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THE PROPHECY GIVEN TO AHAZ AT THE TIME OF THE SYRO-ISRAELITISH WAR. The Syro-Israelitish war is touched on both in Kings and Chronicles. In Kings the alliance between Rezin and Pekah is distinctly declared, as also the fact that they conjointly besieged Jerusalem (2Ki_16:5). From Chronicles we learn that, before the siege, Ahaz was twice defeated with great loss, once by the Syrians (2Ch_28:5), and once by the Israelites (2Ch_28:6). He was probably, therefore, reduced to great straits at the time when Isaiah received directions to seek an interview with him, and communicate to him a comforting message from Jehovah.
Isa_7:1
In the days of Ahaz. The reign of Ahaz covered, probably, the space between B.C. 743 and in B.C. 727. The march on Jerusalem appears to have fallen somewhat late in his reign. Rezin the King of Syria. Rezin is mentioned as King of Damascus by Tiglath-Pfieser II. in several of his inscriptions. In one, which seems to belong to B.C. 732 or 731, he states that he defeated Rezin and slew him. Pekah the son of Remaliah (see 2Ki_15:25). Pekah had been an officer under Pekahiah, the son and successor of Menahem; but had revolted, put Pekahiah to death in his palace, and seized the crown. It is probable that he and Rezin were anxious to form a confederacy for the purpose of resisting the advance of the Assyrian power, and, distrusting Ahaz, desired to place on the throne of Judah a person on whom they could thoroughly depend (see Isa_7:6). It was not their design to conquer the Jewish kingdom, but only to change the sovereign. Toward Jerusalem; rather, to Jerusalem. The allies reached the city and commenced the siege (2Ki_16:5). Could not prevail against it; literally, prevailed not in fighting against it.
Isa_7:2
It was told the house of David. Before the actual siege began, news of the alliance reached Ahaz. It is said to have been" told the house of David," because the design was to supersede the family of David by another—apparently a Syrian—house (see note on Isa_7:6). Syria is confederate with Ephraim; literally, rests upon Ephraim. Under ordinary circumstances the kingdoms of Syria and Israel were hostile the one to the other (see 1Ki_15:20; 1Ki_20:1-3; 1Ki_22:3-36; 2Ki_5:2; 2Ki_6:8-24; 2Ki_8:29; 2Ki_10:32; 2Ki_13:3, 2Ki_13:22, 2Ki_13:25). But occasionally, under the pressure of a great danger, the relations were changed, and a temporary league was formed. The inscriptions of Shalmaneser II. show such a league to have existed in the time of Benhadad II. and Ahab. The invasion of Pul, and the threatening attitude of Tiglath-Pileser. It had now once more drown the two countries together. On the use of the word "Ephraim" to designate the kingdom of Israel, see Hosea, passim. His heart was moved; or, shook. If the two kings had each been able separately to inflict on him such loss (see the introductory paragraph), what must he not expect, now that both were about to attack him together? It is not clear whether Ahuz had as yet applied to Assyria for help or not.
Isa_7:3
Thou, and Shear-Jashub thy son. The name Shear-Jashub, "a remnant shall return," may have been given to Isaiah's son by revelation, as Ewald thinks it was; or Isaiah may have given it to testify his faith both in the threats and in the promises of which he had been made the mouth-piece. The command to take him with him on the present occasion was probably given on account of his name, that the attention of Ahaz might be called to it. The conduit of the upper pool is mentioned also in 2Ki_18:17. It was probably a subterranean duct which brought water into the city from the high ground outside the Damascus gate. Ahaz may have visited it in order to see that it was made available for his own use, but not for the enemy's.
Isa_7:4
Take heed, and be quiet; or, see that thou keep quiet; i.e. "be not disturbed; do not resort to strange and extreme measures; in quietness and confidence should be your strength" (see Isa_30:15). The two tails of these smoking firebrands. Rezin and Pekah are called "two tails," or "two stumps of smoking firebrands," as persons who had been dangerous, but whose power of doing harm was on the polar of departing from them. They could not now kindle a flame; they could only "smoke." The son of Remaliah. Pekah seems to be called "Remaliah's son" in contempt (comp. Isa_7:5, Isa_7:9), Remaliah having been a man of no distinction (2Ki_15:25).
Isa_7:6
Make a breach therein. The word employed means properly "making a breach in a city wall" (2Ki_25:4; 2Ki_2:1-25 Citron. 32:1; Jer_39:2; Eze_26:10), but is used also in a metaphorical sense for injuring and ruining a country (see especially 2Ch_21:17). The son of Tabeal; or, Tubal. "Tab-ill" appears to be a Syrian name, founded upon the same pattern as Tab-rimmon (1Ki_15:18), rite one meaning "God is good, "the other "Rimmon is good." We cannot, however, conclude from the name that the family of Tabeal was monotheistic (Kay), for El was one of the many Syrian gods as much as Rimmon.
Isa_7:7
Thus saith the Lord God; literally, the Lord Jehovah, as in Isa_28:10; Isa_40:10; Isa_48:16, etc. It shall not stand; i.e. "the design shall not hold good, it shall not be accomplished." Rezin and Pekah have planned to set aside the issue of David, to which God had promised his throne (2Sa_7:11-16; Psa_89:27-37), and to act up a new line of kings unconnected with David. They think to frustrate the everlasting counsel of God. Such an attempt was of necessity futile.
