This eBook was produced by David Widger
from etext #1581 prepared by Dennis McCarthy, Atlanta, Georgia and Tad Book, student, Pontifical North American College, Rome.
THE HOLY BIBLE
Translated from the Latin Vulgate
Diligently Compared with the Hebrew, Greek, and Other Editions in Divers Languages
THE OLD TESTAMENT
First Published by the English College at Douay
A.D. 1609 & 1610
and
THE NEW TESTAMENT
First Published by the English College at Rheims
A.D. 1582
With Annotations
The Whole Revised and Diligently Compared with the Latin Vulgate by Bishop Richard Challoner A.D. 1749-1752
THE PROPHECY OF ISAIAS
This inspired writer is called by the Holy Ghost, the great prophet, (Ecclesiasticus:48.25,) 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 perpetual flourishing of the church of Christ: insomuch that he may seem 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: and 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.
Isaias Chapter 1
The prophet complains of the sins of Juda and Jerusalem, and exhorts them to a sincere conversion.
1:1. The vision of Isaias the Son of Amos, which he saw concerning Juda and Jerusalem in the days of Ozias, Joathan, Achaz, and Ezechias, kings of Juda.
1:2. Hear, O ye heavens, and give ear, O earth, for the Lord hath spoken. I have brought up children, and exalted them: but they have despised me.
1:3. The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master's crib: but Israel hath not known me, and my people hath not understood.
1:4. Woe to the sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a wicked seed, ungracious children: they have forsaken the Lord, they have blasphemed the Holy One of Israel, they are gone away backwards.
1:5. For what shall I strike you any more, you that increase transgression? the whole head is sick, and the whole heart is sad.
1:6. From the sole of the foot unto the top of the head, there is no soundness therein: wounds and bruises and swelling sores: they are not bound up, nor dressed, nor fomented with oil.
1:7. Your land is desolate, your cities are burnt with fire: your country strangers devour before your face, and it shall be desolate as when wasted by enemies.
1:8. And the daughter of Sion shall be left as a covert in a vineyard, and as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, and as a city that is laid waste.
1:9. Except the Lord of hosts had left us seed, we had been as Sodom, and we should have been like to Gomorrha.
1:10. Hear the word of the Lord, ye rulers of Sodom, give ear to the law of our God, ye people of Gomorrha.
1:11. To what purpose do you offer me the multitude of your victims, saith the Lord? I am full, I desire not holocausts of rams, and fat of fatlings, and blood of calves, and lambs, and buck goats.
1:12. When you came to appear before me, who required these things at your hands, that you should walk in my courts?
1:13. Offer sacrifice no more in vain: incense is an abomination to me. The new moons, and the sabbaths and other festivals I will not abide, your assemblies are wicked.
1:14. My soul hateth your new moons, and your solemnities: they are become troublesome to me, I am weary of bearing them.
1:15. And when you stretch forth your hands, I will turn away my eyes from you: and when you multiply prayer, I will not hear: for your hands are full of blood.
1:16. Wash yourselves, be clean, take away the evil of your devices from my eyes, cease to do perversely,
1:17. Learn to do well: seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge for the fatherless, defend the widow.
1:18. And then come, and accuse me, saith the Lord: if your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool.
1:19. If you be willing, and will hearken to me, you shall eat the good things of the land.
1:20. But if you will not, and will provoke me to wrath: the sword shall devour you because the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.
1:21. How is the faithful city, that was full of judgment, become a harlot? justice dwelt in it, but now murderers.
1:22. Thy silver is turned into dross: thy wine is mingled with water.
1:23. Thy princes are faithless, companions of thieves: they all love bribes, they run after rewards. They judge not for the fatherless: and the widow's cause cometh not in to them.
1:24. Therefore saith the Lord the God of hosts, the mighty one of Israel: Ah! I will comfort myself over my adversaries: and I will be revenged of my enemies.
1:25. And I will turn my hand to thee, and I will clean purge away thy dross, and I will take away all thy tin.
1:26. And I will restore thy judges as they were before, and thy counsellors as of old. After this thou shalt be called the city of the just, a faithful city.
1:27. Sion shall be redeemed in judgment, and they shall bring her back in justice.
1:28. And he shall destroy the wicked, and the sinners together: and they that have forsaken the Lord, shall be consumed.
1:29. For they shall be confounded for the idols, to which they have sacrificed: and you shall be ashamed of the gardens which you have chosen.
1:30. When you shall be as an oak with the leaves falling off, and as a garden without water.
1:31. And your strength shall be as the ashes of tow, and your work as a spark: and both shall burn together, and there shall be none to quench it.
Isaias Chapter 2
All nations shall flow to the church of Christ. The Jews shall be rejected for their sins. Idolatry shall be destroyed.
2:1. The word that Isaias the son of Amos saw, concerning Juda and Jerusalem.
2:2. And in the last days the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be prepared on the top of mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it.
The last days… The whole time of the new law, from the coming of Christ till the end of the world, is called in the scripture the last days; because no other age or time shall come after it, but only eternity.-Ibid. On the top of mountains, etc… This shews the perpetual visibility of the church of Christ: for a mountain upon the top of mountains cannot be hid.
2:3. And many people shall go, and say: Come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob, and he will teach us his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for the law shall come forth from Sion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.
2:4. And he shall judge the Gentiles, and rebuke many people: and they shall turn their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into sickles: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they be exercised any more to war.
2:5. O house of Jacob, come ye, and let us walk in the light of the Lord.
2:6. For thou hast cast off thy people, the house of Jacob: because they are filled as in times past, and have had soothsayers as the Philistines, and have adhered to strange children.
2:7. Their land is filled with silver and gold: and there is no end of their treasures.
2:8. And their land is filled with horses: and their chariots are innumerable. Their land also is full of idols: they have adored the work of their own hands, which their own fingers have made.
2:9. And man hath bowed himself down, and man hath been debased: therefore forgive them not.
2:10. Enter thou into the rock, and hide thee in the pit from the face of the fear of the Lord, and from the glory of his majesty.
2:11. The lofty eyes of man are humbled, and the haughtiness of men shall be made to stoop: and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day.
2:12. Because the day of the Lord of hosts shall be upon every one that is proud and highminded, and upon every one that is arrogant, and he shall be humbled.
2:13. And upon all the tall and lofty cedars of Libanus, and upon all the oaks of Basan.
2:14. And upon all the high mountains and upon all the elevated hills.
2:15. And upon every high tower, and every fenced wall.
2:16. And upon all the ships of Tharsis, and upon all that is fair to behold.
2:17. And the loftiness of men shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of men shall be humbled, and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day.
2:18. And idols shall be utterly destroyed.
Idols shall be utterly destroyed… or utterly pass away. This was verified by the establishment of Christianity. And by this and other texts of the like nature, the wild system of some modern sectaries is abundantly confuted, who charge the whole Christian church with worshipping idols, for many ages.
2:19. And they shall go into the holes of rocks, and into the caves of the earth from the face of the fear of the Lord, and from the glory of his majesty, when he shall rise up to strike the earth.
2:20. In that day a man shall cast away his idols of silver, and his idols of gold, which he had made for himself to adore, moles and bats.
2:21. And he shall go into the clefts of rocks, and into the holes of stones from the face of the fear of the Lord, and from the glory of his majesty, when he shall rise up to strike the earth.
2:22. Cease ye therefore from the man, whose breath is in his nostrils, for he is reputed high.
Isaias Chapter 3
The confusion and other evils that shall come upon the Jews for their sins. The pride of their women shall be punished.
3:1. For behold the sovereign Lord of hosts shall take away from Jerusalem, and from Juda the valiant and the strong, the whole strength of bread, and the whole strength of water.
3:2. The strong man, and the man of war, the judge, and the prophet and the cunning man, and the ancient.
3:3. The captain over fifty, and the honourable in countenance, and the counsellor, and the architect, and the skilful in eloquent speech.
3:4. And I will give children to be their princes, and the effeminate shall rule over them.
3:5. And the people shall rush one upon another, and every man against his neighbour: the child shall make a tumult against the ancient, and the base against the honourable.
3:6. For a man shall take hold of his brother, one of the house of his father, saying: Thou hast a garment, be thou our ruler, and let this ruin be under thy hand.
3:7. In that day he shall answer, saying: I am no healer, and in my house there is no bread, nor clothing: make me not ruler of the people.
3:8. For Jerusalem is ruined, and Juda is fallen: because their tongue, and their devices are against the Lord, to provoke the eyes of his majesty.
3:9. The shew of their countenance hath answered them: and they have proclaimed abroad their sin as Sodom, and they have not hid it: woe to their souls, for evils are rendered to them.
3:10. Say to the just man that it is well, for he shall eat the fruit of his doings.
3:11. Woe to the wicked unto evil: for the reward of his hands shall be given him.
3:12. As for my people, their oppressors have stripped them, and women have ruled over them. O my people, they that call thee blessed, the same deceive thee, and destroy the way of thy steps.
3:13. The Lord standeth up to judge, and he standeth to judge the people.
3:14. The Lord will enter into judgment with the ancients of his people, and its princes: for you have devoured the vineyard, and the spoil of the poor is in your house.
3:15. Why do you consume my people, and grind the faces of the poor? saith the Lord the God of hosts.
3:16. And the Lord said: Because the daughters of Sion are haughty, and have walked with stretched out necks, and wanton glances of their eyes, and made a noise as they walked with their feet and moved in a set pace:
3:17. The Lord will make bald the crown of the head of the daughters of Sion, and the Lord will discover their hair.
3:18. In that day the Lord will take away the ornaments of shoes, and little moons,
3:19. And chains and necklaces, and bracelets, and bonnets,
3:20. And bodkins, and ornaments of the legs, and tablets, and sweet balls, and earrings,
3:21. And rings, and jewels hanging on the forehead,
3:22. And changes of apparel, and short cloaks, and fine linen, and crisping pins,
3:23. And lookingglasses, and lawns, and headbands, and fine veils.
3:24. And instead of a sweet smell there shall be stench, and instead of a girdle, a cord, and instead of curled hair, baldness, and instead of a stomacher, haircloth.
3:25. Thy fairest men also shall fall by the sword, and thy valiant ones in battle.
3:26. And her gates shall lament and mourn, and she shall sit desolate on the ground.
Isaias Chapter 4
After an extremity of evils that shall fall upon the Jews, a remnant shall be comforted by Christ.
4:1. And in that day seven women shall take hold of one man, saying: We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel: only let us be called by thy name, take away our reproach.
4:2. In that day the bud of the Lord shall be in magnificence and glory, and the fruit of the earth shall be high, and a great joy to them that shall have escaped of Israel.
The bud of the Lord… That is, Christ.
4:3. And it shall come to pass, that every one that shall be left in Sion, and that shall remain in Jerusalem, shall be called holy, every one that is written in life in Jerusalem.
4:4. If the Lord shall wash away the filth of the daughters of Sion, and shall wash away the blood of Jerusalem out of the midst thereof, by the spirit of judgment, and by the spirit of burning.
4:5. And the Lord will create upon every place of mount Sion, and where he is called upon, a cloud by day, and a smoke and the brightness of a flaming fire in the night: for over all the glory shall be a protection.
4:6. And there shall be a tabernacle for a shade in the daytime from the heat, and for a security and covert from the whirlwind, and from rain.
Isaias Chapter 5
The reprobation of the Jews is foreshewn under the parable of a vineyard. A woe is pronounced against sinners: the army of God shall send against them.
5:1. I will sing to my beloved the canticle of my cousin concerning his vineyard. My beloved had a vineyard on a hill in a fruitful place.
My cousin… So the prophet calls Christ, as being of his family and kindred, by descending from the house of David. Ibid. On a hill, etc… Literally, in the horn, the son of oil.
5:2. And he fenced it in, and picked the stones out of it, and planted it with the choicest vines, and built a tower in the midst thereof, and set up a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.
5:3. And now, O ye inhabitants of Jerusalem, and ye men of Juda, judge between me and my vineyard.
5:4. What is there that I ought to do more to my vineyard, that I have not done to it? was it that I looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it hath brought forth wild grapes?
5:5. And now I will shew you what I will do to my vineyard. I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be wasted: I will break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down.
5:6. And I will make it desolate: it shall not be pruned, and it shall not be digged: but briers and thorns shall come up: and I will command the clouds to rain no rain upon it.
5:7. For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel: and the man of Juda, his pleasant plant: and I looked that he should do judgment, and behold iniquity: and do justice, and behold a cry.
5:8. Woe to you that join house to house and lay field to field, even to the end of the place: shall you alone dwell in the midst of the earth?
5:9. These things are in my ears, saith the Lord of hosts: Unless many great and fair houses shall become desolate, without an inhabitant.
5:10. For ten acres of vineyard shall yield one little measure, and thirty bushels of seed shall yield three bushels.
5:11. Woe to you that rise up early in the morning to follow drunkenness, and to drink in the evening, to be inflamed with wine.
5:12. The harp, and the lyre, and, the timbrel and the pipe, and wine are in your feasts: and the work of the Lord you regard not, nor do you consider the works of his hands.
5:13. Therefore is my people led away captive, because they had not knowledge, and their nobles have perished with famine, and their multitude were dried up with thirst.
5:14. Therefore hath hell enlarged her soul, and opened her mouth without any bounds, and their strong ones, and their people, and their high and glorious ones shall go down into it.
5:15. And man shall be brought down, and man shall be humbled, and the eyes of the lofty shall be brought low.
5:16. And the Lord of hosts shall be exalted in judgment, and the holy God shall be sanctified in justice.
5:17. And the lambs shall feed according to their order, and strangers shall eat the deserts turned into fruitfulness.
5:18. Woe to you that draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and sin as the rope of a cart.
5:19. That say: Let him make haste, and let his work come quickly, that we may see it: and let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel come, that we may know it.
5:20. Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter.
5:21. Woe to you that are wise in your own eyes, and prudent in your own conceits.
5:22. Woe to you that are mighty to drink wine, and stout men at drunkenness.
5:23. That justify the wicked for gifts, and take away the justice of the just from him.
5:24. Therefore as the tongue of the fire devoureth the stubble, and the heat of the flame consumeth it: so shall their root be as ashes, and their bud shall go up as dust: for they have cast away the law of the Lord of hosts, and have blasphemed the word of the Holy One of Israel.
5:25. Therefore is the wrath of the Lord kindled against his people, and he hath stretched out his hand upon them, and struck them: and the mountains were troubles, and their carcasses became as dung in the midst of the streets. For after this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.
5:26. And he will lift up a sign to the nations afar off, and will whistle to them from the ends of the earth: and behold they shall come with speed swiftly.
5:27. There is none that shall faint, nor labour among them: they shall not slumber nor sleep, neither shall the girdle of their loins be loosed, nor the latchet of their shoes be broken.
5:28. Their arrows are sharp, and all their bows are bent. The hoofs of their horses shall be like the flint, and their wheels like the violence of a tempest.
5:29. Their roaring like that of a lion, they shall roar like young lions: yea they shall roar, and take hold of the prey, and they shall keep fast hold of it, and there shall be none to deliver it.
