The three prophecies which follow are the finale of the whole. The announcement of the prophet, which has reached its highest point in the majestic vision in ch. lxiii. 1—6, is now drawing to an end. It is standing close upon the threshold of all that has been promised, and nothing remains but the fulfilment of the promise, which he has held up like a jewel on every side. And now, just as in the finale of a poetical composition, all the melodies and movements that have been struck before are gathered up into one effective close; and first of all, as in Hab. iii., into a prayer, which forms, as it were, the lyrical echo of the preaching that has gone before.
The prophet, as the leader of the prayers of the church, here passes into the expanded style of the tep7iillah. Ver. 7. " / xcill celebrate the mercies of Jehovah, the praises of Jehovah, as is seemly for all that Jehovah hath shown us, and the great goodness towards the house of Israel, which He hath shown them according to His pity, and the riches of His mercies." The speaker is the prophet, in the name of the church, or, what is the same thing, the church in which the prophet includes himself. The prayer commences with thanksgiving, according to the fundamental rule in Ps. 1. 23. The church brings to its own remembrance, as the subject of praise in the presence of God, all the words and deeds by which Jehovah has displayed His mercy and secured glory to Himself. Hpn (this is the correct pointing, with 1 protected by gaya; cf. ^3^3 in ch. liv. 12) are the many thoughts of mercy and acts of mercy into which the grace of God, i.e. His one purpose of grace and His one work of grace, had been divided. They are just so many fhilloth, self-glorifications of God, and impulses to His glorification. On '#3, as is seemly, see at ch. lix. 18. There is no reason for assuming that rftB~2Trt is equivalent to 21£~2"i?V^, as Hitzig and Knobel do. 31D~31 commences the second object to ^2tN, in which what follows is unfolded as a parallel to the first. Rabh, the much, is a neuter formed into a substantive, as in Ps. cxlv. 7; robh, plurality or multiplicity, is an infinitive used as a substantive. Tubh is God's benignant goodness; rachdmlm, His deepest sympathizing tenderness; chesed (root Dn, used of violent emotion; cf. Syr. chdsad, chdsam, wmulari;
condescends to and comes to meet a sinful creature. After this introit, the prayer itself commences with a retrospective glance at the time of the giving of the law, when the relation of a child, in which Israel stood to Jehovah, was solemnly proclaimed and legally regulated. Ver. 8. " He said, They are my people, children who will not lie; and He became their Saviour.'1 ^|K is used here in its primary affirmative sense. VljJ^! is the future of hope. When He made them His people, His children, He expected from them a grateful return of His covenant grace in covenant fidelity; and whenever they needed help from above, He became their Saviour (moshia). We can recognise the ring of Ex. xv. 2 here, just as in ch. xii. 2. Moshia is a favourite word in ch. xl.-lxvi. (compare, however, ch. xix. 20 also)
The next verse commemorates the way in which He proved Himself a Saviour in heart and action. Ver. 9. u In all their affliction He was afflicted, and the Angel of His face brought them salvation. In His love and in His pity He redeemed them y and lifted them up, and bare them all the days of the olden time." This is one of the fifteen passages in which the chethib has K7, the keri V. It is only with difficulty that we can obtain any meaning from the chethib: " in all the affliction which He brought upon them He did not afflict, viz. according to their desert " (Targ., Jer., Kashi); or better still, as tsar must in this case be derived from tsitr, and tsar is only met with in an intransitive sense, u In all their distress there was no distress" (Saad.), with which J. D. Michaelis compares 2 Cor. iv. 8, " troubled on every side, yet not distressed.,, The oxymoron is perceptible enough, but the Dr6 (iv &£), which is indispensable to this expression, is wanting. Even with the explanation, "In all their affliction He was not an enemy, viz. Jehovah, to them" (Doderlein), or " No man persecuted them without the angel immediately/' etc. (Cocceius and Rosenmiiller), we miss On? or Dnk. There are other still more twisted and jejune attempts to explain the passage with *6, which are not worth the space they occupy. Even the older translators did not know how to deal with the vb in the text. The Sept. takes tsar as equivalent to tslr, a messenger, and renders the passage according to its own peculiar interpunctuation: ov 7rpea/3v<; ovBe a<yye\o$, a\\9 avrbs eacoaev avroix; (neither a messenger nor an angel, but His face, i.e. He
Himself helped them: Ex. xxxiii. 14, 15; 2 Sam. xvii. 11). Everything forces to the conclusion that the keri ft is to be preferred. The Masora actually does reckon this as one of the fifteen passages in which ft is to be read for fcft.1 Jerome was also acquainted with this explanation. He says: " Where we have rendered it, 6 In all their affliction He was not afflicted/ which is expressed in Hebrew by LO, the adverb of negation, we might read ipse; so that the sense would be, c In all their affliction He, i.e. God, was afflicted.' " If we take the sentence in this way, " In all oppression there was oppression to Him,,, it yields a forcible thought in perfect accordance with the Scripture (compare e.g. Judg. x. 16), an expression in harmony with the usage of the language (compare tsar-ll, 2 Sam. i. 26), and a construction suited to the contents (ft = ipsi). There is nothing to surprise us in the fact that God should be said to feel the sufferings of His people as His own sufferings; for the question whether God can feel pain is answered by the Scriptures in the affirmative. He can as surely as everything originates in Him, with the exception of sin, which is a free act and only originates in Him so far as the possibility is concerned, but not in its actuality. Just as a man can feel pain, and yet in his personality keep himself superior to it, so God feels pain without His own happiness being thereby destroyed. And so did He suffer with His people; their affliction was reflected in His own life in Himself, and shared Him inwardly. But because He, the all-knowing, all-feeling One, is also the almighty will, He sent the angel of His face, and brought them salvation. u The angel of His face," says Knobel, " is the pillar of cloud and fire, in which Jehovah was present with His people in the march through the desert, with His protection, instruction, and guidance, the helpful presence of God in the pillar of cloud and fire." But where do we ever read of this, that it brought Israel salvation in the pressure of
1 There are fifteen passages in which the keri substitutes ft for fcft. See Masora magna on Lev. xi. 21 {Psalter, ii. 60). If we add Isa. xlix. 5, 1 Chron. xi. 20, 1 Sam. ii. 16, there are eighteen (Job, vol. i. p. 213). But the first two of these are not reckoned, because they are doubtful; and in the third, instead of ft being substituted for {ft, jft is substituted for ft (Ges. Thes. 735, b). 2 Sam. xix. 7 also is not a case in point, for there the keri is ft for frft.
great dangers? Only on one occasion (Ex. xiv. 19, 20) does it cover the Israelites from their pursuers; but in that very instance a distinction is expressly made between the angel of God and the pillar of cloud. Consequently the cloud and the angel were two distinct media of the manifestation of the presence of God. They differed in two respects. The cloud was a material medium — the veil, the sign, and the site of the revealed presence of God. The angel, on the other hand, was a personal medium, a ministering spirit (Xeirovpyifcbv TTvevfia), in which the name of Jehovah was indwelling for the purpose of His own self-attestation in connection with the historical preparation for the coming of salvation (Ex. xxiii. 21). He was the mediator of the preparatory work of God in both word and deed under the Old Testament, and the. manifestation of that redeeming might and grace which realized in Israel the covenant promises given to Abraham (Gen. xv.). A second distinction consisted in the fact that the cloud was a mode of divine manifestation which was always visible; whereas, although the angel of God did sometimes appear in human shape both in the time of the patriarchs and also in that of Joshua (Josh. v. 13 sqq.), it never appeared in such a form during the history of the exodus, and therefore is only to be regarded as a mode of divine revelation which was chiefly discernible in its effects, and belonged to the sphere of invisibility: so that in any case, if we search in the history of the people that was brought out of Egypt for the fulfilment of such promises as Ex. xxiii. 20-23, we are forced to the conclusion that the cloud was the medium of the settled presence of God in His angel in the midst of Israel, although it is never so expressed in the tJwrah. This mediatorial angel is called " the angel of His face," as being the representative of God, for:' the face of God" is His self-revealing presence (even though only revealed to the mental eye); and consequently the presence of God, which led Israel to Canaan, is called directly "His face" in Deut. iv. 37, apart from the angelic mediation to be understood; and "my face" in Ex. xxxiii. 14, 15, by the side of " my angel " in Ex. xxxii. 34, and the angel in Ex. xxxiii. 2, appears as something incornparably higher than the presence of God through the mediation of that one angel, whose personality is completely hidden by his mediatorial instrumon- tality. The genitive VOD, therefore, is not to be taken objectively in the sense of " the angel who sees His face," but as explanatory, " the angel who is His face, or in whom His face is manifested." The Kin which follows does not point back to the angel, but to Jehovah, who reveals Himself thus. But although the angel is regarded as a distinct being from Jehovah, it is also regarded as one that is completely hidden before Him, whose name is in him. He redeemed them by virtue of His love and of His chemldh, i.e. of His forgiving gentleness (Arabic, with the letters transposed, chilm; compare, however, chamid, gentle-hearted), and lifted them up, and carried them (Nfr? the consequence of te}, which is similar in sense, and more Aramaean; cf. tollere root taly and ferre root bhar, perf. tuli) all the days of the olden time.
The prayer passes now quite into the tone of Ps. lxxviii. and cvi., and begins to describe how, in spite of Jehovah's grace, Israel fell again and again away from Jehovah, and yet was always rescued again by virtue of His grace. For it is impossible that it should leap at once in nsni to the people who caused the captivity, and ">3W have for its subject the penitential church of the exiles which was longing for redemption (Ewald). The train of thought is rather this: From the proofs of grace which the Israel of the olden time had experienced, the prophet passes to that disobedience to Jehovah into which it fell, to that punishment of Jehovah which it thereby brought upon itself, and to that longing for the renewal of the old Mosaic period of redemption, which seized it in the midst of its state of punishment. But instead of saying that Jehovah did not leave this longing unsatisfied, and responded to the penitence of Israel with ever fresh help, the prophet passes at once from the desire of the old Israel for redemption, to the prayer of the existing Israel for redemption, suppressing the intermediate thought, that Israel was even now in such a state of punishment and longing.
Israel's ingratitude. Ver. 10. u But they resisted and vexed His Holy Spirit: then He turned to be their enemy; lie made war upon them" Not only has toJfjN (to cause cutting pain) faSHj? nwntf as its object, but FMJ has the same (on the primary meaning, see at ch. iii. 8). In other cases, the object of meroth (Jiamroth) is Jehovah, or His word, His promise, His providence, hence Jehovah himself in the revelations of His nature in word and deed; here it is the spirit of holiness, which is distinguished from Him as a personal existence. For just as the angel who is His face, i.e. the representation of His nature, is designated as a person both by His name and also by the redeeming activity ascribed to Him; so also is the Spirit of holiness, by the fact that He can be grieved, and therefore can feel grief (compare Eph. iv. 30, " Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God"). Hence Jehovah, and the angel of His face, and the Spirit of His holiness, are distinguished as three persons, but so that the two latter derive their existence from the first, which is the absolute ground of the Deity, and of everything that is divine. Now, if we consider that the angel of Jehovah was indeed an angel, but that he was the angelic anticipation of the appearance of God the Mediator " in the flesh," and served to foreshadow Him "who, as the image of the invisible God" (Col. i. 15), as " the reflection of His glory and the stamp of His nature " (Heb. i. 3), is not merely a temporary medium of self-manifestation, but the perfect personal self-manifestation of the divine pdnlm, we have here an unmistakeable indication of the mystery of the triune nature of God the One, which was revealed in history in the New Testament work of redemption. The subject to "nsn»n is Jehovah, whose Holy Spirit they troubled. He who proved Himself to be their Father (cf. Deut. xxxii. 6), became, through the reaction of His holiness, the very reverse of what He wished to be. He turned to be their enemy; Ktfi, He,, the most fearful of all foes, made war against them. This is the way in which we explain ver. 10b, although with this explanation it would have to be accentuated differently, viz. *]2m mahpach, DrA pashta, y)tfb zakeph, Kin tiphchah, D3~Dr6j silluk. The accentuation as we find it takes D3"DPife fcttn as an attributive clause: " to an enemy, who made war against them."
