Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 29:7

The voice of the LORD divideth the flames of fire.

7. divideth the flames of fire ] Better, as in R.V., cleaveth the flames of fire; or, as in R.V. marg., heweth out flames of fire; a poetical description of the forked lightnings darting from the cloud.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Divideth the flames of fire – Margin, cutteth out. The Hebrew word – chatsab – means properly to cut, to hew, to hew out; as, for example, stones. The allusion here is undoubtedly to lightning; and the image is either that it seems to be cut out, or cut into tongues and streaks – or, more probably, that the clouds seem to be cut or hewed so as to make openings or paths for the lightning. The eye is evidently fixed on the clouds, and on the sudden flash of lightning, as if the clouds had been cleaved or opened for the passage of it. The idea of the psalmist is that the voice of the Lord, or the thunder, seems to cleave or open the clouds for the flames of fire to play amidst the tempest. Of course this language, as well as that which has been already noticed Psa 29:5, must be taken as denoting what appears to the eye, and not as a scientific statement of the reality in the case. The rolling thunder not only shakes the cedars, and makes the lofty trees on Lebanon and Sirion skip like a calf or a young unicorn, but it rends asunder or cleaves the clouds, and cuts out paths for the flames of fire.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Verse 7. Divideth the flames of fire.] The forked zigzag lightning is the cause of thunder; and in a thunder-storm these lightnings are variously dispersed, smiting houses, towers, trees, men, and cattle, in different places.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

Divideth, Heb. heweth out, i.e. it breaketh out of the clouds, and thereby makes way for the lightnings, which are suddenly dispersed over the face of the earth.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

7. dividethliterally, “hewsoff.” The lightning, like flakes and splinters hewed from stoneor wood, flies through the air.

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

The voice of the Lord divideth the flames of fire. Or “cutteth with flames of fire” e; that is, the thunder breaks through the clouds with flames of fire, or lightning, as that is sometimes called,

Ps 105:32; and with which it cleaves asunder trees and masts of ships, cuts and hews them down, and divides them into a thousand shivers. Some refer this, in the figurative and mystical sense, to the giving of the law on Mount Sinai f, on which the Lord descended in fire, and from his right hand went a fiery law; but rather this may be applied to the cloven or divided tongues of fire which sat upon the disciples on the day of Pentecost, as an emblem of the extraordinary gifts of the Spirit bestowed on them; though it seems best of all, as before, to understand this of the voice of Christ in the Gospel, which cuts and hews down all the goodliness of men, and lays them to the ground, Ho 6:5; and is of a dividing nature, and lays open all the secrets of the heart, Heb 4:12; and, through the corruption or human nature, is the occasion of dividing one friend from another, Lu 12:51; and like flames of fire it has both light and heat in it; it is the means of enlightening men’s eyes to see their sad estate, and their need of Christ, and salvation by him; and of warming their souls with its refreshing truths and promises, and of inflaming their love to God and Christ, and of setting their affections on things above, and of causing their hearts to burn within them.

e “caedit cum flammis ignis”, Cocceius, Gejerus. f Jarchi in loc.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

(7) The voice . . .Literally, the voice of Jehovah cleaving flames of fire. The word is used of hewingstone and wood (Isa. 10:15). The reference to lightning in this verse is universally admitted, some even seeing an allusion to the brief and sudden flash in the single clause of which the sentence is composed. But the most various explanations are given of the image employed. One of thesethat of beating out as from an anvilmay be set aside as clumsy and unworthy of the poet. But the comparison with Isa. 51:9, and Hos. 6:5, where the same verb is used of Gods judgments, makes it possible that the lightnings here are regarded as thought-executing fires, and if language would allow, we might translate hewing with flames of fire, and illustrate by

And ever and anon some bright white shaft
Burnt through the pine-tree roof, here burnt and there,
As if Gods messenger through the close wood screen
Plunged and replunged his weapon at a venture,
Feeling for guilty thee and me.

BROWNING: Pippa Passes.

But this, though the usual ancient translation, is now generally rejected in favour of the allusion to forked lightning, as we call it, the ignes trisulci of Ovid, a natural metaphor by which to try to represent the nimble stroke of quick cross-lightnings. For the apparent physical mistake in making thunder the agent in producing the lightning, see Note on Psa. 29:5.

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

7. Divideth the flames of fire A poetical description of forked lightning, as if it were cleaved or split. The word frequently means hewing and splitting, as Isa 10:15. The grammatical construction would make “the voice of the Lord” (thunder) the cause of cleaving or cutting out, the lightning; but the poet speaks phenomenally, as it appears. Elsewhere the thunder is put for the effect of lightning. Job 37:3-4. “With every thunder peal comes the terrible forked lightning, so striking in tropical and eastern lands. Its vivid, zig-zag, serpent-like flash, is given in a few words.” Perowne.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments