Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Isaiah 33:18
Thine heart shall meditate terror. Where [is] the scribe? where [is] the receiver? where [is] he that counted the towers?
18. shall meditate terror ] Or, better, shall muse on the terror (R.V.), strive to realise its various circumstances which have so completely disappeared.
Where is the scribe? receiver ] Render with R.V. where is he that counted, where is he that weighed; the officers who exacted the tribute.
that counted the towers ] calculating the strength of the city with a view to attack it.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
18, 19. In those days it will require an effort of imagination to recall the dangers of the present, from which the nation shall have been so suddenly and so marvellously saved.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Thine heart – The heart of the people of Jerusalem.
Shall meditate terror – This is similar to the expression in Virgil:
– forsan et haec olim meminisse jurabit.
AEn. ii. 203.
The sense here is, You shall hereafter think over all this alarm and distress. When the enemy is destroyed, the city saved, and the king shall reign in magnificence over all the nation then enjoying peace and prosperity, you shall recall these days of terror and alarm, and shall then ask with gratitude and astonishment, Where are they who caused this alarm? Where are now they who so confidently calculated on taking the city? They are all gone – and gone in a manner suited to excite astonishment and adoring gratitude. Sweet is the recollection, says Rosenmuller, of dangers that are passed.
Where is the scribe? – How soon, how suddenly has he vanished! The word scribe here ( spher) evidently refers to some prominent class of officers in the Assyrian army. It is from saphar, to count, to number, to write; and probably refers to a secretary, perhaps a secretary of state or of war, or an inspector-general, who had the charge of reviewing an army 2Ki 25:19; Jer 37:15; Jer 52:25.
Where is the receiver? – Margin, as in Hebrew, Weigher. Vulgate, Where is he that ponders the words of the law? The Septuagint, Where are the counselors ( sumbouleuontes)? Probably the word refers to him who weighed the tribute, or the pay of the Soldiers; and means, doubtless, some officer in the army of the Assyrian; probably one whose office it was to have charge of the military chest, and to pay the army.
Where is he that counted the towers? – That is, who made an estimate of the strength of Jerusalem – either Sennacherib, or someone appointed by him to reconnoitre and report on the means which the city bad of defense (compare Isa 36:4).
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 18. Where is the scribe?] The person appointed by the king of Assyria to estimate their number and property in reference to their being heavily taxed.
Where is the receiver?] Or he who was to have collected this tribute.
Where is he that counted the towers?] That is, the commander of the enemy’s forces, who surveyed the fortifications of the city, and took an account of the height, strength, and situation of the walls and towers, that he might know where to make the assault with the greatest advantage; as Capaneus before Thebes is represented in a passage of the Phoenissae of Euripides, which Grotius has applied as an illustration of this place: –
, .
Ver. 187.
“To these seven turrets each approach he marks;
The walls from their proud summit to their base
Measuring with eager eye.”
He that counted the towers – “Those who were ordered to review the fortified places in Judea, that they might be manned and provisioned for the king of Assyria. So sure was he of gaining Jerusalem and subduing the whole of Judea, that he had already formed all these arrangements.” – Dodd’s notes.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Thine heart shall meditate terror: this is either,
1. A premonition concerning a future judgment, as if he said, Before these glorious promises shall be accomplished, thou shalt be brought into great straits and troubles. Or rather,
2. A thankful acknowledgment of deliverance from a former danger; as if he had said, When thou art delivered, thou shalt, with pleasure and thankfulness, recall to mind thy former terrors and miseries.
Where is the scribe, & c.? these words are either,
1. Words of gratulation, and insultation over the enemy. Thou shalt then say, Where are the great officers of the Assyrian host? They are no where, they are not, they are dealt or slain. Or rather,
2. The words of men dismayed and confounded, such as proceeded from the Jews in the time of their distress, and are here remembered to aggravate the present mercy. For the officers here mentioned seem not to be those of the Assyrian army, who were actually fighting against the Jews and Jerusalem, (for then he would rather have mentioned the captains of the host, as the Scripture commonly doth in these cases, than the scribes and receivers, &c.,) but rather of the Jews in Jerusalem who, upon the approach of Sennacherib, began to make military preparations for the defence of the city, and to choose such officers as were necessary and usual for that end; such as these were, to wit,
the scribe, whom we call muster-master, who was to make and keep a list of the soldiers, and to call them together, as occasion required.
