The fierce anger of the Lord - i. e., against Babylon. The people of God are to flee away that they may not be involved in the miseries of Babylon. See the Jeremiah 50:8 note.

My people, go ye out - A warning to all the Jews in Babylon to leave the city, and escape for their lives.

My people, go ye out of the midst of her,.... This is a call of the Jews to go out of Babylon, not before the taking of the city by Cyrus; but when he should issue out a proclamation, giving them liberty to return to their own land; which many of them, being well settled in Babylon, would not be ready to accept of, but choose to continue there; wherefore they are urged to depart from thence, because of the danger they would be exposed unto; for though the city was not destroyed by Cyrus upon his taking it, yet it was by Darius Hystaspes some time after. The same call is given to the people of God to come out of mystical Babylon, Revelation 18:4;

and deliver ye every man his soul from the fierce anger of the Lord; shown in the destruction of Babylon; See Gill on Jeremiah 51:6.

Since Babylon will be punished by the Lord with destruction, the people of God are to flee out of it, and to preserve their lives from the fierce anger of Jahveh, which will discharge itself on Babylon. חרון אף, as in Jeremiah 4:8, Jeremiah 4:26, etc.

My people, go ye out of the midst of her, and deliver ye every man his soul from the fierce anger of the LORD.

51:45 Go out of her - At all hazards escape for your lives.

45, 46. (See on [1006]Jer 51:6).

51:1-58 The particulars of this prophecy are dispersed and interwoven, and the same things left and returned to again. Babylon is abundant in treasures, yet neither her waters nor her wealth shall secure her. Destruction comes when they did not think of it. Wherever we are, in the greatest depths, at the greatest distances, we are to remember the Lord our God; and in the times of the greatest fears and hopes, it is most needful to remember the Lord. The feeling excited by Babylon's fall is the same with the New Testament Babylon, Re 18:9,19. The ruin of all who support idolatry, infidelity, and superstition, is needful for the revival of true godliness; and the threatening prophecies of Scripture yield comfort in this view. The great seat of antichristian tyranny, idolatry, and superstition, the persecutor of true Christians, is as certainly doomed to destruction as ancient Babylon. Then will vast multitudes mourn for sin, and seek the Lord. Then will the lost sheep of the house of Israel be brought back to the fold of the good Shepherd, and stray no more. And the exact fulfilment of these ancient prophecies encourages us to faith in all the promises and prophecies of the sacred Scriptures.