בְּצֵאת יִשְׂרָאֵל מִמִּצְרָיִם בֵּית יַעֲקֹב מֵעַם לֹעֵז

When Israel went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a foreign-speaking people, “foreign,” as the Egyptian language was very different from Hebrew,

הָיְתָה יְהוּדָה לְקָדְשׁוֹ יִשְׂרָאֵל מַמְשְׁלוֹתָיו

the tribe of Judah became His holy one. They became the locus of the manifestation of God’s holiness. And Israel became His dominion. They were the ones who accepted upon themselves God’s sovereignty.

הַיָּם רָאָה וַיָּנֹס הַיַּרְדֵּן יִסֹּב לְאָחוֹר

After that, the Almighty revealed Himself further to them: The Red Sea saw and fled. The verse describes the splitting of the Red Sea from the perspective of the water itself rather than the perspective of Israel’s salvation. After witnessing the revelation of God’s glory, the sea retreated in awe. And later, as the Israelites came to the Land of Israel, the Jordan River similarly turned back from its course to allow them to cross into the land.

הֶהָרִים רָקְדוּ כְאֵילִים גְּבָעוֹת כִּבְנֵי צֹאן

The mountains danced like rams, the hills like lambs. The earth quaked, which made it appear as though the mountains and hills were dancing.

מַה לְּךָ הַיָּם כִּי תָנוּס הַיַּרְדֵּן תִּסֹּב לְאָחוֹר

The psalmist poetically turns to the inanimate objects involved and asks: What is it, sea, that makes you flee? The Jordan, that you turn back?

הֶהָרִים תִּרְקְדוּ כְאֵילִים גְּבָעוֹת כִּבְנֵי צֹאן

The mountains, that you dance like rams? The hills, like lambs?

מִלִּפְנֵי אָדוֹן חוּלִי אָרֶץ מִלִּפְנֵי אֱלוֹהַּ יַעֲקֹב

They respond: We quake and flee from before the Master, Creator of the earth, from before the God of Jacob, who created everything and has the power to change the world as He desires.

הַהֹפְכִי הַצּוּר אֲגַם מָיִם חַלָּמִישׁ לְמַעְיְנוֹ מָיִם

Just as He can cause the sea to split and the mountains to quake, it is He who turns the rock into a pool of water, flint into a fountain of water, an allusion to the events described in Exodus 17 and Numbers 20.