3“But draw near here, you sons of a sorceress, you offspring of adulterers and prostitutes.
4Whom do you mock? Against whom do you make a wide mouth and stick out your tongue? Aren’t you children of disobedience and offspring of falsehood,
5you who inflame yourselves among the oaks, under every green tree; who kill the children in the valleys, under the clefts of the rocks?
6Among the smooth stones of the valley is your portion. They, they are your lot. You have even poured a drink offering to them. You have offered an offering. Shall I be appeased for these things?
3 “But draw near here, you sons of a sorceress, you offspring of adulterers and prostitutes.
4 Whom do you mock? Against whom do you make a wide mouth and stick out your tongue? Aren’t you children of disobedience and offspring of falsehood,
5 you who inflame yourselves among the oaks, under every green tree; who kill the children in the valleys, under the clefts of the rocks?
6 Among the smooth stones of the valley is your portion. They, they are your lot. You have even poured a drink offering to them. You have offered an offering. Shall I be appeased for these things?
KJVKing James Version
3 But draw near hither, ye sons of the sorceress, the seed of the adulterer and the whore.
4 Against whom do ye sport yourselves? against whom make ye a wide mouth, and draw out the tongue? are ye not children of transgression, a seed of falsehood,
5 Enflaming yourselves with idols under every green tree, slaying the children in the valleys under the clifts of the rocks?
6 Among the smooth stones of the stream is thy portion; they, they are thy lot: even to them hast thou poured a drink offering, thou hast offered a meat offering. Should I receive comfort in these?
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JPSJPS Tanakh (1917)
3 But draw near hither, ye sons of the sorceress, the seed of the adulterer and the harlot.
4 Against whom do ye sport yourselves? Against whom make ye a wide mouth, and draw out the tongue? Are ye not children of transgression, a seed of falsehood,
5 Ye that inflame yourselves among the terebinths, under every leafy tree; that slay the children in the valleys, under the clefts of the rocks?
6 Among the smooth stones of the valley is thy portion; they, they are thy lot; even to them hast thou poured a drink-offering, thou hast offered a meal-offering. Should I pacify Myself for these things?
Matthew 16:4(v3)An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and there will be no sign given to it, except the sign of the prophet Jonah.” He left…
1 John 3:10(v3)In this the children of God are revealed, and the children of the devil. Whoever doesn’t do righteousness is not of God, neither is he who…
2 Kings 16:3-4(v5)But he walked in the way of the kings of Israel, yes, and made his son to pass through the fire, according to the abominations of the…
Isaiah 1:29(v5)For they shall be ashamed of the oaks which you have desired, and you shall be confounded for the gardens that you have chosen.
Jeremiah 3:9(v6)Because she took her prostitution lightly, the land was polluted, and she committed adultery with stones and with wood.
Show all 85 cross-references
Jeremiah 7:18(v6)The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead the dough, to make cakes to the queen of the sky, and to…
Ezekiel 16:20(v5)“ ‘ “Moreover you have taken your sons and your daughters, whom you have borne to me, and you have sacrificed these to them to be devoured.…
Hosea 1:2(v3)When Yahweh spoke at first by Hosea, Yahweh said to Hosea, “Go, take for yourself a wife of prostitution and children of unfaithfulness;…
James 4:4(v3)You adulterers and adulteresses, don’t you know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Whoever therefore wants to be a…
2 Peter 2:13(v4)receiving the wages of unrighteousness; people who count it pleasure to revel in the daytime, spots and defects, reveling in their deceit…
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Exodus 9:17(v4)because you still exalt yourself against my people, that you won’t let them go.
Leviticus 18:21(v5)“ ‘You shall not give any of your children as a sacrifice to Molech. You shall not profane the name of your God. I am Yahweh.
2 Kings 23:10(v5)He defiled Topheth, which is in the valley of the children of Hinnom, that no man might make his son or his daughter to pass through the…
Psalms 35:21(v4)Yes, they opened their mouth wide against me. They said, “Aha! Aha! Our eye has seen it!”
Isaiah 1:4(v4)Ah sinful nation, a people loaded with iniquity, offspring of evildoers, children who deal corruptly! They have forsaken Yahweh. They have…
Isaiah 1:21(v3)How the faithful city has become a prostitute! She was full of justice. Righteousness lodged in her, but now there are murderers.
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Jeremiah 2:20(v5)“For long ago I broke off your yoke, and burst your bonds. You said, ‘I will not serve;’ for on every high hill and under every green tree…
Jeremiah 3:13(v5)Only acknowledge your iniquity, that you have transgressed against Yahweh your God, and have scattered your ways to the strangers under…
Jeremiah 7:31(v5)They have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the…
Joel 3:9-11(v3)Proclaim this among the nations: “Prepare for war! Stir up the mighty men. Let all the warriors draw near. Let them come up. Beat your…
Habakkuk 2:19(v6)Woe to him who says to the wood, ‘Awake!’ or to the mute stone, ‘Arise!’ Shall this teach? Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, and…
Matthew 3:7(v3)But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for his baptism, he said to them, “You offspring of vipers, who warned you to…
Matthew 12:34(v3)You offspring of vipers, how can you, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.
Matthew 23:33(v3)You serpents, you offspring of vipers, how will you escape the judgment of Gehenna?
Luke 3:7(v3)He said therefore to the multitudes who went out to be baptized by him, “You offspring of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to…
John 8:40-44(v3)But now you seek to kill me, a man who has told you the truth which I heard from God. Abraham didn’t do this. You do the works of your…
Exodus 16:7-8(v4)In the morning, you shall see Yahweh’s glory; because he hears your murmurings against Yahweh. Who are we, that you murmur against us?”…
Exodus 32:6(v5)They rose up early on the next day, and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink,…
Leviticus 20:2-5(v5)“Moreover, you shall tell the children of Israel, ‘Anyone of the children of Israel, or of the strangers who live as foreigners in Israel,…
Numbers 16:11(v4)Therefore you and all your company have gathered together against Yahweh! What is Aaron that you complain against him?”
Numbers 25:1-2(v5)Israel stayed in Shittim; and the people began to play the prostitute with the daughters of Moab; for they called the people to the…
Numbers 25:6(v5)Behold, one of the children of Israel came and brought to his brothers a Midianite woman in the sight of Moses, and in the sight of all the…
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Deuteronomy 32:37-38(v6)He will say, “Where are their gods, the rock in which they took refuge; which ate the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their…
Joshua 10:21(v4)all the people returned to the camp to Joshua at Makkedah in peace. None moved his tongue against any of the children of Israel.
Judges 16:25-27(v4)When their hearts were merry, they said, “Call for Samson, that he may entertain us.” They called for Samson out of the prison; and he…
1 Kings 14:23(v5)For they also built for themselves high places, sacred pillars, and Asherah poles on every high hill and under every green tree.
2 Kings 17:10(v5)and they set up for themselves pillars and Asherah poles on every high hill, and under every green tree;
2 Chronicles 28:3(v5)Moreover he burned incense in the valley of the son of Hinnom, and burned his children in the fire, according to the abominations of the…
Job 16:9-10(v4)He has torn me in his wrath and persecuted me. He has gnashed on me with his teeth. My adversary sharpens his eyes on me. They have gaped…
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Psalms 22:13(v4)They open their mouths wide against me, lions tearing prey and roaring.
Psalms 22:17(v4)I can count all of my bones. They look and stare at me.
Psalms 69:12(v4)Those who sit in the gate talk about me. I am the song of the drunkards.
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Isaiah 10:15(v4)Should an ax brag against him who chops with it? Should a saw exalt itself above him who saws with it? As if a rod should lift those who…
Isaiah 30:1(v4)“Woe to the rebellious children”, says Yahweh, “who take counsel, but not from me; and who make an alliance, but not with my Spirit, that…
Isaiah 30:9(v4)For it is a rebellious people, lying children, children who will not hear Yahweh’s law;
Isaiah 37:23(v4)Whom have you defied and blasphemed? Against whom have you exalted your voice and lifted up your eyes on high? Against the Holy One of…
Isaiah 37:29(v4)Because of your raging against me, and because your arrogance has come up into my ears, therefore I will put my hook in your nose and my…
Isaiah 65:11(v6)“But you who forsake Yahweh, who forget my holy mountain, who prepare a table for Fortune, and who fill up mixed wine to Destiny;
Isaiah 66:3(v6)He who kills an ox is as he who kills a man; he who sacrifices a lamb, as he who breaks a dog’s neck; he who offers an offering, as he who…
Jeremiah 5:9(v6)Shouldn’t I punish them for these things?” says Yahweh. “Shouldn’t my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?
Jeremiah 5:29(v6)“Shouldn’t I punish for these things?” says Yahweh. “Shouldn’t my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?
Jeremiah 9:9(v6)Shouldn’t I punish them for these things?” says Yahweh. “Shouldn’t my soul be avenged on a nation such as this?
Jeremiah 17:2(v5)Even their children remember their altars and their Asherah poles by the green trees on the high hills.
Jeremiah 19:13(v6)The houses of Jerusalem, and the houses of the kings of Judah, which are defiled, will be as the place of Topheth, even all the houses on…
Jeremiah 32:29(v6)The Chaldeans, who fight against this city, will come and set this city on fire, and burn it with the houses on whose roofs they have…
Jeremiah 32:35(v5)They built the high places of Baal, which are in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through…
Jeremiah 44:17-25(v6)But we will certainly perform every word that has gone out of our mouth, to burn incense to the queen of the sky, and to pour out drink…
Jeremiah 50:38(v5)A drought is on her waters, and they will be dried up; for it is a land of engraved images, and they are mad over idols.
Jeremiah 51:7(v5)Babylon has been a golden cup in Yahweh’s hand, who made all the earth drunk. The nations have drunk of her wine; therefore the nations…
Lamentations 2:15-16(v4)All that pass by clap their hands at you. They hiss and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, “Is this the city that men…
Ezekiel 2:4(v4)The children are impudent and stiff-hearted. I am sending you to them, and you shall tell them, ‘This is what the Lord Yahweh says.’
Ezekiel 6:13(v5)You will know that I am Yahweh, when their slain men are among their idols around their altars, on every high hill, on all the tops of the…
Ezekiel 20:26(v5)I polluted them in their own gifts, in that they caused all that opens the womb to pass through the fire, that I might make them desolate,…
Ezekiel 20:31(v5)When you offer your gifts, when you make your sons pass through the fire, do you pollute yourselves with all your idols to this day? Should…
Ezekiel 20:39(v6)“ ‘As for you, house of Israel, the Lord Yahweh says: “Go, everyone serve his idols, and hereafter also, if you will not listen to me; but…
Hosea 4:11-13(v5)Prostitution, wine, and new wine take away understanding. My people consult with their wooden idol, and answer to a stick of wood. Indeed…
Hosea 7:4-7(v5)They are all adulterers. They are burning like an oven that the baker stops stirring, from the kneading of the dough, until it is leavened.…
Hosea 10:9(v4)“Israel, you have sinned from the days of Gibeah. There they remained. The battle against the children of iniquity doesn’t overtake them in…
Amos 2:7-8(v5)They trample on the dust of the earth on the head of the poor, and deny justice to the oppressed; and a man and his father use the same…
Matthew 13:38(v4)the field is the world; and the good seed, these are the children of the Kingdom; and the darnel weeds are the children of the evil one.
Matthew 27:29(v4)They braided a crown of thorns and put it on his head, and a reed in his right hand; and they kneeled down before him, and mocked him,…
Matthew 27:39-44(v4)Those who passed by blasphemed him, wagging their heads, and saying, “You who destroy the temple, and build it in three days, save…
Luke 10:16(v4)Whoever listens to you listens to me, and whoever rejects you rejects me. Whoever rejects me rejects him who sent me.”
Acts 9:4(v4)He fell on the earth, and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”
Ephesians 2:2-3(v4)in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works…
Ephesians 5:6(v4)Let no one deceive you with empty words. For because of these things, the wrath of God comes on the children of disobedience.
Colossians 3:6(v4)For these things’ sake the wrath of God comes on the children of disobedience.
Revelation 18:3(v5)For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her sexual immorality, the kings of the earth committed sexual immorality with…
Jeremiah 3:6(v5)Moreover, Yahweh said to me in the days of Josiah the king, “Have you seen that which backsliding Israel has done? She has gone up on every…
85 distinct cross-references across this passage (86 total citations).
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (21 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
Geneva Bible translators1599 · Public DomainOn vv3, 5, 6He threateneth the wicked hypocrites, who under the pretence…
He threateneth the wicked hypocrites, who under the pretence of the name of God’s people, derided God’s word and his promises: boasting openly that they were the children of Abraham, but because they were not faithful and obedient as Abraham was, he calleth them bastards, and the children of sorcerers, which forsook God, and fled to wicked means for succor.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp1656 · Public DomainOn vv3–6Isa 57:3 But draw near hither, ye sons of…
Isa 57:3 But draw near hither, ye sons of the sorceress, the seed of the adulterer and the whore.
Ver. 3. But draw near hither, ye sons of the sorceress.] Here "Esaias is very bold," as the apostle saith of him in another case, {Rom 10:20} and maketh it appear that he was none of those dumb dogs he had rated at in the former chapter. The Jews gloried much in their pedigree and descent from Abraham, and that they were "born of the free woman." He telleth them flat and plain that they were witches’ children, whores’ sons, a bastardly brood, {a} as our Saviour afterwards called them, a race of rebels, a seed of serpents, shamefully degenerate from their praiseworthy progenitors.
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{a} γενεα μοιχαλις.
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 Poole1685 · Public DomainOn vv3–6Draw near hither, to God’s tribunal, to answer for…
Draw near hither, to God’s tribunal, to answer for yourselves, and to hear what I have to say against you, and to receive your sentence.
Sons of the sorceress; not by propagation, but by imitation; such being frequently called a man or woman’s sons that learn their art, and follow their example: you sorcerers, either properly or metaphorically so called; for the Jews were guilty of it both ways.
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The seed of the adulterer and the whore; not the genuine children of Abraham, as you pretend and boast, but begotten in fornication upon a common whore; which is not to be understood properly, but figuratively, because their dispositions and carriages were far more suitable to a bastardly brood than to Abraham’s seed.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry1710 · Public DomainOn v3We have here a high charge, but a just…
We have here a high charge, but a just one no doubt, drawn up against that wicked generation out of which God's righteous ones were removed, because the world was not worthy of them. Observe,
I. The general character here given of them, or the name and title by which they stand indicted, Isa 57:3. They are told to draw near and hear the charge, are set to the bar, and arraigned there as sons of the sorceress, or of a witch, the seed of an adulterer and a whore, that is, they were such themselves, they were strongly inclined to be such, and their ancestors were such before them. Sin is sorcery and adultery, for it is departing from God and dealing with the devil. They were children of disobedience. "Come," says the prophet, "draw near hither, and I will read you your doom; to the righteous death will bring peace and rest, but not to you; you are children of transgression and a seed of falsehood (Isa 57:4), that have it by kind, and have it woven into your very nature, to backslide from God and to deal treacherously with him," Isa 48:8.
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II. The particular crimes laid to their charge.
1. Scoffing at God and his word. They were a generation of scorners (Isa 57:4): "Against whom do you sport yourselves? You think it is only against the poor prophets whom you trample upon as contemptible men, but really it is against God himself, who sends them, and whose message they deliver." Mocking the messengers of the Lord was Jerusalem's measure-filling sin, for what was done to them God took as done to himself. When they were reproved for their sins, and threatened with the judgments of God, they ridiculed the word of God with the rudest and most indecent gestures and expressions of disdain. They sported themselves, and made themselves merry, with that which should have made them serious, and under which they should have humbled themselves. They made wry mouths at the prophets, and drew out the tongue, contrary to all the laws of good breeding; nor did they treat God's prophets with the common civility with which they would have treated a gentleman's servant that had been sent to them on an errand. Note, Those who mock at God, and bid defiance to his judgments, had best consider who it is towards whom they conduct themselves so insolently.
2. Idolatry. This was that sin which the people of the Jews were most notoriously guilty of before the captivity; but that affliction cured them of it. In Isaiah's time it abounded, witness the abominable idolatries of Ahaz (which some think are particularly referred to here) and of Manasseh. (1.) They were dotingly fond of their idols, were inflamed with them, as those that burn in unlawful unnatural lusts, Rom 1:27. They were mad upon their idols, Jer 50:38. They inflamed themselves with them by their violent passions in the worship of them, as those of Baal's prophets that leaped upon the altar, and cut themselves, Kg1 18:26, Kg1 18:28. Note, Vile corruptions, the more they are gratified the more they are inflamed. They worshipped their idols under every green tree, in the open air, and in the shade; yet that did not cool the heat of their impetuous lusts, but rather the charming beauty of the green trees made them the more fond of their idols which they worshipped there. Thus that in nature which is pleasing, instead of drawing them to the God of nature, drew them from him. The flame of their zeal in the worship of false gods may shame us for our coldness and indifference in the worship of the true God. They strove to inflame themselves, but we distract and deaden ourselves. (2.) They were barbarous and unnaturally cruel in the worship of their idols. They slew their children, and offered them in sacrifice to their idols, not only in the valley of the son of Hinnom, the headquarters of that monstrous idolatry, but in other valleys, in imitation of that, and under the cliffs of the rock, in dark and solitary places, the fittest for such works of darkness. (3.) They were abundant and insatiable in their idolatries. They never thought they could have idols enough, nor could spend enough upon them and do enough in their service. The Syrians had once a notion of the God of Israel that he was a God of the hills, but not a God of the valleys (Kg1 20:28); but these idolaters, to make sure work, had both. [1.] They had gods of the valleys, which they worshipped in the low places by the water side (Isa 57:6): Among the smooth stones of the valley, or brook, is thy portion. If they saw a smooth carved stone, though set up but for a way-mark or a mere-stone, they were ready to worship it, as the papists do crosses. Or in stony valleys they set up their gods, which they called their portion, and took for their lot, as God's people take him for their lot and portion. But these gods of stone would really be no better a portion for them, no better a lot, than the smooth stones of the stream near which they were set up, for sometimes they worshipped their rivers. "They, they, are the lot which thou trustest to and art pleased with, but thou shalt be put off with it for thy lot, and miserable will thy case be." See the folly of sinners, who take the smooth stones of the stream for their portion, when they might have the precious stones of God's Jerusalem, and the high priest's ephod, to portion themselves with. Having taken these idols for their lot and portion, they stick at no charge in doing honour to them: "To them hast thou poured a drink-offering, and offered a meat-offering, as if they had given thee thy meat and drink." They loved their idols better than their children, for their own tables must be robbed to replenish the altars of their idols. Have we taken the true God for our portion? Is he, even he, our lot? Let us then serve him with our meat and drink, not, as they did, by depriving ourselves of the use of them, but by eating and drinking to his glory. Here, in a parenthesis, comes in an expression of God's just resentment of this wickedness of theirs: Should I receive comfort in these - in such a people as this? Can those expect that God will take any pleasure in them, or accept their devotions at his altar, who thus serve Baal with the gifts of his providence? God takes comfort in his people, while they are faithful to him; but what comfort can he take in them when those that should be his witnesses against the idolatries of the world do themselves fall in with them? Should I have compassion on these? (so some), or should I repent me concerning these? so others. "How can they expect that I should spare them, and either adjourn or abate their punishment, when they are so very provoking? Shall I not visit for these things?" Jer 5:7, Jer 5:9. [2.] They had gods of the hills too (Isa 57:7): "Upon a lofty and high mountain (as if thou wouldst vie with the high and lofty One himself, Isa 57:15) hast thou set thy bed, thy idol, thy idol's temple and altar, the bed of thy uncleanness, where thou committest spiritual whoredom, with all the wantonness of an idolatrous fancy, and in direct violation of the covenant of thy God. Thither wentest thou up readily enough, though it was up-hill, to offer sacrifice." Some think this bespeaks the impudence they arrived at in their idolatries; at first they had some sense of shame, when they worshipped their idols in the valleys, in obscure places; but they soon conquered that, and came to do it upon the lofty high mountains. They were not ashamed, neither could they blush. [3.] As if these were not enough, they had household-gods too, their lares and penates. Behind the doors and the posts (Isa 57:8), where the law of God should be written for a memorandum to them of their duty, they set up the remembrance of their idols, not so much to keep up their own remembrance of them (they were so fond of them that they could not forget them), but to show to others how mindful they were of them, and to put their children in mind of them, and possess them betimes with a veneration for these dunghill deities. [4.] As they were insatiable in their idolatries, so they were inseparable from them. They were hardened in their wickedness; they worshipped their idols openly and in public view, as being neither ashamed of the sin nor afraid of the punishment; they went as publicly, and in as great crowds, to the idol-temples, as ever they had gone to God's house. This was like an impudent harlot, discovering themselves to another than God, making profession of another than the true religion. They took a pride in making proselytes to their idolatries, and not only went up themselves to their high places, but enlarged their bed, that is, their idol-temples, and (as the margin reads the following words) thou hewedst it for thyself larger than theirs, than theirs from whom thou copiedst it, and tookest the platform of it, as Ahaz of his altar from that which he saw at Damascus, Kg2 16:10. And being thus involved over head and ears, as it were, in their idolatries, there is no parting them from them. Ephraim is now joined to idols both in love and league. First, In league: "Thou hast made a covenant with them, with the idols, with the idol-worshippers, to live and die together." This was a complete renunciation of their covenant with God and an avowed resolution to persist in their apostasy from him. Secondly, In love: "Thou lovedst their bed, that is, the temple of an idol, wherever thou sawest it." Justly therefore were they given up to their own hearts' lusts.
