THIS chapter consists of three distinguishable parts. The first is a thanksgiving to God for the destruction of Babylon and the deliverance of the Jews, vs. 1—5. The second is a promise of favour to the gentiles and the people of God, when united on Mount Zion, vs. 6-9. The third is a threatening of disgraceful ruin to Moab, vs. 10—12.
It may be mentioned as a specimen of Ewald’s bold and arbitrary criticism, that he connects vs. 6-11 directly with ch. 24, puts the first four verses together as a strophe, and the fifth, twelfth, and first four verses of the next chapter, as another strophe.
It is worthy of remark that, though the modern German writers all regard this chapter as the work of the same period, and indeed of the same author as the one before it, they find here none of those strong proofs of deteriorated taste and diction which are so abundant in the other case. To be consistent, they should either ascribe the passages to different authors, or admit that the twenty-fourth was written at a time and by a man not incapable of pure and lofty composition. It ought to be observed however that the admirable figure in v. 10 strikes the delicate taste of Gesenius as low (unedel) and of Ewald as dirty (schmutzig).
Cocceius, in his exposition of this chapter, still enjoys his old hallucina tion that it is a chapter of church-history, referring the first part to the great rebellion in England, and the last to the destruction of the Turks, etc.
1. Jehovah my God (art) thou; I will exalt thee; I will praise thy name; for thou hast done a wonder, counsels from afar off, truth, certainty. The song of praise opens in the usual lyric style. (See Ex. 15: 2, 11. Ps. 118:28. 145: 1.) Cocceius, Vitringa, and some others, read oh thou my God, without supplying the substantive verb; but the latter construction is more agreeable to usage, trite strictly means I will acknow ledge or confess. The whole phrase may either mean, I will acknowledge thy goodness towards me, or I will confess thee to be what thy name imports, I will acknowledge thy acts to be consistent with the previous reve lations of thine attributes. Some render »bfi simply as a plural. Rosenmiiller explains it as a collective implying that many particular wonders were included. Vitringa more naturally makes it an indefinite expression, some thing wonderful (mirabile quid). What wonder is especially referred to. the next verse explains. The last clause admits of several different constructions. Ewald, with many of the older writers, makes it an independent proposition, of which mss is the subject and fiaiES the predicate. Thus the English Version: thy counsels of old are faithfulness and truth. Barnes supplies another verb: thou hast shown to be faithful and true. Gesenius makes wxsas well as fc^fi the object of the verb rVMBS, and supplies a preposition before Miax or regards it as an adverbial accusative: thou hast executed ancient plans (with) faithfulness and truth. Hitzig simplifies the same construction still more by making all the nouns in the last clause objects of the verb in the first: thou hast brought to pass a wonder, ancient counsels, faithfulness, truth. From afar off seems to imply, not only that the plans were formed of old, but that they were long ago revealed. Even long before the event they are certain. Hitzig, who applies the whole prophecy to Nineveh, is disposed to understand this clause as referring to the earlier prophecies of its destruction by Nahum and Zephaniah. The Septuagint, followed by J. D. Michaelis, reads “pox Amen (ytvoiio) which would here be out of place, ^x and iia-.ax are cognate forms, both de noting truth or certainty, and here combined, according to a very common Hebrew idiom, for emphasis.
