Isaiah 29:13-24

2. THE SECRET COUNSEL OF MEN, AND THE SECRET COUNSEL OF GOD

Isaiah 29:13-24

13          Wherefore the Lord said,

Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth,

And with their lips do honor me,But have removed their heart far from me,And their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men;

14     Therefore, behold, 16I will proceed to do a marvellous work among this people,

Even a marvellous work and a wonder;

For the wisdom of their wise men shall perish,

And the understanding of their prudent men shall be hid.

15     Woe unto them that seek deep to hide their counsel from the Lord,

And their works are in the dark,And they say, Who seeth us? and who knoweth us?

16     17Surely your turning of things upside down shall be esteemed as the potter’s clay;

For shall the work say of him that made it, He made me not?Or shall the thing framed say of him that framed it, He had no understanding?

17     Is it not yet a very little while,

And Lebanon shall be turned into a fruitful field,And the fruitful field shall be esteemed as a forest?

18     And in that day shall the deaf hear the words of the book,

And the eyes of the blind shall seeOut of obscurity, and out of darkness.

19     The meek also 18shall increase their joy in the Lord,

And the poor among men shall rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.

20     For the terrible one is brought to nought,

And the scorner is consumed,And all that watch for 19iniquity are cut off:

21     That make a man an offender 20for a word,

And lay a snare for him that reproveth in the gate,And turn aside the just 21for a thing of nought.

22     Therefore thus saith the Lord, who redeemed Abraham,

Concerning the house of Jacob,Jacob shall not now be ashamed,Neither shall his face now wax pale.

23     22But when he seeth his children, the work of mine hands, in the midst of him,

They shall sanctify my name,And sanctify the Holy One of Jacob,And shall fear the God of Israel.

24     They also that erred in spirit 23shall come to understanding,

And they that murmured shall learn doctrine.

TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL

Isaiah 29:13. That we are to read not נִגַשׂ (with the Targum and many MSS. and Editions, in the sense of “to urge, trouble, torment one’s self,”) but נִגַשׁ, is shown by the antithetic רִחַק. That contrary to the accentuation בפיו is to be connected with נגשׁ, is apparent from this, that the people are to be reproached, not with drawing near to God in general, but with the outward, deceitful approach to Him. The great liberty which in Hebrew is indulged in with reference to person and number, is seen from כבדוני and יראתם in relation to &בפיו שׂפּתיו and לבו. We have to take רחק as a causative, and at the same time intensive Piel (to make removal with zeal = to strive to get away).

Isaiah 29:14. On יוֹסִף as the third person comp. on Isaiah 28:16. [יוֹסִף is the third person of the future. There is an ellipsis to be supplied: Behold, I (am he who) will add, etc.—D. M.]. אֵת after הפליא is not the sign of the accusative, but is the preposition. Instead of a second infinitive, a noun of the same stem פלא is attached to the infinitive absolute (comp. Isaiah 22:17-18; Isaiah 24:19).

Isaiah 29:15. חעמיק is the proper causative Hiphil=to make a deepening, a sinking. At the same time the construction with מִן is a pregnant one; but לסתיר [syncopated Hiphil comp. Isaiah 23:11—D. M.] is not a statement of the design, but is the ablative or gerundine infinitivus modalis, which when united with a causative conjugation, can be expressed by us by a verb with any adverb, as here: who deep from Jehovah hide, etc. Comp. Jeremiah 49:8; Jeremiah 49:30, and as to the usus loquendi Isaiah 7:11; Isaiah 30:33; Isaiah 31:6. אִם in Isaiah 29:16 corresponds to the Latin an, and marks the second member of a disjunctive question, the first of which is to be supplied.

