When Israel went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people of foreign language,
Parallel Translations
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When Israel went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people of foreign language,
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When Israel went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people of strange language;
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When Israel came forth out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people of strange language;
Cross-references (8)
Passages linked to Psalms 114:1 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Exodus 12:41-42 At the end of four hundred thirty years, to the day, all of Yahweh’s armies went out from the land of Egypt. It is a night to be much observed to Yahweh for bringing them out from the land of Egypt. This is that night of Yahweh, to be much observed by all the children of Israel throughout their generations.
- Exodus 13:3 Moses said to the people, “Remember this day, in which you came out of Egypt, out of the house of bondage; for by strength of hand Yahweh brought you out from this place. No leavened bread shall be eaten.
- Genesis 42:23 They didn’t know that Joseph understood them; for there was an interpreter between them.
- Psalms 81:5 He appointed it in Joseph for a covenant, when he went out over the land of Egypt, I heard a language that I didn’t know.
- Deuteronomy 16:1 Observe the month of Abib, and keep the Passover to Yahweh your God; for in the month of Abib Yahweh your God brought you out of Egypt by night.
- Isaiah 11:16 There will be a highway for the remnant that is left of his people from Assyria, like there was for Israel in the day that he came up out of the land of Egypt.
- Exodus 20:2 “I am Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
- Deuteronomy 26:8 Yahweh brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand, with an outstretched arm, with great terror, with signs, and with wonders;
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain 1 When Israel went out from Egypt That exodus…
1 When 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. 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. Judah is called his holiness, and Israel his dominion, 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.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain That is, from them that were of a strange…
That is, from them that were of a strange language.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Psa 114:1 When Israel went out of Egypt, the…
Psa 114:1 When Israel went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people of strange language;
Ver. 1. When Israel went out of Egypt] E medio gentis, id est, ex visceribus Aegyptiorum, qui eos quasi deglutiebant, 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 Jewish doctors gloss upon this text (Midr. Tillin. in Psa 114:1-8).
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From a people of strange language] And yet more estranged affections, jeering them, and their religion, as the word lognez (which is of affinity with logneg, a scoffer) seemeth to sound. Afterwards it was prophesied that five cities in the land of Egypt should speak the language (or lip) of Canaan, Isa 19:18, viz. when the Lord should turn to them a pure language, Zep 3:9.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain Which was a great aggravation of their captivity and…
Which was a great aggravation of their captivity and misery. Compare Jer 5:15.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain The psalmist is here remembering the days of old,…
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.
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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.
III. 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. 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, Co2 10:5.
IV. 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.
V. That God supplied them with water out of the rock, which followed them through the dry and sandy deserts. Well may the earth and all its inhabitants tremble before that God who turned the rock into a standing water (Psa 114:8), and what cannot he do who did that? The same almighty power that turned waters into a rock to be a wall to Israel (Exo 14:22) turned the rock into waters to be a well to Israel: as they were protected, so they were provided for, by miracles, standing miracles; for such was the standing water, that fountain of waters into which the rock, the flinty rock, was turned, and that rock was Christ, Co1 10:4. For he is a fountain of living waters to his Israel, from whom they receive grace for grace.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain When Israel went out of Egypt,.... The people of…
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 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.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain This and the four following psalms, the Jews were…
This and the four following psalms, the Jews were wont to sing at the close of the paschal supper. It is a solemn commemoration of God's delivering Israel, giving them the law, and water out of the rock, ver. 1-8.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Miracles wrought at the exodus of the Israelites from…
PSALM CXIV
Miracles wrought at the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt,
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at the Red Sea, and at Jordan, 1-6;
and at the rock of Horeb, 7, 8.
NOTES ON PSALM CXIV
This Psalm has no title. The word Hallelujah is prefixed in all the Versions except the Chaldee and Syriac. It seems like a fragment, or a part of another Psalm. In many MSS. it is only the beginning of the following; both making but one Psalm in all the Versions, except the Chaldee. It is elegantly and energetically composed; but begins and ends very abruptly, if we separate it from the following. As to the author of this Psalm, there have been various opinions; some have given the honour of it to Shadrach, Meshech, and Abed-nego; others to Esther; and others, to Mordecai.
Verse 1. 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 Ps 81:5; Ge 42:23.
The Chaldee has here מעמי ברבראי 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 Ac 28:2. 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 Jacob fra hethen folke.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain Psa 114:1-2. When Israel went out of Egypt —…
Psa 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.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain When Israel went out of Egypt - literally, “In…
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.
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From a people of strange language - Speaking a foreign or a barbarian tongue. See the notes at Psa 81:5.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain Psalms 114
Psalms 114
1 When Israel went out of Egypt,
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The house of Jacob from a people of strange language,
2 Judah was his sanctuary,
And Israel his dominion.
3 The sea saw it, and fled:
Jordan was driven back.
4 The mountains skipped like rams,
And the little hills like lambs.
5 What ailed thee, O thou sea, that thou fleddest?
Thou Jordan, that thou wast driven back?
6 Ye mountains, that ye skipped like rams;
And ye little hills, like lambs?
