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CLARK'S 

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t'ODBTE SEBleS. 
VOL. XI7. 



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EDINBUEGH: 

T. AND T. CLARK, 38, OEORGE STREET. 

MDCCCLXXVII. 



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BIBLICAL COMMENTARY 



THE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 



FEANZl^ELITZSCH, D.D., 



CianalBleb {coin t^t Ccintan, 
THE EEV. JAMES MAETIN, B.A 



EDINBtTEGH: 

T. & T. OLAEK, 38, GEOEGE STKEET. 

MDCCCLXXVU. 



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'J- 33 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



Inteoduction to the Phophetical Books of the Old Testament, . 

THE PEOPHEOIBS OF ISAIAH. 
'O INTSODUCTION. 

■5 Time of tlie Prophet, ...... 

.,' AirangemeDt of the CoUeclJon, ..... 

r» . The Critical Questions, ...... 

^ Expodljon m its exiatiag state, ..... 

t^ 

•l^ EXPOSITIOH. 

PIEBT BALF OP THE COLLECTION (CHAP. I.-SSXI2.). 

I. Prophecies relatinq to the Onward Coukse of the great 

Mass of the People towards hardening of Heart 

(Chap, i.-vi.) ; 
Opening Address concerning the Ways of Jehovah with His 

TTngratefnl and Bebellious Nation (Chap. i. 2 sqq.), 
The Way of general Judgment ; or ttie Course of Israel from 

Ealae Glory to the True (Chap, ii.-iv.), . . ' . 

Judgment of Devaataiian upon lihe Yineyard of Jehovah 

(ChapT.), . . . . . . 

The Prophet's Accoimt of his own divine Miesion (Cha^. vi.), . 



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TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



II. ComOLATlON OF Imhahiibl in toe uidst of the Asstbun 
Oppressions (Chap, vu.-xn.) ; 
Divine Sign of tlie Tbgin's wondrous Son (Chap, vii.), 
Two Omens of tlie ImmediBte Fntore (Chap. riii. i-i), . 

EBoterio Addresses (Chap. viii. 5-iii.) : 

A. Consolation of Immsnuel in the coining DarknesB (Chap. 

viii. 5-ii. 6), 

B. Jehovah's ontstretohed Hand (Chap. ix. 7-x. 4), . 
G. Destractioa of the imperial Kingdom of tbe World, and 

lUse of tike Kingdom of Jehovah in His Andnt^d (Chap. 



III. Collection op Oracles coNOERNiNa the Heathen (Chap. 
xm.-xxm.) : 

Oracle concerning the Chaldeans, the Heirs of the Assyrians 
(Chap. xiiL 1-nv. 27), .... 

The Oracle concerning Philietia (Chap. siv. 28-82), . 

The Oracle concerning Moab (Chap. xv. zvi.), . 

The Oracle concerning Damascus and Israel (Chap, zvii.), 

Etliiopia's SnbniiaBKHi to Jehovah (Chap, xviii.), 

The Orade ctmceming Egypt (Chap. liz.), 

Symbol of the Fall of Egypt and Ethiopia, and its Interpreta- 
tion (Chap, n.), ..... 

The Oracles concerning the Desert of the Sea (Babylon) (Chap, 
xii. 1-10), 

The Oracle conceniing the Silence of Death (Edom) (Ch^, xii. 
11, 12), 

The Oracle in the Evenii^ (against Arabia) (Chap.xzi. 13-17), 

The Oracle concerning tlie YaUey of Yidon (Jerusalem) (Chap. 

t^i-ii) 

Against Shebna the Steward (Chap. xiii. 15-25), ■ 
The Oracle concerning Tyre (Chap, xiiii,), . 

lY. FlSALB OF THE QBEAT CATASTROPHE (CHAP. XXIV.-XXVIL), 

The Judgment upon tlie EarUi (Chap. zxIt.), . 



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TABLE OF COHTENTS. 

The Fourfold Melodious Echo (Chap. xxr. zxvi.) : 

A. S^nt Echo: SalTatdon oi tlie Nations after the Fall of the 

impeiial City (Chap. ur. 1-8), 

B. Second Echo: The HomiliationDfHoab (Chap. xxr. 9-12), 
G. Third Echo : Israel brought back, or raised from die Dead 

(Chap, zxri.), ...... 

D. The Fourth Echo : The Fruit-bearing Vinejard under the 
Froteotifm of Jehovah (Chap. xxviL S-6), 
Jehovah's chastidiig and saving Course towards Israel (Chap. 
xxriL 7-13) 



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INTRODUCTION 



PROPHETICAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 



■HE prophetical histories are followed in the Old 
Testament canon by t)ie prophetical books of pre- 
diction. The two together form the middle portion 
of the threefold canon, under the common name of 
D'S^aj. On account of their relative position in the canon, the 
former are also described as D':lwr>n D'N'33, the first prophets, 
and the latter Q^liinKH, the last prophets. In the Masora this 
central portion is sometimes designated as ttr|t3?e^ possibly 
because it exhibits a complete and homogeneous whole. The 
first prophets are in that case distinguished from the last, as 
RTiwe Kno^i^ and KJ;3n Knoii!^. 

The thorah is indeed also a prophetical work, since Moses, 
the mediator through whom the law was revealed, was for that 
very reason a prophet without an equal (Deut. xxxiv. 10) ; and 
even the final codification of the great historical law-book 
possessed a prophetical character (Ezra ix. 11). But it would 
not have been right to include the t/wrali (Pentateuch) in that 
portion of the canon which is designated as "the prophets" 
(nebiini), inasmuch as, althotigh similar in character, it is not 
similar in rank to tbe.other prophetical books. It stands by 
itself as perfectly unique — the original record which regulated 
on all sides the being and life of Israel as the chosen nation, 
and to which all other prophecy in Israel stood in a derivative 
relation. And this applies not to prophecy alone, but to all the 
later writings. The thorah was not only the type of the pro- 
phetic historieif, hut of the non-propheticj the priestly, political, 
TOL. I. a 



i.vV^-.OO^^C 



2 iNTEODncrnoN to tiib 

and popular histories also. The former followed the Jehovistic 
or Deuteronomic type, the latter the Elohistic. The thorah 
unites the prophetical and (so to speak) ha^ographical styles 
of historical composition in a manner which b pecaliar to itself, 
and not to be met with in any of the works included among the 

Those who imagine that it u only because of their later 
origin, that the historical works which are found among the 
■ hagiograpba have not found their appropriate place among the 
*' first prophets/' have evidently no idea whatever of this diver- 
sity in the style of historical writing. Ezra — whom we have 
good reason for regarding as the author of the larger " book of 
the Kings," which the chronicler refers to under the title of 
" the story of the book of the Kings" (mtdrash eepher Itam- 
melacimf 2 Chron. zxiv. 27), a compilation relating to the 
history of Israel, to which he had appended the histoiy of the 
time of the restoration as the concluding part — is never called 
a prophet {nabt), and in fact was not one. The chronicler — 
who not only had before him our book of Samuel, which has 
been so arbitrarily divided into two parts, and our book of 
Kings, which has been just as arbitrarily divided in the same 
manner, faut used as his principal authority the book of Ezra 
just referred to, and who worked out from this the compendium 
of histoiy which lies before us, concluding with the memorabilia 
of Ezra, which we possess in a distinct form as the book of 
Szra — also asserts no claim to be a prophet, and, judging from 
the liturgico-historical purpose of his work, is more likely to 
have been a priest. Nehemiah, from whose memorabilia our 
book of Nehemiah is an extract arranged in conformity with 
the book of Ezra, was, as Wq well know, not a prophet, but a 
Tlrsdta,^ i.e. a royal Persian governor, and at the same time an 
Israelitish patriot, whose prayerful heart was set upon the 
welfare of his people, and who had performed good service in 
connection with the restoration of Jerusalem by the erection of 
buildings and the introduction of reforms. The book of Esther, 
with its rehgious features kept as they are in the background, 

' The title Tirskatha is probably to be ezpkined according to the 
irmenian tir-sHt, '"lord of the kingdom or province," Skaiha is ahother 
form of the terminations to Hucb names of towns as Artas&tA (=>• Artsaata, 
tot sStis equivalent to the Persian khsatra), Samosata, et«. 



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FBOPBEnoAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAUENT. S 

is as far removed as possible from the prophetic style of his- 
torical composition : it differs indeed from this qoite as much 
as the feast of purim — that Jewish carnival — differs from the 
feast of passover, the Israelitish Christmas. It does appear 
surprising, however, that the book of Kuth should stand among 
the hagiographa. This little book is so similar in character to 
the concluding portion of the book of Judges (ch. xvii.-xxi.), 
that it might be placed between Jndges and Samuel. And in 
all probability it did stand there originally, bnt for liturgical 
reasons it was added to the so-called five Ttiegilloik (festal rolls), 
which follow one another in our editions, so to speak, according 
to the calendar of feasts of the ecclesiastical year ; for the Song 
of Solomon is the lesson for the eighth day of the feast of 
passover ; Enth, that of the second day of the feast of ShahtoOi. 
(pentecost) ; KInoth (Lamentations), that of the ninth Abib ; 
Koheleth (Ecclesiastes), that of the third day of the feast of 
tabernacles ; and Esther, that of the feast of purim, which 
fell in the middle of Adar. 

This is also the simplest answer to the question why the 
Lamentations of Jeremiah are not placed among the prophetic 
writings, and appended, as we should expect, to the collecdon 
of Jeremiah's prophecies. The Psalms are placed first among 
the hagiographa — although David might be called a prophet 
(Acts ii. 30), and Asaph is designated "the seer" — for the 
simple reason that they do not belong to the literatore of 
prophecy, but to that of the shir Jelwvah, i,e. the sacred 
(liturgical) lyric poetry. Their prophetic contents rest entirely 
upon a lyric ground, whereas it is the veiy reverse with the 
Lamentations of Jeremiah, the lyric contents of which, though 
less prophetic in themselves, presuppose throughout the official 
position and teaching of Jeremiah the prophet. The canonical 
nebiim or prophets embrace only the writings of such persons 
as were cidled to proclaim the word of God publicly, whether 
in writing or by word of mouth ; not like the priests, according 
to definite modes prescribed by the law, but in a free unfettered 
manner, by virtue of a special gift and calling. The word nabi 
is to be regarded, as we may judge from its Arabic flexion, not 
as a passive, hat as an active form ; in fact, as an emphatic 
form of the active participle, denoting the proclaimer, publisher, 
spaker, namely, of God and of His secrets. The oldest use of 



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4 IHTaODOCnON TO THE 

the word (vid. Gen, xx. 7, cf. xsiii. 17-19, and Ps. cv. 15), 
which was revived ty the chronicler, is incomparably less 
restricted ia its meaning than the later nse. But when nsed 
to designate the middle portion of the Old Testament canon, 
althongh the word is not so limited as in Amos vii. 14, where 
it signifies a man who has passed throagh a school of the 
prophets and been trained in intercourse with other prophets, 
and has made prophetic teaching from the very first the exclu- 
sive profession of his life ; yet it is employed in a sense con- 
nected with the organization of the theocratic life, as the title 
given to those who stood forward as public teachere by virtue 
of a divine call and divine revelations, and who therefore not 
only possessed the gift (chariaina) of prophecy, but performed 
the duties of a prophet both in preaching and writing, and 
held an ofGce to which, at least on Ephraimitish soil, the insti- 
tation of schools of the prophets gave the distinct stamp of a 
separate order. This will serve to explain the fact that the 
book of Daniel was not placed among the neJii'm. Daniel 
himself was not a prophet in this sense. Not only was the 
mode in which the divine revelations were made to him a 
different one from the prevailing hrhrvoia irpotfnjTtiei}, as Julius 
Africanns observes in his writing to Origen concerning Susanna, 
bat he did not hold the ofEce of a prophet ; and for this reason 
even the Talmud (h. Megxlla 3a), when speaking of the rela^ 
tion in which the prophets after the captivity stood to him, 
says, " They stood above him, for they were prophets ; hut he 
was not a prophet." *'A distinction must be drawn," as 
Witsius has said, " between the gift of prophecy^ which was 
bestowed even upon private persons, and consisted in the 
revelation of secret things, and the prophetic office, which was 
an extraordinary function in the church, committed to certain 
persons who were set apart by a special call from God,"^ 

The reason, therefore, why all the historical and prophetic 
books which are to be found among the hagiographa {pet^tubim, 
which the son of Sirach speaks of in his prologue as " other 
boohs of our fatliers," and " the rest of the books") were 
excluded from the second or middle part of the Old Testament 
canon called nebiim, rested upon a primary distinction between 
writings that were strictly prophetic and writings that were 
^ See mj article on Daniel in Herxog'g Cyehpxdia. 



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fBOFHETIOAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAUEMT. 5 

not BO, — a distraction wtich existed in the domain of history as 
well as in that of prophecy. Thus the historical books from 
iToshaa to Kings, and the prophetical books from Isaiah to 
Malachi, were aeparated, as works written by men whose 
vocation in life was that of a prophet and therefore works of 
a prophetical character, from such books as Chronicles and 
Daniel, which were written indeed imder the influence of the 
Holy Spirit, bnt not in the exercise of a prophetical calling 
received through a prophetical impulse of the Spirit of God. 
The two different kinds of historical composition are also 
perfectly unmistakeable. Each of them has its own peculiar 
history. The best designation for the non-prophetical, taking 
into account its hbtory and remains, would be the rational or 
onnalistic. Of coarse it is quite possible for a prophetical 
history like the book of Kings, or an annalistic history like 
that of Chronicles, to embrace within itself certain ingredients 
which really belong to the other historical style ; but when we 
have once discovered the characteristics of the two styles, it is 
almost always possible to single out at once, and with perfect 
certainty, those ingredients which are foreign to the peculiar 
character of the work in which they are found, and have simply 
been made subservient to the writer's plan. It is very neces- 
sary, therefore, that we should look more minutply at the two 
styles of historical writing, for the simple reason that the 
literature of the books of prophecy gradually arose out of the 
literature of the prophetical books of history, and so eventually 
attained to an independent standing, though theynever became 
entirely separate and distinct, as we may see from the book of 
Isaiah itself, which is interwoven with many fragments of 
prophetico-historical writing. 

The oldest type of non-prophetic historical writing is to be 
found, as we have already observed, in the priestly ElohisUc 
style which characterizes one portion of the Pentateuch, as 
distinguished from the Jehovistic or Deuteronomic style of the 
other. These two types are continued in the book of Joshna; 
and taken as a whole, the Jehovistic, Deuteronomic type is to 
be seen in those sections which relate to the history of the con- 
quest; the priestly, Elohbtic, in those which refer to the division 
of the land. At the same time, they are coloured in many 
ether ways ; and there ia nothing to favour the idea that the 



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6 INTBODUCTIOK TO THE 

book of Joshna onglit to be combined with tbe Pentateuch, bo 
as ta form a hexateachical whole. The stamp of prophetic 
histoiy is impressed upon the book of Judges at the veiy out- 
set by the introduction, which shows that the histoiy of the 
judges is to be regarded ss a mirror of the saving government 
of God ; whilst the concluding portion, like the book of Ruth, 
is occupied with Bethlehem itish narratives, that point to the 
Davidic kingdom, the kingdom of promise, which formed the 
direct sphere of prophecy. The body of the book is founded, 
indeed, upon oral and even written forms of the »aga of the 
judges ; but not without the intervention of a more complete 
work, from which only extracts are given, and in which the 
prophetic pencil of a man like Samuel bad combined into one 
organic whole the histories of the judges not only to the time of 
Samson, but to the entire overthrow of the Philistian oppres- 
sion. That the books of Samuel are a prophetico-hiatorical work, 
is expressly attested by a passage in the Chronicles, of which 
we shall speak more fully presently; but in the passages relat- 
ing to the conflicts with the four Philistian children of the 
giants (2 Sam. xxi. 15 sqq. = 1 Ciiron, xx. i sqq.), and to the 
Davidic gihborim, i.e. the heroes who stood nearest to him 
(2 Sam. xxiii. 8 sqq. = 1 Chron. si. 11 sqq.), they contain at 
least two remnants of popular or national historical writing, in 
which we discern a certain liking for the repetition of the same 
opening and concluding words, which have all the ring of a 
refrain, and give to the writing very much of the character of 
an epic or popular ode, suggesting, as Eisenlohr has said, the 
legend of Eoland and Artus, or the Spanish Cid. We find 
more of these remains in the Chronicles — such, for example, as 
the list of those who attached themselves to David in Ziklag, 
and, in fact, during the greater part of Saul's persecutions. 
It commences thus : *' And these are they that came to David 
to Ziklag, whilst still bard pressed on the part of Saul the son 
of Kish ; and they belong to the heroes, those ready to help in 
war, armed with bows, both with the right hand and the left 
hand using stones and arrows by means of the bow." Some of 
these fragments may have fallen singly and unwrought into the 
hands of the later historians ; but so far as they are tabulated, 
the chronicler leaves ns in no doubt as to the place where they 
were chiefly to be found. After giving a census of the Levites 



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PBOFHETICAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 7 

from thirty yean old and upwards, in 1 Chron. xxiii. 2-24a, he 
adds, in ver. 24& and the following verses, in a fragmentary 
manner, that David, taking into accoant the fact that the hard 
work of past times had no longer to be performed, lowered the 
age for commencing ofBcial service to twenty, " for in the last 
words of David {dihre David Aa-acheronim) the descendants of 
Levi are nnmbered from the twentieth year of their age." He 
refers here to the last part of the history of David's life in the 
" boot of the kings of Israel " (aepher malce Israel), which lay 
before him ; and from what other work snch lists as these had 
been taken into this his main source, we may learn from 1 Chron. 
xsvii. 24, where he follows up the list of the tribe-princes of 
Israel with this remark with reference to a general census which 
David had intended to take : " Joab the son of Zeruiah began 
to number, but he did not finish it ; and there arose a bursting 
forth of wrath upon Israel in consequence and this numbering 
was not placed in the nombering (iedd3, read nbDS, ' in the 
book ') of the chronicles (dibre kai/yamim) of David." Conse- 
quently the annals or chronicles of David contained such 
tabular notices as these, having the character of popular or 
national historical composition ; and they were copied from 
these annals into the great king's-book, which lay before the 
chronicler. 

The official annals commenced with David, and led to those 
histories of the kingdom from which the authors of the books 
of Kings and Chronicles for the most part drew their materials, 
even if they did not do so directly. Saul's government con- 
SLBted chiefly in military supremacy, and the unity of the king- 
dom as renewed by him did not embrace much more than the 
simple elements of a military constitution. But nnder David 
there grew up a reciprocal rdation between the throne and the 
people, of the most comprehensive character ; and the multipli- 
cation of government offices followed, as a matter of course, 
from the thorough organization of the kingdom. We find 
David, as head of the kingdom, asserting his official supremacy 
on all hands, even in relation to religious affairs, and meet with 
several entirely new posts that were created by him. Among 
these was the office of mazcii- (recorder In Eng. ver. : Te.), i.e. as 
the LXX. have often rendered it, inrofiv^fiaToypaipoi or (in 
2 Sam. viii. 1 6) i^rl rav vnofiinjfidTiiiir (Jerome : a commentariu, 



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8 KTRODncnOH TO THE 

a thoronglily Boman translation). The Targams give a aimilar 
rendering, CJ^^?!"^ '*?^i tli® keeper of the memorabilia (V^. of 
the " book of records " or anoala, 2 Cliron. xxsiv. 8, cf. Ezra 
iv. 15, Esther vi. 1). The mazdr had to keep the annals of 
the kingdom ; and his office was a different one from that of 
the sopher, or chancellor. The gopher (scribe in Eng. ver. : Te.) 
had to draw up the public documents; the mazcir had to keep 
them, and incorporate them in the connected history of the 
nation. Both of these ofBces are met with throughout the 
whole of the East, both ancient and modem, evea to the 
remotest parts of Asia.* It is very evident that the office in 
question was created by David, from the fact that allusions to 
the annals commence with the chronicles (dibre hayyamim) of 
David (1 Chron. xxvii. 24), and are continued in the lepher 
dibre Shelomok (a contraction for eepher dibre hayyamim Shelo- 
moh, "book of the chronicles of Solomon," 1 £ing3 xi, 41). 
The references are then carried on in Judah to the end of the 
reign of Jehoiakim, and in Israel to the end of the reign of 
Pekah. Under David, and also under Solomon, the office of 
national annalist was filled bj Jehoshaphat ben-Ahildd. The 
fact that, with the exception of the annals of David and 
Solomon, the references are always made to annals of the 
" kings of Jndah " and " kings of Israel," admits of a very 
simple explanation. If we regard the national annals as a com- 
plete and independent work, they naturally divide themselves 
into four parts, of which the first two treated of the history 
of the kingdom in its unity ; the last two, viz. the annals of 
the kings of Judah and Israel, of the history of the divided 
kingdom. The original archives, no doubt, perished when 
Jerusalem was laid in ashes by the Chaldeans. But copies 
were taken from them and preserved, and the histories of the 
reigus of David and Solomon in the historical books which 
have come down to us, and are peculiarly rich in annalistic 
' The office of national annalist among the ancient Pereians (see Bris- 
BOnins, Se regno Persarum, 1. § 229), and that of icakajiauwfs, or historiui, 
which still ezislfi at the PeiBisn court, are perfectly eimilar in character. 
The Chinese have had their national historiana from the time of the Emperor 
Wu-fi of the Han dynasty (in the second century after Christ), and the 
annals of each dynasty are published on its extinction. The same insti- 
tation eiiBt«d in the kingdom of Barmt, vhere the annals of every king 
irere 'writl«a aft«r his death. 



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PBOPHETIOAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMEST. 9 

materials, ebow Tety clearly tliat copies of tlie annals of David 
and Solomon were taken and dtstribated with Bpeclal diligence, 
and that thej ^ere probably circolated in a separate form, as 
was the case with some of the decades of Livy. 

Bichard Simon supposed the ^crivains publics to be pro- 
phets; and upon thb hypothesb he founded an exploded view 
as to the origin of the Old Testament writings. Even in more 
recent times the annals have occasionally been regarded as 
prophetic histories, in which case the distinction between pro- 
phetic and annalistic histories would unquestionably fall to the 
ground. But the arguments adduced in support of this do not 
prove what is intended. In the Jirst place, appeal is made to 
the statements of the chronicler himself, with regard to certain 
prophetic elements in the work which constituted his principal 
source, viz. the great king's-book ; and it is taken for granted 
that this great king's-book contained the combined annals of 
the kings of Judali and Israel. Sut (a) the chronicler speaks 
of his principal scarce under .varying names as a book of the 
kings, and oa one occasion as dibre, i.e. ret gesta or histories, 
of the kings of Israel (2 Chron. xxxiii. 18), but never as the 
annals of the kings of Israel or Judah : he even refers to it once 
\ as midrash sepher hammelacim (commentarius libri regum), and 
.consequently as an expository and more elaborate edition either 
bf our canonical book of Kings, or else (a point which we will 
le^ave undecided) of an earlier book generally, (b) In this 
midrash the history of the kings was undoubtedly illostrated by 
□umeroos comprehensive prophetico-historical portions : but the 
chr))nic]er says expressly, on several occasions, tliat these were 
ingredients incorporated into it (2 Chron. xx. 34, xxxil. 32) ; 
so that no conclusion can he drawn from them with regard to 
the prophetic authorship of bis principal source, and still less as 
to that of the annals. We do not, in saying this, dispute for 
a moment the fact, that there were prophetic elements to be 
found among the documents admitted into the annals, and 
not merely such as related to levitical and military affairs, 
or others of a similar kind ; nor do we deny that the inter- 
position of great prophets in the history of the times would 
be there mentioned and described. There are, in fact, distinct 
indications of this, of which we shall find occasion to speak 
more fully by and by. Bat it would be tlie greatest literary 



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10 INtEODDOTIOH TO THE 

blnnder that coald be made, to imagine that the accooots of 
!Elijah and Eltsba, for example, which have all the stamp of 
their Ephraimitish and prophetic authorship upon the forefront, 
could possibly have been taken from the annals ; more espe- 
cially as Joram the king of Israel, in whose reign Elisha lived, 
is the only king of the northern kingdom m connection with 
whose reign there is no reference to the annals at all. The 
kind of documents, which were principally received into the 
annals and incorporated into the connected history, may be 
inferred from such examples as 2 Chron. xxxt, 4, where the 
division of the Levites into classes is taken from "the writing 
of David" and "the writing of Solomon :" whether we suppose 
that the documents in qaestion were designated royal writings, 
because they were drawn up by royal command and had received 
the king's approval ; or that the sections of the annals, in which 
they were contained, were really based upon documents written 
with the king's own hand (vid. 1 Chron, xxviii. 11—19). When 
we hear in mind that the account given by the chronicler of 
the arrangements made by David with reference to priests and 
Levites rests upon the annals as their ultimate source, we have, 
at any rate, in 2 Chron. xxxv. 4 a confirmation of the national, 
and so to speak, regal character of the year-books in question. 
A tecond argument employed to prove that the annals were 
prophetic histories, is the fact that otherwise they would not 
have been written in a theocratic spirit, especially in the king- 
dom of Israel. But (1) their official or state origin is evident, 
from the fact that they break off just where the duties of the 
prophets as historiographs really began. For fourteen of the 
references to the annals in our hook of Kings, from Keho- 
boam and Jeroboam onwards, are to be found in the history 
of the kings of Judah (it being only in the case of Ahaziah, 
Amaziah, and Jehoahaz that the references are wanting), and 
seventeen in the history of the kings of Israel (the reference 
failing in the case of Joram alone) ; whilst in both lines the 
annals do not reach to the last king in each kingdom, but only 
to Jehoiakim and Pekah, from which we may conclude that the 
writing of annals was interrupted with the approaching over- 
throw of the two kingdoms. Now, if (J) we examine the thirty- 
one references carefully, we shall find that sixteen of them 
merely afGrm that the rest of the acts of the king in question, 



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PBOPHETIOU. BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAUEKT. 11 

what he did, are written in the annals (1 Kings ziv. 29 ; 
2 Kings viii. 23, xii. 20, xv. 6, 36, xvi. 19, sxi. 25, xsiii. 28, 
xxiv. 5 ; 1 Kings xv. 31, xvi. 14 ; 2 Kings i. 18, xv. 11, 21, 
26, 31). In the case of fonr Israelitish kings, it is simply 
stated in addition to this, that their geburah (might, heroism, 
i.e, their hravery in war) is written in the annals (1 Kings xti. 
5, 27 ; 2 Kings x. 31, xiii. 8). But In the accounts of the fol- 
lowing kings we find more precise statements aa to what was to 
be read in the annals concerning them, viz. : Ahijam carried on 
war with Jeroboam, as might be read in them (1 Kings xv. 7) ; 
in the case of Asa the; contained an account of " his heroism, 
and all that he did, and the cities which he built" (1 Kings 
XT. 23) ; in that of Jehoshaphat — " the heroic acts that he 
performed, and what wars he carried on" (1 Kings xxii. 46) ; 
in that of Hezekiah— -" all his heroism, and bow he made the 
pool, and the aqueduct, and brought the water into the city" 
(2 Kings XX. 20) ; in that of Manasseh — " all that he did, and 
his sin in which he sinned" (2 Kings xxi. 17) ; in that of Jero- 
boam — " what wars he waged, and bow he reigned" (1 Kings 
xiv. 19); in that of Zimri — "hia conspiracy that he set on 
foot" (1 Kings xvL20); in that of Ahab — "all that he did, 
and the irory house which he erected, and all the towns that 
he built" (1 Kings xxii, 39) ; in that of Joaah — "his heroism, 
how he fought with Amaziah king of Judah" (2 Kings xiii. 
12, xir. 15) ; in that of Jeroboam ll. — "his heroism, how he 
warred, and how be recovered Damascus and Hamath to Judah 
in Israel" (2 Kings xir. 28) ; and in that of Shallum — " his 
conspiracy which he made" (2 Kings xv. 15). These refer- 
ences furnish a very obvious proof, that the aonaliatic history 
was not written in a prophetico-pragmatical form; though there ' 
is no necessity on that account to assume, that in either of the 
two kingdoms it stooped to courtly fiattery, or became the mere 
tool of dynastic selfishness, or of designs at variance with the 
theocracy. It simply re^stered outward occnnences, entering 
into the det^ls of new buildings, and still more into those of 
wars and warlike deeds; it had its roots in the spirit of the 
nation, and moved in the sphere of the national life and its 
institutions ; in comparison with the prophetic histories, it was 
more external than ideal, — more purely historical than didactic, 
— more of the nature of a chronicle than written with any 



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12 INTEODUCTION TO TH« 

special bias or intention : in short, it was more distinctly con- 
nected with political than with sacred histoiy. 

From the time of Samnel, with whom the prophetic period 
in the history of the legally constituted Israel strictly speaking 
commenced (Acts iii. 24), the prophets as a body displayed 
great literary activity in the department of historical composi- 
tion. This is evident from the numerous references made by 
the author of the Chronicles to original historical writings by 
prophetic authors. At the close of the history of David he 
refers to the dibre (Eng. ver. "book") of Samoel the seer, 
Nathan the prophet, and Gad the seer; at the close of the 
history of Solomon (2 Chron. ix. 29), to dibre (Eng. ver. 
" book") of Nathan the prophet, nebuoth (Eng. ver, " the 
prophecy") of Ahijah the Shilonite, and chazoth (visions) of 
Ye'di (Ye'do; Eng. ver. Iddo) the seer; in the case of £eho- 
boam (2 Chron. xii. 15), to dibre of Shemaiah the prophet 
and Iddo the seer ; in that of Abijah (2 Chron. xiii. 22), to the 
midrash (Eng. ver. " story") of the prophet 'Iddo ; in that of 
Jehoshaphat (2 Chron. xx. 34), to dibre of John ben Hanani, 
which were included in the book of the kings of Israel ; in that 
of Uzziah (2 Chron. xxvi. 22), to a complete history of that 
king, which had been composed by Isaiah ben Amoz ; in that 
of Hezekiah (2 Chron. xxxii. 32), to a chazon (Eng. ver, 
"vision") of Isaiah, which was to be found in the book of the 
kings of Judah and Israel ; and in that of Manasseh (2 Chron. 
xsxiii. 19), to dibre of Hosai. The question might be raised, 
indeed, whether the dibre referred to in these passages are not 
to be understood — as in 1 Chfon, xxiii. 27, for example — as sig- 
nifying the historical account of such and such a person ; but 
the following are sufficient proofs that the chronicler used the 
expression in the sense of historical accounts written by the 
persons named. In the first place, we may see from 2 Chron. 
xxvi. 22 how customary it was for him to think of prophets as 
historians of particular epochs of the history of the kings ; 
secondly, even in other passages in which the name of a pro- 
phet is connected with dibre, — such, for example, as 2 Chron. 
xxix. 30, xsxiii. 18, — the former is the genitive of the subject 
or author, not of the object ; thirdly, in the citations given 
above, dibre is used interchangeably with "^IT^V, which requires 
still more decidedly that it should be understood as denoting 



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PBOPHBTICAL BOOKS OP THE OLD TESTAMEHT. 13 

aatborship : and foarthly, this is placed beyond all doubt by 
the alternation of tnidraah Iddo (2 Chron. xiii. 22) with dibre 
Iddo (2 Chron. xiL 15). At the same time, it is evident that 
these accounts, which are called by prophets' names, were not 
lying before the chronicler in the form of separate writings in 
addition to the work which constituted his principal source, 
from the fact that, with the exception of 2 Chron. xssiii. 18, 19, 
he never quotes the two together. They were incorporated into 
the midrash tepher hammelahim (" the story of the hook of the 
kings," Eng. ver.), which lay before him (2 Chron. xsiv. 27), 
though not without showing their prophetic origin in distinction 
from the annalistic sources of the work in question ; and inas- 
mnch as it is inconceivable that the authors of oar canonical 
hooks of Samuel and Kings should have made no use of these 
prophetic records, the question is allowable, whether it is still 
possible for critical amdysis to trace them out either in whole or 
in part, with the same certainty with which it can be affirmed 
that the list of officers which is employed as a boundary-stone 
in 2 Sam. xz. 23—26, and the general survey of Solomon's 
ministers and court in 1 Kings ir. 2-19, together with the 
account of the daily provision for the royal kitchen in 1 Kings 
ir. 22, 23, and the number of stalls for the kin^s horses in 
1 Kings iv. 26, 27, and others of a similar kind, were taken 
from the annals. 

This is not the place in which to enter more minntely into 
such an analysis. It is quite sufficient for our purpose to have 
exhibited, in the citations we have made from the Chronicles, 
the stirring activity of the prophets as historians from the time 
of Samuel onwards ; although this b evident enough, even 
without citations, from the many prophetico-historical extracts 
from the writings of the prophets which we find in the book 
of Kings. Both authors draw either directly or indirectly from 
annalistic and prophetic sources. But when we look at the 
respective authors, and their mode of rounding off and working 
up the historical materials, the book of Kings and the Chronicles 
exhibit of themselves, at least as a whole, the two different 
kinds of historical composition ; for the book of Kings is a 
thoroughly prophetic book, the Chronicles a priestly one. 
The author of the hook of Kings formed his style upon the 
model of Deuteronomy and the prophetic writings j whilst the 



iV^nOO^^lC 



14 istboddctionTo the 

chronicler lo tlioronghly imitated the older dUre-Jua/vamim 
style, that it is often impossible to distinguish hb own style 
from that of the Bonrces which came either directly or in- 
directly to bis band ; and conseqaently his work contains a 
strange admixtoie of very ancient and very modem forms. 
The observation inserted in 2 Kings ZTii. 7 sqq. shows clearly 
enoogh in what spirit and with what intention the writer of 
the book of Kings composed hb work. Like the attthor of the 
book of Judges, who wrote in a kindred spirit (see Judg. ii. 11 
sqq.), be wished to show, in his history of the kings, how the 
Israel of the two kingdoms sank lower and lower both inwardly 
and outwardly till it bad fallen into the depths of captivity, 
in conseqnence of its contempt of the word of God as spoken 
by the prophets, and still more because of the radical evil pf 
idolatry; but how Judah, with its Davidie government, was 
not left without hope of rescue from the abyss, provided it 
would not shut its heart against such prophetic preaching as 
was to be found in its own past history. The chronicler, on 
the other hand, whose love to the divinely chosen monarchy and 
priesthood of the tribes of Judah and Levi is obvious enough, 
from the annalisljc survey with which he prefaces bis work, 
commences with the moarnful' end of Saul, and wastes no 
words upon the path of sorrow through which David reached 
the throne, bat passes at once to the joyful beginning of his 
reign, which he sets before us in the popular, warlike, priestly 
style of the annals. He then relates the history of Judah and 
Jerusalem under the rule of the house of David, almost without 
reference to the bbtory of the northern kingdom, and describes 
it with especial completeness wherever he has occasion to extol 
the interest shown by the king in the temple and worship of 
God, and bis co-operation with the Levites and priests. The 
anthor of the book of Kings shows us in prophecy the spirit 
which pervaded the history, and the divine power which moulded 
it. The chronicler exhibits in the monarchy and priesthood the 
two chambers of its beating heart. In the former we see 
storm after storm gather in the sky that envelopes the history, 
according to the attitude of the nation and its kings towards 
the word of God ; with the latter the history is ever encircled 
by the cloudless sky of the divine institutions. The writer of 
the Chronicles dwells with peculiar preference, and a certain 



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PBOFHETICAL B00E8 OF tUE OLD TESTAUEHT 15 

partiality, apon the brighter portions of the history ; whereas, 
with the aathor of the book of Kings, the law of retributioD 
which prevaOs in the historical materials requires that at least 
an equal prominence should be given to the darker side. In 
short, the history of the book of Etngs is more inward, divine, 
theocratic in its character ; that of the Chronicles more oat- 
ward, human, and popular. The author of the book of Kings 
writes with a prophet's pen ; the chronicler with the pen of an 
annalist. 

Nevertheless, they both of them afford ns a deep insight 
into the laboratory of the two modes of writing history ; and 
the historical productions of both are rich in words of the 
prophets, which merit a closer inspection, since they are to 
be regarded, together with the prophetico-historical writings 
quoted, as preludes and side-pieces to the prophetic literature, 
properly so called, which gradually established itself in more or 
less independence, and to which the nebiim ackaronim (the last 
prophets) belong. The book of Kings contains the following 
words and sayings of prophets ; (1) Ahijah of Shilo to Jero- 
boam (1 Kings xi. 29-39); (2) Shemaiah to Eehoboam(l Kings 
xii. 22-24) ; (3) a man of God to the altar of Jeroboam 
(1 Kings xiii. 1, 2) ; (4) Ahijah to the wife of Jeroboam 
(1 Kings xiv. 5-16) ; (5) Jehu ben HananI to Baasha (1 
Kings xvi. 1-4) ; (6)- a prophet to Ahab king of Israel (1 
Kings XX. 13, 14, 22, 28) ; (7) a pupil of the prophets to 
Ahab (1 Kings xx. 35 sqq.) ; (8) Elijah to Ahab (1 Kings 
xxi. 17-26); (9) Micha ben Yimla to the two kings Ahab 
and Jehoshaphat (1 Kings xxii. 14 sqq.) ; (10) Elisha to Je- 
horam and Jehoshaphat (2 Kings iii. 11 sqq.) ; (11) a pupil of 
Elisha to Jehu (2 Kings ix. 1-10) ; (12) a maasa concerning 
the house of Ahab (2 Kings ix. 25, 26) ; (13) Jehova^i to 
Jehu (^ Kings X. 30); (14) Jonah to Jeroboam U. (indirectly; 
2 Kings xiv. 25-27) ; (15) leading message of the prophets 
(2 Kings xvii. 13) ; (16) Isaiah's words to Hezekiah (2 Kings 
xtx. XX.) ; (17) threat on account of Manasseh (2 Kings xxi. 
10-15) ; (18) Huldah to Josiah (2 Kings xxii. 14 sqq.) ; (19) 
threat of Jehovah concerning Judah (2 Kings xxiii. 27). Of 
aU these prophetic words and sayings, Nos. 2, 9, and 18 are 
the only ones that are given by the chronicler (2 Chron, xi. 
2-4, xviii., and xxxiv.), partly because he confined himself to 



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16 INTEODDOnON TO THE 

tbfl history of tlie kings of Jadah, and partly becaoae he wrote 
with the iatentioa of gupplemeDting our book of Kings, which 
was no doubt lying before him. On the other hand, we find 
the following words of prophets in the Chronicles, which are 
wanting in the book of Kings : (1) words of Shemaiah in the 
war between Eehoboam and Shbhak (2 Chron. lii. 7, 8) ; 
(2) Azariah ben Oded before Asa (2 Ohron. xv. 1-7) ; (3) 
Hanani to Asa (2 Chron. xvi. 7-9) ; (4) Jahaziel the Asaphite 
in the naUonal assembly (2 Ohron. xx. 14-17) > (5) Ehezer 
ben Dodavahn to Jehoshaphat (2 Chron. xx. 37) ; (6) letter of 
Elijah to Jehoram (2 Chron. xxi. 12-15) ; (7) Zechariah ben 
Jehoiada in the time of Joash (2 Chron. xxiv. 20) ; (8) a man 
of God to Amaziab (2 Chron. xxv. 7-9); (9) a prophet to 
Amaziah (2 Ohron. xxv. 15, 16) ; (10) Oded to Pekah (2 
Chron. xxviii. 9-11). To extend the range of our observation 
still further, we may add, (1) the address of the maUach 
Jehovah in Bochim (Judg. ii. 1-5) ; (2) the address of a prophet 
(mA nahi) to Israel, in Judg, vi. 8-10 ; (3) that of a man of 
God to Eli (1 Sam. ii. 27 sqq.) ; (4) Jehovah to Samuel con- 
cerning Eli'a house (1 Sam. iii. 11-14) ; (5) Samuel to Israel 
before the battle at Ebenezer (1 Sam. vii. 3) ; (6) Samuel to 
Saul in Gilgal (1 Sam. xiii. 13, 14) ; (7) Samuel to Saul after 
the victory over Amalek (1 Sam. xv.) ; (8) Nathan to David 
concerning his wish to build the temple (2 Sam. vii.) ; (9) 
Nathan to David after hia adultery (2 Sam. xii.) ; (10) Gad to 
David after the numbering of the people (2 Sam. xxiv.). 

If we take a general survey of these prophetic words and 
sayings, and compare them with one another, there can be no 
doubt that some of them have come down to ua in their original 
form ; such, for example, as the address of the man of God to 
Eli, in the first book of Samuel, and the words of Samuel to 
Saul after the victory over Amalek. This is guaranteed by 
their distinct peculiarity, their elevated tone, and the manifest 
difference between them and the ordinary style of the historian 
who relates them. lu the case of others, at least, all that is 
essential in their form has been preserved; as, for example, in 
the addresses of Nathan to David : this b evident from the 
echoes that we find of them in the subsequent history. Among 
the sayings that have been handed down verbatim by the author 
of the book of Kings, we may include those of Isaiah, whose 



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FBOPESnCAL BOOKS OF TEE OLD TESTJUfEKT. 17 

oii^alitj several tbings combine to Boitain, — viz. the matta 
ID 2 Kings ix. 25, 26, the coiutroction of whidi is peculiar and 
primitive ; together with a few other brief prophetic words, 
poflsibly in all that is essential the words of Hnldah : fcnr it is 
only in the month of Hiildah(2 Kings xxii. 19; 2 Chron.zzxiT. 
27) and Isaiah (2 Kings ziz. 33), and in the massa referred to, 
that we meet with the prophetic " saith the Lord " (n^rr DK3), 
which we also £nd in 1 Sam. ii. 30, with other marks of ori- 
ginality, whilst its great antiquity is attested by Gen. xzii. 16, 
the Davidic Psalms, and 2 Sam. xxiii. 1. In seme of these 
sayings the historian is not at all concerned to give them in 
their orig^al words i they are simply prophetic voices generally, 
which were beard at a particular time, and the leading tones 
of which he desires to preserve — each, for example, as Jsdg. 
Ti. 8-10, 2 Kings xvii. 13, zzi. 10-15. Keprodnctions of 
prophetic witnesses in so general a form as this natorally bear 
the stamp of the writer who reprodoces thetn. In tiie books 
of Judges and Kings, for example, they show clearly the 
Deuteronomic training of their last editors. But we can go 
still further, and maintain generally, that the prophecies in the 
books of Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles contain marked traces 
of the historian's own band, as well as of the sources from 
which they were indirectly drawn. Such sayings as are ojm- 
mcoi to the two books (Chromcles and Kings) are almost word 
for word the same in the former as in the latter ; but the rest 
have all a marked peculiarity, and a totally different physiog- 
nomy. The sayings in the book of Kings almost invariably 
b^n with " Thus saith the Lord," or " Thus saith the Lord 
God of Israel " (also Judg. vi. 8, and 2 Kings xiz. 30, before 
the message of Isaiah) ; and nothing is more frequent in them 
than the explanatory phrase "^B^ ^,, And such Deuteronomic 
ezpresuons as D^jnn, irarin, T3 (m, and others ; to which we 
may add a fondness for similes introduced with "as" (e^. 

1 Kings ziv. 10, 15 ; 2 Kings xxi. 13). The thought of 
Jehovah's chooting occurs in the same words in 1 Kings zL 36 
and 2 Kings xxiii. 27; and the expression, "that David may 
have a light alway," in 1 Kings xi. 36, is exclusively confined 
to the Deuteronomic author of the work (vid. 1 Kings xv. 4, 

2 Kings viii. 19, cf. 2 Chron. xn. 7). The words, « I exalted 
thee from among the people, and made thee prince over mji 

VOL. I. B 

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18 DrrBODUcnoN to the 

people Israel," are not only to be fonnd In the eecond address 
of Atiijah in 1 Kings xiv. 7, bat, with slight alteration, in the 
address of Jehu in ch. xvi. 2. The Words, " Him that dieth 
ia the city shall the dogs eat, and him that dieth in the field 
shall the fowls of the air eat," are found in the same form 
in Ahijah's second address (1 Kings ziv. 11), in Jehu's address 
(ch. xvi. 4), and in that of Elijah to Ahab (ch. xxi. 24). The 
threat, " 1 will cut off all that pisseth agajnst the wait, that is 
shut np and that is free in Israel, and will sweep behind 
the house of Jeroboam," is found, with trifling variations, in 
Ahijah's second address (1 Kings xiv. 10), in Elijah's address 
to Ahab (ch. xxi. 21), and in Elisha's address to Jehu (2 Kings 
ix. 8) ; whilst it is evident from 1 Kings xvi. 11 and 2 Kings 
zir. 2G, that the form of the threat is just in the style of the 
J)euteronomic historian. There can he no question, therefore, 
that nearly all these prophetic sayings, so far as 
impress can exist at all, are of one type, and that the c 
bcmd which encircles them is no other than the prophetic 
subjectivity of the Deuteronomic historian. A similar con- 
clusion may he drawn with regard to the prophetic sayings 
contained in the Ciironicles. They also bear so decidedly the 
evident marks of the chronicler's own work, that Caspari him- 
self, in his work upon the Syro-Ephraimitish war, is obliged to 
admit that the prophetic address in 2 Cbron. xv. 2-7, which is 
apparently the most original of all, recals the peculiar style of 
the chronicler. At the same time, in the case of the chronicler, 
whose principal source of information mnst have resembled his 
own work in spirit and style (as we are warranted in assuming 
by the book of Ezra especially), it is not so easy to determine 
how far liis own freedom of treatment extended as it is in the 
case of the author of the book of Kings, who appears to have 
fonnd the greater part of the sayings given in mere outline in 
the annals, and in taking them thence, to have reproduced 
them freely, in the consciousness of his own unity of spirit 
with the older prophets. 

If these sayings had been handed down to us m their 
ori^nal form, we should possess in them a remarkably impor- 
tant source of information with regard to the historical develop- 
ment of the prophetic ideas and modes of expression. We 
should then know for certain that Isaiah's favourite phrase, 



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FBOPBETICAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAUENT. 19 

" for the Lord hath spoken it," was first employed by Ahijah 
(1 £ings xiv. 11) ; that when Joel prophesied " in Jenualem 
shall be deliyerance " (Joel ii. 32), he hsd already been pre- 
ceded by Shemaiah (2 Chron. xii. 7) ; that Rosea (in cb. iii. 
4, 5, of. V, 15) toot up the declaration of Azariah ben Oded, 
"And many days will Israel continue without the God of 
truth, and without a teaching priest, and without law; bat 
when it tometh in its trouble," et«. (2 Chron. xr. 3, 4, where, 
as the parallel proves, the preterites of ver. 4 are to be interpreted 
according to the prophetic context) ; that in Jer. xxxi. 16, "for 
thy work shall be rewarded " we have the echo of another word 
of the same Azariah ; that in the words spoken by Hanani in 
2 Chron, xti. 9, " The eyes of the Lord mn to and fro through- 
out the whole earth," he was the precursor of Zechariah (cb. iv. 
10) ; and other instances of a similar kind. But, with the infla- 
ence which was evidently exerted upon the sayings quoted by 
the Bubjective peculiarities of the two historians (compare, for 
example, 2 Chron. xv. 2 with xiil. 4 and 1 Chron. xxviii. 9 ; 
2 Chron. xii. 5 with sxiv, 20; also ver. 7 with 2 Chron. xxxiv. 
21, and the parallel 2 Kings sxii. 13 ; and 2 Chron. xv. 5, "In 
those times," with Dan. xl. 14), and with the difficulty of tracing 
the original elements in these sayings (it is quite possible, for 
example, that the thought of a light remaining to David, 1 
Kings XV. 4, 2 Kings viii. 19, was really uttered first of all hj 
Ahijah, 1 Kings xi. 36), it is only a very cautious and sparing 
use that can be made of them for this purpose. It is qoite 
possible, since Deuteronomy is the real prophets book, as com- 
pared with the other hooks of the Pentateuch, that the pro- 
phets of the earlier regal times took pleasure in employing 
Denteronomic expressions; but it cannot be decided whether 
such expressions as " put my name there," in 1 Kings xL 36, 
and " root np Israel," etc., in 1 Kings xiv. 15, received their 
Deuteronomic form (cf. Deut. xii. 5, 21, xiv. 24, xxix. 27) 
from the prophet himself, or &om the author of the book of 
Kings (cf. 1 Kings ix. 3, and the parallel passages, 2 Chron. 
vii. 20, ix. 7, 2 Kings xxi. 7, 8). At the same time, quite 
enough of the original has been retained in the prophecies of 
these earlier propbets, to enable us to discern in them the types 
and precorsors of the later ones. Shemaiah, with his threat 
'and its sabsequeot modification in the case of Asa, calls to mind 



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20 ISTBODUOnOH TO TfflE 

Micah and his words to Hezekiah, in Jer. xzvl. 17 sqq. The 
attitude of Hanani towards Asa, when he bad appealed to Aram 
for help, is jast the same as that which Isaiah assiimed towards 
Ahaz ; and there is also a close analog; in itbe conseqaences of 
the two events. Hosea and Amos prophesy agiunst " the high 
places of Aven '* (Hos. i. 8), and " the altars of Bethel " (Amos 
iii. 14, is. 1), like the man of G^ in Bethel. When Anaos 
leaves his home in consequence of a divine call (ch. vii. 15) 
and goes to Bethel, the headquarters of the image-worship of 
the Israelites, to prophesy against the idolatrous Idngdom ; is 
there not a repetition in this of the account of the prophet in 
1 Kings xiii. t And when Hanani is cast into prison on account 
of his denundation of Asa; is not this a prdnde, as it were, 
to the subsequent fate of Mlcah ben-Imlah (1 Kings zzii.) and 
Jeremiah (Jer. zxxiL) ? And so, agun, Ahijah's confirmation 
and symbolical representation of what he predicted, by the' 
reading in pieces of a new garment (the symbol of the Idngdom 
in its unity and strength), has its analoga in the history of the 
earlier prophets {1 Sam. xv. 26-29) as well as in that of the 
latest (e^, Jer. xxii.). It is only such signs (mophethim), as 
that by which the prophet who came out of Judah into Bethel 
confirmed his prophecy, that disappear entirely from the later 
history, althoogh Isaiah does not think it beneath him to offer 
Ahaz a sign, either in the -depth or in the height above, in 
attestation of his prophetic testimony. 

There was no essential difference, however, between the 
prophets of the earher and those of the later times ; and the 
unity of spirit which hnked together the prophets of the two 
kingdoms from the veif first, notwithstanding the inevitable 
diveruty in their labours in consequence of the different cir- 
cumstances in which they were placed, continued all through. 
Still we do meet with differences. The earlier prophets are 
uniformly occupied with the internal affairs of the kingdom, 
and do not bring within their range the history of other 
nations, with which that of Israel was so intimately inteiwoven. 
Their prophecies are directed ezclnsively to the kings and 
people of the two kingdoms, and not to any foreign nation at 
all, either to those immediately adjoining, or what we certainly 
might expect, to Egypt and Aram. The Mesaianic element still 
remains in a somewhat obscure chrysalis state ; and the poetry 



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PBOFHSnOAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TEffTAHEHT. SI 

of thoughts and words, vhicb grew up afterwards aa the result 
of prophetic inspiration, only jost manifests itself in certain 
striking figores of speech. It is indeed tm^ aa we hav9 
already seen, that it is hardly possible to pronoonce a decided 
opinion respecting the delivery of these earlier prophets ; bat 
from B sufficiently reliable and general impresaioa, we may 
trace this distinction between the prophecy which prevailed till 
about the reign of Joaah and that of the later times, that the 
former was for the most part prophecy in irresistible actions, 
the latter prophecy in convincing words. As G. Baur has 
observed ; in the case of the older prophets it is only aa the 
modest attendants of mighty outward acts, that we meet with 
words at all concerned to produce clear inward conviction. 
For this very reason, they could hardly produce prophetic 
writings in the strict sense of the word. Bnt from the time 
of Samuel downwards, the prophets had made the theocratic 
and pragmatic treatment of the history of their own times a 
part of the regular duties of their calling. The cloistral, though 
by no means quietistic, retirement of their lives in the schools 
of the prophets, was very favourable to this literary occupation, 
more especially in the northern kingdom, and secured for it 
imquestioned liberty. We may see, however, from 2 Chron. 
XX. 34, that the prophets of Judah also occupied themselves 
with writing histoiy; for the prophet Jehu was a Judsean, 
and, as we may infer from 2 Chron. xix. 1-3, had his home 
in Jerusalem. 

The literature of the prophetic writings, strictly so called, 
commenced in the time of Jehoram king of Judah with a 
fugitive writing against Cdom ; if, as we think we have proved 
elsewhere, the vision of Obasiah was occasioned by the cala- 
mity described in 2 Chron. xxi. 16, 17, to which Joel and 
Amos also refer. He was ft^owed by Jobl, who had Oba- 
diab's prophecy before him, since he iatroduces into the wider 
and more comprehensive range of his annooncement, not only 
Obadiah's prophetic matter, but Obadiah's prophetic words. 
We may also see from Joel's writings how the prophetic litera- 
ture, in the stricter sense, sprang out of prophetical histories ; 
for Joel himself relates the result of the penitential worship, 
' which was occasioned by his appeal, in a historical statement 
in (du iL 18^ Ida, throogh which the two halves of his writ- 



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22 INTBODDcnOH TO THE 

ings are linked together. The time when he prophesieil can 
be distinctly proved to hare been the first half of the reign 
of JoBsh king of Jndah. Obadiah and Joel wete both of 
them contemporaries of Elisha. Eliaha himself did not write 
anything, but the schools under his superintendence not only 
produced prophetic deeds, but prophetic writings also; and it 
is a characteristic circumstance, that the writings which bear 
the name of Jonah, whom an ancient Haggada desciibes as 
one of the sons of the prophets belonging to EHsha's school, 
belong far less to the prophetic literature in the strict sense of 
the term than to the prophetical histories, and in fact to the 
historical writings of prophets. At what period it was that 
Jonah's mission to Kineveh took place, may be gathei-ed to some 
extent from 2 Kings xir. 35, where Jonah ben-Amittai, the 
prophet of 6ath ha-Hepher, in the territory of Zebulun, is 
said to have predicted the restoration of the kingdom of Israel 
to its promised boundariesj—a prediction which was fnlBlled 
in Jeroboam ben-Joash, the third in succession from Jehu, 
and therefore was uttered at the commencement of the reign 
of Jeroboam II., if not under Joasb himself. The mission to 
Nineveh may possibly belong to a somewhat earlier period than 
this prediction, namely, to the time of the older Assyrian king- 
dom, which was fast approaching its dissolution. Easebius is 
probably correct in making Sardanapalus the last ruler of the 
old kingdom of Ninos, who was overcome by Arbaces the Mede, 
a contemporary of Jeroboam ii. A glance at the book of 
Ahos, on the other hand, will show us that, at the time when 
be prophesied, a new Asshur was arising, and had already made 
considerable conquests. The date given in Amos i. 1, " two 
years before the earthquake," does not afford us any clue. 
But if Amos prophesied " in the days of Uzziah king of Judah, 
and Jeroboam ben-Joash king of Israel ;" assuming that Jero- 
boam n. reigned forty-one years, commencing with the fifteenth 
year of Amazlah (2 Kings xiv. 23), and therefore was contem- 
porary with Amaziah for fourteen years and with Uzziah for 
twenty-seven, it must have been in the last twenty-seven years 
of Jeroboam's reign that Amos prophesied. At the time when 
his ministry began, the kingdom of Israel was at the summit of 
its greatness in consequence of the successes of Jeroboam, and • 
the kingdom of Judah still continued in the depression into 



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PBOPHETICAL BOOES OF THE OLD TESTAHENT. 23 

which it had fallen in the time of Amaziah ; and to both of 
them hn foretells a common fate at the hands of Asshur, which 
is indicated clearly enough, althoagh not mentioned by name. 
The commencement of the ministry of Hosea coincides at the 
most with the close of that of Amos. The symbolical portion 
(ch. i.-iii.), with which his book commences, brings us to the 
five last years of Jeroboam's reign ; and the prophetic addresses 
which follow are not at variance with the statement in ch. i. I, 
which ia by a later hand, and according to which he still con- 
tinned to prophesy even nnder Hezekiah, and therefore until 
the fall of Samaria, which occurred in the sixth year of Heze- 
kiah's reign. Hosea, the Ephraimitish Jeremiah, was followed 
by Isaiah, who received his call, if ch. vL contains the ao* 
conut of his prophetic consecration, in the last year of Uzziah'a 
reign, and therefore twenty-five years after the death of Jero- 
boam n., and continued his labours at least till the second 
half of Hezekiah's reign, possibly to the commencement of 
that of Manasseb, His yoonger contemporary was MiCAH of 
Moresheth, whose first appearance took place, according to ch. 
i. 1, within the reign of Jotham, and whose book must have 
been written, according to the heading " concerning Samaria 
and Jerusalem," before the fall of Samaria, in the sixth year 
of Hezekiah's reign (with which the account in Jer. zxvi. 17 
gqq. also agrees) ; so that his labours began and ended within 
the incomparably longer period of Isaiah's ministry. This also 
applies to Nahum, whose " burden of Nineveh" closes the 
prophetic writings of the Assyrian age. He prophesied after 
the defeat of Sennacherib, when the power of Asshur was 
broken, and also the yoke upon Jndah's neck (ch. i. 13), 
provided, that is to say, that Asabur did not recover itself again. 
Habakkuk is linked on to Nahum, He was the last prophet 
of Isaiah's type in the book of twelve prophets, and began to 
foretell a new era of judgment, namely the Chaldean. He 
prophesied in the time of Josiah, before Zephanioh and Jere- 
miab, and possibly even as early as the time of Manasseh. 
With Zefhasiah the line of prophets of Jeremiah's type 
begins. He resembles Jeremiah in his reproductive, and, as 
it were, mosaic use of the words of the older prophets. As 
Jebbhiah was called, according to Jer. i. 2, in the thirteenth 
year of Joeiah's leign, his ministty commenced before that of 



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24 INTBODOOnOH TO TBB 

Zephaniith, since we are compelled by internal groonda to 
assign the prophecies of the latter to the period sabsequent to 
the ei^teenth year of Josiah's reign. Jeremiah's labonrs in 
Jadsea, and eventually in Egypt, extended over a period of 
more than forty years. He gave, as a warrant of the threats 
contained io his last prophetic address In ch. xlir., the approach- 
ing fall of Pharaoh Hophra, who lost bis throne and life in the 
year 570 B.O., upon the very spot where his great-grandfather 
Fsammetichns had obttuned forcible possession of the throne of 
Egypt a century before. Contemporaneons with Jeremiah was 
EzEEiBL, who, though not personally acquainted with him, so 
far as we know, laboured in the very same spirit as he among the 
exiles of Jndah. According to ch. i. 1, 2, the year of his call 
was the thirtieth year, viz. of the era of Nabopolassar, which 
was really the fifth year after the captivity of Jehoiachin, 
B.C. 595. The latest date given in connection with his mini- 
stry (ch. xxix. 17) is the seven-and-twentieth year of the cap- 
tivity, which was the sixteenth year from the destruction of 
Jerusalem, the time between Nebuchadnezzar's raising of the 
siege of Tyre and hiS expedition against Egypt. We are 
aware, therefore, of twenty-two years of active life on the part 
of this prophet, who may have been older when called tiian 
Jeremiah, who was youthful still. Jeremiah and Ezekiel were 
the two great prophets who spread their praying hands over 
Jerusalem as a shield as long as they possibly could, and when 
the catastrophe was inevitable, saved it even in its falL Their 
prophecies bridged over the great chasm of the captivity (though 
not without the co-operation of the " book of consolation^" Isa. 
xl.-lxvi., which was unsealed in the time of exile), and prepared 
the way for the restoration of the national community when 
the captivity was over. Into this community HagQAI infused 
a new spirit in the second year of Darius Hystaspis, through 
his prediction of the glory which awaited tdie newly-built temple 
and the house of David, that was raised to honour once more 
in the person of Zernbbabel. Zechabiah began to prophesy 
only two months later. His last prophetic address belongs to 
the third year of Darius Hystaspis, the year after the edict 
requiring Uiat the bnilding ut the temple should be continued. 
The predictions of the second part of his book (ch. jx.-xiv.) 
were hardly delivered publicly : they are throughout eschato- 



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PROFHETIOAL BOOKS OF TEE OLD TESTAUENT. S5 

lo^cal and apocalyptical, and take earlier sitoatiooB and pro- 
phetic words as embloma of the last days. Prophecy was now 
"silent for a long time. At length the last prophetic voice of the 
old covenant was heard in Ma.l'achi. Hia book coincidea 
with the condition of things which Nehemlah foaad on his 
second sojourn in Jemsalem nnder Darias Notns; and his 
peculiar calling in connection with the sacred history was to 
predict, that the messenger who was appointed to precede thjs 
coming of Jeborah woald soon appear, — namely, Elijah the 
l^hbite^ — and that he, the forerunner, a pioneer, would then 
be followed by the Lord Himself, as " the Angel of the cove- 
nant," ue. the Messenger or Mediator of a new covenant. 

Thia general survey will show very clearly that the arrange- 
ment of the nebiim aeharonmt (last prophets) in the canon is 
not a strictiy chronological one. The three " major" prophets, 
who are so called on accoant of the comparative size of their 
books of prophecy, are placed together; and the twelve "minor" 
prophets are also grouped together, so as to form one book 
(monobihloif as Melito calls it), on accoant of the smaller 
extent of their prophetic books {propter paroitatem coUigaH, 
as b. Bathra says). To \ha- the name of "the twelve," or 
" the twelve-prophet-book," was given (vid. Wisd. xlix. 10 ; 
Josepboe, c. Apiojiy i. 8 ; cf . Easebins, h. e. iii. 10). In the 
collection itself, on the otiier hand, the chronological order has 
so far been regarded, that the whole is divisible into three 
groups, representing three periods of prophetic literature, viz. 
prophets of the Assyrian period (Hosea to Nabum), prophets 
of the Chaldean period (Habakkuk and Zephaniah), and pro- 
phets after the captivity (Haggai to Malachi). And there is 
also an obvious desire to pair off as far as possible a prophet of 
the kingdom of Israel with one of the kii^om of Judah, viz. 
Hosea and Joel ; Amos and Obadiah ; Jonah and Micah ; 
Nahum and Habakkuk (for the Elkosh of Nahum, if not the 
town on the' eastern bank of the Tigris near to Mosul, was at 
any rate, according to Eusebius and Jerome, a Galilean town). 
Hosea is placed first, not because the opening word techillath 
made this book a very suitable one with which to begin the 
collection ; still less because Hosea was the first to be called of 
the four prophets, Hosea and Isaiah, Amos and Micah, as b, 
£a^ra affirms ; bat for tiie very same reason for which the 



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26 MTEODUCnON TO THE 

Epistle to the Itomans is placed first among the Fanline epistles, 
viz. because his book is the largest in the collection, — a point of 
view which comes oat still more prominently in the Septnagint, 
where Hosea, Amos, Micah, Joel, and Ohadiah follow one 
another, the first with fourteen chapters, the second with nioe, 
the third with seven, the fonrth with three, and the last with 
one, and then a new series commences with Jonah. But the 
reason why Joel is placed next to Hosea in the Hebrew canon, 
may possibly be found in the contrast which exists between the 
lamentations of the former on account of the all-parching heat 
and the all-consuming swarms of insects, and the dewy, ver- 
dant, and flowery imagery with which the book of Hosea closes. 
Amoa then follows Joel, because he not only takes up again his 
denunciations of judgment, but opens with one of the utter- 
ances with which Joel closes (ch. iv. 16) ; " Jehovah will roar 
out of Zion, and utter His voice from Jerusalem," Then 
follows Ohadiah, on account of the reciprocal relation between 
Obad. 19 and Amos ix. 12. And Jtmah is linked on to Ohadiah : 
for Ohadiah begins thus, "We have heard tidings from Jehovah, 
and a messenger is sent among the nations;" and Jonah was 
such a messenger. Such grounds as these, the further study 
of which we must leave to the introduction to the book of the 
twelve prophets, also had their influence upon the pairing of 
the prophets of Judah with those of Israel. The fact that 
ZephaniaJi follows Hahakkuk may be accounted for froin a 
similar ground, which coincides in this case with the chrono- 
logical order ; for a catchword in Zephaniah's prophecy, " Hold 
thy peace at the presence of Jehovah" (i. 7), is taken from Hab. 
ii. 20. The prophets after the captivity (called in the Talmud 
nebiim ha-acharonim, the last prophets), which necessarily fol- 
lowed one another in the order determined by the date and 
contents of their books, bring the whole to a close. 

The so-called greater prophets are attached in the Hebrew 
canon to the book of Kings; and in both the Hebrew and 
Alexandrian canons Isaiah stands at the head. IsEuah, Jere- 
miah, Ezekiel — this is the order in which they follow one 
another In oar editions, in accordance with the time of their 
respec^ve labours. In German and French codices, we occa- 
sionally meet with a different arrangement, viz. Kings, Jere- 
miah, Ezekiel, Isaiah. This is the order given in the Talmud, 



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PEOPHETICAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMEKT. 27 

b. Bathra, 14J. The principle upon whicli it is founded is the 
kindred nature of the contents, which also helped to determine 
the order of the twelve. Jeremiah follows the book of Bangs, 
hecaose nearly all his predictions groap themselves around ^e 
Chaldean catastrophe, with which the book of Kings closes ; 
and Isaiah follows Ezekiel, whose book closes in a consolatory 
strain, because that of Isaiah is, as the Talmud says, nothing 
but consolation. , But the other arrangement, adopted in the 
Masora and Msa. of the Spanish class, has prevailed over this 
talmudic order, which has been appealed to, though without 
any good ground, hy the opponents of the authenticity of Isa. 
xl.— livi. as supporting their conclusions.' 

' IswAh was regarded as the coiiBolator7 prophet pre-eminetitlf , and 
more especially on ELCcoimt of ch. zl.-Ixvi., bo that, according to b. 
Berachotk, 57b, whoever flaw IgoUh in a dream might look for conaolatioD ; 
and, according to the Midresh on the I^meatations, Isaiah bad previously 
rectified all the evilB that Jeremiah foretold. 



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THE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 



Qui taneto ham inspirasti vt gcriberet, impira quaao mhi til quod 
vcripiit inUUigam, qwa jam inspirasti at credam; nisi enim erediderimta, 
nOH inUlUgemus.—AxiMa>m (t 1166). 



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INTEODUCIION. 

fMORB ESPECIALLY TO THE FIRST PAET. Chap, i.-xxax.)' 



TIME OP THE PBOPHEI. 

She first prerequisite to a clear noderstaDding and 
fall appreciation of the propheciea of Isaiah, is a 
knowledge of his time, and of the different periods 
of his ministry. The first period was in the 
reigns of Uzziah (b.o. 811-759) and Jotham (759-743). The 
precise starting-point depends npon the view we take of ch. vi. 
But, in any case, Isaiah commenced his ministry towards the 
close of Uzziah's reign, and labonred on throughont the aixte^i 
years of the reign of Jotham. The first twenty-seven of the 
fifty-two years that Uzziah reigned ran parallel to the last 
twenty-seven of the forty-one that Jeroboam ii. reigned (b.c 
825-784). Under Joash, and his son Jeroboam ii., the king- 
dom of Israel passed throagh a period of ontward glory, which 
surpassed, both in character and doration, any that it had 
reached before ; and this was also the case with the kingdom 
of Jadah under Uzziah and his son Jotham. As the gloiy of 
the one kingdom faded away, that of the other increased. The 
bloom of the northern kingdom was destroyed and surpassed by 
that of the southern. But ontward splendour contained within 
itself the fatal germ of decay and ruin in the one case as much 
as in the other ; for prosperity degenerated into luxury, and 
the worship of Jehovidi became stiffened into idolatry. It was 
in this last and longest time of Jndab's prosperity diat Is^ah 
' See mf article on leaiah in the Bibk Cj/elt^xdia, edited fa; Profeeeor 
Furbairn. 



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82 THE PBOFHEOIEB OF ISAIAH. 

arose, with the moamf ul vocation to preach repentance withont 
BQCcfss, and couseqaentl; to have to annoonce the judgment 
of hardening and derastatioD, of the ban and of banishment. 
The second period of hU ministry extended from the commence- 
ment of the reign of Ahaz to that of the reign of Hezekiah, 
Within these sixteen years three events occurred, which com- 
bined to bring aboat a new and calamitooa turn in the history 
of Judah. In the place of the worship of Jehovah, which had 
been maintained with outward regularity and legal precision 
under Uzziah and Jotham; as soon as Ahaz ascended the 
throne, open idolatry was introdnced of the most abominable 
description and in veiy various forms. The hostilities which 
began while Jotham was living, were perpetuated by Fekah the 
king of Israel and Bezin the king of Damascene Syria; and tn 
the Syro-KphraimitiBh war, an attack was made upon Jera- 
salem, with the avowed, intention of bringing the Davidic rule 
to an end. Ahaz appealed to Tiglath-pileser, the king of 
Assyria, to help him out of these troubles. He tbns made flesh 
his arm, and so entangled the nation of Jehovah with the king- 
dom of the world, that from that time forward it never truly 
recovered its independence again. The kingdom of the world 
was the heathen state in its Nimrodic form. Its perpetual 
aim was to extend its boundaries hy constant accretions, till it 
had grown into a world-embratung colossus ; and in order to 
accomplish this, it was ever passing beyond its natural boun- 
daries, and coming down like an avalanche upon foreign nations, 
not merely for self-defence or revenge, but for the purpose of 
conquest also. Assyria and Borne were the first and last links 
in that chun of oppression by the kingdom of the worid, which 
ran through the bistoiy of Israel. Thus Isaiah, standing as he 
did on the very threshold of this new and all-important torn in 
the history of his country, and surveying it with his telescopic 
glance, was, so to speak, the universal prophet of Israel. The 
third period of his ministry extended from the accession of 
Hezekiah to the fifteenth year of his reign. Under Hezekiah 
the nation rose, almost at the same pace at which it had pre- 
viously declined under Ahaz, He forsook the ways of his 
idolatrous father, and restored the worship of Jehovah. The 
mass of the people, indeed, remained inwardly unchanged, but 
Judah had once more an upright king, who hearkened to the 



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KTEODrcniOH. 33 

word of the prophet hy hta side, — two pillars of the state, and 
men mighty in prayer (2 Chron. xxxii. 20). When the attempt 
was afterwards made to break away from the Asayrian yoke, so 
far as the leading men and the great mass of the people were 
concerned, this was an act of unbelief originating merely in 
the same confident expectation of help from Egypt which had 
occasioned the deatraction of the northern kingdom in the sixth 
year of Hezekiah'a reign ; but on the part of Hezekiah it was 
an act of faith and confident reliance npon Jehorah (2 Kings 
xviii. 7). CoDseijuently, when Sennacherib, the enccesaor of 
Shalmaneser, marched against Jerusalem, conquering and de- 
vastating the land as he advanced, and Egypt failed to send 
the promised help, the carnal defiance of the leaders and of the 
great mass of the people brought its own punishment But 
Jehovah averted the worst extremity, by destroying the kernel 
of the Assyrian army in a single night ; .so that, as in the Syro- 
Epbraimitish war, Jerusalem itself was never actually besieged. 
Thus the faith of the king, and of the better portion of the 
nation, which rested upon the word of promise, had its reward. 
There was still a divine power in the state, which preserved it 
from destruction. The coming judgment, which nothing in- 
deed could now avert, accordmg to ch. vi., was arrested for a 
time, just when the last destructive blow would naturally have 
been expected. It was in this miraculous rescue, which Isaiah 
predicted, and for which he prepared the way, that the public 
ministry of the prophet culminated. Isaiah was the Amoa of 
the kingdom of Judah, having the same fearful vocation to fore- 
see and to declare the fact, that for Israel as a people and king- 
dom the time of for^veness had gone by. Bat he was not also 
the Rosea of the southern kingdom; for it was not Isaiah, 
but Jeremiah, who received the solemn call to accompany the 
disastrous fate of the kingdom of Judah with the knell of 
prophetic denunciations. Jeremiah was the Hosea of the king- 
dom of Judah. To Isuah was given the commission, which 
was refused to his successor Jeremiah, — namely, to press back 
once more, through the might of his prophetic word, coming as 
it did out of the depths of the strong spirit of faith, the dark 
night which threatened to swallow up his people at the time of 
the Assyrian judgment. After the fifteenth year of Hezekiah's 
reign, he' took no further part in public affairs ; but he lived 
VOL. I 

LY:,l..|lv,V^-.OO^^lC 



34 THE FBOPBECIES OF ISAUH. 

till the commeDcement of Manasseh's reign, when, according 
to a credible tradition, to whicB there is aa evident allosion in 
Heb. >i. 37 (" they were sawn asnnder"),^ he fell a victim to 
the heathenism which became once more supreme in the land. 

To this sketch of the times and ministrf of the prophet we 
will add a review of the Bcriptnral accoont of the fonr kings, 
under whom he laboured acconUng to ch. i. 1 ; since nothing 
is more essential, as a preparation for the stndj of his book, than 
a minute acquuntance with these sections of the books of Kings 
apd Chronides. 

I. Historical Account op Uzziah-Jotham. — The 
account of Uzztah ^ven in the Look of Kings (2 Kings xv. 
1-7, to which we may add siv, 21, 22), like that of Jeroboam ii., 
is not so fnll as we shonld have expected. After the mnrder 
of Amaziab, the people of Jadah, as related in ch. xiv. 21, 22, 
raised to the throne hia son Azariah, probably not his first- 
bom, who was then sixteen years old. It was he who -bnilt 
the Edomitish seaport town of Elath (for navigation and com- 
merce), and made it a permanent possession of Judah (as in the 
time of Solomon). This notice is introduced, as a kind of 
appendix, at the close of Amaziab's life and quite out of its 
chronological posjUon, because the conquest of EUth was the 
crowning point of the subjugation of Edom by Amaziab, and 
not, as Thenins supposes, because it was Azariab's first feat of 
arms, by which, immediately after his accession, he satisfied the 
expectations with which the army had made him king. For 
the victories gained by this king over Edom and the other 
neighbouring nations cannot have been obtained at the time 
when Amos prophesied, which was about the tenth year of 
Uzziah's reign. The attack made by Amaziah upon the king- 
dom of Israel, had brought the kingdom of Jndah into a state 
of dependence upon the former, and almost of total rnin, from 
which it only recovered gradaally, like a house that had fallen 
into decay. The chronicler, following the text of the book of 
Kings, has introduced the notice concerning Elath in the same 
place (2 Cbron, xsvi. 1, 2 : it is written Eloth, as in 1 Kings 

' According to h. Jebamoth, 495, it was found in a roll containing the 
histoiy of a Jeruaalem family j and accoidiog to SanMria, lOSi, is tha 
Taigum on 2 Kings xsi. 16. 



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nmtoDiKmoiL 35 

ix. 26, and the Septnagiot at 2 EiQgs ziv. 22). He calls the 
king Uznaha; and it is only in the table of the kings of 
Jadah, in 1 Chron. iii. 12, that he girea the name as Azariah. 
The anthoT of the book of Kings, accerdiog to our Hebrew 
text, calls him sometimes Azariah or Azaridhuy sometimes 
Uzziah or UzziaJat ; the Septuagint always gives the name as 
Asanas. The occnrrence of the two names in both of the 
historical books is an indubitable proof that they are genuine. 
Azariah was the original name : out of this Uzziah was gra- 
dually formed by a significant elision ; and as the prophetical 
books, from Isa. i. 1 to Zech. zir. 5, clearly show, the latter 
was the name most commonly used. 

.Azariah, as we learn from the- section in the book of Kings 
relating to the reign of this monarch (2 Kings xr. 1-7), 
ascended the throne in the twenty-seventh year of Jeroboam's 
reigo, that is to say, in the fifteenth year of his sole government, 
the twenty-seventh from the time when he shared the govern- 
ment with his father Joaah, as we may gather from 2 Kings xiii. 
13. The youthful sovereign, who was only sixteen years of age, 
was the son of Amaziah by a native of Jerusalem, and reigned 
fifty-two years. He did what was pleasing in the sight of God, 
like his father Amaziah ; i^. although he did not come up to the 
standard of David, he was one of the better kings. He fostered 
the worship of Jehovah, as ^scribed in the law : nevertheless 
he left the high places (bamoth) standing ; and while he was 
reigning, the people maintained in all its force the custom of 
sacrificing and buming incense npon the heights. He was 
punished by God with leprosy, which compelled him to live in 
a ^ck-honse (chophhuth = chaphahitk : sickness) till the day of 
his death, whilst his son Jotham was over the palace, and con- 
ducted the affairs of government. He was buried in the city 
of David, and Jotham followed him on the throne. Thb is 
all that the author of the book of Kings tells us concerning 
Azariah ; for the rest, he refers to the annals of the kings of 
Judah. The section in the Chronicles relating to Uzziah 
(2 Chron. xxvi.) is much more copious : the writer had oar 
book of Kings before him, as ch. xxvi. 3, 4, 21, clearly proves, 
and completed the defective notices from the source which ha 
chiefiy employed, — namely, the much more elaborate midrask. 
Uzziah, be says, was zealous in seeking Elohim in the dgvs 



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36 THE PSOPEEOIES OF ISAIXO. 

of Zechariali, who had understandiog in divine visions ; and in 
the days when he sought Jehovah, God made him to prosper. 
Thus the prophet Zechariah, as a faithful pastor and connsellor, 
stood in the same relation to him in which Jehoiada the high 
priest had stood to Joash, Uzziali's grandfather. The chronicler 
then ^numerates singly the divine blessings which Uzziah en- 
joyed. First, his victoriet over the surrounding nations (passing 
over the victory over Edom, which had been already mentioned), 
viz. : (1) he went forth and warred against the Philistines, and 
brake down the wall of Gath, and the wall of Jabneh, and the 
wall of Ashdod, and built towns b'ashdod and b'phelUtim (i.e. in 
the conquered territory of Ashdod, and in Fhilistia generally) ; 
(2) God not only gave him victory over the Philistines, but also 
over the Arabians who dwelt in Gur-Baal (an unknown place, 
which neither the LXX. nor the Targuraists could esplain), 
and the Mehunim, probably a tribe of Arabia Petrsea ; (3) the 
Ammonites gave him presents in token of allegiance, and his 
name was honoured even as far as Egypt, to such an extent 
did his power grow. Secondly, his buildings : he built towers 
(fortifications) above the comer gate, and above the valley gate, 
and above the Mikzoa, and fortified these (the weakest) por- 
tions of Jerusalem : he also built towers in the desert (probably 
in the desert between Beersheha and Gaza, to protect either 
the landj or the flocks and herds that were pasturing there) ; 
and dug many cisterns, for he had large flocks and herds both 
in the xhepheldh (the western portion of Southern Palestine) 
and in the mishor (the extensive pasture-land of the tribe terri- 
tory of Iteuben on the other side of the Jordan) : he had also 
husbandmen and vine-dressers on the mount^na, and in the 
fruitful fields, for he was a lover of agriculture. Thirdly, his 
well-organized troop» : he had an army of fighting men which 
consisted — according to a calculation made by Jeiel the scribe, 
and Maaseiah, the officer under the superintendence of Hananiah, 
one of the royal princes — of 2600 heads of families, who had 
307,500 men under their command, " that made war with mighty 
power to help the king against the enemy." Uzziah famished 
these, according to all the divisions of the army, with shields, 
and spears, and helmets, and coats of mait, and bows, even 
with slinging-stones. He also had ingenious slinging-machlnes 
{baUitae) made in Jerusalem^ to flx upon the towers and ram- 



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KTBODUCnOK. 87 

parts, for the purpose of shooting arrows and large stones. 
His name resoanded far abroad, for he had marvellous snccess, 
80 that he became very powerful. 

Up to this point the chronicler has depicted the brighter 
side of Uzziah's reign. His prosperous deeds and enterprises 
are all grouped together, so that it is doubtful whether the 
history within these several groups follows the chronological 
order or not. The light thrown upon the history of the times 
by the group of victories gained by Uzziah, would be worth 
twice OB much if the chronological order were strictly observed. 
But even if we might assnme that the victoiy over the Philis- 
tines preceded the victory over the Arabians of Gur-Baal and 
the Mehunim, and this again the subjugation of Ammon, it 
would still be very uncertmn what position the expedition 
against Edom — which wtts noticed by anticipation at the close 
of Amaziah's life — occupied in relation to the other wars, and 
at what part of Uzziah's reign the several wars occurred. All 
that can be affirmed is, that they preceded the closing years of 
his life, when the blessing of God was withdrawn from him. 

The chronicler relates still farther, in ch. zxvi. 16, that as 
Uzziah became stronger and stronger, he fell into pride of 
heart, which led him to perform a ruinous act. He sinned 
against Jehovah his God, by forcing his way into the holy 
place of the temple, to bum incense upon the altar of incense, 
from the proud notion that royalty involved the rights of the 
priesthood, and that the priests were only the delegates and 
representatives of the king. Then Azariah the high priest, 
and eighty other priests, brave men, hurried after him, and 
went up to him, and said, " This does not belong to tliee, 
Uzziah, to bum incense to Jehovah ; but to the priests, the 
SODS of Aaron, who are consecrated to bum incense : go out of 
the sanctuary, for thou sinnest ; and this ia not for thine honour 
with Jehovah £lohim I " Then Uzziah was wroth, as he held 
the censer in his hand ; and while he was so enraged against the 
priests, leprosy broke out upon his forehead in the sight of the 
priests, in the house of Jehovah, at the altar of incense. When 
Azariah the high priest and the rest of the priests turned to 
him, behold, he was leprous in hb forehead ; and they brought 
him hurriedly away from thence, — Id fact, he himself hasted 
to go out< — for Jehovah bad smitten him. After having tlius 



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38 THE PBOPEEOIES OF 18AUB. 

explaiDed the circumstances whicli led to tbe kio^s leprosy, 
the chronicler follows once more the text of the booh of Kings, 
— where the lepro^ itself is also mentioned, — and states that 
the king remaned a leper ontil the day of his death, and lived 
in a sick-hoiue, without ever being able to visit the temple 
again. , But instead of the statement in the book of Kings, 
that he was buried in the city of David, the chronicler affirms 
more particularly that he was not placed in the kin^s sepulchre ; 
but, inasmnch as he was leprous, and would therefore have 
defiled it, was buried in the field near the sepulchre. But 
before introducing this conclusion te the history of Uzziah's 
reign, and instead of referring to the annals of the kings of 
Judah, as the author of the book of Kings has done, or making 
such citations as we generally find, the author simply states, 
that " the rest of the acts of Uzziah, first and last, did Isaiah 
the prophet, the son of Amoz, write." 

It cannot possibly be either the prophecies of Isaiah of the 
time of Uzziah, or a certain historical portion of the original 
book of Isaiah's predictions, to which reference is here made ; 
for in that case we should expect the same notice at the close 
of the account of Jotham's reign, or, at any rate, at the close 
of that of Ahaz (cf. ch. xxvii. 7 and xxviii. 26). It is also 
inconceivable that Isaiah's book of predictions should have con- 
tained either a prophetical or historical account of the first acts 
of Uzziah, since Isaiah was later than Amos, later even than 
Hosea; and his public ministry did not commence till the close 
of his reign, — in fact, not till the year of his death. Conse- 
quently the chronicler must refer to some historical work dis- 
tinct from " the visions of Isaiah." Jnst as he mentions two 
historical works within the first epoch of the divided kingdom, 
viz. Shemaiah's and Iddo's, — the former of which referred more 
especially to the entire history of Behohoam, and the latter to 
the history of Abijah, — and then again, iu the second epoch, an 
historical work by Jehu ben Hanani, which contained a coni* 
plete history of Jehoshaphat from the beginning to the end ; 
so here, in the third epoch, he speaks of Isaiah ben Amoz, the 
greatest Judfean prophet of this epoch, as the author of a 
special histoiy of Uzziah, which was not incorporated in his 
" visions" like the history of Hezekiah(cf. cb. xxsiL 32), but 
formed an independent work. Besides this prophetical history 



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INTBODUOnOH. S9 

of tTzziah, there was also an annalisdc histoiy, as 2 Kings xv. t 
clearly shows ; and it is quite possible that the annals of Uzziah 
were finished when IsaitJi commenced his work, and that they 
were made use of by him. For the leading porpose of the 
prophetical histories was to exhibit the inward and divine con- 
nection between the several outward events, which the annals 
simply re^Bta«d. The historical wriUngs of a pn^het were 
only the other aide of his more pnrely prophetic work. In the 
light of the Spirit of God, the former looked deep into the 
past^ the latter into the present. Both of them had to do with 
the ways of divine justice and grace, and set forth past and 
present^ alike in view of the true goal, in which these two ways 
coincide. 

Jollutm succeeded Uzziah, after having acted as regent, or 
rather as viceroy, for several years (2 Kings xv, 32-38). He 
ascended the throne in the second year of Pekah king of Israel, 
in the twenty-fifth year of his age, and reigned for sixteen 
years in a manner which pleased God, though he still tolerated 
the worship upon high places, as his father had done. He 
built the upper gate of the temple. The author haa no sooner 
written this than be refers to the annals, simply adding, before 
concluding with the usual formula concerning his burial in the 
city of David, that in those days, ('.<. towards the close of 
Jotham'a reign, the hostilities of Kezin of Damascus and Fekah 
of Israel commenced, as a judgment from God upon Jndah. 
The chronicler, however, makes several valuable additions to 
the text of the book of Kings, which he has copied word for 
word down to the notice concerning the commencement of the 
Syro-Ephraimitish hostilities (vid. 2 Chron. xxvii.). We do 
not include in this the statement that Jotham did not force his 
way into the holy place in the temple : this is simply intended 
as a limitation of the assertion made by the author of the book 
of Kings as to the moral equality of Jotham and Uzziah, and 
in favour of the former. The words, " the people continued in 
their destructive course," also contain nothing new, but are 
simply the shorter expression used in the Chronicles to indi- 
cate the continuance of the worship of the high places during 
Jotham*8 reign. But there is something new in what the 
chronicler appends to the remark concerning the building of 
the upper gate of the temple, which b very bold and abrupt aa 



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40 TH£ PROPHECIES Or UAIAH. 

it stands in the book of Kings, viz., " on thd wall of the Opbel 
he built mnch (ue. he fortified this sonthem spar of the temple 
hill fitill more strongly), and pat towns on the moantains of 
Jadah, and erected castles and towers in the forests {for watch- 
towers and defences agtunst hostile attacks). He also fongbt 
with the king of the Ammonites ; and when conquered, they 
were obliged to give him that year and the two foUowing a 
hundred talents of silver, ten thousand cors of wheat, and the 
same quantity of barley, Jotham grew stronger and stronger, 
because he strove to walk before Jehovah his God." The 
chronicler breaks off with this general statement, and refers, 
for the other memorabilia of Jotham, and all his wars and enter- 
prises, to the book of the Kings of Israel and Judah. 

This is what the two historical books relate concerning the 
royal pair — Uzziah-Jotbam — under whom the kingdom of Judah 
enjoyed once more a period of great prosperity and power, — 
"the greatest since the disruption, with the exception of that of 
Jehoshaphat; the longest during the whole period of its existence, 
the last before its overthrow" (Caspari). The sources from 
which the two historical accounts were derived were the annals : 
they were taken directly from them by the author of the book 
of Kings, indirectly by the chronicler. No traces can be dis- 
covered of the work written by Isaiah concerning Uzziab, 
although it may possibly be employed in the midrash of the 
chronicler. There is an important supplement to the account 
given by the chronicler in the casual remark made in 1 Chron. 
V. 17, to the effect that Jotham had a census taken of the 
tribe of Gad, which was settled on the other side of the Jordan. 
We see from this, that in proportion as the northern kingdom 
sank down from the eminence to which it had attained under 
Jeroboam ii., the supremacy of Judah over the land to the 
east of the Jordan was renewed. But we may see from Amos, 
that it was only gradually that the kingdom of Judah -revived 
under Uzziah, and that at first, like the wall of Jerusalem, 
which was partially broken down by Joash, it presented the 
aspect of a house full of fissures, and towards Israel in a very 
shaky condition ; also that the Ephraimitish ox- (or calf-) wor- 
ship of Jehovah was carried on at Beersheba, and therefore 
upon Judiean soil, and that Jndah did not keep itself free from 
the idolatry which it had inherited from the fathers (Amos iL 



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■ IKTRODCCfnON. 4j 

4, 5). Again, assaming that Amos commenced his ministry 
at about the tenth year of Uzziah's reign, we may leam at 
least 80 much from him with regard to Uzziah's victories over 
Edom, Philisda, and Ammon, that they were not gained till 
after the tenth year of hb reign. Hosea, on the other hand, 
whose ministry commenced at the very earliest when that of 
Amos was drawing to a close, and probably not till the last five 
years of Jeroboam's reign, bears witness to, and like Amos con- 
demns, the participation in the Ephraimitish worship, into which 
Judah had been drawn nnder Uzziah-Jotham, Bnt with him 
Beersheba is not referred to any more as an Israelitish seat 
of worship (ch. iv. 15); Israel does not interfere any longer 
with the soil of Judah, as in the time of Amos, since Jndah 
has again become a powerful and well-fortified kingdom (ch. 
viii. 14, cf. i. 7). Bat, at the same time, it has become full of 
carnal trust and' manifold apostasy from Jehovah (ch. v. 10, 
xii. 1) ; so that, although receiving at first a miraculous deli- 
verance from God (ch. i. 7), it is ripening for the same destruc- 
tion as Israel (ch. vi. 11). 

This survey of the kingdom of Judah in the time of Uzziah- 
Jotham by the Israelitish prophet, we shall find repeated in 
Isaiah ; for the same spirit animates and determines the verdicts 
of the prophets of both kingdoms. 

II. HlSTOBICAI, ACCODNT OP AhaZ AKD THE StRO- 
Efhbaimitish Wab. — ^The account of Abaz, given in the 
book of Kings and in the Chronicles (2 Kings xvi., 2 Chron. 
xxviii.), maybe divided into three parts: viz., first, the general 
characteristics ; secondly, the account of the Syro-Ephraimitisb 
war ; and thirdly, the desecration of the temple by Ahaz, mora 
especially by setting up an altar made after the model of that 
atDamascus.^ (l.)2 Kingsxvi. 1-4. Ahaz ascended the throne 
ia the seventeenth year of Pekah. He was then twenty years 
old (or twenty-five according to the LXX. at 2 Chron. xxviii. 
1, which is mnch more probable, as be would otherwise have 
had a son, Hezekiah, in the tenth year of his age), and he 
reigned sixteen years. He did not please God as his forefather 
Pavid had done, but took the way of the kings of Israel, and 
^ On tbe temple at Damascns, wboae altar Abaz imitated, see the Cont- 
nenlary on the Book of Job. 



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43 THE FBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

even made his son pass throngh the fire (t.«. bornt him in 
honour of Moloch), according to the abominaUons of the (Ca- 
naanitish) people nhom Jehovah had driven oat before Israel ; 
and he offered sacrifice and burnt incense upon the high places, 
and npon the hills, and nnder every green tree. The Deutero- 
nomtc colouring of this passage is very obvions. The corre- 
sponding passage in the Chronicles is 2 Chron. xxviii. 1-4, 
where the additional fact is mentioned, that he even made 
molten images for Baalim, and burnt incense in the valley of 
HInnom, and burnt his children in the fire .(" his children," 
a generic plural like " the kings" in ver. 16, and " the sons" in 
, 2 Chron. sxW. 25 : " bumt^' i¥^!l. unless the reading 13^ be 
adopted, as it has been by the LXX., " he caused to pass 
through.") (2.) 2 Kings xvi. 5-9. Then (in the time of this 
idolatrous king Ahaz) the following well-known and memorable 
event occurred: Hezin the king of .Aram, and Pekab the son 
of Bemaliah king of Israel, went np against Jerusalem to war, 
and besieged Ahaz, ** but could not overcome him," i.e., as we 
may gather from Isa. vii. 1, -they were not able to get posses- 
sion of Jerusalem, which was the real object-of their expedition. 
" At that time" (the author of the book of Kings proceeds to 
observe), viz. at the time of this Syro-Epraimitish war, Hezin 
king of Aram brought Elath to Aram (t.e. wrested again from 
the kingdom of Judah the seaport town which Uzziah had 
recovered a short time before), and drove the Judseans out of 
Elath (j!i<;) ; and AramEeans came to Elath and settled there 
unto thb day. Thenius, who starts with the needless assamp- 
tion that the conquest of Elatb took place subsequently to the 
futile attempt to take Jerusalem, g;ives the preference to the 
reading of the Keri, " and Edomites {Edowina) came to Elath," 
and would therefore correct taram (to Aram) into Vedom (to 
Edom). " Hezin," he says, " destroyed the work of Uzziah, 
and gave Edom its liberty again, in the hope that at some 
future time he might have the support of Edom, and bo operate 
against . Judah with greater success." But, in answer to this, 
it may be affirmed that such obscure forms as B'O^IK for O'EISI 
are peculiar to this account, and that the words do not denote 
the restoration of a settlement, hnt mention the settlement as 
a new and remarkable fact. I therefore adopt Caspari's con- 
clusion, that the Syrian king transplanted a Syrian colony of 



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niTBODucrrioN. 43 

traderB to Ekth, to secure the commsnd of the roaritime trade 
with all its attendant advantages; and this colony held its 
ground there for some time after the destruction of the Dama»- 
cene kingdom, as the expression " to this day," found in the 
earlier soorce of the aathor of the book of Kings, clearly implies. 
But if the conquest of Elath fell within the period of the 
Syro-Ephraimitish war, which commenced towards the end of 
Jotham's reign, and probably originated in the bitter feelings 
occasioned by the almost iotal loss to Judah of the country on 
the east of the Jordan, and whicb assumed the form of a direct 
attack upon Jerusalem itself soon after Ahaz ascended the 
throne ; the question arises, How was it that this design of the 
two allied kings upon Jerusalem was not successful f The 
explanation is given in the accoimt contained in the book of 
Kings (vers. 7-9) : " Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglath-pSlezer 
(sic) the king of Asshnr, to say to liim, I am thy servant, and 
thy son ; come up, and save me out of the band of Aram, and 
out of the band of the king of Israel, who have risen up against 
me. And Ahaz took the silver and the gold that was found 
in the house of Jehovah, and in the treasures of the palace, 
and sent it for a present to the king of Asshur. The kmg 
hearkened to his petition; and went against Damascus, and 
took it, and carried the inhabitants into captivity to Kir, and 
slew Rezin." And what did Tiglath-pileser do with Pekaht 
The author of the book of Kings has already related, in the 
section referring to Fekah (2 Kings xv. 29), that he punished 
him by taking away the whole of the country to the east of the 
Jordan, and a large part of the territoiy on this side towards 
the north, and carried the -inhabitants captive to Assyria. This 
section must be supplied here, — an example of the great liberty 
which the historians allowed themselves in the selection and 
arrangement of their materials.' The anticipation in ver. 5 
is also quite in accordance with tb^ usual style : the author 
first of all states that the expedition against Jerusalem was an 
unsuccessful one, and then i^terwards proceeds to mention the 
reason for the failure, — namely, the appeal of Ahaz to Assyria 
for help. For I also agree with Caspar! in this, that the 
Syrians and Epbraimitea were unable to take Jerusalem, 
because the tidings reached them, that Tiglath-pileser had been 
appealed to by Abaz and was coming agjunst ^em; and tbey 



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14 THE PBOFBECIES OF ISAUH. 

were conseqaetitly obliged to raise the siege and ma&e a speedy 
retreat. 

The acconat in the Chronicles (8 ChroB. xxTiii. 5-21) 
famishes us with fall and extensive details, with which to 
supplement the very condensed notice in the book of Kings. 
When we compare the two accounts, the question arises, 
whether they refer to two different expeditions (and if so, 
which of the two refers to the first expedition and which to the 
second), or whether they both relate to the same expedition. 
Let ufl picture to ourselves first of all the facts as given by 
the chronicler. "Jehovah, his God," he says of Ahaz, " deli- 
vered him into the hand of the king of Aram, and they (the 
Aramsans) smote him, and carried off from him a great crowd 
of captives, whom they brought to Damascus; and he was also 
given into the band of the king of Israel, who inflicted upon 
him a terrible defeat." This very clearly implies, as Caspari 
has shown, that although the two kings set the conquest of 
Jerusalem before them as a common end ap which to aim, 
and eventually united for the attEunment of this end, yet for 
a time they acted separately. We are not told here in what 
direction Rezin's army went. But we know from 2 Kings 
xvi. 6 that it marched to Idumiea, which it could easily reach 
from Damascus by going through the territory of his ally, 
— namely, the country of the two tribes and a half. The 
chronicler merely describes the simultaneous invasion of Judiea 
by Pekah, but he does this with all the greater fulness. 

" Pekah the son of Remaliah slew in Judah a hundred and 
twenty thonsand in one day, all valiant men, because they for- 
sook Jehovah, ^e God of their fathers. Zichri, an Ephraim- 
itish hero, slew Ma'asejahn the king's son, and Azrikam the 
governor of the palace, and Elkanah, the second in rank to the 
king. And the Israelites carried away captive of their brethren 
two hundred thousand women, boys, and girls, and took away 
mach spoil from them, and bnraght this booty to Samaria." 
As the Jewish army numbered at that time three hundred 
thousand men (2 Cbron. xxv. 5, xxvi. 13), and the war was 
carried on with the greatest animosity, these numbers need 
not be regarded as either spurious or exaggerated. Moreover, 
the numbers, which the chronicler found in the sources he em- 
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UTBODtJCnOlT. 45 

RUBtained, as generally adopted at that time on the side of 
Judah itself. 

This bloody catastrophe was followed by a very fine and 
touching occnrrence. A prophet of Jehovah, named Oded 
(a contemporary of Hosea, and a man of kindred spirit), went 
out before the army as it came back to Samaria, and charged 
the Tictors to release the captives of their brother nation, which 
had been terribly punished in God's wratb, and by so doing to 
avert the wrath of God which threatened them as well. Fonr 
noble Ephraimitish heads of tribes, whose names the chronicler 
has preserved, supported the admonition of the prophet. The 
array then placed the prisoners and the booty at the disposal of 
the princes and the assembled people ; "And these four memo- 
rable men rose np, and took the prisoners, and all their naked 
ones they covered with the booty, and clothed and shod them, 
and gave them to eat and drink, and anointed them, and con- 
ducted as many of them as were cripples upon asses^ and 
brought them to Jericho the palm-ci^, to the neighbourhood 
of their brethren, and returned to Samaria." Nothing but the 
rudest scepticism conld ever seek to cast a slur upon this 
touching episode, the tmth of which is so conspicuous. There 
is nothing strange in the fact that so horrible a massacre should 
be followed by a strong manifestation of the fraternal love, 
which had been forcibly suppressed, but was now rekindled 
by the prophet^s words. We find an older fellow-piece to this 
in the prevention of a fratricidal war by Shemaiah, as described 
in 1 Kings xii. 22-24. 

Now, when the chronicler proceeds to observe in ver. 16, 
that " at that time Ahaz turned for help to the royal house of 
Assyria" (malce asshur), in all probability this took place at 
the time when he had sustained two severe defeats, one at the 
hands of Fekah to the north of Jerusalem ; and another from 
Rezin in Idnmsea. The two battles belong to the period before 
the siege of Jertisalem, and the appeal for help from Assyria 
falls between the battles and the siege. The chronicler ttien 
mentions other judgments which fell upon the king in his 
estrangement from God, viz. : (1) " Moreover the Edomites 
came, smote Judab, and carried away captives ;" possibly while 
the Syro-Ephraimitish war was still going on, after they bad 
welcomed Bezin as their deliverer, had shaken off the Jewish 



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46 THE FBOFHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

yoke, and bad sapported the Syrian king against Jndah in 
their own land ; (2) the Philistines invaded the low land 
(ihepheloK) and the Bouth land {negeV) of Judah, and took 
sevei'al towns, six of which the chronicler mentions by name, 
and settled in them ; for " Jehovah hnmbled Jndah because 
of Abaz the king of Israel (an epithet with several sarcastic 
allusions), for he acted without restraint in Judah, and most 
wickedly against Jehovah." The breaking away of the Philis- 
tines from the Jewish dominion took place, according to Caspari, 
in the time of the Syro-Ephraimitish war. The position of 
ver. 18 in the section reaching from ver. 5 to ver, 21 (viz. ver. 
18, invasion of the Philtstinee ; ver. 17, that of the Edomites) 
renders this certainly very probable, though it is not conclusive, 
as Caspari himself admits. 

In vers. 20, 21, the chronicler adds an appendix to the pre- 
vious list of punishments : Tiglath-Pilnezer (ate) the king of 
Asshur came upon him, and oppressed him instead of strength- 
ening him; for Abaz had plundered both temple and palace, 
and given the treasures to the king of Asshur, without receiving 
any proper help in return. Thenius disputes the rendering, 
"He strengthened him not" (cf. Ezek, sxx. 21); but Caspari 
has shown that it is quite in accordance with the facts of the 
case. Tiglath-pileser did not bring Abaz any true help ; for 
what be proceeded to do against Syria and Israel was not taken 
in band in the interests of Abaz, but to extend his own imperial 
dominion. He did not assist Ahaz to bring either the Edomites 
or the Philistines into subjection again, to say nothing of com- 
pensating him for bis losses with either Syrian or Ephraimitish 
territory. Nor was it only that be did not truly help him : be 
really oppressed him, by making bim a tributary vassal instead 
of a free and independeat prince, — a relation to Asshur which, 
according to many evident signs, was the direct consequence of 
his appeal for help, and which was established, at any rate, at 
the veiy commencement of Hezekiah's reign. Under what 
circumstances this took place we cannot tell ; but it is veiy 
probable that, after the victories over Kezin and Fekab, a 
second sum of money was demanded by Tiglath-pileser, and 
then from that time forward a yearly tribute. The expression 
used by the chronicler — " he came upon bim" — seems, in fact, 
to mean that he gave emphasis to this demand by sending a 



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TsraoDvcnati. 47 

detachment of his army ; even if we cannot take it, as Caspar! 
does, in a rhetorical rather than a purely historical sense, viz. 
as signifying that, "although Tiglath-pileser came, as Ahaz 
desired, his coming was not such as Ahaz desired, a coming to 
help and benefit, hut rather to oppress and injure." 

(3.) The third part of the two historical accounts describes 
the pernicious infiuence which the alliance with Tiglath-pileser 
exerted upon Ahaz, who was already too much inclined to 
idolatry (2 Kings xtL 10-18). After Tiglath-pileser had 
marched against the ruler of Damascus, and delivered Ahaz 
from the more dangerons of his two odversarieB (and possibly 
from both of them), Ahaz went to Damascus to present bis 
thanks in person. There he saw the altar (which was re- 
nowned as a work of art), and sent an esact model to Uriah 
the high priest, who had an altar constructed like it by the 
time that the king returned. As soon as Ahaz came back he 
went up to this altar and offered sacrifice, thus officiating as 
priest himself (probably as a thanksgiving for the deliverance 
he had received). The brazen altar (of Solomon), which tlriah 
had moved farther forward to the front of the temple building, 
be^pnt farther back again, placing it close to the north side of 
the new one (that the old one might not appear to have the 
slightest preference over the new), and commanded the high 
priest to perform the sacrificial service in future upon the new 
great altar ; adding, at the same time, " And (as for) the 
brazen altar, I will consider (what shall be done with it)." 
*'And king Ahaz," it is stated still further, "broke out the 
borders of the stools, and took away the basons ; and the sea he 
took down from the oxen that hare it^ and set it upon a stone 
pedestal (that took the place of the oxen). And the covered 
sabbath-hall which had been built in the'temple, and the outer 
kin^s entrance, he removed into the temple of Jehovah before 
the king of Assyria." Theuius explains tltis as meaning "he 
altered them" (taking away the valuable ornaments from both), 
that he might be able to take with him to Damascus the neces- 
sary presents for the king of Asshor. Ewald's explanation, 
however, is better than this, and more in accordance with the 
expression " before," viz. " in order that he might be able to 
secure the continued favour of the dreaded Assyrian king, by 
conttnually sending him fresh presents." But 3Dn does not 



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48 THE PBOFBZOIEB Or ISAIAH. 

mean to alter, and 'n n'3 = n n'33 would be an nnmeaning 
addition in the wrong place, whicli would only obscure the 
sense. If the great alterations mentioned in ver. 17 were 
made for the purpose of sending presents to the king of 
Assyria with or from the things that were removed, those 
described in ver. 18 were certainly made from fear of the 
king ; and, what appears most probable to me, not to remove 
the two splendid erections from the sight of the Assyrians, nor 
to prevent their being used in the event of an Assyrian occu- 
pation of Jerusalem, but in order that his relation to the great 
king of Assyria might not be disturbed by bis appearing as a 
zealous worsliipper of Jehovah. They were changes made 
from fear of man and servility, and were quite in keeping 
with the hypocritical, insincere, and ignoble character of Ahaz. 
The parallel passage in the Chronicles is 2 Cbron. xxviii. 
22-25> " In the time of his distress," says the chronicler in 
his reflective and rhetorical style, " he sinned still more griev- 
ously against Jehovah : he, king Ahaz. He sacrificed to the 
gods of Damascus, who had smitten him. For the gods of the 
kings of Aram, he said, helped them ; I will sacrifice to them, 
that they may also help me. And they brought him and all 
Israel to ruin. And Ahaz collected together the vessels of the 
house of God, and cut them in pieces, and Bhut the doors of the 
house of Jehovah, and made himself altars in every comer of 
Jerusalem. And in every town of Judah he erected high 
places to bum incense to other gods, and stirred up the dis- 
pleasure of Jehovah the God of his fathers." Thenius re- 
gards this passage as an exaggerated paraphrase of the parallel 
passage in the book of Kings, and as resting upon a false in- 
terpretation of the latter. But the thronicler does not affirm 
that Ahaz dedicated the new altar to the gods of Damascus, 
but rather that in the time of the Syro-Ephnumitish war he 
attempted to secure for himself the same success in war as the 
Syrians had obtained, by worshipping their gods. The words 
of Ahaz, which are reported by him, preclude any other 
interpretation. He there states — what by no means contradicts 
the book of Kings — that Ahaz Uud violent hands upon the 
furniture of tlie temple. All the rest — namely, the allusion to 
his shntdng the temple-gates, and erecting altars and higb 
places on every hand — is a completion of the account in the 



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nrrBODtrcrnoH. 49 

book of Kings, the historical character of -which it is impossible 
to dispute) if we bear in mind that the Syro-Gpbrdmitish war 
took place at the commencement of the reign of Abaz, who 
was onlj' sixteen years old at the time. 

The author of the book of Kings closes the history of the 
reign of Ahaz with a reference to the annals of the kings of 
Jadah, and with the remark that he was buried in the city of 
David (2 Kings xvi. 19, 20). The chronicler refers to the 
book of the kings of Jndah and Israel, and observes that he 
was indeed bnried in the city (LXX. " in the city of David "), 
bat not in the kin^a sepnlcbre (2 Chron. xxviii. 26, 27). The 
source employed by the chronicler was his midrash of the entire 
history of the kings ; from which he made extracts, with the 
intention of completing the text of onr book of Kings, to which 
he appended his work. His style was formed after that of the 
annals, whilst that of the author of the book of Kings is formed 
after Deuteronomy. But from what source did the anthor of 
the hook of Kings make bis extracts 1 The section relating to 
Abaz has some things qnite peculiar to itself, as compared with 
the rest of the book, viz. a liking for obscure forms, snch as 
Eloth (ver. 6), hakiomim (yet, 7), Btanmeaek (ver. 10), and 
Aromim (ver. 6); the name Ttghih-peleser;^ vpo instead of TD, 
which ia customary elsewhere; the rare and more coUoqnial term 
jehudim (Jews) ; the inaccurate construction nuiann niiaDDn-riK 
(ver. 17) ; and the verb 1^3 (to consider, ver. 15), which does 
not occur anywhere else. These peculiarities may be satisfao- 
torily explained on the assumption that the author employed the 
national annals ; and that, as these annals bad been gradoally 
composed by the successive writings of many different persons, 
whilst there was an essential uniformity in the mode in which 
the history was written, there was also of necessity a great 
variety in the style of composition. But is the similarity 
between 2 Kings xvi. 5 and Isa, vii. 1 reconcilable with this 
annalistic origin ? The resemblance in question certainly 
cannot be explained, as Theniua supposes, from the fact that 

* This mode of epelling the name, also the one adopted hj tbe chronicler 
{Tiglath-pibieitf), &re both incoircct. Pal is the ABsyrian for mn, anA 
accordiEg to Oppert (Expedition Scientifique en M^potamie), the whole 
name -would read thuB : Tiglath-paUi-tihar, i^. reverence to the son of the 
zodiac (the Atfsjnxa Heicules). 

VOL. I. D 



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so THE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

Isa. vii. 1 waa also taken from the national annals ; bat rather 
on the groond assigned by Oaspari, — namely, that the author 
of the Chronicles had not only the national annals before him, 
bnt also the book of Isaiah's prophecies, to which he directs his 
reader^ attention by commencing the history of the Syro- 
Ephraimitish war in the words of the portion relating to Ahaz. 
The design of the two allies, as we know from the farther 
contents of Isa. i., was nothing less than to get possession of 
Jerusalem, to overthrow the Davidic goTemment there, and 
establish in its stead, in the person of a certain ben-Tib'gl 
(" son of Tabeat," Isa. vii. 6), a newly created dynasty, that 
wonld be nnder subjection to themselves. The failure of this 
intention is the thonght that is briefly indicated In 2 Kings 
xvi. 5 and Isa. vii. I. 

m. HiSTOBiOAL Account of Hezbeiah, more egpeciallg 
of the first six years of his reign. — The accoant given of Heze- 
kiah in the book of Kings is a far more meagre one than we 
should expect to find, when wo have taken out the large section 
relating to the period of the Assyrian catastrophe (2 Kings 
xviii. 18-xx. 19), which is also found in the book of Isaiah, 
and which will come under review in the commentary on Isa. 
xxxvi.-xxxix. All that is then left to the author of the book of 
Kings is ch. xviii. 1-12 and xs. 20, 21 ; and in these two para- 
graphs, which enclose the section of Isaiah, there are only a 
few annalistic elements worked ap in Deuteronomical style. 
Hezekiah began to reign in the thu-d year of Hosea king of 
Israel. He was twenty-five years old when he came to the 
throne, and reigned twenty-nine yeara. He was a king after 
the model of David. He removed the high places, broke in 
pieces the statues, cat down the Asheroth, and pounded the 
serpent, which had been preserved from the time of Moses, and 
had become an object of idolatrous worship. In his confidence 
in Jehovah he was unequalled by any of his followers or pre- 
decessors. The allusion here is to that f^th of his, by which 
hebroke away from the tyranny of Asshur, and also recovered 
his supremacy over the Philistines. We have no means of 
deciding in what years of Hezekiab's reign these two events — 
the revolt from Asshur, and the defeat of the Philistines — 
occurred. The author proceeds directly afterwards, with a 



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IMTEODDCnOa 51 

BtndionS repetition of what be has already stated in ch. zvii. in 
the history of Hosea's reign,^ to describe Shalmanassar's expedi- 
tion against Israel in the fourth year of Hezekiab's reign (the 
seventh of Hosea's), and the fall of Samaria, which took place, 
after a si^e of three years, in the sixth year of Hezekiab's 
reign, and the ninth of Hosea's. But as Shalmanasaar made 
no attack npon Judah at the time when he put an end to the 
kingdom of Israel, the revolt of Hezekiab cannot have taken 
place till afterwards. But with regard to the victory over the 
Philistines, there is nothing in the book of Kings to help us 
even to a negative conclusion. In ch. zz. 20, 21, the author 
brings hb history rapidly to a close, and merely refers such as 
may desire to know more concerning Hezekiah, especially con- 
cerning bis victories and aqueducts, to the annals of the kings 
of Judah. 

The chronicler merely ^ves an extract from the section of 
Isaiah ; but he is all the more elaborate in the rest. All that 
he relates in 2 Chron. xxix. 2-xsxi. is a historical commentary 
' upon the good tesUmony ^ven to king Hezekiah in the book 
of Kings (2 Kings :Eviii. 3), which the chronicler places at the 
head of bis own text in cb. xxix. 2. Even in the month Nisan 
of the first year of his reign, Hezekiah re-opened the gates of 
the temple, bad it purified from the defilement consequent 
upon idolatry, and appointed a re-consecration of the purified 
temple, accompanied with sacrifice, music, and psalms (ch. xxis. 
3 sqq.). Hezekiah is introduced here (a fact of importance in 
relation to Isa. xsxviii.) as the restorer of " the song of the 
Lord" (Shir Jehovah), i.e. of liturgical singing. The Levitical 
and priestly music, as introduced and organized by David, Gad, 
and Nathan, was heard agmn, and Jehovah was praised once 

* The Chabor nekar Oozan (Eng, ver.: Habor 6y the rJTer of Gozan), 
vhicli is mentioiied in boUi pasBagea among the diatricts to nhich the 
Teraelitiah exiles were taken, is no donbt the Ch&b&r, which flows into the 
Tigris from the east above Moaul, and of which it is stated in Mer&3id ed. 
JuytiloU, that " it comes from the mountains of the land of Zauxdn," a 
district of outer Armenia lying towards the Tigris, which is described by 
Edrisi in Janbert's translation, Ft. iL p. 830. Another river, on the banks 
of which Ezekiel'a colony of exiles lived, is the Chebar, which flows from 
the north-east into the Euphrates, and the source of which is in the Meso- 
potamian town (rf Rda-tl-'ain, a place celebrated through the marvellous 
epriDgti of this Chaboras, the praises of which have often been sung. 



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52 THE FBOPUbClES OF ISAIAH. 

more in the words of David the king and Asaph the seer. 
The chronicler then relates in ch. xxx. how Hezekiah appointed a 
solemn passover in the second month, to which even inhabitants 
of the northern kingdom, who might he still in the land, were 
formally and urgently invited. It was an after-passover, which 
was permitted by the law, as the priests had been busy with 
the purification of the temple in the first month, and therefore 
had been rendered nnclean themselves : moreover, there would 
not have been sufficient time for summoning the people to 
Jerusalem. The northern tribes as a whole refused tfie invita- 
tion in the most scornful manner, bat certain individuals 
accepted it with penitent hearts. It was a feast of joy, such 
as had not been known since the time of Solomon (this state- 
ment is not at variance with 2 Kings ziiii. 22), affording, as it 
did, once more a representation and assurance of that national 
unity which had been rent in twain ever since the time of 
Kehoboam. Gaspari has entered into a lengthened investiga- 
tion as to the particular year of Hezekiah's reign in which this 
passover was held. He agrees with Keil, that it took place 
after the fall of Samaria and the deportation of the people by 
Shalmanassar ; but he does not feel quite certain of his con- 
clusion. The question itself, however, is one that ought not 
to be raised at all, if we think the chronicler a trustworthy 
authority. He places this passover most unquestionably in the 
second month of the first year of Hezekiah's reign; and there 
is no difficulty occasioned by thb, unless we regard what 
Tiglath-pileser had done to Israel as of less importance than it 
actnally was. The population that was left behind was really 
nothing more than a remnant; and, moreover, the chronicler 
draws an evident contrast between tribes and individuals, so 
that he was conscious enough that there were still whole tribes 
of the northern kingdom who were settled in their own homes. 
He then states in ch. xxxi. 1, that the inhabitants of the towns 
of Judah (whom he calls " all Israel," because a number of 
emigrant Israelites had settled there) went forth, under the 
influence of the enthusiasm consequent upon the passover they 
had celebrated, and broke in pieces the things used in idolatrous 
worship throughout both kingdoms; and in ch. xxxi. 2 sqq., that 
Hezekiah restored the institutions of divine worship tliat had 
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mTBODuonoir. s3 

tbe priests and Levites. Eveiything else that be mentions in 
ch. xKsii. 1-26, 31, belongs to a later period than the four- 
teenth year of Hezekiah's reign ; and bo far as it differs from 
the section in Isaiah, which is repeated in the book of Kings, it 
is a valuable supplement, more especially with reference to Isa. 
xsii. 8-11 (which relates to precautions taken in the prospect 
of the approaching Assyrian siege). But the acconnt of 
Hezekiah's wealth in ch. xxxii. 27-29 extends over the whole 
of his reign. The notice respecting the diversion of the upper 
Gihou (ch. xxxii. 30) reaches rather into the period of the re* 
torn after the Aasynan catastrophe, than into the period before 
it ; bat nothing can be positively afiSrmed. 

Having thus obt^ned the requisite acquaintance with the 
historical accounts which bear throughout upon the book of 
Isaiah, so far as it has for its starting-point and object the 
history of the prophet's own times, we will now turn to the 
book itself, for the purpose of acquiring sach an insight into 
its general plan as ia necessary to enable ns to make a proper 
division of our own work of exposition. 

ARBAITGEMENT OF TEE COLLECTIOK. 

We may safely enter npon our investigation with the pre- 
conceived opinion that the collection before ns was edited by 
the prophet himself. For, with the esception of the book 
of Jonah, which belongs to the prophetico-historical writings 
rather than to the literature of prediction, or the prophetical 
writings in the ordinary acceptation of the term, all the 
canonical books of prophecy were written and arranged by the 
p'rophets whose names they bear. The most important to our 
purpose is the analogy of the lai^er books of Jeremiah and 
Ezekiel. No one denies that Ezekiel prepared his work for 
publication exactly as it lies before ns now ; and Jeremiah in- 
forms us himself, that he collected and published his prophecies 
on two separate occasions. Both collections are arranged 
according to the two different points of view of the subject- 
matter and the order of time, which are interwoven the one 
with the other. And this is also the case with the collection 
of Isaiah's prophedes. As a whole, it is arranged chrono- 
logically. The dates given in ch. vi. 1, vii. 1, xiv. 28, xx, 1, 



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Si THE FBOPHECniS OF ISAUH. 

zxxvi. 1, are so many points in a progressive line. The three 
principnl divisions dso form a chronological series. For cli. 
i.-vi. set forth the ministry of Isaiah under ITzziah-Jotham ; 
ch. 'vii.-xxxix^ his ministry under Ahaz and Hezeklah down to 
the fifteenth year of the reign of the latter ; whilst ch. xl.--lxTi., 
assaming their anthenticlty, were the latest prodnctions of the 
deepest inner-life, and were committed directly to wnting. In 
the central part, the Ahaz group (ch. viL-xii.) also precedes 
the Hezekiah group (ch. ziii.-zzxix.) chronolo^cally. But 
the order of time is interrupted in several places by an arrange- 
ment of the subject-matter, which was of greater importance 
to the prophet. The address in ch. i. is not the oldest, but is 
placed at the head as an introduction to the whole. The con- 
secration of the prophet (ch. vi,), which ought to stand at the 
beginning of the TJzziah-Jotham group, if it relates to hia 
original consecration to his office, is placed at the end, where 
it looks both backwards and forwards, as a prophecy that was 
in course of fulfilment. The Ahaz group, which follows next 
(ch. vii.-xii.), is complete in itself, and, as it were, from one 
casting. And in the Hezekiah group (ch. xiii.-xxxix.) the 
chronological order is frequently interrupted again. The pro- 
phecies against the nations (ch. xiv. 24-xxii.), which belong to 
the Assyrian period, have a maisa upon Babel, the city of the 
world's power, for their opening piece (ch. ziii.-zir. 23) ; a maasa 
upon Tyre, the city of the world's commerce, which was to be 
destroyed by the Chaldeans, for their _^na!e (ch. xxiii.) ; and a 
shorter masm upon Babel, for a party-wall dividing the cycle 
into two halves (ch. zzi. 1—10) ; and all the prophecies upon the 
nations run into a grand apocalyptic epilogue (ch. 3cxiv.-xxvil.), 
like rivers into a sea. The first part of the Hezekiah greup, 
the contents of which are pre-eminently ethnic (ch. xiii.-xxvii.), 
are interwoven with passages which may not have been com- 
posed till after the fifteenth year of Hezekiah's reign. The 
grand epilogue (ch. xxxiv. xxxv.), in which the second portion 
of the Hezekiah group dies away, is also another such passage. 
This second part is occupied chiefly with the fate of Jndah, 
the judgment inflicted upon Jodah by the imperial power of 
Assyria, and the deliverance which awaited it (ch. xxvii.-xsxiii.). 
This prediction closes with a declaration, in ch. zxxiv. xxxv., 
on the one hand, of the judgment of God upon the world of 



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njTBODtfCTlOK. 55 

IsraeTs foes; ftnd on the other hand, of the redemption of 
Israel itself. This passage, T?hicli was composed after the 
fifteeDtb year of Hezeklah's reign, is followed by the historical 
portions (ch. xzxvi.-sxxix.), which enclose in & historical frame 
the predictions of Isaiah delivered when the Assyrian cata- 
strophe was close at hand, and furnish us with tBe key to the 
interpretation not only of ch. vii.— zzxt., but of ch. xl.-lxvi. 
also. 

Taking the book of IsEuah, ^erefore, as a whole, in the 
form in which it lies before us, it may be divided into two 
halves, viz. ch. i. to xzxix., and ch. xl. to Ixvi. The former 
consists of seven parts, the latter of three. The first half may 
be called the ABtyrian, as the goal to which it points is the down- 
fall of Asshur ; the second the Babi/loniaTij as its goal is the 
deliverance from Babel. The first half, however, is not purely 
Assyrian ; bnt there are Babylonian pieces introduced among 
the Assyrian, and stich others, as a rule, as break apocalyptically 
through the limited horizon of the latter. The following are 
the seven divisions in the first half. (1.) Prophecies founded 
upon the growing obduracy of the great mass of the people (ch. 
ii.-vi.). (2.) 7%e consolation of Immanuel under the Assyrian 
oppressions (ch. Tii.-xii.). These two form a syzygy, which con- 
dudes with a psalm of the redeemed (ch. xii.), the echo, in the 
last days, of the song at the Bed Sea. The whole is divided 
by the consecration of the prophet (ch. vi.), which looks back- 
wards and forwards with threatenings and promises. It is 
introduced by a summary prologue (ch. i.), in which the prophet, 
standing midway between Moses and Jesus the Christ, com- 
mences in the style of the great Mosaic ode. (3.) Predictions 
of Uu judgment and salvation of the heathen, which belong, for 
the most part, to the time of the Ass3rrian judgment, though 
they are enclosed and divided by Babylonian portions. For, as 
we have already observed, an oracle concerning Babel, the city 
of the world-power, forms the introduction (ch. xiii.-ziT. 23) , 
an oracle concerning Tyre, the city of the world's commerce, 
which was to receive its mortal wound from the Chaldeans, the 
coDclosioQ (ch. zxiii.) ; and a second oracle on the desert by 
the sea, i.t. Bahel, the centre (ch. xxi, 1-10). (4.) To this so 
thoughtfully arranged coUecUon of predictions concerning the 
nations outside the Israelitish pale, there ia attached a grand 



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56 THE FBOPBEOBS OF 18AUH. 

apocalTptic prophecy of the judgment of the world and the latt 
thinga (ch. xxir.-xxvii.), which gives it s background that 
fades away into eternity, and forms with it a second Bjzjgj. 
(5.) From these eschatological distances the prophet fetoms to 
Uie realities of the present and of the immedi^ fature, and 
describes tke revoUfrom Asshur, and its eonaequencei (ch. zxviii.— 
zxxiii.). The central point of this gronp is the prophecy of the 
precioos comer-stone laid in Zion. (6.) This is also paired off 
by the prophet with a far-reaching eschatological prediction of 
reven^ and redemptum for the chnrch (ch. xxxir. xxxr.), in 
which we already hear, as in ■ prelude, the keynote of ch. 
il.-ls¥i. (7.) After these three syzygies we are carried back, 
in the first two historical accounts of ch. xxxvi.— xxxix., into the 
Assyrian times, whilst the other two show us in the distance 
the fature entanglement witH Babylon, which was commencing 
already. These foor accounts are arranged without regard to 
the chronolo^cal wder, so that one half looks backwards and 
the other forwards, and thus the two halves of the book are 
clasped together. The prophecy in ch. xsxix. 5-7 stands 
between these two halves like a sign-post, with the inscription 
" To Babylon " upon it. It is thither that the further course of 
Israel's histoiy tends. There, from this time forward, is Isaiah 
buried in spirit with his people. And there, in cb. xl.-lxvi., 
he proclaims to the Babylonian exiles their approaching deli- 
verance. The trilogical arrangement of this book of consola- 
tion has been scarcely disputed by any one, since it was first 
pointed out by Kiickert in his Translation and Exposition of 
Hebrew Prophets (1831). It is divided into three sections, each 
containiug three times three addresses, with a kind of refrain 
at the close. 



THE CRITICAL QDESTIOKa. 

The collection of Isaiah's prophecies is thus a complete work, 
most carefully and skilfully arranged. It is thoroughly worthy 
of the prophet. Nevertheless, we should be unable to attribute 
it to him in its present form, (1) if it were impossible that ch. 
xiii.-xiv. 23, xxi. 1-10, xxiii., xxiv.-xxvii., xxxiv., xxxv,, could 
have been composed by Isaiah, and (2) If the hbtorical accounts 
in ch. xxxvL-xxxix., which are also to be found in 2 Kings zviii. 



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IKTBODDCnOH. 57 

I3-XX. 19, have been copied from tbe book of Kings, or even 
directly ffom the national annals. For if the prophecies in 
question be taken away, the beautiful whole unquestipnaWy 
falls into a confused guodUbet, more especially the book against 
the nations ; and if ch. xssvi.-xxxix. were not written directly 
by Isfuah, the two halves of the collection would be left without 
a clasp to bind them together. It would be irregular to think 
of deciding the critical questions bearing upon this point now, 
instead of taking them up in connecUon with our exegetical 
inquiries. At the same time, we will put the reader in posses- 
sion at once of the more general points, which cause ns to 
dissent from the conclusions of the modem critics, who regard 
the book of Isaiah as an anthology composed of the productions 
of different authors. 

The critical treatment of Isaiah commenced as follows ; — It 
began with the second part. Koppe first of all expressed some 
doubts as to the genuineness of ch. 1. Doderlein then gave 
Dtteraoce to a decided suspicion as to the genuineness of the 
whole ; and Jusd, followed by Eichhom, Panlus, and Bertholdt, 
raised this suspicion into firm assurance that the whole was 
spurious. The result thus obtained could not possibly continue 
without reaction upon the first pdrt. Roseumiiller, who was 
always very dependent upon his predecessors, was the first to 
question whether the oracle against Babylon in ch. xiii.-xir. 23 
was really Isaiah's, as the heading affirms ; and to his great 
relief, Jmti and Faulus undertook the defence of his position. 
Further progress was now made. With the first oracle against 
Babylon in ch. 3dii.-xiv. 23, the second, in ch. xxi. 1-10, was 
also condemned; and Rosenmtiller was justly astonished when 
Qesenius dropped the former, bat maintained that the argu- 
ments vrith r^rd to the latter were inconclusive. There still 
remuned the oracle agabst Tyre in ch. xxiii., which might 
either be left as Isaiah's, or attributed to a younger unknown 
prophet, according to the assumption that it predicted the 
destruction of Tyre by Assyrians or by Chaldeans. Eichhom, 
followed by Bosenmiiller, decided that it was not genuine. 
But Gesenius understood by the destroyers the Assyrians ; and 
as tbe prophe<7 consequently did not extend b^ond Isaiah's 
horizon, he defended its antb^iticity. Thus the Babylonian 
series was set aside, or at any rate pronounced thoroughly 



i.v.ioo^^ie 



5d 1 

snspiciotu. Bat the keen eyes of the critics made still farther 
discoveries. Eicbhom found a play apoD words in the c^cle of 
predictions in ch. 3pdT.-xzvii., which was nnworthy of Isaiah. 
Cresanius detected an allegorical announcement of the fall of 
Babylon. Comeqaentlj they both condemned these three 
chapters ; aod it bad its effect, for Ewald transferred them to 
the time of Cambyses. Still shorter work was made with the 
cycle of predictions in cb. zzxiv. xxxr., on account of its rela- 
tion to the second part. Kosenmilller pronounced it, without 
reserve, "a song composed in the time of the Babylonian 
captivity, when it was approaching its termination." This is 
the tme account of the origin of the criticism upon Isaiah. 
It was in the swaddling-clothes of rationalism that it attuned 
its maturity. Its first attempts were very juvenile. The 
names of its founders have been almost forgotten. It was 
Gesenius, Hitzi^ and Ewald, who first raised it to the eminence 
of a sdence. 

If we take our stand upon this eminence, we find that the 
book of Isaiah contains prophecies by Isaiah himself, and also 
prophecies by persons who were either directiy or indirectly his 
disciples. The New Testament passages in which the second 
half of the book of Isaiah is cited as Isaiah's, are no proof to 
the contrary, since Ps. ii., for example, which has no heading 
at all, is cited in Acta iv. 25 as David's, merely because it is con- 
tained in the Davidic Psalter, and no critic would ever feel that 
be was bound by that. But many objections present themselves 
to such a conclusion. In the first place, nothing of the kind can 
be pointed out in any of the other canonical books of prophet^, 
except indeed the book of Zechariah, in which ch. ix.-xiv. is said 
to stand in precisely the same position as Isa. xl^lxvi., accord- 
ing to Hitzig, Ewald, and others; with thb difference, however, 
that Isa. xl.-Ixvi. is attributed to a later prophet than Isaiah, 
whereas Zech. ix.-xiv. is attributed to one or two prophets 
before the time of Zechariah. But even De Wette, who main- 
tained, in the first three editions of his Introduction to the Old 
Testament, that Zecb. ix.-xiv, was written before the captivity, 
altered his views in the fourth edition ; and Eohler has lately 
confirmed the unity of the book of Zechariah after an unbiassed 
investigation. It is Zechariah himself who prophesies of the 
last times in ch, ix.-xiv., in images drawn from the past, and 



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DlTRODDCnOH. 59 

posubly with the mtroduction of earlier oraclea. It remains, 
therefore, that not a siagle book of prophecy is open to any 
such doubts as to the unity of its authorship ; and Hitzig 
admits that even the book of Jeremiah, although interpolated, 
does not contain sporions sections, Kevertheless, it is qnite 
possible that something extraordinary might have taken place 
in connection with the hook of Isaiah, Bnt there are grave 
objections even to such an assumption as this in the face of 
existing facts. For example, it would be a marvellous occur- 
rence in the history of chances, for such a number of predictions 
of this particular kind to have been preserved, — all of them 
bearing so evidently the marks of Isaiah's style, that for two 
thousand years they have been confounded with his own 
prophecies. It would be equally marvellous that the historians 
should know nothing at all about the authors of these pro- 
phecies ; and thirdly, it would be very strange that the names 
of these particular prophets should have shared the common 
fate of being forgotten, although they must all have lived 
nearer to the compiler's own times than the old model prophet, 
whoae style they imitated. It is true that these difBculties are 
not conclusive proofs to the contrary ; but, at any rate, they 
are so much to the credit of the traditional authorship of the 
prophecies attacked, On the other hand, the weight of this 
tradition is not properly appreciated by opponents. Wilful 
contempt of external testimony, and frivolity in the treatment 
of histtn'ical data, have been from the very first the fundamental 
evils apparent in the manner in which modem critics have 
handled the questions relating to Isaiah. These critics approach 
everything that is traditional with ths presumption that it is 
false; and whoever would make a scientific impression upon 
them, must first of all declare right fearlessly his absolute 
superiority to the authority of tradition. Now tradition is 
certainly not infallible. No more are the internal grounds of 
the so-called higher criticism, especially in the questions relating 
to Isaiah. And in the case before ns, the external testimony is 
greatly strengthened by the relation in which Zepbaniah and 
Jeremiah, the two most reproductive prophets, stand not only 
to ch. zL-lxvi,, bnt also to the suspected sections of the first 
half. They had these prophecies in their possession, since they 
evidently copy them, and incorporate passages token from them 



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60 THE PB0PHEOIB8 OF ISAIAH. 

into their own prophecies ; a fact whicli Caspari has most 
conclnsivelj demonstrated, but which not one of the negative 
critica has ventiired to look fairly in the face, or to set aside by 
connter-proofs of eqnal force. Moreover, althongh the sas- 
pected prophecies do indeed contain some things for whic^ 
vouchers cannot be obtained from the rest of the book, yet the 
marks which are distinctly characteristic of Isaiah outweigh by 
far these peculiarities, which have been picked out with sncb 
care ; and even in the prophecies referred to, it is Isaiah's spirit 
which animates the whole, Isaiah's heart which beat^, and 
IsEuah's fiery tongue which speaks in both the substance and 
the form. Again, the type of the suspected prophecies — which, 
if they are genuine, belong to the prophet's latest day&— is not 
thoroughly opposed to the type of the rest; on the contrary, 
those prophecies which are atjtnowledged to be genuine, present 
many a point of contact with this } and even the tran^gured 
form and richer escbatological contents of the disputed prophecies 
have their preludes there. There is nothing strange in this great 
variety of ideas and forms, especially in Isaiah, who is con- 
fessedly the most universal of all the prophets, even if we only 
look at those portions which are admitted to be genuine, and 
who varies his style in so masterly a way to suit the demands 
of his materials, his attitude, and his purpose. One might 
suppose that these three counter-proofs, which can be followed 
up even to the most minute det^ls, wonld have some weight-, 
but for Bitzig, Ewald, and many others, tbey have absolutely 
none. Whynott These critics think it impossible that the world- 
wide empire of Babel, and its subsequent transition to Modes 
and Persians, should have been foreseen by Isaiah in the time 
of Hezekiah. Hitzig affirms in the plunest terms, that the 
very same eati^ futuri covered the eyes of the Old Testament 
prophets generally, as that to which the human race was con- 
demned during the time that the oracle at Delphi was standing. 
Ewald speaks of the prophets in incomparably higher terms ; 
but even to him the prophetic state was nothing more than a 
blazing up of the natuial spark which lies slumbering in every 
man, more especially in Ewald himself. These two eort/pkcei of 
the modem critical school find themselves hemmed in between 
the two foregone conclusiona, "There is no true prophecy," 
and " There is no tme miracle." They call their criticisin 



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CtTBODDOnOlT. 61 

free; but when examined more closely, it is in a Tice. In 
this vice it has two ma^cal fonnnlaries, with which it fortifies 
itself against any impression from historical testimony. It 
either turns the prophecies into merely retrospective glances 
(vaticinia post eventum), as it does the account of miracles into 
taffoa and myths ; or it places the events predicted so close to 
the prophet's own time, that there was no need of inspiration, 
but only of combination, to make the foresight poBsihle. This 
is all that it can do. Now we could do more than thb. We 
conld pronounce all the disputed prophecies the production of 
other authors than Isaiah, without coming into contact with 
any dogmatical assumptions : we conld even boast, as in the 
critical analysis of the historical books, of the extent to which 
the history of literature was enriched through this analysb of 
the book of Isaiah, And if we seem to despise these riches, 
we simply yield to the irresislible force of external and internal 
evidence. This applies even to ch. xxxvi.— xxxix. For whilst it is 
true that the text of the book of Kings is the better of the two, 
yet, as we shall be able to prove, the true relation is this, that 
the author of the book of Kings did not obtain the parallel 
section (2 Kings xviii. 13— xx. 19) from any other source than 
the hook of Isaiah. We have similar evidence in 2 Kings 
xxiv. IS sqq. and xxr., as compared with Jer. lii., that the text 
of a passage may sometimes be preserved in greater purity in 
B secondary work than in the original work from which it was 
taken. It was Isaiah's prophetico-historical pen which com- 
mitted to writing the accounts in ch. xssvi.-ixxix. The prophet 
not only wrote a special history of Uzziah, according to 2 Chron. 
xxvi. 22, bat he also incorporated historical notices of Isaiah 
in his " vision" (2 Chron. xxxii. 32). We reserve the fuller 
demonstration of all this. For whilst, on the one hand, we 
consider ourselves warranted in rejecting those tendencies of 
modem criticism, to which naturalistic views of the world have 
dictated at the very outset full-blown negative results, and we 
do so on the ground of supernatural facts of personal experi- 
ence ; on the other hand, we are very far from wishing to dis- 
pute the well-founded rights of criticism as such. For centuries, 
yea, for thousands of years, no objection was raised as to the 
Davidic origin of a psalm headed " a psalm of David," to say 
nothing of a prophecy of Isaiah ; and therefore no such objection 



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62 THE PB0PHECIE8 OF ISAIAH. 

was refated. Apart from the whi^ms of a few individaals,' 
whicb left no traces behind them, it was universally assumed hy 
both Jewish and Christian writers down to the last century^ 
that all the canonical books of the Old Testament had the Holy 
Qbost aa their one atutor primarius, and for their immediate 
authors the men by whose names they are called. Bat when 
the cbnrch in the time of the Eeformation began to test and 
sift what had been handed down ; when the rapid progress 
that was made in classical and oriental philology compelled the 
students of the Scriptures to make larger if not higher demands 
npon themselves ; when their studies were directed to the lin- 
gnistic, historical, archaological, aesthetic — in short, the human — 
ude of the Scriptures, and the attempt was made to comprehend 
the several aspects presented by sacred literatore in their pro- 
gressive development and relation to one another, — Christian 
science put forth many branches that had never been anticipated 
till then ; and biblical criticism sprang up, which from that time 
forward has been not only an inalienable, but a welcome and 
even necessary, member in the theological science of the church. 
That school of criticism, indeed,' which will not rest till all 
miracles and prophecies, which cannot be set aside esegetically, 
have been eliminated critically, must be regarded by the church 
as self-condemned ; hut the labour of a spiritual criticism, and 
one truly free in spirit, will not only be tolerated, because ''the 
spiritnal man disceraeth all things" (1 Cor. ii. 15), but will ha 
even fostered, and not looked upon as suspicious, although its 
results should seem objectionable to minds that are weakly 
strung, and stand in a false and fettered attitude in relation to 
the Scriptures. For it will be no more offended that the word 
of Crod should appear in the form of a servant, than that Christ 
Himself should do so ; and, moreover, criticism not only brings 
any blemishes in the Scriptures to the light, but affords an 
ever-deepening insight into its hidden glory. It makes the 
sacred writings, as they lie before us, live again ; it takes us 
into its very laboratory ; and without it we cannot possibly 
obtain a knowledge of the historical production of the biblical 
books. 

