{"commentary":{"id":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","website":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamieson-Fausset-Brown_Bible_Commentary","licenseUrl":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","licenseNotes":null,"licenseNotice":null,"englishName":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","language":"eng","textDirection":"rtl","sha256":"db3d4c8b3c1f32ef9d1430a57392e02bda3a17aac1f9bbe398461de021a3cb13","availableFormats":["json"],"listOfBooksApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/books.json","listOfProfilesApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/profiles.json","numberOfBooks":66,"totalNumberOfChapters":1187,"totalNumberOfVerses":17056,"totalNumberOfProfiles":0,"languageName":"English","languageEnglishName":"English"},"book":{"id":"ISA","commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Isaiah","commonName":"Isaiah","introduction":"ISAIAH, son of Amoz (not Amos); contemporary of Jonah, Amos, Hosea, in Israel, but younger than they; and of Micah, in Judah. His call to a higher degree of the prophetic office (Isa 6:1-13) is assigned to the last year of Uzziah, that is, 754 B.C. The first through fifth chapters belong to the closing years of that reign; not, as some think, to Jotham's reign: in the reign of the latter he seems to have exercised his office only orally, and not to have left any record of his prophecies because they were not intended for all ages. The first through fifth and sixth chapters are all that was designed for the Church universal of the prophecies of the first twenty years of his office. New historical epochs, such as occurred in the reigns of Ahaz and Hezekiah, when the affairs of Israel became interwoven with those of the Asiatic empires, are marked by prophetic writings. The prophets had now to interpret the judgments of the Lord, so as to make the people conscious of His punitive justice, as also of His mercy. Isa. 7:1-10:4 belong to the reign of Ahaz. The thirty-sixth through thirty-ninth chapters are historical, reaching to the fifteenth year of Hezekiah; probably the tenth through twelfth chapters and all from the thirteenth through twenty-sixth chapters, inclusive, belong to the same reign; the historical section being appended to facilitate the right understanding of these prophecies; thus we have Isaiah's office extending from about 760 to 713 B.C., forty-seven years. Tradition (Talmud) represents him as having been sawn asunder by Manasseh with a wooden saw, for having said that he had seen Jehovah (Exo 33:20; Kg2 21:16; Heb 11:37). Ch2 32:32 seems to imply that Isaiah survived Hezekiah; but \"first and last\" is not added, as in Ch2 26:22, which makes it possible that his history of Hezekiah was only carried up to a certain point. The second part, the fortieth through sixty-sixth chapters, containing complaints of gross idolatry, needs not to be restricted to Manasseh's reign, but is applicable to previous reigns. At the accession of Manasseh, Isaiah would be eighty-four; and if he prophesied for eight years afterwards, he must have endured martyrdom at ninety-two; so Hosea prophesied for sixty years. And Eastern tradition reports that he lived to one hundred and twenty. The conclusive argument against the tradition is that, according to the inscription, all Isaiah's prophecies are included in the time from Uzziah to Hezekiah; and the internal evidence accords with this.\n\nHis WIFE is called the prophetess [Isa 8:3], that is, endowed, as Miriam, with a prophetic gift.\n\nHis CHILDREN were considered by him as not belonging merely to himself; in their names, Shearjashub, \"the remnant shall return\" [Isa 7:3, Margin], and Maher-shalal-hash-baz, \"speeding to the spoil, he hasteth to the prey\" [Isa 8:1, Margin], the two chief points of his prophecies are intimated to the people, the judgments of the Lord on the people and the world, and yet His mercy to the elect.\n\nHis GARMENT of sackcloth (Isa 20:2), too, was a silent preaching by fact; he appears as the embodiment of that repentance which he taught.\n\nHis HISTORICAL WORKS.--History, as written by the prophets, is retroverted prophecy. As the past and future alike proceed from the essence of God, an inspired insight into the past implies an insight into the future, and vice versa. Hence most of the Old Testament histories are written by prophets and are classed with their writings; the Chronicles being not so classed, cannot have been written by them, but are taken from historical monographs of theirs; for example, Isaiah's life of Uzziah, Ch2 26:22; also of Hezekiah, Ch2 32:32; of these latter all that was important for all ages has been preserved to us, while the rest, which was local and temporary, has been lost.