Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Isaiah 3:9
The show of their countenance doth witness against them; and they declare their sin as Sodom, they hide [it] not. Woe unto their soul! for they have rewarded evil unto themselves.
9. The shew of their countenance ] The safest translation is that of R.V. marg., their respecting of persons, i.e. their partiality in judgment. The familiar phrase “respect persons” (see Deu 1:17, &c.) appears here in the nominal form, the usual infinitive being replaced by a verbal noun. It is not an objection to this view that such a charge only applies to a particular class. The prophet deals with the nation throughout as a political unity, and he knows that the whole people must suffer for the sins of the rulers.
they declare hide it not ] or, they declare their sin, like Sodom, undisguisedly. On the construction see Davidson, Synt. 41, R. 3.
Woe unto their soul ] or, Woe to themselves for they have done themselves evil. The injustice they have done to others witnesses against them and recoils on their own heads.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
The show of their countenance – The word rendered the show is probably derived from a word signifying to know, or to recognize, and here denotes impudence or pride. Septuagint, The shame of their face.
Doth witness against them – Answers to them; or responds to them ( anetah). There is a correspondence between the feeling of the heart and the looks, an answering of the countenance to the purposes of the soul that shows their true character, and betrays their plans. The prophet refers here to the great law in physiology that the emotions of the heart will be usually expressed in the countenance; and that by the marks of pride, vanity, and malice there depicted, we may judge of the heart; or as it is expressed in our translation, that the expression of the face will witness against a wicked man.
They declare … – By their deeds. Their crimes are open and bold. There is no attempt at concealment.
As Sodom – see Gen 19:5; compare the note at Isa 1:10.
Wo unto their soul – They shall bring woe upon themselves; they deserve punishment. This is an expression denoting the highest abhorrence of their crimes.
They have rewarded evil … – They have brought the punishment upon themselves by their own sins.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Isa 3:9
The shew of their countenance doth witness against them
Character revealed in the countenance
What is meant is the insolent look which their sinfulness is stamping upon their faces, without the self-condemnation which in others takes the form of dread to commit sin.
(F. Delitzsch.)
Woe unto their soul!
1. The condition of sinners is woeful and very deplorable.
2. It is the soul that is damaged and endangered by sin. Sinners may prosper in their outward estates, and yet there may be a woe to their souls.
3. Whatever evil befalls sinners, it is of their own procuring (Jer 2:19). (M. Henry.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 9. The show of their countenance] Bishop Lowth has it the steadfastness of their countenance-they appear to be bent on iniquity, their eyes tell the wickedness of their hearts. The eye is the index of the mind. Envy, hatred, malice, malevolence, concupiscence, and murder, when in the heart, look most intelligently out at the eye. They tell the innocent to be on their guard; and serve the same purpose as the sonorous rings in the tail of the rattlesnake-they announce the presence of the destroyer.
They declare their sin as Sodom] Impure propensities are particularly legible in the eyes: whoever has beheld the face of a debauchee or a prostitute knows this; of these it may be said, they wish to appear what they really are. They glory in their iniquity. This is the highest pitch of ungodliness.
They have rewarded evil unto themselves.] Every man’s sin is against his own soul. Evil awaiteth sinners-and he that offends his God injures himself.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
The show of their countenance doth witness against them; their pride, and wantonness, and impiety manifestly shows itself in their very looks and carriages, and will be swift witness against them both before God and men.
They declare their sin; they act it publicly, casting off all fear of God, and reverence to men, and they glory in it.
They hide it not, as men do who have any remainders of modesty or ingenuity.
They have rewarded, i.e. procured a fit recompence for their wickedness, even utter ruin. Or, they have done; for this word is oft so used, without any signification of a recompence, as Psa 7:4. They cannot blame me, but themselves; their destruction is wholly from themselves. Compare Hos 13:9.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
9. showThe Hebrewmeans, “that which may be known by their countenances”[GESENIUS and WEISS].But MAURER translates,”Their respect for person”; so Syriac and Chaldee.But the parallel word “declare” favors the other view.KIMCHI, from the Arabic,translates “their hardness” (Job19:3, Margin), or impudence of countenance (Jer3:3). They have lost not only the substance of virtue, but itscolor.
witnessliterally,”corresponds” to them; their look answers to their innercharacter (Ho 5:5).
