rod to strike the waters; the presence of
the ark of the Lord God, Lord of all the world, is sign enough to these waves, which
now, as if a sinew were broken, run back to their issues, and dare not so much as
wet the feet of the priests that bare it. How subservient are all the creatures to the
God that made them! How glorious a God do we serve; whom all the powers of the
heavens and elements are willingly subject unto, and gladly take that nature which
he pleaseth to give them. —Abraham Wright.
Ver. 3. Jordan was driven back. It was probably at the point near the present
southern fords, crossed at the time of the Christian era by a bridge. The river was at
its usual state of flood at the spring of the year, so as to fill the whole of the bed, up
22. to the margin of the jungle with which the river banks are lined. On the broken edge
of the swollen stream, the band of priests stood with the ark on their shoulders. At
the distance of nearly a mile in the rear was the mass of the army. Suddenly the full
bed of the Jordan was dried before them. High up the river, "far, far away, ""in
Adam, the city which is beside Zaretan, ""as far as the parts of Kirjathjearim"
(Joshua 3:16), that is, at a distance of thirty miles from the place of the Israelite
encampment, the waters there stood which "descended" "from the heights above,
"—stood and rose up, as if gathered into a water skin; as if in a barrier or heap, as
if congealed; and those that "descended" towards the sea of "the desert, "the Salt
Sea, "failed and were cut off." Thus the scene presented is of the "descending
stream" (the words employed seem to have a special reference to that peculiar and
most significant name of the "Jordan"), not parted asunder, as we generally fancy,
but, as the Psalm expresses it, "turned backwards"; the whole bed of the river left
dry from north to south, through its long windings; the huge stones lying bare here
and there, imbedded in the soft bottom; or the shingly pebbles drifted along the
course of the channel. —Arthur Penrhyn Stanly, in "The History of the Jewish
Church, "1870.
BE SO , "Verses 3-6
Psalms 114:3-6. The sea saw it, and fled — Saw that God was present with and
among them in an extraordinary manner, and therefore fled; for nothing could have
been more awful. Jordan is driven back — At the appearance of the divine glory
which conducted them. “Although forty years intervened between the two events
here mentioned, yet, as the miracles were of the same nature, they are spoken of
together.” The mountains skipped like rams — Horeb and Sinai, two tops of one
mountain, and other neighbouring hills and mountains. The same power that fixed
the fluid waters, and made them stand still, shook the stable mountains, and made
them tremble; for all the powers of nature are at the command and under the
control of the God of nature. Mountains and hills are before God but like rams and
lambs; even the largest and the most rocky of them are as manageable by him as the
sheep are by the shepherd. The trembling of the mountains before Jehovah may
shame the stupidity and obduracy of sinners, who are not moved at the discoveries
of his glory. What ailed thee, O sea, that thou fleddest? — What was the reason, or
for what cause was it, that thou didst, with such precipitation, retire and leave the
middle of thy channel dry? Why didst thou, O Jordan, run back toward thy
springs? Ye mountains, that ye skipped, &c. — Whence this unusual motion? Why
did you leap like affrighted rams or lambs, as if you would have run away from the
place where you had so long been fixed?
COFFMA , ""The sea saw it and fled, the Jordan was driven back" (Psalms
114:3). These are obvious references to the Red Sea crossing and to the crossing of
the Jordan river on dry land at the very time when the Jordan was at flood stage!
o greater wonders ever occurred in the history of God's dealings with Israel.
It is not necessary to comment upon those marvelous events here, because we
devoted many pages to full discussions of both events in Vol. 2 of my Commentaries
on the Pentateuch (exodus), pp. 190-198, and in the commentary on Joshua, pp. 31-
23. 34.
ELLICOTT, "(3) Fled.—The Authorised Version weakens the effect by rendering
“it was driven back.” (See Joshua 3:16.) The scene presented is of the “descending
stream” (the words employed seem to have a special reference to that peculiar and
most significant name of the “Jordan”) not parted asunder, as we generally fancy,
but, as the psalm expresses it, “turned backwards” (Stanley, Jewish Church, i. 229).