The receiver; who received and laid out the money for the charges of the war; and he
that counted the towers, who surveyed all the parts of the city, and considered what towers or fortifications were to be made or repaired for the security of the city. And unto these several officers the people resorted, with great distraction and confusion, to acquaint them with all occurrences, or to quicken them to their several works, or to transact matters with them, as occasion required.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
18. meditateon the “terror”caused by the enemy, but now past.
where, c.the languageof the Jews exulting over their escape from danger.
scribewho enrolled thearmy [MAURER] or, whoprescribed the tribute to be paid [ROSENMULLER];or, who kept an account of the spoil. “The principal scribe ofthe host” (2Ki 25:19;Jer 52:25). The Assyrian recordsare free from the exaggerations of Egyptian records. Two scribes areseen in every Assyrian bas-relief, writing down the various objectsbrought to them, the heads of the slain, prisoners, cattle, sheep,&c.
receiver“weigher,”Margin. LAYARDmentions, among the Assyrian inscriptions, “a pair a scales forweighing the spoils.”
counted . . . towershewhose duty it was to reconnoitre and report the strength of the cityto be besieged.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Thine heart shall meditate terror,…. shall recollect, and think of with pleasure and thankfulness, the terror they were formerly seized with, when surrounded and oppressed by their enemies, particularly at the time of the slaying of the witnesses, which will be a terrible time to the church and people of God; but when that is over, they will call it to mind with gratitude, for deliverance from it e. This is commonly understood of the terror and consternation the Jews were in when besieged by the Assyrian army; and so the following words,
Where [is] the scribe? where [is] the receiver? where [is] he that counted the towers? are taken to be either the words of the Jews in their distress, calling for such and such officers to go to their respective posts, and do their duty; as the “scribe”, or muster master, to see that he has his full quota of men; the “receiver” or treasurer, and paymaster of the soldiers, to give the men money and wages, that they may be encouraged to fight; and “the counter of towers”, or engineer, to take care of the fortifications, and give directions about them: or else, as now insulting the Assyrians after the defeat of them, inquiring where were now such and such officers in their army, whom before they dreaded, signifying they were all perished and gone. The apostle cites these words, or at least alludes to them, 1Co 1:20 when he says, “where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world?” triumphing over the wise doctors of the Jews, and the philosophers of the Gentiles, as not being able to face and withstand the power and wisdom of the Gospel; [See comments on 1Co 1:20]. So here, when the people of God will be recovered from their fright, and be brought out of their low estate, and will have ascended into heaven, or be come into a glorious church state, they will then triumph over their enemies, who will be no more, and say, where are the pope and his clergy? his cardinals, archbishops, bishops, priests, monks, friars, c. what are become of them? they are all gone, and will be no more. The Targum is,
“thine heart shall think of great things; where are the scribes? where are the princes? where are the counters? let them come, if they can count the numbers of the slain, the heads of mighty armies;”
which may well enough be illustrated by Re 11:13.
e So Ben Melech interprets it,
“thine heart, which was meditating terror before this.”