declare (Jude13). “Foaming out their own shame”; so far frommaking it a secret, “glorying” in it (Php3:19).
unto themselvesCompare”in themselves” (Pro 1:31;Pro 8:36; Jer 2:19;Rom 1:27).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
The shew of their countenance doth witness against them,…. The word translated “shew” is only used in this place. Some derive it from , “to know”, in the conjugations Piel and Hiphil; and render it, “the knowledge of their countenance” f; that is, that which may be known by their countenances; the countenance oftentimes shows what is in the heart, the cruel disposition of the mind, the pride and vanity of it, the uncleanness and lasciviousness that is in it; to this our version agrees, and which is confirmed by the Chaldee paraphrase,
“the knowledge of their countenance in judgment doth testify against them;”
as they appear there, so it may be judged of them; their guilt flies in their face, and fills them with shame and confusion; and so the Septuagint and Arabic versions render it, “the shame of their face”; but others derive it from , which has the signification of hardness in the Arabic language, and as it is thought by some to have in Job 19:3 and render it, “the hardness of their countenance”; so R. Joseph Kimchi, and others g, meaning their impudence h; not only their words and actions, but their impudent looks, show what they are; which agrees with what follows:
and they declare their sin as Sodom, and
hide [it] not; commit it openly, without fear or shame; glory in it, and boast of it, as the Jews did in their crucifixion of Christ, and their evil treatment of him:
woe to their soul, for they have rewarded evil unto themselves; they have brought upon themselves, soul and body, the just recompence of reward; they have been the cause of their own ruin, and have wronged their own souls.
f “cognitio vultus eorum”, Munster, Vatablus, V. L. g “Obfermatio”, Janius Tremellius “durities”, Piscator. h So Schindler renders the Arabic word , “hacar”, impudence. Vid. Castel. Lexic. col. 846.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
But Israel, instead of walking in the consciousness of being a constant and favourite object of these majestic, earnestly admonishing eyes, was diligently engaged in bidding them defiance both in word and deed, not even hiding its sin from fear of them, but exposing them to view in the most shameless manner. – “The look of their faces testifies against them, and their sin they make known like Sodom, without concealing it: woe to their soul! for they do themselves harm.” In any case, the prophet refers to the impudence with which their enmity against God was shamelessly stamped upon their faces, without even the self-condemnation which leads in other cases to a diligent concealment of the sin. But we cannot follow Luzzatto and Jos. Kimchi, who take haccarath as used directly for azzuth (impudence), inasmuch as the Arabic hakara ( hakira ), to which Kimchi appeals, signifies to be astonished and to stare (see at Job 19:3). And in this case there would be nothing strange in the substantive form, which would be a piel formation like . But it may be a hiphil formation (Ewald, 156, a); and this is incomparably the more probable of the two, as hiccir panim is a very common phrase. It signifies to look earnestly, keenly, or inquiringly in the face of a person, to fix the eye upon him; and, when used of a judge, to take the part of a person, by favouring him unjustly (Deu 1:17; Deu 16:19). But this latter idea, viz., “their acceptance of the person, or partiality” (according to Pro 24:23; Pro 28:21), is inadmissible here, for the simple reason that the passage refers to the whole nation, and not particularly to the judges. “The look of their faces” ( haccarath p’nehem ) is to be understood in an objective sense, viz., the appearance ( , Luk 9:29), like the agnitio of Jerome, id quo se agnoscendum dat vultus eorum . This was probably the expression commonly employed in Hebrew for what we designate by a very inappropriate foreign word, viz., physiognomy, i.e., the expression of the face which reveals the state of the mind. This expression of their countenance testified against them ( anah b’ , as in Isa 59:12), for it was the disturbed and distorted image of their sin, which not only could not be hidden, but did not even wish to be; in a word, of their azzuth (Ecc 8:1). And it did not even rest with this open though silent display: they spoken openly of their sin ( higgid in its simplest meaning, palam facere , from nagad , nagada , to be open, evident) without making any secret of it, like the Sodomites, who publicly proclaimed their fleshly lusts (Gen 19). Jerusalem was spiritually Sodom, as the prophet called it in Isa 1:10. By such barefaced sinning they did themselves harm ( gamal , lit., to finish, then to carry out, to show practically).