EBC, "The historical substratum for Psalms 114:3-4, is the twin miracles of drying
up the Red Sea and the Jordan, which began and closed the Exodus, and the
"quaking" of Sinai at the Theophany accompanying the giving of the Law. These
physical facts are imaginatively conceived as the effects of panic produced by some
dread vision; and the psalmist heightens his representation by leaving unnamed the
sight which dried the sea, and shook the steadfast granite cliffs. In the third pair of
verses he changes his point of view from that of narrator to that of a wondering
spectator, and asks what terrible thing, unseen by him, strikes such awe? All is
silent now, and the wonders long since past. The sea rolls its waters again over the
place where Pharaoh’s host lie. Jordan rushes down its steep valley as of old, the
savage peaks of Sinai know no tremors; -but these momentary wonders proclaimed
an eternal truth.
So the psalmist answers his own question, and goes beyond it in summoning the
whole earth to tremble, as sea, river, and mountain had done, for the same Vision
before which they had shrunk is present to all ature. ow the psalmist can peal
forth the ame of Him, the sight of whom wrought these wonders. It is "the Lord,"
the Sovereign Ruler, whose omnipotence and plastic power over all creatures were
shown when His touch made rock and flint forget their solidity and become fluid,
even as His will made the waves solid as a wall, and His presence shook Sinai. He is
still Lord of ature. And, more blessed still, the Lord of ature is the God of Jacob.
Both these names were magnified in the two miracles (which, like those named in
Psalms 114:3, are a pair) of giving drink to the thirsty pilgrims. With that thought
of omnipotence blended with gracious care, the singer ceases. He has said enough to
breed faith and hearten courage, and he drops his harp without a formal close. The
effect is all the greater, though some critics prosaically insist that the text is defective
and put a row or two of asterisks at the end of Psalms 114:8, "since it is not
discernible what purpose the representation [i.e., the whole psalm] is to serve"
(Graetz)!
BI 3-4, "The sea saw it, and fled.
The removal of obstacles
I. Antagonisms are quelled. Wherever the Church has advanced—
1. Sin and Satan have receded. Where it has not been so the Church is to blame. The
24. promise depends on the proper spirit, and the use of proper means.
2. Idolatry has receded. Christianity simply annihilated the classical, Druidical,
Saxon, Tartar, and Scandinavian mythologies, the bloody rites of the South Seas, and
is now doing the same for the debasing superstitions of Africa and the foul
abominations of Hindostan.
3. Infidelity has receded. For all the ancient philosophies she proved an overmatch.
II. Boundaries are removed. “Jordan was driven back.”
1. Christianity levels all class distinctions. To all castes, Jewish, Roman, Indian, etc.,
it is a formidable foe. It reduces all mankind to one common level of crying need, for
which but one provision has been made.
2. Christianity obliterates all physical barriers. It goes into all the world and
preaches the Gospel to every creature. It was not made for home consumption, but is
the property of all nations.
3. Christianity fills up all intellectual chasms. No greater remove could possibly be
than that between the old philosopher and the common people. Christianity appeals
to both. Its truths are The food of the scholar and the refreshment of the slave.
III. Difficulties are overcome. “The mountains skipped,” etc.
1. All difficulties of nature. Wherever Christianity has appeared “the valleys have
been exalted,” etc. Crooked ways have been made straight. No mountain has been
too high, no sea too broad, no continent too wide, for the pioneers and missionaries
of the faith.
2. All difficulties of human prejudice. Armies have been levied to extirpate it. Fires
have been kindled to burn it. Learning has been accumulated to refute it, but in vain.
In conclusion. This history is prophecy. Fulfilled prophecy in some instances. It
holds good through the ages. Let the Church in the strength of it redouble her
efforts, brighten her hope, perfect her faith, and go on conquering and to conquer.
(J. W. Burn.)
4 the mountains leaped like rams,
the hills like lambs.
BAR ES, "The mountains skipped like rams - As flocks in their gambols. They
25. seemed to move from place to place; everything seemed to be unsettled, and
acknowledged the presence of the Omnipotent One. The word rendered “skipped” means
to leap for joy; to dance. See the notes at Psa_29:6. The reference here is to the
agitations and commotions of the peaks of Sinai, when God came down to deliver the
law. Exo_19:16-18.