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
The tribulation has passed away like a dream. “Thy heart meditates upon the shuddering. Where is the valuer? where the weigher? where he who counted the towers? The rough people thou seest no more, the people of deep inaudible lip, of stammering unintelligible tongue.” The dreadful past is so thoroughly forced out of mind by the glorious present, that they are obliged to turn back their thoughts ( hagah , meditari , as Jerome renders it) to remember it at all. The sopher who had the management of the raising of the tribute, the shoqel who tested the weight of the gold and silver, the sopher ‘eth hammigdal who drew up the plan of the city to be besieged or stormed, are all vanished. The rough people ( , the niphal of , from ), that had shown itself so insolent, so shameless, and so insatiable in its demands, has become invisible. This attribute is a perfectly appropriate one; and the explanation given by Rashi, Vitringa, Ewald, and Frst, who take it in the sense of loez in Psa 114:1, is both forced and groundless. The expressions imke and nilag refer to the obscure and barbarous sound of their language; missh e moa to the unintelligibility of their speech; and to the obscurity of their meaning. Even if the Assyrians spoke a Semitic language, they were of so totally different a nationality, and their manners were so entirely different, that their language must have sounded even more foreign to an Israelite than Dutch to a German.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
18. Thy heart shall meditate terror. Believers are again informed what calamities are at hand, lest, by being suddenly overtaken with such heavy afflictions, they should sink under them. יהגה (yehgeh) is translated by some in the preterite, “meditated,” and by others in the future, “shall meditate;” because such an exchange of tenses is customary in the Hebrew language. For my own part, believing that he warns the people of approaching distresses, instead of relating those which had been formerly endured, I willingly retain the future tense, which is also the tense employed by the Prophet, “shall meditate.”
Where is the scribe? He relates in a dramatic and lively manner ( μιμητικῶς) the speeches of those who, overcome by terror, break out into these exclamations: Where is the scribe? Where is the weigher? thus expressing the powerful impression made on their minds. If any one suppose that the line of thought is suddenly broken off, because the Prophet, having in the former verse spoken of “the kings beauty,” now brings forward terrors, I have no doubt that he magnifies the kindness of God by means of comparison, in order that believers, when they have been delivered, may set a higher value on the condition to which they have attained. Men are forgetful and niggardly in judging of God’s favors, and, after having been once set free, do not consider what was the depth of their misery. Such persons need to be reminded of those wretched and disastrous times, during which they endured great sufferings, in order that they may more fully appreciate the greatness of the favor which God has bestowed on them. We ought also to observe another reason why it was advantageous that the people should be forewarned of that terror. It was that, after having heard of the kings magnificence, they might not promise themselves exemption from all uneasiness, but might be prepared to undergo any kind of troubles and distresses, and that, even while they were subject to tribute and placed under siege, they might, know that the kingdom of Judah was the object of God’s care, and would be rescued from the hands of tyrants.
It is a very wretched condition which the Prophet describes, that a free people should be oppressed by such cruel tyranny as to have all their property valued, and an inventory taken of their houses, possessions, families, and servants. How grievous this slavery is, many persons formerly unaccustomed to it actually know by experience in our times, when their property is valued to the very last farthing, and a valuation is made not only of their undoubted incomes but also of their expected gains, and not only their money and possessions, but even their names are placed on record, while new methods of taxation are contrived, not only on food but on the smallest articles, so that tyrants seize on a large portion of those things which are indispensably necessary to the wretched populace; and yet those calamities do not restrain men from insolence, licentiousness, and rebellion. What then will happen when they shall be free and at full liberty? Will they not, forgetful of all their distresses, and unmindful of God’s kindness, abandon themselves more freely than before to every kind of indulgence and licentiousness? It is not without good reason, therefore, that the Prophet places before the eyes of the people that wretched condition, that they may not, when delivered from it, giveway to their unlawful passions, but may acknowledge their deliverer and may love him with all their heart.
Some have falsely imagined that Paul (1Co 1:20) quotes this passage; for that would spoil the Prophet’s meaning and torture his words to a different purpose. They have been led into a mistake by the mere use of the word “scribe,” which there denotes a Teacher. Isaiah gives the name of “the scribe” to the person who took account of persons, families, lands, and houses, and, in short, who kept the registers of the taxes. By “the weigher,” he means the person who received the taxes, for he “weighed” the money which was paid. That office is discharged in the present day by those who are called treasurers.
