Psalm 93:4

The LORD on high is mightier than the noise of many waters, yea, than the mighty waves of the sea.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(4) Sea.—Whether this description of a raging sea is to be taken literally, or as emblematic of war and its horrors, is doubtful.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

93:1-5 The majesty, power, and holiness of Christ's kingdom. - The Lord might have displayed only his justice, holiness, and awful power, in his dealings with fallen men; but he has been pleased to display the riches of his mercy, and the power of his renewing grace. In this great work, the Father has given all power to his Son, the Lord from heaven, who has made atonement for our sins. He not only can pardon, but deliver and protect all who trust in him. His word is past, and all the saints may rely upon it. Whatever was foretold concerning the kingdom of the Messiah, must be fulfilled in due time. All his people ought to be very strictly pure. God's church is his house; it is a holy house, cleansed from sin, and employed in his service. Where there is purity, there shall be peace. Let all carefully look if this kingdom is set up in their hearts.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The Lord on high is mightier than the noise of many waters - That is, he is more powerful than those waters; he is able to control them. See Psalm 65:7, note; Job 38:11, note. The original here is more rapid in the course of the thought; more emphatic and forcible: "More than the voice of waters - many - mighty - the breakers of the sea - in the high place is Jehovah." He is over all those billows and breakers; more mighty than they all. They can proceed no further than he permits; they will be stayed when and where he commands. We can conceive of few things which more illustrate the power and the majesty of God than the fact that he thus presides over, and controls, the waves of the ocean.

Yea, than the mighty waves of the sea - The original word here corresponds precisely with our word "breakers" - the mighty waves that "break" on the beach.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

2-4. His underived power exceeds the most sublime exhibitions of the most powerful objects in nature (Ps 89:9).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

The King of heaven is too strong for all earthly potentates, and will subdue them under his feet.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

The Lord on high is mightier than the noise of many waters,.... Christ is the most High; he is God over all, higher than the highest; he is, as King, higher than the kings of the earth; he is in the highest heavens, and higher than they; he is highly exalted, as Mediator, at the right hand of God: he is the mighty God, and mighty Saviour; yea, he is Almighty, and therefore mightier than all his enemies, and the noise they make, and the force they use; he is stronger than the strong man armed; than Satan, and all his principalities and powers; than all the persecuting princes and potentates of this world; than antichrist, and all the antichristian states: yea, than "the mighty waves of the sea"; the same are intended as before (c).

(c) Vide Homer. Iliad. 21. v. 190, 91. where the same is said of Jove, almost in the same words, and repeated as here.

Geneva Study Bible

The LORD on high is mightier than the noise of many waters, yea, than the mighty waves of the sea.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

4. The A.V. obliterates the structure of the verse. If the received text is retained we may render,

Above the thundering of many waters,

The mighty (waters), the breakers of the sea,

Jehovah on high is mighty.

But the grammatical construction is anomalous, and an easy emendation gives the sense,

Above the thundering of many waters,

Majestic above the breakers of the sea,

Majestic on high is Jehovah.

The repetition is in harmony with the style of the Psalm. The word for noise, lit. voices, may best be rendered thundering, for the plural is only used of thunder. ’Addîr is inadequately rendered by mighty. It suggests the idea of grandeur and magnificence as well as power. Cp. Exodus 15:6; Exodus 15:11 (a cognate word); Psalm 8:1 (A.V. excellent); Isaiah 33:21.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 4. - The Lord on high (comp. Psalm 92:8) is mightier than the noise of many waters; literally, than the voices of many waters (comp. ver. 3). As the waters represent angry nations, the poet speaks not only of their "noise," but of their "voices." Yea, than the mighty waves of the sea; or, "the glorious breakers of ocean" (so Kay; and comp. Exodus 15:10). Psalm 93:4