And the little hills like lambs - Hebrew, Like the sons of the flock. The reference
here is to the less prominent eminences of Sinai. The lofty hills, and the smaller hills
surrounding, seemed to be all in a state of commotion.
GILL, "The mountains skipped like rams,.... The mountains of Sinai and Horeb
quaked and moved at the presence of the Lord, when he descended thereon to give the
law; these saw his glory and trembled, Exo_19:18.
And the little hills like lambs; very beautiful are the larger mountains of Sinai and
Horeb compared to rams, and the motion of them to their skipping; and the little hills
adjacent to them to lambs: these may represent the greater and lesser governors in the
Roman empire at the time when such large conversions were made in it as before
observed; and which skipped, and trembled, and fled, and were moved out of their
places at the downfall of Paganism and progress of Christianity, Rev_6:14 and also may
be an emblem of the difficulties which lie like mountains and hills in the way of a
sinner's conversion and effectual calling, which yet give way to and are surmounted by
the efficacious grace of God; all mountains become a plain before him, and when he
works none can let.
HE RY 4-7, " That the earth shook and trembled when God came down on Mount
Sinai to give the law (Psa_114:4): The mountains skipped like rams, and then the little
hills might well be excused if they skipped like lambs, either when they are frightened or
when they sport themselves. The same power that fixed the fluid waters and made them
stand still shook the stable mountains and made them tremble for all the powers of
nature are under the check of the God of nature. Mountains and hills are, before God,
but like rams and lambs; even the bulkiest and the most rocky are as manageable by him
as they are by the shepherd. The trembling of the mountains before the Lord may shame
the stupidity and obduracy of the children of men, who are not moved at the discoveries
of his glory. The psalmist asks the mountains and hills what ailed them to skip thus; and
he answers for them, as for the seas, it was at the presence of the Lord, before whom, not
only those mountains, but the earth itself, may well tremble (Psa_114:7), since it has lain
under a curse for man's sin. See Psa_104:32; Isa_64:3, Isa_64:4. He that made the hills
and mountains to skip thus can, when he pleases, dissipate the strength and spirit of the
proudest of his enemies and make them tremble.
JAMISO , "skipped ... rams — (Psa_29:6), describes the waving of mountain
forests, poetically representing the motion of the mountains. The poetical description of
the effect of God’s presence on the sea and Jordan alludes to the history (Exo_14:21;
Jos_3:14-17). Judah is put as a parallel to Israel, because of the destined, as well as real,
prominence of that tribe.
SPURGEO , "EXPOSITIO Ver. 4. The mountains skipped like rams, and the
26. little hills like lambs. At the coming of the Lord to Mount Sinai, the hills moved;
either leaping for joy in the presence of their Creator like young lambs; or, if you
will, springing from their places in affright at the terrible majesty of Jehovah, and
flying like a flock of sheep when alarmed. Men fear the mountains, but the
mountains tremble before the Lord. Sheep and lambs move lightly in the meadows;
but the hills, which we are wont to call eternal, were as readily made to move as the
most active creatures. Rams in their strength, and lambs in their play, are not more
stirred than were the solid hills when Jehovah marched by. othing is immovable
but God himself: the mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed, but the
covenant of his grace abideth fast for ever and ever. Even thus do mountains of sin
and hills of trouble move when the Lord comes forth to lead his people to their
eternal Canaan. Let us never fear, but rather let our faith say unto this mountain,
"Be thou removed hence and cast into the sea, "and it shall be done.
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 4. The mountains skipped like rams, etc. The figure drawn from the lambs and
rams would appear to be inferior to the magnitude of the subject. But it was the
prophet's intention to express in the homeliest way the incredible manner in which
God, on these occasions, displayed his power. The stability of the earth being, as it
were, founded on the mountains, what connection can they have with rams and
lambs, that they should be agitated, skipping hither and thither? In speaking in this
homely style, he does not mean to detract from the greatness of the miracle, but
more forcibly to engrave these extraordinary tokens of God's power on the illiterate.
—John Calvin.
Ver. 4. Skipped. A poetic description of the concussion caused by the thunder and
lightning that accompanied the divine presence. —James G. Murphy.