Isaiah 29:20. שָׁקֵד σπουδάζειν, alacrem esse, vigilare, invigilare, is elsewhere always construed with עַל (Jeremiah 1:12; Jeremiah 5:6; Jeremiah 31:28; Jeremiah 44:27; Proverbs 8:34; Job 21:32). This word is found in Isaiah only here. The construction in this place is to be judged according to such forms of expression as שָׁבֵי פֶשַׁע (Isaiah 59:20), חֲלוּץ צָבָא (Numbers 32:27) and similar phrases. The form יְקשׁוּן might, considered by itself, be the perfect (comp. יָקשְׁתִּי Jeremiah 50:24), as the form יָקשֽׁוּ with the primitive ן must be יְקשֽׁוּן according to the rule that a closed syllable can be without the tone only when it has a short vowel, and an open syllable precedes (comp. יְקוּמֽוּן—יָֽקוּמוּ Ewald, § 85, a; 88, c). But if we have regard to the syntax, the imperfect (future) is more correct, because the Prophet has in his mind not merely single definite facts, but the permanent habit of those people. The form is in this case to be derived from קוֹשׁ, which occurs only here.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

1. The Prophet urges the people to fear Jehovah, and to trust in Him alone. Even in Hezekiah’s times the people were not pleased to do so. On this account the preceding announcement (Isaiah 29:1-8), notwithstanding the glorious promise with which it ends, was to so many an offence (Isaiah 29:9-12). The Prophet, therefore, directs now his discourse against those who honor the Lord with merely external, ceremonial service, and not from the heart (Isaiah 29:13), and announces that the Lord will deal strangely with them, and that their wisdom will be brought to shame (Isaiah 29:14). He further reproves those who imagine that they can carry out in the most profound secresy the plans of their untheocratic policy (Isaiah 29:15), by reminding them that the clay can never be equal to the potter, or the work formed from clay be able to deny the potter, or accuse him of ignorance (Isaiah 29:16). A great change will soon happen: Assyria, which is like Lebanon, shall be brought low; Judah, which resembles only Carmel, shall be highly exalted. Then people will understand the words of the Prophet, which they had before despised, and will perceive that they are true and salutary. But behind that deliverance, which belongs to the history of the nation, the Prophet discerns also Messianic blessing. The comparison has therefore this meaning also for him, that the wilderness shall become uncultivated land, while uncultivated land shall become a wilderness (Isaiah 29:17). This means that a poor condition of external nature shall be remedied by the divine favor, and, conversely, a condition of high culture shall, by the withdrawal of the divine favor, pass into a state of wildness; the deaf shall hear, the blind see (Isaiah 29:18); the poor and oppressed shall become strong and joyful in the Lord (Isaiah 29:19). The violent and false shall be exterminated (Isaiah 29:20-21). For the Lord, who redeemed Abraham will bring Jacob to honor (Isaiah 29:22). For when Jacob shall see the Lord’s wonderful work for his salvation, he will sanctify the Lord (Isaiah 29:23), and understand what makes for his peace (Isaiah 29:24).

2. Wherefore the Lord said——be hid.

Isaiah 29:13-14. By means of ויאמר the Prophet connects what he has to say with the immediately foregoing. He indicates by this verbal form that what follows is occasioned by the stupid and perverse behaviour of the people (Isaiah 29:9-10). That perversity had its root in the people trusting more in themselves and their wisdom than in the Lord. They, therefore, thought that they could satisfy the Lord, whose worship Hezekiah lately imposed on them, by the performance of outward ceremonial service. For the rest, in what concerned their life and conduct, and especially in their policy, they went their own ways. The Lord had already said (Deuteronomy 6:4 sqq.), that He is not satisfied with mere ceremonial service, but desires hearty love from His people. But it was this chief and greatest commandment (Matthew 22:38) which Israel never learned. Hence till the time of the exile the inclination to idolatry prevailed, and if they at times served the Lord, this was only as a pause in the song. And the reformations of Hezekiah and Josiah were no expression of the mind of the people, and were consequently not of long duration. Manasseh followed Hezekiah, and Jehoiakim and Zedekiah followed Josiah. But Isaiah here takes up earlier utterances (Psalms 50:0; Amos 5:21 sqq.; Micah 6:6 sq.). He afterwards returns to this subject (Isaiah 58:2 sqq., comp. Isaiah 1:11 sqq.). The expression מצוה מלמדה is found only here. When we compare such expressions as עֶגְלָה מלמדה. Hosea 10:11, מְלֻמּדֵי שִׁיר1Ch 25:7, מלמדי מלהמהSon 3:8, we perceive that in מלמדה as here used, there lies the idea of training, of external discipline and accustoming. [The complaint is that their religion, instead of being founded on the authority of God’s word, rested on human ordinances.—D. M.]. The punishment for this hypocritical conduct of the people towards Jehovah is that the Lordcontinues to deal with them in a wonderful way. Wonderful had been all the ways which the Lord had from the beginning pursued towards the people. The Prophet seems to wish by the word הסתתר to prepare the transition to Isaiah 29:15. From the wisdom, which must hide itself, because it is brought to disgrace, he passes over to the wisdom which desires to hide itself, while it cannot do so.