3. Another sin charged upon them is their trusting in and seeking to foreign aids and succours, and contracting a communion with the Gentile powers (Isa 57:9): Thou wentest to the king, which some understand of the idol they worshipped, particularly Moloch, which signifies a king. "Thou didst every thing to ingratiate thyself with those idols, didst offer incense and sweet ointments at their altars." Or it may be meant of the king of Assyria, whom Ahaz made his court to, or of the king of Babylon, whose ambassadors Hezekiah caressed, or of other kings of the nations whose idolatrous usages they admired and were desirous to learn and imitate, and for that end went and sent to cultivate an acquaintance and correspondence with them, that they might be like them and strengthen themselves by an alliance with them. See here, (1.) What an expense they were at in forming and procuring this grand alliance. They went with ointments and perfumes, either bestowed upon themselves, to beautify their own faces and so make themselves considerable and worthy the friendship of the greatest king, or to be presented to those whose favour they were ambitious of, because a man's gift makes room for him and brings him before great men. "When the first present of rich perfumes was thought too little, thou didst increase them;" and thus many seek the ruler's favour, forgetting that, after all, every man's judgment proceeds from the Lord. So fond were they of those heathen princes that they not only went themselves, in all their airs, to those that were near them, but sent messengers to those that were afar off, Isa 18:2. (2.) How much they hereby disparaged themselves and laid the honour of their crown and nation in the dust: Thou didst debase thyself even unto hell. They did so by their idolatries. It is a dishonour to the children of men, who are endued with the powers of reason, to worship that as their god which is the creature of their own fancy and the work of their own hands, to bow down to the stock of a tree. It is much more a dishonour to the children of God, who are blessed with the privilege of divine revelation, to forsake such a God as they know theirs to be for a thing of nought, their own mercies for lying vanities. They likewise debased themselves by truckling to their heathen neighbours, and depending upon them, when they had a God to go to who is all-sufficient and in covenant with them. How did those shame themselves to the highest degree, and sink themselves to the lowest, that forsook the fountain of life for broken cisterns and the rock of ages for broken reeds! Note, Sinners disparage and debase themselves; the service of sin is an ignominious slavery; and those who thus debase themselves to hell will justly have their portion there.
III. The aggravations of their sin. 1. They had been tired with disappointments in their wicked courses, and yet they would not be convinced of the folly of them (Isa 57:10): "Thou art wearied in the greatness of thy way; thou hast undertaken a mighty task, to find out true satisfaction and happiness in that which is vanity and a lie." Those that set up idols, instead of God, for the object of their worship, and princes, instead of God, for the object of their hope and confidence, and think thus to better themselves and make themselves easy, go a great way about, and will never come to their journey's end: Thou art wearied in the multitude, or multiplicity, of thy ways (so some read it): those that forsake the only right way wander endlessly in a thousand by-paths, and lose themselves in the many inventions which they have sought out. They weary themselves with fresh chases and fierce ones, but never gain their point, like the Sodomites, that wearied themselves to find the door (Gen 19:11) and could not find it at last. The pleasures of sin will soon surfeit, but never satisfy; a man may quickly tire himself in the pursuit of them, but can never repose himself in the enjoyment of them. They found this by experience. The idols they had often worshipped never did them any kindness; the kings they courted distressed them, and helped them not; and yet they were so wretchedly besotted that they could not say, "There is no hope; it is in vain any longer to expect that satisfaction in creature-confidences, and in the worship of idols, which we have so often looked for, and never met with." Note, Despair of happiness in the creature, and of satisfaction in the service of sin, is the first step towards a well-grounded hope of happiness in God and a well-fixed resolution to keep to his service; and those are inexcusable who have had sensible convictions of the vanity of the creature, and yet will not be brought to say, "There is no hope to be happy short of the Creator." 2. Though they were convinced that the way they were in was a sinful way, yet, because they had found some present sensual pleasure and worldly profit by it, they could not persuade themselves to be sorry for it: "Thou hast found the life of thy hand" (or the living of it); thou boastest how fortune smiles upon thee, and therefore thou art not grieved, any more than Ephraim when he said (Hos 12:8), "I have become rich; I have found out substance." Note, Prosperity in sin is a great bar to conversion from sin. Those that live at ease in their sinful projects, are tempted to think God favours them, and therefore they have nothing to repent of. Some read it ironically, or by way of question: "Thou hast found the life of thy hand, hast found true satisfaction and happiness, no doubt thou hast; hast thou not? And therefore thou art so far from being grieved that thou blessest thyself in thy own evil way; but review thy gains once more, and come to a balance of profit and loss, and then say, What fruit hast thou of those things whereof thou art ashamed and for which God shall bring thee into judgment?" Rom 6:21. 3. They had dealt very unworthily with God by their sin; for, (1.) It should seem they pretended that the reason why they left God was because he was too terrible a majesty for them to deal with; they must have gods that they could be more free and familiar with. "But," says God, "of whom hast thou been afraid or feared, that thou hast lied, that thou hast dealt falsely and treacherously with me, and dissembled in thy covenants with me and prayers to me? What did I ever do to frighten thee from me? What occasion have I given thee to think hardly of me, that thou hast gone to seek a kinder master?" (2.) However, it is certain that they had no true reverence of God nor any serious regard to him. So that question is commonly understood, "Of whom hast thou been afraid, or feared? Of none; for thou hast not feared me whom thou shouldst fear; for thou hast lied to me." Those that dissemble with God make it to appear they stand in no awe of him. "Thou hast not remembered me, neither what I have said nor what I have done, neither the promises nor the threatenings, nor the performances of either; thou hast not laid them to thy heart, as thou wouldst have done if thou hadst feared me." Note, Those who lay not the word of God and his providences to their hearts do thereby show that they have not the fear of God before their eyes. And multitudes are ruined by fearlessness, forgetfulness, and mere carelessness; they do not aright nor to good purpose fear any thing, remember any thing, nor lay any thing to heart. Nay, (3.) They were hardened in their sin by the patience and forbearance of God. "Have not I held my peace of old, and for a long time? These things thou hast done and I kept silence. And therefore, as it follows here, thou fearest me not;" as if because God had spared long he would never punish, Ecc 8:11. Because he kept silence the sinner thought him altogether such a one as himself, and stood in no awe of him.
IV. Here is God's resolution to call them to an account, though he had long borne with them (Isa 57:12): "I will declare (like that, Psa 50:21, But I will reprove thee), I will declare thy righteousness, which thou makest thy boast of, and let the world see, and thyself too, to thy confusion, that it is all a sham, all a cheat, it is not what it pretends to be. When thy righteousness comes to be examined it will be found that it was unrighteousness, and that there was no sincerity in all thy pretensions. I will declare thy works, what they have been and what the gain thou pretendest to have gotten by them, and it will appear that at long-run they shall not profit thee, nor turn to any account." Note, Sinful works, as they are works of darkness, and there is no reason nor righteousness in them, so they are unfruitful works and there is nothing got by them; and, however they look now, it will be made to appear so another day. Sin profits not, nay, it ruins and destroys.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill1763 · Public DomainOn vv3–6But draw near hither,.... The death of the righteous,…
But draw near hither,.... The death of the righteous, and their happiness after it, being observed: the wicked, who thought themselves safe from danger, and the happier that they were rid of the righteous, those witnesses and prophets which had tormented them, and therefore rejoiced on that account, are here summoned to the divine tribunal, to hear their character, and receive their doom, as follows:
ye sons of the sorceress; the children of Jezebel, the witch, and the prophetess that taught the servants of the Lord to commit fornication, and bewitched with her witchcrafts the sons of the apostate church of Rome; by whose sorceries all nations have been deceived, and of which she repents not, Rev 2:20,
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the seed of the adulterer and of the whore; of the great whore of Babylon, with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication; and whose subjects and children are the seed of this whore, and the sons of this idolatrous church: or, "that committeth whoredom" (g); which aggravates the character, that they were not only the children of adulterous persons, but committed whoredom themselves.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley1765 · Public DomainOn vv3–6Hither - To God's tribunal, to receive your sentence.…
Hither - To God's tribunal, to receive your sentence. Sons - Not by propagation, but by imitation. And the whore - Not the genuine children of Abraham, their dispositions were far more suitable to a bastardly brood, than to Abraham's seed.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke1810 · Public DomainOn v6Verse 6. Among the smooth stones of the stream…
Verse 6. Among the smooth stones of the stream - "Among the smooth stones of the valley"] The Jews were extremely addicted to the practice of many superstitious and idolatrous rites, which the prophet here inveighs against with great vehemence. Of the worship of rude stones consecrated, there are many testimonials of the ancients. They were called βαιτυλοι and βαιτυλια probably from the stone which Jacob erected at Beth-el, pouring oil upon the top of it. This practice was very common in different ages and places. Arnobius, lib. i., gives an account of his own practice in this respect before he became a Christian: Si quando conspexeram lubricatum lapidem, et ex olivi unguine sordidatum; tanquam inesset vis praesens, adulabar, affabar, et beneficia poscebam nihil sentiente de trunco. - "When I have met with a smooth stone, smeared with oil, supposing a spiritual power to be connected with it, I worshipped it, paid my addresses to it, and requested blessings," c. Clemens Alex., Strom. lib. vii., speaks of a worshipper of every smooth stone in a proverbial way, to denote one given up to superstition. And accordingly Theophrastus has marked this as one strong feature in the character of the superstitious man: Και των λιπαρων λιθων των εν ταις τριοδοις παριων, εκ της ληκυθου ελαιου καταχειν, και επι γονατα πεσων και προσκυνησας απαλλαττεσθαι. "Passing by the anointed stones in the streets, he takes out his phial of oil, and pours it on them and having fallen on his knees, and made his adorations, he departs." Kimchi says: "When they found a beautiful polished stone in a brook or river, they paid Divine adoration to it." This idolatry is still prevalent among the Hindoos. The stone which is the object of their adoration is called salgram. They are found about eighty miles from the source of the river Sown, in the viceroyalty of Bahar, on the coast of Bengal. Ayeen Akbery vol. ii. p. 29.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson1811 · Public DomainOn vv3, 5Isa 57:3-4. But draw near hither, &c. — “The…
Isa 57:3-4. But draw near hither, &c. — “The prophet proceeds to exhibit the church, totally corrupt as it was, the good men being extinct or dispersed; so that they who remained of the pure seed of the church lay hid in solitary places, while the body of the church appeared like a dead carcass; not the true, but the idolatrous church.” Thus Vitringa, who understands this paragraph as describing the state of the church in the dark ages of popery. It seems, however, by many of the expressions which the prophet uses, that he is rather giving a description of the corrupt state of the Jewish Church, before the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans. Draw near hither — To God’s tribunal, to receive your sentence; ye sons of the sorceress — Not by propagation, but by imitation, those being frequently called men’s sons that follow their example: the seed of the adulterer, &c. — Not the genuine children of Abraham, as you pretend and boast yourselves to be; your dispositions being far more suitable to a spurious brood than to Abraham’s seed. Against whom do you sport yourselves? — Consider who it is that you mock and scoff at when you deride God’s prophets, (see Isa 28:14; Isa 28:22,) and know that it is not so much men that you insult, as God, whose cause they plead, and in whose name they speak. Are ye not a seed of falsehood — A generation of liars, whose practices contradict your professions, who deal deceitfully both with God and man?
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes1834 · Public DomainOn vv3–6But draw near hither - That is, come near…
But draw near hither - That is, come near to hear the solemn sentence which God pronounces in regard to your character and doom. This is addressed to the impenitent and unbelieving part of the nation, and is designed to set before them the greatness of their sin, and the certainty that they would be punished.
Ye sons of the sorceress - You who are addicted to sorcery and enchantments; who consult the oracles of the pagan rather than the only true God. On the meaning of the word used here, see the notes at Isa 2:6. The Hebrews, like other inhabitants of the East, were much addicted to this, and particularly in the time of Manasseh 2Ki 21:6 : ‘And he made his sons pass through the fire, and observed times, and used enchantments, and dealt with familiar spirits, and wizards.’ So much were they devoted to this in his time, that they might be called, by way of eminence, ‘the sons of the sorceress;’ as if a sorceress had been their mother, and they had grown up to walk in her steps, and to imitate her example.
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The seed of the adulterer - Implying that the obligations of the marriage contract were disregarded, and that licentiousness prevailed in the nation. Amidst the other abominations which existed under the wicked and corrupt reign of Manasseh 2 Kings 21, there is every probability that these sins also abounded. Licentiousness had been the invariable attendant on idol-worship; and dissoluteness of manners is the usual accompaniment of all other crimes. It is observable also that the Saviour often charges the same sin on the nation in his own time (Mat 12:39; Mat 16:4; Joh 8:1 ff.) In the language here, however, there is a reference to the fact that the nation had apostatized from God, and they were guilty of spiritual adultery - that is, of unfaithfulness to God. They fixed their affections on other objects than God, and loved the images of idol-worship more than they did their Creator.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
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 Scriptures1864 · Public DomainOn v33 But draw near hither, ye sons of the…
2. THE MOURNFUL PRESENT MARKED BY THE IDOLATROUS DOINGS OF THE NATION
Isa_57:3-14
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3 But draw near hither, ye sons of the sorceress,
The seed of the adulterer and 1the whore.
4 Against whom do ye sport yourselves?
Against whom make ye a wide mouth,
And draw out the tongue?
Are ye not children of transgression, a 2seed of falsehood,
5 Enflaming yourselves [3] 4with idols
Under every green tree,
Slaying the children in the valleys
Under the cliffs of the rocks?
6 Among the smooth stones of the stream is thy portion;
They, they are thy lot:
Even to them hast thou poured a drink offering.
Thou hast offered a meat offering,
5Should I receive comfort in these?
7 Upon a lofty and high mountain hast thou set thy bed:
Even thither wentest thou up to offer sacrifice.
8 Behind the doors also and the posts hast thou set up thy remembrance:
6For thou hast discovered thyself to another than me,
And art gone up; thou hast enlarged thy bed,
7And 8made thee a covenant with them;
Thou lovedst their bed 9where thou sawest it.
9 And 10thou wentest to the king with ointment,
And didst increase thy perfumes,
And didst send thy messengers far off,
And didst 11debase thyself even unto hell.
10 Thou art wearied in the greatness of thy way;
Yet saidst thou not, There is no hope:
Thou hast found the 12life of thine hand;
Therefore thou wast not 13grieved.
11 And of whom hast thou been afraid 14or feared,
That thou hast lied,
And hast not remembered me, nor laid it to thy heart?
Have not I held my peace even of old,
And thou fearest me not?
12 I will declare thy righteousness,
And thy works; for they shall not profit thee.
13 When thou criest, let thy 15companies deliver thee;
But the wind shall carry them all away;
16Vanity shall take them:
But he that putteth his trust in me
Shall possess the land,
And shall inherit my holy mountain;
14 17And shall say, Cast ye up, cast ye up, prepare the way,
Take up the stumbling-block out of the way of my people.
TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL
See List for the recurrence of the words: Isa_57:4. התענג—ילדי־פשׁע. and זרע שׁקר. Isa_57:5. סְעִפֵי הַסְּלָעִים. Isa_57:9. שוּר—עד־מרחוק.
Isa_57:4. The form יִלְדֵי is found only in this place before Makkeph. Except this, יַלְדֵי three times without Makkeph: Isa_2:6; Exo_2:6; Hos_1:2.
Isa_57:5. The participles נחמים and שׁחטי are in apposition with and explanatory of ילדי פ׳ and נֵחָמִים .זרעשׁ׳ is part. Niph. from חמם.—The expression כל־עץ רענן, which occurs only here in Isaiah, is found beside Deu_12:2; 2Ki_16:4; 2Ki_17:10; 2Ch_28:4; Jer_2:20; Jer_3:6; Jer_3:13; Eze_6:13.
