h ■■ i ( i i CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY GIFT OF Daniel J. Theron CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 3 1924 063 722 023 The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924063722023 CLARK'S FOREIGN THEOLOGICAL LIBRARY. NEW SEKIES. VOL. XLII. VOL. I, EDINBUEGH: T. & T. CLARK, 38 GEORGE STREET 1890. PRINTED BV MORllISON AN'D CIBB, FOR T. & T. CLARK. EDINBURGH. LONDON, ..... H.\MILTON, ADAMS, AND CO. nUBLIX, GEORGE HEBBEET. NEW YORK, . . aCRIBNKR AND WELFOBD, BIBLICAL COMMENTARY THE PROPHECIES OF ISAIAH. FRANZ DELITZSCH, D.D., LBIPZIQ. TRANSLATED FROM THE FOURTM EDITION. mitb an JntroOuction Peofessoe S. E. DEIVEE, D.D., Oxford. VOL. I. EDINBUEGH: T. & T. CLAEK, 38 GEOEQE STEEET. 1890. [This Translation is Copyright, hy arrangement with the Author.'] *. J- 1 OXFOKBER MEISTERN ALTTESTAMENTLICHEE FOESCHUNG T. K. CHEYNE und S. K. DKIVER ALS DANK FUR BEWAHETE LIEB' UND TREUE GEWIDMET. AUTHOR'S PREFACE.' This fourth edition of my Commentary on Isaiah contains the fruit of continued labour since the appearance of the third in 1875, and, after the latter was out of print, a thorough revisal of the whole has been made in preparation for a fourth appearance. To the commentary in the form it has hitherto presented, the objection has been made that it contained too much etymological matter and too many curious details far removed from the proper object of an exegetieal work. The com- plaint was not without foundation, and I have taken care that it cannot be raised against the commentary in its present form, especially since, apart from this consideration, I had thought to make the greatest possible curtailment, and my taste is opposed to unnecessary repetitions. In former editions of my commentaries, however, I always leave so much that is peculiar to each, that they do not quite become antiquated by later ones. The illustrative essays contributed by my friends Fleischer (d. Feb. 10, 1888), Wetzstein, and Von Strauss- Torney are to be found in the second and third editions ; those who consider these contributions of importance may still have access to them, at least in libraries.^ The excursus by Wetzstein on the Gable mountain - range in Batanea (Ps. 1 These papers are those of Victor v. Strauss-Torney, " Can QiJiD, in Isa. xlix. 12, he the Chinese ?" and of Wetzstein, in the second edition, " On Isaiah, chap. xxi. ; " " On the Nahl (^33) and kindred stringed instruments, chap. v. 12 ; " « On nniD3, chap. v. 25 ; " " On flDDS and ■(a-; i^i and matters of agricultural botany generally, chap, xxviii. 25 ; " Vi PREFACE. Ixviii. 16), which was published separately in 1884 as a supplement to the fourth edition of my Comtnentary on tlu Psahns (1883), but which has not yet been appreciated as it deserves, was the last conjoint production which I could obtain from him. In the correction of typographical errors appearing in this edition of my Commentary on Isaiah, I have been somewhat fortunate ; perhaps I may venture to hope that it will be found as correct as could possibly be expected. And yet even this book, after it is finished, will sooner or later, in my eyes, shrink into a very imperfect and insignificant produc- tion ; of one thing only do I think I may be confident, that the spirit by which it is animated comes from the good Spirit that guides along the everlasting way. F. D. Leipzig, August 7, 1889. "On n-lTD and nni, cliap. xxx. 24." There are also, in the third edition, papers, "On mn in Isa. xi. 8, and rmrv^ in Josh. xix. 34;" " ^'^ J'?? ^^ I^*- ^^i- 1> ^lii- 11> and mS3 in xxxiv. 6 and Ixiii. 1." The contents of these essays are much more varied than the titles lead one to expect. PUBLISHER'S NOTE. The translation of chaps, i. to iv., and from page 436 to end of this volume, is by the Eev. James Kennedy, B.D., New College, Edinburgh. The Eev. William Hastie, B.D.i and the Eev. Thomas A. Bickerton, B.D. (Examiners in Theology, Edinburgh University), have translated chaps, v. to XX. and chap. xxi. to page 435 respectively. INTRODUCTORY NOTICE By Peofessoe S. E. DEIVER, D.D., Oxfoed.i The death of Professor Franz Delitzsch, which took place on March 4, 1890, deprived Christian scholarship of one of its most highly gifted and influential representatives. Though known probably to the majority of English students only by his commentaries upon parts of the Old Testament, these writings represent, in fact, but a part of the literary activity of his life, and, except to those who can read between the lines, fail entirely to suggest the wide and varied practical interests to which his energies were largely dedicated. The outward story of his life may be told briefly. He was born at Leipzig, February 23, 1813 ; and, having graduated at the University of his native city in 1835, he became Professor at Eostock in 1846, at Erlangen in 1850, and at Leipzig in 1867, the last-named Professorship being retained by him till his death. From his early student days he devoted himself to the subject of theology, and laid the foundation of his knowledge of Hebrew literature (including especially its post- Biblical development in the Talmud and cognate writings), as well as of Semitic philology generally, under the guidance of Julius Fiirst, editor of the well-known Concordance (1840), and H. L. Fleischer, who was destined in future years to become the acknowledged master of all European Arabic scholars. What may be termed the two leading motives of his life, the desire, viz., to make the Old Testament better known to Christians, and the New Testament to Jews, were first kindled in him by the apparent accident of his meeting in these early years two agents of the London Society for Promoting Christianity among the Jews. His earliest publi- 1 Reprinted from Tlie Expository Times, Jixne 1890. viii INTEODUCTOKY NOTICE. cations, which appeared during the time that he was Prirat- docent at Leipzig, were, however, philological or historical. The first of all was a learned and interesting work on the history of post- Biblical Jewish poetry, Zur Geschichte Jiidischer Poesie, 1836, followed, in 1838, by Wissenschaft,Kunst,Juden- tJnim, Schilderungen und Kritiken, and Jesurun, seu Isagogc in grammcbticam et lexicograpJiiam linguae Hebraeae, in wliich, following his teacher, Fiivst, he developed etymological prin- ciples which were far from sound, and which afterwards, at least in great measure, he abandoned. In 1841 he edited a volume of Anehdota in illustration of the history of mediaeval scholasticism among Jews and Moslems. The next work which deserves to be mentioned is of a different kind — a devotional manual bearing the title of Das Sacrament des wahren Leibes und Blutes Jesu Christi, which attained great popularity in the Lutheran Church, and has passed through several editions (the seventh in 1886). In 1842 there appeared a Dissertation on the life and age of Habakkuk, which was followed in 1843 by the first of his exegetical works, consisting of an elaborate philological commentary on the same prophet — part of a series of commentaries which was projected by him at this time in conjunction with his friend, C. P. Caspari, but of which the only other volume that was completed was the one on Obadiah (by Caspari). A treatise on Bie Biblischprophetische Theologie, published in 1845, closes the list of works belonging to the years during which he was Privafdocent at Leipzig. Not much of importance was published by Delitzsch during the Eostock period (1846-50); he was probably at this time engaged in preparing lectures, and also in amassing that store of materials which was to be utilized more fully in future years. The seventeen years of his Erlangen Professorship were more prolific. 1851 saw Das Hohelied untersuclit und ausgelegt ; 1852, the first edition of his Genesis — interesting from the fact that he already clearly recognised the composite structure of the book ; 1855, his System of Biblical Psychology, remarkable for original but difficult thought and subtle specu- lations ; 1857, a Commentary on the Epistle to the Hebrews, to which Bishop Westcott, in his recent edition of the same epistle, acknowledges gratefully his obligations ; 185 9-6 0, the INTKODUCTORY NOTICE. ix first edition of a Commentary on the Psalms; 1861-62, a monograph, entitled, Handschriftliche Funde (notices of the textual criticism of the Apocalypse, and an account of the re-discovery by himself of the famous Codex EeucUini, — a MS. of A.D. 1105 containing the Hebrew Text, with Targum, of the prophets, — which had been used by Erasmus, but had since been lost); 1864 and 1866, the first editions of his Commentaries on Job and Isaiah respectively (in the series edited by himself and C. F. Keil conjointly).- The Erlangen period was closed by a second edition of the Psalms (1867 — incorporated now in the series edited with Keil), and the two instructive descriptive sketches of life in the time of Christ, entitled, Jesus and Sillel (directed against Eenan and the eminent Jewish writer Abraham Geiger), and Artizan Life in the time of Jesus. The literary activity of the last period of his life, the twenty-three years passed by him in his Professorship at Leipzig, shows even greater versatility than that of his earlier years. His inaugural lecture is a study on Physiology and Music in their relation to Grammar, especially Hebrew Grammar. The studies on the age of Christ, just mentioned, were followed before long by others of a similar nature, viz. A Day in GaperrMum (graphically written and learned), Sehet welch ein Mensch ! and Jos6 and Benjamin, a tale of Jerusalem in the time of the Herods. In 1869 he published his System der Christlichen Apologetilc, in 1873 and 1875 Commentaries, likewise in the series edited with Keil, on Proverbs, and on the Song of Songs and Ecclesiastes, respectively. In 1871, 1878, and 1886 there appeared three monographs, fiill of minute and, interesting researches, entitled, Studies on the Origin of the Complutensian Polyglott ; in 1874, in honour of his former teacher and present colleague, Fleischer, Jicdisch- Ardbisehe Poesien aus Vormuhammedischer Zeit ; Ein Speci- men aus Fleischer's Schule als Beitrag zur Feier seines silbernen Jubildums ; in 1885 a short Biblical study, X'er Messias als Versohner ; in 1889 another, Sind die Juden wirklich das auserwahlte Volk ? The publication of Wellhausen's Gesehichte Israels in 1878 stirred him deeply: he was alternately pained by the boldness with which it treated sacred things and impressed by its brilliancy and the frequent cogency of its argument. X INTEOLUCTOKY NOTICH. The immediate result was the series of twelve papers, called Pentateuch-Jcritische Siudien in the Zeitschrift filr KircUiehe Wissemchaft und Kirchliclies Zeben for 1880. In these papers Delitzsch discusses critically certain prominent questions (such as the laws respecting the Passover, the Tabernacle, Deuteronomy, the " Law of Holiness ") on which Wellhausen's conception of the history of Israel turns, and, while fre- quently repudiating particular points in Wellhausen's argu- ment, recognises in his conclusions a large element of truth. Six other papers on cognate topics followed in the same periodical in 1882. About this time also two courses of his lectures were published in English from notes taken by one of his pupils — Messianic Prophecies and The Old Testament History of Redemption (1880, 1881). Meanwhile he had been busy in the preparation of new and improved editions of many of his commentaries. Thus the fourth edition of his Genesis appeared in 1872, the fifth, incorporating the results to which his recent critical studies had led him, under the title Ein neuer Commentar uber die Genesis, in 1887 ; Job reached a second edition in 1876, the Psalms a fourth edition in 1883, Isaiah a fourth edition in 1889. In 1888 a number of discourses and articles were reprinted by him in a volume called Iris ; Farienstudien und Bhcmenstiicke ; here he gives freer scope than usual to his imagination, and treats a variety of topics half playfully, half in earnest, with inimit- able ease and grace. Professor Delitzsch's last work was Messianische Weissagungen in Gcschichtlicher Folge, the preface to which is dated only six days before his death. In this volume, which contains his lectures on Messianic prophecy in the form in which they were last delivered by him in 1887, his aim, he tells us, was to state the results of his lifelong study — " eine Spiitlingsgarbe aus alter und neuer Frucht " — in a clear, compendious form, as a last bequest to those engaged in missionary work. One department of Delitzsch's literary labours remains still to be noticed. As remarked above, it was a guiding aim of his life to make the New Testament better known to Jews. This first bore fruit in the missionary periodical called Saat auf Hoffnung, — " Seed in hope," — which was edited by him- self from 1863, and to which he was a frequent contributor. INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. xi In 1870 it assumed a still more practical shape iii au edition of the Epistle to the Eomans in Hebrew, accompanied by a most interesting introduction, containing an account and criticism of existing translations of the New Testament into Hebrew, and valuable illustrations of the thought and phrase- ology of the apostle from Eabbinical sources. He did not, however, rest here. A series of Tcdmudische Studien, chiefly on linguistic points connected with the New Testament, which ulti- mately extended to seventeen papers, had already been begun by him in the Zeitschrift fur die gesammte Zutheriscke Theo- logie lind Kirclie (1854-77);' and in 1876-88 these were followed in the same periodical by another series of papers, Horae Hehraicae et Talmudicae, supplementary to Lightfoot and Schoettgen, on the Hebrew equivalents of various New Testament expressions. These were, no doubt, " chips " from the great work on which he was at this time busily engaged ; for the desire of his heart, a new Hebrew version of the entire New Testament, was now on the point of being realized, the British and Foreign Bible Society having en- trusted him with the revision of the version published by them. This revision was completed in 1877. The improve- ments which it contained were very numerous ; nevertheless, it was capable of more ; and these, due partly to himself, partly derived from the criticisms and suggestions of other scholars (which Delitzsch always generously welcomed), were incor- porated by him in the editions which followed (the 9 th, in 1889). It was in consequence of some suggestions tendered by him for this purpose that the present writer first made the acquaintance of Professor Delitzsch, and began a literary correspondence with him, which was continued at intervals to the period of his last illness. An interesting account of Professor Delitzsch's labours in connection with this subject has been written by himself in English in a pamphlet called The Hebrew New Testament of the British and Foreign Bible Society (Leipzig 1883). In its successive editions Delitzsch's Hebrew New Testament has enjoyed a very large circulation, partly among Christian scholars, on account of the exegetical interest attaching to it, and partly among Jews, for many of ^ See the subjects and dates in The Hebrew New Testament of the British and Foreign Bible Society, p. 35 f. xii INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. whom the primary documents of Christianity, set forth in their own language, have been found to possess a peculiar attractiveness. During the later years of his life, Delitzsch spent much time in the successive revisions of this work, and was unwearying in the effort to make it correspond more completely with the ideal which he had set himself.^ At the time of his death he had nearly completed his preparations for a tenth edition, which was to include such extensive im- provements as to entitle it to be termed, in a certain sense, a " new " translation.^ The translation, even in the editions which have already appeared, shows great scholarship and accuracy, and every page evinces the care that has been bestowed upon it. Such is the record, though even so not told quite fully ,^ of Professor Delitzsch's wonderfully busy literary life. It can afford no cause for surprise that one who knew him well, and who found him working whilst lying propped up in bed durin" his last illness, should have remarked that he had never known a man who made uniformly such a careful use of his time. His nature was a richly-gifted one ; and he had learnt early how to apply to the best advantage the talents entrusted to his charge. And yet he was no mere student of books. He had a singularly warm and sympathetic dis- position ; he was in the habit of meeting his pupils informally 1 See, most recently, his short papers in the Expositor for February, April, and October 1889 ; twelve others, written by him during his last illness, and published in the Theologisches Literaturblatt, 1889, Nos. 45-52, 1890, Nos. 1 and 2 ; and Saat auf Hoffnung, February 1890, pp. 71-74. - The first of those in the Expositor is of importance as evidence of the friendly spirit in which Delitzsch and Salkinson, the author of another modern Hebrew version of the New Testament, which has sometimes been placed in rivalry with Delitzsch's, regarded personally each other's work. On the characteristics of these two Hebrew New Testaments, the writer may be permitted to refer to an article by himself in the Expositor for April 1886 (though it should be stated that some of the grammatical faults there pointed out in Salkinson's translation have since been corrected). 2 See Saat auf Hoffnung, February 1890, pp. 67-70, 74. ' For some minor writings, as well as several other articles in periodi- cals, and his contributions to Herzog's Real-Encyclopadie (Daniel, Heilig- keit Gottes, Hiob, etc. ; see the list in vol. xviii. p. 725 of the second edition), have, of necessity, been left unnoticed. INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. xiii in both social and religious gatherings ; and he loved to make, and succeeded in making, many friends. His personality was an impressive one, and exerted a wonderful charm upon all who came within reach of its influence. He loved England ; and there are many both in this country and in America who still retain the vivid memory of kindnesses received from him in past years, while they were students at Leipzig, and who have heard with sorrow the tidings of his death. The present writer never had the privilege of meeting him personally, but he has received from him many most genial and friendly letters, besides experiencing in other ways tokens of his re- gard. The depth and reality of his convictions are attested by many passages of his writings. His personal religion was devout and sincere. Mission work, especially among the Jews, interested him warmly ; he was much attracted by the movement among the Jews of South Eussia in the direction of Christianity, headed by Joseph Eabinowitzsch, and published several brochures illustrating its principles and tendencies. Of his pamphlet, Ernste Fragen an die Gebildeten jiidischer Beligion, more than 4000 copies were disposed of in three months. The anti-Semitic agitation which broke out in Germany a few years ago deeply vexed him ; the injustice of the charges and insinuations brought against the Jews by a Eoman Catholic writer in 1881 he exposed in a pamphlet, entitled, Bohling's Talmudjude leleucJitet, which was followed by other publications having a similar aim. As a thinker and author, though he is apt to be less suc- cessful in his treatment of abstract questions, and sometimes does not sufficiently hold his imagination in check, Delitzsch is forcible, original, and suggestive. His literary style is altogether superior to what those who know it only through the medium of translations would suppose to be the case. His commentaries and critical writings are distinguished not less on account of the warm religious feeling which breathes in them than for the exact and comprehensive scholarship which they display. Thoroughness is the mark of all his works. His commentaries, from their exegetical complete- ness, take rank with the best that Germany has produced. He brings out of his abundantly furnished treasury things new and old. Among Christian scholars his knowledge of xiv INTRODUCTOKY NOTICE. Jewish literature was unsurpassed. Jewish views — though these, it is true, are often only of interest as curiosities — ^are noticed in his commentaries more fully than in those of any other modern scholar. In difficult and controverted passages, the interpretations adopted by different authorities, from the earliest times, are compactly stated. The successive editions of his commentaries invariably bear witness to the minute and conscientious labour bestowed upon them. It is not the least valuable of their characteristics that they incorporate, or contain references to, the latest notices or researches whicli have any important bearing upon the text. History, philo- logy, criticism, travel, archaeology, are equally laid under con- tribution by the keen-eyed author. One never turns to any of his commentaries without finding in it the best information available at the time when it was written. His exegesis, if occasionally tinged with mysticism, is, as a rule, thoroughly sound and trustworthy, attention being paid both to the mean- ing and construction of individual words, and also to the connection of thought in a passage as a whole. The least satisfactory of his commentaries is that on the Song of Songs, the view taken by him of the poem as a whole obliging him in many cases to adopt strained interpretations of the text. Delitzsch appreciated scholarly feeling and insight in others, and acknowledges gracefully (in the Preface to the second edition of JoV) his indebtedness to the exegetical acumen of that master of modern Hebraists, Ferdinand Hitzig. In the matter of etymologies, however, Delitzsch never entirely dis- owned the principles which he had imbibed from Fiirst ; and hence, even to the last, he sometimes advocated derivations and connections between words, which are dependent upon questionable philological theories, and cannot safely be accepted. Critically, Delitzsch was open-minded ; and with praise- worthy love of truth, when the facts were brought home to him, did not shrink from frankly admitting them, and modi- fying, as circumstances required, the theories by which he had previously been satisfied. As was remarked above, he had accepted from the beginning, at least in its main features, the critical analysis of Genesis ; and in the earlier editions of his Commentary on Isaiah he had avowed that not all the argu- ments used by rationalists were themselves rationalistic. But INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. XV as late as 1872 he still taught that the Pentateuch, as we have it, was virtually a product of the Mosaic age. A closer study of the siibject, however, which he was led to undertake by the appearance of Wellhausen's History, convinced him that this view was not tenable; and in the papers noticed above, written by him in 1880-1882 (the substance of which is stated in a condensed form in the Introduction to his New Commentary on Genesis), he embraced the critical view of the structure of the entire Hexateuch, treating Deuteronomy as being, in form, the work of a prophet of the age of Hezekiah, and allowing that the ceremonial law was not probably cast into its present shape until a later date still. While accept- ing these conclusions, however, he holds rightly that each of the main Pentateuchal codes embodies elements of much greater antiquity than itself, and rests ultimately upon a genuine Mosaic basis. The importance of this change of position on Delitzsch's part is twofold : it is, firstly, a signi- ficant indication of the cogency of the grounds upon which the critical view of the structure of the Old Testament rests ; and, secondly, it is evidence of what some have been disposed to doubt, viz. that critical conclusions, properly limited and qualified, are perfectly consistent with a firm and sincere belief in the reality of the revelation contained in the Old Testament. In the matter of the authorship of the Psalms, though there are signs in his last edition that he no longer upheld so strenuously as before the authority of the titles, he did not make the concessions to criticism which might per- haps have been expected of him. In the case of the Book of Isaiah, the edition of 1889 — which, by what was felt by both to be a high compliment, was dedicated conjointly to Professor Cheyne and the writer of this notice — is accommo- dated throughout to the view of the origin and structure of the book generally accepted by modern scholars. Such is a sketch, only too inadequate and imperfect, of Franz Delitzsch's life and work. He has left a noble example of talents consecrated to the highest ends. May his devotion to learning, his keenness in the pursuit of truth, his earnest- ness of purpose, his warm and reverent Christian spirit, find many imitators ! S. E. DRIVER. INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPHETICG-PREDICTIVE BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. In the Canon of the Old Testament the prophetico-historical are followed by the prophetico-predictive books. Both to- gether, under the name of C^*^?^, form the middle of the three divisions in the collection, — the first, in accordance with their position, being designated the " Former Prophets " (CS'^an D''yB'K"in), while the second are named the " Later Prophets " (D'Jhnxn D'xuan). in the Masora this middle division is sometimes called 5 in the same verse "X., TTYiV Num. xxix. 35 (and elsewhere also, but not with the Jehovist) ; mDP in the same verse ■Xj Lev. ii. 2, ix. 16, v. 12, vi. 8, |n3n TDpni (viz. the matK)- -^nd is not the altar in heaven, vi. 6, the antitype of the n3TD mDpn in Ex. XXX. 27, etc. ? = This view has been maintained, e.g., hy B. Anger, Geschuhte der messianischen Idee (edited by Max Krenkel, 1873), p. 9. INTEODUCTION. 3 of Kings" to which the Chronicler (2 Chron. xxiv. 27) refers under the title D'aPsn isp ^ym, a collection bearing on the history of Israel, to which he had appended, as the concluding portion, the history of the time of the Eestoration, — is no- where called a " prophet " (K'??), and, in fact, he was not one. The Chronicler also — who, besides the Books of Samuel and of Kings, both of which have been arbitrarily divided into two parts, had also before him that work of Ezra as his main source of authority, and thence produced the historical com- pendium lying before us, the conclusion of which was made up of the memorabilia of Ezra (now, however, in separate form as the Book of Ezra) — makes no claim to be a prophet. Nehemiah, too, — from whose memorabilia our Book of Nehemiah is an extract, arranged in the same fashion as the Book of Ezra, — was not a prophet, but a Tirshatha, i.e. a provincial governor under the king of Persia. The Book of Esther, however, through its relegation of the religious element to the background, is as far as possible removed from the prophetic style of writing history ; from the latter, indeed, it differs as characteristically as the Feast of Purim, the Jewish Carnival, differs from the Passover, the Israelitish Christmas. But it must seem strange that the Book of Euth stands among the Hagiographa. This little work so closely resembles in character the closing portion of the Book of Judges (chaps, xvii.— xxi.) that it might have been placed between Judges and Samuel, and probably did actually stand there originally ; only for liturgical reasons has it been placed beside the so- dalled five Megilloth (festival rolls), which succeed one another in accordance with the festival calendar of the ecclesiastical year ; for the Book of Canticles forms the lesson read on the eighth day of the Feast of Passover, Euth is read on the second day of the Feast of Weeks (Pentecost), Kinoth (Lamentations) on the ninth of the month Abib, Koheleth (Ecclesiastes) on the third day of the Feast of Tabernacles, while Esther is read in the Feast of Purim, which falls in the middle of Adar. This is also the simplest answer to the question why the Lamentations of Jeremiah are not appended to the collection of Jeremiah's prophecies. The Psalms, however, — though David may be called a prophet (Acts ii. 30), and Asaph is named "the seer" (nrhriY — stand first among the Hagio- 4 ISAIAH. grapha, inasmuch as they do not belong to the literature of prophecy (nKHj), but of that of sacred lyric poetry (n'ts- mn"). Their prophetic contents are entirely lyric in their origin, whereas the lyric contents of the Lamentations through- out presuppose the official position and public announcements of Jeremiah as a prophet. Among the canonical books of the prophets (D''N''33) are found only the writings of those who, in virtue of special gifts and calling, were commissioned publicly — whether by word of mouth or by writing — to pro- claim the word of God ; and this they did freely, not being fettered, like the priests, by legal forms. For, though the name ^^'?J denotes one who announces, publishes, proclaims, i.e. (as we must further conceive of him) one who speaks as tlie organ (na, "mouth," Ex. iv. 15 f.; Jer. xv. 19) of God; and though the earliest application of the term (see Gen. xx. 7 ; of. xviii. 17—19 ; Ps. cv. 15), which is revived in the writings of the Chronicler, is far wider than the later ; yet here, in designat- ing the middle division of the Canon of the Old Testament, the word is certainly not so restricted as in Amos vii. 14, where it indicates one who, having gone through a school of the prophets, or at least having been educated through inter- course with prophets, had wholly devoted himself through life to prophetic teaching. It has, however, a specific sense that has been incorporated into the organism of the theocratic life : here it is the designation of one who comes forward, on the basis of a divine vocation and divine revelations, as a public teacher, and who thus professes not merely the gift of predic- tion, but also by preaching and writing exercises the office of a prophet, — an office which, at least on Ephraimitish soil, had further received a distinct and characteristic impress through the institution of the schools of the prophets. This explains the fact that the Book of Daniel could not find a place among the d''N''33. For Daniel was not a prophet in this sense : he received and became the medium of divine revela- tions, but he was not a divinely commissioned public teacher like Nathan and Gad, Ezekiel and Zechariah. As remarked by Julius Africanus (in his letter to Origen concernin inrs It is thus because of a fundamental distinction between literary productions of a prophetic character properly so called, and those which are not prophetic in the same strict sense, — a distinction that holds alike in the domain of history and in that of prediction, — that all the books of historical and pre- dictive content, which stand among the Hagiographa (D'aina, which the grandson of Sirach renders by the expressions to, aWa iraTpia jSt/SXta and to, Twnra t&v ^i^Xuov), have been excluded from the middle division of the Old Testament Canon entitled n''N''33. Distinction was made between the historical books from Joshua to Kings, and the predictive books from Isaiah to Malachi, as works of men who exercised the prophetical office, and thus as works of a prophetic character ; and such books, on the other hand, as Chronicles and Daniel, which, though recognised as having been written under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, were not written on the occasion of a call to make prophetic announcements through speech and writing, and did not thus originate from true prophetic inspiration. The two different styles of writing history are also really unmistakable. Each of them has its own peculiar history. The non-prophetic — considering its history and remains — we would call the national or annalistic. It is evidently quite possible that a prophetic historical work like the Books of Kings and an annalistic work like the Books of Chronicles, may have borrowed certain elements from the other historical style ; but when once the distinguishing features of the two styles have been discerned, those elements which are foreign to the peculiar nature of each work, and which have merely been utilized for carrying out its design, nearly always admit of being made out with certainty. The oldest type of non-prophetical historic composition is found in the priestly-Elohistic style of writing in the, Penta- teuch, as distinguished from the Jehovistic-Deuteronomic style. These two styles are continued in the Book of Joshua, and this, too, in such a way that, generally speaSing, the latter appears in those portions which narrate the history of the 6 ISAIAH. conquest, while the former occurs in those sections which describe the division and apportionment of the land. The Book of Judges, at the very beginning, which holds up the history of the judges as a mirror in which one may see and learn of God's dealing in salvation, bears the impress of a pro- phetic historical production ; while the concluding portion, like the Book of Euth, deals with Bethlehemitish stories, which point to the Davidic kingdom, the promised kingdom which formed the centre of prophecy. And though the main portion of the book is founded upon oral and even written forms of the stories regarding the judges, there are also introduced extracts from a more complete work, in which the prophetic peficil of a man like Samuel had combined into an organic whole the accounts of the judges, not merely down to the times of Samson, but even to the complete overthrow of the Philistine oppression. That the Books of Samuel are a pro- phetico-historical work is expressly attested by the Chronicler in a passage which refers to the main body of these books : in those pieces, however, which record the encounters with the four Philistine children of the giants, 2 Sam. xxi. 15 S. (= 1 Chron. xx. 4 ff.), and those which tell of David's heroes (Dn'3J) who stood nearest to him, 1 Sam. xxiii. 