Isa_7:8
For the head of Syria is Damascus, etc. Syria and Ephraim have merely human heads—the one Rezin, the other (Isa_7:9) Pekah; but Judah, it is implied, has a Divine Head, even Jehovah. How, then, should mere mortals think to oppose their will and their designs to God's? Of course, their designs must come to naught. Within threescore and five years shall Ephraim be broken, etc. If this prophecy was delivered, as we have supposed, in B.C. 733 (see note on Isa_7:1), sixty-five years later would bring us to B.C. 669. This was the year in which Esar-haddon, having made his son, Asshur-bani-pal, King of Assyria, transferred his own residence to Babylon, and probably the year in which he sent from Babylonia and the adjacent countries a number of colonists who occupied Samaria, and entirely destroyed the nationality, which, fifty-three years earlier, had received a rude blow from Sargon (comp. Ezr_4:2, Ezr_4:9, Ezr_4:10, with 2Ki_17:6-24 and 2Ch_33:11). It is questioned whether, under the circumstances, the prophet can have comforted Ahaz with this distant prospect, and suggested that in the present chapter prophecies pronounced at widely distant periods have been mixed up (Cheyne); but there is no such appearance of dislocation in Isa_7:1-25; in its present form, as necessitates any such theory; and, while it may be granted that the comfort of the promise given in Isa_7:8 would be slight, it cannot be said that it would be nil; it may, therefore, have been (as it seems to us) without impropriety added to the main promise, which is that of Isa_7:7. The entire clause, from "and within" to "not a people," must be regarded as parenthetic.
Isa_7:9
If ye will not believe, etc. Translate, If ye will not hold this faith fast, surely ye will not stand fast. Full faith in the promise of Isa_7:7 would have enabled Ahaz to dispense with all plans of earthly policy, and to "stand fast in the Lord," without calling in the aid of any "arm of flesh." Distrust of the promise would lead him to take steps which would not tend to "establish" him, but would make his position more insecure (see 2Ki_16:7-18; 2Ch_28:16, 2Ch_28:20).
Isa_7:10-16
THE SIGN OF IMMANUEL. The supposition that there was a considerable interval between Isa_7:9 and Isa_7:10 (Cheyne) is quite gratuitous. Nothing in the text marks any such interval. God had sent Ahaz one message by his prophet (Isa_7:4-9). It had apparently been received in silence, at any rate without acknowledgment. The faith had seemed to be lacking which should have embraced with gladness the promise given (see the last clause of Isa_7:9). God, however, will give the unhappy monarch another chance. And so he scuds him a second message, the offer of a sign which should make belief in the first message easier to him (Isa_7:11). Ahaz proudly rejects this offer (Isa_7:12). Then the sign of "Immanuel" is given—not to Ahaz individually, but to the whole "house of David," and through them to the entire Jewish people. "A virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, whose name shall be called Immanuel; and before this child shall have grown to the age of moral discernment, God's people will have been delivered, and their enemies made a desolation" (Isa_7:14-16). The exact bearing of the "sign" will be best discussed in the comment upon Isa_7:14.
Isa_7:10
The Lord spake again unto Ahaz. As before (Isa_7:3, Isa_7:4) by the mouth of his prophet.
Isa_7:11
Ask thee a sign. Asking for a sign is right or wrong, praiseworthy or blamable, according to the spirit in which the request is made. The Pharisees in our Lord's time "asked for a sign," but would not have believed any the more had they received the sign for which they asked. Gideon asked for a sign to strengthen his faith (Jdg_6:37, Jdg_6:39), and received it, and in the strength of it went forth boldly against the Midianites. When God himself proposed to give a sign, and allowed his creature to choose what the sign should be, there could be no possible wrong-doing in a ready acceptance of the offer, which should have called forth gratitude and thanks. Ask it either in the depth, or in the height above; i.e. "Ask any sign thou wilt, either in hell or in heaven"—nothing shall be refused thee.
Isa_7:12
I will not ask, neither will I tempt the Lord. Ahaz, who has no wish for a sign, because he has no wish to believe in any other salvation than flint which will follow from the realization of his own schemes, finds a plausible reason for declining to ask for one in those passages of the Law which forbade men to" tempt God" (Exo_17:7; Deu_6:16). But it could not be "tempt-tug God" to comply with a Divine invitation; rather it was tempting him to refuse compliance.
Isa_7:13
O house of David (comp. Isa_7:2). It is not Ahaz alone, but the "house of David," which is on its trial. Men are conspiring to remove it (Isa_7:6). If it will not be saved in God's way, it will have to be removed by God himself. Is it a small thing for you to weary men? i.e. "Are you not content with wearying men; with disregarding all my warnings and so wearying me? Must you go further, and weary God" (or, "wear out his patience") "by rejecting his gracious offers?" My God. In Isa_7:11 Isaiah had called Jehovah "thy God;" but as Ahaz, by rejecting God's offer, had rejected God, he speaks of him now as "my God."