Isa_57:6. The clause כְּחַלְּקֵ׳־נחל חלקך is very difficult; and expositors differ very much about it. The LXX. connect the words כחלקי־נחל with what precedes (σφάζοντες τὰ τέκνα αὐτῶν ἐν ταῖς φάραγξιν ἀνὰ μέσον τῶν πετρῶν ἐν ταῖς μερίσι φάραγγος. Ἐκείνη σου ἠ μερίς, οὖτός σου ὁ κλῆρος). [The words ἐν ταῖς μερίσι φάραγγος are wanting in Tischendorf’s 4th edition of the LXX. of 1869,—Tr.], but that gives an intolerable tautology. Vulg. in partibus torrentis pars tua; thus it takes חַלְּקֵי for חֶלְקֵי.—Targ. Jonatan: in laevibus locis ripae torrentis est pars tua.—Syrus: sors tua et haereditas tua cum sorte torrentium erit. Thus he takes בְּ=cum, and likewise חַלְּקֵי־נחל = חֶלְקֵי־נ׳; the double הֵם he takes as simply=et. Similarly, only still more freely, does the Arabic version in the London Polyglot translate: Sors illorum (scil. idolorum) erit portio vestra. One sees that these ancient versions were little exact in adhering to the original text. Jerome understands the “in partibus torrents,” to declare how “omnes montes, vales atque torrentes plenierant cultu daemonum,” and the “pars tua, sors tua” denotes for him that the demons were to the Israelites what the Lord should have been, according to Deu_32:9; Psa_47:5; Psa_73:26. Later expositors divide into five classes. Some take חַלְּקֵי also to be equal to חֶלְקֵי, which they understand variously, partly in a physical, partly in a spiritual sense. But all these views we must reject as grammatically unfounded. Others take חַלְּקֵי somehow in the sense of “laevitas, laeva, smoothness, smooth places,” but construe חלקך in the sense of “punishment.” According to this the sense would be: stoning with the smooth stones (Raschi), drowning, casting down over smooth, slippery places into the deep (Vitringa: Vos detrudemini in laevia vallis, i.e., in lubrica et salebrosa loca, quae quem in profunda vallis praecipitem agunt), the stony desert (Coccejus),—that is your well-merited portion. But it is manifest that חלקך and גורלך have here nothing to do with punishment, but continue to describe the sin. The third class of expositors construe חֶלְקֵךְ in the sense of “the right place, theatre.” Then the meaning would be: in the smooth clefts of the rock, or in the bare places of the valleys, there is the place where thou carriest on thy iniquitous work (J. D. Michaelis, Paulus, Gesen., Comment., Rueckert, Hitzig, Umbreit). But the following emphatic הֵם הֵם ו׳ and the second half of the verse show, that the mention here is not merely of the theatre of the idolatrous doings. A fourth class see in חלקי a designation of the idol images themselves. They derive the word from the Arabic chalaqa, efformavit, effinxit, so that the meaning would be: “in the images of the valley is thy portion,” or “with the idols in the valley thou carriest on thy trade” (Koppe in Lowth’s Isaiah, Knobel). But the root חָלַק in Hebrew never has this sense. Finally, the fifth class (Lowth, Rosenm., Gesen. Thes., Ewald, Delitzsch, Seinecke, Rohling, [J. A. Alex.]) take חלקך in the spiritual sense in which Jehovah is called the portion of His people (comp. the places cited above, and Psa_119:57; Jos_22:25; Psa_16:5, etc.) But הַלְּקֵי־נחל are smooth stones such as, according to a widespread custom of antiquity, were objects of divine worship. Very properly reference has been made to הֲמִשָׁה חַלֻקֵי אֲבָנִים מִן־הַנַּחַל 1Sa_17:40. Fuerst, in the Concordance, puts our חַלְּקֵי with חַלֻּקֵי under one rubric, in that without further notice he points it חַלֻּקֵי. And indeed the two words differ only by one dot, and hence a copyist’s error were cot impossible. Fuerst in his Lex. derives our חַלְּקֵי from חַלָּק, which would be an abnormal vocalization instead of הַלָּקֵי (Olsh., § 183, a). Now if one may neither read חַלֻּקֵי instead of חַלְּקֵי, nor yet take חַלְּקֵי for an abnormal stat. const. pl. from חַלָּק, then we can only derive חַלְּקֵי either from חָלָק (Isa_30:10) or from חֵלֶק. But the latter were likewise an unusual formation, for the connecting form of the plural must sound חֶלְקִי, according the sole suffix forms in use (comp חֶלְקִי ,חֶלְקֵיהֶם ,חֶלְקֵךְ, Hos_5:7). The Daghesh in ל would any way be Dag. Dirimens. If then we derive our word from the adjective חָלָק “laevus, lubricus, smooth,” then חלקי־נחל would be the smooth things of the valley. But, in view of the intentional paronomasia with חֶלְקֵךּ, we may further assume that חַלְּקֵי the Prophet means nothing else than what is described in 1Sa_17:4, “smooth stones from the brook,” in fact that חלקי־נחל is in the end nothing more than an abbreviation of חַלְקֵי אַבִנֵי הַנַחַל, an abbreviation that of course would be understood only by one that had the passage of 1 Sam. in his mind.—בְּ before חַלְּקֵי is used as Jos_22:25 אֵין־לָכֶם חֵלֶק בַיהוָֹה.
Isa_57:8. מֵאִתִּי גִלִית, as it seems to me, must be judged after the analogy of the expressions גָלָה עַמִּי (Isa_5:13), גָּֽלְתָה יְהוּדָה (Lam_1:3), גָּלָה מָשׂוֹשׁ (Isa_24:11; comp. 1Sa_4:21 sq.; Pro_27:25, etc..). For as גָלָה originally means “to uncover, make bare,” so that form of expression declares that by removal of the people, who as it were cover it, the land Is uncovered, made bare. It is to be noticed, moreover, that אֶרֶץ itself is by metonymy used for the people (Jdg_18:30), and that also other things, e. g., the grass, can be described as uncovering their place by their removal. It is true that only Kal is used in this sense. But had the Prophet written גָּלִית then, according to the constant and frequent usage, one must have taken this in the sense of: “in exilium abiisti.” But he would not say that. What is here spoken of, is no punitive ridding out of a place, but a very spontaneous, headstrong and willful making bare, empty. Hence the Prophet uses the Piel. Therefore I cannot approve of the other explanations that supply “the shame” or “the clothes,” or that treat מִשְׁכָּבֵךְ as the common object of the three verbs (Delitzsch.—יתרת־לך מהם (certainly not castrasti quosdam ex iis, Grotius) is properly without analogy; for 2Ch_7:18 the person with whom the covenant is made is designated by לְ, in 1Sa_20:16; 1Sa_22:8 עִם is used. But these passages show that after כרת the בְּרִית may be omitted. The Prophet might then have written ותכרת לָהֶם. But then the particular would be wanting, that Israel made demands, conditions which were to be fulfilled on the part of the other. One must, to be exact, translate: thou bargainedst, madest conditions for thee from those.—The words יד חזית are likewise without analogy. The explanations: thou descriest a place (to lie down),—where thou seest but a beckoning hand,—thou dividest a hand, i.e., thou dost destine a side of the couch for the lover (Knobel)—all of them contain an unsuitable clumsy thought. One looks for something that belongs to the משׁכב in the sense indicated, or that follows on it. And thus there is much to favor the view that sees in יָד an euphemism for the masculine member. Only analogies from other languages (see Delitzsch) can be adduced, but considering the originality of our author this can be no obstacle. חָזָה then, like רָאָה, according to well known usage, stands for sentire, experiri (comp. Job_8:17; Job_15:17; Job_24:1; Psa_58:11). [J. A. Alexander briefly dismisses the euphemistic view by saying; “the sense gratuitously put upon the phrase by Doederlein, and the praises given him for the discovery, are characteristic of neological aesthetics.” His own comment is: “The most probable interpretation of the last words of the verse is that which gives יָד the same sense as in Isa_56:5” (viz., “a place”). Spite of the respectable commentators that approve of this euphemistic sense (Ewald, Hitzig cited by Delitzsch who agrees), it should be rejected. Delitzsch refers to Eze_16:26; Eze_23:20. But the coarse, plainness of the language there is ground enough for inferring that, did Isaiah mean to express the like here, he would use language as plain. It were just as reasonable to imagine the same significance for יָד in Isa_56:5. There is actually no ground for doing so, in either case. “Thou descriest a place (to lie down)” gives a good rendering. Comp. the clause חזית—אהבת with Job_8:18, עַל־גַּל שָֽׁרָשָׁיו יְסֻבָּב֑וּ בֵּת אֲבָנים יַֽחֱזֶה.—Tr.].
Isa_57:10. נוֹאָשׁ is part. Niph. desperatus (Job_6:26), The neuter only here and Isa 2:25; Isa 18:12.
Isa_57:11. דָאַג is sollicitum esse and has primarily intransitive meaning (Jer_17:8). In this sense it is conjoined with לְ (1Sa_9:5; 1Sa_10:2) or with מִן (Psa_38:19; Jer_42:16). In our text it is used transitively, as in Jer_38:19, joined with the accusative.—The תִּירְאִי with the attached Vav consec., shows that the Prophet conceives of it as the consequence of דאג. The latter accordingly denotes the inward, religious dread, of which the outward evidences are only the consequence. כִּי before תכזבי is the causal “that” after questions.
Isa_57:14. וְאָמַר is used impersonally as in Isa_25:9; Isa_45:24; Isa_65:8.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
1. In this section the Prophet describes the idolatrous, and hence adulterous doings that at the time of this prophecy were prevalent in the entire nation. He summons the nation to approach in order to hear his castigating words. He addresses them as posterity of adulterous parents (Isa_57:3). They had often scoffed at him. Hence he asks them: Who is he whom ye derided, and who are ye? Are ye not as bastards who would supplant the genuine offshoots (Isa_57:4)? And then he points out to them their untheocratic, bastard way, by enumerating facts. Ye carry on your idolatry under every green tree. Ye slay the children by the brooks and in rocky hollows (Isa_57:5). These places have become the holy and promised land to you. And, that every part of the worship of Jehovah may have its idolatrous counterpart, ye do not omit drink and meat offerings for the idols (Isa_57:6). Then by sacrifices ye have made the high mountains the scene of your adulterous worship of idols (Isa_57:7). Jehovah’s mottoes, that should be in every house, are thrust into the corner. But ye do as a woman that forsakes the place at the side of her husband, and sets up a couch of lewdness in another place (Isa_57:8). And also by seeking aid from foreigners ye carry on an adulterous idolatry. For ye sent messengers with rich gifts to foreign kings, yea, ye have boasted even of alliances with hell (Isa_57:9). And ye were indefatigable in these doings; nothing availed to convince you of their vanity. Rather, as long as ye could stir, ye would never confess to sickness (Isa_57:10). How wrong such conduct was appears the more manifest, when one compares whom Israel feared and whom it did not fear. Yea, what sort of beings were those whom thou fearedst, whereas thou fearedst me no more, who so long kept silence spite of thy unfaithfulness? (Isa_57:11). But I will speak and make manifest your righteousness and your works. From that will be seen that ye have no claim to be helped (Isa_57:12). Then let your numerous idols help you. But the wind will carry them off. He, on the contrary, that trusts in me, will receive inheritance in the holy land and on the holy mountain (Isa_57:13). For these there will be a glorious return into the promised land (Isa_57:14).
2. But draw near——falsehood.
Isa_57:3-4. וְאַתֶּם strongly reminds one of that ואתם, Isa_48:6, which, according to our construction, is also to be understood as an address of the Prophet to the people living in his own time. Draw near hither is like a citation before the ruler, who proposes to hold up to the subject his guilt, and to announce the punishment (comp. Isa_34:1; Isa_48:16; Isa_41:1; Isa_41:5; הֵנָּה, as in 2Sa_20:16, and often). The Israelites are addressed as sons of a sorceress (comp. on Isa_2:6). Witchcraft is only possible by reason of idolatrous superstition, because it would produce effects by supernatural powers that are not the powers of the true God. The children of the witch are such as have not only a witch for mother, but have also themselves a witch nature. Thus the idolatrous inclination of the people is charged as something inherited (comp. on Isa_1:4). What is here expressed in one notion is explained in the second half of the verse. For זרע מנאף is seed of the adulterer (comp. ז׳ מְרֶעִים, Isa_1:4; Isa_14:20; ז׳ קֹדֶשׁ, Isa_6:13; ז׳ שֶׁקֶר, Isa_57:4), thus the ancestors of the present generation are designated as adulterers in their relation to Jehovah, i.e., as idolaters. But that the present generation is adulterous, i.e., idolatrous, is expressed by the addition (וַתִּזְנֶה) [Eng-V. “and the whore”]. The view that this word is only the feminine of מנאפ is disproved from the fact that the simple Vav copulative (וְתִזְנֱה) would be used. Moreover, the mode of expression would be affected, and the addition superfluous. For from the view-point of polygamy, adultery is only possible with a married woman. Therefore in זרע מנאף is implied the representation, that the married woman had sinned with another man, i.e., with idols, and that therefore the present generation no longer has Jehovah for a father de facto, though de jure He may still pass for such. But וַתִּזְנֶה expresses that this generation, sprung from adultery, though recognized as legitimate, has itself committed adultery. As is well known, זָנָה stands very often for Israel’s apostacy to idols (Exo_34:15 sq.; Lev_17:7; Num_15:39; Deu_31:16; Hos_2:6 sq.; Isa_1:21, etc.).
In Isa_57:4 the Prophet charges the people with the audacious scoffing with which they persecuted the followers of Jehovah in general and himself, the worthy Prophet in particular. For the question על מי can, of course, in itself have a quantitative sense: are there then men at all, about whom ye make yourselves merry? But why might there not have been men, about whom even such a degenerate people might with a certain justice make themselves merry? For this reason we must take the question על מי in a qualitative sense as in Isa_37:23. There it is asked: whom hast thou derided, etc.? Answer: the holy One of Israel. Thus here, also, the sense of qualis must be in the מי (comp. Isa_57:11; Isa_51:12). The imperfects תתעננו, etc., denote that these derisions still continue. Here also we have that personal אַתֶּם, which makes so entirely the impression of immediate living presence. And if the contemporaries derided Jehovah’s true followers and His prophets especially, who amongst them all was more exposed to the derision and deserved it less, than Isaiah. Hence there seems to me in this על־מי to be expressed the consciousness of personal worth and of outrage perpetrated by wounding it. התעננ, “delectari aliquare, to delight one’s self, to take pleasure from something,” is found only here in a bad sense. Opening wide the mouth along with derisive laughter is mentioned also Psa_22:8; Psa_35:21. Sticking out the tongue as a gesture of derision is not mentioned elsewhere in the Scripture. Expositors cite Livy, VII. Isaiah 10 : linguam ab irrisu exserens. The point of the verse consists in the distinction between the one scoffed at and the scoffers. What the former is, is not said. But we guess it. What the latter are, the Prophet states with the words: are ye not children of sin (i.e., such whose own nature partakes of the sin of those that begot), a spurious seed? That is, I think that זרע שׁקר is the antithesis of זרע אֱמֶת (Jer_2:21). Then it is not a seed in which materially the species “lie.” appears out of the sphere of the genus “sin;” but זרע שׁקר is a seed which any how formally is not what it pretends to be; i.e., a false, spurious seed. Thus the same is expressed as by מנאף זרע Isa_57:3.
3. Inflaming——yourselves comfort in these.
Isa_57:5-6. In what follows the Prophet enumerates all the sorts of idolatry by which the Israelites of his times proved themselves to be “children of sin” and “a spurious seed.” אֵלִים here means terebinths and not “gods,” as appears from the כל־עץ י׳ (see on Isa_1:29) that stands in parallelism. As a beautiful, shady tree, the terebinth played a great part in the idolatrous tree worship of the Hebrews (comp. Eze_6:13; Hos_4:13). It enticed to idolatry. Hence it is said, that the idolatrous fervor, that was only too closely joined to fleshly voluptuousness, was kindled by the terebinths. But not only stately, shady terebinths, every green tree kindled the idolatrous desire. But worse still than the tree-worship, was the murderous Baal and Moloch worship, to which especially the poor children fell a sacrifice (comp. my remarks on Jer_17:2). Although this horrible worship exacted the burning of children, still the word שָׁחַט is used in connection with it, beside other expressions referring to it (Jer_7:31; Jer_19:5; Eze_16:20-21. At the same time it seems to me that the Prophet (who in what follows pursues the thought that Israel in a sacrilegious way transferred all parts of Jehovah’s worship to its idolatrous worship), would here, by the choice of this word שׁחט, express the thought that the children were their עוֹלוֹת. For the slaying of beasts destined for whole-burnt-offerings was expressed by שׁחט, whereas זָבַח was the specific word for the slaying of the שׁלמים (see on Isa_5:7-8). In the valleys, under the clifts of the rocks, thus not only in the vale of Hinnom, but elsewhere also, in forbidding rocky defiles, were those horrid sacrifices offered.
Isa_57:6. Among the smooth stones of the stream is thy portion. See Text. and Gram. By these smooth stones are any way to be understood the sacred anointed stones (Bayetilia). The earliest trace of this usage appears in Gen_28:18; Gen_35:14. But what was originally a simple act of consecration to serve for sacred remembrance, became gradually the substratum of an idolatrous worship, the stone worship (comp. Jer_3:9; Eze_20:32). As the name βαίτυλος, βαιτύλια is of Phœnician origin, the view is not without foundation that this name is to be referred back to בֵּית־אֵל. Comp. [Smith’sDic. of the B. Art. Stones]; Leyrer in Herz. R.-Encycl. XVI. p. 322; Kurtz, Hist. of theOld Covenant, I. § 75, 3; Grimmel, De lapidum cultu, Marburg, 1853. The baetylia were indeed stones smooth with oil. Arnobius (Adver. Gentes I. 39) relates of the heathen period of his life: “Si quando conspexeram lubricatum lapidem et ex olivi unguine sordidatum, tanquam inesset vis praesens, adulabar, affabar et beneficia poscebam nihil sentiente de trunco.” Lowth cites at our text a passage from Theophrast (to Autolykos I. 15) where it is said of a superstitious man: “Καί τῶν λιπαρῶν λίθων τῶν ἐν ταῖς τριόδοις παριὼν ἐκ τῆς ληκύθου ἔλαιον καταχεῖν καὶ ἐπὶ γόνατα πεσὼν καὶ προσκυνήσας ἁπαλλάττεσθαι.” Comp. Clement of Alex. Strom. VII. 843. Our passage indeed does not seem to speak of oily, smooth stones. But it appears that that worship, apart from the smoothing by oil, was only given to stones that by nature or art had a smooth surface. At least we could not suppose that Jacob chose a rough stone for his pillow. And our text favors the idea that one did not choose for adoration any sort of stone remarkable for size or form, but especially smooth stones. The emphatic הֵם הֵםthese, these, refers to the stones as something that Israel in a shameful way made rivals of Jehovah. נּוֹרָל, properly lapillus, is, indeed, no where else so used that Jehovah Himself is called “the lot” of His people. But the word is chosen here because the Prophet intended an allusion to the notion “stone” contained in חלקי־נהל. The thought underlying also the second half of verse 6 is, that the idolatrous Israelites gave to their lumpish idols what was due to Jehovah alone. For here, too, the aping is rebuked, by which they transferred the various parts of Jehovah worship to the idol worship. For נֶסֶךְdrink offering, and מִנְחָהmeat offering were essential parts of Jehovah’s worship. The latter consisted of flour in various forms, with salt, olive oil and incense in addition (Leviticus 2). The former represented the drinking suited to eating, and consisted only of wine (Exo_29:40; Num_15:5 sqq.). הֶֽעֱלָה with the object מנחח = altari imposuit fertum occurs again Isa_66:3. How deeply the Lord feels the insult, is declared in the words: should I console myself (be quiet) concerning such? Niph. נִחַם with עַל denotes 1) to pity one’s self, 2) to feel regret, sorrow, 3) to console one’s self, to quiet one’s self (2Sa_13:39; Jer_31:15; Eze_32:31). A modification of the last meaning given is “to revenge one’s self,” which we had Isa_1:24. The context shows that only the meaning given under 3) suits here.
4. Upon a lofty——sawest it.
Isa_57:7-8. In these two verses the Prophet shows how in idolatrous worship, Israel even (נם־שׁם עלית Isa_57:7) aped the peace offering, the זֶבַח שְׁלָמִים. And he joins with it, in a particularly marked way, the adulterous conduct of which it was thereby guilty. Why the Prophet connects the latter particular just with שְׁלָמִים may have this reason, that these sacrifices were always united with meals, and just these may have given occasion for abandonment to joviality and especially to fleshly debauchery, particularly when celebrated in the open air on mountain elevations. Hos_4:13 also mentions the offering of the idolatrous זֶבַח on mountain tops and connected with licentiousness. The expression חר־נבה ונשֹא is found so exactly only here; but comp. Isa_2:2; Isa_30:25. שַׂמְתְּ מִשְׁכָּבֵךְ is a figurative expression for the act of idolatrous worship. It cannot be doubted that by לִזְבֹּחַ זֶבַח the Prophet means the Shelamim sacrifice. For the זבח was most closely joined with that. “For the Shelamim offering [peace offering] the Pentateuch also uses simply the expression זֶבַח, i.e., killing; indeed this word in the Pentateuch has only this narrower sense, as further the meal of the שׁלמים as often designated by the verb זבח. The reason of this mode of expression was, that, as in the burnt-offering, the peculiar feature was the bringing up of the entire sacrifice on to the altar, so the sacrificial meal belonged essentially to the peace offering. זָבַח denotes the killing with reference to a meal that was to be held (comp. especially Lev_17:3 sqq.; Deu_12:15); it is thus distinguished from שָׁחַט which has no such reference.” (Œhler in Herz., R.-Encycl. X. p. 637).
