Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Isaiah 20:5
And they shall be afraid and ashamed of Ethiopia their expectation, and of Egypt their glory.
5, 6. The effect which the sight of these miserable gangs of captives will produce on the inhabitants of Palestine. This is the real motive of the prophecy. Hezekiah probably took the warning.
they shall be afraid ] R.V. better: dismayed. The subject is indefinite “men.”
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
And they shall be afraid – The Jews, or the party or faction among the Jews, that were expecting aid from allied Ethiopia and Egypt. When they shall see them vanquished, they shall apprehend a similar danger to themselves; and they shall be ashamed that they ever confided in a people so little able to aid them, instead of trusting in the arm of God.
Egypt their glory – Their boast, as if Egypt was able to save them. The word rendered here glory ( tiph’ereth) means properly, ornament, praise, honor; and then it may mean the object of glory, or that in which people boast or confide. That is its sense here (compare Isa 10:12; Isa 13:19; Zec 12:7).
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Isa 20:5
They shall be . . . ashamed of . . . their expectation
Unreasonable expectations
A great deal of the discomfort, a large proportion of the disappointments of the world, may be traced to unreasonable expectations–to the fact that men will persist in expecting what they have no right to expect at all, or to expect in that precise form or degree.
Indeed, so many of the expectations cherished in this world are so vain and unreasonable, involving those who entertain them in such necessary disappointment, that someone has sardonically observed, Blessed is the man who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed. But, while we would not take so gloomy a view of human life as this, we cannot help feeling that much of the worry and mortification of life may be accounted for by our expecting what we have no right to expect. We all suffer from the same complaint, in larger or lesser degree. The symptoms differ in different individuals; the disease is radically the same. Young and old, rich and poor, learned and ignorant, masters and servants, buyers and sellers, husbands and wives, parents and children, pastors and people–all, in some way or other, and to some extent or other, are the victims of unreasonable expectations. Life with all of them would be a brighter, smoother, pleasanter thing, if they expected less. As we grow older we ought to grow wiser in this respect. Having regard only to the ordinary intercourse and social relationships of life–how many complaints would be hushed, how much irritation would be allayed, how much needless mortification be averted, how much resentment cease, how many fancied slights and injuries appear inconsiderable, if, instead of brooding over our rights, which we imagine have been withheld or invaded, we were to sit down, and quietly, dispassionately consider what, living in a world like this, we might, on the whole, reasonably expect. If we were thus to inquire we should find that we were getting more than we deserved; and that, for the most part, we were being treated by others quite as fairly, honourably, and tenderly as we were in the habit of treating them. (T. M. Morris.)
Unreasonable expectations in relation to religion
The subject of unreasonable expectations is of almost illimitable extent, and in further dwelling upon it I would limit my remarks to three points–
I. THE THINGS WHICH GODS PEOPLE UNREASONABLY EXPECT. Nothing can be more plain than that our expectations as Christians should be limited by the teaching and promise of Gods Word. We are safe so long as we rest in the promise of God.
I. It is unreasonable to expect that you can place yourselves in any false position, form any unworthy association, engage in any questionable occupation, and be saved from the natural consequences of so doing. Lot was a very good man, but he made a very great mistake. If, in your legitimate business,–if, in sustaining any of the just relationships of life, you meet with danger or temptation, you may reasonably expect that God will grant you all the necessary assistance and protection. But if the danger or temptation be of your own seeking, it is likely that God will teach you wisdom by leaving you to endure the consequences of your rashness or perversity. It is unreasonable for you to expect that you can touch pitch and not be defiled, take fire in your bosom and not be burned, nourish a viper and not be stung.
2. It is unreasonable to expect that you should grow in grace, or realise any very high degree of enjoyment in the Divine life, if all the while you are neglecting or insufficiently using the means of growth, the sources of enjoyment which are placed within your reach.