7 Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord,
At the presence of the God of Jacob;
8 Which turned the rock into a standing water,
The flint into a fountain of waters.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Contents and Composition.—The wonderful power of God over nature is celebrated in a compact lyrical form and with poetic vividness (Psa_114:3-6), as it was displayed in the leading of the people from Egypt, for the purpose of establishing a Divine government in Israel (Psa_114:1-2), and forms the ground of a summons to the earth to tremble before this wondrous God of Jacob (Psa_114:7-8). The time of composition cannot be ascertained. A union with the preceding so as to make one Passover-Psalm, under the supposition that a sacrifice intervenes (Ewald), is altogether arbitrary. The combination with the following into one Psalm (Sept., Syr., and others, Kimchi and some MSS.) was not made till later, and that for liturgical purposes.
[Perowne: “This is perhaps the most beautiful of all the Psalms which touch on the early history of Israel. It is certainly the most graphic and the most striking in the boldness of its outlines. The following remarks may perhaps illustrate the conception and plan of the Poem. 1. In structure it is singularly perfect.—We have four strophes, each of two verses, and each of these of two lines, in which the parallelism is carefully preserved. 2. The effect is produced, as in Psalms 29, not by minute tracing of details, but by the boldness with which certain great features of the history are presented. 3. A singular animation and dramatic force are given to the Poem by the beautiful apostrophe in Psa_114:5-6, and the effect or this is heightened to 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. 4. Then it is that the truth burst upon his mind, and the impression of this upon the reader is very finely managed. The name of God, which has been entirely concealed up to this point in the poem, …is now only introduced after the apostrophe in Psa_114:5-6.” “The reason 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” (Spectator, No. 461).—J. F. M.]
Psa_114:1-2. The people from which Israel was separated are called stammering [E. V.: of a strange language], not in ridicule, but for the purpose of describing their language as unintelligible, that is, foreign. [Dr. Alexander thinks that such expressions may perhaps involve an allusion to the pre-eminence of Hebrew as the primitive and sacred language. See Alexander on Isa_33:19. For the other view comp. Deu_28:49; Isa_28:11; Jer_5:15.—J. F. M.]. It is characteristic of the poetic plan and beauty of this Psalm that God the Lord is only suggested in Psa_114:2 and not named definitely till Psa_114:7. [See addition above]. The differences in the designations applied to the people of God are also intentional and admirable. They are first named genealogico-historically the house of Jacob. [Alexander: “The house of Jacob is a phrase peculiarly appropriate to those who entered Egypt as a family and left it as a nation.”—J. F. M.]. Next they are termed Judah, in allusion to the sanctuary in their midst; for after David’s time Jerusalem was regarded as belonging to Judah rather than to Benjamin. Lastly they are called Israel, with reference to the relation in which they stood to God as their King, as citizens of His kingdom.—Judah is here feminine, being regarded as a nation or country.
Psa_114:3 ff. The leaping of the mountains probably refers to the shaking of Sinai at the giving of the law (Exo_19:18), since the miracle at the Red Sea, which began the journey through the desert, and that at the Jordan, which terminated it, are mentioned. The last verse alludes to Exo_17:6; Num_20:11; Deu_8:15. The derivation of Challamish (Psa_114:8) is doubtful. According to Wetzstein, it is perhaps the ancient name of basalt. The word appears to be a mingling of the verbal roots: to be hard, and: to be dark-brown.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. The religious reformation of Israel was bound up with its deliverance as a nation, and its historical separation from a strange people and country. Its formation into a separate people is not to be severed from its character as having been chosen, called, and planted as a people consecrated to God and a kingdom of Jehovah.
2. In this, God has proved Himself to be the unconditioned Ruler of all the forces of nature, and manifested Himself to His people as their Deliverer from bodily and spiritual distress. The Church upon the quaking earth should acknowledge this, proclaim it with praises, and exhibit it in her conduct.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
The Lord of nature and the Founder of the Church is one and the same God: what consolation there is in this assurance! And what a warning too in this truth!—Deliverance from the powers of this world, and subjection to the dominion of God, go hand in hand with God’s people.—The Almighty is thy God; what dost thou fear? But He is a holy King, too; how dost thou serve Him?—Let the earth tremble, but bold thou fast to God, us His redeemed people and consecrated inheritance.
Starke: The misery of the oppressed is so much the more aggravated when it is endured in the midst of people whose language they cannot understand.—If we are God’s kingdom, let none become lord and master of our hearts except Him who has purchased us at such a price, to be His peculiar possession.—Sinai and Horeb quaked before the dreadful Lawgiver; Golgotha and Tabor leap with joy for the Redeemer.—If God can make the stones and water, He can also make stones bread and water wine, and thus in every need help His own.—Luther: We now sing this Psalm to the praise of Christ, who leads us out of death and sin, through the raging of the world, the flesh, and the devil, to eternal life.—Osiander: Miracles are related to us that we may know how we, with the help and succor of our God, may overcome all adversity and trouble. For the course of nature must be changed, rather than that God should let us perish.—The best weapon we can use against unbelief is this: with God nothing is impossible. Rieger: Faith must ever keep looking back to the small beginnings of God’s works.—Guenther: All the history of God’s people is prefigurative, both for other nations and for the Church of the Lord, and for each of its members.—Diedrich: Wherever God’s testimony is now beheld, there is Judah, and where there is strife for endless victory through God’s word alone, there is Israel.—Taube: The Lord over all is the Lord of His people, the God of Jacob: the ever-green olive leaf of consolation for His Church at all times.
