Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 89:9
Thou rulest the raging of the sea: when the waves thereof arise, thou stillest them.
9, 10. In this and the following verses thou, thine are the emphatic words.
the raging ] Or, proud swelling. Cp. Psa 46:3. The sea represents the most turbulent and formidable of the powers of nature. Cp. Psa 93:3 f.; Job 38:11. From the sea of nature the poet turns to the sea of nations of which it is the emblem (Psa 65:7). At the Red Sea God proved His sovereignty over both. For Rahab as a name of Egypt see note on Psa 87:4. Broken in pieces denotes crushing defeat (Psa 44:19): as one that is slain expresses the result; the ferocious monster lies pierced through and harmless. A comparison of Job 26:12-13 (on which see Dr Davidson’s notes) suggests that the language is chosen so as to allude not only to the destruction of the Egyptians at the Red Sea, but to the primitive mythological idea of a conflict between God and the powers of nature personified as ‘Rahab.’
with thy strong arm ] Better, With the arm of thy strength didst thou scatter thine enemies. Cp. Isa 51:9-10.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Thou rulest the raging of the sea – The pride; the anger; the lifting up of the sea. That is, when the sea is raging and boisterous; when it seems as if everything would be swept away before it, thou hast absolute control over it. There is, perhaps, no more impressive exhibition of divine power than the control which God has over the raging waves of the ocean: and yet this was the power which Jesus exercised over the raging sea of Galilee – showing that he had the power of God. Mar 4:39-41.
When the waves thereof arise – In the lifting up of the waves; when they seem to raise themselves up in defiance.
Thou stillest them – At thy pleasure. They rise no higher than thou dost permit; at thy command they settle down into a calm. So in the troubles of life – the storms – the waves of affliction; they rise as high as God permits, and no higher; when he commands they subside, and leave the mind as calm as the smooth sea when not a breath of wind moves over its surface, or makes a ripple on its placid bosom.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Psa 89:9
Thou rulest the raging of the sea: when the waves thereof arise, Thou stillest them.
The Divine government of the tumultuous
I. He rules the material sea. How furious does the old ocean sometimes become, how its billows often rise like mountains, roar like lions, and battle like demons! But God rules them. He has set a boundary to them. He holds the waters in the hollow of His hand.
II. He rules the mental sea. The material ocean is but a faint emblem of the mental seas, which are a thousand times deeper, larger and more awful.
1. There is the sea of thought. In every individual mind, thoughts rise and break like billows on the shore, and frequently they are most tumultuous. On this globe there are no less than twelve hundred million such seas, and what is the population of this globe compared to the mental population of the universe? He rules all these seas, rules them all even in their most raging condition.
2. There is the sea of passion. How the passions of men often rage in individuals, communities, nations! How rage, too, the passions of hell. But God rules them all. (Homilist.)
God ruling the storm
I. None who saw the sea, and the destruction it caused, could fail to realize the helplessness of men in presence of those forces by which we are surrounded. The spectators could only wonder. Life was in jeopardy: it was saved at the risk of life. All honour to the men who applied their knowledge of the ways of the sea; that, with their own lives in their hands, they sought to save–and succeeded, too, in rescuing–their fellows from a watery grave.
II. The goodness of God in restraining those forces against which we are so helpless. There is a point beyond which they cannot go. True, there are controlling laws. If the sea, rising under the influence of the sun and moon, reaches a very high point, it is stayed by other forces from going farther. But whence do these forces derive their existence? Not in the material itself. It is the working of His power. He rules the raging of the sea, etc. Thus we discover order and design in the whole range of Gods works; if one force presses downwards, others press upward; if one force imperils the existence of men, another force controls it; if in one direction there is danger, in another direction the means of safety are found.
III. The uncertain tenure on which material good is secured to us. In every combination there are seeds of destruction in the material itself.
IV. God is ever present in the varying conditions of our life. Can He be present in that storm? Did He see the danger of those who stood in peril of their life? No, He could not be there, is the hasty conclusion of most of us. When His waves overwhelm us can He be there? Did not the sea break loose from His hand? No; He rules the raging of the sea. There is a certain extent in which it can remove from its ordinary course, but then it is as much under control as when, with its smooth and glassy surface, it lies basking in the summer sun. And why? Because by His laws He is there. The force is His force, whether it be a storm or calm. Does He, then, destroy? No; the destruction is only to that which trespasses on the sea. His object is health, and the storm is the action of opposing forces restoring their equilibrium, working out purposes of sovereign skill. But God is there. What a consolation and strength! (H. W. Butcher.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 9. Thou rulest the raging of the sea] Whoever has seen the sea in a storm, when its waves run what is called mountain high, must acknowledge that nothing but omnipotent power could rule its raging.
