Bible Strands
Psalms 104:7
At Your rebuke the waters fled; at the sound of Your thunder they hurried away—
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — The psalmist addresses God directly while describing the moment the primordial waters receded to expose dry land. The speaker frames this event as a direct, instantaneous response to divine command rather than a natural process.
The words — גַּעֲרָתֶךָ (ga'aretekha) translates literally as "your rebuke," and יֵחָפֵזוּ (yekhafezu) means "they hurried away." Both terms emphasize the compelled, immediate movement of the waters in direct response to God's voice.
The thread — The pattern of God’s spoken command moving waters appears in Psalms 18:15, where rebuke exposes sea channels, Genesis 8:1, where God sends wind to recede the flood waters, and Mark 4:39, where Jesus rebukes the sea to still it.
Why it lands — The text demands recognition that chaotic forces submit instantly to divine speech. It requires the reader to account for God’s authoritative word as the mechanism that orders creation and limits disorder.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
At thy rebuke they fled; at the voice of thy thunder they hasted away.
Cross-references
- Psalms 18:15 The channels of the sea appeared, and the foundations of the world were exposed, at Your rebuke, O LORD, at the blast of the breath of Your nostrils.
- Genesis 8:1 But God remembered Noah and all the animals and livestock that were with him in the ark. And God sent a wind over the earth, and the waters began to subside.
- Mark 4:39 Then Jesus got up and rebuked the wind and the sea. “Silence!” He commanded. “Be still!” And the wind died down, and it was perfectly calm.
- Psalms 106:9 He rebuked the Red Sea, and it dried up; He led them through the depths as through a desert.
- Psalms 114:3 The sea observed and fled; the Jordan turned back;
- Proverbs 8:28 when He established the clouds above, when the fountains of the deep gushed forth,
- Psalms 77:18 Your thunder resounded in the whirlwind; the lightning lit up the world; the earth trembled and quaked.