^ E.g. that of Abenezra, who regarded king Jehoiakim, who was Bet free 
Id the thirty-seventh year of hta Babylonian captivity, as the author of laa. 



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EXPOSITION IN ITS ESIBTING STATE. 

It was at the time of the Beformation also that hUtorico- 
grammatical ezposition first originated with a distinct conscious- 
nesa of the task that it had to perform. It was then that the first 
attempt was made, under the inflaence of the revival of classi- 
cal studies^ and with the help of a knowledge of the language 
obtained from Jewish teachers, to find out the one trae meaning 
of the Scriptures, and an end was put to the tedions jugglery 
of multiples ScripturcB sensu*. But very little wag accomplished 
in the time of the Beformation for the prophecies of Isaiah. 

Calvin's Commentarii answer the expectations with which 
we take them np ; hat Luther's Scholia are nothing bat col- 
lege notes, of the most meagre description. The productions 
of Grotins, which are generally valuahle, are insignificant in 
Isaiah, and, indeed, throughout the prophets. He mixes up 
things sacred and profane, and, because unable to follow pro- 
phet^ in its flight, cuts off its wings. Aug. Varenins of Rostock 
wrote the most learned commentary of all those composed by 
writers of the orthodox Lutheran school, and one that even now 
is not to he despised; but though learned, it is too great a 
medley, and written without discipline of mind. Campegius 
Vitringa (f 17S2) threw all the labours of his predecessors into 
the shade, and none even of his successors approach him in 
spirit, keenness, and scholarship, His Commentary on Isaiah 
is still incomparably the greatest of all the exegetical works 
upon the Old Testament. The weakest thing in the Commen- 
tary is the allegorical exposition, which is appended to the 
grammatical and historical one. In this the temperate pupil 
of the Cocceian school is dependent upon what was then the 
prevalent style of commentary in Holland, where there was an 
utter absence of all appreciation of the " complex-apotelefr- 
matical " character of prophecy, whilst the most minute allusions 
were traced in the prophets to events connected with the history 
of both the world and the church. The shady sides of the 
Commentary are generally the first to present themselves to the 
reader's eye ; but the longer he continues to use it, the more i 
highly does he learn to value it. There is deep research every-y 
nhere, but nowhere a luxuriance of dry and dead scholarship 
The author's heart is in his work. He sometimes halts in^ 



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64 THE PBOPBECIBS OF ISMAE. 

toilsome path of inqaiiy, and gives vent; to loud, raptnrons 
esclamations. Bat the rapture is very different from that of 
the Lord Bishop Kob»t Lowth, who never gets below the 
surface, who alters the Masoretic text at his pleasure, and goes 
no further than an aesthetic admiration of the form. 

The modem age of exegesis commenced with that destructive 
theology of the latter half of the ei^teenth century, which 
pulled down without being able to build. But even this demo- 
lition was not without good result. The negative of anything 
divine and eternal in the Scriptures secured a fuller recognition 
of its human and temporal side, bringing out the charms of it^ 
poetiy, and, what was of still greater importance, the concrete 
reality of its history. Bosenmiiller's Scholia are a careful, 
lucid, and elegant compilaUon, founded for the most part upon 
Vltringa, and pnuseworthy not only for the judicious character 
of die selection made, but also for the true earnestness which is 
displayed, and the entire absence of all frivolity. The decidedly 
rationalistic Commentary of Gesenius is more independent in its 
verbal exegesis ; displays great care in its historical expositions ; 
and is peculiarly distinguished for its pleasing and transparent 
style, for the survey which it gives of the whole of the literature 
bearing upon Isaiah, and the thoroughness with which the 
author avails himself of all the new sources of grammatical and 
historical knowledge that have been opened since the days of 
Yitringa. Hitzig's Commentary is his best work in our opinion, 
excelHng as it does in exactness and in the sharpness and 
originality of its grammatical criticbms, as well as in delicate 
tact in the discovery of the train of thought and in thorough- 
ness and precision in the exposition of well-pondered results ; 
but it is also disfigured by rash pseudo-critical caprice, and by 
a studiously profane spirit, utterly unaffected by the spirit of 
prophecy. Hendewerk's Commentary is often very weak in 
philological and historical exposition. The style of description 
is broad, but the eye of the disciple of Herbart is too dim to 
distinguish Israelitish prophecy from heathen poetry, and the 
politics of Isaiah from those of Demosthenes, Nevertheless, we 
cannot f^l to observe the thoughtful diligence displayed, and 
the anxious desire to point out the germs of eternal truths, 
although the anther is fettered even in this by his philosophical 
Bta^point. Ewald's natural penetration is universally recog- 



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INTBODXJOnOH. 



■65 



nised, as well as the noble enthusiasm with which he dives into 
the contents of the prophetical books, in which he finds au 
eternal presence. His earnest endeavours to obtain deep views 
are to 8 certain eltent rewarded. But there is something 
irritating in the self-sufiGciency with which he ignores nearly 
all bis predecessors, the dictatorial assumption of his criticism, 
bis false and often nebnloas pathos, and his unqualified identi- 
fication of his own opinions with truth itself. He is a perfect 
master in the characteristics of the prophets, but his translations 
of them are stiff, and hardly to any one's taste. Umbrei^s 
Bi-actical Commentary on Isaiah is a useful and stimulating 
production, exhibiting a deep eesthetic and reli^ous sensibility 
to the glory of the prophetic word, which manifests itself in 
lofty poetic language, heaping image upon image, and, as it 
were, never coming down from the cothomns. Knobel's prose 
is the very opposite extreme. The precision and thoroughness 
of tbb scholar, the third edition of whose Commenttfty on 
Isaiah was one of his last works (he died 25th May 1863), 
deserve the most grateful acknowledgment, whether from a 
philological or an archieological point of view ; but his peculiar 
triviality, which amounts almost to an affectation, seems to shut 
his eyes to the deeper meaning of the work, whibt his excessive 
tendency to " hbtorize" {historisiTen, i.e. to give a purely his- 
torical interpretation to everything) makes him blind even to 
the poetry of the form. Drechsler's Commentaiy was a great 
advance in the exposition of Isaiah. He was only able to cany 
it out himself as far as ch. xxvii. ; but it was completed by 
Delitzsch and H. A. Hahn of Greifswald (f 1st Dec. 1861), 
with the use of Drecbsler's notes, though they contained very 
little that was of any service in relation to ch. xl.-lxvi. This 
was, comparatively speaking, the best commentary upon Isaiah 
that had appeared since the time of Vitringa, more especially 
the portion on ch. xiii.-xxvii. Its peculiar excellency is not to 
be found in the exposition of single sentences, which is un- 
satisfactoiy, on account of the comminuting, glossatorial style 
of its exegesis, and, although diligent and thorongb enough, is 
unequal and by no means productive, more especially from a 
grammatical point of view ; but in the spiritual and spirited 
grasp of the whole, the deep insight which it exhibits into the 
character and ideas of the prophet and of prophecy, its vigorous 
TOL. I. B 



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68 THE PBOPHEOlEfi OF ISAUH. 

penetration mto the very heart of the plan and snhstance of 
the whole book, la the meantime (1850), there had appeared 
the Commentaiy written bj the catholic Professor Feter Schegg, 
which follows the Yalgate, although with as little slavishaess 
as possible, and contains man^ good points, espedally the re- 
marks relating to the history of translation. At the same time 
there also appeared the Commentaiy of Bmst Meier, the 
Tiibingen orientaliBt, which did not get beyond the first half. 
If ever any one was specially called to throw fresh light npon 
the book of Isuab, it was C. P. Caspari of Christiania; but all 
that has yet appeared of his Norwegian Commentary only 
reaches to the end of ch. v. Its further progress has been 
hindered partly by the exhaustive thoroughness at which he 
aimed, and the almost infinite labour which it involved, and 
partly by the fact that the Grundtvig controversy involved him 
in the necessity of pursuing the most extensive studies in 
ecclesiastical history. In the meantime, he has so far expanded 
his treatise om Serapheme (on the Seraphim), that it maiy be 
regarded as a commentary on Isa. vi. ; and rich materials for 
the prophetic sayings which follow may be found in his con- 
tributions to the introduction to the book of Isaiah, and to the 
history of Isaiah's own times, which appeared as a second 
volume of our biblico- theological and apologetico- critical 
Siitdien (1848), his Programme on the Syro-Ephraimitish war 
(1849), and his comprehensive and by no means obsolete article, 
entitled, "Jeremiah a witness to the genuineness of Isa. xxxiv., 
and therefore also to that of Isa. x1.-lxvi., xiii.-xir. 23, and 
xxi. 1-10," which appeared in the Zeitschrtft far d. ges. luth. 
Theohgie «. Kirche (1843), together with an excursus on the 
relation of Zephaniah to the disputed prophecies of Isaiah. 

We shall reserve those works which treat more particularly 
of the second part of the book of Isaiah for our special introduc- 
tion to that part. But there are two other distingnished com- 
mentaries that we must mention here, both of them by Jewish 
scholars : viz, that of M. L. Malbim (Krotoshin 1849), which 
is chiefly occupied with the precise ideas conveyed by synony- 
mous words ^d groups of words ; and that of S. D. Luzzatto 
of Padua, — a stimulating work, entitled Profeta Jeata volgariz- 
zato e commentato ad tuo degli Israeliti, which aims throughout 
at independence, but of which only five parts have yet appeared. 



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EXPOSITION. 



|N passing to oar exposition of the book, the first thing 
which strikes ns b its traditional title — Yea/taiah 
(Isaiah). In the book itself, and throughout the 
Old Testament ScripEures, the prophet is called 
Yeeliayahu ; and the shorter form is found in the latest books 
as the name of other persons. It was a common thing in the 
very earliest times for the shorter forms of snch names to be 
used interchangeably with the longer ; bnt in later times the 
shorter was the only form employed, and for this reason it was 
the one adopted in the traditional title. The name is a com- 
pound one, and signifies " Jehovah's salvation." The prophet 
was conscious that it was not merely by accident that he bore 
this name; for V^_ (he shall save) and ri^E'j (salvation) are 
among his favourite words. It may be said, in fact, that he 
lived and moved altogether in the coming salvation, which was 
to proceed from Jehovah, and would be realized hereafter, when 
Jehovah should come at last to His people as He had never 
come before. This salvation was the goal of the sacred history 
(HeilageKhichte, literally, history of salvation) ; and Jehovah 
was the peculiar name of God in relation to that history. It 
denotes " the existing one," not however " the always existing," 
i.e. eternal, as Bonsen and the Jewish translators render it, but 
*' existing evermore," i.f. filling all history, and displaying His 
glory therein in grace and truth. The ultimate goal of this 
historical process, in which Qod was ever ruling as the abso- 
lutely free One, according to His own self-assertion in Ex. iii. 
14, was true and essential talvation, proceeding outwards from 
Israel, and eventually embracing all mankind. In the name 
of the prophet the totrogrammaton mrr is contracted into vr 



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68 THE FB0PBECIE3 OF ISAIAH. 

(re) by the dropping of the second n. We may easily see from 
this contraction that the name of God was pronounced with an 
a Bonnd, bo that it was either called YaJiveh, or rather Yahacehf 
or else YahvOh, or rather Yahavdh. According to Theodoret, it 
was pronounced 'la^e {Yahaveh) by the Samaritans; and it is 
written in the same way in the list of the names of the Deity given 
in Epipbanios. That the oA sound was also a castomary pronun- 
ciation, may not only be gathered from such names as Jimnab, 
Jimrah, Jishvah, Jishpah (compare Jithlab, the name of a place), 
but is also expressly attested by the ancient yariations, Jao, 
Jeno, Jo (Jer. xxiii. 6, LXX.), on the one hand, and on the 
other band by the mode of spelling adopted by Origen {Jaoia) 
and Theodoret {Aia, not only in qucest. in Ex. § 15, but also in 
Fab. hceret. t. 4 : " Aia signifies the existing one ; it was pro- 
nounced thus by Hebrew^ but the Samaritans call it Jaba\, 
overlooking tbeforceof the word"). The dull-bounding long a 
coald be expressed by omega qnite as well as by alpha. Isidor 
follows these and similar testimonies, and says (^Orig. vii. 7), 
" The tetragrammaton consisted of ia written twice (ta, ia), and 
with this reduplication it constituted the unutterable and glorious 
name of God." ' The Arabic form adopted by the Samaritans 
leaves it uncertain whether it is to be pronounced Yahve or 
Yahva. They wrote to Job Ladolf (in the Episfola Samari- 
tana Siehemitarum tertia, published by Brnns, 1781), in oppo- 
sition to the statement of Theodoret, that they pronounced the 
last syllable with damma; that is to say, they pronounced the 
name Yahavoh (^Yahwh), which was the form in which it was 
written in the last century by Yelthusen, and also by MufE in 
his Disegno di lezioni e di ricerche euUa lingua Ebraica (Pavia, 
1792). The pronunciation Jehovah {YehovaJt) arose out of a 
combination of the keri and the chethib, and has only become 
cnrrest since the time of the Reformation. Qenebrard de- 
nounces it in his Commentarg upon the Psalms with the utmost 
vehemence, in opposition to Beza, as an intolerable innovation. 
" Ungo(Hy violators of what is most ancient," he says, " pro- 
faning and transforming the unutterable name of God, would 
read JOTA or Sebova, — a new, barbarous, fictitious, and irre- 
ligious word, that savours strongly of the Jove of the heathen." 
Nevertheless this Jeltova {Java) forced Its way into general 
adoption, and we shall therefore retain it, notwithstanding the 



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Exposition. 69 

fact that the o sound is decidedly wrong. To return, then : tlie 
prophet's name signiBes " Jehovah's salvation." In the Sep- 
toagint it is always written 'Haataj, with a strong aspirate ; 
in the Vulgate it is written Isaieu, and sometimes Esatas. 

In turning from the outward to the inward title, which is 
contained in tiie book itself, there are two things to be observed 
at the outset : (1.) The division of the verses indicated by tt^ 
pasvk is an arrangement for which the way was prepared as 
early as the time of the Talmud, and which was firmly estab- 
lished in the Masoretic schools ; and consequently it reaches as 
far back as the extreme limits of the middle ages — differing 
in this respect from the division of verses in the New Testa- 
ment. The arrangement of the chapters, however, with the 
indications of the separate sections of the prophetic collection, 
is of no worth to us, simply because it is not older than the 
thirteenth century. According to some authorities, it originated 
with Stephen Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury (f 1227); 
whilst others attribute it to Cardinal Hugo of St Caro (f 1262). 
It ia only since the fifteenth century that it has been actually 
adopted in the text. (2.) The small ring or star at the com- 
mencement points to the footnote, which afiirms that Isa. i, 
1-28 (where we find the same sign again) was the kaphtarak, or 
concluding pericope, taken from the prophets, which was read 
on the same Sabbath as the parashah from the Pentateuch, in 
Dent. i. 1 sqq. It was, as we shall afterwards see, a very 
thoughtful principle of selection which led to the combination 
of precisely these two lessons. 

Title of the collection, as given in ver. It" Seeing of Yesha- 
ydhUf son of Amoz, which he saw over JudcJi and Jerusalem in 
the days of 'Vzziyahu, Jotham, Alias, and YehizMyahu, the 
Hngs of Judah." Isaiah is called the " son of AmozV There 
13 no force in the old Jewish doctrine (6. Megiila 15a), which 
was known to the fathers, that whenever the name of a 
prophet's father is given, it is a proof that the father was also 
a prophet. And we are just as incredulous about another old 
tradition, to the effect that Amoz was the brother of Amaziah, 
the father and predecessor of Uzziah (J. Sota 106). There is 
some significance in this tradition, however, even if it is not 
true. There is something royal in the nature and bearing of 
Isaiah throughout. He spetJts to kings as if he himself were 



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70 THE PBOPHE0IE8 Or ISAUH. 

a king. He confronts with majesty the magnates of the nation 
and of the imperial power. In his peculiar style, he occapies 
the same place among the prophets aa Solomon among the kings. 
Under all circumstances, and in whatever state of mind, he is 
completely master of his materials — simple, yet majestic in his 
style — elevated, yet without affectation — and heautiful, though 
nnadorned. But this regal character had its roots somewhere 
else than in the blood. All that can be affirmed with certainty 
is, that Isaiah was a native of Jerusalem ; for notwithstanding 
his manifold prophetic missions, we never find him outside 
Jerusalem. There he Jived with his wife and children, and, as 
we may infer from ch. xxii. 1, and the mode of his inter- 
course with king Hezekiah, down in the lower city. And there 
he laboured under the four kings named in ver. 1, viz. Uzziah 
(who reigned 52 years, 811-759), Jotham (16 years, 759-743), 
Ahaz (16 years, 743-728), and Hezekiah (29 years, 728-699). 
The four kings are enumerated without a Vav cop, ; there is the 
same asyndeton enumeraiivum as in the titles to the books of 
Hosea and Micah. Hezekiah ia there called Yehizkiyah, the 
form being almost the same as ours, with the simple elision of 
the concluding sound. The chronicler evidently preferred the 
fullest form, at the commencement as well as the termination. 
Koorda imagines that the chronicler derived this ilUshaped form 
from the three titles, where it is a copyist's error for If'JPt'!'! or 
"'j?t'71i hut the estimable grammarian has overlooked the fact 
that the same form is found in Jer. xv. 4 and 2 Kings zx. 10, 
where no such error of the pen can have occurred. Moreover, 
it is not an ill-shaped form, if, instead of deriving it from the 
piel, aa Roorda does, we derive it from the kal of the verb 
("strong is Jehovah," an imperfect noun with a connecting i, 
which is frequently met with in proper names from verbal roots, 
such as JeiimiSl from dm, 1 Chron. iv. 36 : vid. Olshansen, 
5 277, p. 621). Under these four kings Isaiah labonred, or, as 
it ia expressed in ver. 1, saw the sight which is committed to 
writing in the book before us. Of all the many Hebrew syno- 
nyms for seeing, nin (cf. cemere, Kplveiv, and the Sanscrit and 
Persian kar, which ia founded upon the radical notion of cutting 
and separating) ia the standing general expression used to denote 
prophetic perception, whether the form in which the divine 
revelation was made to the prophet was in vision or by word. 



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EXPOsrrioK. 71 

In either case he lato it, becaase lie distinguished this divine 
revelation from his own conceptions and thoughts by means of 
that inner sense, which is designated by the name of the noblest 
of all the five external senses. From this verb chcuah there 
came both the abstract ehazon, seeing, and the more concrete 
cliizzayon, a sight (vuum), -which is a stronger form of ehizyon 
(from chaxai = chaeaJt). The noun cJuuion is indeed used to 
denote a particular sight (comp. Isa. xxix. 7 with Job zx. S, 
ssxiii. 15), inasmuch as it consbts in seeing (visio) ; but here 
in the title of the book of Isaiah the abstract meaning passes 
over into the collective idea of the eight or vision in all its 
extent, i.e, the sum and substance of all that was seen. It is a 
great mutake, therefore, for any one to argue from the ose of 
the word chazon (vision), that ver. la was originally nothing 
more than the heading to the first prophecy, and that it was only 
by the addition of ver. lb that it received the stamp of a general 
title to the whole book. There is no force in the argument. 
Moreover, the chronicler knew the book of laaiah by this title 
(2 Chron. xxxii. 32) ; and the titles of other books of prophecy, 
such as Hosea, Amos, Micah, and Zephanlah, are veiy similar. 
A more plausible argument in favour of the twofold origin of 
ver. 1 has been lately repeated by Schegg and Meier, namely, 
that whilst " Judah and Jerusalem" are appropriate enough as 
defining the object of the first prophecy, the range is too 
limited to apply to all the prophecies that follow ; since their 
object is not merely Judah, including Jerusalem, but they are 
also directed against foreign nations, and at ch. vii. the king of 
Israel, including Samaria, also comes within the horizon of the 
prophet's vision. And In the title to the book of Micah, both 
kingdoms are distinctly named. But it was necessary there, 
inasmuch as Micah commences at once with the approaching 
overthrow of Samaria. Here the designation is a central one. 
Even, according to the well-known maxims a potioriy and a 
proximo, JU denomtnatio, it would not be unsuitable ; but Judah 
and Jerusalem are really and essentially the sole object of the 
prophet's vision. For within the largest circle of the imperial 
powers there lies the smaller one of the neighbouring nations ; 
and in this again, the still more limited one of all Israel, in- 
cluding Samaria ; and within this the still smaller one of the 
kingdom of Jndah. And all these ciroles together form the 



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72 THE PROPHECIES OF ISAUH. 

circumference of Jerusalem, Bince the entire history of tha 
world, BO far as its inmost pragmatism and its ultimate goal 
were concerned, was the history of the church of God, which 
had for its peculiar site the citj of the temple of Jehovah, and 
of the kingdom of promise. The expression " concerning Judah 
and Jentaalem" is therefore perfectly applicable to the whole 
book, in which all that the prophet sees is seen from Jndah- 
Jerusalem aa a centre, and seen for the sake and in the interests 
of both. The title in ver. 1 may pass without hesitation as the 
heading written by the prophet's own hand. This b admitted 
not only by Caspari {Micah, pp. 90-93), hnt also by Hitzig 
and Knobel. By if ver. 1 contains the title to the whole book, 
where is the heading to the first prophecy t Are we to take 
ie'K as a nominative instead of an accusative (yut instead of 
guam, sc. vigwnem), as Luzzatto does T This is a very easy way 
of escaping from the difficulty, and stamping ver. 1 as the 
heading to the first prophetic words in ch. i. ; but it is un- 
natural, as ntn le'tt IMn, according to Ges. ($ 138, note 1), is 
the customary form in Hebrew of connecting the verb with its 
own substantive. The real answer is simple enough. The 
first prophetic address is left intentionally without a heading, 
just because it is the prologue to all the rest ; and the second 
prophetic address has a heading in ch. ii. 1, although it really 
does not need one, for the purpose of bringing out more sharply 
the true character of the first as the prologue to the whole. 



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FIRST HALF OF THE COLLECTION. 

CHAP. I.-XXX1X 



PART I. 



PROPHECIES RELATIKO TO THE ONWARD COURSE OF THE 
GREAT UASS OF THE PEOPLE TOWARDS HARDEHINa OF 
HEART (Chap. I.-VI.). 

OPENIMa ADDBEBS CONCEBHDIQ THE WATS OF JBHOTAH WITH 
HIS UNGKATEFUL AKD BEBELLIOnS NATION. — CHAP. I. i 
8QQ. 

The difficult queation as to the historical and chronological 
standpoint of this overture to all the following addresfies, can 
only be brought fully out when the exposition is concluded. 
Bat there is one thing which we may learn even from a cursory 
inspection : namely, that the prophet was standing at the event- 
ful boundary line between two distinct halves in the history of 
Israel. The people had not been brought to reflection and 
repentance eiUier by the riches of the divine goodness, which 
they had enjoyed in the time of Uzziah-Jotham, the copy of 
the times of David and Solomon, or by the chastisements of 
divine wrath, by which wound after wound was inflicted. The 
divine methods of education were exhausted, and all that now 
remained for Jehovah to do was to let the nation in its ezbting 
state be dissolved in fire, and to create a new one from the 
. remnant of gold that stood the £eiy test. At this time, so 
pregnant with storms, the prophets were more active than at 
any other period. Amos appeared about the tenth year of 
Uz^ah's reign, the twenty-fifth of Jeroboam II. ; Micah pn>- 



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74 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

phesiecl from tlie time of Jotham till the fall of Samana, in 
the uzth year of Hezekiah's reign ; but most prominent of all 
was Isaiah, the prophet par excellence, standing as he did mid- 
way between Moses and Christ. 

In the consciousness of his exalted position in relation to 
the history of salvation, he commences his opening address in 
Deuteronomic style. Modem critics are of opinion, indeed, that 
Deuteronomy was not composed till the time of Josiah, or at any 
rate not earlier than Manasseh ; and even Kabnis adduces this 
as a firmly established fact (see his Dogmatik, i. 277). Bat if 
this be the case, bow comes it to pass, not only that Micah (ch. 
vi. 8) points back to a saying in Deut. x. 12, but that all the 
post-Mosaic prophecy, even the very earliest of all, la tinged 
with a Deuteronomic colouring. This surely confirms the self- 
attestation of the authorship of Moses, which is declared most 
distinctly in ch. xxxi. 9. Deuteronomy was most peculiarly 
Moses' own law-book — his last will, as it were : it was also the 
oldest national book of Israel, and therefore the basis of all 
intercourse between the prophets and the nation. There is one 
portion of this peculiarly Mosaic thorah, however, which stands 
not only in a more truly primary relation to the prophecy of 
succeeding ages than any of the rest, bat in a normative rela- 
tion also. We refer to Moses' dying song, which has recently 
been expounded by Yolck and Camphausen, and is called thircUk 
haazinu (song of " Give ear"), from the opening words in cb. 
xxxii. This song is a compendious outline or draft, and also 
the common key to all prophecy, and bears the same funda- 
mental relation to it as the Decalogue to all other laws, and the 
Lord's Prayer to all other prayers. The lawgiver summed np 
the whole of the prophetic contents of his last words (ch. xxvii.— 
xxviii. xxix.-xxx.), and threw them into the form of a son^ 
that they might be perpetuated in the memories and mouths of 
the people. This song sets before the nation its entire history 
to the end of time. That history divides itself into fonr great 
periods : the creation and rise of Israel ; the ingratitude and 
apostasy of Israel ; the consequent surrender of Israel to the 
power of the heathen ; and finally, the restoration of Israel, 
sifted, but not destroyed, and the unanimity of all nations tn 
the praise of Jehovah, who reveals Himself both in judgment 
and in mercy. This fourfold character is not only verified la 



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CHAP. L 1 BQli. 75 

eyery part of the history of Israel, but is also the seal of that 
history as a whole, even to its remotest end, in New Testament 
times. In every age, therefore, this song has presented to 
Israel a mirror of its existing condition and fntore fate. And 
it was the task of the prophets to hold np this mirror to the 
people of their own times. This is what Isaiah does. He 
- begins his prophetic address in the same form in which Moses 
begins his song. The opening words of Moses are : " Give 
ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak ; and let the earth hear the 
words of my mouth" (Dent, xxxii. 1). In what sense he 
invoked the heaven and the earth, he tells ns himself in Deot. 
xxxi. 28, 29. He foresaw in spirit the future apostasy of Israel, 
and called heaven and earth, which would outlive his earthly 
life, that was now drawing to aclose, as witnesses of what he 
had to say to his people, with such a prospect before them, 
lamah commences in the same way (ch. i. 2a), simply trans- 
posing the two parallel verbs " hear" and " give ear :" "Sear, 
heavem, and give ear, earth ; for Jehovah epeaketh I " The 
reason for the appeal is couched in very general terms : they 
were to hear, because Jehovah was speaking. What Jehovah 
said coincided essentially with the words of Jehovah, which are 
introduced in Deut.' zxxii. 20 with the expression " And He 
said." What it was stated there that Jehovah would one day 
have to say in His wrath, He now said through the prophet, 
whose elating present corresponded to the coming _/w(«r« of the 
Mosaic ode. The time bad now arrived for heaven and earth, 
which are always existing, and always the same, and which had 
accompanied Israel's history thus far in all places and at all 
times, to fulfil their duty as witnesses, according to the word of 
the lawgiver. And this was just the special, true, and ultimate 
sense in which they were called «pon by t!he prophet, as they 
had previously been by Moses, to " hear." They had been 
present, and had taken part^ when Jehovah gave the thorah to 
Hia people : the heavens, according to Dent. iv. 36, as the 
place from which the voice of God came forth ; and the earth, 
as the scene of His great fire. They were solemnly invoked 
when Jehovah gave His people the choice between blessing 
and cursing, life and death (Deut. xxx. 19, iv. 26). And so 
now they are called upon to hear and join in bearing witness 
to all that Jehovah, ^eu: Creator, and the God of Israel, had 



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76 THE FBOFHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

to Bay, and the complaints that He had to make ; " / have 
brought up children, and raised tliem high, aitd they have fallen 
away from me" (ver. 26). Israel is referred to ; bnt Israel is not 
specially named. On the contrary, the historical facta are 
generalized almost into a parable, in order that the appalling 
condition of things which is crying to heaven may be made all 
the more apparent. Israel was Jehovah's son (Ex. iv. 22, 23). 
All the members of the nation were His children (Deut. xiv. 1, 
zzxii. 20). Jehovah was Israel's father, by whom it had been 
begotten (Dent, xxxii. 6, 18). The existence of Israel as a 
nation was secured indeed, like that of all other nations, by 
natural reproduction, and not by spiritual regeneration. Bnt 
the primary ground of Israel's origin was the supernatural and 
mighty word of promise given to Abraham, in Gen. xvii. 15, 
16; and it was by a series of manifestations of miraculous 
power and displays of divine grace, that the development of 
Israel, which dated from that starting-point^ was brought up to 
the position it had reached at the time of the exodos from 
JBgypt. It was in this sense that Israel had been begotten by 
Jehovah. And this relation between Jehovah and Israel, as 
His children, had now, at the time when Jehovah was speaking 
through the mouth of Isaiah, a long and gracious past behind 
it, viz. the period of Israel's childhood in Egypt ; the period of 
its youth in the desert ; and a period of growing manhood from 
Joshua to Samuel : so that Jehovah could say, " I have brought 
up children, and raised them high." The piel (giddel) used 
here signifies " to make great ;" and when applied to children, 
as it is here and in other passages, such as 2 Kings x, 6, it 
means to bring up, to make great, so far as nataral growth is 
concerned. The pilel (romem), which corresponds to the piel 
in the so-called tter^u cavis, and which is also used in ch. xxiii. 4 
and Ezek. xxxi. 4 as the parallel to giddel, signifiea to lift up, 
and is used in a " dignified (dignitative) sense," with reference 
to the position of eminence, to which, step by step, a wise and 
loving father advances a child. The two verses depict the 
state of Israel in the times of David and Solomon, as one of 
mature manhood and proud exaltation, which had to a certun 
extent returned under Uzziah and Jotham. Bat how base had 
been the return which it had made for all that it had received 
from God : " And th^ have fallen away from me'' We should 



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CHAP. L & 77 

liave expected an adversative particle here ; but instead of that, 
we have merely a Vav cop., which is used energetically, as in 
ch. vi. 7 (cf. Ho3, vii. 13). Two things which ought never to 
be coupled — Ifirael'H filial, relation to Jehovah, and Israel's base 
rebellion against - Jehovah — had been realized in their most 
contradictory forms. The radical meaning of the verb is to 
break away, or break loose ; and the object against which the 
act is directed ia construed with Beth. The idea is that of 
dissolving connection with a person with violence and self- 
will ; here it relates to that inward severance from God, and 
renunciation of Him, whibh preceded all outward acts of sin, 
and which not only had idolatry for its ful] and outward mani- 
festation, but was truly idolatry in all its forms. From the 
time that Solomon gave himself up to the worship of idols, 
at the close of his reign, down to the days of Isaiah, idolatry 
had never entirely or pecmanently ceased to exist, even in 
public. In two different reformations the attempt had been 
made to suppress it, viz. in the one commenced by Asa and 
concluded by Jehoshaphat ; and in the one carried out by 
Joash, during the lifetime of the high priest Jehoiada, his tutor 
and deliverer. But*the first was not successful in suppressing 
it altogether ; and what Joash removed, returned with double 
abominations as soon as Jehoiada was dead. Consequently the 
words, " They have rebelled against me," which sum up all the 
ingratitude of Israel in one word, and trace it to its root, apply 
to the whole history of Israel, from its culminating point under 
David and Solomon, dowi^ to the prophet's own time. 

Ver. 3. Jehovah then complains that the rebellion with which 
His children have rewarded Him is not only inhuman, but even 
worse than that of the brutes : " An ox kTwioeth its owner, and 
an aas its master a crib : Israel doth not know, my people doth not 
consider." An ox has a certain knowledge of its buyer and 
owner, to whom it willingly submits ; and an ass has at least a 
knowledge of the crib of its master (the noun for "master" is 
in the plural : this is not to be nnderstood in a namerical, but 
in an amplifying sense, " the authority over it," as in Ex. xxi. 
29 : vid. Ges. § 108, 2, b, and Dietrich's Heb. Gram. p. 45), 
I.e. it knows that it is its master who fills Its crib or manger 
widi fodder {evus, the crib, from avas, to feed, is radically asso- 
dated witn ^arirri, vulgar iradjn), Dor. and Lac. trarvti, and ia 



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78 THE FBOPHEOIES OF ISAIAH. 

applied in the Talmud to the large common porringer nsed \>y 
labourers).' Israel had no snch knowledge, neither instinctive 
and direct, nor acquired by reflection (hithlotuxn, the reflective 
conjugation, with a pausal change of the e into a long a, accord- 
ing to G}«s. S 54, note). The expressions " doth not know" 
and " doth not consider" mast not be taken here in an object- 
less sense, — as, for example, in ch. Ivi. 10 and Ps. Ixxxii. 5, — viz. 
as signifying they were destitute of all knowledge and reflec- 
tion ; but the object is to be supplied from what goes before : 
they knew not, and did not consider what answered in their 
case to the owner and to the crlVwhich the master fills," — 
namely, that they were the children and possession of Jehovah, 
and that their existence and prosperity were dependent upon 
the grace of Jehovah alone. The parallel, with its striking 
contrasts, is self-drawn, like that in Jer. .viii. 7, where animals 
are referred to again, and is clearly indicated in the words 
" Israel" and " my people." Those who were so far surpassed 
in knowledge and perception even by animals, and so thoroughly 
pot to shame by them, were not merely a nation, like any other 
nation on the earth, but were " Israel," descendants of Jacob, 
the wrestler with God, who wrestled down the wrath of God, 
and wrestled out a blessing for himself and his descendants ; 
and *' my people," the nation which Jehovah had chosen out 
of all other nations to be the nation of His possession, and His 
own peculiar government. This nation, bearing as it did the 
God-given title of a hero of faith and prayer, this favourite 
nation of Jehovah, had let itself down far below the level of 
the brutes. This is the complaint which the exalted speaker 
pours ont in vers. 2 and 3 before heaven and earth. The words 
of God, together with the introduction, consist of two tetras- 
tichs, the measure and rhythm of which are determined by the 
meaning of the words and the emotion of the speaker. There 
is nothing strained in it at all. Prophecy lives and moves 
amidst the thoughts of God, which prevail above the evil 
reality : and for that very reason, as a reflection of the glory 

* Nedarim iv. 4 jer. Denial viiL The stable is called repheth. Even in 
]'er. Shebuoth viiL 1, where cattle are spoken of as Htandiog b'emu, the word 
BiKiiifieB a crib or manger, not a atSible. Lnzzatto tries to prove that eriu 
eigaifiea a threehing-floor, and indeed an eaclofied f lace, in diatinction iicm 
gerenf but he is mistaken. 



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OEAP. L 4 79 

of God, which is the ideal of beaaty (Fa. 1. 1), it is throagh 
and through jKietical. That of Isaiah is especially so. There 
was no art of osatory practised in Israel, which Isaiah did not 
master, and which did not serve as the vehicle of the word of 
God, after it had taken shape in the prophet's mind. 

With Ter, 4 there commences a t^itally different rhythm. 
The wcnrds of Jehovah are ended. The piercing lamentation 
of the deeply grieved Father is also the severest accosation. 
The cause of God, however, is to the prophet the cause of a 
friend, who feels an injury done to his friend quite as much 
as if it were done to himself (ch. v. 1). The lamentation of 
God, therefore, is changed now into violent scolding and 
threatening on the part of the prophet; and in accordance 
with the deep wrathful pain with which he is moved, his words 
pour out with violent rapidity, like flash after flash, in climactic 
clauses having no ontward connection, and each consisting of 
only two or three words. — ^Ver. 4. " Woe upon the ainful nation, 
the guiU-laden people, tlte miscreant race, the children acting cor- 
ruptly ! They haoe forsaken Jehovah, blasphemed IsraeVs Holy 
One, turned away backwards." The distinction sometimes 
drawn between hoi (with He) and oi (with A leph) — as equivalent 
to oh I and woe I — cannot be sustained. Hoi is an exclamation 
of pain, with certain donbtful exceptions; and in the case before 
us it is not BO mach a denunciation of woe (vce genti, as the Vul- 
gate renders it), as a lamentation (r<B genlem) filled with wrath. 
The epithets which follow point indirectly to that which Israel 
ought to have been, according to the choice and determination 
of God, and plainly declare what it had become through its 
own choice and ungodly self-determination. (1.) According to 
the choice and determination of God, Israel was to he a holy 
nation (goi kadosh, Ex. xix. 6); but it was a sinful nation — gens 
peeeatrie, as it is correctly rendered by the Vulgate. KUn is not 
a participle here, but rather a participial adjective in the sense 
of what was habitual. It b the singular in common use for 
the plural D'Hsri, Binners, the singnlar of which was not used. 
Holy and Sinful are glaring contrasts : for kadosh, so far as 
its radical notion is concerned (assuming, that is to say, that 
this is to be found in kad and not in dosh : see Psalter, i. 588, 9), 
signifies that which is separated from what is common, nn- 
clean^ or sinful, and raised above it. The alliteration in hei goi 



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t)0 THE PBOPHBCIES OF ISAUH. 

implies that the nation, sa sinful, vaa a nation of woe. (2.) In 
the ihorah Israel was called not only " a hoiy nation," but also 
"the people of Jehovah" (Num. xvii. 6, Eng.;rer. xyi. 41), the 
people chosen and blessed of Jehovah ; but now it had become 
"a people heavy with iniquity." Instead of the most natmra] 
ezprassioD, a people bearing heavy sins ; the sin, or iniquity, 
i^. the weight carried, is attributed to the people themselves 
upon whom the weight rested, according to the common figu- 
rative idea, that whoever carries a heavy burden is so much 
beavier himself (cf. gravis oneribva, Cicero). |^^ (sin regarded 
as crookedness and perversity, whereas xpn suggests the idea 
of going astray and missing the way) is the word commonly 
used wherever the writer intends to describe sin in the mass 
(e^. ch. xxxiii. 24; Gen, xv. 16, xix. 15), including the guilt 
occasioned by it The people of Jehovah had grown into a 
people heavily laden with guilt. So crushed, so altered into the 
very opposite, had Israel's true nature become. It is with do- 
liberate intention that we have rendered "^ a nation {Nation), 
and B? a people ( Volk) : for, according to Malbim's correct defi- 
nition of the distinction between the two, the former is used 
to denote the mass, as linked together by common descent, 
language, and country; the latter the people as bound together 
by unity of government (see, for example, Ps. cr. 13). Conse- 
qaently we always read of the people of the Lord, not the 
nation of the Lord ; and there are only two instances in which 
ffoi is attached to a suffix relating to the ruler, and then it 
relates to Jehovah alone (Zeph, ii. 9 ; Fs. cvi. 5). (3.) Israel 
bore elsewhere the honourable title of the seed of the patriarch 
(ch. xli, S, xlv. 19 ; cf. Gen. xxi. 12) ; but in reality it was a 
seed of evil-doers (miscreants). This does not mean that it was 
descended from evil-doers; but the genitive is nsed in the sense 
of a direct apposition to zera (seed), as in ch. ]xv. 23 (cf. 
ch, Ixi. 9, vi. 13, and Ges. § 116, 5), and the meaning is a 
seed which consists of evil-doers, and therefore is apparently 
descended from evil-doers instead of from patriarchs. This 
last thought is not implied in the genitive, but in the idea of 
'' seed ; " which is always a compact unit, having one ongin, 
and bearing the character of its origin in itself. The render- 
ing brood of evil-doers, however it may accord with the seneey 
would be inaccurate ,- for " seed of evil-doers " is just the same 



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GBAP. L 4. SI 

as "house of evil-doers" in ch. mci. 2. The singular of the 
noon D''inp is n°, with the usual sharpening in the case of 
gutturals in the verba IfV, jno with patach, jng with himeiz in 
pause (ch. is. 16, which see), — a noun derived from the htphU 
participle. (4.) Those who were of Israel were " children of 
Jehovah" through the act of God (Deut. xiv. 1) ; hut in their 
own acts they were "children acting destructively" (bdnim 
tnasltchithim), so that what the thorah feared and predicted had 
now occurred (Deut. iv. 16, 25, xxzi. 29). In all these passages 
we find the hiphil, and in the parallel passage of the great song 
(Deut xxxii. 5) Aepiel — both of them conjugations which con- 
tain within themselves the object of the action indicated (Ges. 
S 53, 2) : to do what is destructive, t.& so to act as to become 
destructive to one'sself and to others. It is evident from ver. 
2b, that the term children is to be understood as indicating 
their relation to Jehovah (cf. ch. zxx. 1, 9). The four inter- 
jectjonal clauses are followed by three declaratory clauses, 
which describe Israel's apostasy as total in every respect, and 
complete the mournful seven. There was apostasy in heart : 
" They have forsaken Jehovah." There was apostasy in words : 
" They blaspheme the Holy One of Israel." The verb literally 
means to sting, then to mock or treat ecomfully ; the use of 
it to denote blasphemy is antiquated Mosaic (Deut. xzxi. 20 ; 
Num. xiv, 11, 23, xvi, 30). It is with intention that God is 
designated here as "the Holy One of Israel," — a name which 
constitutes the keynote of all Isaiah's prophecy (see at ch. vi. 3). 
It was sin to mock at anything holy; it was a doable ein 
to mock at God, the Holy One ; but it was a threefold sin 
for Israel to mock at God the Holy One, who had set Himself 
to be the sanctiiier of Israel, and required that as He was 
Israel's sanctification, He should also be sanctified by Israel 
according to His holiness (Lev. xiz. 2, etc.). And lastly, 
there was also apostasy in action ; " th^ have turned away 
backwards ;" or, as the Vulgate renders it, abalienali sunt. I^tj 
is the reflective of nir, related to 1H and ~i!D, for which it is the 
word commonly used in the Targum. The niplial, which is 
only met with here, indicates the deliberate character of their 
estrangement from God ; and the expression is rendered still 
more emphatic by the introduction of the word "backwards" 
{achor, which is osed emphatically in the place of nnKo). In 
Toil. I. r 



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88 THE PB0PHECIE8 07 ISAUH. 

ftll tbeir actions they ought to have Mlowed Jeho'/ah ; bat they 
had tamed their backs apoa Hiro, and taken the way selected 
by themselves. — ^Ver. 5. In this verse a dispated question arises 
as to the words fiD"?? (fiDj the shorter, sharper form of no, 
which is common even before non-gattarals, Ges. § 32, 1): viz. 
whether they mean " wherefore," as the LXX., Targums, 
Vulgate, and most of the early versions render them, or " upon 
what," i.e. apon which part of the body, as others^ inclnding 
SchrSring, suppose. LuEzatto maintains that the latter render- 
ing is spiritless, more especially because there is nothing in the 
fact that a limb has been struck already to prevent its being 
struck again; but such objections as these can only arise in 
connection with a purely literal interpretation of the passage. 
If we adopted this rendering, tlie real meaning would be, that 
there was no judgment whatever that had not already fallen 
upon Israel on account of its apostasy, so that it was not far 
from utter destruction. We agree, however, with Gaspari in 
deciding in favour (rf the meaning "to what" (to what end). 
For in all the other passages iu which the expression occurs 
(fourteen times in all), it is used in this sense, and once even 
with the verb ktcoAky to smite (Num. xxii. 32), whilst it is only 
in ver. 6 that tbe idea of the people as one body is introduced ; 
whereas the questicm ''apon what" would require that the 
reader or hearer should presuppose it here. But in adopting 
tbe rendering " whereto," or to what end, we do not understand 
it, as Malbim does, in the sense of cttt bono, with the underlying 
thought, " It would be ineffectual, as all the previous smiting has 
proved;" for this thought never comes out in a direct expression, 
as we should expect, but rather — according to the analogy of the 
questions with {amah in Eeek. xviii. 31, Jer, x]jv. 7 — in tbe sense 
of qua de causa, with the underlying thought, " There would be 
only an infatuated pleasure in your own destruction." — Ver, 5a 
we therefore render thus : *' Why would ye he perpetually 
tmitten, multiplying rebellion f liff (with tipkchah, a stronger 
disjunctive than tebir) belongs to ^i^ ; see the same form of 
accentuaUon in Ezek. xiz. 9. They are not two distinct int«r- 
rogative clauses (" why would ye be smitten afresh T why do ye 
add revolt t" — Luzzatto), but the second clause is subordinate 
to the first (without there being any necessity to supply ehi, 
** because" aa Gesenius supposes), ao adverbial minor clause 



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definiDg the main clause more precisely ; at all events this is 
the logical connection, as in ch. t. 11 (cf. Ps. Ixii. 4, "delight- 
ing in lies," and Ps. iv. 3, " loving vanity ") : LXX. ** adding 
iniqnity." Sdrdk (rebellion) is a deviation from truth and rec- 
titude; and here, as in many other instances, it denotes apostasy 
from Jehovah, who is the absolately GcxhI, and absolute 
goodness. There is a still farther dispute whether the next 
words should be rendered "every head" and " every heart," 
or "the whole head" and "the whole heart." In prose the 
latter would be impossible, as the two nouns are written with- 
out the article; bat in the poetic style of the prophets the 
article may be omitted after eol, when used in the sense of "the 
whole" («.^.ch. ix. 12: with whole mouth, i,e. with full mouth). 
Nevertheless eol, without the article following, never signifies 
"the whole" when it occurs several times in succession, as in 
ch. XV. 2 and Ezek. vii. 17, 18. We must therefore render 
ver. 56, "Every head is diseased, and every heart is sick." 
The Lamed ui loclioU indicates the state into which a thing 
has come: every head in a state of disease (Ewald, § 217, d: 
lockoU withoDt the article, as in 2 Chron. xxi. 19). The pro- 
phet asks his fellow-conn try men why they are so foolish as 
to heap apostasy upon apostasy, and so continue to call down 
the judgments of God, which have already fidlen upon them 
blow after blow. Has it reached such a height with them, 
that among all the many heads and hearts there is not one 
head which b not in a diseased state, mot one heart which is 
not thoroughly ill? (davvai an emphatic form of daveh.) Head 
and heart are mentioned as the noblest parts of the outer and 
inner man. Outwardly and inwardly every individual in the 
nation had already been smitten by the wrath of God, so that 
they had had enough, and might have been brought to reSection. 
This description of the total miseiy of every individual in 
the nation is followed by a representation of the whole nation 
as one miserably diseased body. Ver. 6. " From the sole of 
the foot even to the head there is nothing sound in it : cuts, 
and stripes, and festering wounds ; they have not been pressed 
out, nor bound up, nor has there been any soothing with oil" 
The body of the nation, to which the expression " in it" 
applies (i.e, the nation as a whole), was covered with wounds 
of different kinds ; and no means whatever had been applied 



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84 THE PBOFHECnS 07 ISAIAH. 

to heal these many, Tarions woanda, which laj all together, 
close to one another, and one upon the other, corering the 
whole bodj. Cuts (from inCB, to cnt) are wounds that have 
cut into the flesh — sword-cats, for example. These need 
binding up, in order that the gaping wound may close again. 
Stripes {ehabburdhy from ehdbar, to stripe), swollen stripes, 
or weals, as if from a cut with a whip, or a blow with a 
fist: these require softening with oil, that the coagulated 
blood or swelling may disperse. Festering wounds, maccdh 
teriifdh, from tdrdh, to be fresh (a different word from the 
talmudic word (re, Chullin 45&, to thrust violently, so as to 
shake) : these need pressing, for the purpose of cleansing 
them, so as to facilitate their healing. Thus the three 
predicates manifest an approsimatioQ to a chiagtn (the cross- 
ing of the members) ; but this retrospective relation is not 
thoroughly carried out. The predicates are written in the 
plural, on account of the collective subject. The clause 
jotfa naan [6i, which refers to mmn (stripes), so far as the 
sense is concerned (olive-oil, like all oUosa, being a dispers- 
ing medium), is to be taken as neuter, since this is the 
only way of explaining the change in the number: "And 
no softening has been effected with oil." Zora we might 
suppose to be a pual, especially on account of the other 
pwxls near : it is not so, however, for the simple reason that, 
according to the accentuation (viz. with two pashtahi, the 
first of which gives the tone, as in toktt, Gen. i. 2, so that 
it must be pronounced zdru), it has the tone upon the penul- 
timate, for which it would he impossible to discover any 
reason, if it were derived from zdrdh. For the assumption 
that the tone is drawn back to prepare the way for the 
strong tone of the next verb (chubhdslm) is arbitrary, as tlie 
influence of the pause, though it sometimes reaches the last 
word but one, never extends to the last but two. Moreover, 
according to the usage of speech, zordh signifies to be dis- 
persed, not to be pressed out; whereas zur and z&rar are 
commonly used in the sense of pressing together and squeez- 
ing out. Consequently zoru is either the kal of an intran- 
sitive zor in the middle voice (like boshu), or, what is mora 
probable — as zoru, the middle voice in Ps. Iviii. 4, has a 
different meaning (iibalienati sunt : cf . ver. 4) — the hd of 



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CHAP. 1. 7. 65 

idrar («= Arab, eonstringere), which is here conjogated as 
an intransitive (cf. Job xxiv. 24, rommu, and Gen. xlix. 23, 
where robbu is used in an active aense). The surgical treat- 
ment BO needed by the nation was a jigorative representation 
of the pastoral addresses of the prophets, which, had been 
delivered indeed, bnt, inasmuch as their salutary effects were 
dependent upon the penitential sorrow of the people, might 
as well have never been delivered at all. The people had 
despised the merciful, compasnonate kindness of their God. 
They bad no liking for the radical cure which the prophets 
bad offered to effect. All the more pitiable, therefore, was 
the condition of tbe body, which was sick within, and diseased . 
from bead to foot. The prophet is speaking here of tbe 
existing state of things. He afBrms that it is all over with 
the nation; and this is the ground and object of his reproach- 
ful lamentations. Consequently, when he passes in the next 
verse from figurative language to literal, we may presume 
that he is still speaking of his own times. It is Isaiah's 
custom to act in this manner as his own expositor (compare 
ver. 22 with ver. 23). The body thus inwardly and outwardly 
diseased, was, strictly speaking, the people and the land in 
their fearful condition at that time. This is described more 
particularly in ver. 7, which commences with the most general 
view, and returns to it again at the close. Ver. 7. " Your land 
. . a desert; your cities . . burned with Jire; your field . . 
foreigners consuming it before your eyes, and a desert like 
overthrowing by strangers," Oaapari has pointed out, in hia 
Introduction to the Book of Isaiah (p, 204), how nearly every 
word corresponds to the curses threatened in Lev. xxvi. and 
Deut. xsviii. (xxix.) ; Mic, vi. 13-16 and Jer, v. 15 sqq. stand 
in the very same relation to these sections of the Pentateuch. 
From the time of Isaiah downwards, the state of Israel was 
a perfect realization of the curses of the law. The prophet 
inten^onally employs tbe words of the law to describe bis own 
times; he designates the enemy, who devastated tbe land, 
reduced its towers to ashes, and took possession of its crops, by 
the simple term zarim, foreigners or barbarians (a word which 
would have tbe very same meaning if it were really the re- 
duplication of the Aramaean bar ; compare the Syriac barSye, 
a foreigner), without mentioning their particular nationality. 



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86 TEE FBOPBECIES OF ISAIAH. 

He abstracts himself from tke definite historical present, in 
order that he may point out all the more emphatically how 
tboronghly it hears the character of the fore-ordained curse. 
The most emphatic indication of this was to be found in the 
fact, which the clause at the close of ver. 7 paltndromically 
affirms, that a desolation had been brought about "like the 
overthrow of foreigners." The repetition of a catchword like 
zarim (foreigners) at the close of the Terse in this emphatjc 
manner, is a figure of speech, called epanapkora, peculiar to 
the two halves of our collection. The question arises, however, 
whether zarim is to be regarded as the genitive of the subject, 
as Caspari, Knobel, and others suppose, "snch an overthrow 
as is commonly produced by barbarians" (cf. 2 Sam. z. 8, 
where the verb occurs), or as the genitive of the subject, *' such 
an overthrow as comes upon barbarians." As mahpechdh (ovei^ 
throw) is used in other places in which it occurs to denote the 
destruction of Sodom, Gomorrah, etc., according to the primary 
passage Deut. xxix. 22, and Isaiah had evidently also this 
catastrophe in his mind, as ver. 8 clearly shows ; we decide in 
favour of the conclusion that zdrim is the genitive of the object 
(cf. Amos iv. 11). The force of the comparison is also more ob- 
vious, if we understand the words in this sense. The desolation 
which had fallen upon the land of the people of God resembled 
that thorough desolation {aubversio) with which God visited 
the nations outside the covenant, who, like the people of the 
Pentapolis, were swept from off the earth without leaving a 
trace behind. But although there was similarity, there was 
not sameness, as vers, 8, 9 distinctly afiBnn. Jerusalem itself 
was still preserved ; but in how pitiaUe a condition 1 There 
can be no doubt that batJirZion ("daughter of Zion," £ng. 
Ter.) in ver. .8 signifies Jerusalem. The geniUve in this case 
is a genitive of apposition: "daughter Zion," not "daughter 
of Zion " (cf. ch. zxxvii. 22 : see Ges. § 116, 5). Zion itself is 
represented as a daughter, t.«. as a woman. The expression 
applied primarily to the eomtnunify dwelling around the fortress 
of Zion, to which the individual inhabitants stood in the Game 
relation as children to a mother, inasmuch as the community 
sees its members for the time being come into existence and 
grow: they are bom within her, and, as it were, bom and bronght 
up by her. It was then applied secondarily to the «tty itself. 



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CHAP, n 87 

with or without the inhabitants (cf. Jer. xlvi. Id, zlviii. 18; 
Zech. ii. 11). In this instance the latter are included, «s ver. 9 
clearly shows. This is precisely the point in the £rst two com- 
parisons. Ver. 8a. " And tka datighter ofZion remaint tike a hut 
in a vineyard ; like a kammock in a cucumber field" The vine- 
yard and cucnmtter field {mikthah, from hitthu, a cucumher, 
cucumis, not a gourd, eucurbita; at least not the true round 
gourd, whose Hebrew name, dakuOh, does not occur in the Old 
Testament) are pictured by the prophet in their condition 
before the harvest (not after, as the Targums render it), when 
it is necessary that they should be watched. The point of 
comparison therefore is, that in the vineyard and encumber 
field aot* a human being is to be seen in any direction'; and 
there is nothing bat the cottage and the night barrack or 
hammock (cf. Job xxvii. 18) to show that there are any human 
tieings there at all. So did Jerusalem stand in the midst of 
desolation, reaching far and wjde, — a sign, however, that 
the land was not entirely depopulated. But what is the 
meaning of the third point of comparison? Hitzig renders 
it, "like a watch-tower;" Knohel, "like a guard-city." But 
the noun neither means a tower nor a castle (although the 
latter would be quite possible, according to the primary mean- 
ing, cingere) ; and nesurdh does not mean " watch " or " guard." 
On the other hand, the compai'lson indicated (like, or as) does 
not suit what would seem the most natural rendering, viz. 
" like a guarded city," t.(. a city shielded from danger. More- 
over, it is inadmissible to take the first two Caphs in the sense of 
ticut (as) and the third in the sense of mc (so) ; since, although 
this correlative is common in clauses indicating identity, it 
is not so in sentences which institute a simple comparison. 
We therefore adopt the rendeiing, ver. 8b, ^*As a besieged 
eily" deriving nezurSIi not from zur^ ;iiphal ndzor (never used), 
as Luzzatto does, but from n&zar, which signifies to observe 
with keen eye, either with a good intention, or, as in Job vii. 20, 
for a hostile parpose. It may therefore be employed, like the 
synonyms in 2 Sam. si. 16 and Jer. v. 6, to denote the recon- 
noitring of a city. Jerusalem was not actually blockaded at 
the time when the prophet ottered his predictions; but it was 
like a blockaded city. In the case of such a city there is a 
desolate space, completely cleared of human beings, left between 



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So TBE PB0PHECIE3 OF ISAUH. 

it and the blockading army, in the centre of which the city itself 
stands solitary and still, shut np to itself. The citizens do not 
venture out; the enemy does not come within the circle that 
immediately surronnds the city, for fear of the shots of the 
citizens ; and everything within this circle is destroyed, either 
by the citizens themselves, to prevent the enemy from finding 
anything useful, or else by the enemy, who cut down the 
trees. Thus, with all the joy that might be felt at the pre- 
servation of Jerusalem, it presented but a gloomy appearance. 
It was, as it were, in a. state of siege. A proof thit this is the 
way in which the passage is to be explained, may he found in 
Jer. iv. 16, 17, where the actual storming of Jerusalem is 
foretold, and the enemy is called nozerini, probably with refer- 
ence to the simile before as. 

For the present, however, Jemsalem was saved from this 
extremity. — Ver. 9. The omnipotence of God had mereifully 
preserved it : " Unless Jehovah of hosts had Ufi ua a little of 
■what had escaped^ we had become like Sodom, toe were likt 
Gomorrah" Sand (which is rendered inaccurately avepfui 
in the Sept.; cf. Rom. ix. 29) was used, even in the early 
Mosaic usage of the language, to signify that which escaped 
the general destruction (Deut. ii. 34, etc.) ; and Q^?? (which 
might very well be connected with the verbs whicli follow : 
" we were very nearly within a little like Sodom," etc.) is to 
be taken in connection with sarid, as the pausal form clearly 
shows : " a remnant which was bnt a mere trifle " (on this 
nse of the word, 9ee cb. xvi. 14 ; 2 Chron. xii. 7 ; Prov. x, 20 ; 
Ps. cv. 12). Jeliovah Zebaoth stands first, for the sake of em- 
phasis. It would bare been all over with Israel long ago, if it 
had not been for the compassion of God (yid. Hos. xi. 8). 
And because it was the omnipotence of God, which set the will 
of His compassion in motion, He is called Jehovah Zebaoth, 
Jehovah (the God) of the heavenly hosts, — an expression in 
which Zebaoth is a dependent genitive, and not, as Luzzatto 
supposes, an independent name of God as the Absolute, em- 
bracing within itself all the powers of nature. The prophet 
says " us" and " we." He himself was an inhabitant of 
Jerusalem; and even if he had not been so, he was neveiv 
thelesB an Israelite. He therefore associates himself with bia 
people, like Jeremiah in Lam. iii. 22. He had had to ex- 



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CHAP. L W, IL 89 

perience the anger of God along with the rest ; and so, on the 
other hand, he also celebrates the mighty compassion of God, 
which he had experienced in common with them. Bat for this 
compassion, the people of God would have become like Sodom, 
from which only four human beings escaped : it would have 
resembled Gomorrah, which was abaolntely annihilated. (On 
the perfects in the pratasis and apodosia, see Ges. § 12€, 5.) 

The prophet's address has here reached a resting-place. 
The fact that it is divided at this point into two separate 
sections, is indicated in the text by the space left between 
vers. 9 and 10. This mode of marking lai^r or smaller 
sections, either by leaving spaces or by breaking off the line, 
is older than the vowel points and accents, and rests upon a 
tradition of the highest antiquity (Hnpfeld, Gram, p. 86 sqq.). 
The space is called pizka; the section indicated by such a 
space, a closed parashaA (^aethumak) ; and the section indicated 
by breaking off the line, an open parashah (pethuchah). The 
prophet stops as soon as he has affirmed, that nothing but the 
mercy of God has warded off from Israel the utter destruction 
which it so well deserved. He catches in spirit the remon- 
strances of his hearers. They would probably declare that the 
accusations which the prophet had brought against them were 
utterly groundless, and appeal to their scrupulous observance 
of the law of God. In reply to this self-vindication which he 
reads in the hearts of the accused, the prophet launches forth 
the accusations of God. In vers. 10, llj he commences thus : 
" Sear ths word of Jehovah, ye Sodom judges ; give ear to the 
law of our God, Gomorrah nation I What is the multitude 
of your slain-offeringa to mel saitk Jehovah. J am satiated 
tmth whole offerings of rams, and the fat of stalled calves; and 
blood of bulloch andsheep and he-goats I do not like," The 
second start in the prophet's address commences, like the first, 
with "hear" and "give ear." The summons to bear is ad- 
dressed in this instance (as in the case of Isaiah's contemporary 
Micah, ch. iii.) to the kezinim (from idzdh, decidere, from 
which cornea the Arabic el-Kadi, the judge, with the sub- 
stantive termination in.- see Jeehurun, p. 212 ss.), i.e. to the 
men of decisive authority, the rulers in the broadest sense, and 
to the people subject to them. It was through the mercy of 
God that Jerusalem was in existence still, for Jerusalem was 



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90 THE PROPHECIES OF ISAUB. 

" spiritually Sodom," as the Bevelation (xi. 8) distinctly afErma 
of Jerusalem, with evident allusion to this passage of Isaiah. 
Pride, last of the flesh, and umnerciful conduct, were the 
leading una of Sodom, according to Ezek. xvi. 49 ; and of 
these, the rulers of Jerosalem, and the crowd that was subject 
to them and worthy of them, were equally guilty now. But 
they fancied that they could not possibly stand in such evil 
repute with God, inasmuch as they rendered outward satis- 
faction to the law. The prophet therefore called upon them 
to hear the law of the God ot Israel, which he would announce 
to them : for the prophet was the appointed interpreter of the 
law, and prophecy the spirit of the law, and the prophetic 
institution the constant living presence of the trne essence of 
the law hearing its own witness in Israel. "To what purpose 
is the multitude of your sacrifices nuto me t saith Jehovah." 
The prophet intentionally uses the word "^O^', not 'iDtt : this 
was the incessant appeal of Gxid in relation to the spiritless, 
formal worship offered by the hypocritical, ceremonial right- 
eousness of Israel (the future denoting continuous action, 
which is ever at the same time both present and future). 
The multitude of zehdchiiOf i.t. animal sacrifices, had no wortli 
at all to Him. As the whole worship is summed up here in 
one single act, zebdckim appears to denote the ihelamim, peace- 
offerings (or better still, commonlon offerings), with which a 
weal was associated, after the style of a sacrificial festival, 
and Jehovah gave the worshippr a share ta the sacrifice 
offered. It is better, however, to take zehachim as the general 
name for all the bleeding sacrifices, which are then subdivided 
into 'olotJi and cketeb, as consisting partly of whole offerings, or 
offerings the whole of whidi was placed upon the altar, though 
in separate pieces, and entirely consumed, and partly of those 
sacrifices in which only the fat was eonsomed upon the altar, 
namely the un-<^erings, trespass-offerings, and pre-eminently 
the sheldmim offerings. Of the sacrificial animaJs mentioned, 
the bullocks (pdrim) and fed beasts (tnert'tm, fattened calves) are 
species of oxen {bakar) ; and the lambs (cebdshim) and he-goats 
(dtturtm, young he-goats, as distinguished from te'tr, the old 
long-haired he-goat, the animal used as a sin-offering), together 
with the ram (ayil, the customary whole offering of the high 
priest, of the tribe prince, and of the uation gependly on all the 



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CEAf. I. IS, II. 81 

high feast dajs), were species of the flock. The blood of these 
sacrificial animals — such, for esample, as the young oxen, sheep, 
and he-goats — was thrown all round the altar in the case of the 
whole offering, the peace-offering, and the trespass-offering ; in 
that of the sin-offering it was smeared upon the horns of the 
altar, poured out at the foot of the altar, and in some instances ' 
sprinkled upon the walls of the altar, or against the vessels of 
the inner sanctuary. Of such offerings as these Jehovah was 
weary, and He wanted no more (the two perfects denote that 
which long has been and still is : Ges. § 126, 3) ; in fact, He 
never had desired anything of the kind. Jeremiah says this witli 
regard to the sacrifices (ch. vii. 22) ; Isaiah also applies it to 
visits to the temple : Ver. 12. " Wh^n ye come to appear before my 
face, v)ko hath required this at your hand, to tread my courts V 
n^tn? is 8 contracted infinitive uiphal for nlton? (compare the 
hiphil forms contracted in the same manner in ch. iii. 8, 
xxiii. 11). This is the standing expression for the appearance 
of all male Israelites in the temple at the three high festivals, 
as prescribed by the law, and then for visits to the temple 
generally (cf. Ps. xlii. 3, Ixxxiv, 8). *^My face" (^nai): 
according to Ewald, \ 279, c, this is used with the passive to 
designate the subject (" to be seen by the face of God") ; but 
why not rather take it as an adverbial accusative, ** in the face 
of," or "in front of," as it is used interchangeably with the pre- 
positions 7, riM, and ^1 It is possible that ^iSv.'j? is pointed 
as it is here, and in Ex. xxxiv. 24 and Deut. xxsi. 11, instead 
of nltnS>,— like «"! for Wi*, in Ex. xxiii. 15, xxxiv. 20,— for the 
purpose of avoiding an expression which might be so easily mis- 
understood as denoting a sight of God with the bodily eye. But 
the niphal is firmly established in Ex. xxiii. 17, xxxIv. 23, and 
I Sam. i. 22 ; and i» the Mishnah and Talmud the terms n<en 
and [i'MT are applied without hesitation to appearance before 
God at the principal feasts. They visited the temple diligently 
enough indeed, but who had required this at their hand, i.e. 
required them to do this T Jehovah certainly had not. " To 
tread my courts" is in apposition to this, which it more clearly 
defines. Jehovah did not want them to appear before His face, 
i^. He did not wish for this spiritless and undevotional tramping 
thither, this mere oput operalum, which might as well have been 
omitted, since it only wore out the floor, — Ver. 13a. Because 



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92 THE PSOFHECIES 07 ISAIAff. 

tbey had not performed what Jehovah commanded as He com- 
manded it, He expressly forbids them to continue it. " CotUimu 
not to bring lying meat-offering; abominaiion incense is it to me." 
Minchah (the meat-offering) was the vegetable offering, as dis- 
tinguished from zebachf the animal sacrifice. It is called * 
" lying meat-offering," as being a hypocritical dead work, be- 
hind which there was none of the feeling which it appeared 
to express. In the second clause the Sept., Vulg., Oesenius, 
and others adopt tlie rendering " incense — an abomination is 
it to me," ketoreth being taken aa the name of the daily burning 
of incense upon the golden altar in the holy place (Ex. xxx. 8). 
But neither in Fs. cxii, 2, where prayer is offered by one who 
is not a priest, nor in the passage before ns, where the refer- 
ence is not to the priesthood, but to the people and to their 
deeds, is this conUnnal incense to be thought of. Moreover, it 
is much more natural to regard the word ketoreth not as a bold 
absolute case, but, according to the conjunctive darga with 
which it is marked, as constructive rather; and this is perfectly 
allowable. The meat-offering is called "incense" (ketoreth) with 
reference to the so-called azcarah, i.e. that portion which the 
priest humed upon the altar, to bring the grateful offerer into 
remembrance before God (called "burning the memorial," kiktif 
azcdrdh, in Lev. ii. 3). As a general rule, this was accompanied 
with incense (ch. Ixvi. 3), the whole of which was placed upon 
the altar, and not merely a small portion of it. The meat-offer- 
ing, with its sweet-sraeUJDg savour, was merely the form, which 
served as an outward expression of the thanksgiving for God's 
blessing, or the longing for His blessing, which really ascended 
in prayer. But in their case the form had no such meaning. It 
was nothing but the form, with which they thought they had 
satisfied God ; and therefore it was an abonunation to Him. 

Ver. 136. God was just as httle pleased with their punc- 
tilious observance of the feasts : " New-moon and Sabbath, 
calling of festal meetings . . . Z cannot bear UJigodlinesi and 
a festal croiad." The first objective notions, which are logi- 
cally governed by "I cannot bear" (MlK"i6: literally, a 
future hophal — I am onahle, incapable, viz. to bear, which 
may be supplied, according to Ps. ci. 5, Jer. xliv. 22, Prov. 
XXX. 21), become absolute cases here, on account of another 
grammatical object presenting itself in the last two nounii 



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CHAP. L 14. 93 

"ungodliness and a festal crowd." As for new-moon and 
Sabbath (the latter always signifies the weekly Sabbath when 
construed with chodetK), — and, in fact, the calling of meetinga 
of the whole congregation on the weekly Sabbath and high 
festivals, which was a simple duty according to Lev. xxiii., — 
Jehovah could not endure festivals associated with wickedness. 
TWJJ (from 1W, to press, or crowd thickly together) is synony- 
mous with M^^, BO far as its immediate signification is con- 
cerned, as Jer. ix. 1 clearly shows, just as vainjyvptii is 
synonymous with iKKKti<ria. IJS (from 'p», to breathe) is moral 
worthlessnesa, regarded as an utter absence of all that has 
true essence and worth in the sight of Qod. The prophet in- 
tentionally joins these two nonns together. A densely crowded 
festal meeting, combined with inward emptiness and barrenness 
on the part of those who were assembled together, was a con- 
tradiction which God could not endure. 

Ver. 14. He gives a still stronger expression to His repug- 
nance : " Your neto-moone and your fetHve seasons my soul 
hateih ; they have become a burden to me; I am weary of bear' 
ing them." As the soul (n^hesh) of a man, regarded as the 
band which unites together bodily and spintual life, though it 
is not the actual principle of self-consciousness, is yet the place 
in which he draws, as it were, the circle of self-consciousness, so 
as to comprehend the whole essence of His being in the single 
thought of "I;" so, according to a description taken from god- 
like man, the " soul" (rwpAcgA) of God, as the expression " my 
soul" indicates, is the centre of His being, regarded as encircled 
and pervaded (personated) by self-consciousness ; and therefore, 
whatever the sonl of God hates (vid. Jer. xv. 1) or loves 
(ch. xlii. 1), is hated or loved in the inmost depths and to 
the utmost bounds of His being (Psychol, p. 218). Thns He 
bated each and all of the festivals that were kept in Jerusalem, 
whether the beginnings of the month, or the high feast-days 
(moadim, in which, according to Lev. xxiii., the Sabbath was 
also included) observed in the course of the month. For a 
fong time past they had become a burden and annoyance to 
Him : His long-suffering was weary of such worship. " To 
bear'* (KB"?, in Isaiah, even in ch, xviii. 3, for nNb" or nxb, and 
here for hkbo : Ewald, § 285, c) has for its object the seasons 
of worship already mentioned. 



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94 THE FBOPHECIES OF IfiAUH. 

Ver. 15. Their self-rlghteonsness, so far as it rested upon 
sacrifices and festal observances, was now pnt to shame, and 
the last inward bolwark of the sham holy nation was destroyed ; 
" Andif ye stretch md your handg, I hide my e^es from you; if 
ye make ever so muchpraying, Ida not hear; your lumds are fuU 
of blood." Their praying was also an abomination to God. 
Prayer is somettiing common to maa : it is the interpreter of 
religions feeling, which intervenes and mediates between God 
and man ;* it is the true spiritnal sacrifice. The law contains 
no command to pray, and, with the exception of Dent, xxvi,, 
no form of prayer. Fraying is so natural to man as man, that 
there was no necessity for any precept to enforce this, the f nnda- 
mental expression of the true relation to God. The proph^ 
therefore comes to prayer last of all, so as to trace back their 
sbam-hoHness, which was corrupt even to this the last foun- 
dation, to its real nothingness. ** Spread out," parask, or pi. 
fSrSsJi, to stretch oat; used with cappaim to denote swimming 
in ch. XXV. 11. It is written here before a strong suffix, as in 
many other passages, e.g. ch. lii. 13, with the inflection t instead 
of e. This was the gesture of a man in prayer, who spread out 
his hands, and when spread out, stretched them towards heaven, 
or to the roost holy place in the temple, and indeed (as if witii 
the feeling of emptiness and need, and with a desire to receive 
divine ^fts) held np the hollow or palm of his hand (cappaim: 
cf. tendere palmas^ e.g. Virg- Aen. xii. 196, tenditque ad aidera 
palmas). However much they might stand or lie before Him in 
the attitude of prayer, Jehovah hid His eyes, i.e. His omniscience 
knew nothing of it ; and «ven though they might pray load and 

* Tbe primBij ictea of Mthpalld and UpkiUak is not to be obtained from 
Dcut. ix. 18 and Ezrl %. 1, as Dietrich and Fiirgt suppose, who make 
hithpaSel equiTftlent to hithnappel, to throw one's self down ; but from 1 Sam. 
ii. 25, "If amanBmagwnstaman, theaathoritieariglithim"/D"ri^iS6£n: 
it is qoite amietake to maintun tbtitElohim cannot have this meaning), i.e. 
the; can set right the rektion which he has disturbed. "Bat if one un 
ag^net Jehovah, ■vho shall mediate for him Mlr^Bri' 'D, quit mlercedat 
pro «o)?" Vfe may see from this tliat prajrer is regarded as mediation, 
which Bets right and establishes feUovsbip ; and kithpallel signifies to make 
one's self a healer of divisiona, or to aettle for one's self, to Btrive after a settle- 
ment (sibi, pro se, intercedere : cf. Job lix. 16, hilhc?iannen, sibi propitinm 
facere; liii. 27, hiihchakkak,aiMinaculpere,]iko the Assise icktuttit,tabo\ia<l 
ofi for one's self). 



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CHAP. L ML 9S 

long (gam eht, etiamti : compare the Bimple chi, Jer. xiv. 12), 
He was, as it were, deaf to it all. We shoold expect chi here 
to introduce the explanation ; but the more excited the speaker, 
the shorter and more unconnected his words. The plural 
daman always denotes human blood as the result of some 
unnatural act, and then the bloody deed and the bloodguilti- 
ness itself. The plural number neither refers to the quantity 
nor to the separate drops, but is the plural of production, which 
Dietrich has so elaborately discussed in his Abhandlung, p. 40.* 
The terrible damim stands very emphatically before the gorem- 
ing verb, pointing to many murderous acts that had been com- 
•nitted, and deeds of violence akin to mnrder. Not, indeed, 
that we are to understand the words as meaning that there was 
really blood upon their hands when they stretched them out in 
prayer ; but before God, from whom no outward show can 
hide the true nature of things, however clean they might bsve 
washed themselves, they still dripped with blood. The expostn- 
lations of the people against the divine accusatious have thus 
been negatively set forth and met in vera. 11-15 : Jehovah 
could not endure their work-righteous worship, which was thus 
defiled with unrighteous works, even to murder itself. The 
divine accusation is now positively established in vers. 16, 17, by 
the contrast drawn between the true righteousness of which the 
accused were destitute, and the false righteousness of which they 
boasted. The crushing charge is here changed into an admoni- 
tory appeal; and the love which is hidden behind the wrath, and 
would gladly break through, already begins to disclose itself. 
There are eight admonitions. The firat three point to the re- 
moval of evil; the other five to the performance of what is good. 
Ver. 16. The first three run thus: " Waak, clean your- 
selves; put away the badness of your doings from the range of 
my eyes ; cease to do eeil" This is not only an advance from 
figurative language to the most literal, but there is also an ad- 
vance in what is said. The first admonition requires, primarily 
and above all, purification from the sins committed, by means 

^ Aa chitlak Eu'gnifled com standing in tlie field, and cliittim com threshed 
itnd brought to the market, bo damim was not blood when flowing throagh 
the vdca, bnt when it had flowed out, — in other words, when it had been 
violently Bhed. (For the Talmudic misiiiterpTetBtion of t^e :rue state of 
(lie case, see my Generis, p. 626.) 



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99 THE PBOPHBOIKS OF ISAIAH. 

of fur^veDess songht for and obtained. Wash: rachatzUf from 
rachatz, in the frequent middle sense of washing one's self. Clean 
yourselves : lAzzaccu, with the tone upon the last syllable, is not 
the niphal of zdkak, as the first plnr. imper. niph. of such verbs, 
has generally and naturally the tone upon the penultimaM 
(see ch. lii. 11 ; Num. xvii. 10), but the hithpael of zacah for 
hizdaccu, with the preformative Tav resolvedinto the first radical 
letter, as is very common in the hithpael (Ges. § 54, 2, 6). Ac- 
cording to the difference between the two synonyms (to wash 
one's self, to clean one's self), the former most be nnderstood as 
referring to the one great act of repentance on the part of a 
man who is taming to God, the latter to the daily repentance of 
one who has so turned. The second admonition requires them 
to place themselves in the light of the divine countenance, and 
put away the evil of their doings, which was intolerable to pure 
^es (Hab. i. 13). They were to wrestle against the wickedness 
to which their actual sin bad grown, until at length it entirely 
disappeared. Neged, according to its radical meaning signifies 
prominence (compare the Arabic nigd, high land which b visible 
at a great distance), conspicuousness, so that minntged is really 
equivalent to ex apparenUa, 

Ver. 17. Five admonitions relatmg to the practice of what 
is good : " Learn to do good, attend to judgment, set tlie oppreesor 
rightf do justice to the orphan, conduct the cause of the widow." 
The first admonition lays the foundation for the rest. They 
were to learn to do good, — a difBcnIt art, in which a man does 
not become proficient merely by good intentions. " Learn to 
do good : " hetib is the object to Umdu (learn), regarded as an 
accusative ; the inf. abs. £^n in ver. 16 takes the place of the 
object in just the same manner. The division of this primary 
admonition into four minor ones relating to the administration 
of justice, may be explained from the circumstance that no 
other prophet directs so keen an eye upon the state and its 
judicial proceedings as Isaiah has done. He differs in this 
respect from his younger contemporary Micah, whose prophecies 
are generally more ethical in their nature, whilst those of Isaiah 
have a political character throughout. Hence the admonitions : 
" Give diligent attention to judgment " (ddrash, to devote one's 
■elf to a ^ing with zeal and assiduity) ; and " bring the op- 
pressor to the right way." This is the true rendering as 



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CHAP. L IT. Vf 

thdmotz (from ehSmatz, to be aharp in davonr, glaring in appear- 
ance, violent and impetuous in character) cannot well mean 
*' the oppressed," or the man who is deprived of his rights, as 
most of the early translators have rendered it, since this form of 
the noun, especially with an immutable iametz like Tl33 '"H'^ 
(cf. li'J 'T]^?)> is not used in a passive, but in an active or 
attributive sense (Ewald, § 152, b : vid. at Ps. cxxxvii. 8) : it has 
therefore the same meaning as chometz in Ps. bnd. 4, and dthok 
in Jer. xxii. 3, which is similar in its form. But if chdmois 
signifies the oppressive, reckless, churlish man, "^^K cannot 
mean to make happy, or to congratulate, or to set up, or, as in 
the talmudic rendering, to strengthen (Luzzatto : rianimata 
ehi i oppreiso) ; but, as it b also to be rendered in ch. iii. 12, 
ix. 15, to lead to the straight road, or to canse a person to keep 
the straight course. la the case before us, where the oppressor 
is spoken of, it means to direct him to the way of jostice, to 
keep him in bounds by severe punishment and discipline.^ In 
the same way we find in other passages, such as ch. id, 4 and 
Ps. Ixxii. 4, severe conduct towards oppressors mentioned in 
connection with just treatment of the poor. There follow two 
admonitions relating to widows and orphans. 'Widows and 
orphans, as well aa foreigners, were the protigh of God and 
His law, standing under His especial guardianship and care 
(aee, for example, Ex. xxii. 22 (21), cf. 21 (20). " Do justice 
to the orphan" {ih&phat, as in Deut. xxv. 1, is a contracted 
expression for shdphat mishpai) : for if there is not even a 
settlement or verdict in their caose, tiiis is the most crying 
injustice of all, as neither the form nor the appearance of 
justice is preserved. '^Conduct the catae of the widovst:" 2n 
with an accusative, as in ch. li. 22, the only other passage in 
which it occurs, is a contracted form for 3n 3^. Thus all the 
grounds of self-defence, which existed in the hearts of the 
accused, are both negatively and positively overthrown. Th^ 
1 Hie Talmud varies in its explaaation of chamoz: in one instance it it 
applied to a judge who lets his Bentenoe be thoronghly lesveued before 
pionoundiig it ; in another tlie ehamvz is Koid to tngniff a person robbed 
And injured, in opposition to dirrntez (6. Sanhedrin SM). It is an instrno- 
tive fact in relation to the idea suggested by the word, that, according to 
Joma 89i, a mau who had not only taken possession of his omi inheritance, 
but had eeised upon another penon's alto, bora the nickname of btn diaaon 
«8 long as he lived. 

VOL. I. a 



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98 THg fBOFHEOIES OP ISAIAH, 

are thtmdered down and pnt to shame. The law {tJtoraA), 
Rnnonnced in ver. 10, has been preached to them. The prophet 
has cast away the linsks of their dead works, and brought oat 
the moral kernel of the law in its nniversal application. 

The first leading division of the address is brought to a close, 
and Ter. 18 contains the turning-point between the two parts 
into which it is divided. Hitherto Jehovah has spoken to His 
people in wrath. But His love began to move even in the 
admonitions in vers. 16, 17. And now this love, which desired 
not Israel's destraction, but IsraBl's inward and outward salva- 
tion, breaks fully through. Ver. 18. " come, and let m 
reason together, gaith Jehovah. If your sina come forth like 
tearlet cloth, they shall become white as snote; if they are red 
<u crimson, they shall come forth like wool ! " Jehovah here 
challenges Israel to a formal trial: nocach is thus nsed in a 
reciprocal sense, and with the same meaning as nishpat in 
ch. xUii. 26 (Qes. § 51, 2). In such a trial Israel must lose, 
for Israel's self-righteousness rests upon sham righteousness; 
and thb sham righteousness, when rightly examined, is but 
nnrighteousness dripping with blood. It is taken for granted 
that this must be the result of the investigation. Israel 
is therefore worthy of death. Yet Jehovah will not treat 
Israel according to His retributive justice, but according to 
His free compassion. He will remit the punishment, and 
not only regard the sin as not existing, but change it into its 
very opposite. The reddest possible sin shall become, through 
His mercy, the purest white. On the two hiphUa here applied 
to colour, see Gea. § 53, 2 ; though he gives the meaning in- 
correctly, VK. " to take a colour," whereas the words signify 
rather to emit a colour : not colorem accipere, but colorem dare.. 
Shdni, bright red (the plural shdnim, as in Frov. xxxi. 21, 
signifies materials dyed with ehdni), and told, warm colour, are 
simply different names for the same colour, viz. the crimson 
obtained from the cochineal insect, color coccitieua. The re- 
presentation of the work of grace promised by God as a ohange 
from red to white, is founded upon the symbolism of colours, 
quite as much as when the s^nts in the Revelation (ch. xix. 8) 
are described as clothed in white raiment, whilst the clothing of 
Babylon is purple and scarlet (ch. xvii. 4). Bed is the colour 
of fire, and therefore of life : the blood is red because life is a 



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CHAP, t W, SO. 95 

fieiy process. For tihis reason the heifer, from which the ashes 
of pttiification were obttuned for those who had been defiled 
throngh contact with the dead, was to be red ; and the 
sprinkling-bmsh, with which the unclean were sprinkled, was 
to be tied round with a band of scarlet wooL Bat red as con- 
trasted with white, the colour of h*ght (Matt svii, 2), ia the 
colour of selfish, covetoiu, passionate hfe, which is self-seeking 
in its nature, which goes oat of itself only to destroy, and 
drives about with wild tempestuous violence : it b therefore the 
colour of wrath and sin. It is generally supposed that Isaiah 
speaks of red as the colour of sin, because sin ends in morder ; 
and this is not really wrong, though it is too restricted. Sin is 
called red, inasmuch as it ia a burning heat which consumes a 
man, and when it breaks forth consumes his fellow-man as 
well. According to the biblical view, throughout, sin stands 
in the same relation to what is well>pleasing to Qod, and wrath 
in the same relation to love or grace, as fire to light ; ahd 
therefore as red to white, or black to white, for red and black 
are colours which border upon (me another. In the Song of 
Solomon (ch. vii. 5), the black locks of Shulamith are described 
as being " like purple," and Homer applies the same epithet to 
the dark waves of the sea. But the ground of this relation lies 
deeper stilL Red is the colour of fire, which flashes out of 
darkness and returns to it again ; whereas white without any 
admixture of darkness represents the pure, absolute triumph of 
li^t. It is a deeply significant symbol of the act of justifica^ 
tion. Jehovah offers to Israel an actio formawy out of which 
it shall come forth justified by grace, although it has merited 
death on account of its sins. The righteousness, white as snow 
and wool, with which Israel comes forth, is a gift conferred 
upon it out of pure compassion, without being conditional upon 
any legal performance whatever. 

But after the restoration of Israel in integrum by this act 
of grace, the rest would unquestionably depend upon the 
conduct of Israel itself. According to Israel's own decision 
would Jehovah determine Israel's future. Vers. 19, 20. " If 
ye then thdl voiUmgly hear, ye shall eat the good of the 
land; if ye thaU obstinately rebel, ye shaU be eaten by the 
eword : for the mouth of Jehovah hath spoken it." After their 
jnstification, both blessing and corung lay once more before 



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100 THE FS0PHECIE8 OF IftUAH. 

the jiutifiecl, as they had both been long before proclftimnl 
by the law (compare ver. 19b with Dent. zzriiL 3 sqq., Lev- 
xxvi. 3 sqq., and ver. 20b with the threat of vengeance with 
the sword in Lev. xxvi. 35). The promise of eating, i.e. of 
the fall enjoyment of domestic blessings, and therefore of 
settled, peaceful rest at home, is placed in contrast with the 
corse of being eaten with the sword, CJtereh (the sword) is 
the accosaUve of the instmment, as in Ps, xvli. 13, 14; but 
this adverbial construction without either genitive, adjective, or 
enffix, as in Ex. xxz. 20, is very rarely met with (Ges. § 138, 
Anm. 3) ; and in the passage before ns it is a bold constmc- 
tion which the prophet allows himself, instead of saying, ^n 
OSnlin, for the sake of the paronomatia (Bottcher, Collectanea, 
p. 161). In the conditional clauses the two futures are fol- 
lowed by two preterites (compare Lev. ixvL 21, which is more 
in conformity with our western mode of expression), inasmuch 
as obeying and rebelling are both of them conseqaencea of 
an act of will : if ye shall be willing, and in consequence 
of this obey ; if ye shall refuse, and rebel against Jehovah. 
They are therefore, strictly speaking, perfecta oonsecuHva. 
According to the ancient mode of writing, the passage vers. 
18-20 formed a separate paraihah by themselves, viz. a 
aethumah, or parashah indicated by spaces left within the line. 
The piskah after ver. 20 corresponds to a long pause in the 
mind of the speaker. — Will Israel tread the saving path of 
forgiveness thus opened before it, and go on to renewed 
obedience ; and wQl it be possible for it to be brought back by 
this path T Individuals posubly may, but not the whole. The 
divine appeal therefore changes now into a mournful com- 
plaint. So peaceful a solution as this of the discord between 
Jehovah and His cbildrea was not to be hoped for. Jerusalem 
was far too depraved. 

Yer. 21. " ffow it the become a harlot, the faithful cUadel! 
»ht,fvll of right, lodged in righteousness, arid now — mwderers." 
It is the keynote of an elegy (kinah) which is sounded here. 
^}% and but rarely ^K, which is an abbreviated form, is ex- 
pressive of complaint and amazement. This longer form, like 
a long-drawn sigh, is a characteristic of the kinah. The kinolh 
V (Itamentations) of Jeremiah commence with it, and receive 
.; their tide from it; whereas the shorter form is indicative of 



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OBAP. L IL 101 

acornfnl compliuning, and is characteriBtic of the mdshUl (e.g. 
ch. xiv. 4, 12 ; Mic. ii. 4). From this word, which gires 
the keynote, the rest all follows, soft, fnU, moaotonoua, long 
drawD out and slow, jnst in the style of an elegy. We may 
see clearly enough that forms like "fiKr? for ^?^??> softened by 
lengthening were adapted to ele^ac compositions, from the 
first Terse of the Lamentations of Jeremiah, where three of 
these forms occur. Jerusalem had previously been a fsuthful 
city, i.e. one stedfastly adhering to the covenant of Jehovah 
with her (rid. Ps. Ixxviii. 37).' This coreaant was a marriage 
covenant. And she had broken it, and had thereby become a 
zon&k (harlot), — a prophetic view, the germs of which had already 
been given in the Pentateuch, where the worship of idols on 
the part of Israel is called whoring after them (Deut. xxsi. 16 ; 
Bx. zzziv. 15, 16 ; in all, seven times). It was not, however, 
merely gross outward idolatry which made the church of God 
a. " harlot," but infidelity of heart, in whatever form it might 
express itself ; so that Jesus described the people of His own 
time as an " adulterous generation," notwithstanding the Phari- 
saical strictness with which the worship of Jehovah was then 
observed. For, as the verse before us indicates, this marriage 
relation was founded upon right and righteousness in the broadest 
sense : mishpat, "rigfu," i.e. a realization of right answering to 
the will of God as positively declared ; and tzedek, "righteous' 
ness" i.e. a righteous state moulded by that will, or a righteous 
coarse of conduct regulated according to it (somewhat different, 
therefore, from the more qualitative tzeddk&h). Jerusalem was 
once full of such right ; and righteousness was not merely there 
in the form of a hastily passing guest, but had come down from 
above to take np her permanent abode in Jerosalem : she tarried 
Uiere day and night as if it were her home. The prophet had 
in his mind the times of David and Solomon, and abo more 
especially the time of Jehoshaphat ' (about one hundred and 
fifty years before Isaiah's appearance), who restored the ad- 
ministration of justice, which had fallen into neglect since the 

* We have tranBlatod the word KryoA " citadel " (Burg), instead of 
"city;" but Burg ako became the name of the toim which sprang np 
anmnd ihe citadel, and the personB living in and around the Burg or citadel 
wer« called burgentei, " bnrgheis." Jerusalem, which was also called Zion, 
might be called, with qnite aa mncli right, a citadel iBurg), as a city. 



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102 THE PBOPHEaES OF ISAIAH. 

closing years of Solomon's reign and the time of Beboboaa 
and Abijab, to which Asa's reformation had not eictended, and 
re-organized it entirely in the spirit of the law. It b possible 
also that Jehoiada, the high priest in the time of Joasb, may 
have revived the institutions of Jehosbapbat, so far as they had 
fallen into disuse nnder hb three godless successors ; bat even 
in the second half of the reign of Joash, the adminbtr&tion of 
justice fell into the same disgraceful state, at least as compared 
with the times of David, Solomon, and Jebosbaphat, as that 
in which Isaiah fonnd it. The glaring contrast between the 
present and the past b indicated l)y the expression " and now." 
In all the correct HSS. and editions, miahpat is not accented with 
saJxph, but with rebta; and bdh^ which ought to have zakeph, is 
accented with Hphchah, on account of the brevity of the follow- 
ing clause. In this way the statement as to the past condition 
is sufficiently distinguished from that relating to the present.* 
Formerly righteousness, now " murderert " (merazzechim)f and 
indeed, as distinguished from rozechim, murderers by profes- 
sion, who formed a band, like king Ahab and his son (2 Kings 
vi. 32). The control was as glaring as possible, since murder 
is the direct opposite, the most crying violation, of righteousness. 
The complaint now turns from the city generally to the 
authorities, and first of all figuratively. Ver. 22. " J%i/ silver 
has become dross, thy drink mutilated with water." It is 
npon this passage that the figurative language of Jer. vi. 27 
sqq. and Ezek. xxii. 18-22 is founded. Silver b here a figu- 
rative representation of the princes and lords, with special 
reference to the nobility of character naturally associated with 
nobility of birth and rank ; for silver — refined silver — b an 
image of all that is noble and pure, light in all its purity being 
reflected by it (Bahr, Symbolik, i. 284). The princes and lords 
had once possessed all the virtues which the Latins called unitedly 
candor animi, viz. the virtues of magnanimity, affability, im- 

1 II is well known that rebia has lees force as a disjunctive than ttphehah, 
uid Hmt saheph is stronger than «tiier. With regard to the law, according 
to which ISh baa nbUt iostead of nakeph, see Bar, Thoralh Emeth, p. 70. 
To the copiea eonmerated by Luzzatto, aa having the correct accentuatioa . 
(including Bi«scia 1494, andTeaice, by J. B. Cbajim, 15S6), we may add 
FlanUn (1682), Buxtorf (1618), Nissel (1662), and tsimj otheni (cf. Dach- 
■dt^ BibUa accentv,ata, which ia not yet oat of date). 



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CHAP. L tt, U. 103 

psitiality, ani saperiority to bribes. This eUver had now become 
fngim, dross, or base meUl separated (thrown off) from ulver 
in the process of refining (a^, pi. tigim, Hggim from gtig, recedert, 
refuse left in smelting or dross : cf. Prov. sxv. 4, xzvi. 23). 
A second figure compares the leading men of the older Jera- 
selem to good wine, sach as drinkers like. The word employed 
here {»obe) mnst have been nsed in this sense by the more 
cultivated classes in Isaiah's time (cf. Kahnm i. 10). This 
pure, strong, and costly wine was now adulterated with water 
{Ut. ctutratum, according to Pliny's expression in the Natutal 
Sistoty: compare the Horatian phrase, jugulare Falemum), 
and therefore its strength and odour were weakened, and its 
worth was diminished. The present was nothing but the dross 
and shadow of the past. 

In ver. 23 the prophet says this withont a figure ; " TXy 
rulerg are rehetlioue, and companioTta of thieves ; every one loveth 
jrreeentSf tatd hunteth afterpayment; the orphan they riglii not, 
and the cause of the vndaw hat no access to them." In two 
words the prophet depicts the contemptible baseness of the 
national rulers (sdrim). He describes first of all their baseness 
in relation to God, with the alliterative sorervm : reheUwue, 
refractoiy ; and then, in relation to men, companions of thieves, 
inasmuch as they allowed themselves to be bribed by presents 
of stolen goods to acts of injnstice towards those who had been 
robbed. They not only willingly accepted such bribes, and 
that not merely a few of them, but every individual belonging 
to the rank of princes (cullo, equivalent to haccol, the whole : 
every one loveth gifts) ; but they went eagerly in pursuit of 
them (rodq>h). It was not peace {shdlom) that they hunted 
after (Fs. xxxiv. 16), but akalmonimf things that would pacify 
their avarice ; not what was good, but compensation for their 
partiality. — This was the existing state of Jerusalem, and 
therefore it would hardly be likely to take the way of mercy 
opened before it in ver. 18 ; consequently Jehovah would avail 
himself of other means of setting it right : — 

Ver. 24. " Therefore, saying of the Lord, of Jehovah of 
ioets, of the StroTtg One of Israel: Ah! 1 will relieve myself on 
mine adversaries, and will avenge myself i^on mine enemies." 
Salvation through judgment was the only means of improve- 
ment and preservation left to the congregation, which called 



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101 TEE PROPHECIES OF I8AUH. 

itself by the n«ne of Jerasalem. Jehovah would therefore 
afford satisfaction to His holiness, and adnuniater a jadicial 
sifting to Jemsalem. There is no other passage in Isaiah in 
which we meet with such a crowding togetiier of different 
names of God as we do here (compare ch. xix. 4, iii. 1, 
X. 16, 33, iii. 15). With three names, descriptive of the 
irresistible omnipotence of Ood, the irrevocable decree of a 
sifting jadgment b sealed. The word DK], which is nsed here 
instead of ^OK and points back to a verb DK3, related to Q^i and 
non, corresponds to tlie deep, earnest pathos of the words. 
These verbs, which are imitations of sounds, all denote a dull 
hollow groaning. The word osed here, therefore, signifies that 
which is spoken with significant secrecy and solemn softness. 
It is never written absolutely, but is always followed by the 
snhject who speaks (saying of Jehovah it is, i.e. Jehovah says). 
We meet with it first of all in Gen. xxiL 16. In the prophetic 
writings it occnrs in Obadiah and Joel, but most freijuentiy in 
Jeremiah and Ezekiel. It is generally written at the close of 
the sentence, or parenthetically in the middle ; very rarely at the 
commencement, as it is here and in 1 Sam. ii. 30 and Fs. ex. 1. 
The "soffing" commences with hoi (ah!), the p^nfulness of 
pity being mingled with the determined outbreak of wrath. 
By the side of the niphal nikkam min (to be revenged upon a 
person) we find the niphal mcham (lit. to console one's self). 
The two words are derived from kindred roots. The latter is 
conjugated with d' in the preformative syllable, the former with ^ 
according to the older system of vowel-pointing adopted in the 
Kast.^ Jehovah would procure Himself relief from His enemies 
by letting ont upon them the wrath with which He had hitherto 
been burdened (Ezek. v, 13). He now calls the masses of 
Jerusalem by their right name. 

Yer. 25 states clearly in what the revenge consisted with 
which Jehovah was inwardly burdened (innakmah, a cohorts' 
tive with the ah, indicating internal oppression) : " And I will 
bring my hand over, thee, and will smelt out thy dross a$ with 

* The BO-caUed Assyrian mode of pointing, which wsa entirdf anp- 
plBsted, with the exception of a few relica, hy the Tiberisn mode which 
now lies before us, has no legkol (see HMZ. xriii. 322). According U) 
I.iuzatto (Proleg. p. 200), they wrote ekiol instead of iktol, to avoid wa* 
foDDding it with ^^_, which was pronounced iktol, and not yiktoL 



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alkalt, and will clear away all thy lead." As long as God 
leaves a person's actions or safferings alone, His hand, i.e. His 
acting, is at rest. Brining the hand over a person signifies a 
morement of the hand, which has been hitherto at rest, either 
for the purpose of inflicting judicial punishment npon the 
person named (Amoa i. 8 ; Jer. vi. 9 ; Ezek. xxxviii, 12 ; 
Ps. Ixxxi. 15), or else, though this is seldom the case, for the 
purpose of saving him (Zech. siii. 7). The reference here is 
to the divine treatment of Jerusalem, in which punishment and 
salvation were comhined — pnnishment as the means, salvation 
as the end. The interposition of Jehovah was, as it were, 
a smelting, which would sweep away, not indeed Jerusalem 
itself, but the ungodly in Jerusalem. They are compared to 
dross, or (as the verb seems to imply) to ore mixed with dross, 
and, inasmuch as lead is thrown off in the smelting of silver, 
to soch ingredients of lead as Jehovah would speedily and 
thoroughly remove, "like aVeali" i.e. " as if with alkali " (cabbor, 
comparatio deourtata, for c'babbor : for this mode of dropping 
£eth after Cc^h, compare ch. is, 3, Lev. xxii. 13, and many 
other passages). By bedilim (from bddal, to separate) we are 
to understand the several pieces of stannum or lead^ in which 
the silver is contained, and which are separated by smelting, 
all the baser metals being distinguished from the purer kinds 
by the fact that they are combustible (t^e. can be oxidized). 
Both bor, or potash (an alkali obtained from land-plants), and 
nether, natron (t.e. soda, or natron obtained from the ashes of 
marine plants, which is also met with in many mineral waters), 
have been employed from the very earliest times to accelerate 
the process of smelting, for the purpose of separating a metal 
from its ore. 

' Plumhum nigrum, bbjb FHdt', h. n. ixir. 16, is Bometimes found abne, 
and Bometimes niiied with silver : ejus gut pritaui Jiuil in fomacibus liqaor, 
ttanttum appellalur. The reference here ie to the lead separated from the 
we in the process of obtaiaiug pure silver. lu the form of powder this 
droea is called bedil, and the pieces bedilim; vhereaa opkerelh is the name of 
solid kad, obtained bj simply melting down from ore which doee not con- 
tun silver. The tact that bedU is also apparently used as a name for tin, 
may be eiplaiued in the same way as the homonjmy of iron and basalt 
(com. on Job sxviii. 2), and of the oak and terebinth. The two metals are 
called by the aaoie name on account of their having a certain outward 
leeemblsQce, vis. in soltneae, plialolity, oolonr, and Bpeeiflo gravity. 



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106 THE PS0PHECIB8 OP ISAIAH. 

Ver. S6. As the threat coached in the previous figure does not 
point to the destruction, hut simply to the smelting of Jemsa- 
lem, there is nothing strange in the fact that !n ver. 26 it shonid 
pass over into a pure promise; the meltingly soft and jeaminglj 
moamfal termination of the clauses n-ith aj/ich, the keynote of 
the later songs of Zion, heing still continued. "And Ivnll bring 
back thy judges as in the olden time, and Oty couiuellora as in the 
beginning ; afterwards thou wilt he called city of righteownesa, 
faithful citadel." The threat itself was, indeed, relatively a 
promise, inasmuch as whatever could Stand the fire would 
survive the judgment ; and the distinct object of this was to 
bring back Jerusalem to the purer metal of its own true nature. 
But when that had been accomphshed, still more would follow. 
The indestructible kernel that remained would be crystallized, 
since Jemsalem would receive back from Jehovah the judges' 
and counsellors which it had had in the olden flourishing times 
of the monarchy, ever since it had become the ci^ of David 
and of the temple; not, indeed, the very same persons, but 
persons quite equal to them in excellence. Under such God- 
given leaders Jerusalem would become what it had once been, 
and what it ought to be. The names applied to the ci^ indi- 
cate the impression produced by the manifestation of its true 
nature. The second name is written without the article, as in 
fact the word kin/ah (city), with its massive, definite sound, 
always is in Isaiah. Thus did Jehovah announce the way 
which it had been irrevocably determined that He would take 
with Israel, as the only way to salvation. Moreover, this "was 
the fundamental principle of the government of G()d, the law 
of Israel's history. 

Ver. 27 presents it in a brief and concise form : " ^n will 
be redeemed through judgment, and her returning ones through 
righteousness." Mishpat and tzeddiah are used elsewhere for 
divine gifts (ch. xxxiii. 5, xxviii. 6), for such conduct as is 
pleasing to God (ch. i. 21, xszii. 16), and for royal Mes- 
sianic virtues (ch. ii. 6, xi. 3-5, xvi. 5, xxsii. 1). Here, 
however, where we are helped by the context, they are to be 
interpreted according to' such parallel passages as ch. iv. 4, 
V. 16, xxviii. 17, as signifying God's right and righteoosoess 
in their primarily judicious self-fulfilment A judgment, on 
the part of God the righteous One, would be the means by 



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CHAP, t 28, 29. 107 

which Zion itself, so far as it had remained futhfal to Jehovah, 
uid those vho were converted in the midst of the judgment, 
would be redeemed, — a judgment upon sinners and sin, by 
which the power that had held in bondage the divine nature 
of Zion, so far aa it still continued to esist, would be broken, 
and in consequence of which those who turned to Jehovah 
would be incorporated into His true church. Whilst, there- 
fore, 0od was revealing Himself in His punitive righteousness ; 
He was working out a righteousness which would be bestowed 
as a gift of grace upon those who escaped the former. The 
notion of " righteousness" is now following a New Testament 
track. In front it has the fire of the law ; behind, the love of 
the gospel. Love is concealed behind the wrath, like the sun 
behind the thunder-clouds. Zion, so far as it truly is or is 
becoming Zion, is redeemed, and none but the ungodly are 
destroyed. But, as is added in the next verse, the latter takes 
place without mercy. 

Ver. 28. " And hreoking up of the rebellious and sinners 
togeilier; and those who forsake Jehovah will perish" The 
judicial side of the approaching act of redemption is here 
expressed in a way that all can understand. The exclamatory 
substantive clause in the first half of the verse is explained by 
a declaratory verbal clause in the second. The " rebellious" 
were those who had both inwardly and outwardly broken away 
from Jehovah ; " sinners" those who were living in open sins ; 
and " those who forsake Jehovaliy" such as had become estranged 
from God in either of these ways. 

Yer. 29 declares how God's judgment of destmction would 
fall upon alt of these. The verse is introduced with an ex- 
planatoiy " for" (chi) : " For they become ashamed of the ter&- 
binthtf in which ye had your delight; and ye must blush for 
the gardens, in which ye took pleasure." The terebinths and 
gardens (the second word with the article, as in Hab. iii. 8, 
^rst binharim, theti banneharim) are not referred to as objects 
of luxury, as Hib:ig and Drechsler assume, but as unlawful 
places of worship and objects of worship (see Deut. xvi. 21). 
They are both of them frequently mentioned by the prophets 
in this sense (ch. IviL 5, Isv. 3, Ixvi. 17} : chdmar and hdchar 
are also the words commonly applied to an arbitrary choice 
of false gods (ch. xliv. 9, xli. 24, Ixvi. 3), and bosh min is the 



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108 THE FB0FHE0IX8 OF ISAIAS. 

general phrase used to denote the shame which falls npon 
idolaters, when the worthlessness of their idols becomes cod- 
spicQons through their impotence. On the difference between 
bosh and ehdpker, see the coram, on Pa. xsxv. i} The word 
elim is erroneoosly translated "idols" in the Septnagint and 
other ancient verBions. The feeling which led to this, however, 
was a correct one, since the places of worship really stand for 
the idols worshipped in those places.^ The excited state of the 
prophet at the close of his prophecy is evinced by his abmpt 
leap from an exclamation to' a direct address (Gres. § 137, 
Anm. 3). 

Ver. 30. He still continues in the same excitement, piling 
a second explanatory sentence npon the first, and commencing 
this also with "for'* (cht) ; and then, carried away by the 
association of ideas, he takes terebinths and gardens as the 
futnre fignres of the idolatrous people themselves. "For ye 
ihall becQTfie like a terebinth vtith withered leaves, and like a 
garden that hath no water." Their prosperity is destroyed, so 
that they resemble a terebinth withered as to its leaves, which 
in other cases are always green (nobeUth 'aleali, a genitive con- 
nection according to Gea. § 112, 2). Their sources of help 

' It is perfectly certain that eh^her (Arab, ehajira, aa diatinguiahed 
from ckdphar, ka/ara, to dig) signlfiee to blush, erubeicere; but the com* 
Innstion of losh and ySbath {hadd), which would give albacere or m* 
pallacere (to turn whit« or pale) aa the primary idea tit bodi, haa not only 
the Aialnc use of baggada and tbyadda (to rejoice, be made glad) against 
it, but above aU the dialectic becbath, bahita (bahuta), which, when taken 
in connection with betbaA (batla), pcdnts rather to the prinuuy idea of 
being cut oB (abidndi: cf. spa abseiasa). See Lane's Arabic-English Lexi- 
con, i. 263. 

* With regard to the derivation, ^Km, whether used in the sense of 
strong men, or gods, or rams, or terebinths, is still but one woid, derived 
from li or Hi, so that in all three senses it may be written either with or 
without Yod, Nevertheless elim in the sense of " rams" only occuia with- 
out Tod in Job xlii. 8. .In the sense of " gods" it is always written with- 
out Yod; in that of " strong men" with Yod. In the singular the name of 
the terebinth is always written elak without Yod; in the plural, however, 
it is written either with or wit^ont. Bnt tUa no more preanppciMB a 
singular U (ayil) in common use, than b&idm preanpposeB a ungolar biU 
(bayiti) ; BtiU the word el with Yod does occur once, vii. in Gen. liv. 6. 
A^h and allSn, an oak, also spring from the same root, namely 6ldl « ti ; 
loat aa in Arabic both U and iil are used f<^ H (God) ; and 61 and ill, in 
the wnBe of relatioathip, point to a similar change ia Uie form of the root 



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CHAP. 1. SL 109 

are dried up, so tbat tbey are like a garden witbont water, and 
iherefoTo waste. In this withered «tate terebinths and gardens, 
to which the idolatrous are compared, are easily set on fire. 
All that w wanted is a spark to kindle them, when they are 
immediately in flames, 

Ver. 31 shows in a third figure where this spark was to come 
from : " And the rich man becomes tow^ and kie work the tpark ; 
and they will both bum together, and no one extinguishes them." 
The form poalo snggests at first a participial meaning (its 
maker), bat I^onn would be a very jinasual epithet to apply to 
an idol. Morebver, the figure itself would be a distorted one, 
since the natural order woi^d be, that the idol wonld be the thing 
that kindled the fire, and the man the object to be set on fire, 
and not the reverse. We therefore follow the LXX., Targ., and 
Yulg., with Gesenins and other more recent grammarians, and 
adopt the rendering " bis work" (opus ejus). The forms '?}!• 
and 'f^Jl^ (cf. cb. lii. 14 and Jer. xxii. 13) are two equally 
admissible changes of the ground-form wB {Vya). As ver. 29 
refers to idolatrous worship, poalo (his work) is an idol, a god 
made by human bands (cf. cb. ii. 8, xxxvit. 19, etc.). The 
prosperous idolater, who could give gold and silver for idolatrous 
images out of the abundance of his possessions (chason ia to be 
interpreted in accordance with ch. xxxiiL 6), becomes tow (talm, 
" the refuse of fiax :" the radical meaning is to shake out, viz. 
in combing), and the idol the spark which sets this mass of fibre 
in flames, so that tbey are both irretrievably consumed. For the 
fire of judgment, by which sinners are devoured, need not come 
from without. Sin carries the fire of indignation within itself. 
And an idol is, as it were, an idolater's sin embodied and ex- 
posed to the light of day. 

The date of the composition of this first prophecy is a puzzle. 
Caspari thoroughly investigated every imaginary possibility, and 
at last adopted the conclusion that it dates from the time of 
Uzziah, inasranch as vera. 7-9 do hot relate to an actual, but 
merely to an ideal, present. But notwithstanding all the acute- 
ncfls with which Oaspari has worked out his view, it still 
remains a veiy forced one. The oftener we return to the 
reading of this prophetic address, the stronger is our impression 
that vers. 7-9 contain a description of the state of things which 
really existed at the time when the words were spoken. There 



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no TEE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

were actaallj two devastations of the land of Jadah which 
occurred during the ministry of Isaiah, and in which Jemsalem 
was only spared by the miracnloas interpoaition of Jehovah : 
one nnder Ahaz in the year of the Syro-Ephraimitish war; the 
other nnder Hezekiah, when the Assyrian forces laid the land 
waste bnt were scattered at last in their attack upon Jem- 
salem. The year of the Syro-Eplirainiitish war is snpported 
by Gesenius, Bosenmiiller (who e:ipresses a different opinion in 
every one of the three editions ot his Scholia), Manrer, Movers, 
Knobel, Havemick, and others ; the time of the Assyrian op- 
pression by Hitzig, Umbreit, Drechsler, and Lnzzatto. Now, 
whichever of these views we may adopt, there will still remain, 
as a test of Its admissibility, the dii&cnlt question, How did this 
prophecy come to stand at the head of the book, if it belonged 
to the time of Uzziah-Jothamt This qnestion, npon which the 
eolation of the difficulty depends, can only be settled when we 
come to ch. vi. Till then, the date of the composition of ch. i. 
most he left undecided. It is enough for the present to know, 
that, according to the accounts given in the books of Kings 
and Chronicles, there were two occasions when the sitttation of 
Jerusalem resembled the one described in the present chapter. 

THE WAT OF GENERAI, JUDGMENT; OB THE OOUItaE OF ISRAEL 
FBOH FALSE GLOET TO THE TEtJB. — CHAP. II.-IV. 

The limits of this address are very obvious. The end of ch. 
iv. connects itself with the beginning of ch. ii., so as to form a 
circle. After various alternations of admonition, reproach, and 
threatening, the prophet reaches at last the object of the promise 
with which be started. Chap, v., on the other hand, commences 
afresh with a parable. It forms an independent address, 
although it is included, along with the previous chapters, 
tinder the heading in ch. Ii. 1 : " 77i« tcord which Isaiah tha 
gon of Amoz BOW over Judah and Jerusalem." Chap, ii.-v. 
may have existed under this beading before the whole collec- 
tion arose. It was then adopted in tbis form into the general 
collection, so as to mark the transition from the prologue to the 
body of the book. The prophet describes what he here says 
concerning Jndah and Jerusalem as " the word which he saw." 
When men speak to one another, the words are not seen, but 



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CHAP. IL I. lit 

heard. Bat when God spoke to the prophet, it was in a sapei^ 
sensaonB way, and the prophet saw it. The mind indeed has 
no more ejes than ears ; bnt a mind qualified to perceive what 
is sapersensnons is altogether eye. 

The manner in which Isaiah commences this second address 
is altogether nnparalleted. There is no other example of a 
prophecy beginning with ffm. And it is very easy to discover 
the reason why. The prat. eonKcvtivum v'hdt/dh derives the 
force of a future from the context alone ; whereas the/uf. con- 
lecvlivum vai/hi (nith which historical books and sections very 
generally commence) is shown to he an aorist hy its simple form. 
Moreover, the Vav in the fut. coneecut. has almost entirely lost 
its copulative character ; in the prcBt. consee^ on the other hand, 
it retains it with all the greater force. The prophet therefore 
commences with " and" ; and it is from what follows, not from 
what goes before, that we learn that hayah is nsed in a future 
sense. But this is not the only strange thing. It is also an 
unparalleled occurrence, for a prophetic address, which runs as 
this does through all the different phases of the prophetic dis- 
courses generally (viz. exhortation, reproof, threatening, and 
promise), to commence with a promise. We are in a condition, 
however, to expliun the cause of this remarkable phenomenon 
with certainty, and not merely to resort to conjecture. Vers. 
2—4 do not contain Isaiah's pwa words, bnt the words of 
another prophet taken out of their connection. We find them 
again in Mic. iv. 1-4 ; and whether Isaiah took them from 
Micah, or whether both Isaiah and Micah took them from some 
common source, in either case they were not originally Isaiah's.^ , 

' The hutoricRl etatement in Jer. xxri. 18, from nhioh we learn that it 
was ia the days of Hezekiah that Micah utt-ered the threat contained ia 
Uic. iii. 12 ((^ which the promises in Mic. it. 1-4 and laa. ii. 2-i are the 

direct antitheaiB), apparently precladea the idea that Isaiah borrowed from 
Uicab, whilst the opposite is altogether inadmissible, for reasons assigned . 
above. Ewald and Hitdg have tli^erefore come to the conclusion, quite in- 
dependently of each other, tliat both Micah and Isaiah repeated tbe words 
of a third and earlier propliet, meet probably of' Joel And the passaj^ 
iu qneetjon has really very much in common with the book at Joel, viz. 
Ibe idea of the melting down of plonghsharee and pruning-hooks (Joel iii. 
10), the combination of rdb (many) and Stsum (strong), of gephen (vine) 
and le'endk (fig-tree), as compared with Mic. ir. i ; also the attesting for- 
mula, " For Jehovith haj^ spoken it" (cM Jekovak dibber: Joel iii. (iv.) 8), 



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112 THE FB0PHE0IE8 OF UAIAH. 

Nor was H even intended that they shoald appear to be his. 
Isaiah ha« not fused them into the general flow of hL own 
prophecy, as the prophets nsnallj do with the predictions of 
their predecessors. He does not reproduce them, but, as wa 
may observe from the abrupt commencement, be quotes them, 
It is true, this hardly seems to tally with the beading, which 
describes what follows as the word of Jehovah which Isaiah 
saw. Bat the discrepancy is only an apparent one. It was 
the spirit of prophecy, which called to Isaiah's remembrance 
a prophetic saying that had already been ottered, and made it 
the starting-point of the thoughts which followed in Isaiah's 
mind. The borrowed promise is not introdnced for its own 
sake, but is simply a self-expliuning introduction to the exhor- 
tations and threatenings which follow, and through which the 
prophet works bis way to a conclusion of his own, that is closely 
intertwined with the borrowed commencement. 

Ver. 2. The subject of the borrowed prophecy is Israel's 
future glory : " And it cometh to past at the end of the day», the 
mountain of tjie house of Jehovah will be set at the top of the 
mowiiainSf and exalted over hills; and all nations pour uiUo it" 

which is not found in Micah, whereas it is very common in Is&ifth, — a fact 
which mokes the sign itself & veiy feeble one (cf. 1 Eiogs xiv. 11, also Ob. ' 
18). Hitzig, indeed, munUins that it is onlj bj reetoring this passage 
tiiat the prophetic writings of Joel receire their proper rounding off and 
an appropriate terminatdou ; bat although aworda and ipeMS beaten into 
jdonghsharee and pnming-hooka form a good antithesis to plooghahares 
and pmoing-hooks beaten into swords and speara (Joel iv. 10), the otaning 
of great and mighty nations to Moont Zion after the previous judgment of 
ext«nniiiation would be too unprepared or much too abrupt a phenomenon. 
On the other hand, we cannot admit the force of the argumenta adduced 
ritfaer by E. Meio' (Joel, p. 196) or b; Enobel and 0. Banr (Amos, p. SO) 
agunst . the authorship of Joel, which reat npon a misapprehendon of Ote 
meaning of Joel's prophedee, which the former regards aa iao full of stonn 
and battle, the latter as too eicluuve and one-aided, for Joel to be the author 
' of the passage in qa«8tion. At the same time, we would call attontion to 
the fact, that the promises in Micah form the obvcree side to the previoos 
threatenings of }adginent, so that there is a presumption of their originality ; 
also that the passage contains aa many traces of Micah'a atyle (aee above 
at ver. 3) aa we could expect to find in these three verses ; and, as we shall 
■how at the concloaion i^ this cycle of predictions (ch. i.-vi.), that the hia- 
torical fact mentioned in Jer. xxvL 18 mav be reconciled in tlie aimplcet 
poauble manner with the assumption that Isaiah borrowed these words of 
pnnniee from Micah. (See Caspari, Mkha, p. 4 .' ~qq "i 



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CHAP. IL 1. 113 

The expresuon " the last days" (acharith Aoyyamttn, " the end 
of the days"), which does not occur anywhere else in Isaiah, is 
always used in an eschatological sense. It never refers to tlie 
course nf history immediately following the time being, but 
invariably indicates the farthest point in the history of this 
life — the point which lies on the outermost limits of the 
speaker's horizon. This horizon was a very flactnating one. 
The history of prophecy is jnst the history of its gradual ex- 
tension, and of the filling up of the intermediate space. In 
Jacob's blessing (Gen. xlix.) the conqnest of the land stood in 
the foregronnd of the acharith or last days, and the perspective 
was regulated accordingly. But here in Isaiah the acharith 
contained no such mixing together of events belonging to the 
more immediate and the most distant future. It was therefore 
the last time in its most literal and purest sense, commenc- 
ing with the beginning of the New Testament son, and ter- 
minating at its close (compare Heb. L 1, 1 Pet. i. 20, with 
1 Cor. XV. and the Revelation). The prophet here predicted 
that the mountain which bore the temple of Jehovah, and 
therefore was already in dignity the most exalted of all moun- 
tains, would one day tower in actual height above all the high 
places of the earth. The basaltic mountains of Basfaan, which 
rose up in bold peaks and columns, might now look down 
with scorn and contempt upon the small limestone hill which 
Jehovah had chosen (Ps. Ixviii. 16, 17); but this was an in- 
congruity which the last times would remove, by making the 
outward correspond to the inward, the appearance to thfi reality 
and the intrinsic worth. That this is the prophet's meaning is 
confirmed by Eiek. xL 2, where the temple mountain looks 
gigantic to the prophet, and also by Zech. xiv. 10, where all 
Jerusalem is described as towering above the country round 
about, which would one day become a plain. The question 
how this can possibly take place in time, since it presupposes a 
complete subversion of the whole of the existing order of the 
earth's surface, is easily answered. The prophet saw the new 
Jerusalem of the last days on this side, and the new Jerusalem 
of the new earth on the other (Rev. xxi. 10), blended as it 
were together, and did not distinguish the one from the other. 
But whilst we thus avoid all unwarrantable spiritualizing, it 
still remains axiUQ^ou what meaning the prophet attached to 



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] 14' THE FBOFHECIES OF ISAUH. 

the word Vroth {"at the top"). Did he mean that Moriali 
would one day stand upon the top of the mountaina that 
surrounded it (as in Ps. Ixzii. 16), or that it would stand at 
t/teir head (as in 1 Kings xxi. 9, 13, Amos vi. 7, Jer. ixxi. 7) ! 
The former is Hofmann's view, as given in his Weiisa^nff und 
ErfaUung, a. 217: "he did not indeed mean that the moun- 
tains would be piled up one upon the other, and the temple 
mountain open the top, but that the temple mountain wonid 
appear to float upon the summit of the others." But as the 
expression " will he set" (nacon) does not favour this apparently 
romantic exaltation, and 6'rosA occurs more frequently in the 
sense of *'a^ the head" than in that of "on the top" I decide 
for my own part in favour of the second view, though I agree 
so far with Hofmann, that it is not merely an exaltation of the 
temple mountain in the estimation of the nations that is pre- 
dicted, but a physical and external elevation also. And when 
thus outwardly exalted, the divinely chosen monntain would 
become the rendezvous and centre of unity for all nations. 
They would all "flow unto it" (ndhar, a denom. verb, from 
nakar, a river, as in Jer. li. 44, xxxi. 12). It is the temple of 
Jehovah which, being thus rendered visible to nations afar off, 
exerts such magnetic attraction, and with such success. Just 
as at a former period men had been separated and estranged 
from one another In the plain of Shinar, and thus different 
nations had first arisen; so would the nations at a future period 
assemble together on the mountain of the house of Jehovah, 
and there, as members of one family, live together in amity 
again. And as Babel (confusion, as its name signifles) was the 
place whence the stream of nations poured into all the world ; 
so would Jerusalem (the cfty of peace) become the place intn 
which the stream of nations would empty itself, and where all 
would be reunited once more. At the present time there was 
only one people, viz. Israel, which made pilgrimages to Zion 
on the great festivals, but it would be very different then. 

Ver. 3. " And p&oplea in multitude go and tay, Come,letue 
go up to the mountain of Jehovah, to the house of the God of 
Jacob; let Him instruct «s out of Mis ways, and toe will walk in 
His paths." This ia their signal for starting, and their song by 
tlie way (cf. Zech. viii. 21, 22). What urges them on is the 
desire for salvation. Desire for salvation expresses itself in the 



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CHAP. n. J. 115 

name they give to the point towards which they are travelling : 
they call Moriah " the moantain of Jehovah/' and the temple 
upon it " the house of the God of Jacob," Throngh frequent 
use, Itrael had become the popular name for the people of God; 
hot the name they employ is the choicer name Jacob, which is 
the name of affection in ^e mouth of Micah, of whose style we 
are also reminded by the expression " many peoples" (ammim 
rabbtJii). Desire for salvation expresses itaelf in the object of 
their jonmey ; they wish Jehovah to teach them " ovt of His 
ways" — a rich source of instruction with which they desire to 
be gradually entrusted. The preposition min (out of, or from) 
is not partitive here, but refers, as in Ps. xciv. 12, to the source 
of instruction. The " ways of Jehovah" are the ways which 
God Himself takes, and by which men are led by Him — the 
revealed ordinances of His will and action. Desire for salva- 
tion also expresses itself in the resolution with which they set 
out: they not only wish to learn, but are resolved to act accord- 
ing to what they learn. " We toill walk in His paths:" the 
hortative is used here, as it frequently is (e.g. Gen. zxvii. 4, 
vid. Ges. § 128, 1, c), to expres? either the subjective intention 
or subjective conclusion. The words supposed to be spoken 
by the multitude of heathen going up to Zion terminate here, 
The prophet then adds the reason and object of this holy 
pilgrimage of the nations : " For inetruction will go out from 
Zion, and the word of Jehovah from JerveaUm." The principal 
emphasis is upon the expressions "from Zion" and "from 
Jerusalem." It is a triumphant utterance of the sentiment 
that ** salvation 13 of the Jews" (John iv, 22). From Zion- 
Jerusalem there would go forth thorah, i,e. instruction as to 
the questions which man has to put to Qod, and debar Jehovah, 
the word of Jehovah, which created the world at first, and by 
which it is spiritually created anew. Whatever promotes the 
true prosperity of the nations, comes from Zion-Jenisalem. 
There the nations assemble together ; they take it thence to 
their own homes, and thus Zion-Jerusalem becomes the foun- 
tain of universal good. For from the time that Jehovah made 
choice of Zion, the holiness of Sinai was transferred to Zion 
(Fs. Ixviii. 17), which now presented the same aspect as Sinai 
had formerly done, when God invested it with holiness by 
appearing there in the midst of myriads of angels. What had 



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tl6 THE PBOPHEOmS OF ISAIAH. 

been commenced at Sinai £or Israel, wonld be completed at 
Zion for all the world. This was fulfilled on that day of 
Pentecost, when the disciples, the first-fmits of the church of 
Christ, proclaimed the thorah of Zion, i.e. the gospel, in the 
languages of all the world. It was fulfilled, as Theodoret 
observes, in the fact that the word of the gospel, rising from 
Jemsalem " as from a fountwn," flowed through the whole of 
the known world. But these fulfilments were only preludes to 
a conclusion which is still to be looked for in the future. For 
what is promised in the following verse is still altogether un- 
fulfilled. 

Ver. 4. " And Se mil judge JWtoeen the naiione, and delieer 
justice U) many peoples ; cmd they forge their twords into coulters, 
and their spears into pruning-hooks : mttion lifts not up the sword 
against nation, neither do they exercise themselves in war any 
more." Since the nations betake themselves in this manner as 
pupils to the God of revelation and the word of His revelation, 
He becomes the supreme judge and umpire among them. If 
any dispute arise, it is no longer settled by the compulsory force 
of war, but by the word of God, to which all bow with willing 
submission. With such power as this in the peace-sustiuning 
word of God (Zech, ix. 10), there is no more need for weapons 
of iron : they are turned into the instruments of peaceful 
employment^ into itHm (probably a synonym for ethim in 
1 Sam. xiii. 21), plough-knives or coulters, which cat the 
furrows for the ploughshare to turn up ; and mazmeroth, 
bilb or pruning-hooks, with which vines are pruned t« increase 
their fruit-bearing power. There is also no more need for 
military practice, for there is no use in exercising one's self 
in what cannot be applied. It is useless, and men dislike it. 
There is peace, not an armed peace, but a full, true, God-given 
and blessed peace. What even a Kant regarded as possible is 
now realized, and that not by the so-called Christian powers, 
but by the power of God, who favours the object for which 
an Elihu Burritt enthusiastically longs, rather than the politics 
of the Christian powers. It is in war that the power of the 
beast culminates in the history of the world. This beast will 
then be destroyed. The true humanity which sin has choked 
up will gain the mastery, and the world's history will keep 
Sabbath. And may we not indulge the hope, on the ground of 



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CHAP. IL fl. 117 

such prophetic words as these, that the history of the world 
will uot terminate without having kept a Sabbath T Shall we 
correct IsEuah, according to Qceostedt, lest we should become 
chiliastst "The hamanitariaii ideas of Christendom," says a 
thoughtful Jewish scholar, " have their roots in the Pentateuch, 
and more especially in Deuteronomy. But in the prophets, 
particularly in Isaiah, they reach a height which will pro- 
bably not be attained and fully realized by the modem world 
for centuries to come." Yet they will be realized. What the 
prophetic words appropriated by Isaiah here affirm, is a moral 
postulate, the goal of sacred history, the predicted counsel of 
God. 

Isaiah presents himself to his contemporaries with this older 
prophecy of the exalted and world-wide calling of the people 
of Jehovah, holds it np before them as a mirror, and exclaims 
in ver. 5, " Jtouse of Jacob, come, let us tcalk in the light of 
Jehovah" This exhortation is formed under the influence of 
the context, from which vers. 2-4 are taken, as we may see 
from Mic. iv. 5, and also of the quotation itself. , The use of 
the term Jacob instead of Israel is not indeed altogether strange 
to Isaiah (ch. viii. 17, x. 20, 21, xxix. 23), but he prefers the 
use of Israel (compare ch. i. 24' with Gen. xlix. 24). With the 
words " O house of Jacob" he now turns to his people, whom 
so glorious a future awaits, because Jehovah has made it the 
scene of His manifested presence and grace, and summons it 
to walk in the light of such a God, to whom all nations will 
press at the end of the days. The summons, " Come, let us 
walk," is the echo of ver. 3, " Come, let us go ; " and as Hitzlg 
observes, " Isaiah endeavours, like Paul in Hom. xi. 14, to stir 
np his countrymen to a noble jealousy, by setting before them 
the example of the heathen." The '* light of Jehovah" ('or 
JeJiovah, in which the echo of v'lforenu in ver. 3 is hardly 
accidental ; cf. Frov. vi. 23) is the knowledge of Jehovah 
Himself, as furnished by means of positive revelation. His 
manifested love. It was now high time to walk in the light of 
Jehovah, i.e. to turn this knowledge into life, and reciprocate 
this love ; and it was especially necessary to exhort Israel to 
this, now that Jehovah had ^ven up His people, just because 
in their perverseness they had done the very opposite. This 
mournful declaration, which the prophet was obliged to make 



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118 THE PEOPHECiaS OF ISAlAa 

in order to esplain hts warning cry, he changes into the form 
of a prayerful sigh. Ver. 6. "For Thou hast r^ected Thi/ 
people, the house of Jacob; for they are filled roith things from 
the east, and are conjurors like the Philistines; and v>itA tlie 
children of foreigners they go hand in hand." Here again we 
have "for" (chi) twice in succession; the first giving the 
reason for the warning cry, the second vindicating the reason 
assigned. The words are addressed to Jehovah, not to the 
people. Saad., Gecatilia, and Kashi adopt the rendering, 
"Thou hast given up thy nationality;" and this rendering is 
supported by J. D. Michaelis, Hitzig, and Lnzzatto, But the 
word means " people," not " nationality ;" and the rendering 
is inadmissible, and would never have been thought of were it 
not that there was apparently something strange in so sodden 
an introduction of an address to G^od. But in ch. ii. 9, is. 2, 
and other passages, the prophecy takes the form of a prayer. 
And ndtash (cast off) with dm (people) for its object recab such 
passages as Fs. xciv. 14 and 1 Sam, xii. 22. Jehovah had put 
away His people, i.e. rejected them, and left them to them- 
selves, for the following reasons: (1.) Because they were "full 
from the east" {mikkedem .- min denotes the source from which 
a person draws and fills himself, Jer. li. 34, Ezek. xxxii. 6), 
i.e. full of eastern manners and customs, more especially of 
idolatrous practices. By "the east" {kedeni) we are to under- 
stand Arabia as far as the peninsola of Sinai, and also the 
Aramaean lands of the Euphrates. Under Uzziah and Jotham, 
whose away extended to Elath, the seaport town of the ElanJtic 
Gulf, the influence of the south-east predominated; but under 
Ahaz and Hezekiah, on account of their relations to Asshur, 
Aram, and Babylon, that of the north-east. The conjecture of 
Gesenius, that we should read mikkesem, i.t. of soothsaying, b 
a very natural one; but it obliterates without any necessity the 
name of the region from which Judah's imitative propen^ties 
received their impulse and materials. (2.) They were onenim 
(i= meonenim, Mic. v. II, from the poel onen : 2 Kings xxi. 6), 
probably "cloud-gatherers" or "storm-raisers,"^ like the Philis- 

• There is no force ia the eiplanation " concealing," i.e. practising 
aecret arts; for the meaning " cover" or " conceal" ia arbitraxilj transferred 
to the verb OTicn, from ganan md c&nan, which are suppoaed to be cognate 
TOotB. As & denominative of &n&n, tiie cloud, however (on this name for 



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CHAP. II. 7, 8. 119 

tines (the people conquered by TTzziah, and then agEun by 
Hezekiah), among whom witchcraft was carried on in guilda, 
whilst a celebrated oracle of Baal-Zebnb existed at Ekron. 
(il.) And thej mate common cause with children of foreigners. 
This 13 the explanation adopted bj Gesenius, Knobel, and 
others. SdphaJc with cappaim signifies to clap hands (Job xxvii. 
23). The hiphil followed hj Beth is only used here in the sense 
of striking hands witli a person. Luzzatto explains it as mean- 
ing, " They find satisfaction in the children of foreigners ; it is 
only through them that they are contented ;" but this is con- 
trary to the usage of the language, according to which hispik 
in post-biblical Hebrew signifies either suppeditare or (like 
saphak in 1 Kings xx, 10) auficere. Jerome renders it pueris 
alienis adhaterunt; but yalde ndc'rim does not mean pueri 
alieni, boys hired for licentious purposes, but the " sons of 
strangers" generally (ch. Is. 10, Ixi. 5), with a strong emphasis 
upon their unsanctified birth, the heathenism inherited from 
their mother's womb. With heathen by birth, the prophet 
would say, the people of Jehovah made common cause. 

In vers. 7, 8 he describes still further how the land of the 
people of Jehovah, in consequence of all this (on the future 
consec. see Ges. § 129, 2, a), was crammed full of objects of 
luxury, of self-confidence, of estrangement from God; "And 
their land it filled with silver and gold, and there is no end 
of their treasures ; and their land is filled with horses, and there 
is no end of their chariots. And their land is filled with — 
idols; the work of their own hands they worship, titat which t/ieir 

the cloods, see at ch. Ev. 5), onen might mean " he gathered angniiea {rom 
the clonds." Or if we take onen as a Bynonym of innen in Gen. iz. 14, it 
woTild meaa " to raise storms," which would give the rendering m^eiiaKiiti, 
tempestarii, Btoim-raieers. The derivation of onen from ]*jr, in the sense of 
the Arabic 'ana (impf. ya "(nu), as it were to ogle, orulo maUgno peters et 
faseinare, foundeiB on annen, the word used in the TargiuuB, which cannot 
pcMsibtr Iw traced to ]<^. From a purely philological standpoint, however, 
there ia etiU another explanation poasilile. From the idea of coming to meet 
we get the transitive meaning to hold bade, ehut in, or hinder, particularly 
to hold back a horse by the reins (inan), or when applied to SBiual rela- 
tions, 'tmna (unntna, u'tana) 'an el-mar'afi, " h% is prevented (by magic) 
from approaching hia wife." Bedde the Arabic 'innia and ma'nfln (to 
render sexually impotent by witchcraft), we find the Syriac 'anono used iu 



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120 THE PEOP'fiEClES OF ISAIAH. 

own fingers have made." The glory of Solomon, wliich revived 
under Uzziali's fifty-two years' reign, and was sostained through 
Jotham's reign of sixteen years, carried with it the curse of the 
law ; for the law of the king, in Dent. xvii. 14 sqq., prohibited 
the multiplying of horses, and also the accumulation of gold 
and silver. Standing armies, and stores of national treasures, 
like everything else which ministers to carnal self-reliance, were 
opposed to the spirit of the theocracy. Nevertheless Judaea 
was immeasurably full of such seductions to apostasy ; and not 
of those alone, but also of things which plainly revealed it, viz. 
of elilim, idols (the same word is used in Lev. six. 4, xxvi. 1, 
from elil, vain or worthless ; it is therefore equivalent to " not- 
gods"). They worshipped the work of "their own" hands, 
what " their own " fingers had made : two distributive singulars, 
as in ch. v. 23, the hands and fingers of every individual (yid. 
Mic V. 12, 13, where the idols are classified). The condition 
of the land, therefore, was not only opposed to the law of the 
king, but at variance with the decalogue also. The existing 
glory was the most offensive caricature of the glory promised 
to the nation ; for the people, whose God was one day to become 
the desire and salvation of all nations, bad exchanged Him for 
the idols of the nations, and was vying with them in the appro- 
priation of heathen religion and customs. 

It was a state ripe for judgment, from which, therefore, 
the prophet could at once proceed, without any further prepara- 
tion, to the proclamation of judgment itself, Ver, 9, " Thus, 
then, men are bowed down, and lords are brought low; and for- 
give them — no, that Thou wilt not." The consecutive futures 
depict the judgment, as one which would follow by inward 
necessity from the worldly and ungodly gloiy of the existing 
state of things. The future is frequently used in this way (for 
example, in ch. ix. 7 sqq.). It was a j*udgment by which small 
and great, i.e. the people in all its classes, were brought down 
from their false eminence. " Men " and " lords " {dddm and ish, 
as in ch. v. 15, Ps. xlix. 3, and Prov. viii. 4, and like av0panro9 
and aarijp in the Attic dialect), i.e, men who were lost in the 
crowd, and men who rose above it, — all of them the j'udgment 
would throw down to the gronnd, and that without mercy 
(Rev. vi. 15). The prophet expresses the conviction (al as in 
2 Kings vi. 27), that on this occasion God neither could nor 



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CBAP. U. 10-a 121 

would take away the sin by forgiving it. There was nothing 
left for them, therefore, but to carry out the command of the 
prophet in ver. 10 : " Creep into Hie rock, and hurt/ thyself in 
the dusty before the terrible look of Jehovah, and before the glory 
of Hit majetty" The glorioua nation would hide itself most 
ignominionaly, when the only true glory of Jehovah, which had 
been rejected by it, was manifested in judgment. They would 
conceal themselves in holes of the rocks, as if before a hostile 
army (Judg. vi. 2 ; 1 Sam. xiii. 6, ziv. 11), and bury them- 
selves with their faces in the sand, as if before the fatal simoom 
of the desert, that they might not have to bear this intolerable 
eight. And when Jehovah manifested Himself in this way in 
the fiery glance of judgment, the result summed up in ver. 11 
must follow : " T^e people's eyes of haughtiness are humbled, and 
the pride of their lords is bowed doum ; and Jehovah, He only, 
stands exalted in Otat day." The result of the process of judg- 
ment is expressed in pei-fects : nisgab ia the third pers. prcet^ 
not the participle : Jehovah " is exalted," i.e. shows Himself as 
esalted, whilst the haughty conduct of the people is brought 
down (shdphel is a verb, not an adjective ; it is construed in 
the singular by attraction, and either refers to dddm, man or 
people ; Ges. § 148, 1 ; or what is more probable, to the logical 
unity of the compound notion which is taken as subject, the 
constr. ad synesin s. senaum : Thiersch, § 118), and the pride of 
the lords is bowed down (shack = shdchach. Job ix. 13). The 
first strophe of the proclamation of judgment appendai to the 
prophetic saying in vers. 2-4 is here brought to a close. The 
second strophe reaches to ver. 17, where ver. 11 ia repeated as 
a concluding verse. 

