Isaiah 27

27:1 In that day the LORD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan the swift serpent, and leviathan the crooked serpent; and he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea.2, 3 In that day: A vineyard of wine, sing ye unto it. I the LORD do keep it; I will water it 4 every moment: lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day. Fury is not in me: would that the briers and thorns were against me in battle! I would march upon them, I would burn 5 them together. Or else let him take hold of my strength, that he may make peace with me; 6 yea, let him make peace with me. In days to come shall Jacob take root; Israel shall blossom and bud; and they shall fill the face of the world with fruit.7 Hath he smitten him as he smote those that smote him? or is he slain according to the 8 slaughter of them that were slain by him? In measure, when thou sendest her away, thou dost contend with her; he hath removed her with his rough blast in the day of the east wind. 9 Therefore by this shall the iniquity of Jacob be purged, and this is all the fruit of taking away his sin; when he maketh all the stones of the altar as chalkstones that are beaten in 10 sunder, so that the Asherim and the sun-images shall rise no more. For the defenced city is solitary, an habitation deserted and forsaken, like the wilderness: there shall the calf feed, 11 and there shall he lie down, and consume the branches thereof. When the boughs thereof are withered, they shall be broken off; the women shall come, and set them on fire: for it is a people of no understanding; therefore he that made them will not have compassion upon them, and he that formed them will shew them no favour.12 And it shall come to pass in that day, that the LORD shall beat off his fruit, from the flood of the River unto the brook of Egypt, and ye shall be gathered one by one, O ye children of Israel.13 And it shall come to pass in that day, that a great trumpet shall be blown; and they shall come which were ready to perish in the land of Assyria, and they that were outcasts in the land of Egypt; and they shall worship the LORD in the holy mountain at Jerusalem.

Chap. 27. The topics briefly introduced in the two closing verses of chap. 26 are here resumed and made the subject of this chapter. On the one hand, chastisements for God’s people in moderation and in mercy, watched over with the tender care and compassion of a father’s heart, and designed only to reclaim and purify; and, on the other, retributive judgments sent in stern but just severity on the incorrigible who will be nothing but enemies to God. The two processes are carried forward jointly in this description, the writer alternating from one to the other throughout the chapter for the purpose of comparing the discipline brought on God’s people with the retributive judgments visited upon His persistent enemies. H. C.

This chapter is an amplification of the last verse of the one preceding, and contains a fuller statement both of Israel’s chastisements and of Jehovah’s judgments on His enemies. The destruction of the latter is foretold as the slaughter of a huge sea monster, and contrasted with God’s care of His own people even when afflicting them (verses 1-5). Hereafter Israel shall flourish, and even, in the mean time, His sufferings are far less than those of His oppressors (verses 6, 7). The former is visited in moderation for a time, and with the happiest effect (verses 8, 9). The latter is finally and totally destroyed (verses 10, 11). This shall be followed by the restoration of the scattered Jews (verses 12, 13). A.

1. “In that day,” when those things are done which are referred to in chap. 26 : 20, 21. “Leviathan,” a sea serpent or other monster of the sea, sometimes the crocodile of Egypt and the “dragon,” are animals frequently named as symbols or figures to represent the great political powers that were specially hostile and oppressive to God’s people. Leviathan appears in this character Ps. 74 : 14, and the dragon in Ezek. 29 : 3 and 32 : 2, and Isa. 51 : 9. Both, being at once formidable and loathsome, are fit emblems for a great persecuting, oppressive power. There can be no doubt that they refer here to Babylon ; possibly to Egypt also. Babylon we know is before the prophet’s mind, and there is no special objection to supposing that both terms refer to the same enemy.

3. Keeping up the figure of the vineyard, the verse represents the Lord’s constant, precious care that no real harm shall befall His vineyard. He truly loves His people. Never is this love more actively drawn out than while they are in the furnace of affliction ; or, according to this figure, than while foes are coming down upon His vineyard who may crush His vines to the earth, or burn them fatally. H. C.

I will keep it night and day. Grace is determined to complete what it has begun, and to perform the good work unto the day of redemption. The whole Church is given to Christ in covenant, and every individual believer has his share in the blessed security. Looking at the internal strength of the Church, we may say it is endangered ; but looking at the covenant, it is safe. “I the Lord do keep it ; I will water it every moment : lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day.” God’s honor is concerned to bring the disciple through, in spite of all enemies. J. W. A.

Perseverance is not only a condition, but a privilege of the covenant of grace ; for it assures supply of spiritual strength to the sincere believer for performing the condition it requires. If grace were the mere product of free will, the most fervent resolutions would vanish into a lie upon the assault of an overpowering temptation. But sanctifying grace is the effect of the Holy Spirit ; and he that

“begins that good work in the saints will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.” He that inclined them joyfully to choose the spiritual eternal good will bind their unconstant hearts, that by a faithful adherence they shall cleave to their duty and felicity. God hath most graciously declared, “I will put My Spirit into their heart, that they shall never depart from me.” Bates.

