‏ Isaiah 52

CHAPTER 52

Is 52:1-15. First through Thirteen Verses Connected with Fifty-first Chapter.

Zion long in bondage (Is 51:17-20) is called to put on beautiful garments appropriate to its future prosperity.

1. strength--as thy adornment; answering to "beautiful garments" in the parallel clause. Arouse thyself from dejection and assume confidence.

the holy city--(Ne 11:1; Re 21:2).

no more ... unclean--(Is 35:8; 60:21; Joe 3:17; Re 21:27). A prophecy never yet fulfilled.

uncircumcised--spiritually (Eze 44:9; Ac 7:51).

2. from the dust--the seat of mourners (Job 2:12, 13).

arise, and sit--namely, in a more dignified place: on a divan or a throne [Lowth], after having shaken off the dust gathered up by the flowing dress when seated on the ground; or simply, "Arise, and sit erect" [Maurer].

bands of ... neck--the yoke of thy captivity.

3. As you became your foes' servants, without their paying any price for you (Jr 15:13), so they shall release you without demanding any price or reward (Is 45:13), (where Cyrus is represented as doing so: a type of their final restoration gratuitously in like manner). So the spiritual Israel, "sold under sin," gratuitously (Ro 7:14), shall be redeemed also gratuitously (Is 55:1).

4. My people--Jacob and his sons.

went down--Judea was an elevated country compared with Egypt.

sojourn--They went there to stay only till the famine in Canaan should have ceased.

Assyrian--Sennacherib. Remember how I delivered you from Egypt and the Assyrian; what, then, is to prevent Me from delivering you out of Babylon (and the mystical Babylon and the Antichrist in the last days)?

without cause--answering to "for naught" in Is 52:5; it was an act of gratuitous oppression in the present case, as in that case.

5. what have I here--that is, what am I called on to do? The fact "that My people is taken away (into captivity; Is 49:24, 25) for naught" (by gratuitous oppression, Is 52:4; also Is 52:3, and see on Is 52:3) demands My interposition.

they that rule--or "tyrannize," namely, Babylon, literal and mystical.

make ... to howl--or, raise a cry of exultation over them [Maurer].

blasphemed--namely, in Babylon: God's reason for delivering His people, not their goodness, but for the sake of His holy name (Eze 20:9, 14).

6. shall know in that day--when Christ shall reveal Himself to Israel sensibly; the only means whereby their obstinate unbelief shall be overcome (Psa 102:16; Zec 12:10; 14:5).

7. beautiful ... feet--that is, The advent of such a herald seen on the distant "mountains" (see on Is 40:9; Is 41:27; Is 25:6, 7; So 2:17) running in haste with the long-expected good tidings, is most grateful to the desolated city (Na 1:15).

good tidings--only partially applying to the return from Babylon. Fully, and antitypically, the Gospel (Lu 2:10, 11), "beginning at Jerusalem" (Lu 24:47), "the city of the great King" (Mt 5:35), where Messiah shall, at the final restoration of Israel, "reign" as peculiarly Zion's God ("Thy God reigneth"; compare Psa 2:6).

8. watchmen--set on towers separated by intervals to give the earliest notice of the approach of any messenger with tidings (compare Is 21:6-8). The Hebrew is more forcible than English Version, "The voice of thy watchmen" (exclamatory as in So 2:8). "They lift up their voice! together they sing."

eye to eye--that is, close at hand, and so clearly [Gesenius]; Nu 14:14, "face to face"; Nu 12:8, "mouth to mouth." Compare 1Co 13:12; Re 22:4, of which Simeon's sight of the Saviour was a prefiguration (Lu 2:30). The watchmen, spiritually, are ministers and others who pray for the peace of Jerusalem (Is 62:6, 7),

bring again--that is, restore. Or else, "return to" [Maurer].

9. (Is 14:7, 8; 42:11).

redeemed--spiritually and nationally (Is 48:20).

10. made bare ... arm--metaphor from warriors who bare their arm for battle (Eze 4:7).

all ... earth ... see ... salvation of ... God--The deliverance wrought by God for Israel will cause all nations to acknowledge the Lord (Is 66:18-20). The partial fulfilment (Lu 3:6) is a forerunner of the future complete fulfilment.

11. (Is 48:20; Zec 2:6, 7). Long residence in Babylon made many loath to leave it: so as to mystical Babylon (Re 18:4).

ye ... that bear ... vessels of the Lord--the priests and Levites, whose office it was to carry the vessels of the temple (Jr 27:18). Nebuchadnezzar had carried them to Babylon (2Ch 36:18). Cyrus restored them (Ezr 1:7-11).

be ... clean--by separating yourselves wholly from Babylonian idolaters, mystical and literal.

