Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Isaiah 11:6

The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them.

6 8. This remarkable prophecy of the idyllic state of the brute creation is imitated in the Sibylline Oracles (3:766 ff.) and more faintly echoed in the Fourth and Fifth Eclogues of Vergil. Similarly, an Arabic poet ( Ibn Onein, quoted by Ges.) speaks of “a righteousness, through which the hungry wolf becomes tame.” The description is not to be interpreted allegorically, as if the wild beasts were merely symbols for cruel and rapacious men. Neither perhaps is it to be taken quite literally. It is rather a poetic presentation of the truth that the regeneration of human society is to be accompanied by a restoration of the harmony of creation (cf. Rom 8:19-22). The fact that tame and wild animals are regularly bracketed together shews that the main idea is the establishment of peace between man and the animals (Hos 2:20); the animals that are now wild shall no longer prey on those that are domesticated for the service of man. But the striking feature of the prophecy is that the predatory beasts are not conceived as extirpated (as Eze 34:25; Eze 34:28) but as having their habits and instincts changed.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

The wolf also – In this, and the following verses, the prophet describes the effect of his reign in producing peace and tranquility on the earth. The description is highly poetical, and is one that is common in ancient writings in describing a golden age. The two leading ideas are those of peace and security. The figure is taken from the condition of animals of all descriptions living in a state of harmony, where those which are by nature defenseless, and which are usually made the prey of the strong, are suffered to live in security. By nature the wolf preys upon the lamb, and the leopard upon the kid, and the adder is venomous, and the bear, and the cow, and the lion, and the ox, cannot live together. But if a state of things should arise, where all this hostility would cease; where the wild animals would lay aside their ferocity, and where the feeble and the gentle would be safe; where the adder would cease to be venomous, and where all would be so mild and harmless that a little child would be safe, and could lead even the most ferocious animals, that state would represent the reign of the Messiah. Under his dominion, such a change would be produced as that those who were by nature violent, severe, and oppressive; those whose disposition is illustrated by the ferocious and bloodthirsty propensities of the lion and the leopard, and by the poison of the adder, would be changed and subdued, and would be disposed to live in peace and harmony with others. This is the general idea of the passage. We are not to cut the interpretation to the quick, and to press the expressions to know what particular class of people are represented by the lion, the bear, or the adder. The general image that is before the prophets mind is that of peace and safety, such as that would be if a change were to be produced in wild animals, making them tame, and peaceful, and harmless.

This description of a golden age is one that is common in Oriental writers, where the wild beasts are represented as growing tame; where serpents are harmless; and where all is plenty, peace, and happiness. Thus Jones, in his commentary on Asiatic poetry, quotes from an Arabic poet, Ibn Onein, p. 380:

Justitia, a qua mansuetus fit lupus fame astrictus,

Esuriens, licet hinnulum candidurn videat –

Justice, by which the ravening wolf, driven by hunger, becomes tame, although he sees a white kid. Thus, also, Ferdusi, a Persian poet:

Rerum Dominus, Mahmud, rex. potens,

Ad cujus aquam potum veniunt simul agnus et lupus –

Mahmud, mighty king, lord of events, to whose fountain the lamb and the wolf come to drink. Thus Virgil, Eclogue iv. 21:

Ipsae lactae domum referent distenta capellae

Ubera; nec magnos metuent armenta leones –

Home their full udders, goats, unurged shall bear,

Nor shall the herd the lordly lion fear.

And immediately after:

Occidet et serpens, et fallax herba veneni

Occidet –

The snake, and poisons treacherous weed shall die.

Wrangham.

Again, Eclogue, v. 60:

Nec lupus insidias pecori, nec retia cervis

Ulla dolum mediantur: amat bonus otia Daphnis.

So also Horace, Epod. 16:53, 54:

Nec yespertinus circumgemit ursus ovile,

Nec intumescit alta viperis humus.

See also Claudian, Lib. ii. v. 25ff; and Theocritus, Idyl xxiv. 84, as quoted by Gesenius and Rosenmuller.

These passages are beautiful, and highly poetic; but they do not equal the beauty of the prophet. There is an exquisite sweetness in the passage of Isaiah – in the picture which he has drawn – particularly in the introduction of the security of the young child, which does not occur in the quotations from the pagan poets.

That this passage is descriptive of the times of the Messiah, there can be no doubt. It has been a question, to what particular part of his reign the prophet has reference. Some have referred it to the time when he came, and to the influence of his gospel in mitigating the ferocity of his enemies, and ultimately disposing them to suffer Christens to live with them – the infuriated enemies of the cross, under the emblem of the wolf, the bear, the leopard, and the adder, becoming willing that the Christian, under the emblem of the lamb, and the kid, should live with them without molestation. This is the interpretation of Vitringa. Others have referred it to the Millennium – as descriptive of a state of happiness, peace, and universal security then. Others have referred it to the second coming of the Messiah, as descriptive of a time when it is supposed that he will reign personally on the earth, and when there shall be universal security and peace, and when the nature of animals shall be so far changed, that the ferocity of those which are wild and ravenous shall cease, and they shall become harmless to the defenseless. Without attempting to examine these opinions at length, we may, perhaps, express the sense of the passage by the following observations:

(1) The eye of the prophet is fixed upon the reign of the Messiah, not with reference to time, but with reference to the actual facts of that reign. He saw the scene pass before his mind in vision (see the Introduction, Section 7, 3: (4.) (5.), and it is not the nature of such descriptions to mark the time, but the order, the passing aspect of the scene. Under the reign of the Messiah, he saw that this would occur. Looking down distant times, as on a beautiful landscape, he perceived, under the mild reign of the Prince of peace, a state of things which would be well represented by the wolf dwelling with the lamb, the leopard crouching down with the kid, and a little child safe in their midst.

(2) It was, in fact, partially fulfilled in the earliest times of the gospel, and has been everywhere. Under that gospel, the mad passions of men have been subdued; their wild ferocious nature has been changed; their love of conquest, and war, and blood taken away; and the change has been such as would be beautifully symbolized by the change of the disposition of the wolf and the leopard – suffering the innocent and the harmless to live with them in peace.

(3) The scene will not be fully realized until the reign of the Messiah shall be extended to all nations, and his gospel shall everywhere accomplish its full effects. The vision of Isaiah here has not yet received a full completion; nor will it until the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, Isa 11:9. The mind is, therefore, still directed onward. In future times, under the reign of the messiah, what is here described shall occur – a state of security, and peace, and happiness. Isaiah saw that splendid vision, as in a picture, pass before the mind; the wars, and persecutions, and trials of the Messiahs kingdom were, for a time at least, thrown into the back ground, or not represented, and, in that future time, he saw what is here represented. It has been partially fulfilled in all the changes which the Messiahs reign has made in the natural ferocity and cruelty of men; in all the peace which at any time the church has been permitted to enjoy; in all the revolutions promoting human safety, welfare, and happiness, which Christianity has produced. It is to receive the complete fulfillment – to spotelesma – only in that future time when the gospel shall be everywhere established on the earth. The essential thing, therefore, in the prophecy, is the representation of the peace, safety, and harmony which shall take place under the Messiah. So to speak, it was a taking out, and causing to pass before the mind of the prophet, all the circumstances of harmony, order, and love in his reign – as, in a beautiful panoramic view of a landscape, the beauties of the whole scene may be made to pass before the mind; the circumstances that might even then, if surveyed closely, give pain, were hid from the view, or lost in the loveliness of the whole scene.

(4) That it does not refer to any literal change in the nature of animals, so that the ferocity of the untamed shall be wholly laid aside, the disposition to prey on one another wholly cease, and the poisonous nature of the adder be destroyed, seems to me to be evident:

(a) Because the whole description has a highly figurative and poetical cast.

(b) Because such figurative expressions are common in all poetry, and especially among the Orientals.

(c) Because it does not appear how the gospel has any tendency to change the nature of the lion, the bear, or the serpent. It acts on men, not on brutes; on human hearts, not on the organization of wild animals.

(d) Because such a state of things could not occur without a perpetual miracle, changing the physical nature of the whole animal creation, The lion, the wolf, the panther, are made to live on flesh. The whole organization of their teeth and digestive powers is adapted to this, and this alone. To fit them to live on vegetable food, would require a change in their whole structure, and confound all the doctrines of natural history. The adder is poisonous, and nothing but a miracle would prevent the poisonous secretion, and make his bite innocuous. But where is a promise of any such coutinued miracle as shall change the whole structure of the animal creation, and make the physical world different from what it is? It is indeed probable that wild animals and venomous serpents will wholly retire before the progress of civilization and Christianity, and that the earth may be inhabited everywhere with safety – for such is the tendency of the advance of civilization – but this is a very different thing from a change in the physical nature of the animal creation.

The fair interpretation of this passage is, therefore, that revolutions will be produced in the wild and evil passions of men – the only thing with which the gospel has to do as great as if a change were produced in, the animal creation, and the most ferocious and the most helpless should dwell together. The wolf ( z^e‘eb) is a well-known animal, so called from his yellow or golden color. The Hebrew name is formed by changing the Hebrew letter (h) in the word zahab, gold, to the Hebrew letter – Bochart. The wolf, in the Scriptures, is described as ravenous, fierce, cruel; and is the emblem of that which is wild, ferocious, and savage among human beings; Gen 49:27 : Benjamin shall ravin as a wolf; Eze 22:27 : Her princes in the midst thereof are like wolves ravening the prey; Mat 7:15 : Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheeps clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves; Joh 10:12; Mat 10:16; Luk 10:3; Act 20:29. The wolf is described as sanguinary and bloody Eze 22:27, and as taking its prey by night, and as therefore particularly an object of dread; Jer 5:6 : A wolf of the evenings shall spoil them; Hab 1:8 : Their horses are more fierce than the evening wolves; Zep 3:3 : Her judges are evening wolves, they gnaw not the bones until tomorrow. in the Scriptures, the wolf is constantly represented in contrast with the lamb; the one the emblem of ferocity, the other of gentleness and innocence; Mat 10:16; Luk 10:3. The pagan poets also regard the wolf as an emblem of ferocity and cruelty:

Inde lupi cen

Raptores, atra in nebula quos improba ventris

Exegit caecos rabies, etc. –

(Virg. AEn. ii. 355ff.)

As hungry wolves, with raging appetite,

Scour through the fields, nor fear the stormy night –

Their whelps at home expect the promised food,

And long to temper their dry chaps in blood –

So rushed we forth at once.

Dryden.

Cervi, luporum praeda rapacium.

Hor. Car. Lib. iv. Ode iv. 50.

See a full illustration of the nature and habits of the wolf in Boehart, Hieroz. Part i. B. iii. ch. x. pp. 821-830. Shall dwell. ger. Shall sojourn, or abide. The word usually denotes a residence for a time only, away from home, not a permanent dwelling. The idea here is, that they shall remain peacefully together. The same image occurs in Isa 65:25, in another form: The wolf and the lamb shall feed together.

The lamb – Everywhere the emblem of mildness, gentleness, and innocence; and, therefore, applied often to the people of God, as mild, inoffensive, and forbearing; Joh 21:15; Luk 10:3; Isa 40:2. It is very often applied, by way of eminence, to the Lord Jesus Christ; Joh 1:29; Act 8:32; Isa 2:7; 1Pe 1:19; Rev 5:6, Rev 5:8, Rev 5:12-13; Rev 6:16; Rev 7:9-10, Rev 7:14, Rev 7:17, et al.

And the leopard – namer. The leopard, a well-known wild beast, was regarded in Oriental countries as second in dignity only to the lion. The Arabic writers say, He is second in rank to the lion, and, as there is a natural hatred between them, victory is alternate between them. Hence, in the Scriptures, the lion and the leopard are often joined together as animals of the same character and rank; Son 4:8 :

From the lions den,

From the mountains of the leopards.

See Jer 5:6, and Hos 13:7 :

Therefore I will be unto them as a lion,

As a leopard by the way will I observe them.

The leopard is distinguished for his spots; Jer 13:23 : Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? it has small white eyes, wide jaws, sharp teeth, and is represented as extremely cruel to man. It was common in Palestine, and was an object of great dread. It lurked for its prey like the lion, and seized upon it suddenly Jer 5:6; Hos 13:7, and was particularly distinguished for its velocity Hab 1:8), and is often referred to in the classic writers as an emblem of fleetness. See Bochart. The image used here by Isaiah, that the leopard should lie down with the kid, as an emblem of peace and safety, occurs almost in the same form in the Sybilline oracles, Lib. iii:

, –

parklies t’ eriphois hama boskesontai, –

Leopards shall feed together with kids. See Bochart, Hieroz. Part i. B. iii. ch. vii. pp. 786-791.

With the kid – The young of the goat; Gen 37:21; Lev 23:19; Luk 15:29. Like the lamb, it was an emblem of gentleness, mildness, and inoffensiveness.

And the calf – Another emblem of inoffensiveness and innocence.

And the young lion – The Hebrew word used here – k^ephyr – denotes one that is old enough to go abroad for prey. It is employed as emblematic of dangerous enemies Psa 34:2; Psa 35:17; Psa 58:7; and also as emblematic of young heroes, or defenders of a state; Eze 38:15; Nah 2:12.

And the fatling – The calf or other animal that was well fed, and that would be therefore particularly an object of desire to a wild beast. The beauty of the image is heightened, by the circumstance that now the ravenous beast would live with that which usually excites its keenest appetite, without attempting to injure it.

