Jeremiah 51:42

42 The sea has risen over Babylon, she has been covered by the roar of its waves.

Jeremiah 51:42 Meaning and Commentary

Jeremiah 51:42

The sea is come up upon Babylon
A vast army, comparable to the great sea for the multitude thereof, even the army of the Medes and Persians under Cyrus; so the Targum,

``a king with his armies, which are numerous like the waters of the sea, is come up against Babylon:''

she is covered with the multitude of the waves thereof;
being surrounded, besieged, surprised, and seized upon by the multitude of soldiers in that army, which poured in upon it unawares. Some think here is a beautiful antithesis, between the inundation of Cyrus's army and the draining of the river Euphrates, by which means he poured in his forces into Babylon.

Jeremiah 51:42 In-Context

40 "I will bring them down like young rams to slaughter, like rams and goats.

41 How Sheshach is captured, and the glory of all the earth is seized! How Babylon has become as an [object of] horror among the nations!

42 The sea has risen over Babylon, she has been covered by the roar of its waves.

43 Her cities have become as an [object of] horror, a dry land and a wilderness, a land in which no person lives, nor does a son of humankind pass through it.

44 And I will punish Bel in Babylon, and I will wrench out from his mouth {what he has swallowed}. And [the] nations will not stream towards him [any] longer {what's worse}, the wall of Babylon has fallen.