Israel being brought to a right mind in the midst of this state of punishment, longed for the better past to return. Vers. 11-14. " Then His people remembered the days of the olden time, of Moses: Where is He who brought them up out of the sea with the shepherd of his flock? where is He who put the spirit of His holiness in the midst of them; who caused the arm of His majesty to go at the right of Moses; who split the waters before them, to make Himself an everlasting name; who caused them to pass through abysses of the deep, like the horse upon the plain, without their stumbling? Like the cattle which goeth down into the valley, the Spirit of Jehovah brought them to rest: thus hast Thou led Thy people, to make Thyself a majestic name" According to the accentuation before us, ver. 11a should be rendered thus: " Then He (viz. Jehovah) remembered the days of the olden time, the Moses of His people" (LXX., Targ., Syr., Jerome). But apart from the strange expression " the Moses of His people," which might perhaps be regarded as possible, because the proper name mosheh might suggest the thought of its real meaning in Hebrew, viz. extrahens= liberator, but which the Syriac rejects by introducing the reading 'abhdo (Moses, His servant), we have only to look at the questions of evidently human longing which follow, to see that Jehovah cannot be the subject to "I3H (remembered), by which these reminiscences are introduced. It is the people which begins its inquiries with n*K, just as in Jer. ii. 6 (cf. ch. li. 9, 10), and recals " the days of olden time," according to the admonition in Deut. xxxii. 7. Consequently, in spite of the accents, such Jewish commentators as Saad. and Rashi regard "his people" ^arnmd) as the subject; whereas others, such as AE, Kimchi, and Abravanel, take account of the accents, and make the people the suppressed subject of the verb " remembered," by rendering it thus, u Then it remembered the days of olden time, (the days) of Moses (and) His people," or in some similar way. But with all modifications the rendering is forced 'and lame. The best way of keeping to the accents is that suggested by Stier, " Then men (indef. man, the French on) remembered the days of old, the Moses of His people." But why did the prophet not say F*3J?, as the proper sequel to ver. 10? We prefer to adopt the following rendering and accentuation: Then remembered {zakeph gadol) the days-of-old (mercha) of Moses {tiphchah) His people. The object stands before the subject, as for example in 2 Kings v. 13 (compare the inversions in ch. viii. 22 extr., xxii. 2 init.); and mosheh is a genitive governing the composite " days of old" (for this form of the construct state, compare ch. xxviii. 1 and Ruth ii. 1). The retrospect commences with " Where is He who led them up f n etc. The suffix of D&Bn (for D^DH, like Bp in Ps. lxviii. 28, and therefore with the verbal force predominant) refers to the ancestors; and although the word is determined by the suffix, it has the article as equivalent to a demonstrative pronoun (ille qui sursum duxit, eduxit eos). " The shepherd of his flock" is added as a more precise definition, not dependent upon vayyizkor, as even the accents prove. HK is rendered emphatic by yethib, since here it signifies una cum. The Targum takes it in the sense of instar pastoris gregis sui; but though DV is sometimes used in this way, HK never is. Both the LXX. and Targum read nyi; Jerome, on the other hand, adopts the reading *jp, and this is the Masoretic reading, for the Masora in Gen. xlvii. 3 reckons four njn, without including the present passage. Kimchi and Abravanel also support this reading, and Norzi very properly gives it the preference. The shepherds of the flock of Jehovah are Moses and Aaron, together with Miriam (Ps. lxxvii. 21; Mic. vi. 4). With these (i.e. in their company or under their guidance) Jehovah led His people up out of Egypt through the Red Sea. With the reading "•Jp, the question whether beqirbo refers to Moses or Israel falls to the ground. Into the heart of His people (Neh. ix. 20) Jehovah put the spirit of His holiness: it was present in the midst of Israel, inasmuch as Moses, Aaron, Miriam, the Seventy, and the prophets in the camp possessed it, and inasmuch as Joshua inherited it as the successor of Moses, and all the people might become possessed of it. The majestic might of Jehovah, which manifested itself majestically, is called the " arm of His majesty;" an anthropomorphism to which the expression " who caused it to march at the right hand of Moses " compels us to give an interpretation worthy of God. Stier will not allow that ifilNSfl JpT is to be taken as the object, and exclaims, " What a marvellous figure of speech, an arm walking at a person's right hand!" But the arm which is visible in its deeds belongs to the God who is invisible in His own nature; and the meaning is, that the active power of Moses was not left to itself, but the overwhelming omnipotence of God went by its side, and endowed it with superhuman strength. It was by virtue of this that the elevated staff and extended hand of Moses divided the Red Sea (Ex. xiv. 16). V\>)Z has mahpach attached to the 3, and therefore the tone drawn back upon the penultimate, and metheg with the tsere, that it may not be slipped over in the pronunciation. The clause 'W nib>j6 affirms that the absolute purpose of God is in Himself. But He is holy love, and whilst willing for Himself, He wills at the same time the salvation of His creatures. He makes to Himself an " everlasting name," by glorifying Himself in such memorable miracles of redemption, as that performed in the deliverance of His people out of Egypt. According to the general order of the passage, ver. 13 apparently refers to the passage through the Jordan; but the psalmist, in Ps. cvi. 9 (cf. lxxvii. 17), understood it as referring to the passage through the Red Sea. The prayer dwells upon this chief miracle, of which the other was only an after-play. " As the horse gallops over the plain," so did they pass through the depths of the sea WW2\ k? (a circumstantial minor clause), i.e. without stumbling. Then follows another beautiful figure: " like the beast that goeth down into the valley," not " as the beast goeth down into the valley," the Spirit of Jehovah brought it (Israel) to rest, viz. to the menuchdh of the Canaan flowing with milk and honey (Deut. xii. 9; Ps. xcv. 11), where it rested and was refreshed after the long and wearisome march through the sandy desert, like a flock that had descended from the bare mountains to the brooks and meadows of the valley. The Spirit of God is represented as the leader here (as in Ps. cxliii. 10), viz. through the medium of those who stood, enlightened and instigated by Him, at the head of the wandering people. The following |3 ' is no more a correlate of the foregoing particle of comparison than in ch. lii. 14. It is a recapitulation, and refers to the whole description as far back as ver. 9, passing with nW) into the direct tone of prayer.
The way is prepared for the petitions for redemption which follow, outwardly by the change in ver. 146, from a mere description to a direct address, and inwardly by the thought, that Israel is at the present time in such a condition, as to cause it to look back with longing eyes to the time of the Mosaic redemption. Ver. 15. " Look from heaven and see, from the habitation of Thy holiness and majesty! Where is Thy zeal and Thy display of might? The pressure of Thy bowels and Thy compassions are restrained towards me" On the relation between b*3H, to look up, to open the eyes, and n«n? to fix the eye upon a thing, see p. 185. It is very rarely that we meet with the words in the reverse order, W2TY\ n&o (vid. Hab. i. 5; Lam. i. 11). In the second clause of ver. 15a, instead of misshdmayim
(from heaven), we have " from the dwelling-place (mizz'bhul) of Thy holiness and majesty." The all-holy and all-glorious One, who once revealed Himself so gloriously in the history of Israel, has now withdrawn into His own heaven, where He is only revealed to the spirits. The object of the looking and seeing, as apparent from what follows, is the present helpless condition of the people in their sufferings, to which there does not seem likely to be any end. There are no traces now of the kin ah (zeal) with which Jehovah used to strive on behalf of His people, and against their oppressors (ch. xxvi. 11), or of the former displays of His gebhurdh (^JlfVQtt, as it is correctly written in Ven. 1521, is a defective plural). In ver. 156 we have not a continued question (" the sounding of Thy bowels and Thy mercies, which are restrained towards me?"), as Hitzig and Knobel suppose. The words 'elai hWappdqu have not the appearance of an attributive clause, either according to the new strong thought expressed, or according to the order of the words (with vN written first). On strepitus viscerum, as the effect and sign of deep sympathy, see at ch. xvi. 11. &^rn and DW, or rather D^yo (from nyo^ of the form ^Jl), both signify primarily GTrXd^yya, strictly speaking the soft inward parts of the body; the latter from the root JJE, to be pulpy or soft, the former from the root m, to be slack, loose, or soft, |i»n, as the plural of the predicate shows, does not govern T^rn also. It is presupposed that the love of Jehovah urges Him towards His people, to relieve their misery; but His compassion and sympathy apparently put constraint upon themselves (liitliappeq as in ch. xlii. 14, lit. se superare, from 'dphaq, root pa), to abstain from working on behalf of Israel.
The prayer for help, and the lamentation over its absence, are now justified in ver. 16: " For Thou art our Father; for Abraham is ignorant of us, and Israel knoweth us not. Thou, 0 Jehovah, art our Father; our Redeemer is from olden time Thy name." Jehovah is Israel's Father (Deut. xxxii. 6). His creative might, and the gracious counsels of His love, have called it into being: W3K has not yet the deep and unrestricted sense of the New Testament " Our Father." The second kl introduces the reason for this confession that Jehovah was Israel's Father, and could therefore look for paternal care and help from Him alone. Even the dearest and most honourable men, the forefathers of the nation, could not help it. Abraham and Jacob-Israel had been taken away from this world, and were unable to interfere on their own account in the history of their people. JHJ and Van suggest the idea of participating notice and regard, as in Deut. xxxiii. 9 and Ruth ii. 10, 19. WW has the vowel a (pausal for a, ch. lvi. 3) in the place of 8, to rhyme with ttjn* (see Ges. § 60, Anm. 2). In the concluding clause, according to the accents, Dpiyp wNj are connected together; but the more correct accentuation is 137*0 tiphchah, D71JJD mercha, and we have rendered it so. From the very earliest time the acts of Jehovah towards Israel had been such that Israel could call Him 137*0.
But in the existing state of things there was a contrast which put their faith to a severe test. Ver. 17. " 0 Jehovah, why leadest Thou us astray from Thy ways, hardenest our heart, so as not to fear Thee? Return for Thy servants sake, the tribes of Thine inheritance." When men have scornfully and obstinately rejected the grace of God, God withdraws it from them judicially, gives them up to their wanderings, and makes their heart incapable of faith (hiqshlach, which only occurs again in Job xxxix. 16, is here equivalent to hiqshdh in Ps. xcv. 8, Deut. ii. 30). The history of Israel from ch. vi. onwards has been the history of such a gradual judgment of hardening, and such a curse, eating deeper and deeper, and spreading its influence wider and wider round. The great mass are lost, but not without the possibility of deliverance for the better part of the nation, which now appeals to the mercy of God, and sighs for deliverance from this ban. Two reasons are assigned for this petition for the return of the gracious presence of God: first, that there are still u servants of Jehovah" to be found, as this prayer itself actually proves; and secondly, that the divine election of grace cannot perish.