(Note: It may now be accepted as an established fact, that the verb gamal is connected with the Arabic ‘gamala , to collect together, ‘gamula , to be perfect, kamala , kamula id ., and gamar , to finish (see Hupfeld on Psa 7:5, and Frst, Heb. Lex.).)
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
| Judgments Denounced.. | B. C. 758. |
9 The show of their countenance doth witness against them; and they declare their sin as Sodom, they hide it not. Woe unto their soul! for they have rewarded evil unto themselves. 10 Say ye to the righteous, that it shall be well with him: for they shall eat the fruit of their doings. 11 Woe unto the wicked! it shall be ill with him: for the reward of his hands shall be given him. 12 As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and destroy the way of thy paths. 13 The LORD standeth up to plead, and standeth to judge the people. 14 The LORD will enter into judgment with the ancients of his people, and the princes thereof: for ye have eaten up the vineyard; the spoil of the poor is in your houses. 15 What mean ye that ye beat my people to pieces, and grind the faces of the poor? saith the Lord GOD of hosts.
Here God proceeds in his controversy with his people. Observe,
I. The ground of his controversy. It was for sin that God contended with them; if they vex themselves, let them look a little further and they will see that they must thank themselves: Woe unto their souls! For they have rewarded evil unto themselves. Alas for their souls! (so it may be read, in a way of lamentation), for they have procured evil to themselves, v. 9. Note, The condition of sinners is woeful and very deplorable. Note, also, It is the soul that is damaged and endangered by sin. Sinners may prosper in their outward estates, and yet at the same time there may be a woe to their souls. Note, further, Whatever evils befals sinners it is of their own procuring, Jer. ii. 19. That which is here charged upon then is, 1. That the shame which should have restrained them from their sins was quite thrown off and they had grown impudent, v. 9. This hardens men against repentance, and ripens them for ruin, as much as anything: The show of their countenance doth witness against them that their minds are vain, and lewd, and malicious; their eyes declare plainly that they cannot cease from sin, 2 Pet. ii. 14. One may look them in the face and guess at the desperate wickedness that there is in their hearts: They declare their sin as Sodom, so impetuous, so imperious, are their lusts, and so impatient of the least check, and so perfectly are all the remaining sparks of virtue extinguished in them. The Sodomites declared their sin, not only by the exceeding greatness of it (Gen. xiii. 13), so that it cried to heaven (Gen. xviii. 20), but by their shameless owning of that which was most shameful (Gen. xix. 5); and thus Judah and Jerusalem did: they were so far from hiding it that they gloried in it, in the bold attempts they made upon virtue, and the victory they gained over their own convictions. They had a whore’s forehead (Jer. iii. 3) and could not blush, Jer. vi. 15. Note, Those that have grown impudent in sin are ripe for ruin. Those that are past shame (we say) are past grace, and then past hope. 2. That their guides, who should direct them in the right way, put them out of the way (v. 12): “Those who lead thee (the princes, priests, and prophets) mislead thee; they cause thee to err.” Either they preached to them that which was false and corrupt, or, if they preached that which was true and good, they contradicted it by their practices, and the people would soon follow a bad example than a good exhortation. Thus they destroyed the ways of their paths, pulling down with one hand what they built up with the other. Que te beatificant–Those that call thee blessed cause thee to err; so some read it. Their priests applauded them, as if nothing were amiss among them, cried Peace, peace, to them, as if they were in no danger; and thus they caused them to go on in their errors. 3. That their judges, who should have patronized and protected the oppressed, were themselves the greatest oppressors, Isa 3:14; Isa 3:15. The elders of the people, and the princes, who had learning and could not but know better things, who had great estates and were not under the temptation of necessity to encroach upon those about them, and who were men of honour and should have scorned to do a base thing, yet they have eaten up the vineyard. God’s vineyard, which they were appointed to be the dressers and keepers of, they burnt (so the word signifies); they did as ill by it as its worst enemies could do, Ps. lxxx. 16. Or the vineyards of the poor they wrested out of their possession, as Jezebel did Naboth’s, or devoured the fruits of them, fed their lusts with that which should have been the necessary food of indigent families; the spoil of the poor was hoarded up in their houses; when God came to search for stolen goods there he found it, and it was a witness against them. It was to be had, and they might have made restitution, but would not. God reasons with these great men (v. 15): “What mean you, that you beat my people into pieces? What cause have you for it? What good does it do you?” Or, “What hurt have they done you? Do you think you had power given you for such a purpose as this?” Note, There is nothing more unaccountable, and yet nothing which must more certainly be accounted for, than the injuries and abuses that are done to God’s people by their persecutors and oppressors. “You grind the faces of the poor; you put them to as much pain and terror as if they were ground in a mill, and as certainly reduce them to dust by one act of oppression after another.” Or, “Their faces are bruised and crushed with the blows you have given them; you have not only ruined their estates, but have given them personal abuses.” Our Lord Jesus was smitten on the face, Matt. xxvi. 67.
