Text -- Isaiah 26:7 (NET)

God’s People Anticipate Vindication

26:7 The way of the righteous is level, the path of the righteous that you make is straight.

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per phrase)

Wesley: Isa 26:7

O God, who art upright in all thy ways, and therefore a lover of uprightness, and of all upright men, dost weigh (examine) the path of the just, the course of his actions, and, which is implied, dost approve of them, and therefore direct them to an happy issue.

JFB: Isa 26:7

Rather, "is direct," that is, is directed by God to a prosperous issue, however many be their afflictions in the meantime (as in the case of the Jewish exiles); the context requires this sense (Psa 34:19; Pro 3:6; Pro 11:5), [MAURER]: thus "way" means God's dealings with the righteous (Psa 37:23).

JFB: Isa 26:7

(Deu 32:4).

JFB: Isa 26:7

(1Sa 2:3; Pro 5:21). Rather, "thou dost make plain and level" [MAURER], removing all obstacles (Isa 40:3-4).

Calvin: Isa 26:7

7.Straightnesses are the way of the righteous man He does not praise the righteousness of the godly, as some have falsely supposed, but shews that, through the blessing of God, they are prosperous and successful during the whole course of their life. Having only stated briefly in the beginning of the verse, that “their ways are plain and smooth,” he explains more fully in the second clause, ascribing it to the grace of God that in an open plain, as it were, the righteous proceed in their course, till they reach the goal.

Thou wilt weigh the straight path of the righteous The word weigh contains a metaphor, that God, by applying a balance, as it were, brings to an equal measure those things which in themselves were unequal. The Hebrew word ישר ( yāshār) is ambiguous, for it may refer either to God or to the path. Accordingly some render it, Thou, who art upright, will direct the path of the righteous; ¹⁶⁰ and in other passages God is called upright. (Deu 32:4; Psa 25:8.) There would also be propriety in the allusion, that the straightness of which he spoke proceed from God, for he alone is straight or upright. But the other version appears to be more natural. ¹⁶¹

He promises in general, that God will take care of the righteous, so as to lead them, as it were, by his hand. When the wicked prosper and the righteous are oppressed, everything in this world appears to be moved by chance; and although Scripture frequently declares and affirms that God takes care of them, (Psa 37:5; 1Pe 5:7,) yet we can scarcely remain steadfast, but waver, when everything that happens to them is unfavourable. Yet it is true that the ways of the righteous are made plain by God’s balance, however rough and uneven they may appear to be; and not only so, but he has committed them to the guardianship of his angels, “lest they should be injured, or dash their foot against a stone.” (Psa 91:11.) But for this, they would easily fall or give way through exhaustion, and would hardly ever make way amidst so many thorns and briers, steep roads, intricate windings, and rough places, did not the Lord lead out and deliver them.

Let us therefore learn to commit ourselves to God, and to follow him as our leader, and we shall be guided in safety. Though snares and artifices, the stratagems of the devil and wicked men, and innumerable dangers, may surround us, we shall always be enabled to escape. We shall feel what the Prophet says here, that our ways, even amidst deep chasms, are made plain, so that there is no obstacle to hinder our progress. And, indeed, experience shews, that if we are not led by God’s guidance, we shall not be able to push our way through rugged roads; for so great is our weakness that we shall scarcely advance a single step without stumbling at the smallest stone that comes in our way. Satan and wicked men not only entangle and delay us by many perplexities, and not only present to us slight difficulties, but cause us to encounter sometimes high mounds and sometimes deep pits, which even the whole world would be unable to avoid.

It is therefore proper for us to acknowledge how much we need heavenly direction, and to confess with Jeremiah, “I know, O Lord, that the way of man is not in himself; and it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.” (Jer 10:23.) Let us not be puffed up with vain confidence, as if the result were placed in our own power. Let us not boast, as James warns us, that “we shall do this or that.” (Jas 4:15.) Such is the manner of rash men, who act as if they could do everything at their own pleasure; while it is not in our power, as Solomon tells us, to direct our tongue so as to give a proper answer. (Pro 16:1.) In vain, therefore, do men form plans, and deliberate, and decide about their ways, if God do not stretch out his hand. But he holds it out to the righteous, and takes peculiar care of them; for, while the providence of God extends to all, and while he supplies the wants of young ravens (Psa 147:9) and sparrows, (Mat 10:29,) and of the smallest animals, yet he has a fatherly kindness towards the godly, and delivers them out of dangers and difficulties.

TSK: Isa 26:7

way : Isa 35:8; 1Ch 29:17; Job 27:5, Job 27:6; Psa 18:23-26; Pro 20:7; 2Co 1:12; Eph 2:10; 1Jo 3:7, 1Jo 3:10

most : 1Sa 2:2-4; Job 31:6 *marg. Psa 1:6, Psa 11:4, Psa 11:7; Zep 3:5; 1Co 4:5

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per Verse)

Barnes: Isa 26:7

The way of the just is uprightness - The Hebrew is literally, ‘ The way to the just is uprightness;’ the word ‘ way’ probably refers to God’ s way, or his dealings with the righteous. The sentiment is, that his dealings with them are just; that though they are afflicted and oppressed, yet that his ways are right, and they will yet perceive it. This is language supposed to be used by the captive Jews after they had seen the proud city of Babylon taken, and after God had come forth to restore them to their own land. The word ‘ uprightness’ in the original is in the plural number, but is often used in the sense of straightness Pro 23:31; Son 7:10; of sincerity, or uprightness Son 1:4; or of righteousness as a judge Psa 9:9; Psa 58:2; Psa 99:4.

Thou most upright - Evidently an address to God, as being most just, and as having now evinced his uprightness in the deliverance of his people. The same epithet is applied to him in Deu 32:4; Psa 25:8; 92:16.

Dost weigh the path of the just - The word used here ( פלס pâlac ) may mean to weigh as in a balance Psa 58:3; but it may also mean, and does usually, to make straight or smooth; to beat a path; to make level Psa 78:50; Pro 4:26; Pro 5:21. Here it probably means, that God had made the way smooth, or exactly level. He had removed all obstacles, and had conducted his people in a plain and leveled way (see the notes at Isa 40:3-4).

Poole: Isa 26:7

Is uprightness or, most even or plain . Heb. evenness or plainness . Which is understood either,

1. Of the rectitude or goodness of his actions or course; or rather,

2. Of the good success of his affairs; for this suits best with the coherence. When the way of the wicked is rugged, in which they easily stumble and fall into mischief, of which he spoke, Isa 26:5,6 , the path of just men is plain and smooth, and they walk safely and comfortably in it.

Thou, most upright, dost weigh the path of the just: the sense of the words thus rendered is, Thou , O God, who art most upright in all thy ways, and therefore a lover of uprightness. and of all upright men, dost weigh (i.e. examine) the path of the just , the course of his actions, and, which is implied, dost approve of them, and therefore direct them to a happy issue. But the words are otherwise rendered by some late learned interpreters, to this purpose, Thou dost level or make plain (as this very word signifies, Psa 78:50 ) the path of the just exactly, Heb. with evenness , or evenly, so as to make it very even. Thus the first clause declares that it was even or plain, and this showeth whence or by whom it is made such, even by God.

Haydock: Isa 26:7

In. God will remove every obstacle, at their return.

Gill: Isa 26:7

The way of the just is uprightness,.... Or, "the way for the just is uprightnesses" ^s, most upright; the way which is appointed for him, and which he is directed to walk in, is a way of righteousness and holiness, and in which he does walk; he walks uprightly, according to the rules of the word, becoming the Gospel of Christ, and worthy of his calling: or, it is "evennesses"; a most plain and even way, in which men, though fools, shall not err, Isa 35:8 or, "the way" of the Lord "to the just is uprightnesses", or "evennesses"; most upright, or most even; there is no inequality in it, though sometimes so charged, Eze 18:25 it is entirely agreeable to justice, equity, and truth; regular and even, and suited to all his perfections of wisdom, goodness, &c. ^t:

thou most upright; these words are addressed to God, and contain an appellation and description of him, who is upright, just, and true, and loves upright and righteous persons; so Kimchi and Ben Melech take the word to be in the vocative case, and as an address to God; though some render them, "he is upright" ^u; that is, the just man is upright, whose way is uprightness; but the former sense best agrees with what follows:

dost weigh the path of the just; observe, consider, and approve of it, as being according to rule, and agreeable to his mind and will, Psa 1:6 or, "thou dost level" or "make even the path of the just" ^w; remove all impediments and obstructions out of it, direct his goings, order his steps, and cause him to walk in a straight way, wherein he shall not stumble, Jer 31:9 and so this is a reason given why the way of the just is even, because it is made so by the Lord himself.

Commentary -- Verse Notes / Footnotes

NET Notes: Isa 26:7

¹ sn The literary structure of chap. 26 is not entirely clear. The chapter begins with an eschatological song of praise and ends with a lament and prophetic response (vv. 16-21). It is not certain where the song of praise ends or how vv. 7-15 fit into the structure. Verses 10-11a seem to lament the presence of evil and v. 11b anticipates the arrival of judgment, so it is possible that vv. 7-15 are a prelude to the lament and announcement that conclude the chapter.

² tc The Hebrew text has, “upright, the path of the righteous you make level.” There are three possible ways to translate this line. Some take יָשָׁר (yashar) as a divine title: “O Upright One” (cf. NASB, NIV, NKJV, NRSV, NLT). Others regard יָשָׁר as the result of dittography (מֵישָׁרִים יָשָׁר ַמעְגַּל, mesharim yashar ma’gal) and do not include it in the translation. Another possibility is to keep יָשָׁר and render the line as “the path of the righteous that you prepare is straight.”

sn The metaphor of a level/smooth road/path may refer to their morally upright manner of life (see v. 8a), but verse 7b, which attributes the smooth path to the Lord, suggests that the Lord’s vindication and blessing may be the reality behind the metaphor here.

Commentary -- Verse Range Notes

Maclaren: Isa 26:1-10

The Song Of Two Cities

In that day shall this song be sung in the land of Judah; We have a strong city; salvation will God appoint for walls and bulwarks. 2. Open ye the gates, that the righteous nation which keepeth the truth may enter in. 3. Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on Thee; because he trusteth in Thee. 4 Trust ye in the Lord for ever: for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength: 5. For He bringeth down them that dwell on high; the lofty city, He layeth it low; He layeth it low, even to the ground He bringeth it even to the dust. 6. The foot shall tread it down, even the feet of the poor, and the steps of the needy. 7. The way of the just is uprightness: Thou, most upright, dost weigh the path of the just. 8. Yea, in the way of Thy judgments, O Lord, have we waited for Thee; the desire of our soul is to Thy name, and to the remembrance of Thee. 9. With my soul have I desired Thee in the night; yea, with my spirit within me will I seek Thee early: for when Thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness. 10. Let favour be shewed to the wicked, yet will he not learn righteousness: in the land of uprightness will he deal unjustly, and will not behold the majesty of the Lord.'--Isaiah 26:1-10.'

THIS song' is to be interpreted as a song, not with the cold-blooded accuracy proper to a scientific treatise. The logic of emotion is as sound as that of cool intellect, but it has its own laws and links of connection.

First, the song sets in sharp contrast the two cities, describing, in Isaiah 26:1-4, the city of God, its strength defences, conditions of citizenship, and the peace which reigns within its walls; and in Isaiah 26:5-6 the fall and utter ruin of the robber city, its antagonist Jerusalem, on its rocky peninsula, supplies the form of Isaiah's thought; but it is only a symbol of the true city of God, the stable, invisible, but most real, polity and order of things to which men, even while wandering lonely and pilgrims, do come, if they will. It is possible even here and now to have our citizenship in the heavens, and to feel that we belong to a great community beyond the sea of time, though our feet have never trodden its golden pavements, nor our eyes seen its happy glories.

In one aspect, it is ideal, but in truth it is more real than the intrusive and false things of this fleeting present, which call themselves realities. The things which are' are the things above. The things here are but shows and shadows.

The city's walls are salvation. There is no need to name the architect of these fortifications. One hand only can pile their strength. God appoints salvation in lieu of all visible defences. Whom He purposes to save are saved. Whom He wills to keep safe are kept safe. They who can shelter behind that strong defence need no other. Weak, sense-governed hearts may crave something more palpable, but they do not really need it. A parapet on an Alpine road gives no real security, but only satisfies imagination. The sky needs no pillars to hold it up.

Then an unknown voice breaks in upon the song, calling on unnamed attendants to fling wide the gates. The city is conceived of as empty; its destined inhabitants must have certain qualifications. They must be righteous, and must keep faithfulness,' being true to the God who is faithful and true' in all His relations. None but the righteous can dwell in conscious citizenship with the Unseen while here, and none but the righteous can enter through the gates into the city. That requirement is founded in the very nature of the case, and is as emphatically proclaimed by the gospel as by the prophet. But the gospel tells more articulately than he was enlightened to do, how righteousness is to be won. The last vision of the Apocalypse, which is so like this song in its central idea, tells us of the fall of Babylon, of the descent to earth of the New Jerusalem, and leaves as its last message the great saying, Blessed are they that wash their robes that they may, enter in through the gate into the city.'

Our song gives some hint of similar thoughts by passing from the description of the qualifications for entrance to the celebration of the security which comes from trust. The safety which is realised within the walls of the strong city is akin to the perfect peace' in which he who trusts is kept; and the juxtaposition of the two representations is equivalent to the teaching that trust, which is precisely the same as the New Testament faith, is the condition of entrance. We know that faith makes righteous, because it opens the heart to receive God's gift of righteousness; but that effect of faith is implied rather than stated here, where security and peace are the main ideas. As some fugitives from the storm of war sit in security behind the battlements of a fortress, and scarcely hear the din of conflict in the open field below, the heart, which has taken refuge by trust in God, is kept in peace so deep that it passes description, and the singer is fain to give a notion of its completeness by calling it peace, peace.' The mind which trusts is steadied thereby, as light things lashed to a firm stay are kept steadfast, however the ship toss. The only way to get and keep fixedness of temper and spirit amid change and earthquake is to hold on to God, and then we may be stable with stability derived from the foundations of His throne to which we cling.

Therefore the song breaks into triumphant fervent of summons to all who hear it, to trust in Jah Jehovah for ever.' Such settled, perpetual trust is the only attitude corresponding to His mighty name, and to the realities found in His character. He is the Rock of Ages,' the grand figure which Moses learned beneath the cliffs of Sinai and wove into his last song, and which tells us of the unchanging strength that makes a sure hiding-place for all generations, and the ample space which will hold all the souls of men, and be for a shadow from the heat, a covert from the tempest, a shelter from the foe, and a home for the homeless, with many a springing fountain in its clefts.

The great act of judgment which the song celebrates is now (Isaiah 26:5-6) brought into contrast with the blessed picture of the city, and by the introductory for' is stated as the reason for eternal trust. The language, as it were, leaps and dances in jubilation, heaping together brief emotional and synonymous clauses. So low is the once proud city brought, that the feet of the poor tread it down. These poor' and needy' are the true Israel, the suffering saints, who had known how cruel the sway of the fallen robber city was; and now they march across its site; and its broken columns and ruined palaces strew the ground below their feet. The righteous nation' of the one picture are' the poor and needy' of the other. No doubt the prophecy has had partial accomplishments more than once or twice, when the oppressed church has triumphed, and some hoary iniquity been levelled at a blow, or toppled over by slow decay. But the complete accomplishment is yet future, and not to be realised till that last act, when all antagonism shall be ended, and the net result of the weary history of the world be found to be just these two pictures of Isaiah's--the strong city of God with its happy inhabitants, and the everlasting desolations of the fallen city of confusion.