3. Woe unto them——understanding.

Isaiah 29:15-16. We clearly perceive here how significant was the position of the great Prophets. They might be said to be the eye and the mouth of Jehovah. They watched over the course of the theocracy, and the leaders of it could not but respect them. If then the policy approved by the leaders was untheocratic, they must fear the word of the Prophets. For their word was the word of Jehovah. When, therefore, there was a consciousness of an untheocratic aim, care was taken to conceal the political measures from the Prophets. Thus Ahaz sought to hide from Isaiah his Assyrian policy (7). Here likewise Hezekiah tries to keep secret his Egyptian policy. For even Hezekiah does not seem to have risen to the height of the only truly theocratic policy, which must consist in having the Lord alone as their support. והיה וגו׳. Not merely is the plan secretly concocted, but the execution of it, too, takes place with all secresy. מחשׁך, in Isaiah besides only Isaiah 42:16. מעשׂיהם, so far as the form is concerned, might be singular. But as the copula הָיָה precedes, מעשׂיחם can also be the plural, and this view corresponds better to the usus loquendi elsewhere (Isaiah 41:29; Isaiah 59:6; Isaiah 66:18). הפככם Isaiah 29:16 is an exclamation: O your perverting! That is, how ye pervert things! They act, as if their wisdom were greater than the wisdom of God, as if they could therefore review, determine, and according to their pleasure influence and direct the thoughts of the Lord, while they are but clay in the hand of the potter. The word הפככם (on account of the Dagesh lene, not from the Infin Kal, but from the substantive הֹפֶךְ, which occurs only here, comp. הֵפֶך הֶפֶךְEze 16:34) is to be taken in an active signification, so that it marks not so much perversity, as the perversion of ideas which proceeds from perversity, as is in Isaiah 29:15 implicitly, and in Isaiah 29:16 explicitly evinced. If the potter were clay, and the clay were potter, then the clay could determine and direct the potter, could for this purpose lead him astray, deceive him, etc. Either, then, the Israelites are perverse, or the potter is not clay. If indeed the clay were potter, then the former could justly say: he, the potter made me not,—or he understands and observes nothing. This is what Israel says in imagining that he is able to lead astray the Prophet, that is, the omniscient Lord Himself. While the politicians forge Hezekiah’s plans, they think that they knead them, as potters do their vessels, according to their pleasure, and unobserved by the Lord, while they themselves are yet but clay.

4. Is it not yet——a thing of nought

Isaiah 29:17-21. An end will be put to this evil condition. The Lord Himself will reform His people, and that thoroughly. Then the deaf will hear, and the blind see, and to the poor the Gospel will be preached. But those proud, imperious and infatuated politicians, who forcibly suppress all opposition against their line of action, will go to ruin. When the Prophet holds out the prospect of this reformation within a brief period, he does this in the exercise of that prophetic manner of contemplation which reckons the times not according to a human but a divine measure. For in fact the Prophet here beholds along with, and in what is proximate the time of the end. The prospect of blessedness which he presents belongs also to the days of the Messiah, as we clearly perceive from Isaiah 29:18-19. The expression עוד מעט מזער is used thus in Isaiah 10:25 also. Comp. Isaiah 26:20; Isaiah 54:7. In a short time, therefore, Lebanon shall become a fruitful field, and the fruitful field a forest. The expression can be variously explained. It seems to me to denote primarily that the Lord can bring down that which is high, and raise that which is low. And in this sense the word was fulfilled in the overthrow of Sennacherib. Then Assyria, the lofty Lebanon, became the low Carmel; but Judah, which was a little mount, and low plain, became a lofty wooded mountain-range. Thereby it became at the same time evident how false the untheocratic policy was in its calculation, and how truly the Lord’s mouth spoke by the Prophet. Lebanon and the forest represent wild nature, or the natural wilderness; the fruitful field again represents a state of culture (Isaiah 10:18; Isaiah 37:24). All depends on the essential character, the nature of a thing. What in its nature and essence is good, although it looks rough and wild as the wooded mountain-range, shall yet gradually, even in outward appearance, become a fruitful cultivated land; but what is in its nature rough and wild, even when it appears to be cultivated, will certainly sooner or later manifest its true nature as a wilderness, in a corresponding external appearance. In short, the true nature of things must at last be manifest. [“The only natural interpretation of the verse, is that which regards it as prophetic of a mutual change of condition, the first becoming last and the last first.”—Alexander. D. M.].

