You whom I have taken hold of from the ends of the earth, and called from its corners, and said to you, ‘You are my servant, I have chosen you and have not cast you away.’
Parallel Translations
-
You whom I have taken hold of from the ends of the earth, and called from its corners, and said to you, ‘You are my servant, I have chosen you and have not cast you away.’
-
Thou whom I have taken from the ends of the earth, and called thee from the chief men thereof, and said unto thee, Thou art my servant; I have chosen thee, and not cast thee away.
-
Thou whom I have taken hold of from the ends of the earth, and called thee from the uttermost parts thereof, and said unto thee: 'Thou art My servant, I have chosen thee and not cast thee away';
Cross-references (15)
Passages linked to Isaiah 41:9 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- 1 Samuel 12:22 For Yahweh will not forsake his people for his great name’s sake, because it has pleased Yahweh to make you a people for himself.
- Psalms 94:14 For Yahweh won’t reject his people, neither will he forsake his inheritance.
- Deuteronomy 7:6-7 For you are a holy people to Yahweh your God. Yahweh your God has chosen you to be a people for his own possession, above all peoples who are on the face of the earth. Yahweh didn’t set his love on you nor choose you, because you were more in number than any people; for you were the fewest of all peoples;
- Joshua 24:2-4 Joshua said to all the people, “Yahweh, the God of Israel, says, ‘Your fathers lived of old time beyond the River, even Terah, the father of Abraham, and the father of Nahor. They served other gods. I took your father Abraham from beyond the River, and led him throughout all the land of Canaan, and multiplied his offspring, and gave him Isaac. I gave to Isaac Jacob and Esau: and I gave to Esau Mount Seir, to possess it. Jacob and his children went down into Egypt.
- James 2:5 Listen, my beloved brothers. Didn’t God choose those who are poor in this world to be rich in faith, and heirs of the Kingdom which he promised to those who love him?
- Romans 11:1-2 I ask then, did God reject his people? May it never be! For I also am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. God didn’t reject his people, which he foreknew. Or don’t you know what the Scripture says about Elijah? How he pleads with God against Israel:
- 1 Corinthians 1:26-29 For you see your calling, brothers, that not many are wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, and not many noble; but God chose the foolish things of the world that he might put to shame those who are wise. God chose the weak things of the world that he might put to shame the things that are strong. God chose the lowly things of the world, and the things that are despised, and the things that don’t exist, that he might bring to nothing the things that exist, that no flesh should boast before God.
- Isaiah 41:2 Who has raised up one from the east? Who called him to his foot in righteousness? He hands over nations to him and makes him rule over kings. He gives them like the dust to his sword, like the driven stubble to his bow.
- Isaiah 41:8 “But you, Israel, my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the offspring of Abraham my friend,
- Isaiah 43:5-6 Don’t be afraid, for I am with you. I will bring your offspring from the east, and gather you from the west. I will tell the north, ‘Give them up!’ and tell the south, ‘Don’t hold them back! Bring my sons from far away, and my daughters from the ends of the earth—
- Revelation 5:9 They sang a new song, saying, “You are worthy to take the book and to open its seals: for you were killed, and bought us for God with your blood out of every tribe, language, people, and nation,
- Nehemiah 9:7-38 You are Yahweh, the God who chose Abram, brought him out of Ur of the Chaldees, gave him the name of Abraham, found his heart faithful before you, and made a covenant with him to give the land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, the Perizzite, the Jebusite, and the Girgashite, to give it to his offspring, and have performed your words; for you are righteous. “You saw the affliction of our fathers in Egypt, and heard their cry by the Red Sea, and showed signs and wonders against Pharaoh, and against all his servants, and against all the people of his land; for you knew that they dealt proudly against them, and made a name for yourself, as it is today. You divided the sea before them, so that they went through the middle of the sea on the dry land; and you cast their pursuers into the depths, as a stone into the mighty waters. Moreover, in a pillar of cloud you led them by day; and in a pillar of fire by night, to give them light in the way in which they should go. “You also came down on Mount Sinai, and spoke with them from heaven, and gave them right ordinances and true laws, good statutes and commandments, and made known to them your holy Sabbath, and commanded them commandments, statutes, and a law, by Moses your servant, and gave them bread from the sky for their hunger, and brought water out of the rock for them for their thirst, and commanded them that they should go in to possess the land which you had sworn