1For Jehovah will have mercy on Jacob, and will yet choose Israel and settle them in their own land; and the sojourner shall be joined with them, and they shall cling to the house of Jacob. 2And the people shall take them and bring them to their place; and the house of Israel shall possess them in the land of Jehovah for servants and maids. And they shall make captives of their captors; and they shall rule over their oppressors. 3And it shall come to pass in the day that Jehovah shall give you rest from your sorrow, and from your fear, and from the hard service with which you were worked, 4that you shall take up this proverb against the king of Babylon and say, How the oppressor has ceased! The golden city has ceased! 5Jehovah has broken the staff of the wicked, the scepter of the rulers 6who struck peoples in wrath, strokes without letup, ruling the nations in anger, a persecution without restraint. 7The whole earth is at rest and is quiet; they break forth into singing. 8Yea, the noble trees rejoice over you, the cedars of Lebanon, saying, Since you have been laid down, no woodcutter comes up against us. 9Sheol from below is excited over you, to meet you at your coming. It stirs up the dead for you, all the chief of the earth. It has raised up from their thrones all the kings of the nations. 10All of them shall speak and say to you, Are you also as weak as we? Have you become like us? 11Your arrogance is brought down to Sheol, and the noise of your lutes. The maggot is spread under you, and the worms cover you. 12How you are fallen from the heavens, O shining one, son of the morning! How you are cut down to the ground, you who weakened the nations! 13For you have said in your heart, I will ascend into the heavens, I will exalt my throne above the stars of the Mighty God; I will also sit on the mount of the appointed assembly, in the recesses of the north. 14I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the Most High. 15Yet you shall be brought down to Sheol, to the recesses of the Pit. 16Those who see you shall stare at you and consider diligently, saying, Is this the man who made the earth to tremble; who shook kingdoms; 17who made the world as a wilderness, and destroyed its cities; who did not open the house for his prisoners? 18All the kings of the nations, even all of them, lie in glory, every one in his own house. 19But you are cast out of your grave like an abhorred branch, and like the apparel of those who are slain, thrust through with a sword, that go down to the stones of the pit; like a carcass trampled under foot. 20You shall not be joined with them in burial, because you destroyed your land and killed your people; the seed of evildoers shall never be renowned. 21Prepare slaughter for his children because of the iniquity of their fathers, so that they may not rise nor possess the land, nor fill the face of the world with cities. 22For I will rise up against them, says Jehovah of Hosts, and cut off from Babylon the name and remnant, and offspring, and posterity, says Jehovah. 23I will also make it a possession for the hedgehog, and marshes of muddy water; and I will sweep it with the broom of destruction, says Jehovah of Hosts. 24Jehovah of Hosts has sworn, saying, Surely as I have thought, so it shall come to pass; and as I have purposed, so it shall stand; 25to break Assyria in My land, and on My mountains to trample him under foot. Then his yoke shall be removed from them, and his burden shall be taken from off their shoulders. 26This is the purpose that is purposed upon all the earth; and this is the hand that is stretched out upon all the nations. 27For Jehovah of Hosts has purposed, and who shall annul it? And His hand is stretched out, and who shall turn it back? 28This burden was in the year that King Ahaz died: 29Rejoice not, all you of Philistia, because the rod that struck you is broken; for a viper comes forth from the root of the serpent, and his offspring shall be a fiery flying serpent. 30And the firstborn of the poor shall feed, and the needy shall lie down in safety; and I will kill your root with famine, and he shall slay your remnant. 31Howl, O gate! Cry, O city! O Philistia, all of you are melted away; for from the north a smoke comes, with no straggler in his ranks. 32What shall one then answer the messengers of the nation? That Jehovah has founded Zion, and the poor of His people shall take refuge in it.
Jamieson Fausset Brown Bible Commentary 1 CONFIRMATION OF THIS BY THE HEREFORETOLD DESTRUCTION OF THE ASSYRIANS UNDER SENNACHERIB; (
Isa 14:24-
Isa 14:27)
choose--"set His choice upon." A deliberate predilection [HORSLEY]. Their restoration is grounded on their election (see
Ps 102:13-
Ps 102:22).
strangers--proselytes (
Esth 8:17;
Acts 2:10;
Acts 17:4,
Acts 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-
Isa 60:5,
Isa 60:10;
Mic 5:7;
Zech 14:16;
Rom 11:12).