Isa_7:14
Therefore. To show that your perversity cannot change God's designs, which will be accomplished, whether you hear or whether you forbear. The Lord himself; i.e. "the Lord himself, of his own free will, unasked." Will give you a sign. "Signs" were of various kinds. They might be actual miracles performed to attest a Divine commission (Exo_4:3-9); or judgments of God, significative of his power and justice (Exo_10:2); or memorials of something in the past (Exo_13:9, Exo_13:16); or pledges of something still future. Signs of this last-mentioned kind might be miracles (Jdg_6:36-40; 2Ki_20:8-11), or prophetic announcements (Exo_3:12; 1Sa_2:34; 2Ki_19:29). These last would only have the effect of signs on those who witnessed their accomplishment. Behold. "A forewarning of a great event" (Cheyne). A virgin shall conceive. It is questioned whether the word translated "virgin," viz. 'almah, has necessarily that meaning; but it is admitted that the meaning is borne out by every other place in which the word occurs m the Old Testament (Gen_24:43; Exo_2:8; Psa_68:25; Pro_30:19; Son_1:3; Son_6:8). The LXX; writing two centuries before the birth of Christ, translate by παρθένος . The rendering "virgin" has the support of the best modern Hebraists, as Lowth, Gesenins, Ewald, Delitzsch, Kay. It is observed with reason that unless 'almah is translated "virgin," there is no announcement made worthy of the grand prelude: "The Lord himself shall give you a sign—Behold!" The Hebrew, however, has not "a virgin," but "the virgin", which points to some special virgin, pro-eminent above all others. And shall call; better than the marginal rendering, thou shalt call. It was regarded as the privilege of a mother to determine her child's name (Gen_4:25; Gen_16:11; Gen_29:32-35; Gen_30:6-13, Gen_30:18-21, Gen_30:24; Gen_35:18, etc.), although formally the father gave it (Gen_16:15; 2Sa_12:24; Luk_1:62, 83). Immanuel. Translated for us by St. Matthew (Mat_1:23) as "God with us" ( μεθ ἡμῶν ὁ Θεός ). (Comp. Isa_8:8, Isa_8:10.)
Isa_7:15
Butter and honey shall he eat. His fare shall be of the simplest kind (comp. Isa_7:22). That he may know; rather, till he shall know (Rosenmüller); i.e. till he come to years of discretion.
Isa_7:16
The land, etc. Translate, The land shall be desolate, before whose two kings thou art afraid. The "land" must certainly be that of the two confederate kings, Rezin and Pekah, the Syro-Ephraim-itic land, or Syria and Samaria. "Desolate" may be used physically or politically. A land is "desolate" politically when it loses the last vestige of independence.
Isa_7:17-25
THE DANGER TO JUDAH FROM ASSYRIA. The perversity of Ahaz, already rebuked in Isa_7:13, is further punished by a threat, that upon him, and upon his people, and upon his father's house, shall come shortly a dire calamity. The very power whose aid he is himself bent on invoking shall be the scourge to chastise both king and people (Isa_7:17-20). The land shall be made bare as by a razor (Isa_7:20). Cultivation shall cease; its scant inhabitants will support themselves by keeping a few cows and sheep (Isa_7:21), and will nourish themselves on dairy produce, and the honey that the wild bees produce (Isa_7:22). Briers and thorns will come up everywhere; wild beasts will increase; cattle will browse on the hills that were once carefully cultivated to their summits (Isa_7:23-25).
Isa_7:17
The Lord shall bring upon thee, etc. The transition from promises to threatenings is abrupt, and calculated to impress any one who was to any extent impressible. But Ahaz seems not to have had "ears to hear." From the day that Ephraim departed from Judah; i.e. from the time of the revolt under Jeroboam (1Ki_12:16-24)—an evil day, which rankled in the mind of all true Judaeans. Even the King of Assyria. The construction is awkward, since "the King of Assyria' cannot well stand in apposition with "days." Hence many take the words for a gloss that has been accidentally intruded into the text (Lowth, Gesenius, Hitzig, Knobel, Cheyne). Others, however, see in the grammatical anomaly a grace of composition.
Isa_7:18
The Lord shall hiss (see Isa_5:26, and note ad loc.). For the fly that is in the uttermost part of the rivers of Egypt. The "fly of Egypt," like the "bee of Assyria," represents the military force of the nation, which God summons to take part in the coming affliction of Judaea. The prophetic glance may be extended over the entire period of Judah's decadence, and the "flies" summoned may include those which clustered about Neco at Megiddo, and carried off Jehoahaz from Jerusalem (2Ki_23:29-34). There may be allusion also to Egyptian ravages in the reigns of Sargon, Sennacherib, and Esar-haddon. In any general review of the period we shall find it stated that, from the time of Sargon to that of Cyrus, Judaea was the battle-ground upon which the forces of Assyria (or Assyro-Babylonia) and Egypt contended for the empire of western Asia. The desolation of the land during this period was produced almost as much by the Egyptian "fly" as by the Assyrian "bee." The "rivers of Egypt" are the Nile, its branches, and perhaps the great canals by which its waters were distributed. The bee that is in the land of Assyria. The choice of the terms "bee" and "fly," to represent respectively the hosts of Assyria and Egypt, is not without significance. Egyptian armies were swarms, hastily levied, and very imperfectly disciplined. Assyrian were bodies of trained troops accustomed to war, and almost as well disciplined as the Romans.
Isa_7:19
And rest; or, settle. In the desolate valleys. Gesenius and Vance Smith translate "the precipitous valleys;" Mr. Cheyne, "the steeply walled valleys." But the cognate word used in Isa_5:6 can only mean "waste," which supports the rendering of the Authorized Version. The exact word used does not occur elsewhere. Upon all bushes; rather, upon all pastures.
Isa_7:20
Shall the Lord shave with a razor that is hired; rather, with the hired razor; i.e. the razor that Ahaz will have hired (2Ki_16:8). The metaphor well expresses the stripping of the land bare by plunder and exaction (comp. Eze_5:1, Eze_5:12, and 2Ch_28:19-21). God would use Tiglath-Pileser as his instrument to distress Ahaz. By them beyond the river; or, in the parts beyond the river. "The river" is undoubtedly the Euphrates, and they who dwell beyond it the Assyrians. By the King of Assyria. Once more a gloss is suspected, as in Isa_7:17. The meaning would certainly be sufficiently plain without the clause. The head … the hair of the feet … the beard. These three represent all the hair on any part of the body. Judah is to be completely stripped.