But the existing condition of Israel looks like a withdrawal of this grace; and it is impossible that these contrasts should cease, unless Jehovah comes down from heaven as the deliverer of His people. Vers. 18, 19 (lxiv. 1). "For a little time Thy holy people was in possession. Our adversaries have trodden down Thy sanctuary. We have become such as He who is from everlasting has not ruled over, upon whom Thy name was not called. 0 that Thou wouldst rend the heaven, come down, the mountains mould shake before thy countenance" It is very natural to try whether ydreshu may not have tsdrenu for its subject (cf. Jer. xlix. 2); but all the attempts made to explain the words on this supposition, show that lammitsdr is at variance with the idea that ydr'shu refers to the foes. Compare, for example, Jerome's rendering " quasi nihilum {i.e. ad nihil et absque alio labore) possederunt populum sanctum tuum; " that of Cocceius, " propemodum adhcereditatem;" and that of Stier, " for a little they possess entirely Thy holy nation" Mitsdr is the harsher form for mizdr, which the prophet uses in ch. x. 25, xvi. 14, xxix. 17 for a contemptibly small space of time; and as? is commonly used to denote the time to which, towards which, within which, and through which, anything occurs (cf. 2 Chron. xi. 17, xxix. 17; Ewald, § 217, d), lammitsdr may signify for a (lit. the well-known) short time (per breve tempus; like eU, eir, Kar iviavrov, a year long). If miqddsh could mean the holy land, as Hitzig and others suppose, miqddshekhd might be the common object of both sentences (Ewald, § 351, p. 838). But miqdash Jehovah (the sanctuary of Jehovah) is the place of His abode and worship; and " taking possession of the temple " is hardly an admissible expression. On the other hand, ydrash hd'drets, to take possession of the (holy) land, is so common a phrase (e.g. ch. lx. 21, lxv. 9; Ps. xliv. 4), that with the words " Thy holy people possessed for a little (time) " we naturally supply the holy land as the object. The order of the words in the two clauses is chiastic. The two strikingly different subjects touch one another as the two inner members. Of the perfects, the first expresses the more remote past, the second the nearer past, as in ch. lx. 105. The two clauses of the verss rhyme, — the holiest thing in the possession of the people, which was holy according to the choice and calling of Jehovah, being brought into the greatest prominence; boses = Trareiv, Luke xxi. 24, Rev. xi. 2. Hahn's objection, that the time between the conquest of the land and the Chaldean catastrophe could not be called mitsdr (a little while), may be answered, from the fact that a time which is long in itself shrinks up when looked back upon or recalled, and that as an actual fact from the time of David and Solomon, when Israel really rejoiced in the possession of the land, the coming catastrophe began to be foreboded by many significant preludes. The lamentation in ver.
19 proceeds from the same feeling which caused the better portion of the past to vanish before the long continuance of the mournful present (compare the reverse at p. 346). Hitzig renders U"n " we were; " Hahn, " we shall be; " but here, where the speaker is not looking back, as in ch. xxvi. 17, at a state of things which has come to an end, but rather at one which is still going on, it signifies "we have become." The passage is rendered correctly in S.: e<yevri6riixev (or better, 7670- va/iev) &)? air alcovos wv ov/c i^ovaiaaas ovBe eTriKk^Orj to ovofid gov avTols. The virtual predicate to hdylnu commences with me'oldm: "we have become such (or like such persons) as," etc.; which would be fully expressed by "^K DJ73, or merely "it?X3, or without "IKW, and simply by transposing the words, 'til Jw& N?3 (cf. Obad. 16): compare the virtual subject tan« IW in ch. xlviii. 14, and the virtual object *BB>3 fcOj^ in ch. xli. 25 (Ewald, § 333, b). Every form of " as if " is intentionally omitted. The relation in which Jehovah placed Himself to Israel, viz. as its King, and as to His own people called by His name, appears not only as though it had been dissolved, but as though it had never existed at all. The existing state of Israel is a complete practical denial of any such relation. Deeper tones than these no lamentation could possibly utter, and hence the immediate utterance of the sigh which goes up to heaven: " O that Thou wouldst rend heaven! " It is extremely awkward to begin a fresh chapter with rnpa (" as when the melting fire burneth "); at the same time, the Masoretic division of the verses is unassailable.1 For ver. 19 b (ch. lxiv. 1) could not be attached to ch. lxiv. 1, 2, since this verse would be immensely overladen; moreover, this sigh really belongs to ver. 19a (ch. lxiii. 19), and ascends out of the depth of the lamentation uttered there. On utinam discideris = discinderes, see at ch. xlviii. 18. The wish presupposes that the gracious presence of God had been withdrawn from Israel, and that Israel felt itself to be separated from the world beyond by a thick party-wall, resembling an impenetrable black cloud. The closing member of the optative clause is generally rendered {utinam) a facie tua montes diffluerent (e.g. Rosenm tiller after the LXX. TafcfoovTai,), or more correctly, defluerent (Jerome), as nazal means to flow down, not to melt. The meaning therefore would be, " O that they might flow down, as it were to the ground melting in the fire " (Hitzig). The form ndzollu cannot be directly derived from nazal, if taken in this sense; for it is a pure fancy that ndzollu may be a modification of the pausal ^W with 6 for a, and the so-called dagesh affectuosum). Stier invents a verb med. o. H:. The more probable supposition is, that it is a niplial formed from zdldl = nazal (Ewald, § 193, c). But zdlal signifies to hang down slack, to sway to and fro (hence zolel, lightly esteemed, and zalzalllm, ch. xviii. 5, pliable branches), like zul in ch. xlvi. 6, to shake, to pour down; l and ndzollu, if derived from this, yields the appropriate sense concuterentur (compare the Arabic zalzala, which is commonly applied to an earthquake). The nearest niphal form would be ^t: (or resolved, vtt, Judg. v. 5); but instead of the a of the second syllable, the niphal of the verbs V"V has sometimes o, like the verb V'y (e.g. ^J, ch. xxxiv. 4; Ges. § 67, Anm. 5).
The similes which follow cannot be attached to this ndzollu, however we may explain it. Yet ch. lxiv. 1 (2) does not form a new and independent sentence; but we must in thought repeat the word upon which the principal emphasis rests in ch. lxiii. 1% (ch. lxiv. 1). Ch. lxiv. 1, 2 (2, 3). " (Wouldst come down) as fire kindles brushwood, fire causes water to boil; to make known Thy name to Tliine adversaries, that the heathen may tremble before Thy face! When Thou doest terrible tilings which we hoped not for; wouldst come down, {and) mountains shake before Thy countenance!" The older expositors gave themselves a great deal of trouble in the attempt to trace hdmdslm to mdsas, to melt. But since Louis de Dieu and Albert Schultens have followed Saadia and Abulwalid in citing the Arabic ^*Ji>, to confringere, from which comes hashim, broken, dry wood, it is generally admitted that hdmdsim is from hemes (lit. crackling, rattling, Arab, hams), and signifies " dry twigs," arida sarmenta. The second simile might be rendered, "as water bubbles up
1 Just as the Greek has in addition to acth~ii>uv the much simpler and more root-like rt/-u»; so the Semitic has, besides ^T, the roots KT> ]}]: compare the Arabic ^f, INN?, ])W, all three denoting restless motion.
in the fire;" and in that case mayim would be treated as a feminine (according to the rule in Ges. § 146, 3), in support of which Job xiv. 19 may be adduced as an unquestionable example (although in other cases it is masculine), and BW = £W3 would be used in a local sense, like lehdbhdh, into flames, in ch. v. 24. But it is much more natural to take BW, which is just as often a feminine as D^D is a masculine, as the subject of ny^n? and to give to the verb nya? which is originally intransitive, judging from the Arabic Ju, to swell, the Chald. Jfl3, to spring up
(compare fitojns, blisters, pustules), the Syr. W3, to bubble up, etc., the transitive meaning to cause to boil or bubble up, rather than the intransitive to boil (comp. ch. xxx. 13, nV33, swollen = bent forwards, as it were protumidus). Jehovah is to come down with the same irresistible force which fire exerts upon brushwood or water, when it sets the former in flames and makes the latter boil; in order that by such a display of might He may make His name known (viz. the name thus judicially revealing itself, hence " in fire," ch. xxx. 27, lxvi. 15) to His adversaries, and that nations (viz. those that are idolaters) may tremble before Him (T?SD: cf. Ps. lxviii. 2, 3). The infinitive clause denoting the purpose, like that indicating the comparison, passes into the finite (cf. ch. x. 2, xiii. 9, xiv. 25). Modern commentators for the most part now regard the optative lu (O that) as extending to ver. 2 also; and, in fact, although this continued influence of lu appears to overstep the bounds of the possible, we are forced to resort to this extremity. Ver. 2 cannot contain a historical retrospect: the word a formerly" would be introduced if it did, and the order of the words would be a different one. Again, we cannot assume that *?fj D^in ^osp £7X contains an expression of confidence, or that the perfects indicate certainty. Neither the context, the foregoing ni&ofa ^W3 (why not n?ty?), nor the parenthetical assertion pjijM N7, permits of this. On the other hand, 'U1 "JIWJJ3 connects itself very appropriately with the purposes indicated in ver. 1 (2): " may tremble when Thou doest terrible things, which we, i.e. such as we, do not look for," i.e. which surpass our expectations. And now nothing remains but to recognise the resumption of ch. lxiii. 19 (lxiv. 1) in the clause " The mountains shake at Thy presence," in which case ch.
IxiiL 19£-lxiv. 2 (Ixiv. 1-3) forms a grand period rounded off palindromically after Isaiah's peculiar style.