2. For thou hast turned (it) from a city to a heap, a fortified town to a ruin, a palace of strangers from (being) a city; forever it shall not be built. According to Rosenmiiller, city is here put for cities in general, and the verse contains a promise or prophetic description of the golden age when fortifications should no longer be needed, as Virgil says of the same ideal period, that there shall then no more be oppida muris cincta. Most interpreters however are agreed that it refers to a particular city; Grotius says Samaria; Capellus, Jerusalem; Hitzig, Nineveh; the others, Babylon. Cocceius applies the first clause to the overthrow of episcopacy in England, and especially to the exclusion of the bishops from the house of lords. (Sensus hie est: ex ecclesia episcopali fecisti acervum, hoc earn est totam diruisti.) The other clause he applies to the subsequent change of the republic into a tyranny (from a city to a palace of strangers). Frato means strictly thou hast placed, but is often used with £ to denote the conversion of a thing into something else. Here it is separated from ^ by *^SB, an unusual collocation, which led Houbigant to read TO or TOfi, in which he is followed by Lowth, Doderlein, Dathe, Gesenius, and Knobel. J. D. Michaelis reads TO tonsto, which instead of easing the construction makes it still more harsh. The difficulty is entirely removed, without a change of text, by supposing the object of the verb to be TO or STJ^J? understood. Thou hast changed (a city) from a city to a heap. So Vitringa, Rosenmiiller, and others. Gesenius doubts whether such an ellipsis is admissible; but it is surely more so than an arbitrary change of text. Another solution of the syntax is pro posed by Hitzig, c thou hast turned from a city to a heap a fortified town to a ruin,’ in which case rtoeMs an unmeaning repetition of bab, without even parallelism or rhythm to sanction it. The same construction had substantially been given long before by De Dieu. Hendewerk goes still further and connects P&fi»£ with d*nt ‘paix: ’ thou changest the fortified town from a city to a heap, the palaces of strangers from a city to ruins.’ Gesenius gives svfisa here its primary and proper sense of inaccessible. Most of the modern writers understand by a palace of strangers the royal city mentioned in the first clause, called a palace on account of its splendour, or as being a collection of palaces, or because the palace was the most important part of it. i^a must then be taken in a privative sense (so as not to be a city). But as the same phrase in the first clause means from being a city, some give it that sense here and understand the clause to mean that God had changed it from a city to a palace (or royal residence) of strangers. But if it ceased to be a city, how could it become a palace? There is in fact no inconsistency between the senses put upon “i^a by the usual interpretation. Even in the first clause it means strictly from or away from a city, which can be clearly expressed in our idiom only by using a negative expression. For Di it Houbigant proposes to read QVit, wholly without reason or authority. DI^IT has the same sense as in ch. 1: 7. For the use of stranger in the sense of enemy, Gesenius cites the authority of Ossian. Grotius explains it to mean strange gods or their worshippers, and applies the whole phrase to the idolatrous temple of Samaria. The Targum in like manner makes it mean an idol-temple in Jerusalem itself.
3. Therefore a powerful people shall honour thee, a city of terrible nations shall fear thee. The destruction of Babylon, and the fulfilment of prophecy thereby, shall lead even the boldest and wildest of the heathen to acknowledge Jehovah as the true God. It is usual to apply the terms of this verse specifically to the Medes and Persians as the conquerors of Babylon. Hitzig refers them to the Medes and Babylonians as the conquerors of Nineveh. To this it may be objected that the epithets, according to usage, imply censure rather than praise, and that ^sp”^ is applied in the next verse to the conquered Babylonians themselves as having once been tyrants or oppressors. There seems to be no need of applying the verse to a cordial voluntary recognition of Jehovah. It may just as well denote a compulsory extorted homage, fear being taken in its proper sense. The verse will then be an apt description of the effect produced by Jehovah’s overthrow of Babylon on the Babylonians themselves. There is still another explanation, namely, that which understands the verse more indefinitely as descriptive of an effect produced upon the nations generally. This how ever does not agree so well with the use of the terms people and city in the singular number, for although they may be taken as collectives, such a construction should not be assumed without necessity. But even on the other supposition, there is something unusual in the expression city of nations. It must either be explained as implying a plurality of subject nations, or a^is must be taken in its secondary sense of gentiles, heathen, as applied to in dividuals or to one community.
4. For thou hast been a strength (or stronghold) to the weak, a strength (or stronghold) to the poor, in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shadow from the heat, when the blast of the terrible (or of the tyrants) was like a storm against a wall. The nations shall reverence Jehovah, not merely as the destroyer of Babylon, but as the deliverer of his people, for whose sake that catastrophe was brought about, fisn is not merely strength in the abstract, but a strong place or fortress. ^ and •jr^s are epithets often applied to Israel considered as a sufferer. The two figures of extreme heat and a storm of rain are combined to express the idea of persecution or affliction. h5 may also be taken in its usual sense of for, as pointing out the reason why protection was required. n*n does not di rectly denote wrath, but breath, and here a violent breathing as indicative of anger. It is thus explained by Gesenius (Zornhauch), while Ewald gratuitously lowers the tone of the description by translating the word snort ing (Schnauben). Jarchi explains i^p tnt (wall-storm) as denoting a storm which overthrows or destroys a wall. The same idea is expressed in the Targum, Peshito, and Vulgate, and approved by most of the recent writers. Knobel objects that the phrase does not naturally suggest the idea of sub version or destruction, and on that account adopts the reading ^”tip proposed by Cappellus, and approved by Vitringa, Lowth, and Dathe. The phrase would then mean a cold or winter storm. There is no need, however, of a change in the text, although Knobel’s objection to the common explanation is well founded. The Hebrew phrase naturally signifies precisely what the English Version has expressed, to wit, a storm against a wall, denoting the direction and the object of the violence^ but not its issue. As a storm of rain beats upon a wall, so the Babylonian persecution beat upon the captive Jews. The simple but striking and impressive imagery of this verse is very far from indicating an inferior writer or a recent date of composition. It is not strange, however, that this fine passage should be deemed unworthy of Isaiah or his times by those who look upon Macpherson’s Ossian as a relic of antiquity.
