They also reel with wine, and stagger with strong drink. The priest and the prophet reel with strong drink. They are swallowed up by wine. They stagger with strong drink. They err in vision. They stumble in judgment. For all tables are completely full of filthy vomit and filthiness.
Whom will he teach knowledge? To whom will he explain the message? Those who are weaned from the milk, and drawn from the breasts? For it is precept on precept, precept on precept; line on line, line on line; here a little, there a little.
But he will speak to this nation with stammering lips and in another language, to whom he said, “This is the resting place. Give rest to weary,” and “This is the refreshing;” yet they would not hear. Therefore Yahweh’s word will be to them precept on precept, precept on precept; line on line, line on line; here a little, there a little; that they may go, fall backward, be broken, be snared, and be taken.
Therefore hear Yahweh’s word, you scoffers, that rule this people in Jerusalem: “Because you have said, ‘We have made a covenant with death, and we are in agreement with Sheol. When the overflowing scourge passes through, it won’t come to us; for we have made lies our refuge, and we have hidden ourselves under falsehood.’ ” Therefore the Lord Yahweh says, “Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone of a sure foundation. He who believes shall not act hastily. I will make justice the measuring line, and righteousness the plumb line. The hail will sweep away the refuge of lies, and the waters will overflow the hiding place. Your covenant with death shall be annulled, and your agreement with Sheol shall not stand. When the overflowing scourge passes through, then you will be trampled down by it. As often as it passes through, it will seize you; for morning by morning it will pass through, by day and by night; and it will be nothing but terror to understand the message.” For the bed is too short to stretch out on, and the blanket is too narrow to wrap oneself in. For Yahweh will rise up as on Mount Perazim. He will be angry as in the valley of Gibeon; that he may do his work, his unusual work, and bring to pass his act, his extraordinary act. Now therefore don’t be scoffers, lest your bonds be made strong; for I have heard a decree of destruction from the Lord, Yahweh of Armies, on the whole earth.
Give ear, and hear my voice! Listen, and hear my speech! Does he who plows to sow plow continually? Does he keep turning the soil and breaking the clods? When he has leveled its surface, doesn’t he plant the dill, and scatter the cumin seed, and put in the wheat in rows, the barley in the appointed place, and the spelt in its place? For his God instructs him in right judgment and teaches him. For the dill are not threshed with a sharp instrument, neither is a cart wheel turned over the cumin; but the dill is beaten out with a stick, and the cumin with a rod. Bread flour must be ground; so he will not always be threshing it. Although he drives the wheel of his threshing cart over it, his horses don’t grind it. This also comes out from Yahweh of Armies, who is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in wisdom.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 21, 25 Meaning, the hypocrites which were among them, and were…
Meaning, the hypocrites which were among them, and were altogether corrupt in life and doctrine, which is here meant by drunkenness and vomiting.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv7–29 Isa 28:7 But they also have erred through wine,…
Isa 28:7 But they also have erred through wine, and through strong drink are out of the way; the priest and the prophet have erred through strong drink, they are swallowed up of wine, they are out of the way through strong drink; they err in vision, they stumble [in] judgment.
Ver. 7. But they also have erred through wine.] Judah had caught this disease of Ephraim, as the English are said to have done of the drunken Dutchmen. Sin is more contagious and catching than the plague. The Hebrew word importeth an alienation of mind. {Pro 20:1 Hos 11:2-3; Hos 11:12 Jer 23:9} Vino sapientia obscuratur, Wisdom is voided by wine, said Alphonsus, King of Arragon.
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They are swallowed up of wine, they are out of the way through strong drink.] Errarunt propter Shecar: they are bucked in beer; they are drowned in drink, like as George, Duke of Clarence, was drowned in a butt of malmsey {a} by his own election. Nam sicut athletico potore dignum erat, ut potando moreretur, elegit, saith mine author; for, being condemned to die by his brother King Edward IV, he chose that kind of death, as becoming to a stout drunkard.
They err in vision.] The prophets do.
They stumble in judgment.] The priests do, for they were to interpret the law, and to decide differences. Drunkenness in rulers is a capital sin, and maketh the land reel.
{a} A strong sweet wine, originally the product of the neighbourhood of Monemvasia (Napoli di Malvasia) in the Morea; but now obtained from Spain, the Azores, and the islands of Madeira and the Canaries, as well as from Greece.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv7–29 But, alas! Judah is guilty of the same sins…
But, alas! Judah is guilty of the same sins with Israel, and therefore they also must expect the same calamities; of which he speaks afterward. They run into the same excess of wine and strong drink, whereby they besot themselves, and fall into many errors and miscarriages, both in sacred and civil things. The many emphatical phrases and repetitions of the same thing in other words, in this verse, seem to evince that he here speaks of drunkenness, properly so called, although he afterward chargeth them with ignorance, and error, and stupidity; which also were the companions, and in part the effects, of that sin.
The priest, to whom strong drink was expressly forbidden in the time of their sacred ministrations, lest they should thereby be led into errors in their work, Lev 10:9,10.
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The prophet; the teachers, who should have been patterns of sobriety to the people, and to whom sobriety was absolutely necessary for the right discharge of their office.
Have erred in their conversation, and in their holy administrations.
They are swallowed up; they are, as we say, drowned in it; their senses and reason are swallowed up and lost in it. They design only to swallow it, but indeed are swallowed up by it.
They err in vision; the prophets miscarry in their sacred employment of prophesying or teaching, which is called vision, Pro 29:18, and elsewhere.
They stumble in judgment; the priests mistake in pronouncing the sentence of the law, which was their duty, Deu 17:9-11.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On vv9, 14, 23 The prophet here complains of the wretched stupidity of…
The prophet here complains of the wretched stupidity of this people, that they were unteachable and made no improvement of the means of grace which they possessed; they still continued as they were, their mistakes not rectified, their hearts not renewed, nor their lives reformed. Observe,
I. What it was that their prophets and ministers designed and aimed at. It was to teach them knowledge, the knowledge of God and his will, and to make them understand doctrine, Isa 28:9. This is God's way of dealing with men, to enlighten men's minds first with the knowledge of his truth, and thus to gain their affections, and bring their wills into a compliance with his laws; thus he enters in by the door, whereas the thief and the robber climb up another way.
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II. What method they took, in pursuance of this design. They left no means untried to do them good, but taught them as children are taught, little children that are beginning to learn, that are taken from the breast to the book (Isa 28:9), for among the Jews it was common for mothers to nurse their children till they were three years old, and almost ready to go to school. And it is good to begin betimes with children, to teach them, as they are capable, the good knowledge of the Lord, and to instruct them even when they are but newly weaned from the milk. The prophets taught them as children are taught; for, 1. They were constant and industrious in teaching them. They took great pains with them, and with great prudence, teaching them as they needed it and were able to bear it (Isa 28:10): Precept upon precept. It must be so, or (as some read) it has been so. They have been taught, as children are taught to read, by precept upon precept, and taught to write by line upon line, a little here and a little there, a little of one thing and a little of another, that the variety of instructions might be pleasing and inviting, - a little at one time and a little at another, that they might not have their memories overcharged, - a little from one prophet and a little from another, that every one might be pleased with his friend and him whom he admired. Note, For our instruction in the things of God it is requisite that we have precept upon precept and line upon line, that one precept and line should be followed, and so enforced by another; the precept of justice must be upon the precept of piety, and the precept of charity upon that of justice. Nay, it is necessary that the same precept and the same line should be often repeated and inculcated upon us, that we may the better understand them and the more easily recollect them when we have occasion for them. Teachers should accommodate themselves to the capacity of the learners, give them what they most need and can best bear, and a little at a time, Deu 6:6, Deu 6:7. 2. They courted and persuaded them to learn, Isa 28:12. God, by his prophets, said to them, "This way that we are directing you to, and directing you in, is the rest, the only rest, wherewith you may cause the weary to rest; and this will be the refreshing of your own souls, and will bring rest to your country from the wars and other calamities with which it has been long harassed." Note, God by his word calls us to nothing but what is really for our advantage; for the service of God is the only true rest for those that are weary of the service of sin and there is no refreshing but under the easy yoke of the Lord Jesus.
III. What little effect all this had upon the people. They were as unapt to learn as young children newly weaned from the milk, and it was as impossible to fasten any thing upon them (Isa 28:9): nay, one would choose rather to teach a child of two years old than undertake to teach them; for they have not only (like such a child) no capacity to receive what is taught them, but they are prejudiced against it. As children, they have need of milk, and cannot bear strong meat, Heb 5:12. 1. They would not hear (Isa 28:12), no, not that which would be rest and refreshing to them. They had no mind to hear it. The word of God commanded their serious attention, but could not gain it; they were where it was preached, but they turned a deaf ear to it, or as it came in at one ear it went out at the other. 2. They would not heed. It was unto them precept upon precept, and line upon line (Isa 28:13); they went on in a road of external performances; they kept up the old custom of attending upon the prophet's preaching and it was continually sounding in their ears, but that was all; it made no impression upon them; they had the letter of the precept, but no experience of the power and spirit of it; it was continually beating upon them, but it beat nothing into them. Nay, 3. It should seem, they ridiculed the prophet's preaching, and bantered it. The word of the Lord was unto them Tsau latsau, kau lakau; in the original it is in rhyme; they made a song of the prophet's words, and sang it when they were merry over their wine. David was the song of the drunkards. It is great impiety, and a high affront to God, thus to make a jest of sacred things, to speak of that vainly which should make us serious.