The triumphant hurry of the song pauses for a moment to gaze upon the crash, and in Isaiah 26:7 gathers its lessons into a kind of proverbial saying, which is perhaps best translated The path of the just is smooth (or "plain"); Thou levellest smooth the path of the just.' To render upright' instead of smooth' seems to make the statement almost an identical proposition, and is tame. What is meant is, that, in the light of the end, the path which often seemed rough is vindicated. The judgment has showed that the righteous man's course had no unnecessary difficulties. The goal explains the road. The good man's path is smooth, not because of its own nature, but because God makes it so. We are to look for the clearing of our road, not to ourselves, nor to circumstances, but to Him; and even when it is engineered through rocks and rough-nesses, to believe that He will make the rough places plain, or give us shoes of iron and brass to encounter them. Trust that when the journey is over the road will be explained, and that this reflection, which breaks the current of the swift song of the prophet, will be the abiding, happy conviction of heaven.

Lastly, the song looks back and tells how the poor and needy, in whose name the prophet speaks, had filled the dreary past, while the tyranny of the fallen city lasted, with yearning for the judgment which has now come at last. Verses 8 and 9 breathe the very spirit of patient longing and meek hope. There is a certain tone of triumph in that Yea,' as if the singer would point to the great judgment now accomplished, as vindicating the long, weary hours of hope deferred. That for which the poor and needy' wait is the coming in the path of Thy judgments.' The attitude of expectance is as much the duty and support of Christians as of Israel. We have a greater future clearer before us than they had. The world needs God's coming in judgment more than ever; and it says little for either the love to God or the benevolence towards man of average Christians, that they should know so little of that yearning of soul which breathes through so much of the Old Testament. For the glory of God and the good of men, we should have the desire of our souls turned to His manifestation of Himself in His righteous judgments. It was no personal end which bred the prophet's yearning. True, the night' round him was dreary enough, and sorrow lay black on his people and himself; but it was God's name' and memorial' that was uppermost in his desires. That is to say, the chief object of the devout soul's longings should be the glory of God's revealed character. And the deepest reason for wishing that He would flash forth from His hiding-place in judgments, is because such an apocalypse is the only way by which wilfully blind eyes can be made to see, and wilfully unrighteous hearts can be made to practise righteousness.

Isaiah believed in the wholesome effect of terror. His confidence in the power of judgments to teach the obstinate corresponds to the Old Testament point of view, and contains a truth for all points of view; but it is not the whole truth. We know only too well that sorrows and judgments do not work infallibly, and that men being often reproved, harden their necks.' We know, too, more clearly than any prophet of old could know, that the last arrow in God's quiver is not some unheard-of awfulness of judgment, but an unspeakable gift of love, and that if that favour shown to the wicked' in the life and death of God's Son does not lead him to' learn righteousness,' nothing else will.

But while this is true, the prophet's aspirations are founded on the facts of human nature too, and judgments do sometimes startle those whom kindness had failed to touch. It is an awful thought that human nature may so steel itself against the whole armoury of divine weapons as that favour and severity are equally blunted, and the heart remains unpierced by either. It is an awful thought that there may be induced such truculent obstinacy of love of evil that, even when in' a land of uprightness,' a man shall choose evil, and forcibly shut his eyes, that he may not see the majesty of the Lord, which he does not wish to see because it condemns his choice, and threatens to burn up him and his work together. A blasted tree when all the woods are green, a fleece dry when all around is rejoicing in the dew, a window dark when the whole city is illuminated, one black sheep amid the white flock, or anything else anomalous and alone in its evil, is less tragic than the sight, so common, of a man so sold to sin that the presence of good only makes him angry and restless. It is possible to dwell amidst the full light of Christian truth, and in a society moulded by its precepts, and to be unblessed, unsoftened thereby. If not softened, then hardened; and the wicked who in the land of uprightness deals wrongfully is all the worse for the light which he hated because it showed him the sinfulness of the sin which he obstinately loved and would keep.

Our Strong City

In that day shall this song be sung in the land of Judah; We have a strong city; salvation will God appoint for walls and bulwarks. Open ye the gates, that the righteous nation which keepeth the truth may enter in.'--Isaiah 26:1-2.

WHAT day is that day'? The answer carries us back a couple of chapters, to the great picture drawn by the prophet of a world-wide judgment, which is followed by a burst of song from the ransomed people of Jehovah, like Miriam's chant by the shores of the Red Sea. The city of confusion,' the centre of the power hostile to God and man, falls; and its fall is welcomed by a chorus of praises. The words of my text are the beginning of one of these songs. Whether or not there were any historical event which floated before the prophet's mind is wholly uncertain. If there were a smaller judgment upon some city of the enemy, it passes in his view into a world-wide judgment; and my text is purely ideal, imaginative, and apocalyptic. Its nearest ally is the similar vision of the Book of the Revelation, where, when Babylon sank with a splash like a millstone in the stream, the ransomed people raised their praises.

So, then, whatever may have been the immediate horizon of the prophet, and though there may have stood on it some historical event, the city which he sees falling is other than any material Babylon, and the strong city in which he rejoices is other than the material Jerusalem, though it may have suggested the metaphor of my text. The song fits our lips quite as closely as it did the lips from which it first sprang, thrilling with triumph: We have a strong city; salvation will God appoint for walls and bulwarks. Open ye the gates, that the righteous nation which keepeth the truth may enter in.'

There are three things, then, here: the city, its defences, its citizens.

I. The City.

Now, no doubt the prophet was thinking of the literal Jerusalem; but the city is ideal, as is shown by the bulwarks which defend, and by the qualifications which permit entrance. And so we must pass beyond the literalities of Palestine, and, as I think, must not apply the symbol to any visible institution or organisation if we are to come to the depth and greatness of the meaning of these words. No church which is organised amongst men can be the New Testament representation of this strong city. And if the explanation is to be looked for in that direction at all, it can only be the invisible aggregate of ransomed souls which is regarded as being the Zion of the prophecy.

But perhaps even that is too definite and hard. And we are rather to think of the unseen but existent order of things or polity to which men here on earth may belong, and which will one day, after shocks and convulsions that shatter all which is merely institutional and human, be manifested still more gloriously.

The central thought that was moving in the prophet's mind is that of the indestructible vitality of the true Israel, and the order which it represented, of which Jerusalem on its rock was but to him a symbol. And thus for us the lesson is that, apart altogether from the existing and visible order of things in which we dwell, there is a polity to which we may belong, for ye are come unto Mount Zion, the city of the living God,' and that that order is indestructible. Convulsions come, every Babylon falls, all human institutions change and pass. The kingdoms old' are cast into another mould.' But persistent through them all, and at the last, high above them all, will stand the stable polity of Heaven, the city which hath the foundations.'

There is a lesson for us, brethren, in times of fluctuation, of change of opinion, of shaking of institutions, and of new social, economical, and political questions, threatening day by day to reorganise society. We have a strong city'; and whatever may come--and much destructive will come, and much that is venerable and antique, rooted in men's prejudices, and having survived through and oppressed the centuries, will have to go; but God's polity, His form of human society of which the perfect ideal and antitype, so to speak, lies concealed in the heavens, is everlasting. Therefore, whatsoever changes, whatsoever ancient and venerable things come to be regarded as of no account, howsoever the nations, like clay in the hands of the potter, may have to assume new forms, as certainly they will, yet the foundation of God standeth sure. And for Christian men in revolutionary epochs, whether these revolutions affect the forms in which truth is grasped, or whether they affect the moulds into which society is run, the only worthy temper is the calm, triumphant expectation that through all the dust, contradiction, and distraction, the fair city of God will be brought nearer and made more manifest to man. Isaiah, or whoever was the writer of these great words of my text, stayed his own and his people's hearts in a time of confusion and distress, by the thought that it was only Babylon that could fall, and that Jerusalem was the possessor of a charmed, immortal life.

This strong city, the order of human society which God has appointed, and which exists, though it be hidden in the heavens, will be manifested one day when, like the fair vision of the goddess rising from amidst the ocean's foam, and shedding peace and beauty over the charmed waves, there will emerge from all the wild confusion and tossing billows of the sea of the peoples the fair form of the Bride, the Lamb's wife.' There shall be an apocalypse of the city, and whether the old words which catch up the spirit of my text, and speak of that Holy City as descending from heaven' upon earth, at the close of the history of the world, are to be taken, as perhaps they are, as expressive of the truth that a renewed earth is to be the dwelling of the ransomed or no, this at least is clear, that the city shall be revealed, and when Babylon is swept away, Zion shall stand.

To this city--existent, immortal, and waiting to be revealed--you and I may belong to-day. We have a strong city.' You may lay hold of life either by the side of it which is transient and trivial and contemptible, or by the side of it which goes down through all the mutable and is rooted in eternity. As in some seaweed, far out in the depths of the ocean, the tiny frond that floats upon the billow goes down and down and down, by filaments that bind it to the basal rock, so the most insignificant act of our fleeting days has a hold upon eternity, and life in all its moments may be knit to the permanent. We may unite our lives with the surface of time or with the centre of eternity. Though we dwell in tabernacles, we may still be come to Mount Zion,' and all life be awful, noble, solemn, religious, because it is all connected with the unseen city across the seas. It is for us to determine to which of these orders--the perishable, noisy and intrusive and persistent in its appeals, or the calm, silent, most real, eternal order beyond the stars--our petty lives shall attach themselves.

II. Now note, secondly, the defences.

Salvation will God appoint for wails and bulwarks.' This evangelical prophet,' as he has been called, is distinguished, not only by the clearness of his anticipations of Jesus Christ and His work, but by the fulness and depth which he attaches to that word salvation.' He all but anticipates the New Testament completeness and fulness of meaning, and lifts it from all merely material associations of earthly or transitory deliverance, into the sphere in which we are accustomed to regard it as especially moving. By salvation' he means and we mean, not only negative but positive blessings. Negatively it includes the removal of every conceivable or endurable evil, all the ills that flesh is heir to,' whether they be evils of sin or evils of sorrow; and, positively, the investiture with every possible good that humanity is capable of, whether it be good of goodness, or good of happiness. This is what the prophet tells us is the wall and bulwark of his ideal-real city.

Mark the eloquent omission of the name of the builder of the wall. God' is a supplement. Salvation will He appoint for wails and bulwarks.' No need to say who it is that flings such a fortification around the city. There is only one hand that can trace the lines of such walls; only one hand that can pile their stones; only one that can lay them, as the wails of Jericho were laid, in the blood of His first-born Son. Salvation will He appoint for walls and bulwarks.' That is to say in a highly imaginative and picturesque form, that the defence of the city is God Himself; and it is substantially a parallel with other words which speak about Him as being a wall of fire round about it, and the glory in the midst of it.' The fact of salvation is the wall and the bulwark. And the consciousness of the fact, and the sense of possessing it, is for our poor hearts one of our best defences against both the evil of sin and the evil of sorrow. For nothing so robs temptation of its power, and so lightens the pressure of calamities, and draws the poison from the fangs of sin and sorrow, as the assurance that the loving purpose of God to save grasps and keeps us. They who shelter behind that wall, and feel that between them and sin, and them and sorrow, there rises the inexpugnable defence of an Almighty purpose and power to save, lie safe whatever betides. There is no need of other defences. Zion

Needs no bulwarks, No towers along the steep.'

God Himself is the shield, and none other is required.

So, brethren, let us walk by the faith that is always confident, though it depends on an unseen hand. It is a grand thing to be able to stand, as it were, in the open, a mark for all the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,' and yet to feel that around us there are walls most real, though invisible, which permit no harm to come to us. Our feeble sense-bound souls much prefer a visible wall. We like a handrail on the stair. Though it does not at all guard the descent, it keeps our heads from getting dizzy. It is hard for us, as some travellers may have to do, to walk with steady foot and unthrobbing heart along a narrow ledge of rock with beetling precipice above us and black depths beneath, and we would like a little bit of a wall of some sort, for imagination if not for reality, between us and the sheer descent. But it is blessed to learn that naked we are clothed, solitary we have a Companion, and unarmed we have our defenceless heads covered with the shadow of the great wing, which, though sense sees it not, faith knows is there. A servant of God is never without a friend, and when most unsheltered

From merge to blue margeThe whole sky grows his targe,With sun's self for visible boss,'beneath which he lies safe.

Salvation will God appoint for walls and bulwarks,' and if we realise, as we ought to do, His purpose to keep us safe, and His power to keep us safe, and the actual operation of His hand keeping us safe at every moment, we shall not ask that these defences shall be supplemented by the poor feeble earthworks that sense can throw up.

III. Lastly, note the citizens.

Our text is part of a song,' and is not to be interpreted in the cold-blooded fashion that might suit prose. A voice, coming from whom we know not, breaks in upon the first strain with a command, addressed to whom we know not--Open ye the gates '--the city thus far being supposed to be empty --that the righteous nation which keepeth the truth may enter in.' The central idea there is just this, Thy people shall be all righteous.' The one qualification for entrance into the city is absolute purity.

Now, brethren, that is true in regard to our present imperfect denizenship within the city; and it is true in regard to men's passing into it in its perfect and final form. As to the former, there is nothing that you Christian people need more to have dinned into you than this, that your continuance in the state of a redeemed man, with all the security and blessing that attach thereto, depends upon your continuing to be righteous. Every sin, every flaw, every dropping beneath our own standard in conscience of what we ought to be, has for its inevitable result that we are robbed for the time being of consciousness of the walls of the city being about us and of our being citizens thereof. Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in His holy place?' The New Testament, as emphatically as the old psalm, answers, He that hath clean hands and a pure heart.' Let no man deceive you. He that doeth righteousness is righteous.' There is no way by which Christian men here on earth can pass into and keep within the city of the living God, except they possess personal purity, righteousness of life, and cleanness of heart.

They used to say that Venice glass was so made that any poison poured into it shivered the vessel. Any drop of sin poured into your cup of communion with God, shatters the cup and spills the wine. Whosoever thinks himself a citizen of that great city, if he falls into transgression, and soils the cleanness of his hands, and ruffles the calm of his pure heart by self-willed sinfulness, will wake to find himself not within the battlements, but lying wounded, robbed, solitary, in the pitiless desert. My brother, it is the righteous nation' that enters in,' even here on earth.

I do not need to remind you how, admittedly by us all, that is the case in regard to the final form of the city of our God, into which nothing shall enter' that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a lie.' Heaven can only be entered into hereafter by, as here and now it can only enter into, those who are pure of heart. All else there would shrivel as foul things born in the darkness do in the light, and be consumed in the fire. None but the pure can enter and see God.

The nation which keepeth the truth '--that does not mean adherence to any revelation, or true creed, or the like. The word which is employed means, not truth of thought, but truth of character; and might, perhaps, be better represented by the more familiar word in such a connection,' faithfulness.' A man who is true to God, keeping up a faithful relation to Him who is faithful to us, he, and only he, will pass into, and abide in, the city.