8 ff. (= 1 Chron. xi. 11 ff.), they contain at least two remnants of national or popular historical composition, which delights in the repetition of the same words at the beginning and the end, after the manner of a refrain, and touches on the domain of an epic or national ode, reminding us, as Eisenlohr has fitly said, of the legend of Eoland and Artus, and the Spanish Cid. More of such remains are found in the Chronicles, as the list of those who joined David during the time of persecution by Saul, 1 Chron. xii. 1-22, beginning with the words : " Mio these are they who came to David at Ziklag, while he was still hard pressed hy Saiil the son of Kish ; and they belong to the heroes who are ready to help in ivar, armed with hews, with the right hand and the left using stones and arrows by means of the bow." Some of these pieces may have fallen into the hands of the later historians separately, and may have been incorporated without any change ; but, so far as they are tabulated, the Chronicler leaves us in no doubt regarding their main source. After giving a census of the Levites from the age of thirty INTEODUCTION. 7 years and upwards,' in 1 Chron. xxiii. 2-2 4a, he adds in ver. 24& and other verses following, in a sketchy manner, that David, considering afterwards that the heavy work of former days had now ceased, reduced to twenty the age at which service should begin ; for " in the last words of David pn ''^3'i '2''?i"'!]i?'7) ihe descendants of Levi are numhered from the age of twenty." He here refers to the last part of the history of David's life in the " book of the Kings of Israel " C^^o "iDD '??"!?".) which lay before him ; and we learn from 1 Chron. xxvii. 24, regarding the other work from which such lists had been transferred into this his leading source. There, after giving the list of the princes of Israel, he remarks concerning a general census that David had intended to make, " Jodb, the son of Zeruiah, began to count, iut he did not finish ; and there arose because of this an outburst of wrath upon Israel, and this numbering was not put into the numbering (-iaDD3, but read 1303, ' into the book ') of the Chronicles (D''D'n nan) of David." Hence the Annals or Chronicles of David contained such tables, which bore the character of national historic writing ; and from these Annals they were transferred into the large Book of Kings lying before the Chronicler. These official annals began with David. The kingship of Saul rose into little more than a military supremacy ; and the kingdom, as reunited under him, did not develop beyond the first stages of a military constitution. Under David, however, king and people entered into a mutual relationship of the most extensive kind, and the thorough organization of the kingdom was necessarily followed by the multiplication of public servants of various kinds and degrees. We see David, as supreme head of the kingdom in all respects, even in matters of religion, acting on his official supremacy; and we meet with several entirely new offices instituted by him. Among these was the post of the I'^tD, i.e. " recorder," or, as the LXX. often designatively renders the word, viTO(iV7}naT6- jpacpoi, or (as in 2 Sam. viii. 16) o eVi twv vTrofivijfiaTwv (Jerome, in genuine Eoman fashion, " a commentariis "). The Targums similarly render «,'n,3T^5? sapo, "the officer over the memorabilia " (= ^''jnan "lao bv, over the annals, 2 Chron. xxxiv. 8 ; cf. Ezra iv. 15 ; Esth. vi. 1). The T'DTD had to keep the national annals, and his office was different 3 ISAIAH. from that of the "isiD, or chancellor. The naiD had to prepare the public documents ; the •\''2m had to preserve them, and to incorporate them in the connected history of the nation. That it was David who instituted the office of national annalist in Israel is proved by the fact that references to the annals begin with the Chronicles (d'om nan) of David, 1 Chron. xxvii. 24, and are afterwards continued in the " Book of the Chronicles of Solomon " (ncb'i^ nai nao, which is an abbreviation from nD^tylj D'D'n ''-i3T isd), 1 Kings xi. 41. Thereafter, references to them are carried on in Judah to the end of Jehoiakim's reign, and in Israel to the end of the reign of Pekah. Under David, and also under Solomon, the office of national annalist was filled by Jehoshaphat, the son of Ahilud. The fact that, apart from the annals of David and those of Solomon, nothing but the annals of the kings of Judah and those of the kings of Israel are ever cited,is easily and simply explained. When we view the national annals as a whole, they naturally divide themselves into four parts : the first two, the annals of David and of Solomon, set forth the history of the still united kingdom; while the last two, the annals of the kings of Judah and of Israel, presented the history of the nation as divided. The original state archives doubtless perished in the flames when Jerusalem was burnt by the Chaldeans. Copies made from these documents, however, were preserved ; and the histories of the reigns of David and Solomon in the historical books which have been handed down to us, particularly rich as they are in annalistic material, show that diligence in copying and distributing was specially directed to the annals of David and of Solomon, and that these probably were circulated separately, like single decades of Livy. Pdchard Simon thought the icrivains publics were prophets, and in more recent times also the annals have occasionally been regarded as prophetic historical compositions. I. Appeal is made to the statements of the Chronicler regarding prophetic materials in the work which formed his main source, the great Book of Kings; and it is assumed that this great Boole of Kings contained the combined annals of the kings of Judah and of Israel. But {a) the Chronicler cites his chief source under various designations, as a Book of the Kincrs, once INTKODUCTION, 9 (2 Chron. xxxiii. 8) as ''"i.^'n (i,e. res gestae, or his(orice) of the kings of Israel, but never as the annals of the kings of Judah or Israel ; he even designates it once as isp snip ■ Dopsn, commentarius libri regum, and thus, as an explanation and elaboration of our canonical Book of Kings, or — what we leave undecided — of an older Book of Kings altogether. (h) In this Midrash there were, of course, inserted numerous and extensive pieces of a prophetico-historical character, for the purpose of illustrating the history of the kings ; but the Chronicler expressly states, on several occasions, that these were incorporated materials (2 Chron. xx. 34, xxxii. 32). Among tlie documents which were taken into the annals, there must also have been pieces of a prophetic character, and not merely those referring to priestly and Levitical matters, military affairs, and such like ; but it would be the greatest literary blunder to imagine that such pieces as the histories of Elijah and Elisha, which are plainly of Ephraimitish and prophetic origin, have been taken from the annals, especially because Joram of Israel, during whose reign Elisha flourished, is the' only monarch of the northern kingdom in whose case there is no reference to the annals. The character of the documents which were chiefly utilized in the annals, and incorporated into the connected history, may be perceived from an instance found in 2 Chron. XXXV. 4, where the arrangement of the Levites into classes is referred to the " writing of David " (iw ^ns) and the " writing of Solomon " (nb^B' ^^?P), which passed for royal writings, either because they were drawn up by order of the king, and confirmed by him, or because records actually written by the king's own hand formed tlie basis of the sections in the annals (cf. 1 Chron. xxviii. 11-19). When we further bear in mind that the accounts given by the Chronicler of the arrangements made by David regarding the priests and the Levites, point to the annals as the original source, we have — at least in 2 Chron. xxxv. 4 — a confirma- tion of the governmental and (so to speak) royal character of these annals. II. A second reason for regarding the annals as prophetic historical works is the consideration that otherwise, especially in the kingdom of Israel, they could not have been written in 10 ISAIAH. the theocratic spirit. But (a) the official or state origin of the work is implied in the very fact that they end just where the work of a prophetic historiographer would properly have begun. For, of references to the annals in our Book of Kings, there are fourteen (counting from Eehoboam and Jeroboam) in the history of the kings of Judah (references being wanting only in the cases of Ahaziah, Amaziah, and Jehoahaz), and seventeen in the history of the kings of Israel (the case of Joram being the only one in which no reference is given) ; in neither line do the annals come down to the last monarch in the two kingdoms, but only to Jehoiakim and Pekah, from which we must infer that the writing of the national annals ceased with the approaching fall of the two kingdoms. (5) When we look more closely at the thirty - one references, we find that sixteen of these merely state the rest of the acts of the king mentioned are written in the annals: 1 Kings xiv. 29 ; 2 Kings viii. 23, xii. 20, XV. 6, 36, xvi. 19, xxi. 25, xxiii. 28, xxiv. 5; 1 Kings XV. 31, xvi. 14; 2 Kings i. 18, xv. 11, 21, 26, 31. In the case of four Israelitish kings, it is merely stated further that their n^i2|i (heroism, i.e. their brave conduct in war) is described in the annals, 1 Kings xvi. 5, 27 ; 2 Kings X. 34, xiii. 8. More definite statements, however, regarding what was to be read in the annals, are found in the case of Abijam, whose war with Jeroboam was there described, 1 Kings XV. 7 ; in the case of Asa, xv. 23, all whose bravery, and all that he did, and all the cities that he built, being tliere related ; in the case of Jehoshaphat, xxii. 46, where reference is made to the heroic deeds that he performed, and the kind of wars that he carried on ; in the case of Hezekiah, 2 Kings XX. 20, where mention is made of all his heroism, and how he made the pool and the aqueduct, and brought the water into the city; in the case of Manasseh, xi. 17, all that he did, and the sin whereby he sinned ; in the case of Jeroboam, 1 Kings xiv. 19, what kind of wars he carried on, and how he ruled; in the case of Zimri, xvi. 20, his conspiracy that he formed; in the case of Ahab, xxii. 39, all that he did, and the ivory house that he constructed, and the cities that he built ; in the case of Joash, 2 Kings xiii. 12, xiv. 15, his heroism, how he warred with Amaziah, INTEODUCTION. 1 1 king of Judah; in the case of Jeroboam, 2 Kings xiv. 28, his bravery, how he warred, and how he recovered Damascus and Hamath, that belonged to Judah, for Israel ; in the case of Shallum, xv. 15, his conspiracy which he formed. These references furnish plain proof that this annalistic history was not prophetico-pragmatical in its character. It recorded out- ward events, it had its roots in the popular mind and its sphere of action in the national life and institutions ; com- pared with the prophetic history, id was more secular than sacred, more a hisbory of the people than a history of redemption. The numerous references of the Chronicler to historical writings by prophetic authors show the constant literary activity in the field of history which was displayed by the prophets generally, after the time of Samuel, with whom, properly speaking, begins the era of the prophets in Israel as a nation settled and constituted under the law (Acts iii. 24). That writer, at the close of the history of David, refers (1 Chron. xxix. 29) to the words of Q"}}"^) Samuel the seer (nKhn), of Nathan the prophet (K"??!!), and of Gad the seer (nrhn); at the end of the history of Solomon (2 Chron. ix. 29) to the words of O'np'n) the prophecy of (nsup) Ahijah the Shilonite, and the visions of (nirn) Jedi (or Jedo) the seer; in the case of Eehoboam (2 Chron. xii. 15), to the words of Shemaiah the prophet and of Iddo the seer ; in the case of Abijah (2 Chron. xiii. 22), to the commentary of (B'lIP) the prophet Iddo; in the case of Jehoshaphat (2 Chron. XX. 24), to the words of Jehu the son of Hanani, which were included in the Book of the Kings of Israel ; in the case of Uzziah (2 Chron. xxvi. 22), to a complete history of that king, which was composed by Isaiah the son of Amoz ; in the case of Hezekiah (2 Chron. xxxii. 32), to the vision of (ti'!!)) Isaiah, as an account that could be found in the Book of the Kings of Judah and Israel ; in the case of Manasseh (2 Chron. xxxiii. 19), to the words of Hozai. There is certainly room for doubting whether, in these citations, ''^3'7 does not rather (as, for instance, in 1 Chron. xxiii. 27) denote the historical account of such and such a person. The following reasons, however, prove that, in the mind of the Chronicler, historical accounts written by the person named were meant, (a) From 12 ISAIAH. 2 Chron. xxvi. 22 we see how easy and natural it was for him to think of prophets as historians of particular epochs in the history of the kings, (b) In other places also, where ''?3"n is combined with the name of a prophet (as in 2 Chron. xxix. 30, xxxiii. 18), the latter is the genitive of the subject or author, not of the object, (c) In the citations given above, nnna is used interchangeably with ''?,3'=i"^J?, an expression which still more decidedly requires us to understand it as referring to authorship ; and (d) this view is put beyond all doubt by the interchange of "J? ^Vp, in 2 Chron. xiii. 22, with i^y '7.3^, in 2 Chron. xii. 15. That these accounts, how- ever, which are named after prophets, were not lying before the Chronicler as separate writings along with his main source, is evident from the fact that, except in 2 Chron. xxiii. 18 f., he never refers to both together. They had been incorporated in " the commentary of the Book of Kings " (2 Chron. xxiv. 27) lying before him, where, along with the annalistic sources of the work, they could easily be distin- guished as prophetic productions. And inasmuch as it is conceivable that the author of our canonical Books, of Samuel and Kings should not have made use of these sources com- posed by prophetic authors, it is legitimate to ask whether it be still possible for critical analysis to discover these sources, either in whole or in part, — ^just as one may with certainty say that the list of officers used as a boundary-stone in 2 Sam. XX. 23-26, and the survey given in 1 Kings iv. 2-19 of Solomon's ministers and his court, together with the details as to the requirements of the royal kitchen (1 Kin^s v. 2 ff.), the number of stalls for the king's horses (1 Kings v. 6), and similar matters, have been derived from the annals. This is not the place to enter more minutely into such an analysis. It is enough for us, through the references given in Chronicles, to have cast light on the restless activity of the prophets, from the time of Samuel onwards, engaged in writiufr history, — an activity which, even without the express references, is obvious from the many historical extracts in the Book of Kings from the writings of prophet-historians. Both authors draw, directly or indirectly, from annalistic and prophetic sources. But the Book of Kings and the Chronicles them- selves also, taken as a whole — when we look at their authors. INTRODUCTION. 13 and thus at the mode in which the historical materials are arranged and wrought into shape — represent two different styles of historical composition ; for the Book of Kings is the work of a prophet, and is pervaded by the prophetic spirit, while the Book of Chronicles is the work of a priest, and bears a priestly character. The author of the Book of Kings has taken Deuteronomy and the prophetic literature as his models, whereas the Chronicler so closely imitates the old style of the Q'Pjn ''"i.^'n, that his own is often undistinguish- able from the style of the sources from which, directly or indirectly, his material was derived ; the work, accordingly, is a strange mixture of very ancient and very modern phraseology, R-om the view of history which is inserted in 2 Kings xvii. 7 f., one may see the spirit and the purpose of the author in writing the book. Like the author of the Book of Judges, who wrote in a similar spirit (see Judg. ii. 1 1 ff.), he seeks to show, in his history of the kings, how both the king- doms of Judah and Israel, by despising the word of God borne to them by the prophets, and particularly through the great sin of idolatry, had fallen from one stage of inward and outward corruption to another till they reached the depth of misery in the Exile. Judah, ho'wever, with' its Davidic government, was not without hope of rising again from the depths, if the hearts of the people were not closed against the prophetic preaching from their own past history. The Chronicler, on the other hand, permits his love for the monarchy and priesthood, which were chosen from the tribes of Judah and Levi, to be felt even in the annalistic surveys forming the preface to his work ; and, starting at once with the sad end of Saul, wastes not a word on the course of suffering through which David reached the throne, but hastens on to the joyful beginning of his reign, which is pictured to us in a style at once popular, military, and priestly, as in the ease of the annals. Then he sets before us — almost quite apart from the history of the northern kingdom — the history of Judah and Jerusalem under the rule of the Davidic family, and this with special ful- ness when he is able to praise the care of the monarch for the temple and its service, and his co-operation with the Levites and the priesthood. He displays a preference and partiality for the brighter portions of the history ; whereas, in the case 14 ISAIAH. of the author of the Book of Kings, the law of retribution, which prevails in the historical matter, demands at least equal prominence for the darker parts. Both of them, nevertheless, equally afford us a deep insight into the lahoratory of the two modes of writing history, and the historical works of both are rich in discourses hy prophets, which deserve closer consideration, because, equally with the prophetico-historical writings from which citation is made, they are to be regarded as the preliminary and occasional exercises of the prophetic literature, properly so called, which afterwards assumed a more or less independent position, and to which the " Later Prophets " (D'^ns D'«'??) belong. The Book of Kings contains the following utterances and discourses of prophets : (1) Abijah of Shiloh to Jeroboam, 1 Kings xi. 29-39 ; (2) Shemaiah to Eehoboam, xii. 22-24 ; (3) a man of God to the altar of Jeroboam, xiii. 1 f. ; (4) Abijah to the wife of Jeroboam, xiv. 5-16 ; (5) Jehu the son of Hanani to Baasha, xvi. 1-4 ; (6) a prophet to Ahab, king of Israel, XX. 13 f., xxii. 28 ; (7) a pupil of the prophets to Ahab, XX. 35 ff. ; (8) Elijah to Ahab, xxi. 17-26 ; (9) Micaiah the son of Imlah to the two lungs, Ahab and Jehoshaphat, xxii. 14 ff. ; (10) EUsha to Jehoram and Jehoshaphat, 2 Kings iii. 11 ff. ; (11) a pupil of Elisha to Jehu, 2 Kings ix. 1-10 ; (12) a " burden " or message concerning the house of Ahab, ix. 25 f. ; (13) Jehovah to Jehu, x. 30 ; (14) Jonah to Jero- boam II., — indirectly, — xiv. 25—27 ; (15) a general message of the prophets, xvii. 13 ; (16) Isaiah's addresses toHezekiah, chaps, xix. and xx. ; (17) warning prophecy on account of Manasseh, xxi. 10-15 ; (18) Huldah to Josiah, xxii. 14 ff. ; (19) message of warning from Jehovah concerning Judah, xxiii. 27. Of all these prophetic utterances and discourses, only Nos. 2, 9, and 18 are found again with the Chronicler (2 Chron. xi. 24, xviii., xxxiv.), partly because he relates merely the history of the kings of Judah, and partly because he aimed at supplementing our Book of Kings, which doubt- less lay before him. The following prophetic utterances and addresses, not found in the Book of Kings, meet us in the Chronicles : (1) The words of Shemaiah in the war between Eehoboam and Shishak, 2 Chron. xii. 7, 8 ; (2) the words of Azariah the son of Obed before Asa, xv. 1-7 ; (3) Hanani to INTEODUCTION^ 15 Asa, xvi. 7-9 ; (4) Jahaziel the Asapliite in the assembling of the nation, xx, 14-17 ; (5) Eliezer the son of Dodavahu to Jehoshaphat, xx. 37 ; (6) the letter of Elijah to Jehoram, xxi. 12-15 ; (7) Zeehariah the son of Jehoiada in the time of Joash, xxiv. 20 ; (8) a man of God to Amaziah, xxv. 7-9 ; (9) a prophet to Amaziah, xxv. 15, 16 ; (10) Oded to Pekah, xxviii. 9-11. To extend still more widely the sphere of our examination, we add (1) the address of the "messenger of Jehovah " in Bochim, Judg. ii. 1-5 ; (2) the address of a prophet to Israel, in Judg. vl 8-10 ; (3) the address of a man of God to Eli, 1 Sam. ii. 27 ff. ; (4) Jehovah's words to Samuel concerning the house of Eli, 1 Sam. iii. 11-14 ; (5) Samuel's words to Israel before the battle at Ebenezer, 1 Sam. vii. 3 ; (6) Samuel's words to Saul in Gilgal, 1 Sam. xiii. 13 f. ; (7) Samuel to Saul after the victory over Amalek, 1 Sam. XV. ; (8) Nathan to David in view of his intention to build the Temple, 2 Sam. vii. ; (9) Nathan to David after his adultery, 2 Sam. xii. ; (10) Gad to David after the numbering of the people, 2 Sam. xxiv. After taking a general survey of these utterances and addresses, and comparing one with another, we are warranted in assuming that some have been preserved to us in their original form, such as (in the First Book of Samuel) the addresses of the man of God to Eli, and the words of Samuel to Saul after the victory over Amalek : this we infer from their peculiar character, their sublimity, and the difference between their style and that of the historian who gives them, as this is seen elsewhere in his writings. In other cases, at least the essential features have been preserved, as in the addresses of Nathan to David : this is proved by their echoes which reverberate in later history. Among the addresses handed down verbatim by the author of the Book of Kings may be reckoned those of Isaiah (2 Kings xix. 6 ff., 20 f., xx. 1, 5 f., 17 f.) ; the " burden " (K^^) in 2 Kings ix. 25 f., of primitive and peculiar form, together with some other brief utterances of prophets. Possibly also the words of Huldah are given in all essential respects, for it is only in her mouth (2 Kings xxii. 19 ; 2 Chron. xxxiv. 27), in the mouth of Isaiah (2 Kings xxii. 19), and in the "burden" to which reference has just been made, that we find the prophetic 16 ISAIAff. expression " declareth Jehovah " (nin^ CNa), which likewise meets us in 1 Sam. ii. 30 with other tokens of its being original, and whose high antiquity is fully attested by the Davidic Psalms and 2 Sam. xxiii. 1 (cf. Gen. xxii. 16). In some of these utterances the historian does not at all concern himself about giving the original words ; they are prophet- voices which sounded forth at one time or another, and wliose leading tone he seeks to give, as in Judg. vi. 8-10 ; 2 Kings xvii. 13, xxi. 10-15. Eeproductions of prophetic testimonies in such general form naturally bear the impress of the reproducing writer; thus, in the Books of Judges and Kings there is visible the Deuteronomic style of thought of their final editor. But we will go farther, and must affirm generally that the predictions in the Books of Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles bear marked traces of the narrator's own hand, and of the influence exercised by indirect sources. The dis- courses which are common to the Chronicles and the Book of Kings, are almost literally the same in both ; the remainder, liowever, have quite a different look. The addresses in the Book of Kings almost always begin with, "Thus saith Jehovah " (nin^^ "inx nb), or, " Thus saith Jehovah, the God of Israel" (so also in Judg. vi. 8, and in 2 Kings xix. 20 before the addresses of Isaiah) ; and there is nothing that occurs in them more frequently than the phrase "^t^'^ (" because that "), and Deuteronomic expressions like D"'J'?n, «''P.nn, T3 inj, and others ; to which may be added a liking for similes, in- troduced by nB'N3 ("as"), 1 Kings xiv. 10, 15; 2 Kings xxi. 13. The idea of God's "choice" of Jerusalem recurs in the same words in 1 Kings xi. 36; 2 Kings xxiii. 27; and the idea " that there may always remain a light to David " ("illc' ■'"'^), 1 Kings xi. 36, is an exclusive peculiarity of the author among Old Testament writers. The words, "I have raised thee up from among the people, and set thee for a prince over my people Israel," occur not merely in the second address of Ahijah (1 Kings xiv. 17), but also slightly altered in the address of Jehu (xvi. 2). The words, " Him that dieth in the city shall the dogs eat, and him that dieth in the field shall the fowls of the air eat," are found in substantially the same form in the second address of Ahijah (xiv. 11), in Jehu's address (xvi. 4), and in that of Elijah to INTRODUCTION. 17 Ahab (xxi. 24). The threatenings, "I will destroy every man child, him that is shut up and him that is left at large in Israel, and will sweep behind the house of Jeroboam," is found, with slight variation, in the second address of Ahijah (xiv. 10), in the address of Elijah to Ahab (xxi. 21), and in the second address of Elijah to Jehu (2 Kings ix. 8) ; while it is clearly seen from 1 Kings xvi. 11 and 2 Kings xiv. 26, that the form of these threatenings is the style of the narrator. It is therefore undeniable that almost all these prophet- utterances, so far as a common impress is possible at all, are of similar type, and that the common bond which unites them is no other than the subjectivity of the Deutero- nomic narrator. A similar conclusion must be drawn regarding the prophetic addresses in the Chronicles, which likewise so extensively bear the unmistakable traces of the Chronicler's own treatment, that Caspari, in his treatise on the Syro-Ephraimitish war (p. 53 ff.), acknowledges, even regarding what seems to be the most original of all the addresses (in 2 Chron. xv. 2-7), that it recalls the peculiar style of the Chronicler. In the case of the Chronicler, how- ever, whose chief source of material must have resembled the spirit and style of his own, — an assumption which the Book of Ezra especially warrants us in making, — it is less easy to say how far he exercised a free hand than it is in the case of the author of the Book of Kings, who seems to have found the most of the addresses merely indicated in outline, and to have freely reproduced them from such sketches. If these discourses had come down to us in their original form, we should possess in them an exceedingly important source of information for the history of the development of prophetic ideas and forms of expression. We should then know that Isaiah's favourite phrase, " for Jehovah hath spoken it" ("I3'7 '"•i'T'. '?), so far as we have information, was first employed by Ahijah (1 Kings xiv. 11); that Joel, when he prophesied " in Jerusalem shall be deliverance " (Joel iii. 5), had been preceded by Shemaiah (2 Chron. xii. 7); that Hosea, in iii. 4 (cf. v. 15), took up again the utterance of Azariah the son of Oded, " And many days shall Israel con- tinue without the true God, and without a teaching priest, and without law ; but when they turn in their distress "... VOL. I. « 18 ISAIAH. (2 Chron. xv. 3 f., where, as the parallel proves, the perfects in ver. 4 are to be understood in accordance with the pro- phetic context) ; that in Jer. xxxi. 1 6 we have an echo of an utterance by the same Zechariah, in the words, " for there is a reward to thy work;" that Hanani, in saying, "The eyes of Jehovah run to and fro throughout the whole earth " (2 Chron. xvi. 9), is the precursor of Zechariah (iv. 10); and there are other similar instances. But, considering the influ- ence which the idiosyncrasies of the two historians exercised upon the discourses which they communicate (cf. for instance, 2 Chron. xv. 2 with 1 Chron. xxviii. 9 ; 2 Chron. xii. 5 with xxiv. 20; also ver. 7 with 2 Chron. xxxiv. 21, and the parallel in 2 Kings xxii. 1 3 ; and 2 Chron. xv. 5, " In those times," with Dan. xi. 14) ; considering also the difficulty in finding out the original elements of these addresses (pos- sibly, for instance, the idea that a light will remain to David, 1 Kings XV. 4, 2 Kings viiL 1 9, was really first expressed by Ahijah, 1 Kings xi. 36), one will be able to make of them for this purpose only a cautious and sparing use. It is doubtful whether such expressions as, " to put my name there," 1 Kings xi. 36, and "he shall root out Israel from this good land," 1 Kings xiv. 15, have received the Deutero- nomic form (see Deut. xii. 5, 21, xiv. 24, xxix. 27) from the prophet or from the author of the Book of Kings (cf. 1 Kings ix. 3 and the parallel passages in 2 Chron. vii. 20, ix. 7 ; 2 Kings xxi. 7 f.). There remains, however, in the predictions of those older prophets, a sufficient amount of original matter for enabling us to see in them the prefigura- tions and predecessors of the later ones. Thus Shemaiah, with his threat against Eehoboam and its later modification (2 Chron. xii. 5-8), reminds us of Micah opposing Hezekiah (Jer. xxvi. 17 ff.). The position assumed by Hanani towards Asa, when he invoked the aid of Syria, is precisely the same as that of Isaiah in relation to Ahaz,— as there is also a close resemblance generally between both events. Like the man of God in Bethel, Hosea and Amos prophesied against the " high places of Aven " (Hos. x. 8), and the " altars of Bethel " (Amos iii. 14, ix. 1). When Amos, in consequence of the divine call (Amos vii. 15), leaves his home and betakes him- self to Bethel, the chief seat of the Israelitish image-worship, INTEODUCTION. 19 in order to prophesy against the idolatrous kingdom, is there not in this a repetition of the history of the prophet in 1 Kings xiii.? And when Hanani, in consequence of denouncing Asa, is thrown into prison, is this not a kind of prelude to the subsequent fate of Micaiah the son of Imlah (1 Kings xxii.), and of Jeremiah (Jer. xxxii.) ? Moreover, Ahijah's symbolization and confirmation of what he predicted, by rending into twelve pieces a new garment (a symbol of the kingdom still undivided and strong), has its analogies in the history of the earlier prophets (1 Sam. xv. 26-29) as in that of the later (Jer. xxii.). It is only such signs (D^nsio) as that by which the prophet who came from Judah to Bethel confirmed his prophecy (1 Kings xiii. 3), that alifiost wholly disappear from the later history of the prophets, though even Isaiah does not disdain to offer King Ahaz a sign in verifica- tion of his prophetic testimony (Isa. vii. 11). No essential difference exists between the prophecy of earlier and that of later times ; in particular, we see it is the same spirit which from the first, and all through, unites the prophets of both kingdoms, notwithstanding the diversity of action which was necessitated by different circumstances. But differences do present themselves. The earlier prophets are exclusively occupied with the internal affairs of the king- dom, and do not as yet draw within their range the history of other nations in the world with which that of Israel was closely interwoven ; their predictions are exclusively directed to the king and people of both kingdoms, and not yet to a foreign nation, — one of the neighbouring peoples, or what we might expect, the Egyptians and Syrians ; the Messianic element still lies in a non-transparent chrysalis state; and the poetry of thought and language, which afterwards ap- peared as the result of prophetic inspiration, announces itself only in some striking figures of speech. As we have seen, it is perhaps scarcely possible to pronounce a decided opinion regarding the style of delivery of these older prophets ; but, from a general impression of a sufficiently reliable kind, we may distinguish prophecy, down till about the time of King Joash, as the prophecy of overmastering action, from the later prophecy, which was that of convincing speech: as remarked by G. Baur, in the case of the older prophets it is 20 ISAIAH. oaly as a confirmatiou of clear inward conviction that concern is shown about words, — the modest attendants of powerful external action. Just for this reason they could not very well produce prophetic writings in the highest sense of the word. But even from the time of Samuel, the prophets as a body had made it a part of the duties of their calling to treat the history of their time in a theocratic-pragmatic way. The cloistral, but by no means quietistic, retirement of the life in the schools of the prophets was specially favourable in the northern kingdom to this literary occupation, and secured for it unquestioned liberty. From 2 Chron. xx. 34, however, we perceive that prophets in Judah likewise occupied themselves with the writing of history ; for the prophet Jehu belonged to Judah, and, as may be inferred from 2 Chron. xix. 1-3, lived in Jerusalem. The literature of predictive writings, however, properly so called, had begun in the time of Jehoram king of Judah with the " vision " (liin) of Obadiah, — for we think we have proved elsewhere^ that this pamphlet against Edom was occasioned by the calamity mentioned in 2 Chron. xxi. 16, 17, to which also Joel and Amos refer. Obadiah was followed by Joel, who had before him the prophecy of the former, introducing into the wider and fuller circle of his own publication, not only matter, but also expressions, found in the prophecy of Obadiah. Here again the prophetic literature, in the higher sense, shows how it grew out of the prophetico-historical literature ; for Joel informs us of the result of the penitential worship which had been brought about through his appeal, in a historical passage (ii 18, 19a) connecting the two parts of his writings. It is now the fashion to bring him down into post-exilic times, but this is one of the worst fruits of the forced consistency of Penta- teuch - criticism : nothing is more certain than that he flourished during the first half of the reign of Joash the king of Judah." Obadiah and Joel were contemporaries of Elisha. » In the essay, " When did Obadiah Prophesy ? " Zeiischrift fUr das gesammie lutherische Theologie unil Kirche, 1851, p. 91 ff. 2 See my essay, " Two certain Results regarding the Prophecy of Joel " in the same journal, 1851, p. 306 If. ; cf. Le Propheie Joel nach E. Le Savoureiix, von Ant. J. Baumgartner, Paris 1888. mXIiODUCTION. 