5. As heat in a drought (or in a dry place), the noise of strangers wilt thou bring down; (as) heat by the shadow of a cloud, (so) shall the song of the tyrants be brought low. The sufferings of Israel under oppression shall be mitigated and relieved as easily and quietly as the intense heat of the sun by an intervening cloud. The noise mentioned in the first clause is probably the tumult of battle and conquest, and the song in the last clause the triumphal song of the victorious enemy. The meaning branch is more agreeable to usage, but not so appropriate in this connexion. De Dieu’s translation of the last words, the pruning (or excision) of the tyrants shall bear witness, is extremely forced. Still worse is that of Junius and Tremellius: it (the heat) answered (or favoured) the branch of the oppressors. The same idea is expressed in both the clauses, though the first is elliptical. and the idea of a shadowy cloud must be supplied from the second. Gesenius makes nasn intransitive; the later Germans take it as a Hiphil form (he shall bring low) corresponding to s-osn in the other clause. Barnes removes the enallage by rendering nss”1 in the second person. Koppe and Bauer most gratuitously read it as a passive, n?.»\ As TPS is properly an abstract, it may be applied either to time or place, a dry season or a desert, without affecting the sense. The Seventy appear to have read ‘ps Zion, which would change the sense entirely.
6. A.nd Jehovah of Hosts will make, for all nations, in this mountain, a feast of fat things, a feast of wines on the lees, of fat things full of mar row, of wines on the lees well refined. Jerusalem, hitherto despised and oppressed, shall yet be a source of attraction, nourishment, and exhilaration, to mankind. This verse resumes the thread of the discourse, which was interrupted at the end of the last chapter, for the purpose of inserting the triumphal song (vs. 1—5). Having there said that Jehovah and his elders should appear in glory on Mount Zion. he now shows what is there to be bestowed upon the nations, to-wc properly means fatnesses, here put for rich and dainty food. Clericus strangely supplies sheep, as if diawB were an adjective, tfnaiB means the lees of wine, as being the keepers (from laia to keep) or preservers of the colour and flavour. It is here put for wine kept long upon the lees, and therefore old and of superior quality. D^ppTft pro bably means strained or filtered, t^n^ from nn« is put for the more usual form fciriBtt, in order to assimilate it to the other word. This verse contains a general statement of the relation which Jerusalem or Zion should sustain to the whole world, as a source of m^ral influence. There is nothing to indicate the time when the promise should be fulfilled, nor indeed to restrict it to one time exclusively. As the ancient seat of the true religion, and as the cradle of the church which has since overspread the nations, it has always more or less fulfilled the office here ascribed to it.
7. And he will swallow up (i. e. destroy) in this mountain the face of the veil, the veil upon all peoples, and the web, the (one) woven over all the nations. The influence to go forth from this centre shall dispel the darkness, both of ignorance and sorrow, which now broods over the world. The subject of the verb is of course Jehovah. By the face of the veil some understand the veil itself. Others suppose a metathesis for the veil of the face. Lowth adopts the reading in one manuscript, which sets 125 before a^sn V>=. Gesenius, with more probability, infers from the analogous ex pression in Job 41: 5, that the veil or covering is here described as beinothe surface or upper side of the object covered. Most interpreters suppose an allusion to the practice of veiling the face as a sign of mournino- 28 which agrees well with the next verse and is no doubt included, but the words seem also to express the idea of a veil upon the understanding. (Vide supra, ch. 22: 8.) Some have explained the words as relating to the covering of the faces of condemned criminals; but this is neither justified by usage nor appropriate in this connexion. Gesenius makes the second raib an active participle of unusual form, chosen in order lo assimilate it to the fore going noun (the cover covering). But as the language contains traces of the usual form ab, and as the forms here used are not only similar but identical, it seems more natural to suppose an emphatic repetition of the noun itself, especially as such repetitions are so frequent in the foregoing chapter. Some of the ancient versions, deriving HS&T: from a verbal root meaning to anoint, explain the clause as threatening the fall of a tyrannical power. Thus the Targum has ’ the face of the chief who rules over all peoples and the face of the king who rules over all kingdoms.’ Henderson deduces from the Arabic analogy the specific and appropriate sense of web or weaving.