Now, brethren, so far our text carries us, but no further; unless, perhaps, there may be a hint of something yet deeper in the next clause of this song. If any one asks, How does the nation become righteous? the answer may lie in the immediately following exhortation-' Trust ye in the Lord for ever.' But whether that be so or not, if we want an answer to the questions, How can my stained feet be cleansed so as to be fit to tread the crystal pavements? how can my foul garments be so purged as not to be a blot and an eyesore, beside the white, lustrous robes that sweep along them and gather no defilement there? the only answer that I know of is to be found by turning to the final visions of the New Testament, where the spirit of this whole section of our prophet is reproduced. Again, Babylon falls amidst the songs of saints; and then, down upon all the dust and confusion of the crash of ruin, the seer beholds the Lamb's wife, the new Jerusalem, descending from above. To his happy eyes its glories are unveiled, its golden streets, its open gates, its walls of precious stones, its flashing river, its peaceful inhabitants, its light streaming from the throne of God and of the Lamb. And when that vision passes, his last message to us is, Blessed are they that wash their robes that they may enter through the gates into the city.' None but those who wash their garments, and make them white in the blood of the Lamb, can, living, come unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem; or, dying, can pass through the iron gate that opens to them of its own accord, and find themselves as day breaks in the street of the Jerusalem which is above.

MHCC: Isa 26:5-11

The way of the just is evenness, a steady course of obedience and holy conversation. And it is their happiness that God makes their way plain and easy. It is our duty, and will be our comfort, to wait for God, to keep up holy desires toward him in the darkest and most discouraging times. Our troubles must never turn us from God; and in the darkest, longest night of affliction, with our souls must we desire him; and this we must wait and pray to him for. We make nothing of our religion, whatever our profession may be, if we do not make heart-work of it. Though we come ever so early, we shall find God ready to receive us. The intention of afflictions is to teach righteousness: blessed is the man whom the Lord thus teaches. But sinners walk contrary to him. They will go on in their evil ways, because they will not consider what a God he is whose laws they persist in despising. Scorners and the secure will shortly feel, what now they will not believe, that it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. They will not see the evil of sin; but they shall see. Oh that they would abandon their sins, and turn to the Lord, that he may have mercy upon them.

Matthew Henry: Isa 26:5-11

Here the prophet further encourages us to trust in the Lord for ever, and to continue waiting on him; for,

I. He will make humble souls that trust in him to triumph over their proud enemies, Isa 26:5, Isa 26:6. Those that exalt themselves shall be abased: For he brings down those that dwell on high; and wherein they deal proudly he is, and will be, above them. Even the lofty city Babylon itself, or Nineveh, he lays it low, Isa 25:12. He can do it, be it ever so well fortified. He has often done it. He will do it, for he resists the proud. It is his glory to do it, for he proves himself to be God by looking on the proud and abasing them, Job 40:12. But, on the contrary, those that humble themselves shall be exalted; for the feet of the poor shall tread upon the lofty cities, Isa 26:6. He does not say, Great armies shall tread them down; but, When God will have it done, even the feet of the poor shall do it, Mal 4:3. You shall tread down the wicked. Come, set your feet on the necks of these kings. See Psa 147:6; Rom 16:20.

II. He takes cognizance of the way of his people and has delight in it (Isa 26:7): The way of the just is evenness (so it may be read): it is their endeavour and constant care to walk with God in an even steady course of obedience and holy conversation. My foot stands in an even place, goes in an even path, Psa 26:12. And it is their happiness that God makes their way plain and easy before them: Thou, most upright, dost level (or make even ) the path of the just, by preventing or removing those things that would be stumbling-blocks to them, so that nothing shall offend them, Psa 119:165. God weighs it (so we read it); he considers it, and will give them grace sufficient for them, to help them over all the difficulties they may meet with in their way. Thus with the upright God will show himself upright.

III. It is our duty, and will be our comfort, to wait for God, and to keep up holy desires towards him in the darkest and most discouraging times, Isa 26:8, Isa 26:9. This has always been the practice of God's people, even when God has frowned upon them, 1. To keep up a constant dependence upon him: " In the way of thy judgments we have still waited for thee; when thou hast corrected us we have looked to no other hand than thine to relieve us,"as the servant looks only to the hand of his master, till he have mercy upon him, Psa 123:2. We cannot appeal from God's justice but to his mercy. If God's judgments continue long, if it be a road of judgments (so the word signifies), yet we must not be weary but continue waiting. 2. To send up holy desires towards him. Our troubles, how pressing soever, must never put us out of conceit with our religion, nor turn us away from God; but still the desire of our soul must be to his name and to the remembrance of him; and in the night, the darkest longest night of affliction, with our souls must we desire him. (1.) Our great concern must be for God's name, and our earnest desire must be that his name may be glorified, whatever becomes of us and our names. This is that which we must wait for, and pray for. " Father, glorify thy name, and we are satisfied."(2.) Our great comfort must be in the remembrance of that name, of all that whereby God has made himself known. The remembrance of God must be our great support and pleasure; and, though sometimes we be unmindful of him, yet still our desire must be towards the remembrance of him and we must take pains with our own hearts to have him always in mind. (3.) Our desires towards God must be inward, fervent, and sincere. With our soul we must desire him, with our soul we must pant after him (Psa 42:1), and with our spirits within us, with the innermost thought and the closest application of mind, we must seek him. We make nothing of our religion, whatever our profession be, if we do not make heart-work of it. (4.) Even in the darkest night of affliction our desires must be towards God, as our sun and shield; for, however God is pleased to deal with us, we must never think the worse of him, nor cool in our love to him. (5.) If our desires be indeed towards God,. we must give evidence that they are so by seeking him, and seeking him early, as those that desire to find him, and dread the thoughts of missing him. Those that would seek God and find him must seek betimes, and seek him earnestly. Though we come ever so early, we shall find him ready to receive us.

IV. It is God's gracious design, in sending abroad his judgments, thereby to bring men to seek him and serve him: When thy judgments are upon the earth, laying all waste, then we have reason to expect that not only God's professing people, but even the inhabitants of the world, will learn righteousness, will have their mistakes rectified and their lives reformed, will be brought to acknowledge God's righteousness in punishing them, will repent of their own unrighteousness in offending God, and so be brought to walk in right paths. They will do this; that is, judgments are designed to bring them to this, they have a natural tendency to produce this effect, and, though many continue obstinate, yet some even of the inhabitants of the world will profit by this discipline, and will learn righteousness; surely they will; they are strangely stupid if they do not. Note, The intention of afflictions is to teach us righteousness; and blessed is the man whom God chastens, and thus teaches, Psa 94:12. Discite justitiam, moniti, et non temnere divos - Let this rebuke teach you to cultivate righteousness, and cease from despising the gods. - Virgil.

V. Those are wicked indeed that will not be wrought upon by the favourable methods God takes to subdue and reform them; and it is necessary that God should deal with them in a severe way by his judgments, which shall prevail to humble those that would not otherwise be humbled. Observe,

1. How sinners walk contrary to God, and refuse to comply with the means used for their reformation and to answer the intentions of them, Isa 26:10. (1.) Favour is shown to them. They receive many mercies from God; he causes his sun to shine and his rain to fall upon them, nay, he prospers them, and into their hands he brings plentifully; they escape many of the strokes of God's judgments, which others less wicked than they have been cut off by; in some particular instances they seem to be remarkably favoured above their neighbours, and the design of all this is that they may be won upon to love and serve that God who thus favours them; and yet it is all in vain: They will not learn righteousness, will not be led to repentance by the goodness of God, and therefore it is requisite that God should send his judgments into the earth, to reckon with men for abused mercies. (2.) They live in a land of uprightness, where religion is professed and is in reputation, where the word of God is preached, and where they have many good examples set them, - in a land of evenness, where there are not so many stumbling-blocks as in other places, - in a land of correction, where vice and profaneness are discountenanced and punished; yet there they will deal unjustly, and go on frowardly in their evil ways. Those that do wickedly deal unjustly both with God and man, as well as with their own souls; and those that will not be reclaimed by the justice of the nation may expect the judgments of God upon them. Nor can those expect a place hereafter in the land of blessedness who now conform not to the laws and usages, nor improve the privileges and advantages, of the land of uprightness; and why do they not? It is because they will not behold the majesty of the Lord, will not believe, will not consider, what a God of terrible majesty he is whose laws and justice they persist in the contempt of. God's majesty appears in all the dispensations of his providence; but they regard it not, and therefore study not to answer the ends of those dispensations. Even when we receive of the mercy of the Lord we must still behold the majesty of the Lord and his goodness. (3.) God lifts up his hand to give them warning, that they may, by repentance and prayer, make their peace with him; but they take no notice of it, are not aware that God is angry with them, or coming forth against them: They will not see, and none so blind as those who will not see, who shut their eyes against the clearest conviction of guilt and wrath, who ascribe that to chance, or common fate, which is manifestly a divine rebuke, who regard not the threatening symptoms of their own ruin, but cry Peace to themselves, when the righteous God is waging war with them.

2. How God will at length be too hard for them; for, when he judges, he will overcome: They will not see, but they shall see, shall be made to see, whether they will or no, that God is angry with them. Atheists, scorners, and the secure, will shortly feel what now they will not believe, that it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. They will not see the evil of sin, and particularly the sin of hating and persecuting the people of God; but they shall see, by the tokens of God's displeasure against them for it and the deliverances in which God will plead his people's cause, that what is done against them he takes as done against himself and will reckon for it accordingly. They shall see that they have done God's people a great deal of wrong, and therefore shall be ashamed of their enmity and envy towards them, and their ill usage of such as deserved better treatment. Note, Those that bear ill-will to God's people have reason to be ashamed of it, so absurd and unreasonable is it; and, sooner or later, they shall be ashamed of it, and the remembrance of it shall fill them with confusion. Some read it, They shall see and be confounded for the zeal of the people, by the zeal God will show for his people; when they shall be made to know how jealous God is for the honour and welfare of his people they shall be confounded to think that they might have been of that people and would not. Their doom therefore is that, since they slighted the happiness of God's friends, the fire of his enemies shall devour them, that is, the fire which is prepared for his enemies and with which they shall be devoured, the fire designed for the devil and his angels. Note, Those that are enemies to God's people, and envy them, God looks upon as his enemies, and will deal with them accordingly.

Keil-Delitzsch: Isa 26:7

The righteous, who go astray according to the judgment of the world, thus arrive at a goal from which their way appears in a very different light. "The path that the righteous man takes is smoothness; Thou makest the course of the righteous smooth." ישׁר is an accusative predicate: Thou rollest it, i.e., Thou smoothest it, so that it is just as if it had been bevelled with a rule, and leads quite straight (on the derivative peles , a level, see at Job 37:16) and without interruption to the desired end. The song has here fallen into the language of a mashal of Solomon (vid., Pro 4:26; Pro 5:6, Pro 5:21). It pauses here to reflect, as if at the close of a strophe.

Constable: Isa 7:1--39:8

III. Israel's crisis of faith chs. 7--39

This long section of the book deals with Israel's major decision in Isaiah's day. Would she trust in Yahweh or in other nations? The decision was a matter of faith; who is more trustworthy, God or strong people? God promised that trust in the nations would result in destruction (ch. 34) but trust in Him would bring abundance (ch. 35). Israel's decision would also determine whether she had a message for the nations or not and whether she would fulfill her mission to the nations or not. This decision is, of course, one that the people of God of all ages continually face.

Constable: Isa 13:1--35:10

B. God's sovereignty over the nations chs. 13-35

This major section of the book emphasizes the folly of trusting in the nations rather than in Yahweh. The section preceding it shows how King Ahaz trusted in Assyria and experienced destruction (chs. 7-12). The section following it shows how King Hezekiah trusted in the Lord and experienced deliverance (chs. 36-39). In this section the prophet expanded his perspective from Israel to include the world. The God of Israel is also Lord of the nations.

Constable: Isa 24:1--27:13

2. Divine victory over the nations chs. 24-27

This section of the text has similarities to the preceding oracles against the nations (chs. 13-23), but it is also different in certain respects. It is a third cycle, but not a cycle of oracles.²²¹ The content integrates with the oracles, but chapters 24-27 are one continuous whole. It is similar to the finale of a great piece of music; it is climactic but can be appreciated by itself.

Chapters 24-27 also parallel chapters 1-4 in that both sections contain messages of sin, judgment, and restoration "in that day." Likewise 27:2-6 is another song about a vineyard (cf. 5:1-7). Chapters 28-33 contain six woes, like 5:8-30. Chapter 34 assures divine judgment on Gentile oppressors (cf. ch. 10), and chapter 35 promises kingdom blessings for Israel (cf. chs. 11-12).²²²

The theme of this section is the triumph of God over His enemies for His people. Isaiah developed this theme by picturing the destruction of one "city" ("the city of chaos" [v. 10], the city of man, really the whole world) and the establishment of another city (Mount Zion, Jerusalem, the city of God). These two "cities" are the focal points of the judgment and restoration that Isaiah alluded to in the preceding oracles. As the city of man falls under divine judgment, the songs of God-neglecting man disappear; and as the city of God appears, the songs of the redeemed swell.

"The prophet wants to make it plain that God is sovereign actor on the stage of history. It is not he who reacts to the nations, but the nations who respond to him. Thus Israel's [and all God's people's] hope is not in the nations of humanity. They will wither away in a moment under God's blast. Rather, her hope is in the Lord, who is the master of the nations."²²³

Temporally, the first five oracles had strong connections to Isaiah's own times, and the second five reached farther into the future.²²⁴ This section stretches even farther into the future and is mainly eschatological.²²⁵ These are prophecies regarding the eschatological day of the Lord. Later scriptural revelation enables us to locate these judgments more specifically in the Tribulation, at the return of Christ, in the Millennium, and at the very end of human history on this earth.

The original settings of the prophecies that make up this section are even more difficult to nail down than those in the foregoing oracles. Chapters 24-27 develop the calls expressed in 2:2-4 and 5: calls to the nations and to God's people to come to Jerusalem, the magnet of the earth in the future. The structure of the passage is chiastic also centering on Mount Zion (25:6-12).

A The Lord's harvest from a destroyed world (24:1-13: destruction, 1-12; gleanings, 13)

B The song of the world remnant (24:14-16a)

C The sinful world overthrown (24:16b-20)

D The waiting world (24:21-23)

E The song of the ruined city (25:1-5)

F Mount Zion (25:6-12)

E' The song of the strong city (26:1-6)

D' The waiting people of God (26:7-21)

C' Spiritual forces of evil overthrown (27:1)

B' The song of the remnant of the people (27:2-6)

A' The Lord's harvest from a destroyed people (27:7-13: destruction, 7-11; gleanings, 12-13)²²⁶

There is chronological progression in this eschatological section from the Tribulation (24:1-20) to the Second Coming (24:21-23) to the Millennium (chs. 25-27). The millennial sections explain various aspects of God's activity during this time.

Constable: Isa 26:1-21

The future rejoicing of God's people ch. 26

This section focuses on the remnant of Israel during the Millennium. It parallels the oracles against Ephraim (chs. 17-18) and Jerusalem (ch. 22) in the structure of this major part of Isaiah (chs. 13-27). Isaiah voiced the praise and prayer that will come to God from Israel in the future because the Lord destroyed the "city" of man. He closed with a warning for the Israelites (vv. 20-21). The meaning of God's victory over the world for Israel is the theme.

Constable: Isa 26:7-19

A prayer 26:7-19

Isaiah moved from a hymn of praise to a prayer that has two parts: present waiting for God (vv. 7-10) and future expectation from God (vv. 11-19).

26:7 Presently the path of the righteous is smooth in that the trip from justification to glorification is secure, though in experience we encounter many obstacles. Isaiah prayed that the "Upright One" would make the road that the righteous tread level in experience (cf. Matt. 6:13). He used this unusual name for God because He wanted the One who is altogether right to make the path of His people altogether right.

26:8 The faithful people of God, Isaiah added, have waited for the Lord to act while following His commandments. They have sought a greater appreciation of Him rather than a change in their circumstances (cf. 1 John 1:1-4).