21 Elislm himself wrote nothing ; but from the schools under his guidance there proceeded, not merely prophetic deeds, but also prophetic writings ; and it is significant that the writings which bear the name of Jonah, whom an ancient Haggada describes as one of the "sons of the prophets" (D''SU3n '•n) of the school of Elisha, do not so much belong to the prophetic literature, in the higher sense, as rather to the prophetico- historical, and, in fact, to the historical writings by prophets. An approximation to the time when Jonah was sent to Nineveh may seem from 2 Kings xiv. 2 5 — according to whicli Jonah the son of Amittai, of Gath-hepher, in the tribe of Zebulun, had predicted the restoration of the kingdom of Israel to its promised extent — a prediction which was fulfilled in Jeroboam the son of Joash, the third of his house after Jehu, and which thus was issued in the beginning of the reign of Jeroboam II., if not even under Joash. The mission to Nineveh may belong to an earlier period than this predic- tion. A glance at the Book of Amos, on the other hand, shows us that at the time when this prophet flourished, Assyria was about to arise again. The indication of time, " two years before the earthquake " (Amos i. 1), fixes nothing for us. But if Amos prophesied " in the days of Uzziah king of Judah, and of Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of Israel," then — assuming that, according to 2 Kings xiv. 23, Jero- boam II. had reigned forty-one years, from the fifteenth year of Amaziah, and was thus for fourteen years contemporary with Amaziah, and for twenty-seven years with Uzziah — his period of activity lay in the last twenty - seven years of Jeroboam's reign. When he appeared, the kingdom of Israel was still at the height of its power which had been secured through the efforts of Jeroboam, while the kingdom of Judah was yet in the low, estate into which it had fallen under Amaziah ; for both, he predicts a common fate to befall them at the hands of Assyria, which, though not mentioned, is never- theless clearly meant. The beginning of the public ministry of HosE.4. comes into contact, at most, with the close of the ministry of Amos. The symbolical portion (chaps, i.-iii.) with which his book begins takes us to the last five years of Jeroboam's reign, and the subsequent prophetic discourses are not out of accord with the statement in chap. i. 1 (which is 22 ISAIAH. from a later hand), according to which this prophet continued to prophesy under Hezekiah, and thus till the fall of Samaria, in the sixth year of Hezekiah. After Hosea, the Ephraim- itish Jeremiah, appeared Isaiah, who according to chap. vi. was called in the last year of Uzziah, about twenty-five years after the death of Jeroboam II. His younger contemporary was MiCAH, of Moresheth, who, according to chap. i. 1, did not appear till some time within the reign of Jotham, and whose book, according to the inscription " concerning Samaria and Jerusalem," must have been composed after the fall of Samaria in the sixth year of Hezekiah's reign (with which also the narrative in Jer. xxvi. 17 if. agrees), so that his ministry thus began and ended within the far longer ministry of Isaiah. The same remark holds good of Nahum, the Elkoshite, whose " burden of Nineveh " closes the pro- phetic writings of the Assyrian period: he prophesied after the defeat of Sennacherib, when the power of Assyria was broken; but the yoke on Judah's neck (i. 13) was to be viewed as broken only if Assyria did not rise again. Nahuni was followed by Habakkuk, who, among the twelve minor prophets, was the last of the Isaianic type, and began to announce a new era of judgment, — the Chaldean. He prophesied before Zephaniah and Jeremiah,^ during the reign of Josiah, and possibly even as early as Manasseh's time. With Zephaniah, then, begins the series of prophets of the type of Jeremiah, whom he resembles in following older prophets, and reproducing their materials and words in a kind of mosaic. Jeremiah, according to the opening verse in his prophecy, was called in the thirteenth year of Josiah's reign ; hence he began his public ministry before Zephaniah, — for internal grounds ' compel us to place the prophecies of the latter after the eighteenth year of Josiah's reign. Jere- miah's ministry in Judaea, and finally in Egypt, lasted more than eighty years. In his last prophetic discourse (chap, xliv.) he gives a pledge of the certain fulfilment of its threats, in the approaching fall of Pharaoh-Hophrah, who in the year 570 B.C. lost throne and life in the same place where his great-grandfather Psammetichus, a century before, had seized 1 See my Commentary on these prophets, 1843. ^ See my article on Zephaniah in Herzog's Cyclopaedia. INTEODUCTION. 23 the Egyptian crown. Contemporaneously with Jeremiah, though without knowing him personally, so far as we are aware, Ezekiel wrought in the same spirit among the exiles of Judah. According to chap. i. 1, 2, his call took place in the thirtieth year, i.e. of the era of Nabopolassar, which is nearly the fifth year after the captivity of Jehoiakim, 595 B.O. The latest date associated with his ministry (xxix. 17) is the twenty-seventh year of the captivity, which is the sixteenth after the destruction of Jerusalem, — the period between Nebuchadnezzar's raising of the siege of Tyre and his expedition against Egypt. We thus know of a ministry of twenty-two years on the part of this prophet, who, when called, may have already been older than the still very youth- ful Jeremiah. Jeremiah and Ezekiel are the two great prophets who spread their praying and protecting hands over Jerusalem as long as possible, and when the catastrophe was inevitable, saved it even in its fall. Their announcements, together with the prophetic sermon in Isa. chaps, xl.— Ixvi., have bridged over the chasm of the exile, and laid the foundation of the restored national church of post ^ exilian times. This community was cheered and encouraged by Haggai, in the second year of Darius Hystaspes, through his prediction of the glory in store for the temple, now rising anew from its ruins, and for the house of David, which was again coming to honour in Zerubbabel. Only two months later ZechaeIah appeared: his last predictive discourse belongs to the third year of Darius Hystaspes, the year after the promulgation of the edict requiring the building of the temple to be continued. The predictions of the second portion of his book (chaps, ix.— xiv.) are thoroughly eschato- logical and apocalyptic, and make use of older circumstances and utterances of prophets as emblems of the final future. Prophecy was now silent for a considerable time, until the last prophet-voice of the Old Covenant was heard in Malachi. His book accords with the state of things found by Nehemiah on the occasion of his second stay in Jerusalem under Darius Nothus ; and it was his peculiar calling in connection with the history of redemption to predict the speedy advent of the messenger appointed to precede the coming of the Lord,-— namely, Elijah the prophet, — and that the forerunner would 24 ISAIAH. then be followed by the Lord Himself, as " the Angel of the Covenant " (n'isn -jsl^D), the Messenger or Mediator of a New Covenant. This survey shows that the arrangement of the "later prophets" in the Canon is not strictly chronological. The three " gi-eater " prophets, who are so called because of the extent of their books of prophecy, stand together; and the twelve "minor " prophets, because of the smaller extent of their books of prophecy, are conjoined in a /lovo^i^Xoi;, as Melito calls it, which is named IK'S? D''3E', in the Masora "ipnn (=■>?? '?.'?'), in the Hellenistic dialect oi hcoSsKa (Wisd. xlix. io ; Josephus, c. Apion, i. 8; cf. Eusebius, Hist. Eecles. iii. 10), but also to SaySeKairpotpTjrov (the Book of the Twelve I'rophets). Within this collection of the smaller prophetical books, chronological order is so far observed as that they fall into three groups, representing three periods of prophetic literature, viz. prophets of the Assyrian period (Hosea to Nahum), pro- phets of the Chaldean period (Habakkuk and Zephaniah), and ])rophets of the post-exilian period (Haggai to Malachi). There is, moreover, an evident desire to join, as far as possible, a prophet belonging to the kingdom of Israel with one belong- ing to the kingdom of Judah, — -thus, Hosea with Joel, Amos with Obadiah, Jonah with Micah, Nahum with Habakkuk. Besides this, however, Hosea stands first, not so much because the opening word in his book (viz. ripnn, " beginning ") made this an appropriate one with which to begin the collection, — still less because (as is stated in Bathra 14&) of the four prophets, Hosea and Isaiah, Amos and Micah, he was the first to be called, — but (in the same way as, among the Pauline letters, the Epistle to the Eomans is placed first) because his book is the largest; and this principle of arrangement becomes more prominent in the Septuagint, in which Hosea comes first with fourteen chapters, while Amos follows with nine, then Micah with seven, Joel with three, Obadiah with one ; a new series next begins with Jonah. The reason why, in the Hebrew Canon, Joel immediately follows Hosea, may lie in the contrast between the complaint of Joel over the all-parch- ing heat and the all-devouring swarms of insects on the one hand, and the illustrations from vegetable life — bright, fresh, and fragrant — at the close of Hosea on the other. Amos ' INTRODUCTION. 25 then succeeds Joel, because, taking up again the announcement of judgment with which the latter concludes (Joel iv. 1 6), he opens his book with the words, " Jehovah will roar out of Zion, and utter His voice from Jerusalem." Obadiah follows, on account of the mutual relation between Obad. 19 and Amos ix. 12. And Jonah comes after Obadiah, for the latter begins, " We have heard tidings from Jehovah, and a messenger is sent among the nations," and Jonah was such a messenger. Similar reasons of a more accidental character aided in the combination of a Judaic with an Israelitish prophet. The fact that Zephaniah follows Habakkuk is explained on such a ground, which happens also to accord with the chronological order ; for a catchword in the prophecy of Zephaniah (i. 7), " Hold thy peace at the presence of the Lord God," is taken from Habakkuk (ii. 2 0). The post-exilian prophets (called in the Talmud D''j"insn D"'N''33n, " the last prophets ") then form the close, necessarily following in the order of time and in accordance with the contents of the books ; for, like the trans- position of Joel into the post-exilian period, the transposition of Malachi into the time before Ezra is one of the evil results of forced consistency in Pentateuchal criticism.^ "We now return to the so-called Greater Prophets. These immediately follow the Book of Kings, which is now divided into two parts ; and at the head, in the Hebrew as well as in the Alexandrian and Syriac Canon, stands Isaiah. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, — such is the Masoretic arrangement,^ in accordance with the chronological order of their appearance. In the manuscripts, particularly the German and French, an- ' From the fact that no trace of any reference to the Priest-code is found in Malachi, but rather, on the other hand, more reference to Deuteronomy, — for to him the Levite is identical with the priest (ii. 4-Y), his proscribing of mixed marriages (ii. 11) rests on Deut. vii. 3 (but of. also Ezra ix. 14), and his requirement of the tithe and the heave-offering (iii. 8-12) is stated in Deuteronomic language in Deut. xii. 6, xi. 17,— one must draw another inference than that false conclusion of Pentateuchal criticism. 2 In Ochla we-ochla, indeed, the citations from Isaiah follow those from Jeremiah and Ezekiel ; but when the Masora reckons Isa. xvii. 3, >)sn D''S''3i)n, i.e. the middle verse of the division called the D'S^aj, it is understood that Isaiah is the first prophet following after the series from Joshua to Kings. 26 ISAIAH. other arrangement is occasionally found, — Kings, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Isaiah : this is the order laid down in the Baraitha {i.e. the collection of treatises not taken into the official Mishna) regarding the consecution of the Biblical books and their authors, and the regulating principle here was, as shown in the Gemara,' affinity of contents. Jeremiah follows the Book of Kings because his prophecies almost wholly relate to the Chaldean catastrophe, with which the Book of Kings con- cludes ; and Isaiah follows Ezekiel, whose book ends with consolation, because the hortatory portion of Isaiah is consola- tion throughout.^ In opposition to this Talmudic arrangement, — which Lagarde (Symmicta, p. 142) and others, following Eichhorn, erroneously regard as meant to be chronological, but which Cornill (Jeremia und seine Zeit, 1880) thinks was in- tended to express progressive estimation of the worth of the several works, — the order given in the Masora, for which better reasons can be assigned, and which is further attested by the earliest ecclesiastical writers (Melito, Origen, and Jerome), has justly maintained its superiority. 1 The explanation is not a false one, but neither is it exhaustive. The Baraitha regards Jeremiah as the author not merely of the book contain- ing his prophecies but also of the Book of Kings, so that " Kings " and "Jeremiah" inseparably cohere, forming the links uniting the "former prophets" with the "later prophets ;" see Marx (Dalman), Traditio Rab- hinorum veterrima de lihrorum V. T. ordine aique origine, 1884, pp. 34-37. 2 It is precisely with reference to chaps, xl.-lxvi. that Isaiah is regarded as the prophet of comfort xar i^ojctiu ; so that according to Berachoth 57J, whoever sees Isaiah in a dream may look for consolation ; and accordino- to the Midrash on the Lamentations, all the ill that Jeremiah predicted was by Isaiah turned beforehand into good. INTRODUCTION TO THE BOOK OF ISAIAH, ESPECIALLY THE FIEST PAET, CHAPS. I.-XXXIX. § 1. The Time of the Prophet. The first requisite for an understanding and appreciation of the prophecies of Isaiah is the knowledge of his time, and of the periods during which he exercised his ministry. The first period embraces the reigns of Uzziah and Jotham. The starting - point is determined in accordance with the view taken of chap. vL ; but, in any case, Isaiah appeared about the end of Uzziah's reign, and thereafter laboured continuously through the sixteen years of Jotham's reign. The first twenty- seven years of the fifty-two during which Uzziah reigned run parallel with the last twenty-seven of the forty-one during which Jeroboam II. ruled. The kingdom of Israel, under Joash and his son Jeroboam II., and the kingdom of Judah, under Uzziah and his son Jotham, each passed through a season of outward splendour greater in height and duration than had ever been previously experienced. In proportion as the glory of the one kingdom faded, that of the other flourished ; the bloom of the northern kingdom grew fainter as that of the south grew brighter and excelled the other. But outward splendour, in this case as in the former, carried within it the seeds of ruin and decay ; for prosperity degene- rated into luxury, and the worship of Jehovah stiffened into idolatry. It was during this last and longest season of pro- sperity in Judah that Isaiah appeared, called to the sad task 2 8 ISAIAH. of vainly preaching repentance, and therefore also of announc- ing the judgment of hardening and devastation, of the ban and banishment. The second period of his ministry extends from the accession of Ahaz to that of Hezekiah. During these sixteen years three events occurred, all combining to bring on a new and momentous turn in the fate of Judah. In place of the worship of Jehovah, which had been conducted under Uzziah and Jotham with regularity and in external con- formity to the law, open idol-worship of the most varied and abominable character commenced with the reign of Ahaz. Then were resumed and continued the hostilities already begun under Jotham's reign by Pekah the king of Israel, and Eezin the king of Damascene Syria : the Syro-Ephraimitish war threatened Jerusalem with the express purpose of destroy- ing the Davidic kingdom. In this distress, Ahaz invoked the aid of Tiglath-Pileser the king of Assyria ; he made flesh his arm, and thereby entangled the people of Jehovah with the kingdom of the world in a manner unknown before, so that they thenceforward completely lost their independence. The kingdom of the world is the Nimrodic form of the heathen state. Its characteristic feature is the constant endeavour to burst beyond its natural boundaries, not merely for purposes of self-defence or revenge, but for conquest, and to throw itself upon foreign nations like an avalanche, that it may become an ever-growing and world-embracing colossus. Assyria and Eome are the first and the last members of the world-kingdom that brought enslavement and oppression on Israel throughout her history. The times of Isaiah saw the approach of the calamity. Placed thus on the verge of this new and important change in history, and embracing the whole with his far-seeing eye, Isaiah is, so to speak, the universal prophet of Israel. The third period of his active ministry extends from the beginning to nearly the end of Hezekiah's reign. Under this king the nation rose almost in the same degree as it had fallen during the reign of Ahaz. He forsook the course of his idolatrous father, and restored tlie worship of Jehovah. The mass of the people, indeed, remained at heart unchanged, but Judah had once more an upright king who listened to the word of the prophets at his side, — two pillars of the state, men of might in prayer § 1. THE TIME OF THE PEOPHET. 29 (2 Chron. xxxii. 20). When it came therefore to a breaking off from the Assyrian domination, this was certainly an act of unbelief on the part of the nobles and the mass of the people, since they relied on help from Egypt, — an expectation which caused ruin to the northern kingdom in the sixth year of Hezekiah's reign, — but, on the part of Hezekiah, an act of faith in Jehovah (2 Kings xviii. 7). When Senna- cherib tlien, the son and successor of Sargon, was coming against Jerusalem, conquering the country and laying every- thing waste, while Egypt did not bring the help that had been promised, the carnal defiance of the magnates and the mass of the people brought its own punishment. But Jehovah averted the worst of the impending calamity ; the flower of the Assyrian host was destroyed in a night, so that, as in the Syro-Ephraimitish war, now also there was no proper invest- ment of Jerusalem ; thus the faith of the king and of the better portion of the people received a reward for their quiet resting in the word of promise. There was still a power in the state that preserved it from ruin ; and the coming doom, shown in chap. vi. to be inevitable, was yet once more delayed when the last annihilating blow was to have been expected. It was in this miraculous deliverance, which Isaiah predicted, and for which he prepared the way, that the public ministry of the prophet reached its culmination. Isaiah is the Amos of the kingdom of Judah ; for, like the latter, he has the dreadful vocation to see and proclaim the fact that the time of forgiveness for Israel as a people and kingdom is gone for ever. But he was not likewise the Hosea of the kingdom of Judah, for the dreadful call to accompany the fatal course of his country with the knell of prophetic announcements was not assigned to Isaiah, but to Jeremiah. This is the Hosea of the southern kingdom ; for to Isaiah was granted what was refused to his successor Jeremiah, once more to restrain, through the might of his prophetic power, arising from the deep and strong spirit of faith, the coming of the night, which threatened at the time of the Assyrian judgment to engulf his people. The Assyrian oppressions ceased, and, so far as Judah was concerned, were not to be renewed. The view beyond Assyria was clear, and prophecy was about to be concerned with the next world - kingdom, now cautiously 30 iSAiAn. approacliing. Beyond the noon-tide of his puhlic ministry there remained the evening of life, which he cannot have idly spent, devoid of word or deed. But though he no longer took part in public affairs, he lived to the beginning of Manasseh's reign, when, according to credible tradition ^ to which allusion is made in Heb. xi. 3 7 (" they were sawn asunder "), he fell a sacrifice to the heathenism which had once more become predominant. I have purposely refrained from assigning numbers which might indicate the length of reign of the four (or, including Manasseh, five) kings of Judah under whom Isaiah exercised liis ministry. It is certainly difficult enough to make a thoroughly harmonious and consistent arrangement of the dates given in the Book of Kings and also in the Chronicles ; but at present, after the monument literature of Babylonia and Assyria has also come forward as a witness, it is un- deniably certain that the Biblical numbers assigned to the reigns of kings occasionally need correction, though in other respects they are proved to be true by indubitable Assyho- logical testimonies. The founder of the received Biblical chronology was James Ussher (Usserius), in his Annates Veteris et Novi Testamenti, 1650-54,^ a work at which he had laboured for sixty years. We give here a tabular view of his reckoning in that portion of the history of the kings under whom those prophets flour- ished who committed their prophecies to writing. The Biblical reckoning of this section rests on trustworthy tradition, but in a number of instances it is uncertain how ' According to the Talmudic treatise, Jebamoth 496, it was found in a genealogical list of a Jerusalem family ; and according to Sanliedrin 1036 in a Targum on 2 Kings xxi. 16 (published by Assemani, Catal. Vatic. i. 452), it is amplified in a Jerusalem Targum which the Codex Eeuchlin p\its in the margin, Ixvi. 1 ; and appears in simpler form (compared with the Targum) in the Apocryphal "Ascension of Isaiah" (edited in the Ethiopic text by Rich. Laurence in 1819, and by Aug. Dillmann in 1877 ; in Greek, from a MS. in the National Library at Paris, by 0. von Gebhardt in Hilgenfeld's Zeitschrift, xxi. 330 ff.), to which Origen appeals. Regarding a Persian form of this " Ascension," or rather the kindred " Vision of Isaiah," see Spiegel, Literatur der Parsen, p. 128 ff. 2 Gustav Baur also made Ussher's system the basis of his Tahellen iiber die Gesehichte dcs israel. Volkes, 1848, except where Prideaux (on Ezra and Nchemiah) and Bimsen (on Egypt) offered sometliin" better. § 1. THE TIME OF THE PROPHET. 31 the Scripture historian himself counted the beginning and the end of the reigns, and the mutual relation of these in both kingdoms. Alongside of Ussher's calculations, accordingly, I place, by way of example, those of my friend Aug. Kohler (in the appendix to his BiUische Geschichte des A. T., 1884). The figures within parentheses beside the name of the king indicate the duration of his rule, and the large numbers give the year in which the monarch in question ascended the throne. JUDAH. Ussher. Kohler. Israel. Ussher. Kohler. B.C. B.C. B c. B.C. Athaliali (6), . 884 881 Jelui (28), 884 881 Joash (40), 878 875 Jehoahaz (17), . 856 853 Ainaziah (29), . 839 836 Jehoash (16), . 839 838 Uzziah (52), 810 807 Jeroboam 11.(41), 825 822 Zechariali (i), . 773 769 Shallum (,"2), . 772 768 Jotham (16), Menahem (10), . 772 768 Sole ruler, . 758 755 Pekahiah (2), . 761 758 Ahaz (16), 742 739 Pekah (20), 759 756 Hezekiah (29), . 726 724 Inteiregnum . 736 Manasseh (55), . 698 695 Hoshea (9), 730 727 Araon (2), . 643 640 Fall of Samaria, 722 719 Josiah (31), 641 638 This table is merely intended to render the computation of the Books of Kings and Chronicles as objective as possible. Doubt remains especially as to the interregnum between Pekah and Hoshea ; perhaps such a blank should be excluded, and the reign of Pekah made to extend to 727 B.C. No account is taken in the table of the Assyrian chronology : Kohler himself is of opinion that it helps us in several instances to the actually correct dates. He has already shown -^ that what is narrated in Isaiah, chaps, xxxviii., xxxix., occurred in the fourteenth year of Hezekiah's reign ; and, on the other hand, what we read in Isaiah, chaps, xxxvi., xxxvii., happened in his twenty-fourth year (701 B.C.). The following durations of reigns are deiinitely fixed by the testimony of the Assyrian monuments : — Shalmaneser II., .... 860-824 B.C. Tiglath-Pileser II., .... 745-727 „ 1 In the Zdtschrift fiir hUlwische Theolorjie, 1874, pp. 96-98. 32 ISAIAH. Shalmaneser IV., . . . . 727-722 B.C. Sargon, ..... 722— 7 Oo „ The following names and dates are also given : — Ahab (battle at Karkar between Aleppo and Hamath, against the kings of Damascus and Hamath, with their allies ; unless, as Well- hausen and Kamphausen suppose, Ahab is erroneously named instead of his son, Joram), 854 B.C. Jehu (tributary), ..... 842 „ Azariah (i.e. Uzziah, in connection with Tig- lath-Pileser II.), . . . . 740 „ Menahem (made tributary by Pal, i.e. Tiglath- Pileser II.'), . . . . 738 „ Pekah (dethroned by Tiglath-Pileser), . 7.34 „ Fall of Samaria, . . . . . 722 „ Campaign of Sennacherib against Samaria, 701 „ See the thorough investigations of Schrader's Cuneiform In- scriptions and the Old Testament, 2nd edition ; ^ and the sum- maries of Friedrich Delitzsch, under the article, " Sanherib," in Herzog's Real-Encyclop., continued by Hauck, Band xiL (1884). To these Assyrian synchronisms regard is shown, either entirely or in great measure, in the calculations of Well- hausen in his article on " The Chronology of the Book of Kings after the Division of the Kingdom," in the Jahriucher fur Deutsche Theologie, 1875, pp. 607-640; cf. Kamphausen, in Stade's Zeitschrift, iii. (1883) pp. 193-202, and in his work. The Chronology of tlie Hebrew Kings, 1883 ; and of Duncker in his History of Antiquity, 5th edition, 1878. Following S. K. Driver in his Isaiah, his Life and Times (1888, p. 13), we give here the estimates of these three writers, passing over the otherwise important article in The Church Quarterly Eeview for Jan. 1886, pp. 257-271, inas- much as the author is unknown to us, and an anonymous authority is of no weight. 1 His name was probably Pulu (Puru) before he rose to be ruler of the Babylono- Assyrian kingdom. 2 Translated into English by the Rev. Professor Owen C. Whitehouse, London 1885-88, 2 vols.— Tb. § 1. THE TIME OF THE PROPHET. 33 JaDAH. GJ 3 Israel. i a ^ a O ^ ^ 3 B.C. te.c. B.C. B.C. B.C. B.C. Athaliah (6), . 841 843 843 Jehu (28), 84? 843 843 Joash (40), . 83? 837 837 Jehoahaz (17), . 81? 815 815 Amaziah (29), 800 797 797 Jehoash (16), 801 798 798 Uzziali(32), . 791 778 792 JeroboamII.(41), 785 782 790 Zechariah (^), . 746 741 749 Sballum (-^), . 745 741 749 Jotham (16), . (750) (751) Menaliem (10), . 744 741 748 Sole ruler, . 740 736 740 Pekahiah (2), . wanting 738 738 Ahaz (16), . 735 735 734 Pekah (20), 734 736 736 Hezekiali (29), 715 715 728 Hoshea (9), 733 730 734 Manasseh (55), 686 686 697 Fall of Samaria, 722 722 722 Amon (2), 641 641 642 Josiah (31), . 639 639 640 The figures do not give here the year of accession to the throne, but the complete first year of the reign of the monarch which followed his accession. Those of Duncker prefer, in seven places, instead of the Biblical figures, other numbers, which make Jeroboam II. to have come to the throne earlier than Uzziah, and Jotham earlier than Pekah, — an unfounded conjecture, as even Kamphausen thinks. A strange feature in Wellliausen's arrangement is the elimina- tion of Pekahiah (but cf. his Frolegomena, p. 475). Kamp- hausen, in six instances, lengthens or shortens the numbers of the years indicating the duration of reigns (Amaziah, 19 ; Uzziah, 42 ; Ahaz, 20 ; Manasseh, 45 ; Menahem, 3 ; Pekah, 6) ; but, without claiming mathematical exactness for these corrections, he is rather on the whole convinced that, in the Biblical chronology of the period of the kings, we are on really historical ground. It may thus perhaps be necessary also to maintain, with W. Robertson Smith (The Prophets in Israel, pp. 413-419), that the year of Samaria's fall was not one of the last years of Ahaz, but one of the first of Hezekiah. If we place the death of Uzziah in the year 740, and the defeat of Sennacherib before Jerusalem in the year 701, then Isaiah's public ministry embraced a period of forty years. VOL. I. 34 ISAIATI. § 2. The Arrangement of the Collection. The collection of Isaiah's prophecies is, on the whole, chronologically arranged. The dates in vi. 1, vii. 1, xiv. 28, XX. 1, xxxvi. 1, are points in a continuous line. The three main divisions also form a chronological series ; for chaps. i.-vi. set before us the ministry of Isaiah under Uzziah and Jotham; chaps, vii.-xxxix., his ministry under Ahaz and onwards to the last years of Hezetiah ; while chaps. xl.-lx\i. — their authenticity being assumed — are in any case the latest productions of the prophet. In the middle division, likewise, the group in chaps, vii.-xii., belonging to the time of Ahaz, chronologically precedes the prophecies in chaps, xiii.— xxxix., belonging to the days of Hezekiah. In several instances, however, the chronological arrangement is set aside in favour of an arrangement according to the subject-matter. Thus the discourse in chap. i. is not the oldest, but is placed first as an introduction to all the rest ; and the account of the prophet's consecration, given in chap, vi., which should stand at the beginning of the group which belongs to the reigns of Uzziah and Jotham, is placed at the end, where it looks backwards and forwards, like a prediction in the process of being fulfilled. The Ahaz group, which follows in chaps, vii.-xii., is a whole moulded at one casting. But in the group belonging to Hezekiah's time (chaps. xiii.-xxxix.) the chronological order is again interrupted several times. The predictions against the nations, from xiv. 24 to chap, xxii., which belong to the Assyrian period, are introduced by a " burden " concerning Babylon, the city of the world-power (chaps, xiii.-xiv. 23), and closed by one concerning Tyre, the city of the world's commerce, which was to be destroyed by the Chaldeans (chap, xxiii.) ; wliile a shorter " burden " concerning Babylon, in chap. xxi. 1-10, divides the cycle into two halves, and a collection of prophecies regarding the nations converges in the great apocalyptic epilogue (chaps, xxiv.-xxvii.), like streams discharging themselves into a sea. Accordingly, the first portion of the Hezekiah group, of pre-eminently ethnic contents, is interwoven with Babylonian pieces which belong to divers points in the life of Isaiah. Another such piece is the great epilogue in chaps, xxxiv., xxxv., forming the last § 2. THE AEEANGEMENT OF THE COLLECTION. 35 echo of the second portion of the Hezekiah group. This second portion is mainly occupied with the fate of Judah, the judgment which the Assyrian world-power executes upon Judah, and the deliverance that awaits it (chaps, xxviii.-xxxiii.): these announcements are closed with a solemn declaration, in chaps, xxxiv., xxxv., of the judgment of God on the world of Israel's enemies on the one hand, and the redemption of Israel on the other. This Babylonian portion is followed by the historical section in chaps, xxxvi.-xxxix., which form the historical frame of Isaiah's predictions delivered near the time of the Assyrian catastrophe, and furnish us with the key for understanding not merely chaps, vii.— xxxv., but also chaps, xl.— Ixvi. If we take the Book of Isaiah, then, as a whole, in the form in which it lies before us, apart from critical analysis, it falls into two halves, chaps. L-xxxix., and chaps, xl.— Ixvi. The former subdivides into seven parts, the latter into three. The first half may be called the Assyrian, inasmuch as the point at which it aims and in which it terminates is the fall of Assyria ; the second may be called the Babylonian, as its final object is the deliverance from, Babylon. The first half ig not purely Assyrian, however ; but among the Assyrian portions are inserted Babylonian pieces, and generally such as apocalyptically break through the limited horizon of the former. The seven portions of the first half are the following: 1. Prophecies on the growth of obduracy in the mass of the people (chaps, ii.-vi.). 2. The consolation of Immanuel in the Assyrian oppressions (chaps, vii.