5:30. And they shall make a noise against them that day, like the roaring of the sea; we shall look towards the land, and behold darkness of tribulation, and the light is darkened with the mist thereof.
Isaias Chapter 6
A glorious vision, in which the prophet's lips are cleansed: he foretelleth the obstinacy of the Jews.
6:1. In the year that king Ozias died, I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne high and elevated: and his train filled the temple.
6:2. Upon it stood the seraphims: the one had six wings, and the other had six wings: with two they covered his face, and with two they covered his feet, and with two they flew.
6:3. And they cried one to another, and said: Holy, holy, holy, the Lord God of hosts, all the earth is full of his glory,
6:4. And the lintels of the doors were moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke.
6:5. And I said: Woe is me, because I have held my peace; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people that hath unclean lips, and I have seen with my eyes the King the Lord of hosts.
6:6. And one of the seraphims flew to me, and in his hand was a live coal, which he had taken with the tongs off the altar.
6:7. And he touched my mouth, and said: Behold this hath touched thy lips, and thy iniquities shall be taken away, and thy sin shall be cleansed.
6:8. And I heard the voice of the Lord, saying: Whom shall I send? and who shall go for us? And I said: Lo, here am I, send me.
6:9. And he said: Go, and thou shalt say to this people: Hearing, hear, and understand not: and see the vision, and know it not.
6:10. Blind the heart of this people, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes: lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted and I heal them.
6:11. And I said: How long, O Lord? And he said: Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land shall be left desolate.
6:12. And the Lord shall remove men far away, and she shall be multiplied that was left in the midst of the earth.
6:13. And there shall be still a tithing therein, and she shall turn, and shall be made a show as a turpentine tree, and as an oak that spreadeth its branches: that which shall stand therein, shall be a holy seed.
Isaias Chapter 7
The prophet assures king Achaz that the two kings his enemies shall not take Jerusalem. A virgin shall conceive and bear a son.
7:1. And it came to pass in the days of Achaz the son of Joathan, the son of Ozias, king of Juda, that Rasin king of Syria and Phacee the son of Romelia king of Israel, came up to Jerusalem, to fight against it: but they could not prevail over it.
7:2. And they told the house of David, saying: Syria hath rested upon Ephraim, and his heart was moved, and the heart of his people, as the trees of the woods are moved with the wind.
7:3. And the Lord said to Isaias: Go forth to meet Achaz, thou and Jasub thy son that is left, to the conduit of the upper pool in the way of the fuller's field.
7:4. And thou shalt say to him: See thou be quiet: fear not, and let not thy heart be afraid of the two tails of these firebrands, smoking with the wrath of the fury of Rasin king of Syria, and of the son of Romelia.
7:5. Because Syria hath taken counsel against thee, unto the evil of Ephraim and the son of Romelia, saying:
7:6. Let us go up to Juda, and rouse it up, and draw it away to us, and make the son of Tabeel king in the midst thereof.
7:7. Thus saith the Lord God: It shall not stand, and this shall not be.
7:8. But the head of Syria is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rasin: and within threescore and five years, Ephraim shall cease to be a people:
7:9. And the head of Ephraim is Samaria, and the head of Samaria is the son of Romelia. If you will not believe, you shall not continue.
7:10. And the Lord spoke again to Achaz, saying:
7:11. Ask thee a sign of the Lord thy God, either unto the depth of hell, or unto the height above.
7:12. And Achaz said: I will not ask, and I will not tempt the Lord.
7:13. And he said: Hear ye therefore, O house of David: Is it a small thing for you to be grievous to men, that you are grievous to my God also?
7:14. Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son and his name shall be called Emmanuel.
7:15. He shall eat butter and honey, that he may know to refuse the evil, and to choose the good.
7:16. For before the child know to refuse the evil and to choose the good, the land which thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of the face of her two kings.
7:17. The Lord shall bring upon thee, and upon thy people, and upon the house of thy father, days that have not come since the time of the separation of Ephraim from Juda with the king of the Assyrians.
7:18. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall hiss for the fly, that is in the uttermost parts of the rivers of Egypt, and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria.
7:19. And they shall come, and shall all of them rest in the torrents of the valleys, and in the holes of the rocks, and upon all places set with shrubs, and in all hollow places.
7:20. In that day the Lord shall shave with a razor that is hired by them that are beyond the river, by the king of the Assyrians, the head and the hairs of the feet, and the whole beard.
7:21. And it shall come to pass in that day, that a man shall nourish a young cow, and two sheep.
7:22. And for the abundance of milk he shall eat butter: for butter and honey shall every one eat that shall be left in the midst of the land.
7:23. And it shall come to pass in that day, that every place where there were a thousand vines, at a thousand pieces of silver, shall become thorns and briers.
7:24. With arrows and with bows they shall go in thither: for briers and thorns shall be in all the land.
7:25. And as for the hills that shall be raked with a rake, the fear of thorns and briers shall not come thither, but they shall be for the ox to feed on, and the lesser cattle to tread upon.
Isaias Chapter 8
The name of a child that is to be born: many evils shall come upon the
Jews for their sins.
8:1. And the Lord said to me: Take thee a great book, and write in it with a man's pen. Take away the spoils with speed, quickly take the prey.
8:2. And I took unto me faithful witnesses, Urias the priest, and Zacharias the son of Barachias.
8:3. And I went to the prophetess, and she conceived, and bore a son. And the Lord said to me: Call his name, Hasten to take away the spoils: Make hast to take away the prey.
8:4. For before the child know to call his father and his mother, the strength of Damascus, and the spoils of Samaria shall be taken away before the king of the Assyrians.
8:5. And the Lord spoke to me again, saying:
8:6. Forasmuch as this people hath cast away the waters of Siloe, that go with silence, and hath rather taken Rasin, and the son of Romelia:
8:7. Therefore behold the Lord will bring upon them the waters of the river strong and many, the king of the Assyrians, and all his glory: and he shall come up over all his channels, and shall overflow all his banks.
8:8. And shall pass through Juda, overflowing, and going over shall reach even to the neck. And the stretching out of his wings shall fill the breadth of thy, land, O Emmanuel.
8:9. Gather yourselves together, O ye people, and be overcome, and give ear, all ye lands afar off: strengthen yourselves, and be overcome, gird yourselves, and be overcome.
8:10. Take counsel together, and it shall be defeated: speak a word, and it shall not be done: because God is with us.
8:11. For thus saith the Lord to me: As he hath taught me, with a strong arm, that I should not walk in the way of this people, saying:
8:12. Say ye not: A conspiracy: for all that this people speaketh, is a conspiracy: neither fear ye their fear, nor be afraid.
8:13. Sanctify the Lord of hosts himself: and let him be your fear, and let him be your dread.
8:14. And he shall be a sanctification to you. But for a stone of stumbling, and for a rock of offence to the two houses of Israel, for a snare and a ruin to the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
8:15. And very many of them shall stumble and fall, and shall be broken in pieces, and shall be snared, and taken.
8:16. Bind up the testimony, seal the law among my disciples.
8:17. And I will wait for the Lord, who hath hid his face from the house of Jacob, and I will look for him.
8:18. Behold I and my children, whom the Lord hath given me for a sign, and for a wonder in Israel from the Lord of hosts, who dwelleth in mount Sion.
8:19. And when they shall say to you: Seek of pythons, and of diviners, who mutter in their enchantments: should not the people seek of their God, for the living of the dead?
Seek of pythons… That is, people pretending to tell future things by a prophesying spirit.-Ibid. Should not the people seek of their God, for the living of the dead?… Here is signified, that it is to God we should pray to be directed, and not to seek of the dead, (that is, of fortune-tellers dead in sin,) for the health of the living.
8:20. To the law rather, and to the testimony. And if they speak not according to this word, they shall not have the morning light.
8:21. And they shall pass by it, they shall fall, and be hungry: and when they shall be hungry, they will be angry, and curse their king, and their God, and look upwards.
8:22. And they shall look to the earth, and behold trouble and darkness, weakness and distress, and a mist following them, and they cannot fly away from their distress.
Isaias Chapter 9
What joy shall come after afflictions by the birth and kingdom of Christ; which shall flourish for ever. Judgments upon Israel for their sins.
9:1. At the first time the land of Zabulon, and the land of Nephtali was lightly touched: and at the last the way of the sea beyond the Jordan of the Galilee of the Gentiles was heavily loaded.
9:2. The people that walked in darkness, have seen a great light: to them that dwelt in the region of the shadow of death, light is risen.
9:3. Thou hast multiplied the nation, and hast not increased the joy. They shall rejoice before thee, as they that rejoice in the harvest, as conquerors rejoice after taking a prey, when they divide the spoils.
9:4. For the yoke of their burden, and the rod of their shoulder, and the sceptre of their oppressor thou hast overcome, as in the day of Madian.
9:5. For every violent taking of spoils, with tumult, and garment mingled with blood, shall be burnt, and be fuel for the fire.
9:6. For a CHILD IS BORN to us, and a son is given to us, and the government is upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, God the Mighty, the Father of the world to come, the Prince of Peace.
9:7. His empire shall be multiplied, and there shall be no end of peace: he shall sit upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom; to establish it and strengthen it with judgment and with justice, from henceforth and for ever: the zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.
9:8. The Lord sent a word into Jacob, and it hath lighted upon Israel.
9:9. And all the people of Ephraim shall know, and the inhabitants of Samaria that say in the pride and haughtiness of their heart:
9:10. The bricks are fallen down, but we will build with square stones: they have cut down the sycamores, but we will change them for cedars.
9:11. And the Lord shall set up the enemies of Rasin over him, and shall bring on his enemies in a crowd:
9:12. The Syrians from the east, and, the Philistines from the west: and they shall devour Israel with open mouth. For all this his indignation is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.
9:13. And the people are not returned to him who hath struck them, and have not sought after the Lord of hosts.
9:14. And the Lord shall destroy out of Israel the head and the tail, him that bendeth down, and him that holdeth back, in one day.
9:15. The aged and honourable, he is the head: and the prophet that teacheth lies, he is the tail.
9:16. And they that call this people blessed, shall cause them to err: and they that are called blessed, shall be thrown down, headlong.
9:17. Therefore the Lord shall have no joy in their young men: neither shall he have mercy on their fatherless, and widows: for every one is a hypocrite and wicked, and every mouth hath spoken folly. For all this his indignation is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.
9:18. For wickedness is kindled as a fire, it shall devour the brier and the thorn: and shall kindle in the thicket of the forest, and it shall be wrapped up in smoke ascending on high.
9:19. By the wrath of the Lord of hosts the land is troubled, and the people shall be as fuel for the fire: no man shall spare his brother.
9:20. And he shall turn to the right hand, and shall be hungry: and shall eat on the left hand, and shall not be filled: every one shall eat the flesh of his own arm: Manasses Ephraim, and Ephraim Manasses, and they together shall be against Juda.
9:21. After all these things his indignation is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.
Isaias Chapter 10
Woe to the makers of wicked laws. The Assyrian shall be a rod for punishing Israel: but for their pride they shall be destroyed: and a remnant of Israel saved.
10:1. Woe to them that make wicked laws: and when they write, write injustice:
10:2. To oppress the poor in judgment, and do violence to the cause of the humble of my people: that widows might be their prey, and that they might rob the fatherless.
10:3. What will you do in the day of visitation, and of the calamity which cometh from afar? to whom will ye flee for help? and where will ye leave your glory?
10:4. That you be not bowed down under the bond, and fall with the slain? In all these things his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.
10:5. Woe to the Assyrian, he is the rod and the staff of my anger, and my indignation is in their hands.
10:6. I will send him to a deceitful nation, and I will give him a charge against the people of my wrath, to take away the spoils, and to lay hold on the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets.
10:7. But he shall not take it so, and his heart shall not think so: but his heart shall be set to destroy, and to cut off nations not a few.
10:8. For he shall say:
10:9. Are not my princes as so many kings? is not Calano as Charcamis: and Emath as Arphad? is not Samaria as Damascus?
10:10. As my hand hath found the kingdoms of the idol, so also their idols of Jerusalem, and of Samaria.
10:11. Shall I not, as I have done to Samaria and her idols, so do to Jerusalem and her idols?
10:12. And it shall come to pass, that when the Lord shall have performed all his works in mount Sion, and in Jerusalem, I will visit the fruit of the proud heart of the king of Assyria, and the glory of the haughtiness of his eyes.
10:13. For he hath said: By the strength of my own hand I have done it, and by my own wisdom I have understood: and I have removed the bounds of the people, and have taken the spoils of the princes, and as a mighty man hath pulled down them that sat on high.
10:14. And my hand hath found the strength of the people as a nest; and as eggs are gathered, that are left, so have I gathered all the earth: and there was none that moved the wing, or opened the mouth, or made the least noise.
10:15. Shall the axe boast itself against him that cutteth with it? or shall the saw exalt itself against him by whom it is drawn? as if a rod should lift itself up against him that lifteth it up, and a staff exalt itself, which is but wood.
10:16. Therefore the sovereign Lord, the Lord of hosts, shall send leanness among his fat ones: and under his glory shall be kindled a burning, as it were the burning of a fire.
10:17. And the light of Israel shall be as a fire, and the Holy One thereof as a flame: and his thorns and his briers shall be set on fire, and shall be devoured in one day.
10:18. And the glory of his forest, and of his beautiful hill, shall be consumed from the soul even to the flesh, and he shall run away through fear.
10:19. And they that remain of the trees of his forest shall be so few, that they shall easily be numbered, and a child shall write them down.
10:20. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the remnant of Israel, and they that shall escape of the house of Jacob, shall lean no more upon him that striketh them: but they shall lean upon the Lord the Holy One of Israel, in truth.
10:21. The remnant shall be converted, the remnant, I say, of Jacob, to the mighty God.
10:22. For if thy people, O Israel, shall be as the sand of the sea, a remnant of them shall be converted, the consumption abridged shall overflow with justice.
A remnant of them shall be converted… This was partly verified in the children of Israel who remained after the devastations of the Assyrians, in the time of king Ezechias: and partly in the conversion of a remnant of the Jews to the faithful of Christ.-Ibid. The consumption abridged, etc… That is, the number of them cut short, and reduced to few, shall flourish in abundance of justice.
10:23. For the Lord God of hosts shall make a consumption, and an abridgment in the midst of all the land.
10:24. Therefore, thus saith the Lord the God of hosts: O my people that dwellest in Sion, be not afraid of the Assyrian: he shall strike thee with his rod, and he shall lift up his staff over thee in the way of Egypt.
10:25. For yet a little and a very little while, and my indignation shall cease, and my wrath shall be upon their wickedness.
10:26. And the Lord of hosts shall raise up a scourge against him, according to the slaughter of Madian in the rock of Oreb, and his rod over the sea, and he shall lift it up in the way of Egypt.
10:27. And it shall come to pass in that day, that his burden shall be taken away from off thy shoulder, and his yoke from off thy neck, and the yoke shall putrefy at the presence of the oil.
