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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Isaiah 14:21 - 14:21
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“Prepare a slaughter-house for his sons, because of the iniquity of their fathers! They shall not rise and conquer lands, and fill the face of the earth with cities.” They exhortation is addressed to the Medes, if the prophet had any particular persons in his mind at all. After the nocturnal storming of Babylon by the Medes, the new Babylonian kingdom and royal house which had been established by Nabopolassar vanished entirely from history. The last shoot of the royal family of Nabopolassar was slain as a child of conspirators. The second Nebuchadnezzar deceived the people (as Darius says in the great inscription of Behistan), declaring, “I am Nabukudrac ara the son of Nabunita.” בַּל (used poetically for אַל, like בְּלִי in Isa 14:6 for לֹא) expresses a negative wish (as pen does a negative intention): Let no Babylonian kingdom ever arise again! Hitzig corrects עָרִים into עִיִּים (heaps of ruins), Ewald into עָרִיצִים (tyrants), Knobel into רָעִים, and Meier into עָדִים, which are said to signify conflicts, whilst Maurer will not take עָרִים in the sense of cities, but of enemies. But there is no necessity for this at all. Nimrod, the first founder of a Babylonio-Assyrian kingdom, built cities to strengthen his monarchy. The king of Asshur built cities for the Medes, for the purpose of keeping them better in check. And it is to this building of cities, as a support to despotism, that the prophet here refers.