Psalms 114King James Version
When Israel went out of Egypt. The sea saw it, and fled: Jordan was driven back. The mountains skipped like rams, and the little hills like lambs. A short, leaping psalm.
A compact and vivid Exodus poem. When Israel went out of Egypt, Judah became his sanctuary, Israel his dominion. The sea saw and fled; Jordan was driven back; the mountains skipped like rams, the little hills like lambs. What ails you, O sea, that you fled? The closing command is a shock: tremble, O earth, at the presence of the God of Jacob, who turned the rock into a standing water, the flint into a fountain of springs. Pure celebration of the Exodus with cosmic reverberations.
The Exodus was not merely a political event but a cosmic one: creation itself fled, jumped, and trembled at the presence of the God who was with Israel.
verse: "The sea saw it, and fled: Jordan was driven back. The mountains skipped like rams, and the little hills like lambs." The two events (Exodus crossing and Jordan crossing) are held together as one continuous action of divine presence.
No superscription. Second of the Egyptian Hallel. The playful personification (sea fleeing, mountains skipping like rams) is unusual for the Psalter, suggesting this may be among the most ancient poems preserved. The two rivers (Red Sea and Jordan) mark the beginning and end of the wilderness journey.
Israel as the liberated people; Judah as God's sanctuary; the sea, Jordan, mountains, and little hills personified as respondents to God's presence; the God of Jacob as the actor.
Psalm 114 is celebrated for its literary compression: the whole Exodus and Jordan-crossing narrative in eight verses. The personification of creation (sea fleeing, mountains skipping) was influential in later Jewish midrash and Christian typology. The sea's flight was read as the natural world acknowledging divine sovereignty. Part of the Egyptian Hallel.
For moments of remembering how large the deliverance actually was. The psalm insists that it was cosmic, not merely historical.
1When Israel went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people of strange language;
2Judah was his sanctuary, and Israel his dominion.
3The sea saw it, and fled: Jordan was driven back.
4The mountains skipped like rams, and the little hills like lambs.
5What ailed thee, O thou sea, that thou fleddest? thou Jordan, that thou wast driven back?
6Ye mountains, that ye skipped like rams; and ye little hills, like lambs?
7Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob;
8Which turned the rock into a standing water, the flint into a fountain of waters.