At the presence of the oil… That is, by the sweet unction of divine mercy.
10:28. He shall come into Aiath, he shall pass into Magron: at Machmas he shall lay up his carriages.
Into Aiath, etc… Here the prophet describes the march of the Assyrians under Sennacherib; and the terror they should carry with them; and how they should suddenly be destroyed.
10:29. They have passed in haste, Gaba is our lodging: Rama was astonished, Gabaath of Saul fled away.
10:30. Lift up thy voice, O daughter of Gallim, attend, O Laisa, poor Anathoth.
10:31. Medemena is removed: ye inhabitants of Gabim, take courage.
10:32. It is yet day enough, to remain in Nobe: he shall shake his hand against the mountain of the daughter of Sion, the hill of Jerusalem.
10:33. Behold the sovereign Lord of hosts shall break the earthen vessel with terror, and the tall of stature shall be cut down, and the lofty shall be humbled.
10:34. And the thickets of the forest shall be cut down with iron, and Libanus with its high ones shall fall.
Isaias Chapter 11
Of the spiritual kingdom of Christ, to which all nations shall repair.
11:1. And there shall come forth a rod out of the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise up out of his root.
11:2. And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him: the spirit of wisdom, and of understanding, the spirit of counsel, and of fortitude, the spirit of knowledge, and of godliness.
11:3. And he shall be filled with the spirit of the fear of the Lord, He shall not judge according to the sight of the eyes, nor reprove according to the hearing of the ears.
11:4. But he shall judge the poor with justice, and shall reprove with equity the meek of the earth: and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall slay the wicked.
11:5. And justice shall be the girdle of his loins: and faith the girdle of his reins.
11:6. The wolf shall dwell with the lamb: and the leopard shall lie down with the kid: the calf and the lion, and the sheep shall abide together, and a little child shall lead them.
11:7. The calf and the bear shall feed: their young ones shall rest together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
11:8. And the sucking child shall play on other hole of the asp: and the weaned child shall thrust his hand into the den of the basilisk.
11:9. They shall not hurt, nor shall they kill in all my holy mountain, for the earth is filled with the knowledge of the Lord, as the covering waters of the sea.
11:10. In that day the root of Jesse, who standeth for an ensign of the people, him the Gentiles shall beseech, and his sepulchre shall be glorious.
11:11. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall set his hand the second time to possess the remnant of his people, which shall be left from the Assyrians, and from Egypt, and from Phetros, and from Ethiopia, and from Elam, and from Sennaar, and from Emath, and from the islands of the sea.
11:12. And he shall set up a standard unto the nations, and shall assemble the fugitives of Israel, and shall gather together the dispersed of Juda from the four quarters of the earth.
11:13. And the envy of Ephraim shall be taken away, and the enemies of Juda shall perish: Ephraim shall not envy Juda, and Juda shall not fight against Ephraim.
11:14. But they shall fly upon the shoulders of the Philistines by the sea, they together shall spoil the children of the east: Edom, till Moab shall be under the rule of their hand, and the children of Ammon shall be obedient.
11:15. And the Lord shall lay waste the tongue of the sea of Egypt, and shall lift up his hand over the river in the strength of his spirit: and he shall strike it in the seven streams, so that men may pass through it in their shoes.
11:16. And there shall be a highway for the remnant of my people, which shall be left from the Assyrians: as there was for Israel in the day that he came up out of the land of Egypt.
Isaias Chapter 12
A canticle of thanksgiving for the benefits of Christ.
12:1. And thou shalt say in that day: I will give thanks to thee, O Lord, for thou wast angry with me: thy wrath is turned away, and thou hast comforted me.
12:2. Behold, God is my saviour, I will deal confidently, and will not fear: because the Lord is my strength, and my praise, and he is become my salvation.
12:3. Thou shall draw waters with joy out of the saviour's fountains:
12:4. And you shall say in that day: Praise ye the Lord, and call upon his name: make his works known among the people: remember that his name is high.
12:5. Sing ye to the Lord, for he hath done great things: shew this forth in all the earth.
12:6. Rejoice, and praise, O thou habitation of Sion: for great is he that is in the midst of thee, the Holy One of Israel.
Isaias Chapter 13
The desolation of Babylon.
13:1. The burden of Babylon which Isaias the son of Amos saw.
The burden of Babylon… That is, a prophecy against Babylon.
13:2. Upon the dark mountain lift ye up a banner, exalt the voice, lift up the hand, and let the rulers go into the gates.
13:3. I have commanded my sanctified ones, and have called my strong ones in my wrath, them that rejoice in my glory.
13:4. The noise of a multitude in the mountains, as it were of many people, the noise of the sound of kings, of nations gathered together: the Lord of hosts hath given charge to the troops of war.
13:5. To them that come from a country afar off, from the end of heaven: the Lord and the instruments of his wrath, to destroy the whole land.
13:6. Howl ye, for the day of the Lord is near: it shall come as a destruction from the Lord.
13:7. Therefore shall all hands be faint, and every heart of man shall melt,
13:8. And shall be broken. Gripings and pains, shall take hold of them, they shall be in pain as a woman in labour. Every one shall be amazed at his neighbour, their countenances shall be as faces burnt.
13:9. Behold, the day of the Lord shall come, a cruel day, and full of indignation, and of wrath, and fury, to lay the land desolate, and to destroy the sinners thereof out of it.
13:10. For the stars of heaven, and their brightness shall not display their light: the sun shall be darkened in his rising, and the moon shall not shine with her light.
13:11. And I will visit the evils of the world, and against the wicked for their iniquity: and I will make the pride of infidels to cease, and will bring down the arrogancy of the mighty.
13:12. A man shall be more precious than gold, yea a man than the finest of gold.
13:13. For this I will trouble the heaven: and the earth shall be moved out of her place, for the indignation of the Lord of hosts, and for the day of his fierce wrath.
13:14. And they shall be as a doe fleeing away, and as a sheep: and there shall be none to gather them together: every man shall turn to his own people, and every one shall flee to his own land.
13:15. Every one that shall be found, shall be slain: and every one that shall come to their aid, shall fall by the sword.
13:16. Their inhabitants shall be dashed in pieces before their eyes: their houses shall be pillaged, and their wives shall be ravished.
13:17. Behold I will stir up the Medes against them, who shall not seek silver, nor desire gold:
13:18. But with their arrows they shall kill the children, and shall have no pity upon the sucklings of the womb, and their eye shall not spare their sons.
13:19. And that Babylon, glorious among kingdoms, the famous pride of the Chaldeans, shall be even as the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrha.
13:20. It shall no more be inhabited for ever, and it shall not be founded unto generation and generation: neither shall the Arabian pitch his tents there, nor shall shepherds rest there.
13:21. But wild beasts shall rest there, and their houses shall be filled with serpents, and ostriches shall dwell there, and the hairy ones shall dance there:
13:22. And owls shall answer one another there, in the houses thereof, and sirens in the temples of pleasure.
Isaias Chapter 14
The restoration of Israel after their captivity. The parable or song insulting over the king of Babylon. A prophecy against the Philistines.
14:1. Her time is near at hand, and her days shall not be prolonged. For the Lord will have mercy on Jacob, and will yet choose out of Israel, and will make them rest upon their own ground: and the stranger shall be joined with them, and shall adhere to the house of Jacob.
14:2. And the people shall take them, and bring them into their place: and the house of Israel shall possess them in the land of the Lord for servants and handmaids: and they shall make them captives that had taken them, and shall subdue their oppressors.
14:3. And it shall come to pass in that day, that when God shall give thee rest from thy labour, and from thy vexation, and from the hard bondage, wherewith thou didst serve before,
14:4. Thou shalt take up this parable against the king of Babylon, and shalt say: How is the oppressor come to nothing, the tribute hath ceased?
14:5. The Lord hath broken the staff of the wicked, the rod of the rulers,
14:6. That struck the people in wrath with an incurable wound, that brought nations under in fury, that persecuted in a cruel manner.
14:7. The whole earth is quiet and still, it is glad and hath rejoiced.
14:8. The fir trees also have rejoiced over thee, and the cedars of Libanus, saying: Since thou hast slept, there hath none come up to cut us down.
14:9. Hell below was in an uproar to meet thee at thy coming, it stirred up the giants for thee. All the princes of the earth are risen up from their thrones, all the princes of nations.
14:10. All shall answer, and say to thee: Thou also art wounded as well as we, thou art become like unto us.
14:11. Thy pride is brought down to hell, thy carcass is fallen down: under thee shall the moth be strewed, and worms shall be thy covering.
14:12. How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, who didst rise in the morning? how art thou fallen to the earth, that didst wound the nations?
O Lucifer… O day star. All this, according to the letter, is spoken of the king of Babylon. It may also be applied, in a spiritual sense, to Lucifer the prince of devils, who was created a bright angel, but fell by pride and rebellion against God.
14:13. And thou saidst in thy heart: I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God, I will sit in the mountain of the covenant, in the sides of the north.
14:14. I will ascend above the height of the clouds, I will be like the most High.
14:15. But yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, into the depth of the pit.
14:16. They that shall see thee, shall turn toward thee, and behold thee. Is this the man that troubled the earth, that shook kingdoms,
14:17. That made the world a wilderness, and destroyed the cities thereof, that opened not the prison to his prisoners?
14:18. All the kings of the nations have all of them slept in glory, every one in his own house.
14:19. But thou art cast out of thy grave, as an unprofitable branch defiled, and wrapped up among them that were slain by the sword, and art gone down to the bottom of the pit, as a rotten carcass.
14:20. Thou shalt not keep company with them, even in burial: for thou hast destroyed thy land, thou hast slain thy people: the seed of the wicked shall not be named for ever.
14:21. Prepare his children for slaughter for the iniquity of their fathers: they shall not rise up, nor inherit the land, nor fill the face of the world with cities.
14:22. And I will rise up against them, saith the Lord of hosts: and I will destroy the name of Babylon, and the remains, and the bud, and the offspring, saith the Lord.
14:23. And I will make it a possession for the ericius and pools of waters, and I will sweep it and wear it out with a besom, saith the Lord of hosts.
14:24. The Lord of hosts hath sworn, saying: Surely as I have thought, so shall it be: and as I have purposed,
14:25. So shall it fall out: That I will destroy the Assyrian in my land, and upon my mountains tread him under foot: and his yoke shall be taken away from them, and his burden shall be taken off their shoulder.
14:26. This is the counsel, that I have purposed upon all the earth, and this is the hand that is stretched out upon all nations.
14:27. For the Lord of hosts hath decreed, and who can disannul it? and his hand is stretched out: and who shall turn it away?
14:28. In the year that king Achaz died, was this burden:
14:29. Rejoice not thou, whole Philistia, that the rod of him that struck thee is broken in pieces: for out of the root of the serpent shall come forth a basilisk, and his seed shall swallow the bird.
14:30. And the firstborn of the poor shall be fed, and the poor shall rest with confidence: and I will make thy root perish with famine, and I will kill thy remnant.
14:31. Howl, O gate; cry, O city: all Philistia is thrown down: for a smoke shall come from the north, and there is none that shall escape his troop.
14:32. And what shall be answered to the messengers of the nations? That the Lord hath founded Sion, and the poor of his people shall hope in him.
Isaias Chapter 15
A prophecy of the desolation of the Moabites.
15:1. The burden of Moab. Because in the night Ar of Moab is laid waste, it is silent: because the wall of Moab is destroyed in the night, it is silent.
15:2. The house is gone up, and Dibon to the high places to mourn over Nabo, and over Medaba, Moab hath howled: on all their heads shall be baldness, and every beard shall be shaven.
15:3. In their streets they are girded with sackcloth: on the tops of their houses, and in their streets all shall howl and come down weeping.
15:4. Hesebon shall cry, and Eleale, their voice is heard even to Jasa. For this shall the well appointed men of Moab howl, his soul shall howl to itself.
15:5. My heart shall cry to Moab, the bars thereof shall flee unto Segor a heifer of three years old: for by the ascent of Luith they shall go up weeping: and in the way of Oronaim they shall lift up a cry of destruction.
15:6. For the waters of Nemrim shall be desolate, for the grass is withered away, the spring is faded, all the greenness is perished.
15:7. According to the greatness of their work, is their visitation also: they shall lead them to the torrent of the willows.
Torrent of the willows… That is, as some say, the waters of Babylon: others render it, a valley of the Arabians.
15:8. For the cry is gone round about the border of Moab: the howling thereof unto Gallim, and unto the well of Elim the cry thereof.
15:9. For the waters of Dibon are filled with blood: for I will bring more upon Dibon: the lion upon them that shall flee of Moab, and upon the remnant of the land.
Isaias Chapter 16
The prophet prayeth for Christ's coming. The affliction of the Moabites for their pride.
16:1. Send forth, O Lord, the lamb, the ruler of the earth, from Petra of the desert, to the mount of the daughter of Sion.
16:2. And it shall come to pass, that as a bird fleeing away, and as young ones flying out of the nest, so shall the daughters of Moab be in the passage of Arnon.
16:3. Take counsel, gather a council: make thy shadow as the night in the midday: hide them that flee, and betray not them that wander about.
16:4. My fugitives shall dwell with thee: O Moab, be thou a covert to them from the face of the destroyer: for the dust is at an end, the wretch is consumed: he hath failed, that trod the earth under foot.
16:5. And a throne shall be prepared in mercy, and one shall sit upon it in truth in the tabernacle of David, judging and seeking judgment and quickly rendering that which is just.
16:6. We have heard of the pride of Moab, he is exceeding proud: his pride and his arrogancy, and his indignation is more than his strength.
16:7. Therefore shall Moab howl to Moab, every one shall howl: to them that rejoice upon the brick walls, tell ye their stripes.
16:8. For the suburbs of Hesebon are desolate, and the lords of the nations have destroyed the vineyard of Sabama: the branches thereof have reached even to Jazer: they have wandered in the wilderness, the branches thereof are left, they are gone over the sea.
16:9. Therefore I will lament with the weeping of Jazer the vineyard of Sabama: I will water thee with my tears, O Hesebon, and Eleale: for the voice of the treaders hath rushed in upon thy vintage, and upon thy harvest.
16:10. And gladness and joy shall be taken away from Carmel, and there shall be no rejoicing nor shouting in the vineyards. He shall not tread out wine in the press that was wont to tread it out: the voice of the treaders I have taken away.
Carmel… This name is often taken to signify a fair and fruitful hill or field, such as mount Carmel is.
16:11. Wherefore my bowels shall sound like a harp for Moab, and my inward parts for the brick wall.
16:12. And it shall come to pass, when it is seen that Moab is wearied on his high places, that he shall go in to his sanctuaries to pray, and shall not prevail.
16:13. This is the word, that the Lord spoke to Moab from that time:
16:14. And now the Lord hath spoken, saying: In three years, as the years of a hireling, the glory of Moab shall be taken away for all the multitude of the people, and it shall be left small and feeble, not many.
Isaias Chapter 17
Judgments upon Damascus and Samaria. The overthrow of the Assyrians.