Ver. 4. At the giving of the law at Sinai, Horeb and the mountains around, both
great and small, shook with a sudden and mighty earthquake, like rams leaping in a
grassy plain, with the young sheep frisking round them. —Plain Commentary.
Ver. 4-6. When Christ descends upon the soul in the work of conversion, what
strength doth he put forth! The strongholds of sin are battered down, every high
thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of Christ is brought into captivity to
the obedience of his sceptre, 2 Corinthians 10:4-5. Devils are cast out of the
possession which they have kept for many years without the least disturbance.
Strong lusts are mortified and the very constitution of the soul is changed. What
ailed thee, O thou sea, that thou fleddest? thou Jordan, that thou wast driven back?
ye mountains, that ye skipped like rams?, etc. The prophet speaks those words of
the powerful entrance of the children of Israel into Canaan. The like is done by
Christ in the conversion of a sinner. Jordan is driven back, the whole course of the
soul is altered, the mountains skip like rams. There are many mountains in the soul
of a sinner, as pride, unbelief, self conceitedness, atheism, profaneness, etc. These
mountains are plucked up by the roots in a moment when Christ begins the work of
conversion. —Ralph Robinson.
WHEDO , "4. Mountains skipped—That is, Horeb and Sinai moved to and fro.
The word rendered skip, here, indicates a hasty, undulating motion, a coming and
retiring, as from fright. In Exodus 19:18 it is said, “The whole mount quaked
greatly.” See the same figure, Psalms 29:6; Habakkuk 3:8. The phenomenon is that
27. of a violent earthquake.
COFFMA , ""The mountains skipped like rams; the little hills like lambs" (Psalms
114:4). This is a metaphorical reference to the wonders that occurred at Sinai where
God delivered to Israel the Decalogue, ratified with them the covenant, and gave
instructions for the construction of the tabernacle.
EXPOSITOR'S DICTIO ARY, "The Response of the Environment
Psalm 114:1; Psalm 114:4
I. It is said that man is affected by his environment. It is true; but it is equally true
that man"s environment is affected by him. We are influenced by the sights and
sounds around us; but it is no less certain that the sights and sounds around us are
influenced by us. In this passage we have an incident of the latter kind. When Israel
went out of Egypt there was a change in her environment. "The mountains
skipped." She transferred to the things around her the impression of her own joy.
She was inwardly leaping and dancing, and, as in a mirror, she saw the mountains
leaping and dancing too. Why the mountains? Why not the brooks, the streams, the
rivers? Is not the idea of motion more suitable to these? Certainly; therefore the
Psalmist, because he was a poet, did not select them. He selected the most unlikely
things—the mountains. The mountains naturally suggest anything but dancing.
They suggest immobility, steadfastness, iron determination to be affected by
nothing. And that is just where the dramatic power of this poet comes in. He sees the
joy of the soul infecting the most stolid objects in the world—the sober, grave,
serious mountains. If these could be made to dance to the rhythm of the heart, no
part of nature could possibly remain unmoved.
II. I regard it as a fine stroke of literary genius that, in seeking a partner for the
dance of the spirits, the Psalmist should have chosen, not the streams, but the
mountains. He wants to show how utterly dependent is the aspect of ature on the
state of the heart, even where the aspect of ature seems most fixed and stereotyped.
He tells how in the joy of the spirit even the stable mountains cannot keep still to the
eye of the beholder, but leap and bound and vibrate to the pulse of the gladdened
soul.
III. Have you not felt this power of joy over prosaic things. Have you not felt how
cold has lost its chillness, how rain has lost its dreariness, how wind has lost its
bitterness, when the heart was young. Have you not felt how the long way became
short, how the rough road became smooth, how the muddy path became clean, when
the heart was young. The Psalmist was right when he said that when the soul is
emancipated from its Egypt the very mountains leap.
IV. Lord, Thou hast said, "I go to prepare a place for you". Yes, and the
preparation must be rather in me than in the place. Any place will be joyous if my
heart be young. When my heart grows old I get weary of localities; I migrate from
spot to spot, I flit from flower to flower, I sigh for the wings of a dove to break the
28. monotony of my rest. But that is because my heart is not leaping. If my heart would
leap everything would leap—the very mountains. It is not new objects I want; it is
renewed joy in them. Revive the joy of my heart, O Lord! make my spirit young
again! Then shall the waves resound once more; then shall the mountains leap as
they did at morning"s glow.
