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You will make them as a fiery oven in the time of your anger; The Lord will swallow them up in His wrath, And fire will devour them.
Psalms 21:9 · New American Standard Bible
Parallel translations
  • WEB You will make them as a fiery furnace in the time of your anger. Yahweh will swallow them up in his wrath. The fire shall devour them.
  • KJV Thou shalt make them as a fiery oven in the time of thine anger: the LORD shall swallow them up in his wrath, and the fire shall devour them.
  • BSB You will place them in a fiery furnace at the time of Your appearing. In His wrath the LORD will engulf them, and the fire will consume them.
  • NKJV You shall make them as a fiery oven in the time of Your anger; The Lord shall swallow them up in His wrath, And the fire shall devour them.
  • NLT You will throw them in a flaming furnace when you appear. The Lord will consume them in his anger; fire will devour them.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org

Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Quick answer

In his anger God will consume his enemies like a blazing furnace, devouring them in wrath. His judgment against the wicked is severe and certain.

Overview

Using fire imagery, the psalm portrays the Lord's wrath swallowing up his enemies entirely. Such language sober warns of the real and righteous judgment of God against persistent rebellion. While stern, it expresses the holy justice that finally vindicates God's kingdom and underscores the urgency of taking refuge in his anointed (Ps 2:12).

Cross-references & the web

Cross-references · 26

  • Mal 4:1“For, behold, the day comes, it burns as a furnace; and all the proud, and all who work wickedness, will be stubble; and the day that comes will burn them up,” says Yahweh of Armies, “that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.
  • Ps 50:3Our God comes, and does not keep silent. A fire devours before him. It is very stormy around him.
  • Ps 18:8Smoke went out of his nostrils. Consuming fire came out of his mouth. Coals were kindled by it.
  • 2 Th 1:8giving vengeance to those who don’t know God, and to those who don’t obey the Good News of our Lord Jesus,
  • Lam 2:2The Lord has swallowed up all the habitations of Jacob, and has not pitied: He has thrown down in his wrath the strongholds of the daughter of Judah; He has brought them down to the ground; he has profaned the kingdom and its princes.
  • Nah 1:6Who can stand before his indignation? Who can endure the fierceness of his anger? His wrath is poured out like fire, and the rocks are broken apart by him.
  • Deut 32:22For a fire is kindled in my anger, that burns to the lowest Sheol, devours the earth with its increase, and sets the foundations of the mountains on fire.
  • Isa 26:11Yahweh, your hand is lifted up, yet they don’t see; but they will see your zeal for the people, and be disappointed. Yes, fire will consume your adversaries.
  • Gen 19:28He looked toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward all the land of the plain, and looked, and saw that the smoke of the land went up as the smoke of a furnace.
  • Matt 3:12His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will thoroughly cleanse his threshing floor. He will gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn up with unquenchable fire.”
  • Dan 3:20–22He commanded certain mighty men who were in his army to bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and to cast them into the burning fiery furnace.
  • Ps 2:12Give sincere homage to the Son, lest he be angry, and you perish on the way, for his wrath will soon be kindled. Blessed are all those who take refuge in him.
  • Rev 20:14Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire.
  • Ps 2:5Then he will speak to them in his anger, and terrify them in his wrath:
  • Matt 13:50and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be the weeping and the gnashing of teeth.”
  • Matt 13:42and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be weeping and the gnashing of teeth.
  • Matt 22:7When the king heard that, he was angry, and sent his armies, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city.
  • Ps 106:17The earth opened and swallowed up Dathan, and covered the company of Abiram.
  • Rev 19:15Out of his mouth proceeds a sharp, double-edged sword, that with it he should strike the nations. He will rule them with an iron rod. He treads the wine press of the fierceness of the wrath of God, the Almighty.
  • Matt 25:46These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”
  • Matt 3:10“Even now the ax lies at the root of the trees. Therefore every tree that doesn’t produce good fruit is cut down, and cast into the fire.
  • Matt 25:41Then he will say also to those on the left hand, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire which is prepared for the devil and his angels;
  • Rev 6:16–17They told the mountains and the rocks, “Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb,
  • 1 Th 2:16forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they may be saved; to fill up their sins always. But wrath has come on them to the uttermost.
  • Ps 56:1–2For the Chief Musician. To the tune of “Silent Dove in Distant Lands.” A poem by David, when the Philistines seized him in Gath. Be merciful to me, God, for man wants to swallow me up. All day long, he attacks and oppresses me.
  • Job 6:3For now it would be heavier than the sand of the seas, therefore have my words been rash.

Themes, concepts, people & topics

Topics (3)

Resources, by level

Commentaries & study tools

  • VideoBibleProject — Psalms videosBibleProject · Lay · Free · evangelical

    Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.

  • VideoWatch teaching on Psalms 21:9YouTube · Lay · Free

    Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.

  • CommentaryEnduring Word — verse-by-verseDavid Guzik · Lay · Free · evangelical

    Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.

  • CommentaryClassic commentaries for this verseBibleHub (20+ works) · Pastoral · Free

    Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.

  • CommentaryMatthew Henry on PsalmsMatthew Henry · Pastoral · Free · evangelical

    The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).

  • ReferenceInterlinear, lexicon & Strong'sBlue Letter Bible · Seminary · Free

    Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.

Christ at the center

The Psalms are Christ's own prayer book and a gallery of his portraits — the suffering one of Psalm 22, the risen Lord of Psalm 16, the priest-king of Psalm 110, the Son to whom the nations are given.

How Psalms 21:9 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.

Original language

Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.