[Matth. Henry: 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 hath redeemed us that He might bring us into God’s service and engage us for ever in it.—What turns the streams in a regenerate soul? What ails the lusts and corruptions that they fly back? that the prejudices are removed and the whole man becomes new? It is at the presence of God’s Spirit, that imaginations are cast down, 2Co_10:5.—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 same almighty power which turned waters into a rock to be a wall to Israel, Exo_14:22, turned the rock into waters to be a well to Israel; as they were protected so were they provided for by miracles, standing miracles, for such was the standing water, that fountain of waters into which the rock, the flinty rock, was turned, and that rock was Christ, 1Co_10:4. For He is a fountain of living water to His Israel, from whom they receive grace for grace.—J. F. M.]
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 1. Strange language—A foreign and unintelligible language. See Psa_81:5.…
1. Strange language—A foreign and unintelligible language. See Psa_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 Deu_28:49; Isa_28:11; Isa_33:19,) except for punishment.
Jer_5:15. On the strangeness of the dialect of Egypt to the Hebrews see Gen_42:23
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 1. When Israel went forth out of Egypt] LXX…
1. When Israel went forth out of Egypt] LXX ἐν ἐξόδῳ Ἰσραὴλ ἐξ Αἰγύπτου, In the exodus of Israel from Egypt; Vulg. In exitu Israel.
a people of strange language] The Egyptian language was unintelligible to Israelites (Gen_42:23). In the ancient world difference of language emphasised difference of race; and a stranger was presumably an enemy. The tyranny of oppressors seemed to be aggravated by the barrier which difference of language placed between them and their victims. Cp. Deu_28:49; Isa_28:11; Isa_33:19. The Greek work barbãros (used by the LXX here) which originally meant simply a foreigner as one who spoke unintelligibly came gradually to bear the modern sense of barbarous.
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1, 2. When Jehovah brought Israel out of Egypt He separated them from all other nations to be a holy people over which He Himself designed to rule.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (1) When Israel went out.—LXX., in “the Exodus of…
(1) When Israel went out.—LXX., in “the Exodus of Israel.”
A people of strange language.—LXX., rightly, “a barbarous people.” 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.”
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain A PSALM of reminiscence, designed to encourage the exiles…
A PSALM of reminiscence, designed to encourage the exiles on their return from Babylon, during their "day of small things". (Zec_4:10; comp. Ezr_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).
When Israel went out of Egypt; literally, at the going forth of Israel from Egypt; en exodw Israhl , 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," Psa_98:3 Psa_115:12 Psa_135:19) from a people of strange language; literally, from a stammering people; but a people of foreign speech is no doubt meant (compare the Septuagint, ek laou barbarouv ).
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Vers. 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 DWELLING-PLACE IN US. "Judah was his sanctuary" (ver. 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. Now 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 Luk_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 abode with him". (Joh_14:23)
II HIS INHERITANCE IN US. "Israel was his dominion" (ver. 2). The kingdom of Israel, i.e. the people who dwelt within it, were God"s inheritance. (see Psa_94:5 Jer_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 ENERGIZING PRESENCE. (Vers. 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 CONVERTING POWER. (Ver. 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.
HOMILIES BY S. CONWAY Vers. 1-8. The soul"s exodus.
The psalm is a wonderfully vivid and beautiful description of the deliverance of God"s people from Egypt. In all ages of the Church this has been looked upon as the pattern and type of the soul"s deliverance by the redemption of Christ. Much of that history is suggested here. We are shown
I FROM WHENCE THE SOUL WAS SET FREE.
1. From Egypt, the true type of the world. At first so pleasant, so prosperous, so Goshen-like, so free from care, life so easy and secure.
2. But at length its true character is revealed. They are a strange a barbarous, or tyrant, so the word is variously rendered people. And the redeemed soul has found that out.
II WHAT HAPPENED AT THIS EXODUS. (Ver. 2)
1. There was the indwelling of God. The soul became his shrine. He was worshipped, beloved, trusted day by day.
2. There was willing obedience. God was the Lord of their life. The soul becomes the dominion, the domain, of God.
3. Things beforehand impossible, happened. (Vers. 3, 4) The sea, symbol of the whole power of spiritual death, saw and fled. "You hath he quickened who were dead," etc. It is a true picture of what takes place at the real conversion of a soul. Old things pass away. The stream and course of life are turned in an opposite direction, as was the Jordan. On and on, rapidly flowing downwards to the Dead Sea, so was it with the Jordan; so is it with the soul till its redemption comes. But then there is a conversion, a complete turning round, in the aims, principles, and motives of the life. The fixed habits and propensities fixed like the mountains and hills of Sinai the pride, unbelief, selfishness, love of sin, all which seemed firmly settled in our nature, are shaken, plucked up by the roots. The rock-like heart, so hard and barren and lifeless, becomes transformed as into a standing water, a very fountain of waters. (cf. Joh_7:37, Joh_7:38) The soul is blessed, and becomes a blessing.