And a little child shall lead them – This is an especially beautiful image introduced into the picture of peace and prosperity. Naturally, the lion and the leopard are objects of dread to a young child. But here, the state of peace and safety is represented as not only so entire that the child might live with them in safety, but their natural ferocity is so far subdued and tamed, that they could be led by him at his will. The verisimilitude of the picture is increased by the circumstance, that these wild beasts may be so far tamed as to become subject to the will of a man, and even of a child.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Isa 11:6-9

The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb

A portrait of humanity

I.

THE MORAL VARIETIES OF THE RACE. Men are here represented by irrational creatures, differing immensely in their organisations, their habits, and their tempers–the wolf, the lamb, etc. The physical differences between men are great. The mental differences are also great. But the moral varieties are, perhaps, greater still. There are men everywhere about us as ferocious as the lion, as savage as the bear, as snarling as the wolf, as cunning as the leopard, as venomous as the serpent, as harmless as the kid, the lamb, or the little child.

II. THE GOSPEL REFORMATION OF THE RACE. These creatures are here represented as having passed through a wonderful change in their instincts and habits, and this change is ascribed to the advent and reign of Messiah. It is not a change in their physical constitution. The wolf, the leopard, the bear, the lion, and the serpent retain their constitutions intact, though they dwell with the kid, the lamb, and the little child. The change is in their temper–in their ruling instincts. Such is the change that the Gospel works in man. The change is simply in the temper–the heart. It does two things.

1. It extracts social antipathies.

2. It implants social sympathies. This is the only reformation that will meet the case.

III. THE SOCIAL HARMONY OF THE RACE. These creatures, once antagonistic, are here eating together, lying down together, playing together. All are wedded in spirit. Christianity is essentially pacific in its spirit, its teachings, its tendencies and results. (Homilist.)

The fruits of Christs kingdom

1. In every soul which shall come to heaven there must be a change.

2. The change is not of the substantial parts of the body, but of the corrupt qualities of the mind, or soul.

3. The change is made upon the Church of God in this world.

4. The change cometh from the grace of God, and floweth to us by Jesus Christ our Lord.

5. The means by which the change is wrought, namely, by the know ledge of the law, etc.

6. The marks of the change. (R. Sibbes, D. D.)

The touchstone of regeneration

It is an eminent mark of regeneration to have the violence and fierceness of our cruel nature taken away. The signs of regeneration contained in our text are–

I. HARMLESSNESS. This, though it runs along the body of the text and is last mentioned, may be named first, for it is implied in all. How can a man say he is renewed unless in some sort he be like unto God in mercifulness? It is a prime quality in the wicked to do mischief; it is a property of Gods child to be harmless. There are two signs of this sign.

1. If we would not do evil, though we might do it unseen of any creature: as when a little child shall lay his hand on the cockatrices den, the serpent might sting, and yet, unseen of any, pull in the head again.

2. Though we have provocation, we will abstain from doing evil. The little child plays on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child lays his hand upon the cockatrices den. Is not here provocation? Bless them that curse you, etc.

II. SOCIABLENESS. With whom is it that this society holdeth? Not of wild beasts with wild beasts; but there is implied here not only a simple society, as among wild beasts, but a sociableness, as it were, among those of another generation. Naturally all of us have been lions, bears, and wolves, and unsociable haters of goodness in others. This sociableness with those former servants of God, who have been called thus, is a very sure mark of this change in us (1Jn 3:14).

1. No man can love a saint, as a saint, but a saint. A true trial of sociableness is when men will joy to sort themselves with those with whom formerly they have been most unsociable, and whose company they have most loathed.

2. A second sign of this sign is, to love every brother, yea, though it were to lay down our life for a brother.

III. CONSTANCY. How is this implied! By dwelling and lying together. You shall have many companions go with a man for fashions sake to the church, and yet leave going ere it be long. You shall have some men sick, and then like a serpent frozen in winter, which casts his skin, you shall have them cast their skin a little; that is, send for s preacher, make confession of their sins, saying, Oh! if God will spare me, I will become a new man. But when he is well, within a month after, you will find him not with the lamb, but with the bears and the wolves.

IV. INWARDNESS. Their little ones–dear unto them, and of whom they are so jealous and tender–shall lie down together (Act 4:32).

V. TRACTABLENESS. A little child shall lead them and rule them. It is a true sign of grace when we become easy to be ruled, and brought in compass (Job 31:13).

VI. SIMPLICITY. The lion shall eat straw like the ox. Cain was bloody, and fed upon blood; therefore, as it is (Joh 4:32) when a man is come thus far, that he hath meat which one seeth not. Uses–

1. For consolation. Look which religion makes a man most mild, and tames his fierce nature–there is the Church. If we be fierce and savage, let us not deceive ourselves; we are not come to the mountain of which it is said, They shall not hurt nor destroy in all My holy mountain.

2. For exhortation. There is yet a little of the lion and the bear remaining in every one of us–our tree yet bears, on one side of it, crabs. See what minds we must have if we look for a habitation in Gods holy mountain. (R. Sibbes, D. D.)

The splendour and amplitude of Christs kingdom

I. THE MEANING OF THIS PROPHECY. What is meant by the wolf, the leopard, and the rest of the creatures here mentioned? Christ shall come to make the world so happy, that princes and people, the mighty and the meaner sort; the violent, and they that have no power, or no will to resist; the soldier, and the peaceable countryman; the waspish people, and they that are of a sweet disposition, shall all be brought under the same discipline, and submit to the same laws; not to hurt or molest one another, but to promote the common good of the whole body to which they belong.

II. THE TRUTH OF IT; or, that it was exactly fulfilled in our Lord and Saviour.

1. It was the apparent design of our Saviours coming to make such a happy accord among men.

2. The nature of His religion is such as is apt to produce this effect which He designed. This will be evident to everyones satisfaction who will seriously weigh these three things.

(1) The principles of His religion, together with the ways and means whereby these principles were established in mens minds. He taught them that there is but one God, the disbelief of which had set the world at such enmities one with another as they confessed was among the deities. He revealed Him as His and their Father, full of kindness and goodwill to all His children; which St. Paul thought a bond so strong and a motive so efficacious that it concludes the great heap of arguments whereby he persuades Christians to unity of the spirit and peace (Eph 4:6). They are taught to worship this one God, by one Mediator alone. He sent His apostles to baptize all nations into one simple faith (Eph 4:5). The world was to be governed and judged by one common law, and that not the law of Moses, but the plain rules of righteousness, sobriety and godliness. (Eph 2:14; Eph 2:19). All, both Jews and Gentiles, were indifferently endued with one and the same Spirit.

(2) The precepts of His religion. Exact justice (Mat 7:12). Mercy. Meekness and patience. To bless our enemies and do them good, which hath a strange power in it to charm and conquer even the most fierce and barbarous natures. He would have us contented with such things as we have: which evidently destroys that envy, emulation, and ambition, from whence no small stirs and confusions arise in the world. In questions about matters of liberty, He charges those that are satisfied, not to despise such as are not; and those that are not satisfied, not to judge those that are Rom 14:3). In all manner of differences which are apt to arise among us, He would have the peace of God rule in our hearts, so that having this umpire there, we should rest in the determination of what will make most for peace. He instructs likewise our behaviour in our several relations, teaching husbands and wives, parents and children, masters and servants, pastors and people, to demean themselves so to their mutual satisfaction, as to take away the cause of all discord, not only in families and parishes, but in the larger societies of Church and State. The root and foundation of all these our Lord hath laid in much humility and charity.

(3) The obligations He laid upon men to receive these principles and observe these precepts. His doctrine excels that of the best philosophers, who taught many excellent lessons, but could not enforce them with such an assured hope of immortal life or fear of eternal death as our Saviour and His apostles have done.

3. This effect was actually produced in those that heartily embraced His religion (Act 4:32; 2Co 8:3-4). It is to be hoped that the time is coming when Christianity will end, as it began, in abundance of truth and peace, by a right understanding of the will of God and a hearty submission thereto. Let every soul of us do his part that the place where he lives may be in peace–princes and governors, ministers of the Gospel, etc. (S. Patrick, D. D.)

A picture of what the world is to be

It is not a photograph. The poet never photographs, he pictures. And this poet is no exception. He does not wish us to believe that wolves and lambs will one day be friends, and that what Burns calls Natures social union is to be realised by the transfiguration of a lion into a domestic pet or into a beast of the stall. He is not photographing, but picturing a scene which never was and never shall be, in order to represent a splendid spiritual and social reality which must be–the reign amongst men of perfect union and peace on earth. You can see how true this is when you turn over to another picture by this same prophet artist intended to illustrate the same theme. There the wilderness is to be glad, the desert is to blossom as the rose and rejoice, the lame man is to leap as the hart, the highway usually infested by lions and beasts of prey is to be safe as a strong tower, for the obvious reason no lion shall be there. Plainly the prophet is not photographing, but picturing. (R. J. Kyd.)

Natures social union: a picture of heaven upon earth

I. We have A PICTURE OF THE INNER SPIRITUAL UNION AND PEACE WHICH GOD IS CREATING IN EVERY MANS BOSOM. In man all animalism sums itself up in subtlest composition; but there is a Divine element also in his bosom represented by a little child, an elemental force which is placed there to reign over fierce passions and carnal lusts, a force which is destined to be master. Paul gives us insight into this subject. He recognises in mans composite nature the wolf and the lamb, the lion and the child. The flesh lusts against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. The word flesh is Pauls term for that nature in us which loves self and self only, a nature which is characteristic of the whole animal world. The term spirit is a term for that Divine nature in us which loves and cares for others and takes little or no thought of self. As things are, these two natures are at variance more or less in us all. But there should be no war in our bosom. Peace is the ideal state. Love of self and love of others should not clash, but cooperate as they do in the maternal breast. Self-love must not hurt the spirit, the conscience, the finer and higher feelings of charity. This harmony pictured by Isaiah and ethically set forth by Paul is the heaven which has begun to be in our bosom, but only begun. The Child-heart must reign. He who has begun the good work in us will carry it on until the day of Christ.

II. We have A PICTURE OF MANS SOCIAL UNION. His social union is the result of inner spiritual union. When a man is constantly quarrelling with himself, his conscience taunting his cupidity and selfishness, and the child in him leading him to toil and self-sacrifice whilst the animal in him demands ease and pleasure, this picture of union and brotherhood is not possible of realisation. The first thing to be done if we would realise it is to get each mans bosom put right. The wolves of society, the serpents, the land sharks, the men who devour widows houses, the foxes or Herods who are ever looking after Number One, the hypocrite with the slimy lie on his lip whilst the crocodile tear is in his eye, will all be changed into men of honour and kindness, men of purity and righteousness. Social quarrels will end. The labour and capital problem will be solved, and capital and labour will dwell together, like Isaiahs wolf and lamb, in peace. The poor and the weak will not be driven to the wall. Even the innocent child will be safe in the dark. The policemans footstep will cease to be heard in the land, and the soldier will beat his sword into a ploughshare. Blessed outlook!

III. THIS PICTURE IS TO BE REALISED BY THE CHRIST THAT WAS AND IS TO BE. From the power Christ has shown in transfiguring men and raising the tone of society to what it is, we are persuaded that He will succeed in accomplishing His Herculean labour of turning earth into heaven. Surely He must be Divine who proposes to undertake such a work! Let us look at the Divine Man who is able to accomplish what seems to us to be impossible. He has a child-heart in Him. He is, says Isaiah, a Rod out of the stem of Jesse. On Him rests the Spirit of the Lord, the spirit of wisdom and understanding. The Good Shepherds music which brings about the peace of God in our bosom is at first a summons to war. It is a call to the child in us to awake and lead into a glorious captivity the lower animal nature which ever lusts to be first. It is a call to the higher in us to hold in check the lower and bring it by confidence and obedience into union and cooperation. We are summoned to accept the blessed task of being peacemakers in our own breasts, and peacemaking there must begin by a proclamation of war. Strange work for a child! Impossible work! do you affirm? God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty. It is Gods way by things which are not, to bring to nought things that are. (R. J. Kyd.)

The wild beasts

We, who live in countries from which wild beasts have been exterminated, cannot understand the insecurity and terror that they cause in regions where they abound. A modern seer of the times of regeneration would leave the wild animals out of his vision. They do not impress any more the human conscience or imagination. But they once did so most terribly. The hostility between man and the beasts not only formed once upon a time the chief material obstacle in the progress of the race, but remains still to the religious thinker the most pathetic portion of that groaning and travailing of all creation which is so heavy a burden on his heart. (Prof. G. A. Smith, D. D.)

Not exterminated, but tamed

Isaiah would not have the wild beasts exterminated, but tamed. There our Western and modern imagination may fail to follow him, especially when he includes reptiles in the regeneration, and prophesies of adders and lizards as the playthings of children. But surely there is no genial man, who has watched the various forms of life that sport in the Southern sunshine, who will not sympathise with the prophet in his joyous vision. Upon a warm spring day in Palestine, to sit upon the grass, beside some old dyke or ruin with its face to the South, is indeed to obtain a rapturous view of the wealth of life with which the bountiful God has blessed and made merry mans dwelling place. How the lizards come and go among the grey stones and flash like jewels in the dust! And the timid snake rippling quickly past through the grass, and the leisurely tortoise, with its shiny back, and the chameleon, shivering into new colour as he passes from twig to stone, and stone to straw,–all the air the while alive with the music of the cricket and the bee! You feel that the ideal is not to destroy these pretty things as vermin. What a loss of colour the lizards alone would imply! But, as Isaiah declares,–whom we may imagine walking with his children up the steep vineyard paths, to watch the creatures come and go upon the dry dykes on either hand,–the ideal is to bring them into sympathy with ourselves, make pets of them and playthings for children, who indeed stretch out their hands in joy to the pretty toys. (Prof. G. A. Smith, D. D.)