The following clause gives the reason for this; 1 being very frequently the logical equivalent for hi (e.g. ch. iii. 7 and xxxviii. 15). The justification of this wish, which is forced from them by the existing misery, is found in the incomparable acts of Jehovah for the good of His own people, which are to be seen in a long series of historical events. Ver. 3 (4). a For from olden time men have not heard, nor perceived, nor hath an eye seen, a God beside Thee, who acted on behalf of him that waiteth for Him." No ear, no eye has ever been able to perceive the existence of a God who acted like Jehovah, i.e. really interposed on behalf of those who set their hopes upon Him. This is the explanation adopted by Knobel; but he wrongly supplies ni&OU to T\WV\ whereas Hpy is used here in the same pregnant sense as in Ps. xxii. 32, xxxvii. 5, Hi. 11 (cf. gdmar in Ps. lvii. 3, cxxxviii. 8). It has been objected to this explanation, that r?sn js never connected, with the accusative of the person, and that God can neither be heard nor seen. But what is terrible in relation to V^f in Job xlii. 5 cannot be untenable in relation to pTNn. Hearing and seeing God are here equivalent to recognising His existence through the perception of His works. The explanation favoured by Rosenmuller and Stier, viz., " And from olden time men have not heard it, nor perceived with ears, no eye has seen it, O God, beside Thee, what (this God) doth to him that waiteth for Him," is open to still graver objections. The thought is the same as in Ps. xxxi. 20, and when so explained it corresponds more exactly to the free quotation in 1 Cor. ii. 9, which with our explanation there is no necessity to trace back to either ch. Hi. 15, 16, or a lost book, as Origen imagined (see Tischendorf's ed. vii. of the N. T. on this passage). This which no ear has heard, no eye seen, is not God Himself, but He who acts for His people, and justifies their waiting for Him (cf. Hofmann, Die h. Schrift Neuen Testaments, ii. 2, 51). Another proof that Paul had no other passage than this in his mind, is the fact that the same quotation is met with in Clement's Epistle to the Corinthians (ch. xxxiv.), where, instead of " those that love Him," we have " those that wait for Him," a literal rendering of ^"nanD^. The quotation by Paul therefore by no means leads us to take
Elohim as a vocative or *\X\ ii&jp as the object, although it must not be concealed that this view of the passage and its reference to the fulness of glory in the eternal life is an old rabbinical one, as Rashi expressly affirms, when he appeals to R. Jose (Joseph Kara) as bondsman for the other (see b. Sanhedrin 99a). Hahn has justly objected to this traditional explanation, which regards Elohim as a vocative, that the thought, that God alone has heard and perceived and seen with His eye what He intends to do to His people, is unsuitable in itself, and at variance with the context, and that if 'til nb]P was intended as the object, "\WX (nx) would certainly be inserted. And to this we may add, that we cannot find the words Elohim zuldtltkha (God beside Thee) preceded by a negation anywhere in ch. xl.-lxvi. without receiving at once the impression, that they affirm the sole deity of Jehovah (comp. ch. xlv. 5, 21). The meaning therefore is, " No other God beside Jehovah has ever been heard or seen, who acted for (ageret pro) those who waited for Him." Mechakkeh is the construct, according to Ges. § 116, 1; and yaaseh has tsere here, according to Krmchi (Michlol 1256) and other testimonies, just as we meet with rftyyfi four times (in Gen. xxvi. 29; Josh. vii. 9; 2 Sam. xiii. 12; Jer. xl. 16) and nbTO once (Josh. ix. 24), mostly with a disjunctive accent, and not without the influence of a whole or half pause, the form with tsere being regarded as more emphatic than that with seghol.1
After the long period governed by frw has thus been followed by the retrospect in ver. 3 (4), it is absolutely impossible that ver. 4a (5a) should be intended as an optative, in the sense of " O that thou wouldst receive him that," etc., as Stier and others propose. The retrospect is still continued thus, ver. 4a (pa): " Thou didst meet him that rejoiceth to work righteousness, when they remembered Thee in Thy ways" PTO ^ty'V] ®® is one in whom joy and right action are paired, and is therefore equivalent to rt&lb W&. At the same time, it may possibly be more correct to take p^ as the object of both verses, as Hofmann does in the sense of "those who let what is right be their joy, and their action also;" for though 'w& (W'W) cannot be directly construed with the accusative of the object, as we have already observed at ch. viii. 6 and xxxv. 1, it may be indirectly, as in this passage and ch. lxv. 18. On pdga, " to come to meet," in the sense of " coming to the help of," see at ch. xlvii. 3; it is here significantly interchanged with T^T]? of the minor clause bidrdkhekhd yizkerukhd, a those who remember Thee in Thy ways" (for the syntax, compare ch. i. 5 and xxvi. 16): " When such as love and do right, walking in Thy ways, remembered Thee (i.e. thanked Thee for grace received, and longed for fresh grace), Thou earnest again and again to meet them as a friend."
But Israel appeared to have been given up without hope to the wrath of this very God. Ver. 4& (5b). " Behold, Thou, 7 hou art enraged, and we stood as sinners there; already liave we been long in this state, and shall we be saved tn Instead of hen 'attdh (the antithesis of now and formerly), the passage proceeds with hen 'attdh. There was no necessity for 'attdh with qdtsaphtd; so that it is used with special emphasis: "Behold, Thou, a God who so faithfully accepts His own people, hast broken out in wrath" (see p. 345). The following word KOH31 cannot mean "and we have sinned," but is a fut. consec, and therefore must mean at least, "then we have sinned" (the sin inferred from the punishment). It is more correct, however, to take it, as in Gen. xliii. 9, in the sense of, " Then we stand as sinners, as guilty persons:" the punishment has exhibited Israel before the world, and before itself, as what it really is (consequently the fut. consec. does not express the logical inference, but the practical consequence). As Kftrm has tsakeph, and therefore the accents at any rate preclude Schelling's rendering, " and we have wandered in those ways from the very earliest times," we must take the next two clauses as independent, if indeed Dm is to be understood as referring to TWO. Stier only goes halfway towards this when he renders it, " And indeed in them (the ways of God, we sinned) from of old, and should we be helped!" This is forced, and yet not in accordance with the accents. Rosen mtiller and Hahn quite satisfy this demand when they rentier it, " Tumen in viis tuis ceternitas ut salvemur;" but 'oldm, aloov, in this sense of alcoviorrj^j is not scriptural. The rendering adopted by Besser, Grotius, and Starck is a better one: " (Si vero) in Mis (viis tuis) perpetuo (mansissemus), tunc servati fuerimits" (if we had continued in Thy ways, then we should have been preserved). But there is no succession of tenses here, which could warrant us in taking %&}}) as a paulo-post future; and Hofmann's view is syntactically more correct, "In them (i.e. the ways of Jehovah) eternally, we shall find salvation, after the time is passed in which He has been angry and we have sinned" (or rather, been shown to be guilty). But we question the connection between Dl"Q and "p3Vi in any form. In our view the prayer suddenly takes a new turn from hen (behold) onwards, just as it did with lu (O that) in ch. lxiv. 1; and "pDVT in ver. 5a stands at the head of a subordinate clause. Hence D!"Q must refer back to Ktirw DDVp (" in Thine anger and in our sins," Schegg). There is no necessity, however, to search for nouns to which to refer DH3. It is rather to be taken as neuter, signifying "therein" (Ezek. xxxiii. 18, cf. Ps. xc. 10), like E'T??y, thereupon = thereby (ch. xxxviii. 16), ]\}% therein (xxxviii. 16), Dnp thereout (ch. xxx. 6), therefrom (ch. xliv. 15). The idea suggested by such expressions as these is no doubt that of plurality (here a plurality of manifestations of wrath and of sins), but one which vanishes into the neuter idea of totality. Now we do justice both to the clause without a verb, which, being a logical copula, admits simply of a present sumus; and also to 'oldm, which is the accusative of duration, when we explain the sentence as meaning, " In this state we are and have been for a long time." 'Oldm is used in other instances in these prophecies to denote the long continuance of the state of punishment (see ch. xlii. 14, lvii. 11), since it appeared to the exiles as an eternity (a whole seon), and what lay beyond it as but a little while (mits'dr, ch. lxiii. 18). The following word V^\ needs no correction. There is no necessity to change it into JJnsi, as Ewald proposes, after the LXX. Kol iifKavrjOrifiev (" and we fell into wandering"), or what would correspond still more closely to the LXX. (cf. ch. xlvi. 8, DWQ, LXX. TreTfkavqfjLevoi), but is less appropriate here, into W^}\ ("and we fell into apostasy"), the reading supported by Lowth and others. If it were necessary to alter the text at all, we might simply transpose the letters, and read gwta. " and cried for help." But if we take it as a question, " And shall we experience salvation — find help? " there is nothing grammatically inadmissible in this (compare ch. xxviii. 28), and psychologically it is commended by the state of mind depicted in ch. xl. 27, lix. 10-12. Moreover, what follows attaches itself quite naturally to this.
The people who ask the question in ver. 5 do not regard themselves as worthy of redemption, as their self-righteousness has been so thoroughly put to shame. Ver. 5 (6). " We all became like the unclean thing, and all our virtues like a garment soiled with blood; and we all faded away together like the leaves; and our iniquities, like the storm they carried us away? The whole nation is like one whom the law pronounces unclean, like a leper, who has to cry "tame, tame" as he goes along, that men may get out of his way (Lev. xiii. 45). Doing right in all its manifold forms (tseddqoth, like ch. xxxiii. 15, used elsewhere of the manifestations of divine righteousness), which once made Israel well-pleasing to God (ch. i. 21), has disappeared and become like a garment stained with menstruous discharge (cf. Ezek. xxxvi. 17); (LXX. o>? pdicos airoKaO^fievn^ = ddcdh; oh. xxx. 22; nidddh, Lam. i. 17; t*me ah, Lev. xv. 33). 'Iddim (used thus in the plural in the Talmud also) signifies the monthly period (pienstrua). In the third figure, that of fading falling foliage, the form vanndbhel is not kal (= vannibbol or vanibbal; Ewald, § 232, b), which would be an impossibility according to the laws of inflexion; still less is it niphal = vanninndbhel (which Kimchi suggests as an alternative); but certainly a hiphil. It is not, however, from ndbhel = vaimabbel, " with the reduplication dropped to express the idea of something gradual,'5 as Bottcher proposes (a new7 and arbitrary explanation in the place of one founded upon the simple laws of inflexion), but either from bdlal (compare the remarks on b'lll in ch. xxx. 24, which hardly signifies "ripe barley" however), after the form Sw (from 56a), TjD^ (from *|?D), or from bul, after the form DgJ_, etc. In any case, therefore, it is a metaplastic formation, whether from bdlal or bul = ndbhel, like "^ in 1 Chron. xx. 3, after the form "\&\ from "fib = ">^, or after the form JHJ, from "HP = lfcj (compare the rabbinical explanation of the name of the month Bul from the falling of the leaves, in Buxtorf, Lex. talm. col. 271). The hiphil?55 0r b*2\} is to be compared to E^Nj?., to stream out red (= to be red); TJKjJj to make an extension (= to be long); ^")^''7, to strike root (= to root), etc., and signifies literally to produce a fading (= to fade away). In the fourth figure, ^p.ty. (as it is also written in ver. 6 according to correct codices) is a defective plural (as in Jer. xiv. 7, Ezek. xxviii. 18, Dan. ix. 13) for the more usual ^ni\g (ch. lix. 12). f\V is the usual term applied to sin regarded as guilt, which produces punishment of itself. The people were robbed by their sins of all vital strength and energy, like dry leaves, which the guilt and punishment springing from sin carried off as a very easy prey.
Universal forgetfulness of God was the consequence of this self-instigated departure from God. Ver. 6 (7). " And there was no one who called upon Thy name, who aroused himself to lay Jinn hold of Thee: for Thou hadst hidden Thy face from us, and didst melt us into the hand of our transgressions." There was no one (see ch. lix. 16) who had risen up in prayer and intercession out of this deep fall, or had shaken himself out of the sleep of security and lethargy of insensibility, to lay firm hold of Jehovah, i.e. not to let Him go till He blessed him and his people again. The curse of God pressed every one down; God had withdrawn His grace from them, and given them up to the consequences of their sins. The form ^aiori} is not softened from the pilel \)tipn\ but is a kal like *3JW in Job xxxi. 15 (which see), NO being used in a transitive sense, as kun is there (cf. shubh, ch. lii. 8; mush, Zech. iii. 9). The LXX., Targ., and Syr. render it et tradidisti nos; but we cannot conclude from this with any certainty that they read 13papPrt, which Knobel follows Evvald in correcting into the incorrect form tilpFll. The prophet himself had the expression miggen beyad (Gen. xiv. 20, cf. Job viii. 4) in his mind, in the sense of li.qiiefecisti nos in manum, equivalent to liquefecisti et tradidisti (irapehwKas, Rom. i. 28), from which it is evident that T? is not a mere Sid (LXX.), but the "hand" of the transgressions is their destructive and damning power.