The initial words of Isa_57:8 have experienced a double explanation. The ancient expositors from Jerome down understand by זכרון, remembrance, any sort of idolatrous emblem, especially the household gods, Lares. But first it is to be objected, that the expression is a strange one to denote that, and then to put behind the doors and the posts seems rather to describe contemptuous than honorable treatment. Hence modern expositors have justly understood זכרון to mean what in Deu_6:8; Deu_11:20, was prescribed to be written on the מְזִוּזוֹת and on the שְׁעָרִים, especially since in Exo_13:9 a similar memorial is expressly called זִכָּרוֹן. Therefore we may justly regard our text as a reference to the passages of the Pentateuch just cited. The Prophet charges the Israelites with putting those memorials containing the principles of the Theocracy behind the posts and doors, instead of on them, of course to get those hated reminders as far out of sight as possible. This done, they shamelessly left vacant (see Text. and Gram.) the place at the side of their husband, like an adulterous wife, in order to betake themselves to the couch of a lover.—מאתי נלית states how the adulterous wife made empty the place at her husband’s side; ותעלו, how she ascended to the elevation (Isa_57:7); הרחבת משׁבּבך, how she made the lewd bed, i.e. broad, to give room for the lover. יכרת־לך מהם (see Text. and Gram.), describes the coarseness of this relation. The shameless harlot demands her price. What it was is not said. Any way it was agreed to. For the text continues: thou lovedest their embrace (משׁכב frequent in this sense: Num_31:17-18; Num_31:35; Jdg_21:11-12, etc.).
5. And thou wentest—wast not grieved.
Isa_57:9-10. The Prophet has hitherto described what we may call the immediate worship of idols. Now he turns to what may be called the political or indirect idolatry of the Israelites. For when they turned to heathen nations for help, instead of relying on the Lord, that also was idolatry. And it was such not merely in the subtile sense of trusting in an arm of flesh (comp. Jer_17:5-6; Isa_30:1 sq.; Isa_31:1-3; 2Ki_16:7), but also in the grosser sense, inasmuch as trusting in a heathen nation involved trusting in its gods (Isa_10:10-11; Jer_2:33; Jer_2:36; Eze_23:7; Eze_23:30; Hos_12:1). If this is the correct understanding of the fundamental thought of our passage, it is clear that we are not to understand מֶלֶךְ as meaning an idol, as many expositors do. It is therefore neither Moloch (comp. Isa_8:21; Amo_5:26; Jer_49:1; Jer_49:3; Zep_1:5), nor Anamelech, the Chronos of the Sepharvaim (2Ki_17:31), as Hitzig thinks, nor the Phœnician Baal (מֶלֶך בַּעַל) as Knobel says. It seems to me also incorrect to suppose it refers directly to the king of Assyria. For there is nowhere any trace of his having been directly “the king” for the Israelites. And one cannot appeal to Isa_30:30 to show that he was, for there, according to the context (comp. Isa 57:31, אַשׁוּר), only the Assyrian king can be thought of. Hence it seems to me that the Prophet would say: Israel has ever turned to him who, according to existing relations, was for the time the king, κατ’ ἐξοχήν. Nearly like, but not identical, is the construction of Saadia, who understands מלך as collective. Also the choice of the word שׁוּר seems to favor our constructions, for it means “circuire, to go about” (comp. שָׁרָה, the wandering about, for caravans, Eze_27:25). בַּשֶׁמֶן is “with oil.” But it remains doubtful whether that means “as one anointed with oil” (in order to charm the senses, Eze_23:40) or “with presents of oil and ointments.” Grammatically either is allowable. Comp. for the former use, Gen_32:11. But I prefer the latter, because it cannot be said that Israel itself came to the king, but sent ambassadors to remote places. Rather, according to Isaiah’s style, the latter is the explanation of the figure. The great rulers, now Assyria, now Egypt, lived far away. Did Israel perhaps send ambassadors further than that? Any way one may not press the significance of “oil and ointments.” The simple meaning is, that Israel sent the noblest and costliest gifts of its land as presents. The olive tree grew nowhere so well as in Palestine; comp. Leyrer, Herzog’sReal-Enc. X. p. 547. One of the ingredients of the רִקֻּהִים (ἅπ. λεγ., otherwise רֹקַה), “ointments,” perfumes, were בְּשָׂמִים, and Palestine was regarded as the exclusive home of the balsam shrub, ibid. I. 673. Isa_39:2 shows that costly oil and noble ointment belonged to the royal treasures. עִיר=“messenger,” as in Isa_18:2. But Israel’s attempts to find helpers not only went far, but also deep. It is common to understand ער־שׁאול to mean the humble gestures and words of those seeking help. But that were a bad and senseless hyperbole. I believe the Prophet by didst send thy messengers far off refers chiefly to chaps. 28–33, and by thou wentest down to hell has especially in mind Isa_28:15, where the rulers of Jerusalem are made to say: “We have made a covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement.” The Hiph. השׁפיל, therefore, has not an ethical, but a local sense (comp. Isa_25:12; Isa_26:5; Psa_113:6).
Isa_57:10. Thus Israel had wearied itself with much running (דֶּרֶד is abstractum here: the going, running, as often, comp. 1Ki_18:27 and Isa_47:12; 1Ki_19:7); but did not learn to see the uselessness of its efforts. Rather, because the weak hand from time to time felt some life, Israel never came to feel sick, i.e. to know and feel its powerlessness in its complete reality.
6. And of whom hast thou——way of my people.
Isa_57:11-14. Having thus described the idolatrous practices of the nation, the Prophet next asks for the reasons of it. These may be positive and negative: the idols may have advantages that Jehovah has not, and Jehovah may have defects that the idols are free from. I do not believe that את־מי refers to the heathen nations or their rulers, to whom Israel had looked for protection. For the whole context treats essentially of Israel’s religious conduct, and here especially of the reasons Israel might have for preferring idols to Jehovah. And, indeed, according to our remark on Isa_57:9, the dreadfulness of a nation depended on the power of its gods. מִי therefore refers to the idols. It is to be taken in the same sense as in Isa_57:4. Indeed one may say that this את־מי stands in a certain antithetical relation to that על־מי. For if על־מי, Isa_57:4, relates primarily to the Prophet, still it refers indirectly also to Jehovah, because the Prophet is such a one only through Jehovah. Of whom wast thou apprehensive, and so wast afraid. See Text. and Gram. It might be thought that what could move Israel to unfaithfulness to its Lord must be very considerable, grand in power and glory, far superior to Jehovah. But is such the case? No. One might expect the Prophet to dwell here on the contemptible quality of idols, that is intimated only by מִי. But what were the use? Has he not abundantly done so in the first Ennead? See Isa_40:18 sqq.; Isa_41:6 sq.; 21 sqq.; Isa_42:17; Isa_43:9 sqq.; Isa_44:9 sqq.; Isa_45:20; Isa_46:1 sqq.; Isa_47:12; Isa_48:3 sqq.—That thou liedst. The meaning of כִּזֵּב here appears from what follows. It denotes the unfaithfulness, covenant-breaking nature of Israel. For by its deeds it proved its words to be lying words (comp. Psa_78:36 sq.). Apart from single covenants (Exo_19:8; Exo_24:3; Exo_24:7; Deu_5:27 sqq.; Jos_24:16; Jos_24:24) the confession of Jehovah was the standing law in Israel. The sense is: What is the quality of those things that thou fearest, that (בִּי, see Text. and Gram.) thou couldest be seduced by them to break faith with thy God? But, from the antithesis to על־מי, Isa_57:4, and from what the Prophet has already said of the idols, it is seen that Israel found no sufficient motive for apostacy in the nature of its idols. There is another motive, viz. the silence of Jehovah. This must have been of such a nature as to explain the absence of fear of Him who was with Israel. This appears from the apodosis; therefore thou fearest Me not.—Therefore we are not to understand a not-speaking, but a not-doing. The Lord had kept His peace, and indeed from very ancient time (וְ before עולמ=“and indeed,” comp. Isa_13:10; Isa_32:7; Isa_44:28), He had looked on, spared, used forbearance. Of course this must be understood relatively, for single chastisements were not wanting. But in comparison with the language the Lord used in leading Israel into exile, all that had been before was silence. Thus the Lord speaks of such a silence with reference to Israel as He had before spoken of with reference to the Gentiles, Isa_42:14. If one supposes the Prophet to speak from the stand-point of the Exile, it is verily not evident what so terrible happened to the wicked Israelites after the Exile, as to make all that happened before seem silence in comparison.
Isa_57:12. I will declare.—In contrast with His former silence, the Lord says He will speak. He will declare the righteousness of Israel and its fruits, the works. The whole verse is ironically meant. First of all there is irony in אניד. At first sight it seems as if the Lord presented the prospect of an imposing proclamation of the great, hitherto-ignored deserts of Israel. Second, one supposes on this account that by “righteousness” and “works” are to be understood the manifestations of an actually existing righteousness of Israel’s. But in fact the Lord means that the unrighteousness, the malignity, of Israel shall, by a suitable judicial act, be pilloried before the whole world. Third, the expression: but they will not profit thee is an ironical meiosis. For what Israel has to show in fruits of righteousness is so much the opposite of true righteousness that no other fruit than destruction can come of it. It is seen that I do not follow the punctuation of the Masorets. I cannot therefore approve of the rendering: “and as regards thy handiwork (the idols), they will not profit thee (Delitzsch, Seinecke, Rohling, Weber). For 1) the brief words, Isa_57:12 b a, would be no suitable expression for the important thought that the Lord will bring Israel’s sin to light by great judgments; 2) it were strange to say, Isa_57:12 b, of the idols: “they will not help thee,” and then to continue, Isa_57:13 : “when thou criest let them help thee.”—Thus I believe that not till in Isa_57:13 is declared the incapacity of the heaps of idols (קבּוּצִים., ἅπ. λεγ., properly “gatherings” in the sense of “pantheon”).—[“Aben Ezra appears to understand the word generically, as denoting all that they could scrape together for their own security, including idols, armies and all other objects of reliance.” J. A. Alex. This comprehensive meaning would suit the reference of Isa_57:9-10, which, spite of the Author’s interpretation, that makes the main reference in the end to be to idols, certainly does not exclude reliance on foreign kings and their armies.—Tr.]—The wind, yea, a breath will carry away the whole pantheon (Hengstenbebg, Delitzsch, comp. Isa_41:16; Isa_41:29). On the other hand, those that put their trust in the Lord, even if the general calamity shall have carried them off into the Exile, will take possession of the holy hand and of the holy mountain as their inheritance. Hence return out of the Exile is the concluding thought, which is expressed in Isa_57:14 with great emphasis.
Footnotes:
[1]and who thyself playest harlot.
[2]spurious seed.
[3]Or, among the oaks.
[4]by means of the terebinths.
[5]Should I after this have pity.
[6]For the place by me thou modest empty.
[7]And modest terms for thee from them.
[8]Or, hewed it for thyself larger than theirs.
[9]Or, thou providest room.
[10]Or, thou respeetedst the king.
[11]thou didst descend to hell.
[12]Or, living.
[13]sick.
[14]so that thou fearedst.
[15]collections of gods=pantheon.
[16]breath.
[17]And one shall say.
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 Brown1871 · Public DomainOn vv3–6But . . . ye--In contrast to "the righteous"…
But . . . ye--In contrast to "the righteous" and their end, he announces to the unbelieving Jews their doom.
sons of the sorceress--that is, ye that are addicted to sorcery: this was connected with the worship of false gods (Kg2 21:6). No insult is greater to an Oriental than any slur cast on his mother (Sa1 20:30; Job 30:8).
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seed of the adulterer--Spiritual adultery is meant: idolatry and apostasy (Mat 16:4).
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. Whedon1874 · Public DomainOn vv3, 53, 4. Draw near… ye sons of the sorceress…
3, 4. Draw near… ye sons of the sorceress — The Hebrew here is very emphatic: You, you. Sorcery is heathenism, (Furst.)
The seed of the adulterer — In the Old Testament, adultery is a word uniformly used for idolatry — so held, because the covenant between Jehovah and Israel was a marriage covenant. See chap. 54. God is the husband, Israel is the espoused to God. The address is here to the Jews in the plainest terms, equivalent to “let us look at your conduct in its true light. Scorners ye are.”
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Against whom do ye sport — Literally, do ye make up faces? Who is the butt of your mockings? See if jeer and contempt be not due to yourselves alone.
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 Colleges1878 · Public DomainOn vv3, 4, 63, 4. Indignant summons to the apostate community.
3, 4. Indignant summons to the apostate community.
But draw near hither] Better, But as for you, draw near hither &c. to hear your doom (cf. Isa_41:1, Isa_45:20, Isa_48:16).
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ye sons of a sorceress] The most galling insult to an Oriental is to revile his mother (see 1Sa_20:30). By the use of the phrase here the persons addressed are described as nursed in witchcraft and superstition.
seed of an adulterer and a whore] Cf. Eze_16:3; Eze_16:45 (“thy father an Amorite, thy mother a Hittite”). It is not improbable that the words contain a specific allusion to the mixed origin of the Samaritans (2Ki_17:24 ff.); the “adulterer” may be the remains of the old Israelitish population (who had been untrue to the marriage bond with Jehovah), and the “harlot” the heathen element which had been imported by successive kings of Assyria.
3–13. Invective against an idolatrous party.—With regard to the reference of this obscure and difficult passage the following points have to be noticed: (1) The scenery of Isa_57:5-6 is unmistakeably Palestinian (wadis, clefts of the rock, terebinths). (2) Several of the rites specified bear the complexion of Canaanitish heathenism, and could not have been performed in Babylonia. (3) The opening words (“But ye”) seem to imply that the people addressed are distinct from those whose leaders are denounced in Isa_56:10-12. (4) Those spoken of are animated by contempt and hatred of the cause and people of Jehovah (Isa_57:4), while at the same time they advance pretensions to “righteousness” or correctness of religious standing (Isa_57:12). (5) They have persisted in their abominations down to the time of the prophecy (Isa_57:10-13).
On the supposition that the prophecy was written after the return from Babylon, there is much plausibility in the view that the party here addressed is the Samaritan community. This theory is at all events simpler than that advocated by the majority of critics, who have felt the force of the objections against exilic authorship, and have accordingly supposed that the passage (or its original) was written at some time previous to the Captivity and borrowed by the great prophet of the Exile as a warning against idolatrous tendencies which still manifested themselves in Babylon. (See further Introduction, pp. lvii, lix). The connexion between this section and the preceding would be explained by the fact that the Jewish aristocracy cultivated friendly relations with the Samaritans; there was a serious danger that the struggling Jewish community should by these alliances be dragged down to the level of their semi-pagan neighbours.
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 Readers1878 · Public DomainOn vv3–6(3) Ye sons of the sorceress.—The words may be…
(3) Ye sons of the sorceress.—The words may be purely figurative, as meaning those who practise sorcery, but it is also possible that they may have reference to the female soothsayers, such as are described in Eze_13:17-23.
The adulterer.—Here again the epithet may have had both a figurative and a literal application. (Comp. Mat_12:39; Mat_16:4; Jas_4:4.)
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary1880 · Public DomainOn vv3–6Vers. 3-14. ISRAEL SEVERELY REBUKED FOR IDOLATRY. Though Hezekiah…
Vers. 3-14. ISRAEL SEVERELY REBUKED FOR IDOLATRY. Though Hezekiah had made a great reformation of religion when he ascended the throne, (2Ki_18:4 2Ch_29:3-19) and had done his best to put down idolatry, yet it was still dear to large numbers among the people, and was easily revived by Manasseh in the earlier portion of his reign. (2Ch_33:2-9) Isaiah now rebukes various kinds of idolatrous practices, and shows the vanity of them.
Draw near hither. Approach, to hear the reprimand which ye so well deserve. Ye sons of the sorceress; rather, of a sorceress. Judah herself, the nation, is the" sorceress" and "adulteress," whose individual children are summoned to draw near. She is an adulteress; for she has transgressed against the mystic marriage-tie which bound her to Jehovah. (Isa_54:5, and the comment ad lot. ) She is also a sorceress," since she has bewitched her children, and given herself up to magical as well as to idolatrous practices. (2Ch_33:6) Seed of the adulterer and the whore; rather, seed of an adulteress, and that thyself committest whoredom. The congenital tendency has broken out into act. The Israel addressed is as "adulterous," i.e. idolatrous, as the Israel of former times.
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HOMILIES BY E. JOHNSON Vers. 3-10. Pictures of idolatry.
The idolaters are summoned to hear the judgment upon them. They are characterized as "sons of a sorceress, seed of an adulterer." The source of all idolatry is unfaithfulness to God regarded as the Husband of his people. (Eze_16:44, Eze_16:45) Yet, in their pride, these idolaters make sport of and scoff at the true servants of God.
I THE RITES OF IDOLATRY. There were enthusiastic orgies in the sacred groves of oak and in the gardens. (Isa_1:29 Eze_6:13 Hos_4:13) There were sacrifices of children to Moloch. There were fetish-stones, which were anointed with oil, and these continued to be devoted to heathen uses. And Israel, having by covenant a "portion," or property, so to speak, in God, has exchanged this for the senseless stones; and to these food-offerings are made. The pictures of Phoenician, Israelitish, and Greek superstitions are in this respect much the same. Jehovah, in that jealousy which is the expression of a holy love, is deeply grieved by these things.
II THE PROFLIGACY OF IDOLATRY. On the high hills shrines were erected, and tombs are still seen upon them, overshadowed by the tree on which votive offerings hang. Saints or prophets have replaced the old gods. Here idolatrous symbols were set up. And idolatry polluting politics, the people negotiated and coquetted with heathen powers, and humbled themselves to the lowest servility. And yet these negotiations and journeys had been in vain. For all that, the attempts had been renewed. "It is a striking illustration of men seeking happiness away from God. They wander from object to object; become weary in the pursuit, yet do not renounce it; still cling to hope, though often repulsed; though the world gives them no permanent comfort, though wealth, ambition, and gaiety, all fail of imparting happiness, yet they do not give up the pursuit in despair. The world is still pursued with just as little success, with continually augmenting evidence that it cannot satisfy the desires of the immortal soul, with just as much reluctance to seek permanent bliss in God.
III DIVINE REMONSTRANCE. The tone is one of gentleness and softness. "Who is there so strong and so terrible as to justify thee in thy infidelity to Jehovah? None." Yet there may be some excuse for them in his long silence. Passed over again and again, it might seem that God had forgotten to be gracious that they were hidden from him. But now he will draw near again: "The speech of mingled mercy and judgment shall work more effectually on the heart". (cf. Isa_46:13 Psa_22:31 Psa_98:2) Or the words may be taken ironically it depends on whether we read my righteousness" or thy righteousness." In the coming trial, no help but Jehovah"s will avail thee. "Her medley of gods" will not deliver her the Pantheon of various divinations set up by her. (cf. Mic_1:7) The wind shall carry them off like all dwellings and defences of merely human structure. (cf. Mat_7:26, Mat_7:27)
IV ETERNAL ASSURANCE. "To take refuge in Jehovah," in the Eternal, is the only safety, the only guarantee of stability and possession, amidst the flux and change of things. To say that they shall "possess the land" is to say, according to the manner of the Hebrew, everything that denotes favour for this life. (Isa_49:8 Psa_37:11, Psa_37:29; cf. Mat_5:5 Psa_69:35, Psa_69:36) And to "inherit the holy mountain" is to enter upon all spiritual privileges and joys great as if they had possession of a portion of the mount on which the temple was built, and were permitted to dwell there." And then mysterious voices are heard, hinting that all obstacles shall be removed from the path of those who trust in God. The language is suitable to the return from exile, as if persons should go before them, crying, "Cast up!" So before a pacha the labourers go and remove stones out of the way, with the cry," Cast up the way; remove the stones!" (cf. Isa_26:7 Isa_35:8 Isa_40:3, 4 62:10) He who places obstacles in the path (Jer_6:21) is he who gives command in his own time for their removal. War and peace, welfare and hindrances to welfare, are from the same hand. J.
