Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Isaiah 1:15
And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood.
15. your hands (“spread forth” in the attitude of prayer) are full of blood ] a symbol of cruel wrongs perpetrated or tolerated, including the guilt of actual murder ( Isa 1:21).
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Ye spread forth your hands – This is an expression denoting the act of supplication. When we ask for help, we naturally stretch out our hands, as if to receive it. The expression therefore is equivalent to when ye pray, or implore mercy. Compare Exo 9:29; Exo 17:11-12; 1Ki 8:22.
I will hide mine eyes … – That is, I will not attend to, or regard your supplications. The Chaldee Paraphrase is, When your priests expand their hands to pray for you.
Your hands … – This is given as a reason why he would not hear. The expression full of blood, denotes crime and guilt of a high order – as, in murder, the hands would be dripping in blood, and as the stain on the hands would be proof of guilt. It is probably a figurative expression, not meaning literally that they were murderers, but that they were given to rapine and injustice; to the oppression of the poor, the widow, etc. The sentiment is, that because they indulged in sin, and came, even in their prayers, with a determination still to indulge it, God would not hear them. The same sentiment is elsewhere expressed; Psa 66:18 : If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me; Pro 28:9 : He that turneth away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer shall be abomination; Jer 16:10-12; Zec 7:11-12; Pro 1:28-29. This is the reason why the prayers of sinners are not heard – But the truth is abundantly taught in the Scriptures, that if sinners will forsake their sins, the greatness of their iniquity is no obstacle to forgiveness; Isa 1:18; Mat 11:28; Luk 16:11-24.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 15. When ye spread] The Syriac, Septuagint, and a MS., read beparshecem, without the conjunction vau.
Your hands – “For your hands”] – Sept. Manus enim vestrae – Vulg. They seem to have read ki yedeychem.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
When ye spread forth your hands; when you pray with hands spread abroad, as the manner was; of which see Exo 9:29,33; Job 11:13, &c.
I will hide mine eyes from you; which is a gesture of contempt and loathing. I will take no notice of your persons or requests.
Your hands are full of blood; you are guilty of murder, and oppression, and other crying sins, which I abhor, and have forbidden, under pain of mine highest displeasure.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
15. (Psa 66:18;Pro 28:9; Lam 3:43;Lam 3:44).
spread . . . handsinprayer (1Ki 8:22). Hebrew,“bloods,” for all heinous sins, persecution of God’sservants especially (Mt 23:35).It was the vocation of the prophets to dispel the delusion, socontrary to the law itself (De10:16), that outward ritualism would satisfy God.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And when ye spread forth your hands,…. That is, in prayer, this being a prayer gesture: hence the Targum paraphrases it,
“and when the priests spread out their hands to pray for you.”
I will hide mine eyes from you; will not look upon them, nor regard their prayer; see La 3:42
yea, when ye make many prayers; as the Scribes and Pharisees did in Christ’s time, and thought to be heard for their much speaking, like the Gentiles, Mt 6:7
I will not hear; so as to give an answer, or fulfil their requests: the reason follows,
your hands are full of blood; of the prophets of the Lord, of Christ and his followers, whom they put to death.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Their self-righteousness, so far as it rested upon sacrifices and festal observances, was now put to shame, and the last inward bulwark of the sham holy nation was destroyed: “And if ye stretch out your hands, I hide my eyes from you; if ye make ever so much praying, I do not hear: your hands are full of blood.” Their praying was also an abomination to God. Prayer is something common to man: it is the interpreter of religious feeling, which intervenes and mediates between God and man;
(Note: The primary idea of hithpallel and tephillah is not to be obtained from Deu 9:18 and Ezr 10:1, as Dietrich and Frst suppose, who make hithpallel equivalent to hithnappel , to throw one’s self down; but from 1Sa 2:25, “If a man sin against a man, the authorities right him” ( : it is quite a mistake to maintain that Elohim cannot have this meaning), i.e., they can set right the relation which he has disturbed. “But if one sin against Jehovah, who shall mediate for him ( , quis intercedat pro eo )?” We may see from this that prayer is regarded as mediation, which sets right and establishes fellowship; and hithpallel signifies to make one’s self a healer of divisions, or to settle for one’s self, to strive after a settlement ( sibi , pro se , intercedere : cf., Job 19:16, hithchannen , sibi propitium facere ; Job 13:27, hithchakkah , sibi insculpere , like the Arabic ichtatta , to bound off for one’s self).)