This was the case when the measure of Israel's sins had become full. They were carried into exile, where they sank deeper and deeper. The great mass of the people proved themselves to be really massa perdita, and perished among the heathen. But there were some, though a vanishingly small number, who humbled themselves under the mighty hand of God, and, when redemption could not be far off, wrestled in such prayers as these, that the nation might share it in its entirety, and if possible not one be left behind. With nnjn the existing state of sin and punishment is placed among the things of the past, and the petition presented that the present moment of prayer may have all the significance of a turningpoint in their history. Vers. 7, 8 (8, 9). "And now, 0 Jehovah, Thou art our Father: we are the clay., and Thou our Maker; and we are all the work of Thy hand. Be not extremely angry, 0 Jehovah, and remember not the transgression for ever! Behold, consider, we beseech Thee, we are all Thy people." The state of things must change at last; for Israel is an image made by Jehovah; yea, more than this, Jehovah is the begetter of Israel, and loves Israel not merely as a sculptor, but as a father (compare ch. xlv. 9, 10, and the unquestionable passage of Isaiah in ch. xxix. 16). Let Him then not be angry ^IKO"*^ " to the utmost measure" (cf. Ps, cxix. 8), or if we paraphrase it according to the radical meaning of 1KB, " till the weight becomes intolerable." Let Him not keep in mind the guilt for ever, to punish it; but, in consideration of the fact that Israel is the nation of His choice, let mercy take the place of justice. fi strengthens the petition in its own way (see Gen. xxx. 34), just as W does; and tt^? signifies here, as elsewhere, to fix the eye upon anything. The object, in this instance, is the existing fact expressed in " we are all Thy people." Hitzig is correct in regarding the repetition of " all of us " in this prayer as significant. The object throughout is to entreat that the whole nation may participate in the inheritance of the coming salvation, in order that the exodus from Babylonia may resemble the exodus from Egypt.
The re-erection of the ruins of the promised land requires the zeal of every one, and this state of ruin must not continue. It calls out the love and faithfulness of Jehovah. Vers. 9-11. ' The cities of Thy holiness have become a pasture-ground; Zion has become a pasture-ground, Jerusalem a desert. The house of our holiness and of our adorning, where our fathers praised Thee, is given up to the fire, and everything that was our delight given up to devastation. Wilt Thou restrain Thyself in spite of this,
0 Jehovah, be silent, and leave us to suffer the utmost?" Jerusalem by itself could not possibly be called " cities'1 (are), say with reference to the upper and lower cities (Vitringa). It is merely mentioned by name as the most prominent of the many cities which were all u holy cities," inasmuch as the whole of Canaan was the land of Jehovah (ch. xiv. 25), and His holy territory (Ps. Ixxviii. 54). The word midbdr (pasture-land, heath, different from tsiyydh, the pastureless desert, ch. xxxv. 1) is repeated, for the purpose of showing that the same fate had fallen upon Zion-Jerusalem as upon the rest of the cities of the land. The climax of the terrible calamity was the fact, that the temple had also fallen a prey to the burning of the fire (compare for the fact, Jer. Hi. 13). The people call it " house of our holiness and of our glory." Jehovah's qodesh and tipJiereth have, as it were, transplanted heaven to earth in the temple (compare ch. lxiii. 15 with ch. lx. 7); and this earthly dwelling-place of God is Israel's possession, and therefore Israel's qodesh and tipJiereth. The relative clause describes what sublime historical reminiscences are attached to the temple: "i^N is equivalent to D^ 155W, as in Gen. xxxix. 20, Num. xx. 13 (compare Ps. lxxxiv. 4), Deut. viii. 15, etc. W?\I has chatepJi-patJiach, into which, as a rule, the vocal sheva under the first of two similar letters is changed. Machdmaddenu (our delights) may possibly include favourite places, ornamental buildings, and pleasure grounds; but the parallel leads us rather to think primarily of things associated with the worship of God, in which the people found a holy delight, bz, contrary to the usual custom, is here followed by the singular of the predicate, as in Prov. xvi. 2, Ezek. xxxi. 15 (cf. Gen. ix. 29). Will Jehovah still put restraint upon Himself, and cause His merciful love to keep silence, n^P/ty, with such a state of things as this, or notwithstanding this state of things (Job x. 7)? On ps^n?, see ch. lxiii. 15, xlii. 14. The suffering would indeed increase 1N£""JJJ (to the utmost), if it caused the destruction of Israel, or should not be followed at last by Israel's restoration. Jehovah's compassion cannot any longer thus forcibly restrain itself; it must break forth, like Joseph's tears in the recognition scene (Gen. xlv. 1).
After the people have poured out their heart before Jehovah, He announces what they may expect from Him. But instead of commencing with a promise, as we might anticipate after the foregoing prayer, He begins with reproach and threatening; for although the penitential portion of the community had included the whole nation in their prayer, it was destruction, and not deliverance, which awaited one portion of the nation, and that portion was the greater one. The great mass were in that state of " sin unto death" which defies all intercession (1 John v. 16), because they had so scornfully and obstinately resisted the grace which had been so long and so incessantly offered to them. Vers. 1, 2. " I was discernible to those who did not inquire, discoverable by those who did not seek me. I said, l Here am I, here am I,9 to a nation where my name was not called. I spread out my hands all the day to a refractory people, who walked in the way that was not good, after their own thoughts." The LXX. (A) render ver. la, " I was found by those who did not seek me, I became manifest to those who did not ask for me" (B reverses the order); and in Rom. x. 20, 21, Paul refers ver. 1 to the Gentiles, and ver. 2 to Israel. The former, to whom He has hitherto been strange, enter into fellowship with Him; whilst the latter, to whom He has constantly offered Himself, thrust Him away, and lose His fellowship. Luther accordingly adopts this rendering: " I shall be sought by those who did not ask for me, I shall be found by those who did not seek me. And to the heathen who did not call upon my name, I say, Here am I, here am I." Zwingli, again, observes on ver. 1, " This is an irresistible testimony to the adoption of the Gentiles.,' Calvin also follows the apostle's exposition, and observes, that " Paul argues boldly for the calling of the Gentiles on the ground of this passage, and says that Isaiah dared to proclaim and assert that the Gentiles had been called by God, because he announced a greater thing, and announced it more clearly than the reason of those times would bear." Of all the Jewish expositors, there is only one, viz. Gecatilia, who refers ver. 1 to the Gentiles; and of all the Christian expositors of modern times, there is only one, viz. Hendewerk, who interprets it in this way, without having been influenced by the quotation made by Paul. Hofmann, however, and Stier, feel obliged to follow the apostle's exposition, and endeavour to vindicate it. But we have no sympathy with any such untenable efforts to save the apostle's honour. In Rom. ix. 25, 26, he also quotes Hos. ii. 25 and ii. 1 in support of the calling of the Gentiles; whereas he could not have failed to know, that it is the restoration of Israel to favour which is alluded to there. He merely appeals to Hos. ii. in support of the New Testament fact of the calling of the Gentiles, so far as it is in these words of the Old Testament prophet that the fact is most adequately expressed. And according to 1 Pet. ii. 10, Peter received the same impression from Hosea's words. But with the passage before us it is very different. The apostle shows, by the way in which he applies the Scripture, how he depended in this instance upon the Septuagint translation, which was in his own hands and those of his readers also, and by which the allusion to the Gentiles is naturally suggested, even if not actually demanded. And we may also assume that the apostle himself understood the Hebrew text, with which he, the pupil of Rabban Gamaliel, was of course well acquainted, in the same sense, viz. as relating to the calling of the Gentiles, without being therefore legally bound to adopt the same interpretation. The interchange of *ia (cf. ch. lv. 5) and DV; the attribute *OKQ top *6, which applies to heathen, and heathen only; the possibility of interpreting ch. lxv. 1, 2, in harmony with the context both before and after, if ver. 1 be taken as referring to the Gentiles, on the supposition that Jehovah is here contrasting His success with the Gentiles and His failure with Israel: all these certainly throw weight into the scale. Nevertheless they are not decisive, if we look at the Hebrew alone, apart altogether from the LXX. For nidrashtl does not mean " I have become manifest;" but, regarded as the so-called niphal tolerativum (according to Ezek. xiv. 3, xx. 3, 31, xxxvi. 37), u I permitted myself to be explored or found out;" and consequently ^ntttftM, according to ch. lv. 6, " I let myself be found." And so explained, ver. 1 stands in a parallel relation to ch. lv. 6: Jehovah was searchable, was discoverable
(cf. Zeph. 1. 6) to those who asked no questions, and did not seek Him (Kii6 = *6 "»£*&, Ges. § 123, 3), i.e. He displayed to Israel the fulness of His nature and the possibility of His fellowship, although they did not bestir themselves or trouble themselves in the least about Him, — a view which is confirmed by the fact that ver. lb merely refers to offers made to them, and not to results of any kind. Israel, however, is called SB£Q fcOp"N7 ^, not as a nation that was not called by Jehovah's name (which would be expressed by ^i??, ch. xliii. 7; cf. WpE, k\t)t6<; /jlov, ch. xlviii. 12), but as a nation where (supply 'dsher) Jehovah's name was not invoked (LXX. " who called not upon my name"), and therefore as a thoroughly heathenish nation; for which reason we have goi (LXX. e6vos) here, and not 'am (LXX. Xaos). Israel was estranged from Him, just like the heathen; but He still turned towards them with infinite patience, and (as is added in ver. 2) with ever open arms of love. He spread out His hands (as a man does to draw another towards him to embrace him) all the day (i.e. continually, cf. ch. xxviii. 24) towards an obstinate people, who walked in the way that was not good (cf. Ps. xxxvi. 5, Prov. xvi. 29; here with the article, which could not be repeated with the adjective, because of the tib), behind their own thoughts. That which led them, and which they followed, was not the will of God, but selfish views and purposes, according to their own hearts' lusts; and yet Jehovah did not let them alone, but they were the constant thought and object of His love, which was ever seeking, alluring, and longing for their salvation. But through this obstinate and unyielding rejection of His love they have excited wrath, which, though long and patiently suppressed, now bursts forth with irresistible violence. Vers. 3-5. " The people that continually provoketh me by defying me to my face, sacrificing in the gardens, and burning incense upon the tiles; who sit in the graves, and spend the night in closed places; to eat the flesh of swine, and broken pieces of abominations is in their dishes; who say, Stop! come not too near me; for I am holy to thee: they are a smoke in my nose, a fire blazing continually." nV« (these) in ver. 5b is retrospective, summing up the subject as described in vers. 3-5a, and what follows in ver. bb contains the predicate. The heathenish practices of the exiles are here depicted, and in ver. 7 they are expressly distinguished from those of their fathers. Hence there is something so peculiar in the description, that we look in vain for parallels among those connected with the idolatry of the Israelites before the time of the captivity. There is only one point of resemblance, viz. the allusion to gardens as places of worship, which only occurs in the book of Isaiah, and in which our passage, together with ch. lvii. 5 and lxvi. 17, strikingly coincides with ch. i. 29. "Upon my face" (alpdnai) is equivalent to " freely and openly, without being ashamed of me, or fearing me;" cf. Job i. 11, vi. 28, xxi. 31. " Burning incense upon the bricks " carries us to Babylonia, the true home of the cocti lateres (laterculi). The thorah only mentions I'bhenim in connection with Babylonian and Egyptian buildings. The only altars that it allows are altars of earth thrown up, or of unhewn stones and wooden beams with a brazen covering. " They who sit in the graves," according to Vitringa, are they who sacrifice to the dead. He refers to the Greek and Roman inferice and februationes, or expiations for the dead, as probably originating in the East. Sacrifices for the dead were offered, in fact, not only in India and Persia, but also in Hither Asia among the Ssabians, and therefore probably in ancient Mesopotamia and Babylonia. But were they offered in the graves themselves, as we must assume from O^Jipa (not B^P"'?)