17:1. The burden of Damascus. Behold Damascus shall cease to be a city, and shall be as a ruinous heap of stones.
17:2. The cities of Aroer shall be left for flocks, and they shall rest there, and there shall be none to make them afraid.
17:3. And aid shall cease from Ephraim, and the kingdom from Damascus: and the remnant of Syria shall be as the glory of the children of Israel: saith the Lord of hosts.
17:4. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the glory of Jacob shall be made thin, and the fatness of his flesh shall grow lean.
17:5. And it shall be as when one gathereth in the harvest that which remaineth, and his arm shall gather the ears of corn: and it shall be as he that seeketh ears in the vale of Raphaim.
17:6. And the fruit thereof that shall be left upon it, shall be as one cluster of grapes, and as the shaking of the olive tree, two or three berries in the top of a bough, or four or five upon the top of the tree, saith the Lord the God of Israel.
17:7. In that day man shall bow down himself to his Maker, and his eyes shall look to the Holy One of Israel.
17:8. And he shall not look to the altars which his hands made; and he shall not have respect to the things that his fingers wrought, such as groves and temples.
17:9. In that day his strong cities shall be forsaken, as the ploughs, and the corn that were left before the face of the children of Israel, and thou shalt be desolate.
That were left… Viz., by the Chanaanites, when the children of Israel came into their land.
17:10. Because thou hast forgotten God thy saviour, and hast not remembered thy strong helper: therefore shalt thou plant good plants, and shalt sow strange seed.
17:11. In the day of thy planting shall be the wild grape, and in the morning thy seed shall flourish: the harvest is taken away in the day of inheritance, and shall grieve thee much.
17:12. Woe to the multitude of many people, like the multitude of the roaring sea: and the tumult of crowds, like the noise of many waters.
The multitude, etc… This and all that follows to the end of the chapter, relates to the Assyrian army under Sennacherib.
17:13. Nations shall make a noise like the noise of waters overflowing, but he shall rebuke him, and he shall flee far off: and he shall be carried away as the dust of the mountains before the wind, and as a whirlwind before a tempest.
17:14. In the time of the evening, behold there shall be trouble: the morning shall come, and he shall not be: this is the portion of them that have wasted us, and the lot of them that spoiled us.
Isaias Chapter 18
A woe to the Ethiopians, who fed Israel with vain hopes, their future conversion.
18:1. Woe to the land, the winged cymbal, which is beyond the rivers of Ethiopia,
18:2. That sendeth ambassadors by the sea, and in vessels of bulrushes upon the waters. Go, ye swift angels, to a nation rent and torn in pieces: to a terrible people, after which there is no other: to a nation expecting and trodden underfoot, whose land the rivers have spoiled.
Angels… Or messengers.
18:3. All ye inhabitants of the world, who dwell on the earth, when the sign shall be lifted up on the mountains, you shall see, and you shall hear the sound of the trumpet.
18:4. For thus saith the Lord to me: I will take my rest, and consider in my place, as the noon light is clear, and as a cloud of dew in the day of harvest.
18:5. For before the harvest it was all flourishing, and it shall bud without perfect ripeness, and the sprigs thereof shall be cut off with pruning hooks: and what is left shall be cut away and shaken out.
18:6. And they shall be left together to the birds of the mountains, and the beasts of the earth: and the fowls shall be upon them all the summer, and all the beasts of the earth shall winter upon them.
18:7. At that time shall a present be brought to the Lord of hosts, from a people rent and torn in pieces: from a terrible people, after which there hath been no other: from a nation expecting, expecting and trodden under foot, whose land the rivers have spoiled, to the place of the name of the Lord of hosts, to mount Sion.
Isaias Chapter 19
The punishment of Egypt: their call to the church.
19:1. The burden of Egypt. Behold the Lord will ascend upon a swift cloud, and will enter into Egypt, and the idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence, and the heart of Egypt shall melt in the midst thereof.
19:2. And I will set the Egyptians to fight against the Egyptians: and they shall fight brother against brother, and friend against friend, city against city, kingdom against kingdom.
19:3. And the spirit of Egypt shall be broken in the bowels thereof, and I will cast down their counsel: and they shall consult their idols, and their diviners, and their wizards, and soothsayers.
19:4. And I will deliver Egypt into the hand of cruel masters, and a strong king shall rule over them, saith the Lord the God of hosts.
19:5. And the water of the sea shall be dried up, and the river shall be wasted and dry.
19:6. And the rivers shall fail: the streams of the banks shall be diminished, and be dried up. The reed and the bulrush shall wither away.
19:7. The channel of the river shall be laid bare from its fountain, and every thing sown by the water shall be dried up, it shall wither away, and shall be no more.
19:8. The fishers also shall mourn, and all that cast a hook into the river shall lament, and they that spread nets upon the waters shall languish away.
19:9. They shall be confounded that wrought in flax, combing and weaving fine linen.
19:10. And its watery places shall be dry, all they shall mourn that made pools to take fishes.
19:11. The princes of Tanis are become fools, the wise counsellors of Pharao have given foolish counsel: how will you say to Pharao: I am the son of the wise, the son of ancient kings?
19:12. Where are now thy wise men? let them tell thee, and shew what the Lord of hosts hath purposed upon Egypt.
19:13. The princes of Tanis are become fools, the princes of Memphis are gone astray, they have deceived Egypt, the stay of the people thereof.
19:14. The Lord hath mingled in the midst thereof the spirit of giddiness: and they have caused Egypt to err in all its works, as a drunken man staggereth and vomiteth.
19:15. And there shall be no work for Egypt, to make head or tail, him that bendeth down, or that holdeth back.
19:16. In that day Egypt shall be like unto women, and they shall be amazed, and afraid, because of the moving of the hand of the Lord of hosts, which he shall move over it.
19:17. And the land of Juda shall be a terror to Egypt: everyone that shall remember it shall tremble because of the counsel of the Lord of hosts, which he hath determined concerning it.
19:18. In that day there shall be five cities in the land of Egypt, speaking the language of Chanaan, and swearing by the Lord of hosts: one shall be called the city of the sun.
19:19. In that day there shall be an altar of the Lord in the midst of the land of Egypt, and a monument of the Lord at the borders thereof:
19:20. It shall be for a sign, and for a testimony to the Lord of hosts in the land of Egypt. For they shall cry to the Lord because of the oppressor, and he shall send them a Saviour and a defender to deliver them.
19:21. And the Lord shall be known by Egypt, and the Egyptians shall know the Lord in that day, and shall worship him with sacrifices and offerings: and they shall make vows to the Lord, and perform them.
19:22. And the Lord shall strike Egypt with a scourge, and shall heal it, and they shall return to the Lord, and he shall be pacified towards them, and heal them.
19:23. In that day there shall be a way from Egypt to the Assyrians, and the Assyrian shall enter into Egypt, and the Egyptian to the Assyrians, and the Egyptians shall serve the Assyrian.
19:24. In that day shall Israel be the third to the Egyptian and the Assyrian: a blessing in the midst of the land,
19:25. Which the Lord of hosts hath blessed, saying: Blessed be my people of Egypt, and the work of my hands to the Assyrian: but Israel is my inheritance.
Isaias Chapter 20
The ignominious captivity of the Egyptians, and the Ethiopians.
20:1. In the year that Tharthan entered into Azotus, when Sargon the king of the Assyrians had sent him, and he had fought against Azotus, and had taken it:
20:2. At that same time the Lord spoke by the hand of Isaias the son of Amos, saying Go, and loose the sackcloth from off thy loins, and take off thy shoes from thy feet. And he did so, and went naked, and barefoot.
20:3. And the Lord said: As my servant Isaias hath walked, naked and barefoot, it shall be a sign and a wonder of three years upon Egypt, and upon Ethiopia,
20:4. So shall the king of the Assyrians lead away the prisoners of Egypt, and the captivity of Ethiopia, young and old, naked and barefoot, with their buttocks uncovered to the shame of Egypt.
20:5. And they shall be afraid, and ashamed of Ethiopia their hope, and of Egypt their glory.
20:6. And the inhabitants of this isle shall say in that day: Lo this was our hope, to whom we fled for help, to deliver us from the face of the king of the Assyrians: and how shall we be able to escape?
Isaias Chapter 21
The destruction of Babylon by the Medes and Persians: a prophecy against the Edomites and the Arabians.
21:1. The burden of the desert of the sea. As whirlwinds come from the south, it cometh from the desert from a terrible land.
The desert of the sea… So Babylon is here called, because from a city as full of people as the sea is with water, it was become a desert.
21:2. A grievous vision is told me: he that is unfaithful dealeth unfaithfully: and he that is a spoiler, spoileth. Go up, O Elam, besiege, O Mede: I have made all the mourning thereof to cease.
O Elam… That is, O Persia.
21:3. Therefore are my loins filled with pain, anguish hath taken hold of me, as the anguish of a woman in labour: I fell down at the hearing of it, I was troubled at the seeing of it.
21:4. My heart failed, darkness amazed me: Babylon my beloved is become a wonder to me.
21:5. Prepare the table, behold in the watchtower them that eat and drink: arise, ye princes, take up the shield.
21:6. For thus hath the Lord said to me: Go, and set a watchman: and whatsoever he shall see, let him tell.
21:7. And he saw a chariot with two horsemen, a rider upon an ass, and a rider upon a camel: and he beheld them diligently with much heed.
A rider upon an ass, etc… These two riders are the kings of the
Persians and Medes.
21:8. And a lion cried out: I am upon the watchtower of the Lord, standing continually by day: and I am upon my ward, standing whole nights.
And a lion cried out… That is, I Isaias seeing the approaching ruin of
Babylon, have cried out as a lion roaring.
21:9. Behold this man cometh, the rider upon the chariot with two horsemen, and he answered, and said: Babylon is fallen, she is fallen, and all the graven gods thereof are broken unto the ground.
21:10. O my thrashing, and the children of my floor, that which I have heard of the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, I have declared unto you.
21:11. The burden of Duma calleth to me out of Seir: Watchman, what of the night? watchman, what of the night?
Duma… That is, Idumea, or Edom.
21:12. The watchman said: The morning cometh, also the night: if you seek, seek: return, come.
21:13. The burden in Arabia. In the forest at evening you shall sleep, in the paths of Dedanim.
21:14. Meeting the thirsty bring him water, you that inhabit the land of the south, meet with bread him that fleeth.
21:15. For they are fled from before the swords, from the sword that hung over them, from the bent bow, from the face of a grievous battle.
21:16. For thus saith the Lord to me: Within a year, according to the years of a hireling, all the glory of Cedar shall be taken away.
Cedar… Arabia.
21:17. And the residue of the number of strong archers of the children of Cedar shall be diminished: for the Lord the God of Israel hath spoken it.
Isaias Chapter 22
The prophet laments the devastation of Juda. He foretells the deprivation of Sobna, and the substitution of Eliacim, a figure of Christ.
22:1. The burden of the valley of vision. What aileth thee also, that thou too art wholly gone up to the housetops?
The valley of vision… Jerusalem. The temple of Jerusalem was built upon mount Moria, or the mountain of vision. But the city is here called the valley of vision; either because it was lower than the temple, or because of the low condition to which it was to be reduced.
22:2. Full of clamour, a populous city, a joyous city: thy slain are not slain by the sword, nor dead in battle.
22:3. All the princes are fled together, and are bound hard: all that were found, are bound together, they are fled far off.
22:4. Therefore have I said: Depart from me, I will weep bitterly: labour not to comfort me, for the devastation of the daughter of my people.
22:5. For it is a day of slaughter and of treading down, and of weeping to the Lord the God of hosts in the valley of vision, searching the wall, and magnificent upon the mountain.
22:6. And Elam took the quiver, the chariot of the horseman, and the shield was taken down from the wall.
22:7. And thy choice valleys shall be full of chariots, and the horsemen shall place themselves in the gate.
22:8. And the covering of Juda shall be discovered, and thou shalt see in that day the armoury of the house of the forest.
22:9. And you shall see the breaches of the city of David, that they are many: and you have gathered together the waters of the lower pool,
22:10. And have numbered the houses of Jerusalem, and broken down houses to fortify the wall.
22:11. And you made a ditch between the two walls for the water of the old pool: and you have not looked up to the maker thereof, nor regarded him even at a distance, that wrought it long ago.
22:12. And the Lord, the God of hosts, in that day shall call to weeping, and to mourning, to baldness, and to girding with sackcloth:
22:13. And behold joy and gladness, killing calves, and slaying rams, eating flesh, and drinking wine: Let us eat and drink; for to morrow we shall die.
22:14. And the voice of the Lord of hosts was revealed in my ears: Surely this iniquity shall not be forgiven you till you die, saith the Lord God of hosts.
22:15. Thus saith the Lord God of hosts: Go, get thee in to him that dwelleth in the tabernacle, to Sobna who is over the temple: and thou shalt say to him:
22:16. What dost thou here, or as if thou wert somebody here? for thou hast hewed thee out a sepulchre here, thou hast hewed out a monument carefully in a high place, a dwelling for thyself in a rock.
22:17. Behold the Lord will cause thee to be carried away, as a cock is carried away, and he will lift thee up as a garment.
22:18. He will crown thee with a crown of tribulation, he will toss thee like a ball into a large and spacious country: there shalt thou die, and there shall the chariot of thy glory be, the shame of the house of thy Lord.
22:19. And I will drive thee out from thy station, and depose thee from thy ministry.
22:20. And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will call my servant Eliacim the son of Helcias,
22:21. And I will clothe him with thy robe, and will strengthen him with thy girdle, and will give thy power into his hand: and he shall be as a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to the house of Juda.
22:22. And I will lay the key of the house of David upon his shoulder: and he shall open, and none shall shut: and he shall shut, and none shall open.
22:23. And I will fasten him as a peg in a sure place, and he shall be for a throne of glory to the house of his father.
22:24. And they shall hang upon him all the glory of his father's house, divers kinds of vessels, every little vessel, from the vessels of cups even to every instrument of music.
22:25. In that day, saith the Lord of hosts, shall the peg be removed, that was fastened in the sure place: and it shall be broken and shall fall: and that which hung thereon, shall perish, because the Lord hath spoken it.
Isaias Chapter 23
The destruction of Tyre. It shall be repaired again after seventy years.
23:1. The burden of Tyre. Howl, ye ships of the sea, for the house is destroyed, from whence they were wont to come: from the land of Cethim it is revealed to them.
23:2. Be silent, you that dwell in the island: the merchants of Sidon passing over the sea, have filled thee.
23:3. The seed of the Nile in many waters, the harvest of the river is her revenue: and she is become the mart of the nations.
23:4. Be thou ashamed, O Sidon: for the sea speaketh, even the strength of the sea, saying: I have not been in labour, nor have I brought forth, nor have I nourished up young men, nor brought up virgins.
23:5. When it shall be heard in Egypt, they will be sorry when they shall hear of Tyre:
23:6. Pass over the seas, howl, ye inhabitants of the island.
23:7. Is not this your city, which gloried from of old in her antiquity? her feet shall carry her afar off to sojourn.