IV. How severely God would reckon with them for this. 1. He would deprive them of the privilege of plain preaching, and speak to them with stammering lips and another tongue, Isa 28:11. Those that will not understand what is plain and level to their capacity, but despise it as mean and trifling, are justly amused with that which is above them. Or God will send foreign armies among them, whose language they understand not, to lay their country waste. Those that will not hear the comfortable voice of God's word shall be made to hear the dreadful voice of his rod. Or these words may be taken as denoting God's gracious condescension to their capacity in his dealing with them; he lisped to them in their own language, as nurses do to their children, with stammering lips, to humor them; he changed his voice, tried first one way and then another; the apostle quotes it as a favour (Co1 14:21), applying it to the gift of tongues, and complaining that yet for all this they would not hear. 2. He would bring utter ruin upon them. By their profane contempt of God and his word they are but hastening on their own ruin, and ripening themselves for it; it is that they may go and fall backward, may grow worse and worse, may depart further and further from God, and proceed from one sin to another, till they be quite broken, and snared, and taken, and ruined, Isa 28:13. They have here a little and there a little of the word of God; they think it too much, and say to the seers, See not; but it proves too little to convert them, and will prove enough to condemn them. If it be not a savour of life unto life, it will be a savour of death unto death.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv7–28 For all tables are full of vomit and filthiness,....…
For all tables are full of vomit and filthiness,.... The one signifies what is spued out of a man's mouth, his stomach being overcharged, and the other his excrements; and both give a just, though nauseous, idea of a drunken man. This vice was very common; men of all ranks and degrees were infected with it, rulers and people; and no wonder that the common people ran into it, when such examples were set them; the tables of the priests, who ate of the holy things in the holy place, and the tables of the prophets, who pretended to see visions, and to prophesy of things to come, were all defiled through this prevailing sin;
so that there is no place clean or free from vomit and filthiness, no table, or part of one, of prince, prophet, priest, and people; the Targum adds,
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"pure from rapine or violence.''
R. Simeon, as De Dieu observes, makes "beli Makom" to signify "without God", seeing God is sometimes with the Jews called Makom, "place", because he fills all places; and as if the sense was, their tables were without God, no mention being made of him at their table, or in their table talk, or while eating and drinking; but this does not seem to be the sense of the passage. Vitringa interprets this of schools and public auditoriums, where false doctrines were taught, comparable to vomit for filthiness; hence it follows:
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 21, 22, 24, 25, 27, 28, 29 But - Judah is guilty of the same sins…
But - Judah is guilty of the same sins with Israel, therefore they also must expect the same calamities; of which he speaks afterward. The prophet - The teachers, who should have been patterns of sobriety to the people. They err - The prophets miscarry in their sacred employment. Stumble - The priests mistake in pronouncing the sentence of the law, which was their duty.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv9, 10, 12, 15, 16, 18, 20, 21, 22, 23, 26, 27, 28 Verse 9. Whom shall he teach knowledge? - "Whom,…
Verse 9. Whom shall he teach knowledge? - "Whom, say they, would he teach knowledge?"] The scoffers mentioned below, Isa 28:14, are here introduced as uttering their sententious speeches; they treat God's method of dealing with them, and warning them by his prophets, with contempt and derision. What, say they, doth he treat us as mere infants just weaned? doth he teach us like little children, perpetually inculcating the same elementary lessons, the mere rudiments of knowledge; precept after precept, line after line, here and there, by little and little? imitating at the same time, and ridiculing, in Isa 28:10, the concise prophetical manner. God, by his prophet, retorts upon them with great severity their own contemptuous mockery, turning it to a sense quite different from what they intended. Yes, saith he, it shall be in fact as you say; ye shall be taught by a strange tongue and a stammering lip; in a strange country; ye shall be carried into captivity by a people whose language shall be unintelligible to you, and which ye shall be forced to learn like children. And my dealing with you shall be according to your own words: it shall be command upon command for your punishment; it shall be line upon line, stretched over you to mark your destruction, (compare 2Kg 21:13;) it shall come upon you at different times, and by different degrees, till the judgments, with which from time to time I have threatened you, shall have their full accomplishment.
Jerome seems to have rightly understood the general design of this passage as expressing the manner in which the scoffers, by their sententious speeches, turned into ridicule the warnings of God by his prophets, though he has not so well explained the meaning of the repetition of their speech in Isa 28:13. His words are on Isa 28:9 - "Solebant hoc ex persona prophetarum ludentes dicere:" and on Isa 28:14 - "Quod supra diximus, cum irrisione solitos principes Judaeorum prophetis dicere, manda, remanda, et caetera his similia, per quae ostenditur, nequaquam eos prophetarum credidisse sermonibus, sed prophetiam habuisse despectui, praesens ostendit capitulum, per quod appellantur viri illusores." Hieron. in loc.
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And so Jarchi interprets the word משלים mishelim in the next verse: Qui dicunt verba irrisionis parabolice." And the Chaldee paraphrases Isa 28:11 to the same purpose, understanding it as spoken, not of God, but of the people deriding his prophets: "Quoniam in mutatione loquelae et in lingua subsannationis irridebant contra prophetas, qui prophetabant populo huic." - L.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv7, 9, 11, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, 20, 22, 23, 26, 27 Isa 28:7. But they also have erred — But,…
Isa 28:7. But they also have erred — But, alas! Judah is guilty of the same sins with Israel, therefore they also must expect the same calamities, of which he speaks afterward. The priest — To whom strong drink was expressly forbidden in the time of their sacred ministrations; and the prophet — The teachers, who should have been patterns of sobriety to the people, and to whom sobriety was absolutely necessary for the right discharge of their office; have erred — In their conversation and in their holy administrations. They are swallowed up of wine — They are, as we say, drowned in it. They err in vision — The prophets miscarry in their sacred employment of prophesying or teaching, which is sometimes called vision. They stumble in judgment — The priests mistake in pronouncing the sentence of the law, which was their duty.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv7–29 But they also have erred through wine - In…
But they also have erred through wine - In the previous verses the prophet had said that the kingdom of Judah should be saved, while that of Ephraim should be destroyed. Yet he does not deny that they also were guilty of crimes for which punishment would come upon them. To portray these crimes, and to declare the certain judgment which awaited them, is the design of the remainder of the chapter. The word rendered ‘have erred’ (שׁגוּ shâgû) refers usually to the fact that people “stagger” or “reel” through wine, and is applied commonly to those who are intoxicated Pro 20:1. The subsequent part of this verse shows, however, that it does not refer merely to the fact that they stagger and reel as intemperate people do, but that it had an effect on their ‘vision’ and ‘judgment;’ that is, it disqualified them for the discharge of their duties as priests and as prophets. In this part of the verse, however, the simple idea is, that they reel or stagger through wine, that is, they are addicted to intoxication. In the subsequent part of the verse the prophet states the effect in producing indistinctness of vision and error of judgment.
And through strong drink - (see the note at Isa 5:11).
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They are out of the way - (תעוּ tā‛û). They wander; stagger; reel (compare the notes at Isa 19:14).
The priest and the prophet - Probably these persons are specified to denote the higher classes of society. It is probable that the prophet also designs to indicate the enormity of the sins of the nation, from the fact that those who were especially devoted to religion, and who were supposed to have immediate communication with God, were addicted to intemperance.
They are swallowed up of wine - They are completely absorbed by it (see the note at Isa 25:7); they not only themselves indulge in its use, but they are themselves, as it were, swallowed up by it, so that their reason, and strength, and virtue are all gone - as a vessel is absorbed in a maelstrom or whirlpool.
They err in vision - For the sense of the word ‘vision,’ see the note at Isa 1:1. The prophet here states the effect of the use of wine and strong drink on their mental and moral powers. It was the office of the prophets to declare the will of God; probably also to explain the sense of the sacred Scriptures, and to address the people on their duty. Here the prophet says that the effect of their intemperance was that they had themselves no correct and clear views of the truth, and that they led the people into error.
They stumble in judgment - There were many important subjects on which the priests sat in judgment among the Hebrews, particularly in all matters pertaining to religion. By the influence of intoxicating liquors they were disqualified for the high and holy functions of their office; and the consequence was, that the nation was corrupt, and was exposed to the heavy judgments of God.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 21, 22, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29 These also. The kingdom of Juda. (Challoner) --- Ezechias…
These also. The kingdom of Juda. (Challoner) --- Ezechias could not correct every abuse; though what is here specified, regards rather the reigns of his successors.