The expression " that day " suggests the inquiry, What day 
is referred to! The prophet answers this question in the 
second strophe. Ver. 12. "For Jehovah of hosts hath a day over 
everything towering and lofty, and over everything exalted; and 
it becomes low," "Jehovah hath a day" (yom layehovah), lit. 
there is to Jehovah a day, which already exists as a finished 
divine thought in that wisdom by which the course of history 
is guided (ch. xxxvii. 26, cf, xxii. 11), the secret of which He 
revealed to the prophets, who from the time of Obadiah and 
Joel downwards proclaimed that day with one uniform watch- 
word. Bat when the time appomted for that day should 



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122 THE PBOPHECIKS OF ISAUH. 

arrire, it would pass out of the secret of eternity into the 
hbtoiy of time, — a day of world-wide jadgment, which woald 
pass, through the omnipotence with which Jehovah rules over 
the higher as well as lower spheres of the whole creation, 
upon all worldly glory, and it would be brought low (shaphd). 
The corrent accentuation of ver. 126 is wrong; correct MSS. 
have ^ijf with mereha, Kb3"i>3 with tifcha. The word v'skdpliel 
(third pers. pnet. with the root-vowel ^) acquires the force of a 
future, although no grammatical future precedes it, from the 
future character of the day itself : " and it will sink down " 
(Ges. § 126, 4). 

The prophet then proceeds to enumerate all the high things 
upon which that day would fall, arranging them two and two, 
and hinding them in pairs by a double correlative Vav. The 
day of Jehovah comes, as the first two pairs affirm, upon every- 
thing lofty in nature. Vers. 13, 14. " As upon all the cedars of 
Lebanon, the lofty and exalted, so upon all the oaks of Bashan. 
As upon all mountains, the lofty ones, so upon all hills the exalted 
ones" But wherefore upon all this majestic beauty of nature 1 
Is all this merely figurative ? Knobel regards it as merely a 
figurative description of the grand buildings of the time of 
Uzziah and Jotham, in the erection of which wood had been 
used from Lebanon as well as from Bashan, on the western slopes 
of which the old shady oaks (sindidn and ballut) are flourishing 
stall.' But the idea that trees can be used to signify the houses 
built with the wood obtained from them, is one that cannot be 
sustained from ch. ix. 9 (10), where the reference is not to 
houses built of sycamore and cedar wood, but to trunks of trees 
of the kind mentioned ; nor even from Nahum ii. 4 (3), where 
liahheroshim refers to the fir lances which are brandished about 
in haughty thirst for battle. So again mountains and hills 
cannot denote the castles and fortifications built upon them, 
more especially as these are expressly mentioned in ver. 15 in 
the most literal terms. In order to understand the prophet, we 
must bear in mind what the Scriptures invariably assume, from 
their first chapter to the very close, namely, that the totality of 
nature is bound up with man in one common history ; that man 
and the totality of nature are inseparably connected together as 

^ On tbe meaDiDg of the name of this region, Btulum {Ijosanitis), see 
Job, YoL iL pp. S98-400, Eag. Tr. 



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CRAP. IL IS, le. 123 

centre and circumference ; that this circnmfereoce b affected 
by the sin which proceeds from man, as well as by the anger or 
the mercy which proceeds from God to man ; that the jadgraents 
of God, as the history of the nations proves, involve in fellow- 
suffering even that part of the creation which is not free; and that 
this participation in the ** corruption " (phthora) and " glory " 
(doxa) of humanity will come out with peculiar distinctuess 
and force at the close of the world's history, in a manner corre- 
sponding to the commencement ; and lastly, that the world in 
its present condition seeds a palingenesia, or regeneration, quite 
as much as the corporeal nature of man, before it can become 
an object of good pleasure on the part of God. We cannot be 
surprised, therefore, that, in accordance with this fundamental 
view of the Scriptures, when the judgment of God fell upon 
Israel, it ahould also be described as going down to the laud of 
Israel, and as overthrowing not only the false glory of the nation 
itself, but everything gloriona in the surrounding nature, which 
had been made to minister to its national pride and love of 
show, and to which its sin adhered in many different ways. 
What the prophet foretold began to be fuliiiled even in the 
Assyrian wars. The cedar woods of Lebanon were nnsparingly 
destroyed; the heights and valleys of the land were trodden 
down and laid waste ; and, in the period of the great empires 
which commenced with Tiglath-pileser, the Holy Land was 
reduced to a shadow of its former promised beauty. 

The glory of nature ia followed by what is lofty and glori- 
ous in the world of men, snch as magnificent fortifications, 
grand commercial buildings, and treasures which minister to 
the lust of the eye. Vera. 15, 16. "Ai vpon every high tower, 
to upon eoery fortified wall. Ab upon all ships of Tarshiskf so 
upon all works of curiosity," It was by erecting fortifications 
for offence and defence, both lofty and steep {bdznr, prseruptue, 
from bazar, abrampere, secernere), that Uzziah and Jotham 
especially endeavoured to serve Jerusalem and the land at 
large. The chronicler relates, with reference to Uzziah, in 
2 Chron. xxvi., that he bnilt strong towers above " the comer- 
gate, the valley-gate, and the southern point of the cheese- 
makers' hollow," and fortified these places, which had probably 
been till diat time the weakest points in Jerusalem ; also that 
he built towers in the desert (probably in the desert between 



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124 THE PR0FHECI&5 Of ISAIAH. 

Beersbeba and Gaza, to increase the safely of the land, and 
the nnmerons flocks which were pastured in the ehephelak, i.e 
the western portion of sonthem Palestine). With regard to 
Jotham, it is related in both the book of Kings (2 Kings 
XT. 32 sqq.) and the Chronicles, that he bnilt the upper gate 
of the temple ; and in the Chronicles (2 Chron. xxvii.) that 
he fortified the 'Ofel, m. the southern spur of the temple hill, 
still more strongly, and bnilt cities on the mountains of Judah, 
and erected castles and towers in the forests (to watch for 
hostile attacks and ward them off). Hezekiah also distin- 
gnished himself by building enterprises of this kind (2 Chron. 
xxxii. 27-30). Bat the allusion to the ships of Tarshish takes 
ns to the times of Uzziah and Jotham, and not to those of 
Hezekiah (as Ps. xlviii. 7 does to the time of Jehosbaphat) ; 
for the seaport town of Ekth, which was recovered by Uzziah, 
was lost again to the kingdom of Judah during the reign of 
Ahaz, Jewish ships sailed from this Elatb (Ailath) through 
the Bed Sea and round the coast of Africa to the barboDT of 
Tartessus, the ancient Phoenician emporium of the maritime 
region watered hy the Bietis (Guadalquivir), which abounded 
in silver, and then returned through the Pillars of Hercules 
(the Straits of Gibraltar : vid. Duncker, Gesck. i. 312-315). 
It was to these Tartessns vessels that the expression "ships 
of Tarshish" primarily referred, though it was afterwards 
probably applied to mercantile ships in general. The follow- 
^y^ng expression, *' works of curiosity " {sechiyyoth hachemdah), 
is taken in far too restricted a sense by those who limit it, 
as the LXX. have done, to the ships already spoken of, or 
understand it, as Gesenius does, as referring to beautiful flags. 
Jerome's rendering is correct : " et tuper omne quod viau 
pulcrum est" (and upon everything beautifol to look at); 
aeciyyah, from sdcdk, to look (see Job, p. 468), is sight gene- 
rally. The reference therefore is to all kinds of works of art, 
whether in sculpture or paintings (mcudtk is used of both), 
which delighted the observer by Uieir imposing, tasteful appear- 
ance. Possibly, however, there is a more especial reference 
to curiosities of art and nature, whioh were brought by the 
trading vesseb from foreign lands. 

Ver. 17 closes the second strophe of the proclamation of 
judgment appended to the earlier prophetic word : "And the 



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CHAP, IL IB, W. 125 

kaughHneag of the people i» bowed down, and the pride of the 
lordt brought low; and Jehovah, He alone, standx eaialted on that 
day" The closing refrain only variea a little from Tor. 11. 
The subjects of the verbs are transposed. With a feminine 
noon denoting a thing, it is almost a rule that the predicate 
shall be placed before it in masculine (Ges. \ 147, a). 

The closing refrain of the next two strophes is based upon 
the concluding clause of ver. 10. The proclamation of judg- 
ment turns now to the eliUm, which, as being at the root of all 
the evil, occupied the lowest place in the things of which the 
land was full (vers. 7, 8). In a short verse of one clause con- 
sisting of only three words, their future is declared as it were 
with a lightning-flash. Ver. 18. " And the idols utterly past 
atoay." The translation shows the shortness of the verse, but 
not the significant aynaUage numeri. The idols are one and all 
a mass of nothingness, which will be reduced to absolute anni- 
hilation : they will vanish cdlil, i.e. either " they will utterly 
perish" (fundUna peribunt), or, as cdUl is not used adverbially 
in any other passage, "they will all perish" {tota peribunt, 
Judg. XX. 40) — their images, their worship, even their names 
and their memory (Zech. xiii. 2). 

What the idolaters themselves will do when Jehovah has so 
completely deprived their idols of all their divinity, is then 
described in ver. 19 : "And they vnll creep into caves in the 
Tocke, and cellars in the earth, before the terrible look of Jehovah, 
and before the glory of His majesty, when He ari^eth to put the 
earth in terror." Me&rah is a natural cave, and mechillah a 
subterraneous excavation : this is apparently the distinction 
between the two synonyms. " To put the earth in terror :" 
laarotz hd-aretz, a significant paronomasia, which can be repro- 
duced in Latin, thus : ut terreat lerram. Thus the judgment 
would fall upon the earth without any limitation, upon men 
nniversally (compare the word hd-dddm in ver. 20, which is 
scarcely ever applied to a single individual (Josh. xiv. 15), 
excepting, of course, the first man, but generally to men, or 
to the human race) and upon the totality of nature as inter- 
woven in the history of man — one complete whole, in which 
sin, and therefore wrath, had gained the upper hand. When 
Jehovah rose up, t.e. stood up from His heavenly throne, to 
reveal the glory manifested in heaven, and turn its judicial 



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ISO THE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

fiery side towards the sinful earth, the earth would receive 
such a sliock as would throw it into a state resembling the 
chaoa of the beginning. We may see very clearly fi-om Rev, 
vi. 15, where thb deacription is borrowed, that the prophet is 
here describing the last jadgment, althongh from a national 
point of view and bounded by a national horizon. 

Ver. 20 forms the commencement to the fourth strophe: 
"In tJtat day will a man cast away his idols of gold and his idols 
of silver, which they made for him to worship, to the moles and to 
ike bats." The traditional text separates lachpor peroth into two 
words,^ though withoat its being possible to discover what they 
are supposed to mean. The reason for the separation was 
simply the fact that plurilitera were at one time altogether 
misanderstood and regarded as composita: for other plurilitera, 
written as two words, compare cb. Isi. 1, Hos. iv. 18, Jer. 
xlvi, 20. The prophet certainly pronounced the word lachpar- 
pdroth (Ewald, § 157, c); and chapharpdrdh is apparently a 
Tnole (lit. thrower up of the soil), talpa, as it is rendered hy 
Jerome and interpreted by Bashi. Gesenius and Knobel, 
however, have raised this objection, that the mole is never 
found in Iwuses. But are we necessarily to assume that they 
would throw their idols into Inmber-rooms, and not hide them 
in holes and crevices ont of doors f The mole, the shrew- 
mouse, and the bat, whose name (atalhph) is regarded by 
Schultens as a compound word {atal-eph, night-hird), are gene- 
rically related, according to both ancient and modem natu- 
ralists. Eats are to birds what moles are to the smaller 
beasts of prey (vid. lievysohn, Zoohgie des Talmud, p. 102). 
The LXX. combine with these two words Thishtachavoth (to 
worship). Malbim and Lnzzatto adopt this rendering, and 
understand the words to mean that they would sink down to 
the most absurd descriptions of animal worship. But the 

* Abulwalid ParchoD and others regard the doable word as the 
HDgular of a substantive, applied to a particular bird (pceaiblj a wood- 
pecker), as a pecker of fruit {perotli). Kimchi wonld rather take lachpor 
Bs an infinitive {a« iu Josh. il. S), to dig pilA; and compares with it the 
taltnudic word pir, a. pit or grave. No one adopts the rendering " into 
mouse-boles," simplf becanae psrah, a mouse (from an Arabic word fa^ara, 
to dig, or root up), was not a Hebrew word at all, but was adopted at a 
later period from tfae Arabic (hence the Eebneo- Arabic pvrfJi, e. mouse- 
trap). 



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CHAP. II- SI. 127 

sccentuation, wliich iJoas not divide the verse at Tr</^y as we 
bhould ' expect if this were the meaning, is based upon the 
correct interpretation. The idolaters, convinced of the worth- 
lessness of their idols through the jndicial interposition of God, 
and enraged at the disastfouB manner in which they had been 
deceived, would throw away with curses the images of gold 
and silver which artists' hands had made according to their 
inatractions, and hide them in the boles of bats and in mole- 
hills, to conceal them from the eyes of the Judge, and then take 
refuge there themselves after ridding themselves of this useless 
and damnable burden. 

Ver. 21. " To creep into the cavitiea of tlie ttone-hlocha, and 
into the clefts of the rocks, before the terrible look of Jehovah, and 
before the glory of His majesty, when He arises to put the earth in 
terror," Thus enda the fourth strophe of this " dies irce, dies 
ilia," which is appended to the earlier prophetic word. But 
there follows, as an epiphonem, this nota bene in ver. 22 : Ok, 
t/wn, let man go, in whose nose is a breath; for what is he esti- 
mated atf The Septuagint leaves this verse out altogether. 
But was it BO utterly unintelligible then t Jerome adopted a 
false pointing, and has therefore given this marvellous render- 
ing : excelsus (bdmdh !) repiUatus est ipse, by which Luther was 
apparently misled. But if we look backwards aifd forwards, it 
is impossible to mistake the meaning of the verse, which must 
he regarded not only as the resultant of what precedes it, but 
also as the transition to what follows. It is preceded by the 
prediction of the utter demolition of everything which ministers 
to the pride and vain confidence of men ; and in ch. iii. 1 sqq. 
the same prediction is resumed, with a more special reference 
to the Jewish state, from which Jehovah is about to take away 
every prop, so that it shall utterly collapse. Accordingly the 
prophet exhorts, in ver. 22, to a renunciation of trust in man, 
and everything belon^ng to him, just as in Ps. cxviii. 8, 9, 
cxivi. 3, and Jer. xvii. 5. The construction is as general as 
that of a gnome. The dat. commodi os^ (Ges. § 154, 3, e) 
renders the exhortation both friendly and urgent : from regard 
to yourselves, for your own good, for your own salvation, desist 
from man, i.e. from your confidence in him, in whose nose (in 
cujus tmso, the singular, as in Job xxvii. 3 ; whereas the plural 
is used in Gen. ii. 7 in the same sense, in nares ejus, " into his 



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128 THE PSOPHEOIES OF ISAIAH. 

nostrils") is a breath, a breath of life, wbicb God gave to him, 
and can take back as soon as He will (Job zzziv, 14; Fs. 
civ. 29). Upon tbe breath, which passes out and in through 
his nose, his whole earthly existence is suspended ; and this, 
when once lost, is gone for ever (Job vii. 7). It is upon this 
breath, therefore, that all the confidence placed in man most 
rest, — a bad soil and foundation ! Under these conditions, and 
with this liability to perish in a moment, the worth of man as a 
grornid of confidence is really nothing. This thought is ex- 
pressed here in the form of a question : At (for) what is he 
estimated, or to. be estimated ? The passive participle neckihah 
combines with the idea of the actual (cBttimatui) that of the 
necessary {cBitimandwi), and also of the possible or suitable 
(atHmabilis) ; and that all the more because the Semitic lan- 
guages have no special forms for the latter notions. The Beth 
is Bethpretii, corresponding to the Latin genitive {quanii) or 
ablative {quanio), — a modification of the Beth instrwnenti, the 
price being regarded as die medium of exchange or purchase : 
"at what is he estimated," not with what is he compared, 
which would be expressed by ^eth (ch.' liii. 12 ; compare (terA, 
Luke xxii. 37) or 'in* (Ps. Ixxxviij. 5). The word is risa, not TO?, 
because this looser form is only found In cases where a relative 
clause follows '{eo quod, Eccles. iii. 22), and not bammak, because 
this termination with a is used exclusively where the next word 
begins with Aleph, or where it is a pausal word (as in 1 Kings 
xxii. 21) ; in every other case we have bammeh. The question 
introduced with this quanta {guanti), " at what," caunot be 
answered by any positive definition of value. The worth of 
man, regarded in himself, and altogether apart from God, is 
really nothing. 

The proclamation of jadgment pauses at this porisma, bat 
only for the purpose of gathering fresh strength. The prophet 
has foretold in four strophes the judgment of God upou every 
exalted thing in th^ iosmod that has fallen away from com- 
munion with God, just as Amos commences his book with a 
round of judgments, which are uttered in seven strophes of 
uniform scope, bursting like seven thunder-claps upon the 
nations of the existing stage of history. The seventh stroke 
falls upon Jndah, over which the thunderstorm rests after 
finding such abundant booty. And in the same manner Isaiah, 



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CHAF. lU. L 129 

m the instance before ns, reduces the universal proclamation of 
judgment to one more especially affecting Judah and Jerusalem. 
The corrent of the address breaks through the bounds of the 
strophe ; and the exhortation in ch. ii. 22 not to trust in man, 
the reason for which is assigned in what precedes, also forms a 
transition from the oniTeraal proclamation of judgment to the 
more special one in ch. iii. 1, where the prophet assigns a fresh 
ground for the exhortation : — 

Ch. iii. 1. "For, behold, the Jjord, Jehovah ofhoaU, takes away 
from Jerusalem and from Judah supporter and means ofswpport, 
every support of bread and every support of water" The divine 
name given here, '' The Lord, Jehovah of hosts," with which 
Isaiah everywhere introduces the judicial acts of G-od (cf. ch. 
i. 24, z. 16, 33, xix. 4), is a proof that the proclamation of 
judgment commences afresh here. Trusting in man was the 
crying sin, more especially of the times of Uzziah-Jotham, 
The glory of the kingdom at that time carried the wrath of 
Jehovah within it. The outbreak of that wrath commenced in 
the time of Ahaz ; and even under Hezekiah it was merely 
suspended, not changed. Isaiah foretells this outbreak of 
wrath. He describes how Jehovah will lay the Jewish state in 
ruins, by taking away the main supports of its existence and 
growth. "Supporter and means of support" (mash'en and 
masKenah) express, first of all, the general idea. The two 
nouns, which are only the masculine and feminine forms of one 
and the same word (compare Mic. ii. 4, Nahum ii. 11, and 
the examples from the Syriac and Arabic in Ewald, § 172, o), 
serve to complete the generalization : fulcra omne genus (props 
of every kind, omnigena). They are both teclmical terms, 
denoting the prop which a person uses to support anything 
whilst mish'an signifies that which yields support ; so that the 
three correspond somewhat to the Latin fulcrum, fuUuira, 
fuleimen. Of the various means of support, bread and wine 
are mentioned first, not in a fignrative sense, but as the two 
indispensable conditions and the lowest basis of human life. 
Life is supported by bread and water : it walks, as it were, 
upon the crutch of bread, so that " breaking the staff of bread" 
(Lev. xxvi, 26; Ezek. iv. 16, v. 16, xiv. 13; Ps. cv. 16) is 
equivalent to physical destruction. The destruction of the 
Jewish state would accordingly be commenced by a removal on 

TOL. I. I 



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130 THE PBOFBEdES OF I6MAH. 

the part of Jehovah of all the support afforded by bread and 
water, i.e. all the stores of both. And this was literally ful- 
filled, for both in the Chaldean and Boman times Jemsalem 
perished in the midst of just such terrible famines as are 
threatened in the curses in Ler. xxvi., and more especially in 
Dent, zxviii. ; and in both cases the inhabitants were reduced 
to such extremities, that women devoured their own children 
(Lam. ii. 20 ; Josephns, Wars of Jiws, vi. 3, 3, 4). It is very 
unjust, therefore, on the part of modem critics, such as Hitzig, 
Knobel, and Meier, to pronounce ver. lb a gloss, and, in fact, 
a false one. Gesenius and Umbreit retracted this suspicion. 
The construction of the verse is just the same as that of ch. 
XXV. 6 ; and it is Isaiah's custom to explain his own figures, as 
we have already observed when comparing ch. i. 7 sqq. and 
i. 23 with what preceded them. *' Every support of bread and 
every support of water" are not to be regarded in this case as 
an explanation of the general idea introduced before, " sup- 
porters and means of support," but simply as the commencement 
of the detailed expansion of the idea. For the enumeration of 
the supports which Jehovah would take away is continued in 
the next two verses. 

Vers. 2, 3. "Hero arid man of tear, judge and prophet, 
and soolhsatfer and elder; captains of fifty, and the highly di»- 
tingnished, and coujiBelhrs, and masters in art, and those skilled 
in muttering."- As the state had grown into a mUitiiry stale 
under Uzziah-Jotham, the prophet commences in both verses 
with military officers, viz. the gibbor, i.e. commanders whose 
bravery had been already tried ; the " man of war" {ish mil- 
chdmdli), i.e, private soldiers who had been equipped and well 
trained (see Ezek, sxxix. 20) ; and the " captain of fifty" (ear 
cli^misshim), leaders of the smallest divisions of the army, con- 
sisting of only fifty men {pentekontarchoe, 2 Kings i. 9, etc.). 
The prominent members of the state are all mixed np together : 
" the judge" {shophet), i.e. the officers appointed by the govern- 
ment to administer justice ; *' the elder" {zdken), i.e. the heads 
of families and the senators appointed by the town corpora- 
tions ; the " counselhi^' (j/Oetz), those nearest to the king ; the 
" highly distinguished" (nesu panim), lit. those whose personal 
appearance (panini) was accepted, i.e. welcome and regarded 
with honour (Saad. : tca'gih, from wa'gh, the face or appearance), 



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CHAP. IIL !, a. 131 

that is to say, persons of inflaeDce, not only on account of their 
office, but also on account of wealth, age, goodness, etc. ; 
" masters in arf (chacam chardehim : LXX. 1x0^9 apj(iT^KTav'), 
or, as Jerome has veiy ^ell rendered it, in artibut meckanicit 
exereitatut easque eallide tractant (persons well versed in mecha- 
nical arts, and canning them out with skill). In the Ohaldean 
captivities skilled artisans are particularly mentioned as having 
been carried awaj (2 Kings xxiv. 14 sqq. ; Jer. xxiv. 1, xxix. 
2) ; BO that there can be no doubt whatever that chardskim 
(from cheresh) is to be understood as signifying mechanical and 
not magical arts, as Gesenius, Hitzig, and Meier suppose, and 
therefore that chacam ckardshtm does not mean " wizards," as 
Ewald renders it {ch&rdshvm is a different word from chardehim, 
fabri, from chdrdeh, although in 1 Chron. iv. 14, cf. Neh.xi. 35, 
the word is regularly pointed Q'?^!i even in this personal sense). 
Moreover, the rendering " wizards" produces tautology, inas- 
much as masters of the black art are cited as nehon lachaah, 
" skilled in muttering." Lachash is the whispering or mutter- 
ing of magical formulas; it is related both radically and in 
meaning to iiachash, enchantment (Arabic nocAs, misfortune) ; 
it is derived from laehaeh, siMlare, to hiss (a kindred word to 
tidchaah ; hence ndchdeh, a serpent). Beside this, the masters 
of the black art are also represented as koaem, which, in ac- 
cordance with the radical idea of making fast, swearing, con- 
juring, denoted a soothsayer following heathen superstitions, as 
distinguished from the nahi, or false Jehovah prophet (we 6nd 
this as early as Deat. xviii. 10, 14).^ These came next to bread 

* According to tlie prinuTf meuung of the whole tKema, which is 
one of hardnesB, rigidity, fimmess, akaama (H. of k&sam) aignifieB, strictly 
Bpe&kiDg, to make ture, i.e. to swear, either by swearing to the truth aud 
certfunty of a tiling, or by makiiig a person awear that he will do or 
not do a certain thing, hj laying as it were a hasam upon tiim. The kal, 
on tiie other hand (kamma), gets ite meaning to divide from, the turn 
^ven to the radical idea in the aubetanliTa jtum, which aiguifiea, accord- 
ing to the original lexicograpben, something fixed (^1 Rtuib), definite, 
Le. a definite portion. There ia jost the same aaaociation of ideas in 'azama 
as in alaama, namely, literally to be firm or make firm, i.e. to direct oue'a 
will firmly towards an object or place ; also to direct one's will firmly 
towards a person, to adjure him to do a thing or not to do it ; aometdmes 
with a, Bofter meaning, to urge or invite a person to anything, at other times 
to redt« conjuring formalas QazSini^. 



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133 THE PBOFHECIES OF ISAUH. 

and water, and were in a higher grade the props of the Etate. 
They are mixed together in this manner without regular order, 
because the powerful and splendid state was really a quodlibet 
of things Jewish and heathen ; and when the wrath of Jehovah 
broke out, the godless glory would eoon become a mass of 
confusion. 

Ver. 4. Thus robbed of its support, and torn out of its 
proper groove, the kingdom of Judah would fall a prey to the 
most shameless despotism: " And I give them boys for princes, 
and caprices shall rule over them" The revived " Solomonian" 
glory b followed, as before, by the times of Rehoboam. The 
king is not expressly named. This was intentional. He had 
sunk into the mere shadow of a king : it was not he who ruled, 
but the aristocratic par^ that surrounded him, who led him 
about in leading strings as v,num inter pares. Now, if it ia a 
misfortune in most cases for a king to be a child (na'ar, Eccles. 
X. 16), the misfortune is twice as great when the princes or 
magnates who surround and advise him are youngsters (ne'drim, 
i-e, young lords) in a bad sense. It produces a government of 
taalidim. None of the nonns in this form have a personal 
ugnification. According to the primaiy meaning of the verbal 
stem, the word might signify childishnesses, equivalent to little 
children (the abstract for the concrete, hke xd ■rraiSiKa, amasius), 
as Ewald supposes ; or puppets, fantocci, poltroons, or men 
without heart or brain, aa Lnzzatto maintains. But the latter 
has no support in the general usage of the language, and the 
verb yimahelu (shall rule) does not necessarily require a personal 
subject (cf. Ps. xix, 14, ciii. 19). The word taalulim is formed 
from the reflective verb hithallel, which means to meddle, to gra- 
tify one's self, to indulge one's caprice. Accordingly taalulim 
itself might be rendered vexationes (ch. Ixvi. 4). Jerome, who 
translates the word ^ffeminatt, appears to have thought of 
?5ynri in an erotic sense. The Sept. rendering, ifi-n-alicTai, is 
better, though efitralr^fiaTa would be more exact When used, 
as the word is here, along with ne'arim, it signifies outbursts 
of youthful caprice, which do injury to others, whether in 
joke or earnest. Neither law nor justice would rule, but the 
very opposite of justice : a course of conduct which would 
make subjects, hke slaves, the helpless victims at one time 
of their lust (Judg. xix. 25), and at another of their cruelty. 



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They would be governed by lawless and bloodstained caprice, of 
the most despotic character and varied forms. And the people 
would resemble their rulers : their passions would be let loose, 
and all restraints of modesty and decorum be snapt asunder. 

Ver. 5. " And the people oppreei one another, one tkit and 
atiother tJiot ; the hoy breaks out violently upon the old man, and 
the despised upon the honoured." Niggaa is a reciprocal niphal, 
as the clause depicting the reciprocity clearly shows (cf . nilcham, 
ch. xix. 2) ; nagaa followed by Beth means to treat aa a tyrant 
or taskmaster (ch. ix. 3). The commonest selfishness would 
then stifle every nobler motive ; one would become the tyrant 
of another, tuid ill-mannered insolence would take the place of 
that reverence, which is due to the old and esteemed from boys 
and those who are below them in position, whether we regard 
the law of nature, the Mosaic law (Lev. sis, 32), or the com- 
mon custom of society. Nikleh (from kdldh, the synonym of 
■"iP^) ch. viii. 23, xxiii. 9 ; cf. ch. xvi. 14, kal, to be light or 
insignificant) was a term used to denote whoever belonged to 
the lowest stratum of society (1 Sam. xviii. 23). It was the 
opposite of nichad (from cabed, to be heavy or of great Imports 
ance). The Septua^nt rendering, 6 S.Ti[j.o<i irphv rov evrt/iov 
is a very good one (as the Semitic languages have no such 
antithetical formations with a arepTjTiicov). With such con- 
tempt of the distinctions arising from age and position, the 
state would very soon become a scene of the wildest confusion. 

At length there would be no authorities left; even the 
desire to rule would die out: for despotism is sure to be 
followed by mob-rule, and mob-rule by anarchy in the most 
literal sense. The distress wonld become so great, that who- 
ever had a coat (cloak), so as to be able to clothe himself 
at all decently, would be asked to undertake the government. 
Vers. 6, 7. " WTi&i a man shall take hold of hie brother m 
hie father's house, TItou hast a coat, thou shall be our ruler, and 
take this ruin under tky hand ; he will cry out in thai day, I 
do not want to he a surgeon ; there is neither bread nor coat in 
my house: ye cannot make me the ruler of the people" *' His 
father's house" — this is not an unmeaning tnut in the picture 
of misery. The population would have become so thin and 
dispirited through hunger, that with a httle energy it would be 
possible to decide within the narrow circle of a family who 



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134 THE PBOPHEOIES 07 ISAIAH. 

should be ruler, and to give effect to the decision. " Id hia 
father's house :'" Beth dbiv is an ace. loci. The father's boose 
i> the place where brother meets with brother ; and one breaks 
oat with the urgent petition contained in the words, which 
follow without the introdnctory "saying" (cf. ch. xiv. 8, 16, 
and zxii. 16, xxxiit. 14). ns? for ^p with Se otiatis, a form 
rarely met with (yid. Gen. xxvii. 37). f^''^?, which would be 
written *nri before the predicate, is jossive in meaning, though 
not in form. "This ruin:" macshelah is used in Zeph. i. 3 
for that which occasions a person's fall ; here it signifies what 
has been overthrown ; and as cdshal itself, which means not 
only to stumble, trip, or slide, but also to fall in consequence 
of some force applied from without, is not used in connection 
with falling buildings, it must be introduced here with an 
allusion to the prosopopeia which follows in ver. S. The man 
who was distinguished above all others, or at any rate above 
many others, by the fact that he could slill dress himself 
decently (even if it were only in a blouse), should be made 
supreme ruler or dictator (cf. kdtzin, Judg. xi. 6); and the 
state which lay so miserably in ruins should be under hb band, 
i.e. his direction, protection, and care (2 Kings viii. 20; Gen. 
xli. 35, cf. ch. xvi. 9, where the plural is used instead of the 
ordinary singular ydd). The apodosis to the protasis intro- 
dnced with chi as a particle of time {wheji) commences in 
ver. 7. The answer given by the brother to the earnest 
petition is introduced with " he will raise (viz. his voice, cb. 
cdv. 14) in that day, saying." It is given in this circumstantial 
manner because it is a solemn protest. He does not want to 
be a chohesh, i.e. a hinder, namely of the broken arms, and 
bones, and ribs of the mined state (ch, inp;, 26, i. 6, bd. 1). 
The expression ehyeh implies that he does not like it, because 
he is conscious of bb inability. He has not confidence enough 
in himself, and the assumption that be has a coat is a false one: 
he not only has no coat at home (we must remember that the 
conversation b supposed to take place in bis father's bouse), 
but he has not any bread ; so that it is utterly impossible for a 
naked, starving man like hira to do what is suggested (" in my 
house," ubebethi with a Vav of causal connection: Gea. 155, 1, c). 
The prophet then proceeds, in vers. 8-12, to describe this deep, 
tragical misery as a just retribution. Ver. 8. "For JemsaUm 



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CEAT. in «. 135 

i» ruined and Judali fallen ; hecatise their tonfftie and their doings 
(are) against Jehovah, to defy the eyes of His glory" Jerusalem 
as a city ia feminine, according to the usual perscmification ; 
Judah as a people is regarded as masculine.^ The two preterites 
cdah'ldh and ndphal express the general fact, which occasioned 
sach scenes of misery as the ODe just described. The second 
clause, beginning with " because" (chi), is a sabstantative clause, 
and attributes the coming judgment not to future sin, but to sin 
already existing. "Against Jehovah:" -"t* is used to denote a 
hostile attitude, as in ch. ii. 4, Oen. ir. 8, Num. xzxii. 14, Josh. 
X. 6. The capital and the land are against Jehovah both in 
word and deed, " to defy the eyes of His glory" (Jamroth 'enS 
chebodo). ''^. is equivalent to ^?.*}| ; and lamroth is a syncopated 
hiphil, as in ch. xxiii. 11, and like the niphal in ch. i. 12 : we find 
the same form of the same word in Ps. Ixxviii. 17. The kal 
mdrdhf which is also frequently construed with the accusative, 
signifies to thrust away in a refractory manner j the hiphil 
himrdh, to treat refractorily, literally to set one's self rigidly in 
opposition, objiiti; mar, stringere, to draw tightly, with which 
unquestionably the meaning bitter as an astringent is con- 
nected, though it does not follow that mdrdh, himrdh, and 
kemar (Ex. xxiii. 21) can be rendered irapa-jTiKpalveiv, as they 
have been in the Septuagint, since the idea of opposing, 
resisting, fighting in opposition, is implied in all these roots, 
with distinct reference to the primary meaning. The Lamed is 
a shorter expression instead of IVD?, which is the term generally 
employed in such circumstances (Amos ii. 7 ; Jer. vii. 18, 
xxxii. 29). But what does the prophet mean by " the eyes of 
His glory!" Knobel's assertion, that chdbod b used here for 
the religious glory, t.e. the holiness of God, is a very strange 
one, sinra the chdbod of God is invariably the fiery, bright 
doxa which reveals Him as the Holy One. But his remai'k 
does not meet tlie question, inasmuch as it does not settle the 
point in dispute, whether the expression " the eyes of His 
gioty" implies that the glory itself has eyes, or the glory is 
a quality of the eyes. The constmction is certainly not a 
different one from "the arm of His glory" in ch. lii, 10, so 

* Ab a rule, the name of a people (apart from the perEonificatioii of the 
people SB beth, a house) is only used as a feminine, when tbe name of the 
Und Uanda for the nation itsdf (see OeMnins, Lehriegr. p. 469). 



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130 THE FBOPEECIES OF ISAIAH. 

thiit it 18 to be taken as an attribate. Bat this suggests the 
further qaestion, what does the prophet mean hj the glory- 
eyes or glorioos eyes of Jehovah T If we were to say the eyes 
of Jehovah are His knowledge of the world, it woold be im- 
possible to onderstand how they coald be called holy, still less 
how they could he called glorions. This abstract explanation 
of the anthropomorphisms cannot be sostained. The state of 
the case is rather the following. The glory (cAoSod) of God 
is that eternal and glorious morphe which His holy nature 
assumes, and which men must picture to themselves anthropo- 
morpbically, because they cannot imagine anything superior 
to the human form. In this glorions form Jehovah looks upon 
His people with eyes of glory. His pure but yet jealous love, 
His holy love which breaks out in wrath against all who meet 
it with hatred instead of with love, is reflected therein. 

But Israel, instead of walking in the consciousness of being 
a constant and favourite object of these majestic, earnestly 
admonishing eyes, was diligently engaged in bidding them 
defiance both in word and deed, not even hiding its sin from 
fear of them, but exposing them to view in the most shameless 
manner. — Ver. 9. " The look of their facet teetifUt againet them, 
and their sin they make kttomi liie Sodom, without concealing it : 
woe to their soul ! for they do themselvea harm" In any case, 
the prophet refers to the impudence with which their enmity 
against God was shamelessly stamped upon their faces, without 
even the self-condemnation which leads in other cases to a 
diligent concealment of the sin. But we cannot follow Luz- 
zatto and Jos. Kimchi, who take haccdraJJi as used directly for 
azztiih (impudence), inasmuch as the Arabic hakara (haiir'a), 
to which Kimchi appeals, signifies to he astonished and to stare 
(see at Job xix. 3). And in this case there would be nothing 
strange in the substantive form, which would be a piel forma- 
tion like nri^ nttsn. Bat it may be a hipJdl formation (Ewald, 
§ 156, a) ; and this is incomparably the more probable of the 
two, as hiccir panim is a very common phrase. It signifies to 
look earnestly, keenly, or inquiringly in the face of a person, to 
fix the eye upon him ; and, when used of a judge, to take the 
part of a person, by favouring him unjustly (Deut. i. 17, 
xvi. 19). Bat this latter idea, viz. " thar acceptance of the 
person, or partiality" (according to Prov. xxiv, 23, xxviii. 21), 



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CHAP. IIL 10, U. is? 

U inadmiBsible here, for the simple reason that the passage 
refers to the whole nation, and not particularly to the judges. 
" The look of their faces" {haccdralh p'tiekem) is to be under- 
stood in an objective sense, viz. the appearance {rh «So!, Luke 
ix. 29), like the agnitio of Jerome, id quo ee agnoscendum dat 
vultus eorum. This was probably the expression commonly 
employed in Hebrew for what we designate by a very inappro- 
priate foreign word, viz. physiognomy, i.e. the expression of 
the face which reveab the state of the mind. This expression 
of their countenance testified against them (anah b', as in 
ch. liz. 12), for it was the disturbed and distorted image of 
their sin, which not only coold not be hidden, but did not even 
wish to be ; in a word, of their azzvih (Eccles. viii. 1). And it 
did cot even rest with this open though silent display : they 
spoke openly of their sin Qiiggid in its simplest meaning, palam 
facere, from ndgad, nagMOf to be open, evident) without 
making any secret of it, like the Sodomites, who publicly 
proclaimed their fleshly lusts (Gen. xis.). Jerusalem was 
spiritually Sodom, as the prophet called it in ch. i. 10. By 
such barefaced sinning they did themselves harm (gdmal, Ut. 
to finish, then to carry out, to show practically^). 

The prophet's meaning is evident enough. Bat inasmuch 
as it is the cnrae of sin to distort the knowledge of what is 
most obvious and self-evident, and even to take it entirely away, 
the prophet dwells still longer npon the fact that all sinning 
is self-destruction and self-murder, placing this general truth 
against its opposite in a palillogical Jobannic way, and call- 
ing out to bis contemporaries in vers. 10, 11 : " Sai/ of the 
rigkteoui, that it is well with him; for tJiey will enjoy the fruit of 
tlieir doings. Woe to the wicked! it is ill; for what Ms hands have 
wrought will be done to him" We cannot adopt the rendering 
" Praise the righteous," proposed by Vitringa and other modern 
commentators ; for although Smar is sometimes construed with 
the accusative of the object (Ps. xl. 11, cxlv. 6, 11), it never 
means to pruse, but to declare (even in Fs. z1. 11). We have 
here what was noticed from Gen. i. 4 onwards, — namely, the 

• It may now be accepted as an eatabliEhed fact, that the verb gdmal is 
eoanected with the Arobio 'gamala, to collsct together, 'gamula, to be per- 
fect, IcaiKila, kamula id., and gSmar, to finish (see Hnpfeld on Fs. vlL 6, 
and FUiBt, Heb. Lex.^ 



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138 TEE PBOFHEOUS OF ISAIAH. 

obvious antiptdsis or antiphonSsis in the verbs HK^ (ct. ch. zziL 9, 
Ex. ii. 2), jn; (1 Kings v. 17), and ip« (like Xiyeiv, John ix. 9) : 
dicite justtan quod bonva^dicite jwtum eate honum (Evald, 
§ 336, 6). The object of sight, knowledge, or speech, Is first 
of all mentioned in the most general manner; then follows the 
qualification, or more precise definition. 3lo, and in ver. 11 jn 
(in without the pause), might both of them be the third pen. 
pret. of the verbs, employed in a neuter sense: the former 
signifying, it is well, viz. with him (as in Deut. v. 30, Jer. zzii. 
15, 16); the latter, it is bad (as in Ps. cvi. 32). But it is 
evident from Jer. xliv. 17 that wnsia and tnn jn may be used 
in the sense of kcCKSh {kokw) ^et, and that the two espresslons 
are. here thought of in this way, so that there Is no \h to be 
supplied in either case. The form of the first favours this; and 
in the second the accentuation fluctuates between *1M tiphchak 
y&h manach, and the former with merhif the latter tiphchak. 
At the same time, the latter mode of accentuation, wliich is 
favourable to the personal rendering of m, is suppoited hy edi- 
tions of some worth, such as Bresua 1494, Fesaro 1516, Venice 
1515, 1521, and is justly preferred by Luzzatto and Bar. The 
summary assertions, The righteous is well, the wicked ill, are 
both sustained by their eventual fate, in the light of which the 
previous misfortune of the righteous appears as good fortune, 
and the previous good fortune of the wicked as misfortune. 
With an allusion to this great difference in their eventual fate, 
the word " say," which belongs to both clauses, summons to an 
acknowledgment of the good fortune of the one and the mis- 
fortune of the other. O that Judah and Jerusalem would 
acknowledge this to their own salvation before It was too late! 
For the state of the poor nation was already miserable enough, 
and very near to destruction. 

Ver. 12. " My people, its opprettora are boya, and womm 
rule over it; my people, thy leadera are mUleaderSf who swallow 
up the way of thy paths." It is not probable that tn^olet signifies 
maUreaters or trifiers, by the side of the parallel ndehim; more- 
over, the idea of despotic treatment is already contained in 
tiogeaaiv. We expect to find children where there are women. 
And this Is one meaning of meolel. It does not mean a suckling, 
however, as Ewald supposes (§ 160, a), more especially as it 
occurs in connection wiUi yonek (Jer. xliv. 7 ; Lam. ii. 11), and 



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CHAP. UL U. 139 

therefore cannot hare precisely the same meaning ; but, like 
5?iJ' and T^V (the former of which may be contracted from 
meoUT), it refers to the boy as playful and wanton (laseivwm, 
protervutti). Bottcher renders it correctly, pueri, lusores, though 
meolsl is not in itself a collective form, as he supposes ; but the 
singular is nsed collectively, or perhaps better still, the predi- 
cate is intended to apply to every individual included in the 
plural notion of the subject (compare ch. xvi. 8, sx. i, and Gea. 
§ 146, 4) : the oppressors of the people, every one without 
exception, were (even though advanced in yeara) mere hoys or 
youths in their mode of thinking and acting, and made all 
subject to them the football of their capricious humour. Here 
agfun the person of the king is allowed to fall into the back- 
ground. But the female rule, referred to afterwards, points 
tis to the court. And this must really have been the case when 
Ahaz, a young rake, came to the throne at the age of twenty 
(according to the LXX. twenty-five), possibly towards the close 
of the reign of Jotham. With the deepest anguish the prophet 
repeats the expression " my people," as he passes in his address 
to his people from the rolers to the preachers : for the meaa- 
therim or leaders are prophets (Mic. iii. 5) ; but what prophets 1 
Instead of leading the people in a straight path, they lead them 
astray (ch-.ix. 15, cf. 2 Kings xsi. 9). This they did, as we 
may gather from the history of this crowd of prophets, either 
by acting in subservience to the ungodly interests of the court 
with dynastic or demagogical servility, or by flattering the 
worst desires of the people. Thus the way of the path of the 
people, i^. the highway or road by whose ramifying paths the 
people were to reach the appointed goal, had been swallowed 
np by them, i.e. taken away from the sight and feet of the 
people, so that they could not find it and walk therein (cf. ch. 
zzv. 7, 8, where the verb is used in another connection). What 
is swallowed up is invisible, has disappeared, without a trace 
being left behind. The same idea is applied in Job xxzix. 37 
to a galloping horse, which is stud to swallow the road, inasmnch 
as it leaves piece after piece behind it in its rapid course. It 
is Btat«d here with regard to the prophets, that thej swallow up 
the road appointed by Jehovah, as the one in which His people 
were to walk, just as a criminal swallows a piece of paper which 
bears witness against himj and so hides it in his own stomach. 



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140 THE PEOPHECIES 01 ISAIAH. 

Thna the way of salvation pointed oat fey the law waa no longer 
to be either heard of or seen. The prophets, who ought to have 
preached it, said mum^ mum, and kept it swallowed. It had 
completely perished, as it were, in the erroneoos preaching of 
the false prophets. 

This was how it stood. There was bnt little to he expected 
from the exhortaUoos of the prophet; so that be had to come 
back again and again to the proclamation of judgment. The 
judgment of the world comes again before his mind.— Ver. 13. 
" Jehovah has appeared to plead, and ttands up to judge the 
natwru" When Jehovah, weaty with His long-suffering, rises 
up from His heavenly throne, this is described as " standing 
up" (hum, ch. ii. 19, 21, xxxiii. 10); and when He assumes 
the judgment-seat in the sight of all the world, this is called 
" sitting down" (i/askab, Ps. is. 5, Joel iv. 12) ; when, having 
come down from heaven (Mio, i. 2 sqq.), He comes forward as 
accuser, this is called " standing" {nizmh or amad, Ps. Ixxxii. 1 : 
amad is coming forward and standing, as the opposite of sit- 
ting ; niziab, standing, with the subordinate idea of being firm, 
resolnte, ready). This pleading (ribh, Jet. xxv. 31) is also 
judging (din), because His accusation, which is incontrovertible^ 
contains the sentence in itself ; and His sentence, whicli executes 
itself irresistibly, is of itself the infliction of punishment. Thus 
does he stand in the midst of the nations at once accuser, judge, 
and execntioner (Fs. vii. 8). But among the nations it is more 
especially against Israel that He contends ; and in Israel it is 
more especially against the leaders of the poor misguided and 
neglected people that He sets Himself. 

Vers. 14, 15. "Jehovah will proceed to judgment with th^ 
elders of His people, and its princes. And ye, ye have eaten up 
the vineyard ; prey of the suffering is in your houses. W/tat m^an 
ye that ye crush my people, and grind the face of the suffering ? 
Thus saith the Lord Jehovah of hosts'' The words of God 
Himself commence with " and ye" (pattern). The sentence to 
which this (et vos = at voa) is the antithesis is wanting, just 
as in Ps. ii. 6, where the words of God commence with " and 
I" (vt^ani, et ego = ast ego). The tacit clause may easily be 
supplied, viz. I have set you over my vineyard, tut ye have 
consumed the vineyard. The only qaestion is, whether the 
sentence is to fee regarded as suppressed by Jehovah Himself, 



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CHAP. liu. l4. IIl 141 

or liy the prophet. Most certainly by Jehovah Himself. The 
majesty ^ith ^hich He appeared before the rulers of His 
people was, even withoat words, a practical and undeniable , 
proof that their majesty was only a shadow of His, and their 
office His trust. Bat their office consisted in the fact that 
Jehovah had committed His pnople to their care. The vine- 
yard of Jehovah waa His people — a self-evident figure, which 
the prophet dresses up in the form of a parable in eh. v. 
Jehovah had appointed them an gardeners and keepers of thip 
vineyard, but they themselves have become the very beasts 
that they ought to have warded off. ~^ is applied' to the 
beasts which completely devour the blades of a corn-field or 
the grapes of a vineyard (Ex. xzii. 4). This chauge was per- 
fectly obvious. The possessions stolen from their unhappy 
countrymen, which were still in their houses, were the tangible 
proof of their plundering of the vineyard. " The suffering :" 
'ant (depressus, the crushed) is introduced as explanatory of 
haccerem, the prey, because depression and misery were the 
ordinary fate of the congregation which God called His vine- 
yard. It was ecclesia preaaOf but woe to the oppressors I In 
the question "what mean yel" (tnalldcem) the madness and 
wickedness of their deeds are implied, no and 03? are fused 
into one word here, as if it were a prefix (as in Ex. iv. 2, 
Ezek. viii. 6, Mai. i. 13 ; vid. Ges. $ 20, 2). The ken helps to 
make it clear by resolving the ehethibh. The word mallacem 
ought, strictly speaking, to be followed by <M : " What is there 
to you that ye crush my people?" as in db. xxii. 1, 16; but the 
words rush forwards (as in Jonah i, 6), because they are an 
explosion of wrath. For this reason the expressions relating 
to the behaviour of the rulers are the strongest that can pos- 
sibly be employed. K3^ (crush) is also to be met with in Prov. 
zxii. 22; but "grind the face" (tdcAan pW) is a strong 
metaphor without a parallel. The former signifies " to pound," 
the latter " to grind," as the millstone grinds the com. They 
grind the faces of those who are already bowed down, thrusting 
them back with such unmerciful severity, that they stand as it 
were annihilated, and their faces become as white as fiour, or 
as the Germans would say, cheese-white, chalk-white, as pale 
as death, from oppression and despur. Thus the language 
supplied to a certain extent appropriate figures, with which to 



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142 THE PBOPHEOIES OP ISAUH. 

describe the condnct of the rulers of Israel ; bat it contained 
no words that could exhanst the immeasurable wickedness of 
their conduct : hence the magnitude of their sin is set before 
them in the form of a question, « What is to yout" i,e. What 
indescribable wickedness is this which you are committing? 
The prophet hears this sidd by Jehovah, the majestic Judge, 
whom he here describes as Adonai Ehhim Zebaotli (according 
to the Masoretic pointing). This triplex name of God, which 
we find in the prophetic books, viz. frequently in Amos and 
also in Jer. ii. 19, occnrs for the first time in the Eloliistic 
Psalm,' Ps. Ixix. 7. This scene of judgment is indeed depicted 
thronghout in the colours of the Psalms, and more especially 
recals the (Elohistic) Psalm of Asaph (Ps. Issxii.). 

But notwithstanding the dramatic vividness with which the 
prophet pictures to himself this scene of judgment, he is obliged 
to break off at the very beginning of liia description, because 
another word of Jehovah comes upon him. This applies to the 
women of Jerusalem, whose authority, at the time when Isaiah 
prophesied, was no less influential than that of their husbands 
who had forgotten their calling. — Vers. 16, 17. "Jehovah hath 
spoken: Because the daughtere of Zion are liaughty, and walk 
about with extended throat, and blinking with the eyes, walk about 
withtripping gait, ajid tinkle with their foot-ornaments : the Lord 
of all makes the crown of the daughters of Zion scabbed, and 
Jehovah will uncover their shame." Their inward pride (gdbah, 
as in Ezek. xvi. 50 ; cf. Zeph. iii. 11) shows itself outwardly. 
They walk with extended throat, i.e. bending the neck back, 
tiying to make themselves taller than they ore, because they 
think themselves so great. The kei-i substitntes the more usual 
form, ri^t33 ; hut Isaiah in all probability intentionally made use 
of the rarer and ruder form netuvoth, since such a form really 
existed (1 Sam. xxv. 18), as well as the singular nalu for ndttn 
(Job XV. 22, xli. 25 ; Ges. § 76, Anm, 5). They also went 
winking the eyes (mesakkeroth, for which we frequently find 
the erratum meshakkeroth), i.e. casting voluptuous and amatory 
glances with affected innocence (yevfiara 6(j>$a\/j.C)V, LXX). 
" Winking ; " sdkar is not used in the sense of fucare (Targ. 
b. Sabbath 62b, Joma 96, Luther), — which is all the more 
inappropriate, because blackening the eyelids with powder of 
antimony was regarded in the East of ^e Old Testament as 



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CHAF. ni. !». n. 143 

Indispensable to female beanty, — ^but, in the sensp of nictare 
(LXX., Vulg., Syr., lyn. remaz, cf. sekar, Syr. to squint; 
Targ. = shdzaph, Job xs. 9). Compare also the talmndic say- 
ing: God did not create woman out of Adam's ear, that she 
might be no eavesdropper (tsaiikdnith), nor out of Adam's eye, 
that she might be no winker {aakrdnilJt)} The third was, that 
they walked incedendo et trepidando. The second inf. abs. is 
in this case, as in most others, the one which gives the distinct 
tone, whilst the other serves to keep before the eye the occnr- 
rence indicated in its finite verb (Ges. § 131, 3). They walk 
about tripping (tdphopJi, a wide-spread onomato-poetic word), 
i^. taking short steps, just putting the heel of one foot against 
the toe of the other (as the Talmud explains it). Luther 
renders it, "they walk along and waggle" {schwdnzen, i.e. 
elunibuB a^tatis). The rendering is suitable, but incorrect. 
They could only take short steps, because of the chains by 
which the costly foot-rings (acheUim) worn above their ankles 
were connected together. These chiuns, which were probably 
ornamented with bells, as is sometimes the case now in the East, 
they Qsed to tinkle as they walked ; they made an ankle-tinkling 
with their feet, setting their feet down in such a manner that 
these ankle-rings knocked against each other. The writing 
beraglehem (masc.) for beragUhen (feni.) is probably not an 
unintentional synallage gen. : they were- not modest vtVptJies, but 
cold, masculine viragines, so that they themselvea were a synal- 
lage generis. Nevertheless they tripped along. Trippmg is a 
child's step. Although well versed in sin and old in years, the 
women of Jerusalem tried to maintain a youthful, childlike 
appearance. They therefore tripped along with short, childish 
steps. The women of the Mohammedan East still take pleasure 
in such coquettish tinklings, although they are forbidden by 
the Koran, just as the women of Jerusalem did in the days of 
Isuah. The attractive influence of natural charms, especially 

> Abo h. Sota 47h: "Since women have nultjplied with extended necks 
and winking eyes, the number of cases has alao multiplied in which it has 
T>eeii neceasary to resort to the cnree water (Num. v. 18)." In fact, this 
JDcreitBed to such an extent, that Johauan ben Zaklcu, the pupil of H3Iel, 
abolished the ordeal (divine-verdict) of the Sota (the woman suspected of 
adultery) altogetlier. The people of his tjme were altogether an adulterovs 
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144 THE FBOPRECIES OF JSAUH. 

wlien heiglitened by luxnj^ous art, is very great ; but the propbet 
is blind to all this splendour, and seeing nothing but the cor- 
ruption within, foretells to these rich and distinguished women 
a fonl and by no means lesthetic fate. The Sovereign Buler of 
all would smite the crown of their head, from which long hair 
was now flowing, with scab (v'sippach, a progressive preterite with 
Vav apodosis, a denom. verb from tappachatit, the scurf which 
adheres to the skin : see at Hah, ii. 15) ; and Jehovah would 
tincover their nakedness, by giving them np to violation and 
abase at the hands of coarse and barbarous foes, — the greatest 
possible disgrace in the eyes of a woman, who covers herself as 
carefully as she can In the presence of any stranger (ch. xlvii. 3 ; 
Nahum iii. 5 ; Jer. xiii. 22 ; Ezek. zvi. 37). 

The prophet then proceeds to describe still further how the 
Lord would take away the whole of their toilet as plunder. 
Vera, 18-23. " On that day the Lord wiU put away the show of 
the ankle-claspg, and of the head-bands, and of the crescents ; 
the ear-rings, and the arm-chains, and the light veils ; the diadems, 
and the et^ping-chains, and the girdles, and the smelling-bottles, 
and the amulets ; the fingerings, and the nose-rings ; the gala- 
dresses, and the sleeve-frocks, and tJie wrappers, and the pockets ; 
the hand-mirrors, and the Sindu-cloths, and the turbans, and the 
gauze mantles." The fullest explanation of all these articles of 
female attire is to be found in N. W. Schroder's work, entitled 
Commentarius de vestitu mulierum Hebrcearum ad Jea. iii. 16-24, 
Lugd. Batav. 1745 (a quarto volume), and in that of Ant. 
Theod. Hartmaun, consisting of three octavo volumes, and 
entitled IHe Hehrderin am Putztische und als Braut (The Jewess 
at the Toilet-table, and as Bride, 1809-10) ; to .which we may 
also add, Saalschiitz, Archaologie, ch. iii., where he treats of 
the dresses of men and women. It was not asually Isaiah's 
custom to enter into such minute particulars. Of all the pro- 
phets, Ezekiel was the one most addicted to this, as we may 
see, for example, from Ezek. xvi. And even in other pro- 
phecies against the women we find nothing of the kind again 
(ch. xxxii, 9 sqq. ; Amos iv. 1 sqq.). But in this instance, the 
enumeration of the female ornaments is connected with that of 
the state props in ch. iii. 1-3, and that of the lofty and exalted 
in ch. ii. 13-16, so as to form a trilogy, and has its own special 
explanation in that boundless love of ornament which had 



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CHAP. nt. 18-21. 145 

l)ecoine prevalent in the time of Uzziah-Jotham. It was the 
prophet's intention to produce a ludicrous, bat yet serioas impres- 
^on, as to the immeasorable luxury which really existed ; and 
in the prophetic address, his design throughout is to bring oat 
the glaring contrast between the titanic, massive, worldly glory, 
in all its varied forms, and that true, spiritual, and majestically 
ample glory, whose reality is manifested from within outwards. 
In fact, the theme of the whole address is the way of universal 
judgment leading on from the false glory to the true. The 
graieral idea of tiphereth (show : rendered "bravery" in Eng, ver.) 
which stands at the head and includes the whole, points to the 
contrast presented by a totally different tiphereth which follows 
in ch. iv. 2. In explaining each particular word, we must be 
content with what is most necessary, and comparatively the 
most certain. " Ankle-clasps " (acdsim) : these were rings of 
gold, silver, or ivory, worn round the ankles ; hence the denom. 
verb (iccf a) in ver. 16, to make a tinkling sound with these rings. 
*'ffead-bands," or "^frontlets" (shebisim, from shdbas = thdbalz: 
plectere), were plaited bands of gold or silver thread worn below 
the hair-net, and reaching from one ear to the other. There is 
some force, however, in the explanation which has been very 
commonly adopted since the time of Schroder, namely, that 
they were sun-like balls (= shemiatm), which were worn as orna- 
ments round the neck, from the Arabic 'sumeUa (^euheisa), a 
little sun. The " crescents" (saharonim) were little pendants of 
this kind, fastened round the neck and hanging down upon the 
breast (in Judg. viii. 21 we meet with them as ornaments hung 
round the camels' necks). Such ornaments are still worn by 
Arabian girls, who generally have several different kinds of 
tliero ; the hildl, or new moon, being a symbol of increasing 
good fortune, and as such the most approved charm against the 
evil eye, "Ear-^ngs" {neliplioih, ear-drops): we meet with these 
in Judg. viii. 26, as an ornament wwn by Midianitish kings. 
Hence the Arabic munattafe, a woman adorned with ear-rings. 
^'Arm-chains:" theroth, from sAarar, to twist. According to the 
Targum, these were chcuns worn upon the arm, or spangles upon 
the wrist, answering to the spangles upon the ankles. "Fluttering 
veilt" (re'dloth, from ra'aZ, to hang loose) : these were more expen- 
sive than the ordinary veils worn by girls, which were called 
tza'iph. "i>t(ufema"(pe'en'm) are only mentioned in other parts 
VOL. I. X 



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146 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

of the Scripfures as being worn ty men {e.g. by priests, bride- 
grooms, or persons of high rank). "Stepping-ckains:" tze'ddoth, 
from tziddah, a step; hence the chain worn to shorten and give 
elegance to the step. "Girdles:" kisskurim, from kdshar (cingere), 
dress girdles, such as were worn by brides upon their wedding-day 
(compare Jer, ii. 32 withlsa. xlix. 18) ; the word is erroneously 
rendered )ia.ir-p\ns(kalmasmeiai/yah) in the Targum. " Smelling- 
bottles:" botte hannephesh, holders of scent (nephesk, the "breath 
of an aroma). "Amulets:" leckashim (from Idchash, to work by 
incantations), gems or metal plates with an inscription upon 
them, which were worn as a protection as well as an ornament. 
" Fing&'-rings ;" tabbaotk, from tdba, to impress or seal, signet- 
rings worn upon the finger, corresponding to the ckothdm worn 
by men upon the breast sospended by a cord. " iVbse-rtnjrs " 
(nizmS kdaph) were fastened in the central division of the nose, 
and hung down over the mouth : they have been ornaments in 
common use in the East from the time of the patriarchs (Gren. 
xsiv. 22) down to the present day. " Galordresaes " (machald- 
tsoth) are dresses not usually worn, but taken off when at home. 
" Sheve-Jrochs" (ma'atdphah): the second tunic, worn above the 
ordinary one, theHoman stola. "Wrappers" (mitpachoth, from 
tdphach, expandere), broad cloths wrapped round the body, such 
as Ruth wore when she crept in to Boaz in her hest attire 
(Euth iii. 15), " Pockets" (charitim) were for holding money 
(2 Kings V. 23), which was generally carried by men in the 
gjrdle, or in a purse (cis). " Hand-mirrors " (gilyonim) : the 
Septuagint renders this Zta^vrj XaKaviich, sc. i/j-aTui, Lacedae- 
monian gauze or transparent dresses, which showed the naked- 
ness rather than concealed it (from galdh, retegere) ; but the 
better rendering is mirrors with handles, polished metal plates 
(from gdldh, poUre), as gilldyon is used elsewhere to signify a 
smooth table. " Sindurchths" (sedinim), veils or coverings pf the 
finest linen, viz. of Sinda or Hindu cloth ((TivBove?), — Sindu, 
the land of Indus, being the earlier name of India.* " Turbans" 
{tseniphoth, from tsanaplt, convotvere), the head-dress composed 

* The Mishna (^KeUm niv. 13) mentions -fliree different sedinin .• night 
dresses, curtaiug, and embroidery. The tindtm is frequently referred to aa 
a coveriDg wrapped round the person ; and in b. Menachoth 41a, it is 
stated that the dndim is the summer dress, the mrbal (cloak) the winter 
dms, which ma; help to explain Mark ziv. 61, 62. 



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CHAP. IlL 21 147 

of twisted dotlu of different colonrs. " Gauze mantles" (redidim, 
from rddad, extendere, tetaiem faeere), delicate veil-like mantles 
thrown over the rest of the clothes. Stockings and bandker^ 
chiefs are not mentioned : the former wore first introduced inbi 
Hither Asia from Media long after Isiuah's time, and a Jerti' 
aalem lady no more thought of using the latter than a Grecian 
or Roman lady did. Even the veil (fiwko^ noTT commonly 
wom^ which conceals the whole of the face with the exception 
of the eyes, did not form part of the attire of an Israelitish 
woman in the olden time,^ The prophet enumerates twenty-one 
different ornaments : three sevens of a very bad kind, especially 
for the husbands of these state-dolls. There is no particular 
order observed in the enumeration, either from head to foot, or 
from the inner to the onter clothing ; but they are arranged as 
much ad libitum as the dress itself. 

Wlen Jehovah took away alt this glory, with which the 
women of Jerusalem were adorned, they would be toraed into 
wretched-looking prisoners, disfigured hy ill-treatment and 
dirt. — Yer, 24. ^' And instead of balmy scent there will be 
mouldinets, and instead of the sath a rope, and instead of artiatie 
ringlets a baldness^ and instead of tht dress-cloak a frock of sack' 
cloth, branding instead of beauty." Moulditiess, or mother (maJc, 
as in ch. v. 24, the dust of things that have moulded away), 
with which they would be covered, and which they would he 
obliged to breathe, would take the place of the bosetn, i.e. the 
scent of the baUam shrnb {b^sdm), and of sweetr^cented pomade 
in general ; and nifydh that of the beautifully embroidered 
girdle (Frov. xxxi. 24). The meaning of this word is neither 
" a wound," as the Targums and Talmud render it, nor " rags," 
as given by Knobel, ed. 1 (from n^kapK, percntere, perforare), 
but the rope thrown over them as prisoners (from kdphdh=idvdh, 
eontorquere: LXX., Vulg., Syr.).* Baldness takes the place of 

1 Itafihi, however, makes a difFereot statement (Sabbaih 6&a), vis. that 
" laraelitieh women in Arabia go oat with veils which conceal the face, and 
Hum in Media with their mantles fastened aboat the month." 

• Credneir (Joel, p. 147) rendera the word " tatlars ," from nSkaph, to 
mb in pieces ; bnt the word has no sach meaning, whereas the meauing 
vulniu, Ut. percustio, is admifflible (sea at Job xix. 26), hat doe6 not suit 
the antith^i& Lozmtto connects it with n'kaph, to bind (from which 
the makkeph deriTca ita name), and nnderstands it aa refeniog to the 
droeiiig applied to woonds, to lint into which the fpidie was torn. The 



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148 THE PB0PHECIE8 OF ISAIAH. 

artistic ringlets (fit'pD fiEs'JfP, not nfe^, so that it is in apposition : 
cf. ch. XXX. 20 i Ge's, § lis ; Ewald, § 287, 6). The reference 
is not to golden ornaments for the head, as the Sept. rendering 
gives it, althongh miksheh is used elsewhere to signify embossed 
or carved work in metal or wood ; but here we are evidently to 
understand by the "artificial twists" either curls made with 
the curling-tongs, or the hair plaited and twisted up in knots, 
which they would be obliged to cut off in accordance with the 
mourning customs (ch. xv. 2, xxii. 12), or which would fall 
off in consequence of grief. A frock of sackcloth (machagoreth 
sak), i.e. a smock of coarse haircloth worn next to the skin, such 
as Layard found depicted upon a bas-relief at Koayunjik, 
would take the place of the pethigil, i.e. the dress-cloak (either 
from p^hag, to be wide or full, with the substantive termina- 
tion I/, or else composed of pefhi, breadth, and gil, festive re- 
joicing) ; and branding the place of beauty. Branding (ei = ceti, 
from cdvdh, KaUiv), the mark burnt upon the forehead by their 
conquerors : ei is a substantive,^ not a particle, as the Targum 
and others render it, and as the makkepk might make it appear. 
There is something very effective in the inverted order of the 
words in the last clanse of the five. In this five-fold reverse 
would shame and mourning take the place of proud, voluptuous 
rejoicing. 

The prophet now passes over to a direct address to Jerusalem 
itself, since the " daughters of Ziou" are the daughter of Zion 
in her present degenerate condition. The daughter of Zion 

most plausible deriration is from itd^Adi, which is really emplo;red in 
poBt-hiblical usage to signify not only to congeal and wrinkle, but also 
to thicken {Sabbath 21a, riakpoth : " Make the wick thicker, that it may 
bora the brlghtei"). It ia probably radically akin to the Arabic mikbe 
(explained in lAmachzori as eqitivaleat to the Persian mijdn'bend, a girdle), 
which is apparently used to denote the coarse girdle worn by peasants or by 
Arab women of the wandering tribes, resembling a rope of goat's hair, as 
distinguished from the attiftio and coBtly girdle worn by women of the 
upper classes in the towns. 

' It is BO nnderatood in h. Sahbatli 636, with an allusion to the proverb, 
"The end of beauty is burning" (viz. inflammation). In Arabia, the ap- 
plication of the cey with a red-hot iron (mifeujdft) playa a very important 
part in the medical treatment ol both man and beast. Ton meet with 
many men who have been burned not only on their legs and arms, but in 
their faces as well, and, as a role, the finest horses aie disfigured by the 
wy— WEnsTBiM. 



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CHAP. IIL IIL 149 

tosea her sons, and consequently the daughters of Zion their 
husbands. — Ver. 25. " Thy men will fall by ike sw<n-d, and thy 
might in war," The plural methim (the singular of which only 
occurs in the form metkuy with the connecting vowel d as a 
component part of the proper names) is used as a prose word 
iu the Pentateuch; hut in the later literature it is a poetic 
archiusm. " Thy might " is used interchangeably with " thy 
men," the possessors of the might being really intended, like 
robur and robora in Latin (compare Jer. zlix. 35). 

What the prophet here foretells to the daughter of Zion he 
sees in rer. 26 fulfilled upon her : " Then will her gates lament 
and mourn, and desolate is she, sits down upon the ground." The 
gates, where the hnsbands of the daughters of Zion, who have 
now fallen in war, used at one time to gather together in such 
numbers, are turned into a. state of desolation, in which they 
may, as it were, be heard complaining, and seen to mourn 
(chl xiv. 31 ; Jer. xiv. 2 ; Lam. i. 4) ; and the daughter of 
Zion herself is utterly vacated, thoroughly emptied, completely 
deprived of all her former population ; and in this state of the 
most mournful widowhood or orphanage, brought down from 
her lofty seat (ch. xlvii. 1) and princely glory (Jer. xiii. 18), 
she sits down upon the ground, just as Judsea is represented 
as doing upon Roman medals that were struck after the de- 
stmction of Jerusalem, where she is introduced as a woman 
thoronghly broken down, and sitting under a palm-tree in an 
attitude of despiur, with a warrior standing in front of her, the 
inscription upon the medal being Judaea capla, or devicta. The 
Septuagint rendering is quite in accordance with the sense, viz. 
Kol KaTaXeKfiB^aT] fwvTj xal €W t^i' frjp iSa<f>ia-d^trj] (cf. Luke 
xix. 44), except that 36?^ is not the second person, but the third, 
and firii33 the third pera. pret. niph. for nn??, — a pausal form 
which is frequently met with in connection with the smaller 
distinctive accents, such as silluk and athnach (here it occnrs 
with tiphchah, as, for example, in Amos iii. 8). The clause 
" sits down upon the ground " is appended atnvB4To>'i ; — a f re- 
quent constmciion in cases where one of two verbs defines the 
other in a manner which is generally expressed adverbially (t^. 
1 Chron. xiii. 2, and the inverted order of the words in Jer. 
iv. 5 ; cf . xii. 6) : Zion sits upon the earth in a state of utter 
depopulation. 



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150 TEE PB0PHBCIE8 OF ISAIAH. 

When war shall thus onspamglj have swept away the 
men of Zion, a most tmnatnral effect vnll ensue, namely, that 
women will go in search of husbands, and not men in search 
of wives. — Ch. iv. 1. "Atid seven women lay hold of one man 
in that day, saying, We leill eat our own bread, and wear our 
own clothes; only let thy name he named upon tu, take away 
our reproach." The division of the chapters is a wrong one 
here, as this verse is the closing verse of the prophecy against 
the women, and the closing portion of the whole address does 
not begin till ch. iv. 2. The present pride of the daughters 
of Zion, every one of whom now thought herself the greatest 
as the wife of such and such a man, and for whom many men 
were now the suitors, would end in this unnatural self-humilia- 
tion, that seven of them would offer themselves to the same 
man, the first man who presented himself, and even renounce 
the ordinary legal claim upon their husband for clothing and 
food (Ex, xxi. 10). It would be quite su£Gcient for them to be 
allowed to bear his name (" let thy name be named upon us : " 
the name is put upon the thing named, as giving it its distinct- 
ness and character), if he wonld only take away their reproach 
(namely, the reproach of being unmarried, ch. liv. 4, as in Gen. 
XXX. S3, of being childless) by letting them be called his wives. 
The number seven (seven women to one man) may be explained 
on the ground that there is a bad seven as well as a holy one 
(e.g. Matt.xii. 45). 

In ch. ir. 1 the threat denounced against the women of 
Jerusalem is brought to a close. It is the side-piece to the 
threat denounced against the national rulers. And these two 
scenes of judgment were only parts of the general judgment 
about to fall upon Jerusalem and Judah, as a state or national 
commuuity. And this again was merely a portion, viz. the 
central group of the picture of a far more comprehensive 
judgment, which was about to fall upon everything lofty and 
exalted on the earth. Jerusalem, therefore, stands here as the 
centre and focus of the great judgment-day. It was in Jeru- 
salem that the ungodly glory which was ripe for judgment 
was concentrated; and it was in Jerusalem also that the light 
of the true and final glory would concentrate itself. To this 
promise, with which the address returns to its starting-point, 
the prophet now passes on without any further introduction. 



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CHAP, IV. t 151 

In fact it needed no introdaction, for the judgment in itself 
was the medinm of salvation. When Jerusalem was judged, 
it would be sifted ; and hy being sifted, it would be rescued, 
pardoned, glorified. The prophet proceeds in this sense to 
speak of what would happen in that day, and describes the 
one great day of God at the end of time (not a day of four- 
and-twenty honrs any more than the seven days of creation 
were), according to its general character, as opening with 
judgment, but issuing in salvation. — Ver. 2. " In titat day will 
the sprout of Jehovah become an ornament and glori/, and the 
fruit of the land pride and splendour for tlie redeemed of Israel" 
The four epithets of glory, which are here grouped in pairs, 
strengthen onr expectation, that now that the mass of Israel 
has been swept away, together with the objects of its worthless 
pride, we shall find a description of what will become an object 
of well-grounded pride to the " escaped of Israel," i.e. to the 
remnant that has survived the judgment, and been saved from 
destruction. But with this interpretation of the promise it is 
impossible that it can be the church of the future itself, which 
is here called the *' sprout of Jehovah" and "fruit of the land," 
as Luzzatto and Malbim suppose ; and equally impossible, with 
such an antithesis between what is promised and what is abo- 
lished, that the " sprout of Jehovah" and •' fruit of the earth" 
should signify the harvest blessings bestowed hy Jehovah, or 
the rich produce of the land. For although the expression 
zemach Jehottah (sprout of Jehovah) may unquestionably be 
used to signify this, as in Gen. ii. 9 and Ps. civ. 14 (cf. 
Isa. Ixi. 11), and fruitfulness of the land is a standing accom- 
paniment of the eschatological promises (e.g. ch. xxx. 23 sc|q., 
compare the conclusion of Joel and Amos), and it was also 
foretold that the fruitful fields of Israel would become a glory 
in the sight of the nations (£zek. xxxiv. 29 ; Mai. iii. 12 ; 
cf. Joel ii. 17); yet this earthly, material good, of which, 
moreover, there was no lack in the time of Uzzlah and 
Jotham, was altogether unsuitable to set forth such a con- 
trast as would surpass and outshine the worldly glory existing 
befwe. But even granting what Hofmann adduces in support 
of this view, — namely, that .the natural God-given blessings of 
the field do fbrm a fitting antithesis to the studied works of art 
of which men had hitherto been prond, — there is still truth in 



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152 THE PBOPHECIES OP ISAUH. 

, the remark of EoaenniQlIer, that "the magnificence of the whole 
passage is at Tariaoce with snch an interpretation." Only 
compare ch. zxviii. 5, where Jehovah Himself is described in 
the same manner, as the glory and ornament of the remnant 
of Israel. Bat if the "spront of Jehovah" is neither the 
redeemed remnant itself, nor the fruit of the field, it must be 
the name of the Messiah. And it is in this sense that it has 
been understood by the Targum, and by such modem com- 
mentators as Rosenmtiller, Hengstenber^ Steudel, Umbreit, 
Caspari, DrechsW, and others. The great King of the future 
is called zemacJi, avardkq in the sense of Heb. vii. 14, viz. as 
a shoot springing out of the human, Davidic, earthly soil, — a 
shoot which Jehovah had planted in the earth, and would 
cause to break thmugh and spring forth as the pride of His 
congregation, which was waiting for this heavenly child. It 
is He again who is designated in the parallel clause as the 
"fruit of the land" (or lit. fruit of the earth), as being the 
fruit which the land of Israel, and consequently the earth 
itself, would produce, just as in Ezek. xvii. 5 Zedekiah is 
called a " seed of the earth." The reasons already adduced 
to show that " the sprout of Jehovah" cannot refer to the 
blessings of the field, apply with equal force to " the fruit of 
the earth," This also relates to the Messiah Himself, regarded 
as the fruit in which all the growth and bloom of this earthly 
history wonld eventually reach its promised and divinely ap- 
pointed conclusion. The use of thb double epithet to denote 
" the coming One" can only be accounted for, without antici- 
pating the New Testament standpoint,* from the desire to 
depict His double-sided origin. He would come, on the one 
hand, from Jehovah; bat, on the other hand, from the eaiih, 
inasmuch as He would spring from Israel. We have here the 
passage, on the basis of which zemaeh (the sprout or "Branch") 

* From a New Testament potut of view we might eaj tbat the " aprout 
of Jehovah" or " trait of the earth" was the grun of wheat which redeem- 
ing love Bowed in the earth on Good Fridaj ; the grain of wheat which 
began to break through the ground and grow towards heaven on Eaater 
Sunday ; the grain of wheat whose golden blade ascended heavenwaida on 
Ascenuon Day ; the grain of wheat whose myriad-fold ear bent down to 
the earth on the day of Pentecost, and pOured out the gnuns, from which 
the holy church not only was born, but still continues to be bom. But 
Boch Choughte aa these lie outjide the bistorico-grammatical meaning. 



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CHAP. IV. s. 153 

was adopted hy Jeremiah (ch. zxiii. 5 and xxxiii. 15) and 
Zechariah (ch. iii. 8, vi. 13) ae a proper name for the 
Messiah, and apon which Matthew, by combiniDg this proper 
name zemach (sprout) with nezer (ch. xi. 1, cf. liii. 2), rests 
his afficmatioD, that according to the Old Testament' pro- 
phecies the future Messiah was to be called a Kazarene. It 
is undoubtedly strange that this epithet should be introduced 
so entirely without preparation even by Isaiah, who coined 
it first. In fact, the whole passage relating to the Messiah 
stands quite alone in this cycle of prophecies in ch. i.-vi. 
But the book of Isaiah is a complete and connected work. 
What the prophet indicates merely in outline here, he carries 
out more fully in the cycle of prophecies which follows in 
ch. Tii.-xii. ; and there the euigma, which he leaves as an 
enigma in the passage before us, receives the fullest solution. 
Without dwelhng any further upon the wwn of the future, 
described in this enigmatically symbolical way, the prophet 
hurries on to a more precise description of the church of the 
future. — ^Ver. 3. "And it will come to pats, whoever is hfi in 
Zien and remains in Jerusalem, holy will he he called, all who are 
written down for life in Jerusalem." The leading emphasis of 
the whole verse rests upon kadosh (holy). Whereas formerly in 
Jerusalem persons had been distinguished according to their 
rank and condition, without any regard to their moral worth 
(ch. iii. 1-3, 10, 11 ; cf . ch. xxxii. 5) ; so the name hadosh (holy) 
would now be the one chief name of honour, and would be 
given to every individual, inasmuch as the national calling of 
Israel would now be realized in the persons of all (Ex, xix. 6, 
etc.). Consequently the expression " he shall be called" is not 
exactly equivalent to '^he shall be," but rather presupposes 
the latter, as in ch. i. 26, Ixi. 6, Ixii. 4. The term Jcadoth 
denotes that which is withdrawn from the world, or separated 
from it. The church of the saints or holy ones, which now 
inhabits Jerusalem, is what has. been left from the smelting i 
and their holiness is the result of washing. Vrisn is inter- 
changed with '^t^e'Sri. The latter, as Papenheim has shown in 
his Hebrew synonyms, involves the idea of intention, viz. 
"that which has been left behind;" the former merely ex- 
presses the fact, viz. that which remains. The character of 
this "remnant of grace," and the number of members of which 



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154 THE FBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

it wonld consist, are Bhomi in the apposition contained in 
ver. 3b. This apposition means something more than those 
who are entered as living in Jerusalem, i.e. the population of 
Jemsalem as entered in the city register (Hofmann) ; for the 
verb with Latned does not mean merely to enter as a certun 
thing, bat (like the same verb with the accusative in Jer. 
zxii. 30) to enter as intended for a certain purpose. The 
expression O^np may either be taken as a noon, viz. " to life" 
(Dan. xii. 2), or as an adjective, " to the liying" (a meaning 
which is quite as tenable; cf. Ps. Ux. 29, 1 Sara. xxv. 29). 
In either case the notion of predestination is implied, and the 
assumption of the existence of a divine "book of life" (Es. 
xxsii. 32, 33 ; Dan. xii. 1 ; cf. Fa. (^xxxix, 16) ; so that the idea 
is the same as that of Acts xiii. 48 : "As many as were ordained 
to eternal life." The reference here is to persons who were 
entered in the book of Ood, on account of the good kernel of 
faith within them, as those who should become partakers of the 
life in the new Jerusalem, and should therefore be spared in 
the midst of the judgment of sifting in accordance with this 
divine purpose of grace. For it was only through the judg- 
ment setting this kernel of faith at liber^, that such a holy 
community as is described in the protasis which comes after- 
wards, as in Fs. Ixiii. 6, T,.coald possibly arise. 

Ver. 4, " When tJte Lord shall liave washed away the filth 
of the daughters of Zion, and shall have purged away the blood- 
guittines&es of Jerusalem from the midst thereof, by the spirit of 
judgment and by the spirit of sifting," " Wlien," followed by 
a preterite (equivalent to a fut. exact, as in ch. zxiv. 13 j 
Ges. § 126, 5), introduces the circumstance, whose previous 
occurrence would be the condition of all the rest. The force of 
the future yddiach (" shall have purged") is regulated by that 
of the preterite rdchatz, as in ch. vi, 11 ; for although, when 
regarded simply by itself, as in ch. x. 12, the future tense 
may suggest the idea of a future perfect, it cannot have the 
force of such a future. The double purification answers to the 
two scenes of judgment described in ch, iii. The filth of the 
daughters of Zion is the moral pollution hidden under their 
vun and coquettish fineiy ; and the murderous deeds of Jeru- 
salem are the acts of judicial murder committed by its rulers 
upon the poor and innocent. This filth and these spots of 



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CBAF. IT. Sl 155 

blood the Sovereign Euler washes and pm^es away (see 2 Chron. 
iv. 6), by cansing Hia spirit or His breath to burst in upon all the 
inhabitants of Jerusalem, both male and female. This breath is 
called " the spirit of jadgment," because it pnnishea evil ; and 
"the spirit of sifting," inasmnch as it sweeps or cleans it away. 
1^3 is to be explained, as in ch. vi. 13, in accordance with Dent. 
xiii. 6 (5, Eng. Ver.; " put the evil away") and other passages, 
snch especially as ch. xix. 13, xxi. 9. The rendering given in 
the Septuaglnt and Vulgate, viz. " in the spirit of burning," is 
founded upon the radical meaning of the verb, which signifies 
literally to bum up, and hence to clear away or destroy (see 
Job, vol. ii, p. 180, Eng. Tr.). Nevertheless, "burning" in 
connection with judgment is not definite enough, since every 
manifestation of divine judgment is a manifestation of fire ; but 
it is not every jndgment that has connected with it what is here 
implied, — namely, the salutary object of burning away, or, in 
other words, of winnowing. The " spirit" is in both instances 
the Spirit of God which pervades the world, not only generat- 
ing and sustaining life, but also at times destroying and sifting 
(ch. 3CXX. 27, 28), as it does in the case before us, in which the 
imperishable glory described in ver. 5 is so prepared. 

Ver. 5. " And Jehovah creates over every spot of Mount 
Zion, and over its festal assemblies, a cloud by day, and smoke, 
and the shining of faming fire by night: for over all the glory 
comes a canopy" Just as Jehovah gaided and shielded Israel 
in the days of the redemption from Egypt in a smoke-cloud 
by day and a fire-clond by night, which either moved in front 
like a pillar, or floated above them as a roof (Num. xiv. 14, 
etc.), the perpetuation of His presence at Sinai (Ex. xix, 9, 
16 s^q.) ; so would Jehovah in like manner shield the Israel of 
the final redemption, which would no longer need the pillar of 
cloud since its wanderings would be over, but only the cloudy 
covering ; and such a covering Jehovah would create, as the 
prcet. consec. vra.\ ("and He creates") distinctly affirms. The 
verb bdrdh alwajrs denotes a divine and miraculous pro- 
duction, having its commencement in time; for even the 
natural is also supernatural in its first institution by God. 
In the case before us, however, the reference b to a fresh 
manifestation of His gracious presence, exalted above the 
present course of nature. This manifestation would consist 



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156 THE PB0PHECIE8 Or ISAIAH. 

hy dsj in " a cloud," and as the hendiadys " doad and smoke " 
(i.e. clond in form and smoke in substance) distinctly affirms, s 
smoke-clond, not a watery cloud, like those which ordinarily 
cover the sky ; and by night in a fiery splendoor, not merely 
a lingering fieiy splendour like that of the evening sky, but, 
as the words clearly indicate, a flaming brightness {Ulidhah), 
and therefore real and living fire. The purpose of the cloud 
would not only be to overshadow, but also to serve as a wall of 
defence against opposing infiuences;^ and the fire would not 
only give light, but by flaming and flashing would ward off 
hostile powers. But, above all, the cloud and fire were intended 
as signs of the nearness of God, and His satisfaction. In the 
most glorious times of the temple a smoke-^ond of this kind 
filled the Holy of holies ; and there was only one occasion — 
namely, at the dedication of Solomon's temple — on which it 
filled the whole building (1 Kings viii. 10) ; but now the cloud, 
the smoke of which, moreover, would be turned at night into 
flaming fire, would extend over every spot {mdcOn, a more 
poetical word for mdkom) of Mount Zion, and over the festal 
assemblies thereon. The whole monntain would thus become 
a Holy of holies. It would be holy not only as being the 
dwelling-place of Jehovah, bnt as the gathering-place of a 
community of saints. " Her assemhtiei" (mikrdehd) points 
back to Zion, and is a plural written defectively (at least in 
our editions'), — as, for example, in Jer. xix. 8. There is no 
necessity to take this nonn in the sense of "meeting halls" 
(a meaning which it never has anywhere else), as Gesenius, 
Ewald, Hitzig, and others have done, since it may also signify 
" the meetings," though not in an abstract, bat in a concrete 
sense (ecclesim).* The explanatoiy clause, "for over all the 

* The clond derived its ntime, 'dn^n, not from tbe idea of coveriag, but 
from that of coming to meet one. The obnds come towards the man who 
gBxea at them, insertii^ themselves between him and the ekf, and thtu 
fomng 'Uiemeelves npon his notice instead of the sky ; hence the visible 
outer ude of the vault of heaven is also called 'anaa (plur. anan), just as 
the aame word is used to denote the outermost portion of the branches or 
foliage of a tree which is the first to strike the eje (in contradistinction to 
tbe inner portions, which are not ho easily seen, even if viable at all). 

* Such codices and ancient editions as Soncino (14&S), Brescia (1494), 
and man; others, have the word with the yod of the plnn^ 

* It ia doubtful whether the fonn ^bd (^BD) ie ever strict]; a tionwa 



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CHAP. IV. 1 157 

ffhry (comes) a canopy" admits of several interpretal^ons. Dr 
Schegg and others take it in the general sense : " for defence 
and covering are coming for all that is glorious." Now, even if 
this thought were not so jejune as it is, the ■word ckuppdh wocdd 
not be the word used to denote covering for the sake of pro- 
tection ; it signifies rather covering for the sake of beauti- 
fying and honouring that which is covered. Chuppdh is the 
name still given hj the Jews to the wedding canopj, i.e. a. 
canopy supported on four poles and carried by four boys, under 
which tbe bride and bridegroom receive the nuptial blessing, — 
a meaning which is apparently more appropriate, even in Ps. 
xix. 6 and Joel ii. 16, than the ordinary explanation thahmut 
or torus. Such a canopy would Soat above Mount Zion in the 
form of a cloud of smoke and blaze of fire. (There is no 
necessity to take chuppah as a third pera. pital, since f^™?, which 
follows immediately afterwards in ver. 6, may easily be sup- 
plied in thought.) The only question is whether cdlrc&bod 
signifies " every kind of glory," or according to Ps, xxxix. 6, 
xlv. 14, « pure glory" (Hofmann, Stud. w. Krit,. 1847, pp. 936-38). 
The thought that Jerusalem would now be " all glory," as its 
inhabitants were all holiness, and therefore that thia shield 
would be spread out over pure glory, is one that thoroughly 
commends itself. But we nevertheless prefer the former, as 
more in accordance with the substantive danse. The glory 
which Zion would now possess would be exposed to no further 
injury : Jehovah would acknowledge it by signs of His 
gracious presence; for henceforth there would be nothing 
glorious in Zion, over which there would not be a canopy 
spread in the manner described, shading and yet enlightening, 
hiding, defending, and adorning it. 

Thus would Zion be a secure retreat from all adversities 
and disasters. Ver. 6. " And it will he a booth for shade by 
day from Uie heat of the swn, and for a refuge and covert front 
atorm and from rainy The subject to " v}iU be" is not the 
miraculous roofing ; for dndn (cloud) is masculine, and the verb 
femiuine, and there would be no sense iu saying that a ckuppdh 
or canopy would be a sitccdh or booth. Either, therefore, the 
<u»ionwibaI(Gea. §84, U). Its meaning seems rather to be alwajBCODcrete, 
evea iu Arabic, where menSm signifiee a sleeping-place, sleepiiig-time, or a 
di:cam,bntneTerBle^,oraleeping(IikefUi«,Heb.sAen^ornauni,H6b.Nti)n). 



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158 THE PBOPHECIEB OF ISAIAH. 

verb contains the subject in itself, and the meaning is, " There 
will be a booth" (the verb hdydh being used in a pregnant' 
sense, as in ch. xv. 6, xxiii. 13) ; or else Zion (ver. 5) is the 
subject. We prefer the latter. Zion or Jerusalem vronld be 
a booth, that is to say, as the parallel clause affirms, a place of 
security and concealment (mistor, which only occurs here, is 
used on account of the alliteration with machteh in the place 
of aelher, which the prophet more usually employs, viz. in ch. 
xxviii, 17, xxxii. 2). " Bt/ dai/' {yomdm, which is construed with 
7p in the construct state, cf. Ezek. xsx. 16) is left intentionally 
without any " by nighC to answer to it in the parallel clause, 
because reference is made to a place of safety and concealment 
for all times, whethM- by day or night. Heat, storm, and rain 
are mentioned as examples to denote the most manifold dangers ; 
but it is a singular fact that rain, which is a blessing so earnestly 
desired in the time of cliOreh, i.e. of drought and burning heat, 
should also be inclmled. At the present day, when rain falls 
in Jerusalem, the whole city dances with delight. Nevertheless 
rain, t.e. the rain which falls from the clouds, is not paradisaical ; 
and its effects are by no means unfrequently deatnictive. Ac- 
cording to the archives of Genesis, rain from the clouds took 
the place of dew for the first time at the flood, when it fell in 
a continnons and destructive form. The Jerusalem of the last 
time will be psondise restored ; and there men will be no longer 
exposed to destructire changes of weather. In this predic- 
tion the close of the prophetic discourse is linked on to the 
commencement. This mountain of Zion, roofed over with a 
cloud of smoke by day and the shining of a flaming fire by 
night, is no other than the mountain of the house of Jehovah, 
which was to be exalted above all the mountains, and to which 
the nations would make their pilgrimage ; and this Jerusalem, 
so holy within, and all glorious without, is no other than the 
place from which the word of Jehovah was one day to go forth 
into all the world. But what Jerusalem is this 1 Is it the 
Jerusalem of the time of final glory awaiting the people of 
God in thb life, as described in Rev. xi. (for, notwithstanding 
all that a spiritualistic and rationalistic anti-chiliasm may say, 
the prophetic words of both Old and New Testament warrant 
us in expecting such a time of glory in this life) ; or is it the 
Jerusalem of the new heaven and new earth described in Kev. 



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CHAP. T. 159 

xx. 21 ? Tlie true answer is, " Both in one." The prophet's 
real intention was to depict the holy city in ita final and 
imperishable state after the last judgment. But to his view, 
the state beyond and the closing state here were blended to- 
gether, BO that the glorified Jerusalem of earth and the glori- 
fied Jerusalem of heaven appeared as if fused into one. It 
was a distinguishing characteristic of the Old Testament, to 
represent the closing scene on this side the grave, and the eternal 
atate bejond, as a continuous line, having its commencement 
hem. The New Testament first drew the cross line which divides 
time from eternity. It is true, indeed, as the closing chapters 
of the Apocalypse show, that even the New Testament prophe- 
cies continue to some extent to depict the state heyond in figures 
drawn from the present world ; with this difference, however, 
that when the line had once been drawn, the demand was made, 
of which there was no consciousness in the Old Testament, 
that the figures taken from this life should be nnderstood as 
relating to the life heyond, and that eternal realities should be 
separated from their temporal forms. 



JDDQMEKT OP DEVASTATION UPON THE TINETARD OF 
JEHOVAH. — CHAP. V. 

Closing Words of the First Cycle of Prophecies. 

The foregoing prophecy has ran through all the different 
phases of prophetic exhortation by the time that we reach the 
close of ch. iv.; and its leading thought, viz. the overthrow of 
the false glory of Israel, and the perfect establishment of true 
glory tlu'ough the medium of judgment, has been so fully 
worked out, that ch. v. cannot possibly be regarded either as a 
continuation or aa an appendix to that address. Unquestion- 
ably there are many points in which ch. v. refers back to ch. 
ii.-iv. The parable of the vineyard in ch. v. 1-7 grows, as it 
were, out of ch. iii. 14 ; and in ch. t. 15 we have a repetition of 
the refrain in ch. ii. 9, varied in a similar manner to ch. ii. 17. 
But these and other points of contact with ch. ii.-iv., whilst 
they indicate a tolerable similarity in date, by no means prove 
the absence of independence in ch. v. The historical circum- 
stances of the two addresses are the same ; and the range of 



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160 THE TBOPHECIES OF ISAUH. 

thought is therefore closely related. But the leading idea which 
is carried out in ch. t. is a totally different one. The basis of 
the address is a parable representing Israel as the vineyard of 
Jehovah, which, contrary to all expectation, bad produced bad 
fruit, and therefore was given up to devastation. What kind 
of bad fruit it produced is described in a six-fold "woe;" and 
what kind of devastation was to follow is indicated in the dark 
nocturnal conclusion to the whole address, which is entirely 
without a promise. 

The prophet commenced his first address in ch. i. like another 
Moses ; the second, which covered no less ground, ho opened 
with the text of an earlier prophecy ; and now he commences 
the third like a musician, addressing both himself and his 
hearers with enticing words. Ver. la. ^^ Arise, I will sing of my 
beloved, a song of my dearest touching his vineyard." The fugitive 
rhythm, the musical euphony, the charming assonances in this 
appeal, it is impossible to reproduce. They are perfectly inimi- 
table. The Lamed in tldldi is the Lamed objectL The person to 
whom the song referred, to whom it applied, of whom it treated, 
was the singer's own beloved. It was a song of his dearest one 
(not his cousin, palruelis, as Luther renders it in imitation of 
the Vulgate, for the meaning of dod is determined by yddid, 
beloved) touching his vineyard. The Lamed in Vcarmo is also 
Lamed objecti. The song of the beloved is really a song con- 
cerning the vineyard of the beloved ; and this song is a song of 
the beloved himself, not a song written about him, or attributed 
to him, but such a song as he himself had sung, and still had 
to sing. The prophet, by be^nning in this manner, was sur- 
i^junded (either in spirit or in outward reality) by a crowd of 
people from Jerusalem and Judah. The song is a short one, 
and runs thus in vers. 16, 2 : ^' My beloved had a vineyard on a 
fatly nourished mountain-horn, and dug it up and cleared U of 
stones, and planted it with tioble vines, and built a tower in it, and 
also hewed out a wine-press tJierein ; and lioped that it would bring 
forth grapes, and it brought forth icild grapes" The vineyard 
was situated upon a keren, i.e. upon a prominent mountain peak 
projecting like a horn, and therefore open to the sun on all 
Mdes ; for, as Virgil says in the Georgics, " apertoa Bacchus amat 
colUs." This mountain horn was ben-shemen, a child of fat- 
ness : the fatness was innate, it belonged to it by nature (shemat 



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CHAP. Y. 1, 1. 161 

is used, as in ch. xxvUi. 1, to denote the fertility of a natritive 
loamy soil). And tlie owner of the vineyard spared no atten- 
tion or trouble. The plough could not be used, from the steep- 
ness of the mountain slope : he therefore dug it up, that is to 
say, he turned up the soil which was to be made into a vineyard 
with a hoe (izzsk, to hoe ; Arab, mi'zak, mi'zaka) ; and as he 
found it choked up with stones and boulders, be got rid of this 
rubbish by throwing it out (siikel, ft privative piel, lapidiius 
purgare, then operant eonsvmere in lapides, se. ejiciendos, to 
atone, or clear of stones : Ges. § 52, 2). Aft«r the soil had 
been prepared be planted it with eorek, i.e, the finest kind of 
eastern vine, bearing small grapes of a bluish-red, with pips 
hardly perceptible to the tongue. The name is derived from its 
colour (compare the Arabic zerka, red wine). To protect and 
adorn the vineyard which had been so richly pUnted, he built 
a tower in the midst of it. The expression " and also" calls 
especial attention to the fact that he hewed out a wine-trough 
therein {yeheh, the trough into which the must or juice pressed 
from the grapes in the wine-press flows, }acv» as distinguished 
from torcular) j that is to say, in order that the trough 
might be all the more fixed and durable, he constructed it in a 
rocky portion of the ground (chdtsBb bo instead of chataah ho, 
with a and the accent drawn- back, because a Belh was thereby 
easily rendered inaudible, so that chdtalb is not a participial 
adjective, as Bottcher supposes). This was a difficult task, as 
the expression *' and also" indicates ; and for that very reason 
it was an evidence of the most confident expectation. But how 
bitterly was this deceived I The vineyard produced no such 
fruit, as might have been expected from a sorek plantation ; it 
brought forth no 'andbim whatever, %.e. no such grapes as a 
cultivated vine should bear, but only b'ushim, or wild grapes- 
Luther first of all adopted the rendering wild grapes, and then 
altered it to harsh or sour grapes. But it comes to the same 
thing. The difference between a wild vine and a good vine is 
only qualitative. The vUm vinifera, like all cultivated plants, is 
assigned to the care of man, under which it improves ; whereas 
in its wild state it remains behind its true intention (see Genesis, 
§ 622). Consequently the word b'ttshtm (from bd'aih, to be bad, 
or smell bad) denotes not ouly the grapes of the wild vine, which 
are naturally small and harsh (Kashi, lamhruchee, i.e. grapes of 
VOL. I. L 



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162 THE PB0PBE0IB8 OF ISAIAH. 

the liUiruica, which is used now, however, us the botanical name 
of a vine that is American in its origin), but also grapes of a 
good stock, which have either been spoiled or hare failed to 
ripen,^ These were the grapes which the Yineyard produced, 
such as yoa might indeed have expected from a wild vine, bat 
not from carefullf cultivated vines of the very choicest kind. 

The song of the beloved who was so sorely deceived . 
terminates here. The prophet recited it, not his beloved 
himself; bnt as they were both of one heart and one sonl, 
the prophet proceeds thus in vers. 3 and 4 : " And now, 
inhaMtantg of Jerutalem and men of Jvdak, judge, I pray you, 
hetaeen me and my vineyard! Wlwi could liave been done more 
to my vineyard that I have not done in itf Wherefore did I 
hope th^ it would bring fort/i grapes, and it brought forth mid 
grcqiet'i" The fact that the prophet speaks as if he were the 
beloved himself, shows at once who the beloved must be. The 
beloved of the prophet and the lover of the prophet (yddid and 
dad) were Jehov^, with whom he was bo united by a «nw 
mystica exalted above all earthly love, that, like the angel of 
Jehovah in the early histories, he could speai as if he were 
Jehovah Himse^ (see especially Zech. ii. 12-15). To any one 
with spiritual intuition, therefore, the parabolical meaning and 
object of the song would be at once apparent ; and even the 
inhabitauts of Jerusalem and the men of Judah (yoaheb and uh 
are used collectively, as in ch. vlii. 14, ix. 8, iixiL 21, cf. xx. 6) 
were not so stupefied by sin, that they could not perceive to 
what the prophet was leading. It was for them to decide where 
the guilt of this unnatural issue lay — that is to say, of this 
thorough contradiction between the " doing" of the vineyard 
and the " doing" of the Lord ; that instead of the grapes he 
hoped for, it brought forth wild grapes. (On the expression 
** what could have been done," ^id faciendum est, mah-la'atoth, 

' In the JeruBalem Talmud such giapee are called iStshin, the letters 
being transpoeed ; and in the Uiahnah (Ma'aseroth i. 2, Zebt'iih iv. 8) 
E^ttSri is tlie etonding void applied to grapes that are only ball ripe (see 
Lbwy'a Leskon Chachamim, or WdrterbuiA det talmudUchen HebrHisch, Frag 
16i5). With reference to the wild grape (ts dypiix.T.iiftii), a writer, de- 
scribing the useful plants of Greece, eays, " Its fmit (yd d-yfimna^uKu) 
GOn«sts of verj Bmoll berries, not mach larger than bilberries, with a harsh 



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CHAP. 7. 6, <. 163 

see at Hab. i. 17, Ges. § 132, Anm. 1.) Instead of T]d) (m'?) 
we bare the more suitable term ?^^, the latter being used in 
relation to the actual cause (causa effi-dens), the former in 
relation to the object (caueafinalii). The parallel to the second 
part, m. ch. t. 2, resembles the passage before us, not only in 
the use of this particular word, but also in the fact that there, 
as well as here, it relate? to both clauses, and more especially to 
the latter of the two. We find the same paratactic construction 
in connection with other conjunctions (cf. ch. xii. 1, 1x7. 12). 
Thej were called upon to decide and answer as to this vihat 
and yiherefore; but they were silent^ just because they could 
' clearly see that they would have to condemn themselves (as 
David condemned himself in connection with Nathan's parable, 
2 Sam. zii. 5). The Lord of the vineyard, therefore, be^ns 
to speak. He, its accuser, will now also he its judge. — Ver. 5. 
" Now then, I will tell you what Twill do at once to my vineyard : 
ti^e away its hedge, and it shall be for grazing; pull down its 
wall, and it shall be for treading down." Before " now titen" 
(y^attdh) we must imagine a pause, as in ch. iii. 14. The XiOrd 
of the vineyard breaks the silence of the umpires, which indi- 
cates their consciousness of guilt. They shall hear from Him 
what He will do at once to His vineyard (Lamed in I'carmi, as, 
for example, in Deut. xi. 6). "IvriUdo:" am'Oseh,fiit.inslans, 
equivalent to facturus svm (Ges. § 134, 2, h). In the inf. abs. 
which follow He opens up what He will do. On this expla- 
natoiy use of the inf. abs., see ch. xx. 2j Iviii. 6, 7. In such 
cases as these it takes the place of the object, as in other cases 
of the subject, but always in an abrupt manner (Ges. § 131, 1). 
He would take away the mesucah, i.e. the green thorny hedge 
(Prov. XT. 19; Hos.ii. 8) with which the vineyard was enclosed, 
and would pull down the gdrSd, i.e. the low stone wall (Num. 
xxii. 24 ; Prov. xxiv. 31), which had been surrounded by tbe 
hedge of thorn-bushes to make a better defence, as well as for 
the protection of the wall itself, more especially against being 
undermined ; so that tbe vineyard would be given up to grazing 
and treading down (LXX. KaTaTravtifia), i.e. would become an 
open way and gathering-place for man and beast. 

This puts an end to the unthankful vineyard, and indeed 
a hopeless one. Ver. 6. " And I will put an end to it : it shall 
not be pruned nor digged, and it shall break out in thorns and 



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164 TOE PB0PHECIE8 07 ISAIAH. 

UttttUs ; and I wtU command the chvds to rain no rain over it." 
" Put an end:" bdtkdh (= battdh .- Ges. g 67, Anm. 11) Bigaifies, 
aecording to the primary meaning of bdihath (ma, Jirra, see at 
ch. i. 29), viz. absdndere, either abscissum = loctu abscUsits or 
prtBTupttu (ch, vii, 19), or absciasio = deletio. The latter ia the 
meaning here, where skith bdtkd/i Is a refined expression for the 
more usual n73 nb{i, both being construed with the accusativa 
of the thing which is brought to an end. Further pruning and 
hoeing would do it no good, but only lead to further disappoint- 
ment : it was the will of the Lord, therefore, that the deceitful 
vineyard should shoot up in thorns and thistles (^dldh is applied to 
the soil, as in ch. xxxiv. 13 and Prov. xxiv. 31 ; shdmir vdshaitK, 
thorns and thistles, are in the accusative, according to Ges. § 
138, 1, Anm. 2 ; and both the words themselves, and also their 
combination, are exclusively and peculiarly Isaiah's).^ In order 
that it might remain a wilderness, the clouds would also receive 
commandment from the Lord not to rain upon it. There can 
be no longer any doubt who the Lord of the vineyard is. He is 
Lord of the clouds, and therefore the Lord of heaven and earth. 
It ia He who is the prophet's beloved and dearest one. The song 
vrhich opened in so minstrel-like and harmless a tone, has now 
become painfully severe and terribly repulsive. The husk of 
the parable, which has already been broken through, now falls 
completely off (cf. Matt. x^i. 13, xxv. 30). What it sets 
forth in symbol is really true. This tmtli the prophet estab> 
lishes by an open declaration. — Ver. 7. *' For ilte vineyard of 
Jehovah of /losts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are 
the plemtatum of His delight: He waited for justice, and behold 
gr-asping ; for righteousness, and behold a shriek" The meaning 
is not that the Lord of the vineyard would not let any more rain 
fall upon it, because this Lord was Jehovah (which is not 
afiirmed in fact in the words commencing with "for," d), but- 

> CaBselassodateesAamiVas thenameof aplant (saxifraga)v\t\i afiipi^, 
and thaiih with lenlia, dicxuSa ; but the name thdmir ia not at all applicable 
to thoBo small delicate pknte, which are called eaxi/raga (stone-breakers) 
on account of their growing out of clefts in the rock, and so appearing to 
have Bplit the rock itself. Both ahamir vashaxOt aad kdta v'dardar, in Gen. 
iii. 18, aeem rather to point to certain kinds of rkarnrms, together with 
different kinds of thistles. The more arid and waste the ground is, the 
more does it abound, where not altogether without vegetation, in thorny, 
prickly, Btnnted production*. 



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CHAP. T. r. IC5 

a more general one. This was how the case stood with the 
vineyard ; for all Israel, and especially the people of Judah, were 
this vineyard, which had so bitterly deceived the expectations 
of its Lord, and indeed " the vineyard of Jehovah of hosts," and 
therefore of the omnipotent God, whom even the clouds would 
serve when He came forth to punish. The expression " for " 
(ct) is not only intended to vindicate the truth of the last state- 
ment, but the truth of the whole simile, including this : it is an 
explanatory "for" (ci eaplic.), which -opens the epimyihion. 
"The vineyard of the Lord of hosts" (cerem JehovoJi Zebaoth) 
is the predicate. *' The house of Israel " (beth Yierder) was the 
whole nation, which is also represented in other passages under 
the same figure of a vineyard (ch, xxvii. 2 sgq.; Ps. Ixxx., etc.). 
But as Isaiah was prophet in Judah, he applies the figure more 
particularly to Judah, which was called Jehovah's favourite 
plantation, inasmuch as it was the seat of the divine sanctuary 
and of the Davidic kingdom. This makes it easy enough to 
interpret the different parts of the simile employed. The fat 
mountun-hom was Canaan, flowing with milk and honey (Ex. 
XV. 17) ; the digging of the vineyard, and clearing it of stones, 
was. the clearing of Canaan from its former heathen inhabit- 
ants (Ps. sliv. 3) ; the sorek-vines were the holy priests and 
prophets and kings of Israel of the earlier and better times (Jer. 
ii. 21) ; the defensive and ornamental tower in the midst of the 
vineyard was Jerusalem as the royal city, with Zion the royal 
fortress (Mic. iv. 8) ; the winepress-trough was the temple, 
where, according to Ps. xxxvi. 9 (8), the wine of heavenly 
pleasures flowed in streams, and from which, according to Ps. 
xhi. and many other passages, the thirst of the soul might all 
be quenched. The grazing and treading down are explained 
in Jer. v. 10 and xii. 10. The bitter deception experienced by 
Jehovah is expressed in a play upon two words, indicating the 
surprising change of the desired result into the very opposite. 
The explanation which Gesenius, Caspari, Knohel, and others 
give of miepach, viz. bloodshed, does not commend itself ; for 
even if it must he admitted that sdphach occurs once or twice in 
the " Arabizing " book of Job (ch. xxx. 7, xiv. 19) in the sense 
of pouring out, this verbal root is strange to the Hebrew (and 
the Aramsean). Moreover, mispack in any case would only 
mean pouring or shedding, and not bloodshed ; and although 



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168 THE PBOFHEOIES OF ISAIAH. 

the latter wotild certainly be possible by the side of the Arabic 
laffdch, saffdk (shedder of blood), yet it would be such an ellipsis 
as cannot be shown anywhere else in Hebrew usage. On the 
other hand, the rendering " leprosy " does not yield any appro- 
priate sense, as mispachath (sappachaih) is never generalized 
anywhere else into the single idea of " dirt" (Lnzzatto : lozzura), 
nor does it appear as an ethical notion. We therefore prefer 
to connect it with a meaning unquestionably belonging to 
the verb nsiD (see hal, 1 Sam. iii. 36 ; niphal, xiv. I ; hithpael, 
1 Sam. xxvi. 19), which is derived in 1?!, 1??j 1*0, from the 
primaiy notion " to sweep," tpec. to sweep towards, sweep in, 
or sweep away. Hence we regard miapach as denoting the 
forcible appropriation of another man's property ; certainly a 
suitable antithesis to mishpdL The prophet describes, in full- 
toned figures, how the expected noble grapes had turned into 
wild grapes, with nothing more than an outward resemblance. 
The introduction to the prophecy closes here. 

The prophecy itself follows next, a seven-fold discourse 
composed of the six-fold woe contained in vers. 8—23, and the 
announcement of punishment in which it terminates. In this 
six-fold woe the prophet describes the bad fruits one by one. In 
confinnaUon of our rendering of mispdch, the first woe relates to 
covetousness and avarice as the root of all evil. — Ver. 8. " Woe 
unto them that pin house to house, wito lay field to field, till there 
is no more room, and ye alone are dwelling in the midst of the 
land." The participle is continued in the finite verb, as in ver. 
23, ch. X. 1 ; the regular syntactic construction in cases of this 
kind (Ges. § 134, Anm. 2). The preterites after " till" (there 
are two such preterites, for 'ephee is an intensified T? enclosing 
the verbal idea) correspond to future perfects : " They, the in- 
satiable, would not rest till, after every smaller piece of landed 
property had been swallowed by them, the whole land had come 
into their possession, and no one be»de themselves was settled 
in the land" (Job xxii. 8). Such covetousness was all the 
more reprehensible, because the law of Israel had provided so 
very stringently and carefully, that as far as possible there should 
be an equal distribution of the soil, and that hereditary family 
property should be inalienable. All landed property that had 
been alienated reverted to the family every fiftiedi year, or 
year of jubilee ; so that alienation simply bad reference to the 



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OHAP. V. 9, Ml 167 

t of the land till that tune. It was only in the case of 
houses in towns that the right of ledemption was restricted to 
one jear, at least according to a later statute. How badly the 
law of the year of jubilee had been obserTed, may be gathered 
from Jer. xxxiv., where we learn that the law as to the manu- 
mission of Hebrew slaves in the sabbatical year had fallen 
entirely into neglect, Isaiah's contemporary, Micah, makes 
just the same complaint as Isaiah himself (rid. Mic. ii. 2). 
And the denunciation of punishment is made by him in very 
similar terms to those which we find here in vers. 9, 10 : " Into 
mine ears Jehovah of koiU x Of a irvth many houees shall became 
a wilderness, great and beautiful ones deserted. For ten yokes of 
vineyard will yield one pailful, and a quarter of seed-corn will 
produce a buslteL" We may see from ch. zxii. 14 in what sense 
the prophet wrote the substantive clause, *' Into mine ears," or 
more literally, " In mine ears [is] Jehovah Zebaoth," viz. He 
is here revealing Himself to me. In the pointing, ^^nta is 
written with tiphchah as a pausai form, to indicate to the reader 
that the boldness of the expression is to be softened down by the 
assumption of an ellipsis. In Hebrew, " to say into the ears" 
did not mean to "speak softly and secretly," asGeu.zxiii. 10, 16, 
Job xxsiii. 8, and other passages, clearly show ; but to speak in 
a distinct and intelligible manner, which precludes the possi^ 
bility of any misunderstanding. The prophet, indeed, had not 
Jehovah standing locally beside him ; nevertheless, he had Him 
objectively over against his own personality, and was well able 
to diBtingnish veiy clearly the thoughts and words of his own 
personality, from the words of Jehovah which arose audibly 
within him. These words informed him what would be the 
fate of the rich and insatiable landowners. " Of a truth :" 
c6'DK (if not) introduces an oath of an afiBrmative character 
(the complete formula is chat ant 'imr-W, " as I live if not "), 
just as 'tm (if) alone introduces a negative oath (e.g. Num. 
lir. 23). The force of the expression 'im-lo' extends not only 
to rt^bim, as the false accentuation with gershayim (double- 
geresh) would make it appear, but to the whole of tiie following 
sentence, as it is correctly accentuated with rebia in the VeneUan 
(1521) and other early editions. A nniversal desolation would 
ensne: ra&&iM(many)doesnotmean less than all; but the houses 
{bdttimj as the word should be pronounced, notwithstanding 



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168 THE FBOPHICIES OF I&UAH. 

Ewald's objectioD to Kohler'a remarks on Zecli. xiv. 3 ; cf . Job^ 
ii. 31) constituted altogether a very large natnber (compare the 
use of the word " many" in ch. ii. 3, Matt. xx. 28, etc.). r!*P is 
a donble, and therefore an absolute, negation (so that there is 
not, no inhabitant, t.e. not any inhabitant at all). Yer. 10, which 
commences with ct, explains how such a desolation of the houses 
wonld be brought about : failure of crops produces famine, and 
this is followed by depopulation. " Tet\ ztmde (with dagetJi lene, 
Ewald) of vineyard" are either ten pieces of tho size that a man 
could plough in one day with a yoke of oxen, or possibly ten por- 
Uona of yoyte-like espaliers of vines, t.B. of vines trained on cross 
laths(thetnna_jiM7abt of Yarro), which is the explanation adopted 
by Biesenthal. But if we compare 1 Sam. xiv. 14, the former 
is to be preferred, although the links are wanting which wonld 
enable us to prove that the early Israelites had one and the 
same system of land measure as the Komans;^ nevertheless 

^yljj (in Hauran) is precisely similar, and this word signifies 

primarily a yohe of oxen, and then a yoke (jugerwn) regarded 
as a measure of land. Ten days' work would only yield a 
■ingle bath. This liquid measure, which was first introduced 
in the time of the kings, corresponded to the ^hah in dry 
measure (Ezek. xlv. 11). According to Joaephus (Ant. vili. 
2, 9), it was equal to seventy-two Koman saetarii, i.e. a little 
more than thirty-three Berlin quarts ; but in the time of Isaiah 
it was probably smaller. The homer, a dry measure, generally 

' Ontbejuperum, see Hultsch, Griechudit und rSmuche JtfetTotoffU,lB6S. 
The Greek pkthrtm, which was smaller by tvo and a half, corresponded to 
Bome extent to this ; also the Homerio Utragaon, which cannot be more 
predsely defined (according to EnslathiDB, it was a piece of land which a 
skilful labourer conld plongh in one day). According to Herod, ii. 168, in 
the Egyptian Bqaare-measore an ipavpa was equal to 150 cubits sqnare. 
The Fal«BUnian, according to the tables of Julian the Ashkalonite, wea the 
plethron. " The plelhron," he aaya, " was ten perchw, or fifteen fathomsi. 
or thirty paces, sixty cubits, ninety feel" (for the entire text, see L. F. r. 
Fennenberg'H Vntersuchungen fibar alle Langeti-, Feld-, und Wegemaasst, 
1859). Fenneraberg's concln^on is, that the txemed was a plethron, ei^nal 
in length to ten perches of nine feet each. Bat the meaning of the word 
txemtd is of mom importance in helping to detennine the measure referred 
to, than the tables of long measure of the aicbitect of Afihkalon, which have 
been preaerred in the imperial collection of laws of Constantine Harme- 
nopoloB, and which probably belong to a much later period. 



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called a cor after the time of the kings, was eqnal to ten Attic 
medimnm;^ a medimnos being (according to Josephus, ArU. xv. 
9, 2) about 15-16thB of a Berlin bushel, and therefore a llttla 
more than fifteen pecks. Even if this qDantit;^ of com should 
be sown, they would not reap more than an ephah. The 
harvest, therefore, would only yield the tenth part of the 
sowing, since an epkalt was the tenth part of a homer, or three 
eeaks, the usual minimum for one baking (vid. Matt. xiii. 33). 
It is, of course, impossible to give the relative measures exactly 
in our translation. 

The second woe, for which the cnrse about to fall upon 
vinedressing (ver. 10a) prepared the way by the simple asso- 
ciation of ideas, is directed against the debauchees, who in their 
carnal security carried on their excesses even in the daylight. 
Ver. 11. " Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning 
to run after etnyng drink; who continue till late at night with 
wine inflaming them ! " Boker (from hdkar, bakara, to slit, to 
tear up, or split) is the break of day ; and nesheph (from 
ndshaph, to blow) the cool of the evening, including the night 
(ch. xsi. i, lix. 10) ; 'ieklr, to continue till late, as in Frov. 
xxiii. 30 : the construct state before words with a preposition, 
as in ch. ix. 3, xxviii. 9, and many other passages (Ges. 
§ 116, 1). Shscdr, in connection with yayin, is the general 
name for every other kind of strong drink, more especially for 
wines made artificially from fruit, honey, raisins, dates, etc, 
including barley-wine (o7iw9 Kp(Sivo<!) or beer (eV KpiOSsv fU8u 
in ^schyluB, also called ^pvrov ^pvrov, ^os ^vBos, and by 
many other names), a beverage known in Egypt, which was 
half a wine conntty and half a beer country, from as far back 
as the time of the Pharaohs. The form shecdr is composed, 
like ^V. (with the fore-tone tsere), from shdcar, to intoxicate; 
according to the Arabic, literally to close by stopping up, t.«. 
to stupefy.^ The clauses after the two participles are circum- 

' Or rather 7^ Attic metfinttu'i'-lO Attic in«<refoi—>46 Roman nux&i 
(see Biiokh, Metrobgache Unteriuchungen, p. 259). 

* It is a question, therefore, whether the name of angar is related to it 
or not. The Arahic sal^r corresponds to the Hebrew shecSr ; but sngar is 
called takkar, Pera. 'sakkar, 'sakar, no donbt aqnivalent to aAii,yi»pi (Arrian 
in Peripha, fti\i to /nx^i/iirw Ti Xtyoftint «-««x*pOi aacciorum, an Indian 
w^rd, winch is pronounced garhar& in Sanscrit and takkara in Prakrit, 
■lid Bigmfiea " forming broken pieces," w. sugar in grains or sn-all Imnpa 



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170 THE FBOPHEOIES OF ISAUH. 

fltantial clauses (Ewald, § 341, b), indicating the circnmstances 
under which tfae^ ran out so early, and sat till long after dark : 
they hunted after mead, they heated themselves with wine, 
namely, to drown the consciousness of their deeds of darkness. 
Yen 12 describes how they go on in their blindness with 
music and carousing: " And gvitar and harp, kettle-drumy and 
fiuUf and viine, i» their featt; but they regard not the work of 
Jehovahf and see not the pitrpote of His haudt." " 77ieir feast" 
is so and so (On''F\VO is only a plural in appearancej it is really a 
singular, as in Dan. i. 10, 16, and many other passages, with 
the Yod of the primary form, 'fi?*? " '^Pp, softened : see the 
remarks on ri?^ at ch. i. 30, and n'te'll at ch. xxii. 11) ; that is 
to say, their feast consisted or was composed of exciting mmdc 
and wine. Knobel construes it, " and there are guitar, etc., 
and wine is their drink ; " hyit a divided sentence of this kind 
is very tame ; and the other expression, based upon the general 
principle, " The whole is its parts," is thoroughly Semitic (see 
Fleischer's Abhandlungen Uber einige Arten der NbminalappO' 
siHon in den Sitzungsberichten der sdchs. Geselhchaft der Wia- 
smschaft, 1862). Cxnnor (guitar) is a general name for such 
instruments as have their strings drawn (upon a bridge) over a 
sounding board ; and nebel (the harp and lyre) a general name 
for instrnments with their strings hung freely, so as to be 
played with both hands at the same time. Toph (Arab, duff) 
is a general name for the tambourin, the drum, and tbe kettle- 
drum ; ehaUl (lit. that which is bored through) a general name 
for the flute and double flute. In this tumult and riot they 
had no thought or eye for the work of Jehovah and the purpose 
of His hands. This is the phrase used to express the idea 
of the eternal counsel of God (ch. xxxvii. 26), which leads 
to salvation by the circuitous paths of judgment (ch. x. 12, 
zxriii. 21, xxix. 23), so far as that counsel is embodied in 

(btoini Bngar). The art of boiling sugar from the cane w&B aa Indian 
inventbn (see Lanen, Inditcke Allerlhumshutide, i. 269 sqq.)- '^^ earlj 
Egyptian name for beer is iek (Brogecfa, Bectuil, p. 118) ; tbedemotioai>d 
hiontic name henk, tbe Goptia Acn^. The word ^Suc invite) is also oU 
Egn>tiis&. In tbe Boot of the Dead (79, 8) tbe deceased sajs, " I have 
taken aacrifidal cakea from tbe table, T have drank, lelh-l in tbe evening." 
Hoses Stuart wrote axiEiaayvpon the Wines and Strong DriaJu of tlie Ancient 
Hebrewt, which was published in London (1831), with a preface b; J. Fya 
Smitb. 



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CHAP. V. 11. 171 

histoiy, as moulded by Uie invisible iDterposition of Qod. Id 
their joy and glory they had no sense for what was the most 
glorious of all, viz. the moving and working of God in history ; 
so that they could not even discern the judgment which was in 
course of preparation at that very time. 

Therefore judgment would overtake them in this blind, 
dull, and stupid animal condition. Ver. 13. " Tiierefore my 
people go into banithment without knowing; and their glory will 
become starving men, and their tumult men dried up vntli thirst." 
As the word '* therefore" (IdcSn, as in ch. i. 24) introduces the 
threat of punishment, galdh (go into captivity) b a prophetic 
preterite. Israel would go into exile, and that "without 
knowing" (mibb'li-d<£alk'). The meaning of this expression 
cannot be "from want of knowledge," since the mt'n which is 
fused into one word with b'li is not causal, but negative, and 
mibb'li, as a preposition, always signiGes "without" (absque) 
But are we to render it " without knowing it " (as in Hoa. iv. 6, 
where kadda'ath has the article), or " unawares 1 " There ia no 
necessity for any dispute on this point, since the two renderings 
are fundamentally one and the same. The knowledge, of which 
ver. 12 pronounces them destitute, was more especially a know- 
ledge of the judgment of God that was han^ng over them ; so 
that, as the captivity would come upon them without know- 
ledge, it would necessarily come upon them unawares. " TJieir 
ghry" (cebodd) and "their tumuU" (hamono) are therefore to 
be understood, as the predicates show, as collective nonns used 
in a personal sense, the former signifying the more select portion 
of the nation (cf. Mic. i. 15), the latter the mass of the people, 
who were living in rioting and tumult. The former would 
become " men of famine" (mithe rddb : 'HD, like "E'iK in other 
places, viz. 2 Sam. six. 29, or '.??, 1 Sam. xxvi. 16) ; the latter 
" men dried up with thirst" (tsichlh tsamdh: the same number 
as the subject). There is no necessity to read 'Op (dead men) 
instead of "rta, as the LXX. and Ynlgate do, or ^ra (ntD) 
according to Dent, xxxii. 24, as Hitzig, Ewald, Bottcher, and 
others propose (compare, on the contrary, Gen. xxxiv. 30 and 
Job xi. 11). The adjective tzieheh {hapax leg.) is formed Uke 
chirSth, ciheh, and other adjectives which indicate defects : in 
such formations from verbs Lamed-He, instead of e we have an 
a that has grown out of ay (Olshausen, § 182, b). The rich 



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173 THE PR0PHE{3E8 OF ISAUH. 

gluttons voald starve, and the tippling crowd would die with 
^irst. 

The threat of punishment commences again with " there- 
fore;" it has not yet satisfied itself, and therefore grasps deeper 
still. Ver. 14. " Therefore the under^world Opens its jaws vide, 
and stretches open its mouth immeaaurably wide; and the glory of 
Jerusalem descends, and its tumult, and noise, and those who re- 
jffice within it." The verbs which follow Idcin (therefore) are 
prophetic preterites, as in ver. 13. The feminine suffixes 
attached to what the lower world swallows op do not refer to 
sheol (though this is construed more frequently, no doubt, as a 
feminine than as a masculine, as it is in Job sxvi. 6), but, as 
expressed in the translation, to Jerusalem itself, which is also 
necessarily required by the last clause, " those who rejoice 
within it." The withdrawal of the tone from Pjn to the penulti- 
mate (cf. chdphstz in Fs. xviii. 20, xxii. 9) is intentionally 
omitted, to cause the rolling and swallowing up to be heard 
as it were. A mouth is ^cribed to the under-world, also a 
nepkesh, i.e. a greedy soul, in which sense nephesh is then 
applied metonymically sometimes to a thirst for blood (Ps. 
xxvii. 12), and sometimes to simple greediness (cb. Ivi. 11), 
and even, as in the present passage and Hah. ii. 5, to the 
throat or swallow which the soul opens " without measnre," 
when its craving knows no bounds (Psychol, p. 204). It has 
become a common thing now to drop entirely the notion which 
formerly prevailed, that the noun eheol was derived from the 
verb sMal in the sense in which it was generally employed, viz. 
to ask or demand ; but Caspari, who has revived it again, is 
certainly so far correct, that the derivation of the word which 
the prophet had in his mind was this and no other. The word 
theol (an infinitive form, like pekod) signified primarily the 
irresistible and inexorable demand made upon every earthly 
thing ; and then secondarily, in a local sense, the place of the 
abode of shades, to which everything on tbe surface of the 
earth b summoned ; or essentially the divinely appointed corse 
which demands and swallows up everything upon the earth. 
We ^mply maintain, however, that the word sheol, as generally 
used, was associated in thought with eltdsl, to ask or demand. 
Orijpnally, no doubt^ it may have been derived from the 
primary and more material it^a of the verb ^Ke', possibly from 



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the meaning " to be hollow," which is also assumed to be the 
primary meaning of 7w} At any rate, this derivation answers 
to the view that generally prevailed in ancient times. Accord- 
ing to the prevalent idea, Hades was in the interior of the 
earth. And there was nothing really absurd in this, since it is 
quite within the power and freedom of the omnipresent Ood 
to manifest Himself wherever and however He may please. 
As He reveals Himself above the earth, i.e. in heaven, among 
blessed spirits in the light of His love ; so did He reveal Him- 
self underneath the earth, viz. in Sheol, in the darkness and fire 
of His wrath. And with the exception of Enoch and Elijah, 
with their marvellous departure from this life, the way of every 
mortal ended there, until the time when Jesus Christ, having 
first paid the Xvrpav, i.e. having shed His blood, which covers 
oar guilt and turns the wrath of God into love, descended into 
Hades and ascended into heaven, and from that time forth has 
changed the death of all believers from a descent into Hades 
into an ascension to heaven. But even under the Old Testa- 
ment the believer may have known, that whoever hid himself 
on this side the grave in Jehovah the living One, would retain 
his eternal germ of life even in SheSl in the midst of the shades, 
and would taste the love of God even in the midst of wrath. 
It was this postulate of faith which lay at the foundation of 
the fact, that even under the Old Testament the broader and 
more comprehensive idea of Shedl began to be contracted into 

* The meaning " to be hollow" is not very flrmly establiBhed, however ; 
aa the primary meaning of Tyj^, and the analogy sometimes adduced of 
he1l = hoUaw {Holle = H6hk},]B a d^e^tiv6 one, BaHelle (bell), to vHch 
Luther always gives the more correct form Helie, does not mean a hollow, 
but a hidden place (or a place which renderti iavMble ; from hSln, to con- 
ceal), lit celana (see Jutting, Bibl. Worterbuch, 1864, pp. 85, 86). It ia 
much more probable that the meaning of sheol is not the hoUow place, hut 
the depreision or depth, from 'jff, which corresponds precisely to the Greek 
jcny^it B0 far as iU primary meaning is concerned (compare the talmddic 
shtUhSl, to let down; thilshul, inking or'depreedon, EraUn 836; shul, the 
foundation, /unffiu): seeHupfeld on Fs. vi. 6. Luzzatto on this panaageabo 
e^liuns«%eoZ as signifying deptli, and compares the talmudic hi3hchil=liediU, 
to let down (or, according to others, to draw up, — two meaningB which may 
easily be combined in the same word, starting from its radical idea, which 
indicates in general a loosening of the previous connection). Fiiist has 
^so given up the meaning cavita», a hollow, and endeavonrs to find a more 
correct esplanation of the primsiy Unification of Affal (see at ch. xl. 12). 



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174 THE FBOPBECIES OF ISAIAB. 

the mora limited notion of hell (see PsycJtol. p. 415). This is 
the case in the passage before ns, where Isaiah predicts of 
evetytbiDg of which Jerusalem was prond, and in which it 
revelled, including the persons who rejoiced in these things, a 
descent into Hades ; just as the Korahite author of Ps. xlix. 
wrote (ver. 14) that the beauty of the wicked would be given 
up to Hades to be consumed, without having hereafter any 
place in the upper world, when the upright should have 
dominion over them in the morning. Hades even here is 
almost equivalent to the New Testament gekenna. 

The prophet now repeats a thought which formed one of 
the refrains of the second prophetic address (ch. ii. 9, 11, cf. 
ver. 17). It acquires here a still deeper sense, from the con- 
text in which it stands. Vers. 15, 16. " Then are mean men 
bowed down, and lords humbled, and the eyes of lofty men are 
humbled. And Jehovah of hosts shows Himself exalted in 
judgment, and God the Holy One sanctifies Himself in righteous- 
ness." That which had exalted itself from earth to heaven, 
would be cast down earthwards into hell. The consecutive 
futures depict the coming events, which are here represented 
as historically present, as the direct sequel of what is also re- 
presented as present' in ver. 14 : Hades opens, and then both 
low and lofty in Jerusalem sink down, and the soaring eyes 
now wander about in horrible depths. God, who is both 
exalted and holy in Himself, demanded that as the exalted One 
He should be exalted, and that as the Holy One He should 
be sanctified. But Jerusalem bad not done that ; He would 
therefore prove Himself the exalted One by the execution of 
justice, and sanctify Himself (nikdash is to be rendered as a 
reflective verb, according to Ezek. xxxvi. 23, xxxviii. 23) by 
the manifestation of righteousness, in consequence of which 
the people of Jerusalem would have to give Him gloTy against 
thfeir will, as forming part of "the things under the earth" 
(Phil. ii. 10). Jerusalem has been swallowed up twice in this 
manner by Hades ; once in the Chaldean war, and again in 
the Koman. But the invisible background of these outward 
events was the fact, that it had already fallen under the power 
of hell. And now, even in a more literal sense, ancient Jeru- 
salem, like the company of Korab (Num. svi. 30, 33), has 
gone underground. Just as Babylon and Nineveh, the ruins 



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CHIP. T. IT, M. 175 

of which are dag oat of the inexhaoatible mine of their far- 
atretching foundation and soil, have sunk beneath the ground ; 
so do men walk aboat in modem Jemsalem over the ancient 
Jerusalem, which lies buried beneath ; and many an enigma of 
topography will remain an enigma until ancient Jemsalem has 
been dug out of the earth again. 

And when we consider that the Holy Land is at the present 
time an extensive pasture-ground for Arab shepherds, and that 
the modem Jerusalem which has arisen from the dust is a 
Mohammedan city, we may see in this also a literal fulfilment 
of ver. 17 : "And lambs feed at upon their pasture, and nomad 
shepherds eat the waste places of the fat ones." There is no 
necessity to supply an object to the verb iini, aa Knobel and 
others assume, viz. the waste lands mentioned in the second 
clause ; nor is eeddhrdm, to be taken as the object, as Caspari 
supposes ; but the place referred to is determined by the con- 
text : in the place where Jerusalem is sunken, there Iambs feed 
after the manner of their own pasture-ground, i.e. just as if 
they were in their old accustomed pasture (dober, as in Mic. 
ii. 12, from ddhdr, to drive). The lambs intended are those of 
the gdrim mentioned in the second clause. The gdrim them- 
selves are men leading an unsettled, nomad, or pilgrim life ; as 
distingnished from gerim, strangers visiting, or even settled at 
a place. The LXX. have apttf, so that they must have read 
either cdrim or geddim, which Ewald, Knobel, and others adopt. 
But one feature of the prophecy, which is sustaioed by the 
historical fulfilment, is thereby obliterated. Chdrboth mickim 
are the lands of those that were formerly marrowy, i.e. fat and 
strutting about in their fulness; which lands had now become 
waste places. Knobel's statement, that dcdl is out of place in 
connection with gdrim, is overthrown by ch. i. 7, to which he 
himself refers, though he makes he-goats the subject instead of 
men. The second woe closes with ver. 17. It is the longest of 
all. This also serves to confirm the fact that luxury was the 
leading vice of Judah in the time of Uzziah-Jotham, as it was 
that of Israel under Jeroboam n. (see Amos vi., where the 
same threat is held out). 

The third woe is directed against the supposed strong-minded 
men, who called down the judgment of God by presumptuous 
sins and wicked words Ver. 18. " Woe tmto them that draw 



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178 THE PB0FBECIE3 OP ISilAR 

crime with eordt of lying, and sin as wiOi the rope of the waggon^ 
Knobel and moat other commentators take mdshak in the sense 
of altrahere (to draw towards one's self) : " They draw towards 
them sinful deeds with cords of lying palliation, and the cart- 
rope of the most daring presumption;" and cite, as parallel 
examples, Job xl. 25 and Hos. xi. 4. Bat as mdahak is also 
used in Deut. xxi. 3 in the sense of drawing in a yoke, that b 
to say, drawing a plough or chariot ; and as the waggon or cart 
(agdldh, the word commonly nsed for a transport-waggon, as 
distinguished from mercdbdk, the state carriage or war chariot : 
see Genesis, pp. 562-3) b expressly mentioned here, the figure 
employed is certainly the same aa that which underlies the New 
Testament ertpo^ir/hv ("unequally yoked," 2 Oor. vi, 14). 
Iniquity was the burden which they drew after them with cords 
of lying (ihdv'h; see at Ps. xxvi. 4 and Job xv, 31), i.e. "want 
of character or religion ;" and sin was the waggon to which they 
were harnessed as if with a thick cart-rope (Hof mann, Drechsler, 
and Caspar! ; see Ewald, $ 221, a). Iniquity and sin are men- 
tioned here as carrying with them their own punishment. The 
definite |^ (crime or misdeed) is generic, and the indefinite 
nijan qualitative and massive. There is a bitter sarcasm in- 
volved in the bold figure employed. They were proud of their 
unbelief; but this unbelief was like a halter with which, hke 
beasts of burden, they were harnessed to sin, and therefore to 
the punishment of sin, which they went on drawing further and 
further, in utter ignorance of the waggon behind them. 

Ver. 19 shows very clearly that the prophet referred to the 
free-thinkers of his time, the persons who are called foola (nabal) 
and scomers (Ists) in the Psalms and Proverbs. " Who sai/, 
Let Him hasten, accelerate His work, that we may see ; and lei ihe 
counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw near and come, that we 
may experience it." They doubted whether the day of Jehovah 
would ever come (Ezek. xii. 22 ; Jer. v. 12, 13), and went so 
far in their unbelief as to call out for what they could not 
and would not believe, and desired it to come that they might 
see it with their own eyes and experience it for themselves 
(Jer. xvii. 15 ; it is different in Amos v. 18 and Mai. ii. 17— 
iii. 1, where this desire does not arise from scorn and defiance, 
but from impatience and weakness of faith). As the two verbs 
denoting haste are nsed both transitively and intransitively 



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CHAP. V. «. M. 177 

(vid. Jndg. zx. 37, to hasten or make haste), we might render the 
passage " let His work make haste," as Hitzig, Ewald, Umbreit, 
and Drechsler do ; bnt we prefer the rendering adopted hy 
Gesenins, Caspar!, and Knobel, on the basis of cb. \x. 22, and 
take the verb as transitive, and Jehovah as the subject. The 
forms y&ehishdk and taho^ are, with Ps. xx. 4 and Job xi. 17, 
probably tbe only examples of the expression of a wish in the 
third person, strengthened by the oA, which indicates a sammons 
or appeal ; for Ezck. xxiii. 20, which Geaenius cites (§ 48, 3), 
and Job xxii. 21, to which Knobel refers, have no connection 
with this, as in both passages the Sh is the feminine termination, 
and not hortative {yid. Job, i. p. 187 note, and i. p. 441). The 
fact that the free-thinkers called God "the Holy One of Israel," 
whereas they scoffed at His intended final and practical attesta- 
tion of Himself as the Holy One, may be explained from ch. 
XXX. 11 : they took this naipe of God from the lips of the prophet 
himself, so that their scorn affected both God and His prophet 
at the same time. 

