Isaiah 2
Butler2:1 THE word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.
2. And it shall come to pass in the latter days, that the mountain of the LORD’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations 3 shall flow unto it. And many peoples shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the 4 LORD from Jerusalem. And he shall judge between the nations, and shall reprove many peoples: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. 5, 6 O house of Jacob, come ye, and let us walk in the light of the LORD. For thou hast forsaken thy people the house of Jacob, because they be filled with customs from the east, and are soothsayers like the Philistines, and they strike hands with the children of strangers. 7 Their land also is full of silver and gold, neither is there any end of their treasures; their 8 land also is full of horses, neither is there any end of their chariots. Their land also is full of idols; they worship the work of their own hands, that which their own flaggers have 9 made. And the mean man is bowed down, and the great man is brought low: therefore 10 forgive them not. Enter into the rock, and hide thee in the dust, from before the terror of 11 the LORD, and from the glory of his majesty. The lofty looks of man shall be brought low, and the haughtiness of men shall be bowed down, and the LORD alone shall be exalted in 12 that day. For there shall be a day of the LORD of hosts upon all that is proud and haughty, 13 and upon all that is lifted up; and it shall be brought low: and upon all the cedars of 14 Lebanon, that are high and lifted up, and upon all the oaks of Bashan; and upon all the 15 high mountains, and upon all the hills that are lifted up; and upon every lofty tower, and 16 upon every fenced wall; and upon all the ships of Tarshish, and upon all pleasant imagery. 17 And the loftiness of man shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of men shall be brought 18 low: and the LORD alone shall be exalted in that day. And the idols shall utterly pass 19 away. And men shall go into the caves of the rocks, and into the holes of the earth, from before the terror of the LORD, and from the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to shake 20 mightily the earth. In that day a man shall cast away his idols of silver, and his idols of 21 gold, which they made for him to worship, to the moles and to the bats; to go into the caverns of the rocks, and into the clefts of the ragged rocks, from before the terror of the LORD, and from the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to shake mightily the earth. 22 Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils: for wherein is he to be accounted of? 3:1 For, behold, the Lord, the LORD of hosts, doth take away from Jerusalem and from 2 Judah stay and staff, the whole stay of bread, and the whole stay of water; the mighty man, 3 and the man of war; the judge, and the prophet, and the diviner, and the ancient; the captain of fifty, and the honourable man, and the counsellor, and the cunning artificer, and the 4 skilful enchanter. And I will give children to be their princes, and babes shall rule over them. 5 And the people shall be oppressed, every one by another, and every one by his neighbour: the child shall behave himself proudly against the ancient, and the base against the honour- 6 able. When a man shall take hold of his brother in the house of his father, saying, Thou 7 hast clothing, be thou our ruler, and let this ruin be under thy hand: in that day shall he lift up his voice, saying, I will not be an healer; for in my house is neither bread nor cloth- 8 ing: ye shall not make me ruler of the people. For Jerusalem is ruined, and Judah is fallen: because their tongue and their doings are against the LORD, to provoke the eyes of 9 his glory. The shew of their countenance doth witness against them; and they declare their sin as Sodom, they hide it not. Woe unto their soul! for they have rewarded evil unto 10 themselves. Say ye of the righteous, that it shall be well with him: for they shall eat the 11 fruit of their doings. Woe unto the wicked! it shall be ill with him: for the reward of his 12 hands shall be given him. As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and destroy the way of 13, 14 thy paths. The LORD standeth up to plead, and standeth to judge the peoples. The
LORD will enter into judgement with the elders of his people, and the princes thereof : It is ye that have eaten up the vineyard ; the spoil of the poor is in your houses : what mean ye that ye crush my people, and grind the face of the poor ? saith the Lord, the LORD of hosts.