The mystery of the brute creation

What are these animals? Who made them? Who can explain them? Who knows their future? This is a gracious mystery at all events, and may be accepted as a fact–that when man is right with God, the animals will be right with man; when man is right with God, the earth will be right with man, and will feel as if she could not do enough for him in growing him all the bread he wants, and then giving him more than he needs. Let the people praise Thee, O God; let all the people praise Thee. Then shall the earth yield her increase; and God, even our own God, shall bless us. (J. Parker, D. D.)

The redemption of nature

It is one of those errors, which distort both the poetry and truth of the Bible, to suppose that by the bears, lions, and reptiles which the prophet now sees tamed in the time of the regeneration, he intends the violent human characters which he so often attacks. When Isaiah here talks of the beasts, he means the beasts. The passage is not allegorical, but direct, and forms a parallel to the well-known passage in the eighth of Romans. (Prof. G. A. Smith, D. D.)

The legend of St. Blaise

The legend of St. Blaise is of Greek origin. He was bishop over the Christian Church at Sebaste in Cappadocia, and governed his flock for many years with great vigilance, till the persecution under Diocletian, A.D. 289, obliged him to fly; and he took refuge in a mountain cave at some distance from the city. This mountain was the haunt of wild beasts (bears, lions, and tigers); but these animals were so completely subdued by the gentleness and piety of the good old man, that, far from doing him any harm, they came every morning to ask his blessing. If they found him kneeling at his devotions, they waited duteously till he had finished, and, having received the accustomed benediction, they retired. Now, in the city of Sebaste, and in the whole province, so many Christians were put to death, that there began to be a scarcity of wild beasts for the amphitheatres. And Agricolaus, the governor, sent his hunters into the mountains to collect as many lions, tigers, and bears as possible; and it happened that these hunters, arriving one day before the mouth of the cave in which St. Blaise had taken refuge, found him seated in front of it, and surrounded by a variety of animals of different species. The lion and the lamb, the hind and the leopard, seemed to have put off their nature, and were standing amicably together, as though there had been everlasting peace between them; and some he blessed with holy words, knowing that God careth for all things that He has made; and to others that were sick or wounded he ministered gently; and others he reprehended because of their rapacity and gluttony. And, when the hunters beheld this, they were like men in a dream: they stood astonished, thinking they had found some enchanter. And they seized him, and carried him before the governor; and, as they went, the good bishop returned thanks to God, and rejoiced greatly, that, at length, he had been found worthy to die for the cause of Christ. (Mrs. Jameson.)

Man to blame for the wildness of the beasts

We may take on scientific authority a few facts as hints from nature, that after all man is to blame for the wildness of the beasts, and that through his sanctification they may be restored to sympathy with himself. Charles Darwin says: It deserves notice that at an extremely ancient period when man first entered any country the animals living there would have felt no instinctive or inherited fear of him, and would consequently have been tamed far more easily than at present. And he gives some very instructive facts in proof of this with regard to dogs, antelopes, manatees, and hawks. Quadrupeds and birds which have seldom been disturbed by man dread him no more than do our English birds the cows or horses grazing in the fields. Darwins details are peculiarly pathetic in their revelation of the brutes utter trustfulness in man before they get to know him. Persons who have had to do with individual animals of a species that has never been thoroughly tamed, are aware that the difficulty of training them lies in convincing them of our sincerity and good heartedness, and that when this is got over they will learn almost any trick or habit. The well-known lines of Burns to the field mouse gather up the cause of all this, in a fashion very similar to the Bibles. (Prof. O. A. Smith, D. D.)

Mans relation to the lower animals

The practical uses of such a passage of Scripture as this are plain. Some of them are the awful responsibility of mans position as the keystone of creation, the material effects of sin, and especially the religiousness of our relation to the lower animals. (Prof. O. A. Smith, D. D.)

A little child shall lead them

The child to the front

The Bible, when it speaks as it does in these verses, always means something better than it says. Many things come to children much worse than being destroyed by a lion, or eaten by a wolf, or poisoned by a serpents fang, only, I am sorry to believe, neither children nor grown up people think them worse things, nor anything like so dreadful. Perhaps that is the most doleful evil of all. Had I not faith in Gods great wisdom, love, and justice, I should feel that for tens of millions of children in this world it would be infinitely better that they were never born; and that, being born, the next preferable event would be that they should die as soon after birth as possible, even though it were a hungry wolf that should slay them. They come into places more terrible than a wild beasts lair or a cockatrices den. They come into places full of ignorance and iniquity, where they have no opportunity of growing up good, or even of knowing what good is. Now, this text says that in the good time coming all this shall be changed. The day is coming in our country when the child, because of his weakness and his wants, shall be the most cherished and cared for person either in the home, the Church, or the State.

I. From these words, then, we get the idea THAT AS THE WORLD GETS ON, AND MEN GROW WISER, TRUER, AND HOLIER, CHILDREN RISE IN THEIR REGARD. The care for children becomes exalted; it ceases to be a merely natural affection, and is intensified and purified into a moral and spiritual passion. The Bible teaches us that love of children is a note of moral culture, and all history shows that in the measure the claims of the little ones are lightly regarded the moral tone is low. There may be strength and courage for war, there may be art and philosophy, there may be an abundance of physical and intellectual display, but the higher morals–those that are the very graces of the soul, those which perfect men and go to the root of the worlds sins and sorrows–are exceedingly scarce.

II. These words teach us THAT CHILDREN ARE ABLE TO PARTICIPATE IN THAT WHICH IS HIGHEST AND MOST DIVINE–that they can share the best and highest with the best and highest men. The philosophy of the highest good may be far beyond the reach of their reason, but the blessing of it may be realised by them and enjoyed. The sunshine is as warm and delightful to them without any theory of light and heat as with one.

III. Another word we have to speak is, THAT THEY WHO ARE WORKING FOR THE CHILDREN ARE ON THE LINES OF THE WORLDS PROGRESS. The world follows the children–they are always in front. (W. Hubbard.)

Ministry of children

Gods ministers are varied. Children teach many lessons.

1. They purify–by their innocence, teachableness, and purity.

2. They elevate–appealing to our highest and best instincts.

3. They stir. They move us to better living, and stimulate our best qualities.

4. They instruct–e.g., Samuel and Eli.

5. They console–helping to take our minds off trouble.

6. They reconcile. A mother is cheerful for the sake of the children. A father is strengthened by his home life.

7. They gladden. Children are the poetry, flowers, and sunshine of life.

8. They soften and make tender,–for their helplessness appeals to us; the touch of a tiny hand thrills us with pity.

9. They lead Godward.

10. They are a powerful ministry for good.. (Seed for Busy Sowers.)

Led by a child

1. We have no right to sink an interval of many centuries between the verses of this brief prophecy, and to say that while one part of it was fulfilled at the Advent, the other will only be fulfilled in the still distant Millennium. We are rather bound to say: If the Lord Jesus was the Branch that shot forth from Jesses root, and the Spirit of the Lord did really come upon Him that He might rule and reprove the people, then, from that moment, the wolf began to dwell with the lamb, the leopard to lie down with the kid, the lion with the calf; and the little Child went before them, leading them to the holy mountain in which they neither hurt nor destroy. We need fix no date to these words. They are not for an age, but for all time, and for eternity too. They describe the universal reign of Christ. They tell us what the spirit, what the distinguishing characteristics, of that reign always have been and always will be.

2. The beast tamer is distinguished by a quick eye, a prompt punishing hand, a courage and self-possession that never falter; and how should we look for these features and qualities in a child? But may not a child have other qualities quite as potent, and even more potent? Is brute force the only force by which even brutes are ruled? Surely not. Baby lies on the rug with dog and eat. He is not so strong or lithe or quick as they are, or even as you are. Yet he takes liberties with them which you cannot take,–and remember, the cat is of one blood with the leopard, and the dog with the wolf. Nor are even wild beasts insensible to his claim and charm. Else what mean all those stories of helpless and abandoned children suckled, fed, guarded by wolves and bears and lions; or of children chosen by caged wild beasts, the more savage for their captivity, to be their playmates and companions? Many of these stories are quite true, and show what power a little child may have, a power beyond that of man.

3. But when the prophet tells us that in the kingdom of Christ, a little child leads the wolf and the leopard and the lion, as well as the lamb and the kid and the calf, he cannot simply mean that an innocent babe may have more power over the brutes than a grown man. He also meant, no doubt, that in proportion as Christ reigns on the earth the primal order will be restored; that men, reconciled to God and to each other, will also be at peace with all the forces of nature, will rule over them, and bend to their service even those of them which are the most fierce, lawless, hostile, and untameable, and thus regain all, and more than all, that Adam lost.

4. Has not the prediction been verified again and again, and that even on the lower levels of our life! Here, salt, is a bad man,–brutal, fierce, ungoverned and ungovernable. God sends him a little child. And the rough man and the abandoned woman, as they lean over it, are touched, softened, purified. God leads almost all men by their children, leads them to the holy mountain, i.e., to higher levels of life where they breathe a purer air and gain a wider outlook. He sends the little child, and forthwith even the hard and selfish grow tender and unselfish, at least in some of their aims. They will follow him even to the house and worship of God–for many a man repairs to the house of God for his childrens sake who would not come for his own,–and find themselves in the holy mountain or ever they are aware.

5. So that when God sent the Holy Child Jesus to lead men into the kingdom of heaven, He took no new untried way with us, but a way long tried and approved. But, for us, the Lord Jesus is not the Holy Child only at Christmas, or only because He was once a babe in Marys arms. When He grew to be a man, He Himself took a child in His arms, and taught His disciples that to enter His kingdom they must become as little children, and that whosoever most fully possessed himself of the childlike spirit would be greatest in that kingdom. But to enter His kingdom is to begin to grow like Christ; and to become great in it is to grow as like Him as we can. To grow childlike is, therefore, to grow Christlike. But how can that be unless Christ Himself is like a little child?

6. A little child shall lead them. But does he not lead them already? When the little ones come to them, who is it for whom they think, and work, and plan? Who is it that determines the amount of their toil, and even the kind of amusements in which they indulge, and often determines also the very aims and methods of their lives?

7. A little child shall lead them. These words refer to the future as well as to the past and the present. There is a promise in them even for us who are in the kingdom of the Holy Child. And the promise is that as the kingdom of God comes we shall be more and more animated by the child spirit which was and is the Spirit of Christ Himself. (S. Cox, D. D.)

What is the child spirit?

But what is this blessing, and why is it so great? Consider how fearless a child is, so that it can play and take liberties with many a fierce creature whose talons or teeth keep you at a respectful distance. Consider how innocent a child is as compared with you, and what you would give to be equally clear of stinging memories and impure desires. Consider how friendly a little child is, responding with smiles and caresses to every genuine and tender advance. Consider how cheerful it is, with how little it is pleased; how unworldly, making no distinction between beggar and prince, loving its poor nurse better than the fine lady in all her bravery. Consider how free from care a child is, because it trusts in a wisdom, an ability, a goodness beyond its own retaking no thought for what it shall eat or drink or wherewithal it shall be clothed. Consider, too, how lordly a child is. Hardly anything strikes one in little children so much as their calm assumption that all the world was made for them, and that all the men and women in it have nothing else, or nothing else so important, to do as to wait on their will and minister to their whims. (S. Cox, D. D.)

Child leading

I. The text suggests some thoughts about the GENTLENESS AND HUMILITY OF HIM WHO CAME TO US AS A CHILD. Never was a child born into this world in humbler fashion than the Child who came to redeem it. Fit prelude to that strange, solemn, sorrowful, yet infinitely beautiful life! Surely, If humility depends at all on outward circumstances, this little Child was humble indeed. But the inward spirit was in perfect keeping with the outward circumstances. The little Child was never lost in the Man.

II. WAS THIS PROPHECY NOT FULFILLED IN MANY WAYS BY THE CHILD OF BETHLEHEM? He led the herald angels from their highest ministrations in the realms of glory down to the plains of Bethlehem. He led the star that travelled ever westwards until it came and stood over where the young Child was. He led the sages who came with their typical offerings of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. He led the aged prophet, who, in the temple of Jerusalem, caught up the young Child from His mothers arms, and burst into that glad Dismission Hymn which has become incorporated with the liturgies of the Christian Church. Think what marvellous leading is here!

III. DOES NOT THE PROPHECY STILL RECEIVE DAILY FULFILMENT in the history and experience of the world? What is it that brings and binds men to Christ? Is it the Divinity of His person, the glory of His miracles, the thunder of His power, the attraction of heaven, the terrors of hell? Ask a missionary who has laboured for many years among the heathen what has been the element in the Gospel which has drawn men away from their idols to Christ. He will tell you that it was not the Divine power, but the human tenderness that won their hearts. Stern warriors become gentle in His presence. This is He for whom the world has been waiting, and before whom it will bow.

IV. Perhaps YOUR OWN EXPERIENCE will help you to understand the prophets words. Think of your own personal relation to Christ. What was it that first drew you to Him, and now keeps you in His track? It was the gentleness and beauty of His character–the little Child that is forever enshrined in the person of Christ. Or look around you, and see the marvellous power of child leading in the familiar experience of life.

