Psalm 114

PSALM 114

Crossing the Sea and the River

1 When Israel went forth from Egypt,	The house of Jacob from a people of strange language, [1]
2 Judah became His sanctuary,	Israel, His dominion.

3 The sea looked and fled;	The Jordan turned back. [2]
4 The mountains [3] skipped like rams,	The hills, like lambs.
5 What ails you, O sea, that you flee?	O Jordan, that you turn back? [4]
6 O mountains, that you skip like rams?	O hills, like lambs?

7 Tremble, O earth, before the Lord,	Before the God [5] of Jacob,
8 Who turned the rock into a pool of water,	The flint into a fountain of water. [6]

[1] It is fitting that the Hebrew for “strange language” (la`az) occurs only here in the Old Testament (cf. Deut.28:49; Isa.33:19; Jer.5:15).

[2] “He said to the sons of Israel, “When your children ask their fathers in time to come, saying, ‘What are these stones?’ then you shall inform your children, saying, ‘Israel crossed this Jordan on dry ground.’ “For Yahweh your God dried up the waters of the Jordan before you until you had crossed, just as Yahweh your God had done to the Red Sea, which He dried up before us until we had crossed; that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of Yahweh is mighty, so that you may fear Yahweh your God forever.” (Joshua 4:21-24)

[3] Earthquakes in Scripture are signs of cataclysmic upheaval. They are associated with: (1) the coming of Yahweh [Ex.19:18; 1 Kings 19:11,12] (2) God’s waging war on behalf of His people [Judges 5:4,5] (3) God marching before His people on the way to Canaan [Psalm 68:7-10; 77:18; Hab.3:3-6] (4) the day of Yahweh [Isa.13:1-13 {prophecy against Babylon}] (5) the death of Messiah [Matt.27:51,54] (6) Messiah’s resurrection [Matt.28:2]; Messiah’s return [Revelation 6:12-17].

[4] “The waters of the Jordan River are personified as soldiers fleeing in panic before superior forces” (Clifford, 192).

[5] This name for God (eloah) “occurs in some of the oldest ot poetry (Deut 32:15, 17) and very frequently (forty-one times) in the debates between Job (an ancient believer) and his friends. It appears therefore to be an ancient term for God which was later dropped for the most part until the time of the exile and after, when there was great concern for a return to the more ancient foundations. It is not frequently used outside Job. It occurs once in Isa, once in Prov, twice in Hab, four times in the Ps, and then in the postexilic books: II Chr, Neh, and Dan, a total of five times. (TWOT 43)

[6] To hear Psalm 114 sung listen to New Song and/or Jason Coghill.