—G. Matheson, Messages of Hope, p61.
5 Why was it, sea, that you fled?
Why, Jordan, did you turn back?
BAR ES, "What ailed thee, O thou sea, that thou fleddest?... - literally,
“What to thee, O sea,” etc. That is, What influenced thee - what alarmed thee - what put
thee into such fear, and caused such consternation? Instead of stating the cause or
reason why they were thus thrown into dismay, the psalmist uses the language of
surprise, as if these inanimate objects had been smitten with sudden terror, and as if it
were proper to ask an explanation from themselves in regard to conduct that seemed so
strange.
CLARKE, "What ailed thee, O thou sea - The original is very abrupt; and the
prosopopoeia, or personification very fine and expressive: -
What to thee, O sea, that thou fleddest away!
O Jordan, that thou didst roll back!
Ye mountains, that ye leaped like rams!
And ye hills, like the young of the fold!
After these very sublime interrogations, God appears; and the psalmist proceeds as if
answering his own questions: -
At the appearance of the Lord, O earth, thou didst tremble;
At the appearance of the strong God of Jacob.
Converting the rock into a pool of waters;
29. The granite into water springs.
I know the present Hebrew text reads חולי chuli, “tremble thou,” in the imperative; but
almost all the Versions understood the word in past tense, and read as if the psalmist
was answering his own questions, as stated in the translation above. “Tremble thou, O
earth.” As if he had said, Thou mayest well tremble, O earth, at the presence of the Lord,
at the presence of the God of Jacob.
GILL, "What ailed thee, O thou sea, that thou fleddest?.... What was the matter
with thee? what appeared to thee? what didst thou see? what didst thou feel, which
caused thee to flee in such haste?
Thou Jordan, that thou wast driven back? what is the meaning that thou didst not
continue to flow as usual? what was it that stopped thy flowing tide? that cut off thy
waters? that drove them back as fast or faster than they came?
JAMISO , "The questions place the implied answers in a more striking form.
K&D 5-8, "The poet, when he asks, “What aileth thee, O sea, that thou fleest...?” lives
and moves in this olden time as a contemporary, or the present and the olden time as it
were flow together to his mind; hence the answer he himself gives to the question
propounded takes the form of a triumphant mandate. The Lord, the God of Jacob, thus
mighty in wondrous works, it is before whom the earth must tremble. ּוןדፎ does not take
the article because it finds its completion in the following ּבק ֲֽעַי ( ַ ּול ֱ;)א it is the same
epizeuxis as in Psa_113:8; Psa_94:3; Psa_96:7, Psa_96:13. י ִכ ְּפה ַה has the constructive ı
out of the genitival relation; and in ּונְי ְע ַמ ְל in this relation we have the constructive ô,
which as a rule occurs only in the genitival combination, with the exception of this
passage and ּרא ְב ּונ ְ , Num_24:3, Num_24:15 (not, however, in Pro_13:4, “his, the
sluggard's, soul”), found only in the name for wild animals ץ ֶר ֶּו־אתְי ַ,ח which occurs
frequently, and first of all in Gen_1:24. The expression calls to mind Psa_107:35. וּר ַה is
taken from Exo_17:6; and ישׁ ִמ ָ ַח (lxx τᆱν ᅊκρότοµον, that which is rugged, abrupt)
(Note: One usually compares Arab. chlnbûs, chalnabûs the Karaite lexicographer
Abraham ben David writes ;]חלמבוס but this obsolete word, as a compound from
Arab. chls, to be black-grey, and Arab. chnbs, to be hard, may originally signify a hard
black-grey stone, whereas חלמישׁ looks like a mingling of the verbal stems Arab. ᐓms,
to be hard, and Arab. ᐓls, to be black-brown (as Arab. jlmûd, a detached block of rock,
is of the verbal stems Arab. jld, to be hard, and Arab. jmd, to be massive). In Hauran
the doors of the houses and the window-shutters are called Arab. ᐓalasat when they
consist of a massive slab of dolerite, probably from their blackish hue. Perhaps חלמישׁ
is the ancient name for basalt; and in connection with the hardness of this form of
30. rock, which resembles a mass of cast metal, the breaking through of springs is a great
miracle. - Wetzstein. For other views vid., on Isa_49:21; Isa_50:7.)
