Psalm 104:8

They go up by the mountains; they go down by the valleys unto the place which thou hast founded for them.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(8) They go up.—This translation is grammatically possible, but is inconsistent with the preceding description. It is better therefore to take the clause parenthetically, and to make hills and valleys the subjects. Hills rise, valleys sink, an interesting anticipation of the disclosures of geology, which, though in a different sense, tells of the upheaval of mountains and depression of valleys. Two passages in Ovid have been adduced in illustration (Met. i. 43, 344). And Milton, no doubt with the psalm as well as Ovid in his mind, wrote

“Immediately the mountains huge appear

Emergent,” &c—Paradise Lost, book vii.

Benson Commentary

Psalm 104:8. They go up by the mountains — Rather, They went up mountains: they went down valleys, &c. — They went over hill and dale, as we say; they neither stopped at the former, nor lodged in the latter, but made the best of their way to the place founded for them. The psalmist is “describing the motion of the waters in mountains and valleys, when, at God’s command, they filed off from the surface of the earth, into the posts assigned them.” Some interpret the psalmist’s meaning to be, that, in that first division of the waters from the earth, part went upward and became springs in the mountains, but the greatest part went downward to the channels made for them. Thus Dr. Waterland: They climb the mountains; they fall down on the valleys. The Hebrew, however, may be rendered, (as it is by some, both ancient and later interpreters,) The mountains ascended; the valleys descended; that is, when the waters were separated, part of the earth appeared to be high, and formed the mountains, and a part to be low, and constituted the valleys or low grounds. So Bishop Patrick: “Immediately the dry land was seen, part of which rose up in lofty hills; and the rest sunk down in lowly valleys, where thou hast cut channels for the waters to run into the main ocean, the place thou hast appointed for them.” But the former sense seems most agreeable to the context, because he speaks of the waters both in the foregoing and following verses.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

104:1-9 Every object we behold calls on us to bless and praise the Lord, who is great. His eternal power and Godhead are clearly shown by the things which he hath made. God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. The Lord Jesus, the Son of his love, is the Light of the world.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

They go up by the mountains ... - That is, when they were gathered together into seas. They seemed to roll and tumble over hills and mountains, and to run down in valleys, until they found the deep hollows which had been formed for seas, and where they were permanently collected together. The margin here is, "The mountains ascend, the valleys descend." So it is translated in the Septuagint, in the Latin Vulgate, by Luther, and by DeWette. The more natural idea, however, is that in our translation: "They (the waters) go up mountains; they descend valleys."

Unto the place - The deep hollows of the earth, which seem to have been scooped out to make a place for them.

Which thou hast founded for them - Where thou hast laid a permanent foundation for them on which to rest; that is, which thou hast prepared for them.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

6-9. These verses rather describe the wonders of the flood than the creation (Ge 7:19, 20; 2Pe 3:5, 6). God's method of arresting the flood and making its waters subside is poetically called a "rebuke" (Ps 76:6; Isa 50:2), and the process of the flood's subsiding by undulations among the hills and valleys is vividly described.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

In that first division of the waters from the earth, some part of them by God’s command, contrary to their own nature, went upwards, and became springs in the mountains, and the greatest part went downwards to the channels made for them. Others, both ancient and later interpreters, read the words thus, The mountains ascend, the valleys descend; when the waters were separated, part of the earth went upward, and made the mountains; and part went downward, and made the valleys or low grounds. But our translation seems the best, as being most agreeable to the context, because he speaks of the waters both in the foregoing and following verses.

Unto the place which thou hast founded for them; unto their proper channels and receptacles which God provided for them.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

They go up by the mountains, they go down by the valleys,.... The Targum is,

"they ascend out of the deep to the mountains;''

that is, the waters, when they went off the earth at the divine orders, steered their course up the mountains, and then went down by the valleys to the place appointed for them; they went over hills and dales, nothing could stop them or retard their course till they came to their proper place; which is another instance of the almighty power of the Son of God. Some render the words, "the mountains ascended, the valleys descended (m)"; and then the meaning is, when the depth of waters were called off the earth, the mountains and valleys appeared, the one seemed to rise up and the other to go down; but the former reading seems best, and emblematically describes the state of God's people in this world, in their passage to their appointed place; who have sometimes mountains of difficulties to go over, and which seem insuperable, and yet they surmount them; sometimes they are upon the mount of heaven by contemplation, and have their hearts and affections above; they mount up with wings as eagles; sometimes they are upon the mount of communion with God, and by his favour their mount stands strong, and they think they shall never be moved; at other times they are down in the valleys, in a low estate and condition; in low frames of soul, in a low exercise of grace, and in the valley of the shadow of death, of afflictive providences in soul or body: and as the waters, thus steering their course under a divine direction, and by an almighty power, at length came unto the place which, the psalmist says, thou hast founded for them, meaning the seas; which the Lord founded and prepared for the reception of them; and which collection of waters in one place he called by that name, Genesis 1:10. So the Lord's people, through a variety of circumstances, trials, and exercises, will be all brought safe to the place appointed for them, and prepared by Christ in his Father's house; where they will be swallowed up in the boundless ocean of everlasting love.

(m) So Pagninus, Musculus, Cocceius.

Geneva Study Bible

They go up by the mountains; they go down by the valleys unto the place which thou hast founded for them.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

8. (The mountains rise, the vales sink down,)

Unto the place which thou hadst founded for them.

The ‘rebuke’ of God is His command, uttered as it were with a voice of thunder (Psalm 18:15; Isaiah 50:2). It is best to follow the marg. of A.V. and R.V. in taking Psalm 104:8 a as a parenthesis, describing the result of this Divine command. Mountains and valleys appear (Genesis 1:9) as the waters retire to the place appointed for them. Cp. Ov. Metam. i. 344 f.

“Flumina subsidunt, colles exire videntur,

Surgit humus, crescunt loca, decrescentibus undis.”

See also Milton, Par. Lost, vii. 285 ff.

The rendering of the A.V. and R.V., which is also grammatically possible, appears to describe the commotion of the waters as the great deep breaks up and they seek their appointed place.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 8. - They go up by the mountains; they go down by the valleys; rather, they went up mountains; they went down valleys. In the general commotion of the waters, as they "hasted away," sometimes vast waves swept over mountain tops, sometimes huge floods washed down the courses of valleys - a graphic description of the scene which no eye saw, but which the poet figures to himself - a turmoil and confusion beyond that even of the great Deluge itself (see Genesis 7:17-19; Genesis 8:1-3). Unto the place which thou hast (rather, hadst) founded for them. The ocean bed, which had, in intention, been already prepared to receive them. Psalm 104:8

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Psalm 104:8 continues with the words אל־מקום (cf. Genesis 1:9, אחד אל־מקום): the waters retreat to the place which (זה, cf. Psalm 104:26, for אשׁר, Genesis 39:20) God has assigned to them as that which should contain them. He hath set a bound (גּבוּל, synon. חק, Proverbs 8:29; Jeremiah 5:22) for them beyond which they may not flow forth again to cover the earth, as the primordial waters of chaos have done.