This form of speech was probably proverbial, and seems to me in the form in which it here lies to bear the meaning assigned to it. That it was used in yet another form, and then naturally in a signification modified as the case required, we can see from Isaiah 32:15. Instead of שָׁב we find וְהָיָה in Isaiah 32:15. The passage before us seems to be the only one in which שׁוּב is undoubtedly employed in this wider signification = to turn one’s self from one direction to another (it properly signifies; to turn one’s self back). The definite article before כרמל and יער is the generic (comp. Isaiah 29:11). כרמל is used nine times by Isaiah 10:18; Isaiah 16:10; Isaiah 29:17 (bis); Isaiah 22:15-16; Isaiah 33:9 and Isaiah 35:2 (proper name); Isaiah 37:24. The expression יֵחָשֵׁב לְ is not meant to affirm that the fruitful field is merely esteemed as a forest, without really being such. That it really is such, is what the Prophet means to affirm. In the following verses the proverbial and figurative expression, Isaiah 29:17, is illustrated. The deaf shall in that day (i. e., in the time indicated by מעט מזער) hear words of the writing, and the blind will see out of obscurity, and out of darkness.—When the bound senses of the deaf and dumb can freely unfold themselves, when the love of life, which is kept under in the poor and wretched, can display itself without impediment, then Lebanon, the wooded mountain range, has become a fruitful field, for then nature has advanced from neglected disorder to a well-ordered, cultivated condition. When it is said that the deaf will hear, דברי ספר, the word ספר seems superfluous. But the Prophet alludes evidently to Isaiah 29:11, from which it is at the same time clear that he is not speaking of physical deafness, etc. It was there declared of the people present that the Lord had poured out upon them a spirit of sleep (in which, as all know, one does not hear), and bound up their eyes so that the prophecy was to them as the words of a sealed book. When then Lebanon has become a fruitful field, and nature shall have given place to grace, then too the ears of the people that were previously deaf will be opened, and they will understand the דִּבְרֵי סֵפֶר הֶחָתוּם, i. e., the words of the prophecy proceeding from the Lord through His Prophets, and will emerge from gloom. (אֹפֶל only here in Isaiah) and darkness, (in which they hitherto were with their eyes bound up by the Lord), so as to behold the light (comp. 30. 5). They will, therefore, perceive also the errors of their policy, and see that the word of the Prophet which shocked them, pointed out the true way of safety. They who were deaf and blind were also unhappy, just for this cause. When they hear and see, then are they happy men, delivered from oppression and distress, and joyful in their God. ענוים outwardly and inwardly oppressed, in Isaiah besides Isaiah 11:4; Isaiah 61:1; [ענו means meek, and is to be distinguished from עניpoor.—D. M.]. יספו comp. Isaiah 37:31; they obtain joy not only once, but continually, i. e., they increase joy.ביהוה comp. ἐν κυρίῳ in the New Testament; it is therefore not merely = through, but = in the Lord, namely as those who are rooted and grounded in the Lord. The expression אביוני אדם is found only here, comp. Exodus 23:11. קדושׁ י׳ comp. on Isaiah 1:4. יגילו,—the rejoicing too has the Lord first for its basis, afterwards for its object (Isaiah 41:16). Is not the purport of these two verses, 18 and 19, reproduced in the saying of Christ, “The blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the Gospel preached to them” (Matthew 11:5; Luke 7:22)? In this passage in the Gospel allusions are commonly found only to Isaiah 35:5; Isaiah 61:1. Without wishing to deny these references, we yet remark that Isaiah 29:18-19 contains the ideas conjoined, which the other places present apart. And when the Lord in dealing with John, who had fallen into doubt regarding His Messiahship, describes His works by pointing to this passage, are we not justified in saying that this passage is of Messianic import? We of course admit that Matthew 11:5 is not an exact quotation of our passage. The joy of the pious has as its condition the removal of the wicked, whose unchecked display of themselves is identical with the deterioration of the fruitful field into a forest. Hence Isaiah 29:20-21, which explain Isaiah 29:17 b, are connected by כִּי with what immediately precedes. אָפֵס besides only Isaiah 16:4. לֵץ only here in Isaiah, but comp. Isaiah 28:14; Isaiah 28:22. Hiphil החטיא to make, to declare a sinner, (Deuteronomy 24:4; Ecclesiastes 5:5), only here in Isaiah. They make people sinners by words,i. e., they bring about their condemnation not by actual proofs, but merely by lying words. [The rendering of the E.V. is much more easy and natural: that make a man an offender for a word, and is justly preferred by Ewald, Alexander and Delitzsch.—D. M.]. מוֹכִיחַ the reprover, reprehensor, he who maintains the truth. Comp. Job 32:12; Job 40:2; Proverbs 9:7; Proverbs 24:25, et saepe;Ezekiel 3:26. Isaiah seems to have had specially before him Amos 5:10. הִטָּה with the accusative of the thing (Deuteronomy 27:19; Proverbs 17:23; Amos 2:7), or the person (Proverbs 18:5; Amos 5:12), to designate a violent deed perpetrated by wresting judgment, is of frequent occurrence. But where it is joined with בְּ, it denotes the sphere in which, or the means by which the wresting of judgment is accomplished, not the terminus in quem. As moreover תֹּהוּ denotes everywhere in Isaiah what is null, vain, empty, and is synonymous with רוּחַ (wind) &אֶפֶם הֶבֶל (comp. Isaiah 24:10; Isaiah 34:11; Isaiah 40:17; Isaiah 40:23; Isaiah 41:29; Isaiah 44:9; Isaiah 45:18-19; Isaiah 49:4; Isaiah 59:4), we have to regard תֹּהוּ as designating the empty lying accusations which were brought against the Prophet.