\n\nThe INSCRIPTION (Isa 1:1) applies to the whole book and implies that Isaiah is the author of the second part (the fortieth through sixty-sixth chapters), as well as of the first. Nor do the words, \"concerning Judah and Jerusalem\" [Isa 1:1], oppose the idea that the inscription applies to the whole; for whatever he says against other nations, he says on account of their relation to Judah. So the inscription of Amos, \"concerning Israel\" [Amo 1:1], though several prophecies follow against foreign nations. EWALD maintains that the fortieth through sixty-sixth chapters, though spurious, were subjoined to the previous portion, in order to preserve the former. But it is untrue that the first portion is unconnected with those chapters. The former ends with the Babylonian exile (Isa 39:6), the latter begins with the coming redemption from it. The portion, the fortieth through forty-sixth chapters, has no heading of its own, a proof that it is closely connected with what precedes, and falls under the general heading in Isa 1:1. JOSEPHUS (The Antiquities of the Jews, 11. 1, sec. 1, 2) says that Cyrus was induced by the prophecies of Isaiah (Isa 44:28; Isa 45:1, Isa 45:13) to aid the Jews in returning and rebuilding the temple Ezr 1:1-11 confirms this; Cyrus in his edict there plainly refers to the prophecies in the second portion, which assign the kingdoms to him from Jehovah, and the duty of rebuilding the temple. Probably he took from them his historical name Cyrus (Coresh). Moreover, subsequent prophets imitate this second portion, which EWALD assigns to later times; for example, compare Jer. 50:1-51:64 with Isaiah's predictions against Babylon [Isa. 13:1-14:23]. \"The Holy One of Israel,\" occurring but three times elsewhere in the Old Testament [Kg2 19:22; Psa 78:41; Psa 89:18; Jer 50:29; Jer 51:5], is a favorite expression in the second, as in the first portion of Isaiah: it expresses God's covenant faithfulness in fulfilling the promises therein: Jeremiah borrows the expression from him. Also Ecclesiasticus 48:22-25 (\"comforted\"), quotes Isa 40:1 as Isaiah's. Luk 4:17 quotes Isa 61:1-2 as Isaiah's, and as read as such by Jesus Christ in the synagogue.\n\nThe DEFINITENESS of the prophecies is striking: As in the second portion of isaiah, so in Mic 4:8-10, the Babylonian exile, and the deliverance from it, are foretold a hundred fifty years before any hostilities had arisen between Babylon and Judah. On the other hand, all the prophets who foretell the Assyrian invasion coincide in stating, that Judah should be delivered from it, not by Egyptian aid, but directly by the Lord. Again Jeremiah, in the height of the Chaldean prosperity, foretold its conquest by the Medes, who should enter Babylon through the dry bed of the Euphrates on a night of general revelry. No human calculation could have discovered these facts. EICHORN terms these prophecies \"veiled historical descriptions,\" recognizing in spite of himself that they are more than general poetical fancies. The fifty-third chapter of Isaiah was certainly written ages before the Messiah, yet it minutely portrays His sufferings: these cannot be Jewish inventions, for the Jews looked for a reigning, not a suffering, Messiah.\n\nRationalists are so far right that THE PROPHECIES ARE ON A GENERAL BASIS whereby they are distinguished from soothsaying. They rest on the essential idea of God. The prophets, penetrated by this inner knowledge of His character, became conscious of the eternal laws by which the world is governed: that sin is man's ruin, and must be followed by judgment, but that God's covenant mercy to His elect is unchangeable. Without prophetism, the elect remnant would have decreased, and even God's judgments would have missed their end, by not being recognized as such: they would have been unmeaning, isolated facts. Babylon was in Isaiah's days under Assyria; it had tried a revolt unsuccessfully: but the elements of its subsequent success and greatness were then existing. The Holy Ghost enlightened his natural powers to discern this its rise; and his spiritual faculties, to foresee its fall, the sure consequence, in God's eternal law, of the pride which pagan success generates--and also Judah's restoration, as the covenant-people, with whom God, according to His essential character, would not be wroth for ever. True conversion is the prophet's grand remedy against all evils: in this alone consists his politics. Rebuke, threatening, and promise, regularly succeed one another. The idea at the basis of all is in Isa 26:7-9; Lev 10:3; Amo 3:2.