The floods have lifted up, O LORD, the floods have lifted up their voice; the floods lift up their waves.
Parallel translations
- WEB The floods have lifted up, Yahweh, the floods have lifted up their voice. The floods lift up their waves.
- BSB The floodwaters have risen, O LORD; the rivers have raised their voice; the seas lift up their pounding waves.
- NKJV The floods have lifted up, O Lord, The floods have lifted up their voice; The floods lift up their waves.
- NASB ¶The floods have lifted up, Lord, The floods have lifted up their voice, The floods lift up their pounding waves.
- NLT The floods have risen up, O Lord. The floods have roared like thunder; the floods have lifted their pounding waves.
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
The floods lift up their roaring voice and pounding waves. The chaotic forces of the world rise up in apparent defiance.
Overview
The surging floods picture the threatening, chaotic powers that seem to challenge God's order. In ancient imagery the raging waters often symbolize hostile forces and tumult. Yet their threefold uprising only sets the stage for declaring God's greater might in the next verse (Psalm 46:3).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 15
- Ps 96:11Let the heavens rejoice, and let the earth be glad; let the sea roar, and the fulness thereof.
- Ps 69:1–2Save me, O God; for the waters are come in unto my soul.
- Jer 46:7–8Who is this that cometh up as a flood, whose waters are moved as the rivers?
- Ps 124:3–5Then they had swallowed us up quick, when their wrath was kindled against us:
- Isa 17:12–13Woe to the multitude of many people, which make a noise like the noise of the seas; and to the rushing of nations, that make a rushing like the rushing of mighty waters!
- Ps 98:7–8Let the sea roar, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein.
- Isa 55:12For ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace: the mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.
- Ps 18:4The sorrows of death compassed me, and the floods of ungodly men made me afraid.
- Rev 17:15And he saith unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.
- Jonah 2:3For thou hadst cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas; and the floods compassed me about: all thy billows and thy waves passed over me.
- Ps 107:25–26For he commandeth, and raiseth the stormy wind, which lifteth up the waves thereof.
- Ps 69:14–16Deliver me out of the mire, and let me not sink: let me be delivered from them that hate me, and out of the deep waters.
- Ps 2:1–3Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?
- Rev 12:15And the serpent cast out of his mouth water as a flood after the woman, that he might cause her to be carried away of the flood.
- Acts 4:25–27Who by the mouth of thy servant David hast said, Why did the heathen rage, and the people imagine vain things?
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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 93:3 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.