III HOW IS ALL THIS TO BE EXPLAINED? Men will ask this, and no answer will they find save that it is the presence of the Lord (vers. 5-7). It is the standing miracle of the Christian Church. S.C.
HOMILIES BY C. SHORT Vers. 1-8. The spiritual exodus.
I WE MAKE OUR ESCAPE FROM A STATE OF BONDAGE EGYPT.
1. A life of sin is a life of spiritual bondage. (Rom_6:16)
2. Such a life of bondage brings us into "strange" and unnatural relations. (Ver. 1) Egypt was not the home of the Israelites.
II THE SPIRITUAL EXODUS BRINGS US INTO OUR TRUE, OR DIVINE, RELATIONS. (Ver. 2)
1. We become consecrated temples for the indwelling of God. (Ver. 2) "Judah was his sanctuary.
2. We are kingdoms over which God reigns. "And Israel his dominion.
III THIS EXODUS IS ACCOMPANIED BY GREAT EXCITEMENTS.
1. There is a grand revelation of the presence of God. (Ver. 7)
2. A wonderful proclamation of the Law of God. Sinai is shaken by it, and so is the soul of man. Moses said, "I exceedingly fear and quake.
3. There is a revelation of the abundant mercy of God. (Ver. 8) This manifestation of God "turned the rock into a standing water, the flint into a fountain of waters. S.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Charles H. Spurgeon 1885 · Public Domain This sublime SONG OF THE EXODUS is one and…
This sublime SONG 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.
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.
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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!
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,
Like lambs the little hillocks leap;
Not 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 thundersand 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: 1Ti 3:15 Heb 3:6; 1Pe 2:5: and that because of one faith, one God, one Father, one baptism, Eph 4:5. Marloratus.
Ver. 1. A people of strange language. When we find in verse 1, as in Psalm 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 Zep 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 "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.
Ver. 1-2. The time of first delivery from sin a season notable for the peculiar presence of God.
Ver. 1-2. The Lord was to his people
1. A deliverer.
2. A priest"his sanctuary."
3. A king"his dominion."
Ver. 1, 7. "The house of Jacob" and "the God of Jacob, "the relation between the two.
Psalms 114:2*
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. No 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 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.
Charles H. Spurgeon's The Treasury of David (1869–1885) — public domain. Psalms only. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain When Israel went out of Egypt.
Psa_114:1-8
When Israel went out of Egypt.
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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 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 Gods.
(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.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain Psalms 114
Psalms 114
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 Psa_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 ornaments sake. The same peculiarity is found in Psa_113:5-9, where it occurs five times.
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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 Israels prerogative, and another, its apocalypse of the Majesty of Jehovah, the Ruler of Nature 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 Psa_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 psalmists mind had the once dreaded oppressors sunk! The great fact about the Exodus was that it was the birthday of the Nation, 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 Gods 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 Gods temple and 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 Gods temple and realm.
The historical substratum for Psa_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 Pharaohs 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 Nature. Now the psalmist can peal forth the Name 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 Nature. And, more blessed still, the Lord of Nature is the God of Jacob. Both these names were magnified in the two miracles (which, like those named in Psa_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 Psa_114:8, "since it is not discernible what purpose the representation [i.e., the whole psalm] is to serve" (Graetz)!
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain Date and Authorship unknown; ascribed to the three Hebrew…
INTRODUCTION
Date and Authorship unknown; ascribed to the three Hebrew children, Esther and Mordscai.
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BONDAGE AND DELIVERANCE
(Psa_114:1)
I. The bondage was degrading. “Israel,” “Egypt”. The descendants of the “prince with God” making bricks for Pharaoh. So is the bondage of sin. All men are princes. They have crown rights by virtue of their divine parentage and royal brotherhood. They should occupy thrones. All their faculties are regal. Yet how are they employed? In a bondage that is humiliating because of
(1) The master that is served;
(2) The nature of the service;
(3) The wretchedness of the remuneration.
II. The bondage was unnatural. “The house of Jacob.”
1. Once a free and independent tribe, who previously to this had never been in bondage to any man. So man was once independent and free. No evil forces were permitted to exercise dominion over him.
(1.) His reason was free. All God’s vast domain was open to its scrutiny.
(2.) His will was free. No power was permitted to tamper with it, and no predestination fettered it.
(3.) His affections were free.
(4.) His soul was free. All this shows that the bondage under which he groans is not natural to man.
2. A family of a long, ancient and honourable lineage. They were not a people of yesterday, yet they were slaves. Man is a member of a household which dates its origin from before the foundation of the world. The eternal God is his father, and Christ his elder brother. With an ancestry compared with which the oldest dynasty on earth is but of yesterday, man is enslaved. Surely this is the climax of unnaturalness. For the heirs of the Mowbrays, the Bourbons, the Guelphs, the Hohenzollerns, the Hapsburgs, to be in bondage were enough to strike the world dumb with astonishment. Man is a child of God, and yet he is a slave.