\n\nThe USE OF THE PRESENT AND PRETERITE in prophecy is no proof that the author is later than Isaiah. For seers view the future as present, and indicate what is ideally past, not really past; seeing things in the light of God, who \"calls the things that are not as though they were.\" Moreover, as in looking from a height on a landscape, hills seem close together which are really wide apart, so, in events foretold, the order, succession, and grouping are presented, but the intervals of time are overlooked. The time, however, is sometimes marked (Jer 25:12; Dan 9:26). Thus the deliverance from Babylon, and that effected by Messiah, are in rapid transition grouped together by THE LAW OF PROPHETIC SUGGESTION; yet no prophet so confounds the two as to make Messiah the leader of Israel from Babylon. To the prophet there was probably no double sense; but to his spiritual eye the two events, though distinct, lay so near, and were so analogous, that he could not separate them in description without unfaithfulness to the picture presented before him. The more remote and antitypical event, however, namely, Messiah's coming, is that to which he always hastens, and which he describes with far more minuteness than he does the nearer type; for example, Cyrus (compare Isa 45:1 with Isa 53:1-12). In some cases he takes his stand in the midst of events between, for example, the humiliation of Jesus Christ, which he views as past, and His glorification, as yet to come, using the future tense as to the latter (compare Isa 53:4-9 with Isa 53:10-12). Marks of the time of events are given sparingly in the prophets: yet, as to Messiah, definitely enough to create the general expectation of Him at the time that He was in fact born.\n\nThe CHALDÆISMS alleged against the genuineness of the second portion of Isaiah, are found more in the first and undoubted portion. They occur in all the Old Testament, especially in the poetical parts, which prefer unusual expressions, and are due to the fact that the patriarchs were surrounded by Chaldee-speaking people; and in Isaiah's time a few Chaldee words had crept in from abroad.\n\nHis SYMBOLS are few and simple, and his poetical images correct; in the prophets, during and after the exile, the reverse holds good; Haggai and Malachi are not exceptions; for, though void of bold images, their style, unlike Isaiah's, rises little above prose: a clear proof that our Isaiah was long before the exile.\n\nOf VISIONS, strictly so called, he has but one, that in the sixth chapter; even it is more simple than those in later prophets. But he often gives SIGNS, that is, a present fact as pledge of the more distant future; God condescending to the feebleness of man (Isa 7:14; Isa 37:30; Isa 38:7).\n\nThe VARIETIES IN HIS STYLE do not prove spuriousness, but that he varied his style with his subject. The second portion is not so much addressed to his contemporaries, as to the future people of the Lord, the elect remnant, purified by the previous judgments. Hence its tenderness of style, and frequent repetitions (Isa 40:1): for comforting exhortation uses many words; so also the many epithets added to the name of God, intended as stays whereon faith may rest for comfort, so as not to despair. In both portions alike there are peculiarities characteristic of Isaiah; for example, \"to be called\" equivalent to to be: the repetition of the same words, instead of synonyms, in the parallel members of verses; the interspersing of his prophecies with hymns: \"the remnant of olive trees,\" &c., for the remnant of people who have escaped God's judgments. Also compare Isa 65:25 with Isa 11:6.\n\nThe CHRONOLOGICAL ARRANGEMENT favors the opinion that Isaiah himself collected his prophecies into the volume; not Hezekiah's men, as the Talmud guesses from Pro 25:1. All the portions, the dates of which can be ascertained, stand in the right place, except a few instances, where prophecies of similar contents are placed together: with the termination of the Assyrian invasion (the thirty-sixth through thirty-ninth chapters) terminated the public life of Isaiah. The second part is his prophetic legacy to the small band of the faithful, analogous to the last speeches of Moses and of Jesus Christ to His chosen disciples.\n\nThe EXPECTATION OF MESSIAH is so strong in Isaiah, that JEROME To Paulinus calls his book not a prophecy, but the gospel: \"He is not so much a prophet as an evangelist.