— xii.). These two portions form a syzygy, ending with a psalm of the redeemed (chap, xii.), the last echo of the song at the Eed Sea ; and are separated by the consecration of the prophet (chap, vi.), which looks both backward and forward : the opening discourse (chap, i.), as a kind of prologue, forms the introduction to the whole. 3. Prophecies of judgment and salvation of the heathen (chaps, xiii.-xxiii.), chiefly belonging to the period of the judgment on Assyria, but enclosed and intersected by Babylonian pieces. A prophecy concerning Babylon (chap, xiii.-xiv. 23), the city of the world-power, forms its introduction ; while a prophecy concerning Tyre (chap, xxiii.), the city of the world's com- merce, which received its death-blow from the Chaldeans,- 36 ISAIAH. forms its conclusion ; and a second prophecy concerning the desert by the sea, i.e. Babylon (chap. xxi. 1-10), forms the centre. 4. Then follows a great apocalyptic prophecy con- cerning the judgment of the world and the last things (chaps, xxiv.-xxvii.), affording a grand background to the cycle of prophecies concerning the nations, and with it forming a second syzygy. 5. A third syzygy begins with chaps. xxviii.-xxxiii. : this cycle of prophecy is historical, and treats of the revolt from Assyria and its results. 6. With it is combined a far-reaching eschatological prophecy on the avenging and redemption of the Church (chaps, xxxiv., xxxv.), in which we already hear, as in a prelude, the keynote of chaps, xl.— Ixvi. 7. After these three syzygies we are carried back (by chaps, xxxvi.-xxxix.) in the first two historical accounts to the Assyrian period, while the other two show us, afar off, the entanglement with Babylon, which was then but about to begin. These four historical accounts, with the indications of their chronological order, are peculiarly arranged in such a way that half of them look backwards, half of them forwards ; they thus also fasten together the two halves of the whole book. The prophecy in chap, xxxix. 5—7 stands between the two halves like a sign-post, bearing on its arm the inscription " Babylon " (^^s). Thither tends the further course of Israel's history ; there is the prophet henceforward buried in spirit with his people; there (in chaps. xL-lxvi.) does he proclaim to the mourners of Zion the approaching deliverance. The trilogical arrangement of this book of con- solation may be regarded as proved ever since it was first observed and shown by Eiickert in 1831. It falls into three sections, containing three times three addresses (chaps. xl.-xlviii., xlix.-lvii., Iviii.-lxvi.), with a kind of refrain at the close. § 3. The Critical Questions. The collection of Isaiah's prophecies is thus a united whole, whose several parts have been skilfully and significantly arranged. This arrangement is worthy of the prophet. Nevertheless, the present form of the work is not to be attributed to him, if (1) the prophecies in chaps, xiii.-xiv. 23, § 3. THE CEITICAL QUESTIONS. 37 xxi. 1-10, xxiii., xxiv.-xxvii., xxxiv. and xxxv. cannot have been composed by him ; and (2) if the historical accounts in chaps, xxxvi.-xxxix., which we find again in 2 Kings xviii. 13 to XX. 19, are not records from Isaiah's pen. For if those prophecies be taken away, the beautiful whole, especially the book against the nations, tumbles to pieces into a confused quodlihet ; and if chaps, xxxvi.-xxxix. were not directly com- posed by Isaiah, then neither can the arrangement of the whole be directly the work of Isaiah ; for it is precisely chaps, xxxvi.-xxxix. which form the clasp binding the two halves of the collection together. The critical treatment of Isaiah began in the followinfr manner : — The commencement was made with the second part. Koppe first of all expressed doubt regarding the genuineness of chap. 1. ; then Doderlein expressed his decided suspicion as to the genuineness of the whole ; and Justi, followed by Eichhorn, Paulus, and Bertholdt, raised the suspicion into confident assurance of spuriousness. The result thus attained could not possibly remain without reaction on the first part. Eosenmiiller, who was always very dependent upon predeces- sors, was the first to deny the Isaian origin of the prophecy against Babylon, in chaps, xiii.— xiv. 23, though this is attested by the heading ; Justi and Paulus undertook to find further reasons for the opinion. Greater advance was now made. Along with the prophecy against Babylon in chaps, xiii.— xiv. 23, the other, in chap. xxi. 1-10, was likewise condemned, and Eosenmiiller could not but be astonished when Gesenius let the former fall, but left the latter standing. There still remained the prophecy against Tyre, in chap, xxiii., which, according as the announced destruction of Tyre was regarded as accomplished by the Assyrians or the Chaldeans, might either be left to Isaiah, or attributed to a later prophet unknown. Eichhorn, followed by Eosenmiiller, decided that it was spurious ; but Gesenius understood the Assyrians as the destroyers, and as the prediction consequently did not extend beyond the horizon of Isaiah, he defended its genuineness. Thus was the Babylonian series of prophecies set aside. The keen eyes of the critics, however, made still further dis- coveries. In chaps, xxiv.-xxvii., Eichhorn found plays on words that were unworthy of Isaiah, and Gesenius an allegorical 38 ISAIAH. announcement of the fall of Babylon: both accordingly condemned these three chapters, and Ewald transposed them to the time of Cambyses. With chaps, xxxiv., xxxv., on account of their relation to the second part, the procedure was shorter. Eosenmiiller at once pronounced them to be "a poem composed during the Babylonian exile, near its close." Such is the history of the origin of the criticism of , Isaiah. Its first attempts were very juvenile. It was Gesenius, but especially Hitzig and Ewald, who first raised it to the eminence of a science. If we take our stand on this eminence, then the Book of Isaiah is an anthology of prophetic discourses by different authors. I have never found anything inherently objection- able in the view that prophetic discourses by Isaiah and by other later prophets may have been blended and joined together in it on a definite plan. Even in that case the collec- tion would be no play of chance, no production of arbitrary will. Those prophecies originating in post-Isaian times are, in tliought and the expression of thought, more nearly akin to Isaiah than to any other prophet ; they are really the homo- geneous and simultaneous continuation of Isaian prophecy, the primary stream of which ramifies in them as in the branches of a river, and throughout retains its fertilizing power. These later prophets so closely resembled Isaiah in prophetic vision, that posterity might on that account well identify them with him. They belong more or less nearly to those pupils of his to whom he refers, when, in chap, viii. 16, he entreats the Lord, "Seal instruction among my disciples." We know of no other prophet belonging to the kingdom of Judah, like Isaiah, who was surrounded by a band of younger prophets, and, so to speak, formed a school. Viewed in this light, the Book of Isaiah is the work of his creative spirit and the band of followers. These later prophets are Isaian, — they are Isaiah's disciples ; it is his spirit that continues to operate in them, like the spirit of Elijah in Elisha, — nay, we may say, like the spirit of Jesus in the apostles; for the words of Isaiah (viii. 18), "Behold, I and the children whom God hath given me," are employed in the Epistle to the Hebrews (ii. 13) as typical of Jesus Christ. In view of this fact, the whole book rightly bears the name of § 3. THE CRITICAL QUESTIONS. 39 Isaiah, inasmuch as he is, directly and indirectly, the fiuthoi of all these prophetic discourses ; his name is the correct common-denominator for this collection of prophecies, -which, with all their diversity, yet form a unity ; and the second half particularly (chaps, xl.-lxvi.) is the work of a pupil who surpasses the master, though he owes the master every- thing. Such may possibly be the case. It seems to me even prob- able, and almost certain, that this may be so ; but indubitably certain it is not, in my opinion, and I shall die without getting over this hesitancy. For very many difficulties arise, ■ — this first of all, that not a single one of the canonical books of prophecy has a similar phenomenon to present, ex- cepting only the Book of Zechariah, with chaps, ix.-xiv. of which the same is said to be the case as with Isaiah, chaps. xl.-lxvi., with this difference merely, that whereas the latter are ascribed to a prophet who lived during the exile, chaps, ix.-xiv. of Zechariah are attributed to one or two earlier prophets of pre-exile times. Stade has proved the post- exilian origin of Zechariah, chaps, ix.-xiv., also ; and we may still continue to assume that it is the post-exilian — but, after chaps, i.— viii., much older — Zechariah himself who, in chaps, ix.-xiv., prophesies concerning the last days in figures borrowed from the past, and purposely makes use of older prophecies. No other book of prophecy besides occasions Like doubts as to its unity of authorship. Even regarding the Book of Jeremiah, Hitzig allows that, though interpolated, it con- tains no spurious pieces. Something exceptional, however, may have happened to the Book of Isaiah. Yet it would cer- tainly be a strange accident if there should have been preserved a quantity of precisely such prophecies as carry with them, in so eminent a degree, so singularly, and in so matchless a manner, Isaiah's style. Strange, again, it would be that history knows nothing whatever regarding this Isaian series of prophets. And strange is it, once more, that the' very names of these prophets have suffered the common fate of being forgotten, even although, in time, they all stood nearer to the collector than did the old prophet whom they had taken as their modeL Tradition, indeed, is anything but infallible, yet its testimony here is powerfully corroborated by the rela- 40 ISAIAH. tion of Zephaniah and Jeremiah — the two most reproductive prophets — not merely to chaps. xL— Ixvi., but also to the undisputed portions of the first half. To all appearance they had before them these prophecies, making these their model, and taking out passages for incorporation in their own pro- phecies, thus forming a kind of mosaic, — a fact which has been thoroughly investigated by Caspari, but which none of the modern critics as yet has carefully considered, and ventured, with like citation of proofs, to disprove. Further, though the disputed prophecies contain much that cannot be adduced from the remaining prophecies, — material which Driver, in his Isaiah (1888), has carefully extracted and elucidated, — ^}'et I am not convinced that the characteristically Isaian elements do not pre- ponderate. And, thirdly, the type of the disputed prophecies, which, if genuine, belong to the latest period of the prophet, does not stand in sharp contrast to the type of the remainder, — rather do the confessedly genuine prophecies lead us in many ways to the others ; the brighter form and the richer eschato- logical contents of the disputed prophecies find their preludes there. And if the unity of Isaian authorship is actually given up, how many later authors, along with the great anonymous writer of chaps, xl.-lxvi., have we to distinguish ? To this query no one has yet given a satisfactory reply. Such are the considerations which, in the Isaian question, assuredly do not allow me to attain the assurance of mathematical certainty. Moreover, the influence of criticism on exegesis in the Book of Isaiah amounts to nothing. If any one casts reproach on this commentary as uncritical, he will at least be unable to charge it with misinterpretation. Nowhere will it be found that the exposition does violence to the text in favour of a false apologetic design. When John Coleridge Patteson, the missionary bishop of Melanesia, undertook his last voyage of supervision amon" the islands, — a voyage which ended with his martyrdom on September 29, 1871, — he was studying, on board the schooner, the Book of Isaiah, with the help of this com- mentary, regarding which he wrote before on one occasion, " Delitzsch helps me much in Isaiah." His last letter speaks at the close about this commentary and Biblical criticism. Miss Ch. M. Yonge, in her biography, has not given this . § 4. EXPOSITION IN ITS PRESENT STATE. 41 passage.^ But doubtless it expressed his deep and absorbing interest in the Divine word of prophecy, which at present almost completely disappears behind the tangled thorns of an overgrown criticism. Meanwhile, if we hold ourselves warranted, on the one hand, in objecting to that direction of criticism from which a naturalistic contemplation of the world demands foregone conclusions of a negative character, — on the other hand, we are certainly far from denying to criticism as such its well-founded rights. § 4. Exposition in its Present State. When the Church, at the time of the Eeformation, began to examine and sift its possessions that had been handed down by tradition. Biblical criticism also took its rise. At the same time, Scripture exposition on historico-grammatical principles, conscious of its task, endeavoured to reach the one true meaning of Scripture, and put an end to the legerdemain of the " manifold sense of Scripture " which had been developed in accordance with tedious examples ; this advance was made under the influence exerted by the revival of classical studies, and by the help of increased knowledge of Hebrew derived from Jewish teachers. For Isaiah, however, the Eeformation- period itself did not accomplish much. Calvin's Commentaries answer the expectations with which one goes to consult them ; on the other hand, Liofher's Scholia are a second-hand and poor performance. The productions of Grotius, important enough in other fields, are in Isaiah, as throughout the prophets generally, of little consequence ; he mixes up the sacred with the profane ; and being unable to follow prophecy in its flight, he clips its wings. Aug. Varenius, of Eostock, one of the orthodox Lutherans, wrote a Commentary on Isaiah which is not to be despised even DOW ; but, though learned in many ways, it is the confused production of an undisciplined mind. But Campegius Vitringa (who died in 1722 as professor of theology at Franequer), by his Commentary in two folio volumes, which appeared in 1714, threw all the works of his predecessors into the shade. It is he who originated the historical » Ufe of J. C. Patteson, vol. ii. p. 379 (cf. 268), 5th edition (1875). 42 ISAIAH. method of expounding the prophets, and in this he has given us his own work as a model ; ^ but, though starting with the correct principle that it does not exhaust the meaning of the prophet's words, hp nevertheless, in the allegorical explanation appended to the grammatico-historical, shows that he is not yet quite free from the Cocceian method, which, without con- sidering the complex-apotelesmatic character of prophecy, reads in the prophets the most minute allusions to the history of the world and the Church. The shady sides of the commentary usually come before the reader first ; but the more he uses it, the more highly does he learn to value it. There is deep research throughout, — nowhere a superabund- ance of dead and dry learning. The author's heart is present in his work. At times he pauses in the path of toilsome investigation, and gives vent to his thoughts in rapturous expressions. He sees and feels more deeply than Bishop Lowtli, who keeps to the surface, alters the Masoretic text according to his taste,^ and does not get beyond sesthetic admiration of the form. The era of modern exegesis begins with that destructive theology of the latter half of the eighteenth century which pulled down but could not build. This destruction, however, was not unproductive of good : the denial of the divine and eternal in Scripture has helped us to recognise its human and temporal aspects, the charm of its poetry, and — what is of still greater consequence — the concrete reality of its history. BosenmuUer's Scholia (3 vols.; last edition, 1811- 1820) are an industrious, clear, and elegant compilation, chiefly from Vitringa ; the sobriety of judgment displayed in selecting, and the dignified earnestness — far removed from all frivolity — deserve our praise. The Commentary of Gesenius (in three parts, or with the translation, four parts, 1820- 1821), which is more decidedly rationalistic, is also more independent in its exegesis, careful in its historical expositions, and especially distinguished for its pleasing and perspicuous style and the stores of learning gathered from all the literature on Isaiah, especially the new sources of grammatico-historical knowledge opened up since Vitringa's time. The Commentary 1 See Diestel, Geschichte des A. T. in der christlichen Kirche, 436-438. ' Against him, Kijhler wrote Vindiciae texlus Heb. Ksaiae, 1786. § 4. EXPOSITION IN ITS PRESENT STATE. 43 oi Eitzig (1833) remains his best work, eminent for its precision, acuteness, and originality of grammatical perception, its fine tact in discovering the train of thought, its pith and exactness in stating carefully considered results; but it is also disfigured by reckless and pseiido-critical assertions of an arbitrary character, and by a designedly profane style of thought that remains unaffected by the spirit of prophecy. The Commentary of Hendewerk (2 vols. 1838-1843) is in philological and historical exposition often very weak ; the style is diffuse, and the eye of the disciple of Herbart is too dull to distinguish between Israelitish prophecy and heathen poetry, between the politics of Isaiah and those of Demos- thenes. Nevertheless, the careful diligence and earnest endeavour to point out in Isaiah the germs of eternal verities, are unmistakeable. In the work of Ewald (translated into English; London 1875-1881) there is universally recognised his natural penetration, and the noble enthusiasm with which he throws himself into the contents of the prophetic books, in which he finds a perpetual present ; and his endeavour to attain a deep apprehension is in some degree rewarded'. But it is provoking to observe the self-sufiBciency with which he ignores nearly all his predecessors, the dictatorial confidence of his criticism, the false and often nebulous pathos, and the com- plete identification of his opinions with truth itself. In setting forth the characteristics of the prophets, he is a master; his translations, on the other hand, are stiff, and hardly according to the taste of any one. Umbreit's Practical Commentary (2nd edition, 1846) is useful and stimulating; a profound aesthetic and religious conviction of the glorious character of the prophetic word reveals itself in highly poetic language, heaping one figure on another, and almost never descending to an ordinary level. The other extreme is the prose of Knohcl (died 1863). The precision of this scholar, the third edition of whose Commentary on Isaiah (1861) was one of his last works, deserves the most grateful recognition for its excellence in philological as well as in archaeological matters ; but his almost affected commonness of style prevents him from seeing the depth of meaning, while his excessive desire to find historical realization everywhere conceals from him the poetry of the form. The Commentary of Drechsler was a real 44 ISAIAH. advauce in the exposition of Isaiah. It was edited by himself only as far as chap, xxvii., and then completed (2 vols. 1845-57) by me and by H. A. Hahn of Greifswald (who died in 1861), from his notes, though these afforded little that could be used in the exposition of chaps, xl.-xlvi. Since the time of Vitringa, this is comparatively the best Commentary on Isaiah, chaps, i.-xii.,^ and especially on chaps. xiii.-xxviL Its excellence does not lie in the exposition of details, — for this is inadequate, through the fragmentary and glossatorial style of its exegesis, and, though diligent and thorough, especially in a grammatical point of view, is not homogeneous or productive, — but in the spiritual and spirited conception of the whole, the profound perception of the character and the ideas of the prophet and of prophecy, the vigorous penetration into the inmost nature of the plan and contents of the whole. Meanwhile (1850, 2 vols.) there appeared the Commentary of I'eter Schegg, which follows the Vulgate, and contains valuable remarks in connection with the history of translations, but also displays free and profound insight into the genesis and meaning of the prophecies ; at the same time there also appeared the Commentary of Ernst Meier, the Tubingen orientalist, which did not get beyond the first half. If any one was specially called to advance the exegetical study of the Book of Isaiah, it was C. P. Caspari of Christiania ; but of his Norwegian Commentary all that has appeared reaches only to the end of chap, vi.,^ and its progress has been hindered not only by the exhaustive thoroughness of investigation at which he aimed, but also by the Grundtvig controversy, which involved him in very extensive studies in the field of Church history. Wealth of material for the following prophetic dis- courses is also afforded by his " Contributions to the Intro- duction to the Book of Isaiah, and to the history of Isaiah's time," which appeared (1848) as vol. ii. of our Studies in Biblical 1 See the review by Franz Dietrich in Reuters Eepertorium, vol. xlviii. pp. 1-25. In the same year, 1845, Schroring in "Wismar began his Studies in Isaiah, three parts of which (1845, 1852, 1857) have appeared. ^ Commentar til de tolv forste Capitler of Propheten Jesaja, Christiania 1867. Cf. also the treatise on the Seraphim in Isaiah in the Theological Tidsshrift for 1859, and the Essay on the position and meaning of Isaiah viii. in the History of the Kingdom of God, in the Bihelske Afhandlinger, 1884. § 4. EXPOSITION IN ITS PRESENT STATE. 45 Theology ; his "Programm" on the Syro-Ephraimitish war (pub- lished in 1849) ; and his treatise, not by any means obsolete, on "Jeremiah a witness to the genuineness of Isaiah, chap, xxxiv., and hence also to that of Isaiah, chaps, xl.— Ixvi., chaps, xiii.— xiv. 23, and xxi. 1-10 " (with an Excursus on the relation of Zephaniah to the disputed prophecies of Isaiah), which appeared in the Zeitschrift f. d. ges. luth. Theologie u. Kirche, 1843. Among Jewish Commentaries, two must be mentioned ; the work of M. L. Malbim (who died at Kiew 1879), which (published at Krotoschin 1849) especially deals in a concise style with the exact meaning of synonymous words and ex- pressions ; and the learned, subtle, and ever-stimulating work of Samuel David Zuzzatto, of Padua (died 1865), part of which, from the beginning to chap, xxxviii., was published by himself under the title Frofeta Isaia volgarizzato e commentato ad uso degli Israeliti, while the remainder was edited after his death from the materials he had left (Padua 1855—1866). Of additional literature that has been published since the appearance of the second and third editions of this Com- mentary (1869, 1879), the following, arranged in chronological order, is worthy of notice : — Cheyne, T. K. (Oriel Professor at Oxford, and Canon of Colchester) : The Book of Isaiah chronologically arranged. An amended version, with historical and critical introductions and explanatory notes. London 1870. There had previously been published, by the same writer, Notes and Criticisms on the Hebrew text of Isaiah (London 1868) : frequent reference was made to this work in the second edition of our Commentary. Seinecke, L. (Pastor at Hevensen, near Nordheini) : Der Evangelist des Alten Testaments. Erklarung der Weissagung Jesaia's, Kap. xl.-lxvi. Leipzig 1870. See the review by Ed. Eiehm, in Studien u. Kritiken, 1872, pp. 553-578. BiEKS, T. E. : Commentary on the Book of Isaiah. London 1871. 46 LSAIAII. rTVC' "IDD, Liber Jesaiae. Textum raasoreticum accuratissime expressit, e fontibus Masorae varie illustravit, notis criticis confirmavit S. Baer. Praefatus est edendi operis adjutor Fr. Delitzsch. Leipzig 1872. DiESTEL, LuDWiG (died at Tiibingen, 1879): Der Prophet Jesaia, erklart von Aug. Knobel (who died 1863); Aufl. 4. Leipzig 1872. EiEiiM, Ed. (died at Halle, 1888): Das erste Buch Mose nach der deutschen Uebersetzung Dr. Mart. Luthers in rediviertem Text rait Vorbemerkungen und Erlauterungen, und einem die Berichtigungen des Jesaja enthaltenden Anhang im Auftrag der zur Eevision der Uebersetzung des A. T. bei'ufenen Conferenz herausgegeben. Halle 1873. Stade, Bernhaed (Professor in Giessen) : De Isaiae vaticiniis Aethiopicis diatribe. Leipzig 1873. See the notice by Aug. Dillmann in tlie Liter. Centralblatt, 1874, Kr. 9. Strachey, Sir Edward : Jewish History and Politics in the time of Sargon and Sennacherib. An inquiry into the historical meaning and purpose of the prophecies of Isaiah. Second edition, revised. London 1874. Webee, Feed, (died at Polsingen, 1879): Der Profet Jesaja in Bibelstunden ausgelegt. 2 vols. Nordlintren 1875-76. Klostermann, Aug. (Professor in Kiel) : Jesaja, cap. xL- Ixvi. Eine Bitte urn Hiilfe in grosser Noth. In Zeitschrift fiir luth. Theologie, 1876; pp. 1-60. KOHUT, Alex. (Chief Eabbi in FiLnfkirchen) : Antiparsische Ausspriiche im Deuterojesajas. In Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenl. Gesellschaft, 1879, pp. 709-722. Neteler, B. : Das Buch Isaias aus dem Urtext ubersetzt und mit Beriicksichtigung seiner Gliederung und der auf seinen Inhalt sich beziehenden assyr. Inschriften erklart Munster 1876. , See the notice by AV. Eaudissin in the Tlieol. Literaturzeitiui" 1876, Nr. 19. § 4. EXPOSITION IN ITS PRESENT STATE. 47 Eeuss, Ed. (Professor in Strasburg): Les Proplietes (form- ing Part 2 of his work on the Scriptures), 2 vols., the former of which contains the translation and exposition of the old Isaiah portions, while the latter contains the decidedly later portions. Paris 1876, The Fifty-third Chapter of Isaiah according to the Jewish Interpreters. I. Texts edited from printed books and MSS. by Ad. Nenbauer. II. Translations by S. E. Driver and Ad. ISTeubauer. With an introduction to the translations by Prof. E. B. Pusey. Oxford and London 1876-77. See the notice ty Hermann Sti'ack in the Theologische Literatur- zeitung, 1877, Nr. 21. Le Hir (formerly Professor in the Seminary of Saint- Sulpice, Paris): Les trois grands proph^tes, Isaie, J^remie, Ezechiel; analyses et commentaires. Paris 1877. See the notice by W. Bautlissin in the Theologische Literatur- zeitung, 1877, Nr. 11. Nagelsbagh, C. W. Eduard (died at Gunzenhausen, 1880) : Der Prophet Jesaja, theologisch-homiletisch bearbeitet (Theil 14 des Lange'schen Bibelwerks). Bielefeld u. Leipzig 1877. [Translated into English, with additions, by Samuel T. Lowrie and Dunlop Moore. 'New York and Edinburgh 1878.] See the notice in the Beilage zur Luth. Kirchenzeitung, Nr. 1, and that by Em. Kautsch in the Theologische Literaturzeitnng, 1878, Nr. 25. Stragk, Heeji. (Professor in Berlin): Zur Textkritik des Jesaias. In Zeitschrift fiir luth. Theologie, 1877, pp. 17-52. Studee, G. L. (Professor in Berne) : Beitrage zur Textkritik des Jesaja. In the Jahrblicher fiir protest. Theologie, 1877, pp. 706-730. Eehe, Predrik : Profeten Jesaja : Ett gammaltestamentligt Utkast. Upsala 1877. De Lagaede, Paul (Professor in Gottingen): Semitica. Aus dem 23. Bande der Abhandl. der kgl. Gesellschaft der Wissensch. in Gottingen. Gottingen 1878. 48 ISAIAH. Pages 1-32 contain critical remarks on Isaiah, chaps. L-ivii. : see the notice by Eberh. Nestle in the TheoL Literaturzeitung, 1878, Nr. 11. LOHE, Fk (Pastor in Zirchow a/Usedom): Zur Frage uber die EditheitvonJesaias 40-66. DreiHefte. Berlin 1878-80. See the notice in the Liter. Beilage der Luther. Kirchenzeitung, 1879, Nr. 17. KosTLiN, Fkiedeich : Jesaia und Jeremia. Ihr Leben und ihr Wirken aus ihren Schriften dargestellt. Berlin 1879. Earth, J. (Professor in Berlin): Beitrage zur Erklarung des Jesaia. Karlsruhe 1855. ScHOLZ, Anton (Professor in Wiirzburg) : Die alexandrin- isclie Uebersetzung des Buches Jesaias. Wiirzburg 1880. Cheyne, T. K: The Prophecies of Isaiah. A new trans- lation, with commentary and appendices. 2 vols. London 1880-81. [Fifth edition, 1889.] See my notice of the first edition in The Academy, 1880 (Ap. 10). Knabenbauer, a. (Jesuit priest) : Erklarung des Propheten Jesaia. Freiburg i. B. 1881. Distinguished for the very extensive use made of the older exposi- tory literature (certainly with no great profit), and for beneficial regard to the more modern. GuTHE, Heem. (Professor in Leipzig) : Das Zukunftsbild des Jesaia. Leipzig 1885. Beedenkamp, C. J. (Professor in Greifswald) : Der Prophet Jesaia erklart. Drei Lieferungen. Erlangen 1886—7. This author has also published Vaticinium quod de Immanueh edidit Jesaias. Erlangen 1880. Von Oeelli, Cong. (Professor in Basle): Die Propheten Jesaja und Jeremia ausgelegt. Nordlingen 1887. [Trans- lated in Clark's For. Theol. Lib., Edinburgh 1889.] [Deiver, S. li (Eegius Professor of Hebrew in Oxford University): Isaiah, his Life and Times. London 1888.] [Sayce, a. H. : The Life and Times of Isaiah. London 1889.] [Smith, George A. : The Book of Isaiah. 2 vols. London 1889-90.] THE SUPERSCRIPTION OF THE BOOK OP ISAIAH. I. The external title as handed down is njJ'B'^ The LXX. always modifies the form of the prophet's name into H^AIAS (see Frankel, Vorstudien, p. Ill); on the other hand, it renders the name n'^E*' in Ezra viii. 7, 19 by 'I(rata<; (but in other places in many other ways '), both paroxytone, inasmuch as a? in prosody is long ; Lat. Isaias (Usaias), in Prudentius with accented a and short i (but, on the other hand, Jeremias, because in this case the e, which is short in accordance with the Hebrew, is not suited for bearing the accent of the word). In the book itself, and throughout the Old Testament Scrip- tures, the prophet is called ^^1W\ (in the Babylonian Codex, dating from the year 916, in'VB'',, according to the old style of writing) ; on the other hand, in the Books of Chronicles, Ezra, and Nehemiah, the shorter form designates other per- sons. Though the shorter form of such names was in ancient times current along with the longer, it came to be exclusively used in more recent days ; hence its employment as the usual title. The name is a compound word, signifying " Jahu (Jah) has wrought salvation," — JJB''' being equivalent to VTin (in n^J'?'ii^), as am in nj?nn is equivalent to ^''n"!'? — not " salvation of Jahu " (as explained, for instance, by Kiiper, with Caspari) ; for, as Kohler has shown, in the beginning of his Commentary on Zechariah, the number of the names of persons compounded of a substantive and ni is exceeded by ^ 'Hff«i«f (or even 'Uaaia^, following the analogy of 'HmoSoff, 'Havxios) is essentially a modification like 'Itnttas. There are some other proper names beginning with K"', but the LXX. renders none of these by Ho- or la, like this one. In Ezra viii. 7, 19, n'SIK'" is modified into the form 'Ii7«i«j, and in 1 Chron. iii. 21, Neh. xi. 7, into 'leff/ar,— a worse form. VOL. I. D 50 ISAIAII. that of those which are formed from the perfect of the Qal, and this, too, with the meaning of a derived conjugation, especially the Piel and Hiphil. Combined with W', how- ever, the name would probably take the form inw (like "'i?r'n, "Jr'r''?, l"'i?iy), and signify, " Jahu is my salvation ; " hence n'VS'^, like "^^1??, nnat, mn:, will be an exclamation of thankfulness to God made into the name of the child.^ The prophet shows he is conscious that it was not by accident he bore this name ; for V'mri^ VW', and nj)v^'^ are among his favourite words,— nay, we may say, he lives and moves in the coming salvation : but nin' is the God of salvation ; this is the peculiar redemptive designation of God. The name in- dicates the Being who exists absolutely (i.e. eternally and independently), who bears witness to Himself (Ex. iii. 14), as freely and according to His own counsel determining His ways, ruling throughout the course of history, and fixing its form. This work of free grace has for its end that salvation which, beginning with Israel and working outwards, embraces and includes all mankind. The element irT" (rr") in the prophet's name has been shortened from the " tetragrammaton " nin" by rejecting the second n. Prom this abbreviation we see that the vowel a stood at the beginning of the divine name. According to Theodoret, it was pronounced ^la^e by the Samaritans ; this is also the pronunciation given in the Archontic list of the divine names found in Epiphanius. Jacob of Edessa, as we learn from an excursus to his Syriac translation of the Ao'yoi iinOpovioi of Severus of Antioch, was under the erroneous impression that the name in Hebrew was pronounced n''n> like n\nN ; moreover, this OIjCTIj, in the Codex Curzonianius of the Syro-Hexaplar Isaiah, is tran- scribed in Greek characters HEHE {ZeitscTirift der deutschen morgenl. Gesellschaft, xxxii. 465 ff.). The testimony hereby borne to the conclusion of the word in n— is confirmed by the abbreviation into inj, which, after the analogy of similar abbreviations, has come from mn;, through an intermediate form in?. The modified form 'Aid (found in Theodoret) does not point to the divine name nini (which must have been represented by 'Ia/3a), but n''; 'laco with its by-forms is 'nj, and 'lawid (in Origen, contra Celsum, i. 656) is the ^ See Friedr. Delitzsch, Prolegomena, pp. 206-208. THE SUPEESCRIPTIOSr OF THE BOOK OF ISAIAH. 