Isa_7:21
A man shall nourish a young cow, and two sheep; literally, two ewes. A stop having been put to cultivation, men shall return to the pastoral life, but shall not possess more than two or three head of cattle apiece, the Assyrians having swept off most of the beasts. Tiglath-Pileser, in his inscriptions, mentions his carrying off homed cattle and sheep to the amount of many thousands from the countries which he overran or conquered.
Isa_7:22
For the abundance of milk that they shall give. The small number of the cattle will allow of each having abundant pasture. Hence they will give an abundance of milk. He shall eat butter; rather, curds—the solid food most readily obtained from milk (comp. above, Isa_7:15). Curdled milk and wild honey should form the simple diet of the remnant left in the land. It is, of course, possible to understand this in a spiritual sense, of simple doctrine and gospel honey out of the flinty rock of the Law; but there is no reason to think that the prophet intended his words in any but the most literal sense.
Isa_7:23
A thousand vines at a thousand silverlings. By "silverlings" our translators mean "pieces of silver," probably shekels. "A thousand vines at a thousand shekels" may mean either a thousand vines worth that amount, or a thousand vines rented at that sum annually (comp. Son_8:11). The latter would point to vineyards of unusual goodness, since the shekel is at least eighteen pence, and the present rent of a vineyard in Palestine is at the rate of a piastre for each vine, or 2½d. The general meaning would seem to be that not even the best vineyards would be cultivated, but would lie waste, and grow only "briers and thorns."
Isa_7:24
With arrows and with bows. Only the hunter will go there, armed with his weapons of chase, to kill the wild animals that will haunt the thickets.
Isa_7:25
On all hills that shall be digged; rather, that shall have been digged in former times, whether for corn cultivation or for any other. There shall not come thither the fear of briers (so Ewald and Kay). But almost all other commentators translate, "Thou shalt not come thither for fear of briers," etc. The briers and thorns of the East tear the clothes and the flesh. It shall be; i.e. "each such place shall be." For the sending forth of oxen; rather, for the sending in of oxen. Men shall send their cattle into them, as alone able to penetrate the jungle without hurt.
Note on the general purport of the Immanuel prophecy. Few prophecies have been the subject of so much controversy, or called forth such a variety of exegesis, as this prophecy of Immanuel. Rosenmüller gives a list of twenty-eight authors who have written dissertations upon it, and himself adds a twenty-ninth. Yet the subject is far from being exhausted. It is still asked:
(1) Were the mother and son persons belonging to the time of Isaiah himself, and if so, what persons? Or,
(2) Were they the Virgin Mary and her Son Jesus? Or,
(3) Had the prophecy a double fulfillment, first in certain persons who lived in Isaiah's time, and secondly in Jesus and his mother?
I. The first theory is that of the Jewish commentators. Originally, they suggested that the mother was Abi, the wife of Ahaz (2Ki_18:2), and the son Hezekiah, who delivered Judah from the Assyrian power. But this was early disproved by showing that, according to the numbers of Kings (2Ki_16:2; 2Ki_18:2), Hezekiah was at least nine years old in the first year of Ahaz, before which this prophecy could not have been delivered (Isa_7:1). The second suggestion made identified the mother with Isaiah's wife, the "prophetess" of Isa_8:3, and made the son a child of his, called actually Immanuel, or else his son Maher-shalal-hash-baz (Isa_8:1) under a symbolical designation. But ha-'almah, "the virgin," would be a very strange title for Isaiah to have given his wife, and the rank assigned to Immanuel in Isa_8:8 would not suit any son of Isaiah's. It remains to regard the 'almah as "some young woman actually present," name, rank, and position unknown, and Immanuel as her son, also otherwise unknown (Cheyne). But the grand exordium, "The Lord himself shall give you a sign—Behold!" and the rank of Immanuel (Isa_8:8), are alike against this.
II. The purely Messianic theory is maintained by Rosenmüller and Dr. Kay, but without any consideration of its difficulties. The birth of Christ was an event more than seven hundred years distant. In what sense and to what persons could it be a "sign" of the coming deliverance of the land from Rezin and Pekah? And, upon the purely Messianic theory, what is the meaning of verse 16? Syria and Samaria were, in fact, crushed within a few years of the delivery of the prophecy. Why is their desolation put off, apparently, till the coming of the Messiah, and even till he has reached a certain age? Mr. Cheyne meets these difficulties by the startling statement that Isaiah expected the advent of the Messiah to synchronize with the Assyrian invasion, and consequently thought that before Rezin and Pekah were crushed he would have reached the age of discernment. But he does not seem to see that in this case the sigma was altogether disappointing and illusory. Time is an essential element of a prophecy which turns upon the word "before" (verse 16). If this faith of Isaiah's disciples was aroused and their hopes raised by the announcement that Immanuel was just about to be born (Mr. Cheyne translates, "A virgin is with child"), what would be the revulsion of feeling when no Immanuel appeared?
III. May not the true account of the matter be that suggested by Bishop Lowth—that the prophecy had a double bearing and a double fulfillment? "The obvious and literal meaning of the prophecy is this," he says: "that within the time that a young woman, now a virgin, should conceive and bring forth a child, and that child should arrive at such an age as to distinguish between good and evil, that is, within a few years, the enemies of Judah should be destroyed." But the prophecy was so worded, he adds, as to have a further meaning, which wan even "the original design and principal intention of the prophet," viz. the Messianic one. All the expressions of the prophecy do not suit both its intentions—some are selected with reference to the first, others with reference to the second fulfillment—but all suit one or the other, and some suit both. The first child may have received the name Immanuel (comp. Ittiel) from a faithful Jewish mother, who believed that God was with his people, whatever dangers threatened, and may have reached years of discretion about the time that Samaria was carried away captive. The second child is the true "Immanuel," "God with us," the king of Isa_8:8; it is his mother who is pointed at in the expression, "the virgin," and on his account is the grand preamble; through him the people of God, the true Israel, is delivered from its spiritual enemies, sin and Satan—two kings who continually threaten it.