"Waiting is very difficult for most people, for it is an admission that there is nothing we can do at the moment to achieve our ends. Yet that admission is the first requirement for spiritual blessing. Until we have admitted that we cannot save ourselves, God cannot save us."²⁴⁹

26:9 Waiting was the experience of Isaiah individually as it was the experience of the faithful Israelites collectively. He sought the Lord rather than seeking a change in his circumstances. He recognized that God intends His commandments and His providential acts to teach people righteousness.

26:10 Yet the unrighteous do not learn the righteousness of God from His word or his ways to the extent that they should. They do not understand but continue in sin and remain spiritually blind (cf. Rom. 3:9-18).

Isaiah's concern changed from present to future conditions.

26:11 Even though the unrighteous do not recognize God's messages to them now, they will one day understand, when He brings these enemies of His into judgment.

26:12 Yahweh would establish peace for His people (v. 3) because everything that they had done He had really done for them (cf. Phil. 2:12-13). We cannot establish peace for ourselves, but He will. Only He can break through the darkness of human depravity (Jon. 2:9).

26:13 Even though the Israelites had other earthly masters through their history (Pharaoh, the Philistines, et al.), it was Yahweh their God who kept them following Him.

". . . fidelity is not an attribute native to the people of God but a gift which he enables them to exercise."²⁵⁰

26:14 Those who oppressed God's people have died and are gone because God punished them. Many of their names have even been forgotten and are irretrievable by historians.²⁵¹

26:15 Rather than Israel dying out as a nation, the Lord had increased her, as he promised Abraham (Gen. 15:5). This was not Israel's doing; the Lord had increased her borders and so gained great glory for Himself. During the reigns of David and Solomon the Israelites experienced numerical growth and geographical expansion. God would do the same for them in the future.

"It is worth remembering that the land promised to Israel in Exodus 23:31 was never fully occupied, even in the days of David and Solomon, but that the bounds of the messianic kingdom are to be wider still (cf. Ps 72:8)."²⁵²

26:16 The period of the judges is a good example of what the prophet wrote here. The Israelites suffered chastening from the Lord for departing from Him, but when they sought Him in their distress, even with just a whispered prayer, He saved them (cf. 1 Sam. 1:12-15).

26:17-18 During Isaiah's own times Israel went through many pains, as a woman in labor. But rather than giving birth to something significant, the salvation of the world or many individuals, these experiences only proved painful for the Israelites. They had not learned from God's dealings with them any more than the nations had (v. 10).

26:19 Was Isaiah referring to national survival or to individual resurrection here? Probably both.²⁵³ He had been talking about the near-death experiences of Israel in the preceding verses (vv. 16-18), and he had already revealed that a remnant would enter the Millennium (25:6-10; cf. Ezek. 37). However, in the same passage the prophet also looked forward to the abolition of death itself (25:7-8). So probably we have both a figurative and a literal resurrection in view, a figurative resurrection of Israel in the future and a literal resurrection of Israelites in the future (cf. Dan. 12:2; Job 19:26).²⁵⁴ As dew descends, God would come to the Israelites bringing refreshment and vitality (cf. Ps. 72:6; Hos. 14:5).

Guzik: Isa 26:1-21

Isaiah 26 - Judah's Kingdom of God Song

A. The city of God and the city of Man.

1. (1-2) The strength of God's city.

In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah: "We have a strong city; God will appoint salvation for walls and bulwarks. Open the gates, that the righteous nation which keeps the truth may enter in."

a. In that day: The context from Isaiah 24 and 25 points to the day of the Messiah's ultimate triumph, the day when the Messiah reigns over Israel, and over all the world. In that day, there will be a lot of joyful singing, such as this song that will be sung in the land of Judah.

b. We have a strong city: Since cities came into being after the Fall, man has never known a truly godly city, the City of God on earth. In that day, all will know the strength and glory of the city of God.

i. In the fifth century, Rome was conquered by less civilized tribes from the north in Europe. The mighty Roman Empire was no more, and many blamed the fall of Rome on the new religion she had officially embraced in the last 100 years: Christianity. In this time of confusion, the greatest Christian theologian of the time wrote a book titled The City of God. In it, he tried to explain how the fall of the Roman Empire related to the kingdom of God, and he made the contrast between the city of man (ultimately represented by Rome and the mighty Roman Empire) and the City of God (the kingdom of God). Augustine pointed out that though the fall of Rome was tragic for the city of man, it really only hastened the coming of the City of God. Speaking in Augustine's terms, Isaiah writes about the City of God when he says we have a strong city. The strong city is the Kingdom of God, the city of man is the world system.

ii. This is an important and often neglected idea. We often disapprove of the idea of the city, and romanticize the idea of man in isolation, in a rural or primitive setting. But in the Kingdom of Jesus Christ on this earth, there will be cities - but redeemed cities, glorious communities organized under the strength and salvation and righteousness and truth of the LORD. God's supreme ideal is no escape from all community and a private communion with nature; the Kingdom of God will be realized in a strong city.

c. God will appoint salvation for walls and bulwarks: The city of God, from beginning to end, is all about salvation. Even the walls and the bulwarks of the city are saved!

d. Open the gates, that the righteous nation which keeps the truth may enter it: The city of God, with all its strength and salvation, is only for the righteous, and those who keep the truth. In the same principle, the New Jerusalem is a city filled with glory, which excludes the unrighteous (Revelation 21:22-27).

i. We should make a distinction between the Kingdom of the Messiah, the millennial reign of Jesus (described here in Isaiah 26), and the coming of the New Jerusalem (which comes when this earth passes away, Revelation 21:1-2). The cities are similar, because they are both from the LORD, but they come at different times in God's plan of the ages.

2. (3-4) The LORD is our source of strength.

You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in You. Trust in the LORD forever, for in YAH, the LORD, is everlasting strength.

a. You will keep him in perfect peace: What a promise! Perfect peace! God promises that we can have perfect peace, and even be kept in a place of perfect peace.

i. In Hebrew, the term perfect peace is actually shalom shalom. This shows how in Hebrew, repetition communicates intensity. It isn't just shalom; it is shalom shalom, perfect peace.

ii. "Understand, dear soul, that it is thy privilege to live inside the double doors of God's loving care. He says to thee, 'Peace, peace.' If one assurance is not enough, He will follow it with a second and a third." (Meyer)

iii. Some can have this perfect peace, but it is fleeting and they are never kept there. Others can be kept in peace, but it is not a perfect peace, it is the peace of the wicked, the peace of spiritual sleep and ultimate destruction. But there is a perfect peace that the LORD will keep is in.

b. Whose mind is stayed on You: This is the place of perfect peace, and the source of it. When we keep our minds stayed - settled upon, established upon - the LORD Himself, then we can be kept in this perfect peace.

i. To be kept in this perfect peace, it is a matter of our mind. This isn't so much a matter of our spirit or of our soul or of our heart. It is a matter of our mind. We are to love the LORD our God with all of our mind (Matthew 22:37). We are transformed by the renewing of your mind (Romans 12:2). We can have the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:16, Philippians 2:5). We are not to set our mind on earthly things (Philippians 3:19), but to set our mind on things above (Colossians 3:2). The Christian life is not an unthinking life of just doing, or experiencing, but it is also about thinking, and where we set our mind is essential in our walk before the LORD.

ii. To be kept in this perfect peace, our mind must be stayed. The Hebrew word sawmak comes from the root "to prop," and has the idea "to lean upon or take hold of . . . bear up, establish, uphold, lay, lean, lie hard, put, rest self, set self, stand fast, stay (self), sustain." (Strong's Dictionary) In other places the same word is translated sustained (Genesis 27:37, Psalm 3:5), or when the priest would put their hands on the head of a sacrificial animal (Exodus 29:10, 15, 19), or of the laying on of hands in other circumstances (Numbers 27:18), of being upheld (Psalm 71:6), to stand fast upon (Psalm 111:8), of being established (Psalm 112:8), of leaning upon (Isaiah 36:6, 48:2). So, what sustains your mind? What do you lay your mind upon? What upholds your mind? What does your mind stand fast upon? What is your mind established upon? What does your mind lean upon? To have this perfect peace, your mind cannot occasionally come to the LORD; it has to be stayed on Him.

iii. To be kept in this perfect peace, our mind must be stayed on the LORD. If our mind is stayed on ourselves, or our problems, or the problem people in our lives, or on anything else, we can't have this perfect peace. This is the heart that says with the Apostle Paul, that I may know Him (Philippians 3:10). Satan loves to get our minds on anything except the LORD!

c. Because He trusts in You: This is another way of expressing the idea of keeping our minds stayed on Him. Almost always, you keep your mind stayed on whatever you are trusting. When we trust the LORD, we keep our mind stayed on Him.

i. Proverbs 3:5 expresses this same idea: Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding. The word for lean in Proverbs 3:5 comes from the same root as the word stayed in Isaiah 26:3. When we trust in the LORD, we do not lean on our own understanding. To lean on the LORD is to trust Him. To be sustained by the LORD is to trust Him. To be established by the LORD is to trust Him. To upheld by the LORD is to trust Him.

ii. The battle for trust in our lives begins in our minds. If we trust the LORD, it will show in our actions, but it will begin in our mind.

d. Trust in the LORD forever: Because of the promise of Isaiah 26:3, we are exhorted to trust in the LORD forever - and therefore to receive the blessing of the promise, perfect peace!

e. For in YAH, the LORD, is everlasting strength: If the LORD calls us to rely on Him completely with our mind, He appeals to our mind with a rational reason why we should trust the LORD - because He is everlasting strength. It isn't that the LORD has everlasting strength, He is everlasting strength.

i. Clarke's comment on Isaiah 12:2 applies here also: "The word Yah read here is probably a mistake; and arose originally from the custom of the Jewish scribes, who, when they found a line too short for the word, wrote as many letters as filled it, and then began the next line with the whole word."

3. (5-6) The destiny of the city of man.

For He brings down those who dwell on high, the lofty city; He lays it low, He lays it low to the ground, He brings it down to the dust. The foot shall tread it down; the feet of the poor and the steps of the needy.

a. He brings down those who dwell on high, the lofty city: The city of man is lofty, and its exalted ones dwell on high. But the LORD will bring them down nonetheless. The city of man, the world system, is nothing to the LORD; He lays it low.

b. The city of man, the world system, is all about power and prestige, built on the backs of the weak and the poor. But when God brings the city of man down to the dust, He will turn all that around, and the feet of the poor shall tread it down.

i. Jesus expressed the same principle in Matthew 5:5: Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Jesus told us oppose the power and prestige thinking of this world and to live with the thinking of His Kingdom right now (Matthew 20:25-28).

4. (7-9) The way of the upright.

The way of the just is uprightness; O Most Upright, You weigh the path of the just. Yes, in the way of Your judgments, O LORD, we have waited for You; the desire of our soul is for Your name and for the remembrance of You. With my soul I have desired You in the night, yes, by my spirit within me I will seek You early; for when Your judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.

a. The way of the just is uprightness: In the Kingdom of God, His just people walk in a way - the way of uprightness. Isaiah accurately gives the sense of order in this; the LORD makes His people just by a relationship of faith and trust in Him, then they walk in the way of . . . uprightness.

i. Why do they walk in uprightness? Because they serve the LORD God, who is Most Upright Himself. As they trust the LORD, are declared just by the LORD, they walk in His own way.

ii. You weigh the path of the just: The LORD looks at His righteous ones (the just) and He evaluates their path. The LORD cares about the walk of His just ones!

b. The desire of our soul is for Your name: In the Kingdom of God, His just people love Him and desire Him.

i. The desire is displayed in waiting: O LORD, we have waited for You. When you desire something, or someone, you will wait for them, and do it gladly because of your desire.

ii. The desire is displayed in seeking: With my soul I have desired You in the night, yes, by my spirit within me I will seek You early. When you desire something, or someone, you seek them all the time, both early and at night.

c. The way of the upright will be vindicated; one day, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.

5. (10-11) The way of the wicked.

Let grace be shown to the wicked, yet he will not learn righteousness; in the land of uprightness he will deal unjustly, and will not behold the majesty of the LORD. LORD, when Your hand is lifted up, they will not see. But they will see and be ashamed for their envy of people; yes, the fire of Your enemies shall devour them.

a. The wicked are ungrateful for God's goodness: Let grace be shown to the wicked, yet he will not learn righteousness.

b. The wicked end in disaster: And will not behold the majesty of the LORD . . . they will see and be ashamed . . . the fire of Your enemies shall devour them.

B. Promises made to a humble heart.

1. (12-18) The prayer of a humble heart.

LORD, You will establish peace for us, for You have also done all our works in us. O LORD our God, masters besides You have had dominion over us; but by You only we make mention of Your name. They are dead, they will not live; they are deceased, they will not rise. Therefore You have punished and destroyed them, and made all their memory to perish. You have increased the nation, O LORD, You have increased the nation; You are glorified; You have expanded all the borders of the land. LORD, in trouble they have visited You, they poured out a prayer when Your chastening was upon them. As a woman with child is in pain and cries out in her pangs, when she draws near the time of her delivery, so have we been in Your sight, O LORD. We have been with child, we have been in pain; we have, as it were, brought forth wind; we have not accomplished any deliverance in the earth, nor have the inhabitants of the world fallen.

a. You have also done all our works in us: Isaiah must have been reading Ephesians 2:8-10: For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. Even our good works are works that He has done . . . in us.

b. Masters besides You have had dominion over us; but by You only we make mention of Your name: The humble heart repents of past idolatry, and rejoices in the present freedom in the LORD.

i. The humble heart sees the folly of their past idolatry: They are dead, they will not live. The humble heart sees the victory of the LORD over all idols: You have punished and destroyed them. "Obviously this verse does not suggest that the 'other lords' had real existence as deities but simply that they were believed to have and that their rule was sinfully acknowledged by the people in past times." (Grogan)

ii. The Hebrew word for dominion is baal, which can mean master or husband. Of course, Baal was also the chief god of the native Canaanites, and a seductive idol for Israel. In this prayer, Judah essentially says, O LORD our God, masters besides you have "Baal-ed" us.

c. We have been with child, we have been in pain; we have, as it were, brought forth wind: The humble heart knows the futility of working apart from the direction and blessing of God.

i. "We have had the torment of a woman in child-bearing, but not the comfort of a living child . . . for we have brought forth nothing but the wind; all our labours and hopes were vain and unnuccessful." (Poole)

d. You have increased the nation: The humble heart knows the LORD is responsible for increase and blessing.

e. LORD, in trouble they have visited You: The humble heart relies on the LORD in times of distress and futility.

2. (19) The promise of resurrection.

Your dead shall live; together with my dead body they shall arise. Awake and sing, you who dwell in dust; for your dew is like the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead.

a. Your dead shall live: The Old Testament had a shadowy understanding of the life to come, because the secrets of the life to come have now been revealed by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ, who has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel (2 Timothy 1:10). But here is a confident expectation of resurrection and glory for the LORD's righteous ones.

3. (20-21) The promise of refuge in the time of great indignation.