Ver, 20. The fourth woe : " Woe to those who call evil good, 
and good evil ; who give out darkness for light, and light for dark- 
ness ; who give out bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter" The 
previous woe had reference to those who made the facts of sacred 
history the butt of their natnralistic doubt and ridicnle, especially 
so far as they were the subject of prophecy. This fourth woe 
relates to those who adopted a code of morals that completely 
overturned the first principles of ethics, and was utterly opposed 
to the law of God ; for evil, darkness, and bitter, with their 
respective antitheses, represent moral principles that are essen- 
tially relateil (Matt. vi. 23; Jas. iii. 11). Evil, as hostile to 
God, is dark in its nature, and therefore loves darkness, and b 
exposed to the punitive power of darkness. And although it 
may be sweet to the material taste, it is nevertheless bitter, 
inasmuch as it produces abhorrence and disgust in the godlike 
nature of man, and, after a brief period of self-deception, is 
turned into the bitter woe of fatal results. Darkness and light, 
bitter and sweet, therefore, are not tautological metaphors for 
evil and good ; but epithets applied to evil and good accord- 
ing to their essential principles, and their necessary and internal 
effects. 

Ver. 21. The fifth woe: " Woe unto them titat are wise in 
VOh. I. M 



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178 TEE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

thir (Hon «!/*«," and prudent tn their own sight." The third woe 
had reference to the unbelieving aatoralists, the opponents of 
prophecy (nebudh) ; the fonrth to the moralists, who threw all 
into confusion ; and to Uiis there is appended, by a very natural 
association of ideas, the woe denounced upon those whom want 
of humility rendered inaccessible to that wisdom which went 
hand in band with prophecy, and the tme foundation of which 
was the fear of Jehovah (Prov. i. 7 ; Job xxvili. 28 ; Eccles. 
zii. 13). " Be not wise in thine own eyes," is a fundamental 
rule of this wisdom (Frov. iii. 7). It was upon this wisdom 
that that prophetic policy rested, whose warnings, as we read in 
ch. xxviii. 9, 10, they so scornfully rejected. The next woe, 
which baa reference to the adminiatration of justice in the state, 
shows vCTy clearly that in this woe the prophet had more espe- 
cially the want of theoc^^tic wisdom in relation to the affairs of 
state in his mind. 

Vera. 22, 23. The sixth woe : *' Woe to those who are heroes 
to drink wniw, and brave men to mii: strong drink ; who acquit 
criminals for a bribe, and take away from every one the righteous- 
nets of the righteous" We see from ver. 23 that the drinkers 
in ver. 22 are unjust judges. The threat denounced against 
these is Isaiah's universal ceterum censeo ; and accordingly it 
forms, in this instance also, the substance of his sixth and last 
woe. They are heroes ; not, however, in avenging wrong, but 
in drinking wine ; they are men of renown, though not for 
deciding between guilt and innocence, but for mixing up the 
ingredients of strong artistic wines. For the terras applied to 
such mixed wines, see Pa, Ixxv. 9, Prov. xsiii. 30, Song of Sol. 
vii. 3. It must be borne in mind, however, that what is here 
called shecdr was not, properly speaking, wine, but an artificial 
mixture, like date wine and cider. For such things as these 
they were noteworthy and strong ; whereas they judged an- 
justly, and took brib€a that they might consume the reward of 
their injustice in drink and debauchery (ch. xxviii. 7, 8 ; Prov. 
xxxi. 5). *'For reward:" iheb (Arab, 'ukb; different from 
dksb, a heel, = 'oHb) is an adverbial accusative, "in recompense," 
or "for pay." "JFVom him" (mimmennu) is distributive, and 
refers back to tsaddihim (the righteous) ; as, for example, in 
Hos. iv. 8. 

Id the three exdaiaations in vers. 18-21, Jehovah rested 



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CBAP. V. 24. 179 

contented with the simple ondeTeloped " woe " (hot). On the 
other hand, the first two utterances respecting the covetous and 
the debauchees were expanded into an elahorate denunciation of 
punishment. Bat now that the prophet has come to the nnjust 
judges, the denunciation of punishment bursts out with such 
violence, that a return to the simple exclamation of " woe " is 
not to be thought of. To the two " therefores" in vers. 13, 14, 
a third is now added in ver. 24 : « Therefore, as the tongue of 
fire devours stubble, and hay sinks together in the flame, their root 
will become like mould, and their blossom fly up like dust ; for they 
have despised the law of Jehovah of hosts, and scornfully rejected tlte 
proclamation of the Holy One of Israel" The persons primarily 
intended are those described in vers. 22, 23, hut with a further 
extension of the range of vision to Judah and Jemsateni, the 
vineyard of which they are the bad fruit. The sinners are 
compared to a plant which moulders into dust both above and 
below, {.«. altogether (cf. Mai. iii. 19, and the expression, " Let 
there be to him neither root below nor branch above," in the in- 
scription upon the sarcophagus of the Phoenician king Es'mun^ 
'azar). Their root moulders in the earth, and their blossom 
{peraeh, as in ch, xviii. 5) turns to fine dust, which the wind 
carries away. And this change in root and blossom takes place 
suddenly, as if through the force of fire. In the expression 
e^eeolkash leshon 'esh ("as the tongue of fire devours stubble"), 
which consists of four short words with three sibilant letters, we 
hear, as it were, the hissing of the flame. When the infinitive 
construct is connected with both subject and object, the subject 
generally stands first, as in ch. Ixiv. 1 ; but here the object is 
placed first, as in ch. xx. 1 (Ges. § 133, 3 ; Ewald, § 307). In 
the second clause, the infinitive construct passes over into the 
finite verb, just as in the similarly constructed passage in ch. 
Ixiv. 1. As yirpek has the intransitive meaning collabi, to sink 
together, or collapse ; either lehabdli must be an ace. loci, or 
chashash lehdbah the construct state, signifying fiame-hay, i.e. - 
hay destined to the flame, or ascending in fiame.^ As the reason 

' In Arabic also, chaMsh dgnifies baj ; bnt in common ttsage (st kast in 
Syriiic) it is applied cot to dried graas, but to green graGs or barley : hence 
tbe ezpreeaioD yachasK tliere ia green fodder. Here, however, in Isaiah, 
i^AcuAosA is equivalent to chashiMh ySbis, and thia is its trae etTmologicoI 
mewuDg (sea the Lezicousl. But kaih ia still used in Sjio-Arabio, to 



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180 THE FBOFHICIES OF I8AUB. 

for the sudden dissolation of the plantation of Judah, instead of 
certain definite bids being mentioned, the sin of all sins is giren 
at once, namely, the rejection of the word of God with the 
heart (md'as), and in word and deed (ni'eta). The double 'eth 
(with yethih immediately before paehta, as in eleven passages 
in all ; see Heidenheim's MitpetS hzt^amim, p. 20) and v'^lA 
(with tebir) give prominence to the object; and the int^v 
change of Jehovah of hosts with the Holy One of Israel makes 
the sin appear all the greater on account of the exaltation and 
holiness of God, who revealed Himself in this word, and indeed 
had manifested Himself to Israel as Hia own peculiar people. 
The prophet no sooner mentions the great sin of Judah, than 
the announcement of punishment receives, as it were, fresh 
fuel, and bursts out again. — Ver, 25. " Therefore u the arath of 
Jehovah kindled against His people, and He stretches His hand over 
them, atid smites them ; tlien the hills tremble, and their carcases 
become like sweepings in the midst of the streets. For all this 
Sis anger is not appeased, and His luuid is stretched out still." 
We may see from these last words, which are repeated aa a 
refrain in the cycle of prophecies relating to the time of Ahaz 
(ch. ix, 11, 16, s. i), that the prophet bad before bis mind a 
distinct and complete judgment upon Jndah, belonging to the 
immediate future. It was certainly a coming judgment, not 
one already past ; for the verbs after " therefore" (^al-cSn), like 
those after the three previous HeSn^ are all prophetic preterites. 
It is impossible, therefore, to take the words "and the hills 
tremble " as referring to the earthquake in the time of TJzziab 
(Amos i. 1 ; Zech. xiv. 5). This judgment, which was closer at 
hand, would consist in the fact that Jehovah would stretch out 
His band in His wrath over His people (or, as it is expressed 
elsewhere, would swing His hand ; Lutber, " wave His hand," 
i,e. move it to and fro ; vid. ch, a. 15, xix. 16, xxx. 30, 32), 
and bring it down upon Jndah with one stroke, the violence of 
which would be felt not only by men, but by surrounding nature 
as well. What kind of stroke this would be, was to be inferred 
from the circumstance that the corpses would lie nnburied 

mgmfy Qot Btubble, but wheat that ha« been cut aod is not ;«t threshed ; 
whereM the radical word itself Mgnifiea to be &rj, and ck&shash oonee- 
quently ia used for mown grass, and hash for the dry halm of wheat, whether 
aa atabble left standing in the givoud, or as straw (yid. Job, ii. 377J. 



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CHiP. T. Sfi, sa. 181 

in the streets, like common street-sweepinga. The readiug 
nivn mnflt be rejected. Early editors read the word mach 
more correctly nlsn ; Buxtorf (1618) even adopts the reading 
nixvi, which has the " Masoretic pointing in Num. xxii. 39 in 
its favour. It is vety natural to connect eaxsuchdh with the 
Arabic kusdcfta (sweepings ; see at ch. xxxiii. 12) : but kusdcha 
is the common form for waste or rubbish of this kind (e.0. 
htldme, nail-cuttings), whereas cassuaeh is a form which, like 
the forms fast (e.g. chdnats) and fdul (compare the Arabic 
fda&g, a wind-maker, or wind-hag, i.e. a boaster), has always an 
intensive, active (e^, channun), or circumstantial signification 
(like shaceul), but is neverfound in a passive sense. The Caph 
is consequently to be taken as a particle of comparison (followed, 
as is generally the case, with a definite article) ; and sHchdk is 
to be derived from mach (=verrere, to sweep). The reference, 
therefore, is not to a pestilence (which is designated, as a stroke 
from God, not by hicedh, but by ndgapii), but to the slaughter 
of battle ; and if we look at the other terrible judgment threats 
ened in vers. 26 sqq., which was to proceed from the imperial 
power, there can be no doubt that the spirit of prophecy here 
points to the massacre that took place in Jndah in connection 
with the Syro-Ephraimitish war (see 2 Chron. zfviii. 5, 6). 
The mountains may then have trembled with the marching of 
troops, and the din of arms, and the felling of trees, and the 
shout of war. At any rate, nature had to participate in what 
men had brought upon themaelvea ; for, according to the creative 
appointment of God, nature bears the same relation to man as 
the body to the soul. Every stroke of divine wrath which 
falls upon a nation equally affects the land which has grown 
up, as it were, with it ; and in this sense the mountains of Judah 
trembled at the time referred to, even though the trembling was 
only discernible by initiated ears. But " for all this " (Beth, = 
"notwithstanding," "in spite of," as in Job i. 22) the wrath of 
Jehovah, as the prophet foresaw, would not turn away, as it was 
accustomed to do when He was satisfied ; aud His hand would 
still remain stretched out-over Judab, ready to strike again. 

Jehovah finds the human instruments of His further strokes, 
not in Israel and the neighbouring nations, but in the people 
of distant lands. Ver. 26. " And lifts vp a banner to the distant 
nationtf and hitses to it from the end of tlte eartJt ; and, behold^ 



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18S TBE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

U eomet teith hatte swiftly." What the prophet here foretold 
hegsn to he fulfilled in the time of Ahaz. But the prophecy, 
which commences with this verse, has every possible mark of 
the very opposite of a vatunnium post eventum. It ia, atrictly 
speaUng, only what had already been threatened in Deut, 
xxviii. 49 sqq. (cf, ch. xxxii. SI sqq-)) though here it aasumes 
a more plastic form, and is here presented for the first time 
to the view of the prophet as though coming out of a mist. 
Jehovah summons the nations afar off: haggOyim mSr&chok 
signifies, as we have rendered it, the " distant nations," for merd- 
chok is virtually an adjective both here and ch. xlix. 1, just as 
in Jer. zxiii. 23 it b virtually a substantive. The visible work- 
ing of Jehovah presents itself to the prophet in two figures. 
Jehovah plants a banner or standard, which, like an optical 
telegraph, announces to the nations at a more remote distance 
than the horn of battle {ahophar) could possibly reach, that 
they are to gather together ta war. A " banner " {nis) : i.e. a 
lofty staff with flying colours (ch. xxxiii. 23) planted upon a 
bare mountain-top (ch, xiii. 2). ttbi alternates with onn in this 
favourite figure of Isaiah. The nations through whom this 
was primarily fulfilled were the nations of the Assyrian empire. 
According to the Old Testament view, these nations were 
regarded as far off, and dwelling at the end of the earth 
(ch. xxzix. 3), not only inasmuch as the Euphrates formed the 
boundary towards the north-east between what was geogra- 
phically known and unknown to the Israelites (Ps. Ixxii. 8 ; 
Zech. iz. 10), but also inasmuch as the prophet had in his mind 
a complex body of nations stretching far away into further 
Asia. The second figure is taken from a bee-master, who 
entices the bees, by hissing or whistling, to come out of their 
hives and settle on the ground. Thus Virgil says to the bee- 
master who wants to make the bees settle, " Raise a ringing, 
and beat the cymbals of Oybele all around" {Georgic», iv. 54). 
Thns does Jehovah entice the hosts of nations like swarms of 
bees (vii. 18), and they swarm together with haste and swifts 
ness. The plural changes into the singular, because those who 
are approaching have all the appearance at first of a compact 
and indivisible mass; it is also possible that the ruling nation 
among the many is singled out. The thought and expression 
are both misty, and this b perfectly characterbtic. With the 



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CHAP. V. 27, 28. 183 

■word "behold" (hinnSk) the prophet points to them; they are 
approaching mehsrdlt kal, i.e. in the shortest time with swift 
feet, and the nearer they come to his view the more clearly he 
can describe them. — Ver. 27. " There is none exhausted, and 
none ttumbling among them : it gives ittelf no slumber, and no 
etet^; arid to none is the girdle of his hips loosed; and to none is 
Hie lace of his shoes broken" Notwithstanding the long march, 
there is no exhausted one, obliged to separate himself and 
remain behind (Deut. xxv. 18 ; Isa. xiv. SI) ; no stumbling one 
{eOshsl), for they march on, pressing incessantly forwards, as if 
along a well-made road (Jer. xxxi. 9). They do not slumber 
(nuttt), to say nothing of sleeping (^dshsn), so great is their 
eagerness for battle : i.e. they do not slumber to refresh them- 
selves, and do not even allow themselves their ordinary night's 
rest. No one has the girdle of his armour-shirt or coat of mail, 
in which he stack his sword (Neh, iv. 18), at all loosened; nor 
has a single one even the shoe-string, with which his sandals 
were fastened, broken {nittak, disrumpitur). The statement as 
to their want of rest forms a climax descendens ; the other, as to 
the tightness and durability of their equipment, a climax ascen- 
dens : the two statements follow one another after the nature 
of a chiasmus. 

The prophet then proceeds to describe their weapons and 
war-chariots. Ver. 28. " He whose arrows are sltarpened, and 
all his bows strung; the hoofs of his horses are counted liiefliTa, 
and his wheels like tite whirlwind." In the prophet's view they 
are coming nearer and nearer. For he sees that they have 
brought the sharpened arrows in their quivers (ch. xxii. 6); 
and the fact that all their bows are already trodden (namely, as 
their length was equal to a man's height, by treading upon the 
string with the left foot, as we may learn from Arriau's Tndica), 
proves that they are near to the goal. The correct reading 
in Jablonsky (according to Kimchi's Lex. cf . Michlal yofi) is 

I'nfiB'p with dagesh dirimens, aa in Ps. xxxvii. 15 {Ges, § 20, 2, b). 

As the custom of shoeing horses was not practised in ancient 
times, firm hoofs (pirKeu Koprepal, according to Xenophon's 
Hippikos) were one of the most important points in a good 
horse. And the horses of the enemy that was now drawing 
near to Judah had hoofs that would be found like flint (tzar, 



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184 THE PROPHECIES OF ISAUH. 

only used here, eijiuvalent to the Arabic zirr). Homer desig- 
nates such horses chalkopodes, btazen-footed. And the two 
wheels of the war-chariots, to which they were harnessed, turned 
with such velodty, and overthrew everything before them with 
such violence, that it seemed not merely as if a whirlwind drove 
them forward, but as if they were the whirlwind itself (ch, Ixvi. 
15 ; Jer. iv. 13). Nahum compares them to lightning (ch. ii. 5). 
Thus far the prophet's description has moved on, as if by forced 
marches, in clauses of from two to four words each. It now 
changes into a heavy, stealthy pace, and then in a few clauses 
springs like a wild beast upon its prey. — Ver. 29. " Roaring 
issues from it as from the lioness : it roars like lions, and utters 
a lore murmur ; seizes the prey, carries it off, and no one rescues." 
The futures, with the preceding P nJNB' which is equivalent to 
a future, hold each feature in the description fast, as if for 
prolonged contemplation. The lion roars when eager for prey ; 
and such is now the war-cry of the bloodthirsty enemy, which 
the prophet compares to the roaring of a lion or of young 
lions {cephirim) in the fulness of their strength. (The lion is 
described by its poetic name, W'Z?; this does not exactly apply 
to the lioness, which would rather be designated by the term 
■n;3?.) The roar is succeeded by a low growl (ndkam, fremere^f 
when a lion is preparing to fall upon its prey.' And so tha 
prophet hears a low and ominous murmur in the army, which 
is now ready for battle. But he also sees immediately after- 
wards hovf the enemy seizes its booty and carries it irrecoverably 
away: literally, " how he causes it to escape," i,e. not " lets it 
slip in cruel sport," as Luzzatto interprets it, hot carries it to a 
place of safety (Mic. vi. 14). The prey referred to is Judah. 
It also adds to the gloomy and mysterious character of the 
prophecy, that the prophet never mentions Judah. In the 
following verse abo (ver. 30) the object is still suppressed, as 
if the prophet could not let it pass his lips. Ver. 30. " And 
it utters a deep roar over it in that day like the roaring of tha 
sea : and it looie to the earth, and beliold darkness, tribulation, 
and light ; it becomes night over it in the clouds of heaven." The 
subject to " roars" is the mass of the enemy ; and in the expres- 
sions " over it" and " it looks" (nibbat ; the niphal, which is only 
' In Arabic, en-tiehem ia osed to signif j gieedineaB (aee Ali'a Proverbs, 
Wo. 16). 



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CHAP. T. 80. 185 

met with here, in tlie place of the hiphil) tlie prophet has in 
his mind the nation of Judah, upon which the enemy faUs with 
the roar of the ocean— that is to say, overwhelming it like a 
sea. And when the people of Judah look to the earth, i.e. to 
their own land, darkness alone presents itself, and darkness 
which has swallowed tip all the smiling and joyous aspect which 
it had before. And what theni The following words, tzar 
vd'sr, have been variously rendered, viz. " moon (= sahar) and 
Ban" by the Jewish expositors, " stone and flash," i.e. hail and 
thunder-storm, by Drechsler; bnt snch renderings as these, 
and others of a similar kind, are too far removed from the 
ordinary usage of the language. And the separaUoo of the 
two words, so that the one closes a sentence and the other 
commences a fresh one (e.g. " darkness of tribulation, and the 
sun becomes dark"), which is adopted by Hitzig, Gesenius, 
Ewald, and others, is opposed to the impression made by the 
two monosyllables, and sustained by the pointing, that they are 
connected together. The simplest explanation is one which 
takes the word tzar in its ordinary sense of tribulation or oppres- 
sion, and 'or in its ordinary sense of light, and which connects 
the two words closely together. And this is the case with the 
rendering given above : tzar vd'or are " tribulation and bright- 
ening op," one following the other and passing over into the 
other, like morning and night (ch. xxi. 12). This pair of 
words forms an interjectional clause, the meaning of which is, 
that when the predicted darkness had settled upon the land of 
Judah, this would not be the end; but there would still follow 
an alternation of anxiety tqid glimmerings of hope, until at last 
it had become altogether dark in the cloudy sky over all the 
land of Judah (^aripkim, the cloudy sky, is only met with here ; 
it is derived from 'draph, to drop or trickle, hence also 'ardphel : 
the suffix points back to Id'dretz, eretz denoting sometimes the 
earth as a whole, and at other times the land as being part 
of the earth). The prophet here predicts that^ before utter 
ruin has overtaken Judah, sundry approaches will be made 
towards this, within which a divine deliverance will appear again 
and again. Grace tries and tries again and again, until at last 
the me&sure of iniquity is full, and the time of repentance 
past. The history of the nation of Judah proceeded according 
to tEia law until the d^braction of Jerusalem by the Romans. 



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186 THE P&OPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

The Assyrian troubles, and the miraculous light of divine 
help which arose in the destruction of the militaiy power of 
Sennacherib, were only the foreground of thb moomful but 
yet ever and anon hopeful course of history, whic)i tenaioated 
in utter darkness, that has coutiuued now for nearly two thou* 
sand years. 

This closes the third prophetic address. It commences 
with a parable which contains the history of Israel in «mm, 
and closes with an emblem which symbolizes the gradual but 
yet cert^ accomplishment of the judicial, penal termination 
of the parable. This third address, therefore, is as complete 
in itself as the second was. The kindred allusions are to be 
accounted for from the sameness of the historical basis and 
arena. During the com«e of the exposition, it has become 
more and more evident and certain that it relates to the time 
of TJzziah and Jotham, — a time of peace, of strength, and 
wealth, but also of pride and luxury. The terrible slaughter 
of the Syro-Ephraimitish war, which broke out at the end of 
Jotham's reign, and the varied complications which king Ahaz 
introduced between Judah and the imperial worldly power, 
and which issued eventually in the destruction of the former 
kingdom, — those five marked epochs in the history of the 
kingdoms of the world, or great empires, to which the Syro- 
Ephraimitish war was the prelude, — were still hidden from the 
prophet in the womb of the future. The description of the 
great mass of people that was about to roll over Judah from 
afar is couched in such general terms, so undefined and misty, 
that all we can say is, that everything that was to happen to the 
people of God on the part of the imperial power during the 
five great and extended periods of judgment that were now so 
soon to commence (viz, the Assyrian, the Chaldean, the Persian, 
the Grecian, and the Eoman), was here unfolding itself out of 
the mist of futurity, and presenting itself to the prophet's eye. 
Even in the time of Ahaz the character of the prophecy changed 
in this respect. It was then that the eventful relation, in which 
Israel stood to the imperial power, generally assumed its first 
concrete shape in the form of a distinct relation to Asshur 
(Assyria). And from that time forth the imperial power in 
the mouth of the prophet b no longer a majestic thing without 
a name; but although the notion of the imperial power was 



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CHAP. Y. sa 187 

Dot yet embodied in A^shar, it waa called Aashnr, and Assbur 
stood as its representative. It also necessarily follows from 
this, that ch. ii.-iv. and v. belong to the times anterior to 
Ahaz, i,e. to those of Uzziah and Jotham. But several diffe- 
rent questions suggest themselves here. If ch. ii.-iv. and v. 
were uttered under Uzziah and Jotham, how could Isaiah begin 
with a promise (ch. ii. 1-4) which is repeated word for word 
in Mic. iv. 1 sqq., where it is the direct antithesis to ch. iii. 
12, which was uttered by Micah, according to Jer. xxvi. 18, in 
the time of Hezekiah T Again, if we consider the advance 
apparent in the predictions of judgment from the general ex- 
pressions with which they commence in ch. i. to tbe close of 
ch. T., in what relation does the address in ch. i. stand to 
ch. ii.-iv. and v., inasmuch as vers. 7-9 are not ideal (as 
we felt obliged to maintain, in opposition to Oaspari), but 
have a distinct historical reference, and therefore at any rate 
presuppose the Syro-Ephraimitish war? And lastly, if ch. 
vi. does really relate, as It apparently does, to the call of Isfuah 
to the prophetic ofBce, how are we to explain the singular fact, 
that three prophetic addresses precede the history of his call, 
which ought properly to stand at the commencement of the 
bookt Drechsler and Caspari have answered thb question 
lately, by maintaining that ch. vi. does not contain an ac- 
count of the call of Isaiah to the prophetic office, but simply of 
the call of the prophet, who was already installed in that office, 
to one particular mission. The proper heading to be adopted 
for ch. vl. would therefore be, "The ordination of the prophet 
as the preacher of the judgment of hardening ;" and ch. 
i.-v. wonld contain warning reproofs addressed by the prophet 
to the people, who were fast ripening for this judgment of 
hardening (reprobation), for the purpose of calling them to 
repentance. The final decision was still trembling iu the 
balance. But the call to repentance was fruitless, and Israel 
hardened itself. And now that the goodness of Qod had tried 
in vain to lead the people to repentance, and the long-suffering 
of God had been wantonly abused by the people, Jehovah 
Himself would hiurden them. Looked at in this light, ch. vi. 
stands in its true historical place. It contains the divine sequel 
to that portion of Isaiah's preaching, and of the prophetic 
preaching generally, by which it had been preceded. But 



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188 THE PBOPHICIES OF ISAUH. 

tTDfl as it is that the whole of the central pordoD of IsraeFs 
history, which lay midway between the commencement and 
the close, was divided in half by the coatents of ch. ti^ and 
that the distinctive importance of Isaiah aa a prophet arose 
especially from the fact that he stood apon the bonndaiy 
between these two historic halves ; there are serions objections 
which present themselves to such an explanation of ch. vi. 
It is possible, indeed, that this distinctive importance may 
have been given to Isaiah's offidal position at his very first 
calL And what Umbreit says — namely, that ch. vi. most 
make the impresdon npon every unprejudiced mind, that it 
relates to the prophet's inaagnral vision — cannot really be 
denied. Bat the position in which ch. vi- stands in the book 
itself mnst necessarily produce 8 contrary impression, unless 
it can be acconnted for in some other way. Nevertheless the 
impression still remains (jnst as at ch. i. 7-9), and recnrs 
again and again. We will therefore proceed to ch. vi. without 
attempting to efface it. It is possible that we may discover 
some other satisfactory explanation of the enigmatical position 
of ch. vi. in relation to what precedes, 

THE PBOFHET'S account OF HIS (yWTX DITIHE MISSION. — 
CHAF. VI. 

The time of the occurrence here described, viz. " the year 
that king Uzziak {U^ycJtu) died^ was of importance to the 
prophet. The statement itself, in the naked form in which it 
is here introdnced, is mnch more emphatic than if it com- 
menced with "it came to pass" (ya^hi; cf. Ex. xvi. 6, 
Pror. xxiv. 17). It was the year of Uzziah's death, not the 
first year of Jotham's reign ; that is to say, Uzziah was still 
reigning, although his death was near at hand. If this is the 
sense in which the words are to be nnderstood, then, even if 
the chapter before ns contains an account of Isaiah's first call, 
the heading to ch. i., which dates the ministry of the prophet 
from the time of Uzziah, is quite correct, inasmuch as, although 
his public ministry under Uzziah was very short, this is properly 
to be included, not only on account of its own importance, but 
as inaugurating a new era (Ut. " an epoch-making beginning"). 
But is it not stated in 2 Chron. xxvi. 22, that Isaiah wrote a 



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CHAP. VL L 18» 

historical wort embracing the whole of Uzziah's reign t Un- 
questdonablj ; but it by no means follows from this, that he 
commenced his miDistry long before the death of Uzziah. If 
Isaiah received his call in the year that Uzziah died, this 
historical work contained a retrospective view of the life and 
times of Uzziah, the close of which coincided with the call of 
the prophetic author, which made a deep incision into the 
history of Israel. Uzziah reigned fifty-two years (809-758 
B.C.). This lengthened period was just the Bame to the king- 
dom of Judah as the shorter age of Solomon to that of all 
Israel, viz. a time of vigorous and prosperous peace, in which 
the nation was completely overwhelmed with manifestations of 
divine love. But the riches of divine goodness had no more 
influence upon it, than the troubles through which it had passed 
before. And now the eventful change took place in the relation 
between Israel and J^ovah, of which Isaiah was chosen to be 
the instrument before and above all other prophets. The year 
in which all this occurred was the year of Uzziah's death. It 
was in thb year that Israel as a people was given up to hard- 
ness of heart, and as a kingdom and country to devastation 
and annihilation by the imperial power of the world. How 
significant a fact, as Jerome observes in connection with this 
passage, that the year of Uzziah's death should be the year in 
which Eomulus was bom ; and that it was only a short time 
after the death of Uzziah (viz. 754 B.C. according to Varro's 
chronology) that Bome itself was founded I The national 
glory of Israel died out with king Uzziah, and has never re- 
vived to this day. 

In that year, says the prophet, "/ saw the Lord of all 
sitting iq/on a high and exalted throne, and Hit horder» filling tlie 
temple." Isaiah taw, and that not when asleep and dreaming ; 
but God gave him, when awake, an insight into the invisible 
world, by opening an inner sense for the supersensuous, whilst 
the action of the onter senses was snspended, and by condensing 
the supersensuous into a sensuous form, on account of the com- 
posite nature of man and the limits of his present state. This 
was the mode of revelation peculiar to an ecstatic vision (ei> 
iKtrratret, Eng. ver. " in a trance," or ht trpevfiari, " in the 
spirit"). Isaiah is here earned up into heaven ; for although 
in other instances it was andoubtediy the earthly temple which 



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190 TEE PB0PHECIE8 OF ISAIAH. 

was presented to a prophet's view in an ecstatic vision (Atnra 
ix. 1 ; Ezek. viii. 3, x. 4, 5 ; cf. Acts ssii. 17), yet here, as the 
deacription which follows clearly proves, the " high and exalted 
throne"^ is the heavenly antitype of the earthly throne which 
was formed by the ark of the covenant; and the ^^ temple" 
(hScdl: Ut. a spacious hall, the name ^ven to the temple as the 
palace of God the King) is the temple in heaven, as in Fs. 
zi. 4, xviii. 7, xxix. 9, and many other passages. There the 
prophet sees the Sovereign Bnler, or, as we prefer to render 
the noun, which is formed from 'ddan = dan, " the Lord of all" 
(A llrherm, sovereign or absolute Lord), seated upon the throne, 
and iu human form (Ezek. i. 26), as is proved by the robe with 
a train, whose flowing ends or borders {fimhriw: ahuUm, as in 
Ex. xxviii. 33, 34) filled the hall. The Sept., Targum, Vnlgate, 
etc, have dropped the figure of the robe and train, as too 
anthropomorphic. But John, in his Gospel, is bold enongh to 
say that it was Jesus whose glory Isaiah saw (John xii. 41). 
And traly so, for the incarnation of God is the truth embodied 
in all the scriptural anthropomorphisms, and the name of 
Jesus is the manifested mystery of the name Jehovah. The 
heavenly temple is that super-terrestrial place, which Jehovah 
transforms into heaven and a temple, by manifesting Himself 
there to angels and sEunts. But whilst He manifests His glory 
there. He is obliged also to veil it, because created beings are 
unable to bear it. Bnt that which veils His glory is no less 
splendid, than that portion of it which is revealed. And this 
was the truth embodied for Isaiah in the long robe and train. 
He saw the Lord, and what more he saw was the all-filling 
robe of the indescribable One. As far as the eye of the seer 
could look at first, the ground was covered by this splendid robe. 
There was consequently no room for any one to stand. And 
the vision of the seraphim is in accordance with this. Ver. 2. 
'^ Above it stood seraphim : each one had six wings ; with two he 
covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two 
he did fly'' We must not render f? ?PBD " near him ; " for 
although ^? or ^^ is applied to a person standing near or over 
against another who is sitting down (Ex. xviii. 13; Jer. 
xxxvi. 21 ; compare 2 Chron. xxvi. 19, where the latter is used 
' It is to thia, and Dot to 'A6im&i, as the Targiim and apparentlf tlw 
Mweata unply, that the words " high and exalted" refer. 



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CHAP. VI. t 191 

to signify " over against" the altar of incense), and b nsed in 
tbis sense to denote the attitude of spirits (Job i. 6 ; 1 Kings 
rrii. 19 ; Zech. vj. 5), and even of men (Zech. iv. 14), in 
relation to Ood when seated on His throne, in which case it 
cannot possibly be employed in the sense of " towering above;" 
yet ft T???, the strongest expression for »upra, cannot be em- 
ployed in any other than a literal sense here ; for which reason 
Kashi and the Targnnu understand it as signifying "above in 
the attitude of service," and the accentuation apparently, though 
erroneously, implies tbia (Lnzzatto). Wliat Isaiah meant by 
this standing above, may be inferred from the use which the 
seraphim are said to have made of th^ wings. The imperfects 
do not describe what they were accustomed to do (Bottcher and 
others), but what the seer saw them do : with two of their six 
wings he saw them fly. Thus they stood flying, i.e. they hovered 
or soared (cf. Num. xiv. 14), as both the earth and stars are 
said to stand, although suspended in space (Job xxvi. 7). The 
seraphim would not indeed tower above the head of Him that 
sat upon the throne, but they hovered above the robe belonging 
to Him with which the hall was filled, sustained by two ex- 
tended wmgs, and covering their faces with two other wings in 
their awe at the divine glory (Targ. ne videant), and their feet 
with two others, in their consciousness of the depth at which 
the creature stands below the Holiest of all (Targ. tie videantur), 
just as the cherubim are described as veiling their bodi^ in 
Ezek. i. 11. This is the only passage in the Scriptures in which 
the seraphim are mentioned. According to the orthodox view, 
which originated with Dionysius the Areopagite, they stand at 
the head of the nine choirs of angels, the first rank consisting 
of lerapkim, cherubim, and Ihrotii. And this is not without 
support, if we compare the cherubim mentioned in Ezekiel, 
which carried the chariot of the divine throne ; whereas here 
the seraphim are siud to surround the seat on which the Lord 
was enthroned. In any case, the seraphim and cherubim were 
heavenly beings of different kinds ; and there is no weight in 
the attempts made by Hendewerk and Stickel to prove that they 
are one and the same. And certainly the name seraphim does 
not signify merely spirits as such, but even, if not the highest of 
all, yet a distinct order from the rest ; for the Scriptures really 
teach that there ate gradations in rank in the hierarchy of 



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192 THE PBOPSECIES OF ISAIAH. 

beaveiL Nor were they mere Bymbols or fancifal images, as 
HaTemick imagineB, but real spiritoal beings, who Tisibljr ap- 
peared to the prophet, aod that in a form conespondlDg to their 
own snpersensuoos being, and to the design of the whole trans- 
action. Whilst these seraphim hovered above on both ^des of 
Him that sat npon the throne, and therefore formed two oppodte 
choirs, each ranged in a semicircle, they presented antiphonal 
worship to Him that sat upon the throne. 

Ver. 3. " And one cried to the other, oTid laid. Holy, holy, 
holy it Jehovah of ho»ts : filling the whole earth u Hie glon/" 
The meaning is not that they all lifted up their voice in con- 
cert at one and the same time (just as in Fa. xlii. 8 e^ is not 
used in this sense, viz. as equivalent to c'neged), but that there 
was a continuous and unbroken antiphonal song. One set 
commenced, and the others responded, either repeating the 
" Soly, holy, holy" at following with '^filling the whole earth ie 
Bis glory'' Isaiah heard this antiphonal or " hypophonal " song 
of the seraphim, not merely that he might know that the unin- 
terrupted worship of God was their blessed employment, but 
because it was with this doxology as with the doxologies of 
the Apocalypse, it had a certain historical significance in 
common with the whole scene. God is in Himself the Holy 
(hie (kadoah), i.e. the separate One, beyond or above the 
world, true light, spotless purity, the perfect One. His glory 
(cabod) is His manifested holiness, as Oetinger and Bengel 
express it, just as, on the other hand, His holiness is His veiled 
or hidden glory. The design of all the work of God is that 
His holiness should become universally manifest, or, what is the 
same thing, that His glory should become the fulness of the 
whole earth (ch. xi. 9 ; Num. xiv. 21 ; Hah. ii. 14). This 
design of the work of God stands before God as eternally 
present ; and the seraphim also have it ever before them in its 
ultimate completion, as the theme of their song of praise. Bat 
Isaiah was a man living in the very midst of the history that 
was moving on towards this goal ; and the cry of the seraphim, 
in the precise form in which it reached him, showed him to 
what it would eventually come on earth, whilst the heavenly 
shapes that were made visible to him helped him to understand 
the nature of that divine glory with which the earth was to be 
filled. The whole of the book of Isaiah contains traces of the 



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CHAP. VI 8. 193 

impression made bj thia ecstatic vision. The favourite name 
of God in the month of the prophet, viz. " the Holy One of 
Israel" (kedosk YisraeC), is the echo of this seraphic sanctus ; 
and the fact that this name ahready occurs with such marked 
preference on the part of the prophet in the addresses contained 
in ch. i. 2-iv. 5, supports the view that Isaiah is here describing 
his own first call. All the prophecies of Isaiah carry this name 
of God as their stamp. It occurs twenty-nine times (including 
ch. X. 17, sliil. 15, xlix. 7), viz. twelve times in ch, i.-xxxix,, and 
seventeen times in ch. xl.~lxvi. As Luzzatto has well observed, 
" the prophet, as if with a presentiment that the authenticity 
of the second part of his book would be disputed, has stamped 
both parts with this name of God, ' the Hely One of Israel,' 
as if with his own seal." The only other passages in which 
the word occurs, are three times in the Psalms (Ps. Ixxi. 22, 
Ixxviii. 41, Ixxxix. 19), and twice in Jeremiah (Jer. 1. 29, 11. 5), 
and that not without an allusion to Isaiah. It forms an essential 
part of Isuah's distinctive prophetic signature. And here we 
are standing at the source from which it sprang. But did this 
thrice-holy refer to the triune Godt Enobel contents himself 
with saying that the threefold repetition of the word " holy" 
serves to give it the greater emphasis. No doubt men are 
accustomed to say three times what they wish to say iu an 
exhaustive and satisfying manner ; for three is the number of 
expanded unity, of satisfied and satisfying development, of the 
key-note extended into the chord. But why ia this! The 
Pythagoreans said that numbers were the first principle of all 
things ; but the Scriptures, ^cording to which God created the 
world in twice three days by ten mighty words, and completed 
it in seven days, teach ns that God b the first principle of all 
numbers. The fact that three is the number of developed and 
yet self-contained unity, has its ultimate ground in the circum- 
stance that it is the number of the trinitarian process ; and 
consequently the trilogy (trisagion) of the seraphim (like that 
of the cherubim in Kev. iv. 8), whether Isaiah was aware of it 
or no, really pointed in the distinct consciousness of the spirits 
themselves to the triune God. 

When Isaiah heard this, he stood entranced at the farthest 
possible distance from Him that sat upon the throne, namely, 
under the door of the heavenly palace or temple. What he 
TOL.I. H 



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194 TBE PBOPHECmS OF ISAUB. 

bUII farther felt and saw, he proceeds to relate in ver. 4; 
''And the foundations of the thresholdi thook toith the voice of 
them that cried; and the house became full of smoke" By 
'ammolh hasaippim, the LXX., Vulgate, Sjriac, and others 
Tmderstand the posts of the linteU, the Bupporting beams of the 
Buperliminaria, which closed the doorway at the top. But as 
saph is only used in other places to signify the threshold and 
porch (Umen and vestibulum), 'ammoth haseippim must be un- 
derstood here in the (perfectly appropriate) sense of *' the 
foundations of the thresholds" (^'ammdh, which bears the same 
relation to DM, mother, as matrix to mater, is used to denote the 
receptive basis into which the door-sfeps with their plugs were 
inserted, like the talmudic ammetdh derSehayydh, the frame or 
box of the hand-mill {Berachoth 186), and ammath megSrah, 
the wood-work which runs along the back of the saw and keeps 
it firmly extended (^Kelim 21, 3); compare the " SchTavhenr- 
mutter" Hterally screw-mo(Aer, or female screw, which receives 
and holds the cylindrical screw). Eveiy time that the choir of 
seraphim (tt^.^PI? : compare such collective singulars as hd'oreb, 
the ambnsh, in Josh. viii. 19 ; hechdlutz, the men of war, in Josb. 
■ri. 7, etc) began their song, the support of the threshold of the 
porch in which Isaiah was standing trembled. The building was 
fleized with reverential awe throughout its whole extent, and in 
its deepest foundations : for in the blessed state beyond, nothing 
stands immoveable or unsusceptible in relation to the spirits there; 
but all things form, as it were, the accidentia of their free per- 
sonality, yielding to their impressions, and voluntarily following 
them in all their emoUons. The house was also "filled toith 
tmoke" Many compare this with the simil^ occnrrence in 
connection with the dedication of Solomon's temple (1 Kings 
. viii. 10) ; but Drechsler is correct in stating that the two cases 
are not parallel, for there God simply attested His own presence 
by the cloud of smoke behind which He concealed Himself, 
whereas here there was no need of any such self- attestation. 
Moreover, in this instance God does not dwell in the cloud and 
thick darkness, whilst the smoke is represented as the effect of 
the songs of praise in which the seraphim have Joined, and not 
of the presence of God. The smoke arose from the altar of 
incense mentioned in ver. 6. But when Drechsler says that 
it was the prayers of saiids (as in Kev. v. 8, viiL 3, 4), which 



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CHAP. VI S. 195 

ascended to the Lord in the smoke, this is a thought which 
is quite oat of place here. The smoke was the immediate 
COQsequecce of the seraph^ song of praise. 

This be^ns to throw a light npoa the name seraphim, which 
ma^ help as to decipher it. The name cannot possibly^ be 
connect^ with edrdph, a snake (Sanscr. garpOy Lat. lerpeiu) ; 
and to trace tlie word to a verb saraph in the sense of the 
Arabic 'aom/a (^taru/a), to tower high, to be exalted, or highly 
honoured (as Gesenios, Hengstenberg, Hofmann, and others 
have done), yields a sense which does not very strongly com- 
mend itself. On the other hatid, to follow Knobel, who reads 
thdrdlhim (worshippers of God), and thus presents the Lexicon 
with a new word, and to pronoonce the word leraphim a copyist's 
error, would be a rash concession to the heaven-storming omni- 
potence which is supposed to reside in the ink of a German 
scholar. It is hardly admisBtble, however, to interpret the 
name as signifying directly spirits of light or gre, since the true 
meaning of sdrapk is not urere (to barn), but comburere (to set 
on fire or burn Dp). Umbreit endeavours to do jus^ce to this 
transitive meaning by adopting the explanation " fieiy beings," 
by which all earthly corruption is opposed and destroyed. The 
vision itself, however, appears to point to a much more di»- 
tioctive and special meaning in the name, which only occurs 
in this passage of Isaiah, We shall have more to say apon 
this point presently. 

The seer, who was at first overwhelmed and intoxicated by 
the majestic sight, now recovers his self-consciousness. Ver. 5. 
'* T/tenaaidlf Woe to me! for I am lost; for Jam avmn of unclean 
lips, and I am dwelling among a people of unclean lips : for mine 
eyes have seen the King, Jehovah of hosts" That a man cannot 
see God without dying is true in itself, and was an Old Testa- 
ment conviction throughout (Ex. xxxiii. 20, etc.). He must 
die, because the holiness of God is to the sinner a consuming 
fire (ch. xxxiii. 14) ; and the infinite distance between the 
creature and the Creator is sufBcient of itself to produce a 
prostrating effect, which even the seraphim could not resist 
without veiling their faces. Isaiah therefore regarded himself 
as lost (nidmsthi, like SkoiXa, peril, a preterite denoting the fact 
which, although not outwardly completed, is yet effected so far 
as a man's own consciousness is concerned), and all the more 



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19$ THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

because be himself was of unclean lips, and he was also a 
member of a nation of nnclean lips. The unholiness of his 
own person was doubled, in consequence of the closeness of the 
natural connection, by the unholiness of the nation to which he 
belonged. He designates this unholiness as uncleanness of 
lips, because he found himself transported into the midst of 
choirs of beings who were prai^g the Lord with pure lips ; 
and he calls the King Jehmiak, because, although he had not 
seen Jehovah face to face, he had seen the throne, and the all- 
filling robe, and the seraphim who surrounded and did homage 
to EUm that sat upon the throne ; and therefore, as he had seen 
the heavenly King in His revealed majesty, he describes the 
scene according to the impression that he had received. But to 
stand here in front of Jehovah of hosts, the exalted King, to 
whom everything does homage, and to be obliged to remain 
mnte in the consciousness of deep uncleanness, excited within 
him the annihilating anguish of self-condemnation. And this 
is expressed in the confession made by the contrite seer. 

This confession was followed by the forgiveness of his sins, 
of which he received an attestation through a heavenly sacra- 
ment, and which was conveyed to him through the medium of 
a seraphic absolution. Vers.6,7. *' And one of the seraphim jUw 
to me with a red-hot coal in hie hand, which he had tdken'with 
Hie tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth with it, and 
said, Behold, this hath touched thy lipt, and thine iniquity is token 
away; and so thy sin is expiated." One of tlie beings hovering 
round the Lord (there were, therefore, a large and indefinite 
number) flew to the altar of incense, — the heavenly original of 
the altar of incense in the earthly temple, which was reckoned 
as belonging to the Most Holy Place, — and took from this altar 
a ritzpdli, i.e. either a red-hot stone (Vulg. calculum, Ar. radfe 
or radafe), or, according to the prevailing tradition, a red-hot 
coal (vid. rdtzSph = rdshaph, to scatter sparks, sparkle, or glow : 
syn. gacheleth), and that with a pair of tongs, because even a 
seraph's hand cannot touch the vessels consecrated to God, or 
the sacrificea that belong to Him. With this red-hot coal he 
flew to Isaiah, and having touched his mouth with it, i.e. that 
member of his body of whose uncleanness he had more espe- 
cially complained (cf. Jer. i. 9, where the prophet's mouth is 
touched by Jehovah's hand^ and made eloquent in conset^ueace), 



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CHAP. VI 6, T. 197 

he assured him of the forgiveness of his sins, which coincided 
with the application of this sacramental sign. The Vav con- 
nects together what Is affirmed by ndgci (hath toached) and sdr 
(a taker away) as being simultaneous ; the zeh (this) points as 
a neuter to the red-hot coal. The future tecuppar is a future 
consec, separated by Vav conversive for the purpose of bringing 
the subject into greater prominence ; as it is practically impos- 
sible that the removal of guilt should be thought of as immediate 
and momentary, and the expiation as occurring gradually. The 
fact that the guilt was taken away was the very proof that the 
expiation was complete. Cipper, with the " sin " in the accusa- 
tive, or governed by ??, signifies to cover it up, extinguish, or 
destroy it (for the primary meaning, vid. ch. xxviii. 18), so that 
it has no existence in relation to the penal justice of God. All 
sinful uncleanness was burned away from the prophet's mouth. 
The seraph, therefore, did here what his name denotes: he 
burned up or burned away (comburil). He did this, however, 
not by virtue of his own fiery nature, but by means of the divine 
fire which he had taken from the heavenly altar. As the smoke 
which filled the house came from the altar, and arose in conse- 
quence of the adoration offered to the Lord by the seraphim, 
not only must the incense-offering upon the altar and this 
adoration be ck>sely connected; but the fire, which revealed 
itself in the smoke and consumed the incense-offering, and 
which must necessarily have been divine because of its expia- 
tory power, was an effect of the love of God with which He 
reciprocated the offerings of the seraphim. A fiery look from 
God, and that a fiery look of pure love as the seraphim were 
sinless, had kindled the sacrifice. Now, if the fact that a seraph 
absolved the seer by means of this fire of love is to be taken as 
an illustrative example of the historical calling of the seraphim, 
they were the vehicles and media of the fire of divine love, 
just as the cherubim in Ezekiel are vehicles and media of 
the fire of divine wrath. For just as, in the case before us, 
a seraph takes the fire of love from the altar; so there, in 
Ezek. X. 6, 7, a cherub takes the fire of wrath from the throne- 
chariot. Consequently the cherubim appear as the vehicles 
and media of the wrath which destroys sinners, or rather of 
the divine doxa, with its fiery side turned towards the world ; 
and the seraphim as the vehicles and media of the love which 



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193 THE PROPHECIES 07 ISAIAH. 

destroys sin, or of the same divine doxa with ita light side 
towards the world.' 

When Ifiaiah had been thns absolved, the tfne object of the 
heavenly scene was made apparent. Ver. 8. " Then I heard the 
voice of the Lord, saying, Whom ihaU I tend, and who vnll go for 
us? TSen I said, Behold me here; send me!" The plural 
"for us" (Idnu) is not to be accounted for on the ground that, 
in a case of reflection or self-coDsoltaticai, the anbject also stands 
as the object in antithesis to itself (as Hitzig supposes) ; nor is 
it a plnralie majettatia, as Knobel maintains ; nor is the original 
abstract signification of the plnral hinted at, as Meier thinks. 
The plnral is no donbt used here with reference to the seraphim, 
who formed, together with the I/ord, one deliberative council 
(sod kedoshim, Ps. Ixxxix. 8), as in X Kings xxii. 19-22, Dan. 
iv. 14, etc ; just as, from their very nature as *' sons of God " 
(b'nl Hd^lohim), they made one family with Gkid their Creator 
(vid. Eph. iii. 15), all linked so closely together that they them- 
selves could be called Elohim, like God their Creator, just as 
in 1 Cor. xii. 12 the church of believers is called Ckristoe, like 
Christ its head. The task for which the right man was sought 
was not merely dictne, bnt heavenly in the broadest sense : for 
it is not only a matter in which God Himself is interested, that 
the earth should become full of the glory of God, bnt this is 
also an object of solicitude to the spirits that minister unto 
Him. Isuah, whose anxiety to serve the Lord was no longer 
suppressed by the consciousness of his own sinfulness, no sooner 
heard the voice of the Lord, than he exclaimed, in holy eelf- 
conscionsness, " Behold me here ; send me." It is by no means 
a probable thing, that he had already acted as a messenger 
of God, or held the office of prophet. For if the joy, with 
which he offered himself here as the messenger of God, was 
the direct consequence of the forgiveness of sins, of which he 
had received the seal ; the consciousness of his own personal 
sinfulness, and his membership in a sinful nation, would certainly 
have prevented him hitherto from coming forward to denounce 

' Seraphic love is the expreesion lued in thelangosge of the church to 
denote the ne plus ultra of holy love in the creature. The STriao fathers 
regarded the bumiag coal as the Bjmbol of the incarnate Son of God, who 
igoftendedgnatedinpoetryasthe "live or burning ooal" (Ixmttrlo denuro): 
DMZ. 1860, pp. 679, 681. 



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CHAP. VL 9, 10. 199 

judgment upon that nation. And as tlie prophetic oiGce as such 
rested upon an extraordinary call from God, it may fairly be 
assumed, that when Isaiah relates so extraordinary a call as this, 
he is describing the sealing of bis prophetic office, and there- 
fore his own first call. 

This is confirmed by the words in which his commission is 
expressed, and the substance of the message. — ^Vers. 9, 10. "He 
saidy Go, and tell this people, Hear on, and widerstand not ; and 
look on, but perceive not. Make ye the lieart of this people greaty, 
and their ears heavy, and their eyes sticky; that they may Twt tee 
unth their eyes, and hear with their ears, and their heart under- 
stand, and they he converted, and one heal them." " This people" 
points back to the people of nnclean lips, among whom Isaiah 
had complained of dwelling, and whom the Lord would not call 
" my people." It was to go to this people and preach to them, 
and therefore to be the prophet of this people, that he was called. 
But how mournful does the divine commiasioo sound I It was 
the terrible opposite of that seraphic mission, which the prophet 
had experienced in himself. The seraph had absolved Isaiah 
by the burning coal, that he as prophet might not absolve, but 
harden his people by hia word. They were to hear and see, and 
that continually as the gerundives imply (Ges. § 131, 3, b; Ewald, 
§ 280, h),hy having the prophet's preaching actu directo constantly 
before them ; but not to their salvation. The two prohibitoiy 
expressions, "understand not" and ** perceive not," show what 
the result of the prophet's preaching was to be, according to the 
judicial will of God. And the imperatives in ver. 10 are not 
to be understood as simply instructing the prophet to tell the 
people what God had determined to do; for the fact that 
*' pcopbets are often said to do what they announce as about 
to happen," in proof of which Jer. i. 10 is sometimes quoted 
(cf. Jer. zxxi. 28 ; Hos. vi. 5 ; Ezek. xliii. 3), has its truth not 
in a rhetorical figure, but in the very nature of the divine word. 
The prophet was the oigan of the word of God, and the word 
of God was the expression of the will of God, and the will of 
God is a divine act that has not yet become historical. For this 
reason a prophet might very well be said to perform what he 
announced as about to happen : God was the causa ejieiens pnt^ 
cipalis, the word was the causa media, and the prophet the causa 
minieterialis. This is the force of the three imperatives ; they 



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200 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

are three figurative expres^ons of the idea of hardenicg. Tba 
first, hishmin, signifies to make fat (pinguem), m. without 
susceptibility or feeling for the operations of divine grace (Ps. 
cxix. 70) ; the second, hicMd, to make heavy, more especially 
heavy or dull of hearing (ch. lix. 1) ; the third, S^ or Vvn 
(whence the imperative JE'J or VE'n), to smear thickly, or paste 
over, i,e. to put upon a person what is usually the result of 
weak eyes, which become firmly closed by the hardening of 
the adhesive substance secreted in the night. The three 
future clauses, with "lest" (pen), point back to these three 
imperatives in inverse order : their spiritual sight, spiritual 
hearing, and spiritual feeling were to be taken away, their eyes 
becoming blind, and their ears deaf, and their hearts being 
covered over with the grease of insensibility. Under the 
influence of these futures the two preterites V KQj^l 3^ affirm 
what might have been the result If this hardening had not 
taken place, but what would never take place now. The er- 
pressioD p K^l is used in every other Instance in a transitive 
sense, '' to heal a person or a disease," and never in the sense of 
becoming well or being healed ; but in the present Instance it 
acquires a passive sense from the so-called impersonal construc- 
tion (Ges. § 137, 3), "and one heal it," i.e. "and It be healed;" 
and it is in accordance with this sense that it is paraphrased 
in Mark iv. 12, whereas in the three other passages in whicli 
the words are quoted in the New Testament (viz. Matthew, 
John, and Acts) the Septuagint rendering is adopted, " and I 
should heal them" (God Himself being taken as the subject). 
The commission which the prophet received, reads as though It 
were quite irreconcilable with the fact that God, as the Good, 
can only will what is good. But our earlier doctrinarians have 
suggested the true solution, when they affirm that God does not 
harden men positive airf effective, since His true will and direct 
work are man's salvation, but occasionaliter et eventualiter, since 
the offers and displays of salvation which man receives neces- 
aarily serve to fill up the measure of his sins, and judiciaUter so 
far as it Is the judicial will of God, that what was ori^nally 
ord^ned for man's salvation should result after all in judg- 
ment, in the case of any man upon whom grace has ceased to 
work, because all its ways and means have been completely 
exhausted. It is not only the loving will of God which is 



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CHAP. VI. 11-13. 201 

good, but also the wratbfal will into wliicli Hb loving will 
changes, when determinately and obstinately resisted. There 
b a self-hardening in evil, which renders a man thoroughly 
incorrigible, and which, regarded as the fruit of his moral 
behaviour, is no less a judicial punishment inflicted by God, 
than self-induced gnilt on the part of man. The two are 
bound np in one another, inasmuch as sin from its very nature 
bears its own punishment, which consists in the wrath of God 
excited by sin. For just as in all the good that men do, the 
active principle is the love of Gtod ; ao in all the harm that 
they do, the active principle is the wrath of God. An evil act 
in itself is the result of self-determination proceeding from a 
man's own will ; but evil, regarded as the mischief in which 
evil acting quickly issues, is the result of the inherent wrath of 
God, which b the obverse of His inherent love ; and when a 
man hardens himself in evil, it is the inward working of God's 
peremptory wrath. To this wrath Israel had delivered itself np 
through its continued obstinacy in sinning. And consequently 
the Lord now- proceeded to shut the door of repentance against 
His people. Nevertheless He directed the prophet to preach 
repentance, because the judgment of hardness suspended over 
the people as a whole did not preclude the possibility of the 
■alvation of individuals. 

Isaiah heard with sighing, and yet with obedience, in what 
the mission to which he bad so cheerfully offered himself was 
to consist. Ver. 11a. " Then mid I, Lord, hoto long?" He 
inquired how long thb service of hardening and thb state 
of hardness were to continue, — a question forced from him by 
his sympathy with the nation to which he himself belonged 
(cf. Ex. xxsii. 9-14), and one which was warranted by the 
certainty that God, who is ever true to His promises, could not 
cast off Israel as a people for ever. The answer follows in 
vers, 11^13 : " Until lovms are watted witJiout inhabiiant, and 
home* are without man, and the ground shall be hid waste, a wil- 
demesi, and Jehovah shall put men far away, and there eJtall he 
many forsaken places within the land. And is there still a tent/i 
therein, this aho again is given up to destruction, Uke the terebinth 
and like the oak, of which, when they are felled, only a root-stump 
remains : such a root-stump is a holy seed." The answer is 
intentionally commenced, not with ^3"^?, but with OK i^k l]f 



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202 THE PROPHECIES OF I8AUH. 

(the expression only occurs again in Gen. sxviii, 15 and 
Num. xxxii. 17), which, even without dropping the conditional 
force of DK, signified that the hardening judgment would only 
come to an end when the condition had been fulfilled, that 
towns, houses, and the soil of the land of lerael and its environs 
had been made desolate, in fact, utterly and universally deso- 
late, as the three definitions (without iuhabitant, without man, 
wilderness) affirm. The expression richak (put far away) is 
a general and enigmatical description of exile or captivity 
(cf. Joel iv. 6, Jer. xxvii. 10) ; the literal term gdldh has been 
already used in ch. v. 13. Instead of a national term being 
used, we find here simply the general expression "men" (eth- 
hS^dddm ; the consequence of depopulation, viz. the entire 
absence of men, being expressed in connection with the depo- 
pulation itself. The participial nonn hd'az-ubdh'(i\\.e forsaken) 
is a collective term for places once full of life, that had 
afterwards died out and fallen into ruins (ch. ivii. 2, 9). This 
judgment would he followed by a second, which would expose 
the still remaining teAth of the nation to a sifting, n^^, 3^, to 
become again (Ges. § 142, 3) ; 1¥35 fljii, not as in ch. v. 5, but 
as iu ch. iv. 4, after Num. xxiv. 22 : the feminine does not 
refer to the land of Israel (Luzzatto), but to the tenth. Up 
to the words " given up to destruction," the announcement is 
a threatening one; but from this point to '^ remains" a con- 
solatoty prospect begins to dawn ; and in the last three words 
this brighter prospect, like a distant streak of light, bounds the 
horizon of the gloomy prophecy. It shall happen as with the 
terebinth and oak. These trees were selected as illustrations, 
not only because they were so near akin to evergreens, and 
produced a similar impression, or because there were so many 
associations connected with them in the olden times of Israel's 
hbtory ; but also because they formed such fitting symbols of 
Israel, on account of their peculiar facility for sprin^ng np 
again from the root (like the beech and nut, for example), 
even when they had been completely felled. As the forms 
yabbeiheth (dryness), dalleketk (fever), 'awereih (blindness), 
ahachepheth (consumption), are used to denote certain qualities 
or states, and those for the most part faulty ones {Concord. 
p. 1350) ; so thalleeetk here does not refer to the act itself of 
felling or casting away, but rather to the condition of a tree 



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CHAP. VI. 11-18. 203 

that lias been hewn or thrown down ; though not to the con- 
dition of the tnink as it lies prostrate upon the ground, bnt to 
that of the root, which is still left in the earth. Of this tree, 
that had been deprived of its trunk and crown, there was still 
a mazzebeth (a kindred form of mazzebdh), i,e. a root-stump 
(truncm) fast*in the ground. The tree was not yet entirely 
destroyed ; the root-stump could shoot out and put forth 
branches again. And this would take place : the root-sturnp of 
the oak or terebinth, which was a symbol of Israel, was " a holy 
seed." The root-stump was the remnant that had survived the 
judgment, and this remnant would become a seed, out of which 
a new Israel would spring np after the old had been destroyed. 
Thus in a few weighty words is the way sketched out, which 
God would henceforth- take with His people. The passage 
contains an outline of the history of Israel to the end of time. 
Israel as a nation was indestructible, by virtue of the promise 
of God ; but the mass of the people were doomed to destruc- 
tion through the judicial sentence of God, and only a remnant, 
which would be converted, would perpetuate the nationality of 
Israel, and inherit the glorious future. This law of a bless- 
ing sunk in the depths of the curse actually inflicted, still 
prevails in the history of the Jews. Tiie way of salvation is 
open to all. Individuals find it, and give us a presentiment of 
what might be and is to be ; but the great mass are hopelessly 
lost, and only when they have been swept away will a holy 
seed, saved by the covenant-keeping God, grow up into a new 
and holy Israel, which, according to ch. xxvii. 6, will fill the 
earth with its fruits, or, as the apostle expresses it in Bom. 
3d. 12, become " the riches of the Gentiles." 

Now, if the impression which we have received from ch. vi. 
is not a false one, — namely, that the prophet is here relating 
his first call to the prophetic office, and not, as Seb. Schmidt 
observes, his call to one particular duty (ad vnum spedalem 
actum officii), — this impression may be easily verified, inasmuch 
as the addresses in ch. i.-v. will be sure to contain the elements 
which are here handed to the prophet by revelation, and the 
result of these addresses will correspond to the sentence judi- 
cially pronounced here. And the conclusion to which we have 
come will stand this test. For the prophet, in the very first 
address, after pointing out to the nation as a whole the gracious 



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204 THE PBOPHECIKS OF ISAIAH. 

pathway of justification and sanctification, takes the tnrn indi- 
cated in ch. vi. 11-13, in full consciouaness that all is in vain. 
And the theme of the second address is, that it will be only- 
after the overthrow of the false glory of Israel that the true 
glory promised can possibly be realized, and that after the 
destruction of the great body of the people only a small remnant 
will live to see this realization. The parable with which the 
third begins, rests upon the supposition that the measure of the 
nation's iniquity is full ; and the threatening of judgment 
introduced by this parable agrees substantially, and in part 
verbally, with the divine answer received by the prophet to hia 
question " How long?" On every side, therefore, the opinion ia 
confirmed, that in ch. vi. Isaiah describes his own consecration 
to the prophetic office. Tlie addresses in ch. ii.-iv. and v., which 
belong to the times of Uzziah and Jotham, do not fall earlier 
than the year of Uzziah's death, from which point the whole 
of Jotham's sixteen years' reign lay open before them. Now, 
as Micah commenced his ministry in Jotham's reign, though 
his book was written in the form of a complete and chronologi- 
cally indivisible summary, by the working np of the prophecies 
which he delivered under Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, and 
was then read or published in the time of Hezekiah, as we may 
infer from Jer. xxvi. 18, it is quite possible that Isaiah may 
have taken from Micah's own lips (though not from Micah's 
book) the words of promise in ch. ii. 1-4, which he certainly 
borrowed from some quarter. The notion that this word of 
promise originated with a third prophet (who must have been 
Joel, if he were one of the prophets known to us), is rendered 
very improbable by the many marks of Micah's prophetic 
peculiarities, and by its natural position in the context in which 
it there occurs {vtd, Caspari, Micha, pp. 444-5). 

Again, the situation of ch. vi. is not inexplicable. As 
Havernick has observed, the prophet evidently intended to 
vindicate in ch. vi. the style and method of his previous pro- 
phecies, on the ground of the divine commission that he had 
received. But this only serves to explain the reason why Isaiah 
has not placed ch. vi. at the commencement of the collection, 
and not why he inserts it in this particular place. He has 
done this, no doubt, for the purpose of bringing close together 
the prophecy and its fulfilment; for whilst ou the one hand the 



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CHAP. VL 11-18. 205 

judgment of hardening suspended over the Jewish nation is 
brought distinctly out in the person of king Ahaz, on the other 
hand we find ourselves in the midst of the Syro-Ephraimitish 
war, which formed the introduction to the judgments of exter- 
mination predicted in ch. vi. 11-13. It is only the position of 
ch. i. which still remains in obscurity. If ch. i, 7-9 is to bo 
understood in a historically literal sense, then ch. i. must have 
been composed after the dangers of the Syro-Ephraimitish war 
had been averted from Jerusalem, though the land of Judah 
was still bleeding with the open wounds which this war, de- 
signed as it was to destroy it altogether, had inflicted upon it. 
Ch. i. would therefore be of more recent origin than ch. ii.— v., 
and still more recent than the connected ch. vii.-xii. It b only 
the comparatively more general and indefidite character of ch. i. 
which seems at variance with this. But this difficulty b re- 
moved at once, if we assume that ch. i., though not indeed the 
first of the prophet's addresses, was yet in one sense the first, 
— namely, the first that was committed to writing, though not 
the first that he delivered, and that it was primarily intended 
to form the preface to the addresses and historical accounts in 
ch. ii.-xii., the contents of which were regulated by it. For 
ch. ii.-v. and vii.-xii. form two prophetic cycles, ch, i. being 
the portal which leads into them, and ch. vi. the band which 
connects them together. The prophetic cycle in ch. ii.-v. may 
be called the Book of hardening, as it is by Caspar!, and ch. 
vii.-xii. the Book of Tnunanuel, as Chr. Aug. Crusius suggests, 
because in all the stages through which the proclamation in 
ch. vii.-xii. passes, the' coming Immanuel is the banner of 
consolation, which it lifts up even in the midst of the judgments 
already breaking upon the people, in accordance with the doom 
pronounced upon them in ch. vL 



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THE FBOFHEOIES OF ISilAB. 



PART 11. 

CONSOLATION OF DDIANUEL IN THE MIDST OF THE 
ASSYRIAN OPPRESSIONa.-OHAP. vil-xii. 

DITIHB SIQS OF THE TIBOIN's WOmtBOITS SON. — CHAP. VJI. 

Ab the following prophecies could not be nnderstood apart from 
the historical circumstances to which they refer, the prophet 
commences with a historical announcement. Yer. 1. " It came 
to pass, in the daye of Ahaz the son of Jotham, the son of 
XJzziah (Uziydhii), king of Judak, that Rezin the king of 
AramcBO, andPekah (Pekach) tlie son ofMemaliah (Bemalydhv), 
king of Israel, went up toward Jerusalem to war agaitist it, and 
(he) could not make tear vpon it" We have the same words, 
with only slight variations, in the history of the reign of Ahaz 
in 2 Kings xvi. 5. That the author of the book of Kings 
copied them from the book of Isaiah, will be very apparent 
when we come to examine the historical chapters (zxxvi.-xsxix.) 
in their relation to the parallel sections of the book of Kings. 
In the passage before us, the want of independence on the part 
of the author of the book of Kings is confirmed by the fact that 
he not only repeats, but also interprets, the words of Isaiah. 
Instead of saying, " And (he) could not make war npon it," he 
says, " And they besieged Ahaz, and could not make war." The 
singular ydcol (he could) of Isaiah ig changed into the simpler 
plural, whilst the statement that the two allies could not assault 
or storm Jerusalem (which must be the meaning of nilcham 
'al in the passage before us), is more clearly defined by the 
additional information that they did besiege Ahaz, but to no 
purpose (tsur 'al, the usual expression for obsidione claudere ; 
cf. Deut. SK, 19). The statement that " they besieged Ahaz " 
cannot merely signify that "they attempted to besiege him," 
although nothing further is known about this siege. But 
happily we have two accounts of the Syro-Ephrcumitish war 
(2 Kings xvi. and 2 Chron. xxviii.). ■ The two historical books 
complete one another. The book of Kings relates that the 



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CHAP. VU. l 207 

invasion of JuJab by the two allies commenced at die end of 
Jotham's reign (2 Kings zt. 37) ; and in addition to the state- 
ment taken from Isa. vii. 1, it also mentions that Beztn con- 
quered the seaport town of Elath, which then belonged to the 
kingdom of Judab ; whilst the Chronicles notice the fact that 
Eezin brought a number of Judsan captives to Damascus, and 
that Fekab conquered Ahaz in a bloody and destructive battle. ' 
Indisputable as the credibility of these events may be, it is 
nevertheless very difGcult to connect them together, either sub- 
stantJally or chronologically, in a certain and reliable manner, 
as Caspar! has attempted to do in his monograph on the Syro- 
Ephraimitish war (1849). We may refer here to oar own 
manner of dovetailing the historical accounts of Ahaz and the 
Syro-Ephraimitish war in the introduction to the present work 
(p. 41 sqq.). If we could assume that »J (not w3^) was the 
authentic reading, and that the failure of the attempt to take 
Jerusalem, which is njentioned here, was occasioned by the 
strength of the city itself, and not by the Jhterventioaflf Assyria, 
— 80 that ver. Ifi did not contain snch an anticipation as we 
have supposed (p. 43), although summary anticipations of this 
kind were customary with biblical historians, and more especially 
with Isaiah, — the course of events might be arranged in the 
following manner, viz., that whilst Bezin was on his way to 
Elatb, Fekah resolved to attack Jemsalem, but failed in his 
attempt ; but that Kezin was more successful in his expedition, 
which was a much easier one, and after the conquest of Elath 
united his forces with those of his allies. 

It is this which is referred to in ver, 2 : "And it toot told 
the house of David, Aram has settled down upon Ephraim : titen 
his heart shook, and the heart of his people, as trees of the wood 
shake before the wind." The expression nuach 'al (settled down 
upon) is explained in 2 Sam. xvii. 12 (cf. Judg. vii. 12) by the 
figurative simile, " as the dew falleth upon the ground :" there 
it denotes a hostile invasion, here the arrival of one army to the 
support of another. Epkraim (^feminine, like the names of 
countries, and of the people that are regarded as included in 
their respective countries : see, on the other hand, ch. iii. 8) is 
nsed as the name of the leading tribe of Israel, to signify the 
whole kingdom ; here it denotes the whole military force of 
Israel. Following the combination mentioned above, we End 



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208 THE PBOPBECIEG OF ISAIAH. 

tliat the allies now prepared for a second anited expedition 
against Jerusalem. In ttie meantime, Jerusalem was in -the 
condition described in cli. i. 7-9, viz. like a l)esieged city, in 
the midst of enemies plundering and burning on every side. 
Elath had fallen, as Kezin's timely return clearly showed ; and 
in the prospect of his approaching junction with the allied army, 
it was quite natural, from a human point of view, that the court 
and people of Jerusalem should tremble hke aspen leaves. Jf^Jl 
is a contracted /uf. kal, ending with an a sound on account of 
the guttural, as in Ruth iv. 1 (Ges. 5 72, Anm, 4) ; and ^i, 
which is generally the form of the injln, aba. (ch. xxiv. 20), is 
here, and only here, the infin. constr. instead of ^^ (cf. noach, 
Num. xi. 25 ; sJwb, Josh. ii. 16 ; mot, Ps. xxxviii. 17, etc : vid. 
Ewald, 5 238, b). 

In this season of terror Isaiah received the following divine 
instructions. Ver. 3. " Then said Jehovah to Isaiah, Go forth 
now to meet Ahas, thou and Shear-jashub thy son, to the end of 
the aqueduct of the upper pool, to the road of the fuller' e fieW^ 
The fuller's field {aedsh cobSs) was situated, as we may assume 
with Eobinson, Schultz, and Thenius, against Williams, Krafft, 
etc., on the western side of the city, where there is still an " upper 
pool" of great antiquity (2 Chron. xxxii. 30). Near to this pool 
the fullers, i.e. the cleaners and thickeners of woollen fabrics, 
carried on their occupation (cobsa, from cabas, related to cdbash, 
subigere, which bears the same relation to rdchatz as irKvvew to 
\ovfiv). Kobinson and his companions saw some people wash- 
ing clothes at the upper pool when they were there ; and, for a 
considerable distance round, the surface of this favourite wash- 
ing and bleaching place was covered with things spread out to 
bleach or diy. The road {mesilldh), which ran past this fuller's 
field, was the one which leads from the western gate to Joppa. 
King Ahaz was there, on the west of the city, and outside the 
fortifications, — engaged, no doubt, in making provision for the 
probable event of Jerusalem being again besieged in a still more 
threatening manner. Jerusalem received its water supply from 
the upper Gihon pool, and there, according to Jehovah's direc- 
tions, Isaiah was to go with his son and meet him. The two 
together were, as it were, a personified blessing and curse, 
presenting themselves to the king for him to make his own 
selection. For the name Shedr-ydshvh (which is. erroneously 



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CHAP. Vll. 4. 209 

accentnated ■witt Hphchah munach instead of msrchak tiphchali, 
as in ch, x. 22), t'.«. the remnant is converted (ch. x. 21, 22), 
was a kind of abbreviation of the divine answer ^ven to the 
prophet in ch. vi. 11-13, and was indeed at once threatening 
and promising, but in such a way that the curse stood in front 
and the grace behind. The prophetic name of Isuah's son was 
intended to drive the king to Jehovah by force, through the 
threatening aspect it presented ; and the prophetic announce- 
ment of Isaiah himself, whose name pointed to salvation, was 
to allure him to Jehovah with its promising tone. 

No means were left untried. Ver. 4. " And my unto him. 
Take heed, and keep quiet ; and let not thy heart become soft from 
these ttoo smoking Jtrebrand-stumpa : at the fierce anger of Rezin, 
and Aram, and the son of Remaliah" The imperative "^Pl'^ 
(not pointed "lOB'n, as is the case when it is to be connected 
more closely with what follows, and taken in the sense of cave 
ne, or even cave nt) warned the king against acting for himself, 
in estrangement from God; and the imperative kashket exhorted 
him to courageous calmness, secured by confidence in God; or, 
as Calvin expresses it, exhorted him " to restrain himself out- 
wardly, and keep his mind calm within." The explanation 
given by Jewish expositors to the word hisskamSr, viz, confide 
super faces tuas (Luzzatto : vivi riposato), according to Jer. 
zlviii. 11, Zeph. i. 12, yields a sense which hardly suits the 
exhortation. The object of terror, at which and before which 
the king's heart was not to despair, is introduced first of all with 
Min and then with Beth, as in Jer. li. 46. The two allies are 
designated at once as what they were in the sight of God, who 
sees through the true nature and future condition. They were 
two tails, i.e. nothing but the fag-ends, of wooden pokers (lit 
stirrers, t.e. fire-stirrers), which would not blaze any more, but 
only continue smoking. They would bam and light no more, 
though their smoke might make the eyes smart still. Along 
with Eezin, and to avoid honouring him with the title of king, 
Aram (Syria) is especially mentioned ; whilst Fekah is called 
Ben-Bemaliah, to recal to mind his low birth, and the absence 
of any promise in the case of his house. 

The ydan 'aaJier (" because") which follows (as in Ezek. 
xii. 12) does not belong to ver. 4 (as might appear from the 
tethume that comes afterwards), in the sense of "do not be 
vol/. I. o 



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'210 THE PBOPHECIES OP ISAIAE. 

afraid becaose," etc., but m io ba tmderatood as introdticiiig 
the reason for tbe jadicial sentence in ver. 7. — Vera. 5-7. 
" Becaute Aram hath determined evil over tftee, Ephraim 
and the ton of Ranaliah (Remalyahu), paying, We will march 
against Judak, and terrify it, and oonqiter it for ourselves, and 
make the son of TdUil Hng in the midst of it: thus eaith the Lord 
JehovaA, It vill not is brought <^ottt, and will not take placed 
The inference drawn by Caspari {Krieg, p. 98), that at the 
time when Isaiah said this, Jndsea was not yet beaten or coa- 
qaered, is at any rate not conclusive. The promise given to 
Ahaz was founded upon the wicked design, with which the war 
had been commenced. How far the allies had already gone 
towards this last goal, the overthrow of the Davidic sovereignty, 
it does not say. Bat we know from 2 Kings xv. 37 that the 
invasion faad begoa before Ahaz ascended the thr(me ; and we 
may see from ver. 16 of Isaiah's prophecy, that the " terrify- 
ing" (nekltzenndh, from k&tz, tcedere, pavere) bad actually taken 
place ; so that the " conquering" {hib/aa, i.e, splitting, forcing 
of tiie passes and fortifications, 2 Kings zxv. 4, Ezek. xxx. 
16, 2 Chron xxi. 17, xxzii. 1) must also have been a thing 
belonging to the past. For history says nothing abont a 
saccessful re^tance on the part of Judah in this war. Only 
Jerusdem had not yet fallen, and, as the expression " king in 
the midst of it" shows, it is to this that the term '^ Jndah** 
especially refers ; just as in ch. xxiii. 13 Asshur is to be nnder- 
stood as signifying Nineveh. There they determined to en> 
throne a man named Tdb'4l (vid. Ezra iv. 7 ; it is written 
Tdb'al here in panse, although this change does not occur in 
other words (e.g. Israel) m pause — a name resembling the 
Syrian name Tah-rimnton)^ a man who is otherwise anknown ; 
but it never went beyond the determination, never was even 
on the way towards being realized, to say nothing of being 
f nlly accomplished. The allies would not succeed in altering 
the course of history as it had been appointed by the Lord.— 
Vers. 8, 9. " For head of Aram is Damascus, and head of 

* The Haoian inscriptions contaki eerertJ ench compoaita n&mea 
formed like Tab'H wiQk el r see Wetmtein, AiaggwiiklU griechische tmrf 
latcmifehe Insckriften, pp. 843-4, 361-363). By the transformation into 
TaVal, as Luzioitto says, t^e name is changed from Bonu* Dtni to Bonat 



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CHAP. Vtt 8, (. 211 

Damascus Rezin, and in Jtve-and-tixtt/ years will Ephraim as a 
people be broken in pieces. And head of Ephraim is SamariOf 
and head of Samaria the eon of BemalyoJiit; if ye believe not, 
surely ye toill not remain." The attempt to remove ver, 86, as 
a. gloss at variance with the contest, which is aopported by 
Eichhom, Gesenius, Hitzig, Knobel, and others, is a very 
natural one; and in that case the train of thought would 
simply be, that the two hostile kingdoms would continue in 
their former relation without the annexation of Jndah. But 
. when we look more closely, it is evident that the removal of 
ver. 8b destroys both the internal connection and the estemal 
harmony of the clansea. For just as 8a and 6b correspond, so 
do 9a and Qb. Ephraim, i.e. the kingdom of the ten tribes, 
which has entered into so unnatural and ungodly a covenant 
with idolatrous Syria, will cease to exist as a nation in the 
course of sixty-five years ; " and ye, if ye do not believe, but 
make fiesh your arm, will also cease to e^st." Thus tbe two 
clauses answer to one another : 86 is a prophecy announcing 
Ephraim's destruction, and 9b a warning, threatening Judah 
with destruction, if it rejects the promise with unbelief. More- 
over, the style of Sb is quite in accordance with that of Isaiah 
(on I^IQ, see ch. xzi. 16 and xvi. 14 ; and on Q^, " away from 
being a people," in the sense of " so that it shall be no longer a 
nation," ch. zrii. 1, xxv. 2, and Jer. xlviii. 2, 42). And the 
doctrinal objection, that the prophecy is too minute, and there- 
fore taken ex evmtii, has no force whatever, since the Old 
Testament prophecy furnishes an abundance of examples of 
the same kind (yid. cb. xx. 3, 4, xxxviii. 5, xvi, 14, xxi. 16 ; 
Ezek. iv. 5 sqq., xxiv. 1 sqq., etc.). The only objection that 
can well be raised is, that the time given in ver. 8b is wrong, 
and is not in harmony with ver. 16. Now, undoubtedly the 
sixty-five years do not come out if we suppose the prophecy 
to refer to what was done by Tiglath-pileser after the Syro- 
Ephraimi^h war, and to what was also done to Ephraim by 
Shalmanassar in the sixth year of Hezekiah's reign, to which 
ver. 16 unquestionably refers, and more especially to the former. 
But there is another event still, through which the existence 
of Ephraim, not only as a kingdom, but also as a people, was 
broken up, — namely, tlie canying away of the last remnant of 
the Ephraimitish population, and the planting of colonies from 



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212 THE PBOFBECIES OF ISAIAH. 

Eastern Asia bj Esarhnddon^ on Ephraimitish soil (2 Kings 
xvii. 24; Ezraiv. 2). Whereas the land of Judah was left 
desolate after the Chaldean deportation, and a new generation 
grew up there, and those who were in captivity were once 
more enabled to return; the land of Ephraim was occupied 
bj heathen settlers, and the few who were left behind were 
melted up with these into the mixed people of tlie Samaritans, 
and those in captivity were lost among the heathen. We have 
only to assnme that what was done to Ephr^um by Esarhaddon, 
as related in the historical books, took place in the twen^- 
second and twenty-third yeairs of Manasseh (the sixth year of 
Esarhaddon), which is very probable, since it must have been 
under Esarhaddon that Manasseh was carried away to Babylon 
about the middle of his reign (2 Chron. xzziii. 11) ; and we get 
exactly sixty-five years from the second year of the reign of 
Ahaz to the termination of Ephraim's existence as a nation 
(viz. Ahaz, 14 ; Hezekiah, 29 ; Manasseh, 22 ; in all, 65). It 
was then that the unconditional prediction, "Ephraim as a 
people will be broken in pieces," was fulfilled (ylchath tn^dm; 
this 16 certainly not the 3d pers. fut. kal, but the ntphal, 
Mai. ii. 5), just as the conditional threat "ye shall not remain" 
was fulfilled upon Judah in the Babylonian captivity. |0K3 
signifies to have a fast hold, and r?^'7, to prove fast-holding. 
If Judah did not hold fast, to its God, it would lose its fast hold 
by losing its country, the ground beneath its feet. We have 
the same play upon words in 2 Chron. xx. 20. The suggestion 
of Geiger is a very improbable one, viz. that the original reading 
was '3 u'DKn to D«, but that '3 appeared objectionable, and was 
altered into '?■ Why should it be objectionable, when the words 
form the conclusion to a direct address of Jehovah Himself, 
which is introduced with all solemnity! For this '3, passing 
over from a confirmative into an affirmative sense, and em- 
ployed, as it is here, to introduce the apodosis of the hypothetical 
clause, see 1 Sara. xiv. 39, and (in the formula nny '3) Gen. 
xxxi. 42, xliii. 10, Num. xxii. 29, 33, 1 Sam. xiv. 30: their 
continued existence would depend upon their faith, as this chi 
emphatically declares. 

Thus spake Isaiah, and Jehovah through him, to the king 
1 The meaning of this king's name is Assur fratrem dedit (A.iar-ad' 
]liddat) : vid. Op^ert^ Ei^edition, t. iL p. Sbi. 



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CHAP. vn. 10, IL 213 

of Judab. Whether he replied, or what reply he made, we are 
not informed. He was probably silent, because he carried a 
secret in his heart which afforded him more consolation than 
the words of the prophet. The invisible help of Jehovah, and 
the remote prospect of the fall of Ephrcum, were not enough 
for him. His trust was in Aaehur, with whose help he 
woold have a far greater snperioritj over the kingdom of 
Israel, than Israel had over the kingdom of Jadah through 
the help of Damascene Syria. The pious, theocratic po]i(7' 
of the prophet did not come in time. He therefore let 
the enthusiast talk on, and had bis own thoughts about the 
matter. Nevertheless the grace of God did not give up the 
unhappy son of David for lost. Vers. 10, 11. "And Jehovah 
continued tpeaking to Alias as /ollowg : Ask thee a ei^ of 
Jehovah thy God, going deep down into HadeSf or high up to 
the height above" Jehovah continued: what a deep and firm 
consciousness of the identity of the word of Jehovah and the 
word of the prophet is expressed in these words I Accord- 
ing to a vety marvellous interchange of idioms (commtinicatio 
idioituUum) which runs through the prophetic books of the 
Old Testament, at one time the prophet speaks as if he were 
Jehovah, and at another, as in the case before us, Jehovah 
speaks as if He were the prophet. Ahaz was to ask for a sign 
from Jehovah his God. Jehovah did not scorn to call Himself 
the God of this son of David, who had so hardened his heart. 
Possibly the holy love with which the expression "thg God" 
burned, might kindle a flame in his dark heart ; or possibly be 
might think of the covenant promises and covenant duties 
which the words "thy God" recalled to his mind. From this, 
bis God, he was to ask for a sign. A sign (^oth, from 'uth, to 
make an incision or dent) was something, some occurrence, 
or some action, which served aa a pledge of the divine certainty 
of something else. This was secared sometimes by visible 
miracles performed at once (Ex. iv. 8, 9), or by appointed 
symbols of future events (ch. viii. 18, xx. 3) ; sometimes by 
predicted occurrences, which, whether miraculous or natural, 
could not possibly be foreseen by human capacities, and there- 
fore, if they actually took place, were a proof either retrospec- 
tively of the divine causality of other events (Ex. iii. 12), or 
prospectively of their divine certainty (cb. zxxvii. 30 ; Jer. 



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214 THE PBOPBECIES OF ISAUH. 

xliv. 29, 30). The thing to be confirmed on the present 
occasion was what the prophet bad just predicted in bo definite 
a manner, viz. the maintenance of Jndah with its monarchy, 
and the failure of the wicked enterprise of the two allied king< 
doms. If this was to be attested to Ahaz in such a way as to 
demolish his unbelief, it could onlj be effected by a miraculous 
sign. And just os Hezekiah asked for a sign when Isaiah 
foretold his recovery, and promised him the prolongation of his 
life for fifteen years, and the prophet gave him the sign he 
asked, by causing the shadow upon the royal sun-dial to go 
backwards instead of forwards (ch, xxxviii.) ; so here Isaiah 
meets Ahaz with the offer of such a supernatural sign, and 
offers him the choice of heaven, earth, and Hades as the 
scene of the miracle. PPV^. and i^iairr are either in the infinitive 
absolute or in the imperative; and "^^^P is either the imperative 
bxff with the He of challenge, which is written in this form in 
half pause instead of ^/ffB* (for the two similar forms with 
•pashtah and sakepk, vid. Dan. ix. 19), " Only ask, going deep 
down, or ascending to the height," without there being any 
reason for reading n?Ke' with the tone upon the last syllable, as 
Hnpfeld proposes, in the sense of profundam fac (or faciendo) 
precationem (i.e. go deep down with thy petition) ; or else it is 
the pansal subordinate form for •^Y^f, which is quite allowablft 
in itself (cf. yechpdtz, the constant form in pause for yachpStz, 
and other examples. Gen. zliii. 14, xlix. 3, 27), and is ap- 
parently preferred here on account of its consonance with 
",^f' (Ewald, § 93, 3). We follow the Targum, vrith the 
Sept., Syr., and Vulgate, in giving the preference to the latter 
of the two possibilities. It answers to the antithesis; and if we 
had the words before us without points, this would be the first 
to suggest itself. Accordingly the words would read. Go deep 
down (in thy desire) to Hades, or go high up to the height ; 
or more probably, taking pDjn and naan in the sense of gerun- 
dives, " Going deep down to Hades, or {S» from niK, like vel 
from velle = si veils, malis) going high up to the height." This 
offer of the prophet to perform any kind of miracle, either in 
the vforld above or in the lower world, has thrown rationalistic 
commentators into very great perplexity. The prophet, says 
Hitzig, was playing a very dangerous game here; and if Ahaz had 
closed with his offer, Jehovah would probably have left him in 



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CHAP. TIL 13, 18. S15 

the lurch. And tleier observes, that " it can nerer have entered 
the mind of an Isaiah to perform an actual miracle :" probably 
becanse no miracles were ever performed bj Gothe, to whose 
high poetic consecration Meier compares the consecration of the 
prophet as described in ch. vi. Knobel answers the qnestion, 
" What kind of sign from heaven would Isaiah have giiren in 
case it had been asked fort" by saying, " Probably a very simple 
matter." Bnt even granting that an extraordinary heavenly 
phenomenon conld be a " simple matter," it was open to king 
Ahaz not to be so moderate in his demands upon the venture- 
some prophet, a^ Knobel with his magnanimity might possibly 
have been. Dazzled by the gloty of the Old Testament pro- 
phecy, a rationalistic exegesis falls prostrate upon the ground ; 
and it is with such frivolous, coarse, and common words as these 
that it tries to escape from its difficulties. It cannot acknow- 
ledge the miraculous power of the prophet, because it believes 
in no miracles at all. But Ahaz bad no doubt about his miracu- 
Ions power, though he would not be constrained by any miracle 
to renounce his own plans and believe in Jehovah. Ver. 12. 
" But Ahaz replied, I dare not aek, and dare not tempt Jehovah." 
What a pious sound this has I And yet his self-hardenmg 
reached its culminating point in these well-sounding words. He 
hid himself hypocritically under the mask of Deut. vi. 16, to 
avoid being disturbed in his Assyrian policy, and was infatuated 
enough to desiguato the acceptance of what Jehovah Himself 
had offered as tempting God. He studiously brought down 
upon himself the fate denounced In ch. vi., and indeed not upon 
liimself only, but upon all Judah as well. For after a few yean 
the forces of Asshur would stand upon the same fuller's field 
(ch. xxzvl. 2) and demand the surrender of Jerusalem. In that 
veiy hour, in which Isaiah was standing before Ahaz, the fate 
of Jerusalem was decided for more than two thousand years. 

The prophet might have ceased speaking now ; but in 
accordance with the command in ch. vi. he was obliged to speak, 
even though hia word should be a savour of death unto death. 
Ver. 13. " And he spake, Hear ye now, house of David ! Is it 
too little to yov to weary men, tJiat ye weary my God also ? " 
" He spake." Who spake ' According to ver. 10 the speaker 
was Jehovah ; yet what follows is given as the word of the 
prophet. Here again it is assumed that the word of the pro- 



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218 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

phet was the word of God, and that the prophet was the organ 
of Gfod even when he expressly distinguished between himself 
ana God, The words were addressed to the " honse of David," 
i.e. to Ahaz, including all the members of the royal family. 
Ahaz himself was not yet thirty years old. The prophet could 
very well have borne that the members of the house of David 
should thus frustrate all his own faithful, zealous human efforts. 
But they were not content with this (on the expression minut 
quam vos = quam u( vobis eujiciat, see Num. xvi. 9, Job 3tv. 11) : 
they also wearied ont the long-snffering of his God, by letting 
Him exhaust all His means of correcting them without effect. 
They would not believe without seeing ; and when signs were 
offered them to see, in order that they might believe, they wonid 
not even look. Jehovah would therefore give them, against their 
will, a sign of His own choosing. — Vers. 14, 15. " There/ore 
the Lord, He mill give you a sign : Behold, the virgin conceive*, 
and bears a son, and calls his name Immanuel. Butter and 
honey will he eat, at the time that he knows to refuse the evil and 
olwose the good." In its form the prophecy reminds one of Gen. 
xvi. 11, "Behold, thou art with child, and wilt hear a son, and 
call his name Ishmael." Here, however, the words are not ad- 
dressed to the person abont to bear the child, although Matthew 
gives this interpretation to the prophecy ;^ for ritOIJ is not the 
second person, but the third, and is synonymous with HKli) 
(according to Ges. § 74. Anm. 1), another form which is also 
met with in Gen. sxxiii. 11, Lev. xxv. 21, Dent. xxsi. 29, and 
Ps. cxviii. 23.^ Moreover, the condition of pregnancy, which 
is here designated by the participial adjective rnn (cf. 2 Sam. 
xi. 5), was not an already existing one in this instance, but (as 
in all probability also in Judg. xiii. 5, cf . 4} something future, as 
well as the act of bearing, since hinnBh is always used by Isaiah 
to introduce a future occurrence. This use of hinneh in Isaiah 
is a BufEcient answer to Gesenius, Knobel, and others, who 
understand haalmdh as referring to the young wife of the pro- 
phet himself, who was at that very time with child. But it is 

' Jerome diecuBaes tliis diversity in a verj impnrtial and intelligent 
mauner, m'hiaep.ad Pammachium de optmo genere inteTpretandi. 

' The pointing makes a distinction between W^P (she caJIa) and Jlttip, 
as Gen. xvi. 11 should he pointed (thon callest) ; and Olehausen (j 35, 6) 
is wrong in pronouncing the latter a mistakfe 



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CHAP. Til. 14, IB. 217 

altogether improbalDle that the wife of the prophet himself 
shoald be intended. For if it were to her that he referred, he 
ccmld hardly have e^ressed himself in a more ambiguous and 
unintelligible manner ; and we cannot see why he ahonld not 
much rather have said 'RE'K or ^^r•33i^, to say nothing of the fact 
that there is no farther allusion made to any son of the prophet 
of that name, and that a sign of this kind founded upon the 
prophet's own family affairs would hare been one of a very pre- 
carions nature. And the meaning and use of the word 'almdh 
are also at variance with this. For whilst bethtddh (from hdtJial, 
related to bddal, to separate, sejungere) signifies a maiden living 
in seclusion in her parents' house and still a long way from 
matrimony, 'almdh (from 'dlam, related to chdlam, and possibly 
also to Q?lJ, to be strong, full of vigour, or arrived at the age of 
puberty) is applied to one fully mature, and approaching the 
time of her marriage.' The two terms could both be applied 
to persons who were betrothed, and even to snch as were mar- 
ried (Joel ii. 16'; Prov. xxx. 19 ; see Hiteig on these passages). 
It is also admitted that the idea of spotless virginity was not 
necessarily connected with 'almdh (as in Gen. xxiv. 43, cf. 16), 
since there are passages — such, for example, as Song of Sol. vi. 8 
— where it can hardly be distinguished from the Arabic sui'rije ; 
and a person who had a very young-looking wife might be said 
to have an 'almah for his wife. But it is inconceivable that in 
a well-considered style, and one of religious earnestness, a woman 
who had been long married, like the prophet's own wife, could 
be called haahndh without any reserve.^ On the other hand, 
the expression itself warrants the assumption that by haalmdh 
the prophet meant one of the 'aldmoth of the king's harem 
(Lu^atto) ( and if we consider that the birth of the child was 
to take place, as the prophet foresaw, in the immediate future, 
bis thoughts might very well have been fixed upon Abijah (Abi) 

1 Oq the development of Qie mesjungs at 'Atam and chSlantf see Gcs. 
Thu., and my Psychol, p. 282 (see alao the commentary on Job xzxix. 4), 
According to Jerome, alma was Puuic also. In Arabic and Aramaean the 
diminutive form guleime, 'atteimtah, was the favourite one, bnt In Syriac 
'aUtnto (the ripened). 

' A young and newly-mairied wife might be called caUdh (as in Homer 
tiftipii ^ nubiUa and napta ; Eng. bride) ; and even in Homer a married 
woman, if young, ig eometimea called luvfAU Af^exac, but oeitlier nivp* ooc 



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S18 THE PBOPHEOIEB OF 16AUH. 

bath-Zechariah (2 Kings xriii. 2 ; 2 Cliron. xxix, 1), who be- 
came the mother of king Hezeldah, to whom apparently the 
virtues of the mother descended, in marked contrast with the 
vices of his father. This is certainly possible. At the same 
time, it is also certiun that the child who was to be born was 
the Messiah, and not a new Israel (Hofmann, Schriftbeieieis, ii. 
1, 87, 88) ; that is to say, that he was no other than that " won- 
derful" heir of the throne of David, whose birth is huled with 
joy in ch. ix., where even commentators like Knobel are obliged 
to admit that the Messiah is meant. It was the Messiah whom 
the prophet saw here as about to be bom, then again in ch. 
ix. as actoally bom, and again in ch. xi. as reigning, — an indi- 
visible triad of consolatory images in three distinct stages, inter- 
woven with the three stages into which the future history of 
the nation unfolded itself in the prophet's view. If, therefore, 
his eye was directed towards the Abijah mentioned, he must 
have regarded her as the future mother of the Messiah, and ber 
son as the future Messiah. Now it is no doubt true, that in the 
course of the «acred history Messianic expectations were often 
associated with individuals who did not answer to them, so that 
the Messianic prospect was moved further into the future ; and 
it is not only possible, hut even probable, and according to many 
indications an actual fact, that the believing portion of the nation 
did concentrate their Messianic wishes and hopes for a long 
time upon Hezekiah ; but even if Isaiah's prophecy may have 
evoked such human conjectures and expectations, through the 
measure of time which it laid down, it would not be a prophecy 
at all, if it rested upon no better foundation than diia, which 
would be the case if Isaiah had a particular maiden of his own 
day in his mind at the time. 

Are we to conclude, then, that the prophet did not refer to 
any one individual, but that the " virgin" was a personification 
of tlie house of David 1 This view, which Hofmann propounded, 
and Stier appropriated, and which Ebrard has revived, notwith- 
standing the fact that Hofmann relinquished it, does not help 
us over the difficulty ; for we should expect in that case to 
find " daughter of Zion," or something of the kind, since the 
term "virgin" is altogether unknown in a personification of 
this kind, and the house of David, as the prophet knew it, was 
by no means worthy of such an epithet 



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CRAP. viL w, is. 219 

No otber course is left, therefore, than to assnme that whilst, 
on the one hand, the prophet meant by " the virgin" a maiden 
belonging to the honse of David, which the Messianic character 
of the prophecy requires ; on the other hand, he neither thought 
of any particular maiden, nor associated the promised concep- 
tion with any human father, who conld not have been any other 
than Ahaz. The reference' is the same as in Mic. v. 3 (" she 
which travaileth," yolsdah). The objection that haalmdh (the 
virgin) cannot be a person belonging to the future, on account 
of the article (Hofmann, p. 86), does not affect the true expla- 
nation : it was the virgin whom the spirit of prophecy brought 
before the prophet's mind, and who, although he could not give 
her name, stood before him as singled out for an extraordinary 
end (compare the article in hanna'ar in Num. xi. 27, etc.). 
With what exalted dignity this mother appeared to him to be 
invested, is evident from the fact that it is she who gives the 
nanie to her son, and that the name Immanael. This name 
sounds full of promise. But if we look at the expression 
"therefore," and the circumstance which occasioned it, the 
ti^ cannot have been intended as a pure or simple promise. 
We naturally expect, first, that it will be an extraordinary fact 
which the prophet foretells ; and secondly, that it will be a fact 
with 3 threatening front. Now a humiliation of the house of 
David was indeed involved in the fact that the God of whom 
it would know nothing wonld nevertheless mould its future 
history, as the emphatic Kin implies. He (avro^, the Lord Ifim- 
telf), by His own impulse and unfettered choice. Moreover, 
this moulding of the future could not possibly be such an one 
as was desired, but would of necessity be as fall of threatening 
to the unbelieving house of David as it was full of promise to 
the believers in Israel. And the threatening character of the 
"sign" is not to be sought for exclusively in ver. 15, since 
both the expressions " therefore" (IdcSn) and " behold" (hinnsh) 
place the main point of the sign in ver. 14, whilst the intro- 
daction of ver. 15 without any external connection is a clear 
proof that what is stated in ver. 14 is the chief thing, and not 
the reverse. But the only thing in ver. 14 which indicated 
any threatening element in the sign in question, must have been 
the fact that it would not be by Ahaz, or by a son of Ahaz, 
or by the honse of David generally, which at that time had 



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220 THE FBOPHECIES OF ISAIAa 

hardeDed itself agfunst God, that Qod would save His people, 
but that a nameless maiden of low rank, whom God Had singled 
out and now showed to the prophet in the mirror of His counsel, 
would give birth to the divine deliverer of His people in the 
midst of the approaching tribulations, which was a suiBcient 
intimation that He who was to be the pledge of Judah's con- 
tinuance would not arrive without the present degenerate house 
of David, which had brought Judah to the brink of ruin, b^ng 
altogether set aside. 

But the further question arises here, What constituted the 
extraordinary character of the fact here announced! It con- 
sisted in the fact that, according to ch. ix. 5, Immanuel Himself 
was to be a WB (wonder or wonderful). He would be God in 
corporeal self-manifestation, and therefore a " wonder" as being 
a superhuman person. We should not venture to assert this 
if it went beyond the line of Old Testament revelation, but the 
prophet asserts it himself in ch. ix. 5 (cf. ch. s, 21) ; his words 
are as clear as possible ; and we must not make them obscure, 
to favour any preconceived notiona aa to the development of 
history. The incarnation of Deity waa unijuestionably a secret 
that was not clearly unveiled in the Old Testament, but the 
veil was not so thick but that acme rays could pass through. 
Such a ray, directed by the spirit of prophecy into the mind 
of the prophet^ was the prediction of Immanuel. But if the 
Messiah waa to be Immanuel in this sense, that He would Him- 
self be El (Qod), as the prophet expressly affirms, His birth- 
must also of necessity be a wonderful or miraculous one. The 
prophet does not afSrm, indeed, that the " 'almdh," who had 
as yet known no man, would ^ve birth to Immanuel without 
this taking place, so that he could not be bom of the house of 
Da^'id as well as into it, but be a gift of Heaven itself ; but this 
'^'almdk" or vir^n continued throughout an enigma in the Old 
Testament, stimulating " inqniiy" (1 Pet. i. 10-12), and waiting 
for the hbtorical solution. Thus the sign in question was, on 
the one hand, a mystery glaring in the most threatening manner 
upon the house of David; and, on the other hand, a mystery 
smiling with rich consolation upon tb^ prophet aud all believers, 
and couched in these enigmatical terms, in order that those 
who hardened themselves might not understand it, and that 
believers might increasingly long to comprehend its meaning. 



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CHAP. TIL M, IT. 221 

In ver. 15 the threatening element of yet. 14 becomes the 
predominant one. It would not be so, indeed, if *'bntter 
(thickened milk) and honey" were mentioned here as the 
ordiDary food of the tenderest age of childhood (as Geseniua, 
Hengstenberg, and others suppose). But the reason afterwards 
assigned in vers. 16, 17, teaches the very opposite. Thickened 
milk and honey, the food of the desert, would he the only 
provisions furnished by the land at the time in which the 
ripening youth of Immanuel would fall, il^Dp (from won, to be 
thick) is a kind of butter which is still prepared by nomads by 
shaking milk in skins. It may probably include the cream, 
as the Arabic semen signifies both, but not the curds or cheese, 
the name of which (at least the more accurate name) is geblndh. 
The object to inj is expressed in vers. 15, 16 by infinitive abso- 
lutes (compare the more usual mode of expression in ch. viii. 4). 
The Lamed prefixed to the verb does not mean *' until " (Ges. 
§ 131, 1), for Lamed is never used as so definite an indication 
of the terminus ad quem; the meaning is either " towards the 
time when he understands" (Aibos iv. 7, cf. Lev. xxiv. 12, 
*' to the end that "), or about the time, at the time when he 
understands (ch. x. 3 ; Gen. viii. 11 ; Job xxiv. 14). This kind 
of food would coincide in time with his understanding, that is to 
say, would run parallel to it. Incapacity to distinguish between 
good and bad is characteristic of early childhood (Dent. i. 39, 
etc.), and also of old age when it relapses into childish ways 
. (2 Sam. xix. 36). The commencement of the capacity to 
nnderetand is equivalent to entering into the so-called years of 
discretion — the riper age of free and conscious self-determination. 
By the time that Immanuel reached this age, all the blessings 
of the land would have been so far reduced, that from a land 
full of luxumnt corn-fields and vineyards, it would have become 
a large wooded pasture-ground, supplying milk and honey, and 
nothing more. A thorough devastation of the land is therefore 
the reason for this hmitation to the simplest, and, when com- 
pared with the fat of wheat and the cheering influence of wine, 
most meagre and miserable food. And this is the ground 
assigned in vera, 16, 17. Two successive and closely connected 
events would occasion this universal desolation. 

Vers. 16, 17. " For before ike boy shall understand to refuse 
th« evil, and choose the good, the land will he desolate, of wliose 



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z22 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

two IdngB tho%i art afraid. Jehovah will bring upon thee, and 
upon thy people, and upon thy father's home, days such at haoa 
not came since the day when Ephraim broke away from Judah— 
the king of Asshwr." The land of the two kings, Syria and 
Israel, was first of all laid waste hj the Assyrians, whom Ahaz 
called to his assistance. Tiglath-pileser conquered Damascnf 
and a p(»tion of the kingdom of Israel, and led a large part 
of the inhabitants of the two countries into captivity (2 Kings 
XV. 29, xvi, 9). (Tudah was then also laid waste by the 
Assyrians, as a punishment for having refused the help of 
Jehovah, and preferred the help of man. Days of adversity 
would come upon the royal house and people of Judah, such as 
{'asher, qualet, as in Ex. x. 6) had not come upon them sines 
the calamitous day (JmiyyOm, inde a die; in other places we 
find Vmin-hayyom, Ex. ix. 18, Deut. iv. 32, ix. 7, etc.) of the 
falling away of the ten tribes. The appeal to Asshur laid the 
foundation for the overthrow of the kingdom of Judah, qnite 
as much as for, that of the kingdom of Israel. Ahaz became 
the tributary vassal of the king of Assyria in consequence; 
and although Hezekiah was set free from Asshur through the 
miraculous assistance of Jehovah, what Nebuchadnezzar afte^ 
wards performed was only the accomplishment of the frustrated 
attempt of Sennacherib. It is with piercing force that the 
words " the king of Assyria " ('rtA melek Asshur) are intro, 
dnced at the close of the two verses. The particle 'eth is used 
frequently where an indefinite object is followed by the more 
precise and definite one (Gen. vi. 10, xxvi. 34). The point of 
the verse would be broken by eliminating the words as a gloss, 
as Knobel proposes. The very king to whom Ahaz had 
appealed in his terror, woald bring Judah to the brink of 
destruction. The absence of any link of connection between 
vers. 16 and 17 is also very effective. The hopes raised in the 
mind of Ahaz by ver. 16 are suddenly turned into bitter di^ 
appointment. In the face of such catastrophes as these, Isaiah 
predicts the birth of Immamiel. His eating only thickened 
milk and honey, at a time when he knew very well what was 
good and what was not, would arise from the desolation of the 
whole of the ancient territory of the Davidic kingdom that 
had preceded the riper years of his youth, when he would 
certainly have chosen other kinds of food, if they could possibly 



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CEiP. VII. 18. 223 

have been found. Consequently the birth of Immannel ap- 
parently falls between the time then present and the Assyrian 
calamities, and his earliest childhood appears to ran parallel to 
the Assyrian oppression. In any case, their consequences would 
be still felt at the time of his riper youth. In what way the 
truth of the prophecy was maintained notwithstanding, we shall 
see presently. What follows in vers. 18-25, is only a further ex- 
pansion of ver. 17. The promising side of the " sign " remains 
in the background, because this was not for Ahaz. When 
Ewald expresses the opinion that a promising strophe has fallen 
out after ver. 17, he completely mistakes the circumstances 
under which the prophet uttered these predictions. In the 
presence of Ahaz he must keep «Ience as to the promises. 
But he pours out with all the greater fluency his threatening 
of judgment. 

Ver. 18. "And it ^omes to pass in that day, Jehovah will 
hiss for Hie fiy which ie at the end of the Nile-arms of Egypt, 
and the bees that are in the land of Asshur ; and they come and 
settle all of them in the valleys of the slopes, and in the clefts of 
the rocks, and in ^l the thorn-hedges, and upon all grass-plots." 
The prophet has already stated, in ch. v. 26, that Jehovah 
would hiss for distant nations ; and now he is able to describe 
them by name. The Egyptian nation, with its vast and un- 
paralleled nnmbers, is compared to the swarming fly ; and the 
Assyrian nation, with its love of war and conquest, to the 
stinging bee which is so hard to keep off (Deut. i. 44 ; Ps. 
csviii. 12). The emblems also correspond to the nature of 
the two countries : the fly to slimy Egypt with its swarms of 
insects (see ch. xviii. 1),^ and the bee to the more mountunous 
and woody Assyria, where the keeping of bees is still one of 
the principal branches of trade. 1i<'j pi. D'^it^, is an Egyptian 
name (^aro, with the article phiaro, pi. yarSu) for the Nile and 
its several arms. The end of the Nile-arms of Egypt, from a 
Palestinian point ot view, was the extreme comer of the land. 
The military force of Egypt wonid march out of the whole 
compass of the land, and meet the Assyrian force in the Holy 

1 Egypt abonn^ in gnati, etc., more especia]lj in flies (miuniT-uE), 
including a apeci«s of small fly {nemdth), which is a great plogna to men 
throughoTtt all the cotmtry of the Nile (see Hortmann, Nahir-geichieilUch- 
me<^m»dte Skizu der NiMmitr, 1S6&, pp. S04-&>. 



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221 THE PBOPHECIES OF IBAUH. 

Land ; and both togetlier would cover the land in saeh a way 
that the valleys of steep precipitous heights {nachaU liabbaltoth), 
and clefts of the rocks (nekHe Tiasselaim), and all the thom- 
hedges (n^azHzlm) and pastures (nahalolim, from nikel, to lead 
to pasture), would be covered with these swarms. The fact 
that just such places are named, as afforded a suitable shelter 
and abundance of food for flies and bees, is a filling up of the 
figure in simple truthfulness to nature. And if we look at the 
historical fulfilment, it does not answer even in this respect 
to the actual letter of the prophecy ; for in the time of Heze- 
kiah no collision really took place between the Assyrian and 
Egyptian forces ; and it was not till the days of Josiah that a 
coUisioa took place between the Chaldean and ^Egyptian powers 
in the eventful battle fought between Pharaoh-Necho and 
Nebuchadnezzar at Carchemish (Circesium), which decided the 
fate of Judah. That the spirit of prophecy points to this 
eventful occurrence is evident from ver. 20, where no further 
allusiou is made to Egypt, because of its having succumbed to 
the imperial power of Eastern Asia. 

Ver, 20. " In that day will the Lord shave vntk a razor, the 
tiling for hire on the shore of the river, with the Mng of Assyria, 
the head and the hair of the feet; and even the beard it will take 
away." Kaobel takea the hair to be a figurative representation 
of the produce of the land'; but the only thing which at all 
favours the idea that the flora is ever regarded by biblical 
writers as the hairy covering of the soil, is the use of the term 
ttazir as the name of an uuculttvated vine left to itself (Lev. 
xsv. 5). The nation of Judah is regarded here, as in ch. i. 6, 
as a man stript naked, and not only with all the hair of his 
head and feet shaved off (raglaim, a euphemism), but what was 
regarded as the most shameful of all, with the hair of his beard 
shaved off as well. To this end the Almighty would make 
use of a razor, which ia more distinctly defined as hired on 
the shore of the Euphrates {conductitia in Htoribus Euphratis : 
ndhdr stands here for hanndhdr), and still more precisely as 
the king of Asshur (the ktter is again pronounced a gloss by 
Knobel and others). " The thing for hire:" kasseinrdh might 
he an abstract teim (hiring, conductio), but it may also he the 
'eminine of sdcirf which indicates an emphatic advance front 
thb '"drfinitft^C. ^^^ more definite ; in the sense of " with a 



lefiiut^4£ the m( 



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CHXP. VII. 31-IG. S25 

razor, namely, that which was atanding ready to be hired in 
the lands on both sides of the Euphrates, the king of Assyria." 
In haatecirdk (the thing for hire) there was involved the 
bitterest sarcasm for Ahaz. The sharp knife, which it had 
hired for the deliverance of Judah, was hired by the Lobd, 
to shave Jndah most thoroughly, and in the piost disgracefnl 
manner. Thus shaved, Judah would be a depopulated and 
desert land, in which men would no longer live by growing 
com and vines, or by trade and commerce, but by graaing 
alone. — Vers. 21, 22, " And it vnll o&me to pa»» in that daj/, that 
a man will keep a tmall cow and a couple of tlieep; and it eome» 
to pass, for the abundance of the milk they give he will eat eream: 
for butter and honeif will every one eat that is left within the 
land." The former prosperity would be reduced to the most 
miserable housekeeping. One man would keep a milch cow 
and two head of sheep (or goats) alive with the greatest care, 
the strongest and finest full-grown cattle having fallen into 
the hands of the foe (njn, like ri^nn in other places ; ihtl, not 
ahnS, because two female sheep (^ goats are meant). But this 
would be quite enough, for there would be only a few men left 
in the land; add as all the land would be pasture, the small 
number of animals would yield milk in abundance. Bread 
and wine would be onattainable. Whoever had escaped the 
Assyrian razor, would eat thickened milk and honey, that and , 
nothing but that, without variation, ad nauteam. The reason 
for this would be, that the hills, which at other times were fall 
of vines and corn-fields, would be overgrown with briers. 

The prophet repeats this three times in vers. 28-2.') : ^'And 
it will come to past in that day, every place, where a thousand 
vines stood at a thousand eilverlinga, will have become thorns and 
thistles. With arrows and with bows wiil mm go, for the whole 
land will have become thoma and thistles. And all the hills that 
were accustomed to be hoed with the hoe, thou vjih not go to them 
for fear of thorns and thistles ; and it has become a gathering- 
place for oxen, and a treading-plaoe for she^^ The ** thousand 
silverlings" (^eleph ceseph, i.e. a thousand shekels of silver) recal 
to mind Song of Sol. viii. 11, though there it is the value 
of the yearly produce, whereas here the thousand shekels are 
the value of a thousand vines, the sign of a peculiarly valuable 
piece of a vineyard. At the present time they reckon the worth 

TOL. L » 



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226 THE FB0PHECIE8 Or ISAUH. 

c^ a vineyard in Lebanon and Syria according to the valne of 
the separate vines, and generally take the vines at one piastre 
(from 2d. to 3d.) each ; jost as in Gennuiy a Johanniabei^ 
vine is reckoned at a dncat. Every piece of ground, when 
such valnable vines were standing, wonld have fallen a prey 
to the briers. People would go there with bow and arrow, 
becaose the whole land had become thorns and thistles (see A 
ch. V. 12a), and therefore wild animals had made their homes 
there. And thoa (the prophet addresses the conntiyman thus) 
comest not to all the hills, which were formerly cultivated in 
the most careful manner ; thou comest not thither to make 
them arable again, because thorns and thistles deter thee from 
reclaming such a fallow. They would therefore give the oxen 
freedom to rove where th^ would, and let sheep and goata 
tread down whatever grew there. The description is intention- 
ally tfaorooghly tautological and pleonastic, heavy and slow in 
movement. The writer's intention is to produce the impres- 
don of a waste heath, or tedious monotony. Hence the repeti- 
tions of h&ydh end yihyeh. Observe how great the variatitms 
are in the use of the future and perfect, and how the meaning 
is always determined by the context. In vers. 21, 22, the 
futures have a really future sense; in ver. 23 the first and 
third yihyek signify " will have become" {facUu erit onmu 
lociti), and the second " was" (erat) ; in ver. 24 Vfi^^ means 
" will come" (yeniet), and tOiyeh " will have become" {facta 
erit terra) ; in ver. 25 we must render ye'ddir&a, aarciebantar 
(they used to be hoed). And in vers. 21, 22, and 23, hdyah is 
equivalent iofiet (it will become) ; whilst in ver. 25 it mesas 
factum est (it has become). Looked at from a western point of 
view, therefore, the future tense is sometimes a simple future, 
sometimes a future perfect, and sometimes an imperfect or 
synchronistic preterite ; and the perfect sometimes a prophetic 
preterite, sometimes an actnal preterite, but in the sphere of 
an ideal past, or what is the same thing, of a predicted future. 

This ends Isaiah's address to king Ahaz. He does not 
expressly say when Immanuel is to be bom, bnt only what 
will take place before he has reached the riper age of boyhood, 
— namely, first, the devastation of Israel and Syria, and then 
the devastation of Jadah itself, by the Assyrians. From the 
fact that the prophet says no more than this, we may see that 



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CHAP. Tn. a-a. 2z7 

his spirit aai his tongne were under the direction of the 
Spirit of Qod, who does not descend nithia the historical and 
temporal range of vision, without at the same time remaining 
exalted above it. On the other band, however, we may see 
from what he says, that the prophecy has its human side as 
well. When Isaiah speaks of Immannel as eating thickened 
milk and honey, like all who snrvived the Assyrian troubles in 
the Holy Land ; he evidently looks upon and thinks of the 
childhood of Immannel as connected with the time of the 
Assyrian calamities. And it was in snch a perspective com- 
bination of events lying far apart^ that the complex cha^ 
racter of prophecy consisted. The reason for this complex 
character was a double one, viz. the human limits associated 
with the prophet's telescopic view of distant times, and the 
pedagogical wisdom of Ood, in accordance with which He 
entered into these hmits instead of removing them. If, there- 
for^ we adhere to the letter of prophecy, we may easily throw 
doubt upon its veracity; but if we look at the substance of 
the prophecy, we soon find that the complex character by no 
means invalidates its truth. For the things which the prophet 
saw in combination were essentially connected, even thou^ 
chronologically separated. When, for example, in the case 
before us (ch. vii.— xii.), Isaiah saw Asshur only, standing out 
as the imperial kingdom ; this was so far true, that the four 
imperial kingdoms from the Babylonian to the Boman were 
really nothing more than the fall development of the com- 
mencement made in Assyria. And when he spoke of the son of 
the virgin (ch. vii.) as growing up in the midst of the Assj-rian 
oppressions ; this also wab bo far true, that Jesus was really bom 
at a time when the Holy Land, deprived of its previous abun- 
dance, was under the dominion of the imperial power, and in a 
condition whose primary cause was to be traced to the unbehef 
of Ahaz. Moreover, He who became flesh in the fulness of 
Ume, did really lead an ideal life in the Old Testament history. 
He was in the midst of it in a pre-existent presence, moving on 
towards the covenant goal. The fact that the house and nation 
of David did not perish in the Assyrian calamities, was actually 
to be attributed, as ch. viii. presupposes, to His real though 
not His bodily presence. In this vray the apparent discrepancy 
between the prophecy and the history of the fulfilment may be 



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1S8 THX PBOPBEOES OF ISAUa 

solved. We do not require the solation proposed br Yitnnfifl, 
and recently appropriated hj Haneberg, — namely, that the 
prophet takes the stages of the Messiah's life out of the distant 
future, to make them the measure of events about to take 
place in the immediate future; nor that of Bengel, Scbe^, 
Sdimieder, and others, — ^namelj, that the sign consisted in ao 
event belonging to the immediate future, which pointed ^^- 
cally to the birth of the trae Immanuel ; nor that of Hofmann, 
who regards the words of the prophet as an emblematical pre- 
diction of the rise of a new Israel, which would come to the 
possesnoQ of spiritual intelligence in the midst of troublons 
times, occanoned by the want of intelligence in the Israel of 
his OWD time. The prophecy, as will be more fully coufirmed 
as we proceed, is directly Messianic ; it is a divine pr(^heqr 
within human Itnuts. 



TWO OUENB OF TEra IMHEDIATB POTUHB.— 
CHAP. TIU. 1-4. 

In the midst of the Syro-Ephraimitish war, which was not 
yet at an end, Isaiah received instructions from G-od to perform 
a singular prophetic action. Vera. 1, 2. " TTien Jehovah laid ta 
me, Tbifce a large tlab, and write upon it witJt common tiroiet, 
* In Speed Spoil, Booty hatlena ;' and I will take to me trust- 
tBorthy rcitneseet, Uriyah the priest, and Zecharyahu the eon of 
Yeberechyahu" The slab or table (cf. ch. iii. 23, where the 
same word is used to signify a metal mirror) was to be large, 
to produce the impression of a monnment ; and the writing 
npon it was to be " a man's pen " (eheret 'en^h), i.e. written 
in the vulgar, and, so to speak, popular character, consisting of 
iuartbtic strokes that coi^d be easily read {vid. Rev. xiii. 18, 
xzi. 17). Philip d'Aquin, in his Lexicoti, adopts the explana- 
tion, " £^K»A-writing, i.e. hieroglyphic writing, so called because 
it was lirst introduced in the time of Eno»h-" Luzzatto renders 
it, a lettere cvMtali ; but the reading for this would be b' eheret 
ammath 'ish. The only true rendering is etylo vulgari (see Ges. 
TTiet, t.v. 'enosk). The words to be written are introduced with 
Lamed, to indicate dedication (as in Ezek. xxzvii. 16), or the 
object to which the inscription was dedicated or applied, as if it 
read, "A table devoted to ' Spoil very qoickly, booty hastens ;'" 



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CHAP. Tin. 1, t 229 

nnless, indeed, Vtmher is to be taken as a fut. imtans, as it is by 
Luzzatto— after Gen. xv. 12, Josh. ii. 5, Hab. i. 17 — in the 
senise of acceleratura sunt tpolta, or (what the position of the 
words might more naturallj suggest) with maker in a tnuiBitive 
sense, as ia the construction i^^? n^!|l, and others, aceelerationi 
apolia, M. they are ready for hastening. Most of the commen- 
taton have confused the matter here by taking the words as a 
proper name (Ewald, § 288, e), which they were not at first, 
thoQgh they became so afterwards. At first they were an oracular 
amioimcement of the immediate future, acc«/erant«poKa,/ftriin4if 
prceda (spoil is quick, booty hastens). Spoil ; booty ; but who 
would the Tanquished bet Jehovah knew, and His prophet 
knew, although not initiated into the policy of Ahaz. But 
their knowledge was studiously Teiled in enigmas. For the 
writing was not to disclose anything to the people. It was 
simply to serre as a public record of the fact, that the course of 
events was one that Jehovah bad foreseen and indicated before- 
hand. And when what was written npon the table should after- 
wards take place, they would know that it was the fulfilment 
of what had already been written, and therefore was an event 
pre-determined by God. For this reason Jehovah took to 
Himself witnesses. There is no necessity to read <^*?|*l (and 
I had it witnessed), as Knobel and others do ; nor HTl^rn (and 
have it witnessed), as the Sept., Targum, Syriac, and Hitzig do. 
Jehovah said what He would do ; and the prophet knew, without 
requiring to be told, that it was to be accomplished instrumen- 
tally through him. Uriah was no doubt the priest (Urijah), 
who afterwards placed himself at the service of Ahaz to gratify 
his heathenish desires (2 Kings xvi. 10 sqq.), Zechariah b«i 
Yeberechyalin (Berechiah) was of course not the prophet of the 
times after the captivity, but possibly the Asaphite mentioned 
in 2 Chron. xxix. 13. He is not further known to us. In 
good editions, i«n is not followed by maikeph, but marked 
with mercAd, according to the Masora at Gen. zxx. 19. These 
two men were reliable witnesses, being persons of great dis- 
tinction, and their testimony would weigh with the people. 
When the time should arrive that the history of their own 
times solved the riddle of this inscription, these two men were 
to tdl the people how long ago the prophet had written that 
down in his prophetic capacity. 



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S30 THE PBOFHEOIES OF ISAIAH. 

Bat something occurred in the meantiDie whereby tbe place 
of the lifeless tahle was taken bj a more eloquent and living 
one. Vers. 3, 4. " Arid I drew near to the prc^heUtt ; and the 
ooticeived, and bare a son: and Jehovah taid to me, Call hit name 
It^^eed-apoiliooly-haatena {Maher-shalaUhaeh-baz) : for befort 
the hot/ shall know how to cry, My father, and my mother, they will 
carry away the riches of Damaicua, and the spoil of Samaria, be^ 
fore the king of Asshur." To his son Shear^yashub, in whose , 
name the law of the history of Israel, as revealed to the prophet 
on the occasion of bis call (chap, vi.), viz. the restoration <^ 
only a remnant of the whole nation, had been fonnnlated, there 
was now added a second son, to whom the inscription upon the 
table was ^ven as a name (with a small abbreviation, and if the 
Lamed is the particle of dedication, a necessaiy one). He was 
therefore the symbol of the approaching chastisement of Syria 
and the kingdom of the ten tribes. Before the boy bad learned 
to stammer out the name of father and mother, they wonld 
carry away (yissd', not the third pers. fut niphal, which is 
yinnds^, but kal with a latent, indefinite subject hannOsf : 
Qes. § 137, 3) the treasures of Damascus and the trophies (t.«. 
the spoil taken from the fiying or murdered foe) of Samaria 
before the king of Asshur, who would therefore leave the 
toiitory of the two capitals as a conqueror. It is true that 
T^lath-pileser only conquered Damascus, and not Samaria; 
but be took from Fekah, the king of Samaria, the land beyond 
the Jordan, and a portion of the land on this side. The trophies, 
which he took thence to Assyria, were no less the spoil of 
Samaria than if he had conquered Samaria itself (which Shal- 
manassar did twenty years ^terwards). The birth of Maher- 
shalal took place about three-ijuarters of a year later than the 
preparation of the table (as the verb v^darah is an aorist and 
not a pluperfect) ; and the time appointed, from the birth of 
the boy till the chastisement of the allied kingdoms, was about 
a year. Now, as the Syro-Ephraimitish war did not commence 
later tlian the first year of the reign of Ahaz, i.e. the year 743^ 
and the chastisement by Tiglath-pileser occurred in the life- 
time of the allies, whereas Fekah was assassinated in the year 
739, the interval between the commencement of the war and 
the chastisement of the allies cannot have been more tlum three 
years ; so that the preparation of the table most not be assigned 



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CHAP. Tin. 5. 831 

to a macli later period than the interview witli Abaz. The in- 
scription upon the table, which was adopted as the name of the 
child, was not a purely consolatory prophecy, since the prophet 
had predicted, a short time before, that the same Asshnr which 
devastated the two covenant lands would lay Judah waste as 
well. It was simply a practical proof of the omniscience and 
omnipotence of God, by which the history of the future was 
directed and controlled. The prophet had, in fact, the moam- 
fol vocation to harden. Hence the enigmatical character of 
his words and doings in relation to both kings and nation. 
Jehovah foreknew the conseqaences which would follow the 
appeal to Asshnr for help, as regarded both Syria and Israel. 
This knowledge he committed to writing in the presence of 
witnesses. When this should be fulfilled, it would be all over 
with the rejoicing of the king and people at their self-secured 
deliverance. 

But Isaiah was not merely within the broader circle of an 
incorrigible nation ripe for judgment. He did not stand alone; 
but was encircled by a small band of believing disciples, who 
wanted consolation, and were worthy of it. It was to them that 
the more promising obverse of the prophecy of Immannel be- 
longed. Mahersbalal could not comfort them ; for they knew 
that when Assbur had done with Damascus and Samaria, the 
troubles of Judah would not be over, but would only then be 
really about to commence. To be the shelter of the faithful 
in the terrible judidal era of the imp^al power, which was 
then commenting, was the great purpose of Uie prediction of 
Immannel ; and to bring out and expand the consolatory cha- 
racter of that prophecy for the benefit of believers, was the 
design of the addresses which follow. 

ESOTERIC ADDSE88E8. — CHAP. VIH. t-3JI. 

A. ComolaHon of Immanuel in the coming darkness. — 
Chap. viii. 5-ii. 6. 

The heading or introduction, " And Jehovah proceeded still 
further to apeak to me, as follows" extends to all the following 
addresses as far as cb. xii. They all finish with consolation. 
But consolation presupposes the need <£ consolation. Conse- , 



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232 TOE raOPHEClES OP ISUAH. 

qtiendj, even in this instance the prophet is obliged to com- 
mence with a threatening of jndgment. Vers. 6, 7. " Porttt- 
mueh as this people detpueth the waters of SHoah that go sofUy, 
and regardefh at a delight the alUanee with Rezin and the ion of 
Remah/ahu, therefore) Mold! the Lord of all hringeUi up upon 
them the waters of the river, the mighty and the great, tlte king of 
Aaskur and all his military/ power ; and he riteth over aU his 
channels, and goetk over all his banks." The Siloah had its 
name {Shiloach, or, according to the reading of this passage 
contained in ver; good HBS^ Shilloach), ab emitlendo, either in 
an infinitive sense, "shooting forth," or in a participial sense, 
with a passive colouring, emissus, sent forth, spirted ont (vid, 
John ix. 7 ; and on the variations in meaning of this substantive 
form. Concord, p. 1349, a.). Josephns places the fountain and 
pool of Siloah at the opening of the Tyropcoon, on the soua- 
eastem side of the ancient city, where we still find it at the- 
present day (vid. Jos. Wars of the Jews, v. 4, 1 ; also Kobinson, 
PaL i. 504). The clear little brook — a pleasant sight to the 
eye as it issues from the ravine which runs between the sonth- 
westem elope of Horiah and the sonth-easteru slope of Mount 
Zion^ (t. Schubert, Beise, iL 573) — is used here as a symbol 
of the Davidic monarchy enthroned upon Zion, which had the 
promise of God, who was enthroned npon Moriah, in contrast 
with the imperial or world kingdom, which is compared to the 
overflowing waters of the Euphrates. The reproach of despising 
the waters of Siloah applied to Judah as well as Ephraim r to 
the former because it trusted in Asshur, and despised the less 
tan^ble but more certain help which the house of David, if it 
were but believing, had to expect from the God of promise ; to 
the latter, because it had entered into alliance with Aram to 
overthrow the house of David; and yet the house of David, 
although d^enerate and deformed, was the divinely appointed 
source of that salvation, which is ever realized through quiet, 
secret ways. The second reproach apphed more especially to 
Ephraim. The 'eth is not to be taken as the sign of the accusa- 
tive, for ms never occurs with the accusative of the object (not 
even in ch, xxzv. 1), and could not well be so used. It is to 

' It u witli perfect pTopriBtf, therefore, ihftt Jerome aometimce speaks 
of tlie font Siloe as flowing ad raHcet Montis Zion, and at other Idmee as 
ftowiog M rodfctbiw Mmtu Moria, 



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CHAP. TliL a. 233 

be coDStnied as a prepoution in tie sense of " and (or because) 
delight (is felt) wiih (i.e. in) the alliance viith Renn aitd PekaL" 
(On the constroctive before a preposition, see Ges. § 116, 1 : 
a&a 'ith, like rdtzdk 'tm.) Lnzzatto compares, for the constmc- 
tion, Gen, xli. 43, v'ndlh/fn ; bat only the inf. aba. is used in 
thb way as a continoation of the finite verb (see Ges. § 131, 4, a). 
Moreover, b^^ b not an Aramaic infinitive, but a substantive 
oaed in such a way as to retain the power of the verb (like 
JfBD in Num. x. 2, and IBDO in Num. xxiii. 10, unless, indeed, 
the reading here ahonld be "iBO 'd). The substantive clause is 
preferred to the verbal clause \PiP), for the sake of the anti- 
thetical consonance of Wfe'D with D«o. It is also «[uite in 
accordance with Hebrew Bynt&x, that an address which com- 
mences with *2 IP* should here lose itself in the second sentence 
" in the twilight," as Ewald e:q>resseB it (§ 351, c), of a snb- 
stantive clause. Knobel and others suppose the reproof to 
relate to dissatisfied JudEeans, who were secretly favourable to 
the enterprise of the two allied kings. But there is no further 
evidence that there were such persons ; and ver. 8 is opposed 
to this interpretation. The overflowing of the Assyrian forces 
would fall first of all upon Ephraim. The threat of punish- 
ment is introduced with p7\, the Vav being the sign of sequence 
(Ewald, § 348, b). The words "the king of Asshor" are the 
prophet's own gloss, as in ch. vii. 17, 20. 

Not till then would this overflowing reach as far as Judah, 
but then it would do so most certainly and incessantly. Yer. & 
"And presses foneard wto Judah, overflows and pours onward, 
till it reaches to the neck, and the spreading out of its wings Jill 
the breadth of thy land, Jmmanuel." The fate of Judah would 
be different from that of Ephraim. Ephraim would be laid 
completely under water by the river, i.e. would be utterly 
destroyed. And in Judah the stream, aa it rushed forward, 
would reach the most dangerous height ; but if a deliverer 
could be found, there was still a possibility of its being saved. 
Sach a deliverer was Immannel, whom the prophet sees in the 
light of the Spirit living through all the Assyrian calamities. 
The prophet appeals complainingly to him that the land, which 
id his land, is almost swallowed up by ^e world-power : the 
spreadings out (muttoth, a Iicphat noun : for similar substantive 
forms, see ver. 28, ch. xiv. 6, xzix. 3, and more especially Ps. 



i.vV^-.OO^^lC 



234 THE PBOPEEOIES OF IH it lAR . 

bcTi. 11) of the wings of the stream (t.e. of the large bodies of 
water ponring out on both sides from the main stream, as from 
the tnmk, and covering the land like two broad wings) have filled 
the whole land. According to Norzi, TmTnanuil is to be writteD 
here as one word, as it is in ch, vii. 14 ; but the correct reading 
is 'Immdnu El, with mercha silluk (see note on ch. vii. 14), 
thongh it does not therefore cease to be a proper name. As 
Jerome observes, it is nomen proprium, non interpretatum ; and 
so it is rendered in the Sept., Meff fjft&v a Qeo^. 

The prophet's imploring look at Immanuel does not remain 
ananswered. We maysee this from the fact, that what was almost 
a silent {irajer is changed at once into the jubilate of holy de- 
fiance. — Vers. 9, 10. " Exasperate yourselves, nations, and go 
topieces; andseeit,all who are far off in tfi£ earth! Girdyoiir- 
sehea, and go to pieces; gird yourselves, and go topiecesl Consult 
counsel, and it comes to nougltt; speak the Kord, and it is twt 
realized: for with us is God," The second imperatives in ver. 9 
are threatening words of authority, having a future significa^ 
tion, which change into futures in ver, 10 (Ges. § 130, 2) : Go 
on exasperating yourselves (W^ with the tone npon the penul- 
timate, and therefore not the pual of rrin, consociari, which is 
the rendering adopted in the Targom, but the kal of V^n, malum 
esse ; not vociferari, for which I'Vi, a different verb from the 
same root, is commonly employed), go on arming ; ye wUl never- 
theless fall to pieces (chsttu, from ehdthath, related to cdthath, 
confringi, eonatemart). The prophet classes together all the 
nations that are warring against the people of G-od, pronounces 
npon them the sentence of destruction, and calls upon all distant 
lands to hear this ultimate fate of the kingdom of the world, Le. of 
the imperial power. The world-Jungdom must be wrecked on the 
land of Immanuel; "for with us" as the watchword of believers 
rons, pointing to the person of the Saviour, "with u» is God." 

There then follows in ver. 11 an explanatory clause, which 
seems at first sight to pass on to a totally difFerent theme, but 
it really stands in the closest connection with the triumphant 
words of vers. 9, 10. It ia Immannel whom believers receive, 
constitute, and hold fast as their refuge in the approaching 
times of the Assyrian judgment. He is their refuge and God 
in Him, and not any human support whatever. This is the 
link of (wnnection with vers. 11^ 12 : " For Je/ureah hath (po/ten 



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CHAP. mi. II, 11 S35 

thu* to me, overpoweting me with Go<fl hand, and ia$trwting me 
not to waik in the way of thie people, raying. Call ye not con- 
apiraey all that this pe<^le calls compiracy ; and what ie feared 
by it, fear ye not, neith^ think ye dreadfuL" IJf?, " the hand," ia 
the absolute hand, which is no sooner laid apon a man than it 
OTerpowers all perception, sensation, and thoaght: citezkeuh 
hayyad (viz. 'dlai, npon me, Ezek. iii. 14) therefore describes 
a condition in which the hand of God was pnt forth' npon the 
prophet with peculiar force, as dis^goished from the more 
nsnal prophetic state, the effect of a peculiarly impressive and 
emergetic act of God. Lnther is wrong in following the Syriac, 
and adopting the rendering, " taking me by the hand ;" as che£- 
keUh points back to the kal (invaUscere), and not to the hiphil 
{apiprehendere). It is this circumstantial statement, which is 
continued in v'yiitereni (^"and itutmcting me"), and not the 
leading verb 'dmar (" he said") ; for the former is not the third 
pers. pret. piel, which would be v'yitserani, but the third pers. 
fut. kal, from the future form yiaaSr (Hos. x. 10, whereas 
the fut. piel is v'yaeaSr) ; and it is closely connected with 
ohexkath hayydd, according to the analogy of the change from 
.the participial and infinitire construction to the finite verb 
(Ges. S 132, Anm. 2). With this overpowering influence, and 
an instructive warning against going in the way of "this 
people," Jehovah spake to the prophet as follows. With regard 
to the substance of the following warning, the explanation that 
has been commonly adopted since the time of Jerome, viz. noli 
diiorum regvm timers eonjurationem (fear not the conspiracy of 
the two tdngs), is contrfu^ to the reading of the words. The 
warning runs thus : The prophet, and such as were on his side, 
were not to call that kesher which the great mass of the people 
called kesher (cf. 8 Chron. zxiii. 13, " She said, Treason, Trea- 
son !" kesher, kesher) ; yet the alliance of Eezin and Pekah was 
really a conspiracy — a league against the house and people of 
David. Nor can the warning mean that believers, when th^ 
saw how the unbelieving Ahaz brought the nation into distress, 
were not to join in a conspiracy against the person of the king 
(Hofnumn, Drechsler) ; they are not warned at all against 
making a conspiracy, but against joining in the popular cry 
when the people called out kesher. The true explanation has 
t>een given by Boorda, viz. that the reference is to the conspi- 



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286 THE PBOPHECIES OF I8UAH. 

racy, u it was called, of the prapliet and liis disciples (" U!nn» 
He ett de eanjuraiUmef guts dieebatur propheta et ditcipuUtnim 
ejut'^. The Bame thing happened to Isaiah as to Amos (Amoa 
vii. 10) and to Jeremiah. Whenerer the prophets were at all 
zealous in their opposition to the appeal for foreign aid, the^ 
were accused and branded as standing in the service of the 
enemy, and conspiring for the oTertfarow of the kingdom. In 
5nch pervernoa of language as this, the honoarahle among them 
were not to join. The way of God was now a very different 
one from the way of that people. If the prophet and bis 
followers opposed the alliance with Asshnr, Uiis was not a 
common human conspiracy against the will of the king and 
nation, bat the inspiration of God, the true policy of Jehovah. 
Whoever trusted in Him had no need to be afnud of such 
attempts as those of Kezin and Pekah, or to look upon them 
as dreadful. 