? Nothing at all is known of this, and Bottcher (de inferis, § 234) is correct in rendering it " among (inter) the graves," and supposing the object to be to hold intercourse there with the dead and with demons. The next point, viz. passing the night in closed places (i.e. places not accessible to every one: netsurim9 custodita = clausa, like rS'lmim, amoena), may refer to the mysteries celebrated in natural caves and artificial crypts (on the mysteries of the Ssabians, see Chwolsohn, Die Ssabier u. der Ssabismus, ii. 332 sqq.). But the LXX. and Syriac render it iv rofc GTrrjXaLoi? Koifiwvrai 6V evvirvLd, evidently understanding it to refer to the so-called incubare, iy/coijAao-Oat,; and so Jerome explains it. " In the temples of idols," he says, " where they were accustomed to lie upon the skins of the victims stretched upon the ground, to gather future events from their dreams." The expression ubhann'tsurlm points not so much to open temples, as to inaccessible caves or subterraneous places. Gr. Rawlinson
(MonarcJiies, ii. 269) mentions the discovery of "clay idols in holes below the pavement of palaces." From the next charge, " who eat there the flesh of the swine," we may infer that the Babylonians offered swine in sacrifice, if not as a common thing, yet like the Egyptians and other heathen, and ate their flesh (" the flesh taken from the sacrifice," 2 Mace. vi. 21); whereas among the later Ssabians (Harranians) the swine was not regarded as either edible or fit for sacrifice. On the synecdochical character of the sentence D£y3 Ey* S P1^, see at ch. v. 12a, cf. Jer. xxiv. 2. Knobel's explanation, "pieces" (but it is not ^PJW) " of abominations are their vessels, i.e. those of their Upoo-fcoiria" is a needless innovation. ^33 signifies a stench, putrefaction (Ezek. iv. 14, besar piggul), then in a concrete sense anything corrupt or inedible, a thing to be abhorred according to the laws of food or the law generally (syn. 7iB3? ^DS); and when connected with P*}3 (chethib), which bears the same relation to Pip as crumbs or pieces (from P"i3, to crumble) to broth (from P"}£, to rub off or scald off), it means a decoction, or broth made either of such kinds of flesh or such parts of the body as were forbidden by the law. The context also points to such heathen sacrifices and sacrificial meals as were altogether at variance with the Mosaic law. For the five following words proceed from the mouths of persons who fancy that they have derived a high degree of sanctity either from the mysteries, or from their participation in rites of peculiar sacredness, so that to every one who abstains from such rites, or does not enter so deeply into them as they do themselves, they call out their " odi profanum vulgus et arceo." T<?« 31i?, keep near to thyself, i.e. stay where you are, like the Arabic idhab ileika, go away to thyself, for take thyself off. WBtarUl (according to some MSS. with mercha tifchah), do not push against me (equivalent to nH&rnsfr or 1^TO%, get away, make room; Gen. xix. 9, Isa. xlix. 20), for q'dashtikhd, I am holy to thee, i.e. unapproachable. The verbal suffix is used for the dative, as in ch. xliv. 21 (Ges. § 121, 4), for it never occurred to any of the Jewish expositors (all of whom give sanctus prce te as a gloss) that the Kal qddash was used in a transitive sense, like chdzaq in Jer. xx. 7, as Luther, Calvin, and even Hitzig suppose. Nor is the exclamation the well-meant warning against the communication of a burdensome q'dusshdh, which had to be removed by washing before a man could proceed to the duties of every-day life (such, for example, as ih^ qedusshdh of the man who had touched the flesh of a sin-offering, or been sprinkled with the blood of a sin-offering; Lev. vi. 20, cf. Ezek. xliv. 19, xlvi. 20). It is rather a proud demand to respect the sacro-sanctus, and not to draw down the chastisement of the gods by the want of reverential awe. After this elaborate picture, the men who are so degenerate receive their fitting predicate. They are fuel for the wrath of God, which manifests itself, as it were, in smoking breath. This does not now need for the first time to seize upon them; but they are already in the midst of the fire of wrath, and are burning there in inextinguishable flame.
The justice of God will not rest till it has procured for itself the fullest satisfaction. Vers. 6, 7. " Behold, it is written before me: I will not keep silence without having recompensed, and I will recompense into their bosom. Your offences, and the offences of your fathers together, saith Jehovah, that they have burned incense upon the mountains, and insulted me upon the hills, and I measure their reward first of all into their bosom." Vitringa has been misled by such passages as ch. x. 1, Job xiii. 26, Jer. xxii. 30, in which hdthabh (kittebh) is used to signify a written decree, and understands by khHhubhdh the sentence pronounced by God; but the reference really is to their idolatrous conduct and contemptuous defiance of the laws of God. This is ever before Him, written in indelible characters, waiting for the day of vengeance; for, according to the figurative language of Scripture, there are heavenly books, in which the good and evil works of men are entered. And this agrees with what follows: " I will not be silent, without having first repaid," etc. The accentuation very properly places the tone upon the penultimate of the first shillamtl as being a pure perfect, and upon the last syllable of the second as a perf. consec. EK *3 preceded by a future and followed by a perfect signifies, "but if (without having) first," etc. (ch. lv. 10; Gen. xxxii. 27; Lev. xxii. 6; Ruth iii. 18; cf. Judg. xv. 7). The original train of thought was, " I will not keep silence, for I shall first of all keep silence when," etc. Instead of Tal cheqdm, " upon their bosom," we might have W cheqdm, into their bosom, as in Jer. xxxii. 18, Ps. lxxix. 12. In ver. 7 the keri really has *el instead of *al, whilst in ver. 6 the chethib is *al without any keri (for the figure itself, compare Luke vi. 38, " into your bosom "). The thing to be repaid follows in ver. la; it is not governed, however, by shillamti, as the form of the address clearly shows, but by 'ashallem understood, which may easily be supplied. Whether 'dsher is to be taken in the sense of qui or quod (that), it is hardly possible to decide; but the construction of the sentence favours the latter. Sacrificing "upon mountains and hills" (and, what is omitted here, "under every green tree ") is the well-known standing phrase used to describe the idolatry of the times preceding the captivity (cf. ch. lvii. 7; Hos. iv. 13; Ezek. vi. 13). sTNCi\ points back to v'shillamti in ver. 65, after the object has been more precisely defined. Most of the modern expositors take n:b>N*i DHpya together, in the sense of " their former wages," i.e. the recompense previously deserved by their fathers. But in this case the concluding clause would only affirm, by the side of ver. 7a, that the sins of the fathers would be visited upon them. Moreover, this explanation has not only the accents against it, but also the parallel in Jer. xvi. 18 (see Hitzig), which evidently stands in a reciprocal relation to the passage before us. Consequently rishondh must be an adverb, and the meaning evidently is, that the first thing which Jehovah had to do by virtue of His holiness was to punish the sins of the apostate Israelites; and He would so punish them, that inasmuch as the sins of the children were merely the continuation of the fathers' sins, the punishment would be measured out according to the desert of both together.
As the word rVshondh (first of all) has clearly intimated that the work of the future will not all consist in the execution of penal justice, there is no abruptness in the transition from threatening to promises. Vers. 8, 9. " Thus saith Jehovah, As when the must is found in the cluster, men say, Do not destroy it, for there is a blessing within it, so will I do for the sake of my servants, that I may not destroy the whole. And I will bring forth a seed out of Jacob, and an heir of my mountains out of Judah, and my chosen ones shall inherit it, and my servants shall dwell there." Of the two co-ordinate clauses of the protasis (ver. 8a), the first contains the necessary condition of the second. Ilattlrosh (must, or the juice of the grapes, from ydrash, possibly primarily nothing more than receipt, or the produce of labour) and baeslikol have both of them the article generally found in comparisons (Ges. § 109, Anm. 1); IBM signifies, as in ch. xlv. 24, " men say," with the most general and indefinite subject. As men do not destroy a juicy cluster of grapes, because they would thereby destroy the blessing of God which it contains; so will Jehovah for His servants' sake not utterly destroy Israel, but preserve those who are the clusters in the vineyard (ch. iii. 14, v. 1-7) or upon the vine (Ps. lxxx. 9 sqq.) of Israel. He will not destroy hakkol, the whole without exception; that is to say, keeping to the figure, not " the juice with the skin and stalk," as Knobel and Hahn explain it, but " the particular clusters in which juice is contained, along with the degenerate neglected vineyard or vine, which bears for the most part only sour grapes (ch. v. 4) or tendrils without fruit (cf. ch. xviii. 5). The servants of Jehovah, who resemble these clusters, remain preserved. Jehovah brings out, causes to go forth, calls to the light of day (fcOyin as in ch. liv. 16; here, however, it is by means of sifting: Ezek. xx. 34 sqq.), out of Jacob and Judah, i.e. the people of the two captivities (see ch. xlvi. 3), a seed, a family, that takes possession of His mountains, i.e. His holy mountainland (ch. xiv. 25, cf. Ps. cxxi. 1, and har qodshi, which is used in the same sense in ch. xi. 9, lxv. 25). As " my mountain " is equivalent in sense to the a land of Israel," for which Ezekiel is fond of saying " the mountains of Israel" (e.g. ch. vi. 2, 3), the promise proceeds still further to say, " and my chosen ones will take possession thereof" (viz. of the land, ch. lx. 21, cf. viii. 21). From west to east, i.e. in its whole extent, the land then presents the aspect of prosperous peace. Ver. 10. " And the plain of Sharon becomes a meadow for flocks, and the valley of Achor a resting-place for oxen, for my people that asketh for me? Hasshdron (Sharon) is the plain of rich pasture-land which stretches along the coast of the Mediterranean from Yafo to the neighbourhood of Carmel. 'Emeq rAkhor is a valley which became renowned through the stoning of Achan, in a range of hills running through the plain of Jericho (see Keil on Josh, vii. 24 sqq.). From the one to the other will the wealth in flocks extend, and in the one as well as in the other will that peace prevail which is now enjoyed by the people of Jehovah, who inquired for Him in the time of suffering, and therefore bear this name in truth. The idyllic picture of peace is thoroughly characteristic of Isaiah: see, for example, ch. xxxii. 20; and for rebhets with ndveh, compare ch. xxxv. 7.