to give them. “But they and our fathers behaved proudly, hardened their neck, didn’t listen to your commandments, and refused to obey. They weren’t mindful of your wonders that you did among them, but hardened their neck, and in their rebellion appointed a captain to return to their bondage. But you are a God ready to pardon, gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness, and didn’t forsake them. Yes, when they had made themselves a molded calf, and said, ‘This is your God who brought you up out of Egypt,’ and had committed awful blasphemies; yet you in your manifold mercies didn’t forsake them in the wilderness. The pillar of cloud didn’t depart from over them by day, to lead them in the way; neither did the pillar of fire by night, to show them light, and the way in which they should go. You gave also your good Spirit to instruct them, and didn’t withhold your manna from their mouth, and gave them water for their thirst. “Yes, forty years you sustained them in the wilderness. They lacked nothing. Their clothes didn’t grow old, and their feet didn’t swell. Moreover you gave them kingdoms and peoples, which you allotted according to their portions. So they possessed the land of Sihon, even the land of the king of Heshbon, and the land of Og king of Bashan. You also multiplied their children as the stars of the sky, and brought them into the land concerning which you said to their fathers, that they should go in to possess it. “So the children went in and possessed the land, and you subdued before them the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, and gave them into their hands, with their kings and the peoples of the land, that they might do with them as they pleased. They took fortified cities and a rich land, and possessed houses full of all good things, cisterns dug out, vineyards, olive groves, and fruit trees in abundance. So they ate, were filled, became fat, and delighted themselves in your great goodness. “Nevertheless they were disobedient, and rebelled against you, cast your law behind their back, killed your prophets that testified against them to turn them again to you, and they committed awful blasphemies. Therefore you delivered them into the hand of their adversaries, who distressed them. In the time of their trouble, when they cried to you, you heard from heaven; and according to your manifold mercies you gave them saviors who saved them out of the hands of their adversaries. But after they had rest, they did evil again before you; therefore you left them in the hands of their enemies, so that they had the dominion over them; yet when they returned, and cried to you, you heard from heaven; and many times you delivered them according to your mercies, and testified against them, that you might bring them again to your law. Yet they were arrogant, and didn’t listen to your commandments, but sinned against your ordinances (which if a man does, he shall live in them), turned their backs, stiffened their neck, and would not hear. Yet many years you put up with them, and testified against them by your Spirit through your prophets. Yet they would not listen. Therefore you gave them into the hand of the peoples of the lands. “Nevertheless in your manifold mercies you didn’t make a full end of them, nor forsake them; for you are a gracious and merciful God. Now therefore, our God, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who keeps covenant and loving kindness, don’t let all the travail seem little before you, that has come on us, on our kings, on our princes, on our priests, on our prophets, on our fathers, and on all your people, since the time of the kings of Assyria to this day. However you are just in all that has come on us; for you have dealt truly, but we have done wickedly. Also our kings, our princes, our priests, and our fathers have not kept your law, nor listened to your commandments and your testimonies with which you testified against them. For they have not served you in their kingdom, and in your great goodness that you gave them, and in the large and rich land which you gave before them. They didn’t turn from their wicked works. “Behold, we are servants today, and as for the land that you gave to our fathers to eat its fruit and its good, behold, we are servants in it. It yields much increase to the kings whom you have set over us because of our sins. Also they have power over our bodies and over our livestock, at their pleasure, and we are in great distress. Yet for all this, we make a sure covenant, and write it; and our princes, our Levites, and our priests, seal it.”
- Psalms 107:2-3 Let the redeemed by Yahweh say so, whom he has redeemed from the hand of the adversary, And gathered out of the lands, from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south.
- Jeremiah 33:25-26 Yahweh says: “If my covenant of day and night fails, if I have not appointed the ordinances of heaven and earth; then I will also cast away the offspring of Jacob, and of David my servant, so that I will not take of his offspring to be rulers over the offspring of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob: for I will cause their captivity to be reversed and will have mercy on them.”