stands, according to Deu_8:15, poetically for ע ַל ֶ,ס Num_20:11, for it is these two
histories of the giving of water to which the poet points back. But why to these in
particular? The causing of water to gush forth out of the flinty rock is a practical proof of
unlimited omnipotence and of the grace which converts death into life. Let the earth
then tremble before the Lord, the God of Jacob. It has already trembled before Him, and
before Him let it tremble. For that which He has been He still ever is; and as He came
once, He will come again.
CALVI , "5What ailed thee, O sea! The prophet interrogates the sea, Jordan, and
the mountains, in a familiar and poetical strain, as lately he ascribed to them a sense
and reverence for God’s power. And, by these similitudes, he very sharply reproves
the insensibility of those persons, who do not employ the intelligence which God has
given them in the contemplation of his works. The appearance which he tells us the
sea assumed, is more than sufficient to condemn their blindness. It could not be
dried up, the river Jordan could not roll back its waters, had not God, by his
invisible agency, constrained them to render obedience to his command. The words
are indeed directed to the sea, the Jordan, and the mountains, but they are more
immediately addressed to us, that every one of us, on self-reflection, may carefully
and attentively weigh this matter. And, therefore, as often as we meet with these
words, let each of us reiterate the sentiment, — “Such a change cannot be attributed
to nature, and to subordinate causes, but the hand of God is manifest here.” The
figure drawn from the lambs and rams would appear to be inferior to the
magnitude of the subject. But it was the prophet’s intention to express in the
homeliest way the incredible manner in which God, on these occasions, displayed his
power. The stability of the earth being, as it were, founded on the mountains, what
connection can they have with rams and lambs, that they should be agitated,
skipping hither and thither? In speaking in this homely style, he does not mean to
detract from the greatness of the miracle, but more forcibly to engrave these
extraordinary tokens of God’s power on the illiterate.
SPURGEO , "EXPOSITIO Ver. 5. What ailed thee, O thou sea? Wert thou
terribly afraid? Did thy strength fail thee? Did thy very heart dry up?
What ailed thee, O thou sea, that thou fleddest? Thou wert neighbour to the power
of Pharaoh, but thou didst never fear his hosts; stormy wind could never prevail
against thee so as to divide thee in twain; but when the way of the Lord was in thy
great waters thou was seized with affright, and thou becamest a fugitive from before
him.
Thou Jordan, that thou wast driven back? What ailed thee, O quick descending
river? Thy fountains had not dried up, neither had a chasm opened to engulf thee!
The near approach of Israel and her God sufficed to make thee retrace thy steps.
What aileth all our enemies that they fly when the Lord is on our side? What aileth
hell itself that it is utterly routed when Jesus lifts up a standard against it? "Fear
took hold upon them there, "for fear of HIM the stoutest hearted did quake, and
became as dead men.
31. EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 5.
Fly where thou wilt, O Sea!
And Jordan's current cease!
Jordan, there is no need of thee,
For at God's word, whenever he please,
The rocks shall weep new waters forth instead of these.
—Abraham Cowley.
Ver. 5-6. A singular animation and an almost dramatic force are given to the poem
by the beautiful apostrophe in verses 5, 6, and the effect of this is heightened in a
remarkable degree by the use of the present tenses. The awe and the trembling of
nature are a spectacle on which the poet is looking. The parted sea through which
Israel walks as on dry land, the rushing Jordan arrested in its course, the granite
cliffs of Sinai shaken to their base—he sees it all, and asks in wonder what it
means? —J. J. Stewart Perowne.
