Isaiah 51:15

15 For I am the LORD your God, who stirs up the sea, causing its waves to roar. My name is the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

Isaiah 51:15 Meaning and Commentary

Isaiah 51:15

But I am the Lord thy God that divided the sea, whose waves
roared
Referring to the dividing of the Red sea by a violent wind, at which time the waves of it doubtless roared till they were made to stand quietly, as a wall on the right and left, for the Israelites to pass through, as in ( Isaiah 51:10 ) . Or this is to be understood of the power of God at any time in stilling and quieting the sea when it rages; which signification the word ^F19 here used has, as Aben Ezra observes; which power is expressed by a rebuke or reproof of it. And so the Targum,

``I am the Lord thy God, that rebuketh the sea:''

and in like manner the Syriac version; see ( Psalms 106:9 ) ( Isaiah 50:2 ) with which compare ( Matthew 8:26 ) . Now he that can do, and oftentimes has done this, can rebuke, restrain, and still the fury of the oppressors, the rage of the persecutors, Rome Pagan or Papal, and deliver out of their hands, ( Psalms 65:7 ) : the Lord of hosts is his name:
the Lord of armies in heaven and earth, and therefore is able to do these things in a natural, civil, and religious sense.

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FOOTNOTES:

F19 (egr) "qui tranquillat" Gakater; "faciens quiescere", so some in Vitringa; and the word has the signification of rest and quietness in ver 4.

Isaiah 51:15 In-Context

13 Yet you have forgotten the LORD, your Creator, the one who stretched out the sky like a canopy and laid the foundations of the earth. Will you remain in constant dread of human oppressors? Will you continue to fear the anger of your enemies? Where is their fury and anger now? It is gone!

14 Soon all you captives will be released! Imprisonment, starvation, and death will not be your fate!

15 For I am the LORD your God, who stirs up the sea, causing its waves to roar. My name is the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

16 And I have put my words in your mouth and hidden you safely in my hand. I stretched out the sky like a canopy and laid the foundations of the earth. I am the one who says to Israel, ‘You are my people!’”

17 Wake up, wake up, O Jerusalem! You have drunk the cup of the LORD ’s fury. You have drunk the cup of terror, tipping out its last drops.