- Luke 13:29 They will come from the east, west, north, and south, and will sit down in God’s Kingdom.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (11 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
Private notes
Saved on this device only — never synced or sent anywhere.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Isa 41:9 [Thou] whom I have taken from the…
Isa 41:9 [Thou] whom I have taken from the ends of the earth, and called thee from the chief men thereof, and said unto thee, Thou [art] my servant; I have chosen thee, and not cast thee away.
Ver. 9. Thou whom I have taken from the ends of the earth,] sc., In the loins of Abraham thy progenitor.
Read full note →
And called thee from the chief men thereof.] Called thee and culled thee out of the grandees of the Chaldees, the rich, the potent, and the honourable, separate from the common sort, setting thee above the kings of the earth. {Psa 89:27}
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 Thou whom I have taken from the ends of…
Thou whom I have taken from the ends of the earth; thou, Israel, whom I took to myself, and brought hither in the loins of thy father Abraham from a remote country, to wit, Chaldea; or, whom I brought back out of Babylon into thine own land, which though yet to come, he may speak of as of a thing past, as the prophets use to do, as was noted before. Jut the former interpretation seems to agree better with the foregoing verse. From the chief men thereof; from the midst of many great and noble persons, among whom he lived in Chaldea. So this notes God’s singular mercy to Abraham, and consequently to the Israelites descended from him, that he passed by many of Abraham’s betters, and called him into fellowship with himself.
I have chosen thee, and not cast thee away; I have chosen thee not for a small moment, but for ever, by making an everlasting covenant with thee and thy seed through all generations. Or the sense is this; As I have chosen thee at first, so I have not since that time cast thee off, as thou hadst frequently given me sufficient occasion to do. Or, and did not refuse thee, as this word is elsewhere used. So the same thing is repeated in other words, not without some emphasis; for he intimates that he chose them when he had just cause of refusing them.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain Thou whom I have taken from the ends of…
Thou whom I have taken from the ends of the earth,.... Meaning not Abraham, nor his natural seed; but such who believed in Christ, who dwelt in the furthest parts of the earth, to whom the Gospel came, and by which they were laid hold upon, and apprehended by Christ as his own:
and called thee from the chief men thereof; from among the great men of the earth, out of their families, courts, and palaces: or rather called them by grace, when such personages were passed by and left; not many noble, not many mighty, being called in those times, Co1 1:26,
Read full note →
and said unto thee, thou art my servant; and not only called them by the name, but made them such in reality: adding,
I have chosen thee, and not cast thee away; nor does the Lord cast away any whom he has chosen and foreknown; and therefore being thus dear to God, as all the above titles and acts of grace show, and being secured by him from perishing or being eternally lost, this should encourage them to suffer persecution patiently for his name's sake, and not be afraid of any of their enemies, as 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 Thou - Thou Israel, whom I took to myself,…
Thou - Thou Israel, whom I took to myself, and brought hither in the loins of thy father Abraham, from a remote country. Called thee - From the midst of many great persons among whom he lived in Chaldea. Chosen - I have chosen thee and thy seed through all generations.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 9. And called thee from the chief men…
Verse 9. And called thee from the chief men thereof - "And called from the extremities thereof"] אציל מאציליה atsil meatsileyha, signifies the arm, ascilla, ala; and is used like כנף canaph, "the wing," for any thing extended from the extremity of another, or joined on to it. It is here parallel with and synonymous to מקצות mikkatsoth, "from the ends," in the preceding member.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain Thou whom I have taken from the ends of…
Thou whom I have taken from the ends of the earth - From Chaldea - regarded by the Jews as the remote part of the earth. Thus in Isa 13:5, it is said of the Medes that they came ‘from a far country, from the end of heaven’ (see the note on that place). Abraham was called from Ur of the Chaldees - a city still remaining on the east of the river Euphrates. It is probably the same place as the Persian fortress Ur, between Nesibis and the Tigris. It was visited by Mr. Wolfe, Mr. Buckingham, and by others.