Where is he who singles out the principal houses? He now.adds a very troublesome and exceedingly disliked class of men, “the describers of the towers,” that is, of the more remarkable buildings; for they visit and examine each person’s house, in order to know who are more wealthy than others, that they may demand a larger sum of money. Such men,like huntinghounds, are commonly employed by tyrants to scent the track of money, for the sake of laying on some unusual impost in addition to the ordinary taxes. The arrival of such persons must have been exceedingly annoying to the people, for they never cease till they have sucked all the blood and marrow. If any one prefer to view this term as denoting the servants of the king himself, whose business it was to destroy the houses adjoining to the walls of the city, let him enjoy his opinion. For my own part, I think it probable that the Prophet speaks of the receivers of taxes, whom conquerors appoint over vanquished nations for the sake of maintaining their authority.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(18) Thine heart shall meditate terrori.e., shall recall the memory of the past evil days, as a dream that had passed away, leaving behind it the thankful joy which rises out of such recollections.
Where is the scribe?Then, in those times of panic, each Assyrian official was an object of dread. There was the scribe, who fixed the amount of tribute to be paid by each village or landowner; the receiver (literally, weigher), who weighed the gold and silver as it was brought in for payment; the counter of towers, who formed his plans for the operation of the siege. In Psa. 48:13 the same phrase is used of those who defend the city.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
18, 19. Meditate terror So joyous may the people now be, that the dreadful past is a fact to be thought of ( meditated upon) as long since having transpired, and to be recalled by effort of memory. Thoughts recently so engrossing about the scribe, or manager of funds for the war about the receiver, or the weigher of the moneys or about him who counted, that is, examined the strength of the towers are now all vanished amid the present joy.
Not see a fierce people stammering tongue No more are the rough Assyrians, a people of barbarous dialect, or a wretched, ill sounding Semitic patois, to be seen around Jerusalem.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
These precious things are said, to carry off the minds of the people from the terrors of the approaching captivity, to the prospect of gospel times, which should be accomplished by the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Assyrians, and those which would lead Israel into bondage, would be a fierce people, and of a language the Hebrews could not understand: But, saith the Lord, let Zion be comforted in the prospect of his coming, whose advent shall be in righteousness, and who bringeth salvation forever! Oh! how truly blessed is it to read those rich promises, with an eye to Jesus! And now we who live in gospel times have seen them accomplished; what unspeakable mercies have they all found, who have truly found them in Jesus, and Jesus in them! In him and his complete salvation, we are indeed come to that blessed climate, where sickness, sorrow, and death, in the final consequences of it, are done away; and we hear him, in his glorious character, proclaimed, Jehovah Rophe, I am the Lord that healeth thee, Exo 15:26 .
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Isa 33:18 Thine heart shall meditate terror. Where [is] the scribe? where [is] the receiver? where [is] he that counted the towers?
Ver. 18. Thine heart shall meditate terror. ] But thou shalt now think of it as “waters that are past,” calling to mind what speeches among those late distractions had fallen from thee. a
Where is the scribe?
a Olim haec meminisse iuvabit.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
scribe. = the counter.
receiver = the weigher.
he that counted, &c. Referring to Sennacherib’s besieging army.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
heart: Isa 38:9-22, 1Sa 25:33-36, 1Sa 30:6, Psa 31:7, Psa 31:8, Psa 31:22, Psa 71:20, 2Co 1:8-10, 2Ti 3:11
Where is the scribe: 1Co 1:20
receiver: Heb. weigher, Gen 23:16, 2Ki 15:19, 2Ki 18:14, 2Ki 18:31
where is he: Isa 10:16-19
Reciprocal: Psa 48:12 – tell Isa 51:13 – where is Dan 4:9 – no secret
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
33:18 Thy heart {y} shall meditate terror. Where [is] the scribe? where [is] the receiver? where [is] he that counted the towers?
(y) Before this liberty comes you will think that you are in great danger: for the enemy will so sharply assail you that one will cry “Where is the clerk that writes the names of them who are taxed?” another, “Where is the receiver?” another will cry for him that values the rich houses, but God will deliver you from this fear.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
There will be no fear there of enemy officials who noted things down, weighed things out, and assessed Israel’s strength by taking inventories. Neither will there be terror caused by invading armies that used incomprehensible speech (cf. Isa 28:11; Isa 28:19). Foreign tax collectors who spoke an alien language may also be in view. These were all fears that the Judeans had when the Assyrians invaded.