I. THE MADNESS OF OPPOSING GOD. Syria and Ephraim were confederate against Judah. They knew that Judah was in an especial way God's people. They designed to set aside the house of David. They knew, or at any rate Ephraim knew, that the throne belonged to the descendants of David by God's promise. Thus they set themselves against God knowingly. They thought their wisdom would be greater or their strength superior to his. But thus to think is utter madness. The "foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men" (1Co_1:24). In vain do "the kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord, and against his Anointed, saying, Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us. He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision" (Psa_2:2-4). God had only to put it into the heart of the King of Assyria to make an immediate expedition, and all the fine schemes of the confederates, which needed time for their execution, came at once to naught, and were confounded. The would-be allies were crushed separately; their victim escaped them; and "the house of David" outlasted both their own.
II. THE WISDOM OF FULL TRUST IN GOD. When once God had sent him the message, "It shall not stand, neither shall it come to pass," Ahaz might have rested securely on the promise, and have been content simply to "stand still and see the salvation of God." But he can only have had a weak and imperfect trust in Isaiah's words. He must bethink himself how he may escape his foes; he must bring in another to help him besides God. Accordingly, he "goes to Assyria." He takes the silver and gold out of the royal palace and out of the temple treasury, and sends them to Tiglath-Pileser, with the offer of becoming his servant (2Ki_16:7, 2Ki_16:8), and he probably flatters himself that he has done well, and owes his escape from Rezin and Pekah to himself. But he has really taken a step on the downward path which will conduct the house of David and the people of Judah to ruin. He has placed himself under an idolater, and paved the way for new idolatries (2Ki_16:10-16). He has helped to sweep away two states, which, while they continued, served as a breakwater to keep the waves of invasion off his own kingdom. He has called in one, who, from the true point of view, has really "distressed him, and strengthened him not" (2Ch_28:20). How much wiser would he have been to have accepted God's promise in full faith, and not supplemented it by his own "inventions" (Ecc_7:29) God would have found a way to help him and save him, which would have involved no such evil consequences as those which flowed from his own self-willed action.
Isa_7:11-14
"An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign" (Mat_12:39), "This is an evil generation; they seek a sign" (Luk_11:29). "Jesus sighed deeply in his spirit, and saith, Why doth this generation seek after a sign? Verily I say unto you, There shall no sign be given to this generation" (Mar_8:12). "The Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom' (1Co_1:22). On the other hand, it is sometimes spoken of without any dispraise, and seems to be viewed as natural, rightful, even as a sort of proof of faith. Ahaz, in the present passage, is bidden to "ask a sign, and is blamed for refusing to do so. His refusal "wearies" God (Isa_7:13). The disciples ask our Lord, unrebuked," What shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?" (Mat_24:3). Hezekiah asks Isaiah, "What shall be the sign that the Lord will heal me, and that I shall go up into the house of the Lord the third day?" (2Ki_20:8; comp. Isa_38:22). Can any tests be laid down whereby the right and the wrong may be distinguished in this matter? We think that some may.
I. IT IS RIGHT TO ASK FOR A SIGN.
1. When a person comes forward and claims our obedience as a Divine teacher or leader. Moses anticipated that his countrymen in Egypt would refuse to listen to him if he presented himself to them without credentials, and was given at once the power of working certain miracles as signs that he was commissioned by God (Exo_4:1-9). As soon as Jesus came forward to teach and to preach, he was asked, not unreasonably or improperly, "What sign showest thou?" (Joh_2:18), and responded, without blaming those who asked him, by a reference to the greatest of his miracles, his resurrection. The apostles were authorized to work miracles as signs of their Divine mission.
2. When we have an invitation from God through his accredited messenger, as Ahaz had, to ask a sign.
3. When we feel that much depends on our decision in a practical matter—e.g. the lives of others—we may humbly ask, as Gideon did (Jdg_6:36-40), that God will, if he so please, give us some external indication, or else such strength of internal conviction as will assure us what his will is; only in such cases we must be careful to make our request conditional on its being acceptable to him, and we must be ready, if it be not granted, to act in the matter to the best of our ability on such light as is vouchsafed us.
II. IT IS WRONG TO ASK FOR A SIGN.
1. In a captious spirit, with an intention to cavil at it, and (if possible) not accept it. This was the condition of mind of the Pharisees, who would not have believed even had Christ come down from the cross before their eyes, as they asked him to do (Mat_27:42).
2. When we have already had abundant signs given us, and there is no reasonable ground for doubt or hesitation as to our duty. This was the case of those Jews who still "required a sign" (1Co_1:22) after the Resurrection and Ascension.
3. When we ask for it merely to gratify our curiosity, as Herod Antipas just before the Crucifixion (Luk_23:8).
4. When we arbitrarily fix on our own sign, and determine to regard the result, whatever it be, as a sign from heaven. This is the case of those who choose to decide a practical matter by sortes Virgiliance, or sortes Biblicae, or any other appeal to chance. They are not entitled to ask God for signs of this kind, or to regard such signs as significant of his will. To trust to them is not faith, but superstition.