And called thee from the chief men thereof - Or rather, from the extremities of the earth. The word אציל 'âtsiyl means properly “a side”; and when applied to the earth, means the sides ends, or extremities of it. In Exo 24:11, it is rendered ‘nobles,’ from an Arabic word signifying to he deep-rooted, and hence, those who are sprung from an ancient stock (Gesenius). In this place it is evidently used in the same sense as the word (אצל 'ētsel) meaning “side,” in the sense of extremity, or end. The parallelism requires us to give this interpretation to the word. So Jerome renders it, longinquis ejus (sc. terroe). The Septuagint renders it, Ἐκ τῶν σκωπιῶν Ek tōn skōpiōn - ‘From the speculations of the earth’ (Thompson), or rather perhaps meaning from the extremity of vision; from the countries lying in the distant horizon; or from the elevated places which offered an extensive range of vision. The Chaldee renders it, ‘From the kingdoms I have selected thee.’ Symmachus renders it, Ἀπὸ τῶν ἀγκῶνων Apo tōn angkōnōn autēs - from its angles, its corners, its extremities. Some have supposed that this refers to the deliverance from Egypt, but the more probable interpretation is that which refers it to the call of Abraham from Chaldea; and the idea is, that as God had called him from that distant land, and had made him his friend, he would preserve and guard his posterity. Perhaps it may be implied that he would be favorable to them in that same country from where he had called their illustrious progenitor, and would in like manner conduct them to the land of promise, that is, to their own land.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain Abraham, the father of the Jews, taken from the…
Abraham, the father of the Jews, taken from the remote Ur of the Chaldees. Others take it of Israel, called out of Egypt (Deu 4:37; Hos 11:1).
from the chief men--literally, "the elbows"; so the joints; hence the root which joins the tree to the earth; figuratively, those of ancient and noble stock. But the parallel clause "ends of the earth" favors GESENIUS, who translates, "the extremities of the earth"; so JEROME.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 9. taken (better, as R.V., taken hold of) from…
9. taken (better, as R.V., taken hold of) from the ends of the earth] It is disputed whether the reference is to the call of Abraham, or to the Exodus. It is a little difficult to suppose that Egypt could be described as the “ends of the earth” by a Jew; for although the writer may have lived in Babylonia, he could hardly divest himself of the historic consciousness of his nation, that Egypt was the neighbour of Israel. It is more probable, therefore, that he is thinking of Mesopotamia, and of the choice of Israel as effected in the call of Abraham. For chief men render corners (R.V.).
cast thee away] rejected thee—because of thy smallness.
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 (9) From the ends of the earth.—Ur of the…
(9) From the ends of the earth.—Ur of the Chaldees, as belonging to the Euphrates region, is on the extreme verge of the prophet’s horizon.
From the chief men thereof.—Better, from the far-off regions thereof.
Read full note →
I have chosen . . .—Isaiah becomes the preacher of the Divine election, and finds in it, as St. Paul found, the ground of an inextinguishable hope for the nation of which he was a member. As in St. Peter’s teaching, it remained for them to “make their calling and election sure” (2Pe_1:10), though God, in the unchangeableness of His nature, had chosen them before the foundation of the world.
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 Thou whom I have taken from the ends of…
Thou whom I have taken from the ends of the earth; i.e. from Ur of the Chaldees (Mugheir in Lower Babylonia), and again from Egypt, another "end of the earth" compared with Palestine. The prophet views Palestine as Israel"s true habitat, whatever may be its temporary abiding-place. From the chief men thereof. Most moderns translate "from the corners thereof;" but atsilim has the meaning of "chief men" in the only other place where it occurs. (Exo_24:11) And not cast thee away. Not even when in exile was Israel "cast away." God"s care was still extended over them.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 41:9 I have chosen you restates 41:8 to emphasize…
41:9 I have chosen you restates 41:8 to emphasize God’s commitment and faithfulness to his people Israel, who had not been faithful to him. • not throw you away: Because of the Exile, the people felt that God had rejected them (see 49:21; 54:6). However, God had good purposes for them.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.