It is not usual with God to leave His people frequently to relapse into enormities ; for by His spirit and grace, by His smiles and frowns, by His word and rod He usually preserves them from these ; yet He does leave His choicest ones frequently to relapse into infirmities (and of His grace He pardons them in course), as idle words, passion and vain thoughts. And though gracious souls strive against, complain of, and weep over these, yet the Lord, to keep them humble, leaves them oftentimes to such relapses ; but they shall never be their bane, because they are their burden. T. Brooks.

If we have ever so little sincere desire to serve Him and to be His, is it not absolutely certain, from the whole tenor of His words and deeds, that He will meet us more than half way, and bring us on in the right path with more than a mother’s tenderness ? For every responsibility which we have to meet, He offers to qualify us. For every height which we have to climb, He furnishes an inward strength. We need not faint then at any prospect before us. Progress in grace may be arduous, difficult, impossible to flesh and blood—out of the question, it may be said, while living in the old world ; but to all alleged difficulties there is one simple answer, “He giveth more grace.” E. M. G.

4. I am no longer angry with My people ; oh that their enemies (as thorns and briers) would array themselves against Me, that I might rush upon them and consume them. This is the sense of the verse preferred by most of the later writers.

5. Or let him lay hold of My strength and make peace with Me ; peace let him make with Me. The verbs are properly indefinite (let one take hold, etc.), but referring to the enemy described in the preceding verse. The general meaning is that the alternative presented is destruction or submission. A.—I can convey the meaning of this passage so that every one may understand it, by what took place in my own family within these few days. One of my little children had committed a fault for which I thought it my duty to chastise him. I called him to me, explained to him the evil of what he had done, and told him how grieved I was that I must punish him for it. He heard me in silence, and then rushed into my arms and burst into tears. I could sooner have cut off my arm than have then struck him for his fault; he had taken hold of my strength, and he had made peace with me. Thomas Toller (quoted by R. Hall).

Here is a gracious invitation given us to get these matters in variance accommodated: “Let him that is desirous to be at peace with God take hold on His strength, on His strong arm which is lifted up against the sinner, and let him by supplication keep back the stroke; let him wrestle with Me, as Jacob did, resolving not to let Me go without a blessing; and he shall be Israel—a prince with God.” Pardoning mercy is called the power of our Lord; let him take hold on that. Christ is the “arm of the Lord” (53:1). “Christ crucified is the power of God” (1 Cor. 1:24); let him by a lively faith take hold on Him as a man that is sinking catches hold of a bough or cord or plank that is in his reach; or as the malefactor took hold on the horns of the altar, believing that there is no other name by which he can be saved, by which he can be reconciled. H.—The strong in faith grasp and keep hold of the promises. They take God at His word. They have believed in Christ, and they know that in Him all the promises are Yea and Amen. With Christ, the greater gift, they know God in His kingdom of grace will freely give us all things. Resting on the promises they pray, and their prayers are deeds. They put God upon His faithfulness, and He honors it and answers them. They wrestle with Him as if they actually had a hold upon Him. Rising up thus in a mighty energy of prayer to God, their souls have wrought with prayerful energy in the world, and their great works for God have marked the history of their race and have changed its currents. Anon.

In the Christian life it is invariably true that real strength comes only out of that weakness which, distrustful of itself, gives itself up to God. It is invariably true that weakness grows out of the conceit which refuses to depend, and which trusts its own wisdom or strength. It is invariably true that God’s strength shines through human infirmity, and often selects for its best and richest expressions the poorest, weakest, most burdened of mankind. Vincent.—Each new want in us seems to act, as by magnetic influence, in drawing down Divine fulness to meet it; it is a new appeal to His free love, and a new opportunity for its exercise; cise; it is a new knock at His gracious door; it is a new stroke of the rod upon the rock, making the waters to gush forth, and the streams to run down in the desert. Those infirmities of ours, with which we are so often afraid to come to Him, are just the very things which appeal to His strength, and afford occasion for its exercise. They draw it out; they bring it into play; they give it full scope; and thus, instead of making us unwelcome or intrusive applicants, they furnish us with the very claims which He delights to recognize, with the very recommendation which He loves to accept. Instead of separating us, they bring us more closely and directly into contact with Him; they open up to us more of His excellency; they give us a deeper and truer experience of His mighty fulness; they unfold to us something of the inexhaustible resources of His infinite treasure-house of blessing; they afford us an insight into the unsearchable riches of His grace; they bring us acquainted more intimately, more lovingly, more blessedly, with Himself and His love. Anon.