II. The management of this controversy. 1. God himself is the prosecutor (v. 13): The Lord stands up to plead, or he sets himself to debate the matter, and he stands to judge the people, to judge for those that were oppressed and abused; and he will enter into judgment with the princes, v. 14. Note, The greatest of men cannot exempt or secure themselves from the scrutiny and sentence of God’s judgment, nor demur to the jurisdiction of the court of heaven. 2. The indictment is proved by the notorious evidence of the fact: “Look upon the oppressors, and the show of their countenance witnesses against them (v. 9); look upon the oppressed, and you see how their faces are battered and abused,” v. 15. 3. The controversy is already begun in the change of the ministry. To punish those that had abused their power to bad purposes God sets those over them that had not sense to use their power to any good purposes: Children are their oppressors, and women rule over them (v. 12), men that have as weak judgments and strong passions as women and children: this was their sin, that their rulers were such, and it became a judgment upon them.
III. The distinction that shall be made between particular persons, in the prosecution of this controversy (Isa 3:10; Isa 3:11): Say to the righteous, It shall be well with thee. Woe to the wicked; it shall be ill with him. He had said (v. 9), they have rewarded evil to themselves, in proof of which he here shows that God will render to every man according to his works. Had they been righteous, it would have been well with them; but, if it be ill with them, it is because they are wicked and will be so. Thus God stated the matter to Cain, to convince him that he had no reason to be angry, Gen. iv. 7. Or it may be taken thus: God is threatening national judgments, which will ruin the public interests. Now, 1. Some good people might fear that they should be involved in that ruin, and therefore God bids the prophets comfort them against those fears: “Whatever becomes of the unrighteous nation, let the righteous man know that he shall not be lost in the crowd of sinners; the Judge of all the earth will not slay the righteous with the wicked (Gen. xviii. 25); no, assure him, in God’s name, that it shall be well with him. The property of the trouble shall be altered to him, and he shall be hidden in the day of the Lord’s anger. He shall have divine supports and comforts, which shall abound as afflictions abound, and so it shall be well with him.” When the whole stay of bread is taken away, yet in the day of famine the righteous shall be satisfied; they shall eat the fruit of their doings–they shall have the testimony of their consciences for them that they kept themselves pure from the common iniquity, and therefore the common calamity is not the same thing to them that it is to others; they brought no fuel to the flame, and therefore are not themselves fuel for it. 2. Some wicked people might hope that they should escape that ruin, and therefore God bids the prophets shake their vain hopes: “Woe to the wicked; it shall be ill with him, v. 11. To him the judgments shall have sting, and there shall be wormwood and gall in the affliction and misery.” There is a woe to wicked people, and, though they may think to shelter themselves from public judgments, yet it shall be ill with them; it will grow worse and worse with them if they repent not, and the worst of all will be at last; for the reward of their hands shall be given them, in the day when every man shall receive according to the things done in the body.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
9. The proof of their countenance will answer in them, or, will answer against them (59) As the Prophet had to do with impudent and brazen-faced hypocrites, who impudently boasted that they were good men; so he says that their countenance testifies what kind of persons they are, and that it will not be necessary to bring witnesses from a distance, in order to prove their wickedness; for to answer means “to bear testimony,” or “to confess.” Although, therefore, they disguise their face and countenance, so that they frequently deceive others, yet God compels them to show and prove what they are; so that, in spite of themselves they carry, as it were, in their forehead a mark of their deceit and hypocrisy.