16. Moreover the LORD said, Because the daughters of Zion are haughty, and walk with stretched forth necks and wanton eyes, walking and mincing as they go, and making a
17 tinkling with their feet : therefore the Lord will smite with a scab the crown of the head of
18 the daughters of Zion, and the LORD will lay bare their secret parts. In that day the Lord
19 will take away the bravery of their anklets, and the cauls, and the crescents ; the pendants,
20 and the bracelets, and the mufflers ; the headtires, and the ankle chains, and the sashes, and
21, 22 the perfume boxes, and the amulets ; the rings, and the nose jewels ; the festival robes,
23 and the mantles, and the shawls, and the satchels ; the hand mirrors, and the fine linen, and
24 the turbans, and the veils. And it shall come to pass, that instead of sweet spices there shall be rottenness ; and instead of a girdle a rope ; and instead of well set hair baldness ; and
25 instead of a stomacher a girding of sackcloth : branding instead of beauty. Thy men shall
26 fall by the sword, and thy mighty in the war. And her gates shall lament and mourn ; and
4 : 1 she shall be desolate and sit upon the ground. And seven women shall take hold of one man in that day, saying, We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel : only let us be called by thy name ; take thou away our reproach.
2. In that day shall the branch of the LORD be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the land
3 shall be excellent and comely for them that are escaped of Israel. And it shall come to pass, that he that is left in Zion, and he that remaineth in Jerusalem, shall be called holy, even
4 every one that is written among the living in Jerusalem : when the Lord shall have washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion, and shall have purged the blood of Jerusalem from
5 the midst thereof, by the spirit of judgement, and by the spirit of burning. And the LORD will create over the whole habitation of mount Zion, and over her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day, and the shining of a flaming fire by night : for over all the glory shall be spread
6 a canopy. And there shall be a pavilion for a shadow in the day-time from the heat, and for a refuge and for a covert from storm and from rain.
CHAPS. 2-4 constitute one message, introduced by one rich Messianic prophecy (2 : 2-4), and closed with another (4 : 2-6). The intermediate portion details the sins of the people, and threatens sore judgments. This prophecy affords no decisive indications of its date. H. C.—These chapters constitute the second prophecy, the two grand themes of which are the reign of the Messiah and intervening judgments on the Jews for their iniquities. The first and greatest of these subjects occupies the smallest space, but stands both at the opening and the close of the whole prophecy. A.—The first verse is their common title. The message has five parts : (1) The Vision of Zion’s Future Glory (2 : 1-5) ; (2) The Sin and Judgment of Judah (2 : 6-22) ; (3) Their Political Downfall (3 : 1-15) ; (4) The Sentence on Zion’s Daughters (3 : 16 to 4 : 1) ; and lastly (5) The Promise of Coming Deliverance (4 : 2-6). Birks.
2 : 2-4. This passage occurs with no material variation in Micah 4 : 1-4. It stands there in manifest connection with what precedes in the close of chap. 3. Here no such connection appears. It can never be known absolutely which of these prophets (if either) quoted from the other. H. C.
Here the Church is represented as being central and accessible to the entire race, and as capable of receiving and accommodating a worshipping world, as the temple on Zion had been to the tribes of Israel. And the points to be particularly remarked are, that of the nations thronging to it, the great mass has been influenced by the exhortation, “Come, and let us go up to the mountain of Jehovah ;” and that the reason which moves the world toward this central point is, that “out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of Jehovah from Jerusalem”—that through the appointed instrumentality of the Gospel, they hope to be made wise unto salvation ; while the result of that Divine teaching upon the great society of the nations is to be the utter abolition of war, the cultivation of the arts of peace, and the recognition of the Divine authority as universal and supreme. J. Harris.
2. The mountain of the Lord’s house. From the situation of the Jewish Temple on Mount Moriah, a mountain is made to stand for the Christian Church ; of the exaltation of which, and its wonderful prosperity and enlargement, this passage is a prophetical promise. Bp. Hurd.
3. There “He will teach us of His ways.” God’s ways are to be learned in His Church, in communion with His people and in the use of instituted ordinances; the ways of duty which He requires us to walk in, the ways of grace in which He walks toward us. It is God that teaches His people by His Word and Spirit. It is worth while to take pains to go up to His holy mountain to be taught His ways, for those who are willing to take that pains shall never find it labor in vain. Then “shall we know, if we follow on to know the Lord.” H.
