begun in the last clause of the verse preceding, and the summary conclusion of °the whole preceding controversy as to the divinity of any gods except Jehovah. To the usual expressions of nonentity the Prophet adds two other strong descriptive terms, viz. wind and emptiness.
THIS chapter exhibits to our view the Servant of Jehovah, i. e. the Messiah and his people, as a complex person, and as the messenger or representative of God among the nations. His mode of operation is described as being not violent but peaceful, vs. 1-5. The effects of his influence are represented as not natural but spiritual, vs. 6-9. The power of God is pledged for his success, notwithstanding all appearances of inaction or indifference on his part, vs. 10-17. In the latter portion of the chapter, the Church or Body of Christ, as distinguished from its Head, and representing him until he came, is charged with unfaithfulness to their great trust, and this unfaithfulness declared to be the cause of what it suffered, vs. 18—25. Several important exegetical questions with respect to the Servant of Jehovah will be fully canvassed in the exposition of the chapter.
1. Behold my servant! I will hold him fast; my chosen one (in whom) my soul delights; I have given (or put) my Spirit upon him: judgment to the nations shall he cause to go forth. There is no need of assuming (with the English Version) an ellipsis of the relative twice in the same clause. The separate construction of the first two words, as an introduction to the following description, makes them far more impressive, like the ecce homo (ids o avOQ03no^ of John 19: 5.—The first verb, construed as it is here, signifies to hold fast, for the most part writh the accessory idea of holding up, sustaining, or supporting. Elect or chosen does not mean choice or excellent, except by implication; directly and strictly it denotes one actually chosen, set apart, for a definite purpose.—Six1! is the verb ap plied in the Law of Moses to the acceptance of a sacrifice, from which some have inferred that there is here an allusion to expiatory merit; but this, although admissible, is not an obvious or necessary supposition.—By Spirit, as in all such cases, we are to understand, not only divine influence, but the divine person who exerts it. (See the Earlier Prophecies, pp. 59, 219.)— The use of the phrase on him, where in him might have seemed more natural, is probably intended to suggest the idea of descent, or of an influence from heaven.—The last clause is understood by Grotius as denoting that the person here described should denounce the penal judgments of Jehovah on the Medes and Babylonians. But besides the unreasonable limitation of the words to these two nations, this explanation is at variance with the usage of the singular asttja and with the context, which describes the servant of Jehovah as a source of blessing to the gentiles. The same objection does not lie against an explanation of a&tia by Clericus as meaning justice or just government; but this is too restricted, as appears from the subsequent context. The most satisfactory interpretation is the common one, which understands this word as a description of the true religion, and the whole clause as predicting its diffusion. The office thus ascribed to the servant of Jehovah, both here and in the following context, as a teacher of the truth, makes the description wholly inappropriate to Cyrus, who is nevertheless regarded as the subject of the prophecy, not only by Saadias among the Jews, but by Hensler, Koppe, and even Ewald, though the last combines this application with another which will be explained below. Aben Ezra, Grotius, and some later writers, understand the passage as descriptive of Isaiah himself; and this hypothesis is modified by De Wette and Gesenius in his Commentary, so as to embrace all the prophets as a class. Besides the objection to the first of these opinions, somewhat flippantly alleged by J. D. Michaelis, that if Isaiah had thus spoken of himself, he would have proved himself a madman rather than a prophet, it may be objected to the whole hypothesis, that the Prophets of the old dispensation are invariably represented as the messengers of God to the Jews and not the gentiles. And the same thing is still more emphatically true of the Levitical priesthood. Of some but much less weight is the objection to the later form of the same theory, that the collective sense which it puts upon the phrase is neither natural nor countenanced by any satisfactory analogy. There is indeed, as all admit, such a collective use of the phrase servant of Jehovah, in application not to any rank or office or profession, but to Israel the chosen people as such considered. Of this usage we have already had an example in ch. 41:8, and shall meet with many more hereafter. The distinction between this application of the title and the one which De “V^Stte proposes is, that in the former case the national progenitor is put by a natural metonymy for his descendants, whereas there is no such individual Prophet (not even Moses) in whom the whole succession is concentrated either by natural association or by established usage. A third objection to this theory may be drawn from the analogy of other places, where the same great servant of Jehovah is described, not only as a sufferer, but as an atoning sacrifice. Even admitting the gratuitous assumption, that the Prophets, as a class, were habitually subject to malignant persecution, the representation of these sufferings as vicarious and expiatory would be forced and arbitrary in itself, as well as contradicted by the tenor of Scripture. This last objection also lies against the exclusive application of the title to Israel as a people, or to the pious and believing portion of them, which has been maintained by various writers from Solomon Jarchi down to Knobel, who supposes that the servant of Jehovah sometimes means the whole body of the Jews in exile who externally adhered to the worship of Jehovah, sometimes the real spiritual Israel included in this number. But the representation of the Jewish nation as atoning for the sins of the gentiles, or of the pious Jews as atoning for the sins of the whole nation, is without analogy in any other part of the Old Testament. The objections which have now been stated to these various hypotheses may negatively serve to recommend the one adopted in the Targum and by Kimchi and Abarbenel, who represents the champions of the others as struck with judicial blindness. This ancient doctrine of the Jewish church, and of the great majority of Christian writers, is that the servant of the Lord is the Messiah. The lengths of paradoxical extravagance to which the unbelieving critics are prepared to go rather than admit this supposition, may be learned from Knobel’s positive assertion, that the Old Testament Messiah is no where represented either as a teacher or a sufferer, and that the later chapters of Isaiah contain no allusion to a Messiah at all. In favour of the Messianic exposition may be urged not only the tradition of the Jewish church already cited, and the perfect facility with which this hypothesis at once accommodates itself to all the requisitions of the passages to which it is applied, but also the explicit and repeated application of these passages to Jesus Christ in the New Testament. These applications will be noticed seriatim as the texts successively present themselves. To this first verse there are several allusions more or less distinct and unequivocal. Besides the express citation of it, with the next three verses, in Matth. 12: 19-21, there is an obvious allusion to its terms, or rather a direct application of them made by God himself, in the descent of the Holy Spirit on our Saviour at his baptism, and in the words pronounced from heaven then and at the time of his transfiguration: This is my beloved Son in whom 1 am well pleased (Matt. \ 17. 17: 5). The connecting link between the Servant of Isaiah and the Son of Matthew, is afforded by the 71014 of the Septuagint, which includes both ideas. According to the explanation which has just been given, vlog is neither a translation of w, nor a perversion of its meaning, but a clearer designation of the subject of the prophecy. That Christ was sent to the Jews and not the Gentiles, is only true of his personal ministry and not of his whole work as continued by his followers, who were expressly commissioned to go into all the world, to make disciples of all nations, the only restriction imposed being that of beginning at Jerusalem. It only remains to be considered, whether this application of the title and the description to our Saviour is exclusive of all others, as its advocates commonly maintain. This inquiry is suggested by the fact, which all interpreters admit, that Israel, the chosen people, is not only called by this same name, but described as having some of the same attributes, not only elsewhere, but in this very context, and especially in vs. 19, 20, of this chapter, where any other explanation of the terms, as we shall see, is altogether inadmissible. Assuming, then, that the Messiah is the servant of Jehovah introduced at the beginning of the chapter, there are only two ways of accounting for the subsequent use of the same language with respect to Israel. The first way is by alleging a total difference of subject in the different places; which in fact