51 condensed n' in\^ The pronunciation Jehovah {YeJiomh) has arisen from a combination of the Qeri and Kethib, and did not become current till after the sixteenth century ; Galatinus, about 1518, in his work de arcanis catholicae veritatis, was the iirst who remarked that the " tetragrammaton," read as it is pointed, sounds Jehovah (Yehovah) ; from that time people began to pronounce it so, but Genebrard, who died in 1597, in his Commentary on the Psalms, continues against Beza to oppose it as an intolerable innovation : Impii vetustatis temeratores et nominis Dei ineffdbilis 'profaimiores atq%e adeo transformatores JovA vel Jehovah legunt, vocdbulo novo, harlaro, fictitio, irreligioso et Jovem gentilium redolente. 11. The title of the look, given by itself. Ver. 1 : " The vision of Yeshayahu, son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziyahu, Jotham, Alutz, Yehizkiyahu, kings of Judah." Isaiah is here called fioN-ia. The Jewish doctrine, known even to the early Fathers of the Church, that when a prophet's father is named, the latter also was a prophet (Megilla 15a), is unfounded. But there is at least some sense, though no historic basis, in an old tradition repeated in the Midrash (Pesikta de-Bab Cahana ll*Ib) and the Talmuds {Megilla 10&, cf. Sota 10b), that Amoz was the brother of Amaziah, the father and predecessor of Uzziah, and that Isaiah was thus, like the Davidic kings, a descendant of Judah and Tamar. The nature and appearance of Isaiah make a thoroughly royal impression. He speaks to kings like a king. With majestic bearing he goes to meet the magnates of his people, and of the world-power beyond. In his style, he is among the prophets what Solomon was among the kings. In all circumstances and moods, he is master of his materials, a master of language, — simply magnificent, sublime without affectation, splendid though unadorned. But this regal character had its roots somewhere else than in blood. Only this much may be said with certainty, that Isaiah was born in Jerusalem. For the character of his prophecy betokens closest intimacy with the capital : accord- ing to Chagiga 136, he stands in relation to Ezekiel as a native of the chief city to a native of the provinces ; notwith- standing his exceeding manifold prophetic missions, we never ,' Cf. Baudissin, StwUen zur semit. EeligionsgescMchte, i. 183 f. 52 ISAIA.H. find him outside of Jerusalem; here, too, as may be seen from chap. xxii. 1, and the style of his intercourse with king Hezekiah, he lived with his wife and children in the lower part of the city ; here he carried on his ministry under the four kings named in ver. 1, who are enumerated without "vav copulative ; " there is the same unconnected enumeration as in the titles of the Books of Hosea and Micah. There Hezekiah is called ^^W], — almost the same form as here, — but with the simple rejection of the toneless n. The Chronicler especially prefers the complete form, — full both at the beginning and the end, — though he also uses the rarer form in^pTn. Eoorda is of opinion that the Chronicler took this malformation from the three titles, where it is a copyist's error for W'iptni or njiptni ; but it is also found in Jer. xv. 4 and 2 Kings xx. 10, where such an error in transcription could not possibly have taken place. Accordingly, it is not au irregular form ; we must not, however, with Eoorda, derive it from the Piel, but from the Qal of the verb (" strong is Jehovah"), with a connecting i, which occurs pretty frequently in proper names derived from verb-roots with a vowel in the middle, such as bxp'tJ-'^ from D'E', 1 Chron. iv. 36. Under the kings already mentioned Isaiah exercised his ministry, or, as it is expressed in ver. 1, saw the vision which he committed to writing in the book before us. Among the many Hebrew synonyms for seeing, nm is the general ex- pression regularly used for prophetic perception, whether the form in which the divine revelation was made to the prophet was a vision or au audible communication ; in both cases he " sees " it, — distinguishing this divine message, in its super- natural objectivity, from his own conceptions and thoughts by means of the inner sense, which is designated by the term used to denote the noblest of the five external senses. The prophet accordingly is called nth, " a seer " (at an earlier period in the language, nxh, 1 Sam. ix. 9), and prophecy is called (itn ; the term nsuji, which is the cognate of f<'?3, appears only in the latest period (thrice in Chronicles and Nehemiah). The noun liTn, indeed, is also applied to individual visions (cf. Jer. xxix. 7 with Job xx. 8, xxxiii. 15), like li''jn (const, lit^n), which is formed from 'tn by euphonic doubling, and is more frequently used in this sense ; but here, in the title to the THE SUPERSCRIPTION OF THE BOOK OF ISAIAH. 53 Book of Isaiah, the abstract meaning passes over into the still more closely related collective, indicating the whole of what is seen, i.e. the contents of the vision. We may not conclude, therefore, that the first part of ver. 1 was originally the superscription merely of the first prophetic address, and that it was only through the addition of the latter part that it was changed into a general title for the whole book : Vitringa held this view, and perhaps it may even be correct, but with the Chronicler (2 Chron. xxxii. 32) this W)i^^ |irn appears as the general title of the collection. Along with Judah, Jerusalem is further specially mentioned as the object of the vision. The " perpetual Qeri " to th^ify (D7CT"i') is DvK^Ti, which is hardly to be regarded as a " broken dual," i.e. as formed through internal change of sound, but — like nay for liiay, 2 Chron. xiii. 19, and the Aramaic IHP^ — a later form in which the diphthongal ajim or aim has been resolved from the original em, am, an. Cheyne finds in the particularizing, from Judah to Jerusalem, an indication of the fact that Isaiah was a city-prophet. But the object of the prophecies of the provincial prophet Micah is also (i. 1) marked by the mention of the capitals of both kingdoms. The advance from " Judah " to " Jerusalem " is a centralizing step ; and if prn is meant to indicate the totality of what was seen by Isaiah, this designation of the object of Isaiah's prophecies by "Judah and Jerusalem" is centralizing. For his vision extends far beyond Judah, not merely to the sister kingdom of Ephraim, but also to the Gentile nations. Within the widest circle of the nations of the world there lies the smaller one containing the peoples bordering on the Hebrews ; and within this, again, there is the still smaller one of all Israel, including Samaria ; within this, once more, there is the yet smaller circle of the kingdom of Judah ; and all these circles include Jerusalem, because the whole history of the world, regarded in its inmost working and its final purpose, is the history of the Church of God, which has Jerusalem, the city of Jehovah's temple and the kingdom of promise, for its peculiar site. In this sense, the expression "concerning Judah and Jerusalem " is also suitable for the whole book, in which everything that the prophet sees is seen from Judah and Jerusalem, and for the sake of both, and in the interests 54 ISAIAH. of both. It is more probable, however, that the latter part of ver. 1 is a more recent addition, so that the words from ptn to D^B^T' thus formed the original superscription of the first address, and could only indirectly (like the names of the Books of the Pentateuch) be used as the designation of the whole book. Por it is inadmissible, with Luzzatto, to take "i^K as nominative instead of accusative {qui instead of quam, sc. visionem), in order to stamp the words " The Vision of Isaiah, son of Amoz," as the superscription of the first dis- course, in chap. i. ; the suggestion is contrary to the syntax, for nrn -\fii lirn is the usual Hebrew construction of the verb with its own substantive (Ges. § 138. 1). FIRST HALF OF THE COLLECTION OF PROPHECIES. CHAPS. I.-XXXIX. PART I.— PROPHECIES RELATING TO THE COURSE OF THE MASS OP THE PEOPLE ONWARDS TO HARDENING OF HEART, CHAPS. I.-VI. Opening Discourse, eegaeding Jehovah's way with His Ungeateful and Eebellious People, I. 2 ff. The prophet is standing on the fateful boundary-line between the two halves of the history of Israel. Neither by the riches of divine goodness which they experienced during the times of Uzziah and Jotham, which closely resembled those of David and Solomon, nor by the chastisements of the divine displeasure which inflicted wound upon wound, have the people allowed themselves to be brought to repentance and reflection ; the divine means of training have been exhausted, and it only remains that Jehovah should let His people in their present condition be consumed in the fire, that a new people may be formed out of the gold which has stood the fiery test. At this period, so pregnant with storms, appear the prophets, like birds upon the sea, presaging the tempest, and more active than at any other epoch, — Amos in the days of Jeroboam, Micah in the reign of Jotham, but above all Isaiah, the prophet Kar i^o'x^vv, standing midway between Moses and Christ. Conscious of this his exalted position in the history of salvation, he begins his opening address in Deuteronomic fashion, like the grand Song of Moses in Deut. xxxii. This form has been shown by the investigations of Klostermann 55 56 ISAIAH. (Studien u. Krit. 18 71) to have passed current in Hezekiali's time, at latest, as a prophetic testimony reaching back to Moses, so that it may actually be regarded as such (see No. X. of my " Studies in Pentateuchal Criticism," in Luthardt's Zeitschrift, 1880, p. 503 ff.). This song is the compendious programme and the common watchword of all prophecy, to which it stands in the same fundamental relation as the Decalogue to all other laws, and the Lord's Prayer to all other prayers. The law- giver therein sets before the eyes of his people their whole iiistory to the end of time. This history falls into four great periods : the creation and exaltation of Israel ; the ingratitude and apostasy of Israel ; the surrender of Israel into the hands of the heathen ; lastly, the restoration of Israel, — sifted but not destroyed, — and the accord of all nations to praise Jehovah, who has revealed Himself in judgment and in mercy. This fourfold division is not merely preserved in every part of the Iiistory of Israel, but it forms the distinguishing mark of the history as a whole to its remotest end. Every age of Israel has thus in that song a mirror of its present condition and future destiny. This mirror the prophets held up before their contemporaries. Thus did Isaiah. He opens his prophetic address as Moses begins his Song. Moses begins (Deut. xxxi. 1): "Hear, ye heavens, and I will speak, and let the earth hear the words of my mouth." In what sense he calls on heaven and earth he himself tells us in Deut. xxxi. 28 f. He foresees in spirit the future apostasy of Israel, and takes heaven and earth, which will endure beyond his earthly life now drawing to a close, as witnesses of what he has to say to his people with such a prospect. In like manner, — only with the interchange of the parallel verbs VDir and jnxn, — Isaiah begins, " Hear, heavens, and give ear, earth : for Jehovah speaks'' The ground of the demand is put in a general way : they are to hear because Jehovah is speaking. But what Jehovah speaks substantially agrees with that address of Jehovah which is introduced in Deut. xxxii. 2 by the expression " And he said." What Jehovah, according to the statement there, will one day have to say in His wrath, He now says through the prophet, whose present •corresponds to the future of the Song of Moses. For the time has now arrived when heaven and earth, — which always exist CHAPTEE I. 2. 57 and are always the same, which have continued through the past history of Israel in all places and at aU times, — should fulfil the duty laid on them by the lawgiver to be witnesses ; and this is just the special, true, and ultimate sense in which they are required, as they were by Moses, to hear. They were present and shared in the proceedings when Jehovah gave the Law to His people ; the heavens, according to Deut. iv. 36, as the place from which the voice of God issued, and the earth as the place where His great fire appeared. They were solemnly admitted to the scene when Jehovah gave to His people the choice between a blessing and a curse, life and death (Deut. xxx. 19, iv. 26). They are now, therefore, to hear and bear witness regarding what Jehovah, their Creator and the God of Israel, has to say, and what complaints He has to make (ver. 2) : " Children have I brought up and exalted, tut they have rebelled against Me." Though Israel is meant, Israel is not named, but the historical facts are generalized into a parable, in order that the astounding and appalling state of matters may be made more prominent. Israelis Jehovah's son (Ex. iv. 22 f.); all the members of the nation are His children (Deut. xiv. 1, xxxii. 20) ; He is the Father of Israel, whom He has begotten (Deut. xxxii. 6, 18). The existence of Israel as a nation, like that of other nations, is effected, indeed, by means of natural repro- duction, not by spiritual regeneration ; but the primary ground of Israel's origin is the supernaturally ef&cacious word of grace addressed to Abraham (Gen. xvii. 15 f.) ; and a series of wonderful dealings in grace has brought the growth and development of Israel to that point which it had attained at the Exodus from Egypt. It is in this sense that Jehovah has begotten Israel. This relation of Jehovah to Israel as His children has already, in Isaiah's time, a long time of grace behind it in the past, — the time of Israel's childhood in Egypt, the time of youth in the desert, the time of growing manhood from Joshua to Samuel ; and now Joshua can say in the days of Isaiah, " I have brought up children, and exalted them." The opposite of bin? is tb^, that of Q") is %f^. The Piel h? signifies to " make great," and when applied to, children (as here and in 2 Kings x. 6, etc.), to "bring up" in the sense of natural growth; and the Pilel DOii, 58 ISAIAH, which is used also in xxiii. 4, Ezek. xxxi. 4 (cf. the proper names in 1 Chron. xxv. 29-31), as the parallel to ^.3, signifies to "exalt" in the dignitative sense of raising to a high position, to which wise love of a father gradually advances a child. The two verses depict the condition of mature man- hood and high honour which Israel had reached under the monarchy of David and Solomon, and which has again been enjoyed under Uzziah and Jotham. But how ungrateful were they towards God for what they owed to Him, — " but they have broken away from me ! " Instead of an adversative particle (^3K possibly), there is merely 1 copulative, used energetically, as in vi. 7 (cf. DDl, Hos. vii. 13). Two things that ought never to have been conjoined, — the gracious and filial relation of Israel to Jehovah, and Israel's base apostasy from Jehovah, — these, though utterly contradictory, were now actually combined. The verb JJ^'a, ^.mJ (here with retracted tone,^ from the presence of the following '3), in accordance with its radical idea, signifies to " break away, break loose " (Lat. dirumpere, as in amicitiam dirumpere),^ and is followed by 2 with the object forming the completion of the action ; it means violently and determinedly to break connection with any one, and is here used of the inward severance from God, and renunciation of His claims, which forms the climax of nx^n (Job xxxiv. 3 7), and of which the full outward mani- festation is idolatry. From the time that Solomon, towards the end of his reign, gave himself up to idolatry, the worship of idols had never wholly ceased, even in public, down to the days of Isaiah. Two attempts had been made to put an end to it, — the reformation begun by Asa ancj completed by Jehoshaphat, and afterwards the one accomplished by Joash during the lifetime of the high priest Jehoiada, who had I ^ Only in the following cases is tliere no retraction of the tone : (1) "When the syllable to which it would be retracted is a closed syllable ; (2) When the former of the two logically connected words ends with a heavy suffix ; (3) When the final syllable of this word is closed and accented, as in V 0*1?!?. 2 In Arabic, i__£*u,j originally had a purely sensuous meaning, and it is expressly remarked that it received an ethical sense only through Islam ; it is the proper word /for breaking the fruit by bursting open the husk. CHAPTER I. 3. 59 preserved him and brought him up ; the first, however, had not been able -wholly to abolish idolatry altogether, and what had been removed by Joash returned with redoubled abomina- tions as soon as Jehoiada was dead. Hence the expression, " they have broken away from me," which sums up the whole of Israel's ingratitude in the one culminating sin, applies to the entire history of the nation from the zenith of glory under David and Solomon down to the time of the prophet. In ver. 3 Jehovah now complains of the apostasy with which His children have rewarded Him as inhuman, — nay, worse than that which would be shown by the brutes : " An ox Jcnoweth his owner, and an ass the crib of its master,— Israel doth not know, my people doth not consider." A plough- ing ox has a knowledge of its purchaser and owner ('"i.JP), to whom it willingly submits ; and an ass, the domestic animal of proverbial stupidity (in the East also ; see Zeitschrift der deutschen morgenl. Gesellschaft, xl. 266 f.), has a knowledge at least of the crib of its master (17??. ^ plural of excellence, as in Exod. xxi. 29, — a degenerate species of the " extensive " plural, as distinguished from the " multiplicative " plural), i.e. it knows that it is its master who puts its fodder into the manger (D'3^ — from Dax, to fatten cattle — with — instead of — , like the forms y^^^, I'i'i??). No such knowledge has Israel, — neither direct, like instinct, nor indirect, acquired by reflection (tjiann). The expressions JJT" ib and jiinnn t6 can- not be taken here (as for example in Ivi. 10 ; Ps. Ixxxii. 5) in an objectless sense, and as indicating a state or condition, — — as if the meaning were, "they are ignorant and inconsiderate," but the object is implied in what precedes, and the words mean "they know not, consider not what, on their side, Qorresponds to the owner and to the manger which the master fills," — namely, that they are the children and the property of Jehovah, and their existence and prosperity solely depend on the grace of Jehovah (Jer. v. 24, cf. Hos. ii. 10). The parallel, with its many contrasts, like the similar one in Jer. viii. 7, where animals are again introduced, explains itself even through the employment of " Israel " and " my people." Those who, in knowledge and gratitude, are far surpassed and put to shame by the brutes, are not a nation like any other nation among men, but " Israel," descendants of Jacob, who 60 ISAIAH, wrestled with and overcame the wrath of God, and by wrestling also obtained the blessing for himself and his pos- terity ; they are " my people " too, — those whom Jehovah has chosen out of all peoples to be the people of His possession, and most especial care and direction. This people, bearing the honoured name — bestowed by God Himself — of one who was a hero of faith and prayer, — this favoured people of Jehovah lowered itself far beneath the level of the brutes. Such is the complaint poured out before heaven and earth by the noble speaker. The piercing cry of complaint by the deeply-pained Father is at the same time the heaviest impea-chment. But the cause of God is to the prophet the cause of a friend who feels the grief of his friend as he would feel his own (v. 1). Hence the complaint of God now changes into strong invective and threatening on the part of the prophet ; and in conformity with the deep indignation by which he is moved, his discourse in verse 4 moves rapidly along like a lightning storm, giving forth flash upon flash. The address consists of seven mem- bers, not formally connected, but so arranged as to form a climax, and each is composed of but two or three words: " Woe to the sinful nation, the guilt-laden people, the miserable race, the children acting corruptly ! They have forsaken Jehovah, Uasphemed the Holy One of Israel, turned away backwards!" The distinction attempted between lin and >is, making the former to signify " Oh!" and the latter " Woe!" is untenable ; for, with some doubtful exceptions, '>in also is an exclamation of pain, and here not so much a calling down of woe {vae genti, as Jerome renders it), as a lamentation (vae gentem), but one that is fdled with wrath. The appellations of Israel which follow point to what the nation ought to be in accordance with the divine choice and determination, and express what, through its own choice and self-determination in opposition to God, it has become. (1.) According to the divine choice and determination, Israel should be a "holy nation," Ex. xix. 6, but it is a "sinful nation" (gens peccatrix, as the Vulgate correctly translates) ; for son here is not so much a participle as a participial adjective, signifying what is habitual, — the usual singular to the plural D\SBn, dfiap- TwXoi, the singular of which is not in common use, and occurs CHAPTER I. 4. 61 only once (Amos ix. 8) in the feminine as an adjective. " Holy " and " sinful " are sharp contrasts, for t^hij signifies that which is separated from what is common, unclean, sinful, and superior to it. At the same time, the alliteration in lia ••in (with Paseic, to preserve the independence of the two words, whose sound is so similar) is intended to produce the impression that the nation as sinful is a nation of woe. (2.) In the Law, besides being called ^SlP *i3, Israel is called ^T'l ^5? (Num. xvii. 6), the people chosen and highly favoured by Jehovah ; but it is I'lJ' ^33 QV, a people heavy with iniquity. ^33 is the construct from '"ins, "heavy," like ^^V from b-}V; the form 1?? is usually employed with the meaning of "clumsy" (Ex. iv. 10); and besides, the dissyllabic form sounds more rhythmically. Instead of employing the readiest descriptive expression, "a people of heavy iniquity," the property of the iniquity (the weight) is attributed to the people themselves upon whom it lies as a burden, — in accord- ance with the view that he who carries a heavy burden is himself so much the heavier (cf. gravis oneribus in Cicero). I'ly is always the word employed whenever sin is meant to be indicated as heavy and coarse (e.g. in xxxiii. 24; Gen. xv. 16, xix. 15), and when there is further included the idea of the guilt incurred by it. From being the people of Jehovah, they have become a people heavily laden with the guilt of sin. In this way the true nature of Israel has been crushed, and changed into its opposite. We translate lij by " nation," and DV by " people," because the former (from ni5) is the mass of individuals who have been joined together through one common descent, language, and country, whereas DV (from D?V, *r, " to combine ") is the people joined together by unity of government (cf. for instance Ps. cv. 13); hence we always read of the " people of Jehovah " (nin] DV), not the " nation of Jehovah " (nin^ 'is) ; and liJ, free from every slur, occurs only twice (Zeph. ii. 9 ; Ps. cvi. 5), with a suffix referring to Jehovah, but here ii is used as in Mai. iii. 9. (3.) Israel elsewhere bears the honourable title of the seed of the patri- arch (xli. 8, xlv. 19, cf. Gen. xxi. 12); in reality, however, it is a seed of evil-doers (xiv. 20, cf. xxxi. 2). The idea of a similar descent, contained in VIJ, goes back to that of a like 62 ISAIAH. inherited nature (Ixv. 23 ; Prov. xi. 21); and Q''jn» does not mean the fathers, but the contemporaries of the prophet (the genitive being intended to be taken attributively), — a race consisting of miscreants. The singular of the noun D''3'?.lp is V'^p, with the sharpening of Vl» with Pathach, which is usual in j)"v verbs with guttural radicals ; 3n» (with Kcimez in pause, ix. 16, which see) is a Hiphil participial noun. (4.) The children of Israel are, in virtue of the divine act, " children of Jehovah," Deut. xiv. 1 ; but through their own doings they are D'n^riE'p CJa "children acting corruptly;" what the Law had dreaded and predicted had thus come to pass: Deut. iv. 16, 25, xxxi. 29. In all these passages the Hiphil is found, and in the parallel passages of the grand song, Deut. xxxii. 5, the Piel nriB*^ both of which conjugations contain within themselves the object of the action (Ges. § 53. 2): these verbs thus signify to do some- thing destructive, to act in such a way that one becomes a cause of ruin to himself and others. That the degeneration of the children is meant to be regarded in relation to Jehovah, and not to their forefathers, — the opinion of Eosenmiiller, who follows Vitringa, — is evident from the latter part of ver. 2, cf. xxx. 1, 9. After the four exclamatory clauses, there follow — making up the saddening seven — three de- claratory clauses describing Israel's apostasy as complete. There is apostasy in disposition: " they have forsaken Jehovah." There is apostasy in words : " they blaspheme the Holy One of Israel." }*??? (properly, " to sting," then " to mock, treat with contempt"), used of blasphemy, is an old Mosaic word; see Deut. xxxi. 20; Num. xiv. 11, 23, xvi. 30. " The Holy One of Israel " is a title designedly applied to God here ; it is the keynote of Isaianic prophecy, and first sounded in this passage (see under vi. 3). To mock what is holy is in itself sinful ; it is doubly a sin to mock God the Holy One ; it is trebly a sin that Israel mocks God the Holy One, who has set Himself to be the Sanctifier of Israel, and who, as He is the holiness of Israel, so also, in conformity with His holiness, seeks to be sanctified by Israel (Lev. xix. 2, etc.). And lastly, their apostasy is also apostasy in their way of acting : " they have turned away backwards." In the Niphal "i^W, which occurs only here, there is contained the CHAPTER L 5. 63 idea of deliberateness in their estrangement from God : the expression of this is still further intensified by employing nins (which is added emphatically, instead of 1''";D^?). Their conduct should be an imitation of Jehovah's ; but they have turned the back to Him, and entered on the path chosen by themselves. In ver. 5, which now follows, it is, first of all, doubtful re- garding the meaning of np-^jy (no^ as in Ps. x. 1 3, iv. 3, with -^ even in cases where no guttural follows, after by, as after ^3?, Ps. iv. 3 ; I?)!, Hag. v. 9 ; and thrice nD^, l Sam. i. 8 ; see on Prov. xxxi. 2 ; cf. Konig, Lehrgeb. p. 143), whether it signifies " why," as the LXX., Targum, Syriac, Piashi, Kimchi, Hitzig, and now also Cheyne take it, or " on what," i.e. " on which part of the body " (Jerome, Saadias), a view for which Ewald, Knobel, and Schroring (in Part 2 of his Jesaian. Studien) decide. Eeuss also translates, oib vous frappera-t-on encore ? Luzzatto considers the latter rendering insipid, especially because a member of the body that has already been smitten can be repeatedly struck again ; but he thinks the meaning is that there is no judgment which had not already fallen on Israel, so that it is no longer far from utter ruin. Never- theless, we decide with Caspar! for the meaning " to what " (i.e. for what end) ? For in all the other (fourteen) passages in which no'i'JJ occurs, it has this meaning, once even along with nan^ Num. xxii. 32 (cf. Prov. xvii. 26), and the people do not come to be viewed as a body till ver. 6, whereas the interrogative, " upon what," would require the reader or hearer to presuppose it even here. But in translat- ing np"PJ? by " to what end," we do not understand it (as Malbim does, for instance) in the sense of eui bono ? with the idea underlying the question, that it would certainly be fruitless, as all smiting hitherto has proved, — for this thought is not, as we should expect, directly expressed, — but after the analogy of questions with no^ (Ezek. xviii. 31 ; Jer. xliv. 7 ; cf. the comment, on Eccles. v. 5, vii. 16 f.), qua de causa ? with the underlying thought that this continual calling forth of divine chastisement is certainly a mad desire for one's own destruction. Accordingly, -we render the first part of ver. 5 : " Wliy do you wish always to he smitten, increasing your re- bellion?" ISV (with Tiphcha, a stronger disjunctive than 64 ISAIAH. Tebir, cf. Ezek. xix. 9) belongs to isn ; but 13" without nij? would make it appear as if they had not yet been smitten for their apostasy hitherto. There are not two interrogative clauses on the same plane (as Luzzatto thinks), as if the mean- ing were,' " Why do ye wish to be smitten afresh ? Why do ye add revolt ? " Nor is the second clause the answer to the first, to which it assigns the reason (as Nagelsbach thinks), " For what (for what purpose) should ye be smitten still more ? Ye heap rebellion on rebellion;" but the second clause is subordinated to the first, an adverbial secondary clause more closely defining the main proposition, as in v. 11, xxx. 31, cf. Ps. Ixii. 5 (" delighting in lies "), iv. 3 (" while ye love vain show"); also Ps. v. 10, xxvii. 27 ; see Ewald's Hebrew Syntax, § 3416 [Eng. transl. pp. 240, 241]. The LXX. has Trpoa-ri6evTe^ avo/iiav. nno (a fern, partic. used as a noun, with neuter sense) is deviation from truth and rectitude ; here, as pretty frequently elsewhere, it means disloyalty to Jehovah, who is the absolutely Good and absolute Goodness. It is difficult to decide whether t^'J., to be striped) is a swollen stripe or lump, such as is caused by the stroke of a whip or a blow of the fist ; this required softening with oil, in order that the coagulated matter or the swelling might disperse ; "p.^ "3? is the still fresh and bleed- ing wound, which needed pressing out to cleanse it, and thus facilitate healing. The three predicates, in relation to the ideas presented in the subjects, show an approximation to a chiasm. The predicates are plural in form, owing to the subjects being taken collectively ; the expression ipf ? nn3n NPl, VOL. I. E 66 ISAIAH. which, as regards its meaning, refers to mnn, is accordinglj' to be understood as a neuter construction, and to be rendered, " nor has softening with oil been effected." Considering the Pual near it, nif might also appear to be of the same conjuga- tion, but actually is not, because, according to the accentuation (with two Pashtas, the first of which, as in ^nn. GJ-en. i. 2, marks the place of tone, so that the form here is to be pro- nounced zdru), it has the tone on the penult, — a fact for which (in spite of what Stade says, § 415) no reason could be perceived, if the form were from the verb nnr. For the assumption that the tone is retracted in order to prepare us for the heavy incidence of the tone in it^'an (Ewald, § 194c) is quite arbitrary; for, though the influence of the Pause sometimes reaches to the second last word, it does not extend to the third last. Moreover, according to the usage of the language, nnf signifies " to be dispersed," not " to be pressed out," whereas "iiT and i"!T are commonly used in the sense of pressing together, and pressing out. Hence nf (like Vl"3) is either the Qal of a middle-vowel intransitive verb lir, or (more probably)— because the middle-vowel verb ni in Ps. Iviii. 4 has another meaning (" they are estranged ; " cf. '"ifj above, in ver. 4) — the Qal of T]T (=jj, constringere), which is here in- flected as an intransitive verb, and in a measure corresponding to the Arabic passive of the Qal \,jj (Olsh. § 245. 1) ; cf. Job xxiv. 24, V&1, and Gen. xlix. 23, the actively used an, The surgical treatment, so highly necessary for the nation, is a figurative representation of the pastoral address of the prophet, which, though certainly published, was as if it had not been published, inasmuch as its salutary effect was con- ditioned by repentance on the part of the nation. The people despised God's offer of service like that of the good Samaritan (Luke X. 34). They did not like the radical cure of which the prophets made offer. The view of the body as diseased within and wholly lacerated without was thus all the more~ calculated to excite compassion. The prophet speaks of the existing condition of things. He says that it has already come to the worst with the people, and this is precisely the ground and the subject of his inculpatory complaints. Hence, when he passes in ver. 7 from figurative to literal CHAPTER I. 7. 67 language (like ver. 23 after 22), it is to be perceived that he is there also speaking of what was then present. The body thus internally and externally disorganized was, properly speaking, the people and the country in the frightful condition described in ver. 7, which begins in the most compre- hensive manner, and closes in the same way : " Your country — a ivaste ! your cities — turned with fire ! your arable land — lefore your eyes strangers are devouring it, and a desert like an overthrowing by strangers." Caspari (in his Beitrage zur Einl. in das Buch Jesaia, p. 204) has pointed out how nearly every word here corresponds to the threatenings of a curse in Lev. xxvi. and Deut. xxviii. (xxix.). The designation given by the prophet to the foes who have devastated the country, reduced its cities to ashes, and seized its harvest, is simply D^"jT, " strangers," or barbarians (cf. Testus : hostis apud antiques peregrinus dicebatur), without mentioning their nationality. He abstracts from the historic definiteness of the present, in order the more impressively to show that it bears the character of the curse which was predetermined. The climactic ex- pression for this is, that — as stated in the noun-clause at the end of ver. 7, which goes back to repeat what was previously said — there has been wrought a desolation, Ci.T naanoSj " like an overthrow of foreigners." This emphatic repetition of a catchword in a verse, seen here in the case of CIJ, is a figure of speech (called epanaphora) common to the two halves of the collection : Ewald, Studer, Lagarde, and Cheyne, reading DID nasnpa, mistake this peculiarity of Isaiah's writings. It is a question, however, whether, with Caspari, Knobel, and Nagelsbach, Clt is to be taken as a subjective genitive, in which case the clause would mean "like an overthrow such as barbarians usually cause;" or whether we should, with Hitzig, Luzzatto, and others, regard the word as an objective genitive, and render the expression, " like an overthrow such as is wont to befall barbarians." As nasna, in conformity with the primary passage in Deut. xxix. 22, in all other places where it occurs, designates the overthrow of Sodom, Gomorrah, etc. (xiii. 19 ; Amos iv. 11 ; Jer. 1. 