Come, my people, enter your chambers, and shut your doors behind you; hide yourself, as it were, for a little moment, until the indignation is past. For behold, the LORD comes out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity; the earth will also disclose her blood, and will no more cover her slain.

a. Come, my people, enter your chambers: Isaiah, speaking for the LORD, prophesies a time when God's people are invited to come and find refuge until the indignation is past.

i. The refuge is secure. God's people are secure in chambers, with the doors shut behind them. They are hidden securely (Hide yourself).

b. The indignation God's people are hidden from is from the LORD Himself: the LORD comes out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity. This is not persecution from the wicked, but judgment from the LORD. This is not a local judgment, but something the LORD brings upon the inhabitants of the earth in general.

i. The devastation of the indignation of the LORD is seen all over the earth: The earth will also disclose her blood, and will no more cover her slain.

c. When is this time when God's people are carried away, securely hidden, from a time of great indignation the LORD brings upon the earth? It can refer to the deliverance of the Jewish people from the fury of the Antichrist described in Revelation 12:6 and 12:13-16. But it is more likely that it speaks of the refuge, the safety, the security of God's people when they are caught up together with the Lord in the air (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17) and escape the horrific indignation of the Lord that He pours out upon the world in the Great Tribulation (Matthew 24:21-22, Revelation 9:15-21), which will immediately precede the second coming of Jesus Christ (Matthew 24:29-30).

i. Seen this way, this is a powerful passage supporting the teaching of the Pre-Tribulation Rapture, which says that Jesus Christ will remove His people from this earth before the time of Great Tribulation coming upon the earth immediately before His ultimate return.

© 2001 David Guzik - No distribution beyond personal use without permission

Introduction / Outline

JFB: Isaiah (Book 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; 2Ki 21:16; Heb 11:37). 2Ch 32:32 seems to imply that Isaiah survived Hezekiah; but "first and last" is not added, as in 2Ch 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.

His WIFE is called the prophetess [Isa 8:3], that is, endowed, as Miriam, with a prophetic gift.

His 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.

His GARMENT of sackcloth (Isa 20:2), too, was a silent preaching by fact; he appears as the embodiment of that repentance which he taught.

His 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, 2Ch 26:22; also of Hezekiah, 2Ch 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.

The 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 [2Ki 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.

The 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.

Rationalists 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.

The 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.

The 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.

His 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.

Of 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).

The 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.

The 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.

The 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.

His 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.

The FORM is mostly that of Hebrew poetical parallelism, with, however, a freedom unshackled by undue restrictions.

JUDAH, 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.

JFB: Isaiah (Outline)

• PARABLE OF JEHOVAH'S VINEYARD. (Isa. 5:1-30)
• SIX DISTINCT WOES AGAINST CRIMES. (Isa. 5:8-23) (Lev 25:13; Mic 2:2). The jubilee restoration of possessions was intended as a guard against avarice.
• VISION OF JEHOVAH IN HIS TEMPLE. (Isa 6:1-13)
• PREDICTION OF THE ILL SUCCESS OF THE SYRO-ISRAELITISH INVASION OF JUDAH--AHAZ'S ALLIANCE WITH ASSYRIA, AND ITS FATAL RESULTS TO JUDEA--YET THE CERTAINTY OF FINAL PRESERVATION AND OF THE COMING OF MESSIAH. (Isa. 7:1-9:7)
• FATAL CONSEQUENCES OF AHAZ' ASSYRIAN POLICY. (Isa 7:17-25)
• THE COMING DESOLATE STATE OF THE LAND OWING TO THE ASSYRIANS AND EGYPTIANS. (Isa 7:21-25)
• CONTINUATION OF THE PROPHECY IN THE EIGHTH CHAPTER. (Isa 9:1-7)
• PROPHECY AS TO THE TEN TRIBES. (Isa. 9:8-10:4) Heading of the prophecy; (Isa 9:8-12), the first strophe.
• THANKSGIVING HYMN OF THE RESTORED AND CONVERTED JEWS. (Isa 12:1-6)
• THE THIRTEENTH THROUGH TWENTY-THIRD CHAPTERS CONTAIN PROPHECIES AS TO FOREIGN NATIONS.--THE THIRTEENTH, FOURTEENTH, AND TWENTY-SEVENTH CHAPTERS AS TO BABYLON AND ASSYRIA. (Isa. 13:1-22)
• CONFIRMATION OF THIS BY THE HEREFORETOLD DESTRUCTION OF THE ASSYRIANS UNDER SENNACHERIB. (Isa 14:24-27)
• A CHORUS OF JEWS EXPRESS THEIR JOYFUL SURPRISE AT BABYLON'S DOWNFALL. (Isa 14:4-8)
• THE SCENE CHANGES FROM EARTH TO HELL. (Isa 14:9-11)
• THE JEWS ADDRESS HIM AGAIN AS A FALLEN ONCE-BRIGHT STAR. (Isa 14:12-15)
• 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)
• GOD'S DETERMINATION TO DESTROY BABYLON. (Isa 14:21-23)
• A FRAGMENT AS TO THE DESTRUCTION OF THE ASSYRIANS UNDER SENNACHERIB. (Isa 14:24-27) In this verse the Lord's thought (purpose) stands in antithesis to the Assyrians' thoughts (Isa 10:7). (See Isa 46:10-11; 1Sa 15:29; Mal 3:6).
• PROPHECY AGAINST PHILISTIA. (Isa 14:28-32)
• THE FIFTEENTH AND SIXTEENTH CHAPTERS FORM ONE PROPHECY ON MOAB. (Isa 15:1-9)
• CONTINUATION OF THE PROPHECY AS TO MOAB. (Isa 16:1-14)
• CONTINUATION OF THE SUBJECT OF THE NINETEENTH CHAPTER, BUT AT A LATER DATE. CAPTIVITY OF EGYPT AND ETHIOPIA. (Isa 20:1-6)
• REPETITION OF THE ASSURANCE GIVEN IN THE THIRTEENTH AND FOURTEENTH CHAPTERS TO THE JEWS ABOUT TO BE CAPTIVES IN BABYLON, THAT THEIR ENEMY SHOULD BE DESTROYED AND THEY BE DELIVERED. (Isa 21:1-10)
• A PROPHECY TO THE IDUMEANS WHO TAUNTED THE AFFLICTED JEWS IN THE BABYLONISH CAPTIVITY. (Isa 21:11-12)
• PROPHECY THAT ARABIA WOULD BE OVERRUN BY A FOREIGN FOE WITHIN A YEAR. (Isa 21:13-17)
• PROPHECY AS TO AN ATTACK ON JERUSALEM. (Isa 22:1-14)
• PROPHECY THAT SHEBNA SHOULD BE DEPOSED FROM BEING PREFECT OF THE PALACE, AND ELIAKIM PROMOTED TO THE OFFICE. (Isa 22:15-25)
• PROPHECY RESPECTING TYRE. (Isa. 23:1-18)
• THE LAST TIMES OF THE WORLD IN GENERAL, AND OF JUDAH AND THE CHURCH IN PARTICULAR. (Isa. 24:1-23)
• CONTINUATION OF THE TWENTY-FOURTH CHAPTER. THANKSGIVING FOR THE OVERTHROW OF THE APOSTATE FACTION, AND THE SETTING UP OF JEHOVAH'S THRONE ON ZION. (Isa 25:1-12)
• CONNECTED WITH THE TWENTY-FOURTH AND TWENTY-FIFTH CHAPTERS. SONG OF PRAISE OF ISRAEL AFTER BEING RESTORED TO THEIR OWN LAND. (Isa. 26:1-21)
• CONTINUATION OF THE TWENTY-FOURTH, TWENTY-FIFTH, AND TWENTY-SIXTH CHAPTERS. (Isa 27:1-13)
• COMING INVASION OF JERUSALEM: ITS FAILURE: UNBELIEF OF THE JEWS. (Isa. 29:1-24)
• THE THIRTIETH THROUGH THIRTY-SECOND CHAPTERS REFER PROBABLY TO THE SUMMER OF 714 B.C., AS THE TWENTY-NINTH CHAPTER TO THE PASSOVER OF THAT YEAR. (Isa. 30:1-32)
• THE CHIEF STRENGTH OF THE EGYPTIAN ARMIES LAY IN THEIR CAVALRY. (Isa 31:1-9)
• MESSIAH'S KINGDOM; DESOLATIONS, TO BE SUCCEEDED BY LASTING PEACE, THE SPIRIT HAVING BEEN POURED OUT. (Isa. 32:1-20)
• JUDGMENT ON IDUMEA. (Isa. 34:1-17) All creation is summoned to hear God's judgments (Eze 6:3; Deu 32:1; Psa 50:4; Mic 6:1-2), for they set forth His glory, which is the end of creation (Rev 15:3; Rev 4:11).
• CONTINUATION OF THE PROPHECY IN THE THIRTY-FOURTH CHAPTER. (Isa 35:1-10)
• SENNACHERIB'S INVASION; BLASPHEMOUS SOLICITATIONS; HEZEKIAH IS TOLD OF THEM. (Isa. 36:1-22)
• CONTINUATION OF THE NARRATIVE IN THE THIRTY-SIXTH CHAPTER. (Isa. 37:1-38)
• HEZEKIAH'S SICKNESS; PERHAPS CONNECTED WITH THE PLAGUE OR BLAST WHEREBY THE ASSYRIAN ARMY HAD BEEN DESTROYED. (Isa. 38:1-22)
• HEZEKIAH'S ERROR IN THE DISPLAY OF HIS RICHES TO THE BABYLONIAN AMBASSADOR. (Isa 39:1-8)
• SECOND PART OF THE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. (Isa. 40:1-31)
• ADDITIONAL REASONS WHY THE JEWS SHOULD PLACE CONFIDENCE IN GOD'S PROMISES OF DELIVERING THEM; HE WILL RAISE UP A PRINCE AS THEIR DELIVERER, WHEREAS THE IDOLS COULD NOT DELIVER THE HEATHEN NATIONS FROM THAT PRINCE. (Isa. 41:1-29) (Zec 2:13). God is about to argue the case; therefore let the nations listen in reverential silence. Compare Gen 28:16-17, as to the spirit in which we ought to behave before God.
• MESSIAH THE ANTITYPE OF CYRUS. (Isa. 42:1-25)
• CONTINUATION OF THE PREVIOUS CHAPTER. (Isa. 44:1-28)
• BABYLON'S IDOLS COULD NOT SAVE THEMSELVES, MUCH LESS HER. BUT GOD CAN AND WILL SAVE ISRAEL: CYRUS IS HIS INSTRUMENT. (Isa 46:1-13)
• THE DESTRUCTION OF BABYLON IS REPRESENTED UNDER THE IMAGE OF A ROYAL VIRGIN BROUGHT DOWN IN A MOMENT FROM HER MAGNIFICENT THRONE TO THE EXTREME OF DEGRADATION. (Isa. 47:1-15)
• THE THINGS THAT BEFALL BABYLON JEHOVAH PREDICTED LONG BEFORE, LEST ISRAEL SHOULD ATTRIBUTE THEM, IN ITS "OBSTINATE" PERVERSITY, TO STRANGE GODS. (Isa 48:1-5). (Isa. 48:1-22)
• SIMILAR TO CHAPTER 42. (Isa 49:1-9). (Isa. 49:1-26)
• THE JUDGMENTS ON ISRAEL WERE PROVOKED BY THEIR CRIMES, YET THEY ARE NOT FINALLY CAST OFF BY GOD. (Isa 50:1-11)
• ENCOURAGEMENT TO THE FAITHFUL REMNANT OF ISRAEL TO TRUST IN GOD FOR DELIVERANCE, BOTH FROM THEIR LONG BABYLONIAN EXILE, AND FROM THEIR PRESENT DISPERSION. (Isa. 51:1-23)
• FIRST THROUGH THIRTEEN VERSES CONNECTED WITH FIFTY-FIRST CHAPTER. (Isa. 52:1-15)
• MAN'S UNBELIEF: MESSIAH'S VICARIOUS SUFFERINGS, AND FINAL TRIUMPH FOR MAN. (Isa 53:1-12)
• THE FRUIT OF MESSIAH'S SUFFERINGS, AND OF ISRAEL'S FINAL PENITENCE AT HER PAST UNBELIEF (Isa 53:6): HER JOYFUL RESTORATION AND ENLARGEMENT BY JEHOVAH, WHOSE WRATH WAS MOMENTARY, BUT HIS KINDNESS EVERLASTING. (Isa. 54:1-17)
• THE CALL OF THE GENTILE WORLD TO FAITH THE RESULT OF GOD'S GRACE TO THE JEWS FIRST. (Isa 55:1-13)
• THE PREPARATION NEEDED ON THE PART OF THOSE WHO WISH TO BE ADMITTED TO THE KINGDOM OF GOD. (Isa 56:1-12)
• THE PEACEFUL DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS FEW: THE UNGODLINESS OF THE MANY: A BELIEVING REMNANT SHALL SURVIVE THE GENERAL JUDGMENTS OF THE NATION, AND BE RESTORED BY HIM WHO CREATES PEACE. (Isa. 57:1-21)
• REPROOF OF THE JEWS FOR THEIR DEPENDENCE ON MERE OUTWARD FORMS OF WORSHIP. (Isa 58:1-14)
• THE PEOPLE'S SIN THE CAUSE OF JUDGMENTS: THEY AT LAST OWN IT THEMSELVES: THE REDEEMER'S FUTURE INTERPOSITION IN THEIR EXTREMITY. (Isa. 59:1-21)
• ISRAEL'S GLORY AFTER HER AFFLICTION. (Isa. 60:1-22)
• MESSIAH'S OFFICES: RESTORATION OF ISRAEL. (Isa 61:1-11)
• INTERCESSORY PRAYERS FOR ZION'S RESTORATION, ACCOMPANYING GOD'S PROMISES OF IT, AS THE APPOINTED MEANS OF ACCOMPLISHING IT. (Isa 62:1-12)
• MESSIAH COMING AS THE AVENGER, IN ANSWER TO HIS PEOPLE'S PRAYERS. (Isa. 63:1-19)
• TRANSITION FROM COMPLAINT TO PRAYER. (Isa 64:1-12)
• GOD'S REPLY IN JUSTIFICATION OF HIS DEALINGS WITH ISRAEL. (Isa. 65:1-25)
• THE HUMBLE COMFORTED, THE UNGODLY CONDEMNED, AT THE LORD'S APPEARING: JERUSALEM MADE A JOY ON EARTH. (Isa. 66:1-24)

TSK: Isaiah (Book Introduction)

Isaiah has, with singular propriety, been denominated the Evangelical Prophet, on account of the number and variety of his prophecies concerning the advent and character, the ministry and preaching, the sufferings and death, and the extensive and permanent kingdom of the Messiah. So explicit and determinate are his predictions, as well as so numerous, that he seems to speak rather of things past than of events yet future; and he may be rather called an evangelist than a prophet. Though later critics, especially those on the continent, have expended much labour and learning in order to rob the prophet of his title; yet no one, whose mind is unprejudiced, can be at a loss in applying select portions of these prophecies to the mission and character of Jesus Christ, and to the events in his history which they are cited to illustrate by the sacred writers of the New Testament. In fact, his prophecies concerning the Messiah seem almost to anticipate the Gospel history; so clearly do they predict his Divine character. (Compare Isa 7:14 with Mat 1:18-23, and Luk 1:27-35; see Isa 6:1-13; Isa 9:6; Isa 35:4; Isa 40:5, Isa 40:9, Isa 40:19; Isa 42:6-8; compare Isa 61:1, with Luk 4:18; see Isa 62:11; Isa 63:1-4); his miracles (Isa 35:5, Isa 35:6); his peculiar character and virtues (Isa 11:2, Isa 11:3; Isa 40:11; Isa 43:1-3); his rejection (Compare Isa 6:9-12 with Mar 13:14; see Isa 7:14, Isa 7:15; Isa 53:3); his sufferings for our sins (Isa 50:6; Isa 53:4-11); his death and burial (Isa 53:8, Isa 53:9); his victory over death (Isa 25:8; Isa 53:10, Isa 53:12); his final glory (Isa 49:7, Isa 49:22, 33; Isa 52:13-15; Isa 53:4, Isa 53:5); and the establishment, increase, and perfection of his kingdom (Isa 2:2-4; Isa 9:2, Isa 9:7; Isa 11:4-10; Isa 16:5; Isa 29:18-24; Isa 32:1; Isa 40:4, Isa 40:5; Isa 42:4; Isa 46:13; Isa 49:9-13; Isa 51:3-6; Isa 53:6-10; Isa 55:1-3; Isa 59:16-21; 60; Isa 61:1-5; Isa 65:25); each specifically pointed out, and pourtrayed with the most striking and discriminating characters. It is impossible, indeed, to reflect on these, and on the whole chain of his illustrious prophecies, and not be sensible that they furnish the most incontestable evidence in support of Christianity. The style of Isaiah has been universally admired as the most perfect model of elegance and sublimity; and as distinguished for all the magnificence, and for all the sweetness of the Hebrew language.