though not in form is to decline all explanation of the fact in question, as being either needless or impossible. That such a twofold application of equivalent expressions to entirely different subjects is conceivable and must in certain cases be assumed, there is no need of denying. But unless we abandon all attempt to interpret language upon any sett ed principle, we cannot but admit that nothing short of exegetical necessity can justify the reference of the same descriptive terms to different subjects in one and the same context. If then there is an exegetical hypothesis by which these applications can be reconciled, without doing violence to usage or analogy, it seems to be clearly entitled to the preference. Such a hypothesis, it seems to me, is one obscurely stated by some older writers, but which may be more satisfactorily propounded thus, that by the servant of Jehovah in these Later Prophecies of Isaiah, we are to understand the Church with its Head, or rather the Messiah with the Church which is his body, sent by Jehovah to reclaim the world from its apostasy and ruin. This agrees exactly with the mission both of the Redeemer and his people as described in Scripture, and accounts for all the variations which embarrass the interpretation of the passages in question upon any more exclusive exegetical hypothesis. It is also favoured by the analogy of Deut. 18, where the promised Prophet, according to the best interpretation, is not Christ exclusively, but Christ as the Head of the prophetic body who possessed his spirit. Another analogy is furnished by the use of the phrase Abraham’s seed, both individually and collectively He whom Paul describes as the seed of Abraham, and Moses as a prophet like unto himself, in a personal but not an exclusive sense, is described by Isaiah as the servant of Jehovah, in his own person, but not to the exclusion of his people, so far as they can be considered his co-workers or his representatives. Objections founded on the want of agreement between some of these descriptions and the recorded character of Israel, are connected with a superficial view of Israel considered simply as a nation and like other nations, except so far as it was brought 4 into external and fortuitous connexion with the true religion. An essential feature in the theory proposed is that this race was set apart and organized for a specific purpose, and that its national character is constantly subordinate to its ecclesiastical relation. There is precisely the same variation in the language used respecting it as in the use and application of the term ExxkrjGia in the New Testament. Israel is sometimes described as he was meant to be, and as he should have been; sometimes as he actually was. The name is sometimes given to the whole race and sometimes to the faithful portion of it, or, which amounts to the same thing, it is sometimes used to denote the real sometimes the nominal Israel. The apparent violence of applying the same description to an individual person and a body, will be lessened by considering, that the former i. e. Christ was in the highest and the truest sense the servant of Jehovah and his messenger to man, but that his body, church, or people, was and is a sharer in the same vocation, under the gospel as an instrument or fellow-worker, under the law as a type or representative of one who had not yet become visible. Hence the same things might be predicated to a great extent of both. As the Messiah was the servant and messenger of God to the nations, so was Israel. It was his mission also to diffuse the true religion and reclaim the nations. From the very first it was intended that the law should go forth from Zion and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. (Ch. 2:3.) The national restrictions of the old economy were not intended to exclude the gentiles from the church, but to preserve the church from assimilation to the gentiles. All the world might have come in if they would by complying with the terms prescribed; and nothing is more clear from the Old Testament than the fact that the privileges of the chosen people were not meant to be restricted even then to the natural descendants of Israel, for this would have excluded proselytes entirely. Multitudes did embrace the true religion before Christ came; and that more did not, was partly their own fault, partly the fault of the chosen people, who neglected or mistook their high vocation as the Messiah’s representative and as Jehovah’s messenger. If it be asked, how the different applications of this honourable title are to be distinguished so as to avoid confusion or capricious inconsistency, the answer is as follows. Where the terms are in their nature applicable both to Christ as the Head and to his Church as the Body, there is no need of distinguishing at all between them. Where sinful imperfection is implied in what is said, it must of course be applied to the body only. Where a freedom from such imperfection is implied, the language can have a direct and literal reference only to the Head, but may be considered as descriptive of the body, in so far as its idea or design is concerned, though not in reference to its actual condition. Lastly, when any thing is said implying deity or infinite merit, the application to the Head becomes not only predominant but exclusive. It may further be observed that as the Church, according to this view of the matter, represents its Head, so it is represented by its leaders, whether prophets, priests, or kings; and as all these functions were to meet in Christ, so all of them may sometimes be particularly prominent in prophecy. With this explanation, the hypothesis proposed may be considered as approaching very nearly to the one maintained by Umbreit in his work upon the Servant of God (Knecht Gottes, Hamburg, 1840), as well as in his Commentary on Isaiah. A similar theory is broached by Ewald, but with this essential difference, that he excludes all reference to Christ, and identifies the Messiah of these prophecies with Cyrus. A correct view of the manifold and variable usage of the title njrp was is given by Gesenius in his Thesaurus and the later editions of his Lexicon. How far the theory here stated with respect to the ftjrH 122 is either necessary to explain the prophecies or really consistent with their terms can only be determined by a specific application of the principle to the successive parts of the description. If applied to this first verse, it would determine its interpretation, as describing Israel, the ancient church, to be in a peculiar sense the servant of Jehovah, protected and sustained by Him, enlightened by a special revelation, not for his own exclusive u^e but as a source of saving light to the surrounding nations. At the same time it would show him to possess this character not in his own right but in that of another, as the representative and instrument of one who, though he was with God and was God, took upon him the form of a servant and received the Spirit without measure, that he might be a light to lighten the gentiles as well as the glory of his people Israel. (Luke 2: 32.) The reference to Christ is here so evident, however, that there is no need of sup posing any distinct reference to his people at all, nor any advantage in so doing, except that of rendering the subsequent verses still more significant, as descriptive not only of his personal ministry, but of the spirit and conduct of his people, both before and after his appearance.
V..2. He shall not cry (or call aloud), and he shall not raise (his voice), and he shall not let his voice be heard in the street (or abroad, without). The Vulgate strangely supplies D*:D after sty (?wn accipiet personam), and so obtains the customary technical expression for respect of persons or judicial partiality. This construction, which was probably suggested by the supposed analogy of ch. 11: 3, 4, is precluded by its want of agreement with what goes before and follows. The same objection lies, though in a less degree, against Cocceius’s construction of the verb as a reflexive (se efferet), which is moreover not grammatically tenable. It is not even necessary to assume an ellipsis of the noun voice in the first clause, although this may be required to make the sense clear in a version. The Hebrew construction is continued through both clauses, i. e. both verbs govern the same noun. He shall not raise nor suffer to be heard in the street his voice. The simple meaning of the verse is, he shall not be noisy but quiet. Grotius supposes an allusion to the fact that angry persons often speak so loud at home as to be heard in the street. Clericus justly denies any special reference to anger, but perhaps goes too far when he translates S^Ein, dabit operam ut audiatur. The idea seems rather to be that of suffering the voice to be heard in public places. As applied both to Christ and to the Church, this verse describes a silent, unostentatious method of proceeding. The quotation in Matth. 12: 18 is commonly explained as referring to our Saviour’s mild and modest demeanour; but it rather has respect to the nature of his kingdom, and to the means by which it was to be established. His forbidding the announcement of the miracle is not recorded simply as a trait of personal character, but rather as implying that a public recognition of his claims was not included in his present purpose.