23:8. Who hath taken this counsel against Tyre, that was formerly crowned, whose merchants were princes, and her traders the nobles of the earth?
23:9. The Lord of hosts hath designed it, to pull down the pride of all glory, and bring to disgrace all the glorious ones of the earth.
23:10. Pass thy land as a river, O daughter of the sea, thou hast a girdle no more.
23:11. He stretched out his hand over the sea, he troubled kingdoms: the Lord hath given a charge against Chanaan, to destroy the strong ones thereof.
23:12. And he said: Thou shalt glory no more, O virgin daughter of Sidon, who art oppressed: arise and sail over to Cethim, there also thou shalt have no rest.
23:13. Behold the land of the Chaldeans, there was not such a people, the Assyrians founded it: they have led away the strong ones thereof into captivity, they have destroyed the houses thereof, they have, brought it to ruin.
23:14. Howl, O ye ships of the sea, for your strength is laid waste.
23:15. And it shall come to pass in that day that thou, O Tyre, shalt be forgotten, seventy years, according to the days of one king: but after seventy years, there shall be unto Tyre as the song of a harlot.
23:16. Take a harp, go about the city, harlot that hast been forgotten: sing well, sing many a song, that thou mayst be remembered.
23:17. And it shall come to pass after seventy years, that the Lord will visit Tyre, and will bring her back again to her traffic: and she shall commit fornication again with all the kingdoms of the world upon the face of the earth.
23:18. And her merchandise and her hire shall be sanctified to the Lord: they shall not be kept in store, nor laid up: for her merchandise shall be for them that shall dwell before the Lord, that they may eat unto fulness, and be clothed for a continuance.
Sanctified to the Lord… This alludes to the conversion of the
Gentiles.
Isaias Chapter 24
The judgments of God upon all the sinners of the world. A remnant shall joyfully praise him.
24:1. Behold the Lord shall lay waste the earth, and shall strip it, and shall afflict the face thereof, and scatter abroad the inhabitants thereof.
24:2. And it shall be as with the people, so with the priest: and as with the servant so with his master: as with the handmaid, so with her mistress: as with the buyer, so with the seller: as with the lender, so with the borrower: as with him that calleth for his money, so with him that oweth.
24:3. With desolation shall the earth be laid waste, and it shall be utterly spoiled: for the Lord hath spoken this word.
24:4. The earth mourned, and faded away, and is weakened: the world faded away, the height of the people of the earth is weakened.
24:5. And the earth is infected by the inhabitants thereof: because they have transgressed the laws, they have changed the ordinance, they have broken the everlasting covenant.
24:6. Therefore shall a curse devour the earth, and the inhabitants thereof shall sin: and therefore they that dwell therein shall be mad, and few men shall be left.
24:7. The vintage hath mourned, the vine hath languished away, all the merry have sighed.
24:8. The mirth of timbrels hath ceased, the noise of them that rejoice is ended, the melody of the harp is silent.
24:9. They shall not drink wine with a song: the drink shall be bitter to them that drink it.
24:10. The city of vanity is broken down, every house is shut up, no man cometh in.
24:11. There shall be a crying for wine in the streets: all mirth is forsaken: the joy of the earth is gone away.
24:12. Desolation is left in the city, and calamity shall oppress the gates.
24:13. For it shall be thus in the midst of the earth, in the midst of the people, as if a few olives, that remain, should be shaken out of the olive tree: or grapes, when the vintage is ended.
24:14. These shall lift up their voice, and shall give praise: when the Lord shall be glorified, they shall make a joyful noise from the sea.
24:15. Therefore glorify ye the Lord in instruction: the name of the Lord God of Israel in the islands of the sea.
24:16. From the ends of the earth we have heard praises, the glory of the just one. And I said: My secret to myself, my secret to myself, woe is me: the prevaricators have prevaricated, and with the prevarication of transgressors they have prevaricated.
24:17. Fear, and the pit, and the snare are upon thee, O thou inhabitant of the earth.
24:18. And it shall come to pass, that he that shall flee from the noise of the fear, shall fall into the pit: and he that shall rid himself out of the pit, shall be taken in the snare: for the flood-gates from on high are opened, and the foundations of the earth shall be shaken.
24:19. With breaking shall the earth be broken, with crushing shall the earth be crushed, with trembling shall the earth be moved.
24:20. With shaking shall the earth be shaken as a drunken man, and shall be removed as the tent of one night: and the iniquity thereof shall be heavy upon it, and it shall fall, and not rise again.
24:21. And it shall come to pass, that in that day the Lord shall visit upon the host of heaven on high, and upon the kings of the earth, on the earth.
The host of heaven on high… The stars, which in many places of the Scripture are so called. Some commentators explain that these words here signify the demons of the air.
24:22. And they shall be gathered together as in the gathering of one bundle into the pit, and they shall be shut up there in prison: and after many days they shall be visited.
24:23. And the moon shall blush, and the sun shall be ashamed, when the Lord of hosts shall reign in mount Sion, and in Jerusalem, and shall be glorified in the sight of his ancients.
Isaias Chapter 25
A canticle of thanksgiving for God's judgments and benefits.
25:1. O Lord, thou art my God, I will exalt O thee, and give glory to thy name: for thou hast done wonderful things, thy designs of old faithful, amen.
25:2. For thou hast reduced the city to a heap, the strong city to ruin, the house of strangers, to be no city, and to be no more built up for ever.
25:3. Therefore shall a strong people praise thee, the city of mighty nations shall fear thee.
25:4. Because thou hast been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress: a refuge from the whirlwind, a shadow from the heat. For the blast of the mighty is like a whirlwind beating against a wall.
25:5. Thou shalt bring down the tumult of strangers, as heat in thirst: and as with heat under a burning cloud, thou shalt make the branch of the mighty to wither away.
25:6. And the Lord of hosts shall make unto all people in this mountain, a feast of fat things, a feast of wine, of fat things full of marrow, of wine purified from the lees.
25:7. And he shall destroy in this mountain the face of the bond with which all people were tied, and the web that he began over all nations.
25:8. He shall cast death down headlong for ever: and the Lord God shall wipe away tears from every face, and the reproach of his people he shall take away from off the whole earth: for the Lord hath spoken it.
25:9. And they shall say in that day: Lo, this is our God, we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the Lord, we have patiently waited for him, we shall rejoice and be joyful in his salvation.
25:10. For the hand of the Lord shall rest in this mountain: and Moab shall be trodden down under him, as straw is broken in pieces with the wain.
Moab… That is, the reprobate, whose eternal punishment, from which they can no way escape, is described under these figures.
25:11. And he shall stretch forth his hands under him, as he that swimmeth stretcheth forth his hands to swim: and he shall bring down his glory with the dashing of his hands.
25:12. And the bulwarks of thy high walls shall fall, and be brought low, and shall be pulled down to the ground, even to the dust.
Isaias Chapter 26
A canticle of thanks for the deliverance of God's people.
26:1. In that day shall this canticle be sung in the land of Juda. Sion the city of our strength a saviour, a wall and a bulwark shall be set therein.
26:2. Open ye the gates, and let the just nation, that keepeth the truth, enter in.
26:3. The old error is passed away: thou wilt keep peace: peace, because we have hoped in thee.
26:4. You have hoped in the Lord for evermore, in the Lord God mighty for ever.
26:5. For he shall bring down them that dwell on high, the high city he shall lay low. He shall bring it down even to the ground, he shall pull it down even to the dust.
26:6. The foot shall tread it down, the feet of the poor, the steps of the needy.
26:7. The way of the just is right, the path of the just is right to walk in.
26:8. And in the way of thy judgments, O Lord, we have patiently waited for thee: thy name, and thy remembrance are the desire of the soul.
26:9. My soul hath desired thee in the night: yea, and with my spirit within me in the morning early I will watch to thee. When thou shalt do thy judgments on the earth, the inhabitants of the world shall learn justice.
26:10. Let us have pity on the wicked, but he will not learn justice: in the land of the saints he hath done wicked things, and he shall not see the glory of the Lord.
26:11. Lord, let thy hand be exalted, and let them not see: let the envious people see, and be confounded: and let fire devour thy enemies.
26:12. Lord, thou wilt give us peace: for thou hast wrought all our works for us.
26:13. O Lord our God, other lords besides thee have had dominion over us, only in thee let us remember thy name.
26:14. Let not the dead live, let not the giants rise again: therefore hast visited and destroyed them, and hast destroyed all their memory.
26:15. Thou hast been favourable to the nation, O Lord, thou hast been favourable to the nation: art thou glorified? thou hast removed all the ends of the earth far off.
26:16. Lord, they have sought after thee in distress, in the tribulation of murmuring thy instruction was with them.
26:17. As a woman with child, when she draweth near the time of her delivery, is in pain, and crieth out in her pangs: so are we become in thy presence, O Lord.
26:18. We have conceived, and been as it were in labour, and have brought forth wind: we have not wrought salvation on the earth, therefore the inhabitants of the earth have not fallen.
26:19. Thy dead men shall live, my slain shall rise again: awake, and give praise, ye that dwell in the dust: for thy dew is the dew of the light: and the land of the giants thou shalt pull down into ruin.
26:20. Go, my people, enter into thy chambers, shut thy doors upon thee, hide thyself a little for a moment, until the indignation pass away.
26:21. For behold the Lord will come out of his place, to visit the iniquity of the inhabitant of the earth against him: and the earth shall disclose her blood, and shall cover her slain no more.
Shall cover her slain no more… This is said with relation to the martyrs, and their happy resurrection.
Isaias Chapter 27
The punishment of the oppressors of God's people. The Lord's favour to his church.
27:1. In that day the Lord with his hard, and great, and strong sword shall visit leviathan the bar serpent, and leviathan the crooked serpent, and shall slay the whale that is in the sea.
Leviathan… That is, the devil, the great enemy of the people of God. He is called the bar serpent from his strength, and the crooked serpent from his wiles; and the whale of the sea, from the tyranny he exercises in the sea of this world. He was spiritually slain by the death of Christ, when his power was destroyed.
27:2. In that day there shall be singing to the vineyard of pure wine.
The vineyard, etc… The church of Christ.
27:3. I am the Lord that keep it, I will suddenly give it drink: lest any hurt come to it, I keep it night and day.
I will suddenly give it drink… Or, as the Hebrew may also be rendered,
I will continually water it.
27:4. There is no indignation in me: who shall make me a thorn and a brier in battle: shall I march against it, shall, I set it on fire together?
No indignation in me, etc… Viz., against the church: nor shall I become as a thorn or brier in its regard; or march against it, or set it on fire: but it shall always take fast hold of me, and keep an everlasting peace with me.
27:5. Or rather shall it take hold of my strength, shall it make peace with me, shall it make peace with me?
27:6. When they shall rush in unto Jacob, Israel shall blossom and bud, and they shall fill the face of the world with seed.
When they shall rush in, etc… Some understand this of the enemies of the true Israel, that shall invade it in vain. Others of the spiritual invasion made by the apostles of Christ.
27:7. Hath he struck him according to the stroke of him that struck him? or is he slain, as he killed them that were slain by him?
Hath he struck him, etc… Hath God punished the carnal persecuting
Jews, in proportion to their doings against Christ and his saints?
27:8. In measure against measure, when it shall be cast off, thou shalt judge it. He hath meditated with his severe spirit in the day of heat.
When it shall be cast off, etc… When the synagogue shall be cast off, thou shalt judge it in measure, and in proportion to its crimes.-Ibid. He hath meditated, etc… God hath designed severe punishments in the day of his wrath.
27:9. Therefore upon this shall the iniquity of the house of Jacob be forgiven: and this is all the fruit, that the sin thereof should be taken away, when he shall have made all the stones of the altar, as burnt stones broken in pieces, the groves and temples shall not stand.
Of the house of Jacob… Viz., of such of them as shall be converted.
27:10. For the strong city shall be desolate, the beautiful city shall be forsaken, and shall be left as a wilderness: there the calf shall feed, and there shall he lie down, and shall consume its branches.
The strong city… Jerusalem.
27:11. Its harvest shall be destroyed with drought, women shall come and teach it: for it is not a wise people, therefore he that made it, shall not have mercy on it: and he that formed it, shall not spare it.
27:12. And it shall come to pass, that in that day the Lord will strike from the channel of the river even to the torrent of Egypt, and you shall be gathered together one by one, O ye children of Israel.
27:13. And it shall come to pass, that in that day a noise shall be made with a great trumpet, and they that were lost, shall come from the land of the Assyrians, and they that were outcasts in the land of Egypt, and they shall adore the Lord in the holy mount in Jerusalem.
A great trumpet… The preaching of the gospel for the conversion of the
Jews.
Isaias Chapter 28
The punishment of the Israelites, for their pride, intemperance, and contempt of religion. Christ the cornerstone.
28:1. Woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, and to the fading flower the glory his joy, who were on the head of the fat valley, staggering with wine.
Ephraim… That is, the kingdom of the ten tribes.-Ibid. The head of the fat valley… Samaria, situate on a hill, having under it a most fertile valley.
28:2. Behold the Lord is mighty and strong, as a storm of hail: a destroying whirlwind, as the violence of many waters overflowing, and sent forth upon a spacious land.
28:3. The crown of pride of the drunkards of Ephraim shall be trodden under feet.
28:4. And the fading tower the glory of his joy, who is on the head of the fat valley, shall be as a hasty fruit before the ripeness of autumn: which when he that seeth it shall behold, as soon he taketh it in his hand, he will eat it up.
28:5. In that day the Lord of hosts shall be a crown of glory, and a garland of joy to the residue of his people:
28:6. And a spirit of judgment to him that sitteth in judgment, and strength to them that return out of the battle to the gate.
28:7. But these also have been ignorant through wine, and through drunkenness have erred: the priest and the prophet have been ignorant through drunkenness, they are swallowed up with wine, they have gone astray in drunkenness, they have not known him that seeth, they have been ignorant of judgment.
These also… The kingdom of Juda.
28:8. For all the tables were full of vomit and filth, so that there was no more place.
28:9. Whom shall he teach knowledge? and whom shall he make to understand the hearing? them that are weaned from the milk, that are drawn away from the breasts.
28:10. For command, command again; command, command again; expect, expect again; a little there, a little there.
Command, command again, etc… This is said in the person of the Jews, resisting the repeated commands of God, and still putting him off.
28:11. For with the speech of lips, and with another tongue he will speak to this people.
28:12. To whom he said: This is my rest, refresh the weary, and this is my refreshing: and they would not hear.
28:13. And the word of the Lord shall be to them: Command, command again; command, command again; expect, expect again; a little there, a little there: that they may go, and fall backward, and be broken, and snared, and taken.
28:14. Wherefore hear the word of the Lord, ye scornful men, who rule over my people that is in Jerusalem.
28:15. For you have said: We have entered into a league with death, and we have made a covenant with hell. When the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come upon us: for we have placed our hope in lies, and by falsehood we are protected.