TSK: Isaiah 26 (Chapter Introduction)

Overview

Poole: Isaiah (Book Introduction)

THE ARGUMENT

THE teachers of the ancient church were of two sorts:

1. Ordinary, the priests and Levites.

2. Extraordinary, the prophets. These were immediately called by God, and inspired, as with other singular gifts and graces, so particularly with a supernatural knowledge of Divine mysteries, and of future things, and invested by God with an authority superior not only to the ordinary teachers of the church, but in some sort even to the civil powers of the nation. These holy prophets, whose writings are contained in the sacred Scripture, are sixteen. Of these Isaiah is first in place, and, as may seem probable, in time also. But undoubtedly he was contemporary with Hosea, whom others suppose to have been before him. Compare Isa 1:1 , with Hos 1:1 . The Jews tell us that he was of the blood royal of Judah, which is uncertain. But undoubtedly he was the prince of all the prophets, whether we consider the great extent and variety of his prophecies, the excellency and sublimity of those mysteries which were revealed to him and by him, the majesty and elegancy of his style, or the incomparable liveliness and power of his sermons. He doth so evidently and fully describe the person, and offices, and sufferings, and kingdom of Christ, that some of the ancients called him the fifth evangelist. And it is observed, that there are more testimonies and quotations in the New Testament taken out of Isaiah than out of all the other prophets.

Poole: Isaiah 26 (Chapter Introduction)

CHAPTER 26

A song of praise and confidence in God, for the blessings of righteousness, judgments on their enemies, and favour to his people: their chastisement, repentance, and hope.

MHCC: Isaiah (Book Introduction)

Isaiah prophesied in the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah. He has been well called the evangelical prophet, on account of his numerous and full prophesies concerning the coming and character, the ministry and preaching, the sufferings and death of the Messiah, and the extent and continuance of his kingdom. Under the veil of the deliverance from Babylon, Isaiah points to a much greater deliverance, which was to be effected by the Messiah; and seldom does he mention the one, without alluding at the same time to the other; nay, he is often so much enraptured with the prospect of the more distant deliverance, as to lose sight of that which was nearer, and to dwell on the Messiah's person, office, character, and kingdom.

MHCC: Isaiah 26 (Chapter Introduction)

(Isa 26:1-4) The Divine mercies encourage to confidence in God.

(Isa 26:5-11) His judgments.

(Isa 26:12-19) His people exhorted to wait upon Him.

(Isa 26:20, Isa 26:21) Deliverance promised.

Matthew Henry: Isaiah (Book Introduction)

An Exposition, With Practical Observations, of The Book of the Prophet Isaiah

Prophet is a title that sounds very great to those that understand it, though, in the eye of the world, many of those that were dignified with it appeared very mean. A prophet is one that has a great intimacy with Heaven and a great interest there, and consequently a commanding authority upon earth. Prophecy is put for all divine revelation (2Pe 1:20, 2Pe 1:21), because that was most commonly by dreams, voices, or visions, communicated to prophets first, and by them to the children of men, Num 12:6. Once indeed God himself spoke to all the thousands of Israel from the top of Mount Sinai; but the effect was so intolerably dreadful that they entreated God would for the future speak to them as he had done before, by men like themselves, whose terror should not make them afraid, nor their hands be heavy upon them, Job 33:7. God approved the motion ( they have well said, says he, Deu 5:27, Deu 5:28), and the matter was then settled by consent of parties, that we must never expect to hear from God any more in that way, but by prophets, who received their instructions immediately from God, with a charge to deliver them to his church. Before the sacred canon of the Old Testament began to be written there were prophets, who were instead of Bibles to the church. Our Saviour seems to reckon Abel among the prophets, Mat 23:31, Mat 23:35. Enoch was a prophet; and by him that was first in prediction which is to be last in execution - the judgment of the great day. Jud 1:14, Behold, the Lord comes with his holy myriads. Noah was a preacher of righteousness. God said of Abraham, He is a prophet, Gen 20:7. Jacob foretold things to come, Gen 49:1. Nay, all the patriarchs are called prophets. Psa 105:15, Do my prophets no harm. Moses was, beyond all comparison, the most illustrious of all the Old Testament prophets, for with him the Lord spoke face to face, Deu 34:10. He was the first writing prophet, and by his hand the first foundations of holy writ were laid. Even those that were called to be his assistants in the government had the spirit of prophecy, such a plentiful effusion was there of that spirit at that time, Num 11:25. But after the death of Moses, for some ages, the Spirit of the Lord appeared and acted in the church of Israel more as a martial spirit than as a spirit of prophecy, and inspired men more for acting than speaking. I mean in the time of the judges. We find the Spirit of the Lord coming upon Othniel, Gideon, Samson, and others, for the service of their country, with their swords, not with their pens. Messages were then sent from heaven by angels, as to Gideon and Manoah, and to the people, Jdg 2:1. In all the book of judges there is never once mention of a prophet, only Deborah is called a prophetess. Then the word of the Lord was precious; there was no open vision, 1Sa 3:1. They had the law of Moses, recently written; let them study that. But in Samuel prophecy revived, and in him a famous epocha, or period of the church began, a time of great light in a constant uninterrupted succession of prophets, till some time after the captivity, when the canon of the Old Testament was completed in Malachi, and then prophecy ceased for nearly 400 years, till the coming of the great prophet and his forerunner. Some prophets were divinely inspired to write the histories of the church. But they did not put their names to their writings; they only referred for proof to the authentic records of those times, which were known to be drawn up by prophets, as Gad, Iddo, etc. David and others were prophets, to write sacred songs for the use of the church. After them we often read of prophets sent on particular errands, and raised up for special public services, among whom the most famous were Elijah and Elisha in the kingdom of Israel. But none of these put their prophecies in writing, nor have we any remains of them but some fragments in the histories of their times; there was nothing of their own writing (that I remember) but one epistle of Elijah's, 2Ch 21:12. But towards the latter end of the kingdoms of Judah and Israel, it pleased God to direct his servants the prophets to write and publish some of their sermons, or abstracts of them. The dates of many of their prophecies are uncertain, but the earliest of them was in the days of Uzziah king of Judah, and Jeroboam the second, his contemporary, king of Israel, about 200 years before the captivity, and not long after Joash had slain Zechariah the son of Jehoiada in the courts of the temple. If they begin to murder the prophets, yet they shall not murder their prophecies; these shall remain as witnesses against them. Hosea was the first of the writing prophets; and Joel, Amos, and Obadiah, published their prophecies about the same time. Isaiah began some time after, and not long; but his prophecy is placed first, because it is the largest of them all, and has most in it of him to whom all the prophets bore witness; and indeed so much of Christ that he is justly styled the Evangelical Prophet, and, by some of the ancients, a fifth Evangelist. We shall have the general title of this book (Isa 1:1) and therefore shall here only observe some things,

I. Concerning the prophet himself. He was (if we may believe the tradition of the Jews) of the royal family, his father being (they say) brother to king Uzziah. He was certainly much at court, especially in Hezekiah's time, as we find in his story, to which many think it is owing that his style is more curious and polite than that of some other of the prophets, and, in some places, exceedingly lofty and soaring. The Spirit of God sometimes served his own purpose by the particular genius of the prophet; for prophets were not speaking trumpets, through which the Spirit spoke, but speaking men, by whom the Spirit spoke, making use of their natural powers, in respect both of light and flame, and advancing them above themselves.

II. Concerning the prophecy. It is transcendently excellent and useful; it was so to the church of God then, serving for conviction of sin, direction in duty, and consolation in trouble. Two great distresses of the church are here referred to, and comfort prescribed in reference to them, that by Sennacherib's invasion, which happened in his own time, and that of the captivity in Babylon, which happened long after; and in the supports and encouragements laid up for each of these times of need we find abundance of the grace of the gospel. There are not so many quotations in the gospels out of any, perhaps not out of all, the prophecies of the Old Testament, as out of this; nor such express testimonies concerning Christ, witness that of his being born of a virgin (ch. 7) and that of his sufferings, Isa 53:1-12. The beginning of this book abounds most with reproofs for sin and threatenings of judgment; the latter end of it is full of wood words and comfortable words. This method the Spirit of Christ took formerly in the prophets and does still, first to convince and then to comfort; and those that would be blessed with the comforts must submit to the convictions. Doubtless Isaiah preached many sermons, and delivered many messages to the people, which are not written in this book, as Christ did; and probably these sermons were delivered more largely and fully than they are here related, but so much is left on record as Infinite Wisdom thought fit to convey to us on whom the ends of the world have come; and these prophecies, as well as the histories of Christ, are written that we might believe on the name of the Son of God, and that, believing, we might have life through his name; for to us is the gospel here preached as well as unto those that lived then, and more clearly. O that it may be mixed with faith!

Matthew Henry: Isaiah 26 (Chapter Introduction)

This chapter is a song of holy joy and praise, in which the great things God had engaged, in the foregoing chapter, to do for his people against his enemies and their enemies are celebrated: it is prepared to be sung when that prophecy should be accomplished; for we must be forward to meet God with our thanksgivings when he is coming towards us with his mercies. Now the people of God are here taught, I. To triumph in the safety and holy security both of the church in general and of every particular member of it, under the divine protection (Isa 26:1-4). II. To triumph over all opposing powers (Isa 26:5, Isa 26:6). III. To walk with God, and wait for him, in the worst and darkest times, Isa 26:7-9). IV. To lament the stupidity of those who regarded not the providence of God, either merciful or afflictive (Isa 26:10, Isa 26:11). V. To encourage themselves, and one another, with hopes that God would still continue to do them good (Isa 26:12, Isa 26:14), and engage themselves to continue in his service (Isa 26:13). VI. To recollect the kind providences of God towards them in their low and distressed condition, and their conduct under those providences (Isa 26:15-18). VII. To rejoice in hope of a glorious deliverance, which should be as a resurrection to them (Isa 26:19), and to retire in the expectation of it (Isa 26:20, Isa 26:21). And this is written for the support and assistance of the faith and hope of God's people in all ages, even those upon whom the ends of the world have come.

Constable: Isaiah (Book Introduction)

Introduction

Title and writer

The title of this book of the Bible, as is true of the other prophetical books, comes from its writer. The book claims to have come from Isaiah (1:1; 2:1; 7:3; 13:1; 20:2; 37:2, 6, 21; 38:1, 4, 21; 39:3, 5, 8), and Jesus Christ and the apostles quoted him as being the writer at least 21 times, more often than they quoted all the other writing prophets combined.¹ The name of Isaiah, the son of Amoz, is the only one connected with the book in any of the Hebrew manuscripts or ancient versions. Josephus, the Jewish historian who wrote at the end of the first century A.D., believed that Isaiah wrote this book. He said that Cyrus read the prophecies that Isaiah had written about him and wished to fulfill them.²

There is no record of any serious scholar doubting the Isaianic authorship of the entire book before the twelfth century when Ibn Ezra, a Jewish commentator, did so. With the rise of rationalism, however, some German scholars took the lead in questioning it in the late eighteenth century. They claimed that the basis for their new view was the differences in style, content, and emphases in the various parts of the prophecy. Many scholars have noted that it is not really the text itself that argues for multiple authorship as much as the presence of predictive prophecy in chapters 40-66, which antisupernaturalistic critics try to explain away.³ At first, there seemed to these critics to have been two writers whose respective emphases on judgment in chapters 1-39 and consolation in chapters 40-66 pointed to two separate writers, Isaiah and "Deutero-Isaiah." With further study, a theory of three writers ("Trito-Isaiah") emerged because of the differences between chapters 40-55 and 56-66. These critics sensed addresses to three different historical settings in these three parts of the book: Isaiah's lifetime (ca. 739-701 B.C.; chs. 1-39), the Babylonian exile (ca. 605-539 B.C.; chs. 40-55), and the return (ca. 539-400 B.C.; chs. 56-66).⁴

"Along with what is known as the JEDP theory of the origins of the Pentateuch, the belief in the multiple authorship of the book of Isaiah is one of the most generally accepted dogmas of biblical higher criticism today."⁵

However, internal and external evidence points to the unity of authorship. The title for God, "holy one of Israel," which reflects the deep impression that Isaiah's vision in chapter 6 made on him, occurs 12 times in chapters 1-39 and 14 times in chapters 40-66 but only seven times elsewhere in the entire Old Testament. Other key phrases, passages, words, themes, and motifs likewise appear in both parts of the book. Jewish tradition uniformly attributed the entire book to Isaiah as did Christian tradition until the eighteenth century. The Isaiah Dead Sea Scroll, the oldest copy of Isaiah that we have, dating from the second century B.C., has chapter 40 beginning in the same column in which chapter 39 ends.⁶

Isaiah was arguably the greatest of four prophets who lived and wrote toward the end of the eighth century. Amos and Hosea ministered in the northern kingdom of Israel at this time, and Micah and Isaiah served in Judah.⁷ Isaiah's name, "The Lord (Yahweh) is salvation," meaning the Lord is the source of salvation, symbolized his message.

". . . in that one name is compressed the whole contents of the book!"⁸

Isaiah lived in Jerusalem, and that capital city features prominently in his prophecies. His easy access to the court and Judah's kings, revealed in his book, suggests that he ministered to the kings of Judah and may have had royal blood in his veins. Jewish tradition made him the cousin of King Uzziah. His communication gifts and his political connections, whatever those may have been, gave him an opportunity to reach the whole nation of Judah. The prophet was married and had at least two sons to whom he gave names that also summarized major themes of his prophecies (8:18): Shearjashub (a remnant shall return, 7:3), and Maher-shalal-hash-baz (hastening to the spoil, 8:3).

Isaiah received his call to prophetic ministry in the year that King Uzziah died (740 B.C.; ch. 6). He responded enthusiastically to this privilege even though he knew from the outset that his ministry would be fruitless and discouraging (6:9-13). His wife was a prophetess (8:3) probably in the sense that she was married to a prophet; we have no record that she prophesied herself. Isaiah also trained a group of disciples who gathered around him (8:16). His vision of God, which he received at the beginning of his ministry, profoundly influenced Isaiah's whole view of life as well as his prophecies, as is clear from what he wrote.⁹

The prophet had a very broad appreciation of the political situation in which he lived. He demonstrated awareness of all the nations around his homeland. Judah and Jerusalem were the focal points of his prophecies, but he saw God's will for them down the corridors of time as well as in his own day. He saw that the kingdom that God would establish through His Messiah would include all people. He was a true patriot who denounced evils in his land as well as giving credit where that was due. He condemned religious cults yet remained neutral politically. His understanding of theology was profound. He set forth the wonder and grandeur of Yahweh more ably than any other biblical writer. As a writer, Isaiah is without a peer among the Old Testament prophets. He was a poetic artist who employed a large vocabulary and many literary devices to express his thoughts beautifully and powerfully. Most of his prophecies appear to have been messages that he delivered, which means that he was probably also a powerful orator.