Some explain it, that their crimes are so manifest that they cannot avoid seeing, as in a mirror, the baseness which they desire to conceal But the former meaning is confirmed by what immediately follows, that they declared their sin in the same manner as the inhabitants of Sodom. By these words he intimates that they devoted themselves to iniquity in such a manner, that they boasted of their transgressions without any shame; as if it had been honorable and praiseworthy in them to trample on every distinction between right and wrong, and not to indulge in every kind of wickedness. On this account he compares them to the inhabitants of Sodom, (Gen 18:20,) who were so much blinded by their lusts, that they rushed, with brutish stupidity, to everything base. So, then, this is the answer of the countenance, which he mentioned a little before, that they carry about with them plain tokens of impiety, which are abundantly sufficient to prove their guilt.
Woe unto their soul! Here he declares what was formerly mentioned, that the whole cause of their calamities is to be found in themselves; for by their sins and iniquities they provoked the Lord; and consequently that they have no means of evasion, that it is useless to contrive idle pretenses, because the evil itself dwells in their bones; as if he had said, “God cannot be accused, as if he punished you unjustly. Acknowledge that it has been done by yourselves; give glory to a righteous judge and lay the whole blame on yourselves.”
(59) See p. 122.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
SHAMELESS SINNERS
Isa. 3:9. They declare their sin as Sodom, they hide it not.
Extremes are generally detestable: equatorial heat, arctic cold; the speaker whom we must strain to hear, the orator who roars, &c. So in morals: foolhardy rashness, cowardice; prodigality, penuriousness; hypocrites, and such shameless sinners as are spoken of here. Such persons are even more detestable than hypocrites; these at least pay this homage to virtue, that they array themselves in her outer garments. Desperate and vain is the endeavour to cloak iniquity, yet even this is better than the effrontery which leads some to flaunt it in open day. How surprising is such effrontery! When we consider what sin isa thing horribly degrading to man as well as insufferably offensive to Godwe should have expected beforehand that men would have been as anxious to hide their vices, as they are to conceal any loathsome disease with which they may be afflicted. But it is not so. There are tens of thousands of sinners as devoid of shame as were those who dwelt in Sodom; nay, they glory in their shame. Consider
I. THE CAUSES OF SHAMELESSNESS IN SIN.
1. Ignorance. There are many so uninstructed in moral and spiritual things; they have grown up surrounded by such evil examples, that they have no consciousness of the foulness of their vices, any more than a peasant has of the ungracefulness of his manners. This cause operates among the lower classes to an extent scarcely conceivable by the cultured and refined.
2. Habit. Many an open and shameless sinner, at the outset of his career, when he was first betrayed into transgression, was ashamed almost to walk through the street, and imagined that every one whom he met had heard of, and despised him for, his offence. But the offence was repeated; it became a habit; and in proportion as it has done so, has the offenders sense of shame died out of him. He thinks as little of it as a soldier does of his uniform, which when it was first put on caused him to think that all eyes were fixed upon him.
3. A desire to silence conscience. The effrontery is often assumed, just as the rustic traveller when near a churchyard whistles, not because he is courageous, but to keep his courage up. Conscience reproaches and warns, and the sinner seeks to silence it by greater desperation in wickedness.
4. A seared conscience. In the course just named the sinner too often succeeds. Conscience, defied and outraged, desists from her useless efforts, and gives herself over to an insensible lethargy; there will come an hour of terrible awakening; but meanwhile she is blind, deaf, dumb, and the sinner perpetrates the most abominable iniquities without a blush [544]
5. Infidelity. The sinner has succeeded at last in persuading himself that what he wishes were true is true, and that there is no God, and, consequently, no day of judgment and no hell. As soon as men have cast off fear of God, it is easy for them to cast off fear of man. The ordinary fruit of infidelity is vice. What but prudence is left to restrain the infidel from partaking in the pleasures of sin? And how weak prudence is in any real contest with passion!
