It is quite enough to simply make us forget. We can forget because of sleepiness, we can forget because of a lack of attention, we can forget because we are distracted. Woe to the multitude of many people Who make a noise like the roar of the seas, And to the rushing of nations That make a rushing like the rushing of mighty waters!
The nations will rush like the rushing of many waters. The nations will rush like the rushing of many waters : God will use other nations to bring judgment against Syria and Israel. But God will rebuke them and they will flee far away, And be chased like the chaff of the mountains before the wind, Like a rolling thing before the whirlwind. Then behold, at eventide, trouble! And before the morning, he is no more.
This is the portion of those who plunder us, And the lot of those who rob us. Instead, God will rebuke them and they will flee far away.
God can use one sinner to judge another, and then judge the sinner He just used. This is the portion of those who plunder us : This is a comforting principle: Even in the midst of judgment, God shows mercy.
As bad as it was going to be for Israel, it could have been worse. Instead, God would allow it for a time, then He would rebuke those attacking Israel. Israel was not at the mercy of circumstances or their enemies; they were at the mercy of God. Our website uses cookies to store user preferences. By proceeding, you consent to our cookie usage. Please see our Privacy Policy for cookie usage details.
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Recently Popular Media x. Matthew Henry :: Commentary on Isaiah Chapter 17 Syria and Ephriam were confederate against Judah ch. The destruction of the strong cities both of Syria and Israel is here foretold v. In the midst of judgment mercy is remembered to Israel, and a gracious promise made that a remnant should be preserved from the calamities and should get good by them v. The overthrow of the Assyrian army before Jerusalem is pointed at v. Isa We have here the burden of Damascus; the Chaldee paraphrase reads it, The burden of the cup of the curse to drink to Damascus in; and, the ten tribes being in alliance, they must expect to pledge Damascus in this cup of trembling that is to go round.
Damascus itself, the head city of Syria, must be destroyed; the houses, it is likely, will be burnt, as least the walls, and gates, and fortifications demolished, and the inhabitants carried away captive, so that for the present it is taken away from being a city, and is reduced not only to a village, but to a ruinous heap, v.
Such desolating work as this does sin make with cities. The country towns are abandoned by their inhabitants, frightened or forced away by the invaders: The cities of Aroer a province of Syria so called are forsaken v.
Stately houses are converted into sheep-cotes. It is strange that great conquerors should pride themselves in being common enemies to mankind. But, how unrighteous soever they are, God is righteous in causing those cities to spue out their inhabitants, who by their wickedness had made themselves vile; it is better that flocks should lie down there than that they should harbour such as are in open rebellion against God and virtue. The strongholds of Israel, the kingdom of the ten tribes, will be brought to ruin: The fortress shall cease from Ephraim v.
They had joined with Syria in invading Judah very unnaturally; and now those that had been partakers in sin should be made partakers in ruin, and justly. When the fortress shall cease from Ephraim, by which Israel will be weakened, the kingdom will cease from Damascus, by which Syria will be ruined. The Syrians were the ring-leaders in that confederacy against Judah, and therefore they are punished first and sorest; and, because they boasted of their alliance with Israel, now that Israel is weakened they are upbraided with those boasts: "The remnant of Syria shall be as the glory of the children of Israel; those few that remain of the Syrians shall be in as mean and despicable a condition as the children of Israel are, and the glory of Israel shall be no relief or reputation to them.
See here what the glory of Jacob is when God contends with him, and what little reason Syria will have to be proud of resembling the glory of Jacob.
It is wasted like a man in a consumption, v. The glory of Jacob was their numbers, that they were as the sand of the sea for multitude; but this glory shall be made thin, when many are cut off, and few left. Then the fatness of their flesh, which was their pride and security, shall was lean, and the body of the people shall become a perfect skeleton, nothing but skin and bones. Israel died of a lingering disease; the kingdom of the ten tribes wasted gradually; God was to them as a moth, Hos.
Such is all the glory of this world: it soon withers, and is made thin; but thee is a far more exceeding and external weight of glory designed for the spiritual seed of Jacob, which is not subject to any such decay-fatness of God's house, which will not wax lean.
It is all gathered and carried away by the Assyrian army, as the corn is carried out of the field by the husbandmen, v. The corn is the glory of the fields Ps.
The people had by their sins made themselves ripe for ruin, and their glory was as quickly, as easily, as justly, and as irresistibly, cut down and taken away, as the corn is out of the field by the husbandman. God's judgments are compared to the thrusting in of the sickle when the harvest is ripe, Rev. And the victorious army, like the careful husbandmen in the valley of Rephaim, where the corn was extraordinary, would not, if they could help it, leave an ear behind, would lose nothing that they could lay their hands on.
Isa Mercy is here reserved, in a parenthesis, in the midst of judgment, for a remnant that should escape the common ruin of the kingdom of the ten tribes. They shall be but a small remnant, a very few, who shall be marked for preservation v. The body of the people were carried into captivity, but here and there one was left behind, perhaps one of two in a bed when the other was taken, Lu.
The most desolating judgments in this world are short of the last judgment, which shall be universal and which none shall escape. In times of the greatest calamity some are kept safe, as in times of the greatest degeneracy some are kept pure.
But the fewness of those that escape supposes the captivity of the far greatest part; those that are left are but like the poor remains of an olive tree when it has been carefully shaken by the owner; if there be two or three berries in the top of the uppermost bough out of the reach of those that shook it , that is all. Such is the remnant according to the election of grace, very few in comparison with the multitudes that walk on in the broad way. They shall be a sanctified remnant, v.
These few that are preserved are such as, in the prospect of the judgment approaching, had repented of their sins and reformed their lives, and therefore were snatched thus as brands out of the burning, or such as having escaped, and becoming refugees in strange countries, were awakened, partly by a sense of the distinguishing mercy of their deliverance, and partly by the distresses they were still in, to return to God.