III. The bondage was exasperating. “From a people of strange language.” These are circumstances which mitigate that “execrable sum of all human vilanies”—slavery. These obtained largely among the Jews. Often the slave spoke the same language, was protected by the same laws, and was of the same blood as his master. Not so with the poor Egyptian slave.
1. There was no community of feeling and sentiment. Hence terrible oppression and thankless service. Between man and his oppressors there is nothing naturally in common. Man knows it. Satan knows it. Hence the terrible burden of sin and woe, and the terrible insurrections of reason and moral sense against the tyranny.
2. There was no community of language between the Egyptian and the Jew. Hence misunderstanding and distress. Man does not take altogether naturally to the language of hell. Facility in the understanding and use of that language requires long practice, and that practice never makes perfect. Hence constant misunderstandings. Good is represented by evil; evil by good. Ignorance exchanges places with knowledge, and knowledge with ignorance. Pain is substituted for pleasure, and pleasure for pain. And amidst these conflicting dialects man is bewildered; and it is of that bewilderment that Satan takes advantage.
3. There is no community of law. There is a show of one. Liberal terms are offered. Emoluments, honours, rewards, are promised. But there is nothing to make Satan keep his own terms; and, after years of painful and unremunerative toil, the “wages of sin is death.” All these circumstances combine to make the sinners’ bondage most exasperating.
IV. This bondage was followed by a Divine Redemption.
1. That redemption was an historical fact. “When?” Israel looked back upon it as such. So is the redemption of the world by Christ. The Church can be traced back to it without a missing link. Institutions were connected with it, date from it, and are still commemorative of it. In the one case, the Passover, &c., Scripture references and doctrines. In the other, all evangelical preaching commenced with it and refers to it. One day in the year is set apart for its contemplation, and one rite most impressively sets it forth.
2. That redemption was nut an iniquitous proceeding. “Went out.” They were not driven out or stolen out, but went out, through the divinely supported claim of their national rights. Pharaoh had no claim upon them. His service was robbery. Contrast and analogy.
(1.) Contrast. Man is subject to the rightful claims of law on his service. Those claims have been deliberately disregarded, and the law imposes a curse and a penalty. Man is redeemed from the law by Christ bearing that curse and suffering that penalty.
(2.) Analogy. Satan has no right to man’s service. When that ceases Satan suffers no wrong. When man is released he is not stolen or driven, nor does he flee. He marches forth in honourable triumph, because Satan is overthrown and the law satisfied.
(3.) That redemption was the beginning of their national life. “When Israel.… House of Jacob.” Before they were merely a tribe; in Egypt merely a caste; when redeemed, a nation. By Christ’s redemption those who were not a people became the people of God and a holy nation. Before men were disintegrated members of the human race; afterwards brothers, friends, one in life, one in feeling, one in aim. Let political rulers, social agitators, and moral philanthropists note this. The redemption of Jesus Christ has succeeded in social purification and unity where every other scheme has failed.
IN CONCLUSION.—(i.) If the Son has made us free, we are free indeed. (ii.) Stand fast in that liberty, &c.
THE TEMPLE AND THE KINGDOM
(Psa_114:2)
God dwells among His people in a twofold character: as an object of worship, and as a monarch to rule. Hence in the sanctuary He secures His people’s reverence and love. On His throne and over His dominion He secures their obedience and homage. Both the sanctuary and the throne are combined
(1) in the human heart;
(2) the Christian Church;
(3) the material universe.
I. The Temple. “Judah was His sanctuary.” The name is singularly appropriate. “The praise of Jehovah.” In the sanctuary—
1. God dwells. His presence makes the temple what it is. “Nature” would be no “temple” if God were absent from it. Christ in the midst makes the Christian Church a temple; and the indwelling of the Holy Ghost the human heart.
2. God manifests Himself. In nature (Rom_1:20). In the Church by the means of grace. In the soul (Joh_14:23).
3. God communicates His will. In nature (Rom_1:19). In the Church, which is the depository of His written word and the organ for its dissemination. In the heart (Heb_8:10-11).
4. God must be adored. In nature. “All Thy works praise Thee.” In the Church (1Co_14:25). “Bless the Lord, O my soul.”
II. The Kingdom. “Israel His dominion.” The term again is appropriate. God is not the despotic master of a number of slaves, but King of kings and Lord of lords. His people are “princes with God,” “a royal priesthood.” It is the acknowledgment of His rule that ennobles nature, the Church, and the individual soul.
1. God reigns in His dominion. His presence pervades infinite space, and nature’s orderly movements betoken the indwelling of nature’s King. The Church in its spiritual powers, extension, working out of the divine plans, witnesses to the all-pervading presence of her Lord. The soul, in the provision that is made for its wants, and its power to withstand its foes, bears testimony to the presence of its Master.
2. God reigns over His dominion. The forces of nature emanated from Him, and He guides them to the fulfilment of their various destinies. The Church is under His command. It is “Go ye into all the world,” “Ye are My friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you.” The soul is His, and is subject to His authority.
3. God reigns for the good of His subjects. In nature everything serves benevolent ends. Philosophy and legislation have not improved on the laws Christ gave to His Church. Only by keeping God’s laws can the benefit of the soul be secured.