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain On vv14, 23 14 “Wherefore hear the word of the Lord, ye…
2. THE FALSE AND THE TRUE REFUGE
Isa_28:14-22
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14 “Wherefore hear the word of the Lord, ye scornful men,
That rule this people which is in Jerusalem:
15 Because ye have said,
We have made a covenant with death,
And with 15hell are we at agreement;
When the overflowing scourge shall pass through,
It shall not come unto us:
For we have made lies our refuge,
And under falsehood have we hid ourselves:
16 Therefore thus saith the Lord God,
Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone,
A tried stone, a precious corner stone,
A sure foundation:
He that believeth shall not 16make haste.
17 Judgment also will I lay to the line,
And righteousness to the plummet:
And the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies,
And the waters shall overflow the hiding-place.
18 And your covenant with death shall be disannulled,
And your agreement with 17hell shall not stand;
When the overflowing scourge shall pass through,
Then ye shall be 18trodden down by it.
19 19From the time that it goeth forth it shall take you:
For morning by morning shall it pass over,
By day and by night;
And it shall be a vexation only 20to understand the report.
20 For the bed is shorter than that a man can stretch himself on it;
And the covering narrower than that he can wrap himself in it.
21 For the Lord shall rise up as in mount Perazim,
He shall be wroth as in the valley of Gibeon,
That he may do his work, his strange work;
And bring to pass his act, his strange act.
22 Now therefore be ye not mockers,
Lest your bands be made strong;
For I have heard from the Lord God of hosts a consumption,
Even determined upon the whole earth.
TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL
Isa_28:15. שׁוט שׁוטף. So we are to read with the K’ri, 1, because the Kethibh שַׁיִט has in Isa_33:21 the signification “oar,” which is not suitable here; 2, on account of the assonance with שׁוֹטֵף, which would otherwise be lost; 3, because in Isa_28:18 b there is a blending of two figures for the sake of the alliteration. For שׁוֹט is a scourge (Isa_10:26), and שׁטף is to overflow, inundate (comp. on Isa_28:2). A scourge when swung makes a flowing motion; but it does not inundate, overflow. Only the divine judgments do this, and these for another reason can be called the scourge of God. The K’ri יעבר, which is both supported and discountenanced by Isa_28:18, is anyhow unnecessary, for the perfect can be taken as a futurum exactum (comp. Isa_4:4; Isa_6:11).
Isa_28:16. The Dagesh forte in מוּסָּד is manifestly intended to distinguish the word as a participle from the substantive מוּסָד.
Isa_28:20. Hithp. השׂתרע se extendere, porrigere, only here, Kal. שׂרע only Lev_21:18; Lev_22:23.
Isa_28:21. On the absence of the preposition of place before הַר and עֵמֶק, comp. Isa_1:25; Isa_5:18; Isa_5:29; Isa_10:14; Gesenius Gr., § 118, 3, note.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
1. Those scoffers, who are here described as the rulers of the people in Jerusalem, had naturally a foundation on which they rested, in opposition to the foundation of the Prophet which they derided. Their foundation was falsehood and deceit, by the aid of which they hoped that they would have nothing to fear from death and Hades. (Isa_28:14-15). Against this foundation the Lord now says to them: I have laid in Zion my strong corner—and foundation—stone: only he who holds fast to it will not yield (Isa_28:16) And on this foundation-stone the building shall be erected by means of judgment and righteousness; but the flood of waters will sweep away that refuge of lies (Isa_28:17). And that covenant with death and Sheol will not stand. They who made it, shall be trodden down by those who Shall come upon them as the scourge of God (Isa_28:18). That scourge, moreover, shall come not only once, but repeatedly by day and night. Then shall they hear no more a preaching by word, but! a preaching by deed; and it will be nothing but terror (19). For Israel’s might will then prove too weak (Isa_28:20). But the Lord will rise in might as formerly on Mount Perazim, and in the valley of Gibeon, in order to execute His very strange work of destruction, which appears to the secure Jews impossible (Isa_28:21). Therefore the scoffers should be quiet, that they may not remain forever in the snares mentioned Isa_28:13; for that they should not escape from them is announced by the Prophet as the decree of Jehovah, which cannot be averted (Isa_28:22). We perceive, therefore, that the section Isa_28:14-22 corresponds exactly to the preceding one Isa_28:1-13, and especially to the Isa_28:9-13. For here the right foundation is set in opposition to that false one, resting on which those scoffers think that they may deride the Prophet (Isa_28:14-17); then the vanity, yea destructiveness of that false foundation is shown (Isa_28:18-21), and the scoffers are accordingly exhorted to give up their mocking (Isa_28:22).
2. Therefore hear—hid ourselves.
Isa_28:14-15. With לָכֵן, Isa_28:14, the Prophet introduces the judgment of the Lord, which he has to publish on the ground of the accusation preferred Isa_28:9-13. This judgment is addressed to the scoffers (Pro_29:8), whose derisive speeches (Isa_28:10) are quoted, and who, after the judgment has been pronounced, are exhorted to mock no more (Isa_28:22). These scoffers are not insignificant men. They are the leaders of the people (Isa_14:1; Isa_52:5), its Priests and Prophets (Isa_28:7). כִּי in the beginning of Isa_28:15 is “because;” the illative particle לָכֵו in Isa_28:16 corresponding to it. The utterance is put in the mouths of these people, which if not actually spoken by them, yet certainly corresponds to their actual conduct: we have made a covenant with death,etc. This explains why these people scoffed at the Prophet. They stand with their whole manner of thinking and feeling upon another foundation than his. Isaiah has the Lord Himself for his foundation. But they deride this very foundation. They have another and better, as they imagine. This is the art of falsehood, of cunning policy, of fine diplomacy. By its help they hope to be safe from death and Hades. The Prophet admonishes them to obey the Lord, and to trust in Him in order to find protection against Assyria. But in their opinion these are fanatical means of defence, which good policy could not employ. An alliance with Egypt, artfully planned, carried out with all diplomatic skill, appeared to those politicians to be a much more reliable, yea an infallible remedy against the threatening evils. For they hope through that alliance to be proof against death and Hades. They imagine that they have thereby as it were concluded a friendly alliance with death and Hades (כרת ברית as Isa_55:3; Isa_61:8). חֹוֶה (comp. רֹאֶה Isa_28:7), for which below in Isa_28:18חָזוּת stands, has only here the signification “treaty, agreement.” The lie of which they speak, may well refer to the relation of dependence on Assyria into which Ahaz, the predecessor of Hezekiah, had brought Judah (2Ki_16:7 sqq.). For they may even then have considered the right policy to consist in a secret league with Egypt, while appearing to stand by the obligations entered into towards Assyria. A like course was subsequently pursued (2Ki_17:4; Eze_17:15, sqq.). The conjunction of חסה and סתר is characteristic of Isaiah, comp. Isa_28:17; Isa_4:6.