40), that was accomplished by God, and seeing that Isaiah also, as ver. 8 shows, has this catastrophe in his mind, we decide for the view that CiT, like ^'Wl in Prov. xii. 7, is the objective 68 ISAIAH. genitive : this view is further rendered more probable by the form of the noun, which points to a state or condition rather than an action (cf. nJ"?."]», rhm'O, npDB'D) ; in this way also the 3, marking 'the comparison, becomes more significant. The prophet means to say that the desolation which has befallen the country of the people of God is like such com- plete ruin (subversio) as God sends on nations which stand outside of the covenant-relation (cf. Eph. iL 14), and which, like the people of the Pentapolis, are utterly destroyed by Him, leaving no trace behind. But, as declared in vers. 8, 9, there is merely similarity, not identity. Jerusalem is still preserved, but in how sad a condition ! There is no doubt that in ver. 8 " the daughter of Zion " means Jerusalem. The genitive in the expression li'STia is that of apposition, so that " daughter of Zion " is equivalent to "daughter Zion;" cf. li'V"? npina, xxxvii. 22, where annexion comes in twice, instead of apposition (Ges. § 128. 2d). Zion itself is represented as a daughter, ie. as a woman. Such is the name applied, first of all, to the townspeople dwelling round the fortress of Zion, to which the individual inhabitants of the city are related as children to their mother, inasmuch as the community sees its members from time to time coming into existence and growing up, and those who are thus born within her are, as it were, born of her and brought up by her ; but, in the next instance, the name is also applied to the city itself, either including or excluding (cf. Jer. xlvi. 19, xlviii. 18; Zech. ii. 11) the inhabitants, — here, however, as shown in ver. 9, these are included. This is precisely the point of the first two com- parisons. " And the daughter of Zion is left remaining like a booth in a vineyard, like a night - hut in a cucumber -fmld." The vineyard and the cucumber field are considered by the prophet in their condition before the harvest (not after, as the Targums represent it), during which they need to be watched ; hence the point of the comparison is this, that throughout the vineyard and the cucumber field not a single human beinw is to be seen, and that nothing but the booth and the night hut ^ show, nevertheless, that such a being has his abode here. 1 The picture of " a lodge in a garden of cucumbers," in Thomson's Land, and the Book, shows four poles covered above with boughs, and with CHAtTEK I, 8. 69 So stands Jerusalem in the midst of a far-reaching desolation, — a sign, however, that the country ' was not wholly de- populated. But what is the meaning of the third of the comparisons ? Hitzig renders, " like a watch-tower;" Knobel, " like a guard- city;" Eeuss (who, however, would rather expunge the words, which he considers a gloss), " comme un lieu de garde;" but though niWJ may mean a guard, a watch, "fJ? cannot mean a tower. And for the rendering which most readily presents itself, "like a guarded city" {i.e. a city preserved from danger), the 2 of comparison is unsuitable. Nor is it ad- missible to take the first two 3 in the sense of sicut, and the third in the sense of sic; for this correlative 3 is usual only in clauses indicating identity, not in those properly signifying comparison. Weir's conjecture, that the reading should be nma -\''^ (Prov. xxv. 28 ; 2 Chron. xxxii. 5), is ingenious : this would make the clause mean " like a city (with walls) broken through," — hence, defenceless ; but there is no need for this conjecture. We translate, "like a blockaded city," deriving nniSi here, as in Prov. vii. 10, from "iVJ, — not, with Luzzatto, from nis, Ni. iiS3, fern. miS3 (which is not in use, and, moreover, in this obscured feminine form, cannot be proved to exist; see Stade, § 78a), and after the LXX., with Strachey, rendering the words " like a besieged city." i^J signifies to observe with keen eye (cf. nnea, and Jij, ohservare, with Uj, custodire), with good intention, or (as in Job vii. 20) with hostile design ; it may thus, like the synonymous terms in 2 Sam. xi. 16, Jer. v. 6, be used of the investment of a city. Jerusalem was not actually blockaded when the prophet uttered his predictions, but it was just like a blockaded city, inasmuch as between such a town and the blockading enemy there is a desolate and uninhabited space, in the midst of which the city lies in silence and solitude, shut up within itself. The citizens do not venture forth ; while the enemy, on account of the missiles of the citizens, do not hazard an approach into the near vicinity of the walls ; in the suburbs a floor for the watcher, raised somewhat above the ground : the whole thus forms a hut open on all sides. A fuller description is given hy Wetzstein in our Commentary on Job (2nd edition), p. 348. 70 ISAIAH. everything has been laid waste, partly by the citizens, that the enemy may not find anything useful, — partly by the enemy, who, for instance, fell the trees. Thus, in spite of all the joy that might be felt at the preservation of Jerusalem, the city wears a cheerless aspect ; it looks as if it were in a state of blockade. That we must explain the passage in this way, with Caspari, is shown by Jer. iv. 16 f., where the actual storming of Jerusalem is predicted, and the enemy — probably with reference to this comparison by Isaiah (see Hitzig on the passage in Jeremiah) — are called Q'1^3. For the present, Israel has still been spared the worst : the omnipotence of God has graciously prevented it. " Unless Jeliovah of Hosts had left us a little of what escaped, we should have become as Sodom, we should he like Gomorrah" ver. 9. nnB* (for which the LXX. and Eom. ix. 29, with a regard to vi. 13, has o-Trep/ta) is also in Deut. il 34, etc., what escapes by flight from defeat and destruction: and, accord- ing to the accents, f3y»3 is to be taken with T'')E', so that these two words will mean "an escaped remnant, which is nothing more than a trifle:" on this noun-use of t3yp, cf xvi. 14 ; 2 Chron. xii. 7 ; Prov. x. 20 ; Ps. cv. 12. Looking at Ps. Ixxxi. 14 f., cf. Job xxxii. 32 (where the conditional clause is easily supplied), one might be inclined to place tJVl?? in the apodosis, and render it "we would almost . . .;" but considering the accentuation actually before us, the inference is more strictly logical The designation nisax mrc occupies a strongly emphatic position in the front. It would have been all over with Israel long ago but for the compassion of God (cf. Hos. xi. 8) ; and because it is the omnipotence of God which set in motion the will of His compassion. He is called n^^53V n^n^, « Jehovah (the God of) the heavenly hosts," — a title in which nisax is a governed genitive, — not, as Cheyne and Luzzatto think, in accordance with the analogy of cniix, an independent name of God.^ The prophet says " us " and " we :" he is himself an inhabitant of Jerusalem ; and even if he had not been such, he is, nevertheless, an Israelite : 1 That rfsav doea not indicate the hosts of Israel (which was the view of R. Jos^ in Shabuoth 356), but the powers of nature subject to God I think I have shown in the essay, Der Gottesname Jahve Zebaoth, in the Luthffr. Zeitschrift, 1874, p. 217 S. CHAPTEE I. 10, 11. 71 he therefore associates himself with his nation, like Jeremiah in Lam. iii. 22. As he has come to experience the wrath of God along with them, so he now also celebrates the mighty compassion of God which he has experienced with them. But for this compassion, the people of God would have become like Sodom, from which only four human beings escaped : they would have been, like Gomorrah, which was utterly annihilated. , The address of the prophet has now reached a resting- point. That it is here divided into two sections is shown even to the eye by the space left between vers. 9 and 10. The prophet pauses after he has declared that nothing but divine compassion for Israel has prevented the utter destruc- tion it has well deserved. He hears in spirit the remon- strance of his audience. They would fain represent the accusations which he had just uttered as unfounded, by appeal- ing to their exact observance of the divine law ; but in opposition to this ground of self-vindication which the pro- phet has read out of the hearts of those impeached, he but proceeds to prove the divine arraignment, which he begins in vers. 1 0, 1 1 : " Hear the word of Jehovah, ye Sodom-judges ! listen to the law of our God, Gomorrah-nation ! For what purpose is tJie multitude of your slain offerings to me ? saith Jehovah. I am sated with hurnt-offerings of rams, and the suet of fatted calves ; and the Hood of bullocks and lambs and he-goats, I do not like" The second attack in the prophet's address begins, like the first in ver. 2, with " hear ye ! " and " listen ! " The summons to hear is in this instance (just as in the case of Isaiah's contemporary, Micah, — chap, iii.) addressed to the D^3"'yp (from nxj?, ^^, decidere, with the noun -ending p— see Jeshurun, p. 212 ff.), i.e. men with decisive authority, the rulers in the fullest sense, and to the people who are subject to them. It is of the mercy of God that Jerusalem still exists, for Jerusalem is irvevfiaTiKm SoBofia, as is said regarding Jerusalem in the Apocalypse (xi. 8), with reference to this passage in Isaiah. According to Ezek. xvi. 49, pride, the lust of the flesh, and want of mercy were the chief sins of Sodom ; and of these, the rulers of Jerusalem and the multitude subject to them and worthy of 72 ISAIAH. them were not less guilty now. But they think they do not by any means stand in such disfavour with God, because out- wardly they render satisfaction to the law. The prophet, therefore, summons them to hear the law of the God of Israel which he wishes to declare to them, — for the prophets were called to be the expounders of the law, and to announce what was truly the will and good pleasure of God ; and what He requires is, not external acts of worship with no corresponding homage of heart, not ceremonial performances at all in the first instance, but freedom from sin and a course of life that flows from obedience to Him and loving sympathy with other men. " For what purpose is the multitude of your slain- offerings to me ? saith Jehovah." The prophet purposely says ip«\ not ION, to indicate that what he declares is the constant language of God in opposition to the heartless show of rever- ence and the hypocritical ceremonial righteousness of Israel. The multitude of Cnat, i.e. sacrifices of animals which they slaughtered, has no value in His eyes. As the whole worship is here examined in detail, O'li^t appears to denote the n^OTE', i.e. the " peace-offerings " or communion-offerings, with which a meal was associated, for Jehovah vouchsafed to the offerer a share in the enjoyment of what he offered. But it is better to take D^nat as a general name for the bloody sacrifices, which are then divided into nibij? and 3Pn ; for they are partly whole-offerings, which are wholly (though piece by piece) laid on the altar and there consumed by fire, and partly those sacrifices of which only the pieces of fat were burned on the altar, viz. sin-offerings and trespass-offerings, and especially peace - offerings. Of the sacrificial animals mentioned, D''1S (bullocks) and D''i<''"!9 (fatted calves) are species of "11^3 (large cattle), while CB*?? (lambs) and ClifiJ? (young he-goats as distinguished from T'V?', the older long-haired he- goat, the animal taken as a sin-offering) together with the ^''X (ram ; the usual whole-offering of the high priest, the tribe- prince, and the nation on all high feast-days) are species of }xs (smaller cattle). The blood of these sacrificial animals (such as, for example, the young bullocks, sheep, and he-goats) was, in accordance with the requirement of the law, dashed against the altar round about, in the case of the whole-offer- ing, the peace-offering, and the trespass-offering ; in the case CHAPTEE I. 12. 73 of the sin-offering, it was smeared on the horns of the altar, poured out at the foot of the altar, and in some instances sprinkled on the side of the altar or towards the vessels of the inner sanctuary. With such offerings Jehovah is sated, and no longer cares for them. (The two perfects here indi- cate what has long been and still is going on at present.) What Jeremiah (vii. 22) says of sacrifices — that God never properly wished them — Isaiah now says, in ver. 12, regarding visits to the temple : " When ye come to appear before my face, v}ho hath asked this at your haTid, — to tread my courts ? " niX"i7 is a contracted infinitive N"iphal for nixnn^, as in Ex. xxxiv. 24; Deut. xxxi. 11; cf. the similarly contracted Hiphil forms in iii. 8, xxiii. 11 ; on the other hand, it^j?^ in Deut. xxvi. 12=lB'J?b (cf. Xeh. x. 39); as ra^-nD, Dan. ii. 35, iv. 34 = Pp^np. nin^_ ''3a nsnj is the standing expression for the appearing of all male Israelites in the temple, in accordance with the law, at the three great feasts, but it also came to be used in speaking of visiting the temple generally (cf. Ps. xlii. 3, Ixxxiv. 8). According to Ewald (§ 279c), \.3S indicates the subject connected with the passive verb (" to be seen by the face of God ") ; but why is it not rather a local accusative with prepositional meaning, "before the face of" (as Nagelsbach thinks), seeing that it is used interchangeably with the prepositions ?, HK, and ^^ ? It is probable that nis"!;? has thus been pointed here and in Ex. xxxiv. 24, Deut. xxxi. 11, instead of ni^-ib (like iN't.'!, Ex. xxiii. 15, xxxiv. 20, instead of 'i<"!^.), in order to avoid speaking of " seeing God," — an expression which is so apt to be misunderstood as meaning a vision with the eye of sense (cf Ex. xxiv. 11, LXX. w^^i?- sxJ, to be elevated, opp. jli, to be depressed, sunk) signifies prominence (cf. Arab, ndgd, elevated country, visible from afar), conspicuousness, so that 1330 is thus properly equivalent to e conspectu, as 133 is in conspectu : regard- ing ^?5/.'?, see under iii. 4. The five exhortations pointing to the practice of what is good, are in ver. 17 : "Learn to do good, take an interest in judgment, set the oppressor right, pronounce the sentence of the orphan, plead the cause of the widow." The first exhortation is the fundamental one : they are to learn to do good, — a CHAPTER I. 17. 79 difficult art in which one does not become a master merely through good intentions. The inf. absol. ^''^''n is regarded as the accusative of the 110^; and H? in ver. 16 (for which we might also have T}jf^) similarly takes the place of the object : such employment of this infinitive as a noun is not very rare, see vii. 15 f., xlii. 54, Ivii. 20; Jer. ix. 4. That this primary exhortation now branches out into four minor ones referring to the administration of justice, is accounted for by the fact that no other prophet directs so keen an eye upon affairs of state and judicial proceedings as Isaiah. In this respect he differs from his younger contemporary Micah, whose character is more generally ethical, while Isaiah's is largely political. Hence the exhortations : " apply yourselves to judgment," — ^"^ signifying to devote one's self zealously and carefully to a thing ; then : " bring the oppressor to the right way." So we must render the words ; for fi^^} (from r?0> to be sharp in taste, dazzling in appearance, violent or furious in disposition) cannot well mean him who is oppressed, injured in his rights, as most of the old translators have rendered it (LXX. aSiKovfievov, Targ. D''?8<'=!, "who is oppressed"). The form ?iBiJ certainly may have a stative meaning closely connected with the passive, and marking a high degree (as shown by li^n, "provided with a girdle," in relation to iwn, " girded ; " plur. '''liJn, Ezek. xxxiii. 15); but more frequently it has an active sense, like pon (see ver. 31), 1iJ2, Jer. iii. 7, 10; pTB'V, Jer. xxii. 3, and the Qamez is then unchangeable (hence fem. fTiiJ?), after the manner of the Arabic form J»cU (/« «Z) Such is the meaning here ; for the Piel i^N signifies neither to make happy nor to strengthen (Luzzatto renders rianimate chi I oppressd), — nor is the latter its meaning in the Talmud, where it rather signifies to confirm or ratify, — but either to pronounce a person happy or fortunate (the verb being in this case a denominative from "IB'K, ''■?.?'«, like fiuKapi^eiv), a meaning which is quite unsuitable here ; or, as in iii. 2, ix. 1 5 (cf. Prov. xxiii. 19), to lead in the right way; or, to make any one keep the straight course. In this way, then, T^'^? will have the intensified signification of VPi", Ps. Ixxi. 4, ie. it will mean a violent, regardless, heartless man ; and Y^n iiB'X will signify, " show the violent man the way of righteousness : " the 80 ISAIAH. expression does not point so much to punishment and render- ing harmless, as to correction and improvement, Ps. Ixxii. 4} Next follow two exhortations referring to widows and orphans : these, with the stranger, are under very special protection, the objects of care by God and His law; see Ex. xxii. 21, cf. 20. " Pronounce the sentence of the orphan " (OSB', as in Deut. XXV. 1, is abbreviated from 's DSt^p am); for, if no decision and verdict is pronounced in their case, this is the most outrageous unrighteousness, inasmuch as not even the form and appearance of justice are preserved. " Plead the cause of the widow," the imperative ^n, with the accusative of a person (a construction which is further found only in li. 22), is a condensed expression for 'a y] ^''1, to plead and maintain the cause of any one. Thus the reasonings adduced in self-defence by the hearts of the accused are refuted, both negatively and positively. They are thunderstruck and put to shame. The law announced in ver. 10 has been preached to them. The prophet has thrown aside the husks of their dead works, and revealed the moral kernel of the law in its universal application to all mankind. Jehovah has been addressing His people in anger, but even in the exhortations of vers. 16, 17 His love had begun to move. This love, which seeks not the destruction of Israel, but their inward and outward salvation, now breaks forth in ver. 18 : " Come now, and let us reason together, saith Jehovah : if your sins come out like scarlet clothes, they shall become white like snow : if they he red like crimson, they shall come out like vjool." Cheyne translates : " let us bring our dispute to an end," and thus interprets away the offer of free grace, but without giving any reason for the possibility of this rendering. Wellhausen also sets it aside by taking the latter part of ver. 1 8 as a question (" If . . . should they become white ? "). But it is always a very precarious make- shift to regard such clauses as questions without any inter- rogatory sign, when there is no necessity for a resort to this expedient; the Hiphil noin certainly may signify to ^ It is an instructive fact, tlirowing light on the meaning of the word, that in the Talmud {Joma 39J) a person who had usurped not merely his own inheritance but that of another, bore the nickname of jvisn j3 through life. CHAPTER I. 18. 81 "decide;" the Niphal nai), however, does not mean to " bring a lawsuit to an end," but to carry on litigation •with another. Job xxiii. 7 (in post-Biblical Hebrew, nsinn), syn. t3Bf3, xliii. 26. In this litigation it will be made clear that no kind of guilt lies on the side of Jehovah, but that the righteousness which Israel could vindicate for themselves is but a semblance of righteousness, and this seeming righteous- ness, properly regarded, is blood-stained unrighteousness. It is assumed that the investigation can have no other result than this ; hence Israel is worthy of death. Jehovah, how- ever, does not wish to deal with Israel in accordance with His retributive justice, but according to His free mercy and compassion (cf. the expression pointing to " grace alone " in xliii. 25, and further, Micah vii. 18 f.). He is willing to remit the punishment, and not merely to regard the sin as if it were not, but even to change it into its opposite. Sin of the brightest red dye is by His grace to become the purest white. On the two Hiphils indicating colour, see Gesen. § 53. 2, where the signification was formerly stated to be, to assume a colour, or rather to give out (or emit rays of) colour, — not colorem accipere, but colorem dare, ''^f signifies clear or bright red (from n3B'=LL.., to be bright, glisten), not 8i^a. 84 ISAIAH. The second half of the address begins with ver. 21, and like the first it opens with the lamentation of God over the apostasy of His people. To the Piska after ver. 20 corre- sponds a long pause in the mind of the speaker. Will Israel tread the saving path of forgiveness of sins, now offered them, and enter on a life of new obedience, and will it thus be possible for them to be brought back by this way ? Some may perhaps return, but not all ; hence the divine address becomes a mournful complaint. So peaceful a solution of the discord between Jehovah and His children is not to be hoped for ; Jerusalem is far too deeply depraved. " How is she become a harlot, the faithful citadel, — she that vjos full of judgment, and wherein righteousness used to lodge, — tut now murderers ! " The keynote here sounded is that of an elegy. na^K (properly, " how thus ? " — for ''N gives an interrogative sense to demonstrative words), only seldom in the shortened form %''^, is an expression indicative at once of complaint and astonishment. This longer form, more like a sigh, is a word characteristic of the nj'p or lamentation ; thus, while the Lamentations of Jeremiah begin with na^K, and receive their usual designation (in Hebrew) from this word, — on the other hand, the shorter ^'K, used in mocking complaints, is a word characteristic of the ?^p or proverb, see xiv. 4, 12 ; Micah ii. 4. From this word, which gives the keynote, every- thing runs on softly, fully, evenly, and slowly, in the manner peculiar to an elegy. That such forms, moreover, as 'n^.r'P for nxJJD (on the so-called " Hirels: compaginis," see the introduction to Ps. cxvi.), softened through lengthening, are adapted for elegiac productions, is at once evident from the first verse of the Lamentations, which begin with the elegiac keynote struck by Isaiah. Jerusalem was formerly nnp "?CN3, a faithful city, i.e. one that stedfastly adhered to the alliance of Jehovah with her (cf. Ps. Ixxviii. 37). This alliance was a marriage-alliance ; but she has broken it and has thereby become a n3ir, " harlot," — a prophetic view, the outlines of which have already been given in the Pentateuch, Israel's worship of idols being there called a whoring after them, e.g. in the law of the two tables, Ex. xxxiv. 16 ; Num. xiv. 33, etc. (in all, seven passages); cf. Ps. xvi. 4, Ixxiii. 27. It is not merely gross outward idolatry, however. CHAPTEK I. 21. 85 that makes the Church of God a " harlot," but the defec- tion of the heart, however this may at any time express itself ; for which reason Jesus also could call the generation of His time ^ei/ea iMoi)(aXl<;, in spite of the strict worship of Jehovah carried on in Pharisaic spirit. For, as shown by the verse before us, the basis of that marriage-relation was justice and righteousness in the widest sense : ^^P^, i.e. a realization of righteousness corresponding to the will of God as positively made known ; and P"1V, i.e. a righteous state of things regu- lated by that will, a righteous line of conduct in accordance with it (different from the more attributive '^ij'jy). Jerusalem was formerly full of such justice ; and righteousness was not merely like a passing guest in the city, but she who came down from above had there fixed her permanent abode ; there she used to tarry day and night, as if it were her home. When the prophet refers to former days, he has in his mind the times of David and Solomon, but especially those of Jehoshaphat, who (about one hundred and fifty years before Isaiah appeared) restored the administration of justice which had fallen into neglect since the latter years of Solomon and the days of Eehoboam and Abijah, — a point to which the reformation of Asa had not extended, — and who reorganized all in the spirit of the law. Those institutions of Jehoshaphat which fell into decay under his three godless successors may possibly have been re-established by the high priest Jehoiada under the rule of Joash ; but even in the second half of the reign of Joash the administration of justice had already fallen once more into the fearful disorder in which — compared at least with the times of David and Solomon, and afterwards of Jehoshaphat — it still remained even in Isaiah's days. The whole point and weight of the complaint concentrate upon nnjJl, " but now," which expresses the contrast. In correct codices and editions (e.g. Brescia 1494) tiSB'p has not Zakeph, but Behia ; and H3, which ought to have Zakeph, has Tiphcha, on account of the shortness of the succeeding clause. In this way the declaration regarding the former state of things is duly distinguished from that concerning the present. Formerly righteousness, now t3''nri», "murderers," and that too (as distinguished from Cns'i) by profession, who form a band, like King Ahab and his son Joram, 2 Kings vi. 32. 86 ISAIAH. The contrast is as great as it could possibly be ; for murder is the extreme opposite of righteousness, its grossest violation. From the city generally, the complaint now turns to the rulers, and first of all is couched in figurative language, ver. 22 : "Thy silver has lecome dross, thy drink adulterated with water." This passage is the basis of other two in which like figurative language abounds, Jer. vi. 27 ff. ; Ezek. xxii. 18-22. The silver represents the princes and lords, viewed with reference to the nobility of mind associated with their nobility of birth and rank ; for silver — sterling silver — is a symbol of all that is noble and pure, and it is the purity of light which shows itself in it, as in the pure white of byssus and of the lily. The princes and lords formerly possessed the virtues which to- gether are in Latin called candor animi, — the virtues of magna- nimity, courtesy, impartiality, and freedom from the influence of bribes ; now, this silver has become dross, such base metals as are separated or thrown aside (J''?, pi. C^!''?, 0''^?, D'?P, from i^D, to withdraw ; refuse removed in smelting, dross ; cf Prov. xxv. 4, xxvi. 23). In a second figure, the leading men of Jerusalem in former days are compared to X3b, "choice wine," such as drinkers like, — for this must have been the meaning of the word (from S3p, to carouse, Arab. ■'Ix-j, to purchase wine for a carousal) in Isaiah's time (cf. also Nah. i. 1 0) among educated circles. This pure, strong, and costly wine is now adulterated with water (castratum, according to Pliny's expression in his Natural History ; cf. jugulare Falernum, in Martial, i. 1 8), or weakened ; i.e. through this addition, its strength and flavour are diminished. The present is but the dregs and the shadow of the past. In ver. 23 the prophet explains himself ; he repeats in plain language what has been already stated under a figure : " Thy rulers are rebellious, and associates of thieves ; every one loves a bribe, and hunts after payments ; the orphan they judge not, and the cause of the widow has no access to them." The utter and contemptible meanness of the rulers (D'"!^) of the people is here depicted by the alliterating Cl^io in relation to God, " rebellious, stubborn," and by cnM nan in relation to men, " associates of thieves," in that they allow themselves to be bought over, by a present of part of the plunder, to connive at the theft, and to deal unjustly towards those who CHAPTER I 24. 87 were robbed. Such bribes are not merely willingly (3nx) accepted by them, — and that, too, by the whole body of the princes, i.e. every single one of them (i^3 with neuter suffix, synon. P3n, all), — but they even greedily go after them (^7.1). It is not DibB> ("peace") they hunt after (Ps. xxxiv. 15), but D^ibj'B' (« payments," recompense for their trouble ; cf. ^'h^, Micah vii. 3) ; and thus not peace, but something to satisfy their avarice and partiality. Such is the case of Jerusalem, which will hardly enter on the path of grace opened up to it in ver. 1 8 ; Jehovah will therefore employ another means of correction (ver. 24) : " Therefore, declaration of Jehovah, of Jehovah of Hosts, of the Strong One of Israel, Ah ! I shall enjoy m/yself on mine adversaries, and will avenge myself on mine enemies." Salva- tion through judgment is still and ever the only means of improving and preserving the congregation that takes its name from Jerusalem. Therefore Jehovah seeks to satisfy the demands of His holiness, and to sift Jerusalem through judicial dealing. Such an accumulation of divine names as occurs here is nowhere else found in Isaiah; cf. xix. 4, iii. 1, X. 33, xvi. 3, 15. The irrevocable decree concerning the sifting judgment is sealed with three names which indicate the irresistible omnipotence of God. The title i'X'^f 1 T'a^, " the Mighty One of Israel," is derived from Gen. xlix. 24, though the name of the nation is changed. In accordance with the deep and earnest pathos of the address, instead of 1p^' there is here used DW, from DS^pyi are in other places called divine gifts (xxxiii. 5, xxviii. 6), lines of conduct on the part of men that are well-pleasing to God (i. 21, xxxii. 16), royal and Messianic virtues (ix. 6, vi. 3-5, xvi. 5, xxxii. 1). Here, however, the idea is not this peculiarly human one (as Oheyne thinks), but, as shown by parallel passages like iv. 4, v. 16, xxviii. 17, it is to be referred to Jehovah, and the words are to be regarded as meaning God's justice and righteousness in their primarily judicial self-fulfilment. A judgment of God the Eighteous One will be the means through which Zion, — so far as it has remained faithful to Jehovah, — and those who in the midst of the judgment return (7??', instead of which Luther read '^)^^), will be redeemed. This judgment will fall upon sinners and sin, and will be the means of breaking that power which has restrained and impeded the nature and workings of Zion, as these were designed of God ; it will further be the medium through which those who turn to Jehovah are incorporated CHAPTER I. 29. 91 into His true Church. When God therefore reveals Himself in His punitive righteousness. He is working out a righteous- ness which is testowed as a gift of grace on those who escape the former. The idea of " righteousness " (BiKaioavvrj) is here, as in Hos. ii. 21, on New Testament lines. In front, there is the fire of the law ; behind, there is the light of the gospel. Behind the wrath is hidden love, as the ultimate motive- power, like the sun behind the thunder-clouds. Zion, as far as it is truly Zion and is becoming Zion, is redeemed ; only the ungodly are destroyed, but these without mercy, as is added in ver. 28 : " But the destruction of the transgressors and sinners \shall le] together, and those who forsake Jehovah shall perish." In this way even the judicial aspect of the ap- proaching act of redemption is expressed in a manner that can be understood by every one. The impassioned exclama- tory clause in the first half of the verse is explained by the declamatory verb-clause of the second. D''JJB'a are those who in heart and in outward conduct have broken away from Jehovah ; □''Ksn are those who spend their lives in open and prevailing sins ; nin^ \3tj) are those who have become estranged from God in one or other of these ways. Ver. 29, beginning with an explanatory 'a, declares how God's judgment of destruction falls upon all these : " For they shall he ashamed of the terebinths in which ye delighted, and ye must Hush because of the gardens, in which ye had pleasure." The terebinths and gardens (this second word with the article, as in Hab. iii. 8 first D''"in33, then D'nnjzi) are not referred to as objects of luxury (as Hitzig and Drechsler suppose), but as unlawful places of worship (see Deut. xvi. 21) and objects of worship : both of them are frequently mentioned by the prophets with this meaning, Ivii. 5, Ixv. 3, Ixvi. 1 7. ion and nna are the usual verbs employed in speaking of Gentile will- worship {eOekodprjfficela), as in xliv. 9, xli. 24, Ixvi 3 ; and )p tyia is the customary phrase for indicating the shame that comes over idolaters when the helplessness of their idols proves that they are nothing. Eegarding B'ia (to be disturbed, lose self- command) and isn (to be covered over, become covered with shame), see our commentary on Ps. xxxiv. 6, xxxv. 4 ; cf. Wlinsche on Hosea, i. p. 54. The LXX. and other ancient versions incorrectly render ^''^'s by e'iBaXa, though the feeling 92 ISAIAH, by which they were prompted is correct : the places of worship here (cf. Jer. xlviii. 