it is the true spiritual sacrifice. The law contains no command to pray, and, with the exception of Deut 26, no form of prayer. Praying is so natural to man as man, that there was no necessity for any precept to enforce this, the fundamental expression of the true relation to God. The prophet therefore comes to prayer last of all, so as to trace back their sham-holiness, which was corrupt even to this the last foundation, to its real nothingness. “Spread out,” parash , or pi peresh , to stretch out; used with Cappaim to denote swimming in Isa 25:11. It is written here before a strong suffix, as in many other passages, e.g., Isa 52:12, with the inflection i instead of e. This was the gesture of a man in prayer, who spread out his hands, and when spread out, stretched them towards heaven, or to the most holy place in the temple, and indeed (as if with the feeling of emptiness and need, and with a desire to receive divine gifts) held up the hollow or palm of his hand ( Cappaim : cf., tendere palmas , e.g., Virg. Aen. xii. 196, tenditque ad sidera palmas ). However much they might stand or lie before Him in the attitude of prayer, Jehovah hid His eyes, i.e., His omniscience knew nothing of it; and even though they might pray loud and long ( gam chi , etiamsi : compare the simple Chi , Jer 14:12), He was, as it were, deaf to it all. We should expect Chi here to introduce the explanation; but the more excited the speaker, the shorter and more unconnected his words. The plural damim always denotes human blood as the result of some unnatural act, and then the bloody deed and the bloodguiltiness itself. The plural number neither refers to the quantity nor to the separate drops, but is the plural of production, which Dietrich has so elaborately discussed in his Abhandlung, p. 40.
(Note: As Chittah signified corn standing in the field, and Chittim corn threshed and brought to the market, so damim was not blood when flowing through the veins, but when it had flowed out-in other words, when it had been violently shed. (For the Talmudic misinterpretation of the true state of the case, see my Genesis, p. 626.))
The terrible damim stands very emphatically before the governing verb, pointing to many murderous acts that had been committed, and deeds of violence akin to murder. Not, indeed, that we are to understand the words as meaning that there was really blood upon their hands when they stretched them out in prayer; but before God, from whom no outward show can hide the true nature of things, however clean they might have washed themselves, they still dripped with blood. The expostulations of the people against the divine accusations have thus been negatively set forth and met in Isa 1:11-15: Jehovah could not endure their work-righteous worship, which was thus defiled with unrighteous works, even to murder itself. The divine accusation is now positively established in Isa 1:16, Isa 1:17, by the contrast drawn between the true righteousness of which the accused were destitute, and the false righteousness of which they boasted. The crushing charge is here changed into an admonitory appeal; and the love which is hidden behind the wrath, and would gladly break through, already begins to disclose itself. There are eight admonitions. The first three point to the removal of evil; the other five to the performance of what is good.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
15. When ye spread forth your hands The ancient custom of spreading forth the hands in prayer did not arise from superstition; nor did that practice, like many others, obtain currency through foolish and idle ambition; but because nature herself prompts men to declare, even by outward signs, that they betake themselves to God. Accordingly, since they cannot fly to him, they raise themselves by this sign. No injunction, certainly, respecting this sign, was given to the fathers; but they used it as men divinely inspired; and by this very sign all idolaters are convicted of gross blindness; for, while they declare by an outward attitude that they betake themselves to God, in reality they betake themselves to idols. In order to convict them more strongly, the Lord permitted the uninterrupted use of this custom to continue among them. The Prophet, therefore, does not condemn the spreading forth of the hands, but their hypocrisy; because they assumed the appearance of men who called on God, while in their heart they were wholly averse to him, as he elsewhere declares more fully that
“
this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honors me, but have removed their heart far from me” (Isa 29:13.)
The Lord saith that he is nigh, but it is to those who call upon him in truth. (Psa 145:18.)
Where hypocrisy is, there can be no true calling on God. And yet this passage does not contradict what is said elsewhere, “When they shall spread forth their hands, I will hear.” (23) For in that passage the Lord speaks of that calling which proceeds from confidence in him. Faith is the mother of calling on God; and if that be absent, nothing is left but empty mockery.
Yea, when ye make many prayers He amplifies the former statement by threatening that he will be deaf to their cries, to whatever extent they may multiply prayers; as if he had said, “Though you be constant in prayer, that diligence will be of no avail to you.” For this also is a fault which belongs to hypocrites, that the more their prayers abound in words, they think that they are more holy, and will more easily obtain what they wish. Thus their idle talkativeness is indirectly rebuked.