3. Therefore thus saith—the whole earth.
Isa_28:16-22. The scoffers had declared that they had made falsehood their refuge, and that they hope relying on this refuge, to get the better of death and Hades. The Prophet wishes to expose the vanity of this hope. There is only one refuge that guarantees safety. This is the foundation, and corner-stone laid by the Lord Himself in Zion. The water sweeps away the other false foundation, and they who rest upon it go to ruin. Our passage contains, therefore, primarily not a promise, but a threatening. For first of all, the confidence expressed in Isa_28:15 is to be shown to be unfounded. But naturally the (unreal, resting only on appearance) negation of the truth can be overcome only by the positive setting forth of the truth. And where this real positive foundation of truth is exhibited, it involves always eo ipso a promise. לָכֵז, as has been shown, corresponds to the כִּי in Isa_28:15. The false affirmation necessitates a protest in which the truth is testified. הנני יסר=חנְנִי הוּא אֲשֶׁר יִּסַּד comp. Isa_29:14; Isa_38:5. But what sort of a stone is that which the Lord has laid in Zion? It must be a stone which really guarantees truth and right. Consequently it cannot be Zion itself (Hitzig, Knobel), nor the royal house of David (Reinke), nor Hezekiah (Rabbis, Gesenius, Maurer and others; which explanation Theodoret characterizes as ἄνοια ἐσχάτη), nor the temple (Ewald). As Isaiah does not say that they had made Egypt their refuge, but that they had made falsehood their refuge, the antithesis to this refuge of lies can only be a refuge of truth. As such we might, with Umbreit, regard the law, or, with Schegg, the word of God in general. But the law and the word of God, so far as they are laid in Zion as objective means of Salvation, suppose a still deeper, a personal foundation: the law supposes Him through whom the revelation of the law took place; the spoken and written word supposes the living, personal word of God Himself, the Logos (So the Catholic expositors Loch and Reischl, comp. Reinke,the Messianic Prophecies I. p. 404). The Logos, the only mediator between God and men, the Messiah promised in the Old Covenant, who has appeared in the New, this is the personal and living foundation-stone laid in Zion, on whom the whole building fitly framed together grows unto a holy (erected therefore according to the line of right and justice) building (Eph_3:20 sqq.). That the personal Word of the Lord can be called a stone, is apparent from Isa_8:14, where Jehovah Himself is called אֶבֶו and צוּר. It is not impossible that Isaiah had this last passage in view, and perhaps the composer of the 118th Psalm had in Isa_28:22 regard to both these passages of Isaiah. Anyhow Peter (1Pe_2:6-8) combines these three places. The Lord Himself (Mat_21:42-44) had in view the place in the Psalms and Isa_8:14 sq.; and Paul, Rom_9:33, refers to both places of Isaiah; while in Act_4:11 reference is made to the 118th Psalm only; and in Rom_10:11, solely to the place before us. The stone laid in Zion is further called an אבו בחו, i. e., lapis probationis. The term בחו can be taken in an active or passive sense: a tried and a trying stone. The former would mark its tested firmness, the latter would express the idea, that the thoughts of the hearts must be made manifest by it. For no one can escape it, but all must be tried on it, and it must have some effect on all, and be either for their fall or rising. The passages Mat_21:44; Luk_2:34 speak strongly for the latter view. I do not dispute it, but I believe that the Prophet designedly chose an ambiguous expression. For the former interpretation is likewise recommended, being naturally suggested by the expression employed, and by the context. We expect to hear the nature of the stone extolled, and not merely to be told what service it can render. That the praise should be expressed in this particular form is in accordance with the usus loquendiobservable in this chapter, in which so many designations of a property are denoted by a substantive in the genitive (Isa_28:1-5; Isa_28:8). פִנָּה is corner.—And a stone which forms the corner is naturally a corner-stone. (Comp. Isa_19:13; Job_38:6; Jer_51:26; Psa_118:22). יְקָרָה is here, as perhaps also Psa_37:20; Pro_17:27, a substantive, preciousness, so that we must translate; a corner-stone of preciousness of a founded foundation (מוּסָד after the form מוּסָר, comp. 2Ch_8:16; מוּסָדָהIsa_30:32; Eze_41:8; מוּסָּד Part Hoph.), i. e., a corner-stone well suited (1 Kings 5:31; 7:9–11) for a firm foundation. The emphatic expression מוּסָד מוּסָּד is like חֲכָמִים, Pro_30:24. We have already observed that the Prophet shows here a predilection for the accumulation of substantives in the genitive. The firm foundation-stone manifests its saving efficacy, not in a magical way; but this efficacy is conditioned by the inward susceptibility, or faith. The firm foundation itself requires a keeping fast to it. Therefore the Prophet adds: He who believes flees not.—This apothegmatic addition reminds us, both by its form and tenor, of chapter Isa_7:9האמיו ּתֵאָמֵנוּאִם לֹא תַאֲמִינוּ כִּי לֹא occurs further Isa_30:21; Isa_43:10; Isa_53:1. הֵחִישׁ is here not indirectly (to make something or another hasten, Isa_5:19; Isa_60:22) but directly causative; to make haste, to flee hastily, to retreat. There lies in it an antithesis to the idea of firmness, which is contained in what is said of the stone, and in מאמיו. The word has this meaning no where else. Where the firm foundation is objectively laid, and the individual subjectively in faith keeps fast on it, then the erection of a holy temple in the Lord is possible, an erection in which right serves for the line (קַו comp. on Isa_28:10), and righteousness for the plummet (מִשְׁקֶלֶת only here, comp. מִשְׁקלֶת2Ki_21:13); a figurative expression, the meaning of which can be only this, that this building will arise according to the rules of divine justice, and will consequently be a holy building. משׁפט and צדקה stand here related as in Isa_1:27; Isa_5:16; Isa_9:6; Isa_32:16; Isa_33:5; Isa_56:1; Isa_59:9; Isa_59:14. This building stands firm. But the refuge of lies and the hiding-place of deceit the hail will sweep away (יָעָח, whence יָע a shovel for the clearing away of ashes from the altar, Exo_27:3; Exo_38:3; Num_4:14 et saepe, is ἄπ. λεγ) and the waters wash away (Isa_28:2). Inconsequence, that covenant with death and Hades, of which they boasted (Isa_28:15), shall be covered,i. e., obliterated, annulled. The covenant is conceived of as a written document, whose lines are covered, i. e., overspread with the fluid used for writing. Comp. obliterare offensionem, famam, memoriam. To לא יבואנו in verse 15, והייתם לו למרמס corresponds. Comp. Isa_5:5; Isa_7:25; Isa_10:6. The Prophet here leaves the image out of sight. The expression is shaped by his realizing in thought the thing signified by the previous figure, namely, the invading host which serves as the scourge of God. This host shall stamp the scoffers under foot, shall tread them like dirt on the streets. The Prophet had expressly declared in Isa_10:6 that the army of the Assyrians should do this. But the scourge will come not once only, but often. Isa_28:19. The expression יִקַח is suggested by another image, namely, the idea of something which takes away (Jer_15:15), snatches, washes away, corresponding therefore to שׁוטף, as a mighty flood which comes along by rushes. In fact, the invasions by the Assyrians and by the Chaldaeans, who were called to complete their work, were as waterfloods that kept ever inundating the land till it was entirely desolated (Isa_24:1; Isa_24:3). The second half of Isa_28:19 is clearly related to יביו שׁמועה in Isa_28:9. There the scoffers had asked: to whom will he preach? They thought themselves much too high to need the preaching of the Prophet. In opposition to this language Isaiah now tells them: because you would not hear my well-meant preaching by word, which was designed to give you מְנוּחָה, you will be compelled to hear a preaching in act, and it will be naught but terror. זועה stands therefore opposed to מנוחה. If in Isa_28:9הביו שׁמועה signified “to make to know, or understand preaching,” it must in the connexion in which it here stands signify “to hear preaching” (comp. Isaiah 39:16; Job_28:23; Mic_4:12 et saepe). For it is not the preacher who experiences terror, but he who hears the preaching. זְוָעָה (only here in Isaiah, besides comp. Deu_28:25; Jer_15:4 et saepe; Eze_23:46) is concussio, commotio vehemens, formido. The subject of the sentence is הָבִיו and the predicate זְוָעָה. Is not that a dreadful preaching, when one finds himself in a situation which is fittingly compared to a bed that is too short, or to a covering that is too narrow?—This is a distressful condition. For resistance is encountered on all sides, and the means are insufficient for any undertaking. קצר in Isaiah besides only Isa_1:2; Isa_59:1. מַצָּעstratum, ἅπ λεγ. מַסֵּכָה besides only Isa_25:7. בָּנַס, colligere, coacervare, Hithp. se ipsum colligere, to make of one’s self a heap, only here כְּ in כְּהִתְכַּנֵּס marks coincidence = when one bends one’s-self together, coils one’s-self (Isa_18:3; Isa_23:5). That such will really be the nature of the situation is now further illustrated by two historical examples. Israel will themselves be in a condition like that in which they through God’s help twice brought their enemies. One of these events to which the Prophet here alludes, is the defeat which David inflicted on the Philistines at Baal-Perazim (2Sa_5:20; 1Ch_14:11). David there said פָרַץי אֶת־אֹיְבַי לְכָּנַי כְפֶרֶץ מַיִם, i.e., Jehovah has broken through my enemies before me, as water breaks through. Vitringa perceived that Isaiah was led to think of this passage by what he had said in Isa_28:17 and Isa_28:2 of the מים שֹׁטְפִים. The other event I take, with most of the older interpreters, to be the defeat which Joshua inflicted on the Canaanites at Gibeon (Jos_10:10). There, in Isa_28:11, it is said expressly that the Lord crushed the enemy by a great hail-storm. And this circumstance corresponds exactly to what Isaiah in verse 2 and verse 17 had said of the hail from which Israel should suffer. That victory of David over the Philistines at Gibeon (2Sa_5:22 sqq.; 1Ch_14:14 sqq.) does not supply such an analogy. ירנו comp. on Isa_14:9. זר מעשׂהו (comp. Isa_5:12) and נכריה עבדתו (Isa_2:6) are parenthetical clauses, and not in apposition to the preceding מעשׂהו and עבדתו; for the putting of the adjective first would in that case be quite abnormal. Strange, inconceivable is the work of the Lord pronounced, because He does something which could not have been expected of Him. Who could have thought that Jehovah would treat Israel as the heathen, that He would thus destroy His own work? After all these statements we see how foolish and infatuated the people were in scoffing at the warning voice of the Prophet, and in relying on their own miserable, self-chosen supports (Isa_28:15). The admonition which the Prophet adds at the close, and now be ye not mockers is well-meant, and deserving to be laid to heart. Hithp.התלוצץ=to behave mockingly, is found only here. If they do not cease to mock, the bands by which they have been bound ever since Ahaz foolishly made submission to Assyria (2Ki_16:7 sqq.), can never be broken. For that they must bear these bands, and become acquainted with the nature of them, that is the purpose of God, resolved on, and already revealed to the Prophet. On כלה ונחרצה comp. on Isa_10:23.
Footnotes:
[15]Sheol.
[16]flee.
[17]Sheol.
[18]Heb. a treading down to it.
[19]as often as.