5. Therefore thus saith—doctrine.

Isaiah 29:22-24. These verses contain the comprehensive close. According to verses 13 and 14, Israel had omitted to serve the Lord in the proper manner, and according to verse 15, they had omitted to trust in the Lord alone. That on this double sin a double crisis must follow, which will make the good elements of the people ripe for salvation, the bad elements ripe for judgment, had been declared Isaiah 29:16-21. Now the close follows: As the ancestor of Israel had been delivered from the danger of idolatry like a brand plucked from the fire, so shall Israel also be delivered, when it shall have seen that judgment on the wicked. It will sanctify the name of the Lord, it will learn the true wisdom, and that will be its safety. אֶל־בֵּית י׳ Isaiah 29:22 = in reference to the house of Jacob (comp. Genesis 20:2; Psalms 2:7 et saepe), for in what follows it is spoken of in the third person. The clause אשׁר פדה וגו׳ refers to יהוה. That God, who had formerly saved Abraham, the progenitor of Israel, from the snares of idolatry (Joshua 24:2; Joshua 24:14-15), will also redeem Israel from the internal and external dangers which now threaten him. Israel will in the end not be put to shame (Isaiah 19:9; Isaiah 20:5; Isaiah 37:27; Isaiah 45:16-17; Isaiah 54:4 et saepe). חָוַר candidum esse, pallescere isἅπ. λεγ. Delitzschhere observes “that people whose faces are of a bronze color know in their language only of a growing pale for shame, and not of a blushing for shame.” Both the correction (Isaiah 29:20-21), and the deliverance (Isaiah 29:18-19), will bear fruit. The Prophet intends both when he speaks of the work of Jehovah among the people. When Israel (i.e., not the patriarch but his descendants, ילדיו is added by way of explanation to בראותו to obviate any misunderstanding) shall see this, he will sanctify the Lord,i. e., regard Him as holy (comp. on Isaiah 8:13, and the first petition of the Lord’s prayer). [But the E.V., which puts the work of my hands in apposition to his children, is better, comp. Isaiah 49:18-21.—D. M.]. The Prophet states in Isaiah 29:23 b, that the effect of the sanctification of the name of God will be that the people will esteem as holy the Holy One of Jacob, and will fear the God of Israel. Beside the variation of Jacob and Israel, which is so frequent in the second part of Isaiah, mark how the Prophet distinguishes between sanctifying the name of God, and sanctifying the Holy One of Jacob. This sanctification must be substantially one and the same. But when the Holy One of Jacob and the God of Israel is named as object of the second sanctification (Isaiah 29:23 b), a sanctifying seems to be thereby intended, which gives in a way which all men can perceive, the glory to this God above the gods of the heathen. The fruit of the inward disposition of heart which is externally perceptible and operative, seems to be thereby intended. As יּקדישׁו שׁמי refers to Isaiah 8:13, so יעריצו refers to Isaiah 8:12. Thus Israel will become truly wise. That wisdom which they thought they must conceal from God, was both foolishness and destruction. But when they shall have learnt to sanctify the Lord, then they who hitherto erred in spirit (comp. Psalms 95:10), will attain the true wisdom, and they who heretofore murmured against God’s counsel and direction (רגן Kal only here), will be satisfied with the discipline of God, and let it have its effect upon them (לֶקַח what one takes, Proverbs 1:5; Proverbs 4:2 et saepe, only here in Isaiah).

