Isaiah 25

The rest, scattered over all the neighbouring countries, spread there the knowledge of God, and paved the way for the introduction of the gospel. In the close of the chapter, God (in alluding to the eastern custom of allowing persons to remain long in a dungeon before their cause is inquired into) promises to revisit and restore his people in the last age, when the kingdom of God shall be established in such perfection, as wholly to eclipse the glory of the temporary and typical kingdom which then subsisted. Chap. XXV. Ver. 1—12. An ode of thanksgiving for the deliverance just announced.—The short glance which the prophet gave, of the deliverance of Israel, and the Messiah’s kingdom, in the close of the preceding chapter, makes him here break out into a song of praise; whereas, though he first alludes to temporal deliverances, the prophetic spirit carries out his mind in the ecstatic contemplation of the glory and blessedness of the gospel dispensation, which he compares, 1.

To a rich and plentiful feast, of which all nations were invited to partake, “without money and without price.” 2. He compares it to the dawn of light, which “lifts the veil of darkness from all faces.” 3. He who brings “life and immortality to light,” ((2 Timothy 1:10).) will, at the same time, throw into darkness and oblivion the errors and superstitions of paganism; and finally, by his own death, eventually destroy (or, in the Hebrew idiom, swallow up) death itself—wipe away all tears—and introduce into the New Jerusalem above, everlasting joy, and peace, and happiness. (See (Revelation 21:1-4).)

Notes on the verses

Chap. XXV. Ver. 2. A city. _defenced (or fortified) city—and not being named, the ode is equally applicable to the fall of Babylon, or any stronghold of their Pagan enemies.—A palace of strangers.—This, we conceive, confines it to some great commercial city, where splendid residences were built for foreigners engaged with them in commerce. Not considering this, some great critics, on the authority of a few MSS., read, “the proud.” So Lowth, &c. Ver. 3. The strong people—those who boasted themselves invincible. Ver. 4. A strength—that is, “a defence.”—As a storm against the wall.—Lowth, “Rages like a winter storm;” Boothroyd, “As a rapid torrent.” Either makes a good sense, and may be derived from the Hebrew: but the common version gives an excellent sense, “when God protects his people, their enemies spend their rage like a storm upon the walls of a fortress.”

Ver. 5. Strangers.—See note on ver. 2. But perhaps the term as used by the Jews, simply meant heathens—“aliens from the commonwealth of Israel.” (Ephesians 2:12).—Thou shalt bring down, &c.—The verse is rendered by Lowth, “As the heat in a parched land, the tumult of the proud (or strangers) shalt thou bring low; as the heat by a thick cloud, the triumph of the formidable (or terrible ones) shall be humbled.” So Gataker and Boothroyd. [Or, as Weston renders, “as heat in drought;” serdar 2 that the hottest part of the day is always the quietest, the heat making men languid, spiritless, and quiet; and the rays of the sun are sometimes intolerably hot under a thin cloud, and burn as if they came through a lens.]—Bagster. Ver.

6. In this mountain—that is, Zion. See ch. xxiv. 23.—A feast of fat things—or of fatlings, (Matthew 22:4). the richest kind of meats.—Wine on (rather, “from”) the lees, well refined.—According to Harmer, “filtered.” The sense is, undoubtedly, old and choice wines. as. Ver. 10. Rest.—Lowth, “Give rest.”—“And Moab shall be threshed in his place, as the straw is threshed under the wheels of the ear.” Boothroyd, however, adheres to our translation, “As straw (i.e. the refuse of it) is trodden down for the dunghill.” Comp. marginal note, and see our note on (Deuteronomy 25:4).; also ch. xxviii. 27. of this book. Ver. 11. Spread forth his hands.—Lowth and others apply this to Moab, compared here to a man who, in the fear of drowning, spreads forth his hands to swim, but in vain, for God will enervate his hands, alluding, perhaps, to the cramp, which sometimes seizes and drowns the swimmer.

This is very near to the version of Lowth, “With the sudden gripe of his hands;” meaning, that God should seize him as a beast of prey. See (Lamentations 3:10). These last bits of the piece sense, as implying the subjugation and overthrow of Moab, there can be no doubt.