Ver. 5-6. This questioning teaches us that we should ourselves consider and inquire
concerning the reason of those things, which we see to have been done in a
wondrous way, out of the course of nature. There are signs in the sun, moon, stars,
heaven, etc., concerning which Christ has spoken. Let us inquire the reason why
they are, that we be not stupid and inaccurate spectators. The things which are done
miraculously do speak: and they can give answer why they are done. ay, rather,
portents, signs, earthquakes, extraordinary appearances are loud speaking, and
they declare from themselves what they are: namely, that they are prophetic of the
anger and future vengeance of God. Such inquiry as this is not prying curiosity, but
is pious and useful, working to this end, that we become observant of the judgments
of God, with which he visits this world, and yield ourselves to his grace, and so we
escape the coming vengeance. —Wolfgang Musculus.
Ver. 5-6.
What ails thee, sea, to part,
Thee Jordan, back to start?
Ye mountains, like the rams to leap,
Ye little hills, like sheep? —John Keble.
COFFMA , ""What ailest thee, O thou sea? ... thou Jordan? ... ye mountains? ... ye
little hills?" (Psalms 114:5-6). Here, in a figure of speech called `apostrophe,' the
psalmist addresses the sea, the Jordan, the mountains and hills, "Inquiring of them
for what reason they had forsaken their nature and had done such strange
things."[4]
"Thou fleest ... thou turnest back ... ye skip like rams, etc." (Psalms 114:5-6). The
use of the present tense throughout this passage suggests that the psalmist is
addressing the sea, the Jordan, the mountains and the hills as if they were present,
and as if he could actually see them doing such amazing things contrary to nature.
32. 6 Why, mountains, did you leap like rams,
you hills, like lambs?
GILL, "Ye mountains, that ye skipped like rams,.... Not for joy, but fear; what
caused these trembling motions, these violent agitations, and quakings, and movings to
and fro like the skipping of rams?
And ye little hills, like lambs? what was it that disturbed you, and put you into a
panic, that you skipped like frightened lambs? These questions are put, by a beautiful
and poetical figure, to inanimate creatures; the Red sea, the river of Jordan, the
mountains of Sinai and Horeb, and the hills about them; to which an answer is turned in
the next verse.
SPURGEO , "EXPOSITIO Ver. 6. Ye mountains, that ye skipped like rams; and
ye little hills, like lambs? What ailed ye, that ye were thus moved? There is but one
reply: the majesty of God made you to leap. A gracious mind will chide human
nature for its strange insensibility, when the sea and the river, the mountains and
the hills, are all sensitive to the presence of God. Man is endowed with reason and
intelligence, and yet he sees unmoved that which the material creation beholds with
fear. God has come nearer to us than ever he did to Sinai, or to Jordan, for he has
assumed our nature, and yet the mass of mankind are neither driven back from
their sins, nor moved in the paths of obedience.
7 Tremble, earth, at the presence of the Lord,
at the presence of the God of Jacob,
BAR ES, "Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord ... - This is at the
same time an explanation of the facts referred to in the previous verses, and the
33. statement of an important truth in regard to the power of God. The true explanation - as
here implied - of what occurred to the sea, to the Jordan, to the mountains, and to the
hills, was the fact that God was there; the inference from that, or the truth which
followed from that, was, that before that God in whose presence the very mountains
shook, and from whom the waters of the sea fled in alarm the whole earth should
tremble.
GILL, "Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord,.... Or, "the earth has
trembled at the presence of the Lord"; so the Syriac and Arabic versions render it; the
imperative is sometimes put for the preterite or past tense, see Psa_22:9, likewise the
Septuagint and Vulgate Latin versions thus render it, "the earth is moved at the presence
of the Lord"; and then the sense is by a prosopopoeia. Is it to be wondered at, that we,
the sea, the river of Jordan, the mountains and hills, have fled, or have been driven back,
or have skipped like rams and lambs, when the whole earth, of which we are a part, has
trembled at the presence of God? who, when he does but look, the earth trembles; and
when he touches the hills, they smoke, Psa_104:32. It is at the same presence of God we
have been thus moved, the power of which we have felt, even
at the presence of the God of Jacob; who brought Jacob out of Egypt, led him
through the sea, and gave him the law on Sinai. This is not to be understood of the
general and common presence of God, which is everywhere, and with all his creatures
for this is not attended with such wonderful phenomena as here mentioned, either in the
literal or mystic sense; but of the majestic, powerful, and gracious presence of God; such
as he sometimes causes to attend his ministers, his word, his churches, his martyrs and
confessors; and so as to strike an awe upon, and terror into, their greatest enemies, as
well as to convert his own people.