V. It may be that the words will touch for some of us THE SPRING THAT UNLOCKS SECRET AND VERY SACRED MEMORIES. We said, with the stricken parent of old, I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me. But are we very sure of this? Are the mysteries of life and death so clear to us, that we dare not think of child ministers and child leadings continued in spite of death?

VI. A little child shall lead them. The words may have yet ANOTHER FULFILMENT, IN THE LAND THAT IS VERY FAR OFF. Of such is the kingdom of heaven, the Saviour said, as He took the children in His arms. Perhaps when our children sing, Little children shall he there, they touch a truth which their elders are too slow to believe. It may be among the child ministries of heaven to give the first greetings to those who received them in the helplessness of their earthly infancy; and many a weeper may begin to gather the far-off interest of tears, when a little child shall lead them through the forum of the elders to the throne of the King. (J. C. Cameron.)

The power of the children

I. I am going to show you THE POWER OF THE CHILDREN. Again and again great changes have been brought about, history has been made, gown up people have worked and have suffered because of this strange power of the children. If children have power they can use it.

II. THE GOOD THINGS CHILDREN CAN DO. (E. Medley, B. A.)

The child not to rule but to lead

I dont think it is good for children to rule, but I do think it very good for children to lead. (E. Medley, B. A.)

A little child may disarm anger

A missionary on the great River Congo had pushed up on a little steamer into a part where no white man had ever been before. The anchor was let down, and the steamer brought to. Food was needed for the men, and firewood for the engines. The natives came crowding down to the bank to look at this wonderful boat; they were armed with arrows, and big, ugly spears. The missionary tried to talk to them, and made signs of peace. But nothing that he could do seemed to touch them; it was plain that they were partly angry, partly suspicious, and partly afraid, and when savages are in that state they are very dangerous. What was to be done? A happy thought flashed across the missionary. He had his wife and a dear little baby on board; he got the baby, took it up in his arms, and showed it to the people. Now the baby was a really sensible baby, it seemed to understand the situation, and instead of crying, or pretending to be shy, it laughed and crowed as merrily as could be, and when the poor savages saw the baby they felt themselves safe; they understood in a moment that no harm was meant, and so they laid down their arms, and became quite friendly. Even in Africa we can say–a little child shall lead them. (E. Medley, B. A.)

A mother led to Christ by her child

Some years ago, a good woman came to a minister, wanting to join the Church, and confess herself a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ. She was asked how it was that she had come to think of Him, for she had lived a rough, bad life. Oh, said she, it was in this way: I didnt care for good things, I had to slave all day long, I was too busy and too hard hearted and too miserable to care for such things at all. But my little girl, she goes to the Sunday school, and when she comes home she just singe some of the hymns she has learnt–not to me, for I never asked her, but to herself. But I couldnt help hearing, and one of them went to my heart; do what I would, I couldnt forget it, until I began to ask myself whether It too, could not sing–

I heard the voice of Jesus say,

Come unto Me and rest.

I did hear Him, and though I am very dark still, I do love Him. A little child shall lead them; so it is. (E. Medley, B. A.)

Little Lord Fauntleroy

Some of you may have read a very beautiful childrens story called Little Lord Fauntleroy. The pith of it is just this: A noble, open hearted boy is thrown into the company of his grandfather, a proud, hard hearted, selfish, old nobleman, who knows as well as those about him do, what a mean, cynical old tyrant he has been. The earl is thoroughly miserable, only he is too proud to own it. But the lad, who has been brought up in pure and holy ways, insists on thinking well of the old man, attributing to him all sorts of good deeds. In the honest simplicity of his little heart he believes his grandfather to be a very fine man, and says that when he grows up he means to be like him. The trustful love of the boy touches his grandfathers stony heart just as opening spring sunshine touches the winter ice, and it begins to melt; without knowing it the little fellow leads the old man in good ways, and he is won. As to the boy, he is still the merry-hearted fellow he was, not in the least priggish, or goody goody, or conceited, but he has done a work that shall never die. (E. Medley, B. A.)

A childs voice settling a great question

Many years since the see of Milan was vacant, and the position was eagerly sought by two parties who disputed the election with strong and bitter feelings. The prefect of the town, who was a celebrated young lawyer, was called in to quell disorder and settle the dispute. In very earnest and affectionate strains he addressed the excited assembly. But, during one of the momentary pauses in his speech, a childs voice was heard exclaiming, Let Ambrose be our bishop! That tender utterance was accepted like a Divine instruction; the youthful lawyer was forthwith chosen to the occupancy of the episcopal chair, and became a useful servant of the Church. Thus a little child led the assembled electors and secured the ministry of St. Ambrose; St. Ambrose became the means of the conversion of St. Augustine, and St. Augustine by his writings still speaks to Christendom. (J. H. Hitchens, D. D.)

The children leading

A man commonly lives, if possible, nearer to the school to which he sends his children than to his own place of business. It is the children who commonly fix the hour at which he shall dine and often even what he shall have for his dinner, their health and convenience being consulted before his own. He often goes shabby that they may be well clothed, and sometimes hungry that they may be well fed. His very home is furnished with an eye to them; and the new carpets or the costly furniture which he would like to have are postponed till the children are grown up, or the good piano which his wife would like till the children have got through their practising. Where shall the summer holiday be spent? is a question in which the children have the casting vote. How many a man, too, long after he has laid by enough for himself and his wife, and craves retirement and rest, goes labouring on, either that he may provide for children who cannot provide for themselves, or that he may leave them a little more money when he dies! And when the children grow up into young men and women, is it not they who lead the world as once they led their several households. The ruling and shaping spirit of the world changes with every generation. (S. Cox, D. D.)

Age and youth.

Are we, then, to discrown age, experience, authority, and enthrone youth, inexperience, and insolence? Are we to listen to whatever our children may say, and let them lead us where they will! By no means. That would be as injurious to them as to us. But we are to realise the fact that God is educating the race; guiding every generation, and conducting it to a point beyond that of the generation which preceded it. This reverence for youth as the new element, the progressive and advancing element, of the world, is, I believe, peculiar to Christianity, and even in some measure to the Christianity of the present day. (S. Cox, D. D.)

Childrens influence

I heard the other day in the north of England of a large school where the older scholars came together and asked the superintendents that there should be no prizes and no Christmas trees and no ordinary gifts, but that the money should be given to the Soldiers and Sailors Fund. No one had put them up to it. What was the result? All round that district everybody rose up at once to a sense of their responsibility, and the gifts received there exceeded the gifts from other places. (Canon Wilberforce, D. D.)

A beautiful epitaph

In a certain grave yard a white stone that marks the grave of a little girl bears these words: A child of whom her playmates said, It was easier to be good when she was with us. Is not that a beautiful epitaph, little ones?

My darling

One instance wherein the prophets words were fulfilled in spirit, if not in letter, is reported in an American exchange; My darling. These tender words were painted in large letters on the dashboard of a big truck in the street. The thoroughfare was jammed with vehicles and drivers were filling the air with profanity. But the driver of this particular truck sat silent and motionless. No word of his offended the ears of the patient: plodding beast over which he held the reins. During the din of curses a curious man stepped forward and inquired: You seem to take things very easy in this blockade. Yes, mister; Im used to em, was the laconic reply. Besides, he added, it dont help a bit to swear. I notice that you have a name for your truck. Yes, and the stoical mans face brightened and assumed an expression born of a tender heart My darling was my dear little daughter. Shes dead now. Just before she died–but you dont care to hear any part of this – Indeed, I do, interrupted the listener. Well, you see it was this way: Nellie, my darling, took sick, and we couldnt save her; but just before she died she put her thin little arms around my neck and whispered in my ear; Papa, your Nellie is going to die; please promise me that you will be kind to good old Dexter, and dont swear at him. Will you do that for me? Well, sir, I used to be pretty tough and rough, and I could curse with the best of em, but, and the mans voice trembled, I loved my Nellie, and–and I promised her that I would do what she asked. Yes, sir; Ive kept my word. Thats going on three years now, but I havent cussed once since. Thats why Ive named my truck My darling; it always reminds me of my Nellie and her sweet blue eves. Just then the blockade was raised, and My darling rumbled on. (Christian Age.)

The effect of a childs prayer

In a Southern hospital a little girl was to undergo a dangerous operation. She was placed upon the table, and the surgeon was about to give her ether when he said, Before we can make you well, we must put you to sleep. She spoke up sweetly and said, Oh, if you are going to put me to sleep, I must say my prayers first. So she got on her knees, and said the childs prayer, Now I lay me down to sleep. Afterward the surgeon said that he prayed that night for the first time in thirty years. (Christian Endeavour Times.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Verse 6. The wolf also shall, c. – “Then shall the wolf,” c.] The idea of the renewal of the golden age, as it is called, is much the same in the Oriental writers with that of the Greeks and Romans: – the wild beasts grow tame serpents and poisonous herbs become harmless all is peace and harmony, plenty and happiness: –

Occidet et serpens, et fallax herba veneni

Occidet. VIRG. Eclog. iv. 24.

“The serpent’s brood shall die. The sacred ground

Shall weeds and noxious plants refuse to bear.”

____Nec magnos metuent armenta leones.

VIRG. Eclog. iv. 22.

“Nor shall the flocks fear the great lions.”

Non lupus insidias explorat ovilia circum,

Nec gregibus nocturnus obambulat: acrior illum

Cura domat: timidae damae cervique fugaces

Nunc interque canes, et circum tecta vagantur.

VIRG. Georg. iii. 537.

“The nightly wolf that round the enclosure prowled,

To leap the fence, now plots not on the fold:

Tamed with a sharper pain, the fearful doe

And flying stag amidst the greyhounds go;

And round the dwellings roam, of man, their former foe.”

DRYDEN.

Nec vespertinus circumgemit ursus ovile,

Nec intumescit alta viperis humus.

HOR. Epod. xvi. 51.

“Nor evening bears the sheepfold growl around,

Nor mining vipers heave the tainted ground.”

DRYDEN.

‘ ,

.

THEOC. Idyl. xxiv. 84.

There shall be a time when the ravenous wolf shall see the kid lying at ease, and shall feel no desire to do it an injury.

I have laid before the reader these common passages from the most elegant of the ancient poets, that he may see how greatly the prophet on the same subject has the advantage upon the comparison; how much the former fall short of that beauty and elegance, and variety of imagery, with which Isaiah has set forth the very same ideas. The wolf and the leopard not only forbear to destroy the lamb and the kid, but even take their abode and lie down together with them. The calf, and the young lion, and the fatling, not only come together, but are led quietly in the same band, and that by a little child. The heifer and the she-bear not only feed together, but even lodge their young ones, for whom they used to be most jealously fearful, in the same place. All the serpent kind is so perfectly harmless, that the sucking infant and the newly weaned child puts his hand on the basilisk’s den, and plays upon the hole of the aspic. The lion not only abstains from preying on the weaker animals, but becomes tame and domestic, and feeds on straw like the ox. These are all beautiful circumstances, not one of which has been touched upon by the ancient poets. The Arabian and Persian poets elegantly apply the same ideas to show the effects of justice impartially administered, and firmly supported, by a great and good king: –

“Mahmoud the powerful king, the ruler of the world,

To whose tank the wolf and the lamb come, together to drink.”

FERDUSI.

“Through the influence of righteousness, the hungry wolf

Becomes mild, though in the presence of the white kid.”

IBN ONEIN.

JONES, Poes. Asiat. Comment., p. 380.

The application is extremely ingenious and beautiful: but the exquisite imagery of Isaiah is not equalled.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, & c.; the creatures shall be restored to that state of innocency in which they were before the fall of man. But this is not to be understood literally, which is a gross and vain conceit of some Jews; but spiritually and metaphorically, as is evident. And the sense of the metaphor is this, Men of fierce, and cruel, and ungovernable dispositions, shall be so transformed by the preaching of the gospel, and by the grace of Christ, that they shall become most humble, and gentle, and tractable, and shall no more vex and persecute those meek and poor ones mentioned Isa 11:4, but shall become such as they; of which we have instances in Saul being made a Paul, and in the rugged jailer, Ac 16, and in innumerable others. But how can this be applied to Hezekiah with any colour?

A little child shall lead them; they will submit their proud and rebellious wills to the conduct and command of the meanest persons that speak to them in Christs name.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

6. wolf . . . lambEach animalis coupled with that one which is its natural prey. A fit state ofthings under the “Prince of Peace” (Isa 65:25;Eze 34:25; Hos 2:18).These may be figures for men of corresponding animal-likecharacters (Eze 22:27; Eze 38:13;Jer 5:6; Jer 13:23;Mat 7:15; Luk 10:3).Still a literal change in the relations of animals to man andeach other, restoring the state in Eden, is a more likelyinterpretation. Compare Gen 2:19;Gen 2:20; Psa 8:6-8,which describes the restoration to man, in the person of “theSon of man,” of the lost dominion over the animal kingdom ofwhich he had been designed to be the merciful vicegerent under God,for the good of his animal subjects (Ro8:19-22).

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

And the wolf also shall dwell with the lamb,…. This, and the three following verses Isa 11:7, describe the peaceableness of the Messiah’s kingdom; and which the Targum introduces in this manner,

“in the days of the Messiah of Israel, peace shall be multiplied in the earth.”