3. It is unreasonable to expect in Christian life what our Master expressly warns us against expecting. Many seem disappointed because they do not find the way of Christian pilgrimage perfectly smooth and pleasant from its commencement to its close. Your Master tells you plainly that you have to lay your account with suffering and trial, with disappointment and danger. The Christian life is never represented as one of ease and self-indulgence, but rather as a state of warfare. You are treading in the footsteps of those who, in uninterrupted succession, have walked in the same rough way.
4. I might easily enumerate many other unreasonable expectations in which Christians are tempted to indulge. It is unreasonable to expect results from unassisted human nature which can only flow from Divine grace. It is unreasonable to expect from an attempted conformity to the law what can only be secured by a simple dependence on the Gospel. It is unreasonable to expect that we shall find on earth what can be only realised in heaven, or that we can derive from any inferior and created source what can only be found in the centre and sum of all excellency, the Lord Jesus Christ Himself.
II. THE THINGS WHICH ARE UNREASONABLY EXPECTED OF GODS PEOPLE.
1. There are those who make it a matter of reproach against religion, and prefer it as an excuse for their unbelief, that the Gospel, the religion of the Cross, does not come up in sundry particulars to their idea of what a religion which claims mans acceptance and confidence ought to be. Such objections we may dismiss as the fruit of unreasonable expectations, for all, save the most shallow and pretentious of such objectors, are ready to confess that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in their philosophy.
2. There are those who do not go so far as to object against religion as unreasonable, who seem to resent it as an injury that any measure of mystery should attach to any of the statements of Scripture. In reply to this, several things may be said. It might be said that, taking into account what this revelation professes to be, it was reasonable to expect that the truths communicated, while intelligible on the one side, should lose themselves in mystery on the other. And it might be further remarked, in reference to many of those who thus object, that they make but very little use of such light as they confessedly have. Is it not the part of reason first of all to inquire whether the Bible be an authentic and authoritative revelation from heaven to earth, and then, if its claims to be so regarded are substantiated to the satisfaction of reason, is it not the very part and office of reason to sit submissively at the feet of the Divine Teacher and learn of Him?
3. There are many who but very slightly interest themselves in the truth which Christians hold, who seem to take much pleasure in narrowly scrutinising the lives which Christians live. The real or alleged inconsistencies of professing Christians do not afford any ground of reasonable objection against the Gospel, or any valid excuse for its continued rejection. In judging of any practical system, we must have reference to what it professes to be, and to accomplish. If you confine attention to those who are the sincere and genuine followers of the Lamb, it is unreasonable to expect that they should manifest in this world an absolute perfection of character. Such perfection, we believe, can be only realised when this body of sin and death shall have been laid aside.
III. THE THINGS WHICH THOSE WHO ARE NOT GODS PEOPLE UNREASONABLY EXPECT FOR THEMSELVES.
1. It is unreasonable to expect that anything which the world contains can meet the need, or satisfy the desire, of mans immortal soul.
2. It is unreasonable to expect that in religion anyone can serve two masters. No such thing as neutrality is possible in religion, and, strictly speaking, there is no such thing as indecision.
3. It is unreasonable to expect that sinful men can satisfy the requirements of the law, and avert its penalty, by any obedience they can render, by any penance they can endure.
4. It is unreasonable to expect that those who, enjoying Gospel light, die despising Gospel grace, will be in any wise benefited by the uncovenanted mercies of God.
5. It is unreasonable to expect that you can spend a sinful, worldly life, and men have a comfortable death and a happy eternity.
6. It is unreasonable to expect that, because you pass muster in this world, and occupy a moderately creditable position among your fellow men, that therefore you will do moderately well ]n another world; and that, if you do not shine forth conspicuously with the best, you will go through the gates into the city, unnoticed among the crowd.
7. It is unreasonable to expect that, because sentence is not speedily executed against an evil work, that therefore it never will be; and that, because the present order of things has continued so long, that therefore it will continue forever. (T. M. Morris.)