Isa_7:14
1. None but Jesus was ever born of a pure virgin.
2. None but Jesus was ever "God with us."
3. None but Jesus ever knew truly "to refuse the evil and choose the good."
II. DUTIES FLOWING FROM THE BELIEF.
1. If Jesus is "God with us," we must obey him.
2. If Jesus is "God with us," we must trust him.
3. If Jesus is "God with us," we must strive to imitate him.
4. If Jesus is "God with us," we must continually worship and pray to him.
5. If Jesus is "God with us," we must love him.
III. DOCTRINES INCLUDED IN THE BELIEF.
1. The Divinity of Christ, since he is "God with us."
2. His humanity, since he is conceived and born of a woman, and eats earthly food.
3. His love and pardoning grace, since he is "with us," not against us; on our side, not our adversary.
4. His atonement for our sins, since without atonement he could not pardon.
Isa_7:17-20
II. THE ALARM OF THE ROYAL FAMILY. (Isa_7:2.) News is brought to the palace "Aram encampeth in Ephraim;" the junction of the forces of Syria and Israel had taken place. A shivering fear, like the wind swaying the trees of the forest, passed over their hearts. The court went forth to inspect the fortifications and the waterworks, and came to "the end of the conduit of the upper reservoir, upon the path to the fuller's field"—a well-known spot (cf. Isa_36:2; 2Ki_18:1-37.).
III. THE MEETING WITH ISAIAH. At this spot the prophet, with his son, stood before them. It seems that by Divine intimation the prophet had called the boy Shear-Jashub, which means "Remnant-shall-be-converted," reminding us of the hope of his calling (Isa_6:1-13.). He would look upon the boy as a living pledge, not only of conjugal affection, but of Divine promise for a nobler Israel. See how he dwells upon the thought in Isa_10:20-22. Inspired by this confidence, he now addresses the king.
IV. COMFORT FOR THE FAINT-HEARTED. "Take heed, and be quiet; fear not, and be not faint-hearted." A calm, collected mind is a match for any danger. Agitation and fear magnify the ill; stout resolve reduces it to its true proportions. The worst is ever in our own fancy.
"Some of your hurts you have cured,
And the sharpest you still have survived;
But what torments of grief you endured
From evils which never arrived!"
The timid king sees a fiery mass of war rolling towards him; the stout heart of the prophet contemptuously defies the two kings as "two stumps of smoking firebrands." If we would comfort men, we must, like the prophet, tell them to draw upon the resources God has placed in the soul: intelligence, prudence, self-reliance, and self-help. There is no true self-trust which is not at the same time a trust in God.
IV. THE DEEPEST SOURCE OF STRENGTH AND COMFORT. What are the heads of the Syrian power and of Israel's power against Judah's Head, the Lord? Damascus and Samaria will rear their fronts in vain against Jerusalem, if Jerusalem only trust in Jehovah. (Ewald supposes that the words," Judah's head is Jerusalem, and Jerusalem's head is Jehovah," have fallen out of the text, Isa_10:9.) Only have confidence. There is a play upon words in the original which we might represent in English by: "Fear not, fail not;" or, "Firm in faith is free from scathe; "or," If ye confide not, abide ye shall not."
1. Confidence, presence of mind, is a duty in times of danger.
2. It may be gained, if we will fall back upon God as our Leader and Defense. "The Lord is on my side: I will not fear what men shall do unto me."—J.
Isa_7:10-17
I. THE CHALLENGE OF FAITH. In the Name of Jehovah, Isaiah bids the king ask a sign from above—a sign "going deep down to hell or high into heaven." Truth should be its own evidence to every mind; intuition is better than proof. Isaiah has seen and listened to God in the depths of his own spirit, and no sign in the air above or in the earth beneath can give him more assurance than he already possesses. Would any man but listen and look, he should find the shrine, the oracle, the Shechinah, in his own heart. Within that awful volume of the heart, it may be said, lies the mystery of mysteries. Yet not to all is it given to read therein clearly; all other reading, even in dead tongues, is easier.
"Happiest they of human race
To whom our God has granted grace
To read, to fear, to hope, to pray,
To lift the latch and force the way!"
The duller eye, untrained to such visions, needs the large bold characters of the visible sign. "It comes in with its palpable meaning to aid human weakness. The prophets complained of the craving for signs, yet were compelled to comply with it. Men trust their senses more than they trust the ghostly and majestic shape of abstract truth; and the appeal to the ear, as the Roman poet said, produces but a sluggish movement in the mind compared with the appeal to the faithful eye. We must all confess ourselves weak; needing to see before we can believe, instead of believing that we may see. Yet such incidents as this may remind us that there is a Spirit to help our infirmities, and restore its poise to the mind unhinged by doubt. When Midian threatened Israel in the days of old, God's voice was heard by Gideon: "The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valor." Yet the heart of the hero still quailed. "O my Lord, if the Lord be with us, why then is all this befallen us? and where be all his miracles which our fathers told us of?" (Jdg_6:12, sqq.). Again the voice came: "Go and save Israel: have not I sent thee?" And again the diffident reply: "O my Lord, wherewith shall I save Israel? behold, my family is poor, and I am the least in my father's clan." Then the sign is asked for and granted; the fire, bursting from the rock, consumes Gideon's offering. God, in the strength of an almighty wisdom, "reasons together" with men. In our day it is equally hard to "hold on and hope hard in the subtle thing called spirit;" and we crave as urgently for signs, though not of the same kind.