There is no historical record of Isaiah's death. Jewish tradition held that he suffered martyrdom under King Manasseh (697-642 B.C.) because of his prophesying. The early church father Justin Martyr (ca. A.D. 150) wrote that the Jews sawed him to death with a wooden saw (cf. Heb. 11:37).¹⁰ Another ancient source says he took refuge in a hollow tree, but his persecutors discovered and extracted him. This may account for the unusual method of his execution.

Historical Background and Date

Isaiah ministered during the reigns of four Judean kings (1:1): Uzziah (792-740 B.C.), Jotham (750-732 B.C.), Ahaz (735-715 B.C.), and Hezekiah (715-686 B.C.).¹¹ The prophet began his ministry in the year that King Uzziah (or Azariah) died, namely, 740 or 739 B.C. (6:1).

During Uzziah's reign Judah enjoyed peace because of her surrounding nations' lack of antagonism and hostility. However, in 745 B.C. Tiglath-pileser III mounted the throne of Assyria and began to expand his empire. His three successors (Shalmaneser V, Sargon II, and Sennacherib) proved equally ambitious. Aram (Syria) and Israel (Ephraim) felt the pressure of Assyrian expansion before Judah did, but in King Ahaz's reign Judah had to make a crucial decision regarding her relationship to Assyria. Isaiah played a major role in that decision.

A second major crisis arose during the reign of King Hezekiah. By this time Babylon had defeated Assyria, and it was also expanding aggressively in Judah's direction. Again Isaiah played a major part in the decision about how Judah would respond to this threat.

". . . Isaiah exercised his prophetic ministry at a time of unique significance, a time in which it was of utmost importance to realize that salvation could not be obtained by reliance upon man but only from God Himself. For Israel it was the central or pivotal point of history between Moses and Christ. The old world was passing and an entirely new order of things was beginning to make its appearance. Where would Israel stand in that new world? Would she be the true theocracy, the light to lighten the Gentiles, or would she fall into the shadow by turning for help to the nations which were about her?"¹²

Sennacherib outlived Hezekiah, who died in 686 B.C., and Isaiah recorded the death of Sennacherib in 681 B.C. (37:38). Just how long the prophet ministered after that event is impossible to determine, but he must have prophesied for at least 60 years. However the bulk of the material in his book derives from the first 50 of those years (ca. 740-690 B.C.).

Important dates for Isaiah
Years	Events
745	Tiglath-pileser III of Assyria begins his reign
740	Uzziah of Judah dies; Isaiah begins his ministry
735	Ahaz of Judah begins his co-regency with Jotham; Pekah of Israel and Rezin of Aramea ally against Assyria
733-32	Tiglath-pileser invades Aramea and Israel
732	Damascus falls; Pekah and Rezin die; Jotham dies
727	Tiglath-pileser dies
722	Samaria falls; Shalmaneser V of Assyria dies and Sargon II begins to reign
715	Ahaz dies and Hezekiah begins his reign
711	Sargon attacks Ashdod and returns to Assyria
710	Sargon attacks Babylon
705	Sargon dies
701	Sennacherib of Assyria defeats Egypt at Eltekah and departs from Jerusalem; Merodach-baladan of Babylon sends messengers to visit Hezekiah
697	Manasseh of Judah begins his co-regency
690	Tirhakah of Egypt begins his reign
689	Sennacherib of Assyria defeats Babylon
686	Hezekiah dies
681	Sennacherib of Assyria dies and Esarhaddon begins to reign
671	Esarhaddon imports foreigners into Israel and defeats Egypt
612	Nineveh falls to Babylon
609	Nabopolassar of Babylon defeats Assyria and Assyria falls
605	Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon defeats Egypt at Carchemish; first deportation of Judahites to Babylon
597	Second deportation of Judahites to Babylon
586	Jerusalem falls to Nebuchadnezzar
559	Cyrus II of Persia begins to reign
539	Cyrus overthrows Babylon
538	Cyrus issues his decree allowing Jews to return to Palestine
530	Cyrus dies
518	Darius Hystaspes of Persia destroys Babylon

Audience and purpose

Isaiah ministered and wrote to the people of Jerusalem and Judah. His task was to explain to these chosen people that the old world order was passing away and that the new order, controlled by Gentile world empires that sought to swallow Judah up, required a new commitment to trust and obey Yahweh as His servant. The Assyrian threat called for this new dedication. This was a theological even more than a historical and political crisis for Judah. It raised many questions that Isaiah addressed.

"Is God truly the Sovereign of history if the godless nations are stronger than God's nation? Does might make right? What is the role of God's people in the world? Does divine judgment mean divine rejection? What is the nature of trust? What is the future of the Davidic monarchy? Are not the idols stronger than God and therefore superior to him?"¹³

The far-reaching nature of these questions called for reference to the future, which Isaiah revealed from the Lord. The Northern Kingdom had made the wrong commitment, which Amos announced, but the Southern Kingdom still had an opportunity to trust Yahweh and live.

"Stated briefly, the purpose of Isaiah is to display God's glory and holiness through His judgment of sin and His deliverance and blessing of a righteous remnant."¹⁴

Theology

The Book of Isaiah, the third longest book in the Bible after Psalms and Jeremiah, deals with as broad a range of theology as any book in the Old Testament. In this respect it is similar to Romans. However, there are four primary doctrines, all arising out of the prophet's personal experience with God in his call (ch. 6), that receive the most emphasis. These are God, man and the world, sin, and redemption.

Isaiah presented God as great, transcendently separate, authoritative, omnipotent, majestic, holy, and morally and ethically perfect. In contrast, he described sarcastically the stupidity of idolatry. God creates history as well as the cosmos, and He has a special relationship with Israel among the nations. The adjective "holy" (Heb. qadosh) describes God 33 times in Isaiah and only 26 times in the rest of the Old Testament. It is the primary attribute of God that this prophet stressed.

Isaiah showed the tremendous value that God places on humanity and the world but also the folly of pride and unbelief. Assuming pretensions to significance leads to insignificance for the creation, but giving true significance to God results in glory for humanity and the world. As all the other eighth-century prophets, Isaiah condemned injustice.

Sin is rebellion for Isaiah that springs from pride. The book begins and ends on this note (1:2; 66:24). All the evil in the world results from man's refusal to accept Yahweh's lordship. The prophet repeatedly showed how foolish such rebellion is. It not only affects man himself but also his environment. God's response to sin is judgment if people continue to rebel against Him, but He responds with redemption if they abandon self-trust and depend on Him. Sin calls for repentance, and forgiveness for the penitent is available.

God's judgment, the outworking of the personal rage of offended deity, takes many forms: natural disaster, military defeat, and disease being a few, but they all come from God's hand ultimately. The means of salvation can only be through God's activity. Substitutionary atonement makes possible God's announcement of pardon and redemption. This redemption comes through the promised Messiah ultimately, the Lord's anointed king. The goal of redemption is not just deliverance from sin's guilt but the sharing of God's character and fellowship. Salvation could only come to God's people as they accepted the role of servant. Deliverance cannot come to man through his own effort, but he must look to God alone for it. His emphasis on salvation has earned Isaiah the title of evangelist of the Old Testament.

Isaiah is strongly eschatological. In many passages the prophet dealt with the future destiny of Israel and the Gentiles. He wrote more than any other prophet of the great kingdom into which the Israelites would enter under Messiah's rule.

"We stand precisely on 56:1, looking back to the work of the Servant (now fulfilled in the person, life, death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus) and looking forward to the coming of the Anointed Conqueror."¹⁵

Isaiah's emphasis on the coming Messiah is second only to the Psalms in the Old Testament in terms of its fullness and variety. God revealed more about the coming Messiah to Isaiah than He did to any other Old Testament character. Messianic themes in Isaiah include the branch, the stone (refuge), light, child, king, and especially servant. In some of the passages in Isaiah, Israel is the servant of the Lord that is in view, in others the faithful remnant in Israel is the servant, and in still others a future individual, the Messiah, must be in view. As Matthew clarified, Jesus Christ was the fulfillment of what God intended the Israelites to be (Matt. 2:15; cf. Hos. 11:1-2).

"What is the overarching theme of OT theology? Perhaps it is the covenant. Here in Isaiah, God's special relationship with Israel is presupposed throughout. Perhaps it is the kingdom of God. The whole structure of the book brings out the implications of God's sovereign control of things in the interests of his kingdom. Perhaps it is promise and fulfillment. Here we see time and again the word of divine authority being fulfilled and further fulfillment thereby pledged. Perhaps it is simply God himself, Israel's Holy One. This book is one long exposition of the implications--for Israel and the world--of who and what he is. So this great prophecy--its whole structure unified by its teaching about the Holy One of Israel, who is true to his word, faithful to his covenant, and pursues the establishment of his kingdom--is a classic disclosure of the very heart of the OT faith."¹⁶

"The theological message of the book may be summarized as follows: The Lord will fulfill His ideal for Israel by purifying His people through judgment and then restoring them to a renewed covenantal relationship. He will establish Jerusalem (Zion) as the center of His worldwide kingdom and reconcile once hostile nations to Himself."¹⁷

Genre and interpretation

The book is a compilation of the visions that Isaiah received from the Lord. He presented this revelation as messages and compiled them into their present form. His disciples may have put finishing touches on the collection under divine inspiration. Most of the book is poetic in form, the prophet having been lifted up in his spirit as he beheld and recorded what God revealed to him. Much of the content is eschatological and therefore prophetic, though most of the ministry of the prophets, including Isaiah, was forth telling rather than foretelling. Much of what is eschatological is also apocalyptic, dealing with the final climax of history in the future. These portions bear the marks of that type of literature: symbols, analogies, and various figures of speech.¹⁸

Students of Isaiah have difficulty understanding the eschatological portions of the book. Some believe that we should look for a literal fulfillment of everything predicted. Others believe that when Isaiah spoke of Israel and Jerusalem he was referring to the church. More literal interpretation results in a premillennial understanding of prophecy whereas spiritualization results in an amillennial or postmillennial understanding. The problem with taking every prophecy literally is that in many places the prophet used metaphors and other figures of speech to describe his meaning; what he wrote does not describe exactly what he meant. The problem with spiritualizing all the prophecies is that the New Testament teaches that Israel will have a future in God's plans as Israel (Rom. 11:26-27). The church will not replace Israel though the church does participate in some of the blessing promised to Israel. The most satisfying position, for me, is to interpret Isaiah as literally as seems legitimate in view of other divine revelation while at the same time remembering that some of what appears to be literal description may in fact be metaphorical. This is the approach taken by most premillennialists.

"Surely God may be expected to have one basic meaning in what he says. This is true, but just as human speech, especially when it is poetical, may suggest further levels of significance beyond the meaning conveyed by the passage in its context, so may the Word of God."¹⁹

Structure

Occasional time references scattered throughout the book indicate that Isaiah arranged his prophecies in a basically chronological order (cf. 6:1; 7:1; 14:28; 20:1; 36:1; 37:38). However, they are not completely chronological. More fundamentally, Isaiah arranged his prophecies as an anthology in harmony with a unifying principle. That organizing principle seems to be that God's people should view all of life in the light of God's reality and should therefore orient themselves to Him appropriately, namely, as His servants.

Isaiah built a huge mosaic out of his prophecies and used pre-exilic material to serve pre-exilic, exilic, post-exilic, and eschatological ends. It is not unreasonable to assume that after Isaiah had completed what we now have in chapters 1-39 he received new revelations from God along a different line that led him to adopt the somewhat different style that is characteristic of the last part of the book. The first part deals primarily with the threat of Assyria and the second (chs. 40-66) with that of Babylonia, with chapters 36-39 forming a transition. Chapters 1-5 are an introduction to the whole collection of messages. Chapters 6 and 53 are the key chapters because they provide the most concise answers to the great questions raised in the book. The book contains many extended doublets: repetition of the same truth in the same consecutive steps.

Message²⁰

In contrast to the New Testament prophets, Isaiah had very little to say about an individual's relationship with God. His concern was more the relationship of God's people as a whole to the Lord, specifically the nation of Israel's relationship to God. This is true of most of the Old Testament writing prophets. Isaiah focused on Israel's past, her present, her near future, and her distant future. He also gave considerable attention to the fate of the Gentile nations.

In the first section of the book, Isaiah insists that judgment is necessary before there can be peace. He was not referring to judgment beyond this life, judgment when we die. He was dealing with judgment here and now, repentance and divine intervention. Peace on earth requires repentance and divine intervention.

In the last section of the book, Isaiah also stressed the importance of righteousness before there can be peace, righteousness here and now before there can be peace on earth in the future. Thus this emphasis on righteousness and peace acts as bookends and frames the content of Isaiah's prophecies.

The great value of Isaiah is its revelation of the throne of God. This book clarifies the principles by which God rules the universe. In chapter six, Isaiah saw the Lord sitting on His throne. This vision of God impacted the rest of Isaiah's ministry and the rest of his book. In chapter 53, the prophet revealed the Servant of the Lord in whom and through whom God reigns. Isaiah balanced the transcendence of God with the immanence of God. These great revelations of Isaiah come together in the Revelation of John, 5:6: "And I saw between the throne and the elders a Lamb standing." Revelation gives more revelation along the same lines that Isaiah gave earlier. God reigns through people, especially one crucial person. Isaiah had much to say about the coming Messiah throughout this book.

Isaiah lived the early part of his life under the reign of King Uzziah. Uzziah was a good king, and he provided stability for the kingdom of Judah. But when Uzziah died, everyone had questions about the direction Judah would go. It was in the year that King Uzziah died that Isaiah saw his vision of the throne in heaven (6:1). He realized in a deeper way than ever before that the true king of Judah was Yahweh and that Yahweh was still firmly on His throne.

There are two things that mark God's throne: government and grace. Isaiah's contemporaries needed a deeper appreciation of God's government and His grace, and so do all the readers of this book. The fact that Yahweh rules and that He rules graciously were truths that were very familiar to God's people in Isaiah's time. In fact, when Isaiah spoke of God's government and His grace the Israelites mocked him for presenting such a simple message. Their taste ran to the more esoteric, and Isaiah's repetition of basic truth bored them. God told his prophet to expect rejection, and that proved to be Israel's characteristic response to Isaiah's ministry.

We also need a reminder of the basic principles of God's government and His grace. It is not because they are unknown to us but because people do not heed these truths that they are so needful today.

Let's consider first what Isaiah revealed about the government of God.

There are three principles by which God governs. These are holiness, righteousness, and justice. Holiness is the inspiration, righteousness the activity, and justice the result of God's government.

The most outstanding characteristic of God that this book reveals is His holiness. The title "the Holy One of Israel" was Isaiah's hallmark. The angelic beings that Isaiah saw assembled around God's heavenly throne ascribed perfect holiness to Him: "Holy, holy, holy is Yahweh of Hosts" (6:3). The holiness of God describes His "otherliness" from all His creation. God is different in His essence; He is spirit, whereas the creation is material. He is also different in His morality; He is absolutely upright, in contrast to the creation that has suffered from the Fall and its contacts with sin. When Isaiah saw the Lord, in chapter 6, what impressed him was his own uncleanness and the uncleanness of his people. All of God's government, how He governs, derives from His holiness. His holiness inspires all His government.

