5 Now then, what have I here? says the Lord, for my people are taken away without cause; they are made waste and give cries of sorrow, says the Lord, and all the day the nations put shame on my name.
For the name of God is shamed among the Gentiles because of you, as it is said in the holy Writings.
I was angry with my people, I put shame on my heritage, and gave them into your hands: you had no mercy on them; you put a cruel yoke on those who were old;
And when they came among the nations, wherever they went, they made my holy name unclean, when it was said of them, These are the people of the Lord who have gone out from his land. But I had pity for my holy name which the children of Israel had made unclean wherever they went. For this cause say to the children of Israel, This is what the Lord has said: I am doing this, not because of you, O children of Israel, but because of my holy name, which you have made unclean among the nations wherever you went. And I will make holy my great name which has been made unclean among the nations, which you have made unclean among them; and it will be clear to the nations that I am the Lord, says the Lord, when I make myself holy in you before their eyes.
And I was acting for the honour of my name, so that it might not be made unclean in the eyes of the nations, before whose eyes I had taken them out.
The young men were crushing the grain, and the boys were falling under the wood. The old men are no longer seated in the doorway, and the music of the young men has come to an end. The joy of our hearts is ended; our dancing is changed into sorrow.
In his burning wrath every horn of Israel has been cut off; his right hand has been turned back before the attacker: he has put a fire in Jacob, causing destruction round about.
Israel is a wandering sheep; the lions have been driving him away: first he was attacked by the king of Assyria, and now his bones have been broken by Nebuchadrezzar, king of Babylon.
For the Lord says, You were given for nothing, and you will be made free without price.
And I will put it into the hand of your cruel masters, and of those whose yoke has been hard on you; who have said to your soul, Down on your face! so that we may go over you: and you have given your backs like the earth, even like the street, for them to go over.
Your sons are overcome, like a roe in a net; they are full of the wrath of the Lord, the punishment of your God.
And they gave the children of Israel even harder work to do: And made their lives bitter with hard work, making building-material and bricks, and doing all sorts of work in the fields under the hardest conditions. And the king of Egypt said to the Hebrew women who gave help at the time of childbirth (the name of the one was Shiphrah and the name of the other Puah), When you are looking after the Hebrew women in childbirth, if it is a son you are to put him to death; but if it is a daughter, she may go on living.
And Isaiah said to them, This is what you are to say to your master: The Lord says, Be not troubled by the words which the servants of the king of Assyria have said against me in your hearing.
Who are you, and by what right have you made for yourself a resting-place here?
Up! O God, be the judge of your cause; keep in mind the bitter things which the man of evil behaviour says against you every day. Keep in mind the voice of your haters; the outcry of those who come against you goes up every day.
Keep this in mind, O Lord, that your haters have said cruel things, and that your name has been looked down on by a people of evil behaviour.
Because of the voice of him who says sharp and bitter words; because of the hater and him who is the instrument of punishment.
You let your people go for nothing; your wealth is not increased by their price.
And God said, Truly, I have seen the grief of my people in Egypt, and their cry because of their cruel masters has come to my ears; for I have knowledge of their sorrows;
Now after a long time the king of Egypt came to his end: and the children of Israel were crying in their grief under the weight of their work, and their cry for help came to the ears of God. And at the sound of their weeping the agreement which God had made with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob came to his mind.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Isaiah 52
Commentary on Isaiah 52 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 52
The greater part of this chapter is on the same subject with the chapter before, concerning the deliverance of the Jews out of Babylon, which yet is applicable to the great salvation Christ has wrought out for us; but the last three verses are on the same subject with the following chapter, concerning the person of the Redeemer, his humiliation and exaltation. Observe,
Isa 52:1-6
Here,
Isa 52:7-12
The removal of the Jews from Babylon to their own land again is here spoken of both as a mercy and as a duty; and the application of v. 7 to the preaching of the gospel (by the apostle, Rom. 10:15) plainly intimates that that deliverance was a type and figure of the redemption of mankind by Jesus Christ, to which what is here said of their redemption out of Babylon ought to be accommodated.
Isa 52:13-15
Here, as in other places, for the confirming of the faith of God's people and the encouraging of their hope in the promises of temporal deliverances, the prophet passes from them to speak of the great salvation which should in the fulness of time be wrought out by the Messiah. As the prophecy of Christ's incarnation was intended for the ratification of the promise of their deliverance from the Assyrian army, so this of Christ's death and resurrection is to confirm the promise of their return out of Babylon; for both these salvations were typical of the great redemption and the prophecies of them had a reference to that. This prophecy, which begins here and is continued to the end of the next chapter, points as plainly as can be at Jesus Christ; the ancient Jews understood it of the Messiah, though the modern Jews take a great deal of pains to pervert it, and some of ours (no friends therein to the Christian religion) will have it understood of Jeremiah; but Philip, who hence preached Christ to the eunuch, has put it past dispute that of him speaks the prophet this, of him and of no other man, Acts 8:34, 35. Here,