Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Isaiah 39:6
Behold, the days come, that all that [is] in thine house, and [that] which thy fathers have laid up in store until this day, shall be carried to Babylon: nothing shall be left, saith the LORD.
6, 7. This is the only occasion on which a prophecy of the Babylonian Exile appears to be attributed to Isaiah. It is not easy to reconcile such a prediction with the particular circumstances in which it is reported to have been uttered. The announcement naturally left on Hezekiah’s mind the impression that his own days would be spent in peace, whereas in reality the most critical juncture of his reign still lay before him, and it is hardly credible that Isaiah should have disclosed to him the remote fate of his descendants, without warning him of the more immediate and personal consequences of his folly. This difficulty would be removed if we could hold that the prophecy was uttered after the deliverance from Sennacherib; but we have seen that this supposition is inadmissible on historical grounds. A more serious consideration is that Isaiah’s Messianic ideal leaves no room for a transference of the world-power from Assyria to Babylon, or the substitution of the latter for the former as the instrument of Israel’s chastisement. He uniformly regards the intervention of Jehovah in the Assyrian crisis as the supreme moment of human history and the turning point in the destinies of the kingdom of God, to be succeeded immediately by the glories of the Messianic age. The prediction, moreover, is without a parallel in the prophetic literature of Isaiah’s age (in Mic 4:10 the clause “and thou shalt go to Babylon” is inconsistent with the context, and in all probability a gloss). These objections are partly neutralised by the hypothesis that some nearer and more limited judgment is referred to, such as the imprisonment of Manasseh in Babylon (2Ch 33:11) in the reign of Asshurbanipal. The terms of the prophecy fall short of a deportation of the people and a destruction of the city, only the fate of the treasures and the royal family being indicated. No great stress, however, can be laid on this limitation (comp. a somewhat similar case in Amo 7:17) and the suggestion fails to harmonise the prediction with Isaiah’s known anticipation of the course of events. It is possible that the prophet’s actual communication had reached the late writer of this narrative in a form coloured by subsequent events.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Behold, the days come – The captivity of the Jews in Babylon commenced about one hundred and twenty years after this prediction (compare Jer 20:5).
That all that is in thine house – That is, all the treasures that are in the treasure-house Isa 39:2.
And that which thy fathers have laid up in store – In 2Ki 18:15-16, we are told that Hezekiah, in order to meet the demands of the king of Assyria, had cut off even the ornaments of the temple, and taken all the treasures which were in the kings house. It is possible, however, that there might have been other treasures which had been accumulated by the kings before him which he had not touched.
Nothing shall be left – This was literally fulfilled (see 2Ch 36:18). It is remarkable, says Vitringa, that this is the first intimation that the Jews would be carried to Babylon – the first designation of the place where they would be so long punished and oppressed. Micah Mic 4:10, a contemporary of Isaiah, declares the same thing, but probably this was not before the declaration here made by Isaiah. Moses had declared repeatedly, that, if they were a rebellious people, they should be removed from their own to a foreign land; but he had not designated the country Lev 26:33-34; Deu 28:64-67; Deu 30:3. Ahijah, in the time of Jeroboam 1Ki 14:15, had predicted that they should be carried beyond the river, that is, the Euphrates; and Amos Amo 5:27 had said that God would carry them into captivity beyond Damascus. But all these predictions were now concentrated on Babylon; and it was for the first time distinctly announced by Isaiah that that was to be the land where they were to suffer so long and so painful a captivity.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 6. To Babylon] babelah, so two MSS., (one ancient;) rightly, without doubt as the other copy (2Kg 20:17) has it. This prediction was fulfilled about one hundred and fifty years after it was spoken: see Da 1:2; Da 1:3-7. What a proof of Divine omniscience!
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
6. days comeone hundredtwenty years afterwards. This is the first intimation that the Jewswould be carried to Babylonthe first designation of theirplace of punishment. The general prophecy of Moses (Lev 26:33;Deu 28:64); the more particularone of Ahijah in Jeroboam’s time (1Ki14:15), “beyond the river”; and of Am5:27, “captivity beyond Damascus”; are now concentratedin this specific one as to “Babylon” (Mic4:10). It was an exact retribution in kind, that as Babylon hadbeen the instrument of Hezekiah and Judah’s sin, so also it should bethe instrument of their punishment.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Behold, the days come,…. Or, “are coming e”; and which quickly came; after a few reigns more, even in Jehoiakim’s time:
that all that is in thine house, and that which thy fathers have laid up in store until this day, shall be carried to Babylon; as it was, when Jehoiakim king of Judah, his mother, servants, princes, and officers, were taken by the king of Babylon, and carried captive, and along with them the treasures of the king’s house, and also all the treasures of the house of the Lord, 2Ki 24:12:
nothing shall be left, saith the Lord; this was, as Jarchi says, measure for measure; as there was nothing that was not shown to the ambassadors, so nothing should be left untaken away by the Babylonians.
e “venientes”, Montanus; “venturi sunt”, Junius & Tremellius, Piscator.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
6. And nothing shall be left It is proper to observe the kind of punishment which the Lord inflicts on Hezekiah; for he takes from his successors those things of which he vaunted so loudly, in order that they may have no ground for boasting of them. Thus the Lord punishes the ambition and pride of men, so that their name or kingdom, which they hoped would last for ever, is blotted out, and they are treated with contempt, and the remembrance of them is accursed. In a word, he overthrows their foolish thoughts, so that they find by experience the very opposite of those inventions by which they deceive themselves.
If it be objected that it is unreasonable, that the sacking of a city and the captivity of a nation should be attributed to the fault of a single man, while the Holy Spirit everywhere declares (2Ch 36:14) that general obstinacy was the reason why God delivered up the city and the country to be pillaged by the Babylonians; I answer, that there is no absurdity in God’s punishing the sin of a single man, and at the same time the crimes of a whole nation. For when the wrath of the Lord overspread the whole country, it was the duty of all to unite in confessing their guilt., and of every person to consider individually what he had deserved; that no man might throw the blame on others, but that every man might lay it on himself. Besides, since the Jews were already in many ways liable to the judgment of God, he justly permitted Hezekiah to fail in his duty to the injury of all, that he might hasten the more his own wrath, and open up a way for the execution of his judgment. In like manner we see that it happened to David; for Scripture declares that it was not an accidental occurrence that David numbered the people, but that it took place by the fault of the nation itself, whom the Lord determined to punish in this manner.
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The anger of the Lord was kindled against the nation, and he put it into the heart of David to number the people.” (2Sa 24:1.)
Thus in this passage also punishment is threatened against Hezekiah; but his sin, by which he provoked God’s anger, was also the vengeance of God against the whole nation.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(6, 7) Behold, the days come . . .The words, it may be noted, received a two-fold fulfilment, under widely different conditions. Hezekiahs son Manasseh, at the time when Isaiah spoke unborn, was carried as a prisoner to Babylon by Esar-haddon, king of Assyria (2Ch. 33:11). The last lineal heir of the house of David, Jehoiachin, died there after long years of imprisonment (2Ki. 25:27). Daniel and his three companions were of the kings seed and of the princes, and were, probably, themselves reduced to that state, placed under the care of the master of the ennuchs (Dan. 1:3). The actual treasures which Hezekiah showed were probably handed over to Sennacherib (2Ki. 18:15-16); but looking to the fact that that king records his