\" Messiah was already shadowed forth in Gen 49:10, as the Shiloh, or tranquillizer; also in Psalms 2, 45, 72, 110. Isaiah brings it out more definitely; and, whereas they dwelt on His kingly office, Isaiah develops most His priestly and prophetic office; the hundred tenth Psalm also had set forth His priesthood, but His kingly rather than, as Isaiah, His suffering, priesthood. The latter is especially dwelt on in the second part, addressed to the faithful elect; whereas the first part, addressed to the whole people, dwells on Messiah's glory, the antidote to the fears which then filled the people, and the assurance that the kingdom of God, then represented by Judah, would not be overwhelmed by the surrounding nations.\n\nHis STYLE (HENGSTENBERG, Christology of the Old Testament,) is simple and sublime; in imagery, intermediate between the poverty of Jeremiah and the exuberance of Ezekiel. He shows his command of it in varying it to suit his subject.\n\nThe FORM is mostly that of Hebrew poetical parallelism, with, however, a freedom unshackled by undue restrictions.\n\nJUDAH, the less apostate people, rather than Israel, was the subject of his prophecies: his residence was mostly at Jerusalem. On his praises, see Ecclesiasticus 48:22-25. Christ and the apostles quote no prophet so frequently. \n\n\n\nNext: Isaiah Chapter 1\n\n","order":23,"numberOfChapters":66,"sha256":"05afbc35163ce25bd06467062226b36d66e6285d8ca85b4815540db57d9466be","firstChapterNumber":1,"firstChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/ISA/1.json","firstChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"ISA","chapter":1},"lastChapterNumber":66,"lastChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/ISA/66.json","lastChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"ISA","chapter":66},"totalNumberOfVerses":1200},"chapter":{"number":14,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":2,"content":["the people--of Babylon, primarily. Of the whole Gentile world ultimately (Isa 49:22; Isa 66:20; Isa 60:9). \n\ntheir place--Judea (Ezr 1:1-6). \n\npossess--receive in possession. \n\ncaptives--not by physical, but by moral might; the force of love, and regard to Israel's God (Isa 60:14).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":3,"content":["rest-- (Isa 28:12; Eze 28:25-26).\n\nThe whole earth rejoices; the cedars of Lebanon taunt him.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":4,"content":["A CHORUS OF JEWS EXPRESS THEIR JOYFUL SURPRISE AT BABYLON'S DOWNFALL. (Isa 14:4-8)\n\nproverb--The Orientals, having few books, embodied their thoughts in weighty, figurative, briefly expressed gnomes. Here a taunting song of triumph (Mic 2:4; Hab 2:6). \n\nthe king--the ideal representative of Babylon; perhaps Belshazzar (Dan. 5:1-31). The mystical Babylon is ultimately meant. \n\ngolden city--rather, \"the exactress of gold\" [MAURER]. But the old translators read differently in the Hebrew, \"oppression,\" which the parallelism favors (compare Isa 3:5).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":5,"content":["staff--not the scepter (Psa 2:9), but the staff with which one strikes others, as he is speaking of more tyrants than one (Isa 9:4; Isa 10:24; Isa 14:29) [MAURER]. \n\nrulers--tyrants, as the parallelism \"the wicked\" proves (compare see on Isa 13:2).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":6,"content":["people--the peoples subjected to Babylon. \n\nis persecuted--the Hebrew is rather, active, \"which persecuted them, without any to hinder him\" [Vulgate, JEROME, and HORSLEY].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":7,"content":["they--the once subject nations of the whole earth. HOUBIGANT places the stop after \"fir trees\" (Isa 14:8), \"The very fir trees break forth,\" &c. But the parallelism is better in English Version.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":8,"content":["the fir trees--now left undisturbed. Probably a kind of evergreen. \n\nrejoice at thee-- (Psa 96:12). At thy fall (Psa 35:19, Psa 35:24). \n\nno feller--as formerly, when thou wast in power (Isa 10:34; Isa 37:24).\n\nHades (the Amenthes of Egypt), the unseen abode of the departed; some of its tenants, once mighty monarchs, are represented by a bold personification as rising from their seats in astonishment at the descent among them of the humbled king of Babylon. This proves, in opposition to WARBURTON [The Divine Legation], that the belief existed among the Jews that there was a Sheol or Hades, in which the \"Rephaim\" or manes of the departed abode.