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Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
They; all they that shall trust to them, and glory in them, as appears from the following words; the pronoun they being put indefinitely here, as it is Isa 2:19, and elsewhere. But under this general expression the Israelites not only are comprehended, but seem to be principally intended, because to them this prophecy was delivered, and they were eminently guilty of this sin; of which see Isa 30:2; 31:1.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
5. theythe Philistine alliesof Egypt who trusted in it for help against Assyria. A warning to theparty among the Jews, who, though Judah was then the subordinate allyof Assyria, were looking to Egypt as a preferable ally (Isa30:7). Ethiopia was their “expectation”; for Palestinehad not yet obtained, but hoped for alliance with it. Egyptwas their “glory,” that is, boast (Isa13:19); for the alliance with it was completed.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And they shall be afraid and ashamed,…. That is, those that trusted and depended upon the Egyptians and Ethiopians, particularly the Jews after mentioned, shall be “afraid” that it will be their turn next, that they also shall be taken and carried captive; and they shall be “ashamed” that they have put their trust and confidence in those nations, and not in the Lord:
of Ethiopia their expectation; from whom they expected assistance and protection, particularly when Tirhakah king of Ethiopia went out against the king of Assyria, that he would have been a match for him, and have overcome him, and so have freed them from such a powerful enemy:
and of Egypt their glory; who was their ally, and a very potent one, and in whom they gloried; but now should be ashamed, when both those people on whom they relied were carried captive.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
But if Egypt and Ethiopia are thus shamefully humbled, what kind of impression will this make upon those who rely upon the great power that is supposed to be both unapproachable and invincible? “And they cry together, and behold themselves deceived by Ethiopia, to which they looked, and by Egypt, in which they gloried. And the inhabitant of this coast-land saith in that day, Behold, thus it happens to those to whom we looked, whither we fled for help to deliver us from the king of Asshur: and how should we, we escape?” , which signifies both an island and a coast-land, is used as the name of Philistia and Zep 2:5, and as the name of Phoenicia in Isa 23:2, Isa 23:6; and for this reason Knobel and others understand it here as denoting the former with the inclusion of the latter. But as the Assyrians had already attacked both Phoenicians and Philistines at the time when they marched against Egypt, there can be no doubt that Isaiah had chiefly the Judaeans in his mind. This was the interpretation given by Jerome ( “Judah trusted in the Egyptians, and Egypt will be destroyed”), and it has been adopted by Ewald, Drechsler, Luzzatto, and Meier. The expressions are the same as those in which a little further on we find Isaiah reproving the Egyptian tendencies of Judah’s policy. At the same time, by “the inhabitant of this coast-land” we are not to understand Judah exclusively, but the inhabitants of Palestine generally, with whom Judah was mixed up to its shame, because it had denied its character as the nation of Jehovah in a manner so thoroughly opposed to its theocratic standing.
Unfortunately, we know very little concerning the Assyrian campaigns in Egypt. But we may infer from Nah 3:8-10, according to which the Egyptian Thebes had fallen (for it is held up before Nineveh as the mirror of its own fate), that after the conquest of Ashdod Egypt was also overcome by Sargon’s army. In the grand inscription found in the halls of the palace at Khorsabad, Sargon boasts of a successful battle which he had fought with Pharaoh Sebech at Raphia, and in consequence of which the latter became tributary to him. Still further on he relates that he had dethroned the rebellious king of Ashdod, and appointed another in his place, but that the people removed him, and chose another king; after which he marched with his army against Ashdod, and when the king fled from him into Egypt, he besieged Ashdod, and took it. Then follows a difficult and mutilated passage, in which Rawlinson agrees with Oppert in finding an account of the complete subjection of Sebech (Sabako?).
(Note: Five Great Monarchies, vol. ii. pp. 416-7; compare Oppert, Sargonides, pp. 22, 26-7. With regard to one passage of the annals, which contains an account of a successful battle fought at Ra-bek (Heliopolis), see Journal Asiat. xii. 462ff.; Brandis, p. 51.)