Your hands are full of blood Here he begins to explain more fully the reason why he disapproves, and even disdainfully rejects, both their prayers and their sacrifices. It is because they are cruel and bloody, and stained with crimes of every sort, though they come into his presence with hypocritical display. Though he will afterwards add other kinds of crime, yet as he had mentioned the spreading forth of the hands, so he speaks of the hands, and says that in them they carry and hold out a testimony of their crimes, so that they need not wonder that he thrusts them back so harshly. For, on the other hand, the phrase, to lift up clean hands, was employed not only by prophets and apostles, (1Ti 2:8,) but even by profane authors, who were driven by mere instinct to reprove the stupidity of men; if it were not that God perhaps forced them to make this confession, in order that true religion might never be without some kind of attestation.
And yet the Prophet does not mean that they were robbers or murderers, but reproves the tricks and deceit by which they obtained possession of the property of others. God judges in a different manner from men; for the hidden tricks and wicked arts, by which wicked men are accustomed to deceive and take advantage of the more simple, are not taken into account by men; or if they are taken into account, they are at least extenuated, and are not estimated according to their just weight. But God, dragging forth to light those very men of dazzling reputation, who under specious pretenses had been in the habit of concealing their unjust practices, plainly declares that they are murderers. For in whatever way you kill a man, whether you cut his throat or take away his food and the necessaries of life, you are a murderer. Consequently, God does not speak of men who are openly wicked, or whose crimes have made them openly infamous, but of those who wished to be thought good men, and who kept up some kind of reputation.
This circumstance ought to be carefully observed; for on the same grounds must we now deal with wicked men, who oppress the poor and feeble by fraud and violence, or some kind of injustice, and yet cloak their wickedness by plausible disguise. But with whatever impudence they may exclaim that they do not resemble thieves or assassins we must reprove them with the same severity which the Prophet employed towards persons of the same stamp; for when we speak in the name of God, we must not judge according to the views and opinions of men, but must boldly declare the judgment which the Lord hath pronounced.
(23) Our Author seems to allude to Isa 65:24, It shall come to pass that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear. This conjecture is confirmed by the remarks which immediately follow on the word call, as the leading word in the passage. It appears to have escaped his recollection, that in this instance the spreading forth of the hands is not mentioned, though it occurs in an analogous passage of Solomon’s prayer at the dedication of the temple — What prayer or what supplication soever shall be made of any man, when he shall spread forth his hands in this house; then hear thou from heaven thy dwelling-place. 2Ch 6:29. — Ed.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
WORTHLESS HUSKS
Isa. 1:15. And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you; yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear.
The Jews had been likened unto the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah (Isa. 1:10). As such, they are summoned to listen to a series of declarations of which this is the sum, that worship without holiness is a solemn mockery. Confining ourselves to our text only, we may see that it teaches us
I. The worthlessness of ritualism without spontaneity. When ye spread forth your hands, &c.
1. Ritualism is an essential element of public worship. There must be some form by which thought can be expressed, and the devotions of others guided. There may be too little, or too much, but some is indispensable [285]
2. Ritualism may be the expression of earnest spiritual life, and a help thereto. It may be the outcome of sincere feeling and deep pietysuch was the ritual which David and his devout companions devised and elaborated for the service of the Temple. It was costly and magnificent beyond even that which is observed in St. Peters at Rome; but as practised by them it was as spiritual as the baldest service that has ever been conducted in the barest conventicle. A splendid ritual may be acceptable to the Most High, and the followers of George Fox must not imagine that they are the only persons who worship God in spirit and in truth.
3. But ritualism may be, and often is, only a form. It may mean only an exhibition of millinery, a scrupulous observance of a prescribed series of postures and genuflexions. It may be, according to a too suggestive phrase, merely a service performed. In this case God passes it by with contempt. To all engaged in such histrionic performances He says, When ye spread forth your hands, &c. Supplication without desire will never draw down the Divine benediction.
[285] The external part of religion is, doubtless, of little value in comparison with the internal; and so is the cask in comparison with the wine contained in it: but if the cask be staved, the wine must perish. If there were no Sundays or holydays, no ministers, no churches or religious assemblies, no prayers or sacraments, no Scriptures read, or sermons preached, how long would there be any religion left in the world: and who would desire to live in a world where there was none?Horne, 17301792.