[20]Or, when he shall make you to understand doctrine.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv7, 9, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29 Though Judah is to survive the fall of Ephraim,…
Though Judah is to survive the fall of Ephraim, yet "they also" (the men of Judah) have perpetrated like sins to those of Samaria (Isa 5:3, Isa 5:11), which must be chastised by God.
erred . . . are out of the way--"stagger . . . reel." Repeated, to express the frequency of the vice.
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priest . . . prophet--If the ministers of religion sin so grievously, how much more the other rulers (Isa 56:10, Isa 56:12)!
vision--even in that most sacred function of the prophet to declare God's will revealed to them.
judgment--The priests had the administration of the law committed to them (Deu 17:9; Deu 19:17). It was against the law for the priests to take wine before entering the tabernacle (Lev 10:9; Eze 44:21).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv7, 9, 11, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 27 7, 8. But they also — With these words…
7, 8. But they also — With these words the prophet passes from Ephraim to Judah. He had just said that Judah should be spared while Ephraim should be sacked and destroyed. But even Judah is guilty of drunkenness. Those of them who are of the anti-reform party, false prophet and priest, even these err or stagger in vision, that is, while prophesying; and stumble, that is, blunder grievously, in giving judgment, or adjudicating cases, and all through strong drink.
Priest and the prophet — Both these classes were to be found in the worldly, anti-spiritual party, which also absorbed the higher classes of society in Jerusalem. The true prophet was in the minority, hence unpopular and persecuted, though even a king, as did Hezekiah, might favour his cause.
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Tables are… vomit — The terms here are used of the extreme effects of drunkenness. Hyperbole is common among orientals, and is allowable for reaching the depths of the thought in hand, and to present a mirror before real baseness.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29 7. the priest and the prophet] Better: priest and…
7. the priest and the prophet] Better: priest and prophet. These are specially mentioned as the spiritual leaders of the people, who opposed Isaiah in the name of Jehovah, and backed up the plans of the politicians with the pretended authority of Divine revelation.
swallowed up of wine] Perhaps, “confused by wine,” see on Isa_3:12.
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are out of the way] R.V. have gone astray—see Isa_19:14.
vision (a peculiar form in the Hebr.) refers to the function of the prophets; judgment (lit. “judicial matters”) to that of the priests (cf. Deu_17:8 ff; Deu_19:17; Eze_44:24). It is not asserted that the prophets have no visions, but only that, through self-indulgence, they lack the capacity to discern their real significance.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv7, 9, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29 (7) But they also have erred through . .…
(7) But they also have erred through . . .—Better, yet these also reel . . . Isaiah acts on the method of Nathan when he said, “Thou art the man.” He has painted the drunkards of Ephraim; now he turns and paints in yet darker colours the drunkards of Judah. Priests were seen reeling to their services, prophets reeling in the very act of their counterfeit inspiration. The threefold iteration of the word for “reel” emphasises the scandals of the scene. The sins of the sons of Eli, those of which Micah (Isa_2:11) had spoken, were reproduced in all their enormity. The most loathsome features of their drunkenness are printed in Isa_28:8 with a boldness which is almost photographic. The prohibition of wine during the time when the priests were on duty (Lev_10:1-9) adds to the guilt thus represented.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv7–29 Vers. 7-10. JUDAH"S SINFULNESS. The reformation effected by Hezekiah…
Vers. 7-10. JUDAH"S SINFULNESS. The reformation effected by Hezekiah was but a half-reformation. It put away idolatry, but it left untouched a variety of moral evils, as:
1. Drunkenness. Judah was no whir behind Ephraim in respect of this vice. The very priests and "prophets" gave way to the disgusting habit, and came drunk to the most solemn functions of religious teaching and hearing causes.
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2. Scorn and mockery of God"s true prophets. The teaching of Isaiah was made light of by the officials of the priestly and prophetic orders, who claimed to be quite as competent to instruct men in their duties as himself. They seem to have ridiculed the mode of his teaching its catch-words, as they thought them, and its insistence on minutiae.
They also. Judah, no less than Ephraim (see vers. 1, 3). It has been questioned whether literal intoxication is meant, and suggested that Judah "imitated the pride and unbelief and spiritual intoxication of Ephraim" (Kay). But the numerous passages which tax both the Israelites and the Jews of the period with drunkenness, (Isa_5:11, 22 22:13 Hos_4:11 Hos_7:5 Amo_6:6, etc.) are best understood literally. Orientals (e.g, the Persians) are often given to such indulgence. Have erred through wine; rather, reel with wine. Are out of the way; or, stagger. The verbs express the physical effects of intoxication. The priest and the prophet. Priests were forbidden by the Law to drink any wine or strong drink previously to their taking part in the service of the tabernacle, (Lev_10:9) and the prohibition was always understood to apply afortiori to the temple. (Eze_44:21) Prophets might have been expected to act in the spirit of the command given to priests. By "prophets" here Isaiah means, not persons especially called of God, but official members of the prophetical order. Of these there were always many in Judah, who had no strong sense of religion. (see Isa_29:10 Jer_5:13, 31 Eze_13:2-16 Amo_2:12 Zep_3:4, etc.) They err in vision; rather, they reel in the vision. They are drunken, even in the very exercise of their prophetical office when they see, and expound, their visions. They stumble in judgment; or, they stagger when pronouncing judgment (Delitzsch).
Persons in authority had been specially warned not to drink wine before the hearing of causes. (Pro_31:4, Pro_31:5)
Vers. 7-13. The mockers and the prophet.
Here, it appears, the scene changes to Jerusalem. And we should compare the picture of drunkenness and luxury with that in Amo_6:1-7 and Mic_2:11.
I THE PRIESTS AND PROPHETS OF THE TIME. They are seen reeling and staggering in the midst of, or as they come from, their most sacred functions. It is a strong and indignant description of drunkenness in general. (cf. Pro_20:1) What more humiliating than the spectacle! To have "put an enemy in one"s mouth to steal away one"s brains," to be the thrall of one"s own brutal appetites, and a "scoured dish of liquor"! "Ebrius urgeris multis miser undique curls Atque animi incerto fluitans errore vagaris.
How much worse the vice in those who need all the clearness of the brain, all the composure of the nerves, for the discharge of their high office! They should be filled" with another spirit" than this. The effect of the bodily intoxication must be to cloud the judgment, to confuse the perception of truth. And how truly the proverb must apply, Like people, like priest"! If such the habits of the representatives of the people, what must the people themselves have been?
II THE SPIRIT OF MOCKERY. (Vers. 9, 10.) "The drunkards mock Isaiah over their cups. Does he not know what respectable persons he is dealing with not like children, who need leading-strings, but educated priests and prophets?" (Cheyne). They scoff at him by taking up words often on his mouth. Whom would he teach knowledge? This designates prophetic preaching. (see Isa_1:8 Isa_33:6) And tidings? Another word for revelation, for something heard from Jehovah". (ver. 22; cf. Isa_21:10 Isa_53:1) Then they ridicule his manner. He is always harping upon the same string," always dwelling upon the same commonplaces of morality and religion. It is childish repetition," say they. But, in fact, the preacher must keep dwelling upon a few main points, so easily do they slip by us!". (Heb_2:1) "Here a little, and there a little," it is a true description of popular preaching. It may seem foolishness" to a scientifically trained understanding; but it has pleased God to save many by means of it. The gospel requires us to receive it as little children, and little by little, a saying here, and there a verse, and again a proverb; this is how little children learn.
III REPLY OF THE PROPHET. He "retorts their own language upon them. Yes; it shall be, in fact, as you say. This childish monotone shall indeed sound in your ears. The description which you give of the revelations of Jehovah shall be exactly applicable to the harsh laconic commands of a merciless invader. For Assyrian, though closely allied to Hebrew, was sufficiently different from it both in grammar and in vocabulary to seem a "stammering" or "barbarous" tongue to Isaiah"s contemporaries. The common diplomatic and commercial language of Syria and Assyria was Aramaic" (see Isa_36:11) (Cheyne). (For the word rendered "stammer," i.e. speak unintelligibly, as in a foreign tongue, Isa_33:19 Pro_1:26 Pro_17:5 Psa_2:4 Psa_59:9 Job_22:19) The lessons which the people refuse to heed when taught them in their native tongue, shall be pressed home upon them in the harsh accents of the barbarian. "Since the Divine patience has been lost upon them, a stronger way shall be taken to force their attention. God will thunder in their ears what to them will appear jargon, the language of a foreign nation!" How prophetic the words in general! The ill taste on our part which makes truth unpalatable in its simplicity and gentle persuasiveness will be sorely criticized when we are forced to listen to hoarse and rude accents. The prophet"s burden had been of rest rest to the weary; of refreshment by hearty faith in Jehovah. (Isa_30:15; cf. Jer_6:16) And now the old words, "line upon line," etc., will come back upon memory and conscience, to be enforced by retreat, and flight, and fall, and captivity. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear." If truth sound barbarous, it is because we have not the true listening faculty. If it be not sweet to the taste as honey, it is because the stomach is disordered. If the Word profit not, it is because men do not mix it with faith," i.e. with obedient and loving dispositions. A willful ignorance and blindness alone deprives of spiritual benefits; a stubbornness in turning away from the offered light, and choosing to remain in darkness. J. (cf. Isa_8:16 Isa_6:9 Isa_29:11 Mar_4:12)
The moral deterioration of self-indulgent habits.