3. A bruised (or crushed) reed he will not break, and a dim uiclc he will not quench; ly the truth will he bring forth judgment. The verbs of the first clause have no exact equivalents in English. The first appears to mean broken but not broken off, which last is denoted b^ the other. Clericus supposes an allusion to the growing plant, which may be broken and yet live, but if entirely broken off must die.—The common version, smoking flax, is that of the Septuagint and Vulgate. The Hebrew noun really denotes flax (Ex. 9: 31), but the adjective means faint or dim; se that in order to convey the meaning in translation, the former must be taken in the specific sense of wick, which it also has in ch. 43: 17. The application of these figures to the sparing of enemies, or the indulgence of weak friends, or the sustentation of sincere but feeble faith, is too specific and exclusive. The verse continues the description of the mode in which the Messiah and his people were to bring forth judgment to the nations, or in other words to spread the true religion. It was not to be by clamour or by violence. The first of these ideas is expressed in the preceding verse, the last in this. That such is the true import of the words is clear from the addition of the last clause, which would be unmeaning if the verse related merely to a compassionate and sympathetic temper. That this verse is included in Matthew’s quotation (ch. 12: 19), shows that he did not quote the one before it as descriptive of a modest and retiring disposition. For although such a temper might be proved by Christ’s prohibiting the publication of his miracles, this prohibition could not have been cited as an evidence of tenderness and mildness.. The only way in which the whole quotation can be made appropriate to the case in hand, is by supposing that it was meant to be descriptive not of our Saviour’s human virtues, but of the nature of his kingdom and of the means by which it was to be established. That he was both lowly and compassionate is true, but it is not the truth which he established by his conduct upon this occasion, nor the truth which the evangelist intended to illustrate by the citation of these words. As well in their original connexion as in Matthew’s application of them, they describe that kingdom which was not of this world; which came not with observation (Luke 17: 20); which was neither meat nor drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost (Rom. 14:17); which was founded and promoted not by might nor by power, but by the Spirit of the Lord; and of which its founder said (John 18: 36), If my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not he delivered to the Jews, but now is my kingdom not from hence. And again (John 18: 27), when Pilate said unto him, Art thou a king then? Jesus answered, Thou sayest (rightly) that lam a king; to this end was I born, and for this cause came 1 into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth; every one that is of the truth heareth my voice. How perfectly ‘does this august description tally with the great prophetic picture of the Servant of Jehovah who was to bring forth judgment to the nations, and in doing so was not to cry or raise his voice or let men hear it in the streets, not by brutal force to break the crushed reed or quench the dim wick, but to conquer by healing and imparting strength. This passage also throws light on the true sense of the somewhat obscure phrase r.rx£, by showing that it means with respect to the truth, which is here equivalent to saying by the truth. This construction, by presenting an antithesis between the true and false way of bringing forth judgment to the gentiles, is much to be preferred to those constructions which explain the phrase as simply meaning in truth (i. e. truly), or in permanence (i. e. surely), or unto truth (i. e. so as to establish and secure it). All these may be suggested as accessory ideas; but the main idea seems to be the one first stated, namely, that the end in question is to be accomplished not by clamour, not by violence, but by the truth.
4. He shall not be dim, and he shall not be crushed, until he shall set judgment in the earth, and for his law the isles shall wait. He shall neither conquer nor be conquered by violence. This verse is a new proof that the one before it does not describe mere tenderness and pity for the weak. The antithesis would then be, he shall neither be unkind to the infirm nor infirm himself. On the other hand, the sense is clear and pertinent, if v. 3 means that he shall not use violence towards those who are weaker than himself, and v. 4 that he shall not suffer it from those who are more powerful; or rather that he shall not subdue others nor himself be subdued by force. Some interpreters have been misled by not observing the exact correspondence of the verbs nro? and “p”^ with the adjectives and isn. The same oversight has led Cocceius and Vitringa to derive Y^ from 7>n to run, and to understand the clause as meaning that he shall neither he remiss nor precipitate. This construction, it is true, makes the clause itself more antithetical and pointed, but only by the sacrifice of an obvious and beautiful antithesis between it and the first clause of v. 3.—To set or place judgment in the earth is to establish and confirm the true religion. —By his law we are to understand his word or revelation, considered as a rule of duty.—Here again the islands is a poetical expression for the nations, or more specifically for the transmarine and distant nations. The restriction of the term to Europe and Asia Minor (3. D. Michaelis) is as false in geography as it is in taste.—On the ground that the heathen could not wait or hope for that of which they were entirely ignorant, some understand the last verb as meaning they shall trust (i. e. after they have heard, they shall believe it). Besides the preference thus given to a secondary over a primary and proper sense, the general meaning of the clause, and its connexion with what goes before, appear to be misapprehended. The hope meant is not so much subjective as objective. The thing described is not the feeling of the gentiles towards the truth, but their dependence on it for salvation, and on Christ for the knowledge of the truth itself. For his law the isles are waiting (or must wait), and till it comes they must remain in darkness.
5. Thus saith ihc mighty (God), Jehovah, creating the heavens and stretching them out, spreading the earth and its issues, giving breath to the people on it, and spirit to those walking in it. Ewald refers thus saith to the preceding verses, which he supposes to be here described as the words of God himself. But as the following verses also contain the words of God, there is no need of departing from the ordinary usage of the Scriptures, according to which the name of the speaker is prefixed to the report of what he says. We may indeed assume an equal connexion with what goes before and follows, as if he had said, Thus hath Jehovah spoken and he speaks still further.—The appeal is so directly to the power of Jehovah, that the name ^xn, which is expressive of that attribute, ought not to be resolved into the general term God. (See the Earlier Prophecies, p. 75.)—The substitution of the preterite for the participle in the English Version (he that created the heavens and stretched them out) is not only a gratuitous departure from the form of the original, but hides from the English reader the allusion to the creative power of God as constantly exercised in the continued existence of his works. The same figure is exhibited more fully in ch. 40: 22, and the places there referred to. (See above, p. 25, 26.)—This clause is not a scientific but a poetical description. To the eye, the heavens have the appearance of a canopy or curtain, and the verdant surface of the earth that of a carpet. There is no need therefore of supplying a distinct verb to govern its issues. >J5^, though originally used to signify the beating out of metal into thin plates, has acquired in usage the more general sense of spreading or expanding, and is equally applicable to the earth as an apparently flat surface, and to its vegetation as the tapestry which covers it. The prophet’s picture is completely marred by making 3p.** mean *consolida ting, which is wholly inappropriate to JTVKXXX, and has no etymological foundation. Even spj^ in the first chapter of Genesis means an expanse; the idea of a firmament comes not from the Hebrew but the ancient versions. No single English word is so appropriate as issues to express both the meaning and the derivation of the corresponding one in Hebrew, which denotes the things that come out of the earth, its produce, growth, or vegetation, with particular allusion here to grass.—Here, as in ch. 40: 7, the word people is evidently used in application to the whole human race, a fact of some importance in the exposition of what follows. Cocceius alone supposes an antithesis between the people (i. e. Israel) and the rest of men. If this had been intended, the word spirit would no doubt have been connected with the former. By the side of this may be placed Kimchi’s notion that a contrast was intended between men and brutes, on the ground that n«u3a is limited in usage to the former, crp-ji’s in the first clause of this verse is explained by some as a pluralis majestalicus, by others as a singular form peculiar to thett”b verbs and their derivatives. (See the Earlier Prophecies, p. 72.)—The enumeration of Jehovah’s attributes in this verse is intended to accredit the assurances contained in the context.