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 Illustrator1887 · Public DomainOn v6Among the smooth stones of the stream is thy…
Isa_57:6
Among the smooth stones of the stream is thy portion
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Smooth stones
The term portion suggests that the smooth stones were fetishes.
(A. B. Davidson, D. D.)
False sods the idolaters portion
In stony valleys they set up their gods, which they called their portion, and took for their lot, as Gods people take Him for their lot and portion. (M. Henry.)
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The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary1892 · Public DomainOn v6Isa_57:6. I. Human substitutes for true and spiritual worship.…
Isa_57:6. I. Human substitutes for true and spiritual worship. II. Their offensiveness to God.—Dr. Lyth.
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.
Paul E. Kretzmann1924 · Public DomainOn v3Jehovah Rejects all Idolaters
Jehovah Rejects all Idolaters
v. 3. But draw near hither, so the Lord now calls to the apostates, ye sons of the sorceress, men addicted to sorcery, to superstitious practices which were connected with the worship of false gods, the seed of the adulterer and the whore, in whose case idolatry is inherent, their second nature, the expression being the very strongest reproof to the unbelieving and apostate Jews, who depended upon their external membership in Israel to give them a safe standing in the eyes of Jehovah.
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v. 4. Against whom do ye sport yourselves? in malignant joy, in insulting sneers. Against whom make ye a wide mouth and draw out the tongue? in malicious mockery. These gestures of derision on the part of the unbelievers were directed not only against the pious members of the nation in general, but in particular against the righteous, who, as the apostates thought, were cut off so soon on account of some fault in them. Are ye not children of transgression, a seed of falsehood, thoroughly steeped in iniquity,
v. 5. enflaming yourselves with idols under every green tree, burning with lust toward their idolatrous images in the terebinth groves, slaying the children in the valleys under the clifts of the rocks? as a sacrifice to Molech, the abomination of the Moabites. This shows that some of the people, even after the Babylonian exile, once more became addicted to idolatry and its abominations.
v. 6. Among the smooth stones of the stream, the stone formations hollowed out and polished in grotesque images by the action of the water, is thy portion, there the idolaters in Israel brought their sacrifices; they, they are thy lot, upon these dead rocks the idolaters relied; even to them hast thou poured a drink-offering, thou hast offered a meat-offering, giving to them the worship which belongs to Jehovah alone. Should I receive comfort in these? The Lord cannot be quiet any longer, He can no longer keep silence; He is obliged to forsake His mercy and to interfere with His wrath.
v. 7. Upon a lofty and high mountain hast thou set thy bed, in spiritual adultery; even thither wentest thou up to offer sacrifice, in the heathen worship of Baal and Ashtaroth, for this required altars, pillars, and Asherah-idols on all prominent hills.
v. 8. Behind the doors also and the posts, within the house devoted to idolatry, hast thou set up thy remembrance, the memorial tablet reminding the apostates of their idols; for thou hast discovered (uncovered) thyself to another than Me and art gone up, namely, to the couch of sin; thou hast enlarged thy bed and made thee a covenant with them, agreeing upon a price of shame; thou lovedst their bed where thou sawest it, delighting in the filthiness of the spiritual adultery thus openly practiced, the shamelessness thus brazenly paraded.
v. 9. And thou wentest to the king with ointment and didst increase thy perfumes, playing the coquette with the world-power because she doubts the ability of the Lord to help her, and didst send thy messengers far off, in a special embassy to gain the good will of the powerful emperor, and didst debase thyself even unto hell, in a total loss of pride and character.
v. 10. Thou art wearied in the greatness of thy way, by the many trips made in the interest of her lust; yet saidst thou not, There is no hope, in a proper realization of the fruitlessness of her quest; thou hast found the life of thine hand, still being able to sustain life by a steady application of energy, therefore thou wast not grieved, she did not relax in her efforts to gain the heathen emperor’s good will. The Lord now asks the reasons for her faithless intrigues.
v. 11. And of whom hast thou been afraid or feared that thou hast lied and hast not remembered Me, nor laid it to thy heart? In spite of her faithlessness she is utterly callous and indifferent; she is apparently lost to every good influence. Have not I held My peace even of old, being patient in spite of her apostasy, holding back wrath and punishment, and thou fearest Me not? Jehovah had not treated Israel so as to cause any one in the nation to live in terror of Him; the apostates had no excuse for their action. The entire section pictures the tireless seeking of the renegade people after the vanity of idolatry and of heathen customs—surely a sad waste of energy! Therefore Jehovah now, in a burst of holy irony, calls them to task.
v. 12. I will declare thy righteousness, such as it is, and thy works, in breaking the covenant; for they shall not profit thee, all the idolatrous acts being duly exposed.
v. 13. When thou criest, in vexation over disappointed hopes, let thy companies, all the agencies upon which she had relied, deliver thee; but the wind shall carry them all away, a single breath of the Lord being sufficient to overthrow all her allies, vanity shall take them. But he that putteth his trust in Me shall possess the land and shall inherit My holy mountain, the picture of the occupation of Canaan and Zion being a type of the possession and government which pertains to the believers by the merciful gift of Jehovah.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0On vv3, 5, 6But come here
But come here
God is calling all of the unfaithful people to come before him so he can judge them in a strong contrast to the promises for the righteous that came before.
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sons of the sorceress
This is a strong insult against the people who practice sorcery because sorcery and magic includes idolatry. (See: Metaphor)
children of the adulterer and the woman who has prostituted herself
This refers to actual and spiritual adultery. They have abandoned the worship of God and now worship other gods and idols along with actual prostitution in pagan Canaanite ceremonies.
Whom are you merrily mocking? Against whom are you opening the mouth and sticking out the tongue?
Yahweh uses questions to scold the people who are mocking him through false worship. AT: "You are mocking me and making fun of me by opening your mouth wide and sticking out the tongue!" (See: Rhetorical Question)
Are you not children of rebellion, children of deceit?
Yahweh uses another question to scold the people. This does not refer to their birth but to their spiritual state. AT: "You are children of rebellion, children of deceit!" (See: Rhetorical Question)
Tyndale Open Study Notes2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0On vv3–657:3 witches’ children . . . adulterers and prostitutes:…
57:3 witches’ children . . . adulterers and prostitutes: Baal religion, which flourished in Israel before the Exile (see 1:21-23), included lewd sexual practices.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv3, 5, 6 He threateneth the wicked hypocrites, who under the pretence…
He threateneth the wicked hypocrites, who under the pretence of the name of God’s people, derided God’s word and his promises: boasting openly that they were the children of Abraham, but because they were not faithful and obedient as Abraham was, he calleth them bastards, and the children of sorcerers, which forsook God, and fled to wicked means for succor.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv3–6 Isa 57:3 But draw near hither, ye sons of…
Isa 57:3 But draw near hither, ye sons of the sorceress, the seed of the adulterer and the whore.
Ver. 3. But draw near hither, ye sons of the sorceress.] Here "Esaias is very bold," as the apostle saith of him in another case, {Rom 10:20} and maketh it appear that he was none of those dumb dogs he had rated at in the former chapter. The Jews gloried much in their pedigree and descent from Abraham, and that they were "born of the free woman." He telleth them flat and plain that they were witches’ children, whores’ sons, a bastardly brood, {a} as our Saviour afterwards called them, a race of rebels, a seed of serpents, shamefully degenerate from their praiseworthy progenitors.
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{a} γενεα μοιχαλις.
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 vv3–6 Draw near hither, to God’s tribunal, to answer for…
Draw near hither, to God’s tribunal, to answer for yourselves, and to hear what I have to say against you, and to receive your sentence.
Sons of the sorceress; not by propagation, but by imitation; such being frequently called a man or woman’s sons that learn their art, and follow their example: you sorcerers, either properly or metaphorically so called; for the Jews were guilty of it both ways.
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The seed of the adulterer and the whore; not the genuine children of Abraham, as you pretend and boast, but begotten in fornication upon a common whore; which is not to be understood properly, but figuratively, because their dispositions and carriages were far more suitable to a bastardly brood than to Abraham’s seed.
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 v3 We have here a high charge, but a just…
We have here a high charge, but a just one no doubt, drawn up against that wicked generation out of which God's righteous ones were removed, because the world was not worthy of them. Observe,
I. The general character here given of them, or the name and title by which they stand indicted, Isa 57:3. They are told to draw near and hear the charge, are set to the bar, and arraigned there as sons of the sorceress, or of a witch, the seed of an adulterer and a whore, that is, they were such themselves, they were strongly inclined to be such, and their ancestors were such before them. Sin is sorcery and adultery, for it is departing from God and dealing with the devil. They were children of disobedience. "Come," says the prophet, "draw near hither, and I will read you your doom; to the righteous death will bring peace and rest, but not to you; you are children of transgression and a seed of falsehood (Isa 57:4), that have it by kind, and have it woven into your very nature, to backslide from God and to deal treacherously with him," Isa 48:8.
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II. The particular crimes laid to their charge.
1. Scoffing at God and his word. They were a generation of scorners (Isa 57:4): "Against whom do you sport yourselves? You think it is only against the poor prophets whom you trample upon as contemptible men, but really it is against God himself, who sends them, and whose message they deliver." Mocking the messengers of the Lord was Jerusalem's measure-filling sin, for what was done to them God took as done to himself. When they were reproved for their sins, and threatened with the judgments of God, they ridiculed the word of God with the rudest and most indecent gestures and expressions of disdain. They sported themselves, and made themselves merry, with that which should have made them serious, and under which they should have humbled themselves. They made wry mouths at the prophets, and drew out the tongue, contrary to all the laws of good breeding; nor did they treat God's prophets with the common civility with which they would have treated a gentleman's servant that had been sent to them on an errand. Note, Those who mock at God, and bid defiance to his judgments, had best consider who it is towards whom they conduct themselves so insolently.
2. Idolatry. This was that sin which the people of the Jews were most notoriously guilty of before the captivity; but that affliction cured them of it. In Isaiah's time it abounded, witness the abominable idolatries of Ahaz (which some think are particularly referred to here) and of Manasseh. (1.) They were dotingly fond of their idols, were inflamed with them, as those that burn in unlawful unnatural lusts, Rom 1:27. They were mad upon their idols, Jer 50:38. They inflamed themselves with them by their violent passions in the worship of them, as those of Baal's prophets that leaped upon the altar, and cut themselves, Kg1 18:26, Kg1 18:28. Note, Vile corruptions, the more they are gratified the more they are inflamed. They worshipped their idols under every green tree, in the open air, and in the shade; yet that did not cool the heat of their impetuous lusts, but rather the charming beauty of the green trees made them the more fond of their idols which they worshipped there. Thus that in nature which is pleasing, instead of drawing them to the God of nature, drew them from him. The flame of their zeal in the worship of false gods may shame us for our coldness and indifference in the worship of the true God. They strove to inflame themselves, but we distract and deaden ourselves. (2.) They were barbarous and unnaturally cruel in the worship of their idols. They slew their children, and offered them in sacrifice to their idols, not only in the valley of the son of Hinnom, the headquarters of that monstrous idolatry, but in other valleys, in imitation of that, and under the cliffs of the rock, in dark and solitary places, the fittest for such works of darkness. (3.) They were abundant and insatiable in their idolatries. They never thought they could have idols enough, nor could spend enough upon them and do enough in their service. The Syrians had once a notion of the God of Israel that he was a God of the hills, but not a God of the valleys (Kg1 20:28); but these idolaters, to make sure work, had both. [1.] They had gods of the valleys, which they worshipped in the low places by the water side (Isa 57:6): Among the smooth stones of the valley, or brook, is thy portion. If they saw a smooth carved stone, though set up but for a way-mark or a mere-stone, they were ready to worship it, as the papists do crosses. Or in stony valleys they set up their gods, which they called their portion, and took for their lot, as God's people take him for their lot and portion. But these gods of stone would really be no better a portion for them, no better a lot, than the smooth stones of the stream near which they were set up, for sometimes they worshipped their rivers. "They, they, are the lot which thou trustest to and art pleased with, but thou shalt be put off with it for thy lot, and miserable will thy case be." See the folly of sinners, who take the smooth stones of the stream for their portion, when they might have the precious stones of God's Jerusalem, and the high priest's ephod, to portion themselves with. Having taken these idols for their lot and portion, they stick at no charge in doing honour to them: "To them hast thou poured a drink-offering, and offered a meat-offering, as if they had given thee thy meat and drink." They loved their idols better than their children, for their own tables must be robbed to replenish the altars of their idols. Have we taken the true God for our portion? Is he, even he, our lot? Let us then serve him with our meat and drink, not, as they did, by depriving ourselves of the use of them, but by eating and drinking to his glory. Here, in a parenthesis, comes in an expression of God's just resentment of this wickedness of theirs: Should I receive comfort in these - in such a people as this? Can those expect that God will take any pleasure in them, or accept their devotions at his altar, who thus serve Baal with the gifts of his providence? God takes comfort in his people, while they are faithful to him; but what comfort can he take in them when those that should be his witnesses against the idolatries of the world do themselves fall in with them? Should I have compassion on these? (so some), or should I repent me concerning these? so others. "How can they expect that I should spare them, and either adjourn or abate their punishment, when they are so very provoking? Shall I not visit for these things?" Jer 5:7, Jer 5:9. [2.] They had gods of the hills too (Isa 57:7): "Upon a lofty and high mountain (as if thou wouldst vie with the high and lofty One himself, Isa 57:15) hast thou set thy bed, thy idol, thy idol's temple and altar, the bed of thy uncleanness, where thou committest spiritual whoredom, with all the wantonness of an idolatrous fancy, and in direct violation of the covenant of thy God. Thither wentest thou up readily enough, though it was up-hill, to offer sacrifice." Some think this bespeaks the impudence they arrived at in their idolatries; at first they had some sense of shame, when they worshipped their idols in the valleys, in obscure places; but they soon conquered that, and came to do it upon the lofty high mountains. They were not ashamed, neither could they blush. [3.] As if these were not enough, they had household-gods too, their lares and penates. Behind the doors and the posts (Isa 57:8), where the law of God should be written for a memorandum to them of their duty, they set up the remembrance of their idols, not so much to keep up their own remembrance of them (they were so fond of them that they could not forget them), but to show to others how mindful they were of them, and to put their children in mind of them, and possess them betimes with a veneration for these dunghill deities. [4.] As they were insatiable in their idolatries, so they were inseparable from them. They were hardened in their wickedness; they worshipped their idols openly and in public view, as being neither ashamed of the sin nor afraid of the punishment; they went as publicly, and in as great crowds, to the idol-temples, as ever they had gone to God's house. This was like an impudent harlot, discovering themselves to another than God, making profession of another than the true religion. They took a pride in making proselytes to their idolatries, and not only went up themselves to their high places, but enlarged their bed, that is, their idol-temples, and (as the margin reads the following words) thou hewedst it for thyself larger than theirs, than theirs from whom thou copiedst it, and tookest the platform of it, as Ahaz of his altar from that which he saw at Damascus, Kg2 16:10. And being thus involved over head and ears, as it were, in their idolatries, there is no parting them from them. Ephraim is now joined to idols both in love and league. First, In league: "Thou hast made a covenant with them, with the idols, with the idol-worshippers, to live and die together." This was a complete renunciation of their covenant with God and an avowed resolution to persist in their apostasy from him. Secondly, In love: "Thou lovedst their bed, that is, the temple of an idol, wherever thou sawest it." Justly therefore were they given up to their own hearts' lusts.
3. Another sin charged upon them is their trusting in and seeking to foreign aids and succours, and contracting a communion with the Gentile powers (Isa 57:9): Thou wentest to the king, which some understand of the idol they worshipped, particularly Moloch, which signifies a king. "Thou didst every thing to ingratiate thyself with those idols, didst offer incense and sweet ointments at their altars." Or it may be meant of the king of Assyria, whom Ahaz made his court to, or of the king of Babylon, whose ambassadors Hezekiah caressed, or of other kings of the nations whose idolatrous usages they admired and were desirous to learn and imitate, and for that end went and sent to cultivate an acquaintance and correspondence with them, that they might be like them and strengthen themselves by an alliance with them. See here, (1.) What an expense they were at in forming and procuring this grand alliance. They went with ointments and perfumes, either bestowed upon themselves, to beautify their own faces and so make themselves considerable and worthy the friendship of the greatest king, or to be presented to those whose favour they were ambitious of, because a man's gift makes room for him and brings him before great men. "When the first present of rich perfumes was thought too little, thou didst increase them;" and thus many seek the ruler's favour, forgetting that, after all, every man's judgment proceeds from the Lord. So fond were they of those heathen princes that they not only went themselves, in all their airs, to those that were near them, but sent messengers to those that were afar off, Isa 18:2. (2.) How much they hereby disparaged themselves and laid the honour of their crown and nation in the dust: Thou didst debase thyself even unto hell. They did so by their idolatries. It is a dishonour to the children of men, who are endued with the powers of reason, to worship that as their god which is the creature of their own fancy and the work of their own hands, to bow down to the stock of a tree. It is much more a dishonour to the children of God, who are blessed with the privilege of divine revelation, to forsake such a God as they know theirs to be for a thing of nought, their own mercies for lying vanities. They likewise debased themselves by truckling to their heathen neighbours, and depending upon them, when they had a God to go to who is all-sufficient and in covenant with them. How did those shame themselves to the highest degree, and sink themselves to the lowest, that forsook the fountain of life for broken cisterns and the rock of ages for broken reeds! Note, Sinners disparage and debase themselves; the service of sin is an ignominious slavery; and those who thus debase themselves to hell will justly have their portion there.
III. The aggravations of their sin. 1. They had been tired with disappointments in their wicked courses, and yet they would not be convinced of the folly of them (Isa 57:10): "Thou art wearied in the greatness of thy way; thou hast undertaken a mighty task, to find out true satisfaction and happiness in that which is vanity and a lie." Those that set up idols, instead of God, for the object of their worship, and princes, instead of God, for the object of their hope and confidence, and think thus to better themselves and make themselves easy, go a great way about, and will never come to their journey's end: Thou art wearied in the multitude, or multiplicity, of thy ways (so some read it): those that forsake the only right way wander endlessly in a thousand by-paths, and lose themselves in the many inventions which they have sought out. They weary themselves with fresh chases and fierce ones, but never gain their point, like the Sodomites, that wearied themselves to find the door (Gen 19:11) and could not find it at last. The pleasures of sin will soon surfeit, but never satisfy; a man may quickly tire himself in the pursuit of them, but can never repose himself in the enjoyment of them. They found this by experience. The idols they had often worshipped never did them any kindness; the kings they courted distressed them, and helped them not; and yet they were so wretchedly besotted that they could not say, "There is no hope; it is in vain any longer to expect that satisfaction in creature-confidences, and in the worship of idols, which we have so often looked for, and never met with." Note, Despair of happiness in the creature, and of satisfaction in the service of sin, is the first step towards a well-grounded hope of happiness in God and a well-fixed resolution to keep to his service; and those are inexcusable who have had sensible convictions of the vanity of the creature, and yet will not be brought to say, "There is no hope to be happy short of the Creator." 2. Though they were convinced that the way they were in was a sinful way, yet, because they had found some present sensual pleasure and worldly profit by it, they could not persuade themselves to be sorry for it: "Thou hast found the life of thy hand" (or the living of it); thou boastest how fortune smiles upon thee, and therefore thou art not grieved, any more than Ephraim when he said (Hos 12:8), "I have become rich; I have found out substance." Note, Prosperity in sin is a great bar to conversion from sin. Those that live at ease in their sinful projects, are tempted to think God favours them, and therefore they have nothing to repent of. Some read it ironically, or by way of question: "Thou hast found the life of thy hand, hast found true satisfaction and happiness, no doubt thou hast; hast thou not? And therefore thou art so far from being grieved that thou blessest thyself in thy own evil way; but review thy gains once more, and come to a balance of profit and loss, and then say, What fruit hast thou of those things whereof thou art ashamed and for which God shall bring thee into judgment?" Rom 6:21. 3. They had dealt very unworthily with God by their sin; for, (1.) It should seem they pretended that the reason why they left God was because he was too terrible a majesty for them to deal with; they must have gods that they could be more free and familiar with. "But," says God, "of whom hast thou been afraid or feared, that thou hast lied, that thou hast dealt falsely and treacherously with me, and dissembled in thy covenants with me and prayers to me? What did I ever do to frighten thee from me? What occasion have I given thee to think hardly of me, that thou hast gone to seek a kinder master?" (2.) However, it is certain that they had no true reverence of God nor any serious regard to him. So that question is commonly understood, "Of whom hast thou been afraid, or feared? Of none; for thou hast not feared me whom thou shouldst fear; for thou hast lied to me." Those that dissemble with God make it to appear they stand in no awe of him. "Thou hast not remembered me, neither what I have said nor what I have done, neither the promises nor the threatenings, nor the performances of either; thou hast not laid them to thy heart, as thou wouldst have done if thou hadst feared me." Note, Those who lay not the word of God and his providences to their hearts do thereby show that they have not the fear of God before their eyes. And multitudes are ruined by fearlessness, forgetfulness, and mere carelessness; they do not aright nor to good purpose fear any thing, remember any thing, nor lay any thing to heart. Nay, (3.) They were hardened in their sin by the patience and forbearance of God. "Have not I held my peace of old, and for a long time? These things thou hast done and I kept silence. And therefore, as it follows here, thou fearest me not;" as if because God had spared long he would never punish, Ecc 8:11. Because he kept silence the sinner thought him altogether such a one as himself, and stood in no awe of him.