The object of their fear was a very different one. Vers. 
13-15. ''Jehovah of hoatSy sanctify Him; and let Him be 
your fear, and let Him be jrowr terror. So will He become a 
Manctuary, but a stone of gtumbUng and a rock of offence (yexa- 
Hon) to both the houeee of Israel, a mare and trap to the uthabit- 
ante of Jerutalem. And many among them ehall stumble, and 
shall fall; and be dashed to pieces, and be snared and taken!* 
The logical apodosis to ver. 13 commences with v'hdydh (so 
shall He be). If ye actually acknowledge Jehovah the Holy 
One as the Holy One {hikduli, as in ch. zxix. 23), and if 
it is He whom ye fear, and who fiUa yoo with dread (ma'arUz, 
nsed for the object of dread, as morah is for the object of fear ; 
hence "that which terrifies" in a causative sense), He will 
become a miMdsh. The word miiddsh may indeed denote the 
object sanctified, and so Knobel understands it here according 
to Num. xviii. 29 ; but if we adhere to the strict noUon of the 
word, this gives an onmeaning apodous. MOddsk generally 
means the sanctified place or sanctuary, with which the idea 
of an asylum would easily assoeiate itself, since even among 
the Israelites the temple was regarded and respected as an 
asylum (1 Kings L 50, ii. 28). This is the ^cplanation whidi 
most of the commentators have adopted here ; and the punc- 
tnatoTB also took it iu the same sense, when they divided the two 
halves of ver. 14 by athnach as sntttheticaL And miiddsh is 



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OHAP. vni. 1ft S37 

reallj to be taken in liiis sense, altfaongli it cannot be exactly 
rendered '* asylum," Bioce this would improperly limit the mean- 
ing of the word. The temple waa not only a place of sheher, 
but alto of grace, blessing, and peace. All who sanctified the 
Lord of lords He snrroimded like temple walls ; hid them in 
Himself, whilst death and tribnlation reigned without, and 
comforted, fed, and blessed them in His own gracious fellowship. 
This is the true explanation of ^hdydk I'wikddsh, ac63rding to 
saeh passages as ch. iv. 5, 6, Ps. xxvii, 5, xud. 21. To the 
two booses of Israel, on the contrary, i.e. to the great mass 
of the people of both- kingdoms who neither sanctified nor feared 
Jehovah, He would be a rock and snare. The synonyms are 
intentionally heaped together (cf. ch. xxviii. l3), to produce 
the fearful impression of deatL occurring in many forms, bat 
all inevitable. The first three verbs of ver. 15 refer to the 
**Btone" Qeheii) and "rock" (tzilr); the last two to the "snare" 
(pacA), and "trap" or springe {mokitk)} All who did not 
give glory to Jehovah would be dashed to pieces upon His work 
as upon a stone, and caught therein as in a trap. This was the 
burden of the divine warning, which die prophet heard for 
himself and for those that believed. 

The words that follow in ver. 16, "Sind t^ ths testimony, 
teal the lesson in my tUaciplet," appear at first eight to be a 
command of God to the prophet, according to such parallel 
passages as Dan. xiL 4, 9, Kev. xxii. 10, cf. Dan. viii. 36; 
but with this explanation it is impossible to do justice to the 
words " in my disciples" (fi'limmuddt). The explanation given 
by Itosenmuller, Knobel, and others, viz. " by bringing in men 
divinely instnicted" (odAtbitia viris pits et Bapieniibua), is gram- 
matically inadmissible. Consequently I agree with Vitringa, 
Drechsler, and others, in regarding ver. 16 as the prophet's 
own prayer to Jehovah. We (te together (riX, imperf. "rtx = 
l\t) what we wish to keep from getting separated and lost; 
we tetd {ehdiham) what is to be kept secret, and only opened 
by a person duly qualified. And so the prophet here prays 
diat Jehovah would take his testimony with regard to the 

^Halbim olxerrGBqiute correctly, that " tlie pocA catches, bnt does not 
hurt ; the molcesh cabbies and hurta {e.g. by Beizing the legs or noae, Job 
xl. 24) : tlie former ui a mmple uiate (or net), the latter a springe, or Bnara 
which catches by means of a spring " (Amos iii. S). 



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238 THE PBOPHEOtES OF I8AUH: 

fatnre, and his inBtructioii, whicli was designed to prefKiie for 
this fatare, — that testimony/ and thorah which the great mass in 
their hardness did not understand, and in their self-hardening 
despised, — and lay them up well secured and well preserved, as 
if by band and seal, in the hearts of those who receiyed the 
prophet's words with believing obedience (limmGd, as in cfa. 
1. 4, liv. 18). For it would be all over with Israel, nnless a 
comnnmity of believers should be preserved, and all over with 
this community, if the word of Qod, which was the ground' of 
their life, shonld be allowed to slip from their hearts. We 
have here an announcement of the grand idea, which the second 
part of the book of Istuah carries oat in the grandest style. 
It is very evident that it is the prophet himself who is speaking 
here, as we may see from ver. 17, where he continues to speak 
in the first person, though he does not be^n with *^M\, 

Whilst offering this prayer, and looking for its fulfilment, 
he valts upon Jehovah. Ver. 17. " And I vmt upon Jehovah, 
who hides His face before the house of Jacob, and hope for Htm" 
A time of judgment had now commenced, which would still 
last a long time ; but the word of Qod was the pledge of Israel's 
continaance in the midst of it, and of the renewal of Israel's 
glory afterwards. The prophet would therefore hope for the 
grace which was now hidden behind the wrath. 

His home was the future, and to this he was subservient, 
even with all his honse. Yer. 18. '^Behold, land the chUt^-en 
which Jehovah hath given me for tigna and types in Israel, from 
Jehovah of hosts, who dteelleth upon Mount Zion." He pre- 
sents himself to the Lord with hie children, puts himself and 
them into His hands. They were Jehovah's gift, and that fw 
a higher purpose than every-day family enjoyment. They 
subserved the purpose of signs and types in connection with 
the history of salvation, " Signs and types :" 'oth (sign) was an 
omen or prognostic (tr>}fieiov) in word and deed, which pointed 
to and was the pledge of something future (whether it were 
in itself miraculous or natural) ; mopJteth was either something 
miraculous (ripat) pointing back to a supernatural cause, or a 
type (twtto^, prodigium ^ porridigium) which pointed beyond 
itself to something future and concealed, literally twisted round, 
i.e. out of the ordinary course, paradoxical, striking, standing 
out (Arab, aft, ift, res mira, Seivov Tt), from riDK (related to ^sn 



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OEAF. vm. u. 239 

^13K) ^ l^t^, ]ike ^P^ ^ *^D(to, His cbildren were signs and 
enigmatical symbols of the fatore, and that from Jehovah of 
hosts who dwelt on Zion. In accordance with His counsel (to 
which the ^P in 0^ points), He had selected these mgns and 
types : He who could bring to pass the fntore, which they set 
forth, as sorely as He was Jehovah of hosts, and who would 
bring it to pass as surely as He jiad chosen Mount Zion for 
the scene of His gracious presence upon earth. Sbear-yashnb 
and Mahershalal were indeed no less symbols of future wrath 
than of future grace ; bat the name of the father ( YethdyShu) 
was an assmwice that all the future would issue from Jehovah's 
salvation, and end in the same. Isaiah and his cbildren were 
figures and emblems of redemption, opening a way for itself 
through judgment. The Epistle to the Hebrews (ch. ii. 13) 
quotes these words as the distinct words of Jesus, because the 
spirit of Jesus was in Isaiah, — the spirit of Jesus, which in the 
midst of this boly famUy, bound together as it was only by the 
bands of " the shadow," pointed forward to that church of the 
New Testament which would be bound together by the bands 
of the true substance. Isaiah, his children, and his wife, who 
is called " the prophetess" (neh^ah) not only because she was 
the wife of the prophet but becanse she herself possessed the 
gift of prophecy, and all the believing disciples gathered round 
this family, — these together formed the stock of the church of 
the Messianic future, on the foundation and soil of the existing 
maasa perdita of Israel. 

It is to this ecclesioUt in eeclesia that the prophet's admonition 
is addressed. Ver. 19. " And when they shall toy to you. In- 
quire of the necromanceri, and of the soothsayers that chirp and 
whisper: — Should not a people inquire of its God? for the living 
to the dead f" The appeal is supposed to be made by Jadieans 
of the existing stamp ; for we know from ch. ii. 6, iii. 2, 3, 
that all kinds of heathen superstitions had found their way 
into Jerusalem, and were practised there as a trade. The 
persons into whose months the answer is put by the prophet 
(we may supply before ver. 19J, " Thus shall ye say to them;" 
cf. Jer. X. 11), are bis own cbildren and disciples. The cir- 
cumstances of the times were very critical; and the people 
were applying to vrizards to throw light upon the dark future. 
' Ob signified primarily the spirit of witchcraft, then the posses- 



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240 THE PBOPHBCIBS OF ISAUB. 

8or of such a ipirit (eqatvalent to Baal oh), more especially the 
necromancer. Ytdd'oni, on the other hand, signified primarily 
tlie possessor of a prophesying or soothsaying spirit {viGav or 
wevfia Tov mJ^two?), Syr. yodua (after the intensive form 
pd'id with immutable vowela), and then the soothsaying spirit 
itself (Lev. xs. 27), which was properly called yiddam (the 
tnnch knowing), like Balftav, which, according to Plato, is 
eqaivalent to Baij/Miav. These peopl^ who are designated by 
the LXX., both here and elsewhere, as iyyaarpofLvGot, Le. 
Tentriloquista, imitated the chirping of bats, which was snp- 
posed to proceed from the shades of Hades, and nttered their 
magical formulas in a whispering tone.^ What an onufUaral 
thing, for the people of Jehorah to go and inquire, not of 
their own God, but of aneh heathenish and demoniacal deceiren 
and victims as these (ddraah 'el, to go and inquire of a person, 
ch. xi. 10, synonymons with thd'al b', 1 Sam. xxviii. 6) 1 What 
blindness, to consult the dead in the interests of the living I 
By "^ dead" (kammBthirri) we are not to understand "the 
idols" in this passage, as in Ps. cvi. 28, but the departed, as 
Dent, xviii. 11 (cf. 1 Sam xxviii.) clearly proves ; and 1?3 is 
not to be taken, either here or elsewhere, aa equivalent to 
taeha^ (" instead of '^, as Knobel supposes, bnt, as in Jer. zzi. 2 
and other passages, as signifying " for the benefit of." Necro- 
mancy, which makes the dead the instructors of the living, is 
a most gloomy deception. 

In opposition to such a falling away to wretched supersti- 
tion, the watchword of the prophet and bis supporters is this. 
VflT. 20. " To the teaching of God {thorah, Gotteslekre), and to the 

> The Hiebnali Smiedrin 66a gives this definition : " Baal 'o6 ia a pTthon, 
i.e. a aooiba&jta ('with a >iurit of divination'), irho speaks from his 
onu-iut ; yiddoM, a man who speaks with his month." The boat oh, so br 
aa he had to do with the boon of the dead, is called in the Talmud 'oM* 
tenutyya', e.g. the witch of Eodor (J>. Sabbath 1526). On the historj of the 
etjnnological ezpknadon of the word, see Botteher, de in/era, S 206-317. 
If 'ob, a akin or leather bottle, is a word from the same root (rendered 
" beUows" by the LXX at Job xsxiL 19), as it appareDtly is, it may be 
applied to aboUle as a thing which swdls or can be bbwn out, and to a 
wizard or spiit of incantation on account of his pnffing and gupiag. Tb* 
explanation " U remnant," from 31K — Arab. 6ba, to retom, has caJy a 
very weak support in the proper name nVK = avv6b (the penitent, tetutu- 
ing agiun and again to Qod : we again at ch. mii, 4). 



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CHAP, vni vy-a. 241 

tesHnumtf J If they do not accord with this word, they are a 
people for whom no morning daxonB." The summons, " to the 
teaching and to the testhnony" (namely, to those which Jehovah 
gave throagh His prophet, ver. 17), takes the form of a watch- 
word in time of hattle (Jndg. vii. 18). With this construction 
the following Km» (which Knobel anderstands interroga- 
tivelj, " Should not they speak so, vho, etc. t " and Luzzatto 
as an oath, aa in Ps. cxxxi. 2, " Sorely they say such words as 
have no dawn in them") has, at any rate, all the presumption 
of a conditional signification. Whoever had not this watch- 
word would be regarded as the enemy of Jehovah, and suffer 
the fate of snch a man. This is, to all appearance, the meaning 
of the apodosis in?* 17T*K 1E*8, Luther has given the meaning 
correctly, "If they do not say this, they will not have the 
morning dawn ;" or, according to his earlier and equally good 
rendering "They shall never overtake the morning light," 
literally, " They are those to whom no dawn arises," The use 
of &e plural in the hypothetical protasis, and the singular in 
the apodosis, is an intentional and significant change. All the 
several individuals who did not adhere to the revelation m&de 
by Jehovah through His prophet, formed one corrupt mass, 
which would remain in hopeless darkness, ic^ is used in the 
same sense as in ch. v. 28 and 2 Sam. ii. 4, and possibly also 
as in 1 Sam. zv. 20, instead of the more usual 'S, when used 
in the affirmative sense which springs in both particles out of 
the confirmative {namqxu and qwmiam) : Truly they have no 
morning dawn to expect.^ 

The night of despair to which the unbelieving nation wonid 
he brought, is described in vers. 21, 22: "And it goa about 
t/ierein hard pressed and hungry : and it comes to pats, when 
hunger befals it, it frets itself, and curses by its Hng and by 
its God, and turns its face upward, and looks to the earth, 
and behold distress and darkness, benighting with anguish, and 
titruat out into darkness." The singulars attach themselves 
to the \'? in ver. 19, which embraces all tlie unbelievers in one 
, mass ; " therein" {b&h) refers to the self-evident land (eretz). 
The people would be brought to snch a plight in the approach- 
ing Assyrian oppressions, that they would wander about in the 
I Strangely enongb, vcn. 19 and 20 axe described in Lev. Raiba, ch. 
XV., »a mods of the prophet Hoses incorporated in the bo(A of luiah. 
YOi:» I. Q 



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242 THE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

laod pressed down hy their hard fate (nihheK) and hnnj^ 
{r&^eh), became all provisions wonld be gone and the fields 
and vineyards wonld be laid waste. As often as it experienced 
hunger afresh, it would work itself into a rage {vhithkazzaph 
with Vav apod, BnApathach, according to Ges. § 54, Autn,), and 
curse by its king and Ood, i.e. by its idol. This is the way in 
which we must explain the passage, in accordance with 1 Sam. 
xiv. 43, where Hllel bBloMm is equivalent to kilUl b'thgrn elo- 
him, and with Zeph. i. 5, where a distinction is made between 
an oath layehovdk, and an oath h'malcdm ; if we would adhere 
to the usage of the language, in which we never find a 3 7?p 
corresponding to the Latin execrari in aliquem (Ges.), but 
on the contrary the object cursed is always expressed in the 
accusative. We must therefore give np Ps. v. 3 and bcviii. 25 
as parallels to b'malco and heloltdiv: they curse by the idol, 
which passes with them for both king and God, curse their 
wretched fate with this as they suppose the most efFectual 
curse of all, without discerning in it the just punishment of 
their own apostasy, and bumbling themselves penitentially 
under the almighty hand of Jehovah. Consequently all this 
reaction of their wrath would avail them nothing : whether 
they turned upwards, to see if the black sky were not clearing 
or looked down te the earth, everywhere there would meet 
them nothing but distress and darkness, nothing but a night 
of anguish all around (me'upk zukdJi is a kind of sammary ; 
m^Qph a complete veiling, or eclipse, written with & instead 
of the more usual 6 of this substantive form : Ewald, § 160, a). 
The judgment of God does not convert them, but only 
heightens their wickedness ; just as in Rev. xvi. 11, 21, after 
the pouring out of the fifth and seventh vials of wrath, men 
only utter blasphemies, and do not desist from their works. 
After stating what the people see, whether thej turn their eyes 
upwards or downwards, the closing participial clause of ver. 22 
describes how they see themselves "thrust out into darkness" 
(tn caliginem propitlsum). There is no necessity to supply 
tnn ; but out of the previous hinnSh it is easy to repeat kinno 
or hirmstinu («n ip»um). " Into darkneBi :" 'OpMidh (acc. loei) 
is placed emphatically at the bead, as in Jer. xxiii. 12. 

After the prophet has thns depicted the people as without 
morning dawn, he gjves the reason for the assumption that a 



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CHAP. IX L 243 

restoraUon of light is to be expected, althongh not for the exist- 
ing genemtioii. Ch. ix. 1. " For ii does not remain dark where 
there is noxo distress : in the firtt time He brought into disgrace 
the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, and in the last He 
brings to honour the road by the aea, the other side of Jordan, the 
circle of the Gentiles." ^? is neither to be taken rs equivalent to 
the untranslatable ort recitativum (Knobel), nor is there &ny 
necessity to translate it " bnt" or " nevertheless," and snpply 
the cl&us^ *' it will not remain so." The reason assigned for 
the fact that the unbelieving people of Judah had fallen into 
a night without morning is, that there was a morning coming, 
whose light, however, wonld not rise upon the land of Jadah 
first, bnt upon other parts of the land. Mu'dph and mOz^ are 
hophal nouns : a state of darkness and distress. The meaning 
is. There is not, i.e. there will not remun, a state of darkness over 
the land (Idh, like bak in viii. 21, refers to 'eretz), which is now 
in a state of distress ; bat those very districts which God has 
hitherto caused to suffer deep humiliation He will bring to 
booour by and by (hekal= hekel, according to Ges. § 67, Anm, 3, 
opp. hicl^ as in ch. zxiii. 9). The height of the glorification 
wonld correspond to the depth of the disgrace. We cannot 
adopt Knobel's rendering, *' as at a former time," etc., taking 
n? as an accusative of time and 3 as equivalent to ^^'tta, for 
S is never used conjunctionally in this way (see Psalter, i. 301, 
and ii. 514) ; and in the examples adduced by Knobel (viz. 
ch. bd. 11 and Job vii. 2), the verbal clauses after Caph are 
elliptical relative clanses. The rendering adopted by Eosen- 
miiller and others (^stcut tempus prius vilem reddidit, etc., " as a 
former time brought it into contempt") is equally wrong. And 
Ewald, again, is not correct in taking the Vao in v'hd-achardn 
as the Vav of sequence used in the place of the cSn of com- 
parison, l^l^.n nys and pnttn are both definitions of time. 
The prophet intentionally indicates the time of disgrace witli 3, 
because this would extend over a lengthened period, in which 
the same fate wonld occur again and again. The time of glori' 
fication, on the other hand, is indicated by the accvt. temporis, 
because it would occur but once, and then continue in per^ 
petuity and without change. It is certainly possible that the 
prophet may have regarded hd-acharOn as the subject ; but this 
would destroy -the harmony of the antithesis. 3y the laud or 



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244 TEE FBOFBBCIES OF KAIAIL 

territory of Naphtali (^arlzdh, poet, for 'eretz, as in Job xxsiv. 
13, zxxvii. 12, witit a toneless ak) we are to understand the 
upper Galilee of later times,, and hj the land of Zebalnn lower 
Galilee. In the antithetical parallel clause, what is meant l^ 
the two lands is distinctly spedfied : (1) '* the road by the sea," 
derek hatfydm, the tract of land on the western shore of the sea of 
Ohinnereth ; (2) " the other side of Jordan," 'eber hayyarden, 
the country to the east of the Jordan ; (3) *' the circle of the 
Gentiles," ge}il ' haggOyim, the northernmost border-land of 
Palestine, only a portion, of the so-called Galileeaoi after times. 
Ever since the timea of the judges, all these lands had been 
e:iposed, on account of thecoontnea that joined them, to corrup- 
tion from Gentile influence and subjugation by heathen foes. 
The northern tribes on this side, as well as those on the other 
aide, suffered the most in the almost incessant war between 
Israel and the Syrians, and afterwards between Israel and 
the As^^ans ; and the transportation of tJieir inhabitants, 
which continued under Pul, Tiglath-pil^er, and Shalmanassar, 
amounted at last to utter depopulation (Caspari, Beitr. 116-118). 
But these countries would be the very first that would be 
remembered when that morning dawn of glory should break. 
Matthew informs us (ch. iv. 13 sqq.) in what way this was ful- 
filled at the commencement of the Christian times. On the 
ground of this prophecy of Isaiah, and not of a " somewhat 
mistaken exposition of it," as Benan maintains inhis Vie d«Je»w 
(ch. xiii.), the Messianic hopes of the Jewish nation were really 
directed towards Grelilee.^ It is true that^ according to Jerome, 
in he., the Nazarenes supposed ch. ix. 16 to refer to the light of 
the gospel spread by the preaching of Paul in terminos gentitan 
et viam universi marU. But " the sea" {hat/yam) cannot pos- 
sibly be understood as referring to the Mediterranean, as Meier 
and Hofmann suppose, for " the way of the sea" {derek hayyavi) 
would in that case have been inhabited by the Philistines and 
Phoaniclans; whereas the prophet's intention was evidently to 
mention such Israelitish provinces as had suffered the greater 
afiSiction and degradation. 

< The Zohar -was not the firet to teftch that the Meedsh wonid appear in 
GsHlee, snd that ledemptioiL would break forth from Tiherias ; but this is 
found in the Talmod aad Uidraah (see LitlerattiT-blia da Orient*, 1848, 
Cd. 7J6>. 



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The range of vision is first widened in yer. 2 : " The ptopU 
that viali about in darkness see a great light; Hiey who dwell m 
the land of the shadow of death, upon them a light shines." 
The range of vision is here extended ; not to the Gentiles, how- 
ever, bat to nil Israel. ^Solvation would not break forth till it 
had become utterly dark along the horizon of Israel, according 
to the descr^tion in ch. t. 30, i.e. till the land of Jehovah had 
become a land of the shadow of death on account of the apos- 
taay of its inhabitants from Jehovah {zahndveth is modified, after 
the manner of a composite oonn, from zalmuth, according to 
the form iadrOth, and is derived from iht, M£ii.. eaUmOf Arab. 
zaUma, to be dark).' The apostate mass of the nation is to be 
regarded as already swept away ; for if death has cast its 
shadow over the land, it mnst be utterly desolate. In thb 
state of things the remnant left in the land beholds a great 
light, which breaks through the sky that has been hitherto 
covered with blackness. The people, who turned their eyes 
upwards to no pw^se, because they did so with cursing (ch. 
viiL 21), are now no more. It is the rannant of Israel which 
Bees this light of spiritual and material redemption arise above 
its head. In what this light would CDDsist the prophet states 
afterwards, when describing first the blessings and then the 
star of the new time. 

In var. 3 he says, in words of thanks^ving and praise : 
" TTiOU multipliest the norion, preparest it great joy ; they rejoice 
before Thee like the jot/ in harveat, as men rejoice when (key share 
the spoil" "The nation" (haggoi) is nndoubtedly Israel, re- 
duced to a small remnant. That God would make this again 
into a nomeroos people, was a leading feature in the pictures 
drawn of the time of glory (ch. xxvi. 15, Ixvi. 8 ; Zech. 
siv, 10, 11), which would be in this respect the counterpart of 
that of Solomon (1 Kings iv. 20). If our explanation is the 
correct one so far, the only way to give an intelligible meaning 
* He Bhadcrw OT shade, sH, Arab, all (radiciUy rdftted to taU = 'jq, dew), 
dmved its nune ab obtegendo, and acoording to the idea attached to it at 
the opposite of heat or oi light, vae uaed as a Ggare of a beneficent shelter 
(cIl zri. 8), or of what was dark and horrible (cf. Targ. taU&ni, a night- 
demon). The verb xSlam, in the eense of the Arabic zalima, bears the 
aame relatioii to 2&lal ea hSham to bSMh (Gen. p. 9S), 'droni, to be naked, 
to 'drdA (/uAunin, p. 159). The noon ^e2en^ however, is dtherformedfrom 
tliia xalaot, or elw diiectlf from zel, vitli the sabstantiTe tenninatioti em. 



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246 THE PBOPHEOIEfi OF ISAIAH. 

to the ehelhib tA, taking it in a negative sense, is to render It, 
as Hengstenberg, Hitzig, and others have done, " Thou multi- 
pliest the nation to which Thou liadst formerly not given great 
joy," which must signify, per Htoten, " the nation which Thoa 
hadst plunged into deep sorrow." Bnt it is unnatural to take 
any one of the prophetic preterites, commencing with Mclnd in 
vei. 1, in any other than a future sense. We must therefore 
give the preference to the keri 'h^ and render it, " Thou makest 
of the natioq a great multitude, and preparest it greatjoy." 
The pronoun to ia written first, as in Lev. vii. 7-9, Job xli. 4 
(ieri), probably with the emphasis assumed by Drechsler : *' to 
it, in which there was not the smallest indication of such an 
issue as this." The verbs "multiplied" (kigdattd) and "in- 
creased" (hirbitha) are intentionally written together, to put 
the intensity of the joy on a level- with the eztensiveness of 
the multitude. This joy would be a holy joy, as the ex- 
pression " before Thee " implies : the expression itself recab 
the sacrificial meals in the courts of the temple (Beut. xii. 7, 
xiv. 26). It would be a joy over blessings received, as the 
figure of the harvest indicates ; and joy over evil averted, as 
the figure of dividing the spoil presupposes : for the division 
of booty is the business of conquerors. This second figure is 
not merely a figure : the people that are so joyous are really 
victorious and triumphant. Ver. 4. *' For the yoke of it$ 
burden and the stick of it» neci, the stick of its oppressor, Thou 
hast broken to splinters, as in the day of Midian." The suffixes 
refer to the people (hd'dm). Instead of soblo, from sSbel, we 
have intentionally the more musical form VZO (with dagesh 
dirimens and chateph kametz under the influence of the previous 
« instead of the simple sheva). The rhythm of the verso b 
anapsstic. "Its burden" (^suhbdlo) and "its oppressor" (nogBs 
bo) both recal to mind the Egyptian bondage (Ex. ii.'ll, v. 6). 
The future deliverance, which the prophet here celebrates, 
would be the counterpart of the Egyptian. Bnt as the whole 
of the great nation of Israel was then redeemed, whereas only 
B small remnant would participate in the final redemption, he 
compares it to the day of Midian, when Gideon broke the seven 
years' dominion of Midian, not with a great army, but with a 
I On the pasBages in wbich ei^ cheMb is \^ keri, see at Ps. o. S md 



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CHAP. IX 5. 247 

handful of resolnte warriors, strong in the Lord (Judg. vii.). 
The question suggests itself here, Who is the hero, Gideon's 
antitype, through whom all this la to occur t The prophet 
does not say ; but building up one clause upon another with 
*3, he gives first of all the reason for the cessation of the 
oppressive dominion of the imperial power, — namely, the de- 
struction of all the military stores of the enemy. — Ver. 5. " For 
every hoot of those who tramp with boots in the tumult of battle, 
and cloak rolled in blood, shall be for burning, a food of fre." 
That which is the food of fire becomes at the same time a 
terlphdh, inasmuch as the devouring fire reduces it to ashes,' 
and destroys its previous existence. This closing statement 
requires for tVS the concrete sense of & combustible thing; and 
this precludes such meanings as business {Handel und Wandet), 
noise, or din (=I^etC', Jerome, Syriac, Kashi, and others). On 
the other hand, the meaning " military equipment," adopted 
by Knobel and others, — a meaning derived from a comparison 
of the derivatives of the Aranisean inn, &zan, and the Arabic 
z&noj fut. yeztn (to dress or equip), — would be quite admissible; 
at the same time, the interchange of Satnech and Zain in this 
word cannot be dialectically established. Jos. Kimchi has very 
properly referred to the Targum sSn, mesdn (Syr. also sdun 
with an essentially long a), which signifies shoe (see Bynseus, 
de calceo Hebraorwm), — a word which is more Aramfean than 
Hebrew, and the use of which in the present connection might 
be explained on the ground that the prophet had in his mind 
the annihilation of the Assyrian forces. We should no doubt 
expect sd'un (sandaloumenos) instead of aifsn ; bat the denom. 
verb jd'dn might be applied to a soldier's coming up in military 
boots, and so signify caligatum venire, although the primary 
meaning is certainly calceare ee {e.g. Eph. vi. 15, Syr.). Ac- 
cordingly we should render it, " every boot of him who comes 
booted (des Einherstiefelnden) into the tumult of battle," taking 
the word raash, not as Drechsler does, in the sense of the 
noise made by a warrior coming np proudly in his war-boots, 
nor with Luzzatto in the sense of the war-boot itself, for which 
the word is too strong, but as referring to the noise or tumult of 
battle (as in Jer. x. 22), in the midst of which the man comes 
up eqmpped or shod for military service. The prophet names 
the boot and garment with an obvions purpose. The destruction 



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as THE FBOPBECIES OF ISAUH. 

of the bostile weapons follows as a matter of course, if evea tlie 
' military shoes, worn by tW soldiers in the enemies' ranks, and 
the militaiy cloaks that were lying in ddmim, t^. in blood vio- 
lently ehed upon the battle-field, were all given up to the Bre. 

TJpOD the two sentences with ci the prophet now builds a 
third. The reason for the triumph is the deliverance effected ; 
and the reason for the deliverance, the destruction of the foe; 
and the reason for all the joy, all the freedom, all the peace, is 
the new great King. — Ver. 6. '^For unto us a child w bom, unto 
vt a ion ie given ; and the government rests upon His shoulder .* 
and they call His name, Wonder, Counsellor, mighty God, 
Eternal-Father, Prince of Peace." The same person whom the 
prophet foretold in ch. vii. as the bod of the virgin who would 
come to maturity in troublous times, he here sees aa bom, and 
as having already taken possession of the government. There 
he appeared as a sign, here as a gift of grace. The prophet 
does not expressly say that he is a son of David in this 
instance any more than in ch. vii. (for the remaric that has 
been recently made, that yeled is used here for " infant-prince," 
is absurd) ; but this followed as a matter of course, froni tho 
fact that he was to bear the government, with all its official 
rights (ch. xxii. 22) and godlike majesty (Ps. xxi. 6), upon his 
shoulder; for the inviolable promise of eternal sovereignty, of 
which the new-born infant was to be the glorious fulfilment 
had been bound up with the seed of David in the course of 
Israel's history ever since the declaration in 2 Sam. vii. la 
ch. vii. it is the mother who names the child ; here it is the 
people, or indeed any one who rejoices in him : f^J>'!\, " one 
calls, they call, he is called," as Luther has correctly rendered 
it, though under the mistaken idea that the Jews had altered 
the original f^J^?! into ^^1% for the purpose of eliminating 
the Messi^ic sense of the passage. But tlie active verb 
itself ha^ really been twisted by Jewish commentators in this 
way; so that Rashi, Kimchi, Malbim, and others follow the 
Targum, and explain the passage as meaning, " the God, who 
is called and is Wonder, Counsellor, the mighty God, the 
eternal Father, calls his name the Prince of Peace;" but 
this rendering evidently tears asunder things that are closely 
connected. And Lozzatto has justly observed, that you do not 
expect to find attributes of God here, but such as would be 



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CHAP. a. *. 249 

characteristic of the child. He therefore renders the passage, 
" Qod the mighty, the eternal Father, the Prince of Peace, 
resolves upon vonderfnl things," and persuades himself that 
this long clause is meant for the proper name of the child, 
jast as in other cases declaratory clauses are made into proper 
names, e.ff. the names of the prophet's two sons. But even 
granting that such a sesqaipedalian name were possible, in what 
an nnskilf ul manner would the name be formed, since the long- 
winded clause, which vroold necessarily hare to be uttered in 
one breath, would resolve itself again into separate clauses, 
which are not only names themselves, but, contrary to all expec- 
tation, names of God I The motive which prompted Lnzzatto 
to adopt this original interpretation is worthy of notice. He 
had formerly endeavoured, like other commentators, to e^Iiun 
the passage by taking the words from " Wonderful " to *' Prince 
of Peace " as the name of the child ; and in doing this he 
rendered Yff tix " one counselling wonderful tUngs," thus 
inverting the object, and regarded " mighty God" as well as 
"eternal Father" as hyperbolical expressions, like the words 
applied io the Kjng in Ps. xlv. la. But now he cannot help 
regarding it as absolutely impossible for a human child to be 
called el gibbor, like God Himself in ch. x. 31. So far as the 
relation between his novel attempt at exposition and the accen- 
■ tnation' is concerned, it certwnly does violence to this, though 
not to such an extent as the other specimen of exegetical leger- 
demain, which makes the clause from vha to im^tt the subject 
to Kip^. Nevertheless, in the face of the existing accentuation, 
we must admit that the latter is, comparatively speaking, the 
better of the two ; for if 1D» (rtp*l were intended to be the in- 
troduction to the list of names which follows, 'lE^ would not be 
pointed with geresh, but with zak^h. The accentuators seem 
also to have shrank from taking el gibbor as the name of a 
man. They insert intermediate points, as though "eternal 
Father, Prince of Peace," were the name of the child, and all 
that jffecedes, from " "Wonder " onwards, the name of God, who 
would call him by ^ese two honourable names. But^ at the 
very outset, it is improbable that there should be two names 
instead of one or more ; and it is impossible to conceive for what 
precise reason such a periphrastic descriptjon of God should be 
employed in connection with the naming of this child, as is 



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250 THE PBOFHECIBS OF I8AUH. 

not only altogether different from Isaiah's nsual custom, bat 
altogether nnparalleled in itself, especially without the definite 
article. The names of God should at least have been deSned 
thus, liaan W'n tos n?^'?, so as to distinguish them from the two 
names of the child. Even assuming, therefore, that the ac- 
centuation is meant to convey this sense, '* And the wonderful 
Counsellor, the mighty God, calls liis name Eternal-Father, 
Prince of Peace," as appears to be the case; we must necessarily 
reject it, as resting npon a miaunderatanding and misinterpreta- 
tion.^ We regard the whole, from nio onwards, — as the con- 
nection, the expression, and the syntax require, — as a dependent 
accusative predicate to IDE? Mlp^ (they call his name), which 
stands at the bead (compare tnp, they call, it is called, in Gen. 
xi. 9, xvi. 14, Josh. vii. 26, and above ch. viii. i, ttb", they 
will carry: Ges, § 137, 3). If it be urged, as an objection to 
the Messianic interpretation of cb. vii. 14, 15, that the Christ 
who appeared was not named Immanuel, but Jesus, this objec- 

• The ietisha in si's ia the HmallMt of all disjunctiTe •ccente; the 
geresk in iQtff separates rather more Htrongly than this ; the pashta in Yfff' 
Eeparat«e Bomewh&t more than the other two, but less tban the aikeph in 
-1)23 ; and this xakeph is the greatest divider in the sentence. The whole 
sentence, therefore, distribntes iteelf in the following manner : || \tyi^ ttlp^ 

aher^^ 1 ijnaK i;il niaa btt III ysv I t6si- All the wordB from nipi on- 
wardsare anbordinate to the laiepi attached to 113J, which is, to all appear- 
ance, intended to have the force of an introductory colon ; as, for examjde, 
in 2 Sam. xviii. 5 (in the case of "lON^ in the clause 'B"3K"n((l 3K1' 
1DK? TIKTlNl). In smaller subdivisions, again, KPB (_teluka) is connected 
witt )Tn' (pashta), and both together with iiaj im (munach xakepK). If 
onlj SOT Shalom (Prince of Peace) were intended as the name of the child, 
it would necesBarily be accentuated in the following manner : loB" Nip*! 
Icadraa geresh, yy\' txhs telisha gershayim, ■y\2i ?K ^tercha leUr, ^y 'a(t 
tifchah, Dl^Erib siUuh; and the principal disjunctive would stand at 1J( 
instead of 1133. But if the name of the child were intended to form a de- 
claratory clause, commencing with fyi' K?B, "determines wonderful thingB," 
as Luzzatto assumes, we should expect to find a stionger disjunctive than 
teUsha at k^E), tlie watchword of the whole ; and above all, we should 
expect a zakeph at vyff, and not at ~(Oi' This also applies to our (the 
ordinary) explanation. It does not correspond to the accentuation. The 
introductory words IDE' Rnpni ought to have a stronger distinctive accent, 
in order that all which follows might stand as the name which they intro- 
duce. Franeke (see PmlUr, ii. 621) perceived this, and in his Abysms 
mysceriorum Em (ix. 6) he lays great stress upon the fact, that God who 
gives tlie name has Himself a threefold name. 



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CHAP. IX. €. 251 

tion is sufficiently met by the fact that He did not receive as a 
proper name any one of the five names by which, according to 
this second prophecy, He was to be called. Moreover, this 
objection would apply quite as strongly to the notion, which 
has been a very favourite one with Jewish commentators (e.g. 
Kashi, A. E. Eimchi, Ahravanel, Malbim, Luzzatto, and 
others), and even with certain Christian commentators (such as 
GrotiuB, Gesenins, etc.), that the prophecy refers to Hezekiah, 
— a notion which is a disgrace to those who thereby lead both 
themselves and others astray. For even if the hopes held out 
in the prophecy were attached for a long time to Hezekiah, the 
mistake was but too quickly discovered ; whereas the commen- 
tators in question perpetuate the mistake, by forcing it upon the 
prophecy itself, although the prophet, even after the deception 
bad been outlived, not only did not suppress the prophecy, but 
handed it down to succeeding ages as awaiting a future and in- 
fallible fulfilment For the words in their strict meaning point 
to the Messiah, whom men may for a. time, with pardonable 
error, have hoped to find in Hezekiah, but whom, with un- 
pardonable error, men refused to acknowledge, even when He 
actually appeared in Jesus. The name Jesns is the combination 
of all the Old Testament titles used to designate the Coming 
One according to His nature and His works. The names con- 
tained in ch. vii. 14 and ix. 6 are not thereby suppressed ; but 
they have continued, from the time of Mary downwards, in the 
mouths of all believers. There is not one of these names under 
which worship and homage have not been paid to Him. But 
we never find them crowded together anywhere else, as we do 
here in Isaiah; and in this respect also our prophet proves 
himself the greatest of the Old Testament evangelists. The 
first name is l*?B, or perhaps more correctly N?B, which is not 
to be taken in connection with the next word, J^', though this 
construction might seem to commend itself in accordance with 
'^. "vPDj in ch. xxviii. 29. This is the way in which it has 
been taken by the Seventy and others (thus LXX., Bavfioarh'i 
ffv/t/SowXo? ; Theodoretf Oav/iOffT&t ^ov\ev6>v). If we adopted 
this explanation, we might regard ITi' tOS as an inverted form 
for »6ei )Tn' : counselling wonderful things. The possibility of 
such an inversion is apparent from ch. xxii. 2, fiKte niNl^, i.e. 
full of tumult. Or, following the analogy of per^ dddm (a wild 



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252 THE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

man) in Gen. xri. 12, we might regard it as a genitive con- 
struction ; a wonder of a counsellor ; in which case the disjunc- 
tive telishdh gedoWi in j>eW would have to be exchanged for 
a connecting makpack. Both combinations have their doubtful 
points, and, so far as the sense is concerned, would lead us 
rather to expect nsy iPpbo ; whereas there is nothing at all to 
prevent our taking vht and t^' as two separate names (not even 
the accentuation, which is witjiout parallel elsewhere, so far as 
the combination of paskta with teUshah is concerned, and there- 
fore altogether unique). Just as the angel of Jehovah, when 
asked by Manoah what was his name (Judg. xiii. 18), replied 
vB (wB), and indicated thereby his divine nature — a natnre 
incomprehensible to mortal men ; so here the God-given ruler 
is also pele', a phenomenon lying altogether beyond human 
conception or natural occurrence. Not only is this or that 
wond^ul in Him ; but He Himself is throughout a wimder — 
vapaho^atTfio^, as Symmachns renders it. The second name is 
ylfitz, counsellor, because, by virtue of the spirit of counsel 
which He possesses (ch. xi. 2), He can always discern and ^ve 
counsel for the good of His nation. There is no need for Him 
to surround Himself with counsellors ; but without receiving 
counsel at all, He counsels those that are without counsel, 
and is thus the end of all want of counsel to His nation as a 
whole.' The third name, Elgibbor, attributes divinity to Him. 
Not, indeed, if we render the words " Strength, Hero," as 
Lather does ; or " Hero of Strength," as Meier has done ; or 
"a God of a hero," as Hofraann proposes; or "Hero-God," tA 
one who fights and conquers like an invincible god, as Ewald 
does. But all these renderings, and others of a similar kind, 
founder, without needing any further refutation, on ch. x. 21, 
where He, to whom the remnant of Israel will turn with 
penitence, is called El gibbor (the mighty God). There is no 
reason why we should take El in this name of the Messiah in 
any other sense than in Immamt-El; not to mention the fact 
that El in Isaiah is always a name of God, and that the 
prophet was ever strongly conscious of the antithesis between 
El and dd&m, as ch. xxxi. 3 (cf. Hos. xi. 9) clearly shows. 
And finally, El gibbor was a traditional name of God, which 
occurs as early as Dent. x. 17, cf. Jer. xxsii. 18, Neh. ix. 32, 
Ps. xziv, 8, etc. The name gibbor is used here as an adjective, 



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CHAP. IX. (. S53 

Jike ehaddai in El shaddai. The Mesaiah, Aen, is here desig- 
nated " mighty God." Undoubtedly this appears to go beyond 
the limits of the Old Testament horizon ; bnt what if it should 
go beyond them T It stands written once for all, just as in 
Jer. xxiii. 6 Jelwvah 2tdienu (Jehovah our Kighteousness) 
is also used as a name of the Messiah, — a Messianic name, 
which even the synagogue cannot set aside (vid. Midrash 
Miekle 57a, where this is adduced as one of the eight names 
of the Messiah). Still we most not go too far. If we look at 
the spirit of the prophecy, the mystery of the incarnation of 
God is unquestionably indicated in such statements as these. 
But if we look at the consciousness of the prophet himself, 
nothing further was involved than this, that the Mesmh would 
be the image of God as no otlier man ever had been (cf. El, 
Ps. Ixxsii. 1), and that He would have God dwelling within 
Him (cf. Jer. xxsiii. 16). Who else should lead Israel to 
victory over the hostile world, than God the mighty! The 
Messiah is the corporeal presence of this mighty God ; for 
He is with Him, He is in Him, and in Him He is with Israel. 
The expression did not preclude the fact that the Messiah 
would be Gtod and man in one person ; but it did not pene- 
trate to this depth, so far as the Old Testament consciousness 
was concerned. The fourth name springs out of the third: 
1?^?K, eternal Father (not Booty Father, with which Hitzig 
and Knobel content themselves) ; for what is divine must be 
etemaL The title Eternal Father designates Him, however, 
not only as the possessor of eternity (Hengstenberg), but as 
the tender, f^thful, and wise trainer, guardian, and provider 
for His people even in eternity (ch. xxii. 21). He is eternal 
Father, as the eternal, loving King, according to the descrip- 
tion in Ps. Ixxii. Now, if He is mighty God, and nses His 
divine might in eternity for the good of His people. He is also, 
as the fifth name aifirms, aarshdlum, a Prince who i-emoves all 
peace-disturbing powers, and secures peace among the nations 
(Zech. ix. 10), — who is, as it were, the embodiment of peace 
come down into the world of nations (Mic. v. 4). To exalt the 
government of David into an eternal rule of peace, is the end 
for which He is bom ; and moreover He proves Himself to be 
what He is not only called, but actually is. Ver. 7. " To t/te 
increoM of government and to peace icithout end, upon ihe tltront 



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251 THE PBOPHBCIES OF ISAIAO. 

of David, and over his kingdom, to ttrengtlien it, and to tupport U 
through judgment and righteouanets from hencefortli even for 
ever. The jealousy of Jehovah of hosts will fulfl this." ^f'^f 
(written with Mim ctausum in the middle of the one word, and, 
according to Eliaa Levita, properly to be read >^-n Q?, iis magni- 
ficando, in accordance with this way of writing the word ^) is 
not a participle here, bnt a snbstaiitive after the forms ^K^P, 
Flfc*^, and that not from nsin, bnt from '11], an infinitive noun 
expressing, according to its formation, the practical resnlt of an 
action, rather than the abstract idea.? Ever extending dominion 
and endless peace will be brought in by the snblime and lofty 
King's Son, when He sits upon the throne of David and rules 
over David's kingdom. He is a temper Augustus, i.e. a per- 
petual increaser of the kingdom; not by war, however, bnt 
with the spiritual weapons of peace. Aud within He gives 
to the kingdom "judgment" (mishpdl) and "righteousness" 
(ieddkah), as the foundations and pillars of its durability : 
mishpdt, judgment or right, which He pronounces and ordains ; 
and righteousness, which He not only exercises Himself, bnt 
transfers to the members of His kingdom. This new epoch of 
Davidic sovereignty was still only a matter of futh and hope. 
Bnt the zeal of Jehovah was the guarantee of its realizati<»i. 
The accentuation ia likely to mislead here, inasmuch as it 
makes it appear as though the words " from henceforth even 
for ever" {me'attdh v'ad 'oldm) belonged to the closing sen- 
tence, whereas the eternal perspective which they open applies 
directly to the reign of the great Son of David, and only 

' When Bar-Eappara B«y« (b. Sanhedrin 91a) that God dcdgned to 
m&ke Eezekifth the Mee^h and Senniicherib Gog and Magog, but that 
Eezebiah was not found worthj of this, and therefore the Mem of rmarbeh 
was- dosed, there is so far some eenae in this, that the Heaiianic bopea 
naUj could centre for a certain time in Heieki&h ; whereas the ateertjon 
of a certain Eillel (ib. 9&t), that Hezekiali was actually the Heeaiah of 
larael, and no other was to be expected, ia nothing but the perverted 
fancy of an emptj brain. For an instance of the oppodto, see Neh. ii. 18, 
WVnQ on, on vhich passage the Midragh obeerreB, " The broken walls of 
Jeraaalem will be closed in the day of salvation, and the govenimeat 
which has been closed up to the time of the Eing Messiah will be opened 

* We have already observed at p. 166, that thia anhstantivo fonnatitai 
had not a purely abstract meaning even at the first. Fiiret has given the 
torrect explanation in his Lehr^Mttde dtr Aran, Idiome, % ISO. 



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CHAP. IX 7-X. 4. 255 

indirectly to the work of the div-ine jealousy. ** Zeal^ or 
jealousy, kin'dli, lit. glowing fire, from MJ^, Arab, kanaa, to be 
deep red (Deut. iv. 24), ia one of the deepest of the Old 
Testament ideas, and one of the most fruitful in relation to 
the work of reconciliation. It is two-sided. The fire of love 
has for its obverse the fire of wrath. For jealouay contends for 
the object of its love against everything that tonches either the 
object or the love itself.* Jehovah loves His nation. That He 
should leave it in the hands of such bad Davidic kings as Ahaz, 
and give it up to the imperial power of the world, would bo 
altogether irreconcilable with this love, if continued long. But 
His love flares up, consumes all that is adverse, and gives to 
His people the true King, in whom that which was only fore- 
shadowed in David and Solomon reaches its highest antitypical 
folfilment. With the very same words, " the zeal of Jehovah 
of hosts," etc., Isaiah seab the promise in ch. xxxvii. Z'2. 

B. Jehovah's outstretched !tand. — Chap. Jx. 7-x. 4. 
The great light would not arise till the darkness had reached 
its deepest point. The gradual increase of this darkness is pre- 
dicted in tl^ second section of the esoteric addresses. Many 
difficult questions suggest themselves in connection with this 
section. 1. Is it directed against the northern kingdom only, 
or ag^nst all Israel T 2. What was the historical standpoint 
of the prophet himself t The majority of commentators reply 

> Cf. Weber, On (ht Wrath of God (p. luv.). It is evident that 
bf kiiC&h, Zn>-ot, we are to iiudeivtand the energj of love foUowiog up tta 
violated claims upon tlie creature, from the coinpariBOn so commoa in the 
Scriptures between the lore of God to His church and connubial affection. 
It ia the iealoos^ of absolute bve, which seeks to be loved in return, and 
indeed demaqds undivided love, and asserts its claim to reciprocity of love 
wherever this claim is refused. In a word, it is the setf-vindication of 
Hccmful love. But this idea inclndee not oul; joalousj seeking the re- 
covei; of what it has lost, but also jealouay that consumes what cauJiot 
he saved ^ahnm L S ; Eeb. z. 27) ; and the Scriptures therefore deduce 
tbe wrath, by which the love resisted affirms iteelf, and the wntb which 
meets those who have reaiBted love in the form of absolute hostility, — in 
other words, tike jealousy of love as well is the jealousy of hatred, — not 
from love and liDliuesa as two entirely distinct sources, but from the 
single source of absolute holy love, which, just because it is absolute and 
holy, repels and exclndee whatever will not sufier itself to be embraced 
(Josh, z^iiv. 19). 



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25S TEE FROPHBCms OF ISAIAH. 

tiiat the prophet is only prophesying against £phraim here, and 
that Syria and Ephraim hare already been chastised by Tiglath- 
pileser. The former is incorrect The prophet does indeed 
commence with Ephraim, but he does not stop there. The fates 
of both kingdoms flow into one another here, as well as in ch. 
viii. 5 sqt^., jast as they were cansally connected in actual fact. 
And it cannot be maintained, that when the prophet uttered his 
predictions Ephraim had already felt the scourgmg of Tiglath- 
pileser. The prophet takes his stand at a time when judgment 
after judgment had fallen upon all Israel without improving it. 
And one of these past judgments was the scourging of Ephraim 
by Tiglath>pileser. How much or how little of the events 
which the prophet looks back upon from this ideal standpoint 
bad already taken place, it is impossible to determine ; hat this 
is a matter of indifference so far as the prophecy is concerned. 
The prophet, from his ideal standing-place, had not only this 
or that behind him, but all that is expressed in this section by 
perfects and aorists (Gea. J 129, 2, b). And we already know 
from ch, ii. 9, v. 25, that he used the future conversive as the 
preterite of the ideal past. We therefore translate the whole 
in the present tense. In outward arrangement there is no 
section of Isaiah so symmetrical as this. In ch. t. we found 
one partial approach to the strophe in similarity of commence- 
ment, and another in ch. ii. in similarity of conclusion. Bat 
here ch. v. 256 is adapted as the refrain of four symmetrical 
strophes. We will take each strophe by itself. Strophe 1. 
Vers. 8-12, " The Lord sends out a word against Jacob, and it 
descends into Israel. And all the people must make atonement^ 
Ephraim and tlie inhaMtanta of Samaria, saying in pride and 
haughtiness of heart, * Bricks are falleh down, and we build with 
tquare stones ; sycamores are hewn down, and we put cedars in 
their place! Jehovah raises Rezin's oppressors high above him, 
and pricks up his enemies! Aram from the east, and Philistines 
from the west ; they devour Israel with full mouth. For all 
this His anger is not turned away, and Sis hand is stretched otU 
atilV The word (ddbdr) is both in nature and history the 
messenger of the Lord : it runs quickly through the earth 
(Ps. cxivii. 15, 18), and when sent by the Lord, comes to men 
to destroy or to heal (Ps* cvii. 20), and never returns to its 
sender void (ch. Iv. 10, 11). Thus do«s the Lord now send a 



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CHAP. IX. s-u 357 

word against Jacob (Jacob, as in ch. ii. 5) ; and this heavenly 
messenger descends into Israel [naphal, as in Dan. iv. 28, and 
like the Arabic naxala, vrliich is the word usually employed to 
denote the communication of divine revelation), taking shelter, 
as it were, in the soul of the prophet. Its immediate com- 
migsiaa is directed against Ephnum, which has been so little 
bumbled by the calamities that have fallen upon it since the 
time of Jehu, that the people are boasting that they will re- 
place bricks and sycamores (or sycamines, from sMkmin'), that 
wide-spread tree (1 Kings x. 27), with works of art and cedars. 
" We put in their place:" nachaliph is not used here as in Job 
xiv. 7, where it signifies to sprout again (nova germina emitlere), 
but as in ch, zl. 31, xli. 1, where it is construed with ns 
(strength), and signifies to renew (not>as vires aiaumere). In 
this instance, when the object is one external to the subject, 
the meaning is to substitute {substituere), like the Arabic 
achlafa, to restore. The poorest style of building in the land 
b contrasted with the best ; for " the sycamore is a tree which 
only flourishes in the plain, and there the most wretched houses 
are still bnilt of bricks dried in the sun, and of knotty beams of 
sycamore." ^ These might have been destroyed by the wax, bat 
more durable and stately buildings would rise up in their place. 
Ephraim, however, would be made to feel this defiance of the 
judgments of God (to " know," as in Hos. ix. 7, Kzek. xxv. 14). 
Jehovah would give the adversaries of Bezin authority over 
Ephr^m, and instigate his foes : ticsec, as in ch. xix. 2, from 
Bocac, in its primary sense of " prick," figere, which has nothing 
to do with the meanings to plait and cover, but from which we 
have the words ^, ^D, a thorn, nail, or plug, and which is 
probably related to fijfc', to view, lit. to fix ; hence pilpel, to 
prick up, incite^ which is the rendering adopted by the Targum 
hero and in ch. xix. 2, and by the LXX. at ch. six. 2. There 
is no necessity to quote the talmudic aicaec, to kindle (by 
friction), which is never met with in the metaphorical sense 
of exciting. It would be even better to take our sicsSe as an 
intensive form of sdcac, used in the same sense as the Arabic, 
viz. to provide one's self with weapons, to arm ; but this b pro- 
bably a denominative from \sicea, signifying offensive armour, 
with the idea of pricking and spearing, — a radical notion, from 
^ Boeen, Topographiscbu aut Jenuakra. 



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zoo THE PBOPHEOIES Or ISAIAH. 

which it wonld be easy to get at the satisfactory meaning, to 
spar on or instigate. " The oppressors of Seein' {tzdre Eetzin, 
a nmple play apon the words, like hoi got in ch. i. 4, and many 
others in Isaiah) are the Assyrians, whose help had been songht 
1^ Ahaz against Ileziii ; though perhaps not these exclusively, 
bnt possihly also the Trachonites, for example, against whom the 
mountain fortress Bezin appears to have been erected, to pro- 
tect the rich lands of eastern Hanran. In ver. 12 the range of 
vinoD stretches over all Israel. It cannot be otherwise, for the 
northern kingdom never suffered anything from the Philistines ; 
whereas an invasion of Judah by the Philistines was really <me 
of the judgments belonging to the time of Ahaz (3 CbrorL 
xxviii. 16-19). Consequently by Israel here we are to under- 
stand all Israel, the two halves of which would become a rich 
prize to the enemy. Ephraim would be swallowed op by 
Aram, — namely, by those who had been subjugated by Assbur, 
and were now tributary to it, — and Judah would be swallowed 
up by the Philistines. But diis str^t would be very far from 
being the end of the punishments of Gad. Because Israel 
would not turn, the wrath of God would not turn away. 

Strophe 2. Vers. 13-17. " Sut the people titmeth not unto 
Him that smiteth it, avd they seek not Jehovah of hosts. Tliere- 
fore Jehovah rooteth out of Israel head and tail, palm-branch 
and rush, in one day. Elders and highly distinguished men, 
this is the head; and prophets, lying teac/tere, this is the tail. 
The leaders of this people have become leaders astray, and their 
followers swallowed up. Therefore the Lord will not rejoice in 
tfteir young men, and will have no compassion on their orphans 
and widows : for all together are profligate and evil-doers, and 
every mouth speaketh blaspliemy. With all this His anger is 
not turned away, and His hand is stretched out still." As the 
first stage of the judgments has been followed by no true 
conversion to Jehovah the almighty judge, there comes a 
second. IJI ^vj* (to turn unto) denotes a thorough conversion, 
not stopping half-way. " The smiter of it" (hammacc^hu), or 
" he who smiteth it," is Jehovah (compare, on the other hand, 
ch. z. 20, where Asshur is intended). The article and suffix 
are used together, as in ch. xxiv. 2, Prov. xvi. A (vid. Qes. 
§ 110, 2 J Caspari, Arab. Gram. § 472). But there was coming 
now a great day of punishment (in the view of the prophet, it 



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CHAP. IX. 18-17. 259 

was already past), sach as Israel experienced more than once in 
the ABsyrian oppressions, and Judah in the Chaldean, when 
head and tail, or, according to another proverbial expression, 
palm-branch and rush, would be rooted out. We might sup- 
pose that the persons referred to were the high and low ; but 
ver. 15 makes a different application of the first double figure, 
by giving it a different turn from its popular sense (compare 
the Arabic er-rti '&$ w-aUdhndb = lofty and low, in Dietrich, 
Abltandltmg, p. 209). The opinion which has very widely 
prevailed since the time of Koppe, that this verse is a gloss, 
is no doubt a very natural one (see Hitzig, Begriff der Kritik; 
Ewald, Pi-ophetm, i. 57). But Isaiah's custom of supplying his 
own gloss is opposed to such a view; also Ismah's composition 
in ch. iii, 3 and X3:x. 20, and the relation in which this verse 
stands to ver. 16 ; and lastly, the singular character of the 
gloss itself, which is one of the strongest proofs that it contains 
the prophet's exposition of his own words. The chiefs of the 
nation were the head of the national body ; and behind, like a 
waging dog's tail, sat the false prophets with their flatteries 
of the people, loving, as Persius says, blando eaudam jactare 
popello. The prophet drops the figure of cippdh, the palm- 
branch which forms the crown of the palm, and which derives 
its name from the fact that it resembles the palm of the hand 
{instar paltme manvs), and agmOn, the rush which grows in 
the marsli.^ The allusion here is to the rulers of the nation 
and the dregs of the people. The basest extremity were the 
demagogues in the shape of prophets. For it had come to 

• The nonn agam is used in the OW Teetament as well as in the Talmud 
to signiff both a marshj' place (see Baha mesi'a SSb, and more especially 
Aboda zara SSo, where giloi agmah dgnifiee the laying bare of the marshy 
soil by the burning np of the reede), and also the marsh grass (Sabbath 
11a, "if all the agmim were halama, i.e. writing reeds, or pens;" and 
Eiddlain 62b, where agam dgnifiea a stalk of marsh-graBB or teed, a rash 
&e bnhmsh, and is explained, with a reference to Isa. Iviii. 5, as sigDifying 
a tender, weak stalk). The noun agmon, on the other hand, signifies only 
tlie stalk of the nuLTBh-graBB, or the marsh-graHa itself ; and in this sense it 
is not found in the Talmod (see Job, ii. 374). The verbal meaning upon 
which these uames are founded is evident from the Arabic m& S^in 
(ntag&m), "bad water" (see at ch. zix. 10). There is no connection be- 
tween this and maugil, literally a depression of the soU, in which water 
lodges for a long time, aad which is only dried up in summer weather. 



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260 THE FBOPBEOSS OF ISAIAH. 

this, as ver. 16 affirms, that those who promised to lead hy a 
straight road led astray, aad those who suffered themselves to 
be led bj them were as good as already swallowed up by hell 
(cf. ch. V. 14, iii. 12). Therefore the Soyereign Ruler would 
not rejoice over the jouug men of this nation ; that ia to say, 
He would suffer them to be smitten by their enemies, without 
going with them to battle, and would refuse His cnstomaiy 
compassion even towards widows and orphans, for they were 
all thoroughly corrupt on every side. The alienation, obliquity, 
and dishonesty of their heart, are indicated by the word 
chdniph (from chdnaph, which has in itself the indifferent 
radical idea of' incIinatioQ; eo that in Arabic, ckantf, as a 
synonym of 'ddilj' has the very opposite meaning of decision 
in favour of what is right) ; the badness of their actions by 
JHD (in half pause for jnp ' = yip, malejlciu) ; the vicious in- 
fatuation of their words by nebdldh. This they are, and this 
they continue; and consequently the wrathful hand of God is 
. stretched out over them for the infliction of fresh strokes. 

Strophe 3. Vers, 18-21. "For the wickedness bumeth up 
Wee fire : it devours thorns and thistles, and bums in the thickets 
of the wood; and they smoke upwards in a lofty volwme of smoke. 
Through the wrath of Jehovah of hosts the land is turned into 
coal, and the nation has become like the food of fire : not one spares 
his brother. They heio on the right, and are hungry ; and devour 
on the left, and are not satisfied: they devour the flesh of their 
ovm arm : Manasseh, Ephraim. ; and Ephraim, Manasseh : these 
togeilier over Judah, With all this His anger is not turned away, 
and His liand is stretched out still," The standpoint of the 
prophet is at the extreme end of the course of judgment, and 
from that he looks back. Consequently this link of the chain 
is also past in his view, and hence the future conversives. The 
curse, which the apostasy of Israel carries within itself, now 
breaks fully out. Wickedness, i.e. the constant thirst of evil, 
is a fire which a man kindles in himself. And when the grace 

> Tbii is the wa; ia which it shoald be writtea in Job, L 216 ; 'adala 
has also the indifferent meaning of return or decision. 

* NeverthelesB thie readiDg is also met with, and according to Masnra 
j6ia/w,p. 62, col. 8,thi8i8the correct reading (as in Prov. ivii. 4,wliere it in 
donbtful whether the meaning IB a friend or a malevolent person). Tbe ques- 
tion ia not an uniraportant one, as we may see from OlsbauseD, § 268, p. 681. 



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CHAP. IZ. 18-21. 261 

of God, which damps and restrains this fire, is all over, it is 
sore to hnrst forth : the wickedness hursts forth like fire (the 
verb is used here, as in ch. xxx. 27, with reference to the 
wrath of Grod). And this is the case with the wickedness of 
Israel, which now consumes first of all thorns and thistles, i.e. 
individual sinners who are the most lipe for judgment, upon 
whom the judgment commences, and then the thicket of the 
wood (sib-che,^ as in ch. x. 34, from sebac. Gen. xxii. 13 = 
sobec), that is to say, the great mass of the people, which 
ia woven together hy bands of iniquity (vattizzath is not a 
reflective niphal, as in 2 Kings xxii. 13, but kal, to kindle into 
anything, i.e. to set it on fire). The contrast intended in the 
two figures ia consequently not the high and low (Ewald), nor 
the nselesH and useful (Drechsler), but individuals and the whole 
(Vitringa). The fire, into which the wickedness bursts out, 
seizes individuals first of all ; and then, like a forest fire, it 
seizes npon the nation at large in all its ranks and members, 
, who " whirl up (roll up) ascending of smoke" i.e. who roll 
□p in the form of ascending smoke (hith'abbek, a synonym of 
hithhappSk, Judg, vji. 13, to curl or roll). This fire of wicked- 
ness was no other than the wrath (ebrdh) of God : it is God's 
own wrath, for all sin carries this within itself as its own 
self-punishment. By this fire of wrath the soil of the land 
is gradnally but thoroughly burnt out, and the people of the 
land utterly consumed: DHV air. "Key. to be red-hot (LXX. 
cvyxeicavTai, also the Targnm), and to be dark or black (Arabic 
'atame, late at night), for what is burnt out becomes black. 
Fire and darkness are therefore correlative terms throughout 
the whole of the Scriptures. So far do the figures extend, in 
which the prophet presents the inmost essence of this stage of 
judgment. In its historical manifestation it consisted in the 
most inhuman self-destrucUon during an anarchical civil war. 
Destitute of any tender emotions, they devoured one another 
without being satisfied : gdzar, to cut, to hew (hence the Arabic 
for a butcher) : zer^o, his arm, according to Jer. xix. 9, 
' The metheg (saya) in ^220 (to be pronounced sib'Che) baa aimplj the 
enphonio effect of secnring a distinct enunciation to the Eibikut letter (in 
other inetanca to the guttural, vid. 'arbotk, Knm. xzii. 12), in cases wheie 
the second syUable of the woid commencea with a gnttnial or labial letter, 
or with an aapirate. 



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2&2 THE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

equivalent to tLe member of his own family and tribe, wbo was 
figuratively called his arm (Arabic 'aditd: see Ges, Theg. p. 433), 
as being the natural protector and support. This interminable 
self-immolation, and the regicide associated with the jealousy 
of the different tribes, shook the northern kingdom again and 
again to its utter destruction. And the readiness with which 
the nnbrotherly feelings of the northern tribes towards one 
another could turn into combined hostility towards Judah, was 
evident enough from the Syro-Ephraimitish war, the conse- 
quences of which had not passed away at the time when these 
prophecies were uttered. This hostility on the part of the 
brother kingdoms would still further increase. And the end 
of the judgments of wrath had not come yet. 

Strophe i. Oh. x. 1-4. " Woe unto them that decree un- 
righteoua decrees, and to tlie writers who prepare trouble ; to force 
away the needy from demanding justice, and to rob the suffering 
of my people of their rightful claims, tiiat widows may become 
their prey, and they plunder orphans! And what will ye do in 
the day of visitation, and in the storm that cometh from afarf 
To whom will ye jlee for help? and where will ye deposit your 
glory? There w notlting left but to bow dowti under prisoners, 
and they fall under the slain. With all this Ifis anger is not 
turned away, but His hand is stretched out still." This, last 
strophe is directed against the unjust authorities and judges. 
The woe pronounced upon them is, as we have already frequently 
seen, Isaiah's ceterum eenseo. Chakak is their decisive decree 
(not, however, in a denominative sense, but in the primary 
sense of hewing in, recording in official documents, ch. zxx. 8, 
Job xis, 23) ; and cittsb {piel only occurring here, and a 
perfect, according to Gesenius, § 126, 3) their oiEcial signing 
and writing. Their decrees are chiieke 'aven (an open plural, 
as in Judg. v. 15, for chukks, after the analogy of v?3, 'DD?, 
with an absolute chokdMrn underlying it : Ewald, \ 186-7), iilas- 
much as their contents were worthlessness, i.e. the direct oppo- 
site of morality ; and what' they wrote out was 'dmdl, trouble, 
i.e. an unjust oppression of the people (compare wovov and 
•aovT]fi6<i)} Poor persons who wanted to commence legal pro- 

' The current aecentnation, D'2n3Dl mercha, ^DU Hphckah, ia vroog. 
The true accentuation would be the former with tiphchah (and meOieg), the 



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CRAP. X. l-A. 363 

eeediogs were not even allowed to do so, and possessiona to which 
widows and orphans had a well-founded claim were a welcome 
booty to them (for the diversion into the finite verb, see cli. T. 
24, viii. 11, xlix. 5, Iviii. 5). For all this they cotdd not escape 
the judgment of God. This is announced to them in ver. 3, in 
the form of three distinct questions (commencing with UmaA, 
quid igitur). The noun pehtddah in the first question always 
signifies simply a visitation of punishment ; sko'dh is a confused, 
dull, desolate rumbling, hence confusion (lurba), desolation : 
here it is described as " coming from afar," because a distant 
nation (Aashur) was the instrument of God's wrath. Second 
question : " Upon whom will ye throw yourselves in your search 
for help then " (n&s 'al, a constr. prwgnanSf only met with here)t 
Third question : " Where, i.e. in whose hand, will ye deposit 
your wealth in money and possessions" (cdbod, what is weighty 
in value and imposing in appearance) ; 'dzab with b'yad (Gen. 
xxxIk. 6), or with Lamed (Job xxxix. 14), to leave anything 
with a person as property in trust. No one would relieve them 
of their wealth, and hold it as a deposit; it was irrecoverably 
lost. To this negative answer there is appended the following 
bilti, which, when used as a preposition after a previous nega- 
tion, signifies prceter ; when used as a conjunction, nisi (bUti 
'intf Judg. vii. 14) ; and where it governs the whole sentence, as 
in this case, nisi quod (cf. Num. xi. 6 ; Dan. xi. 18). In the 
present instance, where the previous negation is to be supplied 
in thought, it has the force of nil reliquum est nisi quod (there 
is nothing left but). The singular verb {cara) is used con- 
temptuously, embracing all the high persons as one condensed 
ma^ ; and tachath does not mean ceque ac or loco (like, or in 
the place of), as Ewald (J 217, i) maintains, but is used in the 
primary and local sense of infra (below). Some crouch down 
to find room at the feet of the prisoners, who are crowded 
closely together in the prison ; or if we suppose the prophet to 

latter with mereha; tor'SmAl ciltslu is aa attribntire (an elliptical rela- 
tive) clause. According to it« etymon, 'dmal seems to stand by the side ot 
/tuXo;, moles, moleaiwi (eee Fott in Kuhn's Zextsckrift, a. 202) ; but within 
the Semitic itself it stands by the ude of ^Dtt to fade, marceseere, which 
coincides with the Sanscrit root mlA and ite cognates (see Leo Meyer 
VirgldchejuU Grammatik, i. 353), so that '6inal is, strictly speakiDg, to 
wear oat or tire out (vulg. to won;). 



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261 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

have a scene of transportatioD in his mind, they sink down 
under the feet of the other prisoners, in their inability to bear 
such hardships, whilst the rest fall in war ; and as the slaughter 
is of long duration; not only become corpses themselves, bnt 
are covered with the corpses of the slain (cf. ch. xiv. 19). 
And even with this the wrath of God is not satisfied. The 
prophet, however, does not follow out the terrible gradation 
any further. Moreover, the captivity, to which this fourth 
strophe points, actually formed the conclosion of a distinct 
period. 

C. Destruction of the imperial kingdom of the world, and rise of 
the kingdom of Jehovah in His Anointed. — Chap. x. 5.— xii. 
The law of contrast prevails in prophecy, as it does also in 
the history of salvation. When distress is at its height, it is 
suddenly brought to an end, and changed into relief ; and 
when prophecy has become as black with darkness as in the 
previous section, it suddenly becomes as bright and cloudless 
as in that which is opening now. The hoi (woe) pronounced 
upon Israel becomes a hoi upon Assbur. Proud Asshnr, with 
its confidence in its own strength, after having served for a 
time as the goad of Jehovah's wrath, now falls a victim to that 
wrath itself. Its attack upon Jerusalem leads to its own over- 
throw ; and on the ruins of the kingdom of the world there 
rises up the kingdom of the great and righteous Son of David, 
who rules in peace over His redeemed people, and the nations 
that rejoice in Him ;- — the counterpart of the redemption from 
Egypt, and one as rich in materials for songs of praise as the 
passage through the Red Sea. The Messianic prophecy, 
which turns its darker side towards nnbelief in ch. vii., and 
whose promising aspect burst like a great light through the 
darkness in ch. viii. S—ix, 6, is standing now upon its third and 
highest stage. In ch. vii. it is like a star in the night ; in ch. 
viii. 6-ix. 6, like the morning dawn ; and now the sky is per- 
fectly cloudless, and it appears like the noonday sun. The 
prophet has now penetrated to the light fringe of ch. vi. The 
name Shear-yashub, having emptied itself of all the curse that 
it contained, is now transformed into a pure promise. And it 
becomes perfectly clear what the name Immannel and the 
name given to Immanuel, El gibbor (mighty God), declared. 



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CHAP. X. 5, & 265 

The remnant of Israel tnms to God the mighty One ; and God 
the mighty is henceforth with His people in the Sprout of 
Jesse, who has the seven Spirits of God dwelling within Him- 
self. So far as the date of composition is concerned, the 
majority of the more recent commentators agree in assign- 
ing it to the time of Hezekiah, because ch. x. 9-H presup- 
poses the destmction of Samaria by Shalmanassar, which took 
place in the sixth year of Hezekiah. But it was only from 
the prophet's p<unt of view that this event was already past ; 
it bad not actually taken place. The prophet had already 
predicted that Samaria, and with Samaria the kingdom of 
Israel, would succumb to the Assyrians, and had even fixed 
the year (ch. vii. 8 and viii. 4, 7). Why, then, should he not 
be able to presuppose it here as an event already pastt The 
stamp on this section does not tally at all with that of Isaiah's 
prophecy in the times of Hezekiah; whereas, on the other 
hand, it forms so integral a link in the prophetic cycle in 
ch. vii.-xii., and is interwoven in so many ways with that 
which precedes, and of which it forms both the continua- 
tion and crown, that we have no hesitation in assigning it, 
with Yitringa, Caspari, and Drechsler, to the first three years 
of the reign of Aiaz, though without deciding whether it 
preceded or followed the destruction of the two allies by 
Tiglath-pilesCT. It is by do means impossible that it may have 
preceded it. 

The prophet commences with koi (woe I), which is always 
Qsed as an expression of wrathfnl indignation to introduce the 
proclamation of judgment upon the person named ; although, 
as in the present instance, this may not always follow imm^i- 
ately (cf. ch. i. 4, 5-9), but may be preceded by the announce- 
ment of the sin by which the judgment had been provoked. 
In the first place, Asshur is more particularly indicated as the 
chosen instrument of divine judgment upon all Israel. — Vers. 
5, 6. " Woe to Asshur, the rod of mine anger, and it is a staff in 
their hand, mine indignation. Against a wicked nation will I send 
them, and against the people of my wrath give thern a charge^ 
to spoil spoil, and to prei/ prey, to make it trodden down like 
street-mire." "Mine indignation:" za'mi is either a permuta- 
tion of the predicative KW, which is placed emphaticaUy in the 
foreground (compare the tn>mFiK in Jer. xW. 22, which is i^ 



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26B TEE PSOFHECIES OF ISAUH. 

written with makkeph), as we liave translated it, thongh without 
taking («n as a copula (= est), as Ewald does; or else OV^ ton 
is written elliptically for QTa (Wn ne'R, "the staff which they 
hold is mine indignation" (Ges., Kosenmiiller, and others), in 
which case, however, we should rather expect ton Tspi DT3 riDDl. 
It is quite inadmissible, however, to take zami as a separate 
genitive to matteh, and to point the latter with zere, as Knobel 
has done ; a thing altogether nnparalleled in the Hebrew lan- 
guage.^ The futures in ver. 6 are to be taken literally ; for 
what Asshur did to Israel in the sixth year of Hezekiah's reign, 
and to Judah in his fourteenth year, was stili in the future 
at the time when Isaiah prophesied. Instead of iD'fe'S the keri 
has iDlb?!, the form in which the infinitive is written in other 
passages when connected with suffixes (see, on the other hand, 
2 Sam. xiVi 7). " Trodden down :" mirma» with short a is the 
older form, which was retained along with the other form with 
the a lengthened by the tone (Ewald § 160, c). 

Asshur was to be an instrument of divine wrath upon all 
Israel ; but it would exalt itself, and make itself the end instead 
of the means. Ver. 7. " Nevertheless he meaneth not so, neither 
doth Jits heart think so ; for it is in his heart to destroy and ciri 
oj' nations not a few." Asshur did not think so (lo'-cSn), i.e. 
not as he ought to think, seeing that his power over Israel was 
determined by Jehovah Himself. For what filled his heart 
was the endeavour, peculiar to the imperial power, to destroy 
not a few nations, i.e. as many nations as possible, for the pur- 
pose of extending his own dominions, and with the determi- 
nation to tolerate no other independent nation, and the desire 
to deal with Judah as with all the rest. For Jehovah was 
nothing more in his esteem than one of the idols of the nations. 
Vers. 8-11. "For he saith, Are not my generals all kings? Is 
not Calno as Carchemish, or Hamaih as Arpad, or Samaria as 
Damascus f As my hand hath reached the kingdoms of the idols, 
and their graven images were more than those of Jerusal&m and 
Samaria ; shall I not, as I have doTie unto Samaria and her idols, do 
likewise to Jerusalem and her idols V The king of Asshur bore 
the title of the great king (ch. xxxvi. 4), and indeed, as we 
may infer from Ezek. xxvi. 7, that of the king of kings. The 
' In the Arabic, such a separation doea occur as a poetical Uceow (sM 
De Sao7, Gramm. t. ii. § 270). 



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CHAP. X ft 11. 267 

generals in his army he could call kings,^ because the satraps* 
who led their several contingents were equal to kings in the 
extent and splendour of their goremment, and some of them 
were really conc|uered kings (cf. 2 Kings sxv. 28). He proudly 
asks whether every one of the cities named has not been as 
incapable as the rest, of offering a successful resistance to him. 
Carc/temisk ia the later Circesium {Cercnsium), at the junc- 
tion of the Chaboraa with the Euphrates (see above) ; Calno, 
the later Ctesiphon, on the left bank of the Tigris ; Arpad 
(according to Merdahid, i, p. 47, in the paehalic of Chaleb, i.e. 
Aleppo) and Hamatk (i.e. Epiphania) were Syrian cities, the 
latter on the river Orontes, still a large and wealthy place. The 
king of Asshur had also already conquered Samaria, at the 
time when the prophet introduced him as uttering these words. 
Jerusalem, therefore, would be unable to resist him. As he 
had obtained possession of idolatrous kingdoms (? USD, to reach, 
as in Ps. xxi. 9; hd-'elil with the article indicating the genus), 
which had more idols than Jerusalem or than Samaria ; so 
woald he also overcome Jerusalem, which had just as few and 
just as powerless idols as Samaria had. Observe here that ver. 
11 is the apodosis to ver. 10, and that the comparative clause 
of ver. 10 is repeated in ver. 11, for the purpose of instituting 
a comparison, more especially with Samaria and Jerusalem. 
The king of Asshur calls the gods of the nations by the simple 
name of idols, though the prophet does not therefore make him 
speak from his own Israelitish standpoint. On the contrary, 
the great sin of the king of Asshur consisted in the manner 
in which he spoke. For since he recognised no other gods 
than his own Assyrian national deities, he piaced Jehovah 
among the idols of the nations, and, what ought particularly 
to be observed, with the other idols, whose worship had been 
introduced into Samaria and Jerusalem. But in this very fact 
there was so far consolation for the worshippers of Jehovah, 

1 The qneatioD is expressed in Hebrew phraseology, eince sar in Asayiian 
was a superior tMe to that of mekk, as we tnajr see from inscriptioiia and 
piopevnuuea. 

' Satropu is tbe old Peraiaii (arroT-hesded) lUiAalra (SanscT. xatra) 
pavan, i.e. keeper of govenuneut. Pavan (nom. p&vS), which oocun in the 
Zendik as an independent word pavan {pfoa. pavaa} in the sense of sentry 
or watchman, is probably the original of the Hebrew pechSh (aee Spiegel, 
in Kohler on Mai. L 8). 



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368 THE PBOFHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

that such blasphemy of the one living God could not remain 
unavenged ; whilst for the worshippers of idols it contained a 
painful lesson, since their gods really deserved nothing better 
than that contempt should be heaped upon them. The prophet 
has now described the sin of Asshor. It was ambitious self- 
exaltation above Jehovah, amounting even to blasphemy. And 
yet he was only the staff of Jehovah, who could make use of 
him as He would. 

And when He had made use of him as He would, He 
would throw him sway. Ver. 12. " And it will come to pas»y 
xohen the Lord shall have brought to an end all His work upon 
Mount Zion and upon Jerusalem, I will come to punish over th^ 
fruit of the pride of heart of the Icing of Asshur, and over tlte 
haughty look of his eyes." The "fruit" (peri) of the hearths 
pride of Asshnr is his vainglorious blasphemy of Jehovah, in 
which his whole natare is comprehended, as the inward nature 
of the tree is in the fruit which bangs above in the midst of 
the brancheB : tiph'eretli, as in Zech. xii. 7, the self-glorification 
which expresses itself in the lofty look of the eyes. Several 
constructives are here intentionally grouped together (Ges, 
§ 114, 1), to express the great swelling of Asshur even to burst- 
ing. But Jehovah, before whom humility is the soul of all 
virtue, would visit this pride with punisliment, when He should 
have completely cut off His work, i.e. when He should have 
thoroughly completed (bizza, alsolvere) His punitive work 
upon Jerusalem (mdasek, as in ch. xxviii. 21). The prep. BelJi 
is used in the same sense as in Jer. xviii. 23, agere cum aliquo. 
It is evident that mdaaeh is not used to indicate the work of 
punishment and grace together, so that yehazzd could be 
taken as a literal future (as Schroring and Ewald suppose), 
but that it denotes the work of punishment especially; and 
consequently yebazza is to be taken as a futurum exactum 
(cf. ch. ir. 4), as we may clearly Bee from the choice of this 
word in Lam. ii. 17 (cf. Zech. iv. 9). 

When Jehovah had punished to such an extent that He 
could not go any further without destroying Israel, — a result 
which would be opposed to His mercy and truth, — His punish- 
ing wonld turn against the instrument of punishment, which 
would fall under the curse of all ungodly selfishness. Vers. 13, 
14. " For he hath said, By the strength of my hand I hav« done 



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CHAP. X. 18-15. . ' S69 

it, and ly my own wisdom; for I am prudent: and I removed the 
bounds of the nations, and I plundered their stores, and threw 
down rulers^ like a bull. And my hand eaitracted the wealth of 
the nations like a nest : and as mm sweep up forsaken eggs, have 
I sioept the whole earth ; there was none that moved the wing, and 
opened the mouth, and chirped" The futures may be taken most 
safely as regulated by the preterites, and used, like German 
' imperfects, to express that which occurs not once merely, but 
several times. The second of these preterites, 'H'jPitJ", is the only 
example of a poel of verbs Tfh ; possibly a mixed form from 
Dpy (poel of mf) and nSB* (piel of nov). The object to this, 
viz. 'athidoth {chethib) or 'athudoih {keri), is sometimes used 
in the sense of tA fUXKoiira; sometimes, as in this instance, in 
the sense of tcl imap^fovTa. According to the Iceri, the passage 
is to be rendered, " And I, a mighty one, threw down kings " 
(those sitting on thrones), cabbir being taken in the same sense 
as in Job xxxiv. 17, 24, xxxvi. 5. But the chethib cd'abblr is 
to be preferred as more significant, and not to be rendered " as 
a hero" (to which the Caph similiiudinis is so little suitable, 
that it would be necessary to take it, as in ch. xiii. 6, as Caph 
veritalis), but *' as a bull," 'abblr as in Ps. Ixviii. 31, xxii. 13, 
1. 13. A bull, as the excavations show, was an emblem of 
royalty among the Assyrians. In ver. 14, the more stringent 
Vav conv. is introduced before the third pers. fem. The king- 
doms of the nations are compared here to birds' nests, which the 
Assyrian took for himself (^dsaph, as in Hab. ii. 5) ; and their 
possessions to single eggs. The mother bird was away, so that 
there was not even a sign of resistance ; and in the nest itself 
not one of the young birds moved a wing to defend itself, or 
opened its beak to scare the intruder away. Seb. Schmid has 
interpreted it correctly, "7iulla alam movet ad defendendum aut 
OS aperit ad terrendum." Thus proudly did Asshur look back 
upon its course of victory, and thus contemptuously did it look 
down upon the conquered kingdoms. 

This self-exaltation was a foolish sin. Ver. 15. " Dare the 
axe boast itself against him that hewetk therewith, or t/ie saw 
magnify itself against him that useth it? As if a staff were to 
swing those that lift it up, as if a stick should lift up not-wood!" 
** Not-wood" is to be taken as one word, as in ch. xxxi. 8. A 
I ThToneude, lit. those who sat (on throne*). 



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270 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH 

stick is wood, and nothing more ; in itself it ia an absolutely 
motionless thing. A man is " not-wood" an incomparably 
higher, living being. As there mast be "not-wood" to lay 
hold of wood, so, wherever a man performs extraordinary 
deeds, there is always a superhuman cause behind, viz. God 
Himself, who bears the same relationto the man as the man to 
the wood. The boasting of the Assyrian was like the bragging 
of an instrument, such as an axe, a saw, or a stick, against the 
person using it. The verb hsnipk is applied both to saw and 
stick, indicating the oscillating movements of a measured and 
more or less obvioos character. The plural, " those that lift it 
up," points to the fact that by Him who lifts up the stick, 
Jehovah, the cause of all causes, and power of all powers, is 
intended. 

There follows in the next verse the punishment provoked by 
such self-deification (cf. Hab. i. 11). Ver. 16. "Therefore will 
the Lord, iheLwd of hostSf send contumplion against his fat men; 
and wider Asshui^a glory there bums a brand like a firebrand." 
Three epithets are here employed to designate God according 
to His unlimited, all-controlling omnipotence : viz. hd'ddon, 
which is always used by Is^ah in connection with judicial and 
penal manifestations of power ; and adonai zehdoth, a combina- 
tion never met with again, similar to the one used in the 
Elohiatic PsalraB, Ehhim zebaoih (compare, on the other hand, 
ch. iii. 15, s. 23, 24). Even here a large number of codices 
and editions (Norzi's, for example) have the reading Jehovah 
Zebaoth, which is customary in other cases.^ RdzOn (ch. 
xvii. 4) is one of the diseases mentioned in the catalogue of 
curses in Lev. xxvi. 16 and Dent, zxviii. 22. Galloping con- 
sumption comes like a destroying angel upon the great masses 
of flesh seen in the well-fed Assyrian magnates; mishmannim is 
used in a personal sense, as in Pb. Ixxviii. 31. And under the 
glory of Asshur, i.e. its richly equipped army {cdbsd as in ch. 
viii. 7), He who makes His angels dames of fire places fire so 
as to cause it to pass away in flames. In accordance with 
Isaiah's masterly art of painting in tones, the whole passage is 
so ex[H^8sed, that we can hear the crackling, and spluttering 

' This passage is not included in the 134 vaddS'in (t.e. " real") adonaL 
or paaeagee in which adonai is written, and not merely to be read, tliat are 
enumeniMd by the Masora (see Bir'a PsaUeriv-m, p. 133). 



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CHAP. X. i;-i«. 271 

and hissing of the fire, as it seizes upon everythiag within its 
reach. This fire, whatever it may be bo far as its natural and 
phenomenal character is concerned, b in its true essence the 
wrath of Jehovah. — Ver. 17. " And the light of Israel becomes 
afire, and Hit Holy One a fame; and it sets on Jire and devours 
its thistles and thorns on one day" God is fire (Deut. ix. 3), 
and light (1 John i. 5) ; and in His own self-life the former is 
resolved into the latter, Kddosh (holy) is here parallel to **■ 
(light) ; for the fact that God is holy, and the fact that He 
is pure light, are essentially one and the same thing, whethei: 
kddash meant originally to be pure or to be separate. The 
nature of all creatures, and of the whole cosmos, is a mixture of 
light and darkness. The nature of God alone is absolute light. 
But light is love. In this holy light of love He has given 
Himself up to Israel, and taken Israel to Himself. But He 
has also within Him a basis of fire, which sin excites against 
itself, and which was about to burst forth as a Baming fire of 
wrath against Asshor, on account of its sins against Him and 
His people. Before this fire of wrath, this destructive might 
of Hia penal righteousness, the splendid forces of Asshur were 
nothing but a mass of thistles and a bed of thorns (written 
here in the reverse order peculiar to Isaiah, shdmXr vdshaith), 
equally inflammable, and equally deserving to be burned. To 
all appearance, it was a forest and a park, but it was irrecover- 
ably lost. — Vers, 18, 19. " And the glory of his forest and his 
garden-ground will He destroy, even to soul and flesh, so that it is 
at when a sick man dieth. And the reinnant of the trees of his 
forest can be numbered, and a boy could write them." The army 
of Asshur, composed as it was of many and various nations, was 
a forest (ya'ar) ; and, boasting as it did of the beauty of both 
men and armour, a garden ground (carmel), a human forest 
and park. Hence the idea of "utterly" is expressed in the 
proverbial " even to soul and flesh," which furnishes the occa- 
sion for a leap to the figure of the wasting away of a 00^ (Aop. 
leg. the consumptive man, from ndsat, related to n&sk, 'dnash, 
Syr. n'siso, n'shisho, a sick man, baaed upon the radical notion 
of melting away, cf. mdsas, or of reeling to and fro, cf. mat, ni.,t, 
Arab, ndsa, ndta). Only a single vital spark would still glim- 
mer in tlie gigantic and splendid colossus, and with this its life 
would threaten to become entirely extinct. Or, what is the 



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2.72 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

same thing, only a few trees of the forest, such as could he 
easily numbered (mispdr as in Deut. xxxiii. 6, cf. Isa. xxi. 17), 
would still remain, yea, so few, that a boy would be able to 
count and enter them. And this really came to pass. Only a 
small remnant of the army that marched against Jerusalem 
ever escaped. With this small remnant of an all-destroying 
power tlie prophet now contrasts the remnant of Israel, which 
is the seed of a new power that is about to arise. — Ver. 20. 
" And it will come to pass in that day, the remnant of Israel, 
and that which has escaped of the house of Jacob, vnll not contimie 
to stay itself upon its chastiser, and will stay itself upon Jehovah, 
the Holy One of Israel, in truth." Behind the judgment upon 
Asahiir there lies the restoration of Israel. " The chastiser" 
was the Assyrian. While relying upon this, Israel received 
strokes, because Jehovah made Israel's staff into its rod. But 
henceforth it would sanctify the Holy One of Israel, putting 
its trust in Him and not in man, and that purely and truly 
{be'emeth, "in truth"), not with fickleness and hypocrisy. 
Then would be fulfilled the promise contained in the name 
Shear-yashuh, after the fulfilment of the threat that it con- 
tained. — Ver. 21. "The remnant will turn, the remnant of Jacob, 
to God the mighty." El gibbor is God as historically manifested 
in the heir of David (ch. Lx. 6). WhOst Hosea (iii. 5) places 
side by side Jehovah and the second David, Isaiah sees them 
as one. In New Testament phraseology, it would be " to God 
in Christ." 

To Him the remnant of Israel would turn, but only the 
i-emnant. Vers. 22, 23. "For if thy people were even as the 
teorsand, the remnant thereof will turn : destruction is firmly 
determined, flowing away righteousness. For the Lord, Jehovah 
of hosts, completes the finishing stroke and that which is firmly 
determined, within the whole land" As the words are not pre- 
ceded by any negative clause, d 'im are not combined in the 
sense of sed or nisi; but they belong to two sentences, and 
signify nam si (for if). If the number of the Israelites were 
the highest that had been promised, only the remnant among 
them, or of them {bo partitive, like the French en), would turn, 
or, as the nearer definition ad Deum is wanting here, come back 
to their right position. With regard to the great mass, destruc- 
tion was irrevocably determined (rdckatz, rifaieiv, then to resolve 



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CHAP. X. 2*. 273 

upon anjthing, Airorifue'i, 1 Kings xx. 40) ; and this deatntction 
" overflowed with righteousness," or rather " flowed on {ishoteph, 
as in ch. xxviii. 18) righteousness," i.e. brought forth right- 
eousness as it flowed onwards, so that it was like a swell of 
the penal righteousness of Qod {ihdiaph, with the accusative, 
according to Ges. § 138, Asm. 2). That cilldyOn is not used 
here in the sense of completion any more than in Deut. xsviii. 
65, is evident from ver. 23, where cdldk (fern, of cdleh, that 
which vanishes, then the act of vauishing, the end) is used in- 
terchangeably with it, and necherdudh indicates judgment as a 
thing irrevocably decided (as in ch. xsviii. 22, and borrowed 
from these passages in Dan. ix. 27, xi. 3fi). Such a judgment 
of extermination the almighty Judge had determined to carry 
fully out ('jseA in the sense of afvi. tnsfons) within all the land 
{Ukereh, within, not Vthok, in the midst of), that is to say, one 
that would embrace the whole land and all the people, and 
would destroy, if not every individual without exception, at any 
rate the great mass, except a very few. 

In these esoteric addresses, however, it is not the prophet's 
intention to threaten and terrify, but to comfort and encourage. 
He therefore turns to that portion of the nation which needs 
and is susceptible of coDsolation, and draws this conclusion from 
the element of consolation contained in what has been already 
predicted, that they may be consoled.— Ver. 24. " Therefore 
thua aaith the Lord, Jeltovah of hosts. My people that dieelle»t 
ow Zion, he not afraid of Asshur, if it shall smite tkee with 
the rod, and lift its stick against tJiee, in the jnanner of Egypt" 
"Therefore;" lacin never occnrs in Hebrew in the sense of 
attamen (Qesenius and Hitzig), and this is not the meaning 
here, but propterea. The elevating appeal is founded upon 
what has just before been threatened in such terrible words, 
but at the same time contains an element of promise in the 
midst of the peremptory judgment. The very words in which 
the people are addressed, " My people that dwelleth on Zion,'' 
are indirectly encouraging. Zion was the site of the gracious 
presence of Qod, and of that sovereignty which had been 
declared imperishable. Those who dwelt there, and were the 
people of Qod (the servants of God), not only according to their 
calling, but also according to their internal character, were also 
heirs of the promise; and therefore, even if the Egyptian bond- 
VOL. I. 8 



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274 THE PBOPHEGIES OF ISAUH. 

age should be renewed in the Assyrian, they might be assared 
of this to their consolation, that the redemption of Egypt would 
also be renewed. " In the manner of Egypt : " b'derek Mitzraimy 
lit. in the way, t.«. the Egyptians' mode of acting ; dereh de- 
notes the ionrse of active procedure, and also, as in ver. 26 and 
Amos iv. 10, the course of passive «nduranee. 

A still further reason is given for the elevating words, with 
a resumption of the grounds of consolation upon which they 
were founded. Vers. 25, 26. '^ For yet o very little the indig' 
nation it past, and my wrath fums io destroy them: and Jehovah 
of hosts moves the whip over it, at He smote Midian at the rock 
of Oreb; and Hie staff stretches out over the sea, and He lifts it 
vp in the manner of Egypt" The expression " a very little " 
(as in -eh. xvi. 14, x^cix. 17) .does not date from the actual 
present, when the Assyritin oppressions had not yet begun, bnt 
from the ideal present, when they were threatening Israel with 
destruction. The indignation of Jehovah would then suddenly 
come to an end (cdldh zaam, borrowed in Dan. xi. 36, and to 
be interpreted In accordance with ch. xxvi. 30) ; and the wrath 
of Jehovah would be, or go, 'al-tablithdm. Luzzatto recommends 
the following emendation of the text, Qfi) ??n"7y 'B!0, " and my 
wrath against the world will ^ease," tsbil being used, as in cb. 
xiv. 17, with reference to the oikoumenon aa enslaved by the 
imperial power. But the received text gives a better train of 
thought, if we connect it with ver. 26. We must not be led 
astray, however, by the preposition 'at, and take the words as 
meaning, My wrath (bumeth) over the destruction inflicted by 
Asshnr upon the people of God, or the destruction endured by 
the latter. It is to the destruction of the Assyrians that the 
wrath of Jehovah is now directed; 'al being used, as it fre- 
quently is, to indicate the object upon which the eye is fixed, 
or to which the intention points (Ps. xxxiL 8, xviii. 42). With 
this explanation ver. 256 leads on to ver. 26. The destruction 
of Asshur is predicted here in two figures drawn from occur- 
rences In the olden time. The almighty Judge would swing 
the whip over Asshnr ('orer, agilare, as in 2 Sam. xxiii. 18), 
and smite it, as Midian was once smitten. The rock of Oreb 
is the place where the Ephraimites slew the Midianitish king 
'Oreb {Jodg. vii. 25). His staif would then he over the sea, 
i^. would be stretched out, like the wonder-working staff of 



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CHAP. X. 27. 275 

Moses, over the sea of affliction, into which the Ascians had 
driven Israel (i/dm, the sea, an emblem borrowed from the type ; 
see Kohler on Zech. x. 11, cf. Ps. Ixvi. 6) ; and He would lift 
it ap, commanding the waves of the sea, so that tliej woold 
swallow Asshnr. "In the manner of Egypt:" b'derekMttzratm 
(according to Lnzzatto in both instances, "on the way to 
Egypt," which restricts the Assyrian bondage in a most anhis- 
torical manner to the time of the Egyptian campaign) signifies 
in ver. 24, as the Egyptians lifted it np ; but here, as it was 
lifted np above the Egyptians. The expression is intentionally 
conformed to that in ver. 24 : because Asshnr bad lifted up the 
rod over Israel in the Egyptian manner, Jehovah wotdd Uf t it 
up over^ Asshur in the Egyptian manner also. 

The yoke of the imperial power would then burst asunder. 
Ver. 27. " And it vnll come to pass in that day, its burden will 
remove from thy ghoulderf and its yoke from thy neck; and the yoke 
toill be destroyed from the pressure of the fat" We have here 
two figures : in the first {ceasahit onus ejus a cervice tua) Israel 
is represented as a beast of burden ; in the second (et jugum 
yus a collo tuo), as a beast of draught. And this second figure 
is divided again into two fields. For y&a&r merely affirms that 
the yoke, like the burden, will be taken away from Israel ; but 
ehubbal, that the yoke itself will snap, from the pressure of his 
fat strong neck ag^nst it. Knobel, who alters the test, objects 
to this on the ground that the yoke was a cross piece of wood, 
and not a collar. And no doubt the simple yoke is a cross 
piece of wood, which is fastened to the forehead of the ox 
(generally of two oxen yoked together; jumenta = jugmenta, 
like jugum, from jungle) ; but the derivation of the namp 
itself, 'olf iroTa 'dial, points to the connection of the cross 
piece of wood with a collar, and here the yoke is expressly 
described as lying round the neck (and not merely fastened 
against the forehead). There is no necessity, therefore, to 
read chebel {ckablo), as Knobel proposes; ehubbal (Arabic chub- 
bild) indicates here a corrumpi consequent upon a disrumpi. 
(On p'nS, vid. Job xli. 5 ; and for the application of the t«rm 
tnippene to energy manifesting itself in its effects, compare Ps. 
Ixviii. 3 as an example.) Moreover, as Kimchi has observed, 
in most instances the yoke creates a wound in the fat flesh of 
the ox by pressure and friction; but here the very opposite 



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276 THE PBOFHEOIES OF ISAIAH. 

ocean, and the fatness of the ox leads to the destrnction of the 
yoke (compare the figure of grafting employed in Bom. xi 17, 
to which Paol ^ves a torn altogether contrary to nature). 
Salvation, as the doable torn in the second fignre affirms, comes 
no less from within (27&) than from without (27a). It is no 
less a consequence of the world-conquering grace at work in 
Istuah, than a miracle wrought for Israel npon their foes. 

The prophet now proceeds to describe how the Assyrian 
army advances steadily towards Jerusalem, spreading terror on 
every, hand, and how, when planted there like a towering forest, 
it falls to the ground before Uie irresistible might of Jehovah. 
Eichhom and Hitzig pronounce this prophecy a vatieinium poit 
eventum, because of its far too special character ; but Eaobel 
regards it as a prophet^, because no Aasyrian king ever did 
take the course described; in other words, as a mere piece of 
imagination, as Ewald miuntaina. Now, no doubt the Asqrrian 
army, when it marched against Jerusalem, came from the sonth- 
west, namely, from the road to Egypt, and not directly from 
the north. Sennacherib had conquered Lachish; he then 
encamped before Libnah, and it was thence that he advanced 
towards Jerusalem. But the prophet had no intention of giving 
a fragment out of the history of the war : all that he meant to 
do was to give a lively representation of the fnture fact, that 
after devastating the land of Jndah, the Assyrian would attack 
Jerusalem. There is no necessity whatever to contend, as 
Drechsler does, against calling the description an ideal one. 
There is all the difference in the world between idea and 
imagination. Idea is the essential root of the real, and the 
reaUty is its historical form. This form, its essential mani- 
festation, may be either this or that, so far as individnal 
features are concerned, without any violation of its essential 
character. What the prophet here predicts has, when properly 
interpreted, been all literally fulfilled. The Assyrian did come 
from the north with the storm-steps of a conqueror, and the 
cities named were really exposed to the dangers and terrors of 
war. And this was what the prophet depicted, looking as be 
did from a divine eminence, and drawing from the heart of 
the divine counsels, and then painting the fnture with cx>lours 
which were but the broken lights of those coonseU as they 
existed in liis own mind. 



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CHAP. X se-SL 277 

Pathetically con^dered, the description is one of the most 
magnificent that haman poetry has ever produced. Vers. 
28-32. " He comet upon Ayyathy pastes trough Migron ; in 
Michmash he leavet his baggage. TJiey go through the pass : 
let Geha he our quarters for the night I Mamah trembles ; 
Gibeah of Saul flees. Scream aloud, daughter of Gallim ! 
Only listen, Layshal PoorAnMhoth! Madmenah hurries 
away; the inhabitants of Gebim rescue. He still halts in Nob to- 
day ; stoings his hand over the mountain of the daughter ofZion, 
tJie hill of Jerusalem. Behold, the Lord, Jehovah of hosts, 
lops down the branches with terrific force ; and those of towering 
growth are hewn down, and the lofty are humbled. And He 
fells the thickets of the forest with iron; and Lebanon, it falls by a 
Majestic One" When the Aasyrian came upon Ayyath {=Ayyah, 
1 Chron. vii. 28 (?), Neh. si. 31, generally hd-'ai, or 'At), abont 
thirty miles to the north-east of Jerusalem, he trod for the first 
time npon Benjaminitish territory, which was under the away 
of Jadaea. The name of this 'ai, which signifies " stone-heap," 
tallies, as Knobel observes, with the name of the Tell el-hagar, 
which is situated abont three-quarters of an hoar to the south- 
east of Beitln, i.e. Bethel. But there are tombs, reservoirs, and 
mins to be seen abont an honr to the sonUi-east of Beitin ; and 
these Eobinson associates with Ai. From Ai, however, the 
army will not proceed towards Jerusalem by the ordinary 
route, viz. the great north road (or " Nablns road") ; bat, in 
order to surprise Jerusalem, it takes a different route, in which 
it will have to cross three deep and difScnlt valleys. From 
Ai they pass to MiOBON, the name of which has apparently 
been preserved in the ruins of Surg Magrun, situated about 
eight minutes' walk from Beitin.^ Michmabh is still to be 
found in the form of a deserted village with ruins, under the 
name of Muchmas, on the eastern side of the valley of Migron. 
Here they deposit their baggage {hiphkid, Jer. xsxvi. 20), so 
far as they are able to dispense with it, — either to leave it lying 
there, or to have it conveyed after them by an easier route. 
For they proceed thence through the pass of Michmash, a deep 
and precipitous ravine about forty-eight minutes in breadth, 

* I also find the name written IHagrum (reotd Magrun}, vhich is pro- 
bably taken from a more cortect hearsay than the MachrUn of Kobinson 
(ii. 127). 



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378 TEE PfiOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

the present Wadt SnwEtKiT. " The pass" (ma'bdraA) is the 
defile of Michmash, with two prominent rocky cliffs, where 
Jonath&n had his adventure with the garrison of the Philistines. 
One of these cliffs was called Setteh (1 Sam. siv. 4), a name 
which suggests ea-Suweinit. Through this defile th^ pass, 
encouraging one another, as they proceed along the difficult 
march, by the prospect of passing the night in Gleha, which is 
close at hand. It is still disputed whether this Geba is the 
same place as the following Qibeah of Saul or not. There 
is at the present time a village called Geba' below Miaihm^ 
situated upon an eminence. The almost universal opinion now 
is, that this is not Gibeab of Saul, but that the latter is to be 
seen in the prominent Tell {Tuleil) el-Ful, which is situated 
farther south. This is possibly correct.' For there can be no 
doubt that this mountain, the name of which signifies " Bean- 
hillj" would be a very strong position, and one very suitable for 
Qibeah of Saul ; and the supposition that there were two places 
in Benjamin named Geba, Gibeakj or Gibeath, is favoured at 
any rate by Josh, xviii. 21-28, where Geba and Gibeath are 
distinguished from one another. And this mountain, which is 
situated to the south of er-Rdm — that is to say, between the 
ancient Ramah and Anathoth — tallies very well with the route 
of the Assyrian as here described ; whilst it is very impro- 
bable that Isaiah has designated the very same place first of 
all Geba, and then (for what reason no one can tell) Gibeah 
of Saul. We therefore adopt the view, that the Assyrian 
army took up its quarters for the night at Oeba, which still 
- bears this name, spreading terror in all directions, both east 
and west, and still more towards the south. Starting in the 
morning from the deep valley between Michmash and Geba, 
they pass on one side of Haha (the present er-Rdm), situated 
half an hour to the west of Geba, which trembles as It sees 
them go by *, and the inhabitants of Gibeath of Saul, upon 
the " Bean-bill," a height that commands the whole of the sur- 
rounding country, take to flight when they pass by. Every 
halting-place on their route brings them nearer to Jerusalem. 

1 This is supported by BobinsoD in his Later Biblical Researchea in 
Palestine (1857), by YalentiDer (pastor at JeniHalem), and by Keil in the 
ConimentaTy on Joshua, Judges, etc. (pp. 188-9), where all tlie more recent 
writings on this tofK^rapbical qneetion tire given. 



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CHAP, r ae-Bs. i79 

The prophet goes in spirit throngh it all. It is so objectively 
real to him, that it produces the utmost anxiety and pain. The 
cities and villages of the district are lost. He appeals to the 
daughter, i.e. the population, of Q alum, to raise a f ar-sonnding 
yell of lamentation with their voice (Oes.*§ 138, 1, Anm. 3), 
and calls out in deep sympathy to Latbha, which was close 
by (on the two places, both of which have vanished now, see 
1 Sam. XXV. 44 and Judg, sviii. 29), " only listen," the enemy 
is coming nearer and nearer ; and then for Anathoth (^Andtdf 
still to be seen about an hour and a quarter to the north of 
Jerusalem) he utters this lamentation (taking the name as an 
omen of its fate) : O poor Anathoth F There is no necessity 
for any alteration of the text j 'aniyydh is an appeal, or rather 
an exclamation, as in eh. liv. 11 ; and 'anathoth follows, accord- 
ing to the same verbal order as in ch. xxiii. 12, unless indeed 
we take it at once as an adjective written before the nonn, — an 
arrangement of the words which may possibly have been admis- 
sible in such interjectional sentences. The catastrophe so much 
to be dreaded by Jerusalem draws nearer and nearer. Mad- 
HENAH (dung-hill, see Job, ii. 152) flees in anxious haste : the 
inhabitants of Gebim (water-pits) carry off their possessions 
CV'^j from TW) to flee, related to chush, hence to carry off-in 
flight, to bring in haste to a place of security, Ex. is. 19, cf. 
Jer. iv. 6, vi. 1 ; synonymous with hSnU, Ex. ix. 20, Judg. vi. 
11 ; different from 'dzaa, to he. firm, strong, defiant, from which 
md'oz, a fortress, is derived,^in distinction from the Arabic 
tnaddh, a place of refuge : comp. ch. xxx. 2, to flee to Pharaoh's 
shelter). There are no traces left of either place. The passage 
is generally understood as implying that the army rested 
another day in Nob. But this would he altogether at variance 
with the design — to take Jerusalem by surprise by the sudden- 
ness of the destructive blow. We therefore render it, " Even 
to-day he will halt in Nob" (in eo est vt subaistat, Ges. § 132, Anm. 
1), — namely, to gather up fresh strength there in front of the 
city which was doomed to destruction, and to arrange the plan of 
attack. The supposition that NOB was the village of eUIeawiye, 
which is still inhabited, and lies to the south-west of An&ta, 
fifty-flve minutes to the north of Jerusalem, is at variance with 
tlie situation, as correctly described by Jerome, when he says : 
** Stana ia oppidido Nob et procul urbem con^iciens Jenualem." 



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280 THE FBOPHEGIES OF ISAUH. 

A far more appropiiate sitaation is to be foand in tLe hill 
which rises to the north of Jerasalem, and which is called Sadr, 
from its breast-like projection or roundness, — a name which is 
related in meaning to nob, nab, to rise (see Gen. p. 635). From 
this eminence the way leads down into the Talley of Kidron ; 
and as yon descend, the ci^ spreads out before you at a very 
little distance off. It may have been here, in the prophet's 
view, that the Assyrians halted.* It was not long, however 
(as the yenl^hepk which follows aoTwSero)? implies), before hia 
hand was drawn out to strike (ch. xi. 15, xix. 16), and swing 
over the mountain of the daughter of Zion (ch. xvi. 1), over the 
city of the holy hill. Bat what would Jehovah do, who was 
the only One who could save His threatened dwelling-place in 
the face of such an army t As far as ver. 32a, the prophet's 
address moved on at a hurried, stormy pace ; it then halted, and 
seemed, as it were, panting with anxiety ; it now breaks forth 
in a dactylic movement, like a long rolling thunder. The 
hostile army stands in front of Jerusalem, like a broad dense 
forest. Bnt it is soon manifest that Jerusalem has a God who 
cannot be defied with impunity, and who will not leave His city 
in the lurch at the decisive moment, like the gods of Carchemish 
and Calno. Jehovah is the Lord, the God of both spiritual 
and atarry hosts. He smites down the branches of this forest 
of an army : as'eph is a so-called piel privativum, to lop (lit. 
to take the branches in hand ; cf. eikksl, ch. t. 2) ; and pu'roA 
= pe'urah (in Ezekiel pC'rah) is used like the Latin frons, to 
include both branches and foliage, — in other words, the leafy 
branches as the ornament of the tree, or the branches as adorned 
with leaves. The instrument He employs is mdardtzdh, his 
terrifying and crushing power (compare the verb in ch. ii. 19, 
21). And even the lofty trunks of the forest thus cleared of 
branches and leaves do not remain ; they lie hewn down, and 
the lofty ones must falL It is just the same with the trunks, 
i.e. the leaders, as with the branches and the foliage, i.e. with 

' This IB the opnion of ValeDtmer, who also regards the march of the 
ABajriaos m (m " eiecutjon-marcb" in two colunmB, one of which took the 
road through the difficult ground to the east, whilst the other inflicted 
punishment upon the places that stood near the road. The text does not 
require this, however, but describes a march, which ^ead alarm both 
tight and left aa it went along. 



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CHAP, XI. L 281 

tLe great crowded masses. The whole of the forest thicket (as 
in ch. ix. 17) he hews down (nikkaph, third pers. ptel, though it 
may also be niphal) ; and Lebanon, i,e. the army of Asshur which 
is now standing opposite to Moui^t Zion, like Lebanon with its 
forest of cedars, falls down through a Majestic One (^adthr), i.e. 
through Jehovah (ch. xxxiii. 21, of, Ps. Ixxri. 5, xciii. 4). In 
the account of the fulfilment (ch. xxzvii. 36) it is the angel of 
the Lord (mal'ach Jehovah), who is represented as destroying the 
hundred and eighty-fire thousand in the Assyrian camp in asingle 
night. The angel of Jehovah ig not a messenger of God sent 
from afar, bat the chosen organ of the ever-present divine power. 
This is the fate of the imperial power of the world. When 
the axe is laid to it, it falls without hope. But in Israel 
spring is returning. Ch, si, 1, "And there comeOi forth a 
twig out of the stump of Jesse, and a shoot from its roots bringeth 
forth fruit." The world-power resembles the cedar-forest of 
Lebanon ; the house of David, on the other hand, because of 
its apostasy, is like the stump of a felled tree (^eza, iruncus, 
from gdza, truncare), like a root without stem, branches, or 
crown. The world-kingdom, at the height of its power, pre- 
sents the most striking contrast to Israel and the house of 
David in the uttermost depth announced in ch. vi, ^n., muti- 
lated and reduced to the lowliness of its Bethlehemitish origin. 
Bat whereas the Lebanon of the imperial power ia thrown 
down, to remdn prostrate; the house of David renews its 
yonth. And whilst the former has no sooner reached the 
summit of its glory, than it is suddenly cast down ; the latter, 
having been reduced to the utmost danger of destruction, is 
suddenly exalted. What Pliny says of certain trees, "i«- 
arescunt T-ursus^/ue adolescunt, senescwit qiddem, sed e radicibvs 
repullulatit," is fulfilled in the tree of Davidic royalty, that has 
its roots in Jesse (for the figure itself, see P. v, Lasaulx, Philo- 
aophie der Gesehickte, pp. 117-119), Out of the stumps of 
Jesse, i.e. out of the remnant of the chosen royal family which 
has sunk down to the insignificance of the house from which 
it sprang, there comes forth a twig (choter), which promises to 
supply the place of the trunk and crown ; and down below, 
in the roots covered with eartli, and only rising a little above 
it, there shows itself a nitser, %,e. a fresh green shoot (from 
natzer, to shine or blossom). In the historical account of the 



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282 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAa 

fulfilment, even the ring of the words of the prophecy is 
noticed : the nltzer, at first so humble and insignificant, was a 
poor despised Nazarene (Matt, ii, 23), But the expression 
yiphreh shows at once that it wUl not stop at this lowliness of 
origin. The shoot will bring forth fruit (pdrah, different in 
meaning, and possibly' also in root, from pdrach, to blossom and 
bud). In the hnmble beginning there lies a power which will 
carry it up to a great height by a steady and certain process 
(Ezek. xvii, 22, 23). The twig which is shooting up on the 
ground will become a tree, and this tree will have a crown 
laden with fruit. Consequently the state of humiliation will 
be followed by one of exaltation and perfection. 

Jehovah acknowledges Him, and consecrates and equips 
Him for Hia great work with the seven spirits. Ver. 2. *' And 
the %>irit of JekovaJt descends upon Him, spinl of wisdom and 
understanding, spirit of counsel and might, spirit of knowledge 
and fear of Jehovah." " The Spirit of Jehovah" (rvack Ye~ 
hovah) is the Divine Spirit, as the communicative vehicle of 
the whole creative fulness of divine powers. Then follow the 
six spirits, comprehended by the rvach Yehovah in three pairs, 
of which the first relates to the intellectual life, the second 
to the practical life, and the third to the direct relation to 
God. For chocmdh (wisdom) is the power of discerning the 
nature of things through the appearance, and lundh (under- 
standing) the power of discerning the differences of things in 
their appearance ; the former is tro^ia, the latter SidxpioK or 
tyvvetnt, *' Counsel" ('etzdh) is the gift of forming right con- 
clusions, and " might" (gehurdh) the ability to carry them out 
with energy. "The knowledge of Jehovai" (da'ath Yehovah) 
is knowledge founded upon the fellowship of love; and "the 
fear of Jehovah" {yiv'ath Yekovdh), fear absorbed in reverence. 
There are seven spirits, which are enumerated in order from the 
highest downwards ; since the spirit of the fear of Jehovah is 

' We say posdbly, for the Indo-Germanio root bhar, to bear (Sbuhct. 
bharSmi = <plpa, fero, cf. ferax, fertiUs), which QeBeniua takes aa deter- 
mining the radical n^eajiiDg ot pSrach, cannot be traced with aoy certainty 
ia t^e Semitic. Keverthelees pfri and perach bear the same relation to 
one anollier, in tiie ordinary usage of the language, as fruit and blossom : 
the former in bo called, as that which has broken through (cf. pgtSr) tlie 
latter, as that which has broken np, or bndded. 



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the basis of the whole (Frov. i. 7 ; Job xxviii. 28 ; Fs. cxi. 10), 
and the Spirit of Jehovah is the heart of all. It corresponds 
to the shaft of the seven-lighted caadleEtick, and the three 
pair of arms that proceeded from it. In these seven forms 
the Holy Spirit descended upon the second David for a per- 
manent possession, as is affirmed in the -p^f. consec. ^nji (with 
the tone upon the ultimate, on account of the following gut- 
tural, , to prevent its being pronounced nnintelli^bly;^ nuach 
like Kara^alveiv koI fiAveiv, John i. 32, 33). The seven 
torches before the throne of God (Rev. iv. 5, cf. i. 4) bum 
and ^ve light in His soul. The seven spirits are His seven 
eyes (Rev. v. 6). 

And His ragal conduct is regulated by this His thoroughly 
spiritual nature. Ver. 3. "And fear of Jehotah is fragrance 
to Him ; and He jitdgee not according to outward sight, neither 
does He pass sentence according to outward hearing" We must 
not render it : His smelling is the smelling of the fear of God, 
i,e. the penetration of it with a keen judicial insight (as Heng- 
stenberg and Umbreit understand it) ; for hSitach with the 
preposition Beth has not merely the signification to smell (as 
when followed by an accusative, Job sxidx, 25), but to smell 
with satisfaction (like ^ TtK'\j to see with satisfaction), Ex. xxx. 
38, Lev. xxvi. 31, Amos v. 21. The fear of God is that which 
He smells with satisfaction ; it is rBach nichoach to Him. Meier's 
objection, that fear of God is not a thing that can be smelt, 
and therefore that hSrlach must signify to breathe, is a trivial 
one. Just as the outward man has five senses for the material 
world, the inner man has also a sensorium for the spiritual 
world, which discerns different things in different ways. Thus 
the second David scents the fear of God, and only the fear of 
God, as a pleasant fragrance ; for the fear of God is a sacrifice 
of adoration continually ascending to God. His favour or 
displeasure does not depend upon brilliant or repulsive external 

' This moTiDg forward of the tone to the bat Bfllable is also found 
before Ayin in Gen. zsvi 10, &nd very commonlj witlt kBmSh, and verba 
of a dmilar kind ; aim before Elohim and Jeborah, to be read Adonai, and 
before the half-gnttnial resh, Ps. xliii. 1, cxix. 154, but nowhere on any 
other ground than the orthophonio rather than enpbonic one mentioned 
above ; compare aieo mw in ver, 18, with V1D1 (with fl foUowingJ in Ei. 
viii. 7. 



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284 THE PROPHECIES OF KAUH. 

qnalitiefl ; He does not judge according to ontward appearances^ 
bat according to the relation of the heart to His G^. 

This is the standard according to which He will judge when 
saving, and judge when punishing. Yers. iy 5. " And judges the 
poor writh righieoutnega, and pauea aaUenee xeiih eqttitt/ for the 
humble in the land; and tmilet the earth vnlh the rod of Hit moulJt, 
and urith the breath of Hit lips ffeilat/atlie wicked. Andrighleotu- 
nes» is the ^rdU of Hit loins, and faithfulness the girdle of Sit 
hipt" The main feature in rer. 4 is to be seen in the objective 
i<^afl. He will do justice to the dalUm, the weak and helpless, b; 
adopting an incorruptible righteous course towards their oppres- 
sors, and decide with straightforwardness for the humble or meek 
of the land : 'dndv, like 'anl, from 'dndh, to bend, the latter de- 
noting a person bowed down by misfortune, the former a pereoa 
inwardly bowed down, i.e. free from all self-conceit (ha<naeh T, 
las in Job xvi. 31). The poor and humble, or meek, are tho 
peculiar objects of His royal care ; just as it was really to them 
that the fint beatitudes of the Sermon on the Mount applied. 
Bat " the earth" and " the wicked" (the latter is not to be 
understood collectively, but, as in several passages in the Old 
Testament, viz. Ps. Ixviii. 22, ex. 6, Hab. iii. 13, 14, as pointing 
forward prophetically to an eschatological person, in whom 
hostility towards Jehovah and His Anointed culminates most 
satanically) will experience the full force of His penal right- 
eousness. The very word of His mouth is a rod which shatters 
in pieces (Ps. ii..9 ; Hev. i. 16) ; and the breath of His lips is 
sufficient to destroy, without standing in need of any further 
means (2 Thess. ii. 8). As the girdle upon the hips (mothnaim, 
LXX. T^i- oi7<j>vi'), and in front upon the loins (chaldtzaim, 
LXX. tA? trXevpti/i), fastens the dothes together, so all the 
qualities and active powers of His persoij have for their band 
txeddkdh, which follows the inviolable norm of the divine will, 
and hd'emQndh, which holds immovably to the course divinely 
appomted, according to promise (ch, xsr. 1). Special pro- 
minence is given by the article to 'emUndh ; He is the faithful 
and trae witness (Rev, i. 5, iii. 14). Consequently with Him 
there commences a new epoch, in which the Son of David and 
His righteousness acquire a world-subduing force, and find 
theu* home in a humanity that has sprung, like Himself, out of 
deep hnmillatioD. 



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CHAP. XL t-9. 285 

The fruit of righteoosness is peace, which now leigns in 
humanity under the rule of the Prince of Peace, and even in 
the animal world, with nothing whatever to disturb it Vers- 6-9. 
" And the wolf dwelU with the lamh, and the leopard lies down 
with the kid ; and calf and lion and stalled ox together : a little 
hoy drives them. And cow and bear go to the pasture ; their yovng 
ones He down together: atid the lion eats chopped straw like the ox. 
And tlte suckling plays by the hole of the adder, and the weaned 
child stretches Us hand to theptipil of the baailish-viper. They 
will not hurt nor destroy in all my holy maurUain r for the land 
it filled witli knowledge of Jehovah, liJie the waters covering the 
sea," The fathers, and such commentators as Luther, Calvin, 
and Yitrlnga, have taken all these figures from the animal world 
as symholical. Modem rationalists, on the other hand, under- 
stand them literallj, but regard the whole as a beautiful dream 
and wish. It is a prophecy, however, the realization of which 
is to be expected on this side of the boundary between time and 
eternity, and, as Paul has shown in Kom. viii., is an integral 
link in the predestined course of the history of salvation (Heng- 
stenberg, tJmbreit, Hofmann, Drechsler). There now reign 
among irrational creatures, from the greatest to the least, — even 
among such as are invisible, — fierce conflicts and bloodthirsti- 
ness of the most savage kind. Bat when the Son of David 
enters upon the full possession of His royal inheritance, the 
peace of paradise will be renewed, and all that is true in the 
popular legends of a golden age be realized and confirmed. 
This is what the prophet depicts in such lovely colours. The 
wolf and lamb, tiose two hereditary foes, will be perfectly 
reconciled then. The leopard will let the teazing kid lie down 
beside it The lion, between the calf and stalled ox, neither 
seizes upon its weaker neighbour, nor longs for the fatter one. 
Cow and bear graze together, whilst their young ones lie side 
by side in the pasture. The lion no longer thirsts for blood, 
but contents itself, like the ox, with chopped straw. The suck- 
ling pursues its sport (^pilpel of Syf, mulcere) by the adder's 
hole, and the child just weaned stretches out its hand boldly 
and fearlessly to me'arath tztpJioni, It is evident from Jer. 
viii. 17 that tziph'oni is the name of a species of snake. Ac- 
cording to Aquila and the Vulgate, it is hasilis&os, serpens regulus, 
posubly from tzaph, to pipe or hiss (Ges., Fiirst) ; for Isidoms, 



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286 TEE PBOPHBCIES OF ISAIAH. 

in his Origg. zii. 4, sajs, Sibitue idem at qui et regidits ; tUnlo 
emm ocddtt, antequam mordeat vel exarat. For the Aopos l^. 
hdddh, the meaning dirigere, tendere, is established by the 
Arabic ; but there is all the more uncertainty about the mean- 
ing of the hap, Ug. TrtOKO. According to the parallel in, it 
seems to signify the hollow (Syr^ Vnlg,, LXX., Kovni): whether 
from 11M = TW, from which comes fn^D ; or from "ilK, the light- 
hole (like l^KD, which occurs in the Mishna, Oludoth xiii. 1) or 
opening where « cavern opens to the light of day. It is 
probable, however, that misrSh refers to sometliing tiiat exerts 
an attractive inflaence upon the child, either the "blending of 
colours" (Saad. renders txiplioni, errakaa', the motley snake), or 
better still, the "pupil of the eye" (Targtim), taking the word 
as a feminine of tnd'dr, the light of the eye (&. Erubin 55b = 
the power of vision). The look of a snake, more espeually of 
the basilisk (not merely the basilisk-lizard, but also the basilisk- 
viper), was supposed to have a paralyzing and bewitching in- 
flaence ; but now the snake will l(»e this pernicious power (cfa. 
Ixv. 25), and the basilisk become so tame and harmless, as to let 
children handle its sparkling eyes as if they were jewels. All 
this, as we should say with Lnthardt and Hofmann (Sckrift- 
heweit, ii. 2, 567), is only colouring which the hand of the pro- 
phet employs, for the purpose of painting the peace of that 
glorified state which surpasses all possibility of description ; and 
it is unq^uestionably necessary to take the thought of the pro- 
mise in a spiritual sense, without adhering literally to the medium 
employed in expressing it. But, on the other hand, we must 
guard against treating the description itself as merely a drapery 
thrown around the actual object; whereas it is rather the re- 
fraction of the object in the mind of the prophet himself, 
and thwefore a manifestation of the true nature of that which 
he actually saw. But are the animals to be taken as the sub- 
ject in ver. 9 also 1 The subject that most naturally suggests 
itself is undoubtedly the animals, of which a few that are 
alarming and destructive to men have been mentioned just 
before. And the fact that they really are thought of as the 
subject, is confirmed by eh. Ixv. 35, where ch. xi. 6-9a is re- 
peated in a compendious form. The idea that ^irv requires 
men as the subject, is refuted by the common njn n>n (compare 
the parallel promise in Ezek. xixiv. 25, which rests apon Hos. 



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CHAP. Xi. o-», 287 

ii. 20). That the tenn yashehilhu can be applied to animals, is 
evident from Jer. ii. 30, and may be aasnmed aa a matter of 
coarse. But if the animals are the subject, har iodshi (my holy 
moantain) is not Zion-Moriah, upon which wild beaats never 
made their home in historical times ; bat, aa the generah'zing 
eol (all) clearly shows, the whole of the holy moontain-land of 
Israel ; har kodaJU has just this meaning in ch. Ivii. 13 (cf. Ps. 
Ixxviii. 54, Ex. xv, 17), The fact that peace prevuls in the 
animal world, and also peace between man and beast, is then 
attiibated to the uniTersal prevalence of the knowledge of Ood, 
in consequence of which that destructive hostility between the 
animal world and man, by which estrangement and apostasy 
from God were so often punished (2 Kings xvii. 25; Ezek. 
xiv. 15, etc. : see also ch. vii. 24), have entirely come to an 
end. The meaning of "the earth" is also determined by that 
of "all my holy moantain." The land of Israel, the dominion 
of the Son of David in the more restricted sense, will be from 
this time forward the pai'adisaical centre, as it were, of the whole 
earth, — a prelude of its future state of perfect and universal 
glorification (ch. vi. 3, "all the earth"). It has now become 
fall of " the knowledge of Jehovah," i.e. of that experimental 
knowledge which consists in the fellowship of love (filT!, hke 
fiT?, is a secondary form of Tjn, the more common infinitive or 
verbal noun from jn< : Ges, § 133, 1), like the waters which 
cover the sea, i.e. the bottom of the sea (compare Ilab. ii. 14, 
where Iddaath is a virtual accusative, full of that which is to 
be known). " Cover .-" cUtdh S (like sdcac F, Ps. xci. 4), signi- 
fies to afford a covering to another ; the Lamed is frequently 
introduced with a participle (in Arabic regularly) as a sign of 
the object (Ewald, § 292, e), and the omission of the article in 
the case of mecaesim is a natural consequence of the inverted 
order of the words. 

The prophet has now described, in vers, 1-5, the righteous 
conduct of the Son of David, and in vers. 6-9 the peace which 
prevails nnder His government, and extends even to the animal 
world, and which is consequent upon the living knowledge of 
God that has now become aniversal, that is to say, of the 
spiritual transformation of the people subject to His sway, — an 
allusion full of enigmas, but one which is more clearly expoimded 
in the following verse, both in its, direct contents and also in all 



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288 THE PBOFBECIES OF I8AUH. 

that it presupposes. Ver. 10. " Audit will come to pass in that 
day : the root-sprout of Jesse, which stands as a banner of t/te 
peoples, for it will nations ask, and its place of rest is glory" 
The 6ret question which is disposed of here, has reference to 
the apparent restriction thos far of all the blessings of this 
peaceful rule to Israel and the land of Israel. This restriction, 
as we DOW leam, is not for its own sake, but is simply the means 
of an unlimited extension of this fulness of blessing. The proud 
tree of the Davldic sovereignty is hewn down, and nothing is 
left except the root. The new David is shoresh Yishai (the 
root-sprout of Jesse), and therefore in a certain sense the root 
itself, because the latter would long ago have perished if it had 
not borne within itself from the very commencement Him who 
was now about to issue from it. But when He who had been 
concealed in the root of Jesse as its sap and strength should 
have become the rejuvenated root of Jesse itself (cf. Eev. xxii. 
16), He would be exalted from this lowly beginning Cn^s 'ammiri, 
into a banner smnmoning the nations to assemble, and uniting 
them around itself. Thus visible to all the world, He would 
attract the attention of the heathen to Himself, and they would 
turn to Him with zeal, and His menuchdhf i.e. the place where 
He had settled down to live and reign (for the word in this local 
sense, compare Num. s. 33 and Fs. cxxxii. 8, 14), would be 
glory, i.e, tiie dwelling-place and palace of a king whose light 
shines over all, who has all beneath His rule, and who gathers 
all nations around Hiosself. The Vulgate renders it " et sepul- 
crum ejus glorioium " (a leading passage for encouraging pil- 
grimages), but the passion is here entirely swallowed up by the 
splendour of the figure of royalty ; and mmuckah is no more 
the place of rest in the grave than nSs is the cross, although 
nndoubtedly the cross has become the banner in the actual 
fulfilment, which divides the pai-ousia of Christ into a first 
and second coming. 

A second question also concerns Israel. The nation out of 
which and for which this king will primarily arise, will before 
that time be scattered far away from its native land, in accord- 
ance with the revelation in ch. vi. How, then, will it be possible 
for Him to reign in the midst of itt — Vers. H, 12. " And it 
will come to pass in that day, the Lord will stretch out His hand 
again a second time to redeem the remnant of His people that shall 



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OHAP. XI. 11, IL 289 

be left, out of Aathur, and out of Egypt, and out ofPathroe, and 
out of Ethiopia, and out of'Elam, and out of Shinar, and out of 
Samatkf and out of the isUuidt of tht sea. And lie raises a hantier 
for the nationi, and fetches home the outcasts of Israel; and the 
dispersed of Judah will He assemble from the four borders of the 
earth" Asshur aod Egypt stand here in front, and side hy side, 
as the two great powers of the time of Isaiah (cf . ch. vii. 18-20). 
As appendices to Egypt, we have (1) Pathroe, hierogl. to-rge, 
and with the aiticle petorSe, the southland, i.e. Upper Egypt, 
so that Mizraim in the stricter sense is Lower Egypt (see, on 
, the other hand, Jer. zliv. 15) ; and (2) Cush, the land which 
lies still farther south than Upper Egypt on both sides of the 
Arabian Gulf; and as appendices to Asshnr, (1) 'Elam, i.#. 
Elymais, in southern Media, to the east of the Tigris; and (2) 
Shinar, the plain to the south of the janction of the Euphrates 
and Tigris. Then follow the Syrian Satnath at the northern 
foot of the Lebanon ; and lastly, " the islands of the sea" i.c. 
the islands and coast-land of the Mediterranean, together with 
the whole of the insular continent of Europe, There was no 
such diaspora of Israel at the time when the prophet uttered 
this prediction, nor indeed even after the dissolution of the 
northern kingdom; so that the specification is not historical, 
but prophetic. The redemption which the prophet here foretells 
is a second, to be followed by do third ; consequently the banish- 
ment out of which Israel is redeemed is the ultimate form of 
that which is threatened in ch. vi. 13 (of. Dent, x^s, 1 sqq.). It 
is the second redemption, the counterpart of the Egyptian. He 
will then stretch out His hand again {i/Bsiph, supply lishloaeh) ; 
and as He once delivered Israel out of Egypt, so will He now 
redeem it — purchase it hack (kdndhf opp. mdcar) ont of all the 
countries named. The min attached to the names of the countries 
is to be construed with liknOth. Observe how, in the prophet's 
view, the conversion of the heathen becomes the means of tha 
redemption of Israel. The course which the history of salva- 
tion has taken since the first coming of Christ, and which it 
will continue to take to the end, as described by Paul in the 
Epistle to the Romans, is distinctly indicated by the prophet. 
At the word of Jehovah the heathen will set His people free, 
and even escort them (ch. xYix. 22, hui. 10); and thus He will 
gather again (^dsaph, with reference to the one gathering point ; 
VOL. 1. X 



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290 THE PBOPEECIES OP ISAUE. 

lUthetz, with reference to the dispersion of those who are to he 
gathered together) From the atmost ends of the four quarters 
of the globe, " the outcasts of the kingdom of Israel, and the 
dispersed of the kingdom of Judah" (nidcheYiardel QtKphtitzoth 
Yehuddh: nidche = niddeche, with the dagesk dropped before 
the following guttnraP), hoth men and women. 

But this calls to mind the present rent in the anity of the 
nation ; and the third qnestion very naturally arises, whether 
this rent will continue. The answer to this is given in ver. 13 : 
** And the jealousy of Ephraim is removed, and the adveriarUa 
of Judah are cut off ; Ephraim will not show jealousy towards 
Judah, and Judah will not oppose Ephraim." As the safBz 
and genitive after tzOrgr are objective in every other iostance 
(e.g. Amos v. 12), tzor'rB Yehudah must mean, not those mem- 
bers of Judah who are hostile to Ephraim, as Ewald, Knobel, 
and others suppose, but those members of Ephraim who are 
hostile to Judah, as Umbreit and Schegg expound it. In ver. 
13a the prophet has chiefly in his mind the old feeling of 
enmity cherished by the northern tribes, more especially those 
of Joseph, towards the tribe of Judah, which issued eventually 
in the division of the kingdom. It is only in ver. 136 that he 
predicts the termination of the hostility of Judah towards 
Ephraim. The people, when thns brought home again, would 
form one fraternally united nation, whilst all who broke the 
peace of this unity would be exposed to the immediate jud^ 
ment of God (yiccarethu, will be cut off). 

A fourth question has reference to the relation between this 
Israel of the future and the surrounding nations, such as the 
warlike Philistines, the predatory nomad tribes of the East, 
the unbrotherly Edomites, the boasting Mpabites, and the cruel 
Ammonites. Will they not disturb and weaken the new Israel, 
as they did the oldt Ver. 14. "And they fly upon the shoulder 
of the Philistines seawards ; unitedly they plunder the sons 
of the East : tltey seise upon Edom and Moah, and the sons 
of Amman are subject to them." Cathsph (shoulder) was the 
peculiar name of the coast-land of Fhilistia which sloped off 
towards the sea (Josh. xv. 11); but here it is used with an 

I The Kime occura in lyp^j IXB-JI, IKJip,'!, 1((^, IPiSe*, inpn. In every 
case the dagesh has fallen out because of the foUowiog gnttor^ (Luzzatto, 
Gramm. S 180). 



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CHAP. XI. IG, 11. 291 

implied allusion to this, to signify the shoulder of the Philistian 
nation {b'cdtheph = h'cglhgph ; for the canae see at ch. v. 2), 
upon which Israel plunges down like an eagle from the height 
of its mountain-land. The " object of the stretching oat of 
their hand " is equivalent to the object of their grasp. And 
whenever any one of the surrounding nations mentioned should 
^tack Israel, the whole people would make common cause, and 
act together. How does this warlike prospect square, however, 
with the previous promise of paradisaical peace, and the end of 
all warfare which this promise presupposes (cf . ch. ii. 4)t This 
is a contradiction, the solution of which is to be found in the 
fact that we have only figures here, and figures drawn from the 
easting relations and warlike engagements of the nation, in 
which the prophet pictures that supremacy of the future united 
Israel over surrounding nations, which is to be maintained by 
spiritual weapons. 

He dwells still longer upon the miracles in which the anti- 
typical redemption will resemble the typical one. Vers. 15, 16. 
" And Jehovah pronouncet the ban upon tlie sea-tongue of Egypt, 
and iwings Sis hand over the Euphrates in the glow of His breath, 
and smites it into seven brooks, and makes it so that men go 
through in shoes. And there toill be a road for the remnant of 
His people that shall be left, out of Asshur, as tt was for Israel 
in the day of its departure out of tlie land of Egypt " The two 
conntries of the diaspora mentioned first are Asshor and Egypt. 
And Jehovah makes a way by His miraculous power for those 
who are returning out of both and across both. The sea- 
tongue of Egypt, which runs between Egypt and Arabia, i,e, 
the Red Sea {sinua Heroopolitanus, according to another figure), 
He smites with the ban (hecherim, corresponding in meaning 
to the pouring out of the vial of wrath in Rev. xvi. 12, — a 
stronger term than gd'ar, e.g. Pa. cvi. 9) ; and the consequence 
of this is, that it affords a dry passage to those who are coming 
back (though without there being any necessity to read hecherlb, 
or to follow Meier and Knobel, who combine heeherim with 
ehdram, Lev. xsi. 18, in the precarious sense of splitting). 
And in order that the dividing of Jordan may have its antitype 
also, Jehovah swings His hand over the Euphrates, to smite, 
breathing upon it at the same time with burning breath, so 
that it is split up into seven shallow brooks, through which 



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292 THE FBOFBECIES OF ISAIAH. 

men can walk in sandals. ti^^3 stands, according to tbe law of 
sound, for D^ja; and the cm. Xfy. D^ (with a fixed kametz), 
from Dtf = mn, odpi, to glow, signifies a glowing heat, — a mean- 
ing which is also so thoroughly supported by the two Arabic 

verbs med. Ye ilc and *U {inf. 'aim, gaim, internal heat, burn- 
ing thu-st, also violent anger), that there is no need whatever for 
the conjecture of Luzzatto and Gesenius, DSjta. The early 
translators (e.g. LXX. ^rvevfian ^laup, Syr. b'uckdono, with a 
display of might) merely give conjectural renderings of the 
word, which had become obsolete before their time; Saadia, 
however, renders it with etymological correctness sueh&n, from 
aachana, to be hot, or set on fire. Thus, by changing the 
Euphrates in the (parching) heat of His breath into seven 
shallow wadys, Jehovah makes a free course for His people who 
come out of Asshur, etc. This was the idea which presented 
itself to the prophet in just this shape, though it by no means 
followed that it mast necessarily embody itself ia histoiy iu this 
particular form. 

As Israel, when redeemed from Egypt beyond the Ked Sea, 
aang songs of praise, so also will the Israel of the second re- 
demption, when brought, in a no less miraculons manner, across 
the Bed Sea and the Euphrates. Ch. zii. 1, 2. " And in titat 
day thou wilt lay, Itkanh Thee, Jehovah, tfiat Thou wast angry 
vnth me : ] Thine anger is turned away, and Tiiou hast comforted 
me. \ Behold, the God of my salvation; \ I trust, and am not 
afraid : [ for Jah Jehovah is my pride and song, \ and He he- 
came my salvation," The words are addressed to the people of 
the future in the people of the prophet's own time. They give 
thanks for the wrath experienced, inasmuch as it was followed 
by all the richer consolation. The formation of the sentence 
after '3 is paratactic ; the principal tone falls upon lb, where 
ydshoh is written poetically for vayydshob (cf. Deut. xxxii. 8, 18 ; 
Ps. sviii. 12 ; Hos. vi. 1). We hear the notes of Ps. xc. 13, 
xxvii. 1, resounding here ; whilst ver. 2& is the echo of Ex. 
XT. 2 (on which Ps. cxviii. 14 is also founded). M? (to be read 
'ozzi, and therefore also written 'W^ is another form of VP, and 
is used here to signify the proud self -consciousness associated 
with the possession of power : pride, and the expression of it, 
viz. boasting. Zimralh is equivalent in sense, and probably al^ 



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CHAP. XU. 8-<. 293 

m form, to ztmrdthi, just as in Syriac i^mori (my song) is 
regularly pronounced z'mSTf with the i of the suffix dropped 
(see Hupfeld on Ps. xvi. 6). It is also possible, however, that 
it may be only an expansion of the primary form zimrath = 
zimrdk, and therefore that zimrath is only synonymous with 
zimrdUii, as chipheU in 2 Sam. xxiii. 5 is with chephtzi. One 
thing peculiar to this echo of Ex. xr. 2 is the donbling of 
the Jah in Jdh JehovdJt, which answers to the surpassing of the 
type by the antitype. 