8. He has swallowed up death forever, and the Lord Jehovah wipes away tears from off all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from off all the earth, for Jehovah hath spoken (it). The people of God, who seemed to be extinct, shall be restored to life, their grief ex changed for joy, and their disgrace for honour in the presence of the world, a result for which he pledges both his power and foreknowledge. The preterite form 55^2 may either be explained as a descriptive present, or as indicating something previous in point of time to what is mentioned afterwards. Henderson objects to the rendering of the Piel by the English swallow up; but the sense of destroying, which hjj prefers, is evidently secondary and derivative. Barnes, on the other hand, supposes a specific allusion to a maelstrom, which is erring in the opposite extreme. Rosenmiiller under stands the first clause as a promise, that in the golden age which Isaiah anticipated, wars and mutual violence should cease; Gesenius, as a promise of immortality like that which man enjoyed before the fall. Hendewerk applies it to the death and immortality of Israel as a nation. The true sense seems to be that all misery and suffering, comprehended under the generic name of death, should be completely done away. It is then a description of the ultimate effects of the influence before described as flowing from Mount Zion or the church of God. In its highest sense this may never be realized by any individual till after death. Paul says accordingly (1 Cor. 15: 54), that when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Karenodi] 6 ftdvaros c/v nxo?. As this is not an explanation of the text before us, nor even a citation of it in the way of argument, but merely a sublime description, all that it was necessary to express was the final, perpetual, triumphant abolition of death. The phrase aV nxo? there fore (which is also found in Theodotion’s version), although not a strict translation of nsab, is no departure from its essential meaning. In its primary import, the clause is a promise to God’s people, corresponding to the foregoing promise to the nations. While on the one hand he would lift the veil from the latter, and admit them to a feast upon Zion, on the other he would abolish death and wipe tears from the faces of his people. The restriction of these last expressions to the pains of death, or to the sorrow of bereavement, detracts from the exquisite beauty of the passage, which the poet Burns (as Barnes informs us) could not read without weeping, a sufficient proof that he was not aware of the German discovery, that this prediction is an extremely lame and flat composition, quite unworthy of the Prophet to whom it has from time immemorial been erroneously ascribed.
9. And one shall say (or they shall say) in that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, and he will save us; this is Jehovah; we have waited for him; let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation. When these gracious promises shall be fulfilled, those who have trusted in them shall no longer be ashamed of their strong confidence, because it will be justified by the event, and they will have nothing left but to rejoice in the fulfilment of their hopes. This is our God, this is Jehovah; as if they had said, this is the God of whom we have spoken, and for trusting in whom we have so often been derided. We have waited long, but he is come at last, to vindicate his truth and our reliance on him. The augmented futures at the close may either denote fixed determination (we will rejoice, we will be glad) or a proposition (let us then rejoice) for which the language has no other distinct form.
10. For the hand of Jehovah shall rest upon this mountain, and Moab shall be trodden down under him (or in his place) as straw is trodden in the water of the dunghill. While Israel shall thus enjoy the permanent protection of Jehovah, his inveterate enemies shall experience ignominious destruction. God’s hand is the symbol of his power. Its resting on an object is the continued exercise of that power, “whether for good or evil. This is determined by the nature of the object, as this mountain cannot well mean any thing but what is meant in vs. 6, 7, to wit, Mount Zion or the church of God, and the promise of the foregoing context must of course be continued here. Moab and Edom were the two hereditary and inveterate enemies of Israel, their hatred being rendered more annoying and conspicuous by their affinity and neighbouring situation. Hence they are repeatedly mentioned, separately or together, as the representatives of obstinate and malignant enemies in general. Henderson insists upon the word’s being taken in its literal import; but this is not excluded in the usual interpretation. As the name British) in our own revolutionary war, became equivalent to hostile, without losing its specific sense, so might the Prophets threaten Moab with God’s vengeance, without meaning to exclude from the denunciation other likeminded enemies. This wide interpretation, both of Moab and Edom, is confirmed by the fact that one of them is often mentioned where both would seem to be equally included. The figure in the last clause is strongly expressive both of degradation and destruction. Moab is likened not only to straw, but to straw left to rot for the dunghill. The idea of subjection and ruin is expressed by the figure of treading down or trampling under foot, ttito is commonly translated thresh; but as the oriental threshing was performed for the most part by the feet of cattle, this sense and that of treading down are really coincident. In reference to the same usage, the Septuagint, Peshito, and Vulgate introduce the word wagons, meaning the heavy carts or threshing machines of the east. Lowth conjectures that they read nns-.a for nraiB; but the former word denotes a chariot, especially a chariot of war, and the versions in question do not necessarily imply a difference of text. According to some writers, na^^in is the name of a city Madmenahj which may at one time have belonged to Moab, and be mentioned here on account of some local peculiarity. Henderson thinks there can be no allusion to this place; but it is perfectly accordant with the usage of the sacred writers to suppose, that the word was here intended to convey a contemptuous allusion to the primary meaning of the name in question. As an appellative, it is a noun of place derived from “jai and denoting either a manured field or a dunghill. The Iceri, or masoretic read ing in the margin, has laa, a poetical equivalent of 2, the preposition in. The kethib or textual reading, which is probably more ancient, is isa, in the water. This, with the next word, may denote a pool in which the straw was left to putrefy. In Job 9: 30 we have an opposite correction, iaa in the text and i«a in the margin. Under him may either mean under Jehovah or under himself, that is, in his own place, in the country of Moab, or wherever he is found.