The wild and tame creatures shall agree together, and the former shall become the latter; which is not to be understood literally of the savage creatures, as if they should lose their nature, and be restored, as it is said, to their paradisiacal estate, which is supposed to be the time of the restitution of all things; but figuratively of men, comparable to wild creatures, who through the power of divine grace, accompanying the word preached, shall become tame, mild, meek, and humble; such who have been as ravenous wolves, have worried Christ’s sheep, made havoc of them, breathing out slaughter and threatenings against them, as did Saul, through converting grace, become as gentle and harmless as lambs, and take up their residence in Christ’s fold, and dwell with, yea, some of them even feed, Christ’s lambs and sheep, as the above mentioned person:

and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; such who are like the leopard, for the fierceness of his nature, and the variety of his spots; who can no more change their hearts and their actions, than that creature can change its nature and its spots; are so wrought upon by the power of divine grace, as to drop their rage against the saints, alter their course of life, and attend on the word and ordinances, lie down beside the shepherds’ tents, where the church feeds her kids, or young converts:

and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; either dwell and feed together, or lie down together, or walk together, since it follows:

and a little child shall lead them; become through the grace of God so tractable, that they shall be led, guided, and governed by the ministers of the Gospel, Christ’s babes and sucklings, to whom he reveals the great things of his Gospel, and out of whose mouths he ordains praise. Bohlius a interprets this little child of Christ himself, by whom they should be led and directed, see Isa 9:6 and the following passages are referred to the times of the Messiah by the Jewish writers b; and Maimonides c in particular observes, that they are not to be understood literally, as if the custom and order of things in the world would cease, or that things would be renewed as at the creation, but in a parabolical and enigmatical sense; and interprets them of the Israelites dwelling safely among the wicked of the nations of the world, comparable to the wild beasts of the field.

(This verse may apply to the future state when all things will be restored to their original state before man fell. By Adam’s sin, death and bloodshed were introduced into the creation. Ro 5:12. In the final state these will be removed and the wild nature of animals become tame. Editor.)

a Comment. Bibl. Rab. in Thesaur. Dissert. Philolog. par. 1. p. 752. b Tzeror Hammor, fol. 25. 3. Baal Hatturim in Deut. 11. 25. c Hilchot Melachim, c. 12. sect. 1. & Moreh Nevochim, par 3. c. 11. p. 354.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

The fruit of righteousness is peace, which now reigns in humanity under the rule of the Prince of Peace, and even in the animal world, with nothing whatever to disturb it. “And the wolf dwells with the lamb, and the leopard lies down with the kid; and calf and lion and stalled ox together: a little boy drives them. And cow and bear go to the pasture; their young ones lie down together: and the lion eats shopped straw like the ox. And the suckling plays by the hole of the adder, and the weaned child stretches its hand to the pupil of the basilisk-viper. They will not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the land is filled with knowledge of Jehovah, like the waters covering the sea.” The fathers, and such commentators as Luther, Calvin, and Vitringa, have taken all these figures from the animal world as symbolical. Modern rationalists, on the other hand, understand them literally, but regard the whole as a beautiful dream and wish. It is a prophecy, however, the realization of which is to be expected on this side of the boundary between time and eternity, and, as Paul has shown in Rom 8, is an integral link in the predestined course of the history of salvation (Hengstenberg, Umbreit, Hofmann, Drechsler). There now reign among irrational creatures, from the greatest to the least, – even among such as are invisible, – fierce conflicts and bloodthirstiness of the most savage kind. But when the Son of David enters upon the full possession of His royal inheritance, the peace of paradise will be renewed, and all that is true in the popular legends of the golden age be realized and confirmed. This is what the prophet depicts in such lovely colours. The wolf and lamb, those two hereditary foes, will be perfectly reconciled then. The leopard will let the teazing kid lie down beside it. The lion, between the calf and stalled ox, neither seizes upon its weaker neighbour, nor longs for the fatter one. Cow and bear graze together, whilst their young ones lie side beside in the pasture. The lion no longer thirsts for blood, but contents itself, like the ox, with chopped straw. The suckling pursues its sport ( pilpel of , m ulcere ) by the adder’s hole, and the child just weaned stretches out its hand boldly and fearlessly to me’urath tziphoni . It is evident from Jer 8:17 that tziphoni is the name of a species of snake. According to Aquila and the Vulgate, it is basiliskos , serpens regulus , possibly from tzaph , to pipe or hiss (Ges., Frst); for Isidorus, in his Origg. xii. 4, says, Sibilus idem est qui et regulus; sibilo enim occidit, antequam mordeat vel exurat . For the hapax leg. hadah , the meaning dirigere , tendere , is established by the Arabic; but there is all the more uncertainty about the meaning of the hap. leg. . According to the parallel , it seems to signify the hollow (Syr., Vulg., lxx, ): whether from = , from which comes ; or from , the light-hole (like , which occurs in the Mishna, Ohaloth xiii. 1) or opening where a cavern opens to the light of day. It is probable, however, that m e’urah refers to something that exerts an attractive influence upon the child, either the “blending of colours” (Saad. renders tziphoni , errakas’ , the motley snake), or better still, the “pupil of the eye” (Targum), taking the word as a feminine of m a’or , the light of the eye ( b. Erubin 55 b – the power of vision). The look of a snake, more especially of the basilisk (not merely the basilisk-lizard, but also the basilisk-viper), was supposed to have a paralyzing and bewitching influence; but now the snake will lose this pernicious power (Isa 65:25), and the basilisk become so tame and harmless, as to let children handle its sparkling eyes as if they were jewels. All this, as we should say with Luthardt and Hofmann ( Schriftbeweis, ii. 2, 567), is only colouring which the hand of the prophet employs, for the purpose of painting the peace of that glorified state which surpasses all possibility of description; and it is unquestionably necessary to take the thought of the promise in a spiritual sense, without adhering literally to the medium employed in expressing it. But, on the other hand, we must guard against treating the description itself as merely a drapery thrown around the actual object; whereas it is rather the refraction of the object in the mind of the prophet himself, and therefore a manifestation of the true nature of that which he actually saw.

But are the animals to be taken as the subject in Isa 11:9 also? The subject that most naturally suggests itself is undoubtedly the animals, of which a few that are alarming and destructive to men have been mentioned just before. And the fact that they really are thought of as the subject, is confirmed by Isa 65:25, where Isa 11:6-9 is repeated in a compendious form. The idea that requires men as the subject, is refuted by the common (compare the parallel promise in Eze 34:25, which rests upon Hos 2:20). That the term yashchithu can be applied to animals, is evident from Jer 2:30, and may be assumed as a matter of course. But if the animals are the subject, har kodshi (my holy mountain) is not Zion-Moriah, upon which wild beasts never made their home in historical times; but, as the generalizing col (all) clearly shows, the whole of the holy mountain-land of Israel: har kodshi has just this meaning in Isa 57:13 (cf., Psa 78:54; Exo 15:17). The fact that peace prevails in the animal world, and also peace between man and beast, is then attributed to the universal prevalence of the knowledge of God, in consequence of which that destructive hostility between the animal world and man, by which estrangement and apostasy from God were so often punished (2Ki 17:25; Eze 14:15, etc.: see also Isa 7:24), have entirely come to an end. The meaning of “the earth” is also determined by that of “all my holy mountain.” The land of Israel, the dominion of the Son of David in the more restricted sense, will be from this time forward the paradisaical centre, as it were, of the whole earth – a prelude of its future state of perfect and universal glorification (Isa 6:3, “all the earth”). It has now become full of “the knowledge of Jehovah,” i.e., of that experimental knowledge which consists in the fellowship of love ( , like , is a secondary form of , the more common infinitive or verbal noun from : Ges. 133, 1), like the waters which cover the sea, i.e., bottom of the sea (compare Hab 2:14, where ladaath is a virtual accusative, full of that which is to be known). “ Cover:” c issah l’ (like sacac l’ , Psa 91:4), signifies to afford a covering to another; the Lamed is frequently introduced with a participle (in Arabic regularly) as a sign of the object (Ewald, 292, e), and the omission of the article in the case of mecassim is a natural consequence of the inverted order of the words.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

Verse 6-10: MILLENNIAL CONDITIONS

1. The consequence of Messiah’s reign will be universal peace, as illustrated in the realm of nature, (Verse 6-8).

b. The most ferocious of beasts will not only cease to prey on domesticated animals; their very nature (and habits) will be changed from carnivorous (flesh-eating) to herbivorous (plant-eating) creatures, (Verse 6-7).

b. Once-poisonous reptiles will no longer be a danger- even to a weaned child, (Verse 8).

c. In fact, there will be nothing, in that day, to hurt or destroy in all the vast regions of our Lord’s kingdom!

2. In that day Jesse’s “root” will stand as an ensign for all people, and all nations will bow before Him, (Verse 10; Rom 15:8-12).

3. Then will “the place of His rest” (Isa 14:3; Isa 28:12; Isa 32:17-18; Hag 2:9) – His throne – be glorious indeed!

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

6. The wolf shall dwell with the lamb. He again returns to describe the character and habits of those who have submitted to Christ. As there is a mutual relation between the king and the people, he sometimes ascends from the body to the head, and sometimes descends from the head to the body; and we have already seen that Christ reigns, not for himself, but for those who believe in him. Hence it follows that he forms their minds by his heavenly Spirit. But the Prophet’s discourse looks beyond this; for it amounts to a promise that there will be a blessed restoration of the world. He describes the order which was at the beginning, before man’s apostasy produced the unhappy and melancholy change under which we groan. Whence comes the cruelty of brutes, which prompts the stronger to seize and rend and devour with dreadful violence the weaker animals? There would certainly have been no discord among the creatures of God, if they had remained in their first and original condition. When they exercise cruelty towards each other, and the weak need to be protected against the strong, it is an evidence of the disorder ( ἀταξίας) which has sprung from the sinfulness of man. Christ having come, in order to reconcile the world to God by the removal of the curse, it is not without reason that the restoration of a perfect state is ascribed to him; as if the Prophets had said that that golden age will return in which perfect happiness existed, before the fall of man and the shock and ruin of the world which followed it. Thus, God speaks by Hosea:

I will make a covenant with the beast of the field, with the fowl of the heaven, and with the creeping things. (Hos 2:18.)

As if he had said, “When God shall have been reconciled to the world in Christ, he will also give tokens of fatherly kindness, so that all the corruptions which have arisen from the sinfulness of man will cease.”

In a word, under these figures the Prophets teach the same truth which Paul plainly affirms, that Christ came to gather together out of a state of disorder those things which are in heaven and which are on earth. (Eph 1:10; Col 1:20.) It may be thus summed up: “Christ will come to drive away everything hurtful out of the world, and to restore to its former beauty the world which lay under the curse.” For this reason, he says, that straw will be the food of the lion as well as of the ox; for if the stain of sin had not polluted the world, no animal would have been addicted to prey on blood, but the fruits of the earth would have sufficed for all, according to the method which God had appointed. (Gen 1:30.)

Though Isaiah says that the wild and the tame beasts will live in harmony, that the blessing of God may be clearly and fully manifested, yet he chiefly means what I have said, that the people of Christ will have no disposition to do injury, no fierceness or cruelty. They were formerly like lions or leopards, but will now be like sheep or lambs; for they will have laid aside every cruel and brutish disposition. By these modes of expression he means nothing else than that those who formerly were like savage beasts will be mild and gentle; for he compares violent and ravenous men to wolves and bears which live on prey and plunder, and declares that they will be tame and gentle, so that they will be satisfied with ordinary food, and will abstain from doing any injury or harm. On this subject it is proper to argue from the less to the greater. “If Christ shall bring brute animals into a state of peace, much more will brotherly harmony exist among men, who will be governed by the same spirit of meekness.” And yet Isaiah does not mean that any are mild and peaceful by nature before they are renewed, but yet he promises, that whatever may have been their natural disposition, they will lay aside or conquer their fierceness, and will be like lambs and sheep.

And a little child shall lead them. This means that beasts which formerly were cruel and untameable, will be ready to yield cheerful obedience, so that there will be no need of violence to restrain their fierceness. Yet we must attend to the spiritual meaning which I noticed, that all who become Christ’s followers will obey Christ, though they may formerly have been savage wild beasts, and will obey him in such a manner, that as soon as he lifts his finger, they will follow his footsteps, as it is said that his people shall be willing. (Psa 110:3.) Those who are not endued with this meekness do not deserve to be ranked among the sheep. Let us, therefore, permit ourselves to be ruled and governed by him, and let us willingly submit to those whom he has appointed over us, though they appear to be like little children. Besides, I think that the ministers of the word are compared to children, because they have no external power, and exercise no civil government over them.

A question arises, Do we find any persons who are meek, though they have not been tamed by the gospel? The Prophet appears to insinuate this, when he compares some men to sheep, and others to wolves and bears; and certainly among men who follow the bent of their natural disposition, we shall perceive an astonishing diversity. Some are mild and gentle, others are fierce and violent; but it is certain that all men are untamed till Christ subdues them by the gospel; all are swelled with ambition and pride before they are cured by this medicine. Many will be able to make a false and hollow profession of modesty and humility, but they will swell with inward pride. In short, where the Spirit of Christ is not, there will be no true meekness.