Nothing can be built upon this, however; and it must also remain uncertain whether, even if the rest is correctly interpreted, Isa 20:1 relates to that conquest of Ashdod which was followed by the dethroning of the rebellious king and the appointment of another, or to the final conquest by which it became a colonial city of Assyria.
(Note: Among the pictures from Khorsabad which have been published by Botta, there is a burning fortress that has been taken by storm. Isidor Lwenstern (in his Essai, Paris 1845) pronounced it to be Ashdod; but Rdiger regarded the evidence as inconclusive. Nevertheless, Lwenstern was able to claim priority over Rawlinson in several points of deciphering ( Galignani’s Messenger, Rev. 28, 1850). He read in the inscription the king’s name, Sarak.)
This conquest Sargon ascribes to himself in person, so that apparently we must think of that conquest which was carried out by Tartan; and in that case the words, “he fought against it,” etc., need not be taken as anticipatory. It is quite sufficient, that the monuments seem to intimate that the conquest of Samaria and Ashdod was followed by the subjugation of the Egypto-Ethiopian kingdom. But inasmuch as Judah, trusting in the reed of Egypt, fell away from Assyria under Hezekiah, and Sennacherib had to make war upon Egypt again, to all appearance the Assyrians never had much cause to congratulate themselves upon their possession of Egypt, and that for reasons which are not difficult to discover. At the time appointed by the prophecy, Egypt came under the Assyrian yoke, from which it was first delivered by Psammetichus; but, as the constant wars between Assyria and Egypt clearly show, it never patiently submitted to that yoke for any length of time. The confidence which Judah placed in Egypt turned out most disastrously for Judah itself, just as Isaiah predicted here. But the catastrophe that occurred in front of Jerusalem did not put an end to Assyria, nor did the campaigns of Sargon and Sennacherib bring Egypt to an end. And, on the other hand, the triumphs of Jehovah and of the prophecy concerning Assyria were not the means of Egypt’s conversion. In all these respects the fulfilment showed that there was an element of human hope in the prophecy, which made the distant appear to be close at hand. And this element it eliminated. For the fulfilment of a prophecy is divine, but the prophecy itself is both divine and human.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
5. And they shall be afraid. He now shews for whose benefit he had foretold these things about the Egyptians and Ethiopians. It was in order that the Jews might learn amidst their afflictions to hope in God, and might not have recourse to foreign aid, which the Lord had forbidden.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
‘And they will be dismayed and ashamed, because of Cush their expectation, and of Egypt their glory. And the inhabitant of this coastland will say in that day, “Behold, such is our expectation, where we fled for help to be delivered from the king of Assyria, and we, how will we escape?” ’
Thus would Philistia (‘this coastland’), and all who trusted in Egypt recognise their folly in placing confidence in Cush and Egypt. Cush had been their grounds of confidence, Egypt their strongest resource, in whom they had boasted, and they were to be first soundly defeated, and then invaded and crushed. Thus the Philistines and their allies would recognise that in view of this all hope had gone. They had no way of escape. So let Hezekiah beware of trusting in Egypt.
The warning comes to us to that we should not put our final trust in anything or anyone but God, Who alone will not let us down.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Isa 20:5-6. And they shall be afraid, &c. We have, in these words, the consequence of the divine judgment upon the Egyptians and Cushites; and the scope of the prophesy, namely, to convince the inhabitants of Palestine, and, among these, some factious persons in Jerusalem, of the vanity of the confidence which they placed in the Egyptians and Cushites, as their tutelar deity; for when they should see the completion of this prophesy, they would then condemn their own folly, for placing their expectations on so feeble a defence. All the maritime places, or places on the sea-coast, are called by the word ai, isle; the prophet therefore may here mean the seacoasts of Palestine, where was the city of Ashdod, or Azotus. Some, who imagine that the Scriptures call any place or country an isle, suppose that the prophet means Judah, or Jerusalem; but the truth seems to be, that he is to be understood as speaking largely and generally of the inhabitants of Palestine. See Vitringa.
