1 Behold, the LORD H3068 maketh the earth H776 empty, H1238 and maketh it waste, H1110 and turneth H5753 it upside down, H6440 and scattereth abroad H6327 the inhabitants H3427 thereof.
Upon the land H127 of my people H5971 shall come up H5927 thorns H6975 and briers; H8068 yea, upon all the houses H1004 of joy H4885 in the joyous H5947 city: H7151 Because the palaces H759 shall be forsaken; H5203 the multitude H1995 of the city H5892 shall be left; H5800 the forts H6076 and towers H975 shall be for dens H4631 for H5704 ever, H5769 a joy H4885 of wild asses, H6501 a pasture H4829 of flocks; H5739
The LORD H3068 shall bring H935 upon thee, and upon thy people, H5971 and upon thy father's H1 house, H1004 days H3117 that have not come, H935 from the day H3117 that Ephraim H669 departed H5493 from Judah; H3063 even the king H4428 of Assyria. H804 And it shall come to pass in that day, H3117 that the LORD H3068 shall hiss H8319 for the fly H2070 that is in the uttermost part H7097 of the rivers H2975 of Egypt, H4714 and for the bee H1682 that is in the land H776 of Assyria. H804 And they shall come, H935 and shall rest H5117 all of them in the desolate H1327 valleys, H5158 and in the holes H5357 of the rocks, H5553 and upon all thorns, H5285 and upon all bushes. H5097 In the same day H3117 shall the Lord H136 shave H1548 with a razor H8593 that is hired, H7917 namely, by them beyond H5676 the river, H5104 by the king H4428 of Assyria, H804 the head, H7218 and the hair H8181 of the feet: H7272 and it shall also consume H5595 the beard. H2206 And it shall come to pass in that day, H3117 that a man H376 shall nourish H2421 a young H1241 cow, H5697 and two H8147 sheep; H6629 And it shall come to pass, for the abundance H7230 of milk H2461 that they shall give H6213 he shall eat H398 butter: H2529 for butter H2529 and honey H1706 shall every one eat H398 that is left H3498 in H7130 the land. H776 And it shall come to pass in that day, H3117 that every place H4725 shall be, where there were a thousand H505 vines H1612 at a thousand H505 silverlings, H3701 it shall even be for briers H8068 and thorns. H7898 With arrows H2671 and with bows H7198 shall men come H935 thither; because all the land H776 shall become briers H8068 and thorns. H7898 And on all hills H2022 that shall be digged H5737 with the mattock, H4576 there shall not come thither H935 the fear H3374 of briers H8068 and thorns: H7898 but it shall be for the sending forth H4916 of oxen, H7794 and for the treading H4823 of lesser cattle. H7716
Then said H559 I, Lord, H136 how long? And he answered, H559 Until the cities H5892 be wasted H7582 without inhabitant, H3427 and the houses H1004 without man, H120 and the land H127 be utterly H8077 desolate, H7582 And the LORD H3068 have removed H7368 men H120 far away, H7368 and there be a great H7227 forsaking H5805 in the midst H7130 of the land. H776
Your country H776 is desolate, H8077 your cities H5892 are burned H8313 with fire: H784 your land, H127 strangers H2114 devour H398 it in your presence, and it is desolate, H8077 as overthrown H4114 by strangers. H2114 And the daughter H1323 of Zion H6726 is left H3498 as a cottage H5521 in a vineyard, H3754 as a lodge H4412 in a garden of cucumbers, H4750 as a besieged H5341 city. H5892 Except H3884 the LORD H3068 of hosts H6635 had left H3498 unto us a very small H4592 remnant, H8300 we should have been H1961 as Sodom, H5467 and we should have been like H1819 unto Gomorrah. H6017
Awake, H5782 O sword, H2719 against my shepherd, H7462 and against the man H1397 that is my fellow, H5997 saith H5002 the LORD H3068 of hosts: H6635 smite H5221 the shepherd, H7462 and the sheep H6629 shall be scattered: H6327 and I will turn H7725 mine hand H3027 upon the little ones. H6819 And it shall come to pass, that in all the land, H776 saith H5002 the LORD, H3068 two H8147 parts H6310 therein shall be cut off H3772 and die; H1478 but the third H7992 shall be left H3498 therein. And I will bring H935 the third part H7992 through the fire, H784 and will refine H6884 them as silver H3701 is refined, H6884 and will try H974 them as gold H2091 is tried: H974 they shall call H7121 on my name, H8034 and I will hear H6030 them: I will say, H559 It is my people: H5971 and they shall say, H559 The LORD H3068 is my God. H430
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible » Commentary on Isaiah 24
Commentary on Isaiah 24 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 24
Isa 24:1-23. The Last Times of the World in General, and of Judah and the Church in Particular.
