34 And He hath gone round the thickets of the forest with iron, And Lebanon by a mighty one falleth!
By the hand of thy servants Thou hast reviled the Lord, and sayest: In the multitude of my chariots I have come up to a high place of hills, The sides of Lebanon, And I cut down the height of its cedars, The choice of its firs, And I enter the high place of its extremity, The forest of its Carmel.
Bless Jehovah, ye His messengers, Mighty in power -- doing His word, To hearken to the voice of His Word.
And fallen hath Asshur by sword, not of the high, Yea, a sword -- not of the low, doth consume him, And he hath fled for himself from the face of a sword, And his young men become tributary.
And a messenger of Jehovah goeth out, and smiteth in the camp of Asshur a hundred and eighty and five thousand; and `men' rise early in the morning, and lo, all of them `are' dead corpses.
Its voice as a serpent goeth on, For with a force they go, And with axes they have come in to her, As hewers of trees. They have cut down her forest, An affirmation of Jehovah -- for it is not searched, For they have been more than the grasshopper, And they have no numbering.
There is no more praise of Moab, In Heshbon they devised against it evil: Come, and we cut it off from `being' a nation, Also, O Madmen, thou art cut off, After thee goeth a sword.
`I was looking, in the visions of my head on my bed, and lo, a sifter, even a holy one, from the heavens is coming down. He is calling mightily, and thus hath said, Cut down the tree, and cut off its branches, shake off its leaves, and scatter its budding, move away let the beast from under it, and the birds from off its branches;
and that which the king hath seen -- a sifter, even a holy one, coming down from the heavens, and he hath said, Cut down the tree, and destroy it; but the stump of its roots leave in the earth, even with a band of iron and brass, in the tender grass of the field, and with the dew of the heavens it is wet, and with the beast of the field `is' his portion, till that seven times pass over him.
Thus said Jehovah: Though complete, and thus many, Yet thus they have been cut off, And he hath passed away. And I afflicted thee, I afflict thee no more.
and to you who are troubled -- rest with us in the revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven, with messengers of his power,
whereas messengers, in strength and power being greater, do not bear against them before the Lord an evil speaking judgment;
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Isaiah 10
Commentary on Isaiah 10 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 10
The prophet, in this chapter, is dealing,
And this is intended to quiet the minds of good people in reference to all the threatening efforts of the wrath of the church's enemies. If God be for us, who can be against us? None to do us any harm.
Isa 10:1-4
Whether they were the princes and judges of Israel of Judah, or both, that the prophet denounced this woe against, is not certain: if those of Israel, these verses are to be joined with the close of the foregoing chapter, which is probable enough, because the burden of that prophecy (for all this his anger is not turned away) is repeated here (v. 4); if those of Judah, they then show what was the particular design with which God brought the Assyrian army upon them-to punish their magistrates for mal-administration, which they could not legally be called to account for. To them he speaks woes before he speaks comfort to God's own people. Here is,
And yet, for all this, his anger is not turned away, which intimates not only that God will proceed in his controversy with them, but that they shall be in a continual dread of it; they shall, to their unspeakable terror, see his hand still stretched out against them, and there shall remain nothing but a fearful looking for of judgment.
Isa 10:5-19
The destruction of the kingdom of Israel by Shalmaneser king of Assyria was foretold in the foregoing chapter, and it had its accomplishment in the sixth year of Hezekiah, 2 Ki. 18:10. It was total and final, head and tail were all cut off. Now the correction of the kingdom of Judah by Sennacherib king of Assyria is foretold in this chapter; and this prediction was fulfilled in the fourteenth year of Hezekiah, when that potent prince, encouraged by the successes of his predecessor against the ten tribes, came up against all the fenced cities of Judah and took them, and laid siege to Jerusalem (2 Ki. 18:13, 17), in consequence of which we may well suppose Hezekiah and his kingdom were greatly alarmed, though there was a good work of reformation lately begun among them: but it ended well, in the confusion of the Assyrians and the great encouragement of Hezekiah and his people in their return to God. Now let us see here,
Isa 10:20-23
The prophet had said (v. 12) that the Lord would perform his whole work upon Mount Zion and upon Jerusalem, by Sennacherib's invading the land. Now here we are told what that work should be, a twofold work:-
Isa 10:24-34
The prophet, in his preaching, distinguishes between the precious and the vile; for God in his providence, even in the same providence, does so. He speaks terror, in Sennacherib's invasion, to the hypocrites, who were the people of God's wrath, v. 6. But here he speaks comfort to the sincere, who were the people of God's love. The judgment was sent for the sake of the former; the deliverance was wrought for the sake of the latter. Here we have,