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":9,"content":["THE SCENE CHANGES FROM EARTH TO HELL. (Isa 14:9-11)\n\nmoved--put into agitation. \n\nfor thee--that is, \"at thee\"; towards thee; explained by \"to meet thee at thy coming\" [MAURER]. \n\nchief ones--literally, \"goats\"; so rams, leaders of the flock; princes (Zac 10:3). The idea of wickedness on a gigantic scale is included (Eze 34:17; Mat 25:32-33). MAGEE derives \"Rephaim\" (English Version, \"the dead\") from a Hebrew root, \"to resolve into first elements\"; so \"the deceased\" (Isa 26:14) \"ghosts\" (Pro 21:16). These being magnified by the imagination of the living into gigantic stature, gave their name to giants in general (Gen 6:4; Gen 14:5; Eze 32:18, Eze 32:21). \"Rephaim,\" translated in the Septuagint, \"giants\" (compare see on Job 26:5-6). Thence, as the giant Rephaim of Canaan were notorious even in that guilty land, enormous wickedness became connected with the term. So the Rephaim came to be the wicked spirits in Gehenna, the lower of the two portions into which Sheol is divided.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":10,"content":["They taunt him and derive from his calamity consolation under their own (Eze 31:16). \n\nweak--as a shade bereft of blood and life. Rephaim, \"the dead,\" may come from a Hebrew root, meaning similarly \"feeble,\" \"powerless.\" The speech of the departed closes with Isa 14:11.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":11,"content":["\"Pomp\" and music, the accompaniment of Babylon's former feastings (Isa 5:12; Isa 24:8), give place to the corruption and the stillness of the grave (Eze 32:27). \n\nworm--that is bred in putridity. \n\nworms--properly those from which the crimson dye is obtained. Appropriate here; instead of the crimson coverlet, over thee shall be \"worms.\" Instead of the gorgeous couch, \"under thee\" shall be the maggot.\n\nThe language is so framed as to apply to the Babylonian king primarily, and at the same time to shadow forth through him, the great final enemy, the man of sin, Antichrist, of Daniel, St. Paul, and St. John; he alone shall fulfil exhaustively all the lineaments here given.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":12,"content":["THE JEWS ADDRESS HIM AGAIN AS A FALLEN ONCE-BRIGHT STAR. (Isa 14:12-15)\n\nLucifer--\"day star.\" A title truly belonging to Christ (Rev 22:16), \"the bright and morning star,\" and therefore hereafter to be assumed by Antichrist. GESENIUS, however, renders the Hebrew here as in Eze 21:12; Zac 11:2, \"howl.\" \n\nweaken--\"prostrate\"; as in Exo 17:13, \"discomfit.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":13,"content":["above . . . God--In Dan 8:10, \"stars\" express earthly potentates. \"The stars\" are often also used to express heavenly principalities (Job 38:7). \n\nmount of the congregation--the place of solemn meeting between God and His people in the temple at Jerusalem. In Dan 11:37, and Th2 2:4, this is attributed to Antichrist. \n\nsides of the north--namely, the sides of Mount Moriah on which the temple was built; north of Mount Zion (Psa 48:2). However, the parallelism supports the notion that the Babylonian king expresses himself according to his own, and not Jewish opinions (so in Isa 10:10) thus \"mount of the congregation\" will mean the northern mountain (perhaps in Armenia) fabled by the Babylonians to be the common meeting-place of their gods. \"Both sides\" imply the angle in which the sides meet; and so the expression comes to mean \"the extreme parts of the north.\" So the Hindus place the Meru, the dwelling-place of their gods, in the north, in the Himalayan mountains. So the Greeks, in the northern Olympus. The Persian followers of Zoroaster put the Ai-bordsch in the Caucasus north of them. The allusion to the stars harmonizes with this; namely, that those near the North Pole, the region of the aurora borealis (compare see on Job 23:9; Job 37:22) [MAURER, Septuagint, Syriac].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":14,"content":["clouds--rather, \"the cloud,\" singular. Perhaps there is a reference to the cloud, the symbol of the divine presence (Isa 4:5; Exo 13:21). So this tallies with Th2 2:4, \"above all that is called God\"; as here \"above . . . the cloud\"; and as the Shekinah-cloud was connected with the temple, there follows, \"he as God sitteth in the temple of God,\" answering to \"I will be like the Most High\" here. Moreover, Rev 17:4-5, represents Antichrist as seated in BABYLON, to which city, literal and spiritual, Isaiah refers here.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":15,"content":["to hell--to Sheol (Isa 14:6), thou who hast said, \"I will ascend into heaven\" (Mat 11:23). \n\nsides of the pit--antithetical to the \"sides of the north\" (Isa 14:13). Thus the reference is to the sides of the sepulcher round which the dead were arranged in niches. But MAURER here, as in Isa 14:13, translates, \"the extreme,\" or innermost parts of the sepulchre: as in Eze 32:23 (compare Sa1 24:3).