4. God reigns that His dominion may be universally acknowledged. It is so acknowledged in nature. It will be in the moral world by His Church. Christ “shall reign,” &c. God yearns for the homage of each individual heart, and says, “Be ye reconciled to God.”
THE REMOVAL OF OBSTACLES
(Psa_114:3-4)
“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 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 the sea is represented as astonished at this unusual spectacle, and so fleeing in dismay.”—Barnes.
I. Antagonisms are quelled. “The sea saw it and fled.” Wherever the Church has advanced—
1. Sin and Satan have receded. Where it has not been so the Church is to blame. The promise depends on the proper spirit and the use of proper means. It is only when she loses her spirituality, or fights with carnal weapons, or depends upon the arm of flesh, that she has failed. When clad in her armour, she encountered the vices and follies of Roman civilisation, she was “fair as the moon, bright as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners.”
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 Hindustan. If not Christianity, what has? Not civilisation: it boasts that religion is out of its sphere. Not philosophy: in its palmiest days it gave itself to its exposition and was glad of its alliance. Not legislation: it has been the aim of human governments to protect it on utilitarian and other grounds. Clearly no other theory will account for it.
3. Infidelity has receded. For all the ancient philosophies she proved an overmatch. From her infancy she has given birth to giant intellects, who have saved the world from intellectual anarchy. She has vanquished the infidelity of the Renaissance, the French Revolution, the elder Deism, and Tom Paine. Socialism and rationalism have been weakened, and scientific materialism is met by an array of learning and acuteness without a parallel, and it will pass away.
II. Boundaries axe removed. “Jordan was driven back.”
1. Christianity levels all class distinctions. To all castes, Jewish, Roman, Indian, &c., it is a formidable foe. “In Christ Jesus there is neither bond nor free,” &c., 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,” &c.
1. All difficulties of nature. Wherever Christianity has appeared “the valleys have been exalted,” &c. 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.
WHY OBSTACLES ARE REMOVED
(Psa_114:5-7)
I. Because of the omnipotent presence of the Lord. “Nothing is too hard for the Lord” in the physical, intellectual, or moral world. He is the Author of nature, and can either suspend her laws or give His people strength to overcome them. He is the Lord of mind. He can bring to naught the understanding of the proud, or give His servants wisdom to expose their sophistries. He is the Lord of soul. He can subdue its sinfulness, or enable His ministers to bring that moral influence and suasion to bear upon it which shall turn it from darkness to light, &c. He has done, does, and will do so (Isaiah 40; Isa_54:14-16).
II. Because of the covenant presence of the Lord. “The God of Jacob.” He has pledged His gracious presence with His people to lead them on to victory (Isa_54:17; Romans 8). It was by virtue of the covenant made with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and renewed to them, that Israel overcame their obstacles and inherited the promised land. And by virtue of a new and better covenant, God is on the side of His Church and against her numerous foes, and prepares her rest in heaven when her work is done.
III. Because of the merciful presence of the Lord. God rules in mercy as well as in power. It was good for Israel, good for the world then and through all time, that the sea should flee and Jordan should be driven back. The Canaanites were a curse to God’s earth. It was in mercy that they were cut off. God established His people in their place, that through them all the nations of the earth might be blessed. This end has been answered, for of them, “as concerning the flesh, Christ came.” The same applies to the Church.
IV. Because of the righteous presence of the Lord. “Tremble, thou earth,” &c. Since God rules in righteousness He holds the power of retribution. The measure of the iniquities of the enemies of His people became full before the judgment fell. Righteousness still characterises God’s rule. And because of that nations fall and are swept away when they disrespect His covenant and disobey His law.
TO CONCLUDE.—The Lord Omnipotent, covenant, merciful, and just, is with His Church. Let the Church be encouraged, humbled, energised, brave.
DIVINE PROVISIONS
(Psa_114:7-8)
Psa_114:7 is the point of connection between Psa_114:3-6 and Psa_114:8. God’s presence enabled His people to overcome their difficulties, and guaranteed a permanent provision for their need. God employs the Church to accomplish His magnificent designs, and His presence in its midst assures it constant blessing. Divine provisions are—
I. The result of the divine presence. God in His works is the source of their continual stability and strength. The fountain of their life and fruitfulness is there, and by His supports they flourish. God in His word is the source of its continual inspiration and suggestiveness, and because He is there, there is ever more “light to break forth from” it. God in His Church is the guarantee that the means of grace shall be efficient, and in consequence of this she grows in strength as she grows in grace. So in the soul.
II. Contemplate real need. God does not promise the luxuries or superfluities, but the necessaries of life; not confections or things merely grateful to the palate, but things necessary for refreshment, strength, and life. God does not undertake to pamper His people with worldly grandeur and mere material success; but He does promise that all things necessary for life and godliness shall be secured. Men can dispense with wine, but they cannot dispense with water. And so the Church can dispense with State alliances and popular applause, but cannot dispense with the water of life.