For the daily toil of our daily task, with all its disheartening weariness, its trying disappointments, its depressing sense of comparative failure, for the greater conflicts, too, and trials of our ministry, with their sudden pressure of unforeseen difficulties, their sharper anxieties, their keener hopes and fears—for all these there is one, and but one, never-failing source of comfort and of help, one place alone where we may renew our strength—it is at the foot of the cross. There, as we kneel and pray—there, as we kneel and hope—there, as we kneel and vow—as we offer ourselves once more, in the love of our hearts, in the labor of our lives, as willing sacrifices unto God—will there come into our hearts the peace, born not of ease and comfort, but of a death agony of fear, and yet of faith, the peace which came of the vision, seen from afar, of the accomplished travail of the soul of Him who died to win it for us, and with that peace will come the strength it gives, the strength of a heart at one with God, strong in its resolve to do or to suffer His holy will, asking of Him but one thing, to be better taught what that will may be. Abp. Magee.

6. Keeping up still the figure of the vine, the Lord gives a precious promise of future enlargement and prosperity, such enlargement as will overspread the face of the world, such prosperity as will fill all the earth with the fruits of His vineyard. God’s correction of His people in discipline, so far from defeating such results, ensures and hastens them.

7. This verse comes back to the great thought of the chapter—viz., that God’s smiting of His people is entirely a different thing from His smiting of their enemies. It is moderate in degree, and is not mortal in result. The question put here implies the strongest negation. H. C.

8. In measure, by sending her away, thou dost contend with her. He removes her by his hard wind in the day of the east wind. The negation implied in the preceding verse is here expressed more distinctly. The prophet now proceeds to show that Israel was not dealt with like His enemies, by first describing what the former suffered, then what the latter. Israel was punished moderately, and for a time, by being removed out of His place, as if by a transient storm or blast of wind. A.

9. The facts of history have fully justified this strong prediction that the captivity in Babylon should effectually cure the nation of idolatry. Our passage shows this to have been the special purpose of God in this captivity. So His purpose in all the afflictions sent upon His children is definitely to purify, to make the heart and life better. When God’s people truly hunger and thirst after personal righteousness, appreciating heart-purity in some good degree at its real value, they will bless God with overflowing heart for the discipline He finds it wise and needful to inflict, grateful if by any means they may be made more like God, and so more acceptable in His sight.

10,11. These verses take up the case of God’s enemies. The passage stands logically connected with verse 7, the intermediate verses (8, 9) having spoken of God’s people. This begins, “For” (not “yet”), “for” (as if to develop more fully the fearful scourging of the wicked) “the strongly fortified city is made desolate.” The city here thought of is Babylon, seen here forsaken, desolate and made like a wilderness; calves feeding and lying down there; browsing and cropping off all its foliage. Or by yet another figure: when the boughs are withered they are broken off, and then women (who in Oriental life gathered the fuel) came and gathered them to burn—not precisely to set fire to where they lay, but to gather as fuel for household use. Then, dropping all figure, the Lord assigns the reason for such exterminating judgments. They will not consider and understand; will not learn God either through His mercies or His judgments; are therefore unteachable and incorrigible; hence God can show them no mercy. All efforts to enlighten them failing, no hope remains of their turning to God; and therefore destruction must be their doom. H. C.

11. Of no understanding.** A severe judgment from God is described in the words preceding. Here the reason for the judgment is assigned as a guilty ignorance. An ignorance that cannot be helped or remedied is deservedly excused. But an ignorance caused by wilful neglect of the means of knowledge is not excusing, but condemning. Some want of understanding is so far from excusing sin that it is its highest aggravation. In the words that follow, note the strange terms in which God expresses His anger. He assumes the most endearing titles, and under them announces the severest judgments. He joins the creator and the destroyer, expressions that almost confute each other; He clothes Himself in the robes of mercy, and in these pronounces the sentence of death upon the sinner. The remaining words anticipate and forestall an objection frequently in the mouths of the ignorant and in the hearts of the most knowing: that certainly God would never make them to destroy them; and therefore, since He has made them, they roundly conclude that He will not destroy them. South.

12,13. This chapter, and indeed this entire prophetic message of four chapters, closes with a promise of the restoration of God’s people from Babylon (“Assyria”) and from Egypt. All are to be gathered from the channel of the river (Euphrates) to the stream of Egypt. The expression, “shall beat off,” gives us the figure of beating off olives from their tree. So the Lord will carefully gather up His people scattered in their captivity. It is not precisely “gathered one by one,” but rather one to one—i.e., one to another; brought together from their dispersions. The blowing of the Lord’s great trumpet is the signal for this assembling of the outcast and almost perishing exiles. Restored, they worship the Lord (as their fathers did) in the holy mount at Jerusalem. This was definitely fulfilled under Zerubbabel and Ezra. It closed the scene of the great captivity at Babylon. H. C.

13. A great trumpet shall be blown.** Blessed, eternally blessed be our God, for the blowing of the great trumpet of Gospel grace; it is the sound of great love; it proclaims a great salvation—to whom? Even to great sinners; such as see their sins so great that they are ready to perish. The sound of this great trumpet proclaims that “the great God” is “our Saviour Jesus Christ.” It proclaims victory over sin, the law, Satan, death and

hell, through Jesus, who loved us and gave Himself for us. Nor less doth it proclaim holiness than happiness; for it calls us to war with our sins, to peace with God, and to walk in sweet fellowship with God the Father, and His