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":16,"content":["THE PASSERS-BY CONTEMPLATE WITH ASTONISHMENT THE BODY OF THE KING OF BABYLON CAST OUT, INSTEAD OF LYING IN A SPLENDID MAUSOLEUM, AND CAN HARDLY BELIEVE THEIR SENSES THAT IT IS HE. (Isa 14:16-20)\n\nnarrowly look--to be certain they are not mistaken. \n\nconsider--\"meditate upon\" [HORSLEY].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":17,"content":["opened not . . . house . . . prisoners--But MAURER, as Margin, \"Did not let his captives loose homewards.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":18,"content":["All--that is, This is the usual practice. \n\nin glory--in a grand mausoleum. \n\nhouse--that is, \"sepulchre,\" as in Ecc 12:5; \"grave\" (Isa 14:19). To be excluded from the family sepulcher was a mark of infamy (Isa 34:3; Jer 22:19; Kg1 13:22; Ch2 21:20; Ch2 24:25; Ch2 28:27).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":19,"content":["cast out of--not that he had lain in the grave and was then cast out of it, but \"cast out without a grave,\" such as might have been expected by thee (\"thy\"). \n\nbranch--a useless sucker starting up from the root of a tree, and cut away by the husbandman. \n\nraiment of those . . . slain--covered with gore, and regarded with abhorrence as unclean by the Jews. Rather, \"clothed (that is, covered) with the slain\"; as in Job 7:5, \"My flesh is clothed with worms and clods of dust\" [MAURER]. \n\nthrust through--that is, \"the slain who have been thrust through,\" &c. \n\nstones of . . . pit--whose bodies are buried in sepulchres excavated amidst stones, whereas the king of Babylon is an unburied \"carcass trodden under foot.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":20,"content":["not . . . joined with them--whereas the princes slain with thee shall be buried, thou shalt not. \n\nthou . . . destroyed . . . land--Belshazzar (or Naboned) oppressed his land with wars and tyranny, so that he was much hated [XENOPHON, CyropÃ&brvbrdia 4.6, 3; 7.5, 32]. \n\nseed . . . never be renowned--rather, \"shall not be named for ever\"; the Babylonian dynasty shall end with Belshazzar; his family shall not be perpetuated [HORSLEY].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":21,"content":["GOD'S DETERMINATION TO DESTROY BABYLON. (Isa 14:21-23)\n\nPrepare, &c.--charge to the Medes and Persians, as if they were God's conscious instruments. \n\nhis children--Belshazzar's (Exo 20:5). \n\nrise--to occupy the places of their fathers. \n\nfill . . . with cities--MAURER translates, \"enemies,\" as the Hebrew means in Sa1 28:16; Psa 139:20; namely, lest they inundate the world with their armies. VITRINGA translates, \"disturbers.\" In English Version the meaning is, \"lest they fill the land with such cities\" of pride as Babylon was.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":22,"content":["against them--the family of the king of Babylon. \n\nname--all the male representatives, so that the name shall become extinct (Isa 56:5; Rut 4:5). \n\nremnant--all that is left of them. The dynasty shall cease (Dan 5:28-31). Compare as to Babylon in general, Jer 51:62.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":23,"content":["bittern--rather, \"the hedgehog\" [MAURER and GESENIUS]. STRABO (16:1) states that enormous hedgehogs were found in the islands of the Euphrates. \n\npools--owing to Cyrus turning the waters of the Euphrates over the country. \n\nbesom--sweep-net [MAURER], (Kg1 14:10; Kg2 21:13).\n\nThis would comfort the Jews when captives in Babylon, being a pledge that God, who had by that time fulfilled the promise concerning Sennacherib (though now still future), would also fulfil His promise as to destroying Babylon, Judah's enemy.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":24,"content":["A FRAGMENT AS TO THE DESTRUCTION OF THE ASSYRIANS UNDER SENNACHERIB. (Isa 14:24-27)\n\nIn this verse the Lord's thought (purpose) stands in antithesis to the Assyrians' thoughts (Isa 10:7). (See Isa 46:10-11; Sa1 15:29; Mal 3:6).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":25,"content":["That--My purpose, namely, \"that.\" \n\nbreak . . . yoke-- (Isa 10:27). \n\nmy mountains--Sennacherib's army was destroyed on the mountains near Jerusalem (Isa 10:33-34). God regarded Judah as peculiarly His.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":26,"content":["This is . . . purpose . . . whole earth--A hint that the prophecy embraces the present world of all ages in its scope, of which the purpose concerning Babylon and Assyria, the then representatives of the world power, is but a part. \n\nhand . . . stretched out upon--namely, in punishment (Isa 5:25).