28:16. Therefore thus saith the Lord God: Behold I will lay a stone in the foundations of Sion, a tried stone, a corner stone, a precious stone, founded in the foundation. He that believeth, let him not hasten.
A stone in the foundations… Viz., Christ.-Ibid. Let him not hasten, etc… Let him expect his coming with patience.
28:17. And I will set judgment in weight, and justice in measure: and hail shall overturn the hope of falsehood: and waters shall overflow its protection.
28:18. And your league with death shall be abolished, and your covenant with hell shall not stand: when the overflowing scourge shall pass, you shall be trodden down by it.
28:19. Whensoever it shall pass through, it shall take you away: because in the morning early it shall pass through, in the day and in the night, and vexation alone shall make you understand what you hear.
28:20. For the bed is straitened, so that one must fall out, and a short covering cannot cover both.
The bed is straitened, etc… It is too narrow to hold two: God will have the bed of our heart all to himself.
28:21. For the Lord shall stand up as in the mountain of divisions: he shall be angry as in the valley which is in Gabaon: that he may do his work, his strange work: that he may perform his work, his work is strange to him.
As in the mountain, etc… As the Lord fought against the Philistines in
Baal Pharasim, 2 Kings 5., and against the Chanaanites, in the valley of
Gabaon, Jos. 10.
28:22. And now do not mock, lest your bonds be tied strait. For I have heard of the Lord the God of hosts a consumption and a cutting short upon all the earth.
28:23. Give ear, and hear my voice, hearken, and hear my speech.
28:24. Shall the ploughman plough all the day to sow, shall he open and harrow his ground?
28:25. Will he not, when he hath made plain the surface thereof, sow gith, and scatter cummin, and put wheat in order, and barley, and millet, and vetches in their bounds?
28:26. For he will instruct him in judgment: his God will teach him.
28:27. For gith shall not be thrashed with saws, neither shall the cart wheel turn about upon cummin: but gith shall be beaten out with a rod, and cumin with a staff.
28:28. But breadcorn shall be broken small: but the thrasher shall not thrash it for ever, neither shall the cart wheel hurt it, nor break it with its teeth.
28:29. This also is come forth from the Lord God of hosts, to make his counsel wonderful, and magnify justice.
This also, etc… Such also is the proceeding of the Lord with his land, and the divers seeds he throws therein.
Isaias Chapter 29
God's heavy judgments upon Jerusalem, for their obstinacy: with a prophecy of the conversion of the Gentiles.
29:1. Woe to Ariel, to Ariel the city which David took: year is added to year the solemnities are at an end.
Ariel… This word signifies, the lion of God, and here is taken for the strong city of Jerusalem.
29:2. And I will make a trench about Ariel, and it shall be in sorrow and mourning, and it shall be to me as Ariel.
29:3. And I will make a circle round about thee, and I will cast up a rampart against thee, and raise up bulwarks to besiege thee.
29:4. Thou shalt be brought down, thou shall speak out of the earth, and thy speech shall be heard out of the ground: and thy voice shall be from the earth like that of the python, and out of the earth thy speech shall mutter.
29:5. And the multitude of them that fan thee, shall be like small dust: and as ashes passing away, the multitude of them that have prevailed against thee.
29:6. And it shall be at an instant suddenly. A visitation shall come from the Lord of hosts in thunder, and with earthquake, and with a great noise of whirlwind and tempest; and with the flame of devouring fire.
29:7. And the multitude of all nations that have fought against Ariel, shall be as the dream of a vision by night, and all that have fought, and besieged and prevailed against it.
29:8. And as he that is hungry dreameth, and eateth, but when he is awake, his soul is empty: and as he that is thirsty dreameth, and drinketh and after he is awake, is yet faint with thirst, and his soul is empty: so shall be the multitude of all the Gentiles, that have fought against mount Sion.
29:9. Be astonished, and wonder, waver, and stagger: be drunk, and not with wine: stagger, and not with drunkenness.
29:10. For the Lord hath mingled for you the spirit of a deep sleep, he will shut up your eyes, he will cover your prophets and princes, that see visions.
29:11. And the vision of all shall be unto you as the words of a book that is sealed which when they shall deliver to one that is learned, they shall say: Read this: and he shall answer: I cannot, for it is sealed.
29:12. And the book shall be given to one that knoweth no letters, and it shall be said to him: Read: and he shall answer: I know no letters.
29:13. And the Lord said: Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify me, but their heart is far from me, and they have feared me with the commandment and doctrines of men:
29:14. Therefore behold I will proceed to cause an admiration in this people, by a great and wonderful miracle: for wisdom shall perish from their wise men, and the understanding of their prudent men shall be hid.
29:15. Woe to you that are deep of heart, to hide your counsel from the Lord: and their works are in the dark, and they say: Who seeth us, and who knoweth us?
29:16. This thought of yours is perverse: as if the clay should think against the potter, and the work should say to the maker thereof: Thou madest me not: or the thing framed should say to him that fashioned it: Thou understandest not.
29:17. Is it not yet a very little while, and Libanus shall be turned into charmel, and charmel shall be esteemed as a forest?
Charmel… This word signifies a fruitful field.
29:18. And in that day the deaf shall hear the words of the book, and out of darkness and obscurity the eyes of the blind shall see.
29:19. And the meek shall increase their joy in the Lord, and the poor men shall rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.
29:20. For he that did prevail hath failed, the scorner is consumed, and they are all cut off that watched for iniquity:
29:21. That made men sin by word, and supplanted him that reproved them in the gate, and declined in vain from the just.
29:22. Therefore thus saith the Lord to the house of Jacob, he that redeemed Abraham: Jacob shall not now be confounded, neither shall his countenance now be ashamed:
29:23. But when he shall see his children, the work of my hands in the midst of him sanctifying my name, and they shall sanctify the Holy One of Jacob, and shall glorify the God of Israel:
29:24. And they that erred in spirit, shall know understanding, and they that murmured, shall learn the law.
Isaias Chapter 30
The people are blamed for their confidence in Egypt. God's mercies towards his church. The punishment of sinners.
30:1. Woe to you, apostate children, saith the Lord, that you would take counsel, and not of me: and would begin a web, and not by my spirit, that you might add sin upon sin:
30:2. Who walk to go down into Egypt, and have not asked at my mouth, hoping for help in the strength of Pharao, and trusting in the shadow of Egypt.
30:3. And the strength of Pharao shall be to your confusion, and the confidence of the shadow of Egypt to your shame.
30:4. For thy princes were in Tanis, and thy messengers came even to Hanes.
30:5. They were all confounded at a people that could not profit them: they were no help, nor to any profit, but to confusion and to reproach.
30:6. The burden of the beasts of the south. In a land of trouble and distress, from whence come the lioness, and the lion, the viper and the flying basilisk, they carry their riches upon the shoulders of beasts, and their treasures upon the bunches of camels to a people that shall not be able to profit them.
30:7. For Egypt shall help in vain, and to no purpose: therefore have I cried concerning this: It is pride only, sit still.
30:8. Now therefore go in and write for them upon box, and note it diligently in a book, and it shall be in the latter days for a testimony for ever.
30:9. For it is a people that provoketh to wrath, and lying children that will not hear the law of God.
30:10. Who say to the seers: See not: and to them that behold: Behold not for us those things that are right: speak unto us pleasant things, see errors for us.
30:11. Take away from me the way, turn away the path from me, let the Holy One of Israel cease from before us.
30:12. Therefore thus saith the Holy One of Israel: Because you have rejected this word, and have trusted in oppression and tumult, and have leaned upon it:
30:13. Therefore shall this iniquity be to you as a breach that falleth, and is found wanting in a high wall, for the destruction thereof shall come on a sudden, when it is not looked for.
30:14. And it shall be broken small, as the potter's vessel is broken all to pieces with mighty breaking, and there shall not a sherd be found of the pieces thereof, wherein a little fire may be carried from the hearth, or a little water be drawn out of the pit.
30:15. For thus saith the Lord God the Holy One of Israel: If you return and be quiet, you shall be saved: in silence and in hope shall your strength be. And you would not:
30:16. But have said: No, but we will flee to horses: therefore shall you flee. And we will mount upon swift ones: therefore shall they be swifter that shall pursue after you.
30:17. A thousand men shall flee for fear of one: and for fear of five shall you flee, till you be left as the mast of ship on the top of a mountain, and as an ensign upon a hill.
30:18. Therefore the Lord waiteth that he may have mercy on you: and therefore shall he be exalted sparing you: because the Lord is the God of judgment: blessed are all they that wait for him.
30:19. For the people of Sion shall dwell in Jerusalem: weeping thou shalt not weep, he will surely have pity on thee: at the voice of thy cry, as soon as he shall hear, he will answer thee.
30:20. And the Lord will give you spare bread, and short water: and will not cause thy teacher to flee away from thee any more, and thy eyes shall see thy teacher.
30:21. And thy ears shall hear the word of one admonishing thee behind thy back: This is the way, walk ye in it: and go not aside neither to the right hand, nor to the left.
30:22. And thou shalt defile the plates of thy graven things of silver, and the garment of thy molten things of gold, and shalt cast them away as the uncleanness of a menstruous woman. Thou shalt say to it: Get thee hence.
30:23. And rain shall be given to thy seed, wheresoever thou shalt sow in the land: and the bread of the corn of the land shall be most plentiful, and fat. The lamb in that day shall feed at large in thy possession:
30:24. And thy oxen, and the ass colts that till the ground, shall eat mingled provender as it was winnowed in the floor.
30:25. And there shall be upon every high mountain, and upon every elevated hill rivers of running waters in the day of the slaughter of many, when the tower shall fall.
30:26. And the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold, as the light of seven days: in the day when the Lord shall bind up the wound of his people, and shall heal the stroke of their wound.
30:27. Behold the name of the Lord cometh from afar, his wrath burneth, and is heavy to bear: his lips are filled with indignation, and his tongue as a devouring fire.
30:28. His breath as a torrent overflowing even to the midst of the neck, to destroy the nations unto nothing, and the bridle of error that was in the jaws of the people.
30:29. You shall have a song as in the night of the sanctified solemnity, and joy of heart, as where one goeth with a pipe, to come into the mountain of the Lord, to the Mighty One of Israel.
30:30. And the Lord shall make the glory of his voice to be heard, and shall shew the terror of his arm, in the threatening of wrath, and the flame of devouring fire: he shall crush to pieces with whirlwind, and hailstones.
30:31. For at the voice of the Lord the Assyrian shall fear being struck with the rod.
30:32. And the passage of the rod shall be strongly grounded, which the Lord shall make to rest upon him with timbrels and harps, and in great battles he shall overthrow them.
30:33. For Topheth is prepared from yesterday, prepared by the king, deep, and wide. The nourishment thereof is fire and much wood: the breath of the Lord as a torrent of brimstone kindling it.
Topheth… It is the same as Gehenna, and is taken for hell.
Isaias Chapter 31
The folly of trusting to Egypt, and forgetting God. He will fight for his people against the Assyrians.
31:1. Woe to them that go down to Egypt for help, trusting in horses, and putting their confidence in chariots, because they are many: and in horsemen, because they are very strong: and have not trusted in the Holy One of Israel, and have not sought after the Lord.
31:2. But he that is the wise one hath brought evil, and hath not removed his words: and he will rise up against the house of the wicked, and against the aid of them that work iniquity.
31:3. Egypt is man, and not God: and their horses, flesh, and not spirit: and the Lord shall put down his hand, and the helper shall fall, and he that is helped shall fall, and they shall all be confounded together.
31:4. For thus saith the Lord to me: Like as the lion roareth, and the lions whelp upon his prey, and when a multitude of shepherds shall come against him, he will not fear at their voice, nor be afraid of their multitude: so shall the Lord of hosts come down to fight upon mount Sion, and upon the hill thereof.
31:5. As birds flying, so will the Lord of hosts protect Jerusalem, protecting and delivering, passing over and saving.
31:6. Return as you had deeply revolted, O children of Israel.
31:7. For in that day a man shall cast away his idols of silver, and his idols of gold, which your hands have made for you to sin.
31:8. And the Assyrian shall fall by the sword not of a man, and the sword not of a man shall devour him, and he shall flee not at the face of the sword, and his young men shall be tributaries.
31:9. And his strength shall pass away with dread, and his princes fleeing shall be afraid: the Lord hath said it, whose fire is in Sion, and his furnace in Jerusalem.
Isaias Chapter 32
The blessings of the reign of Christ. The desolation of the Jews, and prosperity of the church of Christ.
32:1. Behold a king shall reign in justice, and princes shall rule in judgment.
32:2. And a man shall be as when one is hid from the wind, and hideth himself from a storm, as rivers of waters in drought, and the shadow of a rock that standeth out in a desert land.
32:3. The eyes of them that see shall not be dim, and the ears of them that hear shall hearken diligently.
32:4. And the heart of fools shall understand knowledge, and the tongue of stammerers shall speak readily and plain.
32:5. The fool shall no more be called prince: neither shall the deceitful be called great:
32:6. For the fool will speak foolish things, and his heart will work iniquity, to practise hypocrisy, and speak to the Lord deceitfully, and to make empty the soul of the hungry, and take away drink from the thirsty.
32:7. The vessels of the deceitful are most wicked: for he hath framed devices to destroy the meek, with lying words, when the poor man speaketh judgment.
32:8. But the prince will devise such things as are worthy of a prince, and he shall stand above the rulers.
32:9. Rise up, ye rich women, and hear my voice: ye confident daughters, give ear to my speech.
32:10. For after days and a year, you that are confident shall be troubled: for the vintage is at an end, the gathering shall come no more.
32:11. Be astonished, ye rich women, be troubled, ye confident ones: strip you, and be confounded, gird your loins.
32:12. Mourn for your breasts, for the delightful country, for the fruitful vineyard.
32:13. Upon the land of my people shall thorns and briers come up: how much more upon all the houses of joy, of the city that rejoiced?
32:14. For the house is forsaken, the multitude of the city is left, darkness and obscurity are come upon its dens for ever. A joy of wild asses, the pastures of flocks.
32:15. Until the spirit be poured upon us from on high: and the desert shall be as a charmel, and charmel shall be counted for a forest.
32:16. An judgment shall dwell in the wilderness, and justice shall sit in charmel.
32:17. And the work of justice shall be peace, and the service of justice quietness, and security for ever.
32:18. And my people shall sit in the beauty of peace, and in the tabernacles of confidence, and in wealthy rest.
32:19. But hail shall be in the descent of the forest, and the city shall be made very low.
32:20. Blessed are ye that sow upon all waters, sending thither the foot of the ox and the ass.
Isaias Chapter 33
God's revenge against the enemies of his church. The happiness of the heavenly Jerusalem.
33:1. Woe to thee that spoilest, shalt not thou thyself also be spoiled? and thou that despisest, shalt not thyself also be despised? when thou shalt have made an end of spoiling, thou shalt be spoiled: when being wearied thou shalt cease to despise, thou shalt be despised.
That spoilest, etc… This is particularly directed to Sennacherib.
33:2. O Lord, have mercy on us: for we have waited for thee: be thou our arm in the morning, and our salvation in the time of trouble.