Forms are necessary to religion as the means of its manifestation. As the invisible God manifests His natureHis power, wisdom, and goodness, in visible material forms, in the bright orbs of heaven, in the everlasting hills, in the broad earth with its fruits and flowers, and in all the living things which He has made,so the invisible soul of man reveals its convictions and feelings in the outward acts which it performs. As there could be no knowledge of God without the visible forms in which He reveals Himself, so there could be no knowledge of the religion which exists in the soul of man without the outward forms in which it expresses itself. A form is the flag, the banner, the symbol of an inward life; it is to a religious belief what the body is to the soul; as the soul would be utterly unknown without the body, so religion would be unknown without its forms, a light hidden under a bushel, and not set up in a candlestick that it may give light to all that are in the house.
Forms are necessary not only to the manifestation of religion, but to its nourishment and continued existence. A religion which expressed itself in no outward word or act would soon die out of the soul altogether. The attempt to embody truth and feeling, to express it in words and actions, is necessary to give it the character of living principle in the soul: in this respect forms are like the healthy exercise which at once expresses and increases the vigorous life of the body, or they may be compared to the leaves of a tree, which not only proceed from its inward life, but catch the vitalising influences of the light, the rain and the atmosphere, and convey them down to the root.
What, then, is that formalism which is everywhere in the Scripture, and especially in the discourses of our Lord, described as an offence and an abomination in the sight of God? I answer, formalism is the substitution of the outward rite in the place of the inner spirit and life of the soul; it is the green leaf which still hangs upon the dead branch which has been lopped off.David Loxton.
II. The worthlessness of prayer without purity of heart. When ye make many prayers, I will not hear.
1. Prayer is a necessity of the Christian life. A consciousness of weakness and want, and a profound conviction of Gods power and willingness to succour him, prompts the Christian to make many prayers. And each supplication so inspired finds its way to the throne and heart of God. To hear and answer the prayers of His children is one of our Heavenly Fathers joys (Isa. 65:24).
2. But prayer, like ritualism, instead of being the expression of a realised need, may be only an empty form. The supplications that are offered may be uttered merely by rote, with as little feeling as a child recites the multiplication-table; or they may be devices by which deluded men seek to propitiate that God whom they are offending by their conduct every day,mere lip-homage, which they imagine He will accept in condonation of their habitual disregard of His will. In either case, their many prayers are worthless husks which He rejects with disdain.
If we would have our worship accepted of God, there must be
1. Scriptural conceptions of His character. These will prevent us from mocking Him by merely formal prayers or praises.
2. A solemn realisation of His presence. How often this is lacking in those who take part in the service of the sanctuary, and even in those who conduct them! But God is not throned in some distant heaven, to which our prayers struggle up we know not how: He is HERE! We shall never be nearer to Him than we are to-day!
3. An earnest endeavour after holiness in daily life (Psa. 66:18). See why God would not regard the uplifted hands of the Jewish suppliantsYour hands are full of blood. See also Isa. 59:1-3. To no rebel is access to the presence-chamber of the King of kings granted: this is the high privilege of those only who can lift up holy hands (1Ti. 2:8).A. F. Barfield. [288]
[288] God doth not institute worship-ordinances for bodily motion only; when He speaketh to man He speaketh as to a man, and requireth human actions from him, even the work of the soul, and not the words of a parrot or the motion of a puppet.Baxter, 16151691.
You think you serve God by coming to church; but if you refuse to let the Word convert you, how should God be pleased with such a service as this? It is as if you should tell your servant what you have for him to do, and because he hath given you the hearing, he thinks he should have his wages, though he do nothing of that which you set him to do. Were not this an unreasonable servant? Or would you give him according to his expectation? It is a strange thing that men should think that God will save them for dissembling with Him; and save them for abusing His name and ordinances. Every time you hear, or pray, or praise God, or receive the sacrament, while you deny God your heart and remain unconverted, you do but despise Him and show more of your rebellion than your obedience. Would you take him for a good tenant that at every rent-day would duly wait on you, and put off his hat to you, but bring you never a penny of rent? Or would you take him for a good debtor that brings you nothing but an empty purse, and expects you should take that for payment? God biddeth you come to church and hear the Word; and so you do, and so far you do well; but withal, He chargeth you to suffer the Word to work upon you hearts, and to take it home and consider of it, and obey it, and cast away your former courses, and give your hearts and lives to Him; and this yon will not do. And you think that He will accept of your service!Baxter, 16151691.