6. I Jehovah have called thee in righteousness, and will lay hold of thee (or hold thee fast), and will feeep thee, and will give thee for a covenant of the people, for a light of the gentiles.—The act of calling here implies selection, designation, and providential introduction to God’s service.—In righteousness, i. e. in the exercise of righteousness on God’s part, including the fulfilment of his promises as well as of his threatenings. Unto righteous ness, i. e. to be righteous, is an idea foreign from the context, and one which would not have been thus expressed in Hebrew. Lowth’s translation (for a righteous purpose), although too paraphrastical, may be considered as substantially identical’with that first stated. Those of Gesenius (to salvation) and Hitzig (in grace) are equally gratuitous and contrary to usage.— I will hold thee fast, and thereby hold thee up, sustain thee. (See above, v. 1.)—Lowth and Barnes esteem it an improvement of the common English Version to change ]keep into preserve.—I will give thee for, i. e. create, appoint, or constitute thee.—Hitzig understands by 52 rn’ia a covenantpeople (Bundesvolk), Ewald a mediatorial people (Mittelsvolk), both, denoting a people called or sent to act as a mediator or a bond of union between God and the nations. But this, although it yields a good sense, is a German and English rather than a Hebrew construction, the instances in f which a prefixed noun qualifies the other being very rare and dubious. This objection is sufficient, without adding that the phrase as thus explained would be inapplicable to an individual, whereas the other epithets employed are equally appropriate to persons and communities. Most other writers are agreed in adhering to the obvious construction and in understanding by a covenant of the people a negotiator between God and the people. This use of covenant, although unusual, is in itself not more unnatural or forced than that of light in the next phrase. As light of the nations must mean a source or dispenser of light to them, so covenant of people, in the very same sentence, may naturally mean the dispenser or mediator of a covenant with them. The only reason why the one appears less natural and simple than the other, is that light is habitually used in various languages both for the element of light and for its source or a luminous body, whereas no such twofold usage of the other word exists, although analogies might easily be traced in the usage of such words as justice for judge, counsel for counsellor, in both which cases the functionary takes the name of that which he dispenses or administers.—But supposing this to be the true construction of the phrase, the question still arises, who are the contracting parties, or in other words, what are we to understand by people? The great majority of writers make it mean the Jews, the chosen people of Jehovah, and the covenant the mediator or negotiator of a new covenant between them and Jehovah, according to the representation in Jer. 31: 31-33. To this it may be objected that cs has not the article as usual when employed in that sense, and that even with the article it is applied in the preceding verse to mankind in general. To this it may be added that the word nations in the next clause may as well be exegetical of people as in contrast with it. The first supposition is indeed much more natural, because the words are in such close connexion, and because there is no antithesis between the correlative expressions, light and covenant. To this it is replied, that the reference to Israel in this case is determined by the clear unambiguous analogy of ch. 49: 8, where the phrase recurs and in a similar connexion. This conclusion not only rests upon a false assumption as to the meaning of the context there, but is directly contradicted by the language of v. 6, where it is expressly said that it was not enough for Christ to be the restorer of Israel, he must also be a light to the gentiles; and in direct continuation of this promise it is added in v. 8, without the show of a distinction or antithesis, that he should be a covenant of the people (i. e. of the nations), to restore or re-establish the earth (not the land, which is a perfectly gratuitous restriction), to cause to be inherited the desolate heritages (i. e. the ruins of an apostate world), and to say to the prisoners, Go forth, the arbitrary reference of which words to the Babylonish exile is in fact the only ground for the opinion now disputed. So far is this passage, then, from disproving the wide explanation of the word es in the place before us, that it really affords a very strong analogical reason in its favour, and we need no longer hesitate to understand the clause as a description of the servant of Jehovah in the character, not only of a light (or an enlightener) to the nations, but of a mediator or negotiator between God and the people, i. e. men in general. These are epithets applying in their highest sense to Christ alone, to whom they are in fact applied by Simeon (Luke 2: 32) and Paul (Acts 13:47). That neither of these quotes the phrase a covenant of the people, does not prove that it lias no relation to the gentiles, but only that it does not relate to them exclusively, but to the whole human race; whereas the other phrase, as applying specifically to the gentiles, and as being less ambiguous, was exactly suited to Paul’s purpose.—At the same time let it be observed that this description is entirely appropriate, not only to the Head but to the Body also in subordination to him. Not only the Messiah but the Israel of God was sent to be a mediator or connecting link between Jehovah and the nations. The meaning put upon =2 n-na by Hitzig and Ewald, although not philologically accurate, is perfectly consistent with the teachings of the Old Testament respecting the mission and vocation of Israel, the ancient church, as a covenant-race or middle-people between God and the apostate nations.