Ver. 3, again, contains a prophetic promise, which points 
back to the commencement of ver. 1 ; " And witli ri^ture y« 
will draw water out of the wellt of salvation." Just aa Israel 
was miraculously supplied with water in the desert, so will the 
Crod of salvation, who has become your salvation, open many 
and manifold sources of salvation for you QyHfO as it is pointed 
here, instead of '31?P'), from which ye may draw with and ac- 
cording to your heart's delight. This water of salvation, then, 
forms both the material for, and instigation to, new songs of 
pr^se; and vers. 4-6 therefoi-e continue in the strain of a 
psalm ; " And ye will my in that day, Praise Jehovah^ proclaim 
Hit namtj \ make known Bit doings anumg the nations, \ boast 
thai His name is exalted. \ Harp to •Tehovah; for JB^e has displayed 
majesty: ] let this be known in all lands. | Shovt ajid be jvhilant, 
inhabitant of Zion : \ for great is the Holy One of Israel in the 
midst of thee." The first song of six lines is here followed by a 
second of seven lines ; a prophetic word of promise, inserted 
between them, separates the one from the other. This second 
also commences with the well-known tones of a psalm (compare 
especially Fs. cv, 1, 1 Cbron, xvi. 8). The phrase, " Call upon 
the name of Jehovah," signifles, Make the name of Jehovah the 
medium of invocation (Ges. § 138, Anm. 3*), i.e invoke it, or, 
as heo:^, call it out. Ge'oth is high, towering dignity ; here it is 
used of God, as in ch. xxvi. 10, with 'dsdh: to prove it prac- 
tically, just as with l&bSsk in Ps. xciii. 1, to show one's self 
openly therein. Instead of the Chethib meyudda'ath in ver. 5, 

* The root is the same as, for example, in npjT (they rejoice) and ^'^]l^ ; 
here, however, it is more striking, because the lingalar is written nfO, uid 
not mp. At the sMne ttnie, it is evident ibat the connecting sonnd ay was 
rather [vefetTed than avoided, as Ewald maintains, — as we may see, for 
example, from Uie r^ated aj/ehi in Fa. diL 



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294 THE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

the ken substitutes the hophal form mUda'ath, probably because 
meyudda, according to the standing usage of speech, denotes 
one well known, or intimate ; the passive of the kopluil is cer- 
tainly the more suitable. According to the preceding appeals, 
the words are to be understood as expressing a desire, that 
the glorious self-attestation of the God of salvation might be 
brought to the consciousness of the whole of the inhabitants of 
the earth, i.e. of all mankind. When God redeems His people, 
He has the salvation of all the nations in view. It is the know- 
ledge of the Holy One of Israel, made known through the ward 
of proclamation, that brings salvation to them all. How well 
may the church on Zion rejoice, to have such a God dwelling 
in the midst of it 1 He is great as the giver of promises, and 
great in fulfilling them ; great in grace, and great in judgment ; 
great in ail His saving acts which spread from Israel to all man- 
kind. Thus does this second psaim of the redeemed nation 
close, and with it the book of Immanuel. 



PART III. 



COLLECnON OF OEACLES CONCERNING THE HEATHEN.— 

Chap, xin.-xxin. 

OBAOLE COKCEBNING THE CHALDEANS, THE HEIB3 OF 
THE ASSYKIANa. — CHAP. XIII. 1-SIV. 27. 

Just as in Jeremiah (ch. xlvi.-Ii.) and Ezekiel (ch. x]cv.-xs3ii.), 
so also in Isaiah, the oracles concerning the heathen are all 
placed together. In this respect the arrangement of the three 
great books of prophecy is perfectly homogeneous. In Jeremiah 
these oracles, apart from the prelude in ch. xxr., form the con- 
cluding portion of tha book. In £zekiel they fill np that space 
of time, when Jerusalem at home was lying at her last gasp and 
the prophet was sitting speechless by the Chaboras. And here, 
in IsEuah, they compensate us for the interruption w;hich the 
oral labours of the prophet appear to have sustained in the 
dosing years of the reign of Ahaz. Moreover, this was their 
most suitable position, at the end of the cycle of Messianic 



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CHAF. XIIL 1. 295 

pit^hetnes id ch. vii.-zii. ; for the great consolatoiy thonght of 
the prophecy of Immanuel, that all kingdoms are to become 
the kingdoms of God and His Christ, is here expanded. And as 
the prophecy of Immanuel was delivered on the threshold of 
the times of the great empires, so aa to cover the whole of that 
period with its consolation, the oracles concerning the heathen 
naUons and kingdoms are inseparably connected with that pro- 
phecy, which forms the gronnd and end, the unity and substance, 
of them all. 

The heading in ch. xiii. 1, " Oracle concerning Babel, which 
Isaiah tJu ton of Amaz did see," shows that ch. xiii. forms the 
commencement of another part of the whole book. Mast&h 
(from Kb*!, efferre, then effari, Ex. xx. 7) signifies, as we may 
see from 2 Kings ix. 25, effatutn, the vei'dict or oracle, more 
especially the verdict of God, and generally, perhaps always, 
the jadicial sentence of God,^ though without introducing the 
idea of onus (burden), which is the rendering adopted by the 
Targnm, Syriac, Vulgate, and Luther, notwithstanding the fact 
that, according to Jer. xxiii. 33 sqq., it was the scoffers who 
associated this idea with the word. In a book which could 
throughout be traced to Isaiah, there could be no nece^ity for 
it to be particularly stated, that it was to Isaiah that the oracle 
was revealed, of which Babel was the object. We may therefore 
see from this, that the prophecy relating to Babylon was- origi- 
nally complete in itself, and was intended to be issued in that 
form. But when the whole book waa compiled, these headings 
were retuned as signal-posts of the separate portions of which 
it was composed. Moreover, in the case before us, the retention 
of the heading may be regarded as a providential arrangement. 
For if this " oracle of Babel " lay before us iu a separate form, 
and without the name of Isaiah, we should not dare to attribute 
it to him, for the simple reasou that the overthrow of the 
Chaldean empire is here distinctly announced, and that at a 
time when the Assyriau empire was still standing. For this 
reason the majority of critics, from the time of Bosenmuller and 
Justi downwards, have regarded the spuriousness of the pro- 

' In Zecb. ziL 1 sqq. the proioiBe has, at anf rata, a dark side. In Lam. 
ii. 14 there is no necfssit; %o tluck of promises in connection witli the 
miu'olft ,■ and Pror. zxz. 1 and xixi. 1 cannot help na to determine tiw 
propbeUc oae of the word. 



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296 THE PBOFHECIES OF ISAUE. 

pbeey aa an established fact. Bat the evidence irliich can be 
adduced in support of the testimony contained in the heading 
is far too strong for it to be set aside : viz. (1) the descriptiv© 
stjle as well as the whole stamp of the prophecy, which te- 
sembies the undisputed prophecies of Isaiah in a greater variety 
of points than any passage that can be selected from any other 
prophet. We will show this briefly, bat yet amply, and as far 
as the nature of an exposition allows, ag^nst Knobel and others 
who maintain the opposite. And (2) the dependent relation 
of Zephaniah and Jeremiah, — a relation which the generally 
admitted mnse-like character of the former, and the imitative 
character of the latter, render it impossible to invert. Both 
prophets show that they are acquainted with this prophecy of 
Isaiah, as indeed they are with all those prophecies which are 
set down as sporious. Stahelin, in his work on the Messianic 
prophecies (Excnrstis iv.), has endeavoured to make out that 
the derivative passages in question are the original passages ; 
but gtat pro ratione vohmta*. Now, as the testimony of the 
heading is sustained by such evidence as this, the one argu- 
ment adduced on the other side, that the prophecy has no 
historical footing in the circumstances of Isiuah's times, cannot 
prove anything at all. No doubt all prophecy rested upon an 
existing historical basis. But we must not expect to be able to 
point this out in the case of every single prophecy. In the 
time of Hezekiah, as ch. xxxix. clearly shows (compare Mic. 
iv. 10), Isaiah had become spiritually certain of this, that the 
power by which the final judgment would be inflicted upon 
Judah would not be Asshur, but Babel, i.e. an empire which 
would have for its centre that Babylon, which was already the 
second capital of the Assyrian empire and the seat of kings 
who, though dependent then, were striving hard for indepen- 
dence ; in other words, a Chaldean empire. Towards the end 
of his course Isaiah was full of this prophetic thought ; and from 
it he TOse higher and hi^«- to the consoling discovery that 
Jehovah would avenge His people upon Babel, and redeem 
them from Babel, just as surely as from Asshnr. The fact 
that BO far-reaching an insight was granted to him into the 
counsels of God, was not merely founded on his own personality, 
but rested chiefly on the position which he occupied in the midst 
of the first beginnings of the age of great empires. Conse- 



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CHAP. xui. s, a. 297 

qnently, according to the law of the creative intensity of all 
divinely effected beginnings, he surreyed the whole of this long 
period as a nniversal prophet, outstripped all his successors 
down to the time of Daniel, and left to succeeding ages not 
only such prophecies as those we have already read, which had 
their hasis in the history of his own times and the historical 
fulfilment of which was not sealed up, but such far distant and 
sealed prophecies as those which immediately follow. For since 
Isaiah did not appear in public again after the fifteenth year of 
Hezekiah, the future, as his book clearly shows, was from that 
time forth his true home. Just as the apostle says of the K^ew 
Testament believer, that he must separate himself from the 
world, and walk in heaven, so the Old Testament prophet 
separated himself from the present of his own nation, and lived 
«nd moved in its future alone. 

The prophet hears a call to war. From whom it issnea, and 
to whom or against whom it is directed, still remains a secret; 
but this only adds to the intensity. Ver. 2. " On woodiest 
mountain lift ye up a banner, call to them with loud sounding 
voice, shake the hand, that they may enter into gates ofprincee I " 
The summons is urgent ; hence a threefold signal, viz. the 
banner-staff planted on a mountain " made bald " (niahpeh, from 
which comes sh'phi, which only occurs in Isaiah and Jeremiah), 
the voice raised high, and the shaking of the hand, denoting a 
violent beckoning, — all three being favourite signs with Isaiah. 
The destination of this army is to enter into a city of princes 
(n'dibim, freemen, nobles, princes, Ps. cvii. 40, cf. Ps. cxiii, 8), 
namely, to enter as conqnerors ; for it k not the princes who 
invite them, but Jehovah. — Ver. 3. "/, / have summoned my 
sanctified ones, also called my heroes to my wrath, my proudly 
rejoicing ones." " To my wrath " is to be explained in accord- 
ance with ch. X. 5. To execute His wrath He had summoned 
His "sanctified ones" (m'hidddshim), i.e. according to Jer. 
xxii. 7 (compare Jer. li, 27, 28), those who had already been 
solemnly consecrated by Him to go into the battle, and had 
called the heroes whom He had taken into His service, and who 
were His instruments in this respect, that they rejoiced with 
the pride of men intoxicated with victory (vid. Zeph. i. 7, cf. 
iii. 11). r?jr is a word peculiarly Isaiah's; and the combination 
"i^ tW is so unusual, that we could hardly expect to find it 



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298 THE PB0FHECIE8 OF I8AUH. 

employed by two aathore who stood in no relation whatever to 
one another. 

The command of Jehovah is quickly executed. The great 
army is already coming down from the mountains. Vers. 4, 5. 
" Harh, a rumbling on the mountains after the manner of a great 
people; harh, a rumbling of kingdoms of nations met together! 
Jehovah of hosts musters an army, those that Iiave come out of a 
distant land, from the end of the heaven : Jehovah and His instru- 
ments of wrath, to destroy the whole earth!' Kol commences an 
interjection al sentence, and thus becomes almost an interjection 
itself (compare ch, lii. 8, Isvi. 6, and on Gen. iv. 10). There 
is rumbling on the mountains (ch. xvii. IS, 13), for there are 
the peoples of Eran, and in front the Medes inhabiting the 
mountainous north-western portion of Eran, who come across 
the lofty Shahu (Zagros), and the ranges that lie behind it 
towards the Tigris, and descend upon the h>wlands of Babylon; 
and not only the peoples of Eran, but the peoples of the monn- 
tainous north of Asia generally (Jer. li. 27), — an army under 
the guidance of Jehovah, the God of the hosts of spirits and 
stars, whose wrath it will execute over the whole earth, i.e. 
upon the world-empire ; for the fall of Babel is a ]'udgment, 
and accompanied with judgments upon all the tribes under 
Babylonian rale. 

Then all sink into anxions and fearful trembling. Vers. 
6-8. " Howl; for the day of Jehovah is near ; like a destructive 
force from the Almighty it comes. Therefore all arms hang 
loosely down, and every human heart melts away. And tliey are 
troubled: they fall into cramps and pangs ; like a woman in labour 
they twist themselves: one stares at theolher; their faces are faces 
offiameP The command v'T'ri (not written defectively, wv?) 
is followed by the reason for such a command, viz. " the day 
of Jehovah is near," the watchword of prophecy from the time 
of Joel downwards. The Caph in c'slwd is the so-called Caph 
veritatis, or more correctly, the Caph of comparison between 
the individual and its genus. It is destruction by one who 
possesses nnlimited power to destroy {shod, from sMdad, from 
which we have shaddai, after the form chaggai, the festive one, 
from chdgag). In this play upon the words, Isaiah also repeats 
certain words of Joel (ch. i. 15). Then the hands hang down 
frcon despondem^ and helplessness, and the hearty the seat of 



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CHAP. XIIL 9, 10. S99 

life, melts (ch. six. 1) in the heat of anguish. Universal con- 
sternation ensnes. This is expressed by the word v'nibhdlu, 
which stands in half pause ; the word has sluihlteleth followed 
hy psik {pasek), an accent which only occurs in seven passages 
in the twentj-one prose books of the Old Testament, and 
always with this dividing stroke after it.^ Observe also the 
following yitf. ^raj^ojrica, which add considerably to the energy 
of the description by their anapaestic rhythm. The men (mhj.) 
lay hold of cramps and pangs (as in Job xviii. 20, xxi. 6), the 
force of the events compelling them to enter into snch a con- 
dition. Their faces are faces of flames. Koobel understands 
this as referring to their turning pale, which. is a piece of 
exegetical jugglery. At the same time, it does not suggest 
mere redness, nor a. convulsive movement; but just as a flame 
alternates between light and darkness, so their faces become 
alternately flashed and pale, as the blood ebbs and flows, as it 
were, being at one time driven with force into their faces, and 
then again driven back to the hearty so as to leave deadly pale- 
ness, in consequence of their anguish and terror. 

The day of Jehovah's wrath is coming, — a starless night — a 
nightlike, sunless day. Vers, 9, 10. " Behold, the day of Jehovah 
comelh, a cruel one, and wrath and fierce anger, to turn the earth 
into a wildemees : and its sinners He destroys out of it. For the 
stars of heaven, and its Orions, will not let their light shine: the 
ntn darkens itself at its rising, and the moon does not let Ha light 
shine." The day of Jehovah cometh as one cruelly severe 
i^aczdri, an adj. rel. from 'aczdr, chosh, kosh, to be dry, hard, 
unfeeling), as purely an overilowing of inward excitement, and 
as burning anger ; IdsUm is carried on by the finite verb, ac- 
cording to a well-known alteration of style (= iiPhashmld). It is 
not indeed the general judgment which the prophet is depicting 
here, but a certain historical catastrophe falling upon the na- 
tions, which draws the whole world into sympathetic suffering. 
'Eretz, therefore (inasmuch as the notions of land generally, 
and some particular land or portion of the earth, are blended 
together, ■ — a very elastic term, with vanishing boundaries), 
is not merely the land of Babylon here, as Knobel supposes, 
but the earth. Ver. 10 shows in what way the day of Jehovah 
b a day of wrath. Even nature clothea itself in the colour of 
> For the seren paangea, we Emld, Lehrbaek (ed. 7), f. 221. 



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300 THE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

wratb, which u the verj opposite to light. The hearenly lights 
above the earth go oat; the moon does not shine ; and the son, 
which is abont to rise, alters its miad. *< The Oriont " are 
Orion itself and other constellations like it, just as the morning 
stars in Job xxxviii. 7 are Hespenis and other similar stars. It 
is more probable that the term ceall is used for Orion in the 
sense of "the fool" (^ foolhardy),' according to the older 
translators (LXX. o 'tipiwv, Targnm nephilelion from nephikCf 
Syr. gaboro, Arab, gebbdr, the ^ant), than that it refers to 
Siihfl, i.e. Canapia (see the notes on Job is. 9, xsxviii. 31), 
althongh the Arabic 8uh£l does occur as a generic name f<« 
stars of sarpassiog splendour (see at Job xxxviii. 7). The 
comprehensive term employed is similar to the £gnre of speech 
met with in Arabic (called tagUb, i.e. the preponderance of the 
pan potior), in snch expressions as "the two late evenings" for 
the evening and late evening, " the two Omars " for Omar and 
Ababekr, though the resemblance is still greater to the Latin 
Seipiones, i.e. men of Scipio's greatness. Even the Orions, Le. 
those stars which are at other times the most conspicnons, with- 
hold their light ; for when God is angry, the principle of anger 
is set in motion even in the natural world, and primarily in the 
stars that were created " for signs " (compare Gen. i. 14 with 
Jer. X. 2). 

The prophet now hears again the voice of Jehovah revealing 
to him what His purpose is, — namely, a visitation punishing 
the wicked, humbling the prond, and depopulating the countries. 
Vers. 11, 12. " And I vigit the evil upon the teorld, and upon 
sinners thar guilt, and ainkinto silence thepomp of the proud; and 
the boasting of tyrants I throw to the ground. I make men more 
precious than fine gold, and people than a jewel of Ophir." The 
verb pdkad is construed, as in Jer. xxiii. 2, with the accusative 
of the thing punished, and with TV of the person punished. 
Instead of 'eretz we have here tsbel, which is always used like a 
proper name (never with the article), to denote the earth in its 

> Wben R. Samael of Nebardea, the astronomer, tsj^ in his h. BerachoA 
hSb, " If it weie not for the heat of the ctsU, the world trould perish fnan 
the cold of the Scorpion, and rice twrsa," — he means by the ceml Orion ; 
and tiw tme meaning of the passage is, that the conatell&tioiu of Orion and 
the Soorpion, one of which sppeara in the hot Beaaon, and the other in th« 
ecdd, preswre tiie temperature in eqnilibriam. 



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CHAP, na 18. u 801 

entire circumference. We have also 'dritzlm instead of nedlbim .- 
the latter signifies merely princes, and it is only occasionally 
that it has the subordinate sense of despots ; the former signifies 
men naturally cruel, or tyrants (it occurs very frequently m 
Isaiah). Everything here breathes the spirit of Isaiah both in 
thought and form. " The lofty is thrown down : " this is one 
of the leading themes of Isaiah's proclamation ; and the fact 
that the judgment will only leave a remnant is a fundamental 
thought of his, which also runs through the oracles concerning 
the heathen (ch. xvi. 14, xxi. 17, xsiv. 6), and is depicted by 
the prophet in various ways (ch. x. 16-19, xvii. 4-6, xxiv. 13, 
XXX. 17). There it b expressed under the figure that men 
become as scarce as the finest kinds of gold. Word-painting is 
Isaiah's delight and strength. 'Ophir, which resembles 'oHr in 
sound, was the gold country of India, that lay nearest to the 
Fhoeniciana, the coast-land of Abhira on the northern shore of 
the Munn (/rina), i.e. the salt lake to the east of the mouths of 
the Indus (see at Gen. x. 29 and Job xxii. 24 ; and for the 
Egypticized Sottphir of the LXX., Job xxviii. 16), 

Thus does the wrath of God prevail among men, casting 
down and destroying; and the natural world above and below 
cannot fail to take part in it. Ver. 13. " Therefore I shake the 
heavens, and the earth trembles atoay from its place, because of the 
wrath of Jehovah of hosts, and because of the day of His fierce 
anger." The two Beths have a causative meaning (cf. ch. 
ix. 18). They correspond to 'al-cen (therefore), of which they 
supply the explanation. Because the wrath of God falls upon 
men, every creature which is not the direct object of the judg- 
ment must become a medium in the infliction of it. We have 
here the thought of ver. 9a repeated as a kind of refrain (in a 
similar manner to ch. v. 25). Then follow the several disasters. 
The first is flight. — Ver. 14. " And it comes to pass as with a 
gazelle which is scared, and as with a fUtck without gatherers : tlieg 
turn every one to his people, and they flee every one to his land" 
The neuter v'hdydk affirms that it will then be as described in 
the simile and the interpretation which follows. Babylon was 
the market for the world in central Asia, and therefore a ren- 
dezvous for the most diverse nations (Jer. I. 16, of. li. 9, 44) — 
for a -Tru/i/uKTOi ^X^-**^' ^ -^sehylus says in Jiis Ferace, v. i)2. 
This great and motley mass of foreigners would now be seat- 



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302 TBE FBOPEECIES OF ISAIAB. 

tered in the wildest flight, on the fall of the imperial city. The 
second disaster is violent death. — Yer. 15. " Eoert/ onetltatU 
found ii pierced through, and every one that ia caught falls iy thx 
awordT By " every one that is found" we understand those 
that are taken in the city by the invading conquerors ; and by 
" every one that is caught" those that are overtaken in their 
flight (sdphdh, abripere, ch. vii. 20). All are pat to the sword. 
— The third and fourth disasters are plunder and ravage. Ver. 
16. '^And their infants are dashed to pieces before their eyes, 
their houses plundered^ and their wives ravialied" Instead of 
tisshagalnah, the keri has the euphemistic term tisshdcabnah 
(coneubitum patientur), a passive which never occurs in the 
Old Testament text itself. The keri readings shuceabt in Jer. 
iii. 2, and yiehcdbennah in Deut. xsviii. 30, also do violence to 
the language, which required ^)! ^17 and HK (the latter as a 
preposition in Gen. xix. 34) for the sake of euphemism ; or 
rather they introduce a later (talmudic) usage of speech into 
the Scriptures (see Geiger, Urschrift, pp. 407-8). - The pro- 
phet himself intentionally selects the base term skdgal, though, 
as the queen's name Shegal shows, it must have been regarded 
in northern Palestine and Arameeau as by no means a dis- 
reputable word. In this and other passages of the prophecy 
Knohel scents a fanaticism which is altogether strange to Isaiah. 
With ver. 17 the prophet^ takes a fresh turn, in which the 
veil that has hitherto obscured it b completely broken through. 
We now learn the name of the conquerors. "Behold, I rouse 
up the Medes over them, who do not regard silver, and take no 
pleasure ingold" It was the Medes (Darius Medu8=CyaxareB 
II.) who pnt an end to the Babylonian kingdom in combination 
with the Persians (Cyrus). The Persians are mentioned for 
the first time in the Old Testament by Ezgkiei and Daniel. 
Consequently Mddai (by the side of which £lam is mentioned 
in ch. xxi. 2) appears to have been a general term applied to 
the Arian populations of Eran from the moat important ruling 
tribe. Until nearly the end of Hezekiah's reign, the Medes 
lived scattered about over different districts, and in hamlets 
(or villages) united together by a constitutional organization. 
After they had broken away from the Assyrians (714 B.C.) 
they placed themselves in 709~S B.C. under one common king, 
namely Deyoces, probably for the purpose of apholding their 



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CHAP. XIII. IB, IS. 303 

nHtioDal independence ; or, to speak more correctly, under a 
common monarch, for even the chiefs of the villages were called 
kinga.^ It is in this sense that Jeremiah speaks of " kings of 
Madai ;" at any rate, this is a much more probable supposition 
than that he refers to monarcha in a generic sense. But the 
kings of Media, i.e. the rulers of the several villages, are 
mentioned in Jer. xxv. 25 among those who will have to drink 
the intoxicating cup which Jehovah is about to give to the 
nations through Nebuchadnezzar. So that their expedition 
against Babylon is an act of revenge for the disgrace of 
bondage that has been inflicted upon them. Their disregarding 
ulver and gold is not intended to describe them as a rude, 
imcnltivated people: the prophet simply means that they are 
impelled by a spirit of revenge, and do not come for the 
purpose of gathering booty. Cevenge drives them on to for- 
getfulneas of all morality, and humanity also. — Ver. 18. "And 
bows da»h doum young men ; and they have no compassion on tlie 
fruit of the ujomh : tJteir eye has no pity on children," The bows 
do not stand for the bowmen (see ch. xxi. 17), but the bows of 
the latter dash the young men to the ground by means of the 
arrows shot from them. They did not spare the fruit of the 
womb, since they ripped up the bodies of those that were with 
child (2 Kings viii. 12, xv. 16, etc). Even towards children 
they felt no emotion of compassionate regard, sach as would 
express itself in the eye : ekiiSf to feel, more especially to feel 
with another, t^. to sympathize ; here and in Ezek. v. 11 it is 
ascribed to the eye as the mirror of the soul (compare the 
Arabic chasyet eVain ala fuldnin^ carefulness of eye for a 
person : Hariri, Comment, p. 140). With such inhuman con- 
duct on the part of the foe, the capital of the empire becomes 
the scene of a terrible conflagration. — Ver. 19, "And Babel, 
the ornament of kingdoms, the proud boast of the Chaldeans, 
becomes like Elohim's overthrowing judgment upon Sodom and 
Gomorrah." The ornament of kingdoms (mamMcoth), because 
it was the centre of many conquered kingdoms, which now 
avenged themselves upon it (ver. 4) ; the pride (cf. cli. 
xxviii. 1), because it was the primitive dwelling-place of the 
Chaldeans of the lowlands, that ancient cultivated people, who 
I See Spiegel's EraH das Land iwiscken dem Indus uitd Tigria (1663), 
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804 THE PBOFHECIES OF ISUAH. 

wtre related to the Chaldean tribes of the Cardachisan tnomi' 
tuns in the north-east of Mesopotamia, tbongh not <^ the same 
origin, and of totally different manners (see at ch. xxiii. 13). 
Their present catastrophe resembled tbat of Sodom and Go- 
morrah : the two eths are accBsative ; maJipecah (jcaTiurrpo^) 
is used like dedh in ch. xi. 9 with a verbal force (to xaro- 
errpeifrat, well rendered by the IjXX. ov rpoirov KaTearpo^^v i 
Qeis. On the arrangement of the words, see Qes. § 133, 3). 

Babel, like the cities of the Pentapolis, had now become a 
perpetoal deserL Vers. 20-22. " She remains uninhabited for 
eeeTf and umxcupted into gtneration of generations ; and not an 
Arab pitchex his tent there, and t}iepherds do not make their folds 
there. And there He beasts of the desert, and horn-owls fill their 
houses; and ostriches dwell there, and field-devils hop about there. 
And jachalt hotel in her catties, and wild dogs in palaces of 
pleasure; and her time ts near to come, and her days will not be 
prolonged^ The conclusion is similar to that of the prophecy 
against Edom, in ch, xxxir. 16, 17. There the certuntyof the 
prediction, even in its moat minute particulars, is firmly declared ; 
here the nearness of the time of fulfihnent. But the fulfilment 
did not take place so soon as the words of the prophecy mi^t 
make it appear. According to Herodotus, Cyrus, the leader 
of the Medo-Fersian army, left tbe city still standing, 'with its 
double ring of walls. Darius Hystaspie, who had to conquer 
Babylon a second time in 518 B.C., had tbe walls entirely 
destroyed, with the exception of fifty cubits. Xerxes gave the 
last thrust to the gloiy of the temple of Belus. Having been 
cimquered by Seleucus Nicator (312), it declined just in pro- 
portion as Seleucia rose. Babylon, saya Pliny, ad soliiadinem 
rediit exhausta vicinitate Seleuaa. At the time of Strabo (bom 
60 B.C.) Babylon was a perfect desert ; and he apples to it 
(xvi. 15) the words of the poet, ifnjfUa fteyaKt} 'ariv i) fi^dXai 
woXi^. Consequently, in the passage before us tbe prophecy 
falls under tbe law of perspective foreshortening. But all that 
it foretells has been literally fulfilled. The curse that Babylon 
would never come to be settled in and inhabited again (a 
poetical expression, like Jer. xvii. 25, xxsili. 16), proved itself 
an effectual one, when Alexander once thought of making 
Babylon the metropolis of his empire. He was carried off by 
an eai'Iy death. Ten thousand workmen were at that ^ne 



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CHAP. Xm. 20-22. 805 

employed for two montlis in simply clearing away tfee m1)bish 
of the fonndations of the temple of Belns (the Nimrod-tower), 
" Not an Arab pitcha hU tent there " {'Ardhi, from 'ArdldJi, a 
steppe, is used here for the first time in the Old Testament, 
and then again in Jer. iii. 2 ; yOhelj different from ydksl in 
ch. xiii. 10 and Job xxxi. 26, is a syncopated form of bnR', 
tentorium jiget, according to Ges. J 68, Anm. 2, used instead of 
the customary ^?^^) : this was simply the natural consequence 
of the great field of ruins, upon which there was nothing but 
the most scanty vegetation. But all kinds of beasts of the 
desert and waste places make their homes there instead. The 
list commences with ziyyim (from zi, dryness, or from dyt, an 
adj. relat. of the noun zi), i.e. dwellers in the desert; the 
reference here is not to men, bat, as in most other instances, 
to animals, though it is impossible to determine what are the 
animals particularly referred to. That ocUm are homed owls 
{Uhtu) is a conjecture of Aorivillius, which decidedly com- 
mends itself. On b'noth ya'dndh, see at Job xxxix. 13-18. 
Wetzstein connects ya'dndii with an Arabic word for desert ; it 
is probably more correct, however, to connect it with the Syriac 
lUjr, greedy. The feminine plural embraces ostriches of both 
sexes, just as the 'it/yim (sing. 'M = 'it*, from 'dvdh, to howl : 
flee Bernstein's Lex. on Kirsch's Chrestom. Syr. p. 7), i.e. jackals, 
are called hendt dwa in Arabic, without distinction of sex (area 
in this appellation is a direct reproduction of the natural voice 
of the animal, which is called toaui in vulgar Arabic). Tan 
has also been regarded since the time of Pococke and Schnurrer 
as the name of the jackal ; and this is supported by the Syriac 
and Targum rendering yaruro (see Bernstein, p, 220), even 
more than by the Arabic name of the wolf, tindn, which only 
occurs here and there. *M, ihnu awa, is the common jackal 
found in Hither Asia (^Canis aureus vulgarii), the true type of 
the whole species, which is divided into at least ten varieties, 
and belongs to the same genua as dogs and wolves (not foxes). 
Tan may refer to one of these varieties, which derived its name 
from its distinctive peculiarity as a long-stretched animal, whether 
the extension was in the trunk, the snout, or the tail. The 
animals mentioned, both quadrupeds (rdbatz) and birds (gJidean), ■ 
are really found there, on the soil of ancient Babylon. When 
r Kerporter was drawing near to the Nimrod-tower, he saw lions 
VOL. I. u 



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S06 THE ?SOraEClES or IBAIAH. 

aoiining themsdvee qmetly apon tto walla, whkb came down 
Teiy leisarely when scanned by the cries of the Arabs. And 
as Rich heard in Bagdad, the rains ape still regarded as a 
rendezTotu for ghosts : id'ir, when contrasted with 'attild, sig- 
nifies the fall-grown shaggy back-goat; bat here te'irim ia 
applied to demons in the shape of goats (as ia ch. xxxir. 14). 
According to the Scriptnres, the desert is the abode of miclean 
spirits, and sach nnclean spirits as the popular belief or mytho- 
]ogy pictured to itself were te'irim. Virgil, like Isaiah, calls 
them saltantet Satyrot. It is remarkable also that Joseph 
Wolf, the missionary and traveller to Bochdra, saw pilgrims of 
the sect of Yezidu (or devil-worshippers) apon the ruins of 
Babylon, who performed strange and horrid rites by moonlight, 
and danced extraordinary dances with ungnlar gestores and 
sonnds. On seeing these ghost-lik^ howling, moonlight pilgrims, 
he very naturally recalled to mind the dancing se'irun of pro- 
phecy (see Moritz Wagner's Seise naeh Pereien ufuf dem Lande 
d^r Kurden, Bd. ii. p. 251). And the nightly howling and 
yelling of jackals ^dndk after rikiid, aa in 1 Sam. zviii. 6, 7) 
produces its natural effect upon every traveller there, just as 
in all the other rains of the East. These are now the inhabit- 
ants of the royal 'arm'notk, which the prophet calis 'aim'nolh 
with a sarcastic tarn, on account of their widowhood and 
desolation ; these are the inhabitants of the palaces of pleasure, 
the loxorioas villas and country-seats, with their hanging gai^ 
dens. The Apocalypse, in ch. xviii. 2, takes up this prophecy 
of Isiuah, and applies it to a still existing Babylon, which might 
have seen itself in the mirror of the Babylon of old. 

Bat it is love to His own people which impels the God of 
Israel to suspend sach a jndgment of eternal destructicm over 
Babylon. Ch. siv. I, 2. "i^or Jehovah will have mercy on Jacobs 
mtd unllonee more choose Israel, and toill settle tliem in tkeir own 
land : and the foreigner teill associate with them, and tkey tSHt^^ 
cleave to the hotue of Jacob. And nations take them, and ae- 
eompami them to their place ; and the house of Israel takes them 
to itself in the land of Jehovah for servants and maid^servants : ! 
and they hold in capHvity those who led them away captive; and J 
. become lords over titeir oppressors'' We have here in nuce I 
the comfortmg substance of ch. zlvi.-lxvi. Babylon falls that f 

\ 

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CHAP. XIV. 1-4. 307 

He chooses Israel once more (tferum, as in Job. xiv. 7 for 
example), and therefore makes a new coveuant vith it. Then 
follows their return to Canaan, their own land, Jehovah's land 
(as in Hos. ix. 3). Proselytes from among the heathen, who 
have acknowledged the God of the exiles, go along with them, 
as Buth did with Naomi. Heathen accompany the exiles to 
their own place. And now their relative positions are reversed. 
Those who accompany Israel are now taken possession of by the 
latter (killmachsl, KXifpovofieip eavr^, like kithpattSach, ch, lii. 2, 
"Kuetrffat ; cf. p. 94, note, and Ewald, § 124, fi), as servants and 
maid-servants; and they (the Israelites) become leaders into 
captivity of those who led them into captivity (Lamed with the 
participle, as in ch. xi. 9), and they will oppress (rdddh V, as 
in Fs. xlix. 15) their oppressors. This retribution of like for 
like is to all appearance quite out of harmony with the New 
Testament love. Bat in reality it is no retribution of like for 
like. For, according to the prophet's meaning, to be ruled by 
the people of God is the true happiness of the nations, and to 
allow themselves to be so ruled is their true liberty. At ^e 
same time, the form in which the promise is expressed is cer- 
tainly not that of the New Testament ; and it could not possibly 
have been so, for the simple reason that in Old Testament times, 
and from an Old Testament point of view, there was no other 
visible manifestation of the church (ecclesia) than in the form of 
a nation. This national form of the church has been broken np 
under the New Testament, and will never be restored. Israel, 
indeed, will be restored as a nation ; but the true essence of 
the chnrch, which is raised above all national distinctions, will 
never return to those worldly limits which it has broken through. 
And the fact that the prophecy moves within those limits here 
may be easily explained, on the ground that it is primarily the 
deliverance from the Babylonian captivity to which the promise 
refers. And the prophet himself was unconscious that this 
captivity would be followed by another. 

The song of the redeemed is a song concerning the fall of 
the king of Babel. Vers, 3, 4a. " And t( cometh to pass, on the 
day that Jehovah giveth thee rest from thy plague, and from thy 
caret, and from the heavy bondage wherein thou toast made to 
terve, that thou shaU raise tuch a song of triumph concerning the 
king of Bahel, and say." Instead of the hiphU hmmaeh (to let 



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308 THE PBOPBECIES OF ISAIAH. 

down) of ver. 1, we have here, as in the original passage, Dent 
XXT. 19, the form kgniack, which ia commonlj used in the sense 
of qnieting, or procuring rest. ^-fiJ is trouble which plagues 
(as ?Dy is trouble which oppresses), and rOgez restlessness which 
wears out with anxious care (Job ili. 26, cf. Ezek. m. IS). 
The assimilated min before the two words is pronounced ml^ 
with a weak reduplication, instead of m^, as elsewhere, before 
n, n, and eyen before 1 (1 Sam. xxiii. 28 ; 2 Sam. xviii. 16)- 
In the relative clause ^3~i2y IE'k, "iB^K is not the Hebrew cams 
adverb, answering to the Latin ablative grid servo te tui »unt ; 
nor do ^^ . . . ifK belong to one another in the sense of quo, as 
in Dent, xxi^ 3, gud (vituld) ; but it is regarded as an aee. obj- 
according to Ex. i. 14 and Lev. xxv. 39, gu'on ta fait servir, as 
in Num. xxsii. 5, yu'on dorme h terre (Luzzatto). When de- 
livered from such a joke of bondage, Israel would raise a masMl 
According to its primary and general meaning, mdehdl signifies 
figurative language, and hence poetry generally, more especiall/ 
that kind of proverbial poetry which loves the emblematical, and, 
in fact, any artistic composition that is piquant in its character ; 
so that the idea of what is satirical or defiaOtmay easily be 
associated with it, as in the passage before us. V^ 

The words are addressed to the Israel of the fulMr ^ ^^^ 
Israel of the present, as in ch. xii. 1, The Former woulLthea 
sing, and say as follows. Vers. 46-6. " How hath ilu op^?V* 
ceased I the place of torture ceased! Jehovah hath broken^ 
rod of (Afl wicked, the rulers staff, which smote nations in y^"^ 
wiih strokes withovt ceasing, subjugated natiotia torathfulm^ 
hunting that never stays" Not one of the early translate 
thought of deriving the hap. leg. tnadhebah from the ArB 
(fe&i&(goId), asyitringa,AnrivilIius, andKosenmiUlerha^ 
The former have all translated the word as if it were n 
(haughty, violent treatment), as corrected by J. D. MiJ 
Doederlein, Knobel, and others. But we may arrive j 
same result without altering a single letter, if we take 3M' 
equivalent to 2n^, 31% to melt or pine away, whether we 
back to the kaloi to the hipMl of the verb, and regard the M'en 
as used in a material or local sense. We understand it, accord J 
ing to madmeiiah (dunghill) in ch. xxv. 10, as denoting tlit 
place where they were reduced to pining away, t.«. as applietl 
to Bi^ylon as the house o£ servitude where Israel had beeiT 



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CBAP. XIV. !-«. 809 

wearied to death. The tyrant's sceptre, mentioned in ver. 5, ia 
the Chaldean world-power regarded as concentrated in the king 
of Babel (cf. ahSbSt in Num. xxiv. 17). This tyrant's sceptre 
Bmote nations with incessant blows and hnnting; maccath is con- 
strued with macceh, the derivative of the same \&rh ; and muv' 
ddpk, a hopkalnoaa (as in ch. vili. 23, xxix, 3), with rodeh, which 
is kindred in meaning. Doederlein's conjecture {mirdath), which 
has been adopted by most modem commentators, is quite unneces- 
sary. Unceasing continuance is expressed first of all with hilti, 
which is used as a preposition, and followed by adrdh, a parti- 
cipial noun like cdldhy and then with Vli, which is construed with 
the finite verb as in Gen. xxxi. 20, Job zli. 18 ; for b'U chdsdk 
is an attributive clause : with s hunting which did not restrain 
itself, did not stop, and therefore did not spare. Nor is it only 
Israel and other subjugated nations that now breathe again. 
— Vers. 7, 8. " The whole earth rests, is quiet : they break forth 
into tinging. Even the cypresses rejmce at thee, t!ie cedars of 
Lebanon : ' Since thou hast gone to sleep, no one will come up to 
lay the axe upon us.'" The preterites indicate inchoatively the 
circumstances into which the whole earth has now entered. 
The omission of the subject in the case of pdtz'chu (they break 
forth) gives the greatest generality to the jubilant utterances : 
pdtzach rinndh (erumpere gaudio) is an expression that is charac- 
teristic of Isaiah alone {e.g. ch. xliv. 23, xlix. 13) ; and it is a 
distinctive peculiarity of the prophet to bring in the trees of 
the forest, as living and speaking beings, to share in the uni- 
versal joy (cf. ch. Iv. 12), Jerome supposes the trees to be 
figuratively employed here for the "chiefs of the nations" (^pnn- 
cipet gentium). But this disposition to allegorize not only 
destroys the reality of the contents, but the spirit of the poetry 
also. Cypresses and cedars rejoice because of the treatment 
which they received from the Chaldean, who made use of the 
almost imperishable wood of both of them for ornamental 
buildings, for his siege apparatus, and for his fleets, and even 
for ordinary ships, — as Alexander, for example, boilt himself a 
fleet of cypress-wood, and the Syrian vessels had masts of cedar. 
Of the old cedars of Lebanon, there are hardly thirty left in 
the principal spot where they formerly grew. Gardner Wilkin- 
son (1843) and Hooker the botanist (1860) estimated the whole 
number at about four hnndred; and according to the conclu- 



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310 THE FBOPBECIES OF ISAIAH. 

sioD which the latter drew from the number of concentric rings 
and other signs, not one of them b more than about five hun- 
dred years old,' 

But whilst it has become so qniet on earth, there is the 
most violent agitation in the regions below. Ter. 9. " The king- 
dom of the dead below U all in uproar on account of thee, to meet 
thy coming ; it etirreth up the thades for thee, all the ke-goaU of 
the earth ; it raieeth up from their throne-seats all the kings of tlte 
natioTis." The notion of Hades, notwithstanding the mytho- 
logical character which it had assumed, was based upon the 
double truth, that what a man has been, and the manner in 
which he has lived on this side the grave, are not obliterated on 
the other side, but are then really brought to light, and that 
there is an immaterial self-formation of the soul, in which all 
that a man has become under certain divinely appointed circom- 
Btancea, by his own self-determination, is, as it were, reflected 
in a mirror, and that in a permanent form. This psychical 
image, to which the dead body bears the same relation as the 
shattered mould to a cast, is the shade-like corporeality of the 
inhabitants of Hades, in which they appear essentially thoagh 
spiritually just as they were on this side the grave. This is 
the deep root of what the prophet has here expressed in a 
poetical form ; for it is really a mdahdl that be has interwoven 
with his prophecy here. All Hades is overwhelmed with excite- 
ment and wonder, now that the king of Babel, that invincible 
ruler of the world, who, if not unexpected altogether, was not 
expected so soon, is actually approaching. From'^'?.^!' onwards, 
Sheol, although a feminine, might be the subject ; in which case 
the verb would simply have reverted from the feminine to the 
radical masculine form. But it is better to regard the subject 
as neuter ; a nescio quid, a, nameless power. The shades are 
suddenly siezed with astonishment, more especially the former 
leaders (leading goats or bell-wethers) of the herds of nations, 
so that, from sheer amazement, they spring up from their seats. 

And how do they greet this lofty new-comer t Ver. 10. 
" They all rise up and gay to thee, Art thou also made weak 
like us ? art thou become like uef" This is all that the shades 
say ; what follows does not belong to them. The pual chulldh 
(only used here), " to be made sickly, or powerless," signifies to 
> 3ce WiUdsBon's paper in the AOnnmum (Loudon, Nov. 1862). 



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CHAP. xir. lA-IS. 311 

be transposed into the condition of the latter, viz. the Bephaim 
(a word which also occors in the Phoenician inscnptions, from 
KEn ■= ns^, to be relaxed or weary), since the life of the shades 
is only a shadow of life (cf. eilStu^a, Skikv^, and poasibly also 
Kft/iovret in Homer, when used in the sense of those who are 
dying, exhausted and prostrate with wetness). And in Hades 
we could not expect anything more than ibis expression of 
extreme amazement. For why should they receive their new 
comrade with contempt or seomT From ver. 11 onwards, the 
singers of the mtukal take up the song again. — Yet. 11. " Tki/ 
pomp is cast down to t/ie region of the dead, the noise of thy 
Itarps : maggott are tpread tinder thte, and tiiet/ that cover thee 
are toorms." From the book of Daniel we learn the character 
of the Babylonian music ; it abounded in instruments, some of 
which were foreign. Maggots and worms (a bitter sarcasm) 
now take the place of the costly artistic Babylonian mgs, which 
once formed the pillow and counterpane of the distinguished 
corpse. IT might be s third pers. hoplial (Ges. § 71) ; but here, 
between perfects, it is a third pers. pwd, like yvliad in ch. ix. b. 
Rirnmdh, which is preceded by the verb in a masculine and to 
a certain extent an indifferent form (Ges. § 147, a), is a collec- 
tive name for small worms, in any mass of which the individual 
is lost in the swarm. The passage is continued with T^ (on 
which, as a catchword of the mashal, see at ch. i. 21). — Ver. 12. 
" Hoyo art thou fallen from ijie «iy, tliou star of light, sun of the 
davin, hurled dovm to the earth, thou that didst throw down 
natione from above ?" 7T<} is here the morning star (from hdlal, 
to shine, resolved from hillel, after the form JKD, Jer. xiii. 10, 
^1^, Fs. cxix. 113, or rather attaching itself as a third class to 
the forms ?3^3, Crcs : compare the Arabic sairaf, exchanger ; 
aaikal, sword-cleaner). It derives its name in other ancient 
languages also from its striking brilliancy, and is here called 
ben-shachar (sun of the dawn), just as in the classical mytho- 
logy it is called son of Eos, from the fact that it rises before 
the sun, and swims in the morning light as if that were the 
source of its birth.' Lucifer, as a name ^ven to the devil, 

* It is smgular, however, that among the Semitic natioDS the morniug; 
ttar is not pergomfied u a male (HeStphorot or Phdiphoroi), bat u a 
female (Astarte, see at ch. xvii. 6), and that it ia called N&gKSh, AthtoreHt. 
, Zithara, but never bj a name derived &om Adfol; whilst the moon is le- 



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312 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

was derived from this passage, which the fathers (and lately 
8tier) interpreted, without aoy warrant whatever, aa relaUng 
to the apostasy and panishment of the angelic leaders. The 
appellatJOQ is a perfectly appropriate one for the king of Babel, 
on account of the early date of the Babylonian culture, which 
reached back as far as the grey twilight of primeval times, and 
also because of its predominant astrological character. The 
additional epithet cholSsh 'al-gOyim is founded apon the idea 
of ihevRfiuxus aiderum:^ choleth signifies "overthrowing" or 
laying down (Ex. xvii. 13), and with 'al^ "bringing defeat 
upon ;" whilst the Talmud {b. Sabbath 149&) uses it in the sense 
of projiciena sortem, and thus throws light upon the eholesh 
(— pumA, lot) of the Mishnah. A retrospective glance is now 
cast at the self-deification of the king of Babylon, in which he 
was the antitype of the devil and the type of antichrist (Dan. 
zi. 36 ; 2 Thess. ii. 4), and which had met with its reward. — 
Vers. 13-15. " And thou, thou hast said m t!iy heart, I will 
ascend info heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God, 
and sit down on the mount of the assembly of gods in the comer of 
the north, I will ascend to the heights of the clouds, I will make 
myself like the Most High. Nevertheless, thou wiU be east down 
into the region of the dead, into the comer of the pit." An anti- 
thetical circumstantial clause commences with ifattah, just as in 
ver. 19, " whilst thou," or " whereas thou." The har hammSid 
(monnt of assembly) cannot be Zion, as is assumed by Schegg 
and others, who are led astray by the parallel in Ps. xlviii. 3, 
which has been entirely misunderstood, and has no hearing upon 
this passage at all, Zion was neither a northern point of the 
earth, nor was it situated on the north of Jerusalem. The 
prophet makes the king of Babylon speak according to die 
general notion of his people, who had not tbe seat of the Deity 
in the midst of them, as the Israelites had, but who placed it 
on the summit of the northern mountains, which were lost in 

garded as a male deitj (Sin), and in Arabia hilSl sigiufies the new moon 
(see p. 145), which might be called hen-^acar (soa of tha dawn), from 
the fact that, from the time when it passca out of the invisibility of its 
first phase, it is seen at sunrise, and is as it were bom out of the dawn. 

> In a similar manner, the snn-god (San) is called the " conqueror of 
the king's enemies," " breaikei of oppoeition," etc., on the early Babjlonian 
» (see G. Rawlinson, The Five Great Monarchies, i. 160). 



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CHAP. XIV. la, a. 313 

the cloudfi, just as the mndoos place it on the fahnlous monn- 
tains of Kailasa, which Ke towards the DOTth beyond the 
Himalayas (Lassen, i. 34 sqq.). D^na^'. (with an aspirated 3 
in ft loosely closed pliable) are the two sides into which a 
thing parts, the two legs of an angle, and then the apex at 
which the legs separate. And so here, 'fitfx *n3'i^ (with an 
unaspirated Caph in a triply closed syllable) is the uttermost 
extremity of the north, from which the northern monnttuns 
stretch fork-like into the land, and yarcelhe-bor the interior 
of the pit into which its two walls slope, and from which it 
anfolds or widens. All the foolhardy purposes of the Chal- 
dean are finally comprehended in this, " / will make myself 
like the Most High ;' just as the Assyrians, according to Ctesias, 
and the Persians, according to the Persw of ^achylus, really 
called their king God, and the Sassanidse call themselves bag, 
Theot, npon coins and inscriptions (^eddammeh is hithpael, equi- 
valent to 'ethdamtnek, with the usnal assimilation of the prefor- 
mative Tav: Ges. § 34, 2, b). By the tJK in ver. 14, the high- 
flying pride of the Chaldean is contrasted with bis punishment, 
which hnrls him down into the lowest depths. ^M, which was 
originally aflErmative, and then restrictive (m rah was originally 
restrictive and then affirmative), passes over here jnto an adver- 
sative, just as in Ps. xlix. 16, Job xiii. 15 (a change seen still 
more frequently in pM) : nevert/telesa thou wilt be hurled down ; 
nothing but that will occur, and not what you propose. This 
prophetic t&rad is language that neither befits the inhabitants 
of Hades, who greet his advent, nor the Israel singing the 
tnaekal; but the words of Israel have imperceptibly passed into 
words of the prophet, who still sees in the distance, and as some- 
thing future, what the maghal commemorates as already past. 

The prophet then continues in the language of prediction. 
Vers. 16, 17. " They that tee t/iee look, considering thee, look at 
thee thoughtfully: Is this the man that set the earth trembling, 
and kingdoms shaking f that made the world a wilderness, and 
destroyed its cities^ and did not release its prisoners (to their) 
home?" The scene is no longer in Hades (Knobel, Umbreit). 
Those who are speaking thus have no longer the Chaldean 
before them as a mere shade, bat as an unburied corpse that 
has fallen into cormpdon. As tBbsl is feminine, the suffixes in 
ver. 17 must refer, according to a eonstructio ad.tenaum, to the 



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3H THE FBOPBBCIES OF I8AUH. 

world as changed into a imldemets (midbar). Pathach, to open, 
namely locks and fetters ; here, with baitkdh, it is eqairalent 
to releasing or letting go (syn. akiUsach, Jer. 1, 33). 6j the 
"prisoners" the Jewish exiles are priDcipally intended ; and it 
was their release that had never entered the mind of the king 
of Babylon. 

The prophet, whose own words now follow the words of 
the spectators, proceeds to describe the state in which the tyrant 
lies, and which calls for such serious reflections. Vers. 18, 19. 
"All the kings of the nations, they are all interred in honour, every 
one in hit house : but thou art cast away far from thy sepulchre 
like a shoot hurled away, clothed with slain, with those pierced 
iJirough with the suiord, those tliat go down to the stones of the 
pit; like a carcase trodden under feet." Every other king was 
laid out after his death "in his house" (b'bethJi), i,e. within 
the limits of his own palace ; bat the Chaldean lay far away 
from the sepulchre that was apparently intended for him. The 
IP in V^rfO sigai&es procul ab, as in Num. xv. 24, Prov. xx. 3. 
He lies there like nBtzer nitlCdb, i.e. like a branch torn off from 
the tree, that has withered and become offensive, or rather (as 
nilzer does not mean a branch, but a shoot) hke a side-shoot 
that has been cat off the tree and thrown away with disgust 
as ugly, nseless, and only a hindrance to the regular growth of 
the tree (possibly also an excrescence) ; nith'db (cast away) is 
a pregnant expression, signifying "cast away with disgust." 
The place where he lies is the field of battle. A vatieinium 
post eventmn would be expressed differently from this, as Lu&- 
zatto has correctly observed. For what Seder 'Olam says — 
namely, that Nebuchadnezzar's corpse was taken out of ths 
grave by Evilmerodach, or as Abravanel relates it, by the Medo^ 
Persian conquerors — is merely a conclusion drawn from the 
passage before us, and would lead as to expect riKnn rather 
than ';i3?B'rt, It is a matter of indifference, so far as the truth 
of the prophecy is concerned, whether it was fulfilled in the 
person of Nebuchadnezzar i., oi of that second Nebuchad- 
nezzar who gave himself out as a son of Nabonet, and tried 
to restore the freedom of Babylon. The scene which passes 
before the mind of the prophet is the field of battle. To clear 
this they make a hole and throw stones (abnB-bor, stones of the 
pit) on the top, without taking the trouble to shovel in the 



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CHAP. SIV. 20, 21. 315 

eardi ; bat the king of Babylon is left lying there, like a 
carcase that is trampled under foot, and deserves nothing better 
than to be trampled under foot (mabdSf part. koph. of bfls, 
conculcare). They do not even think him worth throwing into 
a bole along with the rest of the corpses. — Yer. 20. " ITum 
art not united mth them in burial, for thou hast destroyed tliy 
land, murdered thy people : the seed of evU-doers vnll not be 
named for ever." In this way is vengeance taken for the 
tyrannical manner in which he has oppressed and exhausted his 
land, making his people the involuntary instruments of his thirst 
for conquest, and sacrificing them as victims to that thirst. 
For this reason he does not meet with the same compassion as 
those who have been compelled to sacrifice their lives in his 
service. And it is not only all over for ever with him, but it 
is so with his dynasty also. The prophet, the messenger of the 
penal justice of God, and the mouthpiece of that Omnipotence 
which regulates the course of history, commands this. — Ver. 
21. " Prepare a ilaughter-house for his sons, because of the ini- 
quity of titeir fathers ! They shall not rite and conquer lands, 
and Jill the face of the earth with cities." The exhortation 
b addressed to the Medes, if the prophet bad any particular 
persons in his mind at all. After the nocturnal storming of 
Babylon by the Medes, the new Babylonian kingdom and royal 
liouse which had been established by Nabopolassar vanished 
entirely from history. The last shoot of the royal family 
of . Nabopolassar was slain as a child of conspirators. The 
second Nebuchadnezzar deceived the people (as Darius says in 
the great, inscription of Behistan), declaring, " I am Nabukud- 
rac'ara the son of Nabunita." ?1 (used poetically for ?K, like 
^?3 in ch. xiv. 6 for c6) expresses a negative wish (as pen does 
a negative intention) : Let no Babylonian kingdom ever arise 
again I Hitzig corrects CPJ into D'?? (heaps of ruins), Ewald 
into D'V^y (tyrants), Knobel into D'jn, and Meier into DH^, 
which are said to signify conflicts, whilst Maurer will not take 
trt^ in the sense of cities, but of enemies. But there is no 
necessity for this at all. Nimrod, the first founder of a Baby- 
lonio-Assyrian kingdom, built cities to strengthen his monarchy. 
The king of Asshur built cities for the Medes, for the purpose 
of keeping them better in check. And it is to this building of 
cities, as a support to despotism, that the prophet here refers. . 



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316 THE PB0PEE0IE8 OF ISAUK 

ThoB far the prophet has spoken in the name of God. 
Bat the prophecy closes with a word of God Himself, spoken 
through the prophet. — Vers. 22, 23. *'And I will rise up against 
them, gaith Jehovah of hosts, and root out in Babel nanu and 
remnant, sprout and shoot, saith Jehovah. And maie it thepos- 
tession of hedgehogs and marshes of water, and sweep it away 
with the besom of destruction, saith Jehovah of hosts" ^i*E*l DE* 
and 13J] fj are two pairs of alliterative proverbial words, and 
are nsed to signify "the whole, without exception" (compare the 
Arabic expression "Kiesel und Kies," " flint and pebble," in the 
sense of " altogether ;" Noldecke, Poesie der alien Araber, p. 
162), Jehovah rises against the descendants of the king of 
Babylon, and exterminates Babylon ntterly, root and branch. 
The destructive forces, which Babylon has hitherto been able 
to control by raising artificial defences, are now let loose ; and 
the Euphrates, left without a dam, lays the whole re^on under 
water. Hedgehogs now take the place of men, and marshes 
the place of palaces. The kippod occurs in ch, xxxiv, 11 and 
Zeph, ii. 14, in the company of birds ; but according to the 
derivation of the word and the dialects, it denotes the hedgehog, 
which possesses the power of rolling itself up (LXX. eptifiov 
Sum KOfTouatv ij((vov<;\ and which, although it can neither fly, 
nor climb with any pecniiar facility, on account of its mode of 
walking, could easily get upon the knob of a pillar that had 
been throwa down (Zeph. ii. 14). The concluding threat 
makes the mode of Babel's origin the omen of its end: the 
city of 013, i.e. Babylon, which had been built for the most 
pwt of clay or brick-earth, would be strangely sw^ away. 
The pilpel KCKQ (or KQKD, as Kimcbi conjngates it in Michlol 
150ab, and m accordance with which some codices and early 
editions read n'riNQKDl with double zere) belongs to the cognate 
root which is mentioned at Fs. xlii. 5, with an opening i, D, D 
(cf. ch. xxvii. 8), and which signifies to drive or thrust away. 
KDKQD is that with which anythmg is driven out or swept away, 
viz. a broom. Jehoyah treats Babylon as rubbish, and sweeps 
it away, destruction (kashmed: an inf. absol. used as a eabstan- 
tive) serving Him as a broom. 

There now follows, apparently out of all connection, another 
propheq' against Asshnr. It is introduced here quite abruptly, 
like a fragment ; and it is an enigma how it got here, and what 



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CHAP. XIV. M*27. 817 

it means her^ though not an enigma withoat eolation. Thia 
short Assyrian passage reads as follows. Vers. 24-27. " J^vah 
of hosts hatJi sworn, saying, Swely as I have thought, so shall it 
come to pass ; and as I have purposed, that takes place ; to break 
Asshur to pieces in my land, and upon my mountain toUl I tread 
him underfoot: then hie yoke departs from them, and his burden 
mil depart from their neck. This is the purpose that is purposed 
over the whole earth ; and thia the hand that is stretched out ocer 
all tKUions. For Jehovah of hosts hath purposed, and who could 
bring it to noughtf And His hand that is stretched out, who 
can turn it backf" It is evidently a totally different judicial 
catastrophe which is predicted here, inasmuch as the world- 
power upon which it falls is not called Babel or Chaadim, but 
Asahor, which cannot possibly be taken as a name for Babylon 
(Abravanel, Lowth, etc). Babylon is destroyed by the Modes, 
whereas Asshur falls to ruin in the mountain-land of Jehovah, 
which it b seeking to sabjugate, — a prediction which was lite- 
rally fulfilled. And only when this had taken place did a 
6tting occasion present itself for a prophecy against Babel, the 
heiress of the mined Assyrian power. Consequently the two 
prophecies against Babel and Asshor form a bysteron-ptoteron 
as they stand here. The thought which occasioned this arrange- 
ment, and which it is intended to set forth, is expressed by 
Jeremiah in Jer. 1. 18, 19, " Behold, I will punish the king of 
Babylon and his land, as I have punished the king of Assyria." 
The one event was a pledge of the other. At a time when the 
prophecy agiunst Assyria had actually been fulfilled, the prophet 
attached it to the still unfulfilled prophecy agEunst Babylon, to 
^ve a pledge of the fulfilment of the latter. This was the ' 
pedestal upon which the Massdh Bdbel was raised. And it was 
doubly suited ftn: this, on account of its purely epilogical tone 
from Ter. 26 onwards. 



THE ORACLE COHCEBNING PHILISTIA. — CHAP. XIV. 28-82. 
Among the ponishments enumerated in 2 Chron. szviii. 
5-21 as falling upon king Ahaz, we find the following viz. 
that the Philistines invaded the low conntiy {ahephelah) and 
the south land (n«^«&), took several dtiee, six of which are 
mentioned by name, and settled there. This offensive move- 



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918 THE PtOFHSCnS or UAIAH. 

ment of tiie FbilutiDes against die goTemmeDt of Jad^a ww 
probably occasioned either by the oppression of Jndah on the 
part of Syiis and Ephraim, or by the permanent crippling of 
Jndah throngh the Syro-Ephraimitish war. In either case, &e 
fact itself is quite sofficient to throw light upon the threatening 
prophecy which follows. 

This is one of the prophecies the date of which is fixed in 
Ter. 28. " In the year of tfte death of king Ahaz the foUomng 
oracle woe tUtered." "The year of the death of king Ahaz'* 
was (as in ch. vi. 1) the year in which the death of Ahaz was 
to take place. In that year the PhUistineB still remained in 
those possessions, their hold of which was so shameful to Jndah, 
and had not yet metwith any humiliating retribntion. Bat 
this year was the turning-point ; for Hezekiah, the successor of 
Ahaz, not only recovered the cities that they bad taken, bat 
thoroughly defeated them in their own land (2 Kings xviii. 8). 

It was therefore in a most eventful and decisive year that 
Isaiah began to prophe^ as follows. Ver. 29. " Rejoice not to 
fully, Fhilistia, tltat the rod tehtch tmote thee it broken to piece* ; 
for out of the serpenfg root comes forth a basiliek, atid its fntit ie 
a flying dragon" ^Sbet maccsk, " the rod which smote thee " 
(not " of him that smote thee," which is not so appropriate), is 
the Davidic sceptre, which had formerly, kept the Philistines in 
subjection under David and Solomon, and again in more recent 
times since the reign of Uzziah, This eceptre was now broken 
to pieces, for the Davidic kingdom had been brought down by 
the Syro-Epratmitish war, and had not been able to recover 
itself ; and so far as its power over the Burrounding nations was 
concerned, it had completely fallen to pieces. Fhilistia was 
thoroughly filled with joy in consequence, but this jay was all 
over now. The power from which Philistla had escaped was a 
common snake (n4chd»h), which had been either cut to pieces, 
or had died oat down to the very roots. Bat ont of this root, 
ue. ont of the house of David, which had been reduced to the 
humble condition of its tribal house, there was coming forth a 
z^ha', a basilisk (regulua, as Jerome and other early translators 
render it : see at ch. xi. 8) ; and this basilisk, which is dangerotis 
and even fatal in itself, as soon as it had reached maturity, 
would bring forth a winged dragon as its fmit The basilisk 
IB Hezekiah, and the flying dragon is the Messiah (this is the 



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CHAP. XIV. ao, St. SIS 

explfmation given by the Targum) ; or, what is the same thiog, 
the former is the Davidic government of the immediate future, 
the latter the Davidic government of the ultimate future. The 
figure may a{q)eftr an inappropriate one, because the serpent is 
a symbol of evil ; but it is not a symbol of evil only, but of a 
curse also, and a curse is the energetic expressioB of the penal 
justice of God. And it is as the executor of such a curse in 
the form of a judgment of God upon Philistia that the Davidic 
king b here described in a threefold climax as a snake or serpent. 
The selection of this figure may possibly have also been sug- 
gested by Gteo. zlix. 17; for the saying of Jacob concerning 
Dan was fulfilled in Samson, the sworn foe of the Philistines. 

The coming Davidic king is peace for Israel, but for Phi- 
liatia-deatA. Yer. 30. " And the poorest of tlie poor will feed, 
caid needy ones Ue down in peace ; and I kill Hiy root through 
hunger, and he sJags thy remnant" " The poorest of the poor :" 
b'c&re dallim is an intensified expression for b'ng dallim, the 
latter signifying such as belong to the family of the poor, the 
former (cf. Job xviii. 13, mors dirissima) such as hold the 
foremost rank in such a family, — a description of Israel, which, 
although at present deeply, very deeply, repressed and threat- 
ened on eveiy side, would then enjoy its land in quietness and 
peace (Zeph. iii. 13, 13). In this sense ^ini is used absolutely; 
and there is no necessity for Hupfeld's conjecture (Ps. ii. 258), 
that we should read ^^33 (in my pastures). Israel rises again, 
but Philistia perishes even to a root and remnant ; and the hitter 
again falls a victim on the one hand to the judgment of God 
(famine), and on the other to the punishment inflicted by the 
house of David. The change of persons in ver. 30& is no 
aynaUage ; bat the subject to yahirog (slays) is the basilisk, the 
father of the flying dragon. The first strophe of the maiaah 
terminates here. It ccxisists of eight lines, each of the two 
Masoretic verses (29, 30) containing four clauses. 

The massah consists of two strophes. The first threatens 
jadgmentfromjadah, and the second — of seven lines — threatens 
judgment from Asshur. Ver. 31. " Howl, gate! cry, eityf 
O PhiUstia, thou must melt entireiy away ; for from iAa nmih 
eotneth smoke, and there is no isolated one among hia hosts" 
ijW', which is a masculine everywhere else, is cor.stnied here as 
» feminine, poesibly in order that the two imperfects may bar- 



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320 THE PBOFHXCIEfi OF ISAIAH. 

moiiize ; for there is nothmg to recommend Lnzzatto's b 
tioD, that ipe' should be taken &s an accusative. The strong 
gates of the Philistian cities (Aafadod and Gaza),' of world-wide 
renown, and the citiee themselves, shall lift up a cry of anguish ; 
«nd Fhilistia, which has Iiitherto been full of jay, shall m^ 
away in the heat of alarm (ch. xiii. 7, ndmOg, inf. abs. niph',; 
on the form itself, compare ch. lix. 13) : for from the north 
there comes a singing and burning £re, which proclaims its 
coming afar off hj the smoke which it produces; in other 
vords, an all-destroying army, out of whose ranks not one falls 
away from weariness or self-will (cf. ch. v. 27), that is to say, 
an army without a gap, animated throughout with one comnion 
desire, (l^l^, after the form ^^o, the mass of people assembled 
at an appointed place, or m&'ed, Josh. viiL 14, I Sam. zx; 35, 
and for au appointed end.) 

To understand ver. 32, which follows here, nothing more is 
needed than a few simple parenthetical thooghts, which natu- 
rally suggest themselves. This one deedre was the thirst for 
conquest, and such a desire could not possibly have only the 
small strip of Philistian coast for its object ; but the conquest of 
this was intended as the means of securing possession of oth^ 
countries on the right hand and on the left. The question 
. arose, therefore, How would Judah fare with the fire which was 
rolling towards it from the north T For the very fact that the 
prophet of Judah was threatening Fhiliatia with thb fire, pre- 
supposed that Judah itself would not be consumed by it. 

And this b just what is expressed in ver. 32 : " And what 
answer do the meisengere of tlta nationa bring ? That Jehovah 
hath founded Zion, and that the afflicted of Hie people are hidden 
therein" "The messengers of the nations" (maPacS got): 
gm is to be taken in a distributive sense, and the messengers to 
be regarded either as individuals who have escaped from the 
Assyrian army, which was f<»med of contingents from many 
nations, or else (as we should expect ^M^it^ in that case, instead 
of maVacB) messengers from the neighbouring nations, who 
were sent to Jerusalem after the Assyrian army had perished 
in front of the city, to ascertain how the latter had fared. And 
they all reply as if with one month {yaamh) ; Zion has stood 
unshaken, protected by its God ; and the people of this God, the 
poor and despised congregation of Jehovah (cf. Zecb. xi. 7), 



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CHAP. XV. SVI. 321 

are, and know tbat they are, concealed id Zion. The prophecy 
is intentiocallj oracalar. Prophecy does not adopt the same 
tone to the nations as to Israel. Its language to the former is 
dictatorially brief, elevated with strong self-conscionsness, ex- 
pressed in lofty poetic strains, and variondy coloured, according 
to the peculiarity of the nation to which the oracle refers. The 
following prophecy relating to Moab shows na very clearly, that 
in the prophet's view the judgment execnted by Asshar upon 
Philistia would prepare the way for the subjugation of Fhilistia 
by the sceptre of David. By the wreck of the Assyrian world- 
power upon Jerusalem, the house of David would recover its old 
supremacy over the nations round about. And this really was 
the case. But ^e fulfilment was not exhaustive. Jeremiah 
therefore took up the prophecy of his predecessor again at the 
time of the Chaldean judgment upon the nations (Jer. xlvii.), 
hut only the second strophe. The Messianic element of the 
first was continaed by Zechariah (Zech. ix.y. 

THE OKACLE CONOEHITING MOAB. — CHAP. XV^ XVI. 



So far as the surrounding nations were concerned, the 
monarchy of Israel commenced with victory and glory. Saul 
punished them all severely tor their previona offences against 
Israel (1 Sam. ziv. 47), and the Moabitea along with the rest. 
The latter were completely subdued by Bavid (2 Sam. viii. 3). 
After the division of the kingdom,, the northern kingdom took 
possession of Moab. The Moabites paid tribute from their 
fiocks to Samaria. But when Ahab died, Mesha the king of 
Moab refused this frihnte (2 Kings k. 1, iii. 4 sqq.), Ahaziah 
of Israel let this refusal pass. In the meantime, the Moabites 
formed an alliance with other nations, and invaded Judah. But 
the allies destroyed one another, and Jehoshaphat celebrated in 
the valley of Berachah the victory which he had gained without 
a battle, and which is commemorated m several psalms. And 
when Jehoram the king of Israel attempted to subjugate Moab 
again, Jehoshaphat made common cause with him. And the 
Moabites were defeated ; but the fortress, the Moabitish Kir, 
which was situated upon a steep and lofty chalk rock, remtuned 
standing still. The interminable contests of the northern 
kingdom with the Syrians rendered it quite impossible to main- 
vou I. X 



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32S THE PBOPHEOIES OF UAIAH. 

tun either Moab itself, or the land to the east of the Jordan in 
general. Daring the reign of Jeha, the latter, la all its length 
and breadth, even as far sonth as the Amon, was taken by the 
STrians (2 Kings x. 32, 33). The tribes that were now no 
longer tributary to the kingdom of Israel oppressed the Israelitish 
population, and avenged npon the crippled kingdom the loss of 
their independence. Jeroboam ii., as the prophet Jonah had 
foretold (2 Kings xiv. 25), was the first to reconquer the terri- 
tory of Israel from Hamath to the Dead Sea. It is not indeed 
expressly stated that he subjugated Moab again ; but as Moabitish 
bands had disturbed even the country on this side nnder his 
predecessor Joash (3 Kings xiii. 20), it may be supposed that 
he also attempted to keep Moab within bounds. If the 
Moabites, as is very probable, had extended their territory 
northwards beyond the Amon, the war with Moab was inevi- 
table. Moreover, under Jeroboam n. on the one hand, and 
tJzziah-Jotham on the other, we read nothing about the 
Moabites rising ; but, on the contrary, such notices as those 
contained in 1 Ohron. v. 17 and 2 Chron. xxvi. 10, show that 
they kept themselves qniet. But the application made by Ahaz 
to Assyria called np the hostility of Moab and the neighbouring 
nations again. Tiglath-pileser repeated what the Syrians bad 
done before. He took possession of the northern part of the 
land on this side, and the whole of the land on the other nde, 
and depopulated them. This furnished an opportunity for the 
Moabites to re-establish themselves in their original settlements 
to the north of the Amon. And this was how it stood at the 
time when Isaiah prophesied. The calamity which befel them 
came from the north, and therefore fell chiefly and primarily 
npon the country to the north of the Amon, which the Moabites 
had taken possession of but a short time before, after it bad 
been peopled for a long time by the tribes of Beuben and Gad. 
There is no other prophecy in the book of Isjuab in which 
the heart of the prophet la so painfully affected by what his 
mind sees, and his mouth is obliged to prophesy. All that he 
predicts evokes his deepest sympathy, just as if he himself 
belonged to the unfortunate nation to which be is called to be 
a messenger of woe. He commences with an utterance of 
amazement. Ver. 1. *' Oracle concerning Moab ! for in a night 
'Ar'Moah is Itad waste, destroyed ; for ia a night SSr-Mbab m 



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laid watte, destroyed^ The ci (for) ie explanatory in botb 
instances, and not simply affirmative, or, as Knobd maintains, 
recitative, and therefore unmeaning. The prophet jusUfies 
the peculiar heading to his prophecy from the horrible vision 
^ven him to see, and takes us at once into the very heart of 
the vision, as in ch, zvii. 1, xxiii. 1. 'Ar Moah (in which 'Ar 
is Moabitish for 'Ir ; cf. Jer. xlix. 3, where we find '^i written 
instead of 'Ar, which we shoold naturally expect) is the name 
of the capital of Moah (Grecized, Areopolie), which was situated 
to the south of the Amon, at present a large field of ruins, with 
a village of the name of Babba. Kir Moab (in which Kir 
is the Moabitish for ^rt/ah) was the chief fortress of Moab, 
which was situated to the south-east of Ar, the present Ker^ 
where there is still a town with a fortification upon a rock, 
which caa be seen from Jerusalem with a telescope on a clear 
day, and forms so thoroughly one mass with the rock, that in 
1834, when Ibrahim Pasha resolved to pull it down, he was 
obliged to relinquish the project. The identity of Kir and 
Kertk u unquestionable, but that of Ar and Rabba has been 
disputed ; and on the ground of Num. xxii. 36, where it seems 
to be placed nearer the Arnon, it has been transposed to the 
rains on the pasture land at the confluence of the Lyiim and 
Mitjib (= " the city that is by the river " in Bent ii. 36 and 
Josh. jdii. 9, 16: see Com. on Num. xxi. 15), — a conjecture which 
has this against it, that the name AreopolU, which has been 
formed from Ar, is attached to the "metropolit civitaa Ar^ 
which was called Rabba as the metropolis, and of which Jerome 
relates (on the passage before us), as an event associated with 
his own childhood, that it was then destroyed by an earthquake 
(probably in 342). The two names of the cities are used as 
masculine here, like Dammesek in ch. xvii. 1, and Tzor in ch. 
xxiiL I, though it cannot therefore be said, as at Mtc. v. 1, 
that the city stands for the inliabitantt (Ges. Leiirgeb&ade, p. 
469). "/» a night" ('"? absolute, as in ch. xii. 11, not con- 
struct, which would ^ve an illogical asser^on, as ahuddad and 
nidmdh are almost coincident, so far as the sense is concerned) 
the two pillars of the strength of Moab are overthrown. In 
the space of a night, and therefore very suddenly (ch. xvii. 14), 
Moab is destroyed. The prophet repeats twice what it would 
have been quite sufiicient to say once, just as if he bad been 



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324 THE PBOPHBCIXB OF IBUAB. 

condemned to keep hiB eye fixed upon the awful spectacle (on 
the asyndeton, see at ch. xxxiii. 9 ; and on the anadiplo»i», 
ver. 8, ch. viii. 9, zxi. 11, xvii. 12, 13). His first sensation is 
that of horror. 

But just as horror, when once it be^ns to refiect, is dissolved 
in tears, the thunder-claps in ver. 1 are followed by onirersal 
weeping and lamentation. Vers. 2-4. ** Tliey go up to the 
terr^le-ltouie and Dibon, i^ to the heights to weep : upon Nebo 
and upon Medebah of Moab (A«re U weeping : on all heads bald- 
ness, evety beard is mutilated. In the markets of Moab they gird 
themselves with sackclcth; on the roofs of the land, and in Us 
streets, everything inaili, melting into tears. SesJibon cries, and 
'Eldle ; even to Jalias they hear their howling ; even the armed 
men of Moab break out into mourning thereat ; its soul trembles 
within it." The people (the subject to riTjr) ascend the mountain 
with the temple of Chemosh, the central sanctuary of the land. 
This temple is called liab-baithy though not that there was a 
Moabitish town or village with some such came as B€th-Dib- 
lathaim (Jer. xlviii. 22), as Enobel supposes. Dibon, which 
lay above the Amon (^Wady Mvjib), like all the places men- 
tioned in vers. 2-4, at present a heap of ruins, a short hour 
to the north of the central Arnon, in the splendid plain of el- 
Ckura, had consecrated faelghta in the neighbourhood (cf. Josh, 
ziii. 17 ; Nam. zxii. 41), and therefore would turn to them. 
Moab mourns upon Nebo and Medebah; r^^, for which we 
find ''^?'^) in ch. lii. 5, is written intentionally for a double pre- 
formative, instead of rT^ (compare the similar forms in Job 
xxiv. 21, Fs. cxxxviii. 6, and Ges. § 70, Anm.). ^If is to be, 
taken in a local sense, as Hendewerk, Drechsler, and Knobejl 
have rendered it. For Nebo was probably a place situatem 
upon a height on the mountfun of that name, towards the soatht- 
east of Heshbon (the ruins of Naho, Nahau, mentioned in the 
Onom.) ; and Medebah (still a heap of ruins bearing the samQ 
name) stood upon a round hill about two hours to the sonth^ 
east of Heshbon, According to Jerome, there was an image of 
Chemosh in Nebo ; and among the ruins of Madeba, Seetzen 
discovered the foundations of a strange temple. There fol- 
lows here a description of the expressions of pain. Instead of 
the usual I'Ptn, we read v^K^ here. And instead of gedu'dA 
(abteissce), Jeremiah (xlviii. 37) has, according to his osual 



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CHAF. XT. i. its 

■tyle, gent ah (decurtatw), with the simple alteration of a siiigle 
letter.* All runs down with weeping (culbh, written as in ch. 
xvi. 7 ; in ch. ix, 8, 16, we hare cullo instead). In other cases 
it is the eyes that are said to run down in tears, Btreams, or 
water-brooks ; but here, by a Btill bolder metonymy, the whole 
man is said to flow down to the ^x)nnd, as if melting in a stream 
of tears. Heshhon and Elale are still visible in their ruins, 
which lie only half an honr apart upon their separate hills, and 
are still called by the names Husban and eUAl. They were 
both situated upon hills which commanded an extensive pro- 
spect. And there the cry of woe created an echo which was 
audible as far as Jahaz (Jaliza), the city where the king gf 
Heshhon offered battle to Israel in the time of Moses (Deut. 
ii. 32), The general monraing was so great, that even the 
armed men, i^. the heroes (Jer. xlviii. 41) of Moab, were 
seized with despair, and cried oat in their anguish (the same 
figure as in ch. xs^ii. 7). 13*^, thereat, namely on account of 
this universal lamentation. Thus the lamentation was univer- 
sal, without exception. Naphsho (his soul) refers to Moab as a 
whole nation. The soul of Moab trembles in all the limbs of 
the national body ; nyT (forming a play upon the sound with 
yrr), an Arabic word, and in njPT a Hebrew word also, signifies 
tremere, Kite illvc agitari, — an explanation which we prefer, with 
Rosenmiiller and Cresenius, to the idea that in^ is a secondary 
verb to Jlp^, fut. jn;. W is an ethical dative (as. in Ps. cxx. 6 
and cxxiii. 4), throwing the action or the pathos inwardly (see 
Psychology, p. 152), The heart of the prophet pardcipates 
in this pain with which Moab is agitated throughout ; for, as 
Bashi observes, it is jost in this that the prophets of Israel 
were distinguished from heathen prophets, such as Balaam for 
example, viz. that the calamities which they announced to the 
nations went to their own heart (compare ch. xxi. 3, i, with 
ch. xxii. 4). 

The difficult Words in which the prophet expresses this 
sympathy we render as follows : Ver 5a. " My heart, toviarda 
Moab it crieth out ; its bolts reached to Zoar, tlte three-year-old 

' At the same time, tlie Masom on this passage before ub is for geru'eih 
witk Beih, and we aliio find this reading in Ntmel, Clodiua, Jablonaky, and 
in earlier editions; whilst Sono. 14S6, Veu. IfiSl, andotlien, havegedu'ah, 
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326 THE FBOFHEOIES QF ISAUH. 

heifer." The Lamed in tMoab b the same both here and in 
ch. xvi. 11 as in ch. liv. 8, 9, viz. "turned toward Moab." 
Moab, which was mascnline in ver. 4, is feminine here. We 
may infer from this that ijfinp OC^? is a statement which 
concerns Moab as a. land. Now, b'richim signifies the bolts in 
every other passage in which it occars ; and it is possible to 
speak of the bolts of a land with just as much propriety as in 
Lam. ii. 9 and Jer. li. 30 (cf. Jonah ii. 7) of the bolts of a 
city. And the statement that the bolts of this land went to 
Zoar is also a very appropriate one, for Eir Moab and Zoar 
formed the southern fortified girdle of the lard ; and Zoar, on 
the south-western tongue of land which runs into the Dead Sea, 
was the uttermost fortress of Moab, looking over towards Judah ; 
and in its depressed situation below the level of the sea it 
formed, as it were, the opposite pole of Kir Moab, the highest 
point in the high land itself. Hence we agree with Jerom^ 
who adopts the rendering vectes ejus usque ad Segor, whereas 
all the modem translators have taken the word in the sense of 
fugitives. 'Eglath sk'Hshii/T/dh, which Rosenmiiller, Knobel, 
Drechsler, Meier, and others have taken quite unnecessarily as 
a proper name, b either in apposition to Zoar or to Moab. In 
the former case it Is a distinguishing epithet. An ox of the 
three years, or more literally of the third year (cf ■ m'shulUshetli, 
Gen. XV. S), i.e. a three-year-old ox, b one that Is sdll In all the 
freshness and fulness of its strength, and that has not yet been 
exhausted by the length of time that it has worn the yoke. 
The application of the term to the Moabitlsh nation is favoured 
by Jer. xlvi. 20, where Egypt is called " a very fair heifer" 
(^eglah yeplteh-phiyydk), whilst Babylon is called the same in 
Jer. 1. 11 (cf. Hos. iv. 16, x. 11). And in the same way, 
according to the LXX., Vulg., Targum, and Gesenius, Moab 
is called juvenea tertii anni, h. e. indomita jttgogue non assueta, 
as a nation that was still in the vigour of youth, and if it had 
hitherto borne the yoke, had always shaken it off agmn. But 
the application of it to Zoar is favoured (1) by Jer. xlviii. 34, 
where thb epithet is applied to another Moabitlsh city ; (2) by 
the accentuation ; and (3) by the fact that in the other case we 
should expect b'rlchdh (the three-year-old heifer, i.e. Moab, is a 
fugitive to Zoar ; vid. Luzzatto). Thus Zoar, the fine, strong, 
and hitherto unconquered city, b now the destination of the 



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CHAP. XV. 6, 4 327 

wildest fllglit before the foe that is coming from the north. A 
blow has fallen tipon Moah, that is more terrible than anj that 
has preceded it. 

In a few co-ordinate clauses the prophet now sets before as 
the several scenes of mourning and desolation. Vers, hb, 6. 
*' For the Tnountam slope of JjuhiOi tliey ascend with weeping; 
for on the road to Soronat/im they lift up a cry of despair. For 
the waters of Nimrim are waste places from this (im« forth : for 
the grass is dried up, the vegetation wasteth away, tlie green is 
gone." The road to Luhith (according to the Onom. between 
Ai^Moab and Zoar, and therefore in the centre of Moabitia 
proper) led up a height, and the road to Horonayim (according 
to Jer, xlviii. 5) down a slope. Weeping, they ran np to the ■ 
mountain city to hide themselves there {bo, as in Fs. xxiv. 3 ; 
in Jer. xlviiL 5 it is written incorrectly *33). Raising loud 
cries of despair, they stand in front of Horonayim, which lay 
below, and was more esposed to the enemy, n^ is softened 
from viyiy^ (posMbly to increase the resemblance to an echo), like 
33l3 from 3333. The Septuagint renders it very well, Kpavyijv 
awrptfifiov i^avar/epov<Tiv, — an unaccustomed expression of 
intense and ever renewed cries at the threatening danger of 
utter destruction, and with the hope of procuring relief and 
assistance (sheber, as in ch, i. 28, xxx. 26). From the farthest 
sonth the scene would suddenly be transferred to the extreme 
north of the territory of Moab, if JVimrim were the Nimra 
(Beth'Nimra, Talm. mmrin) which was situated near to the 
Jordan in Gilead, and therefore farther north than any of the 
places previously mentioned, and the ruins of which lie a little 
to the south of Salt, and are still called Nimrin. But the 
name itself, which is derived from the vicinity of fresh water 
■ (Arab, mmir, nemir, clear, pure, sound), is one of frequent 
occurrence ; and even to the south of Moabitis proper there is 
a Wadi Numere, and a brook called Moyet Nwnere (two dimi- 
nutives: " dear little stream of Nimra"), which flows through 
stony tracks, and which formerly watered the country (Burck- 
hardt, Seetzen, and De Saalcy). In all probability the ruins 
of Numere by the side of this wady are the Nimrim referred 
to here, and the waters of the brook the " waters of Nimrim " 
{me Nimrim). The waters that flowed fresh from the spring 
had been filled up with rubbish by the enemy, and would now 



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828 THK PB0FHECIE5 OF ISAIAH. 

probably He waste for ever (a similar expression to that in cb. 
svii^2). He had gone through the land scorching and bnming^ 
so that all the vegetation had vanished. On the niiniatnre-like 
short sentences, see cb. xxix. 20, xzxiii. 8, 9, zxxii. 10 j and on 
ii)n (6 (" it IB not in existence," or " it has become not" ue, 
annihilated), vid. E^ek. xxi. 32. 

As Moabitis has thus become a great scene of confUgration, 
the Moabites cross the border and fly to Idtimsea. The reason 
for thb is given in sentences which the prophet again links on 
to one another with the particle ct (for). Vers. 7-9. " There- 
fore what hat beeit spared, what hat been gained, and their 
provision, they carry it over the wiliow-brook. For Oie scream 
has gone Hie round tn the territory of Moah ; the wailing of Moai 
resounds to Eglayim, and his wailing to Belr-Elim. For the 
waters of Dimon are full of blood: for I suspend over ZHmon 
a new calamity, over the escaped of MoaA a lion, and over tht 
remnant of the land." Yithrdh is what is superfluous or exceeds 
the present need, and pekudddh (lit. a laying up, d^tilto) 
that which has been carefully stored; whilst 'dsdh, as the 
derivative passnge, Jer. zlviii. 36, clearly shows (although the 
accusative in the whole of ver. 7 is founded upon a different 
view : see Bashi), is an attributive daose (what has been made, 
worked out, or gained). All these things they carry across 
naahal hd'ardbim, ue. not the desert-stream, as Hitzig, Maorer, 
Ewald, and Knobel suppose, since tlie plural of 'ardbdh is 
'ardboth, but either the Arab stream (LXX., Saad.), or the 
willow-stream, torrent salicum (Vulg.). The latter is more 
suitable to the A)nnection ; and among the rivers which flow to 
the aonth of the Amon from the monntains of the Moabitish 
highlands down to the Dead Sea, there is one which is called 
Wadi Sufaaf, i.e. willow-brook (TzaphtzdphSh is the name of a 
brook in Hebrew also), viz. the northern arm of the SeiX eUKerei. 
This is what we si^pose to be intended here, and not the Wadi 
el-Ahsa, although Uie latter (probably the biblical Zered^) is 
the boundary river on the extreme south, and separates Moab 
from Edom {Kerek from Gebal: see Kitter, Erdk. xv. 1223-4). 
Wading through the willow-brook, they carry their possessions 
across, and hurry off to the land of Edom, for their own land 
1 Hence the Targ, ii. renderB nachal ztred " the brook of the willowi." 
See Bnztorf, Lex. chald. s.v. Zerad. 



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CHAP. XVL 1. 829 

hu become the prey of tbe foe thronghont its whole extent, 
and within tta btmndaries the cry of wailing passes trom 
Eglayim, on the south-west of Ar, and therefore not far from 
the Bonthem extremity of the Dead Sea (Ezek. xlvii. 10), as 
far as Beer-Elim, in the north-east of the land towards, the 
desert (Nam. xxi.l6-18| IV must be supplied : Ewald, § 351, a), 
that is to say, if we draw a diagonal throogh the land, from one 
end to the other. Even the waters of Dibon, which are called 
DimoK here to produce a greater resemhlance in sound to ddnty 
blood, and by which we are probably to understand the Arnon, 
as this was only a short distance off (just as in Jndg. t. 19 
the " waters of Megiddo " are the Kithon), are full of blood,^ so 
that the enemy must have penetrated into the very heart of 
the land in his course of devastation and slaughter. But what 
drives them across the willow-broofc is not this alone ; it is as 
if they forebode that what has hitherto occurred is not the 
worst or the last. Jehovah suspends {ahith, as in Hos. vi. 11) 
over Dibon, whose waters are already reddened with blood, 
nStdphctii, something to be added, i.e. a still further judgment, 
namely a lion. The measure of Moab's misfortunes is uot yet 
foil: after the northern enemy, a lion will come upon those 
that have escaped by flight or have been spared at home (on 
the expresdon itself, compare ch. x. 20, xxxvii. 32, and other 
passages). This lion is no other than the basilisk of the pro- 
phecy agunat Philiatia, but with this difference, that the basilisk 
represents one particular Davidic king, whilst the lion is Judah 
generally, whose emblem was the lion from the time of Jacob's 
blessing, in Gen. xliz. 9. 

But jnst because this lion b Jndah and ita government, the 
summons goes forth to the Moabites, who have fled to Edom, 
and even to Sela, t>. Petra {Wady Mum\ near Mount Hor in 
Arabia Petnea, to which it gave its name, to turn for pro- 
tection to Jerusalem. Ch. zvi. 1. " Send a land-ruler^f tribute 
of lambs fvom Sela deeert-warda to the mountain of the daughter 
of 2ion" This verse is like a long-drawn trumpet-blast. The 
prophecy against Moab takes the same turn here as in ch. xiv. 

^ U1 ^KTDt with manach (which also represents the metheg) at the firet 
srllaUe ol the verb (compare ver. 4, \\i nyy, ^tt wercfta), according lo 
Veoed. 1521, and other good editions. This is also grammatically correct. 



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330 THE FBOFHECIES OF I6AUH. 

32, sviii. 7, six. 16 sf[q^ xxiii. 18. The jadgmeiat first of all 
produces slavbh fear; and this is afterwards refined into loving 
attachment. SabmissioD to tbe boose of David is Moab's only 
deliverance. This is what the prophet, weeping with those that 
weep, calls out to them in sach long-drawn, vehement, and 
urgent tones, even into the farthest hiding-place in which they 
have concealed themselves, viz. the rocky city of the Edomites. 
The tribnte of lambs which was due to the mling prince ia 
called briefly car mOshsVeretz. This tribute, which the holders 
of the pasture-land so rich in fiocks have hitherto sent to 
Samaria (2 Kings iii. 4), they are now to send to Jerusalem, 
the " mountain of the daughter of Zion" (as in ch. x. 32, 
compared with ch. xviii. 7), the way to which lay through 
"the d€»ert," i.e. fii'st of all in a diagonal direction through 
the Arabah, which stretched downwards to ^lath, 

' The advice does not remain without effect, but they em- 
brace it eagerly. Ver. 2. "And the daughters of Moab will 
be lake birds fiuttering ahout, a scared nest, at tlie fords of the 
Amon." "The daughters of Moab," like "the daughters of 
Jndah," for example, in Fs. xlviii. 12, are the inhabitants of the 
cities and villages of the land of Moab. They were already 
like birds soaring about (Prov. xxvii. 8), because of their flight 
from their own land ; but here, as we may see from the expres- 
sion "^y^J^ . . . <^1f], the simile is intended to depict the condition 
into which they would beJ^hrown by the prophefs advice. The 
figure (cf. ch. x. 14) as well as the expression (cf; ch. xvii. 2) 
is thoroughly Isaiah's. It is a state of anxious and timid 
indecision, resembling the fiuttering to and fro of birds, that 
have been driven away from their nest, and wheel anxiously 
round and round, without daring to return to their old home* 
In this way the daughters of Moab, coming out of their hiding- 
places, whether nearer or more remote, show themselves at the 
fords of the Amon, that ia to say, on the very soil of their 
old home, which was situated between the Amon and Wady 
el-Ahsa, and which was now devastated by the hand of a foe. 
|lris? nii3yp we should regard as in apposition to I'noth Moab 
(the daughters of Moab), if mabdrotk signified the coasfc-Iaids 
(like 'ehrS in ch. vii. 20), and not, aa it invariably does, the 
fords. It is locative in its meaning, and is so accentuated. 
There they show themselves, on the spot to which their land 



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CHAP. XVL 8-6. 831 

once reached before it paased into tJie possession of Israel, — 
there, on its farthest boundai7 in the direction towards Jadah, 
whicli was seated ahore; and taking heart, address the following 
petitions to Zion, or to the Daridic court, on the other side. 
Vers. 3, 4a, " Give counsel, form a decision, make t/iy shadow like 
night in the midst of neon ; hide the outcasts, do not betray the 
wanderers. Let mine outcasts tarry in thee, Moah ; he a covert 
to it from before the spoiler." In their extremity they appeal 
to Zion for counsel, and the once proud hut now thoroughly 
humbled Moabites place the decision of their fate in the hands 
of the men of Judah (so according to the keri), and stand 
before Zion praying most earnestly for shelter and protection. 
Their fear of the enemy is so great, that in the light of the 
noon-day sun they desire to be covered with the protecting 
shade of Zion as with the blackness of night, that they may 
not be seen by the foe. The short sentences correspond to the 
anxious nrgency of the prayer (cf. ch. xzxili. 8). Pelildh 
(cf. peUliyi/dh, ch. xxviii. 7) is the decision of a judge {pdhl) ; 
just as in ch. xv. 5 shelishiyyc^ is the age and standing of 
three years. The figure of the shadow is the same as in ch. 
XXX. 2, 3, xxxii. 2, etc.; nodid is the same as in ch. xxi. 14 ; 
nidddchai as in ch. xi. 12 ; sllher as in ch. xxxii. 2, and other 
passages ; shodsd as in ch. xxxiii. 1 ; mipp'nl as in ch. xxi. 15. 
The whole is word for word Isaiah's. There is no necessity 
to read nidchs instead of niddachai Mo'db in ver. 4 ; still less is 
ay a collective termination, as in ch. xx. 4. Nor are the words 
to be rendered " my outcasts ... of Moab," and the expres- 
uon to be taken as a syntaxia omata (cf. ch. xvii. 6). On the 
contrary, such an expression is absolutely impossible here, where 
the speaker is alluding to himself. It is better to abide by the 
punctuation as we have it, with nidddchai {zakeph) closing the 
first clause of ver. 4a, and Moab (tebir, which is subordinate to 
the following tiph^ihah, and with this to athnach) opening the 
second as an absolute noon. This is the way in which we have 
rendered it above : *' Moab ... be. a shield to it . . ." (though 
withoDt taking lama as equivalent to Id), 

The question then arises, By what means has Zion awakened 
such reverence and confidence on the part of Moabi This 
question is answered in vers. 46, 5 : ''For the extortiotier it at an 
end, detol(aion hat dita^eared, treaderi down are away from 



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B32 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

the hnd. And a throne U established by grace, and there site 
thereon in truth in the (en* of David one judging, and sealous 
for right, and practised in righteousness." The imperial world- 
power, wbicli pressed out both marrow and blood (mgiz, a Doon 
of the same form as litz, like mite in Frov. xxx. 33, pressure), 
and devastated and trod down everything (ch- xxix. 20, x. 6, 
xxziii. 1, cf. 8), is swept away from the land on this side of the 
Jordan ; Jerusalem is not subject to it now, but has come forth 
more gloriously oat of all her oppressions than ever she did 
before. And the throne of the kingdom of Jndah has not 
fallen down, but by the manifestation of Jehovah's grace has 
been newly established. There no longer sits thereon a king 
who dishonours Him, and endangers His kingdom ; but tho 
tentr-roof of the fallen and now re-erected hut of David (Amos 
ix. 11) is spread over a King in whom the truth of the promise 
of Jehovah is verified, inasmuch as justice and righteousness 
are realized through all that He does. The MeRsianic times 
must therefore have dawned (so the Targum understands it), 
since grace and truth (chesed ve'enwth) and " justice and right- 
eousness" (miahpiit Utzeddkdh) are the divino-human signs of 
those times, and as it were their kindred genii ; and who can 
here fail to recal to mind the words of ch. bt. 6 (cf. zxxiii. 5, 6) f 
The king depicted here is the same as " the lion out of Judah," . 
threatened against Moab in ch. xv. 9. Only by thus submitting 
to Him and imploring His grace will it escape the judgment. 

-But if Moab does this, and the law of the history of Israel, 
which is that " a remnant shall return," is thus reflected in the 
history of Moab ; ver. 6 cannot possibly contain the answer 
which Moab receives from Zioo, as the more modem com- 
mentators assume according to an error that has almost become 
traditional. On the contrary, the prophecy enters here npon a 
new stage, commencing with Moab's sin, and depicting the fate 
of Moab in still more elegiac strains. Yer. 6. " We have heard 
of the pride of Moab, the very haughty (pride), kU haughtines*^ 
and his pride, and his wrath, the falsehood of his speech." The 
future self-humiliation of Moab, which would be the fruit of 
its sufferings, is here contrasted with the previous self-exalta- 
tion, of which these sufferings were the fruit, " We have 
heard," says the prophet, identifying himself with his people. 
Boasting pompousness had hitherto been the distinguishing 



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CHAP. XTI. T, 8. 333 

vliaracterisUc of Moab id relation to tlie latter (see ch. zxv. 11). 
The heaping np of words of the same verbal stem (cf. ch, 
iii. 1) is here intended to indicate how thoroughlj haugh^ was 
their haughtiness (cf. Kom. vii. 13, "that sin might become 
exceeding sinful"), and how completely it had taken possession 
of Moab. It boasted and was full of rage towards Israel, to 
which, so far as it retained its consciousness of the tmth of 
Jehovah, the talk of Moab (I'la from Tia = K13, Kpa, to talk 
at random) must necessanly appear as HP'C^?, not-right, %.e. at 
variance with fact. These expressions of opinion had been 
beard by the people of God, and, as Jeremiah adds in ch. 
xlviii. 29, 30, by Israel's God as well. 

Therefore the delightful land is miserably laid waste. 
Vers. 7, 8. " Therefore will Moab wail for Moab, everything 
loill wail: for the grape-cakes of Kir'Hareseth will ye whine, 
utterly crushed. For tlie fruitrfelde of Heahbon have faded 
away : the vine of Slhmah, lords of the nationa its branches 
emote down ; they reached to Ja'zer, trailed through the desert : 
Us branches spread themselves out wide, crossed over the sea." 
The Lamed in VMoiA is the same as in ch. xv. 5, and in 
Idashiahe, which follows here. Kir-Hareseth (written Kir' 
Heres in ver. 11, and by Jeremiah ; compare 2 Kings iii. 25, 
where the vowel-pointing is appar^itly false) : Here* or Ho' 
reselh may posnhly refer to the glazed tiles or grooved stones. 
As this was the principal fcHiress of Moab, and according to 
ch. XV. 1 it had already been destroyed, 'ashishg appears to 
mean the "Mrong foundations," — namely, as laid bare ; in othw 
words, the " rains" (cf. Jer. 1. 15, and mos'de in ch. Iviii. 12). 
Bnt in every other passage in which the word occurs it signifies 
a kind of cake ; and as the devastation of the vines of Moab is 
made the sobject of mourning afterwards, it has the same mean- 
ing here as in Hos. iii, 1, namely raisin-cakes, or raisins pressed 
into tlie form of cakes. Such cakes as these may have been a 
special article of the export trade of Kir. Jeremiah has altered 
*dshishS into 'anshe (ch. xlviii. 31), and thus made men oat of 
the grapes. Sdgdh is to be understood in accordance with ch. 
xxxviii. 14, lix. 11 (viz. of the cooing of the dove); 'ac (in 
good texts it is written with Tnercha, not with maikeph) accord- 
ing to Deat. xvi. 15. On the construction of the pluralet. 
shadmoth, compare Hab. iii, 17. We have rendered the clause 



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Sii THE PKOFHECIBS OF ISAIAH. 

commencing with baaU goyim (lords of the nations) with the 
same amphibolism as we find in the Hebrew. It might mean 
eitha " lords of the nations {domivi gentium) smote down its 
branches" (viz, those of the vine of Sibmah ;^ h^Iam being nsed 
as in ch. xli. 7), or " its branches smote down (t.e. intoxicated) 
lords of the onions" (dtmiinos geroium ; hdlam having the 
same meaning as in the nndispnted prophecy of Isaiah in ch. 
xxviii. 1). As the prophet enlarges here upon the excellence of 
the Moabitish wine, the latter is probably intended. The wine 
of Sibmah was bo good, that it was placed npon the tables of 
monarchs, and so strong that it smote down, ue. inevitably 
intoxicated, even those who were accustomed to good wines. 
This Sibmah wine was cultivated, as the prophet says, far and 
wide in Moab, — northwards as far as Ja'zer (between Ramotb, 
i.e. Salt, and Heshbon, now a heap of ruins), eastwards into 
the desert, and aonthnards across the Dead Sea, — a hyper- 
bolical expression for close np to its shores. Jeremiah defines 
^dm (the sea) more closely as j/am Jazer (the sea of Jazer ; 
vid. Jer. xlviii. 32), so that the hyperbole vanishes. Bat what 
sea can the sea of Jazer be f Probably some celebrated large 
pool, like the pools of Heshbon, in which the waters of the 
Wadi/ {Nahr) ^r, which takes its rise close by, were collected. 
Seetzen found some pools still there. The "sea" (i/am) in 
Solomon's temple shows clearly enough that the term tea was 
also commonly applied to artificial basins of a large size ; and 
in Damascus the marble basins of flowing water in- the halls of 
booses are still called bahardt ; and the same term*^ applied to 
the public reserVOTrs in all the streets of the city, which are 
fed by a network of aqueducts from the river Barad&. The 
expression "break through the desert" (td'u midbdr) is also a 
bold one, probably pointing to the fact that, like the red wines 
of Hnngary at the present time, they were trailing vines, which 
did not require to bo staked, but ran along the ground. 

The beauUes of natnre and fruitfulness of the land, which 
come into the possession of any nation, are gifts from the 
riches of divine goodness, remnants of the paradisaical com- 
mencement of the histoiy of man, and types of its paradisical 
close ; and for this very reason they are not matters of in- 

* In KSS. Shibmah is nritten witli ffijid, in order that the two. labials 
may be dietiactly expxued. 



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CEAP. XVL 9. 335 

difference to the spirit of prophecy. And for the same reason, 
it is not unworthy of a prophet, who predicts the renovation of 
nature and the perfecting of it into the beanty of paradise, 
to weep over sacb a devastation as that of the Moabitiali 
vineyards which waa now passing before hia mind (cf. ch. 
xsxji. 12, 13), Ver, 9. " Therefore I bemoan the vines of 
Sibtnah mlh the weeping of Jazer ; I flood thee with my tears, 
ffeshhon and Elealeh, that HSdad hath fallen upon thy fruit- 
harvest and upon thy vintage," A tetrastich, the Hebrew equiva- 
lent, in measure and movement, of a sapphic strophe. The 
circumstantiality of the vision is here swallowed up again 
by the sympathy of the prophet ; and the prophecy, which is 
throughout as truly human as it is divine, becomes soft and 
flowing like an elegy. The prophet mingles his tears with the 
tears of Jazer. Just as the latter weeps for the devastated 
vines of i^bmalt, so does he also weep. The form ^IJJIIW, trans- 
posed from ^1K— ^"is* (cf. Ewald, § 253, o, where it is explained 
as being a rare " voluntative" formation), corresponds to the 
elegiac tone of the whole strophe. Heshbon and Elealeh, those 
closely connected cities, with their luxuriant fields {sh'demotli, 
ver. 8), are now lying in ruins ; and the prophet waters them 
with tears, because hedad has fallen upon the fruit^harveat and 
vintage of both the sister cities. In other instances the term 
katzlr is applied to i\\.e wheat-harvest ; but here it is used in 
the same sense as bdtzfr, to which it is preferred on account 
of Isaiah's favourite alliteration, viz. with hiyts (compare, for 
example, the alliteration of misior with seiher in ch. iv. 6). 
That it does not refer to the wheat-harvest here, but to the 
vintage, which was nearly coincident with the fruit-harvest 
(which is called kaytz, as in ch. sxviii. 4), is evident from the 
figure su^ested in the word hsddd, which was the shout raised 
by the pressers of the grapes, to give the time for moving their 
feet when treading out the wine (ver. 10 ; Jer. xxv. 30). A 
heddd of this bind had fallen upon the rich floors of Heshbon- 
Elealeh, inasmuch as they had been trodden down by enemies, 
— a Hedad, and yet no Hedad, as Jeremiah gives it in a beautiful 
oxymoron (ch. xlviii. 33), i.e. no joyous shout of actual grape- 
treaders. 

The prophet, to whose favourite words and favourite figures 
Canrel belongs, both as the name of a place and as the name 



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of a thing, now proceeds with his picture, and is plunged still 
more deeply into mourning. Vers. 10, 11. " And joy is taken 
away, and the rejoicing of the garden-land; and there it no 
exulting, no shoring in the vineyarde ; the treader treads out no 
wine in tlie pretsei; I put an end to the Hedad. Therefore my 
hovieU aowid for Moab Uke a harp, and my itteide for Kir-Heres." 
It is Jehovah who says " I put an end ; " and consequently the 
words, " My bowels sound like a harp," or, as Jeremiah ex- 
presses it (Jer. xlviii. 36), like flutes, might appear to be expres- 
sive of the feelings of Jehovah. And the Scriptures do not 
hesitate to attribute mi'agim (yiecera) to God (e.g. ch, Ixiii. 15, 
Jer. zxxi. 20). But as the prophet is the sympathizing subject 
throughout the whole of the prophecy, it is better, for the sake 
of unity, to take the words in this instance also as expressing 
the prophet's feelhigs. Just as the hand or plectrum touches 
the strings of the harp, so that they vibrate with sound ; so did 
the terrible things that he bad beard Jehovah say concerning 
Moab touch the strings of his inward parts, and canse them to 
resound with notes of pain. By the bowels, or rather entrails 
(viicera), the heart, liver, and kidneys are intended, — the highest 
organs of the Psyche, and the sounding-board, as it were, of 
those "bidden sounds" which exist in every man. God con- 
versed with the prophet " in the spirit ; " but what passed there 
took the form of individual impregaiooa in the domain of the 
soul, in which impressions the bodily organs of the psychical 
life sympathetically shared. Thus the prophet saw in the spirit 
the purpose of God concerning Moab, in which he could not 
and would not make any change ; but it threw his soul into all 
the restlessness of pain. 

The ultimate reason for this restlessness is, that Moab does 
not know the living God. Ver. 12. " And it will come to pose, 
when it is seen that Moab is weary with weeping upon the moun- 
tain height, and enters into its sanctuary to pray, it will not gain 
anything," fiK?] i^IfU, a pictorial assonance, such as Isaiah 
delights in. nM13 is transferred from the Israelitisb worship 
(appearance before God in His temple) to the heathen ; syn- 
tactically, si apparuerii, etc., with Vav before the apodosb. It 
would be with the Moabites as with the priests of Baal in the 
time of Elijah (1 Kings xviii. 26 sqq.). 

The tnassa is now brought to a close, and there follows an 



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CHAP, xvt w. 837 

epilogue whicli fixes the term of the fulfilment of what is not 
predicted now for the first time, from the standpoint of the 
anticipated history. Yer. 13. " TliU it the word which Jehovah 
ipake long ago concerning Moab. And nov) Jehovali tpeaketh 
thus : In three years, like years of a hireling, the glory of Moab 
is disgraced, together with all the muliilvde of the great; a rem- 
nant is left, contemptibly small, not great at all." The time 
fixed is the same as in ch. sx. 3. Of working time the hirer 
remits nothing, and the labourer gives nothing in. The state- 
ment as to the time, therefore, is intended to be taken exactly : 
three years, not more, rather under than over. Then will the 
old saying of God concerning Moab be fulfilled. Only a rem- 
nant, a contemptible remnant, will be left p^^ cf. is^b'Di, cb. 
viii. 6, in sense equivalent to *^KEn) ; for every history of the 
nations is but the shadow of the history of Israel. 

The nuuta io ch. xv. 1-xvi. 12 was a word that had already 
gone forth from Jehovah "long ago." This statement may be 
understood in three different senses. In the first place, Isaiah 
may mean that older prophecies had already foretold essentially 
the same concerning Moab. But what prophecies! We may 
get an answer to this question from the prophecies of Jeremiah 
concerning Moab in Jer. xlviii. Jeremiah there reproduces 
the massa Moab of the book of Isaiah, but interweaves with 
it reminiscences (1) out of the mdshal on Moab in Num. 
xxi. 27—30} (2) out of Balaam's prophecy concerning Moab in 
Num. xxiv. 17 ; (3) out of the prophecy of Amos concerning 
Moab (Amos ii. 1-3). And it might be to these earher words 
of prophecy that Isaiah here refers (Havemick, Drechsler, and 
others). But this is very improbable, as there is no ring of 
diese earlier passages in the massa, such as we should expect 
if Isaiah had had them in his mind. Secondly, Isaiah might 
mean that ch. xv. 1 sqq. contained the prophecy of an older 
prophet, which he merely brought to remembrance in order to 
connect therewith the precise tenor of its fulfilment which bad 
been revealed to him. This is at present the prevailing view. 
Hitzig, in a special work on the subject (1831), as well as in 
hia Commentary, has endeavoured to prove, on the ground of 
2 Kings xdv. 25, that in all probability Jonah was the author of 
the oracle which Isaiah here resnmes. And Knohel, Maurer, 
Gustav Baur, and Thenius agree with him in this ; whilst De 

VOL. I. T 



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938 THE FBOPHECIES Of ISAIAH. 

Wette, Ewald, and Umbreit regard it as, at any rate, decidedly 
non-Messianic. If the conjecture that Jonah was the aothor 
could bnt be better sustained, we should heartily rejoice in this 
addition to the history of the hteratore of the Old Testament. 
But all that we know of Jonah is at variance with such a con- 
jecture. He was a prophet of the type of Elijah and Elisha, 
in whom the eloquence of a prophet's words was thrown alto- 
gether into the shade by the energy of a prophet's deeds. His 
prophecy concerning the restoration of the kingdom of Israel 
to its old boundaries, which was fulfilled by the victories of 
Jeroboam ii., we cannot therefore imagine to have been so 
pictorial or highly poetical as the massa Moab (which would 
only be one part of that prophecy) really is ; and the fact that 
he was angry at the sparing of Nineveh harmonizes very badly 
with its elegiac softness and its flood of tears. Moreover, it 
is never intimated that the conquerors to whom Moab was 
to succumb would belong to the kingdom of Israel ; and the 
hypothesis is completely overthrown by the summons addressed 
to Moab to send tribute to Jerusalem. But the conclusion 
itself, that the oracle must have originated with any older 
prophet whatever, is drawn from very insufficient premises. 
No doubt it is a thing altogetheir unparalleled even in Isaiah, 
that a prophecy should assume so thoroughly the form of a 
Mnah, or lamentation ; still there are tendencies to this in ch. 
xxii. 4 (cf ■ ch. sji, 3, 4), and Isaiah was an inexhaustible master 
of language of every character and colour. It is true we do 
light upon many expressions which cannot be pointed out any- 
where else in the book of Isaiah, such as baals goyim, hedad. 
y'ldldh, ydra , yithrah, mdhir, mStz, noidphoth, pekudddh (pro- 
vision, possession) ; and there is something peculiar in the 
circular movement of the prophecy, which is carried out to 
such an extent in the indication of reason and consequence, as 
well as in the perpetually returning, monotonous connection 
of the sentences by ei (for) and 'aUcen {Ideln, therefore), the 
former of which is repeated twice in ch. xv. 1, three times in 
ch. XV. 8, d, and four times in succession in ch, xv. 5, 6. But 
there is probably no prophecy, especially in ch. xiii.-xxiii., which 
does not contain expressions that the prophet uses nowhere 
else ; and so far as the conjunctions ci and 'al-cSn (ldc8n) are 
concerned, Isaiah crowds them together in other passages as 



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CEAF. xvn. av 

welt, and bere almost to monotony, as a natural consequence of 
the prevailing elegiac tone. Besides, even Ewald can detect 
the characteristics of Isaiah in ch. svi. 1-6 ; and you have only 
to dissect the whole rhetorically, syntactically, and phtlologically, 
' with the carefulness of a Caspari, to hear throughout the ring 
of Isaiah's style. And whoever has retained the impression 
which he brought with him from the oracle against Fhilistia, 
will be constrained to say, that not only the stamp and outward 
form, hut also the spirit and ideas, are thoroughly Isaiah's. 
Hence the third possible conjecture must be the correct one. 
TJiirdlt/, then, Isaiah may mean that the fate of Moab, which 
he has just procl^med, was revealed to him long ago ; and the 
addition made now is, that it will be falfiUed in exactly three 
years, ttj^ does not necessarily point to a time antecedent to 
that of Isaiah himself (compare ch. xliv, 8, zlviii. 3, 5, 7, with 
2 Sam. XV. 34). If we assume that what Isaiah predicts down 
to ch. zvi. 12 was revealed to him in the year that Ahaz died, 
and that the epilogue reckons from the third or tenth year of 
Hezekiah, in either case the interval is long enough for thei 
me'dz (from of old). And we decide in favour of this. Un- 
fortnnately, we know nothing certain as to the time at which 
the three years commence. The question whether it was Shal- 
manassar, Sargon, or Sennacherib who treated the Moabites so 
harshly, is one that we cannot answer. In Herodotus (ii. 141), 
Sennacherib is called *' king of the Arabians and Assyrians j" 
and Moab might be included in the Arabians. In any case, 
after the fulfilment of Isaiah's prophecy in the Assyrian times, 
there was still a portion left, the fulfilment of which, according 
to Jer. xlviii., was reserved for the Chaldeans. 

THE OEAOLB CONCBRNrNG DAMASCnS AMD ISRAEL. — 
CHAP. XYIl. 

From the Philistines on the west, and the Moabites on tha 
east, the prophecy relating to the neighbouring nations now 
turns, without any chronological order, to the people of Damas< 
cene Syria on the north. The curse pronounced on them, 
however, falls upon the kingdom of Israel also, because it has 
allied itself with heathen Damascus, in opposition to its own 
brother tribe to the south, as well as to the Davidic government ; 



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340 THE PEOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

and by tlis nnnatural alliance with a zdr, or stranger, bad 
become a zdr itself. From tbe period of Hezekiah's reign, to 
which the masta Moab belongs, at least so far as its epilogae 
is concerned, we are here carried back to the reign of Ahaz, 
and indeed far beyond " the year that Ahaz died" (ch. xiv. 28), ■ 
to the very border of the reigns of Jotham and Ahaz, — namely, 
to tbe time when the league for the destruction of Judah had 
only jnst been concluded. At the time when Isaiah incorpo- 
rated tliis oracle in his collection, the threats against the king- 
doms of Damascus and Israel had long been fulfilled. Assyria 
had punished both of them. And Assyria itself had also been 
punished, as the fonrth tarn in the oracle indicates. Conse- 
quently the oracle stands here as a memorial of the truthful- 
ness of the prophecy ; and it answers a farther purpose still, 
viz. to furnish a rich prophetic consolation for tbe church of 
all times, when persecuted by the world, and sighing under the 
oppression of the kingdom of the world. 

The first turn : vers. 1-3. " Behold, Damascus must (be 
taken) awai/ tmt of the number of the cities, and will be a heap 
of fallen ruins. The cities of Aroer are forsaken, they are given 
up to fioclM, ihejf lie there without any one searing them away. 
And the fortress of Ephraim is abolished, and the kingdom of 
Damascus; and it happens to those that are left of Aram as to the 
ghry of the eons of Israel, sailh Jehovah of hosts." " Behold," 
etc : hinnSh followed by a participle indicates here, as it does 
everywhere else, something very near at hand. Damascus is 
removed Typ (= TJ) nl'no, cf. 1 Kings xv. 13), i.e. out of the 
sphere of existence as a city. It becomes 'Pp, a heap of ruins. 
The word is used intentionally instead of 'V, to sound as much 
as possible like "Vyo -. a mutilated city, so to speak. It is just 
the same with Israel, which has made itself an appendage of 
Damascus. The " cities of Aroer" {gen. appos. Ges. § 114, 3) 
represent the land to the east of the Jordan : there the judg- 
ment upon Israel (executed by Tiglath-pileser) first began. 
There were two Aroers : an old Amoritish city allotted to the 
tribe of Reuben, viz. "Aroer on the Amon" (Deut. ii, 36, 
iii. 12, etc.) ; and an old Ammonitish one, allotted to tbe tribe 
of Gad, viz. " Aroer before Kabbah" (Rabbath Ammon, Josh, 
xiii. 25). The ruins of the foriper are Arair, on the lofty 
northern hank of the Mugtb; but the situation of the latter 



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CHAP. XVn. 4-8. 341 

has not yet teen determined with certainty (see Com. on Josh, 
adii. 25). The "cities of Aroer" are these two Aroers, and the 
rest of the cities similar to it on the east of the Jordan ; just 
as " the Orions" in ch. ziii. 10 are Orion and other similar 
stars. We meet here again with a significant play upon the 
sound in the expression 'drB 'Aro'Sr (cities of Aroer): the name 
of Aroer was ominous, and what its name indicated would 
happen to the cities in its circuit, ""jny means " to lay bare," 
to pull down (Jer. li. 58) ; and "^iny, "n-ny^ signiSes a stark-naked 
condition, a state of desolation and solitude. After ver. 1 has 
threatened Damascus in particular, and ver. 2 has done the 
same to Israel, ver. 3 comprehends them hoth. Kphraim 
loses the fortified cities which once seized it as defences, 
and Damascns loses its rank. as a kingdom. Those that are 
left of Aram, who do not fall in the war, become like the 
proud citizens of the kingdom of Israel, i.e. they are cariied 
away into captivity. All this was fulfilled under Tiglath- 
pileser. The accentoation connects tns ikC? (the remnant 
of Aram) with the first half of the verse; but the meaning 
remains the same, as the subject to ViT is in any case the 
Aramaeans. 

Second turn : vers. 4-8. "And it eomet to pass in that day, 
tie glory of Jacob wastta awai/, and Oie fat of his fUth grotee 
thin. And it will "be aa when a reaper graipa tlte stalks of 
wlteat, and hie arm mowe off the ears ; and it will be as with 
one who gathers together ears in the valley of Rephaim. Yet a 
gleaning remains from it, as at the olive-beating : two, tfiree 
berries high up at the top ; four, five in its, the fruit treis, 
branches, saith Jeliovah tlie God of Israel. At that day will 
man look up to his Creator, and his eyes will look to the Holy 
One of Israel. And he will not look to the altars, tlie work of 
hi> hands ; and what hit fingers have made he will not regard, 
neither the Astarles not' the euri-gods." This second turn does 
not speak of Damascus, but simply of Israel, and in fact of 
all Israel, the range of vision widening out from Israel in the 
more restricted sense, so as to embrace the whole. It will all 
disappar, with the exception of a small remnant ; but the latter 
will return. Thus " a remnant will return," the law of IsraeFs 
history, which is here shown first of all in its threatening aspect, 
and then in it3 more promising' one. The reputation and pro- 



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343 THE PBOFHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

sperity to which the two kingdoms were r^sed by Jerobosm n. 
and Uzziab would pass away. Israel was ripe for judgment, 
like a field of com for the harvest ; and it woald be as when a 
reaper grasps the stalks that have shot ap, and cuts off the ears. 
TS|J is not used elliptically for TVi? P'R (Gesenius), nor is it a 
definition of time (Lnzzatto), nor an accusative of the object 
(Knobel), bat a noon formed like K*2i, 77B, }^e, and tised in 
the sense of reaper (kofzSr in other cases).^ The figure sug- 
gested here is more fully expanded in John iv. and lUv. xir. 
Hardly a single one will escape the judgment: just as in the 
broad plain of Rephaim, which slopes off to the south-west of 
Jerusalem as far as Bethlehem, where it is covered with rich 
fields of wheat, the collectors of ears leave only one or two ears 
lying scattered here and there.. Nevertheless a gleaning of 
Israel (" in it," viz. in Jacob, ver. 4, ch. z. 22) will be left, 
jast as when the branches of the olive tree, which have been 
already cleared with the hand, are still further shaken with a 
stick, there still remain a few olives upon the highest branch 
(two, three ; cf. 2 Kings ii. 32), or concealed under the foliage 
of the branches. " Its, the fruit tree's, branches :" this is an 
elegant expression, as, for example, in Prov. ziv. 13 ; the carry- 
ing over of the n to the second word is very natural in both 
passages (see Ges. g 121, b). This small remnant will turn 
with stedfast gaze to the living God, as is becoming in man as 
such (hd'dddm), and not regard the idols as worthy of any look 
at all, at least of any reverential look. Aa hamm&nim are here 
images of the sun-god pn bs2, which is well known from the 
Phcenician monnments,' 'ashSrim (for which we find, though 
more rarely, 'ashiroth) apparently signifies images of the moon- 
goddess. And the combination of " Baal, Asherah, and all the 
host of heaven" in 2 Kings xxiii. 4, as well as the samame 
"queen of heaven" in Jer. vii. 18, xliv. 18, 19, appears to 
require this (Knobel). But the latest researches have proved 
that 'AsIiSrdh is rather the Semitic Aphrodite, and therefore 
the planet Venus, which was called the " little luck" (et-aa'd 

* Instead of k&tzar (to cut oS, or ahortea), th^ now saj kdratz in the 
irbole of the land to the east of the Jordan, which gives the idea of sawing 
off,-^ much more Bnit&ble one where the Sjriaii tickle is noed. 

* See LeT7, PhSnhuehet WUrUrhuch (1864), p. 19 ; and Otto Stianaa 
on Hahiini, p. xxii. m. 



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OHAP. JCTIL 9-IL M3 

eUat'gar) ' by the Arabs, in distinction from Musteri (Jopiter),* 
or "the great Inck." And with this the name 'Atkerah the 
** lucky" (i.e. the source of luck or prosperity) and the similar 
snroame given to the Assyrian htar agree;* for 'Aeherak is 
the rery same goddess as 'Ashtoreih, whose name is thoroughly 
Arian, and apparently signifies the star (Ved. «fn'=«far; Zend. 
ttare ; ' Keo-Fers. ekdre, used chiefly for the morning star), 
although Rawlinson (without being able to suggest any more 
acceptable interpretation) speaks of this view as " not wortliy 
of much attention."* Thus Atherim is used to signify the 
bosqueU (shrubberies) or trees dedicated to the Semitic Aphro- 
dite (Dent. xvi. 31 ; compare the verbs used to signify their 
removal, JTlj, ma, CTU) ; but here it probably refers to her 
statues or images '* (2 Kings xxi. 7 ; compare the mipkletzetk in 
1 Kings XV. Vdy which is used to denote an obscene exhibition). 
For these images of the sun-god and of the goddess of the 
morning star, the remnant of Israel, that baa been purified by 
the smelting furnace of judgment, has no longer any eye. Its 
looks are escluaively directed to the one true God of man. The 
promise, which here begins to dawn at the close of the second 
turn, is hidden again in the third, though only to break forth 
agiun in the fourth with double or triple intensity. 

Third turn: vers. 9-11. "In Hiat day will his fortified 
cities be like the ruint of ike forest and of the mountain top, which 
they cleared before the lona of Israel : and thete arises a waste 
place. For thou hast forgotten the God of thy salvation, and 
hast not tlwught of the Sock of thy stnmghold, therefore thou 
plantedst charming plantations, and didst set Hiem with strange 

* See Erehl, Seligiott der vorialamUcfiert Araher (1863), p. 11. 

* This was lie tutelar deity of DamaEcna ; see Job, ii. 446, 

* " Ishtar" HajB Rawliason in his Five Great Mbnarciies of the Ancient 
Eastern World, — & work which challenges criticism through its dazzling 
results, — '^Ishtar ia the goddeas who rejoicee numkind, and her moet com- 
mon epitbet is Amra, ' the fortunate' or ' the happj.' But otherwise her 
epithets &re TOgue and general, insomuch that she is often scarcely distin- 
gui^ble from Beltis (the wife of Bel-Nimrod}." Vid. vol. i. p. 175 (1862). 

* The planet Venus, according to a Midrasb relating to Gen. -n. I, 3, ia 
'Utehar transferred to the sky ; and this is the same as Zuhare (see Geiger, 
Was ftat Mahammed, etc., 1833, pp. 107-109). 

* The plural Ashtarolk, Haihors, which occnrs upon Assyriau and 
Egyptian monuments, has a different meaniug. 



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8M THE PfiOPBSCIES OF ISAUH. 

vineg. III the day that thou planiedit, thou didst make a fenet ; 
«md loiUi ike morning dawn thou modest thy sowing to blossom ; 
a harvest heap in the day of deep toounds and deadly sorrow of 
heart." The statement in ver. 3, " The fortress of Ephralm is 
abolished," is repeated in ver. 9 in a more descriptive manner. 
The fate of the strongly fortiBed cities of Kphraim would be 
the same as that of the old Canaanltish castles, which were still 
to be discerned in their antiquated remains, either in the depths 
of forests or high up on the mountains. The word 'azubdh^ 
which the early translators qnite misunderstood, signifies, both 
here and in ch. vi. 12, desolate places that have gone to rain. 
They also misunderstood '^'P^'^) Enhri. The Septuagint renders 
it, by a bold conjecture, oi 'A/io^paiot koI ol Eimtoi ; but this is 
at once proved to be false by the inversion of the names of the 
two peoples, which was veiy properly thonght to be necessary. 
^*pMn undoubtedly signifies the top of 8 tree, which is quite 
nnsuitable here. But as even this meaning points back to 
^PM, extolUre, efferre (see at Fs. xcir. 4), it may also mean the 
mountsin-top. The name hd'emori (the Amorites ; those who 
dwell high np in the monntains) proves the possibility of this ; 
and the prophet had this name in his mind, and was guided by 
it in his choice of a word. The subject of UW is self-evident. 
And the reason why only the mins in forests and on mountain! 
are mentioned is, that other places, which were situated on the 
different lines of traffic, merely changed their inhabitants when 
the land was taken by Israel. The reason why the fate of 
Ephraim's fortified castles was the same as that of the Amor- 
itish castles, which were then lying in ruins, was that Ephraim, 
as stated in ver. 10, had turned away from its true rocky 
stronghold, namely from Jehovah. It was a conseqnence of 
this estrangement from God, that Ephraim planted OW^ *I|03^ 
plantations of the nature of pleasant things, or pleasant planta- 
tions (compare on Ps. Izzviii. 4d, and Ewald, § 287, ab), i^, 
cultivated all kinds of sensual accompaniments to its worship^ 
in accordance with its heathen propensities; and sowed, or 
rather (as zemordh is the layer of a vine) " set," this garden- 
ground, to which the suffix ennu refers, with strange grapes, 
by forming an alliance with a zdr (a stranger), namely the 
king of Damascus. On the very day of the planting, Ephraim 
fenced it carefully (this is the meaning of the pilpel, sigtig 



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CHAF. XVIL 9-lL 345 

ftnin nfe'=M, not "to raise," as no such verb as )^=fUfe', WD, 
can be shown to exist), that is to say, he ensured the perpetuity 
of these sensuous modes of worship as a state religion, with all 
the shrewdness of a Jeroboam (see Amos vii. 13). And the 
very next morning he had brought into blossom what he liad 
sown : the foreign layer had shot up like a hot-house plant, i.e, 
the alliance had speedily grown into a hearty agreement, and 
had already produced one blossom at any rate, viz. the plan of 
a joint attack upon Judah. But this plantation, which was so 
flattering and promising for Israel, and which had succeeded 
so rapidly, and to all appearance so happily, was a harvest heap 
for tlie day of the judgment. Nearly ail modem expositors 
have taken ned as the third person (after the form meth, Ges. 
§ 72, Anm. 1), and render it "the harvest flees;" but the third 
person of Ty would be 13, like the participle in Gen. iv. 12; 
whereas the meaning cumulus (a heap), which it has elsewhere 
as a substantive, is quite appropriate, and the statement of the 
prophet resembles that of the apostle in Rom. ii. 5. The day 
of the judgment is called " the day of n5ru" (or, according to 
another reading, fl?f)3), not, however, as equivalent to nachal^ a 
stream (Luzzatto, in giomo di fiumana), as in Fs. csxiv. 4 (the 
tone upon the last syllable proves this), nor in the sense of " in 
the day of possession," as Rosenmiiller and others suppose, since 
this necessarily gives to 13 the former objectionable and (by 
the side of I'^l^) improbable verbal sense ; but as the feminine 
of nachleh, written briefly for maecdh naehldh (Jer. xiv. 17), i-e. 
inasmuch as it inflicts grievous and mortal wounds. Ephraim's 
plantation is a harvest heap for that day (compare kdtzir, the 
harvest of punishment, in Hos. vt. 11 and Jer. li. 33); and 
the hope set upon this plantation is changed into ti^M 3K3, a 
desperate and incurable heartfelt sorrow (Jer. xxx. 15). The 
organic connection between vers, 12-14, which follow, and the 
oracle concerning Damascus and Israel, has also been either 
entirely misunderstood, or not thoroughly appreciated. The 
connection is the following : As the prophet sets before himself 
the manner in which the sin of Ephraim is punished by Asshur, 
as the latter sweeps over the Holy Land, the promise which 
already began to dawn in the second turn bursts completely 
throagh ; the world-power is the instrument of punishment in 
the hands of Jehovah, but not for ever. 



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84S THE PB0PB8CISS 07 I8AUH. 

Fourth turn: vers. 12-14. " Woe to tlie roaring of many 
wiiivnt I liie the roaring of teat they roar ; and to the rwnbUng of 
natiotu, like the rumbling of mighty waters they rumble! Nations, 
like the rumbling of many waters tJiey rumble; and He threatena 
it : then «t flies far away, and is chaeed like chaff of the moun- 
tains before the wind, and like a cloud of dust before the gale. 
At eventide, behold consternation ; and before the motning dawn 
it ia destroyed : this is the portion of our plunderers, and the lot 
of our robbers." It ia the destruction of Asahur that the pro- 
phet is predicting here (as in ch. xiv. 24-27, xsis. 5-8, etc.), 
though not of Asshur as Asshor, but of Asshnr as the imperial 
kingdom, which embraced a multitude of nations (ch, xxii. 6, 
Tiii. 9, 10, xiv. 26, xxix. 7, 8) all gathered together under tho 
rule of one will, to make a common attack upon the church 
of God. The connection between this fourth tnm and the 
third is precisely the same as between ch. viii. 9, 10, and ch. 
viii. 6-8. The exclamation of woe (hoi) is an expression of 
pain, as in ch. x. 1 ; and this is followed by a proclamation of 
the judgment of wrath. The description of the rolling wave 
of nations is as pictorial as the well-known HU inter tese, etc., of 
the Cyclops in Virgil. " It spreads and stretches out, as if it 
would never cease to roll, and roar, and surge, and sweep 
onward in its course" (Drechsler). In the expression "it" (bo) 
in rer. 13a, the many surging nations are kneaded together, as 
it were, into one mass. It costs God simply a threatening 
word ; and this mass all flies apart (mimmerch&k like mSrdcliOk, 
ch. xsiii. 7), and falls into dust, and whirls about in all direc- 
tions, like the chaff of threshing-floors in high situations, or 
like dust whirled up by the storm. The judgment commences 
in the evening, and rages through the night ; and before the 
morning dawns, the army of nations raised by the imperial 
power is all destroyed (compare ch. xxix. 7, 8, and the fulfil- 
ment in ch. xxsvii. 36). The fact that the oracle concerning 
Damascus in its fourth stage takes so comprehensiye and, so far 
as Israel is concerned, so promising a form, may be explained 
on the ground that Syria was the forerunner of Asshur in the 
attack upon Israel, and that the alliance between Israel and 
Syria became the occasion of the complications with Asshur. 
If the substance of the mattd Dammesek (the oracle concern- 
ing Damascus) had been restricted to the prophecy contained 



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CHAP. XVIIL 347 

in the name Maliershalal, the element of promise so charat^ 
teristic of the prophecies against the natioas of the world would 
bo entirely^ wanting. Bnt the shoot of triumph, " This is the 
portion," etc., supplied a terminal point, beyond which the 
masaa could not go withont the sacrifice of its unity. We are 
therefore warranted in regarding ch. xviii, as an independent 
prophecy, notwithstanding its commencement, which apparently 
forms a continnation of the fonith strophe of ch. svii. 



ETHIOPIA 8 SUBMISSION TO JEHOTAB. — CHAP. SVIII, 

The notion that ch. Tcviii, 4-6 contains an account of the 
judgment of Jehovah upon Ethiopia is quite an untenable one. 
The prophet is here predicting the destruction of the army of 
Sennacherib in his usual way, and in accordance with the actual 
fulfilment (ch. sxxvii. 36). The view which Hofmann has 
adopted from the Jewish expositors — namely, that the people 
so strangely described at the commencement and close of the 
prophecy is the Israelitish nation — is equally untenable. It Is 
Ethiopia, Taking both these facts together, then, the con- 
clusion to which we are brought is, that the prophet is here 
foretelling the effect that will be produced upon Ethiopia by 
the judgment which Jehovah is about to inflict upon Asshur. 
But it is altogether improbable either that the prophecy falls 
later than the Assyrian expedition against Egypt (as Schegg 
supposes), or that the Ethiopian ambassadors mentioned here 
are despatched to Jndah to seek for friendship and aid (as 
Ewald, Knobel, Meier, and Thenius maintun). The expe- 
dition was still impending, and that against Judali was the 
means to this further end. The ambassadors are not sent to 
Judah, but carry commands with the most stirring despatch to 
every province under Ethiopian rule. The Ethiopian kingdom 
is thrown into the greatest excitement in the face of the. ap- 
proaching Assyrian invasion, and the messengers are sent out 
to raise the militia. At that time both Egypts were governed 
by the Ethiopian (or twenty-fifth) dynasty, Sabaio the Ethiopian 
haviug made himself master of the country on the Lower Nile.^ 
The king of Egypt who was contemporaneous with Sennacherib 
was the Tirhahi of the Old Testament, the Tarakoa of Manetho, 
> See BrogBch, Stsloire iT^pU, i. (185!)) 244-316. ' 



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348 THE PBOFHEaES OF ISAIAH. 

md the Ttarkon of Strabo, — a grent conqaeror, according to 
Megasthenes, like Sesostris and Nebuchadnezzar, vrho Iiad 
carried his conquests as far as the Pillars of Hercules (Strabo, 
XV. If 6). This explains the strangely Eonnding description 
given in vers. 2 and 7 of the Ethiopian people, which had 
the universal reputation in antiquity of gigantic strength and 
invincibility. It b impossible to determine the length of time 
that intervened between the composition of the prophecy and 
the fourteenth year of Hezekiah's reign, in which the Assyrian 
army commenced the expedition across Judah to Egypt. The 
event which the prophecy foretells — namely, that the jadgment 
of Jehovah upon Asshnr would be followed by the submission 
of Ethiopia to Jehovah — was only pulially and provisionally 
f ul&Ued (2 Chron. xxxii. 23). And there is nothing to surprise 
QS in this, inasmuch as in the prophecies delivered before the 
destruction of Assyria the latter always presented itself to the 
mind of the prophet as the kingdom of the world ; and conse- 
quently the prophecy had also an eschatological feature, which 
still remained for a future and remote fulfilment. 