REASONS FOR THE REJECTION OF PRAYER
Isa. 1:15. When ye make many prayers, I will not hear.
God has characterised Himself as the Hearer of prayer; and it is the great consolation of His people that they cannot seek His face in vain. But here He declares that He will not hear the prayers of Israel, however many. This solemn and momentous declaration may well lead us to inquire why prayer is, in many instances, rejected. Prayer, to be heard, must be both right and real. If it possess neither of these characteristics, or only one of themif it is neither right nor real, or is right without being real, or real without being rightit cannot fail to be rejected.
I. A man may pray rightly, either because he has been taught the principles of orthodoxy, and knows what language is conformable to those principles, or because he uses prayers composed by spiritual men, or, finally, because he uses the very words prescribed or sanctioned by God Himself. But in all these cases, while his prayer may be right, it may be altogether unreal. He may neither know the meaning of the requests it contains, nor desire their fulfilment [291] Thus do many men pray for a free pardon for Christs sake, for entire sanctification, and repeat the Lords Prayer. There is nothing in the heart corresponding to what is expressed by the lips; nay, the heart and the mouth are often completely at variance with each other.
[291] Will mens prayers be answered? Not if they pray as boys whittle sticksabsently, hardly knowing or caring what they are about. I have known men begin to pray about Adam, and go on from him to the present time, whittling their stick clear to a point, with about as much feeling, and doing about as much good as the boy does.Beecher.
I often say my prayers,
But do I ever pray,
And do the wishes of my heart
Go with the words I say?
I may as well kneel down
And worship gods of stone,
As offer to the living God
A prayer of words alone,
For words without the heart
The Lord will never hear;
Nor will He to those lips attend
Whose prayers are not sincere.
John Burton.
II. Prayer may be real without being right. A man may really acknowledge mercies received, and petition for more; and yet neither the acknowledgment nor the petition may be regarded by God. The acknowledgment and the petition have reference to mere earthly desires already gratified or yet to be gratified. He thanks God that his lusts have had the food which they craved; he prays that they may never want it. Pride, vanity, the love of ease, pleasures, and worldly respectability are lusts on which he has hitherto consumed, and on which he intends still to consume, the good things which God has given, or may yet give him. The secret soul of all his supplications is not any zeal for the glory of God, but selfishness. His prayers are of the earth, earthy. The spiritual blessings which God holds out in His right hand he passes by in contemptuous neglect, and clamours for the natural blessings which are in Gods left hand.
III. Both the faults of prayer above referred to are often found in one and the same individual, and the guilt of both accumulated on one and the same head.
Let it not be inferred from what has been said that we lay an interdict on natural blessings, and forbid the seeking of them in prayer. Our Saviour has given us authority to ask for daily bread, and this fully warrants the conclusion that natural blessings, as well as spiritual, may and ought to form a subject of prayer. We ought to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and then ask Him to fulfil His promise of adding unto us all other things.R. Nesbit, Discourses, pp. 308319.
A STARTLING CHARGE
Isa. 1:15. Your hands are full of blood.
Such is the reason which God assigns for turning a deaf ear to the prayers of His ancient people: the hands they lifted up to Him in supplication were blood-stained. It was as if Cain, red with the murder of Abel, had lifted up his hands in prayer to God for blessing. By this startling charge we are reminded
I. That between the estimates formed by God and men as to what takes place in the sanctuary there is often an infinite disparity. Behold the court of the temple filled, apparently, with devout worshippers, who lift up their hands to heaven in earnest supplication,what a pleasing sight! But God looks down, and says, Those hands are full of blood. The same contrast is repeated in another form (Isa. 29:13). Other contrasts: Eli sees what he thinks to be a drunken woman; God sees a humble suppliant (1Sa. 1:12-13). Men see an eminently religious man praying in the sanctuary; God sees a man prostituting prayer into a means of self-glorification (Luk. 18:11-12). Men see a foul wretch whose presence in the sanctuary is a pollution; God sees a broken hearted penitent, and hastens to bless him (Luk. 18:13-14). So it is in our sanctuaries to-day.
