Isa 41:1-3 | KD | STEP | Summons to the contest: “Be silent to me, ye islands; and let the nations procure fresh strength: let them come near, then speak; we will enter into contest together.” The words are addressed to the whole of the heathen world, and first of all to the inhabitants of the western islands and coasts. This was the expression commonly employed in the Old Testament to designate the continent of Europe, the solid ground of which is so deeply cut, and so broken up, by seas and lakes, that it looks as if it were about to resolve itself into nothing but islands and peninsulas. על החרישׁ is a pregnant expression for turning in silence towards a person; just as in it is used with min , in the sense of forsaking a person in silence. That they may have no excuse if they are defeated, they are to put on fresh strength; just as in believers are spoken of as drawing fresh strength out of Jehovah’s fulness. They are to draw near, then speak, i.e., to reply after hearing the evidence, for Jehovah desires to go through all the forms of a legal process with them in pro et contra . The mishpât is thought of here in a local sense, as a forum or tribunal. But if Jehovah is one party to the cause, who is the judge to pronounce the decision? The answer to this question is the same as at Isa 5:3. “The nations,” says Rosenmüller, “are called to judgment, not to the tribunal of God, but to that of reason.” The deciding authority is reason, which cannot fail to recognise the facts, and the consequences to be deduced from them.

‏ Isaiah 41:1-3

Summons to the contest: “Be silent to me, ye islands; and let the nations procure fresh strength: let them come near, then speak; we will enter into contest together.” The words are addressed to the whole of the heathen world, and first of all to the inhabitants of the western islands and coasts. This was the expression commonly employed in the Old Testament to designate the continent of Europe, the solid ground of which is so deeply cut, and so broken up, by seas and lakes, that it looks as if it were about to resolve itself into nothing but islands and peninsulas. על החרישׁ is a pregnant expression for turning in silence towards a person; just as in Job 13:13 it is used with min, in the sense of forsaking a person in silence. That they may have no excuse if they are defeated, they are to put on fresh strength; just as in Isa 40:31 believers are spoken of as drawing fresh strength out of Jehovah’s fulness. They are to draw near, then speak, i.e., to reply after hearing the evidence, for Jehovah desires to go through all the forms of a legal process with them in pro et contra. The mishpât is thought of here in a local sense, as a forum or tribunal. But if Jehovah is one party to the cause, who is the judge to pronounce the decision? The answer to this question is the same as at Isa 5:3. “The nations,” says Rosenmüller, “are called to judgment, not to the tribunal of God, but to that of reason.” The deciding authority is reason, which cannot fail to recognise the facts, and the consequences to be deduced from them. Isa 41:2

The parties invited are now to be thought of as present, and Jehovah commences in Isa 41:2 : “Who hath raised up the man from the rising of the sun, whom justice meets at his foot, He giveth up nations before him, and kings He subdues, giveth men like the dust to his sword, and like driven stubble to his bow?” The sentence governed by “who” (mı̄) ends at leraglō (at his foot); at the same time, all that follows is spoken with the echo of the interrogative accent. The person raised up is Cyrus, who is afterwards mentioned by name. The coming one (if, that is to say, we adhere to the belief in Isaiah’s authorship of these addresses) first approaches gradually within the horizon of the prophet’s ideal present; and it is only little by little that the prophet becomes more intimately acquainted with a phenomenon which belongs to so distant a future, and has been brought so close to his own eyes. Jehovah has raised up the new great hero “from the east” (mimmizrâch), and, according to Isa 41:25, “from the north” also. Both of these were fulfilled; for Cyrus was a Persian belonging to the clan of Achaemenes (Hakhâmanis), which stood at the head of the tribe, or of the Pasargadae. He was the son of Cambyses; and even if the Median princess Mandane were not his mother, yet, according to nearly all the ancient accounts, he was connected with the royal house of Media; at any rate, after Astyages was dethroned, he became head and chief of the Medes as well as of the Persians (hence the name of “Mule” which was give to him by the oracle, and that given by Jerome, “agitator bigae”). Now Media was to the north of Babylonia, and Persia to the east; so that his victorious march, in which, even before the conquest of Babylon, he subjugated all the lands from the heights of Hinduku to the shores of the Aegean Sea, had for its starting-point both the east and north. ^{▼▼See Pahl'es Geschichte des Oriental. Alterthums. (1864), p. 170ff.}

The clause לרגלו יקראהוּ צדק is an attributive clause, and as such a virtual object: “him whom (supply עת־אשׁר) justice comes to meet (קרא) = קרה, Ges. §75, vi.) on his track” (cf., Gen 30:30; Job 18:11; Hab 3:5). The idea of tsedeq is determined by what follows: Jehovah gives up nations before him, and causes kings to be trodden down (causative of râdâh). Accordingly, tsedeq is either to be understood here in an attributive sense, as denoting the justice exercised by a person (viz., the justice executed successfully by Cyrus, as the instrument of Jehovah, by the force of arms); or objectively of the justice awarded to a person (to which the idea of “meeting” is more appropriate), viz., the favourable result, the victory which procures justice for the just cause of the combatant. Rosenmüller, Knobel, and others, are wrong in maintaining that tsedeq (tsedâqâh) in chapters 40-66 signifies primarily justice, and the prosperity and salvation as its reward. The word means straightness, justice, righteousness, and nothing more (from tsâdaq, to be hard, firm, extended, straight, e.g., rumh-un-tsadq, a hard, firm, and straight lance); but it has a double aspect, because justice consists, according to circumstances, of either wrath of favour, and therefore has sometimes the idea of the strict execution of justice, as in this instance, sometimes of a manifestation of justice in fidelity to promises, as in Isa 41:10. יתּן is repeated here in Isa 41:2 (just like וילמדהו in Isa 40:14) with the same subject, but in a different sense. To make sword and bow the subject, in the sense of “his sword gives (sc., 'the foe'),” is a doubtful thing in itself; and as cherebh and qesheth are feminines, it is by no means advisable. Moreover, in other instances, the comparative כ leaves it to the reader to carry out the figure indicated according to his own fancy. And this is the case here: He (Jehovah) makes his sword as if there were dust, his bow as if there were hunted stubble (Böttcher), i.e., pounding the enemy like dust, and hunting it like flying stubble. Our text has כּעפר, but in certain codices we find כּעפר with tzere; and this reading, which is contrary to rule, has in its favour the express testimony of Moses the punctuator. ^{▼▼In his הנקוד דרכי (rules of pointing), with which the Masora finalis is surrounded.} Isa 41:3

The conqueror is now still further described in futures, which might be defined by העיר, and so express a simultaneous past (synchronistic imperfects), but which it is safer to take as standing traits in the picture drawn of the conqueror referred to. “He pursueth them and marcheth in peace by a course which he never trod with his feet.” He marches victoriously further and further, shâlōm,” i.e., “in safety” (or, as an adjective, safely; Job 21:9), without any one being able to do him harm, by a course (accus. Ges. §138, 1) which he has not been accustomed to tread with his feet (ingredi).