7. To open blind eyes, to bring out from prison the bondman, from the house of confinement the dwellers in darkness. This was the end to be accomplished by the Servant of Jehovah in the character or office just ascribed to him. The spiritual evils to be remedied are represented under the figures of imprisonment and darkness, the removal of the latter having obvious allusion to the light of the nations in v. 6. The fashionable explanation of these words, which refers them to the restoration of the Jews from exile, is encumbered with various and complex difficulties. What is said of bondage must be either strictly understood or metaphorically. If the former be preferred, how is it that the Prophet did not use expressions more exactly descriptive of the state of Israel in Babylon? A whole nation carried captive by its enemies could hardly be described as prisoners in dark dun geons. Knobel, with readiness almost rabbinical, supplies the necessary fact by saying that a part of the Jews were imprisoned. But even granting that they were in prison, were they also blind? If it be said that this is a figurative representation of confinement in the dark, the principle of strict interpretation is abandoned, and the imprisonment itself may be a metaphor for other evils. There is then left no specific reason for applying this description to the exile any more than to a hundred other seasons of calamity. Another and more positive objection to this limitation is that it connects this verse with only part of the previous description, and that the part to which it 58 bears the least resemblance. Even supposing what has been disproved, that covenant of the people has respect to Israel alone, how is it that the other attribute, a light to the gentiles, must be excluded in interpreting what follows? It was surely not in this capacity that the Servant of Jehovah was to set the Jewish exiles free. If it be said that this verse has respect to only one of these two characters, this supposition is not only arbitrary, but doubly objectionable; first, because it passes over the nearest antecedent (n^i. II’K) to connect the verse exclusively with one more distant (os rvis), and then, because it passes by the very one to which the figures of this verse have most analogy. The opening of the eyes and the deliverance of those that sit in darkness are correlative expressions to the light of the gentiles, which on this account, and as the nearest antecedent, must decide the sense of this verse, if that sense depend on either of these attributes exclusively. I will make thee a light to the gentiles, to open the blind eyes etc. cannot mean, I will make thee an instructor of the heathen to restore the Jews from captivity in Babylon. Whether the verse before us therefore be strictly or figuratively understood, it cannot be applied to the captivity without doing violence at once to the text and context. The very same reasoning applies to the analogous expressions used in ch. 49: 9, and thus corroborates our previous conclusion, that the context in neither of these places favours, much less requires, the restriction of cs n^s to the Jews. The only natural interpretation of the verse before us is that which makes it figurative like the one preceding it, and the only natural interpretation of its figures is the one which understands them as descriptive of spiritual blindness and spiritual bondage, both which are metaphors of constant application to the natural condition of mankind in the Old as well as the New Testament. The removal of these evils is the work of Christ, as the revealer of the Father who has brought life and immortality to light: but in subordination to him, and as his representative, his church may also be correctly represented as a covenant of the people and a light of the nations; since the law, though a divine revelation, was to go forth from Zion and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.
8. I am Jehovah, that is my name, and my glory to another will I not give, and my praise to graven images. The name Jehovah is here used with emphasis in reference to its etymological import as descriptive of a self-existent, independent, and eternal being. There is no sufficient ground for the opinion that the pronoun &wn is ever used as a divine name, cognate and equivalent to Jehovah. In this case the obvious and usual construction is entirely satisfactory. Graven images are here put, as in many other cases, for idols in general, without regard to the mode of their formation. The connexion of this verse with what precedes may seem obscure, but admits of an easy explanation. From the assertion of Jehovah’s power and perfection as a ground for his people’s confidence, the Prophet now proceeds, by a natural transition, to exhibit it in contrast with the impotence of those gods in whom the gentiles trusted. These are represented not only as inferior to God, but as his enemies and rivals, any act of worship paid to whom was so much taken from what he claimed as his own and as his own exclusively. The general doctrine of the verse is that true and false religion cannot coexist; because, however tolerant idolatry may be, it is essential to the worship of Jehovah to be perfectly exclusive of all other gods. This is included in the very name Jehovah, and accounts for its solemn proclamation here.
9. The, first (or former) things—lo, they have come, and new things I (am) telling; before they spring forth (sprout or germinate) I will make (or let) you hear (them). This is an appeal to former prophecies already verified, as grounds of confidence in those yet unfulfilled. The attempts which have been made to give specific meanings to former things and new things as denoting certain classes of prophecies, are unsuccessful because perfectly gratuitous. The most plausible hypothesis of this kind is Vitringa’s, which applies the one term to the prophecies respecting Cyrus and the Babylonish exile, the other to the prophecies respecting the Messiah and the new dispensation. But the simple meaning of the words appears to be, that as former prophecies (not of Isaiah but of older prophets) had come to pass, so those now uttered should be likewise verified. The strong and beautiful expression in the last clause can only mean that the events about to be predicted were beyond the reach of human foresight, and is therefore destructive of the modern notion, that these prophecies were written after Cyrus had appeared, and at a time when the further events of his history could be foreseen by an observer of unusual sagacity. Such a prognosticator, unless he was also a deliberate deceiver, a charge which no one brings against this writer, could not have said of what he thus foresaw, that he announced it before it had begun to germinate, i. e. while the seed was in the earth, and before any outward indications of the plant could be perceived. As this embraces all the writer’s prophecies, it throws the date of composition back to a period before the rise of Cyrus, and thereby helps to invalidate the arguments in favour of regarding it as contemporaneous with the Babylonish exile.
10. Sing to Jehovah a new song, his praise from the end of the earth, (ye) going down to the sea and its fulness, isles and their inhabitants! To sing a new song, according to Old Testament usage, is to praise God for some new manifestation of his power and goodness. It implies, therefore, not only fresh praise, but a fresh occasion for it. Reduced to ordinary prose style, it is a prediction that changes are to take place joyfully affecting the condition of the whole world. That this is a hyperbole, relating to the restoration of the Jews from Babylon, is too gratuitous and forced a supposition to be imposed upon any reader of the prophecy against his will. Let those who can, receive and make the most of it. The great majority of readers will be apt to reject an assumption which has no foundation in the text and which reduces a sublime prediction to an extravaganza.—Gesenius, for some reason not explained, chooses to read at instead of from the end. The obvious meaning of the phrase is, that the sound of praise should be heard coming from the remotest quarters.—Its fulness may either be connected with the sea and both dependent on go down (to the sea and its fulness), or regarded as a distinct object of address. In the latter case, the marine animals would seem to be intended; in the former, the whole mass of water with its contents; the last is more poetical and natural. The antithesis is then between the sea with its frequenters on the one hand and the isles with their inhabitants on the other.
11. The desert and its towns shall raise (the voice), the enclosures (or encampments, in which) Kedar dwells; the dwellers in the Rock shall shout, from the top of mountains shall they cry aloud. This is a direct continuation of the previous description, in which the whole world is represented as exulting in the promised change. The reference of this verse to the course of the returning exiles through the intervening desert is forbidden by the mention of the sea and its fulness, the isles and the ends of the earth, in the preceding and following verses. If these are not all parts of the same great picture, it is impossible to frame one. If they are, it is absurd to take the first and last parts in their widest sense as an extravagant hyperbole, and that which is between them in its strictest sense as a literal description. The only consistent supposition is that sea, islands, deserts, mountains, towns, and camps, are put together as poetical ingredients of the general conception, that the earth in all its parts shall have occasion to rejoice.—The mention of cities as existing in the wilderness appears less strange in the original than in a modern version, because both the leading words (^1? and -PS?) have a greater latitude of meaning than their usual equivalents, the first denoting properly a pasture-ground, and being applicable therefore to any uncultivated region whether uninhabited or not, the other answering to town in its widest English sense inclusive of both villages and cities. There is no need therefore of supposing a particular allusion to oases in the arid desert, or of assuming, as Gesenius does in his Thesaurus, that -PS sometimes means nothing more than a military station, post, or watch-tower. (See the Earlier Prophecies, p. 8.)—The translation of D^xn by villages is too restricted, since the Hebrew word is applicable also to collections of tents or nomadic encampments, which appears to be the prominent idea here. Kedar was the second son of Ishmael. (Gen. 25: 13.) Here, as in ch. 21: 16, the name is put for his descendants, or by a natural metonymy for the Arabians in general. The rabbinical name for the Arabic language is the tongue of Kedar. The Septuagint takes it as the name of the country (and those inhabiting Kedar). The Vulgate makes this clause a promise (Kedar shall dwell in houses), and the preceding verb a passive (lei the desert and its towns be exalted). Cocceius has the same construction, but gives both the verbs an imperative meaning, and follows the Septuagint in explaining Kedar (efferat se desertum et oppida ejus; per pagos habitetur Kedarena). Most writers, ancient and modern, have regarded a relative construction as more natural (which Kedar doth inhabit). The use of Kedar as a feminine is contrary to general usage, which distinguishes between the name of the country as feminine and that of the nation possessing it as masculine. The rabbins explain it by supposing an ellipsis of rns before it. More probably, however, it is an irregularity or license of construction, such as we have seen already in ch. 21:2 and elsewhere.—Vitringa, J. D. Michaelis, and some later writers, explain 3&o as the proper name of Petra; but the whole connexion renders it more natural to take it in its general sense of rock, and as corresponding not so much to Kedar as to the appellatives, desert, towns, encampments, mountains.