II. That God holds us responsible for the ultimate consequences of our actions. The men who thronged the temple in Isaiahs time, and whose prayers God rejected, were not bandits and murderers in the ordinary and coarse fashion by which men are brought to the scaffold. Yet the charge brought against them was true. For there are other ways of murdering men than by acts of violence of which human law takes note. By grievous oppression millions of men have been brought to an untimely grave. If a man destroys another by slow poison, is he not as truly a murderer as another who kills his victim by means of prussic acid? In Gods sight oppression is murder; and of oppression in its worst forms the Jews had been guilty (Isa. 1:23; Isa. 3:14-15, &c.) It is in accordance with this declaration that opprobrium is heaped upon Jeroboam as the man who made Israel to sin (2Ki. 10:29); and that we are so sternly warned against leading others into transgression (Mat. 18:6, &c.) This fact
1. Casts some light on the doctrine of future punishment. The results of the evil actions of men go on eternally propagating themselves, and it is therefore not unjust that the punishment of those actions should be eternal also.
2. Should cause us to halt when we are tempted to acts of unkindness and oppression. Unwillingly we may thereby become murderers.
3. Should lead us to be most watchful as to the example we set before others. If we hold our false lights by which they are caused to make shipwreck concerning faith and character, God will hold us responsible for the disaster (Rom. 14:15, &c.)
III. That sin is naturally indelible. These Jews came into the sanctuary with hands carefully cleansed, but yet in Gods sight they were full of blood.
1. The stains of sin cannot be washed out by time. Time obliterates much, but it does not obliterate guilt. Men are apt to be troubled in conscience about recent sins, but to be at ease concerning those committed many years previously. But this is a mistake. Lapse of time makes no difference to God; the inscriptions in His books of record never fade. Hence the wisdom of Davids prayer (Psa. 25:7).
2. The stain of sin cannot be washed out by worship. That it might be so was the vain dream of the Jews, as it is of millions to-day. But worship itself is an offence when it is offered by ungodly men; so far from diminishing their guilt, it increases it (Pro. 28:9, &c.)
3. The stain of sin cannot be washed out by sorrow. Sorrow for the past alters nothing in the past: the crime remains, no matter how many tears the criminal may shed [294]
4. The stain of sin cannot be washed out even by reformation of conduct and character. Men speak of turning over a new leaf, and when they have done what this phrase implies, they are apt to be at peace. But this also is a mistake. They forget that the old, evil leaf remains, and that for what is inscribed thereon God will call them to account. As there is a godly sorrow and a worldly sorrow, so there is a religious and an irreligious reformation of conduct. The former is the result of evangelical repentance, and is of exceeding worth (Eze. 18:27-28); the latter is a mere act of prudence, and is of no moral account. In one way, and in one way only, can the stain of guilt be effaced from the human soul (1Jn. 1:7-9).
[294] Repentance qualifies a man for pardon, but it does not, cannot, entitle him to it. It is one of the most elementary and obvious truths of morality, that the performance of one duty cannot be any compensation for neglect to perform another duty. But when a sinner is penitent for his sins, he is merely doing what, as a sinner, he ought to do; and his feelings of contrition do no more to absolve him from his guilt than the gratitude a man feels to a doctor who has cured him from a dangerous illness does to discharge the doctors bill. As in this case there ought to be both gratitude and payment, so in the case of the sinner there must be both penitence and atonement. The sinners sorrow for his sin, while in itself a proper thing, is no more an atonement for his sin than is the remorse that fills the breasts of most murderers any atonement for the murders they have committed. Judas was sorry, profoundly and intensely sorry, for having betrayed our Lord Jesus Christ, but did that do away with the guilt of that betrayal? Was Peter not to be blamed for his denial of his Master, because afterwards he went out and wept bitterly? Did the tears he shed give him any right to say in after yearsYes, I denied my Lord, but I was sorry for it, and go made it straight? Do you think that just as with soap and water you can wash the dirt off your hands, you can with a few tears, or with many tears, wash the guilt of sin from off your soul? No delusion could be more groundless. Oh no! You have the real fact and the true philosophy of the matter in the well-known verse
Not the labours of my hands
Can fulfil Thy laws demands.
Could my zeal no respite know
Could my tears for ever flow,
All for sin could not atone:
THOU must save, and THOU alone.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
(15) When ye spread forth your hands.The words point to the attitude of one who prays, as was the manner of Jews, Greeks, and Romans (tenditque ad sidera palmas, Virg., n., xii. 196), standing, and with hands stretched out toward heaven. (Comp. Luk. 18:11-13.)