The four chapters (the twenty-fourth through the twenty-seventh) form one continuous poetical prophecy: descriptive of the dispersion and successive calamities of the Jews (Isa 24:1-12); the preaching of the Gospel by the first Hebrew converts throughout the world (Isa 24:13-16); the judgments on the adversaries of the Church and its final triumph (Isa 24:16-23); thanksgiving for the overthrow of the apostate faction (Isa 25:1-12), and establishment of the righteous in lasting peace (Isa 26:1-21); judgment on leviathan and entire purgation of the Church (Isa 27:1-13). Having treated of the several nations in particular—Babylon, Philistia, Moab, Syria, Israel, Egypt, Edom, and Tyre (the miniature representative of all, as all kingdoms flocked into it)—he passes to the last times of the world at large and of Judah the representative and future head of the churches.
1. the earth—rather, "the land" of Judah (so in Isa 24:3, 5, 6; Joe 1:2). The desolation under Nebuchadnezzar prefigured that under Titus.
2. as with the people, so with the priest—All alike shall share the same calamity: no favored class shall escape (compare Eze 7:12, 13; Ho 4:9; Re 6:15).
4. world—the kingdom of Israel; as in Isa 13:11, Babylon.
haughty—literally, "the height" of the people: abstract for concrete, that is, the high people; even the nobles share the general distress.
5. earth—rather, "the land."
defiled under … inhabitants—namely, with innocent blood (Ge 4:11; Nu 35:33; Ps 106:38).
laws … ordinance … everlasting covenant—The moral laws, positive statutes, and national covenant designed to be for ever between God and them.
6. earth—the land.
burned—namely, with the consuming wrath of heaven: either internally, as in Job 30:30 [Rosenmuller]; or externally, the prophet has before his eyes the people being consumed with the withering dryness of their doomed land (so Joe 1:10, 12), [Maurer].
7. mourneth—because there are none to drink it [Barnes]. Rather, "is become vapid" [Horsley].
languisheth—because there are none to cultivate it now.
8. (Re 18:22).
9. with a song—the usual accompaniment of feasts.
strong drink—(See on Isa 5:11). "Date wine" [Horsley].
bitter—in consequence of the national calamities.
10. city of confusion—rather, "desolation." What Jerusalem would be; by anticipation it is called so. Horsley translates, "The city is broken down; it is a ruin."
shut up—through fear; or rather, "choked up by ruins."
11. crying for wine—to drown their sorrows in drink (Isa 16:9); Joe 1:5, written about the same time, resembles this.
12. with destruction—rather "crash" [Gesenius]. "With a great tumult the gate is battered down" [Horsley].
13. the land—Judea. Put the comma after "land," not after "people." "There shall be among the people (a remnant left), as the shaking (the after-picking) of an olive tree"; as in gathering olives, a few remain on the highest boughs (Isa 17:5, 6).
14. They—those who are left: the remnant.
sing for the majesty of the Lord—sing a thanksgiving for the goodness of the Lord, who has so mercifully preserved them.
from the sea—from the distant lands beyond the sea, whither they have escaped.