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

(6) The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb . . .It is significant of the prophets sympathy with the animal world that he thinks of that also as sharing in the blessings of redemption. Rapine and cruelty even there were to him signs of an imperfect order, or the consequences of a fall, even as to St. Paul they witnessed of a bondage of corruption (Rom. 8:21). The very instincts of the brute creation should be changed in the age to come, and the lion should eat straw like the ox. Men have discussed the question whether and when the words shall receive a literal fulfilment, and the answer to that question lies behind the veil. It may be that what we call the laws of animal nature in these respects are tending to a final goal, of which the evolution that has tamed the dog, the bull, the horse, is as it were a pledge and earnest (Soph., Antig., 342-351). It may be, however, that each form of brute cruelty was to the prophets mind the symbol of a human evil, and the imagery admits, therefore, of an allegorical rather than a literal interpretation. The classical student will remember the striking parallelism of the fourth Eclogue of Virgil, which, in its turn, may have been a far-off echo of Isaiahs thoughts, floating in the air or embodied in apocryphal Sibylline Oracles among the Jews of Alexandria and Rome.

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

6. Of commentators, most rationalists, and some who were not, have written of these texts as if they are to be taken literally. Not one particle of interest to the cause of truth seems to be served by so understanding them. The whole is so obviously a stream of metaphors, or an allegory, that the plain thing to do is to find what rich truths are taught under such a garb.

The wolf shall dwell Or, shall sojourn; as it were, to stay for the night or longer. The wolf in Palestine, as elsewhere, is the most uneasy, untamable, and ravenous of animals. To sojourn with the lamb, instead of devouring it, is so unnatural that it is necessary to take it as an imagined possibility, not a physical one; hence it becomes a very strong figure to represent the greatest moral change in nature. And this is true of all the other cases in these verses. Wood’s Bible Animals points out that while a wolf attacks sheepfolds, a leopard can follow a kid along precipices where no wolf would venture, and the lion will carry off oxen which neither leopard nor wolf can move. This settles the appositeness and congruity of the metaphoric material of the passage.

A little child He needs not to be a grown man.

Shall lead them Relative superiority of man over the animal world is retained.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Comments The Redemption of Creation – We find a beautiful description in Isa 11:6-9 and a similar one in Isa 65:25 of God’s creatures living in harmony on earth during the Millennial reign of Christ on earth.

Isa 65:25, “The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock: and dust shall be the serpent’s meat. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the LORD.”

The original order of the animal kingdom was for all creatures to eat plants. It was not God’s plan for animals to be carnivorous; rather, in the Story of Creation God gave the green herbs for meat to all the beasts of the field.

Gen 1:30, “And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.”

We see in the book of Isaiah how the lion will one day in the new heavens and new earth return to this order and eat straw like the ox.

Today, scientists tell us of the “food chain” in nature where small animals are eaten by larger animals, until certain predators emerge at the top of these food chains in each ecosystem around the world. In the land of Palestine, it was probably the wolf, the lion and the leopard mentioned in these two verses that were at the top of this food chain. We find a comment on the original harmony of God’s creation in one of the inter-biblical writings of the Jews called The Book of Jubilees. It tells us how the order of animals was originally not to devour one another, but to live together peacefully. It says that this corruption of order in nature took place in Genesis 6 when men became so corrupt that God had to destroy the earth with the flood.

“And it came to pass when the children of men began to multiply on the face of the earth and daughters were born unto them, that the angels of God saw them on a certain year of this jubilee, that they were beautiful to look upon; and they took themselves wives of all whom they chose, and they bare unto them sons and they were giants. And lawlessness increased on the earth and all flesh corrupted its way, alike men and cattle and beasts and birds and everything that walks on the earth – all of them corrupted their ways and their orders, and they began to devour each other , and lawlessness increased on the earth and every imagination of the thoughts of all men (was) thus evil continually. And God looked upon the earth, and behold it was corrupt, and all flesh had corrupted its orders , and all that were upon the earth had wrought all manner of evil before His eyes. And He said that He would destroy man and all flesh upon the face of the earth which He had created. But Noah found grace before the eyes of the Lord. And against the angels whom He had sent upon the earth, He was exceedingly wroth, and He gave commandment to root them out of all their dominion, and He bade us to bind them in the depths of the earth, and behold they are bound in the midst of them, and are (kept) separate.” ( The Book of Jubilees 5.1-7) [30]

[30] The Book of Jubilees, trans. R. H. Charles, in The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament in English With Introductions and Critical and Explanatory Notes to the Several Books, vol 2, ed. R. H. Charles, 1-82 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1913), 20.

Isa 11:11 And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall set his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people, which shall be left, from Assyria, and from Egypt, and from Pathros, and from Cush, and from Elam, and from Shinar, and from Hamath, and from the islands of the sea.

Isa 11:11 Word Study on “Pathros” Gesenius says the Hebrew name “Pathros” “path-roce’” ( ) (H6624) refers to Upper Egypt. The ISBE tells us that the word “Pathros” is of Egyptian origin and literally means, “the south land.” Pathros is a part of Egypt and the home country of the Pathrusim people; probably located in upper Egypt. [31] The Enhanced Strong says this word is used 5 times in the Old Testament, being translated in the KJV as “Pathros.” Note the other five uses:

[31] “Pathros,” in International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, ed. James Orr (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., c1915, 1939), in The Sword Project, v. 1.5.11 [CD-ROM] (Temple, AZ: CrossWire Bible Society, 1990-2008).

Jer 44:1, “The word that came to Jeremiah concerning all the Jews which dwell in the land of Egypt, which dwell at Migdol, and at Tahpanhes, and at Noph, and in the country of Pathros, saying,”

Jer 44:15, “Then all the men which knew that their wives had burned incense unto other gods, and all the women that stood by, a great multitude, even all the people that dwelt in the land of Egypt, in Pathros , answered Jeremiah, saying,”

Eze 29:14, “And I will bring again the captivity of Egypt, and will cause them to return into the land of Pathros , into the land of their habitation; and they shall be there a base kingdom.”

Eze 30:14, “And I will make Pathros desolate, and will set fire in Zoan, and will execute judgments in No.”

Isa 11:11 Comments – Cush and Mizraim were the sons of Ham (Gen 10:6) and lived to the south of Israel, in northern Africa. The inhabitants of Pathros would be descendents of the sons of Ham. Assyria and Elam were the children of Shem (Gen 10:22) and lived to the west and northwest of Israel, whose descendents inhabited the land of Shinar. Hamath was a city to the north of Israel. The islands of the sea would represent the people to the west of Israel across the sea. Thus, we see a description of God bringing back the Jews out of the nations who surround Israel on its four sides. Isa 11:11 appears to list these surrounding nations in the order of their power and eminent threat against Israel during the time of Isaiah. For example, Assyria is listed first and was the leading power of this period in Israel’s history. Egypt, which is listed second, was the second most powerful nation at this time. The least threat to Israel would be the islands of the sea.

Gen 10:6, “And the sons of Ham; Cush, and Mizraim, and Phut, and Canaan.”

Gen 10:22, “The children of Shem; Elam, and Asshur, and Arphaxad, and Lud, and Aram.”

Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures

Isa 11:6-9. The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb We have here the illustrious consequence of the oeconomy of this divine kingdom, this kingdom of righteousness, equity, faith, and grace. Who can wonder that a kingdom, though increasing from the smallest beginning, should make a great progress in a little time, extend its wings widely, and procure for its subjects security, peace, concord, felicity, and a clear and abounding knowledge of the ways of God; whose king, armed with divine power, exercises in the administration of it perfect justice; enriches his subjects with excellent heavenly gifts, and at the same time teaches and instructs them himself? Who would not wish to be the subjects of so blessed, so perfect a kingdom? Who would wonder at the conflux of the nations to this kingdom?A kingdom, if you consider its security and glory; if its discipline and instruction, a school; if its consolation and spiritual food, a fold, for a flock well fed and safely reposed? This is the connection of the prophet. His expressions are metaphorical: he teaches us, that it shall come to pass in this kingdom (which here, changing the metaphor, he represents under the figure of the flock lying down and feeding under the care of the Messiah, as the great and chief shepherd) not only the most profound peace shall flourish, but also the utmost security; insomuch, that the most inveterate enemies of the kingdom of God, brought into its communion, shall lay down their cruelty, barbarity, and ferocity, their inclination to hurt, their craft and subtilty; and not only so, but this kingdom also shall be purged from all offences, from all evils and instruments of malice; which eminent good proceeds from another, and that equally or more remarkable, namely, the repletion of the earth with the knowledge of the Lord; whereby the people being illuminated, shall cast off their barbarous and depraved manners, shall willingly subject themselves to the rule of the Messiah, with meekness and humility, and shall fulfil the law of brotherly love by the grace of the Holy Spirit, in the offices of mutual good-will. This is the sum of the present passage, divested of metaphor, whereof the prophet himself gives us the key in the beginning of the 9th verse. Compare Act 10:10-11; Act 10:48. The holy mountain, Isa 11:9 means the Christian church; and so it is commonly used by our prophet. See ch. Isa 65:25 and Mat 13:41. Michaelis observes, that these figurative expressions have employed the wits of interpreters, who have endeavoured to assign a mystical sense to each of the images; whereas the nature of the description is such, that a general truth is to be deduced from the whole, not a partial one from every particular. The intention of the prophet was, to describe the happiness of the Messiah’s reign, which was to consist in the greatest purity of worship, in the abolition of the Levitical ceremonies, and in the unlimited promulgation of the doctrines of the Gospel throughout the world; the natural tendency of which would be, the promotion of peace, and the exercise of benevolence among mankind. Though it would argue some degree of enthusiasm to interpret Virgil’s 4th Eclogue in this manner, yet it is no absurdity to ascribe this meaning to the sacred prophet. The intention of his whole book is, to communicate the knowledge of future events, and more especially the coming of the Messiah: to interpret this passage, therefore, in that light, is consistent with the whole tenor of the prophet’s writings; and it should be observed, that the Jewish metaphors, which were originally borrowed from hieroglyphics, were used in common to express these hidden sentiments; and the interpretation of them in this sense is natural, and consistent with the canons of true criticism. We may just remark, that the last sentence in the 9th verse, expressing the exuberance of the divine knowledge, is elliptical. The meaning is, “The earth shall be spread over, and filled with the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters spread over the bottom, and entirely fill all the channels of the sea. From the efficacious preaching of the Gospel, and the knowledge of Christ, those wonderful conversions and blessed effects signified in these verses shall proceed.” See Hab 2:14. This prophesy may with propriety be referred to the kingdom of grace, as first established upon the earth; though there can be no doubt that in its perfection it refers to those latter days, that end of time, when we hope and expect that the knowledge of Christianity, universally diffused, will produce a more eminent exertion of all those divine graces and virtues which it inculcates.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

DISCOURSE: 876
THE CHANGE TO BE WROUGHT BY THE GOSPEL IN THE LATTER DAY

Isa 11:6-9. The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.

THE happiness and prosperity of kingdoms depend much on the wisdom and equity of those who govern. Yet the best of rulers cannot always secure their people either from the turbulence of faction, or from assaults of foreign enemies. Thus it is with the kingdom of Christ on earth. He, the Lord and Governor of all, is endowed with every qualification for the discharge of his regal office [Note: ver. 14.], and executes that office with consummate equity and wisdom [Note: ver. 5.]: yet, through the infirmities of his subjects, and the malice of his adversaries, his kingdom is far from enjoying the full advantages of his administration. There will, however, be a time, when his dominion shall be extended over all the earth, and perfect peace shall reign throughout all his empire.

The prophecy on which this observation is grounded, will naturally lead us to shew,

I.

The change that shall be wrought on men in the latter day

Men in their intercourse with each other too much resemble the brute creation
[It is indeed humiliating to compare men with venomous and ferocious beasts: but there is scarcely any beast, however savage, to which God himself has not compared us [Note: He likens us to foxes, Son 2:15; serpents and vipers, Mat 3:7; Mat 23:33; wolves, Mat 10:16; wild asses, Jer 2:24; wild boars, Psa 80:13; wild bulls, Isa 51:20, &c.]. Nor is it by figurative representation only, but by plain and express declarations, that God has marked the evil dispositions of our fallen nature [Note: Rom 1:29-31. 2Ti 3:2-4.]. And if we either look around us, or within us, we shall see that his descriptions are by no means exaggerated. Let any one observe the proud and envious, the wrathful and malicious, the selfish and covetous workings of the heart, and he shall soon perceive that, if man were unrestrained by human laws, he would prey upon his fellow-man with as much ferocity as the beasts themselves.]

But in the latter day universal harmony shall prevail
[Then this beautiful description shall be fully realized. Men shall dwell together as the beasts in the ark, none attempting to hurt or destroy another: or rather, they shall dwell together as the beasts in Paradise: none having so much as n disposition to hurt: but all filled with gentleness and love.
This event is foretold in other passages of Holy Writ [Note: Isa 65:25.]: and it shall surely be accomplished at the appointed season: The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will do this.]

To confirm our expectation of this universal change, let us consider,

II.