12. not ... with haste--as when ye left Egypt (Ex 12:33, 39; De 16:3; compare Note, see on Is 28:16). Ye shall have time to cleanse yourselves and make deliberate preparation for departure.

Lord--Jehovah, as your Leader in front (Is 40:3; Ex 23:20; Mi 2:13).

rereward--literally, "gather up," that is, to bring up the rear of your host. The transition is frequent from the glory of Messiah in His advent to reign, to His humiliation in His advent to suffer. Indeed, so are both advents accounted one, that He is not said, in His second coming, to be about to return, but to come.

13. Here the fifty-third chapter ought to begin, and the fifty-second chapter end with Is 52:12. This section, from here to end of the fifty-third chapter settles the controversy with the Jews, if Messiah be the person meant; and with infidels, if written by Isaiah, or at any time before Christ. The correspondence with the life and death of Jesus Christ is so minute, that it could not have resulted from conjecture or accident. An impostor could not have shaped the course of events so as to have made his character and life appear to be a fulfilment of it. The writing is, moreover, declaredly prophetic. The quotations of it in the New Testament show: (1) that it was, before the time of Jesus, a recognized part of the Old Testament; (2) that it refers to Messiah (Mt 8:17; Mr 15:28; Lu 22:37; Joh 12:38; Ac 8:28-35; Ro 10:16; 1Pe 2:21-25). The indirect allusions to it still more clearly prove the Messianic interpretation; so universal was that interpretation, that it is simply referred to in connection with the atoning virtue of His death, without being formally quoted (Mr 9:12; Ro 4:25; 1Co 15:3; 2Co 5:21; 1Pe 1:19; 2:21-25; 1Jo 3:5). The genuineness of the passage is certain; for the Jews would not have forged it, since it is opposed to their notion of Messiah, as a triumphant temporal prince. The Christians could not have forged it; for the Jews, the enemies of Christianity, are "our librarians" [Paley]. The Jews try to evade its force by the figment of two Messiahs, one a suffering Messiah (Ben Joseph), the other a triumphant Messiah (Ben David). Hillel maintained that Messiah has already come in the person of Hezekiah. Buxtorf states that many of the modern Rabbins believe that He has been come a good while, but will not manifest Himself because of the sins of the Jews. But the ancient Jews, as the Chaldee paraphrast, Jonathan, refer it to Messiah; so the Medrasch Tauchuma (a commentary on the Pentateuch); also Rabbi Moses Haddarschan (see Hengstenberg, Christology of the Old Testament). Some explain it of the Jewish people, either in the Babylonish exile, or in their present sufferings and dispersion. Others, the pious portion of the nation taken collectively, whose sufferings made a vicarious satisfaction for the ungodly. Others, Isaiah, or Jeremiah [Gesenius], the prophets collectively. But an individual is plainly described: he suffers voluntarily, innocently, patiently, and as the efficient cause of the righteousness of His people, which holds good of none other but Messiah (Is 53:4-6, 9, 11; contrast Jr 20:7; 15:10-21; Psa 137:8, 9). Is 53:9 can hold good of none other. The objection that the sufferings (Is 53:1-10) referred to are represented as past, the glorification alone as future (Is 52:13-15; 53:11, 12) arises from not seeing that the prophet takes his stand in the midst of the scenes which he describes as future. The greater nearness of the first advent, and the interval between it and the second, are implied by the use of the past tense as to the first, the future as to the second.

Behold--awakening attention to the striking picture of Messiah that follows (compare Joh 19:5, 14).

my servant--Messiah (Is 42:1).

deal prudently--rather, "prosper" [Gesenius] as the parallel clause favors (Is 53:10). Or, uniting both meanings, "shall reign well" [Hengstenberg]. This verse sets forth in the beginning the ultimate issue of His sufferings, the description of which follows: the conclusion (Is 53:12) corresponds; the section (Is 52:13; 53:12) begins as it ends with His final glory.

extolled--elevated (Mr 16:19; Ep 1:20-22; 1Pe 3:22).

14-15. Summary of Messiah's history, which is set forth more in detail in the fifty-third chapter. "Just as many were astonished (accompanied with aversion, Jr 18:16; 19:8), &c.; his visage, &c.; so shall He sprinkle," &c.; Israel in this answers to its antitype Messiah, now "an astonishment and byword" (De 28:37), hereafter about to be a blessing and means of salvation to many nations (Is 2:2, 3; Mi 5:7).

thee; his--Such changes of persons are common in Hebrew poetry.

marred--Hebrew, "disfigurement"; abstract for concrete; not only disfigured, but disfigurement itself.

more than man--Castalio translates, "so that it was no longer that of a man" (compare Psa 22:6). The more perfect we may suppose the "body prepared" (He 10:5) for Him by God, the sadder by contrast was the "marring" of His visage and form.