That the Lord is King of all the earth, and that He will eventually establish His kingdom, is the broad and general way of stating the prophetic character of Scripture, and it is one that is incontrovertible, while the character itself is without parallel elsewhere. Exclusive as the Jewish nation was, it was nevertheless profoundly impressed with the consciousness of having a mission to the whole world, and possessing a knowledge of God that would one day be confessed. And it is no insignificant fact that the entire Christian Church has accepted that knowledge as authentic, and so far confessed the mission of Israel to have been Divine. This circumstance alone is a striking commentary on such words as “Out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. The Lord thy God, O Zion, shall be King forevermore and throughout all generations” (Ps. 146: 10). Leathes.
4. God shall administer His government over the nations, rebuking their sins and securing radical reform. The instance cited as both proof and specimen is the cessation of all war; the conversion of its implements into those of husbandry, and the utter disuse of the study and drill which prepare men for war. Considering what desolations, moral and physical, war has wrought; how deeply its causes have been imbedded in human selfishness; and, moreover, what mischiefs have come of learning war, it must be admitted that this illustrative case bears in it volumes of precious meaning. If under the universal diffusion of God’s law war shall cease, so shall all other moral and social evils. The very heart of man will be renewed; human society will be regenerated. H. C.
Nation shall not lift up sword against nation. Throughout the prophets the time of the Messiah is represented as a time of universal peace and godliness, in which the natures of men should be changed, and all malice and ill nature rooted out. He Himself is called “the Prince of Peace.” The spiritual sense implies Christ’s being the great Peace maker, who should reconcile both Jews and
Gentiles to God and to each other. If we look upon this and like prophecies as foretelling the outward peacefulness of the kingdom or Church of Christ, they seem to relate to some future flourishing state of the Church, when, after having subdued all His enemies, He shall give rest unto His faithful servants. W. Loweth.
5. From this distant prospect of the calling of the Gentiles, the prophet now reverts to his own times and countrymen, and calls upon them not to be behind the nations in the use of their distinguishing advantages. If even the heathen were one day to be enlightened, surely they who were already in possession of the light ought to make use of it. A.
Christ is revealed in His Book. The sacred page is a living word—the voice of God. The Bible, in its simplicity, its calm authoritative-ness and its directness, finds us at the centres of our being, enters into our life and makes of us a new creature. The Bible is therefore the source of light, sweetness, and life. It brings us into direct relations with God and Christ, and therefore becomes to us the means whereby we may be holy as God is holy. Not the righteousness of man, but the righteousness of Christ, becomes ours. By Christ we are made partakers of the Divine nature and heritors of a perfection which would have been impossible had not Jesus Christ lived and died upon the earth. Interior.
6-8. The exhortation in verse 5 implied that the Jews were not actually walking in God’s light, but were alienated from Him, a fact which is now explicitly asserted and the reason of it given—viz., illicit intercourse with foreign nations, as evinced by the adoption of their superstitious practices, reliance on their martial and pecuniary aid, and last, but worst of all, the worship of their idols. A.
10. Terrible judgments from God are thought of as already present, and the prophet exhorts them to flee for safety to the rocks and caves of the mountains, such as could be readily found in the hill country of Judæ. It would be awful to meet God clothed with vengeance!
12-16. Cedars, oaks, mountains, hills, towers, walls, ships, and pictures are here representatives of human pride. The prophet’s meaning is that the pride and the proud men that they represent shall be utterly abased. H. C.—Pride sets a man in opposition against God. Other sins are aversions from God, but this sin is a coming against God. In other sins a man flies from God; but in this sin a man flies upon God. “God resisteth the proud” (Jas. 4: 6). T. Brooks.
22. He shows the folly of transferring their confidence in idols to human patrons, by a general statement of man’s weakness and mortality, explained and amplified in the following chapter. “Cease ye from man” (cease to trust him or depend upon him), “whose breath is in his nostrils” (whose life is transient and precarious, with obvious allusion to Gen. 2:7), “for wherein is he to be accounted of” (or at what rate is he to be valued)? A.—In the line of the prophet’s thought, thus: Why trust in man, whom you may see fleeing, panic-smitten, before the majesty of Jehovah when He ariseth to smite the earth with terror? H. C.