JAMISO , "at the presence of — literally, “from before,” as if affrighted by the
wonderful display of God’s power. Well may such a God be trusted, and great should be
His praise.
CALVI , "7At the presence of the Lord Having aroused the senses of men by
interrogations, he now furnishes a reply, which many understand to be a
personification of the earth; because they take ,י yod, to be the affix of the verb חולי ,
chuli; and they represent the earth as saying, It is my duty to tremble at the
presence of the Lord. This fanciful interpretation is untenable; for the term, earth,
is immediately subjoined. Others, with more propriety, considering the ,י yod, in
this, as in many other passages, to be redundant, adopt this interpretation: It is
reasonable and becoming that the earth should tremble in the presence of the Lord.
Again, the term ,חולי chuli, is by many rendered in the imperative mood; which
interpretation I readily adopt, as it is most probable that the prophet again makes
an appeal to the earth, that the hearts of men may be the more sensibly moved. The
meaning is the same, — It must be that the earth quake at the presence of her King.
And this view receives confirmation from the term ,אדון adon, being used, which
signifies a lord ora master. He then immediately introduces the name of the God of
34. Jacob, for the purpose of banishing from men all notions of false gods. Their minds
being prone to deceit, they are always in great danger of allowing idols to usurp the
place of the true God. Another miracle is mentioned, in which God, after the
passage of the people through the Red Sea, gave an additional splendid
manifestation of his power in the wilderness. The glory of God, as he informs us, did
not appear for one day only, on the departure of the people; it constantly shone in
his other works, as when a stream suddenly issued out of the dry rock, Exodus 17:6.
Waters may be found trickling out from among rocks and stony places, but to make
them flow out of a dry rock, was unquestionably above the ordinary course of
nature, or miraculous. I have no intention of entering into any ingenious discussion,
how the stone was converted into water; all that the prophet means amounts simply
to this, that water flowed in places formerly dry and hard. How absurd, then, is it
for the sophists to pretend that a transubstantiation takes place in every case in
which the Scripture affirms that a change has been produced? The substance of the
stone was not converted into water, but God miraculously created the water, which
gushed out of the dry rock.
SPURGEO , "EXPOSITIO Ver. 7. Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the
Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob. Or "from before the Lord, the Adonai,
the Master and King." Very fitly does the Psalm call upon all nature again to feel a
holy awe because its Ruler is still in its midst.
"Quake when Jehovah walks abroad,
Quake earth, at sight of Israel's God."
Let the believer feel that God is near, and he will serve the Lord with fear and
rejoice with trembling. Awe is not cast out by faith, but the rather it becomes deeper
and more profound. The Lord is most reverenced where he is most loved.
EXPLA ATORY OTES A D QUAI T SAYI GS.
Ver. 7. Tremble, thou earth. Hebrew, Be in pain, as a travailing woman: for if the
giving of the law had such dreadful effects, what should the breaking thereof have?
—John Trapp.
Ver. 7.
"At the presence of the Lord be in pangs, O earth."
"Lord, "Adon, the Sovereign Ruler. "Pangs, "Chuli: Micah 4:10. The convulsions
of nature, which accompanied the Exodus, were as the birth throes of the Israelite
people. "A nation was born in a day." But the deliverance out of Babylon was the
prelude to a far more wondrous truth; that of him, in whom human nature was to
be regenerated. —William Kay.
Ver. 7-8. Tremble, etc. This is an answer to the preceding question: as if he had said,
It is no wonder that Sinai, and Horeb, and a few adjoining hills should thus tremble
at the majestic presence of God; for the whole earth must do so, whenever he
pleases. —Thomas Fenton.
BE SO , "Verse 7-8
Psalms 114:7-8. Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord — But why do I
ask these questions? Ye mountains and hills were no further moved than was quite
just and proper, at the approach and presence of the great Jehovah. Yea, the whole
earth had reason to tremble and quake on such an occasion. Which turned the rock