II. THE EXCUSE OF MISTRUST. The king alleges that he dare not "tempt Jehovah." True, this was a deep reproach of old against Israel's temper. At Rephidim, in the wilderness, Moses stigmatized the demand of the people for water by this phrase, "Is the Lord among us or not?" (Exo_17:2). There lay the canker of guilty skepticism. In a general way the same thing is seen in our time, in the impatient demand that the difficulties of the great problem of the universe shall be cleared up to our private satisfaction. Who gave us the right thus to interrogate and cross-examine him whose works, as a whole, witness to his goodness and love? God did not copy our puny schemes in this construction; nor does he manage the universe as we manage a business, an expedition, the government of a state. "Ye shall not tempt the Lord your God," means—You shall not weigh him in the scales of your finite intelligence, nor call upon him to execute your wishes as if they were the same as his holy will. So difficult is it to distinguish the plea of honesty and humility from that of dishonesty and disbelief, it looks as if Ahaz might be right, and Isaiah wrong; the latter too bold, the former more reverent. Scripture may be made to mean anything and everything; the right heart alone reads the right meaning for particular time, place, and person. While it is the mark of presumption to "tempt God," it is the symptom of unbelief when proffered light and help are refused.
III. THE PERSEVERANCE OF FAITH. With a rebuke of the king's spirit, charging him in effect with despising the goodness and tending to weary the patience of God, the prophet proceeds with his unasked-for message. What are we to learn from the expression, "wearying God?" All such poetical figures of Scripture have their deep meaning. To despise the riches of God's forbearance, to grieve his Spirit, to quench his Spirit,—these are ways of pointing out and stigmatizing that indifference and coldness to the true and Divine which may be a worse symptom than open hostility. We may either neglect to ask Divine guidance, we may disobey it when we have it intimated, or we may refuse its proffer. Perhaps this last state of mind is the worst. It shows the heart to be already prepossessed and biased. Ahaz was, in fact, under the influence of his false prophets and soothsayers. But why should he decline to hear at least what Isaiah had to say? He should have recognized that there were "two sides" in the great question at issue. Ahaz then warns us against listening to ex parte counsels. He who will only attend to the flattering echoes of his own wishes, is like him who trusteth in his own heart and who proves a fool. From Isaiah, again, the lesson comes back of faithful perseverance in our word and work, in spite of indifference, which threatens to blunt our edge and paralyze our energy. When a matter is on the conscience, let it come forth, "whether men will hear or whether they will forbear." We calculate consequences too much; and while few have the courage to risk danger by preaching unwelcome truth, perhaps fewer still have the faith in its worth to insist on pressing it upon reluctant ears.
IV. THE SIGN FROM JEHOVAH.
1. It will be of mixed import. Partly it will confirm previous expectation, and partly it will intimate what had not been expected. It proclaims a happy event which Ahaz had not looked for, but also a calamity which he might have averted had he possessed greater faith and truth. Mysteriously, our wishes or fears have some creative influence on our future. "Omens follow those who look to them," whether for good or evil.
"Man is his own star; and the soul that can
Render a perfect and an honest man,
Commands all light, all influence, and all fate;
Nothing to him falls early or too late.
Our acts our angels are, or good or ill,
Our fatal shadows that walk by us still."
(Beaumont and Fletcher.)
2. The Immanuel. In a dark saying the prophet opens his mouth. "Lo! haalmah" (the maiden, she who is no longer a girl, nor yet an old woman) "will conceive, and bear a son, and then call his name With-us-God." Time is thus hinted at; it will be soon, perhaps in a year's time. Also the certainty and the joy of deliverance, as the boy's name betokens. It is the very rallying cry of Israel: "God with us." We must have a watchword in every noble cause, that shall condense its purport and sound the tocsin to every true aspiration and energy within. So the Crusaders shouted "Dieu le veut!" at the preaching of Peter the Hermit; so were English warriors heartened in the olden days by the cry of "England and St. George!" Notice how this phrase echoes and re-echoes—"Immanuel, God-with-us"—in Isa_8:8, Isa_8:10 (cf. Isa_9:6). Every great. man raised up from time to time among us in politics, in religion, to deliver, to lead, to counsel, is, in his way, an heroic reflection of Israel's Messiah. To prophetic faith and hope a Messiah, a Deliverer, is ever at the doors. If the Eternal lives and reigns, and fulfils himself by the agency of men, we need not fear that when the hour strikes, the hero, with all the credentials of his anointing, will appear.
3. Speedy help. "Jehovah shall help thee, and that right early," is a chronic promise. When the boy is approaching years of maturity and of judgment, his food will be curds and honey; that is, before he comes to manhood, Ephraim and Damascus will be discomfited, and a new "golden age" will have set in. No more is known about any particular youth of Isaiah's time to whom the mystic prediction could refer than is known about the illustrious boy of Virgil's prophetic Eclogue, who was to restore good King Saturn's reign (Ecl. 4.). It is a misunderstanding of the nature of prophecy when we try to fix its forecasts to place or time. A prophecy is never fulfilled as we expect. It refers to a world not bounded by our horizons, and to a history which does not fall into our time perspective. This ideal Immanuel was destined yet to float before the pious hope of the nation for many centuries, till it was united with the real in the person of Jesus.
4. The chastisement that must precede prosperity. The great Assyrian conquest and the desolation it brings must come, in punishment of the unfaithfulness of the royal house, and the estrangement of the nation from Jehovah's ways. It is only after long trial in the fire and thorough regeneration that prosperity can come. It is a doubtful picture of the future, in which rays of glory strike athwart dark masses of gloom. Such is ever our outlook, whether for personal history, as for Isaiah in the preceding chapter, or for a nation, as here. Never has the hope of Christ been wanting, never the promise of his coming died out; and never proclaimed without the intimation of woes and tribulations first to come. Christ's own forecasts of the future (see the closing chapters of Matthew) present the like half-veiled, half-revealed perspective. We must ever look out upon the coming time with confidence or with mistrust, according as our hearts are stayed, like Isaiah's, upon Jehovah, or weak, because trusting only to the arm of flesh, or to the irrational dreams of superstition, like Ahaz.—J.