[544] Blind and ignorant consciences speak peace, or hold their peace, because they have not skill enough to find fault; they swallow many a fly, and digest all well enough. While the scales were upon Pauls eyes, he was alive and quiet; he thought concupiscence, the sin and breeder of all sin, to be no sin. Such consciences discern sin as we do stars in a dark night,see only the great ones of the first magnitude, whereas a bright even discovers millions; or as we see a few motes in the dark houses, which sunlight shows to be infinite. Such think good meaning will serve the turn, that all religions will save, or a Lord, have mercy on us, at the last gasp. The law which nature has engraven, they tread out with sins, as men do the engravings of tombs they walk on with foul shoes: they dare not look in the glass of Gods law, which makes sin abound, lest the foulness of their souls should affright them. A number of such Scottish souls there be, whose consciences, if God opens, as He did the eyes of the prophets servant, they shall see armies and legions of sins and devils in them.Ward, 15771639.
II. THE CONSEQUENCES OF SHAMELESSNESS IN SIN.
This is declared by the prophet to be woewoe of peculiar intensity and awfulnes. Woe unto their soul! &c. They stand in peril of the severest chastisements of the Divine justice
1. Because shamelessness in sin is an aggravation of sin. It is felt to be so in the home, in the nation. Disloyalty is an evil thing, but to break forth into open rebellion, and to take the field against the monarch, is worse.
2. Because shamelessness in sin adds to the contagiousness of sin. One reason why sin is so hateful in the sight of God is because it renders every sinner a moral pestilence. Corrupt, he corrupts others (Ecc. 9:18). But of shameless sinners this is especially true.
1. They lead many to imitate them in their wickedness. In every community these shameless sinners are ringleaders in vice and recruiting-sergeants for the devil.
2. They confirm many in wickedness. Many are halting between two opinions, and these shameless offenders, by their example, and often by their persuasions, supply that which is needed to bring these irresolute ones to a decision for a life of iniquity. Thus they are soul-murderers as well as soul-suicides. Justice, therefore, demands that their punishment shall be especially severe. Their doom will probably be as manifest as their guilt.
APPLICATION.
1. Let those who have been thus shameless in sin humble themselves before Almighty God. Even for them to-day there is mercy (Isa. 55:7; Isa. 1:18). Let no sinner be deterred from seeking mercy by the greatness of his sins (Ezr. 9:6, with Psa. 108:4, and Rom. 5:20). Yet let no sinner presume further to transgress because God is so merciful. There is an awful warning in the gracious invitation (Isa. 55:6).
2. As ignorance is one main cause of shamelessness in sin, let Sunday-school teachers recognise the importance of the task in which they are engaged. Though they may not be able to point to individual conversions as the result of their efforts, they are not labouring in vain; by them the moral sense of the community is being raised. Evil as are our days, the testimony is conclusive that the former days were not better, but worse.
3. As habit is another main cause of shamelessness in sin, let the young be anxiously on their guard against the formation of evil habits. But habits grow from acts. A single action is consequently more important than it seems. There are certain actions which have in themselves a special decisiveness of influence. When a young man has once entered a bar parlour, he has entered upon the high way to drunkenness; he may not reach it, but he is on the high way to it. Another most decisive step towards shamelessness in sin is taken when a young person who has been trained under Christian influence joins a Sunday excursion. It is by this gate that millions have entered that path of open transgression, along which they have hastened to perdition.
4. Let the people of God be very careful to leave shameless sinners without excuse. It is by the inconsistencies of professing Christians that such persons endeavour to shield themselves from censure and to silence their consciences. Hence Eph. 5:15; Col. 4:5; 1Th. 5:22.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
(9) They declare their sin as Sodom.The comparison is, it should be remembered, of probably an earlier date than that in Isa. 1:10. In the reign of Ahaz (perhaps the prophet, editing in his old age, thought also of that of Manasseh) there was not even the homage which vice pays to virtue by feigning a virtue which it has not. Men fell into an utter shamelessness, like that of the cities of the plain (Gen. 19:5), generally in the luxury and profligacy of their lives (Eze. 16:49), perhaps also with a more definite and horrible resemblance (1Ki. 14:24; 1Ki. 15:12; 2Ki. 23:7).
Woe unto their soul!In the midst of the confusions of the times the prophet is bidden to proclaim that the law of a righteous retribution would be seen working even there.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
9. Show of countenance Its bold, staring effrontery declares, testifies, against them; reveals their own true character exactly. Thoughts only of evil are mirrored in their countenances, and are as clearly open to every one’s view as were the open sins of Sodom. The meaning is not that their looks betray them, but that they attempt no concealment, they hide it not.
Woe unto their soul This expresses the highest abhorrence of their acts.
