Isa 10:16-17 | KD | STEP | There follows in the next v. the punishment provoked by such self-deification (cf., ). “Therefore will the Lord, the Lord of hosts, send consumption against his fat men; and under Asshur’s glory there burns a brand like a firebrand.” Three epithets are here employed to designate God according to His unlimited, all-controlling omnipotence: viz., hâ'âdōn , which is always used by Isaiah in connection with judicial and penal manifestations of power; and adonâi zebâoth , a combination never met with again, similar to the one used in the Elohistic Psalms, Elohim zebaoth (compare, on the other hand, ; ). Even here a large number of codices and editions (Norzi’s, for example) have the reading Jehovah Zebaoth , which is customary in other cases. Râzōn ( ) is one of the diseases mentioned in the catalogue of curses in and Deu 28:22. Galloping consumption comes like a destroying angel upon the great masses of flesh seen in the well-fed Assyrian magnates: mishmannim is used in a personal sense, as in Psa 78:31. And under the glory of Asshur, i.e., its richly equipped army ( câbōd as in ), He who makes His angels flames of fire places fire so as to cause it to pass away in flames. In accordance with Isaiah’s masterly art of painting in tones, the whole passage is so expressed, that we can hear the crackling, and spluttering, and hissing of the fire, as it seizes upon everything within its reach. This fire, whatever it may be so far as its natural and phenomenal character is concerned, is in its true essence the wrath of Jehovah.

‏ Isaiah 10:16-17

There follows in the next v. the punishment provoked by such self-deification (cf., Hab 1:11). “Therefore will the Lord, the Lord of hosts, send consumption against his fat men; and under Asshur’s glory there burns a brand like a firebrand.” Three epithets are here employed to designate God according to His unlimited, all-controlling omnipotence: viz., hâ'âdōn, which is always used by Isaiah in connection with judicial and penal manifestations of power; and adonâi zebâoth, a combination never met with again, similar to the one used in the Elohistic Psalms, Elohim zebaoth (compare, on the other hand, Isa 3:15; Isa 10:23-24). Even here a large number of codices and editions (Norzi’s, for example) have the reading Jehovah Zebaoth, which is customary in other cases. ^{▼▼This passage is not included in the 134 vaddâ'ı̄n (i.e., “real”) adonai, or passages in which adonai is written, and not merely to be read, that are enumerated by the Masora (see Bär’s Psalterium, p. 133).}Râzōn (Isa 17:4) is one of the diseases mentioned in the catalogue of curses in Lev 26:16 and Deu 28:22. Galloping consumption comes like a destroying angel upon the great masses of flesh seen in the well-fed Assyrian magnates: mishmannim is used in a personal sense, as in Psa 78:31. And under the glory of Asshur, i.e., its richly equipped army (câbōd as in Isa 8:7), He who makes His angels flames of fire places fire so as to cause it to pass away in flames. In accordance with Isaiah’s masterly art of painting in tones, the whole passage is so expressed, that we can hear the crackling, and spluttering, and hissing of the fire, as it seizes upon everything within its reach. This fire, whatever it may be so far as its natural and phenomenal character is concerned, is in its true essence the wrath of Jehovah. Isa 10:17 “And the light of Israel becomes a fire, and His Holy One a flame; and it sets on fire and devours its thistles and thorns on one day.” God is fire (Deu 9:3), and light (1Jo 1:5); and in His own self-life the former is resolved into the latter. Kâdōsh (holy) is here parallel to 'ōr (light); for the fact that God is holy, and the fact that He is pure light, are essentially one and the same thing, whether kâdash meant originally to be pure or to be separate. The nature of all creatures, and of the whole cosmos, is a mixture of light and darkness. The nature of God alone is absolute light. But light is love. In this holy light of love He has given Himself up to Israel, and taken Israel to Himself. But He has also within Him a basis of fire, which sin excites against itself, and which was about to burst forth as a flaming fire of wrath against Asshur, on account of its sins against Him and His people. Before this fire of wrath, this destructive might of His penal righteousness, the splendid forces of Asshur were nothing but a mass of thistles and a bed of thorns (written here in the reverse order peculiar to Isaiah, shâmı̄r vâshaith), equally inflammable, and equally deserving to be burned. To all appearance, it was a forest and a park, but is was irrecoverably lost.