"They err in vision, they stumble in judgment." Isaiah treats wine and strong drink in much the same way as we do now. To him it was the prominent instance, and so it could be made the type, of self-indulgence, which has many forms and many expressions. Certain very manifest degradations follow on indulgence in strong drink, or in opium, or in morphia, and in these cases oppressive illustrations are given of the evils that attend lesser or less apparent indulgences. An ever-working law applies to all cases, small as well as great; but we may more easily trace the working in the great. This may be shown by some careful accounts of the deterioration of mind and character following on drink-indulgence in men, and even more painfully in women. Terrible stories of the ruin of character wrought by opium-smoking in China can be given. And recently, very painful revelations have been made of the existence of a degrading morphio-mania, especially among the upper classes. Persons who have had morphia injected under the skin, to relieve pain, find a craving for it created; they indulge the passion, and the result is utter mental and moral helplessness, and a certain, dreadful death. In measure, the law of deterioration applies to indulgence in eating, in drinking tea, in matters of sensual passion, in craving for newspapers, in seeking pleasure, and even in matters of play or of hobby. As soon as the indulgence in anything gets established it begins to degrade. A man loses his manhood as soon as any thing is allowed to gain control over him; and with lost manhood comes dimmed vision and stumbling judgment. The moral consequences of self-indulgence may be fully treated under four divisions.
I PHYSICAL EFFECTS ON BODIES. This must be considered, because we are every day coming better to understand the close connection between bodily conditions and moral states. The moral habit becomes tightly fixed by an actual bodily bias, an actual tendency of nerve and muscle to do again what has been done once.
II MORAL EFFECT ON WILLS. There is an actual weakening of will-force. The power to say "No" fades and dies out, and the will is borne away wheresoever mere appetite leads.
III PRACTICAL EFFECT ON CONDUCT. Wherever moral control is limited conduct becomes dangerous or disgraceful.
IV FINAL EFFECT ON FATE. Whatever the view taken of the future state, they are at terrible disadvantage in it even if it be a continuous reforming condition who start on it degraded by self-indulgence. R.T.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 16, 17, 20, 22, 23, 26, 29 But they also have erred through wine
Isa_28:7-8
But they also have erred through wine
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Swallowed up of wine
This is how all debasement continues, aggravates itself, and brings itself to shameful issue.
No man begins at the point of being swallowed up in any evil: he approaches it almost stealthily, he touches it experimentally, he retains for a certain time his self-control in relation to it,--he will handle it, but easily, so that he can set it down again should it so please him. But at the end there is swallowing up, destruction--death is in the cup, and death must be drunk up by those who put their lips to the forbidden vessel. When Edward IV condemned his own brother, George Duke of Clarence, to be killed, we are told that the duke desired to be drowned in a butt of Malmsey, and the historian well adds, as became so stout a drunkard. To this end may men come who never dreamed of coming to it, who meant to show the world how easy it would be to toy with the devil, to touch him, set him back, smile at him, laugh at him, use him as a dog, bind him as a slave; and to all these initial usages will the devil submit himself, knowing that at some fatal unsuspected moment he will lasso the man who supposes he can take him captive, and he will carry him away to the chambers of death. (J. Parker, D. D.)
Erred through wine
Preaching in London, the Rev. Egerton Young, so long a missionary to the Hudson Bay Indians, said he would like to bring some of his converts to this land, but he dared not until the temperance cause was more advanced. One native preacher had been brought over, but kind friends thought that he required a little stimulant after the fatigue of the meeting, and the poor Indian had gone back with such a taste for spirits that he had to be expelled from his office, and finally died a drunken outcast. (Australian Sunday School Teacher.)
Intemperance a pestilence
No pestilence has ever destroyed so many millions of men, women, and children as intemperance; for a pestilence comes and goes, and often at long intervals, but intemperance is a fixed and permanent plague, always spreading, and always destroying our people, body and soul. (Cardinal Manning.)
Intemperance a peril to national life
On the east coast of our country the sea has been encroaching for centuries. Acre after acre of corn land has tumbled down into the waves, and churches, threatened by every high tide, are pointed out which, at the time of their erection, stood a mile from the sea. And by a similar process of encroachment and destruction fruitful sections of our national life are broken down and churned in the raging flood of this terrible curse, and places are not unknown in which the very church itself threatens to topple into ignominy and ruin. (T. G. Selby.)
Drunkenness degrades
Dr. Louis A. Banks tells how a drunkard in New Orleans was reformed. A friend of his, who was a stenographer, sat down in a corner of the saloon in which he was carousing, and made a full shorthand report of every word he said. The next morning the stenographer copied the whole thing neatly and sent it round to his office. In less than ten minutes he came tearing with his eyes fairly standing out of their sockets. Great heavens, he gasped, what is this? Its a stenographic report of your monologue at the restaurant last evening, and gave him a brief explanation. Did I really talk like that? he asked faintly. I assure you it is an absolutely verbatim report, was the reply. He turned pale and walked out. He never drank another drop. (Christian Age.)
The degradation of drunkenness
It is told by Victor Hugo that in the capital of Burgundy the corporation had four silver goblets. When a prince or any distinguished person passed through their city they were offered wine in these silver goblets. The wine of Burgundy is very famous, but the people knew not only its merits, but its dangers. On the first goblet was inscribed a monkey, on the second a lion, on the third a sheep, and on the fourth a swine. This meant to denote the degrees of drunkenness which their wine produced. (G. H. Morrison, M. A.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On vv9, 12, 16, 17, 18, 20, 22, 24, 29 (Sunday School Anniversary Sermon.)
EARLY RELIGIOUS TRAINING
(Sunday School Anniversary Sermon.)
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Isa_28:9-10. Whom shall He teach knowledge? &c.
Whether we regard these verses as the language of the drunkards of Ephraim, deriding the Lord’s messengers for the plainness and urgency of their unwelcome instructions, or as the language of the prophet himself affirming interrogatively the spiritual ignorance and imbecility of the people, with their prophets and priests, they suggest the importance of earnestly instructing the young in the knowledge of our relations to God and eternity. We may turn to them more hopefully than to the old. Youth is the time for learning. In the first ten years of life are laid the foundations of the social and religious character which every man carries to the grave. Therefore we should not leave them to be laid haphazard, but should do our utmost to bring it to pass that they shall be such that on them can be built the structure of a holy life. To accomplish this we must instruct them in the revealed will of God.
1. The youth learns nothing good until he is taught. Though wise to do evil, to do good he has no knowledge.
2. The young mind is susceptible of deep and enduring impressions (H. E. I., 775, 776, 786).
3. Scriptural knowledge is not only of surpassing value, but is more easily imparted to the young than most of that human knowledge for which the opening powers are often severely taxed. If difficulties arise from immaturity and levity of mind, they are more than balanced by freedom from the prejudices of age, and the perplexing cares of life; by their docility and instinctive desire to penetrate the unknown; by the eagerness with which they seize upon the explanations of facts in nature and providence, or on similitudes and allegories; and by their unsuspecting confidence in the ability of their appointed teachers. Their natural aversion to God is but partially developed, and waits the coming of riper years to mature its strong resistance to the Divine claims.
4. The weightiest obligations rest on parents to give their children religious instruction (H. E. I., 803–806). When parents are unable to do so personally, through defect of ability, or the urgency of paramount duties, it is their privilege to do so through the kind offices of others.
5. A failure in the discharge of parental obligations to children imposes on others who fear God the duty of teaching them knowledge. They are immortal; for them Christ died. Of the fulness and glory of the results of a faithful performance of this duty no adequate conception can be formed by us on this side of heaven.—R. S. Storrs, D.D.: American National Preacher, xix. 121–141.
THE POWER OF LITTLES
Isa_28:10. Here a little and there a little.
The application of this text is first of all to the impressions produced by the Word of God and the efficacy of constant religious instruction. But it is in this same way, by little and little, that all great and lasting impressions are made and the mightiest results accomplished.
I. The processes of nature.—Mighty and sudden changes are not the rule, but gradual and prepared ones. The seasons, the months, day into night, night into day—how gradual and imperceptible the transitions. The germination of seed, &c.
II. The formation of character.—Little by little every man’s character is formed (H. E. I., 709–711, 1836–1851) or spoiled (H. E. I., 4521–4523, 4720–4725). All the steps, successively, that lead either to heaven or hell are small, one by one, except in great crimes, and even then there has been a gradual preparation for them (H. E. I., 428, 429). So conversion, that great change of the soul, is prepared for imperceptibly (H. E. I., 1462). From minute and commonplace thoughts, words, actions, results character for eternity!
III. Christian service.—Called not to acts of heroism, but to a faithful discharge of commonplace duties (H. E. I., 4149).