The prophecy now turns again to those already indicated and threatened in vers. 1-7. Vers. 11, 12. " And ye, who are enemies to Jehovah, 0 ye that are unmindful of my holy mountain, who prepare a table for Gad, and fill up mixed drink for the goddess of destiny, — / have destined you to the sword, and ye ivill all bow down to the slaughter, because I have called and ye have not replied, I have spoken and ye have not heard; and ye did evil in mine eyes, and ye chose that which I did not like" It may be taken for granted as a thing generally admitted, that ver. 116 refers to two deities, and to the lectisternia (meals of the gods, cf. Jer. vii. 18, li. 44) held in their honour. TO jr6^ is the other side of the ledum sternere, i.e. the spreading of the cushions upon which the images of the gods were placed during such meals of the gods as these. In the passage before us, at any rate, the lectus answering to the shulchdn (like the sella used in the case of the goddesses) is to be taken as a couch for eating, not for sleeping on. In the second clause, therefore, ^DOD *}£>? DWOttm (which is falsely accentuated in our editions with tifchah mercha silluk, instead of mercha tifchah silluk), *pftD Na>d signifies to fill with mixed drink, i.e. with wine mixed with spices, probably oil of spikenard. K?p may be connected not only with the accusative of the vessel filled, but also with that of the thing with which it is filled (e.g. Ex. xxviii. 17). Both names have the article, like?yan. "ran is perfectly clear; if used as an appellative, it would mean u good fortune." The word has this meaning in all the three leading Semitic dialects, and it also occurs in this sense in Gen. xxx. 11, where the chethib is to be read *U2 (LXX. iv T^X0)' The Aramajan definitive is &H3 (not fetti), as the Arabic 'guild evidently shows. The primary word is Tl_3 (Arab, 'gadda), ii>_, signifies that which is appointed, more especially the good fortune appointed. There can be no doubt, therefore, that Gad, the god of good fortune, more especially if the name of the place Baal- Gad is to be explained in tlie same way as Ilaal-Iiammdn, is Baal (Bel) as the god of good fortune. Gecatilia (Mose ha-Cohen) observes, that this is the deified planet Jupiter. This star is called by the Arabs " the greater luck " as being the star of good fortune; and in all probability it is also the rabb-el-bacht (lord of good fortune) worshipped by the Ssabians (Chwolsohn, ii. 30, 32). It is true that it is only from the passage before us that we learn that it was worshipped by the Babylonians; for although H. Rawlinson once thought that he had found the names Gad and Menni in certain Babylonian inscriptions {Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, xii. p. 478), the Babylonian Pantheon in G. Rawlinson's Monarchies contains neither of these names. With this want of corroborative testimony, the fact is worthy of notice, that a Rabbi named ' Vila, who sprang from Babylon, explains the B0"n of the Mishna by tfiTi KD"iy (a sofa dedicated to the god of prosperity, and often left unused) (b. Nedarim 56a; cf. Sanhedrin 20a).1 But if Gad is Jupiter, nothing is more probable than that Meni is Venus; for the planet Yenus is also regarded as a star of prosperity, and is called by the Arabs " the lesser luck." The name Meni in itself, indeed, does not necessarily point to a female deity; for meni from mdndh, if taken as a passive participial noun (like ^ T?> a creature), signifies " that which is apportioned;" or if taken as a modification of the primary form many, like **$j *?*?> *??> and many others, allotment, destination, fate. We have synonyms in the Arabic mana-n and meniye, and the Persian bacht (adopted into the Arabic), which signify the general fate, and from which bagobacht is distinguished as signifying that which is exceptionally allotted by the gods. The existence of a deity of this name meni is also probably confirmed by the occurrence of the per-
1 The foreign formula of incantation given in b. Sabbath 67c?, "HJ 1} •Ofc^m ^K'lN tib p)¥D) (according to the glosses, " 0 Fortune, give good fortune, and be not tardy day and night"), also belongs here; whereas the name of a place not far from Siloah, called Gad-yavan (Gad of Greece), contains some allusion to the mythology of Greece, which we are unable to trace. In the later usage of the language Gad appears to have acquired the general meaning of numen (e.g. b. Chullin 40a; irn fcCM, the mountainspirit); and this helps to explain the fact that in Pehlewi p*T!l signifies majesty in a royal, titular sense (see Vuller's Lex.; and Spiegel in the Jndische Studien, 3, 412).
sonal name ^D13JJ on certain Aramreo-Persian coins of the Aclurmenides,1 with which Fiirst associates the personal name Achiman (see his Lex.), combining \o with Mrjv, and ^D with Mi)vq, as Movers (Phonizier, i. 650) and Knobel have also done. \0 and ^0 would tlien be Semitic forms of these Indo- Germanic names of deities; for Mrjv is Deus Limits, the worship of which in Carrse (Charran) is mentioned by Spartian in ch. vi. of the Life of Caracalla, whilst Strabo (xii. 3, 31, 32) speaks of it as being worshipped in Pontus, Phrygia, and other places; and Mi]vq is Dea Luna (cf. Teveijr) Mdvrj in Plut. qucest. rom. 52, Genita Mana in Plin. h. n. 29, 4, and Lea Mena in Augustine, Civ. 4, 11), which was worshipped, according to Diodorus (hi. 56) and Nonnus (Dionys. v. 70 ss.), in Phoenicia and Africa. The rendering of the LXX. may be quoted in favour of the identity of the latter with ^"0 (erotfid- £bzrre? tco Saijxovup (another reading haipiovi) rpdire^av /cal irXrjpovvres rfj tv^V icepaafia), especially if we compare with this what Macrobius says in Saturn, i. 19, viz. that " according to the Egyptians there are four of the gods which preside over the birth of men, AaipLoov, Tv^n, "Epcos, ' 'AvdyKrj. Of these Daimon is the sun, the author of spirit, of warmth, and of light. Tyclie is the moon, as the goddess through whom all bodies below the moon grow and disappear, and whose ever changing course accompanies the multiform changes of this mortal life."2 In perfect harmony with this is the following passage of Vettius Valens, the astrologer of Antioch, which has been brought to light by Selden in his Syntagma de Diis Syris: KXijpot, t?5? Tv%r}<; koX rod Sai/jLcvos a7)ixatvovaiv (viz. by the signs of nativity) i)\iov re koX aek^ynv. Rosenmliller very properly traces back the Sept. rendering to this Egyptian view, according to which Gad is the sun-god, and M'ni the lunar goddess as the power of fate. Now it is quite true that the passage before us refers to Babylonian deities, and not to Egyptian; at the same time there might be some relation between the two views, just as in other instances ancient Babylonia and Egypt coincide. But there are many objections that may be offered to the combination of "OD (Meni) and M/jvrj: (1) The Babylonian moon-deity was either called Sin, as among the ancient
Shemites generally, or else by other names connected with ITV (VfT) ind chdmar, (2) The moon is called mas in Sanscrit, Zendic rndo, Neo-Pers. mdh (mah); but in the Arian languages we meet with no such names as could be traced to a root man as the expansion of md (to measure), like fit]v (fjbrjvr}), Goth. mena; for the ancient proper names which Movers cites, viz. fApia/iev7]<;, 'Apra/ievr}?, etc., are traceable rather to the Arian manas = fiivos, mens, with which Minerva (Menerva, endowed with mind) is connected. (3) If m'ni were the Semitic form of the name for the moon, we should expect a closer reciprocal relation in the meanings of the words. We therefore subscribe to the view propounded by Gesenius, who adopts the pairing of Jupiter and Venus common among the Arabs, as the two heavenly bodies that preside over the fortunes of men; and understands by Meni Venus, and by Gad Jupiter. There is nothing at variance with this in the fact that 'Ashtoreth (Ishtar, with 'Asherdh) is the name of Venus (the morning star), as we have shown at ch. xiv. 12. M'ni is her special name as the bestower of good fortune and the distributor of fate generally; probably identical with Mandt, one of the three leading deities of the prae-Islamitish Arabs.1 The address proceeds with umdnlthi (and I have measured), which forms an apodosis and contains a play upon the name of Meni, ver. 11 being as it were a protasis indicating the principal reason of their approaching fate. Because they sued for the favour of the two gods of fortune (the Arabs call them es-saddni, " the two fortunes ") and put Jehovah into the shade, Jehovah would assign them to the sword, and they would all have to bow down (5H3 as in ch. x. 4). Another reason is now assigned for this, the address thus completing the circle, viz., because when I called ye did not reply, when I spake ye did not hear (this is expressed in the same paratactic manner as in ch. v. 4, xii. 1, 1. 2), and ye have done, etc.: an explanatory clause, consisting of four members, which is repeated almost word for word in ch. lxvi. 4 (cf. lvi. 4). On the ground of the sin thus referred to agam, the proclamation of punishment is renewed, and the diffei-ent fates awaiting the servants of Jehovah and those by whom He is despised are here announced in five distinct theses and anti-
1 See Krehl, Religion der vorislamischen Araber, p. 78. Sprenger in his Life of Mohammad, 1862, compares the Arabic Manat with *0D.
theses. Vers. 13-16. " Therefore thus saith the Lord, Jehovah: Behold my servants will eat, but ye will hunger; behold my servants will drink, but ye will thirst; behold my servants will rejoice, but ye will be put to shame; behold my servants will exult for deliqht of heart, but ye will cry for anguish of heart, and ye will lament for brokenness of spirit. And ye will leave your name for a curse to my chosen ones, and the Lord, Jehovah, will slay thee; but His servants He will call by another name, so that whoever blesseth himself in the land will bless himself by the God of truthfulness, and whoever swearelh in the land will swear by the God of truthfulness, because the former troubles are forgotten, and because they have vanished from mine eyes." The name Adonai is connected with the name Jehovah for the purpose of affirming that the God of salvation and judgment has the power to carry His promises and threats into execution. Starving, confounded by the salvation they had rejected (^'3fl as in ch. Ixvi. 5), crying and wailing (vy3^ fut. hiph. as in ch. xv. 2, with a double preformative; Ges. § 70, 2 Anm.) for sorrow of heart and crushing of spirit (shebher, rendered very well by the LXX. crvvrpt^i], as in ch. Ixi. 1, crvvTeTpLfAfiivovs), the rebellious ones are left behind in the land of captivity, whilst the servants of Jehovah enjoy the richest blessings from God in the land of promise (ch. lxii. 8, 9). The former, perishing in the land of captivity, leave their name to the latter as shebhudh, i.e. to serve as a formula by which to swear, or rather to execrate or curse (Num v. 2.1), so that men will say, u Jehovah slay thee, as He slew them." This, at any rate, is the meaning of the threat; but the words 'U1 *jlVDm cannot contain the actual formula, not even if we drop the Vav, as Knobel proposes, and change ^TO into VYTQ7; for, in the first place, although in the doxologies a Hebrew was in the habit of saying " b'rukh shemo " (bless his name) instead of yehl shemo bdruhh (his name be blessed), he never went so far as the Arab with use of the perfect (indicative) in such sentences as " may he slay thee," instead of the future (voluntative) WW, unless the perfect shared the optative force of the previous future by virtue of the consecutio temporum. And secondly, the indispensable DH3 or n^xa would be wanting (see Jer. xxix. 22, cf. Gen.
xlvili. 20). We may therefore assume, that the prophet has before his mind the words of this imprecatory formula, though he does not really express them, and that he deduces from it the continuation of the threat. And this explains his passing from the plural to the singular. Their name will become an execration; but Jehovah will call His servants by another name (cf. ch. Ixii. 2), so that henceforth it will be the God of the faithfully fulfilled promise whose name men take into their mouth when they either desire a blessing or wish to give assurance of the truth (Jdthbdrekh b% to bless one's self with any one, or with the name of any one; Ewald, § 133, Anm. 1). No other name of any god is now heard in the land, except this gloriously attested name; for the former troubles, which included the mixed condition of Israel in exile and the persecution of the worshippers of Jehovah by the despisers of Jehovah, are now forgotten, so that they no longer disturb the enjoyment of the present, and are even hidden from the eyes of God, so that all thought of ever renewing them is utterly remote from His mind. This is the connection between ver. 16 and vers. 13-15. *i^ does not mean eo quod here, as in Gen. xxxi. 49 for example, but ita ut9 as in Gen. xiii. 16. What follows is the result of the separation accomplished and the promise fulfilled. For the same reason God is called Elohe 'amen, "the God of Amen," i.e. the God who turns what He promises into Yea and Amen (2 Cor. i. 20). The epithet derived from the confirmatory Amen, which is thus applied to Jehovah, is similar to the expression in Rev. iii. 14, where Jesus is called " the Amen, the faithful and true witness." The explanatory kl (for) is emphatically repeated in *31, as in Gen. xxxiii. 11 and 1 Sam. xix. 4 (compare Job xxxviii. 20). The inhabitants of the land stand in a close and undisturbed relation to the God who has proved Himself to be true to His promises; for all the former evils that followed from the sin have entirely passed away.