13) stand for the idols (ciiK, for which the form D''b''K is never written when Dii is the meaning). The abrupt transition from plain statement to direct address shows how excited the prophet is here at the close of the discourse. In this animated strain he continues ; and, led by the association of ideas, he makes terebinths and gardens the future figures of the idolaters themselves. Ver. 30 : " For ye shall be like a terebinth with withered leaves, and like a garden in which there is no water." Their prosperity is being destroyed, and they are thus like a terebinth npy npai. This last expression does not mean " withered its foliage," i.e. whose foliage is withered (for n?jJ is masc), but " which is withered in its foliage " ^ (genitival construction, as in xxx. 27; see Ewald's Syntax, § 288c); their sources of help are dried up, and thus they resemble a garden that has no water, and is therefore waste. The terebinth (turpentine-pistacia), a native of southern and eastern Palestine, casts its leaves (which are small, and resemble those of the walnut-tree) in the autumn. In this dry and parched condition, terebinth and garden, to which the idolaters are compared, are readily inflammable. There is but needed a spark to kindle, and then they are consumed in the flames. Ver. 31, in a third figure, shows the quarter from which this kindling spark will come : " And the wealthy one becomes tow, and his work a spark ; and both shall burn together, and no one extinguishes them." The form v^S primarily suggests a participial meaning, " he who prepares it ; " but JiDnn would be an unusual epithet to apply to the idol. Besides, the figure, on this view, becomes distorted, for certainly the natural order is that the idol is what kindles or inflames, while man is the object to be kindled, — not the converse. Hence 'OVB here means " his work " (as in the LXX., Targum, 1 The noun n^y is a collective, and not till we come to Nehemiah do we find the plur. uhv, just as it is not till we reach, the post- Biblical Hebrew that a plur. nilS is formed from the collective na. We might have expected ^hv instead of n^V>— like niB' in 2 Kings viii. 3 ; but such nouns from verbs rh are mostly combined with the suffixes ehu, ^ha {e.g. nsno for P1S10, Lev. xiii. 4, xx. 25), the termination a=aj having an influence on the choice of the suffix-form (Gesen. § 91, note 16). OHAPTEK I. 31. 93 and Vulgate): the forms i% and i^Jja (cf. Hi. 14; Jer. xxii. 13) are two equally possible modifications of the funda- mental form iPJ'a (ibfSi). As ver. 29 referred to the worship of idols, ?V3 does not here mean work in the general ethical sense (as Gesenius thinks, Thes), hut the idol, as something made (cf. ii. 8, xxxvii. 1 9, etc.). The wealthy idolater, who out of the abundance of his possessions (tph, xxxiii. 6) could afford gold and silver for making idols, will become tow (Talm. \T\tt ^E' mj?3, " refuse of flax," from np, to shake out, viz. in the swingling and combing; and, on the other hand, tph is the Talmudic word for flax that is still uncombed and un- dressed), and the idol will he the spark that sets this mass of fibres on fire, so that both will burn without any possibility of being saved (regarding iva, see the remarks on iv. 4).^ For the fire of judgment that consumes sinners does not need to come from without : sin carries within itself the fire of wrath. But the idol is the corpus delicti, — the sin of the idolater, as it were, set forth and embodied in visible form. The time when this first prophetic discourse was composed is a difficult problem. Gaspari, in his Contributions, has thoroughly examined all possible dates, and has finally decided in favour of the view that it belongs to the time of TJzziah, on the ground that vers. 7-9 do not relate to an actual, but merely to an ideal present. But this view is, and must con- tinue to be, arbitrary. Every unprejudiced reader will receive from vers. 7—9 the impression that what is there depicted is something actually present. Moreover, during the period of Isaiah's ministry the land of Judah was actually laid waste on two occasions, on both of which Jerusalem was spared only through the miraculous protection of Jehovah, — once during the reign of Ahaz, in the year of the Syro-Ephraimitish war ; and the second time during Hezekiah's reign, when the Assyrian host laid waste the country, only to be finally dashed to pieces at Jerusalem. Gesenius, Maurer, Movers, Knobel, Driver, and 1 This ton is an old Hebrew word preserved in the Mishna {Shdblath ii. 1). Eabbi Joseph there explains it, with reference to the present passage, paj x^l p^nT N3n*3, flax which has been broken, but not yet combed ; and it seems to be assumed there that Isaiah, when he calls the idolater ponn, alludes to JdH : "As the miW proceeds from the pin, so will the idolatrous pDH become n"l1V3-"— (Dr. H. Ehrentreu.) 94 ISAIAH. Others decide in favour of the year when the Syro-Ephraimitisb war took place ; while Hitzig, Umbreit, Drechsler, Luzzatto, and Kuper hold that the time was that of the Assyrian oppression. Whichever view we may take, there ever remains, as the test of its admissibility, the difficult question, How has this pro- phecy come to stand at the beginning of the book, if it belongs to the times of Uzziah and Jotham ? This question we shall endeavour to answer when we reach chap. vi. The path of General Judgment, showing the course of Israel from False to True Glory, Chaps. IL-IV. The limits of this discourse cannot be mistaken. From the beginning of chap. ii. to the end of chap. iv. a complete circle is formed. After frequent changes between exhortation, reproach, and threatening, the prophet reaches the object of the promise with wliich he began. On the other hand, chap. v. commences with a wholly new subject, forming an indepen- dent discourse, though connected with that which precedes by the superscription in ii. 1 : " The ivord vjMch Isaiah the son of Amos saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem." Chaps, ii.— v. may possibly have already existed under this heading before the whole collection was formed : this superscription was then taken over into the entire work, in order to call attention to the transition from the prologue to the body of the book. What the prophet utters concerning Judah and Jerusalem he calls " the word which he saw." When men speak one to another, the words are not seen, but heard ; but when God speaks with the prophet, this is done in a supersensuous manner, and the prophet sees it in this way, — for though the spirit of man has neither eyes nor ears, yet when enabled to perceive the supersensuous, it is altogether eye. The way in which Isaiah begins this second discourse is without a parallel ; there is no other prophetic address whatever that commences with n^ni (for Ezek, xxxviii. 1 is not a begin- ning, but a continuation). It is easy to tell the reason, however. This " consecutive preterite " receives the meaning of a future only from the context;' whereas ''n^. (with which historical books and sections very commonly begin) shows its character by its very form. It is further to be noted that the copu- CHAPTEE ir. 1. 95 lative meaning of the i in tlae " consecutive imperfect " retains less of its living force than in the "consecutive perfect." The prophet accordingly begins with " and ; " and that n\n is meant to bear a future sense is to be made out, not from vyhat precedes, but from what follows. This, however, is not the only strange thing here ; for there is, further, no other case in which a prophetic address — especially one like this, which runs through all the phases of prophetic discourse (exhortation, reproof, threatening, promise) — ^begins with a promise. We are in a condition, however, to see clearly the reason of this remarkable phenomenon ; for vers. 2-4 are not at all the words of Isaiah himself, but the words of another, taken out of their connection. "Every one of the prophets," says the Pesikta de-Bah Oahana 1256, "follows the precedent set him by those who have gone before (n''33 iK'I'i ''Bd) ; but thou, Isaiah, dost prophesy under the direct influence of the divine majesty" (mujn 'Sd). This is a grand testimony to the originality of Isaiah, yet it does not exclude his falling back on his predecessors. For we also find the words of vers. 2-4, in a slightly different form, in Micah iv. 1—4 ; and whether Isaiah took the words of this prediction from Micah, or whether both prophets derived them from a common source, in any case they are not Isaiah's originally.^ Nor was it at all intended that they should ^ Tlie statement in Jer. xxvi. 18, tliat Micah uttered the threatening, recorded in Micah iii. 12 (the counterpart of which is the promise in Micah iv. 1-4 and Isa. ii. 2-4) during the reign of Hezekiah, seems to militate against the idea that Isaiah borrowed from Micah. Independently of each other, Ewald {Prophets of the Old Testament, Eng. trans, vol. ii. pp. 27, 314) and Hitzig {Commentary on Isaiah and Micah; Studien wid Kritihen for 1829, 2) have conjectured that hoth Micah and Isaiah repeat what was first uttered by a third and earlier prophet, whom Hitzig further supposes to have been Joel ; Cheyne also (1868) thinks this prob- able. The passage in question has actually many points in common with the Book of Joel, such as the picture given of the reforging of the D'riK and nilOtD (iv. 10), the combinations of 31 and DISVi of ISJ and TOSn (cf. with Micah iv. 4). In Micah, however, it forms the obverse side of the threat of judgment that preceded ; ver. 3 also reminds us ol Micah's style (see the remarks on that verse) ; and the statement in Jer. xxvi. 18 is quite compatible with the supposition tliat Isaiah borrowed these words of promise from Micah (see the closing remarks on chaps, i.-vi.). Of. Caspari on Micah, p. 444 if. 96 ISAIAH. seem to be his. Isaiah has not fused them into the general current of his own address, as prophets are elsewhere wont to do with the predictions of their predecessors. He does not reproduce them, but, as we are meant to observe, from the abrupt beginning, he quotes them. This certainly does not seem to agree with the heading, according to which the succeeding declarations are the word of Jehovah which Isaiah saw ; but there is no real disagreement. It is just the spirit of prophecy which here brings into Isaiah's remembrance a prophetic utterance already recorded, and makes it the starting- point of the series of thoughts which follow. The borrowed promise is not by any means cited for its own sake, but serves merely as a basis for the following exhortation and threat of judgment, through which, after the borrowed introduction, Isaiah's discourse aspires to a conclusion of its own. The subject-matter of the borrowed words of prophecy is the future glory of Israel. Ver. 2 : " And it comes to pass at the end of the days, the mountain of the house of Jehovah will he established on the top of the mountains, and exalted over hills, and all nations stream unto it." The expression " the last days," or " end of the days " (^'P^D fTnnx), -which does not occur anywhere else in Isaiah, may either, in contrast with the time of commencement, signify the time of the end, or, in contrast with the present, the time that follows (as in Deut. xxxi. 29; Jer. xxiii. 20); according to preponderating usage, however, this expression is applied to the future that forms the close of history. Whether we render it by ev ia-xaraiii rj/jLepai-i or (as in 1 Tim. iv. 1) by iv var€pot,<; Kai,pol<;, the idea it presents is eschatological, but this in relation to the horizon of the speaker. This horizon is very varied ; and the history of prophecy is just the history of its gradual extension and completion. In the blessing of Jacob, Gen. xlix., the occupation of the land of Canaan stands in the foreground of the "last days," and regulates the per- spective ; but here, in Isaiah, " the last days " mean the time of the end in the most simple and literal sense. The prophet predicts that the mountain on which the temple was built will one day visibly tower above all the heights of the earth, and be enthroned like a king over his subjects. At present, the south-eastern hill on which the temple is built is sur- CHAPTER II. 2. 97 passed in height by the south-western hill ; and the basaltic mountains of Bashan, rising in bold peaks and columns, look down with scorn and contempt on the little limestone-hill which Jehovah has chosen (Ps. Ixviii. 16 f.), — a wrong re- lation which the last times wiU remove, by making the out- ward correspond to the inward, the appearance to the reality and intrinsic worth. That such is the prophet's meaning is confirmed by Ezek. xl. 2, where the temple-mount appears gigantic to the prophet, and by Zech. xiv. 10 (parallels, which Cheyne also compares), according to which all Jeru- salem will one day, as the actual centre and apex (cf. Ezek. v. 5), tower above the country round about, which shall have become a plain. If this be the meaning of the passage, there still remains doubt regarding the sense attaching to tyNia. Is it meant that Moriah will come to stand " upon the top " of the mountains surrounding it (tysia being rendered as in Ps. Ixxxii. 16), or that it will stand "at the head" of them (the expression being used as in 1 Kings xxi. 9, 12; Amos vi. 7 ; Jer. xxxi. 7) ? The former is the view of Hofmann (in his Weissag. und Erfullung, ii. 217): his opinion is, not that the mountains will be piled up, one on the top of the other, with the temple-mount over all (as it is said in PesiMa de-Bab Cahana 1445, that God will brino; together Sinai, Tabor, and Carmel, and erect the temple-bailding upon the top of them), but that Zion wUl seem to float on the summit of the other mountains : this is also the explanation given by Ewald. But inasmuch as the expression Ii3J, " established," is not favourable to this mode of getting rid of a wonderful phenomenon, and because t^sna, in the sense of "at the head," occurs still more frequently than with the meaning "on the top," what is meant is the exaltation of Zion by means of lifting, yet this in such a way that the physical and visible elevation is but a means to the dignitative and moral, and easily changes from the literal sense to the ideal. Eaised to a position towering over everything besides, the mountain chosen of God becomes the place of meeting and the centre of unity for all nations. It is the temple of Jehovah which now, visible to the nations from afar, exercises such magnetic powers of attraction, and with such results (cf. IvL 7 ; Jer. iii. 17 ; Zech. viii. 20 if.). Now, it is but a single nation, Israel, VOL I. G 98 ISAIAH. that makes pilgrimages to the temple-mount on great festivals, — then it will be otherwise. Ve;r. 3 : "And peoples in multitudes go and say, Come and let us go up to the mountain of Jehovah, to the house of the God of Jacob : let Him instruct us out of Sis ways, and we will walk in His paths." This is their watchword for the starting, this is their song on the way that they go (of. Zech. viii. 21 f., ii. 15). What urges them is the desire of salvation. Desire for salvation expresses itself in the name they give to the goal of their journey: they call Zion ( = Mount Moriah, 2 Chron. iii. 1) the " mountain of Jehovah ; " they call the temple built on it " the house of the God of Jacob ; " " Israel," as the name of the people of God, has by frequent use become common, so they employ the more refined name "Jacob," — the name dear to Micah, of whose style (see iv. 11, 13, v. 6 f.) we are further reminded by the expression "many nations." Desire of salvation shows itself in the object of their journey ; they wish Jehovah to teach them " out of His ways " 0"'?11P) — rich material for instruction with which they would like to be gradually intrusted (I? is here used in a partitive sense, — "out of the fulness of this material for instruction," cf. xlvii. 13, and the somewhat different IP in Ps. xciv. 12) : " the ways of Jehovah " are those in which He Himself walks and in which He conducts men, the revealed ordinances of His government and His will. Desire of salvation also shows itself in their resolution to set out : they not merely wish to learn, but they have made glad resolve to act in accordance with what they have learned : " so will we walk in His paths," — the cohortative, as frequently is the case {e.g. Gen. xxvii. 4), being used as the expression of the subjective purpose, or the subjective inference. Here end the words of the multitude of the heathen who are going up to Zion ; but the prophet, at the end of ver. 3 further adds the reason and motive of this holy pilgrimage of the nations : " For from Zion will a law go forth, and the word of Jehovah from Jerusalem." Zion ^ was originally the name of the south-eastern hill (not, as is now acknowledged, of the south-western lull which was erroneously considered ' On the meaning of the word, see "Wetstein in my Commentary on Genesis, 4th edition (English translation, Edinburgh 1889). CHAPTEE II. 4. 99 Zion) on which, at several successive stages of descent, were built the temple, the palace of Solomon, and the city of David ; ^ then it came to be specially applied to the height on which the temple stood, and by synecdoche to the whole of Jerusalem, the true centre of which is the sanctuary. The greatest emphasis is laid on the expressions " out of Zion " and " out of Jerusalem," which indicate a feeling of triumph, and remind us of John iv. 22, 17 a-eoTrjpia e« tcov 'lovBaiwv icrriv. From Zion-Jerusalem wUl go forth niin, i.e. instruc- tion regarding the questions which man has to ask at God ; and " the word of Jehovah " is that by which the world was created and by which it is spiritually transformed. Hence, what makes the nations truly prosperous comes from Zion- Jerusalem. Thither assemble the nations, thence they carry away a blessing with them to their homes, and thus Zion- Jerusalem becomes the source of all-embracing good; for, from the time that Jehovah chose Zion, the sanctity of Sinai (according to Ps. Ixviii. 18) was transferred to Zion; and what was begun at Sinai for Israel is completed from Zion for all the world. This was fulfilled at that Feast of Pente- cost when the first-fruits of the Church of Christ proclaimed the law of Zion, i.e. the gospel, in all the languages of the world. It is fulfilled, as Theodoret here remarks, in the fact that the word of the gospel, beginning at Jerusalem olov airo Two] (properly, 116 ISAIAH. one whose face {i.e. personal appearance) is accepted — i.e. one who is beloved and respected : Saad. wdgth, from wdgh, the face, appearance) is a person held in esteem, not merely in virtue of his office, but also on account of his wealth, age, benevolence, etc. ; DT'lO ^^^ is in the LXX. rendered a-ocftoi apxiTeKTwv, and very well explained by Jerome as in artibus mechanicis exercitatus casque collide tractans. In the Chaldean captivities, skilled artisans especially were carried away (2 Kings xxiv. 14 ff. ; Jer. xxiv. 1, xxix. 2) ; hence there can be no doubt that Ci'^nn, from the sing. B'^.n (different from D'Knn, workmen, the singular of which is tJ'nn for tsnn, — though in 1 Chron. iv. 14, cf Neh. xi. 35, we find the vocaliza- tion Ct^'^n in this personal sense also, from ^J}, following the analogy of the form Dsn), is intended to mean mechanical arts (not " magical arts," as Gesenius, Hitzig, and Meier affirm), and the DT^n Q?" therefore does not signify, as Ewald formerly rendered the expression, a sorcerer or wizard. The masters of the black art are introduced under the designation B'nb 1133 : trn^ is the whisper, the muttering of magical formulas. Moreover, the master of the black art further comes before us under the name opp, a term which (from the radical idea of making fast — as seen in Dp ; cp, — swearing, conjuring), together with t<''33, the false prophet of Jehovah whose predictions are also merely Dbp (Micah iii. 11 ; Ezek. xxii. 28), signifies a soothsayer that cherishes heathen superstition : the word is found as early as in Deut. xviii. 10, 14. After bread and water, these are the supports of the State. They are here intermingled thus, without any attempt at arrangement, because the mighty and magnificent State, properly regarded, is but a heterogeneous mixture of Judaism and heathenism, and the godless glory will become a mass of utter confusion when the wrath of Jehovah bursts fortL Deprived of its proper foundation and torn from its grooves, the kingdom of Judah falls a prey to the most audacious despotism, as shown in ver. 4 : " And I give them loys as princes, and childish caprices shall rule over them." The revived glory of Solomon is thus anew followed, as before, by Eehoboam-times. The king is not expressly mentioned, — intentionally so : he has sunk to the mere shadow of a king ; it is not he who rules, but the party of aristocrats around CHAPTEE III. 5. 117 him, who move him about like a puppet as they choose, treating him like one of themselves. Now, if it is in itself generally a misfortune when the king of a country is a lad ("iW, Eccles. X, 16), it is doubly so when the princes or magnates surrounding and advising him are also youths (D''"?V?) or youngsters, in the bad sense of the term : this produces a government of Ci''^i^j;ri. None of the nouns of this form has a personal meaning. According to the root-idea of the verb- stem, it is possible that the word may be explained (with Ewald, § 1676) as signifying " childishness," and this as being equivalent to "little children" (the abstract being used for the concrete, like to, iraihiKo). But there is no need for supposing that iyhh)lT\ stands for W%V (or n^'b^l^JD ; see under ver. 12); or, what is comparatively more admissible, that it is an adverbial accusative (the opinion of Cheyne, who trans- lates the passage, " and with wilfulness shall they rule over them ") ; for i-'P'p' does not necessarily require a personal subject (cf. Ps. xix. 14, ciii. 19). The form D''^i^yn (which occurs only in the plural, and is formed like D'^inw) takes its meaning from the reflexive ^W^"^, which signifies to meddle with, make sport of, give vent to one's caprice ; hence this noun signifies " vexations, annoyances " (Ixvi. 4). Jerome, who translates the word by effeminati, appears to have been thinking of ^?V^'} in an obscene sense ; better is the rendering of the LXX. which gives i/i-TraiKTai, though ifiirair/iiaTa would be more exact ; here, in association with D''"ij;j, it denotes out- bursts of youthful caprice, which, whether in joke or in earnest, do injury to others. It is not law and righteousness that will rule, but the very opposite of righteousness, — a course of conduct which treats the subjects as the helpless plaything, at one time of their lust (Judg. xix. 25), at another of their cruelty. Varying humour, utterly unregulated and unrestrained, rules supreme. Then the people become like the government : passions are let loose, and all restraints of modesty are burst asunder. Ver. 5 : " And the people oppress one another, one this and another that ; the hoy breaks out furiously upon the old man, and the despised upon the honoured." As shown by the clause describing the mutual relation of the persons, t^M is a Niphal with reciprocal meaning (cf. Dnpi, xix. 2) ; this verb, followed 118 ISAIAH. by 3, signifies to treat as a tyrant or taskmaster (see ix. 3). The meanest selfishness then stifles all nobler motives ; one becomes a tyrant over another, and rude insolence takes the place of reverence, which, by the law of nature, as well as the Torah (Lev, xix. 32) and custom, is due to the aged and superiors from boys and those in the humbler ranks. n?i53 (from n^i5, which is synonymous with 7\^\}, viiL 23, xxiii. 9 ; cf. xvi. 14 ; the root of which is iip, to be light, small) means one who belongs to the lowest stratum of society (1 Sam. xviii. 23), and is the opposite of 1333 (from 133, to be difficult, weighty): the LXX. well renders o drifio'; Trpo? tov evTi/jLov. When there is this disregard of the distinctions due to age and rank, the State in a short time becomes a wild and waste scene of confusion. At last, there is no longer any authority bearing rule ; even the desire to govern dies out, for despotism is followed by mob-rule, and this by anarchy in the most literal sense ; distress becomes so great that he who has a coat (cloak), so as to be still able in some degree to clothe himself respectably, is besought to undertake the government. Vers. 6, 7 : " When a man shall lay hold of his brother in his father's house [and say], ' Thou hast a cloak ; thou shall he our ruler, and take this rxiin under thy hand,' he will cry out on that day, saying, ' I do not want to he a surgeon, when there is in my house neither hread nor cloak ; ye cannot make me ruler of the j)eople' " The population will have become so lean and dispirited through hunger, that, with a little energy, it would be possible to decide, within the narrow circle of a family, who is to be ruler, and to carry out the decision. The father's house is the place where (71*3 being here the local accusative) one brother meets the other; and one breaks out into the following words of urgent entreaty, which are here introduced without ibw (cf. xiv. 8, 16, also xxii. 16, xxxiii. 14). na? is a rare mode of writing I^J, found also in Gen. xxvii. 37 ; n;nn indicates the assumption, without any ceremony, that he will agree to what is expected. In Zeph. i- 3, n?B''3D means that through which one comes to ruin ; here it means the thing itself that has been overthrown, and this because V? (not merely to stumble, trip, slip, but actually to tumble over after being thrown off the equilibrium by a CHAPTER in. 8. 119 thrust from the outside) is not used of buildings that fall into ruin, and with a reference to the prosopopeia which follows in ver. 8. He who has the advantage over many, or all others, of still being able to clothe himself respectably (even though it were merely with a blouse) is to become supreme ruler or dictator (of. TVi^, Judg. xi. 6), and the State, now lying in a wretched state of ruin, is to be under his hand (i.e. his dominion, his protection and care: 2 Kings viii. 20; Gen. xli. 35 ; cf. xvi. 9, where, instead of the more usual singular Ti, the plural is found). With ver. 7 begins the apodosis to the protasis introduced by ''3 as a particle of time. The answer given by the brother to the urgent request of those who make the appeal is introduced by the words, " he will raise (viz. his voice; see xxiv. 14) on that day, saying:" it is stated in this circumstantial manner because it is a solemn protest. He does not like to be E*?", i.e. a binder (viz. of the broken arms and legs and ribs of the ruined State, xxx. 26, i. 6, IxL 1). It is implied in the form njns that he does not like it, because he is conscious of his inability. He has no confidence in himself, and the assumption that he has a coat is false ; not merely has he no coat at home in his house (in view of which we must remember that the conversation is carried on in his father's house), but he has no bread ; hence what is expected from him, almost naked and starving as he is, becomes impossible. "When the purple of the ruler," says the Midrash on Esth. iii. 6, " is offered for sale at the market, then woe to the buyer and the seller alike ! " This deep and tragic misery, as the prophet proceeds to show in vers. 8-12, is righteous retribution. Ver. 8 : "For Jerusalem is overthrown and Judah is fallen, hecause their tongue and their doings are against Jehovah, to defy the, eyes of His glory." The name of the city of Jerusalem is regularly (Gesen. § 122. 'ia) treated as feminine, the name of the people of Judah as masculine ; names of nations appear as feminines only when there is a blending of the two ideas, the country and the people (as, for instance. Job i. 15). The two preterites ^^'^ and ^W express the general fact which will prove the occasion of such scenes of misery as have just been described. The second clause (a substantive one), on the other hand, beginning with 'S, assigns already 120 ISAUH. present sin, not sin still future, a? the reason of the coming judgment. ^>? is employed to indicate hostile direction, as in ii. 4 ; Gen. iv. 8 ; Num. xxxii. 14 ; Josh. x. 6. The capital and the country are in word and deed against Jehovah i^^3 '•pv nina^. Here '^j? = ''rj? and niio^ (as in Ps. Ixxviii. 17) is the syncopated Hiphil inf. for ninprip (cf. the syncopated forms in xxiii. 11, i. 12). The Qal mo, which is likewise pretty often construed with the accusative, means to reject in a contumacious manner, and the Hiphil nnipri to treat contumaciously, — properly, to oppose strenuously, avrireiveiv, dbniti : the root is ID, j^, stringere, and this is connected with ip, the name of anything bitter, as being astringent, though there is no warrant for the rendering in the LXX. of n-jD men, ipn, Ex. xxiii. 21, by TrapaiTiKpaiveiv. The ? is a somewhat shortened expression for ]V'>i?, Amos ii. 7 ; Jer. vii. 18, xxxii. 29. But what does the prophet mean by " the eyes of His glory " ? The con- struction is certainly just the same as is " the arm of His holiness" (lii. 10), and a reference to the divine attributes is thus intended. The glory of God is that eternal manifesta- tion of His holy nature in its splendour which man pictures to himself anthropomorphically, because he cannot conceive of anything more sublime than the human form. It is in this glorious form that Jehovah looks upon His people. In this is mirrored His condescending yet jealous love, His holy love which breaks forth into wrath against all who requite His love with hate. But Israel, instead of living in the consciousness of being a constant and favoured object of these majestic and earnestly admonishing eyes, is studiously defying them in word and deed, not even hiding its sin through fear of them, but exposing it to view all unabashed. Ver. 9 : " The appear- ance of their faces testifies against them, and their sin they declare like Sodom, without concealing it; woe to their soul! for they do evil to themselves." In any case, what is meant is the insolent look which their sinfulness is stamping upon their faces, without the self-condemnation which in others takes the form of dread to commit sin (Seneca, de vita ieata, c. 12). The construct form ITian, if derived from lan (Jos. Kimchi and Luzzatto), would follow the analogy of iTipa CHAPTEB III. 10, 11. 121 in Ezek. xxxiv. 12. But nan = Arab, hahara Qiahira), affords no suitable meaning ; nniiPi is the active noun formed from the Hiphil 'i"'3n. The common expression c^a "i^sn signifies to look searchingly, inquiringly, keenly into the face of a person, to fix the eye upon him ; and, when used of a judge, to take the side of a person, by showing undue regard to him (Deut. i. 17, xvi. 19). This latter meaning, however (" their respect of persons," " their partiality," Prov. xxiv. 23, xxviii. 21), though supported by Hitzig, Maurer, and Gesenius, is inadmissible here, simply because the words do not refer to judges specially, but to the whole nation. " The appearance of their faces " is to be understood here in an objective sense, their look (to etSo?, Luke ix. 29), as the agnitio of Jerome is also to be taken as meaning id quo se agnoscendum dot vultus eorum. This is probably the usual Hebrew designation for what we call physiognomy, — the meaning indicated by the expression of the face, and then the latter itself. The expression of their countenance testifies against them (3 n:y as in lix. 12) ; for it is the distorted and troubled image of their sin that cannot and will not hide itself. They do not even content themselves, however, with this open though silent display; they further speak openly of their sin, making no concealment of it, like the Sodomites who proclaimed their fleshly lust (Gen. chap. xix.). Jerusalem is, in fact, spiritually Sodom, as the prophet called it in i. 10. Through such shameful sinning they do themselves harm (?D3, allied to "ips, signifies to complete, then to carry out, to show by actual deed) : this is the undeniable fact, the actual experience. But seeing it is the curse of sin that the knowledge of what is perfectly clear and self-evident is just what is marred and even obliterated for man, the prophet dwells still longer on the fact that all sin is self-destruction and self-murder, presenting this general truth with its opposite in palilogic fashion, like the Apostle John, and calling to his contem- poraries in vers. 10,11: " Say of the just, that it is well with him ; for they will enjoy the fruit of their doings. Woe to the wicked ! it is ill ; for what his hands have wrought will he done to him." What is declared in Prov. xii. 14 is here re-echoed in prophetic form. We cannot, with Vitringa and 122 ISAIAH. some modern commentators, translate " Praise the righteous one ; " for, though lOK is sometimes construed with the accusative (Ps. xl. 11, cxlv. 6, 11), it never means to praise, but to utter, express (see also Ps. xl. 11). We have here the transposition familiar to us even from Gen. L 4, — simple and natural in the case of the verbs nsn (cf. also xxii. 9 ; Ex. ii. 2), 5?"]; (1 Kings v. 17), and ip? (like Xiyeiv, John ix. 19): dicite justum quod honus = dicite justum esse honum (Ewald, § 3365): the object of seeing, knowing, or saying is first mentioned generally, and then what qualifies it or defines it in some way. 31 D and, in ver. 11, J'^ (V"} when not in pause) might both be the 3rd sing, perfect of their verbs, used in a neuter sense : 3it3, " it is well," viz. to him (as in Deut. v. 30; Jer. xxii. 15 f.); and V] (from JT,), " it is ill" (as in Ps. cvi. 32). But Jer. xliv. 17 shows that we may also say ^<1^ 3it3, Nin j?"i, in the sense of Kaku^ ^X^'> KaKW e^ei, and that both expressions have been so regarded, and hence in both cases do not need i^ to be supplied. The form of the first favours this, while in the second the accentua- tion vacillates between iis with Tifcha, yenb with Munach, and 'IS with Merkah, VE'ii' with Tifcha ; the latter mode of accentuation, however, which favours the personal view of jfn, is presented by important editions (such as those of Breschia, 1494; Pesaro, 1516; Venice, 1515 and 1521), and rightly preferred by Luzzatto and Baer. The summary statements, " the righteous is well," " the wicked is ill," are established by the latter end of both, in the light of which the previous misfortune of the righteous appears as good fortune, and the previous good fortune of the wicked as misfortune. With reference to this difference in the eventual fate of each, the call " say," which is common to both clauses, summons to a recognition of the good fortune of the one and the ill fortune of the other. that Judah and Jerusalem recognised this for their salvation, ere it becomes too late ! For the state of the poor nation is already sad enough, and they are very near destruction. Ver. 12: " My people, — its oppressors are hoys, and women rule over it; my people, thy leaders are misleaders, and they have swallowed the way of thy patlis." The idea that "^bilJO signifies those who maltreat or abuse others, is opposed by CHAPTER ra. 12. 