IV. Christian work.—It is by little and little that, in such a world as this, we must do the greater part of the good that we ever accomplish (H. E. I., 1725).
V. The training of children.—Heavenly habits are to be formed in them by the influence upon them of daily, familiar, minute, but ever-recurring examples set before them (H. E. I., 777–779, 790, 802).
VI. Preparation for heaven.—Try to gain a little for God, a little for heaven, a little more of grace every day. Do this in little things and you will accomplish great things. Here a little and there a little will carry you on from step to step, from grace to glory (H. E. I., 2512, 2537).—G. B. Cheever, D.D.: American National Preacher, xxvi. 145–152.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On vv16, 21, 23
Isaiah
THE FOUNDATION OF GOD
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Isa 28:16.
‘Therefore thus saith the Lord.’ Then these great words are God’s answer to something. And that something is the scornful defiance by the rulers of Israel of the prophet’s threatenings. By their deeds, whether by their words or no, they said that they had made friends of their enemies, and that so they were sure that, whatsoever came, they were safe. To this contemptuous and false reliance God answers, not as we might expect, first of all, by a repetition of the threatenings, but by a majestic disclosure of the sure refuge which He has provided, set in contrast to the flimsy and false ones, on which these men built their truculent confidence; ‘I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone.’ And then, after the exhibition of the great mercy which has been evoked by the very blasphemy of the rulers, and not till then, does He reiterate the threatenings of judgment, against which this foundation is laid, that men may escape; God first declares the refuge, and then warns of the tempest.
Without entering at all upon the question, which for all believing and simple souls is settled by the New Testament, of the Messianic application of the words before us, I take it for granted. There may no doubt be an allusion here to the great solid blocks which travellers tell us may still be seen at the base of the encircling walls of the Temple hill. A stone so gigantic and so firm God has laid for man to build upon.
I. Note, then, first, the foundation, which is Christ.
There are many aspects of the great thought on which I cannot touch even for a moment. For instance, let me remind you how, in a very deep sense, Jesus Christ is the foundation of the whole of the divine dealings with us; and how, in another aspect, historically, since the day on which He appeared on earth, He has more and more manifestly and completely been the foundation of the whole history of the world. But passing these aspects, let us rather fix upon those which are more immediately in the prophet’s mind.
Jesus Christ is the foundation laid for all men’s security against every tempest or assault. The context has portrayed the coming of a tremendous storm and inundation, in view of which this foundation is laid. The building reared on it then is, therefore, to be a refuge and an asylum. Have not we all of us, like these scornful men in Jerusalem, built our refuges on vain hopes, on creatural affections, on earthly possessions, on this, that, and the other false thing, all of which are to be swept away when the storm comes? And does there not come upon us all the blast of the ordinary calamities to which flesh is heir, and have we not all more or less consciousness of our own evil and sinfulness; and does there not lie before every one of us at the end of life that solemn last struggle, and beyond that, as we most of us believe, a judgment for all that we have done in the body? ‘I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone.’ Build upon that, and neither the tempest of earthly calamities, changes, disappointments, sorrows, losses, nor the scourge that is wielded because of our sins, nor the last wild tempest that sweeps a man on the wings of its strong blast from out of life into the dark region, nor the solemn final retribution and judgment, shall ever touch us. And when the hail sweeps away the refuge of lies, and the waters overflow the hiding-place, this foundation stands sure-
And lo! from sin and grief and shame
I hide me, Jesus, in Thy name.
Brethren, the one foundation on which building, we can build secure, and safe as well as secure, is that foundation which is laid in the incarnation, death, resurrection, and ascension of the Son of God. The foundation of all our security is Jesus Christ.
We may look at the same thought under somewhat different aspects. He is the foundation for all our thinking and opinions, for all our belief and our knowledge. ‘In Him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge,’ and whatsoever of solid fact men can grasp in their thinkings in regard to all the most important facts and truths with which they come into relation, is to be found in the life and death of Jesus Christ, and in the truths which these reveal. He is the foundation of all our knowledge of God, and of all our true knowledge of ourselves, of all our true knowledge of duty, and all our true knowledge of the relations between the present and the future, between man and God.
And in His life, in the history of His death and resurrection, is the only foundation for any real knowledge of the awful mysteries that lie beyond the grave. He is the Alpha from whom all truth must be deduced, the Omega to which it all leads up. Certitude is in Him. Apart from Him we are but groping amid peradventures. If we know anything about God it is due to Jesus Christ. If we know anything about ourselves it is due to Him. If we know anything about what men ought to do, it is because He has done all human duty. And if, into the mist and darkness that wraps the future, there has ever travelled one clear beam of insight, it is because He has died and risen again. If we have Him, and ponder upon the principles that are involved in, and flow from, the facts of His life and death, then we know; and ‘the truth as it is in Jesus’ is the truth indeed. To possess Him is to hold the key to all mysteries, and knowledge without Him is but knowledge of the husk, the kernel being all unreached. That Stone is the foundation on which the whole stately fabric of man’s knowledge of the highest things must ever be reared.
He is the foundation of all restful love. A Czar of Russia, in the old days, was mad enough to build a great palace upon the ice-blocks of the Neva. And when the spring came, and the foundations melted, the house, full of delights and luxury, sank beneath the river. We build upon frozen water, and when the thaw comes, what we build sinks and is lost to sight. Instead of love that twines round the creature and trails, bleeding and bruised, along the ground when the prop is taken away, let us turn our hearts to the warm, close, pure, perfect changeless love of the undying Christ, and we shall build above the fear of change. The dove’s nest in the pine-tree falls in ruin when the axe is laid to the root. Let us build our nests in the clefts of the rock and no hand will ever reach them. Christ is the foundation on which we may build an immortal love.
He is the foundation for all noble and pure living. He is the fixed pattern to which it may be conformed. Otherwise man’s notions of what is virtuous and good are much at the mercy of conventional variations of opinion. This class, that community, this generation, that school, all differ in their notions of what is true nobleness and goodness of life. And we are left at the mercy of fluctuating standards unless we take Christ in His recorded life as the one realised ideal of manhood, the pattern of what we ought to be. We cannot find a fixed and available model for conduct anywhere so useful, so complete, so capable of application to all varieties of human life and disposition as we find in Him, who was not this man or that man, in whom the manly and the feminine, the gentle and the strong, the public and the private graces were equally developed. In Christ there is no limitation or taint. In Christ there is nothing narrow or belonging to a school. This water has no taste of any of the rocks through which it flowed. You cannot say of Jesus Christ that He is a Jew or a Gentile, that He is man or woman, that He is of the ancient age or the modern type, that He is cut after this pattern or that. All beauty and all grace are in Him, and every man finds there the example that he needs. So, as the perfect pattern, He is the foundation for all noble character.
As the one sufficient motive for holy and beauteous living, He is the foundation. ‘If ye love Me, keep My commandments.’ That is a new thing in the world’s morality, and that one motive, and that motive alone, has power, as the spring sunshine has, to draw beauty from out the little sheaths of green, and to tempt the radiance of the flowers to unfold their lustre. They that find the reason and the motive for goodness and purity in Christ’s love to them, and their answering love to Christ, will build a far fairer fabric of a life than any others, let them toil at the building as they may. So, dear brethren, on this foundation God has built His mercy to all generations, and on this foundation you and I may build our safety, our love, our thinkings, our obedience, and rest secure.
II. Note next the tried preciousness of the foundation.
The language of the text, ‘a stone of proof,’ as it reads in the original, probably means a stone which has been tested and stood the trial. And because it is thus a tested stone, it therefore is a precious stone. There are two kinds of testing-the testing from the assaults of enemies, and the testing by the building upon it of friends. And both these methods of proof have been applied, and it has stood the test.
Think of all the assaults that have been made from this side and the other against Christ and His gospel, and what has become of them all? Travellers tell us how they often see some wandering tribes of savage Arabs trying to move the great stones, for instance, of Baalbec-those wonders of unfinished architecture. But what can a crowd of such people, with all their crowbars and levers, do to the great stone bedded there, where it has been for centuries? They cannot stir it one hair’s-breadth. And so, against Jesus Christ and His gospel there has stormed for eighteen hundred years an assaulting crowd, varying in its individuals and in its methods of attack, but the same in its purpose, and the same in the fruitlessness of its effort. Century after century they have said, as they are saying to-day, ‘Now the final assault is going to be delivered; it can never stand this.’ And when the smoke has cleared away there may be a little blackening upon the edge, but there is not a chip off its bulk, and it stands in its bed where it did; and of all the grand preparations for a shattering explosion, nothing is left but a sulphurous smell, and a wreath of smoke, and both are floating away down into the distance. Generation after generation has attacked the gospel; generation after generation has been foiled; and I do not need to be a prophet, or the son of a prophet, to be quite sure of this, that all who to-day are trying to destroy men’s faith in the Incarnate Son of God, who died for them and rose again, will meet the same fate. I can see the ancient and discredited systems of unbelief, that have gone down into oblivion, rising from their seats, as the prophet in his great vision saw the kings of the earth, to greet the last comer who had fought against God and failed, with ‘Art thou also become weak as we? Art thou become like unto us?’ The stone will stand, whosoever tries to blow it up with his dynamite, or to pound it with his hammers.
