Or who shut up the sea with doors, when it brake forth, as if it had issued out of the womb? Who shut up the sea with doors - Who gathered the waters together into one place, and fixed the sea its limits, so that it cannot overpass them to inundate the earth?
When it brake forth, as if it had issued out of the womb? - This is a very fine metaphor. The sea is represented as a newly born infant issuing from the womb of the void and formless chaos; and the delicate circumstance of the liquor amnii, which bursts out previously to the birth of the foetus, alluded to. The allusion to the birth of a child is carried on in the next verse.