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. On Isaiah 29:1-8. The Prophet designates Jerusalem as Ariel in a four-fold sense. Taking Ariel as denoting the city of God, the name suits Jerusalem as the holy, separated dwelling-place in which the church of God, and all saving ordinances have their seat and centre. Taking Ariel as the lion of God, the names applies to Jerusalem as the ecclesia militans, as the host of God fighting against the worldly power and conquering it. Taking Ariel as denoting the Altar of God, it sets forth Jerusalem as the place in which reconciliation with God, and the bestowal of all the gifts of His grace take place. And, lastly, Jerusalem appears as Ariel in the signification of Mount of God, because it is the height of God which overtops all other heights, in which He manifests His glory to all the world, and to which all nations flow in order to worship Him (Isaiah 2:2 sqq.). But when Jerusalem forgets these her high honors, and neglects the obligations thereby laid upon her, she is corrected and humbled as any other city. [There may be an allusion made by the Prophet to the two-fold meaning of Ariel as lion of God, and hearth of God, but sober exegesis will be slow to admit the other meanings attached to the name of Ariel, and supposed to be here significantly alluded to by Isaiah.—D. M.].

2.Isaiah 29:3. [“It was the enemy’s army that encamped against Jerusalem; but God says that He will do it, for they are His hand, He does it by them. God had often, and long, by a host of angels, encamped for them round about them, for their protection and deliverance; but now He was turned to be their enemy, and fought against them: The siege laid against them was of His laying, and the forts raised against them were of His raising. Note, when men fight against us, we must, in them, see God contending with us.” Henry.—D. M.].

3. On Isaiah 29:7 sq. “A very consolatory comparison. The Romans and all enemies of the church are as blood-thirsty dogs. But when they have drunk up a part of the blood of the saints, and imagine, that they have swallowed up the church, it is only a dream. Since we see, that Christ and His Christians are, thank God, not yet destroyed.”—Cramer.

4. On Isaiah 29:9-12. “Awful description of the sorest punishment from God, which is spiritual, confirmed blindness; which is at this day so manifest in the Jews. For although they are confuted by so many clear and plain Scriptures of the Prophets, although they must themselves confess that the time is past, the place no more in existence, the lineage of David extinct, so that they can have no certain hope of a Messiah, they yet remain so hardened and obstinate in their opinion, as if they were drunken, mad and drowned in the snares of the devil by which they are bound, and could not come to sober and rational thoughts. This we ought to take as a mirror of the wrath of God, that we, while the book is yet open to us, may freely and diligently look into it, that it may not be closed and sealed before our eyes also.—Cramer.

5. On Isaiah 29:9-12. To all those who bring to the reading of the Holy Scripture not the Spirit, from whom it proceeded, but the opposite spirit, the spirit of the world, the Scripture must be a sealed book, into which they can stare with plastered eyes, which see and yet do not see, which watch and yet at the same time sleep (Isaiah 6:9-10; Luke 8:10; Acts 28:26-27).