IV. Here is God's resolution to call them to an account, though he had long borne with them (Isa 57:12): "I will declare (like that, Psa 50:21, But I will reprove thee), I will declare thy righteousness, which thou makest thy boast of, and let the world see, and thyself too, to thy confusion, that it is all a sham, all a cheat, it is not what it pretends to be. When thy righteousness comes to be examined it will be found that it was unrighteousness, and that there was no sincerity in all thy pretensions. I will declare thy works, what they have been and what the gain thou pretendest to have gotten by them, and it will appear that at long-run they shall not profit thee, nor turn to any account." Note, Sinful works, as they are works of darkness, and there is no reason nor righteousness in them, so they are unfruitful works and there is nothing got by them; and, however they look now, it will be made to appear so another day. Sin profits not, nay, it ruins and destroys.
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 vv3–6 But draw near hither,.... The death of the righteous,…
But draw near hither,.... The death of the righteous, and their happiness after it, being observed: the wicked, who thought themselves safe from danger, and the happier that they were rid of the righteous, those witnesses and prophets which had tormented them, and therefore rejoiced on that account, are here summoned to the divine tribunal, to hear their character, and receive their doom, as follows:
ye sons of the sorceress; the children of Jezebel, the witch, and the prophetess that taught the servants of the Lord to commit fornication, and bewitched with her witchcrafts the sons of the apostate church of Rome; by whose sorceries all nations have been deceived, and of which she repents not, Rev 2:20,
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the seed of the adulterer and of the whore; of the great whore of Babylon, with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication; and whose subjects and children are the seed of this whore, and the sons of this idolatrous church: or, "that committeth whoredom" (g); which aggravates the character, that they were not only the children of adulterous persons, but committed whoredom themselves.
(g) "qua scortata est", Piscator; "quod scortaris", Junius & Tremellius; "qui scortaris", Cocceius.
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 vv3–6 Hither - To God's tribunal, to receive your sentence.…
Hither - To God's tribunal, to receive your sentence. Sons - Not by propagation, but by imitation. And the whore - Not the genuine children of Abraham, their dispositions were far more suitable to a bastardly brood, than to Abraham's seed.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On v6 Verse 6. Among the smooth stones of the stream…
Verse 6. Among the smooth stones of the stream - "Among the smooth stones of the valley"] The Jews were extremely addicted to the practice of many superstitious and idolatrous rites, which the prophet here inveighs against with great vehemence. Of the worship of rude stones consecrated, there are many testimonials of the ancients. They were called βαιτυλοι and βαιτυλια probably from the stone which Jacob erected at Beth-el, pouring oil upon the top of it. This practice was very common in different ages and places. Arnobius, lib. i., gives an account of his own practice in this respect before he became a Christian: Si quando conspexeram lubricatum lapidem, et ex olivi unguine sordidatum; tanquam inesset vis praesens, adulabar, affabar, et beneficia poscebam nihil sentiente de trunco. - "When I have met with a smooth stone, smeared with oil, supposing a spiritual power to be connected with it, I worshipped it, paid my addresses to it, and requested blessings," c. Clemens Alex., Strom. lib. vii., speaks of a worshipper of every smooth stone in a proverbial way, to denote one given up to superstition. And accordingly Theophrastus has marked this as one strong feature in the character of the superstitious man: Και των λιπαρων λιθων των εν ταις τριοδοις παριων, εκ της ληκυθου ελαιου καταχειν, και επι γονατα πεσων και προσκυνησας απαλλαττεσθαι. "Passing by the anointed stones in the streets, he takes out his phial of oil, and pours it on them and having fallen on his knees, and made his adorations, he departs." Kimchi says: "When they found a beautiful polished stone in a brook or river, they paid Divine adoration to it." This idolatry is still prevalent among the Hindoos. The stone which is the object of their adoration is called salgram. They are found about eighty miles from the source of the river Sown, in the viceroyalty of Bahar, on the coast of Bengal. Ayeen Akbery vol. ii. p. 29.
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 vv3, 5 Isa 57:3-4. But draw near hither, &c. — “The…
Isa 57:3-4. But draw near hither, &c. — “The prophet proceeds to exhibit the church, totally corrupt as it was, the good men being extinct or dispersed; so that they who remained of the pure seed of the church lay hid in solitary places, while the body of the church appeared like a dead carcass; not the true, but the idolatrous church.” Thus Vitringa, who understands this paragraph as describing the state of the church in the dark ages of popery. It seems, however, by many of the expressions which the prophet uses, that he is rather giving a description of the corrupt state of the Jewish Church, before the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans. Draw near hither — To God’s tribunal, to receive your sentence; ye sons of the sorceress — Not by propagation, but by imitation, those being frequently called men’s sons that follow their example: the seed of the adulterer, &c. — Not the genuine children of Abraham, as you pretend and boast yourselves to be; your dispositions being far more suitable to a spurious brood than to Abraham’s seed. Against whom do you sport yourselves? — Consider who it is that you mock and scoff at when you deride God’s prophets, (see Isa 28:14; Isa 28:22,) and know that it is not so much men that you insult, as God, whose cause they plead, and in whose name they speak. Are ye not a seed of falsehood — A generation of liars, whose practices contradict your professions, who deal deceitfully both with God and man?
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 vv3–6 But draw near hither - That is, come near…
But draw near hither - That is, come near to hear the solemn sentence which God pronounces in regard to your character and doom. This is addressed to the impenitent and unbelieving part of the nation, and is designed to set before them the greatness of their sin, and the certainty that they would be punished.
Ye sons of the sorceress - You who are addicted to sorcery and enchantments; who consult the oracles of the pagan rather than the only true God. On the meaning of the word used here, see the notes at Isa 2:6. The Hebrews, like other inhabitants of the East, were much addicted to this, and particularly in the time of Manasseh 2Ki 21:6 : ‘And he made his sons pass through the fire, and observed times, and used enchantments, and dealt with familiar spirits, and wizards.’ So much were they devoted to this in his time, that they might be called, by way of eminence, ‘the sons of the sorceress;’ as if a sorceress had been their mother, and they had grown up to walk in her steps, and to imitate her example.
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The seed of the adulterer - Implying that the obligations of the marriage contract were disregarded, and that licentiousness prevailed in the nation. Amidst the other abominations which existed under the wicked and corrupt reign of Manasseh 2 Kings 21, there is every probability that these sins also abounded. Licentiousness had been the invariable attendant on idol-worship; and dissoluteness of manners is the usual accompaniment of all other crimes. It is observable also that the Saviour often charges the same sin on the nation in his own time (Mat 12:39; Mat 16:4; Joh 8:1 ff.) In the language here, however, there is a reference to the fact that the nation had apostatized from God, and they were guilty of spiritual adultery - that is, of unfaithfulness to God. They fixed their affections on other objects than God, and loved the images of idol-worship more than they did their Creator.
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 vv3–6 Sorceress. Septuagint, "lawless" children. (Haydock)
Sorceress. Septuagint, "lawless" children. (Haydock)
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 v3 3 But draw near hither, ye sons of the…
2. THE MOURNFUL PRESENT MARKED BY THE IDOLATROUS DOINGS OF THE NATION
Isa_57:3-14
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3 But draw near hither, ye sons of the sorceress,
The seed of the adulterer and 1the whore.
4 Against whom do ye sport yourselves?
Against whom make ye a wide mouth,
And draw out the tongue?
Are ye not children of transgression, a 2seed of falsehood,
5 Enflaming yourselves [3] 4with idols
Under every green tree,
Slaying the children in the valleys
Under the cliffs of the rocks?
6 Among the smooth stones of the stream is thy portion;
They, they are thy lot:
Even to them hast thou poured a drink offering.
Thou hast offered a meat offering,
5Should I receive comfort in these?
7 Upon a lofty and high mountain hast thou set thy bed:
Even thither wentest thou up to offer sacrifice.
8 Behind the doors also and the posts hast thou set up thy remembrance:
6For thou hast discovered thyself to another than me,
And art gone up; thou hast enlarged thy bed,
7And 8made thee a covenant with them;
Thou lovedst their bed 9where thou sawest it.
9 And 10thou wentest to the king with ointment,
And didst increase thy perfumes,
And didst send thy messengers far off,
And didst 11debase thyself even unto hell.
10 Thou art wearied in the greatness of thy way;
Yet saidst thou not, There is no hope:
Thou hast found the 12life of thine hand;
Therefore thou wast not 13grieved.
11 And of whom hast thou been afraid 14or feared,
That thou hast lied,
And hast not remembered me, nor laid it to thy heart?
Have not I held my peace even of old,
And thou fearest me not?
12 I will declare thy righteousness,
And thy works; for they shall not profit thee.
13 When thou criest, let thy 15companies deliver thee;
But the wind shall carry them all away;
16Vanity shall take them:
But he that putteth his trust in me
Shall possess the land,
And shall inherit my holy mountain;
14 17And shall say, Cast ye up, cast ye up, prepare the way,
Take up the stumbling-block out of the way of my people.
TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL
See List for the recurrence of the words: Isa_57:4. התענג—ילדי־פשׁע. and זרע שׁקר. Isa_57:5. סְעִפֵי הַסְּלָעִים. Isa_57:9. שוּר—עד־מרחוק.
Isa_57:4. The form יִלְדֵי is found only in this place before Makkeph. Except this, יַלְדֵי three times without Makkeph: Isa_2:6; Exo_2:6; Hos_1:2.
Isa_57:5. The participles נחמים and שׁחטי are in apposition with and explanatory of ילדי פ׳ and נֵחָמִים .זרעשׁ׳ is part. Niph. from חמם.—The expression כל־עץ רענן, which occurs only here in Isaiah, is found beside Deu_12:2; 2Ki_16:4; 2Ki_17:10; 2Ch_28:4; Jer_2:20; Jer_3:6; Jer_3:13; Eze_6:13.
Isa_57:6. The clause כְּחַלְּקֵ׳־נחל חלקך is very difficult; and expositors differ very much about it. The LXX. connect the words כחלקי־נחל with what precedes (σφάζοντες τὰ τέκνα αὐτῶν ἐν ταῖς φάραγξιν ἀνὰ μέσον τῶν πετρῶν ἐν ταῖς μερίσι φάραγγος. Ἐκείνη σου ἠ μερίς, οὖτός σου ὁ κλῆρος). [The words ἐν ταῖς μερίσι φάραγγος are wanting in Tischendorf’s 4th edition of the LXX. of 1869,—Tr.], but that gives an intolerable tautology. Vulg. in partibus torrentis pars tua; thus it takes חַלְּקֵי for חֶלְקֵי.—Targ. Jonatan: in laevibus locis ripae torrentis est pars tua.—Syrus: sors tua et haereditas tua cum sorte torrentium erit. Thus he takes בְּ=cum, and likewise חַלְּקֵי־נחל = חֶלְקֵי־נ׳; the double הֵם he takes as simply=et. Similarly, only still more freely, does the Arabic version in the London Polyglot translate: Sors illorum (scil. idolorum) erit portio vestra. One sees that these ancient versions were little exact in adhering to the original text. Jerome understands the “in partibus torrents,” to declare how “omnes montes, vales atque torrentes plenierant cultu daemonum,” and the “pars tua, sors tua” denotes for him that the demons were to the Israelites what the Lord should have been, according to Deu_32:9; Psa_47:5; Psa_73:26. Later expositors divide into five classes. Some take חַלְּקֵי also to be equal to חֶלְקֵי, which they understand variously, partly in a physical, partly in a spiritual sense. But all these views we must reject as grammatically unfounded. Others take חַלְּקֵי somehow in the sense of “laevitas, laeva, smoothness, smooth places,” but construe חלקך in the sense of “punishment.” According to this the sense would be: stoning with the smooth stones (Raschi), drowning, casting down over smooth, slippery places into the deep (Vitringa: Vos detrudemini in laevia vallis, i.e., in lubrica et salebrosa loca, quae quem in profunda vallis praecipitem agunt), the stony desert (Coccejus),—that is your well-merited portion. But it is manifest that חלקך and גורלך have here nothing to do with punishment, but continue to describe the sin. The third class of expositors construe חֶלְקֵךְ in the sense of “the right place, theatre.” Then the meaning would be: in the smooth clefts of the rock, or in the bare places of the valleys, there is the place where thou carriest on thy iniquitous work (J. D. Michaelis, Paulus, Gesen., Comment., Rueckert, Hitzig, Umbreit). But the following emphatic הֵם הֵם ו׳ and the second half of the verse show, that the mention here is not merely of the theatre of the idolatrous doings. A fourth class see in חלקי a designation of the idol images themselves. They derive the word from the Arabic chalaqa, efformavit, effinxit, so that the meaning would be: “in the images of the valley is thy portion,” or “with the idols in the valley thou carriest on thy trade” (Koppe in Lowth’s Isaiah, Knobel). But the root חָלַק in Hebrew never has this sense. Finally, the fifth class (Lowth, Rosenm., Gesen. Thes., Ewald, Delitzsch, Seinecke, Rohling, [J. A. Alex.]) take חלקך in the spiritual sense in which Jehovah is called the portion of His people (comp. the places cited above, and Psa_119:57; Jos_22:25; Psa_16:5, etc.) But הַלְּקֵי־נחל are smooth stones such as, according to a widespread custom of antiquity, were objects of divine worship. Very properly reference has been made to הֲמִשָׁה חַלֻקֵי אֲבָנִים מִן־הַנַּחַל 1Sa_17:40. Fuerst, in the Concordance, puts our חַלְּקֵי with חַלֻּקֵי under one rubric, in that without further notice he points it חַלֻּקֵי. And indeed the two words differ only by one dot, and hence a copyist’s error were cot impossible. Fuerst in his Lex. derives our חַלְּקֵי from חַלָּק, which would be an abnormal vocalization instead of הַלָּקֵי (Olsh., § 183, a). Now if one may neither read חַלֻּקֵי instead of חַלְּקֵי, nor yet take חַלְּקֵי for an abnormal stat. const. pl. from חַלָּק, then we can only derive חַלְּקֵי either from חָלָק (Isa_30:10) or from חֵלֶק. But the latter were likewise an unusual formation, for the connecting form of the plural must sound חֶלְקִי, according the sole suffix forms in use (comp חֶלְקִי ,חֶלְקֵיהֶם ,חֶלְקֵךְ, Hos_5:7). The Daghesh in ל would any way be Dag. Dirimens. If then we derive our word from the adjective חָלָק “laevus, lubricus, smooth,” then חלקי־נחל would be the smooth things of the valley. But, in view of the intentional paronomasia with חֶלְקֵךּ, we may further assume that חַלְּקֵי the Prophet means nothing else than what is described in 1Sa_17:4, “smooth stones from the brook,” in fact that חלקי־נחל is in the end nothing more than an abbreviation of חַלְקֵי אַבִנֵי הַנַחַל, an abbreviation that of course would be understood only by one that had the passage of 1 Sam. in his mind.—בְּ before חַלְּקֵי is used as Jos_22:25 אֵין־לָכֶם חֵלֶק בַיהוָֹה.
Isa_57:8. מֵאִתִּי גִלִית, as it seems to me, must be judged after the analogy of the expressions גָלָה עַמִּי (Isa_5:13), גָּֽלְתָה יְהוּדָה (Lam_1:3), גָּלָה מָשׂוֹשׁ (Isa_24:11; comp. 1Sa_4:21 sq.; Pro_27:25, etc..). For as גָלָה originally means “to uncover, make bare,” so that form of expression declares that by removal of the people, who as it were cover it, the land Is uncovered, made bare. It is to be noticed, moreover, that אֶרֶץ itself is by metonymy used for the people (Jdg_18:30), and that also other things, e. g., the grass, can be described as uncovering their place by their removal. It is true that only Kal is used in this sense. But had the Prophet written גָּלִית then, according to the constant and frequent usage, one must have taken this in the sense of: “in exilium abiisti.” But he would not say that. What is here spoken of, is no punitive ridding out of a place, but a very spontaneous, headstrong and willful making bare, empty. Hence the Prophet uses the Piel. Therefore I cannot approve of the other explanations that supply “the shame” or “the clothes,” or that treat מִשְׁכָּבֵךְ as the common object of the three verbs (Delitzsch.—יתרת־לך מהם (certainly not castrasti quosdam ex iis, Grotius) is properly without analogy; for 2Ch_7:18 the person with whom the covenant is made is designated by לְ, in 1Sa_20:16; 1Sa_22:8 עִם is used. But these passages show that after כרת the בְּרִית may be omitted. The Prophet might then have written ותכרת לָהֶם. But then the particular would be wanting, that Israel made demands, conditions which were to be fulfilled on the part of the other. One must, to be exact, translate: thou bargainedst, madest conditions for thee from those.—The words יד חזית are likewise without analogy. The explanations: thou descriest a place (to lie down),—where thou seest but a beckoning hand,—thou dividest a hand, i.e., thou dost destine a side of the couch for the lover (Knobel)—all of them contain an unsuitable clumsy thought. One looks for something that belongs to the משׁכב in the sense indicated, or that follows on it. And thus there is much to favor the view that sees in יָד an euphemism for the masculine member. Only analogies from other languages (see Delitzsch) can be adduced, but considering the originality of our author this can be no obstacle. חָזָה then, like רָאָה, according to well known usage, stands for sentire, experiri (comp. Job_8:17; Job_15:17; Job_24:1; Psa_58:11). [J. A. Alexander briefly dismisses the euphemistic view by saying; “the sense gratuitously put upon the phrase by Doederlein, and the praises given him for the discovery, are characteristic of neological aesthetics.” His own comment is: “The most probable interpretation of the last words of the verse is that which gives יָד the same sense as in Isa_56:5” (viz., “a place”). Spite of the respectable commentators that approve of this euphemistic sense (Ewald, Hitzig cited by Delitzsch who agrees), it should be rejected. Delitzsch refers to Eze_16:26; Eze_23:20. But the coarse, plainness of the language there is ground enough for inferring that, did Isaiah mean to express the like here, he would use language as plain. It were just as reasonable to imagine the same significance for יָד in Isa_56:5. There is actually no ground for doing so, in either case. “Thou descriest a place (to lie down)” gives a good rendering. Comp. the clause חזית—אהבת with Job_8:18, עַל־גַּל שָֽׁרָשָׁיו יְסֻבָּב֑וּ בֵּת אֲבָנים יַֽחֱזֶה.—Tr.].