Because God is holy, He always does what is right. Conduct issues from and reflects character. Because God is holy in His character, He conducts Himself in righteousness. He always does what is right. There is a strong emphasis on righteousness in Isaiah, God's righteousness and the need for human righteousness. Isaiah's emphasis on righteousness is one of the reasons his book has been called the Romans of the Old Testament.

The result of righteous conduct is justice. God deals with His own people and all other people in justice. A holy God can do nothing else. He will do what is fair, what is straight, what is proper. We can see the justice of God in God's call to His people to reason with Him (1:18). Because God is just, sin inevitably brings punishment. Much of this prophecy is designed to help the people of God know how to avoid sin and its punishment and how to manage sin and its punishment. Justice in interpersonal and international affairs is an important motif in Isaiah.

Whereas the principles of God's government are holiness, righteousness, and justice, the methods by which He governs are revelation, explanation, and prediction.

According to Isaiah, the outstanding characteristic of God that distinguishes Him from all false gods (idols) is that He has revealed Himself; He has spoken. Isaiah referred to three primary revelations of God to humankind: general revelation, special revelation, and incarnate revelation. God has built a revelation of Himself into His creation so that everyone can see that a true God does exist (cf. Rom. 1). Second, He revealed His will as well as His existence. The revelation of His will came to the Israelites through what God taught them, the Torah (instruction). This revelation is what we have in Scripture, and it came to Israel for Israel to share with the world for the world's blessing, not to hoard to herself for her own blessing. Third, God revealed Himself through a person: the Messiah, the Servant of the Lord, the Divine Warrior. The revelation of how God would deal with the sin problem came through this person. Isaiah reveals that God would deliver Israel from destruction, from captivity, and from sin. He would make her in the future the servant of His that He always intended her to be but which she failed to become because of her sin.

God went beyond just giving revelations, however. He also provided explanations. This was one of the major ministries of the prophets in general and of Isaiah in particular. God explained through Isaiah why the Israelites and their neighbor nations were experiencing what they were going through. He gave these explanations so they could learn from their past, walk in His ways in the present, and enjoy His blessings in the future. God explained that He not only had the ability to save Israel, but He also had the desire to do so.

Not only did God explain the past, He also predicted the future. He did this to prove that He is the only true God. In order to predict the future accurately, one must be able to control the future. Yahweh is the only true God. He is the only God who can create history in time as well as creating the material world in space. His ability to predict the future is the great testimony to His unique sovereignty. The outstanding predictions in this book concern those whom God would anoint for special ministries in the future. These individuals were Cyrus, who would be Israel's redeemer from Babylon's captivity, and the Servant, who would be Israel's redeemer from sin's captivity. The exodus motif is strong throughout Isaiah looking back to the Exodus from Egypt and forward to future exoduses.

The characteristics of God's government as revealed in Isaiah are also three: patience, persistence, and power.

God deals with people patiently. He allows them the opportunity to repent and to return to Himself. There is much emphasis in this book on the importance of returning to God. God had been very patient with Judah, but the day of His patience would end, so she needed to repent while there was still opportunity. The day of salvation would not last forever.

Second, God deals with people persistently. He does not disregard people's sin after a time, but He always deals with it righteously. Likewise He persists in blessing those who faithfully follow Him even though they live among a nation of apostates. God has a plan for Israel as a nation, and He also had a plan for the faithful among the apostates in the nation. His faithfulness to His promises is the mainspring that keeps the hands of His providence moving persistently.

Third, God ever demonstrates His supernatural power. What is natural does not bind Him. He can and does intervene to provide power that overcomes His sinful people and holds them in captivity. The expectation of more exoduses is strong throughout this book. Isaiah's audience looked forward to captivity in Babylon, but beyond that there was the promise of liberation, and beyond that there was the promise of liberation from sin. Fire is a fitting symbol of all these characteristics of God's government. It consumes patiently, it persists until it has run its full course, and it has great power. Isaiah pictured Yahweh as a consuming fire in relation to His people as well as in relation to unbelieving nations.

Parallel to these emphases on the government of God is an equally strong emphasis on the grace of God in Isaiah.

Along with the holiness, righteousness, and justice of God, we have an equally strong emphasis on the love, mercy, and goodness of God. Isaiah wrote that God's children had rebelled against Him. His wife had been unfaithful to Him. Those He had chosen to bless uniquely among all the nations of the earth had grieved His Holy Spirit. The breaking heart of God is as clear a revelation in Isaiah as are the broken commandments of God.

Similarly, God's revelations, His explanations, and His predictions arise out of His mercy. God has revealed Himself in nature so everyone can enter into relationship with a gracious God. He has explained Himself so His people can understand His dealings with them as being gracious. He has predicted the future so everyone will appreciate that His plans for humanity are gracious plans involving redemption from captivity and sin.

God's grace is the reason He is patient with people. His grace is the inspiration for His persistence with people. And His grace is the passion of His power on behalf of people. In short, all the outstanding characteristics of God in Isaiah trace back to His goodness. The Servant Songs, particularly the third one (52:13-53:12), overflow with the grace of God for His helpless and hopeless people. He is the key to their justification, sanctification, and glorification. Note again the similarity with Romans.

The living message of this book is that acknowledgment of God's sovereign rule is the key to successful human life on every level: individually, nationally, and historically. The only hope for human failure caused by enslavement to sin is divine redemption that a God of grace provides. God is not only able but also willing to save.

To enjoy the benefits of God's grace, people must submit to His government. To submit to His government, they must receive the benefits of His grace. Israel failed to enjoy the benefits of God's grace because she failed to submit to His rule. She failed to submit to His rule because she failed to trust His grace. God brings us into right relationship with His government through His grace. In order to enjoy the benefits of His grace, we must submit to His government. Both government and grace find their source in Yahweh and their expression in Jesus Christ.

Constable: Isaiah (Outline)

Outline

I. Introduction chs. 1-5

A. Israel's condition and God's solution ch. 1

1. The title of the book 1:1

2. Israel's condition 1:2-9

3. God's solution 1:10-20

4. Israel's response 1:21-31

B. The problem with Israel chs. 2-4

1. God's desire for Israel 2:1-4

2. God's discipline of Israel 2:5-4:1

3. God's determination for Israel 4:2-6

C. The analogy of wild grapes ch. 5

1. The song of the vineyard 5:1-7

2. The wildness of the grapes 5:8-25

3. The coming destruction 5:26-30

II. Isaiah's vision of God ch. 6

A. The prophet's vision 6:1-8

B. The prophet's commission 6:9-13

III. Israel's crisis of faith chs. 7-39

A. The choice between trusting God or Assyria chs. 7-12

1. Signs of God's presence 7:1-9:7

2. Measurement by God's standards 9:8-10:4

3. Hope of God's deliverance 10:5-11:16

4. Trust in God's favor ch. 12

B. God's sovereignty over the nations chs. 13-35

1. Divine judgments on the nations chs. 13-23

2. Divine victory over the nations chs. 24-27

3. The folly of trusting the nations chs. 28-33

4. The consequences of Israel's trust chs. 34-35

C. Tests of Israel's trust chs. 36-39

1. The Assyrian threat chs. 36-37

2. The Babylonian threat chs. 38-39

IV. Israel's calling in the world chs. 40-55

A. God's grace to Israel chs. 40-48

1. The Lord of the servant ch. 40

2. The servant of the Lord chs. 41:1-44:22

3. The Lord's redemption of His servant chs. 44:23-47:15

4. The servant's attention to her Lord ch. 48

B. God's atonement for Israel chs. 49-55

1. Anticipation of salvation 49:1-52:12

2. Announcement of salvation 52:13-53:12

3. Invitation to salvation chs. 54-55

V. Israel's future transformation chs. 56-66

A. Recognition of human inability chs. 56-59

1. The need for humility and holiness chs. 56-57

2. The relationship of righteousness and ritual chs. 58-59

B. Revelation of future glory chs. 60-62

1. Israel among the nations ch. 60

2. Israel under the Lord chs. 61-62

C. Recognition of divine ability chs. 63-66

1. God's faithfulness in spite of Israel's unfaithfulness 63:1-65:16

2. The culmination of Israel's future 65:17-66:24

Constable: Isaiah

Isaiah

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Copyright 2003 by Thomas L. Constable

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Haydock: Isaiah (Book Introduction)

THE PROPHECY OF ISAIAS.

INTRODUCTION.

This inspired writer is called by the Holy Ghost, (Ecclesiasticus xlviii. 25.) the great prophet; from the greatness of his prophetic spirit, by which he hath foretold, so long before, and in so clear a manner, the coming of Christ, the mysteries of our redemption, the calling of the Gentiles, and the glorious establishment, and perpeutal flourishing of the Church of Christ: insomuch that he seems to have been rather an evangelist than a prophet. His very name is not without mystery: for Isaias in Hebrew signifies the salvation of the Lord, or, Jesus is the Lord. He was, according to the tradition of the Hebrews, of the blood royal of the kings of Juda; an after a most holy life, ended his days by a glorious martyrdom; being sawed in two, at the command of his wicked son-in-law, king Manasses, for reproving his evil ways. (Challoner) --- He began to prophesy ten years before the foundation of Rome, and the ruin of Ninive. His style is suitable to his high birth. He may be called the prophet of the mercies of the Lord. Under the figure of the return from captivity, he foretells the redemption of mankind (Calmet) with such perspicuity, that he might seem to be an evangelist. (St. Jerome)

Gill: Isaiah (Book Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO ISAIAH

This book is called, in the New Testament, sometimes "the Book of the Words of the Prophet Esaias", Luk 3:4 sometimes only the "Prophet Esaias", Act 8:28 and sometimes, as here, the "Book of the Prophet Esaias", Luk 4:17. In the Syriac version the title is, "the Prophecy of Isaiah the Son of Amos": and in the Arabic version, "the Beginning of the Prophecy of Isaiah the Prophet". It stands first of all the prophets; though the order of the prophets, according to the Jews ^a, is, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Isaiah, and the twelve. But it is here placed first, not because Isaiah prophesied before the other prophets; for Joel, Jonah, Hosea, and Amos, begun before him, namely, in or before the days of Jeroboam the Second; but because of the excellency of the matter contained in it. Isaiah is called by Ben Syra ^b the great prophet, and by Eusebius ^c the greatest of the prophets; and Jerom ^d a says, he should rather be called an evangelist than a prophet, since he seems rather to write a history of things past, than to prophesy of things to come; yea, he styles him an apostle, as well as an evangelist ^e: and certain it is that no one writes so fully and clearly of the person, offices, grace, and kingdom of Christ; of his incarnation and birth of a virgin; of his sufferings and death, and the glory that should follow, as he does. John, the forerunner of Christ, began his ministry with a passage out of him concerning himself, Mat 3:3. Our Lord preached his first sermon at Nazareth out of this book, Luk 4:17 and it was in this the eunuch was reading when Philip came up to him, who from the same Scripture preached to him Christ, Act 8:28. And there are more citations in the New Testament made out of this prophecy than any other book, excepting the book of Psalms, as Musculus observes. To which may be added, as another reason, the elegance and sublimity of his style in which he exceeds the greatest of orators, Demosthenes among the Greeks, and Tully among the Romans; and this is observed both by Jews and Christians. Abarbinel ^f says, that the purity, and elegance of his diction is like that of kings and counsellors, who speak more purely and elegantly than other men: hence their Rabbins, he says, compare Isaiah to a citizen, and Ezekiel to a countryman. And Jerom ^g observes, that Isaiah is so eloquent and polite, that there is nothing of rusticity in his language; and that his style is so florid, that a translation cannot preserve it. Moreover, another reason of this book being placed first may be the bulk of it; it being larger, and containing more chapters, than any of the greater prophets, and almost as many as all the lesser prophets put together. That Isaiah was the writer of this book is not to be questioned; many of the prophecies in it are by name ascribed to him, Mat 13:14 though some others might be the compilers of it, collect his prophecies, and digest them in order: so the Jews say ^h, that Hezekiah and his company wrote Isaiah, &c. At what time, and in whose days he prophesied, may be learnt from Isa 1:1 by which it appears that he prophesied long, and lived to a good old age. He began to prophesy about A. M. 3236, and about seven hundred and seventy years before Christ. Abulpharagius, an Arabic writer, says ⁱ, he lived an hundred and twenty years, eighty five of which he prophesied. It is a generally received tradition with the Jews, that he lived to the time of Manasseh, and that he was sawn asunder by him; and which has been embraced by the ancient Christian writers, and is thought to be referred to in Heb 11:37. See Gill on Heb 11:37. But Aben Ezra on Isa 1:1 observes, that had he lived to the time of Manasseh, it would have been written, and is of opinion that he died in Hezekiah's time. According to the Cippi Hebraici ^k, he was buried at Tekoah, over whose grave a beautiful monument was erected; though Epiphanius ^l, or the author of the Lives of the Prophets that go by his name, says he was buried under the oak of Rogel, near the fountain of Siloam; and it is a tradition with the Syriac writers, that his body lay hid in the waters of Siloah; See Gill on Joh 5:4 but these are things not to be depended on; and alike fabulous are all other writings ascribed to him, besides this prophecy; as what are called the ascension of Isaiah, the vision of Isaiah, and the conference of Isaiah. This book contains some things historical, but chiefly prophetic; of which some relate to the punishment of the Jews, and other nations; but for the most part are evangelical, and concern the kingdom and grace of Christ; of which some are delivered out more clearly and perspicuously, and others more obscurely, under the type of the deliverance of the Jews from the Babylonish captivity.

Gill: Isaiah 26 (Chapter Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO ISAIAH 26

This chapter contains a song of praise for the safety and prosperity of the church, and the destruction of its enemies. The church is represented as a strong city, whose walls and bulwarks are salvation, Isa 26:1 it is said to have gates which are to be opened to a righteous nation, Isa 26:2 its inhabitants, being such who trust in the Lord, are promised perfect peace, Isa 26:3 hence the saints are exhorted to trust in him, Isa 26:4 then follows an account of another city, described as lofty, and its inhabitants as dwelling on high, who are brought down, and trampled on, by the feet of the poor and needy, Isa 26:5 when the prophet returns to the righteous, and asserts their way to be uprightness, because their path is weighed or levelled by God the most upright, Isa 26:7 and in the name of the church declares that they had waited for the Lord in the way of his judgments; and that the desire of their souls was to his name, and the remembrance of it; and that they continued, and would continue, to desire him, and seek after him, seeing righteousness was to be learned by his judgments, Isa 26:8 and though the wicked would not be brought to repentance and reformation by the goodness of God, nor take notice of his hand, yet they should see and be ashamed, and destroyed at last, Isa 26:10 but notwithstanding these judgments of God in the earth, the church professes her faith in the Lord, that he would give her peace and prosperity, from the consideration of what he had wrought for her, and in her, Isa 26:12 and rejects all other lords but him, Isa 26:13 who were dead, and should not live again, but were visited and destroyed, and their memory made to perish, Isa 26:14 but the righteous nation should be increased, though they should meet with trouble, which would cause them to go to the throne of grace, and there pour out their complaints, express their pain and distresses, and the disappointments they had met with, Isa 26:15 to which an answer is returned, promising a glorious resurrection, Isa 26:19 and calling upon the people of God to retire to their chambers for protection in the mean while, until the punishment to be inflicted on the inhabitants of the earth for their sins was over, Isa 26:20.