The means by which it shall be effected

It is beyond the power of any human efforts to accomplish it
[However civilization may have changed the manners of men, it is but too evident that their hearts are the same as ever. In proof of this we need only appeal to the bloody wars which nations wage with each other: to the duels which are fought on account of the most trifling injuries or insults: and to the execrable traffic in slaves, which, to the disgrace of the Christian name, yea, to the disgrace of humanity itself, is justified and carried on amongst us, in spite of all the efforts that have been made for its abolition. If further proof were necessary, we may all find it very abundantly in the various circles in which we move: for there is scarcely a society, or even a single family, in which feuds, dissensions, quarrels, do not frequently arise: yea, the very relatives most interested in cultivating love and harmony, are often most at variance. Does not this shew how untamed we are, notwithstanding the restraints of wholesome laws, and the instructions given us in the word of God?]
But the Gospel of Christ, when universally received, shall soon effect it
[Men continue like wild beasts, because they know not the Lord [Note: 1Sa 2:12.]. The knowledge of Christ, and of his salvation, would produce a wonderful change on their spirit and conduct. Behold, what it wrought as soon as ever the Gospel was preached! Thousands of blood-thirsty murderers were transformed into the most lovely and loving of the human race [Note: Act 4:32.]. And, wherever it is received, its tendency is the same. It is the rod of Gods strength, which brings down every adverse power, and accomplishes for man the salvation of his soul [Note: Psa 110:2. 2Co 10:4-5. Rom 1:16.]. It renews all after the same image [Note: Col 3:10.]; brings all into the same family [Note: Eph 2:19. 2Co 6:18.]; unites all in the same interests [Note: Eph 4:4-5.]; and forms all into one mystical body [Note: 1Co 12:20-21; 1Co 12:25; 1Co 12:27.]: how then can it fail of producing harmony and love? This knowledge shall at a future period be universally diffused [Note: Hab 2:14.]: and these effects shall as universally result from it [Note: Isa 2:4 and Tit 2:11-12.].]

Let us learn from this subject,
1.

The nature of true conversion

[Conversion does not consist in embracing any tenets, however scriptural, or important. The knowledge of Christ is indeed, as has been before observed, the means of converting us; but conversion itself consists in a thorough change in all our tempers, dispositions, and conduct, and in a renewal of our souls after the divine image [Note: 2Co 5:17. Eph 4:22-24.]. The lion must become a lamb: we must become as little children, if ever we would enter into the kingdom of heaven [Note: Mat 18:3.].]

2.

The excellency of the Gospel

[In vain is the moral fitness of things insisted on; yea, in vain are the demands of the law and the terrors of hell displayed, for the conversion of men: nothing but the knowledge of Christ crucified can ever operate on the soul of man, so as to produce in it a radical and universal change [Note: Rom 8:3.]. But, where Christ is known aright, there the whole man will assume a new character: and in proportion as his glory is seen by us, we shall be assimilated to his image [Note: 2Co 3:18.]. Let not the Gospel then be despised as fanatical, or be defamed as licentious; but let it be revered and embraced with our whole hearts.]

3.

The blessedness of those who know the Lord

[It is to be lamented that the knowledge of Christ does not produce in these days the full effects that were visible in the Apostles. But the fault is in us, and not in the Gospel. Nevertheless there are many, who, even in this age of vice and infidelity, are monuments of the power and grace of Christ; and who, from having been as despiteful towards each other as Jews and Gentiles, are living in the sweetest communion with each other, and with their God. Happy they, whose views are thus rectified, whose passions are thus subdued, and whose lives are thus regulated by the Gospel of Christ [Note: Deu 33:29.]! They have indeed a paradise below; and shall soon enjoy uninterrupted harmony in heaven [Note: 1Jn 1:3; 1Jn 4:16-17.].]

Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)

Spiritual blessings are promised, under figurative expressions. Such are the blessed effects introduced into the circumstances of mankind by the gospel of Christ, that, like the beasts of the forest tamed and brought under order, the passions of our fallen nature shall be regulated and restrained. A little child shall lead them; that is, the Lord’s people shall be so much under the blessed influence of grace in the heart, that they will need nothing of human learning to guide them. And was not this prophecy fulfilled in the days of the gospel, when Mary became the first preacher of the resurrection? Angels brought the tidings to the women; and they, and not the apostles, first spread it abroad.

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

“Handfuls of Purpose”

For All Gleaners

“The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the falling together; and a little child shall lead them.” Isa 11:6

Some have seen in these words a promise that the animal world should in some way share in the blessings of redemption. It has been supposed by them that rapine and cruelty were signs of an imperfect order, and that when man is put right as to his spirit and action the influence of the restoration will be felt as widely as was the influence of his fall. We need not attempt to give the words a literal fulfilment. They admit of an accommodation which is most legitimate, indeed, so legitimate as to hardly be an accommodation. It is almost a literal interpretation of them to point out that the great object of the kingdom of heaven amongst men is to drive away all disorder, all cruelty, all wrong-doing, and to bring universal Sabbath to shine upon the darkness and the tumult of time. These words may be taken as allegorical or as literal, according to the conviction of the reader. It is certain, however, that when the work of Christ is perfected upon the earth there shall be a great reconciliation of classes, of interests, and of policies; man shall no longer vex man, or oppress him, or reap his fortunes in the fields of human misery. We have today, even amongst men, the wealthy and the lowly, the strong and the weak, the rapacious and the unselfish. We need not go to zoology to find instances of opposed temper and blood. We find such instances in abundance amongst ourselves. There are men of uncontrollable temper, men of insatiable cupidity, men of consuming ambition, men gentle, patient, and helpful. Indeed, the words “the wolf” and “the lamb” almost literally represent the varieties of temper which we find in human society. If we regard the words as conveying a Gospel promise, then they may be so read as to give us the assurance that when the work of Christ is complete in the earth all men will feel the passion and enter into the joy of true brotherhood. All rapacity, cruelty, selfishness, will be done away. Any religion that contemplates such a consummation is by so much a religion that ought to challenge our reason and our confidence. Note how grand, how glorious the object of Christ’s kingdom is continually represented to be. It is never associated with anything that is petty or dishonourable. It is never brought in to the loss of any honest soul. Wherever the kingdom of Christ comes, summer comes, Sabbath comes, a great harvest of joy comes. Judge the kingdom by its results. Judge the Cross of Christ not by some metaphysical standard but by the great object which it has in view, and it will be then seen that behind all the mystery is a purpose of love vast as infinity, tender as the very spirit of pity.

Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker

Isa 11:6 The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them.

Ver. 6. The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb. ] Not worrying as he was wont, but made tame and tractable. Lo, such a blessed change is wrought in all true converts, as is to be seen in Paul, that wolf of the tribe of Benjamin, prophesied of by Jacob, Gen 49:27 as some hold. And the like may be said of Petrus Paulus Vergerius, once the Pope’s nuncio, but afterwards a great preacher of the gospel. Hugh Latimer, once as obstinate a Papist as any was in England – they are his own words – but converted by blessed Bilney, as he called him usually, he became a zealous promoter of the truth according to godliness, confessor general to all Protestants troubled in mind, and the treasury into which restored ill-gotten goods were cast, to be bestowed on the poor according to his discretion, a

And the leopard shall lie down with the kid. ] As they did at the creation, and afterward in Noah’s ark; all bloodiness and rapine laid aside. Those that love not one another out of a pure heart fervently, but are filled with envy, malice, debate, deceit, malignity, are none of Christ’s subjects, nor fellow-citizens with the saints.

And a little child shall lead them. ] That is, the child Jesus, say some interpreters, by the conduct of his Holy Spirit; or the apostles and other godly ministers, who were counted but as little children to the Pharisees and philosophers, called the grandees and “princes of this world.” 1Co 2:8 But they do best that understand it of such a tractableness and teachableness in Christians, that they can be content to learn of any one, though never so mean, that can better inform them. b See this in Apollos. Act 18:26 Augustine, as himself witnesseth thus in one of his epistles, En adsum senex a iuvene coepiscopo, episcopus tot annorum a collega nondum anniculo paratus sum discere, I am here an old man, ready to learn from a young man, my coadjutor in the ministry; and so old a bishop, from one who hath scarce been a year in the service. Hippocrates adviseth men not to slack or disdain to learn even of those who are counted idiots. c

a Sleidan, lib. xxi., p. 650. Bucholc., A.D. 1548. Act, and Mon., 919; Fuller’s Church History, fol. 405.

b Ut vel ex puero, i.e., ex inopi et simplici quovis. – Scultet.

c M .

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Isa 11:6-9

6And the wolf will dwell with the lamb,

And the leopard will lie down with the young goat,

And the calf and the young lion and the fatling together;

And a little boy will lead them.

7Also the cow and the bear will graze,

Their young will lie down together,

And the lion will eat straw like the ox.

8The nursing child will play by the hole of the cobra,

And the weaned child will put his hand on the viper’s den.

9They will not hurt or destroy in all My holy mountain,

For the earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD

As the waters cover the sea.

Isa 11:6-9 This is a picture of the Messianic era, described in terms of Genesis 1 and used in Revelation 22. Nature has been affected by mankind’s sin, Genesis 3. It will also be affected by the Messiah’s salvation (cf. Rom 8:19-25). Notice the emphasis again on the small child of the new age.

The fellowship between humans and animals reflects the Garden of Eden. Humans have so much in common with the animals that occupy the surface of this planet. They were also created for fellowship with God (cf. Job 38:39; Job 40:34) and us! The Bible starts with God, humans, and animals in a garden setting (Genesis 1-2) and it concludes with God, humans, and with these passages in Isaiah, animals (cf. Isa 65:15; Hos 2:18; Revelation 21-22). I personally do not think our pets will be in heaven, but I do think animals will be a part of eternity! They add a wonderful richness to life. They only became food and coverings after the Fall!

Another point about the inherent ambiguity involved in texts associated with the eschaton is the age of the persons mentioned. Little children (Isa 11:6) and infants (Isa 11:8) implies that physical birth continues. This assumes an earthly setting totally analogous to current life (cf. Mat 24:38; Luk 17:27). However, Jesus asserts that there will be no sexual activity in the new age (cf. Mat 22:29-30). Will humans in the eschaton be all different ages? Will they grow old? These are questions that have caused commentators to postulate a limited earthly period of restored righteousness (i.e., a millennium) and a future idealized state. Some have even postulated a split between a group in heaven and a group on earth. I prefer a single, visible Second Coming and an immediate idealized fellowship with God. If this is true, much of the OT and NT has to be viewed as accommodation related to the spiritual Kingdom of God. Please see my commentaries on Revelation, Daniel, Zechariah online free at www.freebiblecommentary.org.

This new day of universal peace is described in idealistic, area-wide, inclusivistic terms. When is this new age to manifest itself?

1. return from exile under Zerubbabel and Joshua (i.e., Ezra and Nehemiah)

2. the Maccabean period (interbiblical)

3. the inauguration of the Kingdom of God in Jesus’ lifetime (Gospels)

4. a millennial period (Rev 20:1-10 only)

5. an eternal kingdom (cf. Dan 7:14)

Each is viewed as a new opportunity, but with problems (#1-4). This is where different systematic (denominational) theologies take the ambiguous references and turn them into a theological grid through which to view all Scripture. The promises are sure! But the time frame and specifics are not.

One central question which deals with this issue is how literal is the restoration of an earthly garden (i.e., Eden) to be taken (Genesis 1-3 and Revelation 21-22)? Is (1) this planet the focus; (2) the kosmos the focus; or (3) a spiritual realm beyond time-space, possibly another dimension of reality (cf. Joh 4:21-24; Joh 18:36)?

Isa 11:6

NASB, NKJV,

NRSVand the fatling

REV, REBwill feed together

NJBfat-stock beast

The LXX and Peshitta add ox and also add the VERB feed together. The MT has fatling, but no VERB. With an emendation and the fatling () can be changed to will be fed (). The UBS Hebrew Text Project gives the VERB a C rating (considerable doubt). With the parallelism of the first two and fourth lines of poetry having VERBS, one would expect the third line to have one also. The Dead Sea Scroll of Isaiah and the Septuagint have the VERB fed.

The fatling would have sacrificial connotations (cf. Isa 1:11; Amo 5:22).

Isa 11:9 My holy mountain This does not refer to Jerusalem or Sinai, but to the entire earth as the parallel phrase in Isa 11:9 b shows. Also notice that the attributes of the Messiah have now been effectively communicated to all humans (cf. Gen 1:26-27; Gen 3:15). He is the ideal covenant man!

Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley

wolf. Figure of speech Ampliatio. App-6.

little child = youth.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

The Child as Leader

And a little child shall lead them.Isa 11:6.

You will remember the context of this verse. Isaiah is drawing a picture of redeemed nature. Under the rule of the promised Prince of Davids line, the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; andas a charming finishing touch to the idyllic scenea little child shall lead them. I do not think that when Isaiah talks of bears and lions and reptiles, he means fierce and cruel and cunning men. When he talks of the beasts he means the beasts. The passage is a parallel to St. Pauls vision of a ransomed nature in the 8th chapter of Romans. And Isaiah does not wish to exterminate the wild animals, but to tame them. This is the more remarkable, because in countries where wild beasts abound they are not looked upon as big game, but as dangerous enemies. After all, man is largely to blame for the wildness of the beasts. Darwin gives us pathetic instances of the trustfulness of wild animals towards man, until they come to know him. If ever man becomes sufficiently civilised to cease from the wanton destruction of animal life, the wild creatures will soon become his friends.

I

1. How should a little child lead the savage wolf, the fierce leopard, the powerful and majestic lion? Even a man can hardly do that. Before he can tame them to his will, he must show himself strong as the lion, fierce as the leopard, cunning as the wolf. The beast-tamer is distinguished by a quick eye, a prompt punishing hand, a courage and self-possession that never falter; and how should we look for these features and qualities in a child? We cannot expect them; we should be sorry to see them in any child we loved. But may not a child have other qualities quite as potent, and even more potent? Is brute force the only force by which even brutes are ruled? Surely not. Baby lies on the rug with dog and cat. He is not so strong or lithe or quick as they are, or even as you are. Yet he takes liberties with them which you cannot take,and remember, the cat is of one blood with the leopard and the dog with the wolf. He lies upon them, rolls over them, treads on their sensitive feet, pulls them about by fur or hair; and yet by some wonderful instinct they recognise his innocence of illintention and respect it. Were you to inflict half the pain on them which he inflicts, they would soon let you know that they had teeth and claws; but they hardly ever turn on him. The little child leads them where he will, and pretty much as he will.