2 the people--of Babylon, primarily. Of the whole Gentile world ultimately (
Isa 49:22;
Isa 66:20;
Isa 60:9).
their place--Judea (
Ezra 1:1-
Ezra 1:6).
possess--receive in possession.
captives--not by physical, but by moral might; the force of love, and regard to Israel's God (
Isa 60:14).
3 rest-- (
Isa 28:12;
Ezek 28:25-
Ezek 28:26).
The whole earth rejoices; the cedars of Lebanon taunt him.
4 A CHORUS OF JEWS EXPRESS THEIR JOYFUL SURPRISE AT BABYLON'S DOWNFALL. (
Isa 14:4-
Isa 14:8)
proverb--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).
the king--the ideal representative of Babylon; perhaps Belshazzar (Dan. 5:1-31). The mystical Babylon is ultimately meant.
golden 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).
5 staff--not the scepter (
Ps 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].
rulers--tyrants, as the parallelism "the wicked" proves (compare see on
Isa 13:2).
6 people--the peoples subjected to Babylon.
is persecuted--the Hebrew is rather, active, "which persecuted them, without any to hinder him" [Vulgate, JEROME, and HORSLEY].
7 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.
8 the fir trees--now left undisturbed. Probably a kind of evergreen.
rejoice at thee-- (
Ps 96:12). At thy fall (
Ps 35:19,
Ps 35:24).
no feller--as formerly, when thou wast in power (
Isa 10:34;
Isa 37:24).
Hades (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.
9 THE SCENE CHANGES FROM EARTH TO HELL. (
Isa 14:9-
Isa 14:11)
moved--put into agitation.
for thee--that is, "at thee"; towards thee; explained by "to meet thee at thy coming" [MAURER].
chief ones--literally, "goats"; so rams, leaders of the flock; princes (
Zech 10:3). The idea of wickedness on a gigantic scale is included (
Ezek 34:17;
Matt 25:32-
Matt 25:33). 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;
Ezek 32:18,
Ezek 32:21). "Rephaim," translated in the Septuagint, "giants" (compare see on
Job 26:5-
Job 26:6). 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.
10 They taunt him and derive from his calamity consolation under their own (
Ezek 31:16).
weak--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.
11 "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 (
Ezek 32:27).
worm--that is bred in putridity.
worms--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.
The 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.
12 THE JEWS ADDRESS HIM AGAIN AS A FALLEN ONCE-BRIGHT STAR. (
Isa 14:12-
Isa 14:15)
Lucifer--"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
Ezek 21:12;
Zech 11:2, "howl."
weaken--"prostrate"; as in
Exod 17:13, "discomfit."
13 above . . . God--In
Dan 8:10, "stars" express earthly potentates. "The stars" are often also used to express heavenly principalities (
Job 38:7).
mount of the congregation--the place of solemn meeting between God and His people in the temple at Jerusalem. In
Dan 11:37, and
2Thess 2:4, this is attributed to Antichrist.
sides of the north--namely, the sides of Mount Moriah on which the temple was built; north of Mount Zion (
Ps 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].
14 clouds--rather, "the cloud," singular. Perhaps there is a reference to the cloud, the symbol of the divine presence (
Isa 4:5;
Exod 13:21). So this tallies with
2Thess 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-
Rev 17:5, represents Antichrist as seated in BABYLON, to which city, literal and spiritual, Isaiah refers here.
15 to hell--to Sheol (
Isa 14:6), thou who hast said, "I will ascend into heaven" (
Matt 11:23).
sides 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
Ezek 32:23 (compare
1Sam 24:3).
16 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-
Isa 14:20)
narrowly look--to be certain they are not mistaken.
consider--"meditate upon" [HORSLEY].
17 opened not . . . house . . . prisoners--But MAURER, as Margin, "Did not let his captives loose homewards."
18 All--that is, This is the usual practice.
in glory--in a grand mausoleum.
house--that is, "sepulchre," as in
Eccl 12:5; "grave" (
Isa 14:19). To be excluded from the family sepulcher was a mark of infamy (
Isa 34:3;
Jer 22:19;
1Kgs 13:22;
2Chr 21:20;
2Chr 24:25;
2Chr 28:27).