When ye make many prayers.The Pentateuch contains no directions for the use of forms of prayer beyond the benediction of Num. 6:23-26, and two forms connected with the Passover in Deu. 26:5-10; Deu. 26:13-15. The eighteen prayers for daily use belong to the later Rabbinic stage of Judaism. It lies in the nature of the case, however, that first a real, and then an ostentatious devotion would show itself in the use of such forms, possibly, as in Psa. 119:164, seven times a day. In Pro. 27:14; Pro. 28:9, which belong to the reign of Hezekiah, and may, therefore, indirectly represent Isaiahs teaching, we have the warnings of the wise as to the right use of such forms.
Your hands are full of blood.Literally, bloods, as implying many murderous acts. The words point to the guilt of judges and princes, such as that described in Hos. 4:2. Life was sacrificed to greed of gain, or lust, or vindictiveness. To the prophets eye those hands, stretched upwards in the Temple by some, at least, of the kings ministers and judges, were red with the blood of the slain. (Comp. Isa. 59:3.)
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
Isa 1:15 And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood.
Ver. 15. And when ye spread forth your hands. ] This was the ancient guise and garb in extraordinary and most earnest prayer, especially to spread forth the arms, and lay open the hands as it were, to receive a blessing from the Almighty. Exo 9:23 Psa 44:20 ; Psa 143:6 1Ki 8:22 ; 1Ki 8:38
I will hide mine eyes from you.
Yea, when ye make many prayers.
I will not hear.
Your hands are full of blood.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
And when = Even when.
spread forth your hands. Put by Figure of speech Metonymy (of Adjunct), for “pray”, in which hands are spread forth.
make many prayers = multiply your prayers.
blood. Put by Figure of speech Metonymy (of Effect), for the acts which shed the blood.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
when: Isa 59:2, 1Ki 8:22, 1Ki 8:54, Ezr 9:5, Job 27:8, Job 27:9, Job 27:20, Psa 66:18, Psa 134:2, Pro 1:28, Jer 14:12, Eze 8:17, Eze 8:18, Mic 3:4, Zec 7:13, Luk 13:25-28, 1Ti 2:8
I will: Isa 58:7, Psa 55:1
make many prayers: Heb. multiply prayer, Mat 6:7, Mat 23:14
your hands: Isa 59:2, Isa 59:3, Jer 7:8-10, Mic 3:9-11
blood: Heb. bloods
Reciprocal: Exo 9:29 – spread Lev 10:19 – should Jdg 9:7 – Hearken 1Sa 8:18 – will not hear 2Sa 22:42 – unto the Lord 1Ki 8:35 – and turn 1Ki 8:38 – spread forth 2Ch 6:29 – spread forth Job 8:6 – thou wert Job 11:14 – iniquity Job 16:18 – let my cry Job 17:9 – clean Job 22:30 – pureness Job 35:13 – God Psa 18:41 – General Psa 24:4 – He that Psa 35:16 – hypocritical Psa 106:38 – the land Psa 109:7 – and let Psa 145:18 – call upon Pro 6:17 – and hands Pro 21:13 – at Pro 28:9 – turneth Pro 28:27 – hideth Isa 45:19 – Seek Isa 58:9 – shalt thou Jer 4:31 – spreadeth Jer 7:16 – I will Jer 11:11 – cry Jer 22:3 – neither Jer 33:5 – I have hid Jer 42:2 – and pray Lam 1:17 – spreadeth Lam 4:14 – they have polluted Eze 7:23 – for Eze 11:6 – General Eze 14:3 – should Eze 20:3 – As I Eze 20:31 – and shall Eze 23:37 – and blood Eze 34:3 – ye kill Eze 39:23 – hid I Mat 6:5 – thou shalt not Luk 5:33 – and make Luk 13:24 – for Luk 18:11 – God Luk 18:12 – fast Joh 9:31 – we know Jam 1:7 – General Jam 4:3 – and Jam 4:8 – Cleanse 1Jo 3:22 – whatsoever
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Isa 1:15. When ye spread forth your hands When ye pray with your hands spread abroad, as the manner was; I will hide mine eyes from you I will take no notice of your persons or requests. Your hands are full of blood You are guilty of murder and oppression, and of other crying sins, which I abhor, and have forbidden under pain of my highest displeasure.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
1:15 And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide my eyes from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full {x} of blood.
(x) He shows that where men are given to evil, deceit, cruelty and extortion, which is meant by blood, there God will show his anger and not accept them though they seem holy, as in Isa 59:3 .