123 the parallel Q'K'i ; moreover, the notion of despotic treatment is already contained in VB'Jb. Along with women, one expects to find children ; ^ and this, too, bb'tVKi means, but not a suck- ling (Ewald, § 160a), like is^j? and b'')}! (see our commentary on Job xvi. 11), for the active form requires an active idea; but ijij; does not mean "to suckle" (rather to support, nourish), much less then "to suck," so that it would thus need to signify the suckling in the sense of one who is nourished. This is improbable, however, for the simple reason that it occurs in Jer. xliv. 7 and Lam. ii. 11 along with P?}\ and thus cannot have exactly the same meaning as the latter word, but, like ^^ij^ and ^^iJ? (the former of which may have been contracted from ^'iJ'P), signifies a boy as playful and wanton (lascivum, protervum) : see the remarks on ver. 4 (where Qvl^i?? occurs with D""?!'?), and cf. the Bedouinic iji^sjj, plur. 'awdlil, with the sense of juvencus (a young bull, three or four years old). Bottcher correctly renders the word by pueri (lusores) ; bb'WO, however, is not, as he supposes, in itself a collective form, but the singular is used collectively ; or perhaps better still, the predicate is meant to apply to every individual included in the plural idea of the subject (cf. xvi. 8, xx. 4 ; Gesenius, § 145. 6), so that the meaning is, — the oppressors of the people, every one without exception, are (even though advanced in years), in their way of thinking and acting, like boys or youths, who make all those subject to them the plaything of their capricious humour. The person of the king — vb'J: being understood by Hitzig, Ewald, and Cheyne as a plural of excellence — is here also placed in the background ; but the female sway, afterwards mentioned, points us to the court. This must have been the state of the case when Ahaz, a young spendthrift, twenty years of age (according to the LXX., twenty-five), came to the throne, after the end of Jotham's reign. Once more the prophet, with deep pain, repeats the words " my people," and, addressing them directly, passes from the rulers of the nation to the preachers, — for the DnE'sp are prophets (Micah iii. 5) ; but what characters ! ^ An Arabic proverb {Cat. Codd. Lips. p. 373) runs thus : " I flee to God in order to escape from the domination of boys and the government of women." 124 ISAIAH. Instead of leading the people on the straight road, they lead them astray (ix. 15 ; cf. 2 Kings xxi. 9); for, as we know from the history of this gang of prophets, they ministered to the godless interests of the court, making themselves the slaves either of the dynasty or the demagogues; or they pandered to the desires of the people, which were of no higher tone. Moreover, " the way of the path " of the people {i.e. the main-road or highway, by the branches of which the people were to reach the goal designed by God) have they " swallowed " (i.e. taken away the eyes and feet of the people), so that they cannot find it and walk in it. Nagelsbach renders this passage differently, — " they drag down thy path of life into destruction ; " but the solemn nature of the expression rather points to the conclusion that " way " means law, or the path of duty (Theodoret, Jerome, Luther). Whatever is swallowed is invisible ; it has disappeared without leaving a trace behind. " To swallow," in the sense of deglutire, is expressed by the Qal, as in xxviii. 4 ; the Piel J??? signifies absorption, in the sense of annihilation. Tlie way of salva- tion shown in the law is no more to be seen or heard ; it has perished, as it were, in the preaching of the false prophets with their misleading doctrines. Such is the state of matters. The exhortations of the prophet have no great range or breadth of view, for he must ever recur to the announcement of judgment. The judgment of the world comes anew before his mind in ver. 13 : "Jehovah is standing to plead, and has stepped forward to judge the nations." When Jehovah, wearied of exercising patience, arises from His heavenly throne, this is called Dip, as in ii. 19, 21, xxxiii. 10 ; when He sits down on the judgment-seat before the eyes of all the world, this is called ^?>1, as in Ps. ix. 5 ; Jonah iv. 12; when He descends from heaven (Micah i. 2 ff.) and comes forward as accuser, this is called 32f3 or ^»S', Ps. Ixxxii. 1, — the latter word signifies to go forward and stand, in contrast with sitting; while the former means to stand, with the additional idea of being firm, fixed in purpose, ready. But Jehovah's pleading (3n, Jer. XXV. 31) is likewise judging (pn), because His accusation, which cannot possibly be denied as false, is at the same time the sentence of condemnation ; and this sentence, which CHAPTEK III. 14, 16. 125 irresistibly operates, is at the same time also the execution of the punishment. Thus God stands — Accuser and Judge and Executioner in one Person — in the midst of the nations (Ps. vii. 8). But among the nations it is Israel specially, and among the Israelites it is particularly the leaders of the poor misguided and neglected people against whom He stands, as shown in vers. 14, 15 : "Jehovah will enter into judgment with the elders of His people and their princes, — and you, ye have eaten up the vineyard; the plunder of the sufferer is in your houses. What do you want, that you crush my people, and grind the face of those in suffering ? Declaration of the Lord Jehovah of hosts." With the first part of ver. 14 cf. Ps. cxliii. 2. The address of God begins with D^xi ; the clause to which this " and ye " (or " but ye ") forms the contrast is wanting, just as in Ps. ii. 6, where the address of God begins with "'3^5, " and 1" = " but I." The suppressed clause, however, is easily supplied in some such way as this : " I set you over my vineyard, but ye have eaten up the vineyard." The question has been asked whether it is God Himself who silently passes over this clause, or the prophet ; but certainly it is Jehovah Himself. The majesty with which He comes before the rulers of His people of itself practically and undeniably declares, even without express statement in words, that their majesty is but a shadow of His, and that their office is held from Him and under Him. But their office is owing to God's having committed His people to their care ; the vineyard of Jehovah is His people, — a figure which the prophet, in chap, v., forms into a parable. Jehovah appointed them to be keepers and pre- serves of this vineyard, but they have themselves become the cattle ("'■'J'?) which they were to drive off; the verb 13?3 is used in speaking of the cattle that utterly devour the stalks of what grows in a field, or the tender vines in a vineyard (Ex. xxii. 4). The property of which their unhappy fellow- countrymen have been robbed is in their houses, and attests the plundering that has been carried on in the vine- yard. ^^V[} forms an explanation of D^3n ; for a lowly and distressful condition is the usual lot of the community which God calls His vineyard ; it is an oppressed Church, but woe to the oppressors ! In the question D3^o there is implied the 126 ISAIAH. want of understanding and the bold insolence of the begin- ning they have made: np is here, after the manner of a prefix, fused into one word with tiJ?, as in Ex. iv. 1 ; Ezek. viii. 6 ; Mai. i. 13. The Qen, by resolving the Kethih, helps us to understand the meaning. D3?o should properly be followed by '3 (quid est vohis quod atteritis populum meum, as in xxii. 1, 16), but the discourse hurries on (as in Jonah i. 6) because it is an outburst of wrath. Hence also the expres- sions setting forth the conduct of the rulers of the people are the strongest possible. ^^T occurs also in Prov. xxii. 22, but ''3a \r\a is a strong metaphor of which no other example is found. The former signifies to beat (or pound), while the latter (the extreme opposite of '^s n^n) means to grind small (to powder), as the millstone grinds the grain. They beat the face of those who are already bowed down, repelling them with such merciless harshness that they stand as if they were annihilated, and their face becomes pale and white, from oppression and despair, — ^or even (without any reference to the loss of colour) so that their joyful appearance is ex- changed for the features and gait of men in despair. Thus far, language still affords figurative expressions fitted in some measure for describing the conduct of the rulers of Israel, but it lacks the power of adequately expressing the boundless im- morality of this conduct ; hence the greatness of their wicked cruelty is set before them for consideration in the form of a question : " What is it to you ? " i.e. what kind of unutterable wickedness is this you are beginning ? Thus the prophet hears Jehovah speak, — the majestic Judge whom he here calls ni«3y nin;_ •'Jis (to be read Adond^ Eloldm ZehaJoth, according to the traditional vocalization). This threefold name of God, which pretty frequently occurs in Amos, and also in Jer. ii. 19, first appears in the Elohistic psalm Ixix. (ver. 7), — as this judgment-scene generally is painted with psalm-colours, and especially reminds us of Ps. Ixxxii. (Elohistic, and a psalm of Asaph). But though the prophet has this judgment - scene thus vividly and dramatically before him, yet he cannot help breaking off, even after he has but begun the description ; for another message of Jehovah comes to him. It is for the women of Jerusalem, whose sway is now, when the prophet CHAPTEE in. 16, 17. 127 is delivering his burden, not one whit less influential in the capital (see ver. 12, beginning) than that of their husbands, who had forgotten their calling. Vers. 16, 17: "And Jehovah hath spoken : Because the daughters ofZion are haughty, and walk with necks stretched fortJi and twinkling with the eyes, walk with tripping gait, and tinkle with their foot ornaments ; therefore the Lord maketh the crown of the head of Zion's daughters scabbed, and Jehovah will make hare their secret parts." Their pride of heart (i^?a is used as in Ezek. xvi. 50, of. Zeph. iii. 11) reveals itself in their outward conduct. They go with outstretched neck, i.e. bending back the fore part of the neck, seeking to make themselves taller than they are, since they think themselves exceedingly great. Cornelius k Lapide here remarks : instar gruum vel cygnoram ; habitus hie est insolentis ac procacis. (The Qeri here substitutes the usual form n^itip, but Isaiah perhaps intentionally employed the more rare and rugged form niiDJ, for this form actually occurs in 1 Sam. xxv. 18, as also its singular its: for WBJ iu Job XV. 22, xli. 25.) Moreover, they go twinkling (niiipB'D, not niiijiB'D, " falsifying ") the eyes (like iiil, the accusative of closer specification), i.e. in pretended innocence casting wanton and amatory glances about them (LXX. vevixara o^daXiiSsv) : this participle comes from ipB'—li'p, not in the sense oifucare (Targum, Shabhath 626, Yoma 9&, Luther), properly "to dye reddish-yellow" (Pesikta, ed. Buber, 132a, "with red colly- rium;" Talm. piK>, parall. bn2, Kethuboth I7a) ; but secondarily to paint the face. This derived sense is in itself not probable here, from the simple fact that the painting of the eyelids black with powdered antimony (Tjiia, liv. 11) was not con* sidered a piece of vanity, but regarded as an indispensable item of female adornment. The verb is rather used in the sense of nictare (LXX. Vulgate, Syriac, cf. Saad. " making their eyes flash "), syn. T?"j, cf. ipp, Syr. to squint, Targ. = ^V^, Job XX. 9. Compare also the Talmudic witticism, " God did not create the woman out of Adam's ear, lest she might become an eavesdropper (n'jn^V) ; nor out of Adam's eye, lest she might become a winker (nv^i??)." ^ ' Cf. also Sota 4:7b : " Since there has been increase in the number of women with extended neck and winking eyes, there has also been increase of the cases in which the curse-water (Num. v. 18) had to be used." To 128 ISAIAH, The third descriptive clause states that they walk incedendo et saliendo : the second infinitive absolute is here, as usual, that which gives the definite colour to the expression, while the other keeps before the eye the occurrence that would be denoted by the verb in its finite form. They go skipping along (►"ibi?, cf. i_il5 ik, to spring, so called from drawing the feet together ; hence «1^, the skipping little family), i.e. taking short and tripping steps, almost always placing the heel at the great toe, as the Talmud everywhere says. The LXX. gives a rendering of interest for the history of luxury in dress: Kal T§ TTopeLo, Twv TToBcav a/jta avpova-at, roix; 'x^irSyva^. Quite as appropriate, but contrary to the meaning of the words, is the rendering of Luther, " they walk along and waggle," i.e. clunibus agitatis, a meaning for which the Semitic has other expressions (see Zeitschrift der deutsch. morgenl. Gesellschaft, xvi. 587).^ But the rendering should rather be "tripping;" for only such little steps can they take, owing to their pace- chains, which join together the costly foot-rings (Q'???) that were placed above the ankle. With these pace-chains, which perhaps even then as now, were sometimes provided with little laells, they make a tinkling sound, — an idea which is here expressed by the denominative verb D2j? ; -with their feet they make a tinkling sound, clinking the ankle-ornaments, by placing the feet in such a way as to make these ankle-rings strike one another. In view of this fact, Qn"^J"!3 for I?'^,^na is perhaps not an unintentional interchange of gender; they are not modest virgines, but bold viragines, and thus in their own persons display a synallage generis. This coquettish clinking, sucli an extent, indeed, did the evil grow, as is well known, tliat Jolianan ben Zaccai, the pupil of Hillel, completely abolished the ordeal of the Sota (i.e. the woman suspected of adultery) ; his contemporaries were thoroughly adulterous (fioixay^U). Synonymous with nilpK'D is paeta, a Latin epithet of Venus, which Philoxonus glosses by /ivuip roij o/.t.fi{x.ai ; but a different meaning is conveyed by iypa, which also is a term having reference to the eyes. 1 The translation of the Targum |Sj3a |nnB31 is explained in the same way by Gesenius {Thesaurus, p. 554) to mean dunes agitantes, but more correctly by Eashi to signify "putting on false hair-toupees," Nns = nnNB (nKSn). See Levy's Targumic Dictionary, under flpj Land SDNa- CHAPTEE III. 18-23. 129 though forbidden by the Qoraii, is still the delight of women in Moslem Oriental countries at the present day, as the women of Jerusalem enjoyed it in Isaiah's days. Great is the attractive influence of natural charms, especially when enhanced by lavish employment of art ; but the prophet, blind to this display of splendour, sees only the filthiness within, and announces to the women of rank a foul and by no means aesthetic fate. The Almighty will smite with scab the crown of their head, from which long hair now flows down (natyi has 1 consecutivie, and, at the same time, forms the apodosis ; the verb is a " denominative " from nnsp, which means the scab or scurf which deposits itself on the skin) ; and Jehovah, by delivering them over to the violation of and insult of coarse enemies, wUl uncover their nakedness, — the greatest disgrace in the eyes of a woman, who covers herself as carefully as possible from every stranger (xlvii. 3 ; Nab. iii. 5 ; Jer. xiii. 22 ; Ezek. xvi. 37). The noun na is derived from a verb nia (Arab, faut, tefdwut, signifying inter- capedo), so that I[]na or inna (cf. Stade, § 353&, and, further, jrix for I^^ in Ezek. xxxiv. 3 1) is thus a designedly disrespectful term ; cf. 'ina, plur. nina, a Biblical and Talmudic word signi- fying cardo femina. The Babylonians read pna from na, which is rather derived from nna (cf I3T ; also nriB in the sense of vulva, in Fesachim 8 7a ; and iu explanation of this passage, Shahhath &2V)} The prophet now proceeds in vers. 18-23 to describe further how the Lord will tear from them their whole toilet as plunder for their foes : " On that day will the Lord remove the splendour of the ankle-clasps, and of the forehead-hands, and of the crescents ; the ear-drops, and the arm-chains, and the light veils ; the tiaras, and the stepping-chains, and the girdles, and the smelling-bottles, and the amulets ; the finger-rings and the nose-rings ; the gala-dresses, and the sleeved-frocks, and the wrapping-cloaks, and the pockets ; the Jiand-mirrors, and the ^ LiTzzatto explains na by the Aram, ans , " forehead ;" but this word, the full form of which is STOSJK, is equivalent to SSX, X>SX, the face or countenance ; moreover, the Syriac fUt (whence comes l'fAt='^sf), which Bernstein regards as a collateral form iiomf4m, D1S, the " mouth," is the apocopated ajoM = apm. VOL. I. I 130 ISAIAH. Sindu-covers, and the turhans, and the gauze-mantles." The oldest commentary on this passage, important for the infor- mation it affords regarding ancient costumes, though itself needing explanation, is found in the Jerusalem Talmud, Shabbath vi. 4. Later writers who have industriously treated of these articles of female dress are Nic. Wilh. Schroder, in his Commeniarius de vestitu mulierum Hebraearum ad Jes. iii. 16-24 (Lugd. Batav. 1745, 4to), and Ant. Theod. Hart- mann (sometime Professor in Eostock), in his work entitled. Die Eebraerin am Putztische und als Braut, 1809-10 (3 vols. 8vo); cf. Saalschiitz's Archdologie (1885), chap. 3 of which treats of the dress of men and women ; and Sal. Eubin, |1N3 Di^E'lT'l mw (on the luxury, love of show, and mode of living among the Hebrew women referred to in the Bible), in vol. i. of the monthly magazine called -intJ'n (also published sepa- rately, Vienna 1870). [See also Keil's Biblical Archaeology (English translation, Edinburgh 1888), vol. ii. 142.] It is not customary elsewhere with Isaiah to be so detailed in his descriptions; among all the prophets, Ezekiel most displays this style of writing (see, for example, chap, xvi.) ; nor do we find anything similar again in other prophecies against women (cf xxxii. 9 ff.; Amos iv. 1 if.). Here ends the enumeration of articles of female finery and show ; and while it forms a trilogy with the enumeration of the props of State in iii. 1—3, and the enumeration in ii. 13—16 of persons and things lofty and exalted, it has its own special ground in the boundless love of ornament which had become prevalent especially during the reigns of Uzziah and Jotham, it is intended to make a serious impression, and yet show the ridiculous cha- racter of the unrestrained luxury actually existing ; for it is the prophet's design in this address throughout to draw a sharp contrast between the titanic, party-coloured, noisy, worldly glory, and the true glory, which is spiritual, grandly simple, and shows itself in working outwards from within. Indeed, the subject of the whole address is the course of universal judgment from false glory to the true. The general idea of " splendour " or " glory " (iTixan), which stands at the head and forms the foundation of the whole, already points to the contrast which follows in iv. 2, with quite another kind of glory. CHAPTER III. 18-23. 131 In explaining eacli particular term, we must content our- selves with stating what is most necessary and comparatively- most certain regarding the words which here occur. '2*p2j? (from D3J?, fjjSs- i^jSs-, to bind, see the remarks on lix. 5) are rings worn round the ankles, and made of gold, silver, or ivory: hence the denominative verb DSj; (used in ver. 16), to make a clinking sound with these rings. D^p''3B' (from 0?^=r3»', to weave) are bands woven of gold or silver thread, worn on the forehead and under the hair-net, and extendirig from one ear to the other ; plausible, but less probable, is the explanation current since Schroder's time, that the word means sun-like balls (D''p''pE'), worn as ornaments round the neck (Arab, sumeisa, siibeisa, a little sun). Ci''3nnB' are luUulae of this kind, moon-shaped ornaments (Arab, j^, Aram, -ino, moon), fastened round the neck, and hanging down on the breast (Judg. viii, 26 ; cf. 21, royal ornaments), half-moons or crescents (hildlat), like those of which an Arabic girl usually possesses several kinds, for the Midi (new moon) is an emblem of increasing good fortune,^ and, as such, the most approved means of warding off the evil eye.^ niSDJ are ear-drops (found in Judg. viii. 2 6 as a designation of the ornament worn by Midianite kings); hence the Arab, munattafa, a female adorned with ear-rings. nnB' (from ilK*, to twist) are chains, and these, too (according to the Targum), chains for the arms, • or spangles for the wrists, corresponding to the spangles for the ankles; the arm-chain or bracelet is still at the present day called siwdr (hence the denominative jj-), to present or adorn with a bracelet), f^i^yi are veils (from ^V], Aram. ^ In this sense tie crescent is the sign (wasm) with which the tribe of the Buwale mark their herds as their property. ^ " Amulet " and " talisman " are both words derived from the Arabic ; II II the former comes from liLx-*,*. instead of the plural JjU.i>- (from ^\.^e>-^ to bear, carry), which is more usual in this sense, — see, however, Gildemeister (in the Zdischrift der deutsch. morgenl. Gesellschaft, xxxviii. 140-142), who considers amoletum an old Latin word : the latter is from l»*julb, the Arabic form of TiT^tnfix. 132 ISAIAH. ^n, Jxj, Ji,, J ji, to be loose and flaccid, to hang down or hang over loosely) ; these were more costly and of better quality than the ordinary veil worn by maidens, which is called TJ'S. D^IXS are tiaras: the term occurs elsewhere in Scripture only in passages in which the word is applied to coverings for the heads of men (the priests, the bridegroom, and persons of rank). '"liivy are the stepping-chains (from rrijjs, which primarily means a step or pace ; then the little chain which makes the pace short and elegant). O'lB^p (from t^\>, to gird) are dress girdles, such as the bride wears on the marriage-day (cf. Jer. ii. 22 with Isa. xlix. 18) ; the Targum wrongly renders '''tpipKi?? hair-pins (KaXa/xtSes). ti'SJ ''na are holders of scent (tysa being used only here in the sense of the breath of an aroma). Luther appropriately renders the ex- pression " musk-apples," i.e. capsules filled with musk, i^''t^'^? (from tyn?, to wliisper, to work magically) are amulets worn either as charms or as a protection against witchcraft, perhaps something like the later nijJ^Dp (Shabbath 60a), i.e. small plates with an inscription, or small bunches of plant- roots with sanative powers, niyao (from y?Q, to sink into, seal) are signet-rings worn on the finger, corresponding to the Dnin worn by men on a string hanging down over the breast. ^^\} 'PP are the nose-rings in common use from patriarchal times (Gen. xxiv. 22) till the present, generally put through the right nostril, and hanging down over the mouth ; they are different from nn (a word occurring seven times), which is the ring put through the nose of animals, though this term is also found along with DM in Ex. xxxv. 22 as the designation of an ornament.^ nis^np are garments such as a person of rank brings out and presents to another,— gala-dresses, robes of honour (from J'pn, ^i^^, to draw out ; as a denominative verb it signifies to put on a gala - dress) ; the Arab, is ajtLi- (usually pronounced ielrS^, whence our " gala," Spanish gala ; it does not come from ^^J^ =7n, r\'3JJ by way of distinction ; see the essay on " Ohrgehange (QidH) als gotzendienerisches Gerath," in Geiger's Zeitschrift, x. (1872) pp. 45-48. CHAPTER III. 18-23. 133 nanjJD is the second tunic or frock, -which was worn over the ordinary one, — the Eoman stola. nlnsiBp (from nan, to spread out) are wrappers or broad wrapping - cloths,^ like the one which Euth wore when she crept close to Boaz in her best attire (Euth iii. 15). CtJnn (here written D''i?''"!nn with the article, according to the Masora) are pockets into which people put money (2 Kings v. 23), which at other times is carried in the girdle or in a purse (D''3). Qij^ba (according to LXX. Bia53J=b^J. But, as shown by the use of the word in other passages, the root does not mean to roll or wind, but to make smooth, or lay bare. * The Mishna {Kelim xxiv. 13) distinguishes between three kinds of pjno, the material used for bed-clothes, the material used for curtains, and that used for embroidering. The Sindon is pretty often mentioned as a covering for the body ; and in Menachoth 41a we read XCpP Si'lD Sinoi' ^?^3■^D1, "the sindon is summer clothing, the sarbal (cloak) is winter clothing," — a passage which explains Mark xiv. 51 f. 134 ISAIAH. CTH (from T]"! = 111, to spread out) are wide mantles, light and loose, for throwing over the shoulders and the body. No mention is made of stockings and pocket-handkerchiefs ; the former were not introduced into Western Asia from Media till long after Isaiah's time, and a lady of Jerusalem needed a pocket-handkerchief as little as one of Greece or Eome. The a-ovSdpca koX a-ifiiK(v6ia mentioned in Acts xix. 1 2 were not used for cleaning the nose. Nor did the veil (burha), now commonly used for muffling the face, except- ing the eyes, form a portion of female dress among the ancient Israelites.^ The prophet mentions together twenty-one articles of personal adornment, a threefold evil seven, especially for the husbands of these State dolls. In the enumeration there is no order observed, — from above downwards, or from ■\\ithout inwards ; there is as little arrangement in it as in the whole array of attire itself. When Jehovah now will take away all this grandeur with which the women of Jerusalem are laden, they will become wretched - looking captives, disfigured by ill - treatment and dirt. Ver. 24 : "And instead of lalmy fragrance there will he a mouldy smell, and instead of a sash a rope, and instead of artistic dressing of hair a baldness, and instead of a wide cloak a frock of sackcloth, branding instead of beauty." Then, in place of the OB'S (ix. the odour arising from the powder of balsam, and aromatic powder in general) there comes mouldi- ness (PP, as in v. 24, the dust of things that have rotted or moulded away) from which a dust may be raised, and the smell of which cannot but be felt; and in place of the ir^i^n (the beautifully embroidered girdle, Prov. xxxi. 24) there shall be nBp3. This word signifies neither a " wound " (as inter- preted by the Targum and Talmud) nor " rags " (the opinion of Knobel in his first edition), — views which find some support in the derivation from ^P3 as meaning to smite through, cut through, — but it denotes the rope (as rightly rendered in ^ Eashi remarks on Shabbath 65a, " The Israelitish women in Arabia go out veiled (niljlj)"!, wearing a veil that muffles the countenance), while those in India go out niailS (with a cloak fastened together above, about the month)." ClIAPTEE III. 24. 135 the LXX. Vulgate, and Syriac) which is thrown over them as prisoners : the word is derived from f\p_:, to turn round, revolve, and is thus the feminine of a masc. flP3 or ^\>}, : it is un- necessary to assume the existence of a verb nap=riip, signifying to twist (as is done by Meier, and by Knobel in his second edition).^ A baldness takes the place of naJipp nbj/a (not "??'J(P, so that the second noun is in apposition, as in the case of two indeterminate notions; see also Ezek. xxii. 18; 1 Chron. xv. 19, etc.; cf. also the remarks on xxx. 20), i.e. not (as the LXX. renders) a golden head -ornament, though nsj'pD in other passages signifies embossed or carved work in metal or wood: by " artificial turned- work" is here meant hair either crisped with the curling-iron, or artificially plaited and set up, which custom compels them to cut off in times of mourning (xv. 2, xxii. 12), or which falls off from them through grief. A pB* n^JTO, i.e. a smock of coarse hair-cloth, comes in place of the ^''^''ria, i.e. dress cloak (from Jna the root of which is ns, to be open, spreading, with the noun- ending il : Targ. 3ria=E''>i3?, pip; by the old interpreters, beginning with the Talmud, the word was misunderstood, as if it were a compound of "'ns and i"?) ; and in place of beauty comes ''3, a branding mark (= *1.3, the cognate form being n»i3^ which occurs in the legal enactment, Ex. xxi. 2 5 ; the word is derived from nj3, Arab. ^^, which is especially used of cauterizing with the i\^, i.e. red-hot iron, as practised by surgeons), which is burnt by the conquerors into their fore- head, though proud and beautiful as Juno's. For ''3 (Arab. ^) is a noun,^ not a particle, as in Jer. ii. 34 ; in correct codices it stands without Maqqeph, and with Tifcha, but nnn with Mercha, and the first letter of this word with Dagesh. f '^ Of cognate origin perliaps is the Arab, nukba (explained in Zamaoli^ari, Mohaddima, Wetstein's edition, p. 62, by the Persian mijdn-hend, a waist- belt), a kind of apron fastened by means of a drawing-string, according to the Turkish Klimt.s.—FL ^ In Arabia the application of the kej by means of a red-hot piece of iron (mihwdh) plays an important part in the medical treatment of man and beast. One sees many people who have been burned, not merely on the legs and arms, but also on the face ; and the most beautiful horses are generally disfigured by the Jcej. 136 ISAIAH. The form of the word is like % % "V, "\, Job xxxvii. 11 ; along with *"!, Simson ha-Nakdan also compares ''3 ia Ezek. xxvii. 32. The inverted arrangement of the words in the last of the five clauses is very effective. In the fivefold exchange, shame and sadness take the place of the haughty- rejoicing of luxury. The prophet now, by a sudden transition, directly addresses the people of Jerusalem ; for the " daughters of Zion " are the daughter Zion in her present degenerate state. The daughter Zion loses her sons ; the daughters of Zion thereby lose their husbands. Ver. 25 : " Thy men will fall hy the sword, and thy heroism in the war." The plural cnp (the singular of which — in Ethiopic, met, " man " in the sense of husband, the Latin maritus — is still found only in the form in», with the union-vowel H, as a constituent part of proper names) is a prose- word in the Pentateuch, especially Deuteronomy ; else- where it is a poetic archaism. ^;np is changed for ^D";'33, " thy heroic power," an abstract expression meaning the inhabitants of the city, in the same way as robur and roiora are also used in Latin (probably in like manner Jer. xlix. 35). What the prophet here predicts for the daughter Zion he sees in ver. 2 6 as fulfilled on her : " Then will her gates lament and mourn ; and she is made desolate, sits down on the earth." The gates where the husbands of the daughter of Zion, now fallen in the war, used at one time to assemble in such numbers, have been deserted, and in this condition one as it were hears them complain and sees them mourn (xiv. 31 ; Jer. xiv. 2 ; Lam. i. 4) ; and the daughter Zion herself is quite vacated, thoroughly emptied, utterly stripped of her former population. In this state of saddest widowhood, or bereavement of her children, brought down from her former exalted position (xlvii. 8) and princely adornment (Jer. xiii. 18), she sits on the ground in the manner shown on Eoman commemorative medals, struck after the destruction of Jerusalem, which represented Judea as a woman utterly crushed and in despair, sitting under a palm-tree before a warrior standing erect, while there is inscribed at the side, Judaea capta (or devicta). The LXX. translates in accord- ance with the general sense, kuI KaraXei^drjari fiovjj Kal et? OHAPTEE IT. 1. 137 TTjv r^riv iBa(j}ia-6^aTj (cf. Luke xix. 14), — only 3BW is not the second, but the third person, as also nni53 is third person perfect Niphal (for firii??). a pausal form, such as is often found also with smaller distinctive accents than Silluk and Athnach (here in connection with Tifcha, as also in v. 9, xxii. 14 ; 1 Kings V. 31 ; Amos iii. 8). The clause ^tpn pN^ follows without any connecting particle, as is pretty frequently the case when one of the two verbs stands in relation to the other as a closer specification which would otherwise be expressed adverbially, as for instance in 1 Chron. xiii. 2, and with inverted arrangement of the words, Jer. iv. 5 ; cf. xii. 6 ; in her depopulated and therefore isolated condition, or her deprivation also of even the most necessary articles of house- hold furniture (cf. xlvii. 1, 5, and the Talmudic \''D2iO '