REFLECTIONS.We have here,
1. The date of the prophesy. See the Critical Annotations.
2. The sign given of the destruction to be brought on Egypt and Ethiopia. Isaiah is commanded to take off his habit of sackcloth, (which, as a prophet, he wore to signify his deadness to the ornaments of dress, or as mourning over the desolations of Judah and Israel,) to put his shoes, and to walk naked, probably not absolutely so, but stripped of his upper garment, and barefoot. How long he continued to go thus is not certain; whether once, or three days, a day for a year, or possibly three years, as our English translation seems to imply; though the three years rather refer to the prophesy, which should be accomplished after that time; or imply that so long a time the Assyrian king would employ in subduing them. See the Notes. The prophet, without hesitation, as a faithful servant, obeys the divine command, dangerous as it might be to his health, and however much it exposed his person to contempt. And God explains the sign, as prefiguring the miserable and shameful captivity of the Egyptians and Ethiopians, who should thus be led away prisoners by the Assyrians. Note; (1.) When duty calls, we must trust health, character, and all into God’s hands. If he says, Well done, good and faithful servant, it will infinitely overbalance every inconvenience or insult that we may have received. (2.) Miserable is the condition of these poor captives; but how much more miserable those slaves of sin, who are led captive by the devil at his will! What confusion will cover them, when, in the presence of God, his saints and angels, the shame of their nakedness shall appear, and no eye pity them!
3. The warning given the Jews of the folly of depending on these nations. Ethiopia was their trust, and Egypt the ally in which they gloried; but now, afraid at the ruin of these potent neighbours, and confounded at seeing their supports thus removed, the inhabitants of this isle, Palestine, so called, shall say, Behold such is our expectation, so vain, so foolish, whither we flee for help, even to those who cannot help themselves; and how then shall we escape, when mightier foes are unable to withstand the victorious arms of the Assyrian army? Note; Creature-confidences will assuredly fail us; and they who have neglected to make God their refuge in the day of calamity, will be abandoned to despair, and too late bewail their folly.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Isa 20:5 And they shall be afraid and ashamed of Ethiopia their expectation, and of Egypt their glory.
Ver. 5. And they shall be afraid and ashamed. ] They – that is, as many as confided in them – seeing themselves thus confuted, shall be abashed and terrified ( perterrefient ) at the fall of their confederates, and their own approaching calamity.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
expectation. Put by Figure of speech Metonymy (of Adjunct), for the help expected from Egypt.
Egypt their glory. Put by Figure of speech Metonymy (of Adjunct), for the Egyptians, in whom they gloried.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
afraid: Isa 30:3, Isa 30:5, Isa 30:7, Isa 36:6, 2Ki 18:21, Eze 29:6, Eze 29:7
their glory: Isa 2:22, Jer 9:23, Jer 9:24, Jer 17:5, 1Co 3:21
Reciprocal: Psa 4:2 – my glory Isa 30:2 – walk Jer 2:36 – thou also shalt Jer 22:20 – and cry Jer 46:25 – and all Lam 4:17 – our eyes Eze 29:16 – the confidence Eze 30:9 – messengers Nah 3:9 – Ethiopia Zep 2:12 – Ethiopians Zec 9:5 – for
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
20:5 And they shall be afraid and ashamed of {e} Cush their expectation, and of Egypt their {f} glory.
(e) In whose aid they trusted.
(f) Of whom they boasted and gloried.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
Isaiah predicted the dismay of the pro-Egyptian faction in Judah when Assyria carried the Egyptians and Cushites off as captives. This happened in 701 B.C. The Judeans had hoped that they would get help from the Egyptians and Cushites against the Assyrians, but now how could they escape? The obvious though unstated answer is, Trust in the Lord, not Egypt!