2. But when the prophet tells us that in the Kingdom of Christ a little child leads the wolf and the leopard and the lion, as well as the lamb and the kid and the calf, he cannot simply mean that an innocent babe may have more power over the brutes than a grown man. He also means, no doubt, that in proportion as Christ reigns on the earth the primal order will be restored; that men, reconciled to God and to each other, will also be at peace with all the forces of Nature, will rule over them, and bend to their service even those of them which are the most fierce, hostile, and untamable, and thus regain all, and more than all, that Adam lost.

3. We need not cling too closely to the literal words and circumstances. The leadership of the little child may represent for us those simplest principles and powers of life to which men are often so unwilling to submit, but in submission to which all the best life comes; in submission to which alone the complete life of man can ever come. The familiar interpretation, which takes the wild beasts as symbols of the savage passions of men, is a permissible application of the words of the prophet, though not a direct interpretation. If the simplicity, tenderness, and playfulness of the kid and the lamb rise to their highest expression in men, so also do the cunning and fierceness of the wolf and the leopard. Taking them thus here, the prediction is that under the rule of Christ even the most unruly appetites, even the most cruel passions of humanity shall be chastened into harmony with its gentler attributes, and men shall be led along the path of peace, following in the footsteps of a little child.

There is a certain valley in the North where a rude path, hardly distinguishable at the best of times, leads through dangerous moss-hags right across the centre of a morass. In rainy weather the track would be wholly obliterated but for the little footprints of a band of children who go to school that way. Many a traveller has found his path safely through the Slough of Despond by following in the childrens footsteps.1 [Note: J. Kelman, in The Expository Times, xvi. p. 544.]

II

What are the characteristics of a little child?

1. Trustfulness.Every reasonable man has some general conception, more or less clearly realised, about the humanity of which he is a part. He either holds that mankind is trustworthy, with frequent flagrant exceptions of falseness and deceit; or else he holds that mankind is base and deceitful, with the occasional intrusion of an upright and honest man. If he holds the first idea, he will be wisely trustful; he will feel that the safest attitude towards men is confidence, combined with such a reasonable watchfulness as shall keep him from being a foolish and easy dupe. If he holds the other idea, he is suspicious, he distrusts everybody at the first meeting. The first is the attitude of youth. And I ask you to remember that practically no man has largely led or ruled the world without it. Christ Jesus had it perfectly. How gloriously He trusted men. The fervour of His terrible denunciations of the wicked gets its vividness from the background against which it stands of honour for and confidence in the soul of man. And the whole Bible, with its large, unguarded, unsuspicious utterance of God to man, laying itself open to a thousand misconceptions, always trusting itself cordially to mens wish to understand itthere could be nothing like the Bible, with its regal influence, to illustrate how all true leadership of men has for its first principle confidence in the men it tries to lead.

Can I go and help grandpa along the walk, mamma?

Help him! laughed Guy, before mamma could answer. Why, youre a little tot of a girl, Bertha, and grandpa is very tall. Hes deaf as a post, too.

Yes, dearie, you can go, said mamma, as quietly as though Guy had not said a word.

And I can make him hear with my hand, smiled Bertha.1 [Note: A. Percival Hodgson, Thoughts for the Kings Children, p. 192.]

2. Goodness.This is the principle of absolute morality, the principle that the right is to be done simply because it is the right. Honesty is the best policy, says experience, trying with laborious ingenuity to disguise its conscience in the robes of selfishness. Honesty is right, says the child and the child-like community. There is room for the exercise of simple goodness; there is need for it. For it has come to this: that a man who, in a mixed company of practical men, debating what is profitable and what will pay, says quietly, We must do this, whether it pays or not, for it is right, makes a stir run through the company as if a breath out of the fresh open heaven blew in through the suddenly opened window of a close and overheated room.

When the news was brought to the Princess Victoria that her uncle was dead, and that she was no longer Princess but QueenI will be good, she said. What more could she have said, or better?

Just to be good,

This is enoughenough!

Oh, we who find sins billows wild and rough,

Do we not feel how more than any gold

Would be the blameless life we led of old?

Ah! though we miss

All else but this,

To be good is enough.

It is enough

Enoughjust to be good!

To lift our hearts where they are understood;

To let the thirst for worldly power and place

Go unappeased; to smile back in Gods face

With the glad lips our mother used to kiss.

Ah! though we miss

All else but this,

To be good is enough.

3. Religion.This is the strongest power that our human nature can submit to. Yet the dominion of it is constantly pushed out of sight as men grow more complicated in their living and thinking. It is not that men are irreligious, though there are irreligious men. It is not that men are worldly, though there seem to be men who find their whole satisfaction here; who crawl over the mountains and the fields of the earth, like moles or lizards taking the colour of the ground they crawl on. It is that men are really religious and yet hide their religion from their fellows, never mentioning Gods name aloud, never referring their life openly to Him in whose hands they know it lies. Heaven lies about us in our infancy. The child frankly and simply acknowledges God, sets Him openly on the throne over every act for every man to see. Let us go to God simply, freely, spontaneously, lovingly, as the bird goes to the nest, as the child goes to the mother.

III

1. The religion of the child is not an unintellectual religion. The truly cultivated man has the first healthy instincts of humanity developed and enriched by all his culture, but not altered in their character, made on the contrary all the more truly themselves, as their character has been brought out. The love of God should be stronger in the man of true culture than in the savage. Says Professor Inge, In a very fascinating medival religious book, which I have tried to make better known, the Revelations of Julian of Norwich, the wise and saintly authoress says, To me was shown no higher stature than childhood. Not, of course, that we should remain children in understanding; not that when we have become men, we should refuse to put away childish things; but that there should remain much of the child-character in us to the end.

2. And the religion of the child with all its simplicity is a religion which retains the mystery. Most good men would admit that in the hour when they have stood nearest to the unveiled heart of God, when with reverent wonder they have looked into the unknown depths of His infinite affection, they have been led to that holy place by the hand of a little child. In the deepest reaches of His glorious life God is ever a mystery to us all.

They say that God lives very high:

But if you look above the pines

You cannot see our God; and why?

And if you dig down in the mines

You never see Him in the gold;

Though from Him all thats glory shines.

God is so good, He wears a fold

Of heaven and earth across His face

Like secrets kept, for love, untold.

But still I feel that His embrace

Slides down by thrills, through all things made,

Through sight and sound of every place.

As if my tender mother laid

On my shut lids her kisses pressure,

Half waking me at night, and said

Who kissed you through the dark, dear guesser?1 [Note: Mrs. Browning, A Childs Thought of God.]

3. It is only the child that is acceptable to God. It is only those who turn and become as little children that enter the Kingdom. It is not the will of your Father which is in heaven that one of these little ones should perishthat is the great encouragement of all who turn.

I was in heaven one day when all the prayers

Came in, and angels bore them up the stairs

Unto a place where he

Who was ordained such ministry

Should sort them so that in that palace bright

The presence-chamber might be duly dight;

For they were like to flowers of various bloom;

And a divinest fragrance filled the room.

Then did I see how the great sorter chose

One flower that seemed to me a hedgling rose,

And from the tangled press

Of that irregular loveliness

Set it apart! andThis, I heard him say,

Is for the Master; so upon his way

He would have passed; then I to him:

Whence is this rose, O thou of cherubim

The chiefest? Knowest thou not? he said, and smiled:

This is the first prayer of a little child.2 [Note: T. E. Brown.]

The Child as Leader

Literature

Aitchison (J.), The Childrens Own, 207.

Arnold (T.), Sermons, i. 47.

Austin (G. B.), The Beauty of Goodness, 166.

Barton (G. A.), Roots of Christian Teaching, 149.

Bradley (G. G.), Innocents Day Addresses, 13.

Brooks (P.), Seeking Life, 19.

Buckland (A. R.), Text Studies for a Year, 23.

Cox (S.), Genesis of Evil, 122, 135.

Davies (D.), Talks with Men, Women, and Children, 5th Ser., 481

Davies (J. P.), The Same Things, 19.

Gray (W. H.), Our Divine Shepherd, 201.

Hodgson (A. R.), Thoughts for the Kings Children, 190.

Houchin (J. W.), The Vision of God, 11.

Inge (W. R.), All Saints Sermons, 11.

Jerdan (C.), Messages to the Children, 1.

Knowles (A. C.), The Holy Christ-Child, 145.

Kuegele (F.), Country Sermons, N.S. i. 100.

Macleod (A.), The Child Jesus, 251.

MKim (R. H.), The Gospel in the Christian Year, 43.

Pierson (A. T.), The Making of a Sermon, 23.

Wilmot Buxton (H. J.), Led by a Little Child, 1.

Bulletin of the Crozer Theological Seminary, January 1910, 39.

Christian World Pulpit, xv. 181 (Cameron); xxv. 9 (Hitchens); xxxiii. 394 (Hubbard); xxxviii. 116 (Medley); li. 28 (Bradley); lvii. 90 (Wilberforce).

Church of England Pulpit, xliii. 145 (Bradley); xlix. 97 (Wilberforce).

Churchmans Pulpit, Sermons to the Young, i. 35 (Bolton).

Fuente: The Great Texts of the Bible

Isa 65:25, Eze 34:25, Hos 2:18, Act 9:13-20, Rom 14:17, 1Co 6:9-11, 2Co 5:14-21, Gal 3:26, Gal 3:27, Eph 4:22-32, Col 3:3-8, Tit 3:3-5, Phm 1:9-16, Rev 5:9, Rev 5:10

Reciprocal: Gen 7:9 – General Gen 7:15 – General 1Sa 25:7 – we hurt Psa 72:7 – In his days Psa 133:1 – how good Isa 2:4 – and they Isa 9:6 – The Prince of Peace Isa 32:17 – quietness Isa 35:9 – No lion Isa 43:20 – beast Isa 55:13 – of the thorn Eze 17:23 – under Eze 19:2 – young lions Eze 34:15 – General Eze 47:8 – the waters Mic 4:3 – they shall Zep 3:13 – not Joh 3:10 – and knowest Act 10:11 – and a Act 10:12 – General Act 16:33 – washed Heb 12:14 – Follow

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

Isa 11:6-8. The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, &c. We have here the illustrious consequence of the economy of this divine kingdom, this kingdom of righteousness, equity, faith, and grace. The expressions which describe it are metaphorical: they represent the subjects of it under the figure of a flock, lying down and feeding under the care of the Messiah, as the great and chief shepherd, in the utmost peace, harmony, and security. Men of fierce, cruel, and ungovernable dispositions shall be so transformed by the preaching of the gospel, and by the grace of Christ, that they shall become most humble, gentle, and tractable, and shall no more vex and persecute those meek and poor ones, mentioned Isa 11:4; but shall become such as they. Yea, the most inveterate enemies of the kingdom of God, such as the persecuting Saul, shall be brought into its communion, having laid down their cruelty, barbarity, and ferocity, their inclination to hurt, their craft and subtlety; and not only so, but this kingdom also shall be purged from all offences, from all evils and instruments of malice. For the people, being enlightened with truth, and renewed by grace, shall put off their barbarous and depraved manners; shall willingly subject themselves to the rule of the Messiah, with meekness and humility, and shall fulfil the law of brotherly love in all the offices of good-will. This is the sum of the present passage, divested of metaphor. For, it is evident, as Michaelis has observed, that a mystical sense is not intended to be assigned to each of these images, or figurative expressions, and a particular and partial truth to be deduced therefrom; but a general doctrine is to be learned from the whole, namely, that the kingdom of the Messiah is a kingdom of peace, as well as of righteousness; of happiness, as well as of holiness; and that the natural tendency of his religion is to produce meekness, gentleness, long- suffering, and the exercise of mutual benevolence among men, as well as piety in all its branches toward God. This indeed is declared in plain words in the next verse.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

11:6 The {c} wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them.

(c) Men because of their wicked affections are named by the names of beasts, in which the same affections reign: but Christ by his Spirit will reform them, and work in them such mutual charity, that they will be like lambs, favouring and loving one another and cast off all their cruel affections, Isa 65:25 .

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes

Security and safety would result from this king’s rule. Whereas the conditions described may occur literally in the Millennium, Isaiah probably used them to represent those conditions figuratively. The presently rapacious-represented by the wolf, leopard, lion (twice), bear, cobra, and viper-will coexist peacefully with the defenseless-the lamb, the kid, the calf, the cow, the ox, the nursing child, and the weaned child. "The fatling" (NASB) breaks the parallelism and may be better rendered "will graze" (NET). People least able to control wild things will be able to exercise effective leadership over them then, because God will change their natures.

In that day death itself will have lost its sting (cf. Hos 13:14; 1Co 15:55). People will have no fear of what is now fatal. The serpent will have been subdued (Gen 3:15). Note again the recurrence of the child motif in this section, to stress the victory of humility over self-assertiveness (cf. Mat 18:2-5). In short, these conditions indicate a return to paradise on earth (cf. Gen 1:28-30; Psalms 8; 1Co 15:25-28; Heb 2:5-9).

Amillennial interpreters do not believe there will be a future reign of Messiah on the earth for a millennium. They believe the conditions Isaiah described here are either figurative descriptions of the peace that Christ has brought to humanity through His saving work, or they describe conditions in heaven.

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)