33:3. At the voice of the angel the people fled, and at the lifting up thyself the nations are scattered.
33:4. And your spoils shall be gathered together as the locusts are gathered, as when the ditches are full of them.
33:5. The Lord is magnified, for he hath dwelt on high: he hath filled Sion with judgment and justice.
33:6. And there shall be faith in thy times: riches of salvation, wisdom and knowledge: the fear of the Lord is his treasure.
33:7. Behold they that see shall cry without, the angels of peace shall weep bitterly.
The angels of peace… The messengers or deputies sent to negotiate a peace.
33:8. The ways are made desolate, no one passeth by the road, the covenant is made void, he hath rejected the cities, he hath not regarded the men.
33:9. The land hath mourned, and languished: Libanus is confounded, and become foul, and Saron is become as a desert: and Basan and Carmel are shaken.
33:10. Now will I rise up, saith the Lord: now will I be exalted, now will I lift up myself.
33:11. You shall conceive heat, you shall bring forth stubble: your breath as fire shall devour you.
33:12. And the people shall be as ashes after a fire, as a bundle of thorns they shall be burnt with fire.
33:13. Hear, you that are far off, what I have done, and you that are near know my strength.
33:14. The sinners in Sion are afraid, trembling hath seized upon the hypocrites. Which of you can dwell with devouring fire? which of you shall dwell with everlasting burnings?
33:15. He that walketh in justices, and speaketh truth, that casteth away avarice by oppression, and shaketh his hands from all bribes, that stoppeth his ears lest he hear blood, and shutteth his eyes that he may see no evil.
33:16. He shall dwell on high, the fortifications of rocks shall be his highness: bread is given him, his waters are sure.
33:17. His eyes shall see the king in his beauty, they shall see the land far off.
33:18. Thy heart shall meditate fear: where is the learned? where is he that pondered the words of the law? where is the teacher of little ones?
33:19. The shameless people thou shalt not see, the people of profound speech: so that thou canst not understand the eloquence of his tongue, in whom there is no wisdom.
33:20. Look upon Sion the city of our solemnity: thy eyes shall see Jerusalem, a rich habitation, a tabernacle that cannot be removed: neither shall the nails thereof be taken away for ever, neither shall any of the cords thereof be broken.
33:21. Because only there our Lord is magnificent: a place of rivers, very broad and spacious streams: no ship with oars shall pass by it, neither shall the great galley pass through it.
Of rivers… He speaks of the rivers of endless joys that flow from the throne of God to water the heavenly Jerusalem, where no enemy's ship can come, etc.
33:22. For the Lord is our judge, the Lord is our lawgiver, the Lord is our king: he will save us.
33:23. Thy tacklings are loosed, and they shall be of no strength: thy mast shall be in such condition, that thou shalt not be able to spread the flag. Then shall the spoils of much prey be divided: the lame shall take the spoil.
Thy tacklings… He speaks of the enemies of the church, under the allegory of a ship that is disabled.
33:24. Neither shall he that is near, say: I am feeble. The people that dwell therein, shall have their iniquity taken away from them.
Isaias Chapter 34
The general judgment of the wicked.
34:1. Come near, ye Gentiles, and hear, and hearken, ye people: let the earth hear, and all that is therein, the world, and every thing that cometh forth of it.
34:2. For the indignation of the Lord is upon all nations, and his fury upon all their armies: he hath killed them, and delivered them to slaughter.
34:3. Their slain shall be cast forth, and out of their carcasses shall rise a stink: the mountains shall be melted with their blood.
34:4. And all the host of the heavens shall pine away, and the heavens shall be folded together as a book: and all their host shall fall down as the leaf falleth from the vine, and from the fig tree.
And all the host of the heavens… That is, the sun, moon, and stars.
34:5. For my sword is inebriated in heaven: behold it shall come down upon Idumea, and upon the people of my slaughter unto judgment.
Idumea… Under the name of Idumea, or Edom a people that were enemies of the Jews, are here understood the wicked in general, the enemies of God and his church.
34:6. The sword of the Lord is filled with blood, it is made thick with the blood of lambs and buck goats, with the blood of rams full of marrow: for there is a victim of the Lord in Bosra and a great slaughter in the land of Edom.
34:7. And the unicorns shall go down with them, and the bulls with the mighty: their land shall be soaked with blood, and their ground with the fat of fat ones.
The unicorns… That is, the great and mighty.
34:8. For it is the day of the vengeance of the Lord, the year of recompenses of the judgment of Sion.
The year of recompenses, etc… When the persecutors of Sion, that is, of the church, shall receive their reward.
34:9. And the streams thereof shall be turned into pitch, and the ground thereof into brimstone: and the land thereof shall become burning pitch.
34:10. Night and day it shall not be quenched, the smoke thereof shall go up for ever: from generation to generation it shall lie waste, none shall pass through it for ever and ever.
34:11. The bittern and ericius shall possess it: and the ibis and the raven shall dwell in it: and a line shall be stretched out upon it, to bring it to nothing, and a plummet, unto desolation.
34:12. The nobles thereof shall not be there: they shall call rather upon the king, and all the princes thereof shall be nothing.
34:13. And thorns and nettles shall grow up in its houses, and the thistle in the fortresses thereof: and it shall be the habitation of dragons, and the pasture of ostriches.
34:14. And demons and monsters shall meet, and the hairy ones shall cry out one to another, there hath the lamia lain down, and found rest for herself.
34:15. There hath the ericius had its hole, and brought up its young ones, and hath dug round about, and cherished them in the shadow thereof: thither are the kites gathered together one to another.
34:16. Search ye diligently in the book of the Lord, and read: not one of them was wanting, one hath not sought for the other: for that which proceedeth out of my mouth, he hath commanded, and his spirit it hath gathered them.
34:17. And he hath cast the lot for them, and his hand hath divided it to them by line: they shall possess it for ever, from generation to generation they shall dwell therein.
Isaias Chapter 35
The joyful flourishing of Christ's kingdom: in his church shall be a holy and secure way.
35:1. The land that was desolate and impassable shall be glad, and the wilderness shall rejoice, and shall flourish like the lily.
35:2. It shall bud forth and blossom, and shall rejoice with joy and praise: the glory of Libanus is given to it: the beauty of Carmel, and Saron, they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the beauty of our God.
35:3. Strengthen ye the feeble hands, and confirm the weak knees.
35:4. Say to the fainthearted: Take courage, and fear not: behold your God will bring the revenge of recompense: God himself will come and will save you.
35:5. Then shall the eyes of the blind be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped.
35:6. Then shall the lame man leap as a hart, and the tongue of the dumb shall be free: for waters are broken out in the desert, and streams in the wilderness.
35:7. And that which was dry land, shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water. In the dens where dragons dwelt before, shall rise up the verdure of the reed and the bulrush.
35:8. And a path and a way shall be there, and it shall be called the holy way: the unclean shall not pass over it, and this shall be unto you a straight way, so that fools shall not err therein.
35:9. No lion shall be there, nor shall any mischievous beast go up by it, nor be found there: but they shall walk there that shall be delivered.
35:10. And the redeemed of the Lord shall return, and shall come into Sion with praise, and everlasting joy shall be upon their heads: they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and mourning shall flee away.
Isaias Chapter 36
Sennacherib invades Juda: his blasphemies.
36:1. And it came to pass in the fourteenth year of king Ezechias, that Sennacherib king of the Assyrians came up against all the fenced cities of Juda, and took them.
36:2. And the king of the Assyrians sent Rabsaces from Lachis to Jerusalem, to king Ezechias with a great army, and he stood by the conduit of the upper pool in the way of the fuller's field.
36:3. And there went out to him Eliacim the son of Helcias, who was over the house, and Sobna the scribe, and Joahe the son of Asaph the recorder.
36:4. And Rabsaces said to them: Tell Ezechias: Thus saith the great king, the king of the Assyrians: What is this confidence wherein thou trustest?
36:5. Or with what counsel or strength dost thou prepare for war? on whom dost thou trust, that thou art revolted from me?
36:6. Lo thou trustest upon this broken staff of a reed, upon Egypt: upon which if a man lean, it will go into his hand, and pierce it: so is Pharao king of Egypt to all that trust in him.
36:7. But if thou wilt answer me: We trust in the Lord our God: is it not he whose high places and altars Ezechias hath taken away, and hath said to Juda and Jerusalem: You shall worship before this altar?
36:8. And now deliver thyself up to my lord the king of the Assyrians, and I will give thee two thousand horses, and thou wilt not be able on thy part to find riders for them.
36:9. And how wilt thou stand against the face of the judge of one place, of the least of my master's servants? But if thou trust in Egypt, in chariots and in horsemen:
36:10. And am I now come up without the Lord against this land to destroy it? The Lord said to me: Go up against this land, and destroy it.
36:11. And Eliacim, and Sobna, and Joahe said to Rabsaces: Speak to thy servants in the Syrian tongue: for we understand it: speak not to us in the Jews' language in the hearing of the people, that are upon the wall.
36:12. And Rabsaces said to them: Hath my master sent me to thy master and to thee, to speak all these words; and not rather to the men that sit on the wall; that they may eat their own dung, and drink their urine with you?
36:13. Then Rabsaces stood, and cried out with a loud voice in the Jews' language, and said: Hear the words of the great king, the king of the Assyrians.
36:14. Thus saith the king: Let not Ezechias deceive you, for he shall not be able to deliver you.
36:15. And let not Ezechias make you trust in the Lord, saying: The Lord will surely deliver us, and this city shall not be given into the hands of the king of the Assyrians.
36:16. Do not hearken to Ezechias: for thus said the king of the Assyrians: Do with me that which is for your advantage, and come out to me, and eat ye every one of his vine, and every one of his fig tree, and drink ye every one the water of his cistern,
36:17. Till I come and take you away to a land, like to your own, a land of corn and of wine, a land of bread and vineyards.
36:18. Neither let Ezechias trouble you, saying: The Lord will deliver us. Have any of the gods of the nations delivered their land out of the hand of the king of the Assyrians?
36:19. Where is the god of Emath and of Arphad? where is the god of Sepharvaim? have they delivered Samaria out of my hand?
36:20. Who is there among all the gods of these lands, that hath delivered his country out of my hand, that the Lord may deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?
36:21. And they held their peace, and answered him not a word. For the king had commanded, saying: Answer him not.
36:22. And Eliacim the son of Helcias, that was over the house, and Sobna the scribe, and Joahe the son of Asaph the recorder, went in to Ezechias with their garments rent, and told him the words of Rabsaces.
Isaias Chapter 37
Ezechias, his mourning and prayer. God's promise of protection. The
Assyrian army is destroyed. Sennacherib is slain.
37:1. And it came to pass, when king Ezechias had heard it, that he rent his garments and covered himself with sackcloth, and went into the house of the Lord.
37:2. And he sent Eliacim who was over the house, and Sobna the scribe, and the ancients of the priests covered with sackcloth, to Isaias the son of Amos the prophet.
37:3. And they said to him: Thus saith Ezechias: This day is a day of tribulation, and of rebuke, and of blasphemy: for the children are come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth.
37:4. It may be the Lord thy God will hear the words of Rabsaces, whom the king of the Assyrians his master hath sent to blaspheme the living God, and to reproach with words which the Lord thy God hath heard: wherefore lift up by prayer for the remnant that is left.
37:5. And the servants of Ezechias came to Isaias.
37:6. And Isaias said to them: Thus shall you say to your master: Thus saith the Lord: Be not afraid of the words that thou hast heard, with which the servants of the king of the Assyrians have blasphemed me.
37:7. Behold, I will send a spirit upon him, and he shall hear a message, and shall return to his own country, and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own country.
37:8. And Rabsaces returned, and found the king of the Assyrians besieging Lobna. For he had heard that he was departed from Lachis.
37:9. And he heard say about Tharaca the king of Ethiopia: He is come forth to fight against thee. And when he heard it, he sent messengers to Ezechias, saying:
37:10. Thus shall you speak to Ezechias the king of Juda, saying: Let not thy God deceive thee, in whom thou trustest, saying: Jerusalem shall not be given into the hands of the king of the Assyrians.
37:11. Behold thou hast heard all that the kings of the Assyrians have done to all countries which they have destroyed, and canst thou be delivered?
37:12. Have the gods of the nations delivered them whom my fathers have destroyed, Gozam, and Haram, and Reseph, and the children of Eden, that were in Thalassar?
37:13. Where is the king of Emath, and the king of Arphad, and the king of the city of Sepharvaim, of Ana, and of Ava?
37:14. And Ezechias took the letter from the hand of the messengers, and read it, and went up to the house of the Lord, and Ezechias spread it before the Lord.
37:15. And Ezechias prayed to the Lord, saying:
37:16. Lord of hosts, God of Israel who sitteth upon the cherubims, thou alone art the God of all the kingdoms of the earth, thou hast made heaven and earth.
37:17. Incline, O Lord, thy ear, and hear: open, O Lord, thy eyes, and see, and hear all the words of Sennacherib, which he hath sent to blaspheme the living God.
37:18. For of a truth, O Lord, the kings of the Assyrians have laid waste lands, and their countries.
37:19. And they have cast their gods into the fire, for they were not gods, but the works of men's hands, of wood and stone: and they broke them in pieces.
37:20. And now, O Lord our God, save us out of his hand: and let all the kingdoms of the earth know, that thou only art the Lord.
37:21. And Isaias the son of Amos sent to Ezechias, saying: Thus saith the Lord the God of Israel: For the prayer thou hast made to me concerning Sennacherib the king of the Assyrians:
37:22. This is the word which the Lord hath spoken of him: The virgin the daughter of Sion hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn: the daughter of Jerusalem hath wagged the head after thee.
37:23. Whom hast thou reproached, and whom hast thou blasphemed, and against whom hast thou exalted thy voice, and lifted up thy eyes on high? Against the Holy One of Israel.
37:24. By the hand of thy servants thou hast reproached the Lord: and hast said: With the multitude of my chariots I have gone up to the height of the mountains, to the top of Libanus: and I will cut down its tall cedars, and its choice fir trees, and will enter to the top of its height, to the forest of its Carmel.
Carmel… See these figurative expressions explained in the annotations on the nineteenth chapter of the fourth book of Kings.
37:25. I have digged, and drunk water, and have dried up with the sole of my foot, all the rivers shut up in banks.
37:26. Hast thou not heard what I have done to him of old? from the days of old I have formed it: and now I have brought it to effect: and it hath come to pass that hills fighting together, and fenced cities should be destroyed.
37:27. The inhabitants of them were weak of hand, they trembled, and were confounded: they became like the grass of the field, and the herb of the pasture, and like the grass of the housetops, which withered before it was ripe.
37:28. I know thy dwelling, and thy going out, and thy coming in, and thy rage against me.
37:29. When thou wast mad against me, thy pride came up to my ears: therefore I will put a ring in thy nose, and a bit between thy lips, and I will turn thee back by the way by which thou camest.