19 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").
branch--a useless sucker starting up from the root of a tree, and cut away by the husbandman.
raiment 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].
thrust through--that is, "the slain who have been thrust through," &c.
stones of . . . pit--whose bodies are buried in sepulchres excavated amidst stones, whereas the king of Babylon is an unburied "carcass trodden under foot."
20 not . . . joined with them--whereas the princes slain with thee shall be buried, thou shalt not.
thou . . . destroyed . . . land--Belshazzar (or Naboned) oppressed his land with wars and tyranny, so that he was much hated [XENOPHON, Cyropćdia 4.6, 3; 7.5, 32].
seed . . . never be renowned--rather, "shall not be named for ever"; the Babylonian dynasty shall end with Belshazzar; his family shall not be perpetuated [HORSLEY].
21 GOD'S DETERMINATION TO DESTROY BABYLON. (
Isa 14:21-
Isa 14:23)
Prepare, &c.--charge to the Medes and Persians, as if they were God's conscious instruments.
his children--Belshazzar's (
Exod 20:5).
rise--to occupy the places of their fathers.
fill . . . with cities--MAURER translates, "enemies," as the Hebrew means in
1Sam 28:16;
Ps 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.
22 against them--the family of the king of Babylon.
name--all the male representatives, so that the name shall become extinct (
Isa 56:5;
Ruth 4:5).
remnant--all that is left of them. The dynasty shall cease (
Dan 5:28-
Dan 5:31). Compare as to Babylon in general,
Jer 51:62.
23 bittern--rather, "the hedgehog" [MAURER and GESENIUS]. STRABO (16:1) states that enormous hedgehogs were found in the islands of the Euphrates.
pools--owing to Cyrus turning the waters of the Euphrates over the country.
besom--sweep-net [MAURER], (
1Kgs 14:10;
2Kgs 21:13).
This 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.
24 A FRAGMENT AS TO THE DESTRUCTION OF THE ASSYRIANS UNDER SENNACHERIB. (
Isa 14:24-
Isa 14:27)
In this verse the Lord's thought (purpose) stands in antithesis to the Assyrians' thoughts (
Isa 10:7). (See
Isa 46:10-
Isa 46:11;
1Sam 15:29;
Mal 3:6).
25 That--My purpose, namely, "that."
break . . . yoke-- (
Isa 10:27).
my mountains--Sennacherib's army was destroyed on the mountains near Jerusalem (
Isa 10:33-
Isa 10:34). God regarded Judah as peculiarly His.
26 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.
hand . . . stretched out upon--namely, in punishment (
Isa 5:25).
27 (
Dan 4:35).
To 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 (
2Chr 26:6); but in the reign of Ahaz (
2Chr 28:18), they took several towns in south Judea. Now Isaiah denounces their final subjugation by Hezekiah.
28 PROPHECY AGAINST PHILISTIA. (
Isa 14:28-
Isa 14:32)
In . . . year . . . Ahaz died--726 B.C. Probably it was in this year that the Philistines threw off the yoke put on them by Uzziah.
29 Palestina--literally, "the land of sojourners."
rod . . . broken--The yoke imposed by Uzziah (
2Chr 26:6) was thrown off under Ahaz (
2Chr 28:18).
serpent'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 (
2Kgs 18:8).
30 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
Ps 72:4, "Children of the needy," expressing those "needy in condition."
feed--image from a flock feeding in safety.
root--radical destruction.
He shall slay--Jehovah shall. The change of person, "He" after "I," is a common Hebraism.
31 gate--that is, ye who throng the gate; the chief place of concourse in a city.
from . . . north--Judea, north and east of Palestine.
smoke--from the signal-fire, whereby a hostile army was called together; the Jews' signal-fire is meant here, the "pillar of cloud and fire," (
Exod 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.
none . . . 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-
Isa 5:27), [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
Ps 102:7;
Hos 8:9.
32 messengers of the nation--When messengers come from Philistia to enquire as to the state of Judea, the reply shall be, that the Lord . . . (
Ps 87:1,
Ps 87:5;
Ps 102:16).
poor-- (
Zeph 3:12).
LOWTH 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.