When the waves thereof arise, thou stillest them.] Thou governest both its flux and reflux. Thou art the Author of storms and calms. There may be a reference here to the passage of the Red Sea, and the strong wind that agitated its waves at that time; as the next verse seems to indicate.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Giving commands and setting bounds to its waves when they are most impetuous and unruly.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
Thou rulest the raging of the sea,…. The power, pride, and elation of it, when it swells, and foams, and rages, and becomes boisterous, and threatens vessels upon it with utter ruin and destruction; but the Lord, who has it under his dominion and government, restrains it; he has made and can manage it, and he only: his power over it is seen in assigning it its place, and ordering the waters of it to it when first made; in placing the sand for its boundary by a perpetual decree, which it cannot pass; by commanding the stormy wind to lift up its waves, and by making the storm a calm, and the waves thereof still; see Ps 107:25, instances of this were at the universal deluge, and at the Red sea:
when the waves thereof arise, thou stillest them; when the sea lifts up its waves, and both lift up their voice, and make a noise, and roar, the Lord hushes them, and makes them still and quiet, as a parent its child when it cries, or a master his scholars, when they are noisy and tumultuous; so Christ rebuked the wind, and checked the raging sea, and made it calm, when the ship in which he was with his disciples was covered with its waves; and as this is mentioned here as an instance of the great power and strength of the Lord of hosts, so that was a proof and evidence of the true and proper divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, Mt 8:24, all this may be understood, in a mystical sense, of the sea of this world, and the wicked inhabitants of it, who are as the troubled sea, and cannot rest, casting up mire and dirt, reproaching and blaspheming God and man; and particularly of tyrannical princes and potentates, who are like the proud waters and raging waves of the sea; but the Lord on high is mightier than they, and can and does restrain their wrath and rage, so that his people have nothing to fear from them; see Ps 124:3.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
At the time of the poet the nation of the house of David was threatened with assault from violent foes; and this fact gives occasion for this picture of God’s power in the kingdom of nature. He who rules the raging of the sea, also rules the raging of the sea of the peoples, Psa 65:8. , a proud rising, here of the sea, like in Psa 46:4. Instead of , Hitzig pleasantly enough reads = from ; but is also possible so far as language is concerned, either as an infinitive = , Psa 28:2; Isa 1:14 (instead of ), or as an infinitival noun, like , loftiness, Job 20:6, with a likewise rejected Nun. The formation of the clause favours our taking it as a verb: when its waves rise, Thou stillest them. From the natural sea the poet comes to the sea of the peoples; and in the doings of God at the Red Sea a miraculous subjugation of both seas took place at one and the same time. It is clear from Psa 74:13-17; Isa 51:9, that Egypt is to be understood by Rahab in this passage as in Psa 87:4. The word signifies first of all impetuosity, violence, then a monster, like “the wild beast of the reed,” Psa 68:31, i.e., the leviathan or the dragon. is conjugated after the manner of the Lamed He verbs, as in Psa 44:20. is to be understood as describing the event or issue (vid., Psa 18:43): so that in its fall the proudly defiant kingdom is like one fatally smitten. Thereupon in Psa 89:12-15 again follows in the same co-ordination first the praise of God drawn from nature, then from history. Jahve’s are the heavens and the earth. He is the Creator, and for that very reason the absolute owner, of both. The north and the right hand, i.e., the south, represent the earth in its entire compass from one region of the heavens to the other. Tabor on this side of the Jordan represents the west (cf. Hos 5:1), and Hermon opposite the east of the Holy Land. Both exult by reason of the name of God; by their fresh, cheerful look they give the impression of joy at the glorious revelation of the divine creative might manifest in themselves. In Psa 89:14 the praise again enters upon the province of history. “An arm with ( ) heroic strength,” says the poet, inasmuch as he distinguishes between the attribute inherent in God and the medium of its manifestation in history. His throne has as its , i.e., its immovable foundation (Pro 16:12; Pro 25:5), righteousness of action and right, by which all action is regulated, and which is unceasingly realized by means of the action. And mercy and truth wait upon Him. is not; to go before any one ( , Ps 85:14), but anticipatingly to present one’s self to any one, Psa 88:14; Psa 95:2; Mic 6:6. Mercy and truth, these two genii of sacred history (Psa 43:3), stand before His face like waiting servants watching upon His nod.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
9. Thou governest the pride of the sea. I have already observed that what the prophet has hitherto spoken generally concerning the power of God, is to be referred to the miracle of the deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt, which he now celebrates in express terms. According to the interpretation of some, God is said to still the impetuous waves of the sea, because he does not suffer it to break forth and overflow the whole world by a deluge. But I would read the 9 and 10 verses connectedly, and would understand the prophet as speaking of the Red Sea, which God divided to make a way for the chosen tribes to pass over. The Psalmist adds immediately after, that all the land of Egypt was overthrown as a wounded man By these words he magnifies the grace of God, which was displayed in the deliverance of the Church. He intended, there can be no doubt, to set before his own mind and the minds of others, the paternal love of God, to encourage both himself and others to have recourse to Him for succor, with the greater freedom and alacrity. And in affirming that God had broken in pieces his enemies with his mighty arm, he concludes from the past experience of the Church, that his mode of acting will be always similar, whenever in his infinite wisdom he sees it to be required.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
9. Thou rulest the raging of the sea And therefore canst control the passions of men and the ambition of princes.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Psa 89:9 Thou rulest the raging of the sea: when the waves thereof arise, thou stillest them.
Ver. 9. Thou rulest the raging of the sea ] That it overwhelm not the earth: this work of God’s power is often celebrated, as well it may, all things considered.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Psa 29:10, Psa 65:7, Psa 66:5, Psa 66:6, Psa 93:3, Psa 93:4, Psa 107:25-29, Job 38:8-11, Nah 1:4, Mat 8:24-27, Mat 14:32, Mar 4:39, Mar 4:41
Reciprocal: Job 26:12 – the proud Job 38:11 – but Psa 44:2 – how thou didst afflict Psa 107:29 – General Jon 1:15 – and the Zec 8:20 – there Mat 8:26 – and rebuked
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
89:9 {i} Thou rulest the raging of the sea: when the waves thereof arise, thou stillest them.
(i) For as he delivered the Church by the Red sea, and by destroying Rahab, that is, the Egyptians, so will he deliver it, when the dangers are great.