12. They shall place (or give) to Jehovah honour, and his praise in the islands they shall show forth (or declare). Still another mode of say ing, the whole we rid shall praise him. The islands are again mentioned, either as one out of several particulars before referred to, or with emphasis, as if he had said, even in the islands, beyond sea, and by implication in the furthest regions.—As the verb to give, in Hebrew usage, has the secondary sense of placing, so the verb to place is occasionally used as an equivalent to that of giving. (See the Earlier Prophecies, p. 445.)—The translation of the verbs in this verse as imperatives (let them give glory and declare), although substantially correct, is a needless departure from the form of the original, in which the idea of command or exhortation is sufficiently implied though not expressed.—The verbs do not agree with the series of nouns in the foregoing verse (desert, towns, etc.), for these could not celebrate Jehovah in the islands. The construction is indefinite, they, i. e. men in general, a form of speech of far more frequent occurrence in Hebrew than would be suspected by a reader of the English Bible.
13. Jehovah, like a strong one, will go forth; like a warrior (lite rally a man of battle) he will rouse (his) zeal; he will shout, yea he will 6a CHAPTERXLII. cry; against his foes he will make (or show) himself strong. From the effect he now reverts to the efficient cause. The universal joy before described is to arise from Jehovah’s triumph over his enemies. The martial figures of the verse are intelligible in themselves and all familiar to the usa<’e of the Scriptures.—Lowth and Barnes amend the common version of the first clause by reading, he shall march forth like a hero. The modern Germans also use the word Held (hero). Luther and Calvin prefer giant. It may be doubted whether any English word is more appropriate or striking than the strict translation strong or mighty. To go forth is the common Hebrew phrase for going out to war or battle. (See above, on ch. 40: 26.) Junius and Tremellius understand the plural battles as a superlative expression, and translate the phrase vir bellicosissimus evigilans zelo. The ver sions of Clericus (vir militaris) and Vitringa (peritus bellattir) greatly weaken the expression. riiOp may either have its general sense of ardour, strong and violent affection of whatever kind, or its more specific sense of jealousy or sensitive regard for his own honour and for the welfare of his people. (See the Earlier Prophecies, p. 165.) The idea is that of an ancient warrior exciting his own courage by a shout or war-cry.—The last clause may be understood to mean, he shall prevail over his enemies; but although this idea is undoubtedly included, it is best to retain the reflexive form and import of the verb, as far as may be, in translation.
14. I have long been still (saying) 1 will hold my peace, I will restrain myself. (But now) like the travailing (woman) I will shriek, I will pant and gasp at once. The consecution of the tenses in the first clause has occasioned the most opposite constructions. Of these the most violent and ungrammatical is that of Augusti, who translates all the verbs of the verse as preterites. With this exception, it appears to be agreed on all hands that the verbs of the last clause are either futures proper, or descriptive presents, and the only question is in reference to those of the first. According to Luther, these are all presents; while the Vulgate, followed by most modern writers, makes them all refer to past time. That such assimilations do occur, is certain; but a general maxim of interpretation makes it highly desirable to regard the distinction of the tenses, where we can, as intentional and significant. Lowth and Ewald accordingly follow the Septuagint in retaining the future form of the second and third verbs, but read them interrogatively (I have long been silent. Shall I hold my peace and restrain myself for ever?). This involves the necessity of reading Q^^rt (for ever?) and connecting it against the accents with what follows. It is true that interrogative sentences, without the interrogative particle expressed, are not unknown to Hebrew usage; but their occurrence is comparatively rare, and ought not to be assumed without necessity, which of course has no existence if the clause can be affirmatively read without abandoning the strict sense of the future. This can be done, as may be seen in the translation above given, by regarding the second and third verbs as the expression of his own determination or intention while the silence lasted. The omission of the verb to say before such repetitions or citations is not only frequent in general usage, but the more natural in this case from the fact that this whole verse is universally regarded as the words of God himself, although he is not expressly introduced as the speaker. The necessity of supplying (at least in thought) the words but now before the last clause, is not peculiar to this view of the passage, but common to it with all others, except Augusti’s paradoxical construction.—The word M2B:a is twice used elsewhere by Isaiah (30: 6. 59: 5) as a noun meaning a viper or some other venomous serpent, in which sense it is also used by Job (20: 16). The general principles of analogical interpretation would require this sense to be retained here; but the only writers who have ventured so to do are Junius and Tremellius who translate the clause, utparturientem viptram desolabo. Even the rabbins give the word the sense of crying, which is plainly a conjecture from the context. Bocha-rt attempts a compromise between the two opinions, by supposing that the word originally means to hiss like a serpent; and Gesenius connects it with nxs to blow. The only objection to the common version, shriek or scream, is^that it seems too strong both for the etymology and the analogy of the verbs which follow and which seem to denote a suppressed sound rather than a loud one, I will pant and gasp at once. There is indeed another very ancient explanation of these two verbs, given in the Vulgate and by Calvin, Grotius, Hitzig, and Hendewerk. as well as in the English Version, I will destroy and devour at once. This refers nisx to the root DCIU to lay waste (and more generally to destroy), and gives £|S the sense of swallowing and then (like s^s) that of des.troying. But Pixd means elsewhere *to'pant* or *gasp;* and EEK may be readily regarded as a synonyme, if derived from cttis *to breathe,* of which it would be the natural future. It is true that this verb does not occur elsewhere, but its derivative frattja *breath* is of perpetual occurrence; and the very same writers who reject the derivation from caa on this ground, assume that of fiSBK from USB not only in the absence of any other instance, but in opposition to the usage which.determines it to be a noun. The authority of Gesenius may be cited upon both sides of this question, not only from his earlier and later works but from the last edition of his Lexicon, in which the two explanations of this clause are separately given as correct, the one under t)&Wj, which is explained as meaning to breathe hard, to pant, to blow, " e. g. of an angry person Is. 42: 14," the other under oa«o, where the two verbs are translated, " I will destroy and gulp down together." The para phrase added in the latter case, " my wrath, long restrained, I will now let break forth," is no doubt the true sense of the verse on either supposition.