III. Come in unexpected forms. Even the faith of Moses would hardly have looked to the hard granite of Horeb, or the basalt of the desert, for refreshing streams. Yet at the command of God the rock was turned into standing water. And so invariably with the operations of providence and grace. Israel was led out of Egypt and to the promised land under the guidance of a shepherd. By a shepherd she was consolidated into a permanent kingdom. The prophets and apostles, as a rule, were drawn from the lowest stratum, and the foolishness of preaching has silenced the rhetoric of the schools. The good things of the world’s redemption came out of Nazareth, and the power that has moved the world emanated from a malefactor’s cross. Gain has come out of loss, life out of death, prosperity out of suffering “at the presence of the Lord.”
IV. Flow with abounding fulness—“a fountain of waters.” Wealth and prodigality characterise the divine gifts. Men minimise and contract them, but not God. The air, light, showers, sun, the magnificence of the heavens, the beauty of the landscape, and the grandeur of the mountains and the sea, all witness to the bounty which is at the disposal of needy man. But “these things are an allegory” of “the riches of His grace.” “Ask whatsoever ye will;” “My God shall supply all your need;” &c. “God is able to do exceeding abundantly,” &c. God “multiplies to pardon,” gives “plenteous redemption,” and finally vouchsafes “an abundant entrance into His everlasting kingdom.”
V. Are constantly permanent.
“Fountain.” “Standing water.” As God changes not, His bountiful provisions do not change. Man’s need is abiding, so is God’s gift. Man always needs water—at all times His water is sure. The Church needs a perpetual application of the benefits of Christ’s death. His “eternal redemption” supplies the eternal need. The Spirit abides ever in the soul to confirm its faith, soothe its sorrow, and brighten its hope.
FINALLY.—It is to this and other passages (Exo_17:6-7; Num_28:11) that the Apostle (1Co_10:4) draws his spiritual inferences respecting the support and refreshment Christ gives to His people. In the wilderness Israel (i.) Were supplied without money and without price. So Christ offers the water of life freely. (ii.) Were indebted to the cleaving of the rock at the word of Moses. So Christ, the Rock of ages, was cleft for us, and from His riven side flowed those streams which are for the cleansing and refreshment of the world. (iii.) Now, as then, the blessings are permanent, to stimulate our courage and confirm our faith.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible 1900 · Public Domain (with Deu 32:13)
Psa 114:8
(with Deu 32:13)
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I. Is it not instructive to us that things so high have become so low; that firmamental elements offer themselves, in the shape of stones, for the humblest uses? How beautifully passive they are to all operators and operations. They are as meekly submissive to the lowest uses as to the highest.
II. Hear another stone-sermon: We are stones, and you are souls. Our day of freedom is coming. Take heed, O souls, lest in the day of God, when stones shall awake to light, you should enter the house of darkness and bondage.
III. Stones are stubborn things, but stubborn souls are the stubbornest stones. Stones are less capable of resisting the influences of nature than souls the influences of God.
IV. Hear the stones once more, and from their heart of hearts: We are stones, and you are souls; but your Lord is our Lord, and our Lord is your Lord. He made us, and not we ourselves; and there is not a stone that is not pervaded through and through by His presence. When He died, souls mocked Him; but stones trembled to their centre.
V. We are stones, and you are souls. When the Lord lay enclosed in stone, we offered no resistance to His resurrection. Have you yielded, that He might rise from the dead in you?
VI. We have the substance of stones, but there is no stony will in us to resist Him whom nothing ought to resist. You have the substance of souls; but you carry within you a stony will, by which you resist your Lord, as stones never did. It is better to be stones than such souls.
J. Pulsford, Quiet Hours, p. 241.
References: Psa 115:3.—A. Mursell, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xvii., p. 8. Psa 115:12.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. viii., p. 249. Psa 115:15—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xviii., No. 1077.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
F. W. Grant 1903 · Public Domain The power of Jacob’s God.
The power of Jacob’s God.
The first psalm of the series is of the simplest character. It dwells upon the power of God as seen in the deliverance out of Egypt, and upon His gracious identification of Himself with them as His people at that time. It merely describes with emphatic brevity these things: suggesting the questions which formally it does not raise. Its fragmentary character is itself strikingly suggestive. Why should the history of which it speaks be thus exceptional and fragmentary? The covenant-Name, Jehovah, is significant in a very different way.
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1. The psalm is in two parts of four verses each. The first speaks of God as Lord, and yet without mentioning Him: there was no need to do so. There is but One who can dry up the sea and make the mountains skip.
It was the beginning of their history as a nation: the passover, as we know, rearranged their year for them. Egypt, though so long the place of their abode, is but a place of strange language to those who are now to be the holy people of God. Only with redeemed ones can God dwell; and where He dwells He reigns: "Judah was His sanctuary; Israel His dominion." The names have their significance otherwise than historically: the "prince with God" is thus ennobled by the yoke he bears; the holy place is one with the place of "praise."
Nature realizes and owns her God: the sea and Jordan alike, at the two ends of the desert journey; Sinai between them no less manifests its awe: "the mountains skipped like rams, and the hills like lambs."
2. The second part begins with an inquiry as to the cause of this, the answer revealing another character of Him whose sovereignty is thus recognized, and who yet softens the majesty of His presence, to walk in company with the "worm Jacob." Nay, His glorious power is made but to serve the necessities of His creatures: "turning the rock into a pool, -the flint into a fountain of waters."