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":27,"content":["(Dan 4:35).\n\nTo comfort the Jews, lest they should fear that people; not in order to call the Philistines to repentance, since the prophecy was probably never circulated among them. They had been subdued by Uzziah or Azariah (Ch2 26:6); but in the reign of Ahaz (Ch2 28:18), they took several towns in south Judea. Now Isaiah denounces their final subjugation by Hezekiah.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":28,"content":["PROPHECY AGAINST PHILISTIA. (Isa 14:28-32)\n\nIn . . . year . . . Ahaz died--726 B.C. Probably it was in this year that the Philistines threw off the yoke put on them by Uzziah.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":29,"content":["Palestina--literally, \"the land of sojourners.\" \n\nrod . . . broken--The yoke imposed by Uzziah (Ch2 26:6) was thrown off under Ahaz (Ch2 28:18). \n\nserpent's root--the stock of Jesse (Isa 11:1). Uzziah was doubtless regarded by the Philistines as a biting \"serpent.\" But though the effects of his bite have been got rid of, a more deadly viper, or \"cockatrice\" (literally, \"viper's offspring,\" as Philistia would regard him), namely, Hezekiah awaits you (Kg2 18:8).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":30,"content":["first-born of . . . poor--Hebraism, for the most abject poor; the first-born being the foremost of the family. Compare \"first-born of death\" (Job 18:13), for the most fatal death. The Jews, heretofore exposed to Philistine invasions and alarms, shall be in safety. Compare Psa 72:4, \"Children of the needy,\" expressing those \"needy in condition.\" \n\nfeed--image from a flock feeding in safety. \n\nroot--radical destruction. \n\nHe shall slay--Jehovah shall. The change of person, \"He\" after \"I,\" is a common Hebraism.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":31,"content":["gate--that is, ye who throng the gate; the chief place of concourse in a city. \n\nfrom . . . north--Judea, north and east of Palestine. \n\nsmoke--from the signal-fire, whereby a hostile army was called together; the Jews' signal-fire is meant here, the \"pillar of cloud and fire,\" (Exo 13:21; Neh 9:19); or else from the region devastated by fire [MAURER]. GESENIUS less probably refers it to the cloud of dust raised by the invading army. \n\nnone . . . alone . . . in . . . appointed times--Rather, \"There shall not be a straggler among his (the enemy's) levies.\" The Jewish host shall advance on Palestine in close array; none shall fall back or lag from weariness (Isa 5:26-27), [LOWTH]. MAURER thinks the Hebrew will not bear the rendering \"levies\" or \"armies.\" He translates, \"There is not one (of the Philistine watch guards) who will remain alone (exposed to the enemy) at his post,\" through fright. On \"alone,\" compare Psa 102:7; Hos 8:9.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":32,"content":["messengers of the nation--When messengers come from Philistia to enquire as to the state of Judea, the reply shall be, that the Lord . . . (Psa 87:1, Psa 87:5; Psa 102:16). \n\npoor-- (Zep 3:12).\n\nLOWTH thinks it was delivered in the first years of Hezekiah's reign and fulfilled in the fourth when Shalmaneser, on his way to invade Israel, may have seized on the strongholds of Moab. Moab probably had made common cause with Israel and Syria in a league against Assyria. Hence it incurred the vengeance of Assyria. Jeremiah has introduced much of this prophecy into his forty-eighth chapter.\n\n\n\n\nNext: Isaiah Chapter 15\n\n"]}],"introduction":"CONFIRMATION OF THIS BY THE HEREFORETOLD DESTRUCTION OF THE ASSYRIANS UNDER SENNACHERIB; (Isa 14:24-27)\n\nchoose--\"set His choice upon.\" A deliberate predilection [HORSLEY]. Their restoration is grounded on their election (see Psa 102:13-22). \n\nstrangers--proselytes (Est 8:17; Act 2:10; Act 17:4, Act 17:17). TACITUS, a heathen [Histories, 5.5], attests the fact of numbers of the Gentiles having become Jews in his time. An earnest of the future effect on the heathen world of the Jews' spiritual restoration (Isa 60:4-5, Isa 60:10; Mic 5:7; Zac 14:16; Rom 11:12).\n\n"},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/ISA/14.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"ISA","chapter":14},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/ISA/15.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"ISA","chapter":15},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/ISA/13.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"ISA","chapter":13},"numberOfVerses":31}