Rewarded evil unto themselves Reaped punishment as the only proper retribution.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
What Men Sow They Will Reap – A Wisdom Song ( Isa 3:9-11 ).
Isa 3:9-11
‘Woe to them themselves,
For they have rewarded themselves with evil.
Say of the righteous that it is well,
For they will eat the fruit of their doings.
Woe to the wicked for it is ill,
For the reward of his hands will be done to him.’
Isaiah comes in with a further interjection (compare Isa 2:5; Isa 2:22), this time concerning the righteous and the wicked. He declares woes on the wicked and blessing on the righteous. He proclaims woe on his people because they have brought their own evil on themselves, and then makes a general contrasting statement about the righteous and the wicked. Both have brought on themselves what they will receive. It will in the end be well with the righteous because they will eat the fruit of their behaviour, it will be woe to the wicked, and ill with them, because what they deserve from their behaviour will be done to them.
The comment on the righteous was necessary. He has been proclaiming continual doom. It was therefore essential to assure the righteous that God would not overlook them. In one way or another in the midst of judgment God would be their stay.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
“Handfuls of Purpose”
For All Gleaners
“The shew of their countenance doth witness against them.” Isa 3:9
Whatever men live upon shows itself even in the body. Our food becomes in a sense ourselves. If this is true of food for the body it is also true of food for the mind. Men cannot read perniciously and look virtuously. The ideas in which the mind most delights will give figure and colour and meaning to the very face. He who thinks mean thoughts cannot have a noble expression of countenance. He may have largeness and dominance and force, but when the full meaning of the face is searched into it will be found to be mean, dishonourable, and representative of an ill-treated soul. If this is true of the body and of the intellect, it is pre-eminently true of the spiritual nature. An atheist must have a face as withered as his heart. In mere outline and structure it may not even be without handsomeness; but in all its higher and subtler suggestiveness it is the face of a man who is without God in the world. A man cannot be a drunkard without his drunkenness writing itself upon the face. If a man is a tyrant, the tyranny will express itself in his very eyes. Blessed be God, what is true on one side is true also on the other; so that beneficence of soul is represented by beauty of countenance. The beauty may not be formal or structural; it will be spiritual, subtle, but most evident to those who are most familiar with it. There is great comfort in the thought that everything we do has its outward representation. A neglected house shows itself in the very windows and doors. A neglected child has the word Neglect written broadly all over him. A neglected garden bears its own witness. It is even so with a neglected character. By an unwritten law men know it, and are ashamed of it; they either ignore it or they distrust it. All culture tells. In all labour there is profit; in all industry there is an outcome of strength of character, beauty of countenance, gentleness of tone. Thus we write our biography day by day. Thus we keep our memorandum-book in our very face. Thus we become witnesses either for ourselves or against ourselves. Do not let us dwell exclusively upon either one side of this truth or the other. The way of the Lord is equal. If neglect writes its own condemnation on the face, so culture writes in outward and evident signs its own approval and benediction. We are daily writing judgment either for or against ourselves.
“They have rewarded evil unto themselves.” Isa 3:9
We have often seen that the man who is wicked is not an enemy of some distant or external law only, but is really his own enemy. The bad man cuts his own throat. The man who starves his soul must carry all the evidence, discomfort, and humiliation of such neglect in himself. If we refrain from prayer we shall hurt our own spirits. If we do not give ourselves up to the working of righteousness, another power will arise within us and triumph over our best nature, trampling it in the dust and gradually extinguishing the very image and likeness of God. A wonderful thing is this in the whole process of human education. A truly wonderful thing that the power of suicide runs through the whole economy of life. As a man can put out the eyes of his body, so he can put out the eyes of his soul. We do not injure God only by our unrighteousness, we injure ourselves. That is the very point of the text. What quality we may have lost, what dignity, what influence! Oh that we had hearkened unto the divine law! then had our peace flowed like a river and our righteousness like the waves of the sea. The meaning is that obedience would have rewarded itself in the very enlargement, refinement, and contentment of our own spirits. When a man denies God he denies himself. When a man does not go out into the larger fellowship of the Church that he may make common prayer with his fellows, his own prayers at home are stunted and stifled. Beware of self-deterioration. It lies on the way to suicide. We may not be conscious of having committed spiritual suicide, yet our souls may be lying murdered within us. Do thyself no harm. Take heed unto thyself. Nurture the soul by being good, by doing good, by heavenly exercise in all the ways of sympathy and benevolence.
Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker
Isa 3:9 The shew of their countenance doth witness against them; and they declare their sin as Sodom, they hide [it] not. Woe unto their soul! for they have rewarded evil unto themselves.
Ver. 9. The show of their countenance doth witness against them, ] q.d., You may see by their very looks what lewd lowlies they are. Their cruelty, pride, envy, hypocrisy, mulieorsity sitteth and showeth itself apparently in their faces and foreheads. Wisdom maketh the face to shine, saith Solomon; et ipse aspectus viri boni delectat. Good men look lovely, saith Seneca, as did that angel of God, John Bradford, quoth Dr Taylor, martyr; not so Cain, when discontented at God, and displeased at his brother; Gen 4:6 he scowled and looked like a dog under a door, as we say. The thoughts are oft known by the countenance; and the heart is printed upon the face. Damascen calleth the eyes the exact images of the imaginations? a And the Italians have a proverb, that a man with his words close and his countenance loose, may travel undiscovered what he is, or goes about, all the world over. The word here used for “show” or “trial,” doth in Hithpael signify to make a man’s self unknown.
And they declare their sin, as Sodom.
They hide it not.
Woe to their soul.
a T . – Hom. .
b Epiphan. apud Lonicer. in Theat. Histor. p. 96.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
shew = expression.
witness = testify.
declare. hide it not = have declared. have not hidden.
Sodom. See Isa 1:9, Isa 1:10.
their soul = them (emphatic). Hebrew. nephesh. App-13.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
The show: Isa 3:16, 1Sa 15:32, 2Ki 9:30, Psa 10:4, Psa 73:6, Psa 73:7, Pro 30:13, Jer 3:3, Jer 6:15, Dan 7:20
and they declare: Gen 13:13, Gen 18:20, Gen 18:21, Gen 19:5-9, Jer 44:16, Jer 44:17, Eze 23:16
Woe: Lam 5:16, Hos 13:9
Reciprocal: Gen 19:34 – General 1Sa 2:23 – by all 2Sa 13:4 – from day to day 2Sa 16:22 – went in Psa 18:27 – bring Pro 6:17 – A proud look Jer 2:19 – Thine Jer 8:12 – ashamed when Eze 3:7 – all the Eze 16:25 – at every Eze 16:30 – the work Eze 16:49 – pride Eze 21:24 – your transgressions Eze 23:18 – discovered Eze 23:39 – they came Eze 24:7 – her blood Hos 5:5 – the pride Joh 18:5 – stood Act 23:14 – General Rev 17:5 – upon
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Isa 3:9. The show of their countenance Their pride, wantonness, and impiety, manifestly show themselves in their very looks and whole behaviour, and will be swift witnesses against them, both before God and men. They declare their sin as Sodom They commit it publicly, casting off all fear of God, and reverence to men; and they glory in it. They hide it not As men do, who have any remains of modesty or ingenuity. They have rewarded evil to themselves That is, procured a fit recompense for their wickedness, even utter ruin; or, they have done evil, &c. They cannot blame God, but themselves: their destruction is wholly from themselves. The word , rendered show, in the first clause of the verse, not occurring elsewhere in the Bible, is of rather uncertain signification. Bishop Lowth renders it, steadfastness; and Dr. Waterland, impudence. The former translates the whole verse thus: The steadfastness of their countenance witnesseth against them: for their sin, like Sodom, they publish, they hide it not: wo to their souls! for upon themselves have they brought down evil.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
3:9 The {h} show of their countenance doth witness against them; and they declare their sin as Sodom, they hide [it] not. Woe to their soul! for they have rewarded evil to themselves.
(h) When God examines their deed on which they now set an impudent face, he will find the mark of their impiety in their forehead.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
Instead of bowing before Yahweh’s glorious face, the Israelites were with brazen faces rebelling against Him, as the people of Sodom did. So it would go hard for them. "Woe" is an interjection of threat or distress. This Hebrew word, ’oy, and its companion, hoy, occur 22 times in Isaiah, more frequently than in any other prophetic book. The Israelites had brought the judgment of God on themselves by their pride.