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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Isaiah 50:8 - 50:8
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In the midst of his continued sufferings he was still certain of victory, feeling himself exalted above every human accusation, and knowing that Jehovah would acknowledge him; whereas his opponents were on the way to that destruction, the germ of which they already carried with them. “He is near that justifieth me; who will contend with me?! We will draw near together! Who is my adversary in judgment?! Let him draw near to me! Behold, the Lord Jehovah will help me; who is he that could condemn me?! Behold, they all shall fall to pieces like a garment; the moth shall eat them up.” הִצְדִּיו and הִרְשִׁיעַ are forensic antitheses: the former signifies to set one forth, both practically and judicially, as righteous (2Sa 15:4; Psa 82:3); the latter as guilty, רָשָׁע (Deu 25:1; Psa 109:7). נַעַמְדָה, which has lost the principal tone on account of the following יָחַד (יָּהַד), has munach instead of metheg in the antepenultimate. Ba‛al mishpâtı̄ means, “he who has a judicial cause of lawsuit against me,” just as in Roman law the dominus litis is distinguished from the procurator, i.e., from the person who represents him in court (syn. ba‛al debhârı̄m, Exo 24:14, and 'ı̄sh rı̄bhı̄ in Job 31:35; compare Isa 41:11). מִי־הוּא are connected, and form an emphatic τίς, Rom 8:34 (Ewald §325, a). “All of them” (kullâm): this refers to all who are hostile to him. They fall to pieces like a worn-out garment, and fall a prey to the moth which they already carry within them - a figure which we meet with again in Isa 51:8 (cf., Job 13:28; Hos 5:12), and one which, although apparently insignificant, is yet really a terrible one, inasmuch as it points to a power of destruction working imperceptibly and slowly, but yet effecting the destruction of the object selected with all the greater certainty.