11. And he shall spread forth his hands in the midst of it, as the swimmer spreadeth forth his hands to swim; and he shall humble his pride, together with the spoils (or devices} of his hands. From this ignominious doom Moab shall in vain try to save himself; his pride shall be humbled, and his struggles only serve to precipitate his ruin. Having compared the fall of Moab to the treading down of straw in a filthy pool, the Prophet carries out his figure here, but with a change so slight and at the same time so natural, as almost to escape observation, while it greatly adds to the life of the description. The downtrodden straw now becomes a living person, and struggles in the filthy pool to save himself from drowning, but in vain. The older writers for the most part make Jehovah the subject of the verb at the beginning of the sentence. But the image then becomes incongruous, not only as applied to God, but as failing to express any appropriate action upon his part. It is indeed explained to mean that God will strike him here and there, or in every part, as a swimmer strikes the waves in all directions; but this idea might have been expressed more clearly by a hundred other images. So too la^psis explained to mean that God would strike, not merely on the surface or extremities of Moab, but in the very midst of him, or to his very centre, which is still more forced and arbitrary. The only idea nat urally suggested by the images employed is that of a drowning man struggling in the water. The latest writers therefore follow Grotius in referring tons to 2x1-2, and the suffix in ia-pa to the pool or dunghill, ma-is has been variously explained as meaning strength, spoils, arms, armpits, joints, etc. The sense by the strength of his hands (i. e. God’s) is precluded by the preposition ns, which does not indicate the instrument or means, but signifies together with. Rosenmiiller and Ewald prefer the meaning joints, founded on an Arabic analogy. Gesenius adheres to Hebrew usage and explains the word to mean devices, plots (insidiis, which Robinson translates am buscades, a word of less extensive import than the Latin one). The mention of the hands is explained by Gesenius from the fact that a is pr warily means to knit, spin, or weave. It is hard, however, to resist the impression, that these last words have respect to the image in the first clause, and de scribe the movements of the swimmer’s hands in endeavouring to save him self. Eichhorn, Umbreit and Knobel carry the figure through the verse, explaining inixn to mean his back or his rising, and the last words either his arms or the motions of his hands. But most interpreters suppose the figure to be dropped in this clause and the humbling of Moab to be here foretold in literal terms. Lowth’s proposition to read nnia for firtu (he that sinks for he that swims) is not only needless, but injurious to the force of the expression, puts an unusual sense upon the word supposed, and does away with an example of a very common Hebrew idiom, that of combining verbs with their participles and derivative nouns.
12. And the fortress of the high fort of thy walls he hath cast down, humbled, brought to the ground, to the very dust (or even to the dust). Many interpreters suppose that the Prophet here reverts from Moab to the city mentioned in the second verse. Others more naturally understand this as the close of the prediction against Moab; first, because abrupt transitions should not be assumed without necessity; and secondly, because the verse appears to be an amplification of the phrase imsa b-‘&iBn in that before it. ixao and amutt are equivalent in usage though distinct in etymology. Both are local nouns and mean a place of safety, but the prominent idea in the first is that of fortification, in the second that of loftiness. Some manuscripts read Tpnfch in the feminine, in which case the city or country is the object of address, in the other the nation, or Moab represented as a man. The specific fulfilment of this prophecy cannot be distinctly traced in history. It was certainly verified, however, in the downfall of the Moabitish nation, whenever it took place.