Far apart as they may be in time and diverse in Planner, we see that it is the same God who afterwards put on a lowlier, yet more glorious dress in which to serve His people, coming into the wilderness Himself in fashion as a man; to do here the works which no other man did. What altered so for this people, the grace of such a beginning? What has banished from the world the tender presence of the Son of man? The two questions have but one answer. The generations of men; however far apart in time or place, have one fatal resemblance throughout. In the words of the apostle, "they did not like to retain God in their knowledge."
F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain This has been called 'one of the finest lyrics…
This has been called 'one of the finest lyrics in literature.' Probably it is a post-exilic psalm wherein, under the figure of the old exodus from Egypt, the Psalmist chants the return from Babylon. In all ages of the Church it has been used to celebrate the release from the bondage of sin. Hence it is a hymn for Easter night.
1. Strange language] i.e. unintelligible speech—foreign.
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2. Was] RV 'became.'
3. Saw it] i.e. the presence of God. The allusion is to the dividing of the Red Sea and of Jordan, the opening and closing events of the deliverance from Egypt.
4. Skipped] i.e. trembled: cp. Sinai, Exo_19:18.
5. What ailed?] The answer is, the presence of God.
8. Cp. Exo_17:6; Num_20:11
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain Psalm 114-117
Psalm 114-117
Psalm 114
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Retrospect
As in the book of Deuteronomy God’s ways with His people are reviewed so we find in some of these Psalms the reminders of God’s dealing with Israel in the past. Here it is first of all the deliverance out of Egypt and what happened then, the type of the greater deliverance effected by the power of God. (See Jer 16:14-15.)
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain The God of Jacob the Deliverer out of Egypt.
The God of Jacob the Deliverer out of Egypt.
A majestic song celebrating the care of God for His people at the time of the exodus from Egypt, when all the powers of nature were called to contribute for their benefit.
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v. 1. When Israel, God’s chosen people, who had accepted the true God as their King, went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob, which had entered Egypt as a family and left it as a nation, from a people of strange language, that is, unintelligible, foreign, Hebrew being considered the sacred language,
v. 2. Judah, the tribe which assumed the leadership and to whose tribe the capital was reckoned after the time of David, was His Sanctuary and Israel, the entire nation, as His Church, His dominion, His rule over them being acknowledged by all the true Israelites, Exodus 6, 7.
v. 3. The sea saw it and fled, the Red sea opening up before the people, Exo 14:21; Jordan was driven back, Jos 3:13-16;
v. 4. the mountains skipped like rams and the little hills like lambs, the reference being to the quaking of Mount Sinai and the surrounding country at the time of the giving of the Law.
v. 5. What ailed thee, O thou sea, that thou fleddest? thou Jordan, that thou wast driven back? the reference being to the two events that marked the beginning and the end of the wilderness journey.
v. 6. Ye mountains, that ye skipped like rams? and ye little hills, like lambs? Why should all nature be in a turmoil with so many manifestations of His divine power?
v. 7. Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord, that being the explanation of the agitation in nature at various times during the wilderness journey, at the presence of the God of Jacob,
v. 8. which turned the rock into a standing water, on the two occasions when Moses, at the command of God, smote the rock and water gushed forth, the flint into a fountain of waters, Exo 17:6; Num 20:11. It is a source of great comfort to New Testament believers to know that the spiritual Rock on whom the children of Israel depended was Christ. 1Co 10:4-9.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 General Information:
General Information:
Parallelism is common in Hebrew poetry. (See: Poetry and Parallelism)
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When Israel left Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people who spoke a foreign language
These two lines are parallel, with "Israel" and "the house of Jacob" meaning the same thing and "Egypt" and "that foreign people" referring to the same people. (See: Parallelism)
the house of Jacob from a people who spoke a foreign language
The word "house" here represents the family or descendents. The verb may be supplied to this phrase. AT: "the descendants of Jacob left people who spoke a language that the descendants of Jacob did not understand" (See: Metonymy and Ellipsis)
Judah became his holy place, Israel his kingdom
Possible meanings for "Judah" and "Israel" are 1) they refer to the land. AT: "The land of Judah became Yahweh's holy place, the land of Israel became his kingdom" or 2) they are metonyms for the people of Judah and Israel. AT: "The people of Judah became those among whom Yahweh lived, the people of Israel became those over whom he ruled" (See: Metonymy and Ellipsis)
translationWords
Israel
Egypt
house
Jacob
alien
people group
Judah
holy place
kingdom
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 Ps 114 This lyrical celebration of the Lord’s power…
Ps 114 This lyrical celebration of the Lord’s power in nature recalls Israel’s beginning as a nation at the Exodus (114:1-2) and upon their entry to the Promised Land (114:3-6). It promotes reverence for the God of Jacob (114:7-8).
114:1-2 At the time of Israel’s exodus from Egypt and their entrance into the Promised Land, Israel was one holy kingdom (Exod 19:5-6). • The separate references to the land of Judah and Israel indicate that the psalm was composed after the kingdom was divided (1 Kgs 12:16-17; cp. 1 Sam 11:8; 1 Kgs 1:35), and probably after the Exile. The land of Judah became God’s sanctuary because the people worshiped God; his Tabernacle and later his Temple were located there.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.