The prophecy commences with koi, which never signifies 
heut, but always vce (woe). Here, however, it differs from 
ch. xvii. 12, and is an expression of compassion (cF. Isa. Iv. 1, 
Zech. ii. 10) rather than of anger; for the fact that the mighty 
Ethiopia is oppressed by the still mightier Asshnr, is a humilia- 
tion which Jehovah has prepared for the former. Vers. 1, 2a.' 
" Woe to the land of the whirring of utings, which ie beyond the 
riveri of Cush, tliat aende amhaseadora into the tea and m baaU 
ofpapyrut over ike face of the waters." The land of Cu»h com- 
mences, according to Ezek. xxix. 10 (cf. xxx. 6), where Upper 
Egypt ends. The SevBnek {Aswan), mentioned by Ezekiel, is 
the boundary-point at which the Nile enters Mizraim proper, 
and which is still a depot for goods coming from the south 
down the Nile. The naJiarS-Cush (rivers of Cush) are chiefly 
those that surround the Cushite Sela (Gen. x. 7). This is the 
name given to the present Senn&r, the Meroitic island which 
is enclosed between the White and Blue Nile (the Attapos of 
Ptolemy, or the present Bahr el-Abyad, and the Aelaborai of 
Ptolemy, or the present BaJir el-Azra&). According to the 
latest researches, more especially those of Speke, the White 
Nilc^ which takes its rise in the Lake of Nyanza, is the chief 



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CHAP. XVIIL 1, 1 319 

soarce of the Nile. The latter, and the Bine Nile, whose con- 
fiucnce (makrari) with it takes place in lat. 1.5° 2d', are fed bj 
many larger or smaller tributary streams (as well as mountaia 
torrents) ; the Blue Nile evea more than the Nile proper. 
And this abundance of water in the land to the south of 
Sev3nsh, and still farther south beyond Seba (or Meroe), might 
very well have been known to the prophet as a general fact. 
The land "beyond the rivers of Cush" is the land bounded by 
the sources of the- Nile, i.e. (including Ethiopia itself in the 
stricter sense of the word) the south land under Ethiopian rule 
that lay still deeper in the heart of the country, the land of its 
African anxiliary tribes, whose names (which probably include 
the later Nubians and Abyssinians), as given in 2 Chron. xii. 3, 
Nahnm iii. 9, Ezek. ssx. 5, Jer. xlvi. 9, suppose a minuteness 
of information which has not yet been attained by modem 
research. To this Etliiopia, which is designated by its farthest 
limits (compare Zeph. iii. 10, where Wolff, in his hook of 
Judith, erroneously supposes Media to be intended as the 
Asiatic Cush), the prophets give the strange name of ereti 
tziltzal cmdphaim. This has been interpreted as meaning " the 
land of the wings of an army with clashing arms" hy Qesenins 
and others; but eendphaim does not occur in this sense, like 
'agappim in Ezekiel. Others render it "the land of the noise 
of waves " (Umbreit) ; but cendpliaim cannot he used of waters 
except in such a connection as ch. viii. 8. Moreover, tziltzal is 
not a fitting onomatopoetic word either for the clashing of arms 
or the noise of waves. Others, again, render it "the land of 
the double shadow" (Grotiaa, Vitringa, Knohel, and others); 
but, however appropriate this epithet might be to Ethiopia as a 
tropical land, it is very hazardous to take the word in a sense 
which is not sustained hy the usage of the language ; and the 
same objection may be brouglit against Luzzatto's " land of the 
far-sliadowing defence," Shelling has also suggested another 
objection, — namely, that the shadow thrown even in tropical 
lands is not a double one, falling northwards and southwards 
at the same time, and therefore that it cannot he figuratively 
described as double-winged. Tziltzal eendphaim is the buzzing 
of the wings of insects, with which Egypt and Ethiopia swarmed 
on account of the climate and the abundance of water: ^f^y 
eonatr. W^i^ tinnitus, itridor, a primary meaning from which 



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350 THE FKOPBECraS or I8AUB. 

the other three meaniDgs of the word — cTmhal, harpoon (a 
whirring dart), 'and grasshopper^ — are derived. In ch. vii. 18 
the forces of Egypt are called "the fly from the end of the 
rivers of Egypt." Here Egypt and Ethiopia are called the 
land of the whirring .of winga, inaamach as the prophet had in 
his mind, under the designation of swarms of insects, the motley 
swarms of different people included in this great kingdom that 
were so fabulously strange to an Asiatic. Within this great 
kingdom messengers were now passing to and fro upon its great 
waters in boats of papyrus (on game, Copt. 'gOme, Talm. gdmi, 
see at Job viii. 11), Greek ffapiBe; •n-wrrvpivai (ffapis, from the 
Egyptian bari, bali, a barque). In such vessels as these, and 
with Egyptian tackle, they went as far as the remote island of 
Taprobane. The boats were made to clap together (pliciUiUs), 
so as to lie carried past the cataracts (Parthey on Plutarch, de 
Jeide, pp. 198-9), And it is to these messengers in their paper 
boats that the appeal of the prophet is addressed. 

He sends them home ; and what they are to say to their own 
people is generalized into an announcement to the whole earth. 
Vers. 2b, 3. *' Go, awi/t mesaengert, to the people stretched out 
and politJiedy to the terrible people far awai/ on tlie otiier side, to 
tJte nation of command upon command and treading down, whose 
land rivers cut through. All ye poseeseors of the globe and in- 
habitants of the earth, when a banner rises on tlte mountains, look 
ye ; and when they blow the trumpets, hearken I" We learn from 
what follows to what it is that the attention of Ethiopia and all 
the nations of the earth is directed: it is the destruction of 
Asshnr by Jehovah. They are to attend, when they observe 
the two signals, the banner and the trumpetr-blast ; these are 
decisive moments. Becanse Jehovah was about to deliver the 
world from the conquering might of Assyria, against which the 
Ethiopian kingdom was now summoning all the means of self- 
defence, the prophet sends the messengers home. Their own 

' Scbroring eupposes UsUlial to be the searabxui meer (Linn.) ; bnt it 
would be much more natural, if any particular animal is intended, to think 
of the tzaltzalya, as it is called va the language of the Gallas, the tzetxe ia 
the Betechnana language, the most dreaded diptera of the interior of Africa, 
a dpecies of glossina irhich attacks all the larger tnamiDalia (though not 
mea). Vid. SattvasMa, Nalurgeschiehtlich'tiiedic. Sktzxe der NtiUinder, Abtk. 



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CHAP, xnu- 1, & 851 

people, to wliicb he sends them home, are elaborately described. 
They are memusehdk, stretched out, i.e. very tall (LXX, eBinK 
fieriiopov), just as the SabEeaos are said to have been in ch. xlv. 14. 
They are also nUirdt = m'mordt (Qes. § 52, Anm. 6), smoothed, 
politui, i,e, either not disfigured by an ugly growth of hair, or 
else, without any reference to depilation, but rather with refer- 
ence to the bronze colour of their skin, smooth and shining 
with healthy freshness. The description which Herodotus gives 
of the Ethiopians, ftSytarot km koXKuttoi av6panmv iroiTon' (iil. 
20), quite answers to these first two predicates. They are still 
further described, with reference to the wide extent of their 
kingdom, which reached to the remotest south, as " the temble 
nation ^^f^ wnio," f^. from this point, where the prophet 
meets with the messengers, farther and farther off (compare 
1 Sam. sx. 21, 22, but not 1 Sam. zviii. 9, where the expres- 
sion has a chronological meaning, which would be less suitable 
here, where eveiything is so pictorial, and which is also to be 
rejected, because wn"lD cannot be equivalent to ton iB'Mp ; 
cf. Nahum ii. 9). We may see from ch. xzviii. 10, 13, what 
kdv (kHv, with connecting accusatives and before maMepfi), 
a measuring or levelling line, signifies, when used by the pro- 
[ihet with the reduplication which he employs here : it is a 
people of ** command npon command," — that is to say, a com- 
manding nation ; (according to Kwald, Knobel, and others, 
kdv is equivalent to the Arabic kutee, strength, a nation of 
double or gigantic strength.) "A people of treading down" 
(tc. of others ; m'butah is a second genitive to goi), i.e. one 
which subdues and tramples down wherever it appears. These 
are all distinctive predicates — a nation of imposing grandeur, 
a lulling and conquering nation. The last predicate extols its 
fertile land. KD we take not in the sense of diripere, or as 
equivalent to bdzaz, like DKD, to melt, equivalent to mdsas, 
but in the sense of Jinderef i.e. as equivalent to Vl^, like KQi, to 
sip = Vpi. For it is no praise to say that a land is scoured 
out, or washed away, by rivers. Bottcher, who is wrong in 
describing this chapter as " perhaps the most difficult in the 
whole of the Old Testament," very aptly compares with it the 
expression used by Herodotus (ii. 108), Ka-vevfi-qSi] fj AiyvTrro^, 
But why this strange elaboration instead of the simple namet 
There is a divine irony in the fact that a nation so great and 



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353 THE PBQPHECIBB OF ISAIAH. 

glorious, and (tliongh not without reason, consideriog its natural 
gifts) so full of self-consciousness, should 1>e thrown into such 
violent agitation in the prospect of the danger that threatened 
it, and should be making such strenuous exertions to avert that 
danger, when Jehovah the God of Israel was about to destroy 
the threatening power itself in a night, and consequently all 
the care and trouble of Ethiopia were utterly needless. 

The prophet knows for certain that the messengers may go 
home and announce this act of Jehovah to their own people and 
to all the world. Vers. 4-6. "For iliue hath Jehovah spoken to 
me: I will be still, and will observe upon my throne during clear 
tceatlter in sunshine, during a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest 
For be/ore the harvest, when the blossom falls off, and the fruit 
becomes the ripening grape: then will He cut off the branches with 
pruning-hooks ; and the tendrils lie removes, breaks off. T}iey 
are left altogether to the birds of prey on the mountains, and io 
the cattle of the land ; and the birds of prey summer tliereon, and 
all the cattle of the land will winter thereon." The prophecy 
explains itself here, as is veiy frequently the case, especially 
with Isaiah ; for the literal words of ver. 6 show us unquee- 
tionablj what it is that Jehovah will allow to develop itself so 
prosperously under favourable circumstances, and without any 
interpositioa on His part, nntil He suddenly and violently puts 
an end to the whole, just as it is approaching perfect maturity. 
It is the might of Assyria. Jehovah quietly looks on from 
the heavenly seat of His glorious presence, without disturbing 
the course of the thing intended. This quietness, however, is 
not negligence, but, as the hortative expressions show, a well- 
considered resolution. The two Capka in ver. 4 are not com- 
parative, but indicate the time. He remains quiet whilst there 
is clear weather with sunshine (v{{ indicating continuance, as 
iu Jer.viii. 18, 1 Sam. nv. 32), andwhibt there is a dew-cloud 
in the midst of that warmth, which is so favourable for the 
harvest, by causing the plants that have been thoroughly heated 
iu the day and refreshed at night by the dew, to shoot up and 
ripen with rapidity and luxuriance. The plant thought of, aa 
ver. 5 clearly shows, is the vine. By liphnS kdtzir (before the 
harvest) we are either to understand the period just before the 
wheat^harvest, which coincides with the flowering of the grape ; 
or, since Is^ah uses Mtsir for bdLsir in cb. xvi. 9, the time at 



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cdX5.xviu.r. 353 

ttie close of the summer, immediately preceding the vintage. 
Here again the Capk indicates the time. When the blossoming 
is over, so that the flower fades away, and the fruit that has set 
becomes a ripening grape (baser, as in Job sv. 33, not in the 
sense of labruscum, but of ompkax; and gdmal, matureicere, as 
in Num. xvii. 23, maturare), He cuts off the branches izalzallim, 
from zilzBl, to swing to and fro ; compare the Arabic ddliye, a 
vine-branch, from dald, to hang long and loose) upon which the 
nearly ripened grapes are banging, and removes or nips off* 
the tendrils {netiahoth, as in Jer. v. 10, from ndtath, to stretch 
far out ; nipJial, to twist abont a long way, cb. xvi, 8, compare 
Jer. xlviii. 32) ; an intentional asyndeton with a pictorial sound. 
The words of Jehovah concerning Himself have here passed 
imperceptibly into words of the prophet concerning Jebovab. 
The ripening grapes, as ver. 6 now explains, are the Assyrians, 
who were not far from the summit of their power ; the fruit- 
brancbes that are cut off and nipped in pieces are their corpses, 
which are now through both summer and winter the food of 
swarms of summer birds, as well as of beasts of prey that 
remain the whole winter through. This is the act of divine 
judgment, to which the approaching exaltation of the banner, 
and the approaching blast of trumpets, is to call the attention 
of the people of Ethiopia. 

What effect this act of Jehovah would have upon the 
Ethiopian kingdom, if it should now takq^^lace, is described 
in ver. 7 : " ^( tliat time will there be offered as a homage to 
Jehovah ofhosU a nation stretched out and polished, and from a 
terrible people, far away on the other aide ; a nation of comnumd 
upon command and treading down, whose land rivers-cut through, 
at the place of the name of Jehovah of hosts, the ntountain of 
Zion" D¥ (b people), at the commencement, cannot possibly 
be equivalent to DV? (from a people). If it were taken in this 
sense, it would be necessary to make the correction accordingly, 

' tnn = tnn with & pansal sharpening of the tore, which U lengthened 
by the foae, from tSzaz or (tz in poBt-bihlical Hebrew, to knock off, knock 
to jueces, or weaken (compnre tashash). On this change of vowels in 
pause, see at Oea. xrii. 14 ; and compare Olshanseu, § 91, d. For an 
example of the poet-biblical nee of the word, vid. h. Sanhedrin 103a, 
" like two atdcke hammataz5ih," i.e. one of which " hita the other in two" 
. (hiitit, apparently from tOx or iiz, like hinrOach from nuach). 
vol.. I. z 



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354 THE FBOFKECIES OF I8AUH. 

as Knobet has done ; but tbe iiuportaat parallels in ch. Izvi. 30 
and Z^h. iii. 10 are against this. Conseqaently 'am and ffoi 
(people and nation) most be rendered as snbjects ; and the |0 
in OJIO must be taken as partitive. Ethiopia is offered, i.e. 
offers itself, as a free-will offering to Jehovah, impelled irre- 
sistibly by the force of the impression made by the mighty act 
of Jehovah, or, as it is expressed in " the Titan among the 
Psalms" (Ps. Ixviii. 32, probably a Davidic psalm of the time 
of Hezekiah), " there come kingdoms of splendour out of 
Egypt; Cnsh rapidly Etretches out its hands to Elohim." In 
order that the greatness of this spiritual conc^uest might be 
fully appreciated, the description of this strangely glorious 
people is repeated here ; and with this poetical rounding, the 
prophecy itself, which was placed as a kind of overture before 
the following massa Mitzraim when the prophet collected the 
whole of his prophecies together, is brought to a close. 

THE OBACLE CONCEENING EGYPT. — CHAP. XIX. 

The three prophecies in ch. xviii. six. and xx. really form a 
trilogy. The first (ch. xviii.), which, like ch. i., the introduction 
to the whole, is without any special heading, treats in language 
of the sublimest pathos of Ethiopia. The second (ch. xix.) 
treats in a calmer and more descriptive tone of Egypt. The 
third (ch. xx.) treats of both Egi/pt and Ethiopia in the style 
of historic prose. The kingdom to which all three prophecies 
refer is one and the same, viz, the Egypto-Ethiopian kingdom ; 
but whilst ch. xviii. refers to the ruling nation, ch. xix. treats 
of the conquered one, and ch. xx. embraces both together. The 
reason why such particular attention is given to Egypt in the 
prophecy, is that no nation on earth was so mised up with 
the history of the kingdom of God, from the patriarchal times 
downwards, as Egypt was. And because Israel, as the law 
plainly enjoined upon it, was never to forget that it had been 
sheltered for a long time in Egypt, and there had grown into 
a great nation, and had received many benefits ; whenever 
prophecy has to speak concerning Egypt, it is quite as earnest 
in its promises as it is in its threats. And thus the massa of 
laaiah falls into two distinct halves, viz. a threatening one 
(vers. 1-16), and a promising one (vers. 18-25) ; whilst be- 



l.;,V^lOt>^IC 



CHAP. IE. I-*. 355 

tween the judgment and the salvation (in vera. 16 and 17) 
there standi the alarm, fonning as it were a connecting bridge 
between the two. And jnst in proportion as the coil of punish- 
ments is unfolded on the one hand by the prophet, the pro- 
mise is also unfolded in just as many stages on the other; and 
moving on in ever new grooves, rises at length to such a height, 
that it breaks not only through the limits of contemporaneous 
history, hut even through those of the Old Testament itself, 
and speaks in the spiritual language of the world-embracing 
love of the New Testament. 

The oracle opens with a short introduction, condensing the 
whole of the substance of the first half into a few weighty 
words, — an art in which Isaiah peculiarly excelled. In this 
the name of Egypt, the land without an equal, occurs no less 
than three times. Ver. 1. " Behold, Jehovah rideth upon a light 
cloud, and Cometh to Egypt ; and ike idols of Egypt shake before 
Him, and the heart of Egypt melt-etk within it." Jehovah rides 
upon clouds when He is about to reveal Himself in His judicial 
majesty (Fs. xviii. 11) ; and in this instance He rides upon 
a light cloud, because it will take place rapidly. The word 
ial signifies both light and swift, because what is light moves 
swiftly ; and even a light cloud, which is light because it is thin, 
is comparatively 3^, i.e. literally dense, opaque, or obscure. 
The idols of Egypt shake (?13, as in eh. vi. 4, vii. 2), because 
Jehovah comes oyer them to judgment (cf. Ex. xii. 12 ; Jer. 
xlvi. 25 ; Ezek. xxx. 13) : they must shake, for they are to be 
thrown down ; and their shaking for fear is a shaking to their 
fall (pi, as in ch. xxiv, 20, xsix. 9), The Vav apodosis in WJl 
(j>ri^ com. with the tone upon the last syllable) connects 
together the cause and effect, as in ch. vi, 7. — In what judg- 
ments the judgment will be fulfilled, is now declared by the 
majestic Judge Himself. Vers. 2-4. " And I spur Egypt 
against Egypt: and they go to war, every one with his brother, 
and every one with his neighbour; city against city, kingdom 
against kingdom. And the spirit of Egypt is emptied out within 
it: and I swallow up its ready counsel; and they go to the idols to 
inquire, and to Uie mutterers, and to tlie oracle-spirits, and to the 
soothsayers. And I shut up Egypt in the hand of a hard rule; 
and a fierce king will reign over them, saith the Lord, Jehovah of 
hosts." Civil war will rage in Egypt (on sicsSc, see at ch. ix. 10). 



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356 THE PBOFHGCIES OP ISAUS. 

Tke people once so shrewd are now at their wits' end ; tbeii 
Hpirit is quite poured out (p\^^^, with the reduplication removed, 
for fi^OJ, according to Ges. § 68, Arm. 11, — as, for esample, in 
Gen. xi. 7, Ezek, sli. 7), so that there is nothing left of either 
intelligence or resolution. Then (and this is also part of the 
judgment) they tnrn for help, in counsel and action, where no 
help is to be found, viz, to their "nothings" of gods, and the 
manifold demoniacal arts, of which Egypt could boast of being 
the primary seat. On the names of the practisers of the bla<^ 
art, see ch. viii. 19; 'ittim, the mutterers, is from 'dtat, to sqneak 
(used of a camel-saddle, especially when new), or to rumble 
(used of an empty stomach) : see Lane's Lexicon. But all 
this is of no avail : Jehovah gives them up ("i??, syn, I'Jpri, 
avftcKtiuv) to he ruled over by a hard-hearted and cruel king. 
The prophecy does not relate to a foreign conqueror, so as to 
lead ns to think of Sargon (Knobel) or Camhyses (Luzzatto), 
but to a native despot. In comparing the prophecy with the 
fulfilment, we must bear in mind that ver. 2 relates to the 
national revolution which broke out in Sais, and resulted in 
the overthrow of the Ethiopian rule, and to the federal dodekr 
archy to which the rising of the nation led. " Kingdom 
against kingdom :" this exactly suits tihose twelve small king- 
doms into which Egypt was split up after the overthrow of the 
Ethiopian dynasty in the year 695, until Psammetichus, the 
dodekarch of Sais, succeeded in the year 670 in comprehend- 
ing these twelve states once more under a single monarchy. 
This very Psammetichas (and the royal house of Psammetichus 
generally) is the hard ruler, the reckless despot. He succeeded 
in gaining the battle at Momemphis, hy which he established 
himself in the monarchy, through having first of all strength- 
ened himself with mei-cenary troops from Ionia, Caria, and 
Greece. From his time downwards, the true Egyptian cha- 
racter was destroyed by the admixture of foreign elements ;' 
and this occasioned the emigration of a large portion of the 
military caste to Meroe. The Egyptian nation very soon came 
to feel how oppressive this new dynasty was, when Necho 
(616-597), the son and successor of Psammetichus, renewed 

' See Leo, Unwersalgescli. L 152, and what Brugsch bsjb in his Histoirt 
iPEgypte, i. 250, vfith regard to tlie brtuquet changemeaU that Egypt en- 
dured under FsammBtichuB. 



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CHAP. xiz. 5-ia 357 

the project of Eamses-Miamun, to constrnct a Snez canal, and 
tore away 120,000 of the natives of the land from their homes, 
sending them to wear out their lives in forced labour of the 
most wearisome kind. A revolt on the part of the native 
troops, viho had been sent against the rising Cyrene, aad driven 
back into the desert, led to the overthrow of Hophra, the 
grandson of Necho (570), and put an end to the hateful 
gOTemment of the family of Psammetichus. 

The prophet then proceeds to foretell another misfortune 
which was coming npon- Egypt : the Nile dries np, and with 
this the fertility of the land disappears. Vers. 5-10. " And the 
waters will dry up from tlie sea, and the river is parched and 
dried. And the arms of Uie river spread a stench; the channeU 
of MatzoT become shallow and parched: reed and rusk shrivel up. 
The meadows by the Nile, on tlie border of the Nile, and every 
eom-field of the Nile, dries up, is scattered, and disappears. And 
the fisftermen groan, and all who throw draw-nets into t/te Nile 
lament, and they that spread out the net upon tfie face of the 
waters languish away. And the workers of fine combed ^x are 
confounded, and the weavers of cotton fabrics. And tite pillars 
of the land are ground to powder; all that work for wages are 
troubled in mind." In ver. 5 the Nile is called yam (a sea), 
jnst as Homer calls it Oceanus, which, as Diodorus observes, was 
the name given by the natives to the river (Egypt, oham). The 
White Nile is called bahr eUabyad (the White Sea), the Blue 
Nile bahr eUazrak, and the combined waters bahr en-Nil, or, 
in the language of the Besharin, as here in Isaiah, yam. And 
in the account of the creation, in Gen. i., yammim is the 
collective name for great seas and rivers. But the Nile itself 
is more like an inland sea than a river, from the point at which 
the great bodies of water brought down by the Blue Nile and 
the White Nile, which rises a few weeks later, flow together; 
partly on account of its great breadth, and partly also because 
of its remaining stagnant throughout the dry season. It is not 
till the tropical rains commence that the swelling river begins 
to flow more rapidly, and the ydm becomes a ndhar. But when, 
as is here threatened, the Nile sea and Nile river in Upper 
Egypt sink together and dry up {nissh'thu, niphal either of 
sMUiath = ndehattu, to set, to grow shallow ; or more probably 
from ndehath, to dry up, since cb. xli. 17 and Jer. li. 30 



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358 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAO, 

warrant tbe assumption that there was such a verh), the months 
(or arms) of the Nile {neMrotli), which flow through the Delta, 
and the many canals (ye'orim), by which the benefits of the 
overflow are conveyed to the Nile valley, are turned into 
stinking puddles (in'JTKn, a hiphil, half substantive half verbal, 
unparalleled elsewhere,^ signifying to spread a stench ; possibly 
it may have been used Jn the place of n'^TPij from njTK or nj^K, 
stinking, to which a different application was given in ordi- 
nary use). In all probability it is not without intention that 
Isaiah uses the expression Maizor, inasmuch as he distinguishes 
Matzor from Pathros (ch. xi. 11), i.e. Lower from Upper Egypt 
(Egyp. sa-liet, the low land, and ^o-ras, the higher land), the 
two together being Mitzrayim. And r/e'orim (by the side of 
neliarotK) we are warranted in regarding as the name given of 
the Nile canals. The canal system in Sgypt and the ^tem 
of irrigadon are older than the invasion of the Hyksos (md. 
Lepsius, in Herzog's Cyclopcedia), On the other hand, y^dr 
in ver. 7 (where it is written three times plene, as it is also in 
ver. 8) is the Egyptian name of the Nile generally (t/aro).' It 
is repeated emphatically three times, like MUzrayim in ver. 1. 
Parallel to mizra, but yet different from it, is ^^"^^1 from niy, 
to he naked or bare, which signifies, like many derivatives of 
the synonymous word in Arabic, either open spaces, or as 
here, grassy tracts by the water-side, i^. meadows. Even the 
meadows, which lie close to the water-side (pi = ora, as in Ps. 
cxxxiii. 2, not ostium), and all the fields, become so parched, 
that they blow away like ashes. Then the three leading 
sources from which Egypt derived its maintenance all fail : — 
viz. the fishing ; the linen manufacture, which supplied dresses 
for the priests and bandages for mummies; and the cotton 
manufacture, by which all who were not priests were supplied 

* It is not unparalleled as a Aipft. denom. (compare TnYTT, <«!, ^^W, 
to press, Job xiiv. 11, Talm, yfjnn, to become worm-eatOT, and many 
oUiera of a Bunilar kind) ; and ss ft mixed form (possibly a mixture of tiro 
leadings, aa GeseniuB and Bottcher suppoae, though it ia not neeeesaril; bo), 
'Uie langnage admitted of much that was atrauge, more espedallT' ia tbe 
vulgar tongue, which found its waj here and there into wiitteti composition. 

* From the fact tiiat aur in old Egyptian means the NOe, we laaj 
explain the ^fovafa iroi Nii>,of, vith wbicb the Lfflercvlitt of Eratosthenes 



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CEAP. XIX. ll'lt. 359 

with clothes. The Egyptian fishery was very importsnt. In 
the Berlin Museum there Is an Egyptian micmoreth with lead 
attached. The mode of working tha flax by means of terikdh, 
pectinatio (compare p1^D, wool-comba, Kelim, 12, 2), is shown 
on the moDnmentB. In the Berlin Mnsenm there are also 
EgypUan combs of this description with which the flax was 
carded. The productions of the Egyptian looms were cele- 
brated in antiquity: eh6r&y, lit. white cloth (singularet. with the 
old termination ay), is the general name for cotton fabrics, or 
the different kinds of byssus that were woven there (compare 
the ^vaalvwv oBovlav of the Hosetta inscription). All the 
castes, from the highest to the lowest, are now thrown into 
agonies of despair. The shdthoth (an epithet that was probably 
so^ested by the thought of sltelhi, a warp, Syr. 'ashti, to weave, 
through the natural association of ideas), i.€, the "pillars" of 
the land (with a suffix relating to Mitxrayim, see at ch, iii. 8, 
and construed as a masculine as at Fs. xi. 3), were the highest 
castes, who were the direct supporters of the state edifice ; and 
-alff ^]ps) cannot mean the citizens engaged in trade, i.e. the 
middle classes, but such of the people as hired themselves to 
the employers of labour, and therefore lived npon wages and 
not npon their own property (*>3^ is used here as in Prov. xi. 
18, and not as equivalent to ^3D, the dammers-up of the water 
for the pnrpose of catching the fish, like P|?, Kelim, 23, 5). 

The prophet now dwells upon the pumshment which falls 
npon the pillars of the land, and describes it in vers. 11-13: 
" The princes of Zoan become mere fools, tfte wise eounaellort of 
Pharaoh ; readiness in counsel is siupifed. How can ye say to 
Pharaoh, I am a son of wise men, a son of Hngs of the olden 
timef Where are they then, thy wise menf Let them announce 
to thee, and hiow vihat Jehovah of Jiosts hath determined con- 
cerning Egypt. The princes of Zoan have become fools, the 
. princes of Memphis are deceived ; and they have led Egypt astray 
who are the cornerstone of its castes." The two constructives 
'S^ 'Mn do not stand in a subordinate relation, but in a 
co-ordinate one (see at Ps. Ixxviii. 9 and Job xx. 17 ; compare 
also 2 Kings svii. 13, keri), viz. " the wise men, counsellon 
of Pharaoh,"^ so that the second noun b the explanatory per- 
I Pharaoh doeo not mean " the king " {eqaiyalent to the Coptic r-ovft), 
but accoidiiig to BrugEoh, " great house" (Upper Egyptian perSa, Lower 



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360 TH£ PBOPHECIES OF lEAUH. 

mutative of the first. Zoan is the Tanii of primeval times 
(Num. xiii. 22), which was situated on one of the arms through 
which the Nile flows into the sea (viz. the ostium TaniHcurn), 
and was the home from which two dynasties sprang. Nbph 
{per aphar. = Menoph, contracted into Moph in Hos. ix. 6) ia 
Memphis, probably the seat of the Pharaohs in the time of 
Joseph, and raised by Fsammetichus into the metropolis of the 
whole kingdom. The village of Mitrahenni still stands upon 
its ruina, with the Serapeum to the north-west.* Consequently 
princes of Zoan and Memphis are princes of the chief cities 
of the land, and of the supposed primeval pedigree; probably 
priest-princes, since the wisdom of the Kgyptian priest was of 
world-wide renown (Herod, ii. 77, 260), and the oldest kings 
of Egypt sprang from the priestly caste. Even in the time of 
Hezekiah, when the military caste had long become the ruling 
one, the priests once more succeeded in raising one of their 
own number, namely Sethos, to tbe throne of Sais. These 
magnates of Egypt, with their wisdom, would be turned into 
fools by the history of Egypt of the immediate future; and 
(this is the meaning of the sarcastic " how can ye say") tbey 
would no longer trust themselves to boast of their hereditary 
priestly^ wisdom, or their royal descent, when giving counsel to 

Egyptian pher-So ; vid. aui dtm Orxent, i. S6). lAUth refers in confinna- 
tion of tiiiB to Honipollo, L 62, S^it ssi elxt; /tiyas ir ftia^ suroii ariftaim 
^i»Ai«, and eiplains this Coptic name for a king from that of the Ovf»iaf 
((SefjKiHSf) upon the head of the king, which waa a epecificalljr re^al 
sign. 

' What the lexicons mj with reference to Zoan and Noph needs rectify- 
ing. Zoan (o]d Egyptian Zone, with the hieroglyphic of striding legs, Copt. 
'Gan«)pointa back to tbe radical ideaofpeHi or ^jere; and according to the 
latest researches, to which the Tnrin papyrus No. 112 has led, it is the same 
aa Auapic {'Afinpis), which is said t^) mean the house of flight (_Ha-uare), 
and was the seat of government under tbe Hykshos. But Memphit is not 
equivalent to ifa-m-ptak, as Champollion assumed (altliough this city is 
nnquestionably sometimes called Ha-lca-ptah, house of the essential being 
of Ptah) ; it is rather equivalent to Men-nefer (with tbe hieroglypiiic <^ 
the pyramids), place of the good (see Brugsch, Hutoire iFEgypte, i. 17). 
[ft tlie later language it is called pa-wf or ma-nu/, which iiaa the aame 
meaning (Copt niiJL, good). Hence Moph is the contraction of the name 
commencdng with ma, and Noph tlie ahbreviatton of the name commencing 
with ma or pa 1^ the rejection of the local prefix ; for we cannot for a 
moment lUnk of Nup, which is tbe second district of Upper Egypt (Bragsch, 
Geogr. i 66). Noph ia nndoabtedly Memphis. 



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CHAP, nt it-i7. 361 

Phamoli. They were the corner-stone of the shehdtim, i.e. of 
the caates of Egypt (not of the districts or provinces, vofioC) ; 
but instead of supporting and defending their people, it is now 
very evident that they only led them astray. Vrin, as the 
Masora on ver. 15 ob3er\'es, has no Vav cop. 

In vers. 14 and 15 this state of confusion is more minutely 
described : " Jehovah hath poured a spirit of giddiness into the 
heart of Egypt, ao that they have led Egypt astray in all its 
doing, as a drunken man wandereth about in his vomit. And 
there does not occur of Egypt any work, which worked, of head 
and tail, palmr-hranch and rush." The spirit which God ponrs 
out (as is also said elsewhere) is not only a spirit of salvation, 
but also a spirit of judgment. The judicial, penal result which 
He produces is here called B'V1?j which is formed from IJW 
(root W, to curve), and is either contracted from Q'l^V, or points 
back to a supposed singular nyiji {vid. Ewald, § 158, *). The 
snfBx in b^kirbdk points to Egypt. The divine spirit of judg- 
ment makes use of the imaginary wisdom of the priestly caste, 
and thereby plunges the people, as it were, into the giddiness of 
intoxication. The prophet employs the hiphil <^V^<} to denote 
the carefully considered actions of the leaders of the nation, 
and the niphal Ti^ri3 to denote the constrained actions of a 
drunken man, who has lost all self-control. The nation has 
been so perverted by false counsels and hopes, that it lies there 
like a drunken man in his own vomit, and gropes and rolls 
about, without being able to find any way of escape. "No 
work that worked," i.e. that averted trouble (riE'y is as emphatic 
as in Dan. viii. 24), was successfully carried out by any one, 
either by the leaders of the nation or by the common people 
and their flatterers, either by the upper classes or by the mob. 

The result of all these plagues, which were coming upon 
Egypt, would be fear of Jehovah and of the people of Jehovah. 
Vers. 16, 17. " In that day will the Egyptians become like 
women, and tremble and be alarmed at the swinging of the hand 
of JehovaJi of hosts, which He sets in motion against it. And 
the land of Judah becomes a shuddering for Egypt ; as often as 
they mention this against Egypt, it is alarmed, because of the 
decree of Jehovah of hosts, that He suspendelh over it." The 
swinging (tenuphdh) of the hand (ch. zxx. 32) points back to 
the foregoing judgments, which have fallen upon Egypt blow 



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862 THE FS0FHEGIE8 OF ISAIAH. 

after blow. These hamiliatioDs make the Egyptians as soft 
and timid as women (tert. eompar., not as in ch. xiii. 7, 8, 
xxi. 3, 4). And the sacred soil of Jadah (^ad&mdh, as in cb. 
jiv. 1, 2, xxxii. 13), which Egypt has so often made the scene 
of war, throws them into giddiness, into agitation at the sight 
of terrors, whenever it is mentioned ("iKit 73^ cf. 1 Sam. 
ii. 13, lit. " whoever," equivalent to " as often as any one," 
Ewald, § 337, 3, /; v.v\ b written according to the Aramaean 
form, with Aleph for He, like Kil in Num. xi. 20, Knn^ in Ezek- 
xxxvii. 31, compare K^3, Ezek. xxsvi. 5, and similar in form 
to nen in ch. iv. 5). 

The author of the plagues is well known to them, their 
faith in the idols is Bhaken,,and the desire arises in their heart 
to avert fresh plagues by presents to Jehovah. 

At first there is only slavish fear; but there is the be^n- 
ning of a turn to something better. Ver, 18. " In that day 
there will be Jive cities in the land of Effi/pt speaking the lan- 
guage of Canaan, and swearing to Jehovah of hosts : 'Ir ha-Heres 
will one he called." Five cities are very few for Egypt, which 
was completely covered with cities; but this is simply a 
fragmentary commencement of Egypt's future and complete 
conversion. The description ^ven of them, aa beginning to 
speak the language of Canaan, i.e. the sacred language of the 
worship of Jehovah (comp. Zeph. iii. 9), and to give themselves 
up to Jehovah with vows made on oathj is simply a periphrastic 
announcement of the conversion of the five cities, f S^f? 
(different from 3P?E'J, ch. Ixv. 16, as ch. xlv, 23 clearly eJiowb) 
»gnifies to swear to a person, to promise him fidelity, to give one's 
self up to him. One of these five will be called 'Ir ha-Herea. 
As this is evidently intended for a proper name, Id'echdth does 
not mean unicuique, as in Judg. (iii. 18 and Esek, i. 6, but unt. 
It is a cnstomary thing with Isaiah to express the nature of 
anything under the form of some future name (vid. ch. iv. 3, 
iss.n. 5, Ixi. 6, Ixii. 4). The name in this instance, therefore, 
must have a distinctive and promising meaning. But what 
does 'Ir ha-Herea mean t The Septuagint has changed it into 
woXt? aaehiie, equivalent to 'Ir hazzedek (city of righteousness), 
possibly in honour of the temple in the Heliopolitan nomos, 
which was founded under Ptolenmus Philometor about 160b.o., 
during the Syrian reign of terror, by Oniaa IV., son of tha 



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CHAT. XEC IB. 363 

high priest Onias in., who emigrated to Egypt.' Maurer in 
his lexicon imagines that lie has found the trae meaning, when 
he renders it "city of rescue; " but the progressive advance 
from the meaning "to pnll off" to that of "setting free" 
cannot he established in the case of the verb Ivdrag ; in fact, 
hdrat does not mean to pull off or pnll out, but to pnll down. 
Heret cannot have anj other meaning in Hebrew than that 
of " destruction." But as this appears unsuitable, it is more 
natural to read 'Ir ka-cheres (which is found in some codices, 
thongh in opposition to the Masora'). This is now generally 
rendered "city of protection" (Rosenmiiller, Ewald, Knobel, 
and Meier), as being equivalent to an Arabic word signifying 
divinitiu proteeta. But such an appeal to the Arabic is con- 
trary to all Hebrew usage, and is always a very precarious 
loophole. 'Ir ha-cheres would mean " city of the sun" (eherea 
as in Job ix. 7 and Judg. xiv. 18), as the Talmud in the 
leading passage concerning the Ooias temple (in b. Menakoth 
110a) thinks that even the received reading may be under- 
stood in accordance with Job ix. 7, and says "it is a descripUon 
of the sun." " Sun-city" was really the name of one of the 
most celebrated of the old Egyptian cities, viz. Heliopolis, the 
city of the snn-god Ra, which was sitnated to the north-east of 
Memphis, and is called On in other passages of the Old Teet^ 
ment. Ezekiel (xxx. 17) alters this into Avm^ for the purpose 
of branding the idolatry of the city.' But this alteration of 
the well-attested text is a mistake ; and the true explanation 
ia, that Ir-haheres is simply used with a play upon the name 
It^hackeres. This is the explanation given by the Targum: 
"Heliopolis, whose future fate will be destruction." But even 
if the name is intended to have a distinctive and promising 
meaning, it is impossible to adopt the explanation g^ven by 

' See Frankel on this Egyptian anziliftrf temple, in his MoKaUehrifi 
JUr Geschiehte und Wissenscliafl det Judenthims, 1852, p. 273 sqq. ; Hera- 
feld, Gtschichte da Volka Israd, iii. 460 Bqq., 657 eqq. ; EUid Qi^lz, 
Gachichle dtr Juden, iii. 36 aqq. 

> But DO .Greek cpdei has the reading xixis ATitfis (eee Eolmee-Pac- 
•ons' Y. T. Grxcam c. var. ltd. t. iv. on this passage), aa the Compluten- 
dan haa emended it after the Vulgate (see the VocabuUiHum Hebr. 37a, 
bebnging to the Complutensian). 

^ BeUopoUi anawen to the sacred name Pt-ra, house of the Bun-god 
(like Pt-Ramtua, hotue of Bameea), which was a name borne bj the city 



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364 THE PBOFHECIES OF ISAUH. 

Luzzatto, ''a city restored from tlie rains;" for the tiatne points 
to destruction, not to restoration. Moreover, Heliopolis never 
has been restored since the time of its destruction, vrhich 
Strabo dates as far back as the Persian invasion. There is 
nothing left standing now out of ail its monuments but one 
granite obelisk : they are all either destroyed, or carried away, 
like the ao-called " Cleopatra's Needle," or sunk in the soil 
of the Nile (Parthey on Plutarch, de Iside, p. 162). This 
destruction cannot be the one intended. But Iidras is the 
word commonly used to signify the throwing down of heathen 
altars (Judg, vi. 25 ; 1 Kings sviii. 30, six. 10, 14) ; and the 
meaning of the prophecy may be, that the city which had 
hitherto been '/r Iia-cheres, the chief city of the sun-worship, 
would become the city of the destruc^on of idolatry, as Jere- 
miah prophesies in ch. xliii. 13, *' Jehovah will break in pieces 
the obelisks of the sun-temple in the land of Egypt." Hence 
Herzfeld's interpretation : " Ci(y of demolished Idols" (p. 561). 
It is tme that in this case kaJteret merely announces the 
breaking up of the old, and does not say what new thing will 
rise upon the niins of the old ; but the context leaves no doubt 
as to this new thin^ and the one-sided character of the de- 
scription is to be accounted for from the intentional play upon 
the actual name of that one city out of the five to which the 
prophet gives especial prominence. With this interpretation — 
for which indeed we cannot pretend to find any special con- 
firmation in the actual fnlfilment in the history of the church, 
and, 80 to speak, the history of missions — the train of thought 
in the prophet's mind which led to the following groove of 
promises is a veiy obvious one. — The allusion to the sun-city, 
which had become the city of destruction, led to the mazzehoth 

th&t was at otiier times called Or (old Egyptian anti). Cfrill, however, 
explains even the latter tbna, 'nc JJ 'uriiun ulmii i i>.ns ("On, according 
to ttidr interpretation, is the sun"), which is so far tme according to 
Laath, that Ain, Oin, Oni, ngniAw the ^e as an emblem of tlie san ; and 
from tliis, the tenth month, which marks tlie retaru of the sun to the 
equinoctial point, derives its name of Pa-ont, Pa-one, Pa-uni. It may 
poesiblf be with reference to this tliat Heliopolis in called Ain a-itva in 
Arabic (see Arnold, Ckrestotn. Arab. p. 66 s.}. Edrisi (iii. S) speaks of 
this Ain ti-tems as " the countf^-seat of Pbaiaoh, which maj God cntsa ; " 
just as Ibn tl-Faratm is a common ezpTeasion of contempt, which tlia 
Arabs apply to the Coptic fellah*. 



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CHAF. XIX. 19, 30. 365 

or obelisks (see Jer. xliti. 13), which were standing there on 
the spot where Ra was worshipped. Vera. 19, 20. " In that day 
there Hands an altar consecrated to Jehovah in tlie midst of the 
land of Egypt, and an obelisk near the border of the land con- 
secrated to Jehovah. And a sign and a witness for Jehovah of 
hosts it this in t/ie land of Egypt: when they cry to Jehovah for 
oppressors, He will tend them, a helper and champion, and deliver 
them" This is the passage of Isaiah (not rer. 18) to which 
Onias it. appealed, when be sought permission of Ftoletnseus 
Fhilometor to build a temple of Jehovah in Egypt. He built 
Buch a temple in the nomas of Heliopolis, 180 stadia (22^ miles) 
to the north-east of Memphis (Josephus, Bell. vii. 10, 3), and 
on the foundation and soil of the ox^ptofia in Leontopolis, 
which was dedicated to Bubastis {Ant. xiii. 3, 1, 2).^ This 
temple, which was altogether unlike the temple of Jerusalem in 
its outward appearance, being built in the form of a castle, and 
which stood for more than two hundred years (from 160 B.o. 
to A.D. 71, when it was closed by command of Vespasian), was 
splendidly furnished and much fi^quented; bat the recognition 
of it was strongly contested both in Palestine and Egypt. It 
was really situated " in the midst of the land of Egypt." But 
it is out of the question to seek in this temple for the fulfilment 
of the prophecy of Isaiah, from the simple fact that it was "bj 
Jews and for Jews that it was erected. And whei-e, in that 
case, would the obelisk be, which, as Isfuah prophesies, was to 
stand on the border of Egypt, i.e. on the side towards the 
desert and Canaan ? The altar was to be " a lign" (^oth) that 
there were worshippers of Jehovah in Egypt ; and the obelisk 
a "witness" (id) that Jehovah had proved Himself, to Egypt's 

' We are iUiqiiMnt«d with two cities caUed Leontopolis, vie. tbe capital 
of tlie nomos called hj Ha Ukme, which vas situated between the Badridc 
and the Tanitic nomoi; and a Becond between HeroBn-polu and MagdSUm 
(see Brugsch, Geogr. i. 262). The Leontopolia of Josephus, however, must 
have been another, or third. It may poedblj have derived ite name, as 
Lanth conjectures, from the fact that the goddeas Boat (from wliich comes 
Boulastos, House of Bast) was called Paeht when regarded in her de- 
MTUctive character (Todtenbach, 161, 12). The meaning of the name is 
" lioness," and, as her many statues show, she was represented with a lion's 
head. At tbe some time, the bouadariee of the districts fluctuated, and 
the Eeliopolitan Leontopolis of 3oaephua may have originalljr belonged to 
tbe Bubasbo district. 



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36S THE PB0PBECIE8 OF ISAIAH.- 

salvatioD-, to be the God of the gods of Egypt. And now, if 
they who erected thia place of worship and this monnment 
cried to Jehovah, He would show Himself ready to help them ; 
and they wonld no longer, cry in vain, as they had formerly 
done to their own idols (ver. 3). Consequently It is the 
approaching conversion of the native Egyptians that is here 
spoken of. The fact that from the Grecian epoch Judaism 
became a power in Egypt, is certainly not unconnected with 
this. But we should be able to trace this connection more 
clostiy, if we had any information as to the extent to which 
Judaism had then spread among the natives, which we do 
know to have been by no means small. The therapeutte 
described by Fhilo, which were spread through all the nomai of 
Egypt, were of a mixed Egypto-Jewish character (yid. Fhilo, 
0^. ii. p. 474, ed. Mangey). It was a victory on the part of 
the religion of Jehovah, that Egypt was covered with Jewish 
synagogues and coenobia even in the age before OlirisL And 
Alexandria was the place where the law of Jehovah was 
translated into Greek, and thus made accessible to the heathen 
world, and where the religion of Jehovah created for itself 
those forms of language and thought, under which it was to 
become, as Christianity, the religion of the world. And after 
the introduction of Christianity into the world, there were 
more than one maxzehaji (obelisk) that were met with on the 
way from Palestine to Egypt, even by the end of the first 
century, and more than one mizbeach (altar) found iu the 
heart of Egypt itself. The importance of Alexandria and of 
the monasticism and anachoretism of the peninsula of Sinai 
and also of Egypt, in connection with the history of the spread 
of Christianity, is very well known. 

When Egypt became the prey of Islam in the year 640, 
there was already to be seen, at all events in the form of a 
magnificent prelude, the fulfilment of what the prophet fore- 
tells in vers. 21, 22 : "And Jehovah makes Himself known to 
t!ie Egyptians, and the Egyptians know Jehovah in that day; and 
tJiey serve vdth slain-offerings and meat-offerings, and cow vows 
to Jehovah, and pay them. And Jehovah smites Egypt, smiting 
and healing ; and if tJiey return to Jehovah, He svffers Himself to 
be entreated, and Iteals them" From that small commencement 
of five cities, and a solitary altar, and one solitacy obelisk, it 



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CEAP. SIX M-15. 867 

lias now come to this : Jehovah e:ttenda the knowledge of 
Himself to the whole of Egypt (I'liJj reflective se cognoseendttm 
dare, or neater innotescere), and throughout all Egypt there 
arises the knowledge of God, which soon shows itself in acts 
of worship. This worship is- represented by the prophet^ just 
as we should expect according to the Old Testament view, as 
consisting in the offering of bleeding and bloodless, or legal and 
free-will offerings : '13JJ1., viz. Hin^rM, so that ^3J' is construed 
with a double accusative, as in Ex. x. 26, cf. G-en. xxx, 29 ; or 
it may possibly be used directly in the sense of sacrificing, as 
in the Phcenician, and like ^^ in the Thorah; and even if we 
took it in this sense, it would yield no evidence against Isaiah's 
authorship (compare ch. xxviii. 21, xxxii. 17). Egypt, though 
converted, is still sinful ; but Jehovah smites it, " smiting and 
healing" (ndgoph t^rdpho', compare 1 Kings xx. 37), so that 
in the act of smiting the intention of healing prevails; and 
healing follows the smiting, since the chastisement of Jehovah 
leads it to repentance. Thns Egypt is now under the same 
plan of salvation as Israel (e.g. Lev. xxvi. 44, Beut. xxxii. 36). 

Asshur, as we already know from ch. xviii., is equally 
humbled; so that now the two great powers, which have 
hitherto only met as enemies, meet in the worship of Jehovah, 
which unites them together. Ver. 23. " In thaf day a road 
will mn from Egypt to Asehur, and Aishur comes into Egypt, 
and Egypt to Asskur; and Egypt worships (Jehovah) with 
Asshur." TN is not a sign of the accusative, for there can he 
no longer any idea of the subjection of Egypt to Asshur : on 
the contrary, it is a preposition indicating fellowship ; and n?W 
is used in the sense of worship, as in ver. 21. Friendly inter- 
course is established between Egypt and Assyria by the fact 
that both nations are now converted to Jehovah. The road of 
communication mns through Canaan. 

Thus is the way prepared for the highest point of all, which 
the prophet foretells in vers. 24, 25 : " In that day will Israel 
be the ihirdpart to Egypt and Asshur, a blessing in the midst of 
the earth, since Jehovah of hosts blesseth them thus : Blessed be 
thou, my people Egypt ; and thou Asshur, the work of my hands ; 
and thou Israel, mine inheritance" Israel is added to the 
covenant between Egypt and Asshur, so that it becomes a 
tripartite covenant in which Israel forms the "third part" 



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31)8 THE PB0PHECIE3 OF ISAIAH. 

(shelishiyydlt, ierlia pars, like 'aairiyyah, decima pars, in eh. 
vi. 13). Israel has now reached the great end of its calling — 
to be a blessing in " the midst of the earth " (b'kereb hd'aretz, 
in the whole circuit of the earth), all nations being here repre- 
sented hy ^gjpt and Assyria. Hitherto it had been only to 
the disadvantage of Israel to be situated between Egypt and 
Assyria. The history of the Ephraimitish kingdom, as well as 
that of Judah, clearly proves this. If Israel relied upon Egypt, 
it deceived itself, and was deceived ; and if it relied on Assyria, 
it only became the slave of Assyria, and had Egypt for a foe. 
Thus Israel was in a most painful vice between the two great 
powers of the earth, the western and the eastern powers. But 
how will all this be altered now I Egypt and Assyria become 
one in Jehovah, and Israel the third in the covenant. Israel 
is no longer the only nation of God, the creation of God, the 
heir of God ; but all this applies to Egypt and'Assyria now, as 
well as to IsraeL To give full expression to this, Israel's three 
titles of hononr are mixed together, and each of the three 
nations receives one of the choice names, — nachalif " my inherit- 
ance," being reserved for Israel, as pointing back to its earliest 
history. This essential equalization of the heathen nations and 
Israel is no degradation to the latter. For although from this 
time forward there is to he no essential difference between the 
nations in their relation to God, it is still the God of Israel 
who obtains this universal recognition, and the nation of Israel 
that has become, according to the promise, the medium of 
blessing to the world. 

Thus has the second half of the prophecy ascended step by 
step from salvation to salvation, as the first descended step by 
step from judgment to judgment. The culminating point in 
ver. 25 answers to the lowest point in ver. 15. Every step in 
the ascending half is indicated by the expression " in that day." 
Six times do we find this sign-post to the future within the 
limits of vers. 16-25. This expression is almost as characteristic 
of Isaiah as the corresponding expression, '* Behold, the days 
come" (Iiitmek ydmim bd'im), is of Jeremiah (compare, for 
example, Isa. vii. 18-35). And it is more particularly in the 
promising or Messianic portions of the prophecy that it is so 
favourite an introduction (ch. xi. 10, 11, xii. 1 ; compare Zecb. 
xii. xiii. xiv.). Nevertheless, the genuineness of vers. 16-25 



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CHAP. XIX. 869 

fias recently hsea called in question, more especially by Hitzig. 
SomeUmes this passage has not been found fanatical enough to 
hare emanated from Isaiah, i.e. too free from hatred towards 
the heathen ; whereas, on the other hand, Knobel adduces 
evidence that the prophet was no fanatic at all. Sometimes it 
is too fanatical ; in reply to which we observe-, that there never 
was a prophet of Qod in the world who did net appeitr to a 
"sound human understanding^" to he beside himself, since, even 
assuming that this human uoderstanding be sound. It is only 
within the four sides of its own peculiar province that it is so. 
Again, in vers. 18, 19, a prophecy has been discovered which is 
too special to be Isaiah's, in opposition to which Knobel proves 
that it is not so special as is supposed. But it is quite speeial 
enough; and this can never astonish anyone who can discern in 
the prophecy a revelation of the future communicated hy God, 
whereas in itself it neither proves nor disproves the authorship 
of Isaiah. So far as the other arguments adduced against 
the genuineness are concerned, they have been answered ex- 
haustively by Caspar!, in a paper which he contributed on the 
subject to the Lutkerische Zeitschrifi, 1841, 3. Havemick, in 
his Introduction, has not been able to do anything better than 
appropriate the arguments adduced by Caspari. And we will 
not repeat for a third time what has- been said twice already. 
The two halves of the prophecy are like the two wings of a 
bird. And it is only through its second half that the [vophecy 
becomes the significant centre of the Ethiopic and Egyptian 
trilogy. For ch. xix. predicts the saving effect that will be 
produced upon Egypt by the destruction of Assyria. And ch. 
zix, 23 sqq. announces what will become of Assyriah Assyria 
will also pass through judgment to salvation. This eschatologicul 
conclusion to ch. six., in which Egypt and Assyria are raised 
above themselves into representatives of the two halves of the 
heathen world, is the golden clasp which connects ch. xix. and 
XX. We now turn to this third portion of the trilogy, which 
bears the same relation to ch. xix. as ch. xvi. 13, 14 to ch. 
xv.-xvi. 12. 



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THE FBOPEBCIBS OF ISAUH. 



SYMBOL OP THE FiXL OF EGYPT AWD ETHIOPIA, AMD ITS 
INTEBPEBTATION. — CHAP. XX. 

This section, commencing ia the form of historic prose. 
introduces itself thus: vers. 1, 2a. "In the year that Tartan 
oame to Athdod, Sargo7i the king of Atshur hamng sent him (and 
he made war against Ashdod, and captured it) ; at that- time 
Jehovah spake through Yeshayaka the ton of Amoz as follows" 
I.e. He commanicated the following revelation through the 
roediam of Isaiah {b'yad, as in ch. xxxvii. 24, Jer. xxxvii. 2, 
and many other passages). The revelation itself was attached 
to a symbolical act. Byad (lit. "by the hand of") refers to 
what was abont to be made known through the prophet by 
means of the command that was given him ; in other words, 
to ver. 3, and indirectly to ver. 26. Tartan (probably the 
same man) is met with in 2 Kings zviii. 17 as the chief 
captain of Sennacherib. No Assyrian king of the name of 
Sargon is mentioned anywhere else in the Old Testament ; but 
it may now be accepted as an established result of the re- 
searches which have been made, that Sargon was the successor 
of Shalmanassar, and that Shaltnaneser (Shalman, Hos. x. 14), 
Sargon, Sennacherib, and Eaarhaddon, ar& the names of the 
four Assyrian kings who were mixed up with the closing 
history of the kingdoms of Israel and Jndah. It was Long- 
perrier who was the first to establish the identity of the monarch 
who bnilt the palaces at Khorsabad, which form the north- 
eastern comer of ancient Nineveh, with the Sargon of the 
Bible. We are now acc^nainted with a considerable number 
of brick, harem, votive-tablet, and other inscriptions which 
bear the name of this kin^ and contain all kinds of testimony 
concerning himself.^ It was he, not Shalmanassar, who took 
Samaria after a three years' siege ; and in the annalistic in- 
scription he boasts of having conquered the city, and removed 
the boaae of Omri to Assyria. Oppert is right in calling 
attention to the fact, that in 2 Kings xviii. 10 the conquest is 

* See Oppert, ExpiditUm, i. S38-350, and the picture of Sargon in his 
-war-chariot in R&wliuBon's Five Great Monarthiei, i. 868 ; compare also 
p. S04 (priaonera tafcen hy Sargon), p. 852 (the plan of his palace), p. 483 
(a glaaa Teasel vith his name), and many other engravings in vol. iL 



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CHAP. XX. 1, S. 371 

not attributed to Shalmanaasar himself, but to the army. Shal- 
manassar died in front of Samaria ; and Sargon not only pnt 
himself at the head of the army, but seized upon the throne, in 
which he succeeded in establishing himself, after a contest of 
several years' duration with the legitimate heirs and their party. 
He was therefore a nsurper.* Whether bis name as it appears 
on the inscriptions is Sar-kih or not, and whether it signifies 
the king de facto as distinguished from the king de jure, we will 
not attempt to determine now.' This Sargon, the founder of a 
new Assyrian dynasty, who reigned from 721-702 (according 
to Oppert), and for whom there is at all events plenty of room 
between 721-20 and the commencement of Sennacherib's 
reign, first of all blockaded Tyre for five years after the fall 
of Samaria, or rather brought to an end the siege of Tyre 
which had been begun by Shalmanassar (Jos, Ant, ix. 14, 2), 
though whether it was to a successful end or not is quite 
nncertain. He then pursued with all the greater energy 
his plan for following up the conquest of Samaria with the 
sabjugation of Egypt, which was constantly threatening the 
possessions of Assyria in western Asia, either by instigation 
or support. The attack upon Ashdod was simply a means to 
this end. As the Philistines were led to join Egypt, not only 
by their situation, but probably by kinship of tribe as well, the 
conquest of Ashdod — a fortress so strong, that, according to 
Herodotus (ii. 157), Psammetichus besieged it for twenty-nine 
years — was an indispensable preliminary to the expedition 
against Egypt. When Alexander the Great marched against 
Egypt, he had to do the same with Gaza. How long Tartan 

1 See Oppert, Les rnaeriptiong Atsyriennex det Sargonides tt lea Faata de 
Ninive (Verajulles, 1862), and Bawlinson (vol. ii. 406 sqq.), who here 
agreee with Oppert in all essential points. Consequently there can no 
longer Iw anj thought of identifjing Sargon with Shalmanacear (see 
Brandis, Ueber den hutoritehen Gewinn aus der Entzifferung der assyr. In- 
tchnften, 185G,p. 48 eqq.). Kawliiuon hiinaelf at first thought thej were 
the same peison (vtd. Jountal of the Asiatic Society, lii. 2, 419), ontil 
grodnallj the evidence increaiied that Sargon and ShalmanaSBar were the 
nsmes of two different kings, altiiongb no independent inscription of the 
latter, the actual besieger of Samaria, has yet been fonnd. 

* Hitdg ventures a derivation of the name from the Zend ; and Grote- 
fend compares it with the Chaldee SdTsk, Dan. vi. 3 (in bit Abhandlttug 
Hber Anhst und ZeretSning der Gehdude von Nimrud^ 18&1)> 



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372 THE PE0PHE0IE8 OP ISAUH. 

required is not to be gathered from ver. 1. Bat if he con- 
quered it as quickly as Alexander conquered Gaza, — viz. in 
fire montba, — it is impossible to understand why the follow- 
ing prophecy should defer for three years the subjugation of 
Ethiopia and Egypt. The words, " and fought against Ash- 
dod, and took it," must therefore be taken as anticipatory and 
parenthetical. 

It was not after t^e conquest of Ashdod, but in the year in 
which the siege commenced, that Isaiah received the following 
admonition : 25. " Go and loosen the smoch-frock from off thy 
him, and take off thy shoes from tk^ feet. And he did so, went 
stripped and barefooted." We see from this that Isaiah was 
clothed in the same manner as EHjah, who wore a fur coat 
(2 Kings i. 8, cf. Zecb. xiii. 4, Heb. xi. 37), and John the 
Baptist, who had a garment of camel hair and a leather girdle 
round it (Matt. iii. 4) ; for sak is a coarse linen or hairy over^ 
coat of a dark colour (Rev. vi. 12, cf. Isa. 1. 3), such as was 
worn by mourners, either next to the skin (^al-habbdadrf 1 Kings 
xxi. 27, 2 Kings vL 30, Job xvi. 15) or over the tunic, in 
either case being fastened by a girdle on accoant of its want of 
shape, for which reason the verb chdgar is the word commonly 
used to signify the putting on of such a garment, instead of 
Idbash, The use of the word 'drOm does not prove that the 
former was the case in this instance (see, on the contrary, 
2 Sam. vi. 20, compared vrith ver. 14 and John xxi. 7). With 
the great importance attached to the clothing in the East, where 
- the feelings upon this point are peculiarly sensitive and modest, 
a person was looked upon as stripped and naked If he had only 
taken off his upper garment. What Isaiah was directed to do, 
therefore, was simply opposed to common custom, and not to 
moral decency. He was to lay aside the dress of a mourner 
and preacher of repentance, and to have nothing on but his 
tunic (cetoneth) ; and in this, as well as barefooted, he was to 
show himself in public. This was the costume of a man who 
had been robbed and disgraced, or else of a be^ar or prisoner 
of war. The word cSn (so) is followed by the inf. abs., which 
develops the meaning, as in ch. v. 5, Iviii. 6, 7. 

It is not till Isaiah has carried out the divine instructions, 
that he learns the reason for this command to strip himself, and 
the length of time that he is to continue so stripped. Vers. 



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CHAP. XZ. 1-0. 373 

3, 4 : " And Jehovah mid, As my servani YethayaJtu goeth naied 
and barefooted, a sign and type for three yean long over Egypt 
and over EtJiiopia, so will the king of Asshur carry away the 
prisoners of Egypt and the exiles of EtJtiopia, children and old 
men, naked and barefooted, and with their seat uncovered — a 
shame to Egypt." The expression "as he goeth" (eciaiher 
hdlac) stands here at the commen cement of the symbolical 
action, bat it is introdnced as if with a retrospective glaace at 
its dnratioi^ for three years, unless indeed the preterite hdlae 
stands here, as it frequently does, to express what has already 
commenced, and is still continuing and customary (compare, for 
example, Job i. 4 and Fs. i, 1). The strange and unseemly 
dress of the prophet, whenever he appeared in his official capacity 
for thrae vrhole years, was a prediction of the fall of the Egypto- 
Ethiopian kingdom, which was to take place at the end of these 
three years. Kgypt and Ethiopia are as closely connected here 
as Israel and Judah in ch. xi,'l2. They were at that time one 
kingdom, so that the shame of Egypt was the shame of Ethiopia 
also. 'Ervah is a shameful nakedness, and 'ervalh Mttzrayim 
is in apposition to all that precedes it in ver. 4. Slieih is tlie 
seat or hinder part, as in 2 Sam. x. 4, from shdthdh, to set or 
seat; it is a substantive form, like 13, H^j ^ ^^j with the third 
radical letter dropt. ChashupAay has the same ay as the words 
in ch. xix. 9, Judg. v. 15, Jer. xxii. 14, which can hardly be 
regarded as constmctive forms, as Ewald, Knobel, and Gesenius 
suppose (although '7- of the construct has arisen from 't'), but 
rather as a singular form with a collective signiGcatioD. The 
emendations suggested, viz. chasnphe by Olshansen, and eko' 
sUphl with a connecting i by Meier, are quite unnecessary. 

But if Egypt and Ethiopia are thus shamefully humbled, 
what kind of impression will this make upon those who rely 
upon the great power that is supposed to be both unapproach- 
able and invincible f Vers. 5, 6. " And they cry together, and 
behold themselves deceived by Ethiopia, to which they looked, 
and by Egypt, in which they gloried. And the inhabitant of 
this coast-land saith in that day, Behold, thus it happens to those 
to whom we looked, whither we fled for help to deliver us from 
the Hng of Asshur: and how should we, we escape J " 'N, which 
signifies both an island and a coast-land, is used as the name of 
Fhilistta in Zeph. ii. 5, and as the name of Phoenicia in ch. 



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374 THE FBOPHECIES OF I8AUH. 

xjdii, 2, 6 ; and for fhb reason Knobel and others nnderstand 
it here as denoting the former with the inclusion of the lattes. 
Bat as the Assyrians had already attacked both Phoenicians 
and Philistines at the time when they marched against Egypt, 
there can be no donbt that Isaiah had chieSy the Judteans 
in hb mind. This was the int^pretation given by Jerome 
(*'Jadah trusted in the Egyptians, and Egypt will be de> 
stroyed"), and it has been adopted by Ewald, Drechsler, Ldz- 
zatto, and Meier. The expressions are the sama as those in 
which a little further on we find Isaiah reproving the Egyptian 
tendencies of Jndah's policy. At the same time, by " the 
inhabitant of this coast-land" we are not to understand Jndah 
exdnsively, bnt the inhabitants of Palestine generally, with 
whom Judah was mixed up to ita sham^ because it bad denied 
its character as the nation of Jehovah in a manner so thoroughly 
opposed to its theocratic standing. 

Unfortunately, we know very little concerning the Assyrian 
campaigns in Egypt. But we may infer from Nahum iii. 8-10, 
according to which the Egyptian Thebes had fallen (for it is 
held np before Nineveh as the mirror of its own fate), that 
after the conquest of Ashdod Egypt was also overcome by 
Sargon*8 army. In the grand inscription found in the halls of 
the palace at Khorsabad, Sargon boasts of a successfnl battle 
which he had fought with Pharaoh Sebech at Raphia, and in 
consequence of which the latter became tributary to him. 
Still further on he relates that he had dethroned the rebellious 
king of Ashdod, and appointed another in his place, but that 
the people removed him, and chose another king ; after which 
he marched with his army against Ashdod, and when the king 
fled from him into Egypt, he besieged Ashdod, and took it. 
Then follows a difficult and mutilated passage, in which Baw- 
linson agrees with Oppert in finding an account of the complete 
subjection of Sebech (Sabakot).' Nothing can be built upon 
this, however; and it must also remain uncertain whether, even 
if the rest is correctly interpreted, ch. xz. 1 relates to that 
conquest of Ashdod which was followed by the dethroning of 

* Five Great Moaardtiei, voL iL pp. 416-7 ; compare Otq>ert, Sargo- 
nidet, pp. 2S, 26-7. Witii regard to one passage of the annals, which 
contains an account of & succesful battle fought at Ra-bek (Heliopolis), 
see Journal AmU. ziL 462 sqq. ; Biandia, p. 61. 



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CHAP. xz. s, 0. d75 

tbe rebellions king and the appointment of another, or to the 
final conqaest by which it became a colonial city of Assyria.^ 
This conquest Sargon ascribes to himself in person, 30 that 
apparently we must think of that conqaest which was carried 
ont by Tartan ; and in that case the words, *' he fought against 
it," etc^ need not be taken as anticipatory. It is quite sufficient, 
that the monuments seem to intimate that the conquest of 
Samaria and Ashdod was followed by the subjugation of the 
Egypto-Bthiopian kingdom. But inasmuch as Judah, trusting 
in the reed of Egypt, fell away frcmi Assyria under Hezekiah, 
and Sennacherib had to make war upon Egypt again, to all 
appearance the Assyrians never had much cause to congratulate 
themselves upon their possession of Egypt^ and that for reasons 
which are not difficult to diacorer. At the time appointed by 
the prophecy, Egypt came under tbe Assyrian yoke, from 
which it was first delivered by Fsammetichus ; but, as the 
constant wars between Assyria and Egypt clearly show, it 
never patiently submitted to that yoke for any length of time. 
The confidence which Judah placed in Egypt turned out most 
disastrously for Judah itself, just as Isaiah predicted here. 
But the catastrophe that occorred in front of Jerusalem did 
not put an end to Assyria, nor did the campaigns of Sai^n 
and Sennacherib bring Egypt to an end. And, on the oUier 
hand, the triumphs of Jehovah and .of the prophecy cooceming 
Assyria were not the means of Eg^t's conversion. In all 
these respects tbe fulfilment showed that there was an element 
of human hope in the prophecy, which made the distant appear 
to be close at hand. And this element it eliminated. For the 
fulfilment of a prophecy is divine, but the prophecy itself b 
both divine and human. 

t Among the pictnm from Eborsabad whidi bave been pnliJielied hj 
BottA, there is a bumiug fortreM that has been taken hj storm. Isidor 
LSwenstern (in his Etiai, Paris 1S45) pronoonced it to be Ashdod ; but 
Rodiger regarded the erideuce as inconclusive. Nevertheless, LoweuBtern 
was able to cMm priority over Rawlinaon in several points of deciphering 
{GaiignanCi Mesitnger, Feb. 3S, IS&O). He read in the iasciiptioi) th« 
king's name, Siiniib 



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THE PBOFBECIES OF tSAUH. 



THE OBACLB COHCEBNINO THE DESERT OF THB SEA 
(BABTLON).— CHAP. XXI. 1-10. ' 

Ewald prononnces this nid other headings to be the glosses 
of ancient readers (Proph. i. 56, 57). Even Vitringa at fit* 
attributed it to the collectors, bat he afterwards saw that this 
was inadmissible, ia fact, it is hardly possible to understand 
how the expression " desert of the sea" (midbar-j/dm) could have 
been taken from the prophecy itself; for ydm cannot signify 
the south (as though synonymous with negeb), but ia invariably 
applied to the west, whilst there is nothing about a tea in 
the prophecy. The beading, therefore, is a peculiar one ; and 
this Knobel admits, though he nevertheless adheres to the 
opinion that it sprang from a later hand. But whyT Accord- 
ing to modem critics, the hand by which the whole matea 
was written was certainly quite late enough. From Koppe to 
Knobel they are almost unanimous in asserting that it eman- 
ated from a prophet who lived at the -end of the Babylonian 
captivity. And Meier asserts with dictatorial brevity, that no 
further proof is needed that Isaiah was not the author. But 
assuming, what indeed seems impossible to modem critics, — 
namely, that a prophet^s insight into futurity might stretch 
over hundreds of years, — the massa contains within itself and 
round about itself the strongest proofs of its genuineness. 
Within itself: for both the thoughts themselves, and the manner 
in which they are expressed, are so thoroughly Isaiah's, even in 
the most minute points, that it is impossible to conceive of any 
prophecy in a form more truly his own. And round about 
itself: inasmuch as the four massa's (ch. xxi. 1-10, 11-12, 
13-17, and xxii.) are so intertwined the one with the other as 
to form a tetralogy, not only through their emblematical titles 
(compare ch. xxx. 6) and their visionary bearing, but also in 
many ways through the contexts themselves. Thus the de- 
signation of the prophet as a " watchman" is common to the 
jint and second massa's ; and in the fourth, Jerusalem is called 
the valley of vision, because the watch-tower was there, from 
which the prophet surveyed the future fate of Babylon, Edom, 
and Arabia. And just as in the first, Elam and Madai march 
against Babylon ; so in the fourth (ch. xsii. 6) Eir and Elam 



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CHAP. TSL 1, t 377 

march against Jerusalem. The form of ezpressbn is also 
strikingly similar in both instances (compare ch. xxii. 6, 7, with 
ch. xxi. 7). Is it then possible that the first portion of the 
tetralogy ehoald be sporions, and the other three genuine! 
We come to the same conclnsion in this instance as we did 
at ch. ziii. 1 sqq. ; and that, most truly, neither from a need- 
leas apologetical intere^ nor from forced traditional prejudice. 
Just as the matad B&bel rests npon a prophecy against Asshur, 
which forms, as it were, a pedestal to it, and cannot be supposed 
to have been placed there by any one but Isaiah himself ; so 
the mtuta midbar-ydm rests, as it were, upon the pillars of its 
genuineness, and announces itself ve/uf de tripode as Isaiah's, 
This also applies to the heading. We have already noticed, in 
connection with cb. xv. 1, how closely the headings fit in to 
the prophecies themselves. Isaiah is fond of symbolical names 
(ch. xxix. 1, XXX. 7). And midbar-ydm (desert of the sea) is 
a name of this kind applied to Babylon and the neighbourhood. 
The continent on which Babylon stood was a midbdr, a great 
plain running to the south it^ Arabia deaerta; and so inter- 
sected by the Euphrates as well as by marshes and lakes, that 
it floated, as it were, in the sea. The low-lying land on the 
Lower Euphrates had beea wrested, as it were, from the sea ; 
for before Semiramia constructed the dams, the Euphrates 
used to overflow the whole just like a sea (ire^o^^eii', Herod, 
i. 184), Abydenus even says, that at first the whole of it 
was covered with water, and was called ihakuaa (Euseb. prcsp. 
ix, 41). We may learn from ch. xiv. 23, why it was that the 
prophet made use of this symbolical name. The origin and 
natural features of Babylon are made into ominous prog- 
nostics of its ultimate fate. The true interpretation is found 
in Jeremiah (Jer, li. 13, 1. 38), who was acquainted with this 
oracle. 

The power which first brings destrucUon upon the city of 
the world, is a hostile army composed of several nations. Vers. 
1, 2. "As slorma in the south approach, it comes from Hie desert, 
from a terrible land. Hard vision is made known to me : the 
spoiler spoilt, and the devastator devastates. Govp,ElamJ Siir- 
round, Maday I I put an end to all their sighing," " Storms 
in the south" (compare ch. xxviii. 21, Amos iii. 9) are storms 
which have their starting-point in the south, and therefore 



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378 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

come to Babylon from Araiia deseria; and like all winds tliat 
come from boundless steppes, they are always violent (Job 
i, 19, zzxrii, 9 ; see Hos. siii. 15). It would be natural, 
therefore, to connect mimmidbdr with laclialsph (as Knobel 
and Umbreit do), but the arrangement of the words is opposed 
to this ; laehal(ph (" pressing forwards") is used instead of 
t/ac?tal/^k (see Ges. $ 132, Anm. 1, and still mare fully tm 
Hah. L 17). The conjunclio periphrastica stands with great 
force at the close of the comparisoD, in order that it may 
express at the same time the violent pressure with which the 
progress of the storm is connected. It is true that, according 
to Herod, i. 189, Cyrus came across the Gyndes, so that he 
descended into the lowlands to Babylonia through Chalonitis 
and Apolloniatia, by the road described by Isidor v. Gharax in 
liis Itirurarivm^ over the Zagros pass through the Zagros-gate 
(Ptolem. vi. 2) to the upper course of the Gyndes (the present 
Diyala), and then along this river, which he crossed before its 
junction with the Tigris. But if the Medo-Persian army came 
in this direction, it could not be regarded as coming "from 
the desert." If, however, the Median portion of the army 
followed the course of the Ohoaspes {Kerkha) so as to descend 
into the lowland of Chuzistan (the route taken by Major 
Bawlinson with a Guran regiment),' and thus approached 
Babylon from the south-east, it might be regarded in many ' 
respects as coming mimmidhdr (from the desert), and primarily . 
because the lowland of Chuzistan is a broad open pltun — that 
is to say, a midbdr. According to the simile employed of storms 
in the south, the assumption of the prophecy is really this, that 
the hostile army is advancing from Chuzistan, or (as geo- 
graphical exactitude is not to be supposed) from the direction 
of the desert of ed-Dakna, that portion of Arabia deseria which 
bounded the lowland of Chaldea on the south-west. The 
Medo-Fersian land itself is called " a terrible land," because 
it was situated outside the circle of civilised nations by which 
the land of Israel was surrounded. After the thematic com- 
mencement in ver. 1, which is quite in harmony with Isuah's 

* See C. Maffion'i " DIuBtration of the route from Seleum to ApobA- 
t&Dft, as given bj laid, of Cbamx," in the Asiatic Journal, zii. 97 aqq. 

* See BawliDBon'a route as described in Bitter's Erdkunde, ix. S (West- 
•nen), p. S97 «qq. 



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CHAP. XXI. B, 1. 3?9 

nsaiil costoiD, the prophet beg^ again in rer, 2. Chdzuth (a 
vision) has the same meaning here as in ch. xxix. 11 (thongh 
not cb. :sxviii. 18) ; and chdzuth Mskdh is the ohject of the 
passive which follows (Ges. § 143, 1, b). The prophet calls 
the look into the f utore, which is given to him bj divine in- 
spiration, hard or heavy (though in the sense of di_ffioiliSf not 
gravis, cdbed), on account of its repulsive, unendurable, and, 
so to speak, indigestible nature. The prospect is wide-spread 
plunder and devastation (the expressioD is the same as in 
ch. xxnii. 1, compare ch. xvi, 4, xsiv. 16, bdgad denoting 
faithless or treacherona conduct, then heartless robbety), and 
the summoning of the nations on tlie east and north of 
Babylonia to the conqnest of Babylon ; for Jehovah is about 
to pnt an end {hiihbatti, as in ch. z'vi. 10) to all their sighing 
(anchdthdh, with He raf. and the tone upon the last syllable), 
t.e. to all the lamentations forced out of them far and wide by 
the oppressor. 

-Here again, as in the case of the prophecy concerning 
Moab, what the prophet has given to him to see does not 
pass without exciting his feelings of humanity, but works 
upon him like a horrible dream. Vers. 3, 4. " There/ore are 
tny loim full of cramp : pangs have taken hold of me, as the 
pangs of a travailing woman: I twist myself, so tfiat I do not 
hear; I am brought down with fear, so that I do not see. My 
• heart beats wildly ; horror hath troubled ms : the darhisss of night 
tiiat 1 love, he Iiath turned for me into quaking." The prophet 
does not describe in detail what he saw ; but the violent agita- 
tion produced by the impression leads us to conclude how 
horrible it must have been. Chalcidldh is the contortion pro 
duced by cramp, as in Nahnm ii. 11 ; tzirim is the word properly 
applied to the pains of childbirth ; naavdh means to bend, or 
bow one's self, and is also used (o denote a convulsive utterance 
of pain; td'dh, which is nsed in a different sense from Ps. 
xcv, 10 (compare, however, Ps, xxxviii, 11), denotes a feverish 
and irregnlar beating of the pulse. The darkness of evening 
and night, which the prophet loved so much (chSshek, a desire 
ariung from inclination, 1 Kings ix. 1, 19), and always longed 
for, either that he might ^ve himself np to contemplation, or 
that he might rest from outward and inward labour, bad been 
changed into quaking by the horrible viuon. It ie quite impos- 



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380 THE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

sible to imagine, as UmbTeit snggests, that neahtpJt chiskH (the 
darkness of mj pleasure) refers to the nocturnal feast during 
which Babylon was stormed (Herod, i. 191, and Xenophon, 
Cyrop. vii. 23). 

On the other hand, what Xenophon so elaborately relates, 
and what is also in all probability described in Dan. v. 30 
(compare Jer. li. 39, 57), is referred to in ver. 5 : ** IVtei/ 
cover the table, watch the watch, eat, drink. Miee up, ye princes { 
Aimnt the shield !" This is not ft scene from the hostile camp, 
where they are strengthening themselves for an attack upon 
Babylon : for the express alluaion to the covering of the table 
is intended to create the impression of confident and careless 
good living ; and the exclamation " anoint the shield" (cf . Jer. 
li, 11) presupposes that they have first of all to prepare them- 
selves for battle, and therefore that they have been taken by 
surprise. What the prophet sees, therefore, is a banquet in 
Babylon. The only thing that does not seem quite to square 
with this is one of the infinitives with which the picture is so 
vividly described (Ges. § 131, 4, b), namely tzdphohhatztzdphtth. 
Hitzig's explanation, "they spread carpets" (from tzdphdh, 
latpandere, ohducere, compare the Talmudic tziph&h, tziphtdh, 
a mat, storea), commends itself thoroughly ; but it is without 
any support in biblical usage, so that we prefer to follow the 
Targum, Peshito, and Vulgate (the Sept. does not give any 
translation of the words at all), and understand the hap. leg. ' 
tzdphith as referring to the wateh: "they set the watch." They 
content themselves with this one precautionary measure, and 
give themselves up with all the greater recklessness to their 
night^s debauch (cf. ch. xxii. 13). The prophet mentions this, 
because (as Meier acknowledges) it is by the watch that the 
cry, " Kise up, ye princes," etc., is addressed to the feasters. 
' The shield-leather was generally oiled, to make it shine and 
protect it from wet, and, more than all, to cause the strokes it 
might receive to glide off (compare the lieves clypeoe in Virg. 
j^En. vii. 626). The infatuated self-confidence of the chief men 
of Babylon was proved by the fact that they had to be aroused. 
They fancied that they were hidden behind the walls and waters 
of the city, and therefore they had not even got their weapons 
ready for use. 

The prophecy is continned with the conjunction "for" (ci). 



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OEAP. XXL 6, T. 381 

Tlie tacit link in tlie train of thoaght is this : they act thus in 
Babylon, because tlie destruction of Babylon is determined. 
The form in whicb this thought is embodied is the following : 
the prophet receives instruction in the vision to set a n^tzappeh 
upon the watch-tower, who was to look out and see what more 
took place. Ver. 6. " For thus said the Lord to me, Go, set a 
spy ; what he seeth, let him declare." In other cases it is the 
prophet himself who stands upon the watch-tower (ver. 11; 
Hah. ii. 1, 2) ; but here in the vbion a distinction is made 
between the prophet and the person whom he stations upon the- 
watch-tower (specula). The prophet divides himself, as it were, 
into two persons (compare ch. xviii. 4 for the introduction ; and 
for the expression " go," ch. xx. 2). He now sees through the 
mediam of a spy, just as Zechariah sees by means of the angel 
speaking in him ; with this difference, however, that here the 
spy is the instrument employed by the prophet, whereas there 
the prophet is the instmment employed by the angel. 

What the man upon the watch-tower sees first of all, b a 
long, long procession, viz. the hostile army advancing quietly, 
like a caravan, in seri'ied ranks, and with the most perfect self- 
reliance. Ver. 7. "And he saw a procession of cavalry, pairs 
of horsemen, a procession of asses, a procession of camels; and 
listened sharply, as sharply as he could listen." Jteceb, both here 
and in ver. 9, signifies neither riding-animals nor war-chariots, 
but a troop seated upon animals — a procession of riders. In 
front there was a procession of riders arranged two and two, 
for Persians and Modes fongbt either on foot or on horseback 
(the latter, at any rate, from the time of Cyrus ; vid. Cyrop. 
iv. 3) ; and pdrdsk signifies a rider on horseback (in Arabic it 
is Qsed in distinction from r^b, the rider on camels). Then 
came lines of asses and camels, a large number of which were 
always taken with the Persian army for different purposes. 
They not only carried baggage and provisions, but were taken 
into battle to throw the enemy into confusion. Thus Cyrua 
gained the victory over the Lydians by means of the great 
number of his camels (Herod, i. 80), and Darius Hystaspls the 
victory over the Scythians by means of the number of asses 
that he employed (Herod, iv. 129). Some of the subject tribes 
rode upon asses and camels instead of horses : the Arabs rode 
upon camels in the army of Xerxes, and the Caramanians rode 



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^3 THB PBOFHEOIES OF ISAIAH. 

upon asses. What the spy saw was tberefore, no doubt, tha 
Persian army. Bnt be only saw and listened. It was indeed 
"listening, greatness of listening" i.e. he stretcbed bis ear to 
the utmost (rab la a snbstantiTe, as in cb. Iziii. 7, Fs. cxiv. 7 ; 
and hiJahtbf according to its radical notion, signtSes to stiffen, 
viz. the ear) ;* bat he heard nothing, becaase the long procession 
was moving with the stillness of death. 

At length the proces^on has vanished ; be sees nothing and 
bears nothing, and is seized with impatience. Ver. 8. " Thai 
he cried with Uon't voice, Upon the watch-tovier, Ziord, lafand 
continually by day, and upon my wUeh I keep my stand ail the 
nights." He loses all his patience, and growls as if be were a 
lion (compare Rev. x. 3), with tbe same dull, angry sound, 
the same long, deep breath out of full lungs, complaining to 
Orod that he has to stand so long at bis post without seeing 
anything, except that inexplicable proces^oa that has now 
vanished away. 

But when be is about to speak, bis complaint is stifled in bis 
month. Ver. 9. "And, behold, titers came a cavalcade of men, 
pairs of horsemen, and lifted up its voice, and said. Fallen, 
fallen is Babylon; and all the images of its gods He hath dashed 
to the ground!" It b now clear enough where the long pro- 
cession went to when it disappeared. It entered Babylon, 
made itself master of the city, and established itself there. And 
BOW, after a long interval, there i^pears a smaller cavalcade, 
which has to cany the tidings of victory somewhere ; and tbe 
spy bears them cry out in triumph, *' Fallen, fallen is Babylon 1 " 
Lt Rev. xviiL 1, 2, tbe same words form the shout of triumph 
raised by tbe angel, the antitype being more majestic than the 
type, whilst upon the higher ground of the New Testament 
everything mores on in spiritual relations, all that is merely 
national baring lost its power. Still eren here tbe spiritual 
inwardness of the affair is so far expressed, that it is Jehovah 
who dashes to the ground; and even tbe heathen conquerors are 

> Bottoher has Tery correctly cornered k&shah (kaniba) with kStk6h 
(kaia), and Fleiacher with tarra (fzdrar), which is applied in the kal aud 
hipftU (oiarra) to any animal (horse, aas, etc.) when it holds its ears straight 
&ud erect to listen to any noise (tarra lidJmeihi, or vdhnahu bi-itdJmeihi, or 
bi-udhmhi iv., aiarra bi-tulkniki, aud also abeolutely aiarra, exactly lilce 
likthib). 



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CHAP. XXL 11, IS. 383 

obliged to confesa that the fall of Babylon and its pesilim 
(compare Jer. li. 47, 52) is the work of Jehovah Himself. 
What is here only hinted at from afar — namely, that Cyras 
would act as the anointed of Jehoyah — is expanded in the second 
part (ch. xl.-Ixvi.) for the consolation of the captives. 

The night vision related and recorded by the prophet, a 
prelude to the revelations contained in ch. xl.-lx., was also 
intended for the consolation of Israel, which had ah^ady much 
to suffer, when Babylon was stjll Assyrian, but would have to 
Buffer far more from it when it should become Chaldean. 
Ver. 10. " thou my threshing, and child of my threihtng-floor! 
What I have heard from Jehovah of JiotU, the God of Israel, I 
have declared to you." Threshing (dueh) is a figure used to 
represent crushifig oppressiim in ch. xli. 15 and Mic. iv. 12, 13; 
and judicial visitation in Jer. li. 33 (a parallel by which we 
must not allow ourselves to he misled, as Jeremiah has there 
given a different turn to Isaiah's figure, as he very frequently 
does) ; and again, as in the present instance, chattieijig plagues, 
in which wrath and good intention are mingled together. 
Israel, placed as it was under the tyrannical snpremacy of the 
imperial power, is called the mediUshdk (for medashah, i.e. the 
threshing) of Jehovah, — in other words, the com threshed by 
Him ; also His *' child of the threshing-floor," inasmuch as it 
was laid in the floor, in the bosom as it were of the threshing- 
place, to come out threshed (and then to become a thresher 
itself, Mic. iv. 12, 13)^ This floor, in which Jehovah makes 
a jadicial separation of grains and husks in Israel, was their 
captivity. Babylon is the instrument of the threshing wrath of 
God. But love also takes part in the threshing, and restrains 
the wrath. This is what the prophet has learned in the vision 
("I have heard," as in ch. xxviii. 22), — a consolatory figure 
for the threshing-corn in the floor, i.i. for Israel, which was 
now subject to the power of the world, and had been mowed off 
its own field and caAied captive into Babylonia. 



THE OBACIJ: OONOEBNmO THE SILENCE OF DEATH (EDOM). — 
CHAP. XSI, 11, la. 
This oracle consists -of a question, addressed to the prophet 
from Seir, and of the prophet's reply. Seir is the mountainooa 



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381 THE FBOFHEOIES 07 ISAUH. 

Gotmtry to the aoath of Palestine, of which Edom took posses- 
sion after the emulsion of the Horites. Conseqaently the 
Ihtmah of the heading cannot be either the Duma of Eastern 
Hauran (by the side of which we find also a Tema and a 
Buzan) ; or the Duma m the high land of Arabia, on the great 
NabatEean line of traffic between the northern harbours of the 
Bed Sea and Irak, which bore the cognomen of the rocky 
{eUgendet) or Synan Duma (Gen. zxv. 14) ; or the Duma 
mentioned in the Onom^ which was seventeen miles from 
Elentheropolis (or according to Jerome on this passage, tn'entj) 
" t'n Daroma tioc est ad australem plagam," and was probably 
the same place as the Duma in the mountains of Jndah, — that 
is to say, judging from the ruins of Daume, to the south-east 
of £leutheropolis (see the Com. on Josh. xv. 52), a place ont 
of which Jerome has made " a certain region of Idnmsea, near 
which are the mountains of Selr." The name as it stands here 
is symbolical, and without any demonstrable topographical appli- 
cation. Dumdh is deep, utter silence, and therefore the land of 
the dead (Ps. xcir, 17, czt. 17). The name avw is turned into 
an emblem of the futnre fate of Edom, by the remoral of the 
a-sound from the beginning of the word to the end. It becomes 
a land of deathlike stillness, deathlike sleep, deathhke darkness. 
Ver. 11. "A cry cornea to me out of Seir: Watchmati, how far it 
it in the night? Watchman, hoto far in the nightV Luther trans- 
lates the participle correctly, " they cry" (man ruft; compare the 
similar use of the participle in ch. xxx. 24, xssiii. 4). For the 
rest, however, we have deviated from Luther's excellent transla- 
tion, for the purpose of giving to some extent the significant 
change from n?]9p and 7'vp. The more winged form of the 
second question is expressive of heightened, anxious urgency 
and haste. The wish is to hear that it is very late in the night, 
and that it will soon be past ; mtn is partitive (Saad.), " What 
part of the night are we at nowl" Just as a sick man longs 
for a sleepless night to come to an end, and is constantly asking 
what time it is, so do they inquire of the prophet ont of fidom, 
whether the night of tribnlation will not be soon over. We 
are not to understand, however, that messengers were really sent 
out of Edom to Isaiah ; the process was purely a pnenmatical 
one. The prophet stands there in Jerusalem, in the midst of 
the benighted world of nations, like a sentiy upon the watch- 



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CHAP. XXL tl S85 

tower ; lie understands the anxious inquiries of the nations afar 
off, and answers them according to the word of Jehovah, which 
is the plan and chronological measore of the history of the 
nations, and the key to its interpretation. What, then, is the 
prophet's reply t He lets the inquirer " see through a glass 
darkly." — Ver. 12. " Watchman says. Morning amteth, and also 
night. Will ye inquire, inquire! Turn, cornel I" The answer 
is intentionally and pathetically expressed in an AraniEean form 
of Hehrew. WJ» (written even with K at the end, cf. Dent, 
xxxiii. 2) is the Aramaean word for Kb ; and nya (n:P2) the 
Aramseaa word for 7>Kf, from the primary form of which QV^) 
the future Ub'dyiin is taken here (as in cb. xxxiii. 7), and the 
imperative b''dyu (Qes. § 75, Anm. 4). Vr.K, which is here 
pointed in the Syriac style, VHK, as in ch. Ivi. 9, 12, would be 
similarly traceable to ^nM (cf. Ges, § 75, Anm. 4, with § 23, 
Anm. 2). But what is the meaning t Lather seems to me to 
have hit upon it : " When the morning comes, it will still be 
night." But v'gam (and also) is not equivalent to " and yet," as 
Schroring explains it, with a reference to Ewald, § 354, a. With 
the simple connection in the clauses, the meaning cannot pos- 
sibly he, that a morning is coming, and that it will nevertheless 
continue night, hut that a morning is coming, and at the same 
time a night, i.e. that even if the morning dawns, it will be 
swallowed up again directly by night. And the history was 
quite in accordance vrith such an answer. The Assyrian period 
of judgment was followed by the Chaldean, and the Chaldean 
by the Persian, and the Persian by the Grecian, and the Grecian 
by the Roman. , Again and again there was a glimmer of morn- 
ing dawn for Kdom (and what a glimmer in the Herodian 
age I), but it was swallowed up directly by another night, 
until Edom became an utter Sum&h, and disappeared from the 
history of the nations. The prophet does not see to the utmost 
end of these Edomitish nights, but he has also no consolation 
for Edom. It b altogether different with Edom from what it is 
with Israel, the nocturnal portion of whose history has a mom* 
ing dawn, according to promise, as its irrevocable close. The 
prophet therefore sends the inquirers home. Would they ask 
any further qaestiona, they might do so, might turn and come. 
In ahabil (turn back) there Uea a significant thongh ambigu- 
ous hint. It is only in the case of their taming, coming, i.«. 

TOL. I, IB. 



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380 THE FIIOPHKCIES OF ISAIAH. 

coming back converted, tbat the prophet has any consolatory 
answer for them. So long as they are not so, there is suspended 
over their futore an interminable night, to the prophet as much 
as to themselves. The way to salvation for every other people 
is jost the same as for Israel, — namely, the way of repentance. 

THE OB&CLE IN THE EVENING (AQAINBT ARABIA). — 
CHAP. XXI. 13-17. 

The heading y^TB ttto fthe jr written according to the best 
codd. with a simple sheva), when pointed as we have it, si^ 
nifies, according to Zech. ix. 1 (cf. Isa. ix. 7), " oracle agaiDst 
Arabia." But why not maisd 'Ardb, since matsd is followed 
by a simple genitive in the other three headings t Or again, 
is this the only heading in the tetralogy that ia not symbolical! 
We mnat assume that the Beth by which this is distinguished 
is introduced for the express purpose of rendering it symbolical, 
and that the prophet pointed it first of all 21^3, but had at the 
same time a^^a in his mind. The earlier translators (LXX., 
Targnm, Syr., Vulg., Ar.) read the second ^Tjfa like the first, 
but without any reason. The oracle commences with an evening 
scene, even without our altering the second ^lya. And. the 
massa has a symbolical title founded upon this evening scene. 
Just as *Edom becomes Dumah, inasmuch as a. night without a 
morning dawn falls upon the mountain land of Seir, so will 3']^ 
soon be ^'^^3, inasmuch as the snn of Arabia is setting, Kvening 
darkness is settling upon Arabia, and the moming-land is be- 
coming an evening-land. Vers. 13-15: " In the ■wildemeis in 
Arabia ye must pass the night, caravans of the Dedartians. Bring 
water to meet thirsty ones! The inhabitants of the landofTema 
are coming with its breadbefore the fugitive. For they are flying 
before swords, before drawn swords, and before a bent bow, and 
before oppressive war." There is all the less ground for making 
any alteration in 3"iJ)2 1J>_'3, inasmuch as the second Beth (wil- 
derness in Arabia for o/ Arabia) is favoured by Isaiah's common 
usage (ch. xxviii, 21, ix. 2 ; compare 2 Sam. i. 21, Amos iii. 9). 
'Arab, written with pathach, is Arabia (Ezek. xxvli. 21 ; 'ardb 
in pause, Jer. xxv. 24) ; and ya'ar here is the solitary barren 
desert, as distinguished from the cultivated land with its cities 
and villages. Wetzstein rejects the meaning itemus, syiva. 



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CHAP. XXL 18-m 887 

whicH ydar has been assnined to have, becanse it would be 
rather a promiee than a threat to be told that they notild have 
to flee from the steppe into the wood, since a shady tree is the 
most delicioas dream of the Bedains, who not only find shade 
in the forest, bat a constant snpplj of green pastnre, and fuel 
for their hospitable hearths. He therefore renders it, *' Ye will 
take refage in the Var of Arabia," i.e. the open steppe will no 
longer afford you any shelter, so tiiatye will be obliged to hide 

yonrselves in the Var. jUj tot example, is tfae name applied to 

the trachytic rayon of the Syro-Haaranitic volcanoes which is 
covered with a layer of stones. Bnt as the Var in this sense- 
is also planted with trees, and famishes firewood, tlib epithet 
most rest upon some pecnliar distinction in the radical meaning 
of the word yaar, which really does mean a forest in Hebrew, 
though not necessarily a forest of lofty trees, but also a wilder- 
ness overgrown with bmshwood and tbom-bushes. The mean- 
ing of the passage before us we therefore take to be this : the 
trading caravans (^drchsth, like hakcoth In Job vi. 19) of the 
Dedanians, that mixed tribe of Cuahites and Abrahamides 
dwelling in the neighbourhood of the Kdomites (Gen. x. 7, 
XXV. 3), when on their way from east to west, possibly to Tyre 
(Ezek. xxvii. 20), would be obliged to encamp in the wilderness, 
being driven ont of the caravan road in consequence of the war 
that was spreading from north to south. The prophet, whose 
sympathy mingles with the revelation in this instance also, asks 
for water for the panting fugitives (}''J^\t, aa in Jer. xii. 9, an 
imperative equivalent to ^'JIW? = ^^5*iJ j compare 2 Kings ii, 8 : 
there is no necessity to read 'O"!!^, as the Targum, Doderlein, 
and Ewald do). They are driven back with fright towards 
the south-east as far as Tema, on the border of Negd and the 
Syrian desert The Tema referred to is not the trans-Han rani an 
TImfl, which is three-quarters of an hour from Dumah, although 
there is a good deal that seems to favour this,^ bnt the Tema 
on the pilgrim road from Damascus to Mecca, between Tehuk 
and Wadi eUKora, which is about the same distance (four days' 
journey) from both these places, and also from Chaibar (it is 
to be distingubhed, however, from Tihama, the coast land of 
Yemen, the antithesis of which is ne'gd, the mountain distri<^ 
> Bee Wetrnteb, ut stipra, p. 202 ; compare Job, ii. 425. 



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S88 TEE PB0PHECIE8 OF ISAUH. 

of Yemen'). Bat even here in the land of Tema they do not 
feel themselves safe. The inhabitants of Tema are obliged to 
bring them water and bread (" its bread," lachmo, referring to 
nodsd: the bread necessaiy in order to save them), into the 
hiding-places in which they have concealed themselves. " How 
humiliating," as Drechsler well observes, *'to be obliged to 
practise their hospitality, the pride of Arabian customs, in so 
restricted a manner, and with such unbecoming secrecy 1" But 
it could not possibly be done in any other way, since the 
weapons of the foe were driving them incessantly before them, 
and the war itself was rolling incessantly forward like an oveiv 
whelming colossus, as the repetition of the word "before" 
(mipp'ne) no less than fonr times clearly impliefl. 

Thus does the approaching fate of Arabia present itself in 
picture before the prophet's eye, whilst it is more distinctly 
revealed in vers. 16, 17 : " For thus Itath the Lord spoken to me^ 
Within a year, as the years of a hired lohourery it ia over with all 
the glory of Kedar. And the remnant of the number of bows 
of the heroes of the Kedarenes will be small : for Jehovah, the 
God of Israel, fiath spoken." The name Kedar is here the 
collective name of the Arabic tribes generally. In the stricter 
sense, Kedar, like Nebaioth, which is associated with it, was 
a nomadic tribe of Ishmaelites, which wandered as far as the 
Elanitic Gulf. Within the apace of a year, measured as exactly 
as is generally the case where employers and labourers are con- 
cerned, Kedar* 3 freedom, military strength, numbers, an^ wealth 
(all these together constituting its glory), would all have dis- 
appeared. Nothing but a small remnant would be left of the 
heroic sons of Kedar and their bows. They are numbered 
here by their bows (in distinction from the numbering by 
heads), showing that the fighting men are referred to, — a mode 
of numbering which is customary among the Indian tribes of 
America, for example." The noun she'dr (remnant) is followed 
by five genitives here (just as peri is by four in ch. x. 12) ; 
and the predicate ^t3^^ is in the plural because of the copious 
ness of the subject. The period of the fulfilment of the pro- 
phecy keeps us still within the Assyrian era. In Herodotus 

^ See Sprenger, Post und Seut-routen da Orients, Heft L (1864), pp^ 
118, 119. 

* See the work of t. Hortius on the Indiana of Brazil, i. S96, 411, eto. 



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CHAP, XXII. 1-lt 889 

(2, 141), Sennacherib is actaally called " king of Arabians and 
Assyrians" (compare Josephus, Ant. x. 1, 4) ; and both Sargon 
and Sennacherib, in their annalistic inscriptions, take credit to 
themselves for the subjugation of Arabian tribes. But in the 
Chaldean era Jeremiah predicted the same things against Kedar 
(ch. slix.) as against Edom ; and Jer, xlix. 30, 31 was evidently 
written with a retrospective allusion to this oracle of Isaiah. 
When the period fixed by Isaiah for the fulfilment arrived, a 
second period grew oat of it, and one still more remote, inas- 
moch as a second empire, viz. the Chaldean, grew out of the 
Assyrian, and inaugurated a second period of judgment for the 
nations. After a short glimmer of morning, the night set in a 
second time apon Edom, and a second time npon Arabia. 

THE ORACLE CONOEENING THE VALLBT OF VISION 
{JESUSALEM). — CHAP. SXII. 1-H. 

The chdzUth concerning Babylon, and the no less visionary 
prophecies concerning Edom and Arabia, are now followed by 
a moi&df the object of which is " the valley of vision " (jrs* 
chizzdy/in) itself. Of coarse these four prophecies were not 
composed in the tetralogical form in which they are grouped 
together here, but were joined together at a later period in a 
gronp of this kind on account of their close affinity. The 
internal arrangement of the group was suggested, not by the 
date of their composition (they stand ratlier in the opposite 
relation to one another), but by the idea of a storm coming 
from a distance, and bursting at last over Jerusalem ; for there 
can be no doubt that the " valley of vision" is a general name 
for Jerusalem as a whole, and not the name given to one 
particular valley of Jemsalem. It is true that the epithet 
applied to the position of Jerusalem does not seem to be in 
harmony with this ; for, according to Josephns, " the city was 
built upon two hills, which are opposite to one another and 
have a valley to divide them asunder, at which valley the 
corresponding rows of houses on both hills end" (Wars of the 
Jews, V. 4, 1 ; Whiston). But the epithet is so far allowable, 
that there are mountains round Jemsalem (Fs. cncxv. 2) ; and 
the same dty which is on an eminence in relation to the land 
generally, appears to stand on low ground when contrasted 



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390 TEE FSQFHECIES OF ISilAO. 

with the moantains in the immediate neighbourhood (vpot Si 
ri ey^pfieva tovti)^ yijoXa^ j(dtma\i^ai, aa Phocas says). 
According to this twofold aspect, Jerasalem is called the 
" inhabitant of the valley" in Jer. xxi. 13, and directly after- 
wards the " rock of the plain;" just as in Jer. xvii. 3 it is 
called the mountain in the fields, whereas Zepbaniah (i. 11) 
applies the epithet mactSsh (the mortar or caoldron) not to all 
Jerusalem, bat to one portion of it (probably the ravine of the 
Tyropieum). And if we add to this the fact that Isaiah's 
honse was sitnated in the lower town, — and therefore the stand- 
point of the epithet is really there, — ^it is appropriate in other 
respects still ; for the prophet bad there the temple-hill and the 
Mount of Olives, which is three hundred feet higher, on the 
east, and Moant Zion before him towards the sontb ; so that 
Jerusalem appeared like a city in a valley in relation to the 
mountains inside, quite as ranch as to those outside. But the 
epithet is intended to be something more than geographical. 
A valley is a deep, still, solitary place, cat off and shut in by 
moantains. And thus Jerusalem was an enclosed place, hid- 
den and shut o£f from the world, which Jehovah had chosen aa 
the place in which to show to His prophets the mysteries of 
His government of the world. And upon this sacred prophets' 
city the judgment of Jehovah was about to fall ; . and the 
announcement of the judgment upon it is placed among the 
oracles concerning the nations of the world 1 We may see 
from this, that at the time when this prophecy was uttered, 
the attitude of Jerusalem was so worldly and heathenish, that 
it called forth this dark, nocturnal threat, which is penetrated 
by not a single glimmer of promise. But neither the pro- 
phecies of the time of Ahaz relating to the Assyrian age of 
jadgment, nor those which were uttered in the midst of the 
Assyrian calamities, are bo destitute of promise and so peremp- 
tory as this. The massa therefore falls in the intermediate 
time, probably the time when the people were seized with the 
mania for liberty, and the way was prepared for their breaking 
away from Assyria by their hope of an alliance with Egypt 
(vid, Delitzsch-Oaspari, Studien, ii. 173-4). The prophet ex- 
poses the nature and worthlesaness of their confidence in vers. 
1-3 : " Wliat aileUi thee, thm, that thou art wholly ascended 
upon the house-tops f full of tumult, thou noisy city, shouiittg 



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CHAP. XXU. 4, S. 891 

eaille, thi} alain men are not slain vtith the sword, nor stavghtered 
m battle. All thy rulers departing together are fettered without 
bow; all thy captured ones are fettered together, fleeing far away." 
From the 62t honse-tops thej all look out together at the 
approaching army of the foe, longing for hattle, and sure of 
victory (cuUdk is for cullik, ch. xiv. 29, 31). They have no 
suspicion of what is threateDiDg them ; therefore are they so 
sure, HO contented, and so defiant HftOD niKETl is inverted, and 
stands for nlK^ nK^D, like rmo H^it in ch. viii. 22. nr^Ji 
is used to denote self-confident rejoicing, as in Zeph. ii. 15. 
How terribly they deceive themselves I Not even the honour 
of failing npon the battle-field is allowed them. Their rulers 
(tdtzin, a judge, and then any person of rank) depart one and 
all out of the city, and are fettered outside " without bow" 
(niikkeshelJi), i.e. without there being any necessity for the bow 
to be drawn (min, as in Job xxi. 9, 2 Sam. i. 22 ; cf. Ewald, 
§ 217, b). All, without exception, of those who are attacked in 
Jerusalem by the advancing foe (nimzd'aik, thy captured ones, 
as in ch. siii. 15), fall helplessly into captivity, as they are 
attempting to flee far away (see at ch. xvii. 13 j the perf. de 
conalu answers to the classical prcesens de conatu). Hence 
(what is here affirmed indirectly) the city is besiegedj and in 
consequence of the long siege hunger and pestilence destroy 
the inhabitants, and every one who attempts to get away falls 
into the hands of the enemy, without venturing to defend him- 
self, on account of his emaciation and exhaustion from hunger. 
Whilst the prophet thus pictures to himself the fate of Jeru- 
salem and Judah, through their infatuation, he is seized with 
inconsolable anguish. — Vers. 4, 5. " Therefore I say, Look away 
from me, that I may weep bitterly; press me not with consolations 
for the destruction of the daughter of my people ! For a day of 
noise, and of treading doion, and of confusion, cometh from the 
Lord, JehovaJi of hosts, in the valley of visioTi, breaking down 
walls; and a cry of woe echoes against the mountains." The 
note struck by Isaiah here is the note of the kinah that ia 
continued in the Lamentations of Jeremiah. Jeremiah says 
sheher for shod (Lam. iii. 48), and bath-ammi (daughter of my 
people) is varied with bath-zion (daughter of Zion) and bath- 
yekudah (daughter of Judah). Merir babheci (weep bitterly) 
b more than hdc&Ji mar (ch. xxxiii. 7) : it signifies to give one's 



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392 THE FBOFBECIES OF ISAIAH. 

self thoronglil]'' up to bitter weeping, to exhaust one's self with 
weeping. Tlie two similar sounds which occur in ver. 5, in 
imitation of echoes, can hardly be tranelated. The day of 
divine jndgment is called a day in which masses of men crowd 
together with great noise (mehumdJi), in which Jerusalem and 
its inhabitants are trodden down by foes (mebusdh) and are 
thrown into wild confusion (mebucdh). This is one play upon 
words. The other makes the crashing of the walls audible, 
as they are hnrled down by the siege-artillery (mekarkar Hr). 
Kirklr is not a denom. of Idr, as Kimchi and Ewald suppose 
(nnwalling walls), but is to be explained in accordance with 
Num. xxiv. 17, " he undermines," i.e. throws down by remov- 
ing the supports, in other words, "to the very foundations" 
(kur, to dig, hence karkdrSh, the bottom of a vessel, Kelim 
ii. 2; kurkoreth, the bottom of a net, ib. xxviii. 10, or of a cask, 
Ahaloth iz. 16). When this takes place, then a cry of woe 
echoes ag^nst the mountain (shffd, like s/iOa', sheva), i^. 
strikes against the mountains that surround Jerusalem,, and is 
echoed back again. Knobel understands it as signifying a cry 
for help addressed to the mountain where Jehovah dwells ; 
hut this feature is altogether unsuitable to the God-forgetting 
worldly state in which Jerusalem is found. It is also to be 
observed, in opposition to Knobel, that the description does not 
move on in the same natural and literal way as in a historical 
narrative. The prophet is not relating, but looking ; and in 
ver. 5 he depicts the day of Jehovah according to both its 
ultimate intention and its ultimate result. 

The advance of the besiegers, which leads to the destmc- 
tion of the walls, is first described in vers. 6, 7. " And Elam 
has taken the quiver, together with chariots with men, hortemen; 
and Kir hoe drawn out the shield. And then it comes to pass, 
that thy choicest valUifs are filled with chariots, and the horsemen 
plant a firm foot towards the gate" Of the nations composing 
the Assyrian army, the two mentioned are Elam, the Semitic 
nation of Susiana (Chozistan), whose original settiements were 
the row of valleys between the Zagros chain and the chain of 
advanced mountains bounding the Assyrian plains on the east, 
and who were greatly dreaded as bowmen (Ezek. xxxii. 24 ; 
Jer. zlix. 35), and Kir, the inhabitants of the conntry of the 
Cyrus river, which was an Assyrian province, according to 



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CHAP. XXIL t, '.. S93 

2 Kings XT). 9 and Amos i. 5, and still retained its depen- 
dent position even in the time of the Ach^menides, when 
Armenia, at any rate, is expressly described in the arrow- 
headed writings as a Persian province, thongh a rebellious one. 
The readiness for battle of this people of Kur, who represent, 
in combination with Elam, the whole extent of the Assyrian 
empire from south to north,^ is attested by their " drawing ont 
the shield " (irdh m&gSn), which Osesar calls icutis tegimenta 
detrahere (bell. gall. ii. 21) ; for the Talmndic meaning appli- 
care cannot be thought of for a moment (Buxtorf, Ux. col. 
1664). These nations that fought on foot were accompanied 
(betk, as in 1 Kings x. 2) by chariots filled with men {receb 
'dddm), t.^Trar-chariots (as distinguished from 'agdloth), and, 
as is added aotwS^<iiJ«, by pdrdihtm, riders (i.e. horsemen 
trained to arms). The historical tense b introdaced with ''^)1 
in ver. 7, bat in a purely future sense. It is only for the sake 
of the favourite arrangement of the words that the passage 
does not proceed with Vav relat. '"tdi. " Thy valleys " (amd- 
iaik) are the valleys by which Jerusalem was encircled on the 
east, the west, and the south, viz. the valley of Kidron on the 
east ; the valley of Gihon on the west ; the valley of Rephaim, 
stretching away from the road to Bethlehem, on the sonth- 
west (ch. xvii. 5) ; the valley of Hinnom, which joins the 
Tyrop^eum, and then runs on into a south-eastern angle ; and 
possibly also the valley of Jehosliaphat, which ran on the north- 
east of the city above the valley of Kidron. These valleys, 
more especially the finest of them towards the south, are now 
cut up by the wheels and hoofs of the enemies' chariots and 
horses ; and the enemies' horsemen have already taten a firm 
position gatewards, ready to ride full speed against the gates 
at a given signal, and force their way into the city (shith with 
a thoth to strengthen it, as in Ps. iii. 7 ; also elm in 1 Kings 
XX. 12, compare 1 Sam. xv. 2). 

When Judah, after being for a long time intoxicated with 

^ The juune Gtirgutan (^ Georgia) has nothing to do with the river 
Knr ; and it is a eospicioas fact that Kir has it at the commencement, and 
I in the middle, whereas the name of the river which joins the Antxes, and 
ilowB into the Caspian sea, is pronoimced Kur, and ia written in Peraan 
with £=! (answering to the Armenian and old Persian, in which Kuru is 
eqnivalent to KSfOf). WetBtein coDBders Kir a portion of Heaopotamia. 



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394 THE FBOFHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

hope, shall become aware of the extreme daoger in which it Is 
standing it will adopt prudent measures, but without GtoA. Vers. 
8-11. " Then he takes away ike covering ofJudah, and than lookest 
in that day to the store of arms of the forest-house; and ye see tlte 
breaches of the city of David, tliat there are many of them ; and 
ye collect together the waters of the lower pool. And ye member 
the houses of Jerusalem, and pull down the houses, to fortify the 
toall. Ajidye make a hasisi between the two walls for the waters 
of the old pool ; and ye do not look to Sim who made it, neither 
do ye have regard to Him who fashioned it long ago." Mds&k is 
the curtain or covering which made Judah blind to the threat- 
ening danger. Their looks are now directed first of all to the 
forest-house, built by Solomon upon Zion for the storing and 
display of valuable arms and utensils (nishek, or rather, accord- 
ing to the Masora on Job xz. 24, and the older editions, ngshile), 
and so called because it rested upon four rows of cedar colamna 
that ran all round (it was in the centre of the fore-court of 
the royal palace ; see Thenius, das vorexil. Jerusalem, p. 13). 
They also noticed in the city of David, the southern and highest 
portion of the city of Jerusalem, the bad state of the walls, and 
began to think of repairing them. To this end they numbered 
the houses of the city, to obtain building materials for strengthen- 
ing the walls and repairing the breaches, by pulling down such 
houses as were snttable for the purpose, and could be dispensed 
with (vattitlilzu, from ndthatz, with the removal of the recom- 
pensative reduplication). The lower pool and tfie old pool, 
probably the upper, i.e. the lower and upper Gihon, were 
npon the western side of the city, the lower (Birket es-SuUtm) 
to the west of Sion, the upper (Birket eUMamilla) farther 
up to the west of Akra (Robinson, i. 483-486; v. Hanmer, 
PaL pp. 305-6). KibbStz either means to collect in the pool 
^y stopping up the outflow, or to gather together in the reser- 
voirs and wells of the city by means of artificial canals. The 
latter, however, would most probably be expressed by 'IDM ; go 
that the meaning that moat naturally suggests itself is, that 
they concentrate the water, so as to be able before the siege 
to provide tbe city as rapidly as possible with a large supply. 
The word sdtham, which is used in the account of the actual 
measures adopted by Hezekiah when he was threatened with 
siege (2 Chron. xx^. 2-5), is a somewhat different one, and. 



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CHAP. XXIL 8-lt. S95 

iodicates the stopping np, not of the outflow but of the spriiigs, 
and therefore of the influx. But in all essential points the 
measures adopted agree with those indicated here in the pro- 
phecy. The chronicler closes the accoaut of Hezekiah's reign 
bj still further observing that "Hezekiah also stopped the out- 
flow of the upper Gihon, and carried the water westwards 
underground to the city of David" (2 Chron. xsxn, 30, expla- 
natory of 2 Kings XX. 20). If the upper Gihon is the same 
as the upper pool, there was a coadmt (t^dlah), connected with 
the upper Gihon as early as the time of Ahaz, ch. vii. 3. 
And Hezekiah's peculiar work consisted in carrying the water 
of the upper pool "into the city of David." The mikndh 
between the two walls, which b here prospectively described 
by Isaiah, is connected with this water supply, which Hezekiah 
teally carried out. There is still a pool of Hezekiah (also 
called Birket elrBatrak, pool of the patriarchs, the Amygdalon 
of Josephna) on the western side of the city, to the east of the 
Jt^pa gate. During the rainy season this pool is supplied by 
the small conduit which runs from the upper pool along the 
surface of the ground, and then under the wall against or 
near the Joppa gate. It also lies between two walls, viz. the 
wall to the north of Zion, and the one which runs to the north- 
east round the Akra (Kobinson, i. 487-489). How It came 
to pass that Isaiah's words concerning " a basin between the 
two walls " were so exactly carried out, as though they had 
furnished a hydraulic plan, we do not know. But we will 
offer a conjecture at the close of the exposition. It stands 
here as one of those prudent measures which would be resorted 
to in Jerusalem in the anticipation of the coming siege ; but 
it would be thought of too late, and in self-reliant alieoation 
from God, with no look directed to Him who had wrought and 
fashioned that very calamity which they were now seeking to 
avert by all these precautions, and by whom it had been pro- 
jected long, long before the actual realization. n'B^ might be 
a plural, according to ch. liv. 5 ; but the parallel ^^ favours 
the singular (on the form itself, from ^^V = i^, see ch, xlii, 5, 
and at ch, v. 12, i, 30). We have here, and at ch. xxxvii. 26, 
i.e. within the first part of the book of Isaiah, the same doctrine 
of " ideas " that forms so universal a key-note of the second 
part, the authenticity of which has been denied. That which 



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396 THE PBOPBECIES OF ISAIAH. 

18 realized in time has e^sted long before as a spiritual pattern, 
i.e, as an idea in God. God shows this to His prophets ; and 
60 far as prophecy foretells the future, whenever the event 
predicted is fulfilled, the prophecy becomes a proof that the 
event is the work of God, and was long ago the predetermined 
counsel of God. The whole of the Scripture presupposes this 
pre-existence of the divine idea, before the historical realization, 
and IsEuah in Israel (like Plato in the heathen world) was the 
assiduous interpreter of this supposition. Thus, in the case 
before us, the fate of Jerusalem is said to have been fashioned 
''long ago" in God. But Jerusalem might have averted its 
realization, for it was no decretum absolutum. If Jerasalem 
repented, the realization would be arrested. 

And BO far as it had proceeded already, it was a call from 
Jehovah to repentance. Vers. 12-14. " The Lord, Jehovah of 
hosts, calls in tliat day to weeping, and to mourning, and to the 
pulling out of hair, and to girding with sackcloth ; and behold 
joy and gladnestf slaughtering of oxen and killing of she^, 
eating of jlesh and drinking of wine, eating and drinking, for 
'to-morrow we die' And Jehovah of hosts hath revealed in min« 
ears. Surely this iniquity shall not be expiated for you until ye 
die, taith the Lord, Jehovah of hosts." The first condition of 
repentance is a feeling of pain produced by the punishments of 
God. But upon Jerusalem they produce the opposite effect. 
The more threatening the future, the more insensibly and madly 
do they give themselves up to the rude, Bensual enjoyment of 
the present. Shdlholh is interchanged with shdtho (which is 
only another form of fihB', as in ch. vi. 9, xxx. 19), to ring with 
ihdchot (compare Hos. x. 4). There are other passages in 
which we meet with nnnsual forms introduced for the sake of 
the play upon the words {vid. ch. iv. 6, viii. 6, xvi. 9, and com- 
pare Ezek. xliii. 11, and the keri of 2 Sam. iii. 25). The words 
of the rioters themselves, whose conduct is sketcJied by the inf, 
abs., which are all governed by hinnSh, are simply *' for to- 
morrow we shall die." This does not imply that they feel any 
pleasure in the thought of death, but indicates a love of life 
which scoffs at death. Then the unalterable will of the all- 
commanding God is audibly and distinctly revealed to the 
prophet. Such scoffing as this, which defies the chastisements 
of God, will not be expiated in any other way than by the 



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CHAP. ZXU. 12-14. 397 

death of the scoffer (cuppar, from cdphar, tegere, means to be 
covered over, i.e, expiated). This is done in the case of sin 
either by the justice of God, as io the present instance, or by 
the mercy of God (ch. vi. 7), or by both justice and mercy 
combined (as in ch. xxvii. 9). In all three cases the expiation 
is demanded by the divine holiness, which requires a covering 
between itself and sin, by which sin becomes as thongh it were 
not. In this instance the expunging act consists in punish- 
ment. The sin of Jerusalem b expiated by the giving up of 
the sinners themselves to death. The verb temUthUH (ye shall 
die) is written absolutely, and therefore is all the more dread- 
ful. The Targnm renders it " till ye die the second (eternal) 
death" (mSthdh thinydndh). 

So far as this prophecy threatened the destruction of 
Jemsalem by Assyna, it was never actually fulfilled; but the 
very opposite occurred. Asshur itself met with destruction in 
front of Jemsalem. But this was by no means opposed to the 
prophecy ; and it was with this conviction that Isaiah, never- 
theless, included the prophecy in the collection which he made 
at a time when the non-fulfilment was perfectly apparent. It 
stands here in a double capacity. In the first place, it is a 
memorial of the mercy of God, which withdraws, or at all 
events modifies, the threatened judgment as soon as repentance 
intervenes. The falling away from Assyria did take place; 
but on the part of Hezehiah and many others, who had taken 
to heart the prophet's announcement, it did so simply as an 
aSaAx that was surrendered into the hands of the God of Israel, 
through distrust of either their own strength or Egyptian 
assistance. Hezekiah carried out the measures of defence 
described by the prophet ; but he did this for the good of 
Jemsalem, and with totally different feelings from those which 
the prophet had condemned. These measures of defence pro- 
bably included the reservoir between the two walls, which the 
chronicler does not mention till the close of the history of his 
reign, inasmtich as he follows the thread of the book of Kings, 
to which his book stands, as it were, in the relation of a com- 
mentary, like the midrash, from which extracts are made. The 
king regulated his actions carefully by the prophecy, inasmuch 
as after tbe threats had produced repentance, vers. 8-11 still 
remained as good and wise coonsels. In the second place, the 



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396 t THE PBOPHEOIES OF ISAtAH. 

is realiagtands here as the procIamaUon of a judgment deferred 
Le. as amrepealed. Even if the danger of destntction which 
BO far aed Jemsalem on the part of Assyria had been merd- 
predictedised to pass away, the threatening word of Jehovah 
event is fallen to the gi-ound. The counsel of God contained 
counsel vord of prophecy still remained ; and as it was the counsel 
pre-e% Omniscient, the time would sorely come when it would 
an^ out of the sphere of ideality into that of actual fact. It 
'remained hovering over Jerusalem like an eagle, and Jerusalem 
would eventually become its carrion. We have only to com- 
pare the temSthan of this passage with the atroBavetade of John 
viii. 21, to see when the eventual fulfilment took place. Thus 
the " massa of the valley of vision " became a memorial of 
mercy to Israel when it looked back to its past history ; but 
when it looked into the future, it was still a mirror of wrath. 

AGAINST SHEBNA THE 8TEWAED. — CHAP. XXII. 16-26. 
(appendix to the tetralogy in chap. XXI. -xxu. 14.) 

Skehna (l«3f; 2 Kings xviii. 18, 26, rw^f") is officially de- 
scribed as " over the fiouse." This was the name given to an 
office of state of great importance iu both kingdoms (1 Kings 
iv. 6, xviii. 3), in fact the highest office of all, and one so vastly 
superior to al] others (ch. xxxvi. 3, xxxvii. 2), that it was some- 
times filled by the heir to the throne (2 Chron. xxvi. 21). It 
was the post of minister of the household, and resembled the 
Merovingian office of major domus (maire du palais). The 
person " who was over the house " had the whole of the domestic 
afFairs of the sovereign under his superintendence, and was 
therefore also called the socSn or administrator (from sdcan, 
related to thacan, to assist in a friendly, neighbourly manner, 
or to he generally serviceable : see on Job xxii. 2), as standing 
nearest to the king. In this post of eminence Shebna had 
helped to support that proud spirit of self-security and self- 
indulgent forgetfulness of God, for which the people of Jeru- 
salem had in the foregoing oracle been threatened with death. 
At the same time, he may also have been a leader of the 
Egyptian party of magnates, and with this anti-theocratical 
\policy may have been the opponent of Isaiah in advising the 



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CHAP. xxn. is-iB. 897 

king. Hence the general character of ch. xxii. l-^ng to be 
changes into a distinct and special prophecy against thi^ ^f ^Jq 
The time at whicli it was folfllled was the same as tha^^.^ ^j. ^y 
to in ch. mil. 1-14. There was still deep peace, and ^^ mercy 
minister of state was driving about with splendid et^^j^tion 
and engaged in superintending the erection of s f3niilj.^verin? 
chre. Vers. 15-19. " Thus spake Hie Lord, Jeliovak of.'- ^^re 
Go, get thee to that steward there, to Shebna the Jiouse-mog.^_ 
What heat thou here, and whom hast thou here, that tlum hasf 
hewn thyself out a sepulchre here, hewing out his sepulchre high 
v,p, digging himself a dwelling in rocks f Behold, Jelwvah 
hurleth thee, hurling with a marCs throw, atid graspeth thee grasp' 
ing. Coiling, He coileth thee a coil, a ball into a land far and 
wide ; there shall thou die, and thither the chariots of thy glorii, 
thou shame of the house of thy lord I And I thrust thee from thy 
post, and from thy standing-place he pulleth thee down," {<3"Tp, 
go, take thyself in, — not into the house, however, but into the 
present halting-place. It is possible, at the same time, that the 
expression may simply mean " take thyself away," as in Gen. 
xlv. 17 and Ezek. iii. 4. The preposition ?K is interchanged 
with ?!', which more commonly denotes the coming of a stronger 
man upon a weaker one (1 Sam. xii. 12), and is here used 
to designate the overwhelming power of the prophet's word. 
" That steward there:" this expression points contemptnously 
to the position of the minister of the court as one which, how- 
ever high, was a subordinate one after all. We feel at once, 
as we read this introduction to the divine address, that insatiable 
ambition was one of the leading traits in Shebna's character. 
What Isaiah is to say to Shebna follows somewhat abruptly. 
The words " and say to him," which are added in the Septua^nt, 
uatnrally suggest themselves. The question, What hast thou 
to do here, and whom hast thou to bury here ? is put with 
a glance at Shebna's approaching fate. This building of a 
sepulchre was quite unnecessary ; Shebna himself would never 
lie there, nor would he be able to bury his relations there. The 
threefold repetition of the word " here " (poh) is of very inci- 
sive force : it is not here that he will stay, — here, where he is 
even now placing himself on a bier, as if it were his home. 
The participles '2Xn and 'i^ijn (with chirek compaginis : see on 
Ps. cziii.) are also part' of the address. The third person 



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400 THE FBOPEEOIES OF ISAIAH. 

which b introduced here is syntactically regular, althongh tlie 
second person is used as veil (ch. zxiil. 2, 3 ; H&b. ii. 15). 
Bock-tombs, i.e. a collection of tombs in the form of chambers 
in the rocks, were indeed to be found to tlie east of Jerusalem, 
on the western slope of the Mount of Olives, and in the wall 
of rock to the west of Jerusalem ; but the word mdrom (" high 
up "), in connection with the threefold " here " (^poh), and the 
contemptuous " that administrator there," warrants us in assum- 
ing that mdrom refers to " the height of the sepulchres of the 
sons of David" (2 Chron. zxxii. 33), i.e. the eastern slope of 
Zion, where the tombs of the kings were excavated in the 
rocks. So high did Shebna stand, and so great did he think 
himself, that he hoped after his death to rest among kings, and 
by no means down at the bottom. But how he deceived him- 
aelf I Jehovah would hurl him far away (talf to be long; pilpel, 
to throw or stretch out to a distance ^), 113 "ij???. This is either 
equivalent to 13| n?B7B npopB, with a man's throw (Rosenmuller), 
or '13] is in apposition to Jehovah (Gesenins and Knobel). As 
taltilah stands too baldly if the latter be adopted, for which 
reason the vocative rendering " O man," which is found in 
the Syriac, does not commend itself, and as such an elliptical 
combination of the absolute with the genitive is bj no means 
onuBual (e.g. Prov. xxii. 21, Jer. x. 10), we ^ve the prefer- 
ence to the former. Jerome's rendering " as they carry off a 
cock," which he obtiuned from the mouth of his HebrcBus, can- 
not be taken into consideration at all; althongh it has been 
retained by Schegg (see Qeiger, LeeestScke aus der MUohna, 
p. 106). The verb nc^ does not give a suitable sense as used 
in Jer. xliii. 12, where it merely signifies to cover one's self, not 
to wrap up ; nor can we obtain one from 1 Sam. xv. 19, xxv. 14, 
xiv. 32, since the verbal forms which we find there, and which 
are to be traced to t^ij) (from which comes ti)?, a bird of prey), 
and not to ncJJJ, signify "to rush upon anything" (when con- 
strued with either 3 or 7^). It b better, therefore, to take it, as 
Michaelis, Eosenmiiller, Knobel, and others do, in the sense of 
graaping or laying hold of. On the other hand, tzdnapk, which 
b applied in other instances to the twbting of a turban, also 
' In the later form of the laogUAge, tMa verbal atem signifies generally 
to move onward ; hence tiyyul, motion, or a walk, and metaltelin, furuitmre^ 
i.«. moveable goods. 



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CHAP. SXIL 30-24. 401 

sigDifies to wrap np, make up into a bundle, or coil up. And 
eadduT, like tzenSpkak, signifies that into which Shebna would 
be coiled up ; for the Caph is not to be taken in a comparative 
sense, since the use of caddur in the sense of globus or sphcera 
is established by the Talmud (see at Job xv. 24), whereas the 
Arabic daur only means gyrus, periodus. Shebna is made into 
a round coil, or ball, which is hurled into a land stretching out 
on both sides, m. over the broad surface of Mesopotamia, where 
he flies on farther and farther, without meeting with any obstacle 
whatever.' He comes thither to die — he who, by his exaggera^ 
tion and abuse of his position, has not only dishonoured his 
office, but the Davidic court as well ; and thither do his state 
carriages also come. There can be no doubt that it was by 
the positive command of Jehovah that Isfuah apostrophized the 
proud and wealthy Shebna with such boldness and freedom as 
this. And such freedom was tolerated too. The murder or 
incarceration of a prophet was a thing of rare occurrence in the 
kingdom of Judah before the time of Manasseh. In order to 
pave the way for the institution of another in Shebna's office, 
the punishment of deposition, which cannot be understood in 
any other way than as pi-eceding the punishment of banish- 
ment, is placed at the close of tiie first half of the prophecy. 
The subject in ver. 19i is not the king, as Ltizzatto supposes, 
bat Jehovah, as in ver. 19a (compare ch. x. 12). 

Jehovah first of all gives him the blow which makes him 
tremble in his post, and then pulb him completely down from 
this his lofty station,* iu order that another worthier man may 
take his place. Vers. 2&-24. " And it toill come to pass in that 
day, iJiat I call to my servant EUaMm the son of HiVdah, and 
invest him tnith thy coat, and I throw thy sash firmly round 
him, and place thy govemmmt in his hand; and he will become a 

* Compare the old saying, ** The heart of nuiD is an apple diiven bj a 

tempest over tin open plain." 

* IIOSTSDI lias not only the melheg reqairecl \>j the kamelz on account 
of the long vowel, and the meiheg required by the patack on accoont of 
the following ehaleph pataeh (the latter of which aleo tales the pl&ce of the ' 
metheg, as the sign of a subordinate tone), but also a third meiheg with the 
ehirek, which only aHaiata the emphatic pionnndation of the pcepositioD, 
bnt which would not rtond there at all unlesB the word had had a disjunc- 
ttTe accent (compare clt. Iv. 9, Fa. xviii. ib, Boa. zi. 6). 

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402 THE PB0FEECIE8 OF ISAIAH. 

father to the mhahitantt of Jerusalem and to the house ofJitdah. 
And I place the key of David tq>on his shoulder: and when he 
opens, no man shuts; and when he shuts, no man opens. And I 
fasten him as a plug in a fast place, and he becomes the seat of 
honour to his father's house. And Hie whole mass of his father's 
liouse hangs upon him, the offshoots and side-shoots, every smalt 
vessel^ from the vessel of the basins even to every vessel of the 
pitchers'' Eiiakim is called the " Bervant of Jehovah," a^ one 
who -was already a eervant of God in his heart and condoct ; 
the official service is added for the first lime here. This title 
of honour geaerallj embraces hoth kinds of service (ch. xz. 3). 
It is qnjte in accordance with oriental custom, that this trans- 
fer of the ofBce is effected by means of investiture (compare 
1 Kings xix. 19) : ehizzsk, with a double accusative, viz. that 
of the person and that of the official girdle, is used here accord- 
ing to its radical signification, in the sense of girding tightly or 
girding round, putting the girdle round him so as to cause the 
whole dress to sit firmly, without hanging loose. The word 
metnshaltekd (thy government) shows how very closely the office 
forfeited by Shebna was connected with that of the king. 
This is also proved by the word " father," which is applied in 
other cases to the king as tlie father of the land (ch. ix. 5). 
The " key" signifies the power of the keys ; and for this reason 
it is not given into Eliakim's hand, but placed upon his shoulder 
(ch. ix. 5). This key was properly handled by the king (Kev. 
iii. 7), and therefore by the " house-mayor" only in his stead. 
The power of the keys consbted not only in the supervision of 
the royal chambers, but also in the decision who was and who 
was not to be received into the king's service. There is a 
resemblance, therefore, to the giving of the keys of the king- 
dom of heaven to Peter under the New Testament. But there 
the " binding" and " loosing" introduce another figure, though 
one similar in sense; whereas here, in the " opening" and 
" shutting," the figure of the key is retained. The comparison 
of the institution of Eiiakim in his office to the fastening of a 
tent-peg was all the more natural, that ydthsd was also used 
as a general designation for national rulers (Zech. x. 4), who 
stand in the same relation to the commonwealth as a tentnpeg 
to the tent which it holds firmly and keeps upright. As the 
tent-peg is rammed into the ground, so that a person coold 



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CHAP. XXIL s& 408 

easily sit apon it, the figure is changed, uti the tent-peg 
becomes a seat of honour. As a splendid chair is an ornament 
to a room, bo Klialdm would be an honour to his hitherto nndis- 
tingolshed family. The thought that naturally su^ests itself 
■^namely, that the members of the family would sit upon this 
chair, for the purpose of raising themselves to honour — ts ex- 
pressed by a different figure. Eliakim is once more depicted 
as Aydt/iSd, bat it is as a still higher one this time, — namely, as 
the rod of a wardrobe, or a peg driven high up into the wall. 
Upon this rod or peg they hang {tlt&hi, i.e. one hangs, or there 
hangs) all the cdbod of the house of Eliakim, Le. not every one 
who wished to be honoured and attained to honour in this 
way (cf. ch. v. 13), but the whole weight of his family (as in 
ch. viii, 7). This family is then subdivided into its separate 
parts, and, as we may infer from the juxtaposition of the mas- 
coline and feminine nouns, according to its male and female 
constituents. In B'tPfffX (offshoots) and nijiw (" side-shoots," 
from y^'i, to push oat; compare TP'i, dung, with nKV, mire) there 
is contained the idea of a widely ramifying and nndistingaished 
family connection. The numerous rabble consisted of nothing 
but vessels of a small kind (hakkdldn), at the best of basons 
(aggdnoili) like those used by the priests for the blood (Ex. 
xxiv. 6), or in the house for mixing wine (Song of Sol. vii. 3 ; 
Aram, aggono. At. iggdna, ingdne, a washing bason), but chiefly 
of nebdlim, i.e. leather bottles or earthenware pitchers (ch. 
zxx. 14). The whole of this large but hitherto ignoble family 
of relations would fasten upon Eliakim, and climb through hiro 
to honour. Thus all at once the prophecy, which seemed so 
full of promise to Eliakim, assumes a satirical tone. We get 
an impression of the favouring of nephews and cousins, and 
cannot help asking how this could be a suitable prophecy for 
Shebna to hear. 

We will refer to this again. But in the meantime the 
impression is an irresistible one ; and the Targnm, Jerome, 
Hitzi^ and others, are Aerefore right in assuming that Elia- 
kim is the peg which, however glorious its beginning may 
have been, comes at last to the shameful end described in ver. 
25 ; " In that dag, gaith Jehovah of hosts, will tlie peg that is 
fastened in a sure place be removed, and be cast down, and fall; 
and the burden that it borefallt to t/ie ground: for Jehovah hath 



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104 THE FBOPHKCIEe OT ISAIAH. 

spoken!* The prophet could not express in clearer terms the 
identity of the peg threatened here with Eli:^Qi himself ; for 
how IB it conceivable that the prophet conld -turn all that he has 
predicated of Eliakim in vera. 23, 24 into predicates of Shehna? 
What CTmbreit says — namely, that common sense mnst refer 
ver. 25 *> Shebna — is the very reverse of correct, Eliakim 
himself is also brought down at last by the greatness of hia 
power, on account of the nepotism to which he has given way. 
His family makes a wrong nse of him ; and he is more yielding 
than he ought to be, and makes a wrong nse of his office to 
favoDrthem I He therefore falls, and brings down with him 
all that hung upon the peg, i.e. all Hs relations, who have 
brought him to ruin through the rapacity with which they 
hawe grasped at prosperity. 

Ritzig maintains that vers. "24, 25 form a later addition. 
But it is much better to assume that the prophet wrote down 
ch. xxii. 15-25 at on© sitting, after the predicted fate of the 
two great ministers of state, which had been revealed -to him 
at two different times, had been actually fulfilled. We know 
nothii^ more about them than this, that in the fourteenth 
year of Hezekiah it was not Shebna, but Eliakim, *' who was 
over the house " (eh. xxxvi. 3, 22, xxxvii. 2). But Shebna 
also filled another office of importance, namely that of eSpher. 
Was he really taken prisoner and carried away (a thing which 
is perfectly conceivable even without an Assyrian captivity 
of the nation generally) t Or did he anticipate the threatened 
judgment, and avert it by a penitential self-abasement I To 
this and other questions we can give no reply. One thing alone 
is certain, — namely, that the threefold prediction of Shebna's 
fall, of Eh^im's elevation, and of Eliakim's fall, would not 
stand where it does, if there were any reason whatever to be 
ashamed of comparing the prophecy with its fulfilment. 



THE OEACLE CONCEKSIKG TYEE.— <1HAP. XSin. 
(CONCLUSION OP THE CTCLE OF PROPHECIES BELATINfi TO TBS HEATHEW.) 