37:30. But to thee this shall be a sign: Eat this year the things that spring of themselves, and in the second year eat fruits: but in the third year sow and reap, and plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them.
37:31. And that which shall be saved of the house of Juda, and which is left, shall take root downward, and shall bear fruit upward:
37:32. For out of Jerusalem shall go forth a remnant, and salvation from mount Sion: the zeal of the Lord of hosts shall do this.
37:33. Wherefore thus saith the Lord concerning the king of the Assyrians: He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow into it, nor come before it with shield, nor cast a trench about it.
37:34. By the way that he came, he shall return, and into this city he shall not come, saith the Lord.
37:35. And I will protect this city, and will save it for my own sake, and for the sake of David my servant.
37:36. And the angel of the Lord went out and slew in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred and eighty-five thousand. And they arose in the morning, and behold they were all dead corpses.
37:37. And Sennacherib the king of the Assyrians went out and departed, and returned, and dwelt in Ninive.
37:38. And it came to pass, as he was worshipping in the temple of Nesroch his god, that Adramelech and Sarasar his sons slew him with the sword: and they fled into the land of Ararat, and Asarhaddon his son reigned in his stead.
Isaias Chapter 38
Ezechias being advertised that he shall die, obtains by prayer a prolongation of his life: in confirmation of which the sun goes back. The canticle of Ezechias.
38:1. In those days Ezechias was sick even to death, and Isaias the son of Amos the prophet cane unto him, and said to him: Thus saith the Lord: Take order with thy house, for thou shalt die, and not live.
38:2. And Ezechias turned his face toward the wall, and prayed to the Lord,
38:3. And said: I beseech thee, O Lord, remember how I have walked before thee in truth, and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good in thy sight. And Ezechias wept with great weeping.
38:4. And the word of the Lord came to Isaias, saying:
38:5. Go and say to Ezechias: Thus saith the Lord the God of David thy father: I have heard thy prayer, and I have seen thy tears: behold I will add to thy days fifteen years:
38:6. And I will deliver thee and this city out of the hand of the king of the Assyrians, and I will protect it.
38:7. And this shall be a sign to thee from the Lord, that the Lord will do this word which he hath spoken:
38:8. Behold I will bring again the shadow of the lines, by which it is now gone down in the sun dial of Achaz with the sun, ten lines backward. And the sun returned ten lines by the degrees by which it was gone down.
38:9. The writing of Ezechias king of Juda, when he had been sick, and was recovered of his sickness.
38:10. I said: In the midst of my days I shall go to the gates of hell: I sought for the residue of my years.
Hell… Sheol, or Hades, the region of the dead.
38:11. I said: I shall not see the Lord God in the land of the living. I shall behold man no more, nor the inhabitant of rest.
38:12. My generation is at an end, and it is rolled away from me, as a shepherd's tent. My life is cut off, as by a weaver: whilst I was yet but beginning, he cut me off: from morning even to night thou wilt make an end of me.
38:13. I hoped till morning, as a lion so hath he broken all my bones: from morning even to night thou wilt make an end of me.
38:14. I will cry like a young swallow, I will meditate like a dove: my eyes are weakened looking upward: Lord, I suffer violence, answer thou for me.
38:15. What shall I say, or what shall he answer for me, whereas he himself hath done it? I will recount to thee all my years in the bitterness of my soul.
38:16. O Lord, if man's life be such, and the life of my spirit be in such things as these, thou shalt correct me, and make me to live.
38:17. Behold in peace is my bitterness most bitter: but thou hast delivered my soul that it should not perish, thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back.
38:18. For hell shall not confess to thee, neither shall death praise thee: nor shall they that go down into the pit, look for thy truth.
38:19. The living, the living, he shall give praise to thee, as I do this day: the father shall make the truth known to the children.
38:20. O Lord, save me, and we will sing our psalms all the days of our life in the house of the Lord.
38:21. Now Isaias had ordered that they should take a lump of figs, and lay it as a plaster upon the wound, and that he should be healed.
38:22. And Ezechias had said: What shall be the sign that I shall go up to the house of the Lord?
Isaias Chapter 39
Ezechias shews all his treasures to the ambassadors of Babylon: upon which Isaias foretells the Babylonish captivity.
39:1. At that time Merodach Baladan, the son of Baladan king of Babylon, sent letters and presents to Ezechias: for he had heard that he had been sick and was recovered.
39:2. And Ezechias rejoiced at their coming, and he shewed them the storehouses of his aromatical spices, and of the silver, and of the gold, and of the sweet odours, and of the precious ointment, and all the storehouses of his furniture, and all things that were found in his treasures. There was nothing in his house, nor in all his dominion that Ezechias shewed them not.
39:3. Then Isaias the prophet came to king Ezechias, and said to him: What said these men, and from whence came they to thee? And Ezechias said: From a far country they came to me, from Babylon.
39:4. And he said: What saw they in thy house? And Ezechias said: All things that are in my house have they seen, there was not any thing which I have not shewn them in my treasures.
39:5. And Isaias said to Ezechias: Hear the word of the Lord of hosts.
39:6. Behold the days shall come that all that is in thy house, and that thy fathers have laid up in store until this day, shall be carried away into Babylon: there shall not any thing be left, saith the Lord.
39:7. And of thy children, that shall issue from thee, whom thou shalt beget, they shall take away, and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.
39:8. And Ezechias said to Isaias: The word of the Lord, which he hath spoken, is good. And he said: Only let peace and truth be in my days.
Isaias Chapter 40
The prophet comforts the people with the promise of the coming of Christ to forgive their sins. God's almighty power and majesty.
40:1. Be comforted, be comforted, my people, saith your God.
40:2. Speak ye to the heart of Jerusalem, and call to her: for her evil is come to an end, her iniquity is forgiven: she hath received of the hand of the Lord double for all her sins.
40:3. The voice of one crying in the desert: Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the wilderness the paths of our God.
40:4. Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall become straight, and the rough ways plain.
40:5. And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh together shall see, that the mouth of the Lord hath spoken.
40:6. The voice of one, saying: Cry. And I said: What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all the glory thereof as the flower of the field.
40:7. The grass is withered, and the flower is fallen, because the spirit of the Lord hath blown upon it. Indeed the people is grass:
40:8. The grass is withered, and the flower is fallen: but the word of our Lord endureth for ever.
40:9. Get thee up upon a high mountain, thou that bringest good tidings to Sion: lift up thy voice with strength, thou that bringest good tidings to Jerusalem: lift it up, fear not. Say to the cities of Juda: Behold your God:
40:10. Behold the Lord God shall come with strength, and his arm shall rule: Behold his reward is with him and his work is before him.
40:11. He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather together the lambs with his arm, and shall take them up in his bosom, and he himself shall carry them that are with young.
40:12. Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and weighed the heavens with his palm? who hath poised with three fingers the bulk of the earth, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance?
40:13. Who hath forwarded the spirit of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor, and hath taught him?
40:14. With whom hath he consulted, and who hath instructed him, and taught him the path of justice, and taught him knowledge, and shewed him the way of understanding?
40:15. Behold the Gentiles are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the smallest grain of a balance: behold the islands are as a little dust.
40:16. And Libanus shall not be enough to burn, nor the beasts thereof sufficient for a burnt offering.
40:17. All nations are before him as if they had no being at all, and are counted to him as nothing, and vanity.
40:18. To whom then have you likened God? or what image will you make for him?
40:19. Hath the workman cast a graven statue? or hath the goldsmith formed it with gold, or the silversmith with plates of silver?
40:20. He hath chosen strong wood, and that will not rot: the skilful workman seeketh how he may set up an idol that may not be moved.
40:21. Do you not know? hath it not been heard? hath it not been told you from the beginning? have you not understood the foundations of the earth?
40:22. It is he that sitteth upon the globe of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as locusts: he that stretcheth out the heavens as nothing, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in.
40:23. He that bringeth the searchers of secrets to nothing, that hath made the judges of the earth as vanity.
40:24. And surely their stock was neither planted, nor sown, nor rooted in the earth: suddenly he hath blown upon them, and they are withered, and a whirlwind shall take them away as stubble.
40:25. And to whom have ye likened me, or made me equal, saith the Holy One?
40:26. Lift up your eyes on high, and see who hath created these things: who bringeth out their host by number, and calleth them all by their names: by the greatness of his might, and strength, and power, not one of them was missing.
40:27. Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and speakest, O Israel: My way is hid from the Lord, and my judgment is passed over from my God?
40:28. Knowest thou not, or hast thou not heard? the Lord is the everlasting God, who hath created the ends of the earth: he shall not faint, nor labour, neither is there any searching out of his wisdom.
40:29. It is he that giveth strength to the weary, and increaseth force and might to them that are not.
40:30. You shall faint, and labour, and young men shall fall by infirmity.
40:31. But they that hope in the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall take wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.
Isaias Chapter 41
The reign of the just one: the vanity of idols.
41:1. Let the islands keep silence before me, and the nations take new strength: let them come near, and then speak, let us come near to judgment together.
41:2. Who hath raised up the just one from the east, hath called him to follow him? he shall give the nations in his sight, and he shall rule over kings: he shall give them as the dust to his sword, as stubble driven by the wind, to his bow.
41:3. He shall pursue them, he shall pass in peace, no path shall appear after his feet.
41:4. Who hath wrought and done these things, calling the generations from the beginning? I the Lord, I am the first and the last.
41:5. The islands saw it, and feared, the ends of the earth were astonished, they drew near, and came.
41:6. Every one shall help his neighbour, and shall say to his brother: Be of good courage.
41:7. The coppersmith striking with the hammer encouraged him that forged at that time, saying: It is ready for soldering: and he strengthened it with nails, that it should not be moved.
41:8. But thou Israel, art my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraham my friend:
41:9. In whom I have taken thee from the ends of the earth, and from the remote parts thereof have called thee, and said to thee: Thou art my servant, I have chosen thee, and have not cast thee away.
41:10. Fear not, for I am with thee: turn not aside, for I am thy God: I have strengthened thee, and have helped thee, and the right hand of my just one hath upheld thee.
41:11. Behold all that fight against thee shall be confounded and ashamed, they shall be as nothing, and the men shall perish that strive against thee.
41:12. Thou shalt seek them, and shalt not find the men that resist thee: they shall be as nothing: and as a thing consumed the men that war against thee.
41:13. For I am the Lord thy God, who take thee by the hand, and say to thee: Fear not, I have helped thee.
41:14. Fear not, thou worm of Jacob, you that are dead of Israel: I have helped thee, saith the Lord: and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel.
41:15. I have made thee as a new thrashing wain, with teeth like a saw: thou shalt thrash the mountains, and break them in pieces: and shalt make the hills as chaff.
41:16. Thou shalt fan them, and the wind shall carry them away, and the whirlwind shall scatter them: and thou shalt rejoice in the Lord, in the Holy One of Israel thou shalt be joyful.
41:17. The needy and the poor seek for waters, and there are none: their tongue hath been dry with thirst. I the Lord will hear them, I the God of Israel will not forsake them.
41:18. I will open rivers in the high hills, and fountains in the midst of the plains: I will turn the desert into pools of waters, and the impassable land into streams of waters.
41:19. I will plant in the wilderness the cedar, and the thorn, and the myrtle, and the olive tree: I will set in the desert the fir tree, the elm, and the box tree together:
The thorn… In Hebrew, the shitta, or setim, a tree resembling the white thorn.
41:20. That they may see and know, and consider, and understand together that the hand of the Lord hath done this, and the Holy One of Israel hath created it.
41:21. Bring your cause near, saith the Lord: bring hither, if you have any thing to allege, saith the King of Jacob.
41:22. Let them come, and tell us all things that are to come: tell us the former things what they were: and we will set our heart upon them and shall know the latter end of them, and tell us the things that are to come.
41:23. Shew the things that are to come hereafter, and we shall know that ye are gods. Do ye also good or evil, if you can: and let us speak, and see together.
41:24. Behold, you are of nothing, and your work of that which hath no being: he that hath chosen you is an abomination.
41:25. I have raised up one from the north, and he shall come from the rising of the sun: he shall call upon my name, and he shall make princes to be as dirt, and as the potter treading clay.
41:26. Who hath declared from the beginning, that we may know: and from time of old, that we may say: Thou art just. There is none that sheweth, nor that foretelleth, nor that heareth your words.
41:27. The first shall say to Sion: Behold they are here, and to Jerusalem I will give an evangelist.
41:28. And I saw, and there was no one even among them to consult, or who, when I asked, could answer a word.
41:29. Behold they are all in the wrong, and their works are vain: their idols are wind and vanity.
Isaias Chapter 42
The office of Christ. The preaching of the gospel to the Gentiles. The blindness and reprobation of the Jews.
42:1. Behold my servant, I will uphold him: my elect, my soul delighteth in him: I have given my spirit upon him, he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.
My servant… Christ, who according to his humanity, is the servant of
God.
42:2. He shall not cry, nor have respect to person, neither shall his voice be heard abroad.
42:3. The bruised reed he shall not break, and smoking flax he shall not quench, he shall bring forth judgment unto truth.
42:4. He shall not be sad, nor troublesome, till he set judgment in the earth, and the islands shall wait for his law.
42:5. Thus saith the Lord God that created the heavens, and stretched them out: that established the earth, and the things that spring out of it: that giveth breath to the people upon it, and spirit to them that tread thereon.
42:6. I the Lord have called thee in justice, and taken thee by the hand, and preserved thee. And I have given thee for a covenant of the people, for a light of the Gentiles:
42:7. That thou mightest open the eyes of the blind, and bring forth the prisoner out of prison, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison house.
42:8. I the Lord, this is my name: I will not give my glory to another, nor my praise to graven things.
42:9. The things that were first, behold they are come: and new things do I declare: before they spring forth, I will make you hear them.
42:10. Sing ye to the Lord a new song, his praise is from the ends of the earth: you that go down to the sea, and all that are therein: ye islands, and ye inhabitants of them.
42:11. Let the desert and the cities thereof be exalted: Cedar shall dwell in houses: ye inhabitants of Petra, give praise, they shall cry from the top of the mountains.
Petra… A city that gives name to Arabia Petraea.
42:12. They shall give glory to the Lord, and shall declare his praise in the islands.
42:13. The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man, as a man of war shall he stir up zeal: he shall shout and cry: he shall prevail against his enemies.
42:14. I have always held my peace, I have kept silence, I have been patient, I will speak now as a woman in labour: I will destroy, and swallow up at once.
42:15. I will lay waste the mountains and hills, and will make all their grass to wither: and I will turn rivers into islands, and will dry up the standing pools.
42:16. And I will lead the blind into the way which they know not: and in the paths which they were ignorant of I will make them walk: I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight: these things have I done to them, and have not forsaken them.
42:17. They are turned back: let them be greatly confounded, that trust in a graven thing, that say to a molten thing: You are our god.
42:18. Hear, ye deaf, and, ye blind, behold that you may see.
42:19. Who is blind, but my servant? or deaf, but he to whom I have sent my messengers? Who is blind, but he that is sold? or who is blind, but the servant of the Lord?