They shall look up to their Creator, shall enquire, Where is God my Maker, who giveth songs in the night, in such a night of affliction as this? Job , They shall acknowledge his hand in all the events concerning them, merciful and afflictive, and shall submit to his hand. They shall give him the glory due to his name, and be suitably affected with his providences.
They shall expect relief and succour from him and depend upon him to help them. Their eyes shall have respect to him, as the eyes of a servant to the hand of his master, Ps. Observe, It is our duty at all times to have respect to God, to have our eyes ever towards him, both as our Maker the author of our being and the God of nature and as the Holy One of Israel, a God in covenant with us and the God of grace; particularly, when we are in affliction, our eyes must be towards the Lord, to pluck our feet out of the net Ps.
They shall look off from their idols, the creatures of their own fancy, shall no longer worship them, and seek to them, and expect relief from them. For God will be alone regarded, or he does not look upon himself as at all regarded. He that looks to his Maker must not look to the altars, the work of his hands, but disown them and cast them off, must not retain the least respect for that which his fingers have made, but break it to pieces, though it be his own workmanship- the groves and the images; the word signifies images made in honour of the sun and by which he was worshipped, the most ancient and most plausible idolatry, Deu.
We have reason to account those happy afflictions which part between us and our sins, and by sensible convictions of the vanity of the world, that great idol, cool our affections to it and lower our expectations from it. Isa Here the prophet returns to foretel the woeful desolations that should be made in the land of Israel by the army of the Assyrians. That the cities should be deserted.
Even the strong cities, which should have protected the country, shall not be able to protect themselves: They shall be as a forsaken bough and an uppermost branch of an old tree, which has gone to decay, is forsaken of its leaves, and appears on the top of the tree, bare, and dry, and dead; so shall their strong cities look when the inhabitants have deserted them and the victorious army of the enemy pillaged and defaced them, v.
They shall be as the cities so it may be supplied which the Canaanites left, the old inhabitants of the land, because of the children of Israel, when God brought them in with a high hand, to take possession of that good land, cities which they built not.
The glory of Jacob was their numbers, that they were as the sand of the sea for multitude; but this glory shall be made thin, when many are cut off, and few left.
Then the fatness of their flesh, which was their pride and security, shall was lean, and the body of the people shall become a perfect skeleton, nothing but skin and bones.
Israel died of a lingering disease; the kingdom of the ten tribes wasted gradually; God was to them as a moth, Hos. It is all gathered and carried away by the Assyrian army, as the corn is carried out of the field by the husbandmen, v. The corn is the glory of the fields Ps. The people had by their sins made themselves ripe for ruin, and their glory was as quickly, as easily, as justly, and as irresistibly, cut down and taken away, as the corn is out of the field by the husbandman.
God's judgments are compared to the thrusting in of the sickle when the harvest is ripe, Rev. And the victorious army, like the careful husbandmen in the valley of Rephaim, where the corn was extraordinary, would not, if they could help it, leave an ear behind, would lose nothing that they could lay their hands on. Verses Mercy is here reserved, in a parenthesis, in the midst of judgment, for a remnant that should escape the common ruin of the kingdom of the ten tribes.
Though the Assyrians took all the care they could that none should slip out of their net, yet the meek of the earth were hidden in the day of the Lord's anger, and had their lives given them for a prey and made comfortable to them by their retirement to the land of Judah, where they had the liberty of God's courts.
They shall be but a small remnant, a very few, who shall be marked for preservation v. The body of the people were carried into captivity, but here and there one was left behind, perhaps one of two in a bed when the other was taken, Lu. The most desolating judgments in this world are short of the last judgment, which shall be universal and which none shall escape. In times of the greatest calamity some are kept safe, as in times of the greatest degeneracy some are kept pure.
But the fewness of those that escape supposes the captivity of the far greatest part; those that are left are but like the poor remains of an olive tree when it has been carefully shaken by the owner; if there be two or three berries in the top of the uppermost bough out of the reach of those that shook it , that is all. Such is the remnant according to the election of grace, very few in comparison with the multitudes that walk on in the broad way.
They shall be a sanctified remnant, v. These few that are preserved are such as, in the prospect of the judgment approaching, had repented of their sins and reformed their lives, and therefore were snatched thus as brands out of the burning, or such as having escaped, and becoming refugees in strange countries, were awakened, partly by a sense of the distinguishing mercy of their deliverance, and partly by the distresses they were still in, to return to God.
They shall look up to their Creator, shall enquire, Where is God my Maker, who giveth songs in the night, in such a night of affliction as this? Job , They shall acknowledge his hand in all the events concerning them, merciful and afflictive, and shall submit to his hand. They shall give him the glory due to his name, and be suitably affected with his providences. They shall expect relief and succour from him and depend upon him to help them.
Their eyes shall have respect to him, as the eyes of a servant to the hand of his master, Ps. Observe, It is our duty at all times to have respect to God, to have our eyes ever towards him, both as our Maker the author of our being and the God of nature and as the Holy One of Israel, a God in covenant with us and the God of grace; particularly, when we are in affliction, our eyes must be towards the Lord, to pluck our feet out of the net Ps.
They shall look off from their idols, the creatures of their own fancy, shall no longer worship them, and seek to them, and expect relief from them.
For God will be alone regarded, or he does not look upon himself as at all regarded. We have reason to account those happy afflictions which part between us and our sins, and by sensible convictions of the vanity of the world, that great idol, cool our affections to it and lower our expectations from it. Verses Here the prophet returns to foretel the woeful desolations that should be made in the land of Israel by the army of the Assyrians.
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