Chap. 3. From the grand moral features of the judgment the prophet turns to describe those great evils in the State which would prepare its way. The bulwarks of the kingdom would be withdrawn, and the whole fabric sink into ruin. Birks.
1. This verse assigns as a reason for the exhortation in the one preceding (2:22), that God was about to take away from the people every ground of reliance, natural and moral. Cease ye from man-i.e., cease to trust in any human protection, “For, behold” (implying a proximate futurity) “the Lord” (God considered as a sovereign) “Jehovah of Hosts” (as self-existent and eternal, and at the same time as the God of revelation and the God of His people) “is taking away” (or about to take away) “from Jerusalem and from Judah” (not only from the capital, but from the whole kingdom) “the stay and the staff” (i.e., all kinds of support, and first of all), “the whole stay of bread and the whole stay of water” (the natural and necessary means of subsistence). The terms are applicable either to a general famine produced by natural causes, or to a scarcity arising from invasion or blockade, such as actually took place when Judah was overrun by Nebuchadnezzar. A. 4. Ahaz came to the throne at twenty, Manasseh at twelve, and the reigns of Amon, Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, Jeconiah, Zedekiah, ended at the ages of twenty-four, twenty-three, thirty-six, eighteen, and thirty-two years. The want of all wisdom in the rulers would cause a rank growth of lawlessness and oppression. The first commandment with promise being thus despised, a curse must follow. Young children disobedient to parents, arrogant and rude to their elders, are one of the plainest portents of national ruin near at hand. Birks. 5. As the preceding verse describes bad government, so this describes anarchy, the suspension of all government, and a consequent dis order in the relations of society, betraying itself in mutual violence, and in the disregard of natural and artificial claims to deference. “And the people shall act tyrannically, man against man, and man against his fellow. They shall be insolent, the youth to the old man, and the mean man to the noble.”
6,7. Having predicted the removal of those qualified to govern, the rise of incompetent successors, and a consequent insubordination and confusion, the prophet now describes this last as having reached such a height that no one is willing to hold office, or, as Matthew Henry says, “the government goes a begging.” A.-The condition of the State is so bad that no man is willing to hold office in it. This is put by a special case. A man living quietly at home in the house of his father (in the house, rather “of” the house), according to patriarchal usage, is pressed by his brother to take the office of ruler, but positively refuses. He will not take this responsibility of trying to restore a ruined State. These graphic touches indicate both the general destitution and the utter prostration of civil society and government. 8. This explains why the people are without bread, clothing or rulers. Their words and deeds have been utterly “against the Lord,” contemptuously hostile and defiant. Surely the Lord would have us understand that He has keen sensibilities to the outrages of sin, and that he feels the abuse and wrong which the sinner perpetrates upon Him. Is anything more sensitive to violence than the eye? 9. These are bold sinners, of shameless, unblushing brow and bearing. The expression of their countenance witnesses to their heart sin. Woe to their souls, for they bring ruin upon themselves! H. C.—The sins of the people, like those of Sodom, are bringing down the fierce anger of God, and to the prophet’s eye their ruin seems as if already come. Pride and lust are written on their very faces, and cannot be concealed. Nay, so shameless are they grown they do not even try to conceal them. Effrontery doubles their guilt, and makes judgment inevitable. When vice grows bold and shameless, woe to the guilty land! Birks. 10, 11. The Lord is not a bare spectator, He is both a rewarder and an avenger. Therefore, from the ground of this truth, that the Lord seeth all our ways and counteth all our steps, we, as the prophet exhorts, may “say to the righteous, that it shall be well with him; for they shall eat the fruit of their doings.” We may also say, “Woe unto the wicked! it shall be ill with him: for the reward of his
hands shall be given him.” Only idols which have eyes and see not, have hands and strike not. Caryl.