Isa_57:10. נוֹאָשׁ is part. Niph. desperatus (Job_6:26), The neuter only here and Isa 2:25; Isa 18:12.
Isa_57:11. דָאַג is sollicitum esse and has primarily intransitive meaning (Jer_17:8). In this sense it is conjoined with לְ (1Sa_9:5; 1Sa_10:2) or with מִן (Psa_38:19; Jer_42:16). In our text it is used transitively, as in Jer_38:19, joined with the accusative.—The תִּירְאִי with the attached Vav consec., shows that the Prophet conceives of it as the consequence of דאג. The latter accordingly denotes the inward, religious dread, of which the outward evidences are only the consequence. כִּי before תכזבי is the causal “that” after questions.
Isa_57:14. וְאָמַר is used impersonally as in Isa_25:9; Isa_45:24; Isa_65:8.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
1. In this section the Prophet describes the idolatrous, and hence adulterous doings that at the time of this prophecy were prevalent in the entire nation. He summons the nation to approach in order to hear his castigating words. He addresses them as posterity of adulterous parents (Isa_57:3). They had often scoffed at him. Hence he asks them: Who is he whom ye derided, and who are ye? Are ye not as bastards who would supplant the genuine offshoots (Isa_57:4)? And then he points out to them their untheocratic, bastard way, by enumerating facts. Ye carry on your idolatry under every green tree. Ye slay the children by the brooks and in rocky hollows (Isa_57:5). These places have become the holy and promised land to you. And, that every part of the worship of Jehovah may have its idolatrous counterpart, ye do not omit drink and meat offerings for the idols (Isa_57:6). Then by sacrifices ye have made the high mountains the scene of your adulterous worship of idols (Isa_57:7). Jehovah’s mottoes, that should be in every house, are thrust into the corner. But ye do as a woman that forsakes the place at the side of her husband, and sets up a couch of lewdness in another place (Isa_57:8). And also by seeking aid from foreigners ye carry on an adulterous idolatry. For ye sent messengers with rich gifts to foreign kings, yea, ye have boasted even of alliances with hell (Isa_57:9). And ye were indefatigable in these doings; nothing availed to convince you of their vanity. Rather, as long as ye could stir, ye would never confess to sickness (Isa_57:10). How wrong such conduct was appears the more manifest, when one compares whom Israel feared and whom it did not fear. Yea, what sort of beings were those whom thou fearedst, whereas thou fearedst me no more, who so long kept silence spite of thy unfaithfulness? (Isa_57:11). But I will speak and make manifest your righteousness and your works. From that will be seen that ye have no claim to be helped (Isa_57:12). Then let your numerous idols help you. But the wind will carry them off. He, on the contrary, that trusts in me, will receive inheritance in the holy land and on the holy mountain (Isa_57:13). For these there will be a glorious return into the promised land (Isa_57:14).
2. But draw near——falsehood.
Isa_57:3-4. וְאַתֶּם strongly reminds one of that ואתם, Isa_48:6, which, according to our construction, is also to be understood as an address of the Prophet to the people living in his own time. Draw near hither is like a citation before the ruler, who proposes to hold up to the subject his guilt, and to announce the punishment (comp. Isa_34:1; Isa_48:16; Isa_41:1; Isa_41:5; הֵנָּה, as in 2Sa_20:16, and often). The Israelites are addressed as sons of a sorceress (comp. on Isa_2:6). Witchcraft is only possible by reason of idolatrous superstition, because it would produce effects by supernatural powers that are not the powers of the true God. The children of the witch are such as have not only a witch for mother, but have also themselves a witch nature. Thus the idolatrous inclination of the people is charged as something inherited (comp. on Isa_1:4). What is here expressed in one notion is explained in the second half of the verse. For זרע מנאף is seed of the adulterer (comp. ז׳ מְרֶעִים, Isa_1:4; Isa_14:20; ז׳ קֹדֶשׁ, Isa_6:13; ז׳ שֶׁקֶר, Isa_57:4), thus the ancestors of the present generation are designated as adulterers in their relation to Jehovah, i.e., as idolaters. But that the present generation is adulterous, i.e., idolatrous, is expressed by the addition (וַתִּזְנֶה) [Eng-V. “and the whore”]. The view that this word is only the feminine of מנאפ is disproved from the fact that the simple Vav copulative (וְתִזְנֱה) would be used. Moreover, the mode of expression would be affected, and the addition superfluous. For from the view-point of polygamy, adultery is only possible with a married woman. Therefore in זרע מנאף is implied the representation, that the married woman had sinned with another man, i.e., with idols, and that therefore the present generation no longer has Jehovah for a father de facto, though de jure He may still pass for such. But וַתִּזְנֶה expresses that this generation, sprung from adultery, though recognized as legitimate, has itself committed adultery. As is well known, זָנָה stands very often for Israel’s apostacy to idols (Exo_34:15 sq.; Lev_17:7; Num_15:39; Deu_31:16; Hos_2:6 sq.; Isa_1:21, etc.).
In Isa_57:4 the Prophet charges the people with the audacious scoffing with which they persecuted the followers of Jehovah in general and himself, the worthy Prophet in particular. For the question על מי can, of course, in itself have a quantitative sense: are there then men at all, about whom ye make yourselves merry? But why might there not have been men, about whom even such a degenerate people might with a certain justice make themselves merry? For this reason we must take the question על מי in a qualitative sense as in Isa_37:23. There it is asked: whom hast thou derided, etc.? Answer: the holy One of Israel. Thus here, also, the sense of qualis must be in the מי (comp. Isa_57:11; Isa_51:12). The imperfects תתעננו, etc., denote that these derisions still continue. Here also we have that personal אַתֶּם, which makes so entirely the impression of immediate living presence. And if the contemporaries derided Jehovah’s true followers and His prophets especially, who amongst them all was more exposed to the derision and deserved it less, than Isaiah. Hence there seems to me in this על־מי to be expressed the consciousness of personal worth and of outrage perpetrated by wounding it. התעננ, “delectari aliquare, to delight one’s self, to take pleasure from something,” is found only here in a bad sense. Opening wide the mouth along with derisive laughter is mentioned also Psa_22:8; Psa_35:21. Sticking out the tongue as a gesture of derision is not mentioned elsewhere in the Scripture. Expositors cite Livy, VII. Isaiah 10 : linguam ab irrisu exserens. The point of the verse consists in the distinction between the one scoffed at and the scoffers. What the former is, is not said. But we guess it. What the latter are, the Prophet states with the words: are ye not children of sin (i.e., such whose own nature partakes of the sin of those that begot), a spurious seed? That is, I think that זרע שׁקר is the antithesis of זרע אֱמֶת (Jer_2:21). Then it is not a seed in which materially the species “lie.” appears out of the sphere of the genus “sin;” but זרע שׁקר is a seed which any how formally is not what it pretends to be; i.e., a false, spurious seed. Thus the same is expressed as by מנאף זרע Isa_57:3.
3. Inflaming——yourselves comfort in these.
Isa_57:5-6. In what follows the Prophet enumerates all the sorts of idolatry by which the Israelites of his times proved themselves to be “children of sin” and “a spurious seed.” אֵלִים here means terebinths and not “gods,” as appears from the כל־עץ י׳ (see on Isa_1:29) that stands in parallelism. As a beautiful, shady tree, the terebinth played a great part in the idolatrous tree worship of the Hebrews (comp. Eze_6:13; Hos_4:13). It enticed to idolatry. Hence it is said, that the idolatrous fervor, that was only too closely joined to fleshly voluptuousness, was kindled by the terebinths. But not only stately, shady terebinths, every green tree kindled the idolatrous desire. But worse still than the tree-worship, was the murderous Baal and Moloch worship, to which especially the poor children fell a sacrifice (comp. my remarks on Jer_17:2). Although this horrible worship exacted the burning of children, still the word שָׁחַט is used in connection with it, beside other expressions referring to it (Jer_7:31; Jer_19:5; Eze_16:20-21. At the same time it seems to me that the Prophet (who in what follows pursues the thought that Israel in a sacrilegious way transferred all parts of Jehovah’s worship to its idolatrous worship), would here, by the choice of this word שׁחט, express the thought that the children were their עוֹלוֹת. For the slaying of beasts destined for whole-burnt-offerings was expressed by שׁחט, whereas זָבַח was the specific word for the slaying of the שׁלמים (see on Isa_5:7-8). In the valleys, under the clifts of the rocks, thus not only in the vale of Hinnom, but elsewhere also, in forbidding rocky defiles, were those horrid sacrifices offered.
Isa_57:6. Among the smooth stones of the stream is thy portion. See Text. and Gram. By these smooth stones are any way to be understood the sacred anointed stones (Bayetilia). The earliest trace of this usage appears in Gen_28:18; Gen_35:14. But what was originally a simple act of consecration to serve for sacred remembrance, became gradually the substratum of an idolatrous worship, the stone worship (comp. Jer_3:9; Eze_20:32). As the name βαίτυλος, βαιτύλια is of Phœnician origin, the view is not without foundation that this name is to be referred back to בֵּית־אֵל. Comp. [Smith’sDic. of the B. Art. Stones]; Leyrer in Herz. R.-Encycl. XVI. p. 322; Kurtz, Hist. of theOld Covenant, I. § 75, 3; Grimmel, De lapidum cultu, Marburg, 1853. The baetylia were indeed stones smooth with oil. Arnobius (Adver. Gentes I. 39) relates of the heathen period of his life: “Si quando conspexeram lubricatum lapidem et ex olivi unguine sordidatum, tanquam inesset vis praesens, adulabar, affabar et beneficia poscebam nihil sentiente de trunco.” Lowth cites at our text a passage from Theophrast (to Autolykos I. 15) where it is said of a superstitious man: “Καί τῶν λιπαρῶν λίθων τῶν ἐν ταῖς τριόδοις παριὼν ἐκ τῆς ληκύθου ἔλαιον καταχεῖν καὶ ἐπὶ γόνατα πεσὼν καὶ προσκυνήσας ἁπαλλάττεσθαι.” Comp. Clement of Alex. Strom. VII. 843. Our passage indeed does not seem to speak of oily, smooth stones. But it appears that that worship, apart from the smoothing by oil, was only given to stones that by nature or art had a smooth surface. At least we could not suppose that Jacob chose a rough stone for his pillow. And our text favors the idea that one did not choose for adoration any sort of stone remarkable for size or form, but especially smooth stones. The emphatic הֵם הֵםthese, these, refers to the stones as something that Israel in a shameful way made rivals of Jehovah. נּוֹרָל, properly lapillus, is, indeed, no where else so used that Jehovah Himself is called “the lot” of His people. But the word is chosen here because the Prophet intended an allusion to the notion “stone” contained in חלקי־נהל. The thought underlying also the second half of verse 6 is, that the idolatrous Israelites gave to their lumpish idols what was due to Jehovah alone. For here, too, the aping is rebuked, by which they transferred the various parts of Jehovah worship to the idol worship. For נֶסֶךְdrink offering, and מִנְחָהmeat offering were essential parts of Jehovah’s worship. The latter consisted of flour in various forms, with salt, olive oil and incense in addition (Leviticus 2). The former represented the drinking suited to eating, and consisted only of wine (Exo_29:40; Num_15:5 sqq.). הֶֽעֱלָה with the object מנחח = altari imposuit fertum occurs again Isa_66:3. How deeply the Lord feels the insult, is declared in the words: should I console myself (be quiet) concerning such? Niph. נִחַם with עַל denotes 1) to pity one’s self, 2) to feel regret, sorrow, 3) to console one’s self, to quiet one’s self (2Sa_13:39; Jer_31:15; Eze_32:31). A modification of the last meaning given is “to revenge one’s self,” which we had Isa_1:24. The context shows that only the meaning given under 3) suits here.
4. Upon a lofty——sawest it.
Isa_57:7-8. In these two verses the Prophet shows how in idolatrous worship, Israel even (נם־שׁם עלית Isa_57:7) aped the peace offering, the זֶבַח שְׁלָמִים. And he joins with it, in a particularly marked way, the adulterous conduct of which it was thereby guilty. Why the Prophet connects the latter particular just with שְׁלָמִים may have this reason, that these sacrifices were always united with meals, and just these may have given occasion for abandonment to joviality and especially to fleshly debauchery, particularly when celebrated in the open air on mountain elevations. Hos_4:13 also mentions the offering of the idolatrous זֶבַח on mountain tops and connected with licentiousness. The expression חר־נבה ונשֹא is found so exactly only here; but comp. Isa_2:2; Isa_30:25. שַׂמְתְּ מִשְׁכָּבֵךְ is a figurative expression for the act of idolatrous worship. It cannot be doubted that by לִזְבֹּחַ זֶבַח the Prophet means the Shelamim sacrifice. For the זבח was most closely joined with that. “For the Shelamim offering [peace offering] the Pentateuch also uses simply the expression זֶבַח, i.e., killing; indeed this word in the Pentateuch has only this narrower sense, as further the meal of the שׁלמים as often designated by the verb זבח. The reason of this mode of expression was, that, as in the burnt-offering, the peculiar feature was the bringing up of the entire sacrifice on to the altar, so the sacrificial meal belonged essentially to the peace offering. זָבַח denotes the killing with reference to a meal that was to be held (comp. especially Lev_17:3 sqq.; Deu_12:15); it is thus distinguished from שָׁחַט which has no such reference.” (Œhler in Herz., R.-Encycl. X. p. 637).
The initial words of Isa_57:8 have experienced a double explanation. The ancient expositors from Jerome down understand by זכרון, remembrance, any sort of idolatrous emblem, especially the household gods, Lares. But first it is to be objected, that the expression is a strange one to denote that, and then to put behind the doors and the posts seems rather to describe contemptuous than honorable treatment. Hence modern expositors have justly understood זכרון to mean what in Deu_6:8; Deu_11:20, was prescribed to be written on the מְזִוּזוֹת and on the שְׁעָרִים, especially since in Exo_13:9 a similar memorial is expressly called זִכָּרוֹן. Therefore we may justly regard our text as a reference to the passages of the Pentateuch just cited. The Prophet charges the Israelites with putting those memorials containing the principles of the Theocracy behind the posts and doors, instead of on them, of course to get those hated reminders as far out of sight as possible. This done, they shamelessly left vacant (see Text. and Gram.) the place at the side of their husband, like an adulterous wife, in order to betake themselves to the couch of a lover.—מאתי נלית states how the adulterous wife made empty the place at her husband’s side; ותעלו, how she ascended to the elevation (Isa_57:7); הרחבת משׁבּבך, how she made the lewd bed, i.e. broad, to give room for the lover. יכרת־לך מהם (see Text. and Gram.), describes the coarseness of this relation. The shameless harlot demands her price. What it was is not said. Any way it was agreed to. For the text continues: thou lovedest their embrace (משׁכב frequent in this sense: Num_31:17-18; Num_31:35; Jdg_21:11-12, etc.).
5. And thou wentest—wast not grieved.
Isa_57:9-10. The Prophet has hitherto described what we may call the immediate worship of idols. Now he turns to what may be called the political or indirect idolatry of the Israelites. For when they turned to heathen nations for help, instead of relying on the Lord, that also was idolatry. And it was such not merely in the subtile sense of trusting in an arm of flesh (comp. Jer_17:5-6; Isa_30:1 sq.; Isa_31:1-3; 2Ki_16:7), but also in the grosser sense, inasmuch as trusting in a heathen nation involved trusting in its gods (Isa_10:10-11; Jer_2:33; Jer_2:36; Eze_23:7; Eze_23:30; Hos_12:1). If this is the correct understanding of the fundamental thought of our passage, it is clear that we are not to understand מֶלֶךְ as meaning an idol, as many expositors do. It is therefore neither Moloch (comp. Isa_8:21; Amo_5:26; Jer_49:1; Jer_49:3; Zep_1:5), nor Anamelech, the Chronos of the Sepharvaim (2Ki_17:31), as Hitzig thinks, nor the Phœnician Baal (מֶלֶך בַּעַל) as Knobel says. It seems to me also incorrect to suppose it refers directly to the king of Assyria. For there is nowhere any trace of his having been directly “the king” for the Israelites. And one cannot appeal to Isa_30:30 to show that he was, for there, according to the context (comp. Isa 57:31, אַשׁוּר), only the Assyrian king can be thought of. Hence it seems to me that the Prophet would say: Israel has ever turned to him who, according to existing relations, was for the time the king, κατ’ ἐξοχήν. Nearly like, but not identical, is the construction of Saadia, who understands מלך as collective. Also the choice of the word שׁוּר seems to favor our constructions, for it means “circuire, to go about” (comp. שָׁרָה, the wandering about, for caravans, Eze_27:25). בַּשֶׁמֶן is “with oil.” But it remains doubtful whether that means “as one anointed with oil” (in order to charm the senses, Eze_23:40) or “with presents of oil and ointments.” Grammatically either is allowable. Comp. for the former use, Gen_32:11. But I prefer the latter, because it cannot be said that Israel itself came to the king, but sent ambassadors to remote places. Rather, according to Isaiah’s style, the latter is the explanation of the figure. The great rulers, now Assyria, now Egypt, lived far away. Did Israel perhaps send ambassadors further than that? Any way one may not press the significance of “oil and ointments.” The simple meaning is, that Israel sent the noblest and costliest gifts of its land as presents. The olive tree grew nowhere so well as in Palestine; comp. Leyrer, Herzog’sReal-Enc. X. p. 547. One of the ingredients of the רִקֻּהִים (ἅπ. λεγ., otherwise רֹקַה), “ointments,” perfumes, were בְּשָׂמִים, and Palestine was regarded as the exclusive home of the balsam shrub, ibid. I. 673. Isa_39:2 shows that costly oil and noble ointment belonged to the royal treasures. עִיר=“messenger,” as in Isa_18:2. But Israel’s attempts to find helpers not only went far, but also deep. It is common to understand ער־שׁאול to mean the humble gestures and words of those seeking help. But that were a bad and senseless hyperbole. I believe the Prophet by didst send thy messengers far off refers chiefly to chaps. 28–33, and by thou wentest down to hell has especially in mind Isa_28:15, where the rulers of Jerusalem are made to say: “We have made a covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement.” The Hiph. השׁפיל, therefore, has not an ethical, but a local sense (comp. Isa_25:12; Isa_26:5; Psa_113:6).
Isa_57:10. Thus Israel had wearied itself with much running (דֶּרֶד is abstractum here: the going, running, as often, comp. 1Ki_18:27 and Isa_47:12; 1Ki_19:7); but did not learn to see the uselessness of its efforts. Rather, because the weak hand from time to time felt some life, Israel never came to feel sick, i.e. to know and feel its powerlessness in its complete reality.