6. On Isaiah 29:13. Ah! how pious people would be, if only piety consisted in lip-service, and external behavior! Dévotion aisée, convenient religion, that is the business of all those who would willingly give to God what is God’s, and to the devil, what is the devil’s; that is, who would like to have a religion because it is required by a voice within the breast, and the power of custom and example, without thereby paining the flesh. Comp. Isaiah 1:11 sqq.; Isaiah 58:2 sqq.; Amos 5:23; Matthew 15:7 sqq.

7. On Isaiah 29:14. [“They did one strange thing, they removed all sincerity from their hearts; now God will go on and do another, He will remove all sagacity from their heads: the wisdom of their wise men shall perish. They played the hypocrite, and thought to put a cheat upon God, and now they are left to themselves to play the fool; and not only to put a cheat upon themselves, but to be easily cheated by all about them …. This was fulfilled in the wretched infatuation which the Jewish nation were manifestly under, after they had rejected the gospel of Christ … Judgments on the mind, though least taken notice of, are to be most wondered at.—Henry, D. M.].

8. [Formalism in worship is here assigned as the cause of the judicial blindness which has happened to Israel. Mark the logical connection between Isaiah 29:13-14. The same judgment inflicted for the same reason, has befallen a large part of the nominal Christian Church. They who worship God must worship Him in spirit and in truth. We are amazed at the ignorance in matters of religion displayed by men of great mental capacity and learning, who have appeared among the Jews, and professors of a corrupt Christianity. That which excites our astonishment is here accounted for.—D. M.].

9. On Isaiah 29:18 sqq. “Here everything is reversed. Before, he had said, the wise shall be blind. Here he says, the blind shall see. The scope of all that is said is that they who were in office and were called priests and Levites, together with the bulk of the people, should be blinded for their unbelief. On the other hand, the poor, wretched people, that had neither office nor reputation, together with the heathen, shall be called, and shall be the people of God, who truly know God, invoke His name, and have joy, comfort and help in Him.” Veit. Dietrich.

10. On Isaiah 29:23. [“The emphatic mention of the Holy One of Jacob and the God of Israel, as the object to be sanctified, implies a relation still existing between all believers and their spiritual ancestry, as well as a relation of identity between the Jewish and the Christian church. Alexander.—D. M.].

HOMILETICAL HINTS

On Isaiah 29:1-8. How the Lord regards and deals with His church. 1) She is precious in His eyes, a. as the city of God; b. as the lion of God; c. as the altar of God; d. as the mount of God. 2) He brings her very low (Isaiah 29:2-6). 3) He delivers her wonderfully (Isaiah 29:7-8).

2. On Isaiah 29:9-12. As the light of the sun does not illuminate, but dazzles and closes an eye which is not adapted for receiving it (e. g., that of the mole), so also the word of God is for those who are not born of God and cannot receive the Spirit of God, by no means a light which enlightens their inner sense, but rather an element which dazzles their mental eye, and confuses their senses, so that they stand before the word as one who can read stands before a sealed book, or as one who cannot read before a writing which is handed to him.

3. On Isaiah 29:13-14. Warning against hypocrisy. 1) Its nature (it consists in honoring God with self-invented, external, ceremonial service, while yet the heart is far from Him); 2) its punishment (the wisdom which is self-asserting and forgets God will come to shame).

4. On Isaiah 29:15-24. Every man has his task in this life. Some, however, are minded to transact their affairs without God. For either they do not believe that there is a God, or if they believe it, they wish to be independent of Him. They wish to execute everything according to their own mind and their own lusts. But when they imagine that they can carry out their plans as it were behind God’s back, unobserved by Him, this cannot be (Isaiah 29:15-16). This is great folly, too. For such a work cannot succeed. Therefore the Prophet utters a woe on such an attempt, Isaiah 29:15. They, on the other hand, who do everything with God, partake of the most manifold blessing; the deaf hear, the blind see, the wretched rejoice, the poor are enriched, the oppressed and despised are delivered.

Footnotes:

[16]Heb. I will add.

[17]O your perverting! Or is the clay esteemed like the potter, that the work should say to its maker, etc.

[18]Heb; shall add.

[19]mischief.

[20]by word.

[21]by deceit.

[22]For when he, when his children, see the work of my hands, etc.

[23]Heb. shall know understanding.