15. I will lay waste mountains and hills, and all their herbage will I dry up; and I will turn (literally place) streams to islands, and pools (or lakes’) will I dry up. Having described the effect and the cause of the great future change, he now describes the change itself, under the common form of a complete revolution in the face of nature, sometimes with special reference to the heavens (ch. ]3: 10), sometimes (as here and in ch. 35: 6, 7) to the earth. It is strange that, with these analogies in view and after such descriptions as those previously given, any should still suppose that by mountains and hills we are here to understand states and governments, and by their herbs the citizens or subjects. There is more probability in the opinion that the verse contains an allusion to the ancient cultivation of the hills of Palestine, by means of terraces, many of which are still in existence. (See the Earlier Prophecies, p. 134.) Houbigant and Lowth read fi^s (dry deserts), which is not only needless but contrary to u.sa^e, as 01*25 no where signifies deserts themselves, but always their inhabitants. Gesenius and the other modern writers suppose o^x to be here used in the sense of dry land as opposed to water. The necessity of this explanation may however be avoided by adopting the ingenious suggestion of Clericus, that what is here described is the actual appearance of islands in the channels of the streams on the subsiding of the water.—The drying of the bed of the Euphrates by Cyrus can at the utmost only be the subject of an indirect allusion. A literal prophecy of that event would be entirely misplaced in a series of bold metaphorical descriptions.—Rosenmiiller goes to an extravagant length in attempting to connect this verse with the preceding context by explaining it to mean that the excited warrior will dry up vegetation with his burning breath.
16. And I will make the blind walk in a way they knew not, in paths they knew not I will make them tread; I will set (or turn) dark ness before them to light, and obliquities to straightness. These are the words; I have made them (or done them} and have not left them. The particle before the first verb is conversive i. e. gives a future meaning to the preterite, because preceded by the future proper. (See Nordheimer, <§> 219.) The ellipsis of the relative, which twice occurs in this clause, is precisely the same both in Hebrew and in English.—:”i£p?r maybe translated crooked or uneven places, as opposed to what is level, or to superficial rectitude. (See above, on ch. 40: 4, p. 4.) The combination of these two antitheses (light and dark, crooked and straight-) shows clearly that they are both metaphorical expressions for the same thing that is represented under other figures in the verse preceding, viz. total change; in what respect and by what means, the metaphors themselves do not determine. And yet some writers understand the first clause as specifically meaning, that the exiles in Babylon should be delivered at a time and in a manner which they had not expected; while another class apply the words exclusively to spiritual exercise or religious experience. To both these objects the description admits of an easy application; but neither of them is to be considered its specific subject. It is impossible, without the utmost violence, to separate this one link from the chain of which it forms a part, that is to say, from the series of strong and varied metaphors, by which the Prophet is expressing the idea of abrupt and total change. The same thing that is meant by the wasting of cultivated hills, the withering of herbage, and the drying up of streams and lakes, is also meant by the leading of blind men in a new path, i. e. causing them to witness things of which they had had no previous experience.—The usual construction of the last clause supplies a relative before the leading verb and takes its suffix as a dative—(these are the words or things which I have done for them and have not left them.’ Another construction separates the members as distinct propositions—’ these are the words (or the things \which I have promised to the people); I have made them and have, not forsaken them.’ The simplest and most regular construction is that given by Jerome and Cocceius, which refers the pronouns not to a noun understood but to the expressed antecedent: These are the words (i. e. my promises), I have performed them and have not abandoned them, that is to say, I have not relinquished my design until it was accomplished. (Compare the last clause of Ezekiel 17: 24.) The translation of these verbs as futures has arisen merely from a feeling on the part of the interpreter that the words ought to contain a promise; whereas the promise is implied or rather superseded by the declaration that the work is done already, or at least that the effect is already secured. The usual construction, which makes one a preterite and one a future, is doubly arbitrary and capricious.
17. They are turned back, they shall be ashamed with shame (i. e. ‘ utterly ashamed), those trusting in the graven image, those saying to the molten image, Ye are our gods. This verse describes the effect to be produced by the expected changes on the enemies of God and the worshippers of idols. They are turned back, utterly defeated, foiled in their malignant opposition. Nor is this all; for they are yet to be utterly ashamed, con founded, disappointed, and disgraced. In the’last clause it is plain that the graven and molten image are separated only by the parallelism, because the address at the end is in the plural form, not thou art, but ye are our gods. On the usage of these two nouns, see Earlier Prophecies, p. 519.
18. Ye deaf, hear! and ye blind, look to see! From the connexion, this would seem to be a call upon the worshippers of idols, to open 5 their eyes and ears, and become conscious of their own delusions.—The infinitive at the end of the sentence does not express the manner but the purpose of the act required. Vitringa’s version therefore (videndo intuemini) is less correct than that of Jerome (intuemini ad videndum).
19. Who (is) blind but my servant, and deaf like my messenger (whom) I will send 1 Who (is) blind like the devoted one, and blind like the servant of Jehovah. Why should he call the heathen blind and deaf, when Israel himself, with all his honours and advantages, refused to see or hear? The very people whose mission and vocation it was to make the gentiles see and hear, seemed to emulate their insensibility. The most difficult expression in this verse is dbira, which the Seventy seem to have read c^br^ anc’ understood as meaning those that have dominion over them. The various explanations the common text may all be reduced to two distinct senses of the verbal root, viz. that of being at peace and that of being perfect or complete. The latter meaning is assumed by Luther, Calvin, Cocceius, and Vitringa; while Clericus modifies it so as to mean a man of consummate wisdom, and Lowth one ‘perfectly instructed. On the other hypothesis, Junius renders it donatus pace; Gesenius, the friend of God; Hitzig, Ewald, and Umbreit, the devoted or the God-devoted. This last is favoured by the analogy of ^JLwwuo in Arabic, the name by which the Mohammedans describe themselves, and which denotes one who gives himself to God. From the use of the Piel in the sense of completing, making good, repaying, are derived the Vulgate version (venundatus) and that of Rosenmiiller (redemtus). As to the application of the term here, Clericus supposes that it means the High Priest or some eminent person of the sacerdotal order. But the great majority of writers understand it as descriptive of Israel, the chosen people. The objection arising from the use of similar expressions at the beginning of the chapter with respect to the Messiah is usually set aside by arbitrarily assuming entire diversity of subject. Henderson alone has the intrepidity to understand this verse of the Messiah likewise, accounting for the application of such epithets to such a subject by assuming that it expresses the opinion of the unbelieving Jews respecting Christ. The obvious objection to this mode of exposition is, that it opens the door to endless license of interpretation, by admitting that a passage may be referred at will to the subject which it is least adapted to describe, by simply making it express the mind not of the writer, as it seems to do, but of another party not expressly mentioned. A purely arbitrary supposition cannot be justified by the assumption of another like it. The true solution of the difficulty seems to be the one already given in explaining the first verse, viz. that the Servant of Jehovah is a title applying not only to the Head but to the Body also. Here, where the language implies censure and reproach, the terms must be referred exclusively to Israel, the messenger whom God had sent to open the eyes of the other nations, but who had himself become wilfully blind. The future nVrx implies that the mission was not yet fulfilled. Jerome’s construction, unto whom I sent my messengers, is wholly ungrammatical and a mere expedient to avoid a seeming difficulty. It is scarcely credible that Clericus seems half-inclined to take “^xb^ as the proper name of Malachi.