6. And of whom hast thou——way of my people.
Isa_57:11-14. Having thus described the idolatrous practices of the nation, the Prophet next asks for the reasons of it. These may be positive and negative: the idols may have advantages that Jehovah has not, and Jehovah may have defects that the idols are free from. I do not believe that את־מי refers to the heathen nations or their rulers, to whom Israel had looked for protection. For the whole context treats essentially of Israel’s religious conduct, and here especially of the reasons Israel might have for preferring idols to Jehovah. And, indeed, according to our remark on Isa_57:9, the dreadfulness of a nation depended on the power of its gods. מִי therefore refers to the idols. It is to be taken in the same sense as in Isa_57:4. Indeed one may say that this את־מי stands in a certain antithetical relation to that על־מי. For if על־מי, Isa_57:4, relates primarily to the Prophet, still it refers indirectly also to Jehovah, because the Prophet is such a one only through Jehovah. Of whom wast thou apprehensive, and so wast afraid. See Text. and Gram. It might be thought that what could move Israel to unfaithfulness to its Lord must be very considerable, grand in power and glory, far superior to Jehovah. But is such the case? No. One might expect the Prophet to dwell here on the contemptible quality of idols, that is intimated only by מִי. But what were the use? Has he not abundantly done so in the first Ennead? See Isa_40:18 sqq.; Isa_41:6 sq.; 21 sqq.; Isa_42:17; Isa_43:9 sqq.; Isa_44:9 sqq.; Isa_45:20; Isa_46:1 sqq.; Isa_47:12; Isa_48:3 sqq.—That thou liedst. The meaning of כִּזֵּב here appears from what follows. It denotes the unfaithfulness, covenant-breaking nature of Israel. For by its deeds it proved its words to be lying words (comp. Psa_78:36 sq.). Apart from single covenants (Exo_19:8; Exo_24:3; Exo_24:7; Deu_5:27 sqq.; Jos_24:16; Jos_24:24) the confession of Jehovah was the standing law in Israel. The sense is: What is the quality of those things that thou fearest, that (בִּי, see Text. and Gram.) thou couldest be seduced by them to break faith with thy God? But, from the antithesis to על־מי, Isa_57:4, and from what the Prophet has already said of the idols, it is seen that Israel found no sufficient motive for apostacy in the nature of its idols. There is another motive, viz. the silence of Jehovah. This must have been of such a nature as to explain the absence of fear of Him who was with Israel. This appears from the apodosis; therefore thou fearest Me not.—Therefore we are not to understand a not-speaking, but a not-doing. The Lord had kept His peace, and indeed from very ancient time (וְ before עולמ=“and indeed,” comp. Isa_13:10; Isa_32:7; Isa_44:28), He had looked on, spared, used forbearance. Of course this must be understood relatively, for single chastisements were not wanting. But in comparison with the language the Lord used in leading Israel into exile, all that had been before was silence. Thus the Lord speaks of such a silence with reference to Israel as He had before spoken of with reference to the Gentiles, Isa_42:14. If one supposes the Prophet to speak from the stand-point of the Exile, it is verily not evident what so terrible happened to the wicked Israelites after the Exile, as to make all that happened before seem silence in comparison.
Isa_57:12. I will declare.—In contrast with His former silence, the Lord says He will speak. He will declare the righteousness of Israel and its fruits, the works. The whole verse is ironically meant. First of all there is irony in אניד. At first sight it seems as if the Lord presented the prospect of an imposing proclamation of the great, hitherto-ignored deserts of Israel. Second, one supposes on this account that by “righteousness” and “works” are to be understood the manifestations of an actually existing righteousness of Israel’s. But in fact the Lord means that the unrighteousness, the malignity, of Israel shall, by a suitable judicial act, be pilloried before the whole world. Third, the expression: but they will not profit thee is an ironical meiosis. For what Israel has to show in fruits of righteousness is so much the opposite of true righteousness that no other fruit than destruction can come of it. It is seen that I do not follow the punctuation of the Masorets. I cannot therefore approve of the rendering: “and as regards thy handiwork (the idols), they will not profit thee (Delitzsch, Seinecke, Rohling, Weber). For 1) the brief words, Isa_57:12 b a, would be no suitable expression for the important thought that the Lord will bring Israel’s sin to light by great judgments; 2) it were strange to say, Isa_57:12 b, of the idols: “they will not help thee,” and then to continue, Isa_57:13 : “when thou criest let them help thee.”—Thus I believe that not till in Isa_57:13 is declared the incapacity of the heaps of idols (קבּוּצִים., ἅπ. λεγ., properly “gatherings” in the sense of “pantheon”).—[“Aben Ezra appears to understand the word generically, as denoting all that they could scrape together for their own security, including idols, armies and all other objects of reliance.” J. A. Alex. This comprehensive meaning would suit the reference of Isa_57:9-10, which, spite of the Author’s interpretation, that makes the main reference in the end to be to idols, certainly does not exclude reliance on foreign kings and their armies.—Tr.]—The wind, yea, a breath will carry away the whole pantheon (Hengstenbebg, Delitzsch, comp. Isa_41:16; Isa_41:29). On the other hand, those that put their trust in the Lord, even if the general calamity shall have carried them off into the Exile, will take possession of the holy hand and of the holy mountain as their inheritance. Hence return out of the Exile is the concluding thought, which is expressed in Isa_57:14 with great emphasis.
Footnotes:
[1]and who thyself playest harlot.
[2]spurious seed.
[3]Or, among the oaks.
[4]by means of the terebinths.
[5]Should I after this have pity.
[6]For the place by me thou modest empty.
[7]And modest terms for thee from them.
[8]Or, hewed it for thyself larger than theirs.
[9]Or, thou providest room.
[10]Or, thou respeetedst the king.
[11]thou didst descend to hell.
[12]Or, living.
[13]sick.
[14]so that thou fearedst.
[15]collections of gods=pantheon.
[16]breath.
[17]And one shall say.
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 vv3–6 But . . . ye--In contrast to "the righteous"…
But . . . ye--In contrast to "the righteous" and their end, he announces to the unbelieving Jews their doom.
sons of the sorceress--that is, ye that are addicted to sorcery: this was connected with the worship of false gods (Kg2 21:6). No insult is greater to an Oriental than any slur cast on his mother (Sa1 20:30; Job 30:8).
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seed of the adulterer--Spiritual adultery is meant: idolatry and apostasy (Mat 16:4).
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 vv3, 5 3, 4. Draw near… ye sons of the sorceress…
3, 4. Draw near… ye sons of the sorceress — The Hebrew here is very emphatic: You, you. Sorcery is heathenism, (Furst.)
The seed of the adulterer — In the Old Testament, adultery is a word uniformly used for idolatry — so held, because the covenant between Jehovah and Israel was a marriage covenant. See chap. 54. God is the husband, Israel is the espoused to God. The address is here to the Jews in the plainest terms, equivalent to “let us look at your conduct in its true light. Scorners ye are.”
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Against whom do ye sport — Literally, do ye make up faces? Who is the butt of your mockings? See if jeer and contempt be not due to yourselves alone.
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 vv3, 4, 6 3, 4. Indignant summons to the apostate community.
3, 4. Indignant summons to the apostate community.
But draw near hither] Better, But as for you, draw near hither &c. to hear your doom (cf. Isa_41:1, Isa_45:20, Isa_48:16).
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ye sons of a sorceress] The most galling insult to an Oriental is to revile his mother (see 1Sa_20:30). By the use of the phrase here the persons addressed are described as nursed in witchcraft and superstition.
seed of an adulterer and a whore] Cf. Eze_16:3; Eze_16:45 (“thy father an Amorite, thy mother a Hittite”). It is not improbable that the words contain a specific allusion to the mixed origin of the Samaritans (2Ki_17:24 ff.); the “adulterer” may be the remains of the old Israelitish population (who had been untrue to the marriage bond with Jehovah), and the “harlot” the heathen element which had been imported by successive kings of Assyria.
3–13. Invective against an idolatrous party.—With regard to the reference of this obscure and difficult passage the following points have to be noticed: (1) The scenery of Isa_57:5-6 is unmistakeably Palestinian (wadis, clefts of the rock, terebinths). (2) Several of the rites specified bear the complexion of Canaanitish heathenism, and could not have been performed in Babylonia. (3) The opening words (“But ye”) seem to imply that the people addressed are distinct from those whose leaders are denounced in Isa_56:10-12. (4) Those spoken of are animated by contempt and hatred of the cause and people of Jehovah (Isa_57:4), while at the same time they advance pretensions to “righteousness” or correctness of religious standing (Isa_57:12). (5) They have persisted in their abominations down to the time of the prophecy (Isa_57:10-13).
On the supposition that the prophecy was written after the return from Babylon, there is much plausibility in the view that the party here addressed is the Samaritan community. This theory is at all events simpler than that advocated by the majority of critics, who have felt the force of the objections against exilic authorship, and have accordingly supposed that the passage (or its original) was written at some time previous to the Captivity and borrowed by the great prophet of the Exile as a warning against idolatrous tendencies which still manifested themselves in Babylon. (See further Introduction, pp. lvii, lix). The connexion between this section and the preceding would be explained by the fact that the Jewish aristocracy cultivated friendly relations with the Samaritans; there was a serious danger that the struggling Jewish community should by these alliances be dragged down to the level of their semi-pagan neighbours.
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 vv3–6 (3) Ye sons of the sorceress.—The words may be…
(3) Ye sons of the sorceress.—The words may be purely figurative, as meaning those who practise sorcery, but it is also possible that they may have reference to the female soothsayers, such as are described in Eze_13:17-23.
The adulterer.—Here again the epithet may have had both a figurative and a literal application. (Comp. Mat_12:39; Mat_16:4; Jas_4:4.)
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 vv3–6 Vers. 3-14. ISRAEL SEVERELY REBUKED FOR IDOLATRY. Though Hezekiah…
Vers. 3-14. ISRAEL SEVERELY REBUKED FOR IDOLATRY. Though Hezekiah had made a great reformation of religion when he ascended the throne, (2Ki_18:4 2Ch_29:3-19) and had done his best to put down idolatry, yet it was still dear to large numbers among the people, and was easily revived by Manasseh in the earlier portion of his reign. (2Ch_33:2-9) Isaiah now rebukes various kinds of idolatrous practices, and shows the vanity of them.
Draw near hither. Approach, to hear the reprimand which ye so well deserve. Ye sons of the sorceress; rather, of a sorceress. Judah herself, the nation, is the" sorceress" and "adulteress," whose individual children are summoned to draw near. She is an adulteress; for she has transgressed against the mystic marriage-tie which bound her to Jehovah. (Isa_54:5, and the comment ad lot. ) She is also a sorceress," since she has bewitched her children, and given herself up to magical as well as to idolatrous practices. (2Ch_33:6) Seed of the adulterer and the whore; rather, seed of an adulteress, and that thyself committest whoredom. The congenital tendency has broken out into act. The Israel addressed is as "adulterous," i.e. idolatrous, as the Israel of former times.
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HOMILIES BY E. JOHNSON Vers. 3-10. Pictures of idolatry.
The idolaters are summoned to hear the judgment upon them. They are characterized as "sons of a sorceress, seed of an adulterer." The source of all idolatry is unfaithfulness to God regarded as the Husband of his people. (Eze_16:44, Eze_16:45) Yet, in their pride, these idolaters make sport of and scoff at the true servants of God.
I THE RITES OF IDOLATRY. There were enthusiastic orgies in the sacred groves of oak and in the gardens. (Isa_1:29 Eze_6:13 Hos_4:13) There were sacrifices of children to Moloch. There were fetish-stones, which were anointed with oil, and these continued to be devoted to heathen uses. And Israel, having by covenant a "portion," or property, so to speak, in God, has exchanged this for the senseless stones; and to these food-offerings are made. The pictures of Phoenician, Israelitish, and Greek superstitions are in this respect much the same. Jehovah, in that jealousy which is the expression of a holy love, is deeply grieved by these things.
II THE PROFLIGACY OF IDOLATRY. On the high hills shrines were erected, and tombs are still seen upon them, overshadowed by the tree on which votive offerings hang. Saints or prophets have replaced the old gods. Here idolatrous symbols were set up. And idolatry polluting politics, the people negotiated and coquetted with heathen powers, and humbled themselves to the lowest servility. And yet these negotiations and journeys had been in vain. For all that, the attempts had been renewed. "It is a striking illustration of men seeking happiness away from God. They wander from object to object; become weary in the pursuit, yet do not renounce it; still cling to hope, though often repulsed; though the world gives them no permanent comfort, though wealth, ambition, and gaiety, all fail of imparting happiness, yet they do not give up the pursuit in despair. The world is still pursued with just as little success, with continually augmenting evidence that it cannot satisfy the desires of the immortal soul, with just as much reluctance to seek permanent bliss in God.
III DIVINE REMONSTRANCE. The tone is one of gentleness and softness. "Who is there so strong and so terrible as to justify thee in thy infidelity to Jehovah? None." Yet there may be some excuse for them in his long silence. Passed over again and again, it might seem that God had forgotten to be gracious that they were hidden from him. But now he will draw near again: "The speech of mingled mercy and judgment shall work more effectually on the heart". (cf. Isa_46:13 Psa_22:31 Psa_98:2) Or the words may be taken ironically it depends on whether we read my righteousness" or thy righteousness." In the coming trial, no help but Jehovah"s will avail thee. "Her medley of gods" will not deliver her the Pantheon of various divinations set up by her. (cf. Mic_1:7) The wind shall carry them off like all dwellings and defences of merely human structure. (cf. Mat_7:26, Mat_7:27)
IV ETERNAL ASSURANCE. "To take refuge in Jehovah," in the Eternal, is the only safety, the only guarantee of stability and possession, amidst the flux and change of things. To say that they shall "possess the land" is to say, according to the manner of the Hebrew, everything that denotes favour for this life. (Isa_49:8 Psa_37:11, Psa_37:29; cf. Mat_5:5 Psa_69:35, Psa_69:36) And to "inherit the holy mountain" is to enter upon all spiritual privileges and joys great as if they had possession of a portion of the mount on which the temple was built, and were permitted to dwell there." And then mysterious voices are heard, hinting that all obstacles shall be removed from the path of those who trust in God. The language is suitable to the return from exile, as if persons should go before them, crying, "Cast up!" So before a pacha the labourers go and remove stones out of the way, with the cry," Cast up the way; remove the stones!" (cf. Isa_26:7 Isa_35:8 Isa_40:3, 4 62:10) He who places obstacles in the path (Jer_6:21) is he who gives command in his own time for their removal. War and peace, welfare and hindrances to welfare, are from the same hand. J.
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 v6 Among the smooth stones of the stream is thy…
Isa_57:6
Among the smooth stones of the stream is thy portion
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Smooth stones
The term portion suggests that the smooth stones were fetishes.
(A. B. Davidson, D. D.)
False sods the idolaters portion
In stony valleys they set up their gods, which they called their portion, and took for their lot, as Gods people take Him for their lot and portion. (M. Henry.)
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The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v6 Isa_57:6. I. Human substitutes for true and spiritual worship.…
Isa_57:6. I. Human substitutes for true and spiritual worship. II. Their offensiveness to God.—Dr. Lyth.
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.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v3 Jehovah Rejects all Idolaters
Jehovah Rejects all Idolaters
v. 3. But draw near hither, so the Lord now calls to the apostates, ye sons of the sorceress, men addicted to sorcery, to superstitious practices which were connected with the worship of false gods, the seed of the adulterer and the whore, in whose case idolatry is inherent, their second nature, the expression being the very strongest reproof to the unbelieving and apostate Jews, who depended upon their external membership in Israel to give them a safe standing in the eyes of Jehovah.
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v. 4. Against whom do ye sport yourselves? in malignant joy, in insulting sneers. Against whom make ye a wide mouth and draw out the tongue? in malicious mockery. These gestures of derision on the part of the unbelievers were directed not only against the pious members of the nation in general, but in particular against the righteous, who, as the apostates thought, were cut off so soon on account of some fault in them. Are ye not children of transgression, a seed of falsehood, thoroughly steeped in iniquity,
v. 5. enflaming yourselves with idols under every green tree, burning with lust toward their idolatrous images in the terebinth groves, slaying the children in the valleys under the clifts of the rocks? as a sacrifice to Molech, the abomination of the Moabites. This shows that some of the people, even after the Babylonian exile, once more became addicted to idolatry and its abominations.
v. 6. Among the smooth stones of the stream, the stone formations hollowed out and polished in grotesque images by the action of the water, is thy portion, there the idolaters in Israel brought their sacrifices; they, they are thy lot, upon these dead rocks the idolaters relied; even to them hast thou poured a drink-offering, thou hast offered a meat-offering, giving to them the worship which belongs to Jehovah alone. Should I receive comfort in these? The Lord cannot be quiet any longer, He can no longer keep silence; He is obliged to forsake His mercy and to interfere with His wrath.
v. 7. Upon a lofty and high mountain hast thou set thy bed, in spiritual adultery; even thither wentest thou up to offer sacrifice, in the heathen worship of Baal and Ashtaroth, for this required altars, pillars, and Asherah-idols on all prominent hills.
v. 8. Behind the doors also and the posts, within the house devoted to idolatry, hast thou set up thy remembrance, the memorial tablet reminding the apostates of their idols; for thou hast discovered (uncovered) thyself to another than Me and art gone up, namely, to the couch of sin; thou hast enlarged thy bed and made thee a covenant with them, agreeing upon a price of shame; thou lovedst their bed where thou sawest it, delighting in the filthiness of the spiritual adultery thus openly practiced, the shamelessness thus brazenly paraded.
v. 9. And thou wentest to the king with ointment and didst increase thy perfumes, playing the coquette with the world-power because she doubts the ability of the Lord to help her, and didst send thy messengers far off, in a special embassy to gain the good will of the powerful emperor, and didst debase thyself even unto hell, in a total loss of pride and character.
v. 10. Thou art wearied in the greatness of thy way, by the many trips made in the interest of her lust; yet saidst thou not, There is no hope, in a proper realization of the fruitlessness of her quest; thou hast found the life of thine hand, still being able to sustain life by a steady application of energy, therefore thou wast not grieved, she did not relax in her efforts to gain the heathen emperor’s good will. The Lord now asks the reasons for her faithless intrigues.
v. 11. And of whom hast thou been afraid or feared that thou hast lied and hast not remembered Me, nor laid it to thy heart? In spite of her faithlessness she is utterly callous and indifferent; she is apparently lost to every good influence. Have not I held My peace even of old, being patient in spite of her apostasy, holding back wrath and punishment, and thou fearest Me not? Jehovah had not treated Israel so as to cause any one in the nation to live in terror of Him; the apostates had no excuse for their action. The entire section pictures the tireless seeking of the renegade people after the vanity of idolatry and of heathen customs—surely a sad waste of energy! Therefore Jehovah now, in a burst of holy irony, calls them to task.
v. 12. I will declare thy righteousness, such as it is, and thy works, in breaking the covenant; for they shall not profit thee, all the idolatrous acts being duly exposed.
v. 13. When thou criest, in vexation over disappointed hopes, let thy companies, all the agencies upon which she had relied, deliver thee; but the wind shall carry them all away, a single breath of the Lord being sufficient to overthrow all her allies, vanity shall take them. But he that putteth his trust in Me shall possess the land and shall inherit My holy mountain, the picture of the occupation of Canaan and Zion being a type of the possession and government which pertains to the believers by the merciful gift of Jehovah.
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 vv3, 5, 6 But come here
But come here
God is calling all of the unfaithful people to come before him so he can judge them in a strong contrast to the promises for the righteous that came before.
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sons of the sorceress
This is a strong insult against the people who practice sorcery because sorcery and magic includes idolatry. (See: Metaphor)
children of the adulterer and the woman who has prostituted herself
This refers to actual and spiritual adultery. They have abandoned the worship of God and now worship other gods and idols along with actual prostitution in pagan Canaanite ceremonies.
Whom are you merrily mocking? Against whom are you opening the mouth and sticking out the tongue?
Yahweh uses questions to scold the people who are mocking him through false worship. AT: "You are mocking me and making fun of me by opening your mouth wide and sticking out the tongue!" (See: Rhetorical Question)
Are you not children of rebellion, children of deceit?
Yahweh uses another question to scold the people. This does not refer to their birth but to their spiritual state. AT: "You are children of rebellion, children of deceit!" (See: Rhetorical Question)
translationWords
son
sorcerer
children
adultery
prostitute
tongue
rebel
deceive
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 vv3–6 57:3 witches’ children . . . adulterers and prostitutes:…
57:3 witches’ children . . . adulterers and prostitutes: Baal religion, which flourished in Israel before the Exile (see 1:21-23), included lewd sexual practices.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.