15. in the fires—Vitringa translates, "in the caves." Could it mean the fires of affliction (1Pe 1:7)? They were exiles at the time. The fires only loose the carnal bonds off the soul, without injuring a hair, as in the case of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego. Lowth reads, in the islands (Eze 26:18). Rather translate for "fires," "in the regions of morning light," that is, the east, in antithesis to the "isles of the sea," that is, the west [Maurer]. Wheresoever ye be scattered, east or west, still glorify the Lord (Mal 1:11).
16. Songs to God come in together to Palestine from distant lands, as a grand chorus.
glory to the righteous—the burden of the songs (Isa 26:2, 7). Amidst exile, the loss of their temple, and all that is dear to man, their confidence in God is unshaken. These songs recall the joy of other times and draw from Jerusalem in her present calamities, the cry, "My leanness." Horsley translates, "glory to the Just One"; then My leanness expresses his sense of man's corruption, which led the Jews, "the treacherous dealers" (Jer 5:11), to crucify the Just One; and his deficiency of righteousness which made him need to be clothed with the righteousness of the Just One (Ps 106:15).
treacherous dealers—the foreign nations that oppress Jerusalem, and overcome it by stratagem (so in Isa 21:2) [Barnes].
17. This verse explains the wretchedness spoken of in Isa 24:16. Jeremiah (Jer 48:43, 44) uses the same words. They are proverbial; Isa 24:18 expressing that the inhabitants were nowhere safe; if they escaped one danger, they fell into another, and worse, on the opposite side (Am 5:19). "Fear" is the term applied to the cords with feathers of all colors which, when fluttered in the air, scare beasts into the pitfall, or birds into the snare. Horsley makes the connection. Indignant at the treatment which the Just One received, the prophet threatens the guilty land with instant vengeance.
18. noise of … fear—the shout designed to rouse the game and drive it into the pitfall.
windows … open—taken from the account of the deluge (Ge 7:11); the flood-gates. So the final judgments of fire on the apostate world are compared to the deluge (2Pe 3:5-7).
19. earth—the land: image from an earthquake.
20. removed like a cottage—(See on Isa 1:8). Here, a hanging couch, suspended from the trees by cords, such as Niebuhr describes the Arab keepers of lands as having, to enable them to keep watch, and at the same time to be secure from wild beasts. Translate, "Shall wave to and fro like a hammock" swung about by the wind.
heavy upon it—like an overwhelming burden.
not rise again—not meaning, that it never would rise (Isa 24:23), but in those convulsions it would not rise, it would surely fall.
21. host of … high ones—the heavenly host, that is, either the visible host of heaven (the present economy of nature, affected by the sun, moon, and stars, the objects of idolatry, being abolished, Isa 65:17; 60:19, simultaneously with the corrupt polity of men); or rather, "the invisible rulers of the darkness of this world," as the antithesis to "kings of the earth" shows. Angels, moreover, preside, as it were, over kingdoms of the world (Da 10:13, 20, 21).
22. in the pit—rather, "for the pit" [Horsley]. "In the dungeon" [Maurer]. Image from captives thrust together into a dungeon.
prison—that is, as in a prison. This sheds light on the disputed passage, 1Pe 3:19, where also the prison is figurative: The "shutting up" of the Jews in Jerusalem under Nebuchadnezzar, and again under Titus, was to be followed by a visitation of mercy "after many days"—seventy years in the case of the former—the time is not yet elapsed in the case of the latter. Horsley takes "visited" in a bad sense, namely, in wrath, as in Isa 26:14; compare Isa 29:6; the punishment being the heavier in the fact of the delay. Probably a double visitation is intended, deliverance to the elect, wrath to hardened unbelievers; as Isa 24:23 plainly contemplates judgments on proud sinners, symbolized by the "sun" and "moon."
23. (Jer 3:17). Still future: of which Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem amidst hosannas was a pledge.
his ancients—the elders of His people; or in general, His ancient people, the Jews. After the overthrow of the world kingdoms. Jehovah's shall be set up with a splendor exceeding the light of the sun and moon under the previous order of things (Isa 60:19, 20).