The fact that they have thus passed away is now still further explained; the prophet heaping up one kl (for) upon another, as in ch. ix. 3-5. Vers. 17-19. "For behold I create a new heaven and a new earth; and men will not remember the first, nor do they come to any ones mind. No, be ye joyful and exult for ever at that which J create: for behold I turn
Jerusalem into exulting, and her people into joy. And I shall exult over Jerusalem, and be joyous over my people, and the voice of weeping and screaming will be heard in her no moreV The promise here reaches its culminating point, which had already been seen from afar in ch. li. 16. Jehovah creates a new heaven and a new earth, which bind so fast with their glory, and which so thoroughly satisfy all desires, that there is no thought of the former ones, and no one wishes them back again. Most of the commentators, from Jerome to Hahn, suppose the rishonoth in ver. 16 to refer to the former sorrowful times. Calvin says, " The statement of the prophet, that there will be no remembrance of former things, is supposed by some to refer to the heaven and the earth, as if he meant, that henceforth neither the fame nor even the name of either would any more be heard; but I prefer to refer them to the former times." But the correctness of the former explanation is shown by the parallel in Jer. iii. 16, which stands in by no means an accidental relation to this passage, and where it is stated that in the future there will be no ark of the covenant, "neither shall it come to mind, neither shall they remember it," inasmuch as all Jerusalem will be the throne of Jehovah, and not merely the capporeth with its symbolical cherubim. This promise is also a glorious one; but Jeremiah and all the other prophets fall short of the eagle-flight of Isaiah, of whom the same may be said as of John, uvolat avis sine metaV Luther (like Zwingli and Stier) adopts the correct rendering, " that men shall no more remember the former ones (i.e. the old heaven and old earth), nor take it to heart." But 'dldh 'al-lebh signifies to come into the mind, not " to take to heart," and is applied to a thing, the thought of which " ascends " within us, and with which we are inwardly occupied. There is no necessity to take the futures in ver. 176 as commands (Hitzig); for lfc*b"OK V? (^ with munach, as in Yen. 1521, after the Masora to Num. xxxv. 33) fits on quite naturally, even if we take them as simple predictions. Instead of such a possible, though not actual, calling back and wishing back, those who survive the new times are called upon rather to rejoice for ever in that which Jehovah is actually creating, and will have created then. ">$?'«, if not regarded as the accusative-object, is certainly regarded as the object of causality, u in consideration of that which n (cf. ch. xxxi. 6, Gen. iii. 17, Judg. viii. 15), equivalent to, "on account of that which" (seeatch. lxiv. 4, xxxv. 1). The imperatives sisu vegllu are not Words of admonition so much as words of command, and kl gives the reason in this sense: Jehovah makes Jerusalem glldh and her people mdsos (accusative of the predicate, or according to the terminology adopted in Becker's syntax, the " factitive object," Ges. § 139, 2), by making joy its perpetual state, its appointed condition of life both inwardly and outwardly. Nor is it joy on the part of the church only, but on the part of its God as well (see the primary passage in Deut. xxx. 9). When the church thus rejoices in God, and God in the church, so that the light of the two commingle, and each is reflected in the other; then will no sobbing of weeping ones, no sound of lamentation, be heard any more in Jerusalem (see the opposite side as expressed in ch. li. 36).
There will be a different measure then, and a much greater one, for measuring the period of life and grace. Ver. 20. u And there shall no more come thence a suckling of a few days, and an old man who has not lived out all his days; for the youth in it will die as one a hundred years old, and the sinner be smitten with the curse as one a hundred years old" Our editions of the text commence ver. 20 with nWR?, but according to the Masora (see Mas. finalis, p. 23, col. 7), which reckons five n\T~&6l at the commencement of verses, and includes our verse among them, it must read nWl6l| as it is also rendered by the LXX. and Targum. The meaning and connection are not affected by this various reading. Henceforth there will not spring from Jerusalem (or, what hay ah really means, u come into existence;" " thence" misshdm, not " from that time," but locally, as in Hos. ii. 17 and elsewhere, cf. ch. lviii. 12) a suckling (see vol. i. p. 138) of days, i.e. one who has only reached the age of a few days (ydmlm as in Gen. xxiv. 55, etc.), nor an old man who has not filled his days, i.e. has not attained to what is regarded as a rule as the full measure of human life. He who dies as a youth, or is regarded as having died young, will not die before the hundredth year of his life; and the sinner (N^nm with seghol, as in Eccl. viii. 12, ix. 18; Ges. § 75, Anm. 21) upon whom the curse of God falls, and who is overwhelmed by the punishment, will not be swept away before the hundredth year of his life. We cannot maintain with Hofmann (Schriftbeiveis, ii. 2, 567), that it is only in appearance that less is here affirmed than in ch. xxv. 8. The reference there is to the ultimate destruction of the power of death; here it is merely to the limitation of its power.
In the place of the threatened curses of the law in Lev. xxvi. 16 (cf. Deut. xxviii. 30), the very opposite will now receive their fullest realization. Vers. 21-23. " And they will build houses and inhabit them, and plant vineyards and enjoy the fruit thereof. They will not build and another inhabit, nor plant and another enjoy; for like the days of trees are the days of my people, and my chosen ones will consume the work of their hands. They will not weary themselves in vain, nor bring forth for sudden disaster; for they are a family of the blessed of Jehovah, and their offspring are left to tliem" They themselves will enjoy what they have worked for, without some one else stepping in, whether a countryman by violence or inheritance, or a foreigner by plunder or conquest (ch. lxii. 8), to take possession of that which they have built and planted (read ty&\ without dagesh); for the duration of their life will be as great as that of trees (i.e. of oaks, terebinths, and cedars, which live for centuries), and thus they will be able thoroughly to enjoy in their own person what their hands have made. Billdh does net mean merely to use and enjoy, but to use up and consume. Work and generation will be blessed then, and there will be no more disappointed hopes. They will not weary themselves pyjl with a preformative * without that of the root) for failure, nor get children labbehdldh, i.e, for some calamity to fall suddenly upon them and carry them away (Lev. xxvi. 16, cf. Ps. lxxviii. 33). The primary idea of bdhal is either acting, permitting, or bearing, with the characteristic of being let loose, of suddenness, of overthrow, or of throwing into confusion. The LXX. renders it ew /carapav, probably according to the Egypto-Jewish usage, in which behdldh may have signified cursing, like bahle, buhle in the Arabic (see the Appendices). The two clauses of the explanation which follows stand in a reciprocal relation to the two clauses of the previous promise. They are a family of the blessed of God, upon whose labour the Messing of God rests, and their offspring are with them, without being lost to them by premature death. This is the true meaning, as in Job xxi. 8, and not " their offspring with them," i.e. in like manner, as Hitzig supposes.
All prayer will be heard then. Ver. 24. "And it will come to pass: before they call, I will answer; they are still speaking, and I already hear? The will of the church of the new Jerusalem will be so perfectly the will of Jehovah also, that He will hear the slightest emotion of prayer in the heart, the halfuttered prayer, and will at once fulfil it (cf. ch. xxx. 19).
And all around will peace and harmony prevail, even in the animal world itself. Ver. 25. " Wolf and lamb then feed together, and the lion eats chopped straw like the ox, and the serpent — dust is its bread. They ivill neither do harm nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith Jehovah" We have frequently observed within ch. xl.-lxvi. (last of all at ch. lxv. 12, cf. lxvi. 4), how the prophet repeats entire passages from the earlier portion of his prophecies almost word for word. Here he repeats ch. xi. 6-9 with a compendious abridgment. Yer. 256 refers to the animals just as it does there. But whilst this custom of self-repetition favours the unity of authorship, ^ns3 for VnrP = una, which only occurs elsewhere in Ezra and Ecclesiastes (answering to the Chaldee "TJ!^), might be adduced as evidence of the opposite. The only thing that is new in the picture as here reproduced, is what is said of the serpent. This will no longer watch for human life, but will content itself with the food assigned it in Gen. iii. 14. It still continues to wriggle in the dust, but without doing injury to man. The words affirm nothing more than this, although Stier's method of exposition gets more out, or rather puts more in. The assertion of those who regard the prophet speaking here as one later than Isaiah, viz. that ver. 25 is only attached quite loosely to what precedes, is unjust and untrue. The description of the new age closes here, as in ch. xi., with the peace of the world of nature, which stands throughout ch. xl.-lxvi. in the closest reciprocal relation to man, just as it did in ch. i.-xxxix." If we follow Hahn, and change the animals into men by simply allegorizing, we just throw our exposition back to a standpoint that has been long passed by. But to what part of the history of salvation are we to lcok for a place for the fulfilment of such prophecies as these of the state of peace prevailing in nature around the church, except in the millennium? A prophet was certainly no fanatic, so that we could say, these are beautiful dreams. And if, what is certainly true, his prophecies are not intended to be interpreted according to the letter, but according to the spirit of the letter; the letter is the sheath of the spirit, as Luther calls it, and we must not give out as the spirit of the letter what is nothing more than a quid-pro-quo of the letter. The prophet here promises a new age, in which the patriarchal measure of human life will return, in which death will no more break off the life that is just beginning to bloom, and in which the war of man with the animal world will be exchanged for peace without danger. And when is all this to occur? Certainly not in the blessed life beyond the grave, to which it would be both absurd and impossible to refer these promises, since they presuppose a continued mixture of sinners with the righteous, and merely a limitation of the power of death, not its utter destruction. But when then? This question ought to be answered by the anti-millenarians. They throw back the interpretation of prophecy to a stage, in which commentators were in the habit of lowering the concrete substance of the prophecies into mere doctrinal loci communes. They take refuge behind the enigmatical character of the Apocalypse, without acknowledging that what the Apocalypse predicts under the definite form of the millennium is the substance of all prophecy, and that no interpretation of prophecy on sound principles is any longer possible from the standpoint of an orthodox antichiliasm, inasmuch as the antichiliasts twist the word in the mouths of the prophets, and through their perversion of Scripture shake the foundation of all doctrines, every one of which rests upon the simple interpretation of the words of revelation. But one objection may be made to the supposition, that the prophet is here depicting the state of things in the millennium; viz. that this description is preceded by an account of the creation of a new heaven and a new earth. The prophet appears, therefore, to refer to that Jerusalem, which is represented in the Apocalypse as coming down from heaven to earth after the transformation of the globe. But to this it may be replied, that the Old Testament prophet was not yet able to distinguish from one another the things which the author of the Apocalypse separates into distinct periods. From the Old Testament point of view generally, nothing was known of a state of blessedness beyond the grave. Hades lay beyond this present life; and nothing was known of a heaven in which men were blessed. Around the throne of God in heaven there were angels and not men. And, indeed, until the risen Saviour ascended to heaven, heaven itself was not open to men, and therefore there was no heavenly Jerusalem whose descent to earth could be anticipated then. Consequently in the prophecies of the Old Testament the eschatological idea of the new Cosmos does unquestionably coincide with the millennium. It is only in the New Testament that the new creation intervenes as a party-wall between this life and the life beyond; whereas the Old Testament prophecy brings down the new creation itself into the present life, and knows nothing of any Jerusalem of the blessed life to come, as distinct from the new Jerusalem of the millennium. We shall meet with a still further illustration in ch. lxvi. of this Old Testament custom of reducing the things, of the life to come within the limits of this present world.