Psalms 29:7

“The voice of the Lord divideth the flames of fire.] Or “cutteth with flames of fire” f447; that is, the thunder breaks through the clouds with flames of fire, or lightning, as that is sometimes called, (<19A532>Psalm 105:32); and with which it cleaves asunder trees and masts of ships, cuts and hews them down, and divides them into a thousand shivers. Some refer this, in the figurative and mystical sense, to the giving of the law on Mount Sinai f448 , on which the Lord descended in fire, and from his right hand went a fiery law; but rather this may be applied to the cloven or divided tongues of fire which sat upon the disciples on the day of Pentecost, as an emblem of the extraordinary gifts…”

“divideth--literally, "hews off." The lightning, like flakes and splinters hewed from stone or wood, flies through the air.”

“Divideth the flames of fire - Margin, “cutteth out.” The Hebrew word - חצב châtsab - means properly “to cut, to hew, to hew out;” as, for example, stones. The allusion here is undoubtedly to lightning; and the image is either that it seems to be cut out, or cut into tongues and streaks - or, more probably, that the “clouds” seem to be cut or hewed so as to make openings or paths for the lightning. The eye is evidently fixed on the clouds, and on the sudden flash of lightning, as if the clouds had been “cleaved” or “opened” for the passage of it. The idea of the psalmist is that the “voice of the Lord,” or the thunder, seems to cleave or open the clouds for the flames of fire to play amidst…”

“The flames - The lightnings. Psalms 29:8”

“divideth: Heb. cutteth out flames: Psa 77:18, Psa 144:5, Psa 144:6; Exo 9:23; Lev 10:2; Num 16:35; Kg2 1:10-12; Job 37:3; Job 38:35 Psalms 29:8”