20. Thou hast seen many things, and wilt not observe. (Sent) to open ears! and he will not hear. In the first clause he turns to Israel and addresses him directly; in the last he turns away from him again, and, as it were, expresses his surprise and indignation to the by-standers. The sense of the whole, leaving out of view this difference of form, is the same as in the foregoing verse, namely, that Israel had eyes but saw not, and instead of opening the ears of others was himself incapable of hearing. The sentence may be said to exhibit a climax. In the first clause the contrast is between the blindness of the people and the light which they enjoyed; in the last it is between their deafness and their high vocation to open the ears of others. Hence the abrupt and impassioned form of expression in the latter case. The marginal reading m’jn, though susceptible of explanation as an infinitive, is an unnecessary emendation of the textual n^ao. The infinitive nps might be considered as deriving a preterite sense from the preceding verb; but a better explanation is afforded by the analogy of v. 7, where the same infinitive describes the end for which the Servant of Jehovah was sent.
21. Jehovah (is) willing for his righteousness’ salce; he will magnify the law and make it honourable. The people, being thus unfaithful to their trust, had no claim to be treated any longer as an object of Jehovah’s favour; and yet he continues propitious, not on their account, but out of regard to his own engagements, and for the execution of his righteous pur poses. For these reasons he will still put honour on the chosen people and the system under which they lived. Gesenius and Hitzig arbitrarily construe ysn with ^’^, is pleased to magnify, of which construction there is no example elsewhere, and then make this an idiom of the later Hebrew. Still less grammatical is the construction of the ancient versions, ‘ it pleased God to justify or sanctify him,’ whether this be understood to imply the reading “ip^st, or taken as a paraphrase of the common text. The application of the words to the righteousness of Christ is inconsistent with the terms of censure and disapprobation which precede and follow.
22. And (yet) it (is) a people spoiled and robbed, ensnared in holes all of them, and in homes of confinement they are hidden. They have become a spoil, and there is none delivering; a prey, and there is none saying, Restore. Here another contrast is brought into view. As the conduct of the people did not answer to their high vocation, so their treat ment does not answer to the preceding declaration of God’s purpose. If he still designed to honour them, though not for their own sake, how was this to be reconciled with what they suffered at the hands of their enemies? The terms are no doubt metaphorical, and therefore not exclusively descriptive of literal captivity. At the same time it may be admitted that the suffer ings of Israel in exile furnished one of the most memorable instances of what is here described in general.—D^na is explained in the ancient versions, and by many modern writers, to mean youths or chosen men, as it does above in ch. 40: 30. But why should this class be described as in captivity? Cocceius and Vitringa change the meaning of the clause by making n£fi the infinitive of n*iB to blow or puff, and explaining the whole phrase, ‘they are all the puffing of the young men,’ i. e. objects of derision and contempt, But this construction violates the parallelism for the sake of an extremely forced and far-fetched meaning. Most of the modern writers follow Luther in explaining fi nina to mean in holes or pitfalls, corresponding to s^? ^}3 in the other member.
23. Who among you will give ear to this, will hearken and hear for the time to come 1 By this we are not to understand merely the fact recorded in the foregoing verse, but the doctrine of the whole preceding context as to the vocation and mission of Israel and as to his actual condition. God had appointed him to be a source or at least a medium of light and blessing to the nations; but instead of acting up to this high character, he not only left the nations without light, but was wilfully blinded and insensible himself. Yet God would still be true to his engagements, and put honour on the special revelation which he had already given. Why, then. it might be asked, was Israel suffered to fall before his enemies? The answer to this question is introduced by an indirect caution to consider it and bear it in mind. The interrogative form implies the possibility of their neglecting or refusing to obey it.—The last phrase is explained to mean behind or backwards by Vitringa (a tcrgo) and Ewald (zuruckwarts), who seem to understand it as denoting reflection on the past, or the act of meditating upon what they heard.—Most other writers understand it as relating either to the time of hearing (henceforth or hereafter) or the subject of the declarations to be heard (concerning the future).
24. Who has given Jacob for a prey, and Israel to spoilers? Has not Jehovah, against whom we have sinned, and they were not willing in MS ways to walk, and did not hearken to his law 1 This was what they were to bear in mind, viz. that what they suffered was ordained of God and on account of their iniquities. The errors of which this verse is the negation are those of supposing that they suffered without fault, and that they suffered, as it were, in spite of God’s protection, or because he was unable to prevent it. The interrogation makes the statement more emphatic: Who else can be imagined to have done it, or for what other cause except our sins? The change of person in the last clause is a common Hebrew idiom and does not seem to be significant. (See the Earlier Prophecies, p. -20.) If the Prophet identifies himself with the people in the first phrase, he cannot be supposed to exclude himself in that which follows.—Hitzig’s translation of the last word (his instruction) is too weak, as it fails to suggest the idea of obligation. It is also at variance with usage, which requires rnin to be taken not in its etymological sense merely but in that of law.—This verse is strictly applicable to the sufferings of the Jews in Babylon, and it was no doubt so applied by them; but in itself it is a general declaration of a fact which has been often verified and was especially exemplified in ancient Israel, viz. that the sufferings even of God’s people are the consequence of sin.
25. And he (Jehovah) poured upon him (Israel) fury (even) his wrath and the strength (or violence) of war: and it set him on fire round about, and he knew (it) not; and it burned him, and he will not lay it to heart. This continues and concludes the description of God’s judgments and of Israel’s insensibility. Most writers explain M^n as an absolute form used for the construct (Jury of his anger). Junius and Vitringa make it an adverbial expression qualifying I’BX (excanu’cscentid or cum excandescentid iram). The simplest construction is to put the nouns in apposition, either as mere equivalents (my anger as fury), or as exegetical the one of the other (fury, to wit, my anger).—He knew not does not here mean unawares, without his knowledge, but, as the parallel clause shows, implies extreme insensibility. The translation of the last verb as a preterite is ungrammatical, and the assimilation of the two as presents an evasion. That a preterite precedes, instead of showing that the future must refer to past time, shows the contrary, by leaving us unable to account for the difference of form if none of meaning was intended. However necessary such assimilations may be elsewhere, they are inadmissible in cases like the present, where the change of tense admits of an easy explanation, to wit, that the writer intended to describe the people not only as having been insensible before but as likely to continue so in time to come.—On the usage of the phrase to put or lay upon the, heart, see above, p. 42.