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

All the raging of the world, therefore, will not be able to hinder the progress of the kingdom of God and its final breaking through to the glory of victory. The sea with its mighty mass of waters, with the constant unrest of its waves, with its ceaseless pressing against the solid land and foaming against the rocks, is an emblem of the Gentile world alienated from and at enmity with God; and the rivers (floods) are emblems of worldly kingdoms, as the Nile of the Egyptian (Jeremiah 44:7.), the Euphrates of the Assyrian (Isaiah 8:7.), or more exactly, the Tigris, swift as an arrow, of the Assyrian, and the tortuous Euphrates of the Babylonian empire (Isaiah 27:1). These rivers, as the poet says whilst he raises a plaintive but comforted look upwards to Jahve, have lifted up, have lifted up their murmur, the rivers lift up their roaring. The thought is unfolded in a so-called "parallelism with reservation." The perfects affirm what has taken place, the future that which even now as yet is taking place. The ἅπαξ λεγ. דּכי signifies a striking against (collisio), and a noise, a din. One now in Psalm 93:4 looks for the thought that Jahve is exalted above this roaring of the waves. מן will therefore be the min of comparison, not of the cause: "by reason of the roar of great waters are the breakers of the sea glorious" (Starck, Geier), - which, to say nothing more, is a tautological sentence. But if מן is comparative, then it is impossible to get on with the accentuation of אדירים, whether it be with Mercha (Ben-Asher) or Dechמ (Ben-Naphtali). For to render: More than the roar of great waters are the breakers of the sea glorious (Mendelssohn), is impracticable, since מים רבים are nothing less than ים (Isaiah 17:12.), and we are prohibited from taking אדירים משׁברי־ים as a parenthesis (Kצster), by the fact that it is just this clause that is exceeded by אדיר במרום ה. Consequently אדירים has to be looked upon as a second attributive to מים brought in afterwards, and משׁבּרי־ים (the waves of the sea breaking upon the rocks, or even only breaking upon one another) as a more minute designation of these great and magnificent waters (אדירים, according to Exodus 15:10),

(Note: A Talmudic enigmatical utterance of R. Azaria runs: באדירים יבא אדיר ויפרע לאדירים מאדירים, Let the glorious One (Jahve, Psalm 93:4, cf. Isaiah 10:34; Isaiah 33:21) come and maintain the right of the glorious ones (Israel, Psalm 16:3) against the glorious ones (the Egyptians, Exodus 15:10 according to the construction of the Talmud) in the glorious ones (the waves of the sea, Psalm 93:4).)),

and it should have been accented: מים רבים אדירים משברי ים מקלות. Jahve's celestial majesty towers far above all the noisy majesties here below, whose waves, though lashed never so high, can still never reach His throne. He is King of His people, Lord of His church, which preserves His revelation and worships in His temple. This revelation, by virtue of His unapproachable, all-overpowering kingship, is inviolable; His testimonies, which minister to the establishment of His kingdom and promise its future manifestation in glory, are λόγοι πιστοί καὶ ἀληθινοί, Revelation 19:9; Revelation 22:6. And holiness becometh His temple (נאוה־קדשׁ, 3rd praet. Pilel, or according to the better attested reading of Heidenheim and Baer, נאוה;

(Note: The Masora on Psalm 147 reckons four נאוה, one ונאוה, and one נאוה eno d, and therefore our נאוה is one of the יז מלין דמפקין אלף וכל חד לית מפיק (cf. Frensdorf's Ochla we-Ochla, p. 123), i.e., one of the seventeen words whose Aleph is audible, whilst it is otherwise always quiescent; e.g., כּמוצאת, otherwise מוצאת.)

therefore the feminine of the adjective with a more loosened syllable next to the tone, like יחשׁב־לּי in Psalm 40:18), that is to say, it is inviolable (sacrosanct), and when it is profaned, shall ever be vindicated again in its holiness. This clause, formulated after the manner of a prayer, is at the same time a petition that Jahve in all time to come would be pleased to thoroughly secure the place where His honour dwells here below against profanation.