But there is the other kind of testing. One proves the foundation by building upon it. If the stone be soft, if it be slender, if it be imperfectly bedded, it will crumble, it will shift, it will sink. But this stone has borne all the weight that the world has laid upon it, and borne it up. Did any man ever come to Jesus Christ with a sorrow that He could not comfort, with a sin that He could not forgive, with a soul that He could not save? And we may trust Him to the end. He is a ‘tried stone.’ ‘This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles,’ has been the experience of nineteen centuries.
So, being tried, it is precious,-precious to God who laid it there at a great and real cost to Himself-having given up ‘His only begotten Son’; precious, inasmuch as building upon it is the one safety from the raging tempest and flood that would else engulf and destroy us.
III. Note, next, the process of building.
The metaphor seems to be abandoned in the last words of our text, but it is only apparently so. ‘He that believeth shall not make haste.’ So, then, we build by believing. The act of building is simple faith in Jesus Christ. We come to Him, as the Apostle Peter has it in his quotation of this text-come to Him as unto a living stone, and the coming and the building are both of them metaphors for the one simple thing, trust in the Lord. The bond that unites men on earth with Christ in Heaven, is the exercise of simple faith in Him. By it they come into contact with Him, and receive from Him the security and the blessing that He can bestow. Nothing else brings a man into living fellowship with Him. When we trust in the Lord we, as it were, are bedded into Him; and resting upon Him with all our weight, then we are safe. That confidence involves the abandonment of all the ‘refuges of lies.’ There must be utter self-distrust and forsaking and turning away from every dependence upon anything else, if we are to trust ourselves to Jesus Christ. But the figure of a foundation which gives security and stability to the stones laid upon it, does not exhaust all the blessedness of this building upon Christ. For when we really rest upon Him, there comes from the foundation up through all the courses a vital power. Thus Peter puts it: ‘To whom, coming as unto a living stone, ye also as living stones are built up.’ We might illustrate this by the supposition of some fortress perched upon a rock, and in the heart of the rock a clear fountain, which is guided by some pipe or other into the innermost rooms of the citadel. Thus, builded upon Christ, ‘our defence shall be the munitions of rocks, and our waters shall be sure.’ From Him, the foundation, there will rise into all the stones, built upon Him, the power of His own endless life, and they, too, become living stones.
IV. So note, lastly, the quiet confidence of the builders.
‘He that believeth shall not make haste.’ The word is somewhat obscure, and the LXX., which is followed by the New Testament, readers it, ‘Shall not be confounded or put to shame.’ But the rendering of our text seems to be accurate enough. ‘He shall not make haste.’ Remember the picture of the context-a suddenly descending storm, a swiftly rising and turbid flood, the lashing of the rain, the howling of the wind. The men in the clay-built hovels on the flat have to take to flight to some higher ground above the reach of the innundation, on some sheltered rock out of the flashing of the rain and the force of the tempest. He who is built upon the true foundation knows that his house is above the water-level, and he does not need to be in a hurry. He can remain quietly there till the flood subsides, knowing that it will not rise high enough to drown or even disturb him. When all the other buildings are gone, his stands. And he that thus dwells on high may look out over the wild flood, washing and weltering to the horizon, and feel that he is safe. So shall he not have to make haste, but may wait calm and quiet, knowing that all is well.
Dear friends, there is only one refuge for any of us-only one from the little annoyances and from the great ones; from to-day’s petty troubles, and from the day of judgment; from the slight stings, if I may so say, of little sorrows, cares, burdens, and from the poisoned dart of the great serpent. There is only one refuge for any of us, to build upon Jesus Christ, as we can do by simple faith.
And oh! remember, He must either be the foundation on which we build, or the stone of stumbling against which we stumble, and which one day will fall upon us and grind us to powder. Do you make your choice; and when God says, as He says to each of us: ‘Behold! I lay in Zion a foundation,’ do you say, ‘And, Lord, I build upon the foundation which Thou hast laid.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On vv15, 18 Heb. "Sheol," (See Scofield "Hab 2:5")
hell
Heb. "Sheol," (See Scofield "Hab 2:5")
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On vv14, 23 The False qnd the True Refuge
The False qnd the True Refuge
v. 14. Wherefore hear the word of the Lord, ye scornful men, those who despised and mocked the prophet’s warning, that rule this people which is in Jerusalem, the capital being named for the entire Southern Kingdom.
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v. 15. Because ye have said, in some further mockery which is now recorded, We have made a covenant with death, confident that death itself could not harm them, and with hell, the realm of the dead, are we at agreement, hoping to be safe against its power on account of their alliance with Egypt; when the overflowing scourge, the Assyrian army, shall pass through, it shall not come unto us, for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood have we hid ourselves, concealing their real intention and purposes by the use of cunning policy, of fine diplomacy, the same procedure being found in all unbelievers to this day:
v. 16. therefore thus saith the Lord God, in another beautiful statement concerning the true foundation of the believer’s trust, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation, as the Rock upon which His Church is firmly founded, a Stone, a tried Stone, one who is Himself approved, and by whom the hearts of all men are tested, a precious Corner-stone, one laid where two walls meet, which serves to connect them firmly, a sure Foundation, literally, "a Corner-stone of preciousness and a founded Foundation," to emphasize the solidity of this foundation. He that believeth shall not make haste, he who relies on Him shall not be confounded or flee in hasty alarm, for this Cornerstone is Jesus Christ Himself, the Rock of Ages for His Church. Cf Mat 21:42; Act 4:11; Rom 9:33; Rom 10:11; Eph 2:20; 1Pe 2:6-8.
v. 17. Judgment also will I lay to the line and righteousness to the plummet, the acts of Jehovah being regarded as the erecting of a building against the scorners according to the strictest vengeance of His Law; and the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies, as the shovel cleared away the ashes from the altar in the Temple, and the waters shall overflow the hiding-place, thereby both exposing and sweeping away the fabric of lies built by the leaders of Judah.
v. 18. And your covenant with death shall be disannulled, its writing obliterated and the covenant nullified, and your agreement with hell, with the realm of death, shall not stand, these enemies rather overcoming them; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, when the flood of the Assyrian army would come along, then ye shall be trodden down by it, literally, "ye shall be to it a treading down," signifying a complete subjection.
v. 19. From the time that it goeth forth it shall take you, one Assyrian campaign after the other would be successful; for morning by morning shall it pass over, in one wave of invasion after the other, by day and by night; and it shall be a vexation only to understand the report, the scoffers would now hear a preaching in act, which would be naught but terror.
v. 20. For the bed is shorter than that a man can stretch himself on it, and the covering narrower than that he can wrap himself in it, that is, the people of Jerusalem would find that the Egyptian covenant in which they hoped to find safety and rest would prove altogether insufficient.
v. 21. For the Lord shall rise up as in Mount Perazim, He shall be wrath as in the Valley of Gibeon, when, at the time of David, as an ally of Israel, He overthrew the armies of the Philistines and afforded deliverance to His people, 2Sa 5:20; 1Ch 14:11-15, that He may do His work, His strange work, for it would surely appear strange to other nations to see Jehovah punishing His own children in this manner, and bring to pass His act, His strange act, whereby He destroys His own people.
v. 22. Now, therefore, so the prophet, in conclusion, warns the scoffers, be ye not mockers, lest your bands be made strong, namely, the fetters of their submission to Assyria; for I have heard from the Lord God of hosts a consumption, that He intended a general destruction, even determined upon the whole earth. Therefore quick repentance was in order, lest the punishment of the Lord consume them all.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv7, 9, 11, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, 20, 22, 23, 25, 27, 29 But even these
But even these
"But even the leaders"
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The priest and the prophet
This does not mean a specific priest or prophet. It refers to priests and prophets in general. AT: "The priests and the prophets" (See: Generic Noun Phrases)
reel with wine, and stagger with strong drink
These two phrases mean basically the same thing and emphasize that the priests and the prophets cannot do their job because they are very drunk. AT: "stumble around because they are drunk" (See: Parallelism)
they are swallowed up by wine
Their drinking so much that they can no longer think properly is spoken of as if the wine swallowed them. This can be stated in active form. AT: "the wine is causing them to be confused" (See: Metaphor and Active or Passive)
staggering in vision and reeling in decision
Just like they are too drunk to walk correctly, they are too drunk to understand the visions God gives them or to make good decisions.
translationWords
wine
strong drink
priest
prophet
vision
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv7, 9, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 20, 21, 23, 24, 27, 28, 29 28:7-13 The focus returns to the lamentable present situation…
28:7-13 The focus returns to the lamentable present situation in Israel (and Judah). The leaders and people will be ensnared by their own schemes.
28:7 The priests and prophets led the people astray. • Intoxicating beverages such as wine and alcohol were prohibited for priests while fulfilling their duties (Lev 10:9).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.