The second leading type of the pride o( heathen power 
closes the series of prophecies against the nations, as Stier 
correctly observes, just as Babylon opened it. Babylon was 



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CHAP. xxra. 405 

tlie city of the imperial power of the world ; Tyre, the city of 
the commerce of the world. ■ The former was the centre of the 
greatest land power ; the latter of the greatest maritime power. 
The former subjugated the nations with an iron arm, and 
ensured its rule by means of deportation ; the latter obttuned 
possession of the treasures of the nations in as peaceable a 
manner as possible, and secured its advantages- by colonies and 
factories. The Phcenician cities formed at firsb six or eight 
independent states, the government of which was in the hands 
of kings. Of these, Sidon was much older than Tyre. The 
thorah and Homer mention only the former. Tyre did not 
rise into notoriety till after the time of David. But in the 
Assyrian era Tyre had gained a kind of supremacy over the 
rest of the Phcenician states. It stood by the sea, five miles 
from Sidon ; but when hard pressed by enemieS' it had trans- 
ferred the true seat of its trade and wealth to a small island, 
which was three-quarters of a mile farther to the north, and 
only twelve hundred paces from the mainland. The strait 
which separated this insular Tyre (Tyrus) from ancient Tyre 
(Palceti/rus) was mostly shallow, and its navigable waters near 
the island had only a draught of about eighteen feet, so that on 
one or two occasions a siege of insular Tyre was effected by 
throwing np an embankment of earth, — namely, once by Alex- 
ander (the embankment still in existence)) and once possibly 
by Nebuchadnezzar, for Tyre was engaged in conflict with 
the Chaldean empire as well as the Assyrian. Now which of 
these two conflicts was it that the prophet had in his mind t 
Eichhom, Rosenmuller, Hitzig, and Movers say the Chaldean, 
and seek in tbis way to establish the spuriousness of the 
passage ; whereas Gesenius, Maurer, Umbreit, and Knobel say 
the Assyrian, thinking that this is the only way of sustaining its 
genuineness. Ewald and Meier say the same ; but they pro- 
nounce vers. 15—18 an interpolation belonging to the Persian era. 
De "Wette wavera between the genuineness and spuriousness of 
the whole. In onr opinion, however, as in that of Vitringa and 
those who tread in his footsteps, the question whether the im- 
perial power by which T^re was threatened was the Assyrian or 
the Chaldean, is a purely exegetical question, not a critical one. 
The prophecy commences by introducing the trading vessels 
of Fhoemcia on their return home, as they bear with alarm the 



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406 THE PBOPHEOIES OF ISAUH. 

tidings of the fate that has befallen their home. Ver. 1. "Hoiel, 
ye thips of Tarshish;/oi- it it laid waste, to that there is no house, 
no entrance any more ! Out of the land of the Chittceant it is 
made known to them." Even upon the open sea they bear of it 
as & mmonr from the ships that they meet. For their voyage is 
a veiy long one : they come from the Fhoenician colony on the 
Spanish B^etis, or the Gnadali^uivir, as it was called from the 
time of the occupation hy the Moors. " Ships of Tarshish" 
are ships that sail to Tartessos (LXX. inaccurately, irXota 
Kapj^Sovoi). It is not improbable that the whole of the 
Me<^ten-anean may have been called "the sea of Tarshish;" 
and hence the rendering adopted by the Targum, Jerome, 
Luther, and others, naves maris (see Humboldt, Kosmos, ii. 
167, 415). These ships are to howl (helilQ instead of the 
feminine, as in ch. zszii. 11) because of the devastation that 
has taken place (it is easy to surmise that Tyre has been the 
victim) ; for the home and harbour, which the sailors were 
rejoicing at the prospect of being able to enter once more, 
have both been swept away. Cyprus was the last station on 
this homeward passage. The Chittim (written in the legends 
of coins and other inscriptions with Caph and Cheth) are the 
inhabitants of the Cyprian harbour of Citium and its territoiy. 
But Epiphanius, the bishop of Salamis in the island of Cyprus, 
says that Citium was also used as a name for the whole island, 
or even in a still broader sense. Cyprus, the principal mart of 
the Phcenicians, was the last landing-place. As soon as they 
touch the island, the fact which they have only heard of as 
a rumour upon the open sea, is fully disclosed (nigld/i), i.e. it 
now becomes a clear undoubted certainty, for they are told of 
it by eye-witnesses who have made their escape to the island. 
The prophet now turns to the Phoenicians at home, who have 
this devastation in prospect, — Vers. 2, 3. " Be alarmed, ye in- 
habitants of the coast! Sidontan merchants, sailing over the sea, 
filled thee once. And the towing of Sichor came upon great 
watera, the harvest of the Nile, her store; and she became gain for 
nationt." The suffixes of vha (to fill with wares and riches) 
and nifian (the bringing in, viz. into bams and granaries) 
refer to the word *K, which is used here as a feminine for the 
name of a country, and denotes the Fhcenician coast, including 
the insular Tyre. " Sidonion merehants" are the Phcenicians 



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CHAP. xzm. i. 407 

generalljr, as in Homer; for the *' great Sidou" of antiquity 
(Zidon rabbdh, Josh. xi. 8, ax, 28) was the motber-cily of 
FIuBaicia, which so tborooghly stamped its name upon the 
whole nation, that Tjrre is called D?Ty DK upon Phoenician coins. 
The meaning of ver. 3a is not that the revenue of Tyi% which 
accrued to it on the great unfruitful sea, was like a Nile- 
sowing, or an Egyptian harvest (HItzig, Knobel). Such a 
simile would be a very beautiful one, but it is a very unlikely 
one, since the Phoenicians actually did buy up the corn-stores 
of Egypt, that granary of the ancient world, and housed the 
cargoes that were brought to them " upon great waters," i.e. on 
the great Mediterranean, Siehor is a Hebruc form of Siris 
(the native name of the upper Nile, according to Dionysius 
Ferieg. and Pliny). It signifies the black river (Metat, Eust. 
oo Dion. Per. 222), the black slime of which gave such fertility 
to the land. " The harvest of the Nile" is not so mnch an ex- 
planation as an amplification. The valley of the Nile was the 
field for sowing and reaping and the Phoenician coast was the 
bant for this valuable com ; and inasmuch as com and other 
articles of trade were purchased and bartered there, it thereby 
became gain (constr. of tachar, Ewald, 213, a, used in the same 
sense as in ver. 18, ch. xlv. 14, end Frov. iii. 14), i.e. the means of 
gain, the sonrce of profit or provision, to whole nations, and even 
tomanysuch. Othersrendertheword"emporium;" \i\Asdch&r 
cannot have this meaning. Moreover, foreigners did not come 
to Fhcenida, but the Phoenicians went to them (Luzzatto). 

The address to the whole of the coast-land now passes 
into an address to the ancestral city. Ver. 4. " Shudder, 
Sidon; for the sea epeaketh, the fortress of the eea, thus: I 
have not travailed, nor given birth, nor trained up young men, 
brought up maidens" The sea, or more closely considered, the 
fortress of the sea, i.e. the rock-island on which Neo-tyrus 
stood with its strong and lofty houses, lifts pp its voice in 
lamentation. Sidon, the ancestress of Canaan, must hear 
with overwhelming shame how Tyre mourns the loss of her 
daughters, and complains that, robbed as she has been of her 
children, she is like a barren woman. For the war to have 
murdered her young men and maidens, was exactly the same 
as if she had never given birth to them or brought them up. 
Who is there that does not recognise in this the language of 



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408 THE FBOFHECIGS OF ISAIAH. 

laaiah (compare ch. i. 2) 1 — Even in Egypt the fate of Ph{&. 
nicia produces alarm. Ver. 5. " Wh^n the report cometh to 
Egypt, they tremble at the report from Tzor." In the protasis 
(ver. 5a) Ptnttzraim (to Egypt) the verb " cometh" ia implied ; 
the Caph in ver, 56 signifies Bimultaneouaness, as in ch. xriii. 4 
and XXX. 19 (Ges. Tkea. p. 650). The news of the fall of Tyre 
spreads nniversal terror in Egypt, because its oVn prosperity de- 
pended upon Tyie, which was the great market for its corn ; and 
when SQch a bulwark had fallen, a similar fate awaited itself. 

The inhabitants af Tyre, who desired to escape from death 
or transportation, are obliged to take refuge in the coldnies, 
and the farther off the better : not in Cyprus, not in Carthage 
(as at the time when Alexander attacked the insular Tyre), but 
in Tartessus itself, the farthest off towards the west, and the 
hardest to reach. Vers. 6-9. " Past ye over to Tarahish; howly 
ye inhabitants of the coast I Is this your fate, thou full of «- 
joicing, whose origin is from the days of t/ie olden time, whom 
her feet carried far away to settle ? Who hath determined suck 
a thing concerning Tzor, the distributor of crowns, whose mer- 
chants are princes, whose traders are the chief men of Hie earth ? 
Jehovah of hosts hath determined it, to desecrate the pomp of 
every kind of ornament, to dishonour the chief men of the earth, 
all of them." The exclamation " howl ye" (liSlilu) implies their 
right to give themselves up to their pain. In other cases 
complaint is unmanly, but here it is justifiable (compare ch. 
XV. 4). In ver. 7o the question arises, whether 'allizdh is a 
nominative predicate, as is generally assumed ("Is this, this 
deserted heap of rains, your formerly rejoicing city?"), or 
a vocative. We prefer the latter, because there is nothing 
astonishing in the omission of the article in this case (ch. 
xxii. 2; Ewald, 827, a); whereas in the former case, although it 
is certainly admissible (see ch. xxxii. 13), it is very harsh (com- 
pare ch. xiv. 16), and the whole expression a very doubtful one 
to convey the sense of tab iVfti n-^S nnp nttm. To 'allizdh 
there is attached the descriptive, attribative clause : whose 
origin (kadmdh, Ezek. xvi. 55) dates from the days of the 
olden time ; and then a second " whose feet brought her far 
away {raglaim construed as a masculine, as in Jer. xiii. 16, for 
example) to dwell in a foreign land. This is generally under- 
•tood as signifying transportation by force into an enemy's 



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CHAP. XXIII. 6-8. «09 

coantiy. Bat Lnzzatto very properly objects to this, partly on 
the ground that n'WT ni?3* (her feet carried her) is the strongest 
expression that can be nsed for voluntary emigration, to which 
IdgUr (to settle) also corresponds ; and partly because we tniss 
the antithetical nriyi, which we should expect with this inter- 
pretation. The reference is to the trading journeys which 
extended' " far away" (whether by land or sea), and to the 
colonies, i,e. the settlements founded in those distant places, 
that leading characteristic of the Tyro-Phoenician peop.le (this 
is expressed in the imperfect by yobiludk) quam portabant ; gur 
is the most appropriate word to apply to such settlements : for 
niBr&ehohj see at ch. xvii. 13). Sidon was no doubt older than 
Tyre, but Tyre was also of primeval antiquity. Straho speaks 
of it as the oldest Phoenician city " after Sidon ;" Curtius calls 
it vetastate originU insignia ; and Josephus reckons the ^me 
from the founding of Tyre to the building of Solomon's temple 
as 240 years {Ant. viii. 3, 1 ; compare Herod, ii. 44). Tyre is 
called kamma'atirahj not as wearing a crown (_Vulg. quondam 
coronata), but as a distributor of crowns (Targum). Either 
wonld be suitable as a matter of fact ; but the latter answers 
better to the hiphil (as Mkrin, hiphris, which are expressive of 
results produced from within outwards, can hardly be bronght 
into comparison). Such colonies as Citium, Tartessns, and 
at first Carthage, were governed by kings appointed by the 
mother city, and dependent npon< her. Her merchants were 
princes (compare ch. x. 8), the most hoooored of the earth ; 
*?.^? acquires a superlative meaning from the genitive connec- 
tion (Ges. § 119, 2). From the fact that the Phoenicians had 
the commerce of the world in their hands, a merchant was 
called cendani or cenaan (Hos. xii. 8 ; from the latter, not 
from cin'dni, the plural cin'dTiim which we find here is formed), 
and the merchandise cin'dh. The verb chillel, to desecrate or 
profane, in connection with the " pomp of every kind of orna- 
ment," leads us to think more especially of the holy places of 
both insular and continental Tyre, among which the temple of 
Melkarth in the new city of the former was the most prominent 
(according to Arrian, Anab. ii. 16, irdKaunaTov Ssv fivjfii) 
avSpoyirimi Siaffa^erai). These glories, which were thought so 
inviolable, Jehovah will profane. " To dishonour the chief men;" 
fhdkel (ad ignominiam deducere, Vnlg.) as in ch. viii. 23. 



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410 TEE PBOPHECIES OF UAUH. 

Tlie conseqaence of the fall of Tyre is, that the colonies 
KchieTe their independence, Tarteasos being mentioned bj way 
of example, Ver. 10. " Overflow ihy land Wee the Nile, O 
daughter of Tarthuht No girdle ratraint tkee any longer r 
The ^rdle {mlzaeh) is the supremacy of Tyre, which has 
hitherto restrained all independent action on the part of the 
colony. Now they no longer need to wait in the harbonr for 
the ships of the mother city, no longer to dig in the mines as her 
tribataries for Bilver and other metals. The colonial territory is 
their own freehold now, and they can spread themselves over it 
like the Nile when it passes beyond its banks and overflows the 
land. Eoppe has already ^ven this as the meaning of ver. 10. 

The prophet now proceeds to relate, as it were, to the 
Phcenicio-Spanish colony, the daughter, i.e. the popolation of 
Tartessos, what has happened to the mother country. Vers. 
11, 12. " His hand hath He etretched over the sea, thrown itny- 
doTne into trembling ; Jekorah hath given commandment concerning 
Kendan, to destroy her fortresaei. And He said, lliou ehaU not 
r^oice any further, thou disgraced one, virgin daughter of Sidonf 
Get up to Kittim, go over ; tJiere also shaU thou not find rest" 
There is no ground whatever for restricting the "kingdoms" 
(mamldcoth) to the several small Phosnician states (compare 
ch. xix. 2). Jehovah, reaching over the sea, has thrown the 
lands of Hither Asia and Egypto-Ethiopia into a state of the 
most anxious excitement, and has snmmoned them as instra- 
ments of destruction with regard to Kena'an (7tt, like 7H in 
Esther iv. 5). Fhcenicia called itself Kenyan (Canaan) ; bat 
this is the only passage in the Old Testament in which the 
name occurs in this most restricted sense. T^D??, for TOE'n?, as 
in Num. v, 22, Amos viii. 1. The form CV!!!? '^ >"'>'^ ^^'^i 
bat it is not a deformity, as Enohel and others maintain. Thero 
are other examples of the same resolution of the reduplication 
and transposition of the letters (it stands for C^JlfO, poswbly 
a Phoenician word; see Hitzig, Grabschrifi, p. 16, and Levi, 
Phcenieische Studien, p. 17), viz. «pFi in Lam. iii. 22 (yid. at 
Pa. Ixiv. 7), and ^^ in Num. xxiii. .13, at least according to 
the Jewish grammar (see, however, Ewald, § 250, b).^ " Virgin 

> Biittcher derives the form from ttjn, a snppoaed diminutiTo ; mb, 
however, Jeiurm, pp. 212-216. 



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CHAP. XXm. 18, 14. 411 

of Ihe daughter of Sidon" (equivaleDt to " virgin daiigliter of 
SidoD " two epexegetical genitivea ; Ewald, § 289, c) is syuimy- 
mous with Kendan. The name of the ancestral city (corapare 
ch^ xzzvii. 23) has here become the name of the whole nation that 
has sprang from it Hitherto this nation has been untonched, 
like a vii^n, but now it resembles one ravished and defiled. 
If now they flee across to Oypma {ciuiyim or cUtim), there will 
be no rest for them even there, becanae the colony, emancipated 
from the Phoenician yoke, will only be too glad to rid herself of 
the unwelcome gnests from the despotic mother country. 

The prophet now proceeds to describe the fate of Phcenicia. 
Vers. 13, 14. " Behold the Chaldefin land: thit people that hat 
not been (Aashur — it hath prepared the aame/or desert beatts) — 
they net up their eiege-towers, destroy the palaces of Kendan^ 
make ii a heap of ruins. Mourn, ye ships of Tarihith : for yovr 
fortreei it laid waste"' The general meaning of ver. 13, as the 
text now rnns, is that the Chaldeans have destroyed Kena'an, 
and in fact Tyre. Wp? (they set up) points to the ploral idea 
of " thb people," and l^ina {ehethib VJ'C?) to the singular idea 
of the same ; on the other hand, the feminine suffixes relate 
to Tyre, "They (the Chaldeans) have laid bare the palaces 
(^armenoih, from ^armoneth) of Tyre" i.e. have thrown them 
down, or bnmed them down to their very foondations (pf^V, 
from Ti» = ny, Ps. cxxxvii. 7, like ipP in Jer. li. 58) ; it (the 
Chaldean people) has made her (Tyre) a heap of rubbish. So 
far the text is clear, and there is no ground for hesitation. But 
the question arises, whether in the words D'W WlD'^ -iV^ Asshnr 
is the subject or the object. In the former case the prophet 
points to the land of the Chaldeans, for the purpose of describ- 
ing the instruments of divine wrath ; and having called them 
"a nation which has not been" (nm lo), explains this by saying 
that Asshur first founded the land which the Chaldeans now 
inhabit for them, i.e. wild hordes (Pa. Ixxii. 9) ; or better still 
(as tziyyim can hardly signify mountain hordes), that Asahur 
has made it (this nation, D^ feib., as in Jer. viii. 5, Ex. v. 16) 
into dwellers in steppes (Knobel), which could not be conceived 
of in any other way than that Asshur settled the Chaldeans, 
who inhabited the northern monntains, in the present so-called 
land of Chaldea, and thus made the Chaldeans into a people, 
i.e. a settled, cultivated people, and a people bent on conquest 



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412 THE PBOPHEOIES OF ISAIAH. 

and takiog part in the histoiy of the world (according to 
Knobel, primarily as a component part of the Assyrian army). 
But this vidw, which we meet with even in Calvin, is exposed 
to a grave difficulty. It is by no means improbable, indeed, 
that the Chaldeans, who were descendants of Nahor, according 
to Gen. jcsii. 22, and therefore of Semitic descent,' came down 
from the monntains which bound Armenia, Media, and Assyria, 
having been forced oat by the primitive migration of the Arians 
from west to east ; althoagh the more modem hypothesis, which 
represents them as a people of Tatar descent, and as mixing 
among the Shemites of the conntries of the Euphrates and 
Tigris, has no historical support whatever, the very reverse 
being the case, according to Gen. x., since Babylon was of non- 
Semitic or Cushite origin, and therefore the land of Chaldea, as 
only a portion of Babylonia (Strabo, xvi. 1, 6), was the land 
of the Shemites. But the idea that the Assyrians brought 
them down from the mountains into the lowlands, though not 
under Ninns and Semiramis,^ as Yitringa supposes, bnt about 
the time of Shalmanaasi^ (Ges>, Hitztg, Knobel, and others),* 
is pure imagination, and merely an inference drawn from this 
passage. For this reason I have tried to give a different 
interpretation to the clause D'^ <^B> iwJw in my Com. on 
ffabakkui (p. 22), viz. " Asahur — it has assigned the same to 
the beasts of the desert." That Asshur may be used not only 
pre-eminently, but directly, for Nineveh (like Kenaan for Tzor), 
admits of no dispute, since even at the present day the ruins 

are called j^jSl, and this is probably a name applied to Nineveh 
in the arrow-headed writings also (Layard, Nineveh and itt 

' Arpachihad (Gen. x, 22), probably the ancestor of tlie oldeet Chal- 
deans, was also Semitic, whether hU name is equivalent to Armachshad 
(the Chaldean high-land) or not. ArrapachitiatmgihkeAUiagh, the name 
of the table-land between the lake of Urmia and that of Van, according to 
which shad was the common Armenian termination for names of places. 

■ The Bame view ia held' hy Oppert, though he regarda the Casdim ta 
the primitive Turanian (Tatar) inhabitants of Shinar, and Bnpposea this 
passage to relate to their subjugation by the Semitic Aeayrians. 

* For an impartial examination of this migration or transplantalidn 
hypothesia, which is intunately connected with the Scythian hypothesis, see 
H. V. Niebuhr's Geachkkte Aasun uud Babels ieil Phul (1857, pp. 152-154). 
Rawlinson (Monarehiet, i. 71-74) decidedly rejects the latter as at variance 
witii the testimonies of Scripture, of Beroens, and of tlie monametita. 



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CHAP. XXni. 18, 14. 413 

Setntuns). The word tziyt/tm is commonly applied to beasts 
of the wilderness (e.g. ch. xiii. 21), and ^'"!^ 1?; for n^ Db* 
(nsed of Nineveh in Zeph. ii. 13, 14) may be explained in ac- 
cordance with Ps. civ. 8. The form of the parenthetical clause, 
however, wonid be like that of the concluding clause of 
Amos i. 11. But what makes me distrustful even of this view 
is not a doctrinal ground (Winer, Seal Wdrterbwh, i. 218), 
but one taken from Isaiah's own prophecy. Isaiah undonbtedly 
sees a 'Chaldean empire behind the Assyrian ; hut this would 
be the only passage in which he prophesied (and that quite by 
the way) how the imperial power would pass from the latter to 
the former. It was the task of Nahnm and Zephaniah to draw 
this connecting line. It is true that this argument is not 
sufficient to outweigh the objections that can be brought against 
the other view, which makes the text declare a fact that is 
never mentioned anywhere else ; but it is important never- 
theless, for this reason it is possible, indeed, that Ewald's 
conjectare is a right one, and that the original reading of the 
text was O'ijnii )^K jn. Read in this manner, the first clause 
runs thus: "Behold the land of the Canaaneans : this people 
has come to nothing ; Asshur has prepared it (their land) for 
the beasts of the desert." It is true that njri lO generally means 
not to exist, or not to have been (Ob. 16) ; but there are also 
cases in which (6 is nsed as a kind of substantive (cf. Jer. 
xsxiii. 25), and ihe words mean to become or to have become 
nothing (Job vi. 21, Keek. xsi. 32, and possibly also Isa. xv. 6). 
Such an alteration of the text is not favoured, indeed, hy any 
of the ancient versions. For our own part, we still abide by 
the explanation we have given in the Commentary on Hahakkuh, 
not so much for this reason, as because the seventy years 
mentioned afterwards are a decisive proof that the prophet had 
the Chaldeans and not Asshur in view, as the instruments em- 
ployed in executing the judgment upon Tyre. The prophet 
points out the Chaldeans, — that nation which (although of 
primeval antiqnity, Jer. v. 15) had not yet shown itself as a con- 
queror of the world (of. Hab. t. 6), having been hitherto snbject 
to the Assyrians ; but which had now gained the mastery after 
having first of all destroyed Asshur, i.e. Nineveh' (namely, with 
' This destrnetdon of Nineveh was leallf soch an one as could be called 
^ftaor Vayyim (& preparation for beasts of tlie desert), for it has been ever 



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411 THE PSOPHEGIES 07 ISAIAH. 

the Medo-Babylonian army nnder Nabopolassar, the fonnder of 
the Neo-BabyloniaD empire, in 606 B.C.), — aa the destroyers of 
the palaces of T^re. With the appeal to the ships of Tarsbish 
to poar out their lamentation, the prophecy retams in ver. 14 
to the opening words in ver. 1. According to ver. i, the 
fortress here is insular T^re. As the prophecy thus closes 
itself by completing the circle, vers. 15-18 might appear to be 
a later addition. This is no more the case, however, here, than 
in the last part of ch. xix. Those critics, indeed, who do not 
acknowledge any special prophecies that are not vaticiniapoit 
eventum, are obliged to assign vers. 15-18 to the Persian era. 

The prophet here foretells the rise of Tyre again at the 
close of the Chaldean world-wide monarchy. Vera. 15, 16. 
" And it idU come to pass in tiwi day, that Tzor will be for- 
gotten seventy years, eqval to the days of one Hng ; after the end 
of the eeventy yeart, Tzor will go, according to the song of the 
harlot. Take the guitar, sweep through the city, forgotten 
harlot ! Play bravely, sing zealously, that tftou mayeat be re- 
membered!" The "days of a king" are a fixed and unchange- 
able period, for which everything is determined by the one 
BOvereigD will (as is the case more especially in the East), aud 
is therefore stereotyped. The seventy years are compared t» 
the days of sacb a king. Seventy is well fitted to be the 
number used to denote a uniform period of this kind, being 
equal to 10 X 7, t.e. a compact series of beptada of years 
(ahahbalhotli). But the number is also historical, prophecy 
being the power by which the history of the future was 
"periodized" beforehand iu this significant manner. They 
coincide with the seventy years of Jeremiah (compare 2 Chron. 
xzxvi. 21), that is to say, with the duration of the Chaldean 
rule. During this period Tyre continued with its world-wide 
commerce in a state of involuntary repose. " Tyre will be 
forgotten :" v^ntahcacluith is not a participle (Bijttcher), but the 
perf. eons, which is required here, and stands for fpSB'il with 
an original D fern, (cf. ch. vii. 14, Pa. cxviii. 23), After the 
seventy years (that is to aay, along with the commencement 

Bince a heapof ruins, which the earth gradually swdlowed up; so that when 
Xenophon went past it, he was not even told that these vtm Uie rmns of 
the ancient Ninos. On iba later bnildiiiga erected upon the tuina, see 
Marcos v. Niebnhr, p. 203. 



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OHAF. XXin. 17, u. 415 

of the Persian rule) the harlot is welcomed again. She is like 
a bayadere or troubadour going through the streets with song 
and guitar, and bringing her charms into notice again. The 
prophecy here falls into the tone of a popular song, as in ch, 
T. 1 and xzvii. 2. It will be with Tyre as with such a mnmcian 
and dancer as the one described in the popular song. 

When it begins again to make love to all the world, it will 
get rich again from the gain acquired by this worldly inter- 
course. Ver. 17. '^Arid it vnlt come to pais at the end of the 
aeventi/ years: Jeliovah vnll visit Tzor, and she eomes again to Iter 
hire, and commita prostitution with all the kingdoms of the earth on 
the broad surface of the globe." Such mercantile trading as hers, 
which is only bent upon earthly advantages, is called zdndli, on 
account of its recognising none of the limits opposed by God, 
and making itself common to all the world, partly because it is 
a prostitution of the soul, and partly because from the veiy 
earliest times the prostitution of the body waa also a common 
thing in markets and fairs, more especially in those of Phoenida 
(as the Phoenicians were worshippers of Afitarte). Hence the 
gain acquired by commerce, which Tyre had now secnred 
f^in, is called 'ethndn (Deut. xxiii. 19), with a feminine suffix, 
according to the Masora without inappik (Ewald, § 247, a). 

This restoration of the trade of Tyre is called a visitation 
on the part of Jehovah, because, however profane the conduct 
of Tyre might be, it was nevertheless a holy purpose to which 
Jehovah rendered it subservient. Ver. 18. "And her gain 
and her reward of prostitution will he holy to Jehooaft: it w not 
stored up nor gathered together ; hut her gain from commerce 
will be theirs who dwell before Jehovah, to eat to satiety and for 
stately clothing" It is not the conversion of Tyre which ts 
held np to view, but something approaching it. Sachar (which 
does not render it at all necessary to assume a form sftch&r for 
ver. 3) is used here in connection with 'ethnan, to denote the 
occupation itself which yielded the profit. This, and also the 
profit acquired, would become holy to Jehovah ; the latter 
would not be treasured op and capitalized as it formerly was, 
but they would give tribute and presents from it to Israel, and 
thus help to sustain in abundance and clothe in stately dress 
the nation which dwelt before Jehovah, i.e. whose true dwell- 
ing-place was in the temple before the presence of Qod (Ps. 



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416 THE PBOPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

xxvii. 4, Ixxxiv. 5 ; mecatsek = that which covers, t.e. the cover- 
ing ; 'dthik, like the Arabic 'atik, old, noble, honourable). A 
strange prospect I As Jerome says, " Scee tecunditm higtoriam 
necdum facta comperimua." 

The Assyrians, therefore, were not the predicted instra- 
ments of the punishment to be inflicted upon Fhcenicia. Nor 
was Shalmanassar sticcessfal in his Fhcenician war, as the 
extract from the chronicle of Menander in the Antiqnitiet of 
Josephua (Ant. is. 14, 2)' clearly shows. EIuIebus,. the king of 
Tyre, had succeeded in once mord subduing the rebellions 
Cyprians (Kittaiot). But with their assistance (if indeed ^1 
TouTow TTc/i^Mt? b to be BO interpreted") Shalmanassac made 
war upon Phcenicia, though a general peace soon put an end to 
this campaign. Thereupon Sidon, Ace, Palsetyrus, and many 
other cities, fell away from Tyrus (insular Tyre), and placed 
themselves under Assyrian supremacy. But as the Tyrians 
would not do this, Sbalmanassar renewed the war; and the 
Phoenicians that were under his sway supplied him with six 
hundred ships and eight hundred rowers for this purpose. The 
Tyrians, however, fell upon tbem with twelve vessels of war, 
and having scattered the hostile fleet, took about five hundred 
prisoners. This considerably heightened the distinction of 
Tyre. And the king of Assyria was obliged to content him- 
self with stationing guards on the river (Leontes), and at the 
conduits, to cut off the supply of fresh water from the Tyrians. 
This lasted for five years, during the whole of which time 
the Tyrians drank from welb that they had sunk themselves. 
Now, unless we want to lower the prophecy into a mere picture 
of the imagination, we cannot understand it as pointing to 
Asshnr as the instrument of punishment, for the simple reason 
that Shalmanassar was obliged to withdraw from the " fortress 
of the sea" without accomplishing his purpose, and only suc- 
ceeded in raising it to all the greater honour. But it is a 

^ The view held by Johami Brandis ia probably the more correct oDe, 
— munelj, that Shalmanaasar commenced the contest bj sending an army 
over to the island agftinet the Chittteaiu (>tJ not in the Bause of aif, to, 
bnt of contra, agaiuHt, just as in the expremion further on, it* iturait 
irioTpK^t, contra eoi rediif), probably to ctflnpel them to revolt again 
from the l^rians. SawlinKiD {Monarchia, ii. 405) propoees, aa an emen- 
dation of the text, M ■nviw, by which the Cyprian expedition is got rid 
of alt(>({etliear. 



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CRAP. ZZia IS. 417 

qaestion whether even Nebuchadnezzar vas more saccessfal 
with Jnsalar Tyre. All that Joeephus is able to tell as from 
the Indian and Phcenician stories of Fhilostratus, is that 
Nebuchadnezzar besieged Tjre for thirteen years in the reign 
of Ithobal (^Ant x. 11, 1). And from Phoenician sources them- 
selves, he merely relates (c. Ap. i. 21) that Nebnchadnezzar 
besieged Tyre for thirteen years under Ithobal (viz, from the 
seventh year of his reign onwards). But so much, at any rate, 
may apparently be gathered from the account of the Tyrian 
government which follows, viz. that the Persian era was pre- 
ceded by the subjection of the Tyrians to the Chaldeans, inas- 
much as they sent twice to fetch their king from Babylon. 
When tlie Chaldeans made themselves masters of the Assyrian 
empire, Phcenicia (whether with or without insular Tyre, we 
do not know) was a satrapy of that empire (Josephus, Ant. x. 
11, 1 ; c. Ap. i. 19, from Berosus), and this relation still con- 
tinued at the close of the Chaldean rule. So much is certain, 
however, — and Berosus, in fact, says it expressly, — viz. ^at 
Nebuchadnezzar once more subdued Phoenicia when it rose in 
rebellion ; and that when he was called home to Babylon in 
consequence of the death of his father, be returned with Phoe- 
nician prisoners. What we want, however, is a direct account 
of the conquest of Tyre by the Chaldeans. Neither Josephus 
nor Jerome could give any such account. And the Old Tes- 
tament Smptures appear to state the very opposite, — namely, 
the failure of Nebuchadnezzar's enterprise. For in the twenty- 
seventh year after Jehtnachim's captivity (the sixteenth from 
the destruction of Jerusalem) the following word of the Lord 
came to Ezekiel (Ezek. xxix. 17, 18) : *' Son of man, Nebuchad- 
nezzar the king of Babylon has caused his army to perform a 
long and hard service against Tyre : every head is made bald, 
and every shoulder peeled ; yet neither he nor bis army has 
any wages at Tyre for the hard service which they have per- 
formed around the same." It then goes on to annonnce that 
Jehovah would give Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar, and that this 
would be the wages of his army. Gesenios, Winer, Hitzig, 
and others, infer from this passage, when taken in connection 
with other non-IsraelitJsh testimonies given by Josephus, which 
merely speak of a siege, that Nebuchadnezzar did not conquer 
Tyre; but Hengstenberg (de rebus Tffriorum, 1832), Haver- 



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418 THE PBOPBEOIES OF ISAIAH. 

nick {Ezek. pp. 427-442), and Dreclisler (/bo. ii. 166-169) 
maintain hj arguments, which have been passed again and 
agun through the sieve, that this passage presupposes the con- 
quest of Tyre, and merely annomices the disproportion between 
the profit which Nebuchadnezzar derived from it and the 
effort that it cost him. Jerome (on Ezekiel) gives the same 
explanation. When the army of Nebuchadnezzar had made 
insular Tyre accessible by heaping up an embankment with 
enormous exertions, and they were in a position to make use of 
their siege artillery, they found that the lyrians had canied 
away all their wealth in vessels to the neighbouring islands ; 
" so that when the city was taken, Nebuchadnezzar found 
nothing to repay him for his labour ; and because he had 
obeyed the will of God in this undertaking, after the Tyrian 
captivity had lasted a few years, Egypt was ^ven to him" 
(Jerome). I also regard this as the correct view to take ; 
though without vrishing to maintain that the words might not 
be understood as implying the failure of the siege, quite as 
readily as the nselessness of the conquest. But on the two 
following grounds, I am persuaded that they are used here in 
the latter sense. (1.) In the great trilogy which contains Eze- 
kiel's prophecy against Tyre (Ezek. xxvi.-xxviii.), and in which 
he more than once introduces thoughts and figures from Isa. 
xxiii., which he still further amplifies and elaborates (according 
to the general relation in which he stands to hia predecessors, 
of whom he doea not make a species of mosaic, as Jeremiah 
does, but whom he rather expands, fills up, and paraphrases, as 
seen more especially in his relation to Zephaniab), he predicts 
the conquest of insular Tyre hy Nebuchadnezzar. He foretells 
indeed even more than this ; but if Tyre had not been at least 
conquered by Nebuchadnezzar, the prophecy would have fallen 
completely to the ground, like any merely human hope. Now 
we candidly confess that, on doctrinal grounds, it is impossible 
for us to make such an assumption as this. There is indeed 
an element of human hope in all prophecy, but it does not 
reach such a point as to be put to shame by the test supplied 
in Dent, xviii. 21, 22. (2.) K I take a comprehensive surv^ 
of the following ancient testimonies: (a) that Nebuchadnezzar, 
when called home in consequence of his father's death, took 
some Phoenician prisoners with him (Berosus, ut sup.); (b) that 



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CHAP. XZIII. It. 419 

witli this fact before ns, the statement foand in the FbosTiician 
sources, to the effect that the Tynans fetched two of their 
rulers from Babylon, viz. Herbal and Eirom, presents a mach 
greater resemblance to i Kings xxir. 12, 14, and Dan, i. 3, 
than to 1 Kings xii. 2, 3, with which Hitzig compares it ; 
(c) that, according to Josephns (<;. Ap. i. 20), it was stated "in 
the archives of the Phoenicians concerning this king Nebuchad- 
nezzar, that he conquered all Syria and Fhcenicia;" and (tf) 
that the voluntary submission to the Persians (Herod, iii. 19 ; 
Xen. Cyrop. i. 1, 4) was not the commencement of servitude, 
but merely a change of masters ; — ^if, I say, I put all these 
things together, the conclusion to which I am brought is, that 
the tliirteen years' siege of Tyre by Nebuchadnezzar ended in 
its capture, possibly throngh capitulation (as Winer, Movers, 
and others assume). 

The difficulties which present themselves to us when we 
compare together the prophecies of Isaiah and Ezekiel, are still 
no doubt very far from being removed ; but it is in this way 
alone that any solution of the difficulty is to be found. For 
even assuming that Nebuchadnezzar conquered Tyre, he did 
not destroy it, as the words of the two prophecies would lead 
us to expect. The real solution of the difficulty has been 
already given by Havernick and Drechsler : " The prophet 
sees the whole enormous mass of destruction which eventually 
came upon the city, concentrated, as it were, in Nebuchad- 
nezzar's conquest, inasmuch as in the actual historical develop- 
ment it was linked on to that fact like a closely connected 
chun. The power of Tyre as broken by Nebuchadnezzar is 
associated in his view with its utter destruction." Even Alex- 
ander did not destroy Tyre, when he had conquered it after 
seven months' enormous exertions. Tyre was still s flourishing 
commercial city of considerable importance under both the 
Syrian and the Boman sway. In the time of the Crusades it 
was still the same; and even the Crusaders, who conquered it 
in 1125, did not destroy it. It was not till about a century 
and a half later that the destruction was commenced by the 
removal of the fortifications on the part of the Saracens. At 
the present time, all the glory of Tyre is either sunk in the 
sea or buried beneath the sand, — an inexhaustible mine of 
building materials for Beirut and other towns upon the coast. 



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420 TBE PB0PHECIE8 OF ISAUH. 

Amidst these vast rains of the island city, there is nothing 
standing now bnt a village of wretched wooden hats. And the 
island is an island no longer. The embankment which Alex- 
ander threw np has grown into a still broader and stronger 
tongne of earth through the washing ap of sand, and now 
connects the island with the shore, — a standing memorial of 
divine justice (Strauss, iSirtat und Golgotha, p. 357). This 
picture of destruction stands before the prophet's mental eje, 
and indeed immediately behind the attack of the Chaldeans 
upon Tyre,- — the two thousand years between being so com- 
pressed, that the whole appears as a continuous event. This 
is the well-known law of perspective, by which prophecy ta 
governed throughout. This law cannot have been unknown to 
Uie prophets themselves, inasmuch as they needed it to accredit 
their prophecies even to themselves. Still more was it neces- 
saiy for future ages, in order that they might not be deceived 
with regard to the prophecy, that this universally determin- 
ing law, in which human limitations are left unresolved, and 
are miraculously intermingled with the eternal view of God, 
shonld be clearly known. 

Bat another enigma presents itself. The prophet foretells 
a revival of Tyre at the end of seventy years, and the passing 
over of its world-wide commerce into the service of the con- 
gregation of Jehovah, We cannot agree with K. O. Gilbert 
{Theodulvx, 1855, pp. 273-4) in regarding the seventy years as 
a sacred number, which precludes all clever human calculation, 
because the Lord thereby conceals His holy and irresistible 
decrees. The meaning of the seventy is clear enough : they 
are, as we saw, the seventy years of the ChaldeEin rule. And 
this is also quite enough, if only a prelude to what is predicted 
here took place in connection with the establishment of the 
Persian sway. Such a prelude there really was in the fact, 
that, according to the edict of Cyrus, both Sidonians and 
Tyrians assisted in the building of the temple at Jerusalem 
(£zra iii. 7, cf. I. 4). A second prelude is to be seen in the 
fact, that at the very commencement of the labours of the 
apostles there was a Christian church in Tyre, which was 
visited by the Apostle Paul (Acts xxi. 3, 4), and that this 
church steadily grew from that time forward. In this way again 
the trade of Tyre entered the service of the God of revelation. 



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CHAP. XXIV.-ZXTn. 421 

Bat it is Christian Tyre which now lies in ruins. One of the 
most remarkable ruins is the splendid cathedi'al of Tyre, for 
which Eusebins of Ctesarea wrote a dedicatory address, and in 
which Friedrich Barbarossa, who was drowned in the Saly< 
kadnos in the year 1190, is supposed to have been buried. 
Hidierto, therefore, these have been only preludes to the fulfil- 
ment of the prophecy. Its ultimate fulfilment has still to be 
waited for. But whether the fulfilment wOI be an ideal one, 
when not only the kingdoms of the world, but also the trade of 
the world, shall belong to God and His Christ; or tpiritually, in 
tlie sense in which this word is employed in the Apocalypse, 
i.e. .by the true essence of the ancient Tyre reappearing in 
another city, like that of Babylon in Bome ; or literally, by 
the fishing village of Tzur actually disappearing again as Tyre 
rises from its ruins, — it would be impossible for any commen- 
tator to say, unless he were himself a prophet. 



FINALE OF THE GREAT CATASTROPHE. 

Chap, xxiT.-xxvn. 

The cycle of prophecies which commences here has no 
other parallel in the Old Testament than perhaps Zech. ix.-xiv. 
Both sections are thoroughly eschatological and apocryphal in 
their character, and start from apparently sharply defined 
historical circumstances, which vanish, however, like will-o*-the 
wisps, as soon as you attempt to follow and seize them ; for 
the simple reason, that the prophet lays bold of their radical 
idea, carries them out beyond their outward historical form, 
and uses them as emblems of far-ofE events of the last days. 
It is not surprising, therefore, that the majority of modem 
critics, from the time of Eicbhom and Koppe, have denied the 
genuineness of these four chapters (xxiv.-xxvii.), notwithstand- 
ing the fact that there is nothing in the words themselves that 
passes beyond the Assyrian times. Bosenmiiller did this in the 
first edition of bis Scholia; hat in the second and third editions 



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422 THE FBOPHECIES Of ISAUH. 

he has fallen into another error, chiefly because the prophecy 
contains nothing which passes beyond the political horizon of 
Isaiah's own times. Now we cannot accept this test of genuine- 
ness ; it is just one of the will-o'-the-wisps already referred to. 
Another consequence of this phenomenon is, that our critical 
opponents inevitably get entangled in contradictions as soon 
as they seek for a different historical basis for this cycle of 
prophecies from that of Isaiah's own times. According to 
Gesenius, De Wette, Maurer, and Umbreit, the author wrote 
in Babylonia ; according to Eichhom, Ewald, and Knobel, in 
Jadah, In the opinion of some, he wrote at the close of the 
captivity ; in that of others, immediately after the OTertfarow of 
the kingdom of Judah. Hitzig supposes the imperial city^ 
whose destruction is predicted, to be Nineveh ; others, for tha 
most part, suppose it to be Babylon. But the prophet only 
mentions Egypt and Asshur as powers by which Israel ta 
enslaved ; and Knobel consequently imagines that he wrote in 
this figurative manner from fear of the enemies that were still 
dwelling in Judah. This wavering arises from the fact, that 
what is apparently historical is simply an eschatological emblem. 
It is quite impossible to determine whether that which sounds 
historical belonged to the present or past in relation to the 
prophet himself. His standing-place was beyond all t^e his- 
tory that has passed by, even down to the present day; and 
everything belonging to this history was merely a figure in the 
mirror of the last lines. Let it be once established that no 
human critics can determine ^ priori the measure of divine 
revelation granted to any prophet, and all possible grounds 
combine to vindicate Isaiah's authorship of ch. xxiv.-zxvii., as 
demanded by its place in the book of Istdah.' Appended as 
they are to ch. ziii.-xxiii. without a distinct heading, they are 
intended to stand in a relation of steady progress to the oracles 
concerning the nations ; and this relation is sustained by the 
* The gemiineDees is ropported bf BoBenmiiller, Henslar (Jesaia nev 
UbeTKtzt, nut Anm.'), Paulua (_Clavis liber Jaaia), Auguati (Sxe^. Hand- 
6ucA), Beckhaus {ilher Integritat der prqpA. Schriften da A. T. 1796), 
Kleinert (Jlhtr dU Echtheit tdmmtlicher in d. Buclte Jesaia enth. Weissa- 
gungen, 1829), Kiiper (Jeremiag libronan aacr. interpret atqut vindez, 1837), 
and Jahn, E&vernick, Keil (in their latrodjictiont). In monographs, C. F. 
L. Anidt (De loco, c. xxiv.-xxvii., Jesaix vindicando tt expUeando, 1826), 
and Ed. Bohl (Vaticinium Jei. cap. zxiv.-zxTii. eommentario Uluitr. 1861), 



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CHAP. Xznr.-XxviL 423 

fact that Jeremiah read tKem in connection with these oracles 
(compare ch. zxiv. 17, 18, with Jer. xlviii. 43, 44), and that 
they are full of retrospective allasions, which run ont like a 
handred threads, though grasped, as it were, in a single hand. 
Ch. xxiv.-xxvii. stand in the same relation to ch. xiii.-zxiii., as 
ch. xi, zii. to ch. Tii.-x. The particnhir judgments predicted 
in the oracle against the nations, all flow into the last judgment 
as into a aea ; and all the salvation which formed the shining 
edge of the oracles against the nations, is here concentrated in 
the glory of a mid-day son, Ch. xsiv.-zxvii. form the finale 
to ch. xiii.-zxiii., and that in a strictly mnsical sense. What 
the finale should do in a piece of music — namely, gather ap the 
scattered changes into a grand impressive whole — is done here 
by this closing cycle. But even apart from this, it is full of 
muuc and song. The description of the catastrophe In ch, 
xxiv. is followed by a simple hymnal echo. As the book of 
ImOiannel closes in ch. sli. with a psalm of the redeemed, so 
have we here a fourfold song of praise. The overthrow of 
the imperial city is celebrated in a song in ch. xxv. 1-5; 
another song In ch. xxv. 9 describes how Jehovah reveals 
himself with His saving presence; another in ch. xxvi. 1-19 
celebrates the restoration and resurrection of Israel; and a 
fourth in ch. zzvii. 2-5 describes the vineyard of the church 
bringing forth fmit under the protection of Jehovah. And 
these songs contain every variety, from the most elevated 
heavenly hymn to the tenderest popular song. It is a grand 
manifold concert, which is merely introduced, as it were, by 
the epic opening in ch. zxiv. and the epic close in ch. xxvii. 6 
sqq., and in the midst of which the prophecy unfolds itself 
in a kind of recitative. Moreover, we do not find so much real 
music anywhere else in the ring of the words. The heaping np 
of paronomasia has been placed among the arguments against 
the genuineness of these diapters. But we have already shown 
by many examples, drawn from nndispnted prophecies (such as 
ch. xxii. 5, xvii. 12, 13), that Isaiah is fond of painting for the 
ear; and the reason why he does it here more than anywhere - 
else, is that ch. xxiv.-xxvii. formed a finale that was intended 
to surpass all that had gone before. The whole of this finale 
is a grand hallelujah to ch. xii!.-xxili., hymnic in its character, 
and musical in form, and that to such a degre^ that, like ch. 



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421 THE PRPFBECIES OF ISAIAH. 

xxT. 6, the prophecy is, u it were, both text sod divisiooB at 
the same time. There was no other thao Isaiah who was lo 
incomparable a master oF langnage. Again, the incompanble 
depth in the contents of ch. zxiT.-xxvii. does not shate tm 
confidence in his authorship, since the whole book of this 
Solomon among the prophets is fall of what is incomparable. 
And in addition to mncb that is pecnliar in this cycle of 
prophecies, which does not astonish ns in a prophet so richlj 
endowed, and so characterized by a continnal change " from 
glory to glory," the whole cycle is so thoroughly Isaiah's in its 
deepest foundation, and in a hundred points of detail, that it is 
most uncritical to prononnce the whole to be certainly not Isaiah's 
simply because of these pecaliaritiea. So far as the eschato- 
logicEil and apocalyptical contents, which seem to point to a 
very late period, are concerned, we would simply call to mind 
the wealth of eschatological ideas to be found even in Joel, 
who prophesies of the pouring out of the Spirit, the march of 
the nations of the world against the church, the signs that 
precede the last day, the miraculous water of the New Jeru- 
salem. The revelation of all the last things, which the Apo- 
calypse of the New Testament embraces in oue grand picture, 
commenced with Obadiah and Joel; and there is nothing 
strange in the fact that Isaiah also, in cb. zxir.-xxvii., ^ould 
turn away from the immediate external facts of the history of 
his own time, and pass on to these depths beyond. 

THE JUDGMENT UPON THE EARTH. — CHAP. XXIV. 

It is thoroughly characteristic of Isaiah, that the commence- 
ment of this prophecy, like ch. xix. 1, places as at once in the 
very midst of the catastrophe, and condenses the contents of 
the subsequent picture of judgment into a few rapid, vigorous, 
vivid, and comprehensive clauses (like ch. xv. 1, xvii. 1, xxtii. 1, 
cf. xxxiii. 1). Vers. 1-3. ''Behold, Jeltovah emptieth the eartli, 
and ktyeth it waste, and marrelh its form, and scattereth iit 
inhabitant!. And it kappetieth, aa to the people, eo to the priest; 
aa to the servant, so to his master; at to the maid, to to her 
mistress ; aa to the buyer, eo to the seller ; as to the lender, eo to 
the borrovier; aa to the creditor, so to the debtor. Emptying l/te 
earth is emptied, and plundering it plundered : for Jehovah haUi 



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CHAP. XXIV. i-s. 425 

tpokm thu word." The qaestion, whether the prophet is speak- 
ing of a past or fatnre jndgment, whidi is one of importance 
to the interpretation of the whole, is answered by the fact that 
with iBfuah " hinngh" (behold) always refers to something 
futare (oh. iii. 1, xvii. 1, xix. 1, xxx. 27, etc.). And it is only 
in his case, that we do meet with prophecies commencing- so 
immediately with hinneh. Those in Jeremiah which approach 
this the most nearly (viz. Jer. zlvii. 2, xlix. 35, cf. li. 1, and 
Ezek. xzix. 3) do indeed commence with hinneh, but not without 
being preceded by an introductory formula. The opening 
" behold" corresponds to the confirmatory " for Jehovah hath 
spoken," which is always employed by Isaiah at the close of 
statements with regard to the future and occurs chiefly,* 
though not exclusively,' in the book of Isaiah, whom we may 
recognise in the detailed description in ver. 2 (yid. ch. ii. 12-16, 
iii. 2, 3, 18-23, as compared with ch. ix, 13; also with the 
description of judgment in ch. xix. 2—4, which closes in a 
similar manner). Thus at the vary outset we meet with Isaiah's 
peculiarities ; and Caspar! is right in saying that no prophecy 
could possibly commence with more of the characteristics of 
Isaiah than the prophecy before us. The play upon words 
commences at the very outset. Bdkak and hdlak (compare the 
Arabic baMka, a blank, naked desert) have the same ring, 
just as in Nahum ii. 11, cf. 8, and Jer. li. 2. The niplial 
futnres are intentionally written like verbs Pe-Vdv (tibhok and 
tibbSZf instead of tibhak and Ubhaz), for the purpose of making 
them rhyme with the infinitive absolutes (cf. ch. xxii. 13). So, 
again, cag^birtdk is so written instead of eigbirtdh, to produce 
a greater resemblance to the opening syllable of the other 
words. The form JTB'3 b interchanged with KB") (as in 1 Sam. 
Jtxii. 2), or, according to Kimchi's way of writing it, with Kt?J 
(written with tzere), just as in other passages we meet with 

KB'J along with n^3, and, judging from l-J, to postpone or 

credit, the former is the primary form. Nctheh is the creditor, 
and i3 KP3 *iE'« is not the person who has borrowed of him, but, 
as '"lEij invariably signifies to credit {kiphU, to give credit), the 

* Vtd. ch. L 20, zxi. 17, zxu. S5, zzv. S, zL 6, Iviii. 14 ; also compara 
cli. xix. 4, ivi 13, and sxxvii, 22. 

* Yid. Ob. 18, Joel iv. 8, Mic. It. 4, I Kings xiv. 11. 



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426 THE PB0PEEOIE8 OF ISAIAH. 

person whom be credits (with 3 obj., like ? I?U in cb. is. '3), not 
" the person tfarongh whom he b KPi " (Hitag on Jer. xv. 10). 
Hence, " lender and borrower, creditor and debtor " (or taker 
of credit). It ia a judgment which embraces all, without dis- 
tinction of rank and condition ; and it is a aniversal one, not 
merely throughout the whole of the land of Israel (as even 
Drechsler renders n??)> ''"' in all the earth ; for as Amdt 
correctly observes, Y^^"^ signifies "the earth" in this passage, 
including, as in ch. xi. 4, the ethical New Testament idea of 
"the world" {ko$mo$). 

That this is the case is evident from vers. 4-9, where the 
accursed state into which the earth is brought is more fully 
described, and the cause thereof is given. Vers. 4-9. " Smitten 
down, withered up u tfie earth ; pined aviay, watted away is the 
world; pined away have they, the foremost of the people of Ute 
earth. And the earth has become wicked arrumg ite inhabitants ; 
for they transgressed revelations, set at nought the ordinance, 
broke tite everlasting covenant. Therefore hath the curse devoured 
the earth, and tliey who dwelt in it make expiation: therefore are 
the inhabitants of the earth withered up, and there are very few 
mortals left. Neai wine moumeth, vine is parclied, all the merry- 
hearted groan. The joymie playing of tabreta is eitent ; the noise 
of them that r^oice hath ceased ; the joyous playing of the guitar 
is silent. They drink no wine with a song ; meth tastes bitter to 
them that drink it." " The world" (tibsl) is used here in ver. 
4, as in ch. zxvi. 9 (always in the form of a proper name, and 
without the article), as a parallel to " Hie earth " (hd'dretz), with 
which it alternates throughout this cycle of prophecies. It is 
used poetically to signify the globe, and that without limitation 
(even in ch. xiii. 11 and zviii. 3) ; and therefore " the earth " 
is also to he understood here in its most comprehensive sense 
(in a difFerent sense, therefore, from ch. xzxiii. 9, which con- 
tains the same play upon sounds). The earth is sunk in 
mourning, and has become like a faded plant, withered up with 
heat ; the high ones of the people of the earth (merom ; abstr. 
pro coticr., like c^icd m ch. v. 13, xxii. 34) are included (OP 
is used, as in ch. xlii. 5, xl. 7, to signify humanity, i.e. man 
generally), ^^/^t* (for the form, see Job, i. 328) stands in half 
pause, which throws the subjective notion that follows into 
greater prominence. It isithe punishment of the inhabitants of 



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CHAP XXIV. i-a. 4S7 

the eartli, which ihe earth has to ahara, hecaase it haa shared 
in the wickednesa of those who lire upon it: ckdnaph (not 
related to tdnaph) signifies to be degenerate, to have decided 
for what is evil (ch. ix. 16), to be wicked; and in this intransi- 
tive sense it is applied to the land, which is said to be affected 
with the gnilt of wicked, reckless condnct^ more especially of 
blood-guiltiness (Ps. cvi. 38, Num. xxxv. 33 ; compare the 
transitive use in Jer. iii. 9). The wicked conduct of men, 
which has caused the earth also to become changpkdh, is de- 
scribed in three ^ort, rapid, involuntarily excited sentences 
(compare cb. xv. 6, svi. 4, xxix. 20, xxxiii. 8 ; also ch. xdv. 5, 
i. 4, 6, 8 ; ont of the book of Is^ah, however, we only meet 
with this in Joel i. 10, and possibly Josh. vii. 11). Undei^ 
standing " the earth " as we do m a general sense, *' the law " 
cannot signify merely the positive law of Israel. The Gentile 
world had also a tordh or divine teaching within, which con- 
tained an abundance of divine directions (tOrOih), They also 
had a law written in their hearts ; and it was with the whole 
human race that God concluded a covenant in the person of 
Noah, at a time when the nations had none of them come into 
existence at all. This is the e^lanation given by even Jewish 
commentators; nevertheless, we must not forget that Israel 
was included among the transgressors, and the choice of ex- 
pression was determined by this. With the expression " there- 
fore" the prophecy mores on from sin to punishment, just as 
in ch. T. 25 (cf. ver. 24). n|iM is the cnrse of God denounced 
against the transgressors of His law (Dan. ix. 11 ; compare 
Jer. xxiii. 10, which is founded upon this, and from which njOK 
has been introduced into this passage in some codices and 
editions). The curse of God devours, for it is fire, and that 
from within outwards (see ch. i. 31, v. 24, ix. 18, x. 16, 17, 
xxix. 6, XXX. 27 sqq., xxxiii. 11-14): chdm {miUlf aacQ paehta is 
an ace. poBtpos.),^ from chdrar, they are burnt up, exiuti. With 
regard to ^0^.1^, it is hardly necessary to observe that it cannot 
be traced hack to Q^M = DB*^, DDB'; and that of the two meanings, 
ou^am eontrahere and eitlpam tuiHnere, it has the latter mean- 
ing here. We must not overlook the genuine mark of Isuah 
here in the description of the vanishing away of men down to 
1 In correct texts chSm haa tv a pa Ala*, die former indicaliiig theplaoe 
of tbe tone. 



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428 THE PBOPHEOES OF BJU&H. 

a iinall remnant : IKE^ 0?^ i^ ^^ standing word used to 
denote this ; ^VTO (nsed with regard to nnniher both here and in 
ch. zri. 14 ; and with regard to time in ch. x. 25 and xxix. 17) 
is exclnsivelj Isuah's ; and V?\M is used in the same sense as in 
ch. xzxiii. S (cf. cb. ziiL 12). In ver. 7 we are reminded of 
Joel i. (on die short sentences, see ch. zziz. 20, xri. S-IO) ; in 
,Ters. 8, 9 anj one acquEunted with Isaiah's style will recal to 
mind not only ch. T. 12, 14, but a multitude of other parallels. 
We content ourselves with pointing to Vv^ (which belongs ez- 
clnsively to Isaiah, and is taken from Isa. s^. 2 and xxxii. 13 
in Zeph. ii. 15, and from Isa. xlii. 3 in Zeph. iii. 11) ; and for 
batshir (with joyous song) to ch. xxx. 32 (with the beating of 
drums and playing of guitars), together with ch. xxviii. 7. The 
picture is elegiac, and dwells so long upon the wine (cf. ch. 
xvi.), just because wine, both as a natural production and in 
the form of drink, is the most exhilarating to the heart of all 
the natural ^fts of God (Pa. civ. 15 ; Judg. ix. 13). All the 
sonrces of joy and gladness are destroyed ; and even if there is 
ranch still left of that which onght to give enjoyment, the taste 
of the men themselves turns it into bittemeBs. 

The world with its pleasure is judged ; the world's city is 
also judged, in which both the world's power and the world's 
pleasure were concentrated. Vers. 10-13. " The city oftoku is 
broken to -pieces ; every House is shut up, to that no man can come 
in. There is lamentation far wine in the fields; all rejoicing has 
let ; the delight of the earth is banished. What is left of the eihf 
it vtildemess, and the gate was shattered to ruins. For so will it 
be within the earth, in tlie midst of the natiojis ; as at the olive- 
beating, as at the gleaning, when the vintage is over." The city 
of tohu {kiryath tohu) : this cannot be taken collectively, as 
Bosenmiiller, Amdt, and Drechsler suppose, on account of the 
annexati<»i of idryath to tohu, which is turned into a kind of 
proper name ; nor ciui we understand it as referring to Jem- 
salem, as the majority of commentators have done, including 
even Sche^ and Stier (according to ch. xxxii. 13, 14), after 
we have taken "the earth" (hS&retz) in the sense of kosmos 
(the world). It is rather the central city of the worid as 
estranged from God ; and it is here designated according to 
its end, which end will be tohu, as its natiu^ was tohu. Its true 
nature was the la^aking up of the harmony of all divine order ; 



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CHAP. xxnr. u-is. 429 

and so its end will be the breaking up of its own standing, and 
a hulling back, as It were, into the ehaoi of its primeval be^n- 
ning. With a very similar significance Borne is called turbida 
JRoma in Fersios (i. 5). The whole is thorooghly Isaiah's, even 
to the finest points : tohtt is the same as in ch. xziz. 21 ; and 
for the expression ttiap (so that you cannot enter; namely, on 
account of the ruins which block up the doorway) compare ch. 
xxiii, 1, vii. 8, xvii. 1, also v. 9, vi. II, zxxii. 13. The cry or 
lamentation for the wine out in the fields (ver. 11; cf. Job 
v. 10) is the mourning on account of the destruction of the 
vineyards; the vine, which is one of Isaiah's most favourite 
symbols, represents in this instance also all the natural sources 
of joy. In the term 'drbdh (rejoicing) the relation between 
joy and light is presupposed ; the sun of joy is set (compare 
Mic. iii. 6). What remains of the city (yii^ is partitive, just as 
ia in ch. x. 22) is ghammah (desolation), to which the whole 
- city has been brought (compare ch. v. 9, xxxii. 14). The 
strong gates, which once swarmed with men, are shattered to 
ruins (yuccatk, like Mic. i. 7, for yucath, Ges. § 67, Anm. 8 ; 
n>MK', air. Xey., a predicating nonn of sequence, as in ch. xxxvii. 
26, "into desolated heaps;" compare ch. vi. 11, etc., and other 
passages). In the whole circmt of the earth (ch. vi. 12, vii. 22 ; 
h^drett is " the earth" here as in ch. x. 23, xix. 24), and in 
the midst of what was once a crowd of nations (compare Mic. 
V. 6, 7), there is only a small remnant of men left. This is 
the leading thonght, which runs through the book of Isaiah 
from beginning to end, and is figuratively depicted here in 
B miniature of ch. xvIi. 4-6. The state of things produced 
by the catastrophe is compared to the olive-beating, which 
fetches down what fruit was left at the general picking, and 
to the gleaning of the grapes after the vintage has been fully 
gathered in (cdWi is used here as in ch. x. 25, xvi. 4, xxi. 16, 
etc., viz. " to be over," whereas in cb. xxxiL 10 it means 
to be hopelessly lost, as in ch. xv. 6). There are no more 
men in the whole of the wide world than there are of olives 
and grapes after the principal gathering has taken place. 
The persona saved belong chiefly, though not exclusively, to 
Israel (John iii. 5). The place where they assemble is the 
land of promise. 

There is now a church there refined by the judgment, and 



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480 THK PBOrmOIES OF ISAUa. 

rejoicing in its spostolic calling to the whole world. Veri. U, 
15. " They wiU lift vp their voice, and exuU; for the majeitjj 
of Jehovah they ahottt from the sea : therefore praiee ye Jehovah 
tn the landt of the nm, in the islands of the sea tJie name of 
Jehovah the God of laraeV The ground and subject of the 
rejoicing is " the majesty of Jehovah," t.& the fact that J^ 
horalrhad shown Himself so majesUc in jadgment and laexef 
(ch. xii. 5, 6), and was now so manifest in His gloiy (ch. ii. 
11, 17). Therefore rejoicing was heard " from the sea" (the 
Mediterranean), by which the abode of the congregation of 
Jehovah was washed. Taming in that direction, it had the 
islands and coast lands of the European West in front {iyyi 
hayydm ; the only other passage in which this occurs is ch. xj. 
11, cf. Ezek. xxri. 18), and at its back the lands of the 
Asiatic East, which are called 'urttn, the lands of light, i.e. 
of the sun-rising. This is the true meaning of 'unm, as J. 
Schelling and Drechsler agree ; for Doderlein's comparison of 

the rare Arabic word ,1 aeptentrio is as far removed from the 

Hebrew usage as that of the Talmud "llK K^^K, veapera. 
Hitzi^s proposed reading D"eu (according to the LXX.) 
diminishes the snbstance and destroys the beau^ of the ap- 
peal, which goes forth both to the east and west, and summons 
to the praise of the name of Jehovah the God of Israel, I?"??, 
i.e. because of His manifested gloty. His "name" (cf. ch. 
xxz. 27) is His nature as revealed and made " nameable" in 
jadgment and mercy. 

This appeal is not made in vain. Ver. 16a. "From the 
border of the earth tee hear tongs : Praise to t/ie Righteous 
One!" It no doubt seems natural enough to understand the 
term tzaddik (righteous) as referring to Jehovah ; hut, aa 
Hitzig observes, Jehovah is never called "the Righteous One" 
in so absolute a manner as this (compare, however, Ps. cxii. 4, 
where it occurs in connection with other attributes, and Ex. ix. 
37, where it stands in an antithetical relation) ; and in addition 
to this, Jehovah gives '2? (ch. iv. 2, xxviii. 5), whilst 1133, and 
not '3S, is ascribed to Him. Hence we must take the word in 
the same sense as in ch. iii. 10 (cf. Hab. ii. 4). The reference 
is to the church of righteous men, whose faith has endured the 
fire of the judgment of wrath. In response to its sammons to 



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CHAP. XZIV. ie-20. 431 

Ibe praise of Jehovah, they answer it in songs from the horder 
of the earth. The earth is here thought of as a garment spread 
oat ; eenaph is the- point or edge of the garment, the extreme 
eastern and western ends (compare ch. xi. 12). Thence the 
church of the futare catches the sonnd of this gratefnl song as 
it is echoed from one to the other. 

The prophet feels himself, " in spirit," to he a memher of 
this church; bat all at once he becomes aware of the sufferings 
which will have first of all to be overcome, and which he 
cannot look upon without sharing the suffering himself. Vers. 
16—20. " Then Itatdf Ruin tome! ruin to me! Woe to me! 
JRohbers rob, and robbing, tliey rob as robbers. Horror, and 
pit, and snare, are over thee, inltabitant of the earth! And it 
Cometh to pass, whoever Jleeth from tJte tidings of horror falleth 
iitto the pit ; and wJtoever eseapeth out of the pit is caught in 
the snare: for the trap-doort on high are cpened, and tlie firm 
foimdations of the earth shake. Tlie earth rending, is rent 
asunder; the earth bursting, is burst in pieces; the eart/i shaking, 
tottereth. The earth reeling, reeleth like a drunken man, and 
swingetit like a hammock ; and its burden of sin presseth upon it ; 
and it falleth, and riselh not again" The expression " Then I 
said" (cf. ch, vi. 5) stands here in the same apocalyptic con- 
nection as in Rev. v!i. 14, for example. He said it at that time 
in a state of ecstasy ; so that when he committed to writing 
what he had seen, the saying was a thing of the past. The 
final salvation follows a final judgment; and looking hack upon 
the latter, he bursts out into the exclamation of pain : rdiull, 
consumption, passing away, to me (see ch. x. 16, xvii. 4), i,e. I 
must perish {rdzi is a word of the same form as kdli, shdni, 
'dni; literally, it is a neuter adjective ^gnifying eimaciatu.m = 
mades; Ewald, § 749, g). He sees a dreadful, bloodthirsty 
people preying among both men and stores (compare ch. xxi. 2, 
xxxiii. 1, for the play upon the word with 1J3, root 1), cf. 
itevBetv Tiva ri, teete agere, i.e. from behind, treacherously, like 
assassins). The exclamation, "Horror, and pit," etc. (which 
Jeremiah applies in Jer. xlviii. 43, 44, to the destruction of 
Moab by the Chaldeans), is not an invocation, but simply a 
deeply agitated utterance of what is inevitable. In the pit and 
snare there is a comparison implied of men to game, and of the 
enemy to sportsmen (cf. Jer. xvi. 16, Lam. iv. 19 ; yiUdcBr, as 



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132 THE PBOFHBCIES OF ISAIAH. 

in cb. viii. 15, izviii. 13). The ?y in 1*?^ is exactly the same 
as in Judg. xvi. 9 (cf. Isa. xvj. 9). They who sliould flee as 
BOon as the horrible news arrived (mtn, as in ch. xxxiii. 3) wonld 
not escape destruction, bat would become victims to one form 
if not to another (the same thought which we find expressed 
twice in Amos v. 19, and still more fully in ch. ix. 1-4, as well 
as in a more dreadfully exalted tone). Observe, however, in 
how mysterious a background those human instruments of 
punishment remain, who are suggested by the word hogdim 
(robbers). The idea that the judgment is a durect act of 
Jehovah, stands in the foreground and governs the whole. 
For this reason it is described as a repetition of the flood (for 
the opened windows or trap-doors of the firmament, which let 
the great bodies of water above them come down from on high 
upon the earth, point back to Gen. vii. 11 and viii. 2, cf. Fs. 
Ixxviii. 23) ; and this indirectly implies its universality. It is 
also described as an earthquake. "The foundations of the 
earth" are the internal supports upon which the visible crust 
of the earth rests. The way in which tbe earth in its quaking 
first breaks, then bursts, and then falls, is painted for the ear 
by the three reflective forms in ver, 19, together with their 
gerundives, which keep each stage in the process of the cata- 
strophe vividly before the mind, fijfi b apparently an error of 
the pen for Jrt, if it is not indeed a n. actionis instead of the 
inf. absol. as in Hah. iii. 9. The accentuation, however, re- 
gards the ah as & toneless addition, and the form therefore as 
a gerundive (like kob in Num. sxiii. 25). The reflective form 
Jfjhnn ia not the liiihpalel of pil, vociferari, but the Hithpoel of 
S^ {yri), frangere. The threefold play upon the words would 
he tame, if the words themselves formed an anti-climax ; but it 
is really a eUmait aseendens. The earth first of all receives 
rents ; then gaping wide, it bursts asunder ; and finally sways 
to and fro once more, and falls. It is no longer possible for it 
to keep upright. Its wickedness presses it down like a burden 
(ch. i. 4 ; Ps. xxxviii. 5), so that it now reels for the last time 
like a drunken man (ch. xxviii. 7, xxix. 9), or a hammock (ch. 
L 8), until it falls never to rise again. 

But if the old earth passes away in this manner out of the 
system of the universe, the punishment of God must fall at the 
same time both upon the princes of heaven and upon the princes 



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CHAP. XXIV. £l-iS. 433 

of earth (the prophet does not arrange what belongs to the end 
of all things in a " chronotactic" manuer). They are the secrets 
of two worlds, that are here anveiled to the apocalyptic seer of 
the Old Testament. Vers. 21-23. " And it cometh to pass in 
that day, Jehovah will visit the army of tlie high place in ifte 
high place, and the kings of the earth on the earth. And they are 
imprisoned, as one imprisons captives in the pit, and shut up in 
prison; and in the course of many days t/iey are visited. And 
the moon blushes, and the sun turns pale : for Jehovah of hosts 
reigns royally upon Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, and before 
His elders is glory" With this doubly expressed antithesis of 
mdrOm and 'addmdh (cf. xxiii. 17^) before us, brought out as !t 
is as sharply as possible, we cannot understand " the army of 
the high place" as referring to certain earthly powers (as the 
Targum, Luther, Calvin, and Havemick do). Moreover, the 
expression itself is also opposed to such an interpretatiou ; for, 
as ver. 18 clearly shows, in which mimmdrom is equivalent to 
mitshdmaim (cf. ch. xxxiii. 5, xxxvii. 23, xl. 26), CflO »yi is 
synonymous with D'OB'n K2Vr; and this invariably signiGes either 
the starry host (ch. xl. 26) or tlie angelic host (1 Kings 
xxii, 19; Ps. cxlviii. 2), and occasionally the two combined, 
without any distinction (Neh. ix. 6). As the moon and sun 
are mentioned, it might he supposed that by the "host on 
high" we are to understand the angelic liost, as Abravanel, 
Umhreit, and others really do: " the stars, that have been made 
into idols, the shining kings of the sky, fall from their altars, 
and the kings of the earth from their thrones." But the very 
antithesis in the word " kings" {malchl) leads us to conjecture 
that "the host on high" refers to personal powers; and the 
view referred to founders on the more minute description of 
the visitation {pdkad 'al, as in ch. xxvii. 1, 3, cf. xxvi. 21), 
*' they are imprisoned," etc. ; for this must also be referred 
to the heavenly host. The objection might indeed be urged, 
that the imprisonment only relates to the kings, and that the 
visitation of the heavenly host finds its full expression in the 
eharaing of the moon and sun (ver. 23) ; but the fact that the 
mooD and sun are thrown into the shade by the revelation of 
the glory of Jehovah, cannot be regarded as a judgment in- 
flicted upon them. Hence the commentators are now pretty 
well agreed, that " the host on high" signifies here the angelic 
VOL. I. as 



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434 THE PROPEEOIES OF ISAIAK 

army. But it is self-evident, that a visitation of the angelic 
army cannot be merely a relative and partial one. And it ia 
not BufBcient to understand the passage as meaning the wicked 
angels, to the exclusion of the good. Both the context and 
the parallelism show that the reference must be to a penal 
visitation in the spiritnal world, which stands in the closest 
connection with the history of man, and in fact with the his- 
tory of the nations. Consequently the host on high will refer 
to the angels of the nations and kingdoms ; and the prophecy 
her© presupposes what is affirmed in Dent, xxxii. 8 (LXX.), 
and sustained in the book of Daniel, when it speaks of a tar of 
Persia, Javan, and even the people of Israel. Id accordance 
with this exposition, there is a rabbinical saying, to the effect 
that " God never destroys a nation without having first of all 
destroyed its prince," i.e. the angel who, by whatever means he 
first obtained possession of the nation, whether by the will of 
God or against His will, has exerted an ungodly influence upon 
it. Just as, according to the scriptural view, both good and evil 
angels attach themselves to particular men, and an elevated 
state of mind may sometimes afford a glimpse of this encircling 
company and this conflict of spirits ; so do angels contend for 
the rule over nations and kingdoms, either to guide them in 
the way of God or to lead them astray from God ; and there- 
fore the judgment upon the nations which the prophet here 
foretells will be a judgment upon angels also. The kingdom 
of spirits has its own histoiy running parallel to the destinies 
of men. What is recorded in Gen. vi. was a seduction of men 
by angels, and one of later occurrence than the temptation by 
Satan in paradise ; and the seduction of nations and kingdoms 
by the host of heaven, which is here presupposed by the pro- 
phecy of Isaiah, is later than either. Ver. 22a announces the 
preliminary punishment of both angelic and human princes: 
'asSphdh stands in the place of a gerundive, like taltiidh in 
ch. xxii. 17. The connection of the words 'asSpJtdh 'aseir is 
exactly the same as that of talteldh gdblr in ch. xxii. 17 : in- 
carceration after the manner of incarcerating prisoners ; 'dsaph, 
to gather together (ch. x. 14, xxxiii. 4), signifies here to incar- 
cerate, just as in Gen. xlii, 17. Both verbs are construed with 
'al, because the thrusting is from above downwards into the 
pit and prison (al embraces both upon or over anything, and 



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CHAF. xxtr. »-ss. 435 

into it, e.fr. 1 Sam. xxxi. 4, Job vi. 16; see Hitzig on Nah, 
iii. 12). "We may see from 2 Pet. ii. 4 and Jude 6 how this 
is to be understood. The reference is to the abyss of Hades, 
where they are reserved in chains of darkness unto the judg- 
ment of the great day. According to this parallel, yippdkedu 
(shall be visited) ought apparently to be understood as denot- 
ing a visitation in wrath (like ch. xxix. 6, Ezek. xxsviti. 8 ; 
compare pdkad followed by an accnsaUve in ch. xxvl. 21, also 
xxvi. 14, and Ps. lix. 6 ; niphkady in fact, is never used to 
signify visitation in mer<^), and therefore as referring to the 
infliction of the final punishment. Hitzig, however, under- 
stands it as relating to a visitation of mercy; and in this he 
is supported by Ewald, Knobel, and Luzzatto. Qesenius, 
Umbreit, and others, take it to indicate a tntation or summons, 
though without any ground either in usage of speech or actual 
custom. A comparison of ch. zxiii. 17 in its relation to ch. 
xxiii. 15^ favours the second explanation, as being relatively the 
most correct; but the expression is intentionally left ambiguous. 
So far as the thing itself is concerned, we have a parallel in 
Rev. XX. 1-3 and 7-9 : they are visited by being set free again, 
and commencing their old practice once more ; but only (as 
ver. 23 afBrms) to lose again directly, before the glorious and 
triumphant might of Jehovah, the power they have temporarily 
reacquired. What the apocalyptist of the New Testament 
describes in detail in Bev. xx. 4, xx. 11 sqq,, and xxi., the 
apocalyptist of the Old Testament sees here condensed into 
one fact, viz. the enthroning of Jehovah and His people in 
a new Jerusalem, at which the silvery white moon (lebdndh) 
turns red, and the glowing sun (chammdh) turns pale ; the two 
great lights of heaven becoming (according to a Jewish ex- 
pression) *' like a lamp at noonday" in the presence of such 
gloiy. Of the many parallels to ver. 23 which wo meet with 
in Isdah, the most worthy of note are ch. xi. 10 to the con- 
cluding clause, " and before His elders is glory" (also ch. 
iv. 5), and ch. i. 26 (cf. iii. 14), with reference to the use of 
tlie word zekSnim (elders). Other parallels are ch. xsx. 26, for 
ehammdih and lebdndh; cb. i. 29, for chdphSr and bOsh; ch. 
xxxiii. 22, for mdlai; ch. x. 12, for " Mount Zion and Jeru- 
salem." We have already spoken at cb. i. 16 of the word mged < 
' Cf. Targ., Saad., " they will come into Temembnnce Bgain.*' 



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436 TBE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

(Arab, at'gd, from ndgad,^^, to be exalted; titif. opp-Xe, to 

be pressed down, to sink), as applied to that which stands out 
prominently and clearly before one's eyes. According to 
Hofmsiin (SehriftheweU, i. 320-1), the elders here, like the 
twenty-four presbvieroi of the Apocalypse, are the sacred 
spirits, forming the council of God, to which He makes known 
His will concerning the world, before it is executed by His 
attendant spirits the angels. But as we find connseltors 
promised to the Israel of the new Jemsalem in ch. i. 26, tn 
contrast with the bad z'ksnim (elders) which it then possessed 
(cb. iii. 14), snch as it had at the glorious commencement of 
its history ; and as the passage before ns says essentially the 
same with regard to tbe zeksnim as we find in ch. iv, 5 with 
regard to the festal meetings of Israel (yid, ch. xxx. 20 and 
zxxii. 1) ; and still fmther, as Rer. xx. 4 (cf. Matt. xix. 28) is 
a more appropriate parallel to the passage before ns than Bev. 
iv. 4, we may assume with certainty, at least with regard to 
this passage, and without needing to come to any decision con- 
cerning Rev. iv. 4, that the i^kenim here are not angels, but 
human elders after God's own heart. These elders, being 
admitted into the immediate presence of God, and reigning 
together with Him, have nothing but glory in front of them, 
and they themselves reflect that glory. 

THE FOnKFOIJ> MELODIOUS ECHO. — CHAP. XXT. XXVI. 

A. Firatecho: Salvation of the naiions after Ike fall of iJte 
imperial city. — Chap. xxv. 1-8. 

There is not merely reflected glory, but reflected sound as 
well. The melodious echoes commence with ch. xxv. 1 sqq. 
The prophet, transported to the end of the days, commemorates 
what be has seen in psalms and songs. These psalms and 
songs not only repeat what has already been predicted; but, 
sinking into it, and drawing out of it, they partly expand it 
themselves, and partly prepare the way for its further extension. 

The first echo is ch. xxv, 1-8, or more precisely. ch. xxv, 1-5. 
The prophet, whom we already know as a psalmist from ch. xii., 
now acts as choral leader of the church of the future, and 



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CHAP. HT. 1-6. 43T 

praises Jehovah fm having destroyed the mighty imperial citv, 
and proved Himself a defence and shield against its tyranny 
towards His oppressed chnrch. Vers. 1-5. "Jehovah, Thou art 
my God; IwiU exalt Thee, I will praise Thy name, that Thouhatt 
wrought wonders, counsels from afar, sincerity, truth. For Thou 
hast turned it from a city into a heap of stones, the steep castle into a 
ruin; the palace of the barbarians from being a city, to be rebuilt no 
more for ever. Therefore a wild people will honour Thee, cities of 
violent nations fear Thee. For Thouprovedst Thyself a stronghold 
to the lowly, a stronghold to the poor in his distress, as a shelter 
from the storm of rain, as a shadow from the burning of the sun ; 
for the blast of violent ones was tike a storm of rain against a wall. 
lAke ike burning of Hie sun in a parched land, Thou subduest the 
noise of the barbarians; {like) the burning of the sun through the 
shadow of a cloud, the triumphal song of violent ones was brought 
low." The introductory clause is to be anderstood as in Ps. 
cxviii. 28 : Jehovah (voc), my God art Thou. " Thou hast 
wrought wonders :" this is taken from Ex. xr. 11 (as in Ps. 
Ixxvii. 15, Ixsviii. 12 ; like ch. xii. 2, from Ex. xv. 2). The 
wonders which are now actually wrought are " counsels from 
afar" {mSrdcliOk), counsels already adopted afar off, i.e, long 
before, thoughts of God belonging to the olden time ; the same 
ideal view as in ch. sxii. 11, xsxvii. 26 (a parallel which coincides 
with oar passage on every aide), and, in fact, throughout the 
whole of the second part. It is the manifold " counsel" of the 
Holy One of Israel (ch. v. 19, xiv. 24-27, xix. 12, 17, xxiii. 8, 
xxviii. 29) which displays its wonders in the events of time. 
To the verb n<^ we have also a second and third object, viz. 
|DK ^^OK. It is a common custom with Isaiah to place deriva- 
tives of the same word side by side, for the purpose of giving 
the greatest possible emphasis to the idea (ch. iii. 1, xvi. 6). 
nntsM indicates a quality, \o^ an actnal fact. What He has 
executed is the realization of His faithfulness, and the reality 
of His promises. The imperial city is destroyed. Jehovah, 
as the first clause which is defined by tzakeph affirms, has 
removed it away from the nature of a city into the condition 
of a heap of stones. The sentence has its object within itself, 
and merely gives prominence to the change that has been 
effected; the Lamed is used in the same sense as in ch. xxiii. 13 
(cf . xxxvii. 26) ; the mtn, as in ch. vii. 8, xvii. 1, xxiii. 1, xxiv, 10. 



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43S THE PBOPHECISS OF ISAIAB. 

MappBldk, with himetz or Uere before the' tone, la a word that 
can only be accredited from the book of Isaiah (ch. xvii. 1, 
xxiii. 13). 1'?, riTIP, and jIl^K are common parallel words in 
Isaiah (ch. i. 26, zxii. 2, xxxii. 13, 14) ; and zdrim, as in ch. 
i. 7 and xxix. 5, is the most general epithet for the enemies 
of the people of God. The fall of the imperial kingdom is 
followed hj the conversion of the heathen ; the songs proceed 
from the mouths of the remotest nations. Ver. 3 runs parallel 
with Rot. xv. 3, 4. Nations hitherto rude and passionate now 
submit to Jehorah with decorous reverence, and those that 
were previously oppressive ('arttetm, as in ch. xiii. 11, in form 
like pdritzim, ahdUahlm) with bumble fear. The caoae of this 
conversion of the heathen is the one thus briefly indicated in the 
Apocalypse, *' for thy judgments are made manifest" (Rev. sv. 
4). in and ll'3t( (at. ch.2iv. 30, xxix. 19) are names well known 
from the Psalms, aa applying to the church when oppressed. 
To this church, in the distress which she had endnred (p 1X3, 
as in ch. xxvi. 16, Isiii. 9, cf. xxxiii. 2), Jehovah had proved 
Himself a strong castle (md'Sz; on the expression, compare ch. 
xsx. 3), a shelter from storm and a shade from heat (for the 
figures, compare ch, iv, 6, xxxii. 2, xvi. 3), so that the blast of 
the tyrants (compare ruach in ch. xxx. 28, xxxiii. 11, Fs. Ixxvi. 
13) was like a wall-storm, i.e. a storm striking against a wall 
(compare ch. ix. 3, a shoulder-stick, i.e. a s^ck which strikes 
the shoulder), sounding against it and bursting upon it without 
being able to wash it away (ch. xxviii. 17 ; Pa. Ixii, 4), because 
it was the wall of a strong castle, and this strong castle was 
Jehovah Himself. As Jehovah can suddenly subdue the heat 
of the sun in dryness (Jtzdydn, abstract for concrete, aa in ch. 
xxxii. 2, equivalent to dry land, ch. xli. 18), and it must give 
way when He brings up a ahady thicket (Jer. iv. 29), namely 
of clouds (Ex, xix. 9 ; Pa. xviii. 12), so did He auddenly sub- 
due the thundering (sAd'on, as in ch. xvii. 12) of the hordes 
that stormed against His people; and the song of triumph 
{z&nlr, only met with again in Song of Sol. ii. 12) of the 
tyrants, which passed over the world like a scorching heat, was 
soon " brought low" (dndh, in its neuter radical signification 
" to bend," related to ^^3, as in ch. xxxi. 4). 

Thus the first hymnic echo dies sway; and the eschatolo^ca) 
prophecy, coming back to ch. xnv. 23, bat with deeper prayei^ 



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CHAT. XXV. 6-8. ' 439 

like penetration, proceeds thus in ver. 6 : " And Jehovah of 
hoate preparet for all naUona upon this mountain a feast of fat 
t/iinga, a feast ofviinea on the lees, of fat things rich in marrow, 
of wines on tlie lees thoroughly strained." " This mountain " is 
Zion, the seat of God's presence, and the place of His church's 
worship. The feast is therefore a spiritual one. The figure 
is taken, as in Fs. xxii. 27 sqq., from the sacrificial meals con- 
nected with the ehetdmim (the peace-offerings), Sh'mdrim 
m'stiktakim are wines which have been left to stand upon 
their lees after the first fermentation ia over, which have thus 
thoroughly fermented, and have been kept a long time (from 
thdmar, to keep, spec, to allow to ferment), and which are then 
filtered before drinking (GV. otvo^ aaxieia^, i^. tivKivfUvo^ or 
iifiQiKoi, from SirjSeiv, percolate), hence wine both strong and 
clear. Memuchdi/Jm might mean emedullaUB (" with the mar- 
row taken out ;" compare, perhaps^ Frov. xxxi. 3), but this 
could only apply to the bones,, not to the fat meat itself ; the 
meaning is therefore " mixed with marrow," made marrowy, 
medullosce. The thing symbolized in this way is the full en- 
joyment of blessedness in the perfected kingdom of God. The 
heathen are not only humbled so that they submit to Jeliovab, 
but they also take part in the blessedness of His church, and 
are abundantly satisfied with the good tilings of His house, and 
made to drink of pleasure as from a river (Ps. xxxvi. 9), The 
ring of the verse is inimitably pictorial, It is like joyful music 
to the heavenly feast. The more flexible form B'^nno (from 
the original, 'noD = nnoD) is intentionally chosen in the place 
of D^noD. It is as if we heard stringed instruments played 
with the most rapid movement of the bow. 

Although the feast is on earth, it is on an earth which has 
been transformed into heaven; for the party-wall between God 
and the world has fallen down : death is no more, and all tears 
are for ever wiped away. Vers. 7, 8. " And He casts away upon 
this mountain the veil that veiled over all peoples, and the covering 
tJtat covered over all nations, lie putt away death for ever; and 
the Lord Jehovah wipes the tear from every face ; and He removes 
the shame of His people from the whole eartli : for Jehovah hath 
spoken it." What Jehovah bestows is followed by what He 
puts away. The " veil " and " covering " (masslcdh, from 
tMsac = mdsdc, ch, xxii. S, from sdcac, to weav% twis^ aod 



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no THE PBOPBECIES OF tSAUH. 

twist over = to cover) are not symbols of mourning and afflic- 
tion, but of spiritual blindness, like the " veil " upon the heart 
of Israel mentioned in 2 Cor. iii. 15. The p*ne kallct (cf. Job 
xli. 5) it the upper side of the veil, the side turned towards 
you, by which Jehovah takes hold of the veil to lift It up. 
The second hallfft stands for D)>ri (Ges. $ 71, Anm. 1), and is 
written in this form, according to Isaiah's peculiar style (yid. 
ch. iv. 6, vii. 11, viii. 6, xxii. 13), merely for the sake of the 
sound, like the obscnrer niphal forms in ch. xxiv. 3. The only 
difference between the two nonns is this : in Ist the leading idea 
is that of the completeness of the covering, and in massScdh 
that of its thickness. The removing of the veil, as well as of 
death, is called ffp?, which we find applied to God in other 
passages, viz. ch. xix. 3, Pa. xxi. 10, Iv. 10. Swallowing up 
is used elsewhere as et^uivalent to making a thing disappear, by 
taking it into one's self ; but here, as in many other instances, 
the notion of receiving into one's self is dropped, and nothing 
remains but the idea of taking away, unless, indeed, abolish- 
ing of death may perhaps be regarded as taking it back into 
what hell shows to be the eternal principle of wrath out of 
which God called it forth. God will abolish death, so that 
there shall be no trace left of its former sway. Paul gives 
a free rendering of this passage in 1 Cor. xv. 54, Kareiro&ij 6 
QatiaTOi el^ vucos (after the Aramsean n'tzach, vincere). The 
Syriac combines both ideas, that of the Xargum and that of 
Paul : abaorpla ett mors per victoriam in serripUemum. But the 
abolition of death is not in itself the perfection of blessednras. 
There are sufferings which force out a sigh, even after death 
has come as a deliverance. But all these sufferings, whose 
ultimate ground is sin, Jehovah sweeps away. There is some- 
thing very significant in the use of the expression ^p^ (a 
tear), which the Apocalypse renders wav Sdxpvov (Bev. xxi. 4). 
Wherever there is a tear on any face whatever, Jehovah wipes 
it away ; and if Jehovah wipes away, this must be done most 
thoroughly : He removes the cause with the outward symptom, 
the sin as well as the tear. It is self-evident that this applies 
to the church triumphant. The world has been judged, and 
what was salvable has been saved. There is therefore no more 
shame for the people of God. Over the whole earth there is 
no farther place to be found for this ; Jehorah has taken it 



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CHAP. XXT. 9-11. 441 

kwaj. The earth is therefore a holy dwelling-place for hieased 
men. The Dew Jernsalem is Jehovah's throne, bat the whole 
earth is Jehovah's glorious kingdom. The prophet is here 
looking from just the same point of view as Fanl in 1 Cor. 
XV. 28, and John in the last page of the Apocalypse. 

B. Second eeho: The humiliation of Moah. — Chap. xxr. 9-12. 

After this prophetic section, which follows the first melo- 
dioQs echo like an interpolated recitative, the song of praise 
begins again; bat it is soon deflected into the tone of pro- 
phecy. The shame of the people of God, mentioned in ver. 8, 
recals to mind the special enemies of the church in its imme- 
diate neighbonrhood, who conld not tyrannize over it indeed, 
like the empire of the world, hot who nevertheless scoffed at 
it and persecuted it. The representative and emblem of these 
foes are the prond and boas^g Moab (ch. zvi. 6 ; Jer. 
xlviii. 39). All such attempts as that of Knobel to turn this 
into history are but so much lost trouble. Moab is a mystic 
name. It is the prediction of the hamiliation of Moab in this 
spiritual sense, for which the second echo opens the way by 
celebrating Jehovah's appearing. Jehovah is now in His 
manifested presence the conqueror of death, the drier of tears, 
the saviour of the honotu: of His oppressed church. Ver. 9. 
*' And they lay in that day, Behold our God, for whom we 
waited to help us: this is Jehovah, for wJiom we waited; let us be 
ghd and rejoice in Hit salvation." The undefined but self- 
evident subject to v'dmar ("they say") is the church of the 
last days. "Behold:" hitmlh and zeh belong to one another, 
as in ch. xxi. 9. The waiting may be understood as implying 
a retrospective glance at all the remote past, even as far back 
as Jacob's saying, *' I wait for Thy salvation, O Jehovah " 
(Gen. xlix. 18). The appeal, "Let us be glad," etc., has 
passed over into the grand hodu of Ps. cxviii. 24. 

In the land of promise there is rejoicing, but on the other 
side of the Jordan there is fear of ruin. Two contrasted pic- 
tures are placed here side by side. The Jordan is the same as 
the " great gulf " in the parable of the rich man. Upon Zioti 
Jehovah descends in mercy, but upon the highlands of Moab 
in His wrath. Vers. 10-12. "For the hand of Jehovah udll 
sink down upon this mountain, and Moab it trodden down tJtere 



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442 TBE PBOFHECtES OF ISAIAH. 

where it is, a* gtram is trodden domn in the water of the dung-pit 
And he spreadetii out his Itands in the pool therein, as the swimmer 
tpreadeth them out to »unm ; but JehovaJi foreeth down the pride 
of Moab in spite of the artifices of his hands. Yea, thy ste^, 
towering walls He bows down, forces under, and casta earthwardt 
into dust." Jehovah brings down His hand apon Zion (niUush, 
as in ch. vii. 2, xi. 1), not only to shelter, but also to avenge. 
Israel, that has been despised, He now makes glorious, and for 
contemptaoos Moab He prepares a shameful end. In the place 
where it now is (I'PI'W, as in 2 Sam. vii, 10, Hab. iii. 16, " in 
its own place," its own land) it is threshed down, stamped or 
trodden down, as straw is trodden down into a dung-pit to turn 
it into manure : hidduah, the inf. constr., with the vowel sound 
u, possibly to distinguish it from the inf. absol. hiddosh (Ewald, 
§ 240, b). Instead of loa (aa in ch. xliii. 2), the chethib has 
'03 (cf. Job ix. 30) ; and this is probably the more correct 
reading, since madmlndh, hy itself, means the dunghill, and 
not the tank of dung water. At the same time, it is quite pos- 
sible that Vmo is intended as a play upon the name Moab, just 
as the word madmlndh may possibly hare been chosen with a 
play upon the Moabitish Madtngn (Jer. xlviii. 2). In ver. 11 
Jehovah would he the subject, if Vkirbo (in the midst of it) 
referred back to Moab ; but although the figure of Jehovah 
pressing down the pride of Moab, by spreading out His hands 
within it like a swimmer, might produce the impression of 
boldness and dignity in a different connection, yet here, where 
Moab has just been described as forced down into the manure- 
pit, the comparison of Jehovah to a swimmer would be a very 
offensive one. The swimmer is Moab itself, as Gesenius, Hitzig, 
Knobel, and in fact the majority of commentators suppose. 
" In the midst of it :" b'Hrbo points back in a neuter sense to 
the place into which Moab had been violently plunged, and 
which was so little adapted for svrimming. A man cannot 
Bwim in a manure pond ; but Moab attempts it, though without 
success, for Jehovah presses down the pride of Moalj in spite 
of its artifices (D?, as in Neb. v, 18 ; nijnw, written with dagesk 
according to the majority of Mss., from fi3lK, like the Arabic 
urbe, irbe, cleverness, wit, sharpness), i.e. the skilful and canning 
movement of its hands. Saad. gives it correctly, as muehdtale, 
wiles and stratagems ; Hitzig also renders it " machinations," 



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CHAP. XSVL 1, S. 443 

1^. twistings and tnrnings, which Moab makes with its arms, 
for the purpose of keeping itself up in the water. What ver. 
11 affirms in figure, ver. 12 illustrates without any figure. If 
the reading were T^V?D niDln 2ato, the reference would be to 
Kir-Moab (ch. xv. 1, xvi. 7). But aa the text stands, we are 
evidently to understand by it the strong and lofty walls of the 
cities of Moab in general. 

C. Third echo : Israel hrought hack, or raised from the dead. — 
Chap. zxvi. 

Thos the second hymnic echo has its confirmation in a 
prophecy against Moab, on the basis of which a third hymnic 
echo now arises. Whilst on the other side, in the land of Moab, 
the people are trodden down, and its lofty castles demolished, 
the people in the land of Judah can boast of an impregnable 
dty. Ver. 1. " /n that day will this song be sung in the land of 
Judah, : A citj/ of defence w cure ; salvation He sets for walla 
and bulwari" According to the punctuation, thb ought to be 
rendered, " A city is a shelter for us ;" but Til Ty seem rather 
to be connected, according to Prov. xvii. 19, *' a city of strong, 
i.e. of impregnable offence and defence." The subject of n'PJ 
is Jehovah. The future indicates what He is constantly doing, 
and ever doing afresh ; for the waljs and bulwarks of Jem- - 
salem (chil^ as in Lam. ii. 8, the small outside wall which 
encloses all the fortifications) are not dead stone, but yeshudh, 
ever living and never exhausted salvation (ch. Ix. 18). In just 
the same sense Jehovah is called elsewhere the wall of Jeru- 
salem, and even a wall of fire in Zech. ii. 9, — parallels which 
show that yeshudh is intended to be taken as the accusative of 
the object, and not as the accusative of the predicate, according 
to ch. V. 6, Pa. xxi. 7, Ixxxiv. 7, Jer. xxii, 6 (Luzzatto). 

In ver. 1 this city is thought of as still empty : for, like 
paradise, in which man was placed, it is first of all a creation 
of God ; and hence the exclamation in ver. 2 ; " Open ye the 
gates, that a righteous people may enter, one keeping truthfulness." 
The cry is a heavenly one ; and those who open, if indeed we 
are at liberty to inquire who they are, must be angels. We 
recal to mind Fs. zxiv., but the scene is a different one. The 
author of Ps. cxviii. has given individuality to this passage in 
vers. 19, 20. Goi tzaddii (a righteous nation) is ^e church 



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441 THB PB0PHZCIE8 OF tSAUB. 

of the righteous, as in ch. xxiv. 16. Got (nation) is used Leie, 
aa in ver. 15 and ch. a. 2 (cf. p. 80), with reference to Israel, 
which has now by grace become a righteoos nation, and has 
been established in covenant trath towards GK>d, who keepeth 
truth (^emunim, from 'BmUn, Ps. xzxi. 24). 

The relation of Israel and Jehovah to one another is now 
a permanent one. Ver. 3. " Tlwu keepest the jirmly-eilahlished 
mind in peace, peace ; /or his confidence resU on Thee." A gnome 
(borrowed in Ps. cxii. 7, 8), but in a lyrical connection, and with 
a distinct reference to the church of the last days. There is no 
necessity to take ^dd ir as standing for "i^. ipOD, as Knobel 
does. The state of mind is mentioned here as designating the 
person posaesang it, according to his inmost nature, lyi (the 
mind) is the whole attitude and habit of a man as inwardly 
constituted, i.e, aa a being capable of thought and will. TpOD 
is the same, regarded as having a firm hold in itself, and this 
it has whenever it has a firm hold on God (ch. x. 20). This 
is the mind of the new Israel, and Jehovah keeps it, shdhm, 
ihdlom (peace, peace ; accusative predicates, nsed in the place 
of a consequential clause), i.e, so that deep and constant peace 
abides therein (Phil. iv. 7). Such a mind is thus kept by 
Jehovah, because its trust is placed in Jehovah. fTiD3 refers 
to "^..i according to Ewald, § 149, d, and is therefore equivalent 
to KW niD3 (cf. Ps. vii. 10, Iv. 20), the passive participle, like 
the Latin confims, frettu. To hang on God, or to be tlioronghly 
devoted to Him, secures both stability and peace. 

A cry goes forth again, as if from heaven, exhorting Israel 
to continue in this mind. Ver. 4. " ffang confidenthf on Je- 
Aooo/i for ever: for in Jah, Jehovah, w an everlasting rock" 
The combination Jah Jehovah u only met with here and in 
ch. zii. 2. It is the proper name of God the ttedeemer in 
the most emphatic form. The Beth essentite frequently stands 
before the predicate (Ges. § 151, 3) ; here, however, it stands 
before the subject, as in Ps. Ixviii. 5, Iv. 19. In Jah Jehovah 
(munach, tzak^h) there is an everlasting rock, i.e. He is essen- 
tially snch a rock (compare Dent, xxxii. 4, like Ex. xv. 2 for 
ch. xii. 2). 

He has already proved Himself to be such a rock, on which 
everything breaks that would attack the faithful whom He sur- 
rounds. Vers. 5, 6. " For He hath bent down them that dwell 



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OHAF. XXTL S-S. 445 

on high; the towerii^ eaitU, Be tore U down, tore it down to 
tJu earth, east & into diut. The foot treade it to piecet, feet 
of the poor, stept of the lowly'' Passing beyond the fall of 
Moab, the fall of the imperial city is . celebrated, to trhich 
Moab was only an annex (ch. xxr. 1, 2, xdv. 10-12). The 
futures are determined by the preterite ; and the anadiplomy 
which in other instances {e.g. ch. xxv. 1, cf. Ps. cxriii. 11) 
links together derivatives or variations of form, is satisfied 
in this instance with clianging the forms of the snfBx. The 
second thonght of ver. 6 is a more emphatic repetition of the 
first : it is trodden down ; the oppression of those who hare 
been hitherto oppressed is trodden down. 

The righteous, who go astray according to the judgment of 
the world, thus arrive at a goal from which their way appears 
in a very different light. Ver. 7. ** The path that the righteoue 
man takes ts emoothnesi ; Thou makeat the course of the rigldeoue 
smooth." ^f*^ is an accusative predicate : Thou rollest it, i.e. 
Thou smoothest it, so that it is just as if it had been bevelled 
with a rule, and leads quite straight (on the derivative peles, a 
level, see at Job xxxvii. 16) and without interruption to the 
desired end. The song has here fallen into the language of a 
mashal of Solomon (vtd. Prov. iv. 26, v. 6, 21). It pauses here 
to reflect, as if at the close of a strophe. 

It then commences again in a lyrical tone in vers. 8 and 9 : 
" We have also waited for Thee, that TIiou shouldest come in the 
path of Thy judgments ; the desire of the soul went after Thy 
name, and after Thy remembrance, WUh my soul I desired 
Thee in the night; yea, with my spirit deep within me, I longed 
to have Thee here : for when Thy judgments strike the earth, the 
inhabitants of the earth learn righteousness^ In the opinion of 
Hitzig, Knobel, Drechsler, and others, the prophet here comes 
back from the ideal to the actual present. But this is not the 
case. The church of the last days, looking back to the past, 
declares with what longing it has waited for that manifesta- 
tion of the righteousness of God which has now taken place. 
" The path of Thy judgments : " 'orach mishpdtekd belongs 
to the te ; venietUem (or venturum) being understood. The 
clause follows the poetical construction fTiK Kl3, after the ana- 
logy of TJ^ ^rt. They longed for God to come as a Bedeemer 
in the way of His judgments. The " name" and " remem- 



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446 THE PBOPHECIZS 07 ISAUH. 

brence" are the natare of God, that has become nameable 
and memorable through self-aasertion and self-manifestadon 
(Ex. iii. 15). They desired that God shoold present Himself 
■gain to the cooscionsness and memory of man, by such an act 
as should break throngh His concealment and silence. The 
prophet says this more especiallj of himself; for he feels him- 
Belf " in spirit" to be a member of the perfected charch. " Mj 
soul" and " my spirit" are accosatives giving a more preciee 
definition (Ewald, § 281, e). ** Tlu night" is the night of 
affliction, as in ch. xn. 11. In connection with this, the word 
ahiehir (lit. to dig for a thing to seek it eagerly) is employed 
here, with a play apon ehtKhar, The dawning of the mtHning 
after a night of suffering was the object for which he longed, 
naphthi (my sonl), i.e. with his entire personality (Pgyckol. p- 
202), and ruehi b'kirbi (my spirit within me), i.e. with the sfniit 
of his mind, irvevfia rov voo^ (Ptychol. p. 183). And wbyt 
Because, as often as God manifested Himself in jadgmen^ 
this brought men to the knowledge and possibly also to the 
recognition, of what was right (cf. Ps. ix. 17). ** WiU Uam:' 
Idmdu is a prcet. gnomieum, givbg the result of much practical 
experience. 

Here again the thlr has struck the note of a mashdl. And 
proceeding in this tone, it pauses here once more to reflect as 
at the close of a strophe. Ver. 10. "I/foDOur it thown to Ot 
vncked man, he does not learn righteousness ; in the most vpriglii 
land he acts wickedly, and has no eye for the majesty of Jehovah- 
pen |rp js a hypothetical clause, which is left to be indicated by 
the emphasis, like Neh. i. 8 (Ewald, § 357, b) : granting that 
favour (cA5n = " goodness," Bom. ii. A) is constantly shown to 
the wicked man. "The most vpright land:" 'eretz tieeochoA 
is a land in which everything is right, and all goes hononrablf- 
A worthless man, supposing he were in such a land, would still 
act knavishly; and of the majesty of Jehovah, showing itself 
in passing punishments of sin, though still sparing bin), he 
would have no perception whatever. The prophet utters this 
with a painful feeling of indignation ; the word 6al indicating 
denial with emotion. 

The situation still remains essentially the same in vers. 
11-13 : "Jehovah, Thy hand has been exalted, hut they didf^ 
see; they will see the seal for a people, being put to shame; j/w, 



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CHAP. XXVL 11-18. '447 

firt aill devour Thine adversaries, Jehovah, Thou wilt establish 
peace for us : for Thou hast accomplished all our work for us. 
Jehovah our God, lords besides Thee had enslaved us ; but 
through Thee we praise Thy name" Here are three forms of 
address beginning with Jehovali, and rising in the third to 
" Jehovah our God," The standpoint of the first is the tirae 
before the judgment ; the standpoint of the other two is in the 
midst of the redemption that has been effected through judg- 
ment. Hence what the prophet states in ver. 11 wil' be a 
general truth, which has now received its most splendid con- 
firmation through the overthrow of the empire. The complaint 
of the prophet here is the same as in ch. liii. 1. We may also 
compare Ex. xiv. 8, not Ps. x, 5; {ram does not mean to 
remain beyond and unrecognised, but to prove one's self to be 
high.) The hand of Jehovah had already shown itself to be 
highly exalted (rdmdh, 3 pr.), by manifesting itself in the 
history of the nations, by sheltering His congregation, and 
preparing the way for its exaltation in the midst of its humi- 
liation ; but as they had no eye for this hand, they would be 
made to feel it upon themselves as the avenger of His nation. 
The " zeal for a people," when reduced from this ideal expres- 
sion into a concrete one, is the zeal of Jehovah of hosts (ch. ix. 
6, xsxvii. 32) for His own nation (as in ch. xlix. 8). Kin'cUh 
'dm (zeal for a people) is the object to yechezu (they shall 
see) ; v'ySbSshu (and be put to shame) being a parenthetical 
interpolation, which does not interfere with this connection. 
" Thou wilt establish peace" {tishpSt sftdlom, ver. 12) expresses 
the certain hope of a future and imperturbable state of peace 
(pones, stabilies) ; and this hope is founded upon the fact, that 
all which the church has hitherto accomplished (ma'aseh, the 
acting out of its calling, as in Ps. xc. 17, see at ch. v. 12) has 
not been its own work, but the work of Jehovah for it. And 
the deliverance just obtained from the yoke of the imperial 
power is the work of Jehovah also. The meaning of the 
' complaint, " other lords beside Thee had enslaved us," is just 
the same as that in ch. Ixiii. 18 ; but there the standpoint is in 
the midst of the thing complained of, whereas here it is beyond 
it. Jehovah is Israel's King. He seemed indeed to have lost 
His rule, since the masters of the world had done as they liked 
with IsraeL But it was very different now, and it was only 



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448 THE FSOFHECIBS OF ISAIAH. 

tbrongh Jehovah (" throngh Tliee") that Israel could now once 
more gratefully celebrate Jehovah's name. 

The tyrants who usmrped the rule over Israel have now 
utterly disappeared. Yer. 14. " Dead m«n live not again^ ahadta 
do not rite again : so hatt Thou visited and deetroyed them, and 
caused all their memory to perith." The meaning is not that 
Jehovah had put them to death because there was no resor- 
rection at all after death ^ for, as we shall see further on, the 
prophet was acqamnted with such a resurrection. In meihim 
(dead men) and rephd'im (shades) he had directly in mind the 
oppressors of Israel, who had been thrust down into the region 
of the shades (like the king of Babylon in ch, siv.), so that 
there was no possibility of their being rused up or setting 
themselves up again. The 1^7 is not argumentative (which 
would be very freezing in this highly lyrical connectioa), but 
introduces what must have occurred eo ipto when the otbei' 
had taken place (it corresponds to the Greek apa, and is used 
here in the same way as in ch. Ixi. 7, Jer. v. 2, ii. 33, Zech. 
xi. 7, Job xxxiv. 25, xlii. 3). They had fallen irrevocably 
into Sheol (Ps. zliz. 15), and consequently God had swept 
them away, so that not even their name was perpetuated. 

Israel, when it has such cause as this for praising Jehovah, 
will have become a numerous people once more. Yer. 15, 
" Thou hast added to the nation, Jehovah, hatt added to the 
nation; glorified Thyeelf; moved out all the borders of the landT 
The verb ^DJ, which is construed in other cases with ?¥, ?K, 
here with ?, carries its object within itself : to add, i.e. to give 
an increase. The allusion is to the same thing as that which 
caused the prophet to rejoice in ch. ix. 2 (compare ch. xlix. 
19, 20, liv. 1 sqq., Mic. ii. 12, iv. 7, Obad. 19, 20, and 
many other passages; and for ricK^itd, more especially Mic. 
vii. 11). Just as ver. 13 recals the bondage in Egypt, and 
ver. 14 the destruction of Pharaoh in the Bed Sea, so ver. 16 
recals the numerical strength of the nation, and the extent 
of the conntry in the time of David and Solomon. At the - 
same time, we cannot say that the prophet intended to recal 
these to mind. The antitypical relation, in which the last 
times stand to these events and circumstances of the past, is 
a fact in sacred history, though not particularly referred to 
here. 



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CHAP. xivi. ia-18. 449 

Tlie ttpMlldh now returns to tlie retrospective glance already 
cast in vers. 8, 9 into that night of afSictioo, which preceded the 
redemption that had come. Vers. 16-18. " Jehovah, in trouble 
tJtetf missed Thee, poured out light ntppUcation when Thy chas- 
tisement came upon tJtem. As a woman vdth child, who draws 
near to her delivery, writhes and cries out in her pangs, so were 
we in Thy sight, JehovaJu We went with child, we writhed; 
it was as if we brought forth wind. We- brought no deliverance 
to the land, and the inhainitmts of the world did not come to the 
UgM" The Eubstantive drcumstantial clause in the parallel 
l^e, ^13? 11Q^t3« eastigatione tua eos affligente (? as in ver. 9), 
corresponds to "W?; and E'n? pps, a preterite (FlX=py, Job 
axviii. 2, zxix. 6, to be poured out and tnelt awaj) with iVun 
paragogic (which is only met with again in Dent, viii. 3, 16, 
the yekoshun in Isa. xxix, 21 being, according to the syntax, 
the future of hosh), answers to pdkad, wiiiph is used here as in 
ch. xxziv. 16, 1 Sam. XX. 6, xxv. 15, in the sense of Ivstrando 
desiderare. Lachath is a quiet, whispering prayer (like the 
whispering of forms of incantation in ch. iii. 3) ; sorrow ren- 
ders speechless in the long ran ; and a consciousness of sin 
crushes so completely, that a man does not dare to address God 
alond (cl). xxix. 4). Pregnancy and pangs are symbols of a 
state of expectation strained to the utmost, the object of which 
appears all the closer the more the pains increase. Often, says 
the perfected church, as it looks back upon its past history, 
often did we regard the coming of salvation as ceitain ; but 
again and again were our ht^s deceived. The first tos b 
equivalent to 3, *'o» a woman with child," etc. (see at ch. 
viii. 23) s the second is equivalent to iBJia, " as it were, we 
brought forth wind." This is not an inverted expression, sig- 
nifying we bronght forth as it were wind; but ^03 governs 
the whole sentence in the sense of " (it was) as if." The issue 
of all their painful toil was like the result of a false pregnancy 
{empneumatonis), a delivery of wind. This state of things also 
proceeded from Jehovah, as the expression "before Thee" 
implies. It was a consequence of the sins of Israel, and of a 
continued want of true susceptibility to the blessings of salva- 
tion. Side by side with their disappointed hope, ver. 18 places 
the ineffectnal character of their own efforts. Israel's own 
doings, — no, they could never make the land into TiSW* {i.e. 

\OL. 1. 2 p 



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450 THE PBOPHEOIES OF ISAIAH. 

bring it iDto a state of complete salvation) ; and (bo might th« 
final clause be understood) tbey waited in vain for the judg- 
ment of Jehovah upon the sinful world that was at enmity 
against them, or they made ineffectnal efforts to overcome it. 
This explanation is favoured by the fact, that throughout the 
whole of this cycle of prophecies yOshbS tsbel does not mean 
the inhabitants of the holy land, but of the globe at large in 
the sense of " the world " (ver. 21, ch. xxiv. 5, 6). Again, 
the relation of '0& to the VBR in ver. 19, and the figure pre- 
viously employed of the pains of child-birth, speak most 
strongly in favour of the conclusion, that wdphal is here used 
for the fallmg of the froit of the womb (cf. Wisd. vii. 3, 11. 
adx. 110, AMToweo-eu' and Tretreiv). And yoshhs tshel (the in- 
habitants of the world) fits in with this sense (viz. that the 
expected increase of the population never came), from the 
fact that in this instance the reference is not to the inhabitants 
of the earth ; but the words signify inhabitants generally, or, 
as we should say, young, new-born " mortals." The pnnish- 
ment of the land under the weight of the empire still con- 
tinued, and a new generation did not come to the light of day 
to populate the desolate land (cf. Psychol, p. 414), 

But now all this had taken place. Instead of singing what 
has occurred, the tepldllah .places itself in the midst of the 
occurrence itself. Ver. 19. *' Thy dead will live, my corpgea 
rise again. Awake and rejoice, ye that Ue in the dutt I For thy 
dew is dew of tJie lights, and the earth wilt bring shades to the 
day." The prophet speaks thus out of the heart of the church 
of the last times. In consequence of the long-continued suffer- 
ings and chastisements, it has been melted down to a very small 
remnant ; and many of those whom it could once truly reckon 
as its own, are now lying as corpses in the dust of the grave. 
The church, filled with hope which will not be put to shame, 
now calls to itself, "Thy dead will live" (1^? ^^^\, reviviscentj 
as in O'nart n;riri, the resurrection of the dead), and consoles 
itself with the working of divine grace and power, which is 
even now setting itself in motion : " my corpses will rise again " 
(po^ ^nj^^, nebelah : a word without a plural, but frequently 
used in a plural sense, as in ch. v. 25, and therefore connected 
with PDp'_, equivalent to njpi)ri : here before a light suffix, witli 
the < retained, which is lost in other cases). It also cries out^ 



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CHAP. XZTL 19. 451 

in full aqsnmice of the purpose of God, the believing word 
of commaDd over the burial-groand of the dead, " Wake up 
and rejoice, ye that sleep in the dust," and then justifies to 
itself this believing word of command by looking up to Jehovah, 
and confessing, " Thy dew is dew bom ont of (supernatural) 
lights," as the dew of nature is bom out of the womb of the 
morning dawn (Ps. ex. 3). Others render it " dew upon 
herbs," taking nhlN as equivalent to llpn^, as in 2 Kings iv. 39, 
We take it as from rrilK (Pa. csxxix. 12.), in the sense of 
D'^nn "liK. The plural implies that there is a perfect fulness 
of the lighta of life in God (" the Father of lights," Jas. i. 17). 
Ont of these there ia bora the gentle dew, which gives new life 
to the bones that have been sown in the ground (Ps, cxli, 7), — 
a 6gure full of mystery, which is quite needlessly wiped away 
by Hofmann's explanation, viz. that it is equivalent to tal 
hSrOt/t, " dew of thorough saturating." Luther, who renders 
it, " Thy dew is a dew of the green field," stands alone among 
the earlier translators. The Targnm, Syriac, Vulgate, and 
Saad. all render it, "Thy dew is light dew;" and with the 
uniform connection in which the Scriptures place 'or (light) 
and ekayyim (life), this rendering is natural enough. We now 
translate still further, " and the earth {yd'dretz, as in ch. Izv. 17, 
Prov. XXV. 3, whereas pKI is almost always in the constmct 
state) will bring shades to the day" (hippil, as a causative of 
ndphal, ver. 18), i.e, bring forth again the dead that have 
sunken into it (like Luther's rendering, "and the laud will 
cast ont the dead" — ^^the rendering of our English version also : 
Tb.). The dew from the glory of God falls like a. heavenly 
seed into the bosom of the earth ; and in consequence of this, the 
earth gives ont from itself the shades which have hitherto been 
held fast beneath the ground, so that they appear alive again 
on the surface of the earth. Those who understand ver. 18 as 
relating to the earnestly descried overthrow of the lords of the 
world, interpret this passage accordingly, as meaning either, 
" and thon caatest down shades to the earth" (px, ace. loci, 
= p«~iy, ver. 5, ptA, ch. xxv. 12), or, "and the earth causeth 
shades to fall," i.e. to fall into itself. This is Rosenmiiller's 
explanation (terra per prosopopaeiarn, ut supra xxiv, 20, indiicta, 
deturbare m orcum siatitur impioe, eo ipso manes eos reddens). 
But although rephaim, when eo interpreted, agrees with ver. 



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453 TBE PBOFBECUS OF ISAIAH. 

14, wliere this name is ^ven to the oppressors of the people of 
God, it would be out of place here, where it would necessarily 
meaD, " tliose who are just becoming shades." But, what is of 
greater importance still, if this concluding clause is understood 
as applying to the overthrow of the oppressors, it does not give 
any natural sequence to the words, " dew of the lights is thy 
dew ;" whereas, according to our interpretation, it seals the 
faith, hope, and prayer of the church for what is to follow. 
When compared with the New Testament Apocalypse, it is 
" the firat resurrection " which is here predicted by Baiah. 
The confessors of Jehovah are awakened in their graves to 
form one glorious church with those who are still in the body. 
Id the case of Ezekiel also (Ez. xsxvii. 1-14), the resurrection 
of the dead which he beholds is something more than a figurative 
representation of the people that were buried in captivity. The 
church of the period of glory on this side is a church of those 
who have been miraculously saved and wakened up from the 
dead. Their persecutors lie at their feet beneath the ground. 

The judgment upon them is not mentioned, indeed, till 
after the completion of the church through those of its mem- 
bers that have died, although it must have actually preceded 
the latter. Thus the standpoint of the prophecy is incessantly 
oscillating backwards and forwards in these four chapters 
(xxiv.-xxvii.). This explains the exhortation in the next verses, 
and the reason assigned. Vers. 20, 21. " Go in, my people, 
into thy chambers, and ihut the door behind thee ; hide Hiyself a 
little moment, till the judgtnent of vrath passes by. For, be/iold, 
Jehovah goeth oiU from Hie place to visit the iniquity of the ui- 
habitants of the earth upon them ; and the earth discloses tlie blood 
that it has sucked up, and no more covers her slaijt." The sklr 
is now at an end. The prophet speaks once more as a prophet. 
Whilst the judgment of wrath {za'am) is going forth, and until 
it shall have passed by (on ihefut, exact., see ch. x. 12, iv. 4 ; 
and on the fact itself, acltarith kazza'am, Dan. viii. 19), the 
people of God are to continue in the solitude of prayer (Matt. 
vi. 6, cf. Ps. xxvii. 5, xxxi. 21). They can do so, for the 
judgment by which they get rid of their foes is the act of 
Jehovah alone ; and they are to do so because only be who is 
hidden in God by prayer can escape the wrath. The judgment 
only lasts a little while (ch. x. 24, 25, liv. 7, 8, cf. Ps. xxx. 6), 



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CHAP. XXTIL L ibS 

a short time which ia shortened for the elect's sake. Instead 
of the dual 'V^(\ (as the house-door is called, though not the 
chamber-door), the word is pointed Vl>^, (from hth = nS), just 
as the prophet intentionally chooses the feminine *^ instead 
of ^t!> The nation is thought of as feminine in this particular 
instance (cf. ch. liv. 7, 8) ; because Jehovah, ita avenger and 
protector, is acting on its behalf, whilst in a purely passive 
attitude it hides itself in Him. Just as Noah, behind whom 
Jehovah shut the door of the ark, was hidden in the ark whilst 
the water-floods of the judgment poured down without, so 
should the church be shut off from the world without in its life 
of prayer, because a judgment of Jehovah was at hand. " He 
goeth out of His place" (verbatim the same as in Mic. i. 3), 
i.e, not out of His own divine life, as it rests witliin Himself, 
but out of the sphere of the manifested glory in which He 
presents Himself to the spirits. He goeth forth thence equipped 
for judgment, to visit the iniquity of the inhabitant of the earth 
upon him (the singular used collectively), and more especially 
their blood- guiltiness. The prohibition of murder was pven to 
the sons of Noah, and therefore was one of the stipulations of 
" the covenant of old " (ch. xxiv. 5). The earth supplies two 
witnesses : (1) the innocent blood which has been violently shed 
(on ddmim, see ch. i. 15), wbicb she has bad to suck up, and 
which is now exposed, and cries for vengeance ; and (2) the 
persons themselves who have been murdered in their innocence, 
and who are slumbering within her. Streams of blood come 
to light and bear testimony, and martyrs arise to bear witness 
against their murderers. 

Upon whom the judgment of Jehovah particularly falls, 
is described in figurative and enigmatical words in ch. xxvii. 
1 : "In that day will Jehovah visit teith His sword, with the 
hard, and the great, and the strong, leviathan tlie fleet serpent, 
and leviatlum the twisted serpent, and slay the dragon in the 
sea." No doubt the three animals are emblems of three im- 
perial powers. The assertion that there are no more three 
animals than there are three swords, is a mistake. If the 
preposition were repeated in the case of the swords, as it is 
in the case of the animals, we should have to understand the 
passage as referring to three swords as well as three animals. 
But this is not the case. We have therefore to inquire what 



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454 THE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

the three world-powers are ; and this question ts quite a justi- 
fiable one: for we have no reason to rest satisfied with the 
opinion held by Brechsler, that the three emblems are symbols 
of ungodly powers in general, of every kind and every sphere, 
unless the question itself is absolutely unanswerable. Now 
the tannin (the stretcbed-out aquatic animal) is the stand- 
ing emblem of Egypt (ch. li. 9; Ps. Ixxiv. 13; Ezek. xxix. 
3, zxxii, 2). And as the Euphrates-land and Asshur are 
mentioned in vers. 12, 13 in connection with Egypt, it ia 
immediately probable that the other two animals signify the 
kingdom of the Tigris, Le. Assyria, with its capital Nineveh 
which stood on the Tigris, and the kingdom of the Euphrates, 
i.e. Chaldea, with its capital Babylon which stood upon the 
Euphrates, Moreover, the application of the same epithet 
Leviathan to both the kingdoms, with simply a difference in 
the attribntes, is suggestive of two kingdoms that were related 
to each other. We must not be misled by the fact that ndelidsli 
bdriaeh is a constellation in Jobxxvi. 13; we have no bam~ 
mardm (on high) here, as in ch. xxiv. 21, and therefore are 
evidently still upon the surface of the globe. The epithet 
employed was primarily suggested by the situation of the two 
cities. Nineveh was on the Tigris, which was called Chiddekel^ 
on account of the swiftness of its course and its terrible rapids ; 
hence Assliur is compared to a serpent moving along in a rapid, 
impetuous, long, extended course {bdriaeh, as in cb. xHii. 14, 
is equivalent to barriachf a noun of the same form as r?J', and 
a different word from h'riach, a bolt, ch. sy. 5). Babylon, on 
the other hand, is compared to a twisted serpent, i.e. to one 
twisting about in serpentine curves, because it was situated on 
the very winding Euphrates, the windings of which are espe- 
cially labyrinthine in the immediate vicinity of Babylon. The 
river did indeed flow straight away at one time, but by artificial 
cuttings it was made so serpentine that it passed the same place, 
viz. Arderikka, no less than three times ; and according to the 

' In point of fact, not onl; does yj eigcif; both aa arrow and the 
Tigns, according to the Neo-Forsian lexicons, but the old explanation 
"Tigris, swift sa a dart, aince the Medes call the Tigris toxeiaaa" (the 
shot or shot arrow ; Ewstath. on Dion Perieg, v. 984), is confirmed by the 
Zendic tighri, which has been proved to be used in the sense of arrow oi 
shot {YeiM 8, 6, yaiha tigknii maiayarogao), i.e. lite & heavenly anovr. 



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CHAP. SSTIL 2-6. 455 

declaration of Hetodotns in his own time, when any one s^led 
down the river, he had ta pass it three times in three days 
(Bitter, x. p. 8). The real meaning of the emblem, however, is 
no more exhausted by this allusion to the geographical situation, 
than it was in the case of *' the desert of the sea" (ch. xxi, 1). 
The attribute of winding is also a symbol of the longer duration 
of one empire than of the other, and of the more numerous 
complications into which Israel would be drawn by it. The 
world-power on the Tigris fires with rapidity upon Israel, so 
that the fate of Israel is very quickly decided. But the world- 
power on the Euphrates advances by many windings, and en- 
circles its prey in many folds. And these windings are all the 
more numerous, because in the prophet's view Babylon is the 
final form assumed by the empire of the world, and therefore 
Israel remains encircled by this serpent until the last days. 
The judgment upon Asshur, Babylon, and Egypt, is the judg- 
ment upon the world-powers universally, 

D. Tlie fourth echo : The fruit-hearing vineyard under the 
protection ofJehovaJi. — Chap, xxvii. 2-6. 

The prophecy here passes for the fourth time info the tone 
of a song. The church recognises itself in the judgments upon 
the world, as Jehovah's well-protected and beloved vineyard. 
Vers. 2-5. " In that day 

A merry vineyard — sing it I 

I, Jehovah, its keeper, 

Every moment I water it. 

That nothing may come near rf, 

/ watch it night and day. 

Wrath have I none ; 

0, had Itlwrns, thistles before me ! 

I would make up to them in battle, 

Sum them all together. 

Men would then Iwxe to grasp at my protection^ 

Make peace with me, 

Make peace with me" 

Instead of introducing the song with, " In that day shall this 
song be sung" or some such introducUon, the prophecy passes 
at once into the song. It consists in a descending scale of 



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456 THE FBOFHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

strophes, consisting of one of five lines (vers. 2, 3), one of foar 
lines (ver. 4), and one of three lines (ver. 5). The thema ia 
placed at the beginning, in the absolnte case: eerem chaner. 
This may signify a vineyard of fiery or good wine (compare 
cerem zaith In Jndg. xv. 5) ; bnt it is possible that the reading 
should be cerem chemed, aa in ch. xxzii. 12, as the LXX., 
Targum, and most modern commentators assume. ? nj? Big- 
nifies, according to Num. xxi. 17, Ps. cxlvii. 7 (cf. Ex. xxxii. 18, 
Ps. Ixsxviii. 1), to strike up a song with reference to anything, 
— an onomatopoetic word (different from n:y, to begin, literally 
to meet, see p. 156). Cerem (the vineyard) is a feminine here, 
like ^K3, the well, in the song of the well in Nam. xxi. 17, 18, 
and just as Israel, of which the vineyard here is a symbol 
(ch, iii. 14, v. 1 sqq.), is sometimes regarded as masculine, and 
at other times as feminine (ch. xxvi. 20). Jehovah Himself 
is introduced as speaking. He is the keeper of the vineyard, 
who waters it every moment when there is any necessity 
{lirgSim, like hhb'Mrim in ch. zxxiii. 3, every morning), and 
watches it by night as well as by day, that nothing may visit it. 
^11 "^^^ (to visit upon) is used in other cases to signify the 
infliction of punishment; here it denotes visitation by some 
kind of misfortnne. Because it was the church purified through 
afSictions, the feelings of Jehovah towards it were pure lov^ 
without any admixture of the burning of anger (cJtSmSh). 
This is reserved for all who dare to do injury to this vineyard. 
Jehovah challenges these, and says, Who is there, then, that 
gives me thorns, thistles I ('^JH) = 7 \r\\, aa in Jer. ix. J, cf. Josh. 
XV. 19.) The asyndeton, instead of n^B*! TOE', which is cus- 
tomary elsewhere, corresponds to the excitement of the exalted 
defender. If He had thorns, thistles before Him, He would 
break forth upon them in war, m. make war upon them (bdh, 
neater, upon such a mass of bush), and set it all on fire 
(n'X{i = ri'Sri). The arrangement of the strophes requires that 
we should connect HDn!^? with ^^fOS (var. ny^BK), though 
this is at variance with the accents. We may see very clearly, 
even by the choice of the expression bammilchdmak, that thorns 
and thbtles are a figurative representation of the enemies of 
the church (2 Sam. xxiii, 6, 7). And in this sense the song 
concludes in ver. 5 : only by yielding themselves to mercy will 
they find mercy. \» with a voluntatlve following, " unless," as 



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CHAP. XXVII. «-& 457 

ill Lev. xxvi. 41. " Take hold of:" hechSzih V, as in 1 Kings 
i. 50, of Adonijali, Trho lays hold of the horns of the altar. 
" Make peace with :" 'asdh skdlom t, as in Josh. ix. 15. The 
song closes here. What the church here utters, is the con- 
sciousness of the gracious protection of its God, as confirmed 
in her by the most recent events. 

The prophet now adds to the song of the vineyard, by way 
of explanation, — Ver. 6, " In future will Jacob strike roots, 
Israel blossom and bud, and Jill the surface of the globe vdth 
fruits." We may see from D't*?!? {ace. temp, as in Eccles. ii. 16, 
equivalent in meaning to "Behold, the days come," Jer. vii. 32, 
etc.), that the true language of prophecy commences again 
here. For the active 'K?^, compare Jer. six. 4, Ezek. viii. 17, 
etc Tlie pi'ophet here says, in a figure, just the same as the 
apostle in Rom. xi. 12, viz. that Israel, when restored once 
more to favour as a nation, will become "the riches of the 
Gentiles." 

Jehovah's chastising and saving course towaeds 
israel. — chap. sxvii. 7-x3. 

The prophet does not return even now to bis own actual 
times ; but, with the certainty that Israel will not be exalted 
until it has been deeply humbled on account of its sins, he 
places himself in the midst of this state of punishinent, And 
there, in the face of the glorious future which awaited Israel, 
the fact shines ont brightly before his eyes, that the punishment 
which God inflicts upon Israel is a very different thing from 
that inflicted upon the world. Vers. 7, 8. " ffath He smitten 
it Uke the smiting of its smiter, or is it slain like the slaying of 
those slain by Him ? Thou punisltedst it with measures, when 
tkott didst thrust it away, sifting with violent breath in the day of 
the east wind." " Its smiter" (maccsha) is the imperial power 
by which Israel had been attacked (ch. x. 20) ; and *' those 
slain by Hira" O'J'^^) are the slain of the empire who had 
fallen under the strokes of Jehovah. The former smote un- 
mercifully, and its slain ones now lay without hope (ch. xxvi. 14). 
Jehovah smites differently, and it is very different with the 
church, which has snccumbed in the persons of its righteous 
members. For the double play upon words, see ch. xxiv. 16, 



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458 THB PBOPHEaES OF ISAUH. 

xxii. 18, X. 16. When Jehovah put Israel tmaj (as if l^ 
means of a " bill of divorcement," ch. I. 1), He strove against it 
(ch. xlis. 25), i.e. punished it, "in measure" i.e, determining 
the measure very exactly, that it might not exceed the enduring 
power of Israel, nor endanger the existence of Israel as a 
nation (cf. I'mishpdi in Jer. x. 24, xxx. 11, xlvi. 28). On the 
other hand, Hitzig, Ewald, and Knobel read nttpKD^ from a 
word RDK?,^ related to Jpttj or even '(OKD, " when thon didst 
disturb (or drive forth) ;" but the traditional text does not 
indicate any various reading with n tnappie,, and the ancient 
versions and expositors all take the word as a reduplication of 
nKD, which stands here as the third of an ephah to denote a 
moderately large measure. The clause kdgdh b'rUcltG is probably 
regarded as an elliptical relative clause, in which case the tran- 
sition to the third person can be best explained : *' thou, who 
siftedat with violent breath." Hdgdh, which only occurs again 
io Prov. ixv. 4, signifies to separate, e.g. the dross from silver 
(ch. i. 25). Jehovah sifted Israel (compare the figure of the 
threshing-floor in ch. xxi. 10), at the time when, by suspeujling 
captivity over it, He blew as violenfcly upon it as if the east 
wind had raged (vid. Job, ii. 77). But He only sifted, He 
did not destroy. 

He was angry, but not without love ; He punished, but 
only to be able to pardon again. Ver. 9. " Therefore v>iU the 
guilt of Jacob be purged thus ; and this it all the fruit of tJie 
removal of his tin : when He maketli all altar-etonet like chalh- 
ttones that are broken in pieces, Aetarte images and sun-pillars 
■ do not rise up again." With the word "therefore" (^Idcen) a 
conclusion is drawn from the expression " hy measure." God 
punished Israel " by measure ; " His punishment is a way to 
salvation : therefore it ceases as soon as its purpose is secured ; 
and so would it cease now, if Israel would thoroughly renounce 
its sin, and, above all, the sin of all sins, namely idolatry. 
" Thus " (by this) refers to the iDiha which follows ; " by this," 
namely the breaking to pieces of the altars and images of the 
moon goddess ; or possibly, to speak more correctly, the goddess 
of the morning-star, and those of the sun-god as well (see ch, 

' Bottcher refers to a Talmodic word, H^DTI (to remove), but this is to 

be pronoanced (ppii ( = yeil), and is, moreover, very nncertfdn. 



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CHAP. XXVIL 10, It 459 

xvii. 8). By the fact that Israel put away the fundameDtfil 
caase of all mischief, viz. idolatry, the guilt for which it had 
yet to make. atonement wonld be covered, made good, or wiped 
away (on cuj^ar, see at ch. xxii. 14). The parenthesis (cf. ch. 
xxvi. l\h) affirms that this very consequence wonld he all the 
fruit (cdl-peri) desired by Jehovah of the removal of tlie ain of 
Israel, which the chaatisement was intended to effect. 

The prophet said this from out of the midst of the state 
of punishment, and was therefore able still further to confirm 
the fact, that the punishment would cease with the sin, by the 
punishment which followed the sin. Vers. 10, 11. "For the 
utrong dti/ U solitary/, a dwelling given up and forsaken like the 
steppe : there calves feed, and there they lie down, and eat off its 
branches. When its branches become withered, they are broken : 
women come, make fires vrith them ; for it is not a people of intel- 
ligence : therefore its Creator has no pity upon it, and its Former 
does not pardon it." The nation without any intelligence (ch. 
i. 3), of which Jehovah was the Creator and Former (oh. 
xxii. 11), is Israel ; and therefore the fortress that has been 
destroyed is the city of Jerusalem. The standpoint of the 
prophet must therefore be beyond the destruction of Jerusalem, 
and in the midst of the captivity. If this appears strange for 
Isaiah, nearly every separate word in these two verses rises up 
as a witness that it is Isaiah, and no other, who is speaking 
here (compare, as more general proofs, ch. xxxii. 13, 14, and 
V. 17 ; and as more specific exemplifications, ch. xvi. 2, 9, xi. 7, 
etc.). The sufiix in "/tfr branches " refers to the city, whose 
ruins were overgrown with bushes. Synonymous with Q'app, 
branches (always written with dagesh in distinction from Q'EiyD, 
clefts, ch. ii. 21), is k&f-ztr, cuttings, equivalent to shoots that 
can be easily cut off. It was a mistake on the part of the early 
translators to take kdtztr in the sense of "harvest" (Vulg., 
Symm., Saad., though not the LXX. or Luther). As kdtzir 
is a collective term here, signifying the whole mass of branches, 
the predicate can be written in the plural, tisshdbamdk, which 
is not to be explained as a singular form, as in ch.. xxviii, 3. 
nniK, in the neuter sense, points back to this : women light it 
(Tsrij as in Mai. i. 10), i.e. make with it a lighting Same (nlx) 
and a warming fire ("IW, ch. xliv. 16). So desolate does Jeru- 
salem lie, that in the very spot which once swarmed with men 



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460 TH£ PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. 

a calf now quietly eats the green fulSage of tlie bnslies tliat 
grow between the ruins; and in the place whence hostile armies 
had formerlj beeh compelled to withdraw without accomplish- 
ing their purpose, women now come and supply themselves with 
wood without the slightest opposition. 

But when Israel repents, the mercy of Jehovah will change 
all this. Vera. 12, 13. " And it tmll come to pass on that dayy 
Jelwodh will appoint a beating of com from the water-flood of 
the Euphrates to t/ie hrook of Egypt, and ye will be gathered to- 
gether one by one, tons of Israel. And it will come to pass in 
that day, a great trumpet will be blown, and the lost ones in the 
landof Asshur come, and the ovtcasts in the land of Egypt, and 
cast themselves down before Jehovah on the holy mountain in 
Jerusalem" I regard every exposition of ver. 12 which sup- 
poses it to refer to the return of the captives as altogether false. 
The Euphrates and the brook of Egyp^ i.e. the Wady eUArish, 
were the north-eastern and south-western boundaries of the 
land of Israel, according to the original promise (Gen. j:v. 18 ; 
1 Kings viii. 65), and it is not stated that Jehovah will beat 
on tlie outside of these boundaries, but within them. Hence 
Gesenius is upon a more correct track, when ho e:ip1ains it as 
meaning that " the kingdom will be peopled again in its greatest 
promised extent, and that as rapidly and numerously as if men 
had fallen like olives from the trees." No doubt the word 
chdbat is applied to the beating down of olives in Deut. xxiv. 20 ; 
but this figure is inapplicable here, as oUves must already exist 
before they can be knocked down, whereas the land of Israel 
is to be thought of as desolate. What one expects is, that 
Jehovah will cause the dead to live within the whole of the 
broad expanse of the promised land (according to the promise 
in cb. xzvi. 19, 21). And the figure answers this expectation 
most clearly and most gloriously. Chdbat was the word com- 
monly applied to the knocking out of fruits with husks, which 
were too tender and valuable to be threshed. Such fruits, as 
the prophet himself affirms in ch. xxvlii. 27, were knocked oat 
carefully with a stick, and would have been injured by the 
violence of ordinary threshing. And the great field of dead 
that stretched from the Euphrates to the Rhinokoloura,^ re- 
' ShitiohiUnira (or BhiaolMrouTa) : for the oriein of thia Dsme of the 
VfitAj ol-Arisli, see Strabo, ztL 3, 51. 



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CHAP, xxvii. la, 11. 4C1 

scmbled a floor covered over with such tender, costly fmit. 
There tnie Israelites and apostate Israelites lay mixed together. 
But Jehovah would separate them. He would institute a 
beatingi 90 tliat the true members of the church would come to 
the light of day, being separated from the false like grains 
sifted from their husks. " Thy dead will live ;" it is to this 
that the prophet returns. And this view is supported by the 
choice of the word shibholetli, which combines in itself the 
meanings of "flood" (Pa. Ixix. 3, 16) and "ear" (so. of 
com). This word gives a fine dilngy (compare the dilogy in 
ch, six. 18 ajid Hab. ii. 7). From the '-ear" of the Euphrates 
down to the Peninsula of Sinai, Jehovah would knock — a great 
heap of ears, the grains of which were to be gathered together 
" one by one," i.e. singly (in the most careful manner possible ; 
Greek, KaBel';, Kaff Ivd). To this risen church there would be 
added the still living diaspora, gathered together by the signal 
of God (compare ch. xviii. 3, xi. 12). Asshur and Egypt are 
named as lands of banishment. They represent all the lands 
of exile, as in ch. xix. 23-25 (compare ch. xi. 11). The two 
names are emblematical, and therefore not to be used as proofs 
that the prophecy is within the range of Isaiah's horizon. Nor 
is there any necessity for this. It is just as certain that the 
cycle of propliecy in ch. xxiv.-xxvii. belongs to Isaiah, and not 
to any other prophet, as it is that there are not two men to be 
found in the world with faces exactly alike. 



END OF VOI_ I. 



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