Isa_7:18-25
II. DEVASTATION. Another striking image. The land, devoured by strangers, will be like a man clean shaven from top to toe of all his manly ornament of hair and beard. Like a keen razor will be the sweeping penal judgment of Jehovah on the holy laud. The rich vineyards will disappear. No pruning nor digging will go forward. Briers and thorns, quick usurpers of the neglected corn-fields, will flourish, and the courts of the houses will be weed-grown (cf. Isa_5:6; Isa_32:13). Here and there will be seen a cow and a sheep or two, grazing as on a great common or desert. The farmer will disappear, or will return to the wild nomad life, living on the produce of his few cattle and on honey. Thorns and thistles will replace the vines, and the hunter will wander with bow and arrow where once the husbandman had been seen busy with spade or plough. The hoe will cease from its work, for, alas! with hope of fruit the "fear of thorns and thistles" has ceased; and the ox and the sheep will find free pasture everywhere. We have seen Landseer's two striking pictures, "War" and "Peace," in the National Gallery, and can feel their pathos. To look out from peace and plenty upon a perspective of smoke, bloodshed, and desolation is that to which the prophet calls the king. Yet amidst the gloom appears the figure, mystically hinted, of the young Messiah. And, indeed, it was in the midst of down-trodden Galilee, over which armies had so often tramped, that Jesus appeared, and adopted the holy and comforting mission of the Messiah as his own (Luk_4:1-44.).—J.
I. THE PROPHETIC REVELATION. It is very wonderful, and very distinct. See the succeeding (Isa_7:14): "Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel." Well, therefore, has Isaiah been called" the evangelical prophet," seeing that we have in his words the revelation of an immaculate Messiah and a suffering Messiah.
II. THE GENERAL PRINCIPLE. That we are not "established" unless we believe is a principle, not only of particular but of universal application. We must believe in each other to have commerce established. Home itself is never secure without mutual trust, and there can be no established character in religion unless we have that faith without which it is impossible to please God, and which gives vital energy to all other graces.
III. THE ABSOLUTE CONDITION. "If ye will not believe." Here is the responsibility of the soul. And doubtless we are responsible for our beliefs. We are to weigh, to judge, to consider, to prove all things. "Judge, I pray you," says God in this same Book of Isaiah (Isa_5:3), "betwixt me and my vineyard." The condition must be absolute. It is not a threat; it is a statement of that which cannot be other than so. If I do not believe that corn will grow, I shall not plant it. If I do not believe that God is able and willing to save, I shall not be amongst those who believe to the saving of their souls. If I do not believe that spiritual aid will be given to perfect my. graces, I shall not pray for it. "If ye will not believe, surely ye shall not be established."—W.M.S.
1. His faith was sorely tried. "His heart was moved as the trees of the wood by the wind" when he heard that two powerful monarchs were confederate against him (Isa_7:1, Isa_7:2). It required no little faith to accept, without reserve, the assurances of Isaiah (verses 4-9).
2. But he had solid ground on which to build his hope. The history of his country should have made it perfectly practicable to believe that, whatever the Lord had decided upon, all the hosts of heathendom would be unable to withstand.
3. His human fears proved too strong for his religious convictions.
4. The prophet warned him that with the failure of his faith would come material loss. This minatory prediction was only too painfully fulfilled. Elath, a port on the Red Sea, was lost to the kingdom (2Ki_16:6); great numbers of the people were slaughtered (2Ch_28:6); many captives were carried away (2Ch_28:8); Judah became tributary to Assyria (2Ki_16:8, 2Ki_16:9). "The Lord brought Judah low because of Ahaz" (2Ch_28:19). He was not established; he was enfeebled and humiliated.
The lesson which the passage, particularly these final words, conveys to us is this, that WHEN FAITH FAILS, POWER DEPARTS; that faith is the one sustaining power which will establish us in the spiritual position to which we have attained. We look, therefore, at this broad principle applicable to every one.
1. As Christian men we enjoy an excellent estate. We are "kings and priests unto God;" we are made to "sit in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." "Now are we the sons of God," and all the joys and privileges of sonship are ours.
2. But our position is threatened by powerful adversaries. There come up against us the foes of our race—worldly allurements, fleshly indulgences, incitements to spiritual pride and unbelief, temptations to fall into selfishness or into untruthfulness, etc.
3. Only a living faith will uphold us in our integrity. We must have the faith which
(1) enables us to realize the nearness of the living God;
(2) makes spiritual realities and successes seem to our souls the great things they are;
(3) brings near to our hearts the future world, with its judgment and its reward;
(4) calls down from above, by believing prayer, Divine direction and support. Without this living faith, we may expect the enemy to overcome us; with it, we may hope to be established in our high and blest estate.—C.
Isa_7:10-13
I. THAT THE WORTH OR UNWORTHINESS OF AN ACTION DEPENDS LARGELY ON ITS ATTENDANT CONDITIONS. The Jews who sought a sign from Christ were rebuked by him for so doing (Mat_12:38, Mat_12:39). Ahaz is reproved for not asking for one on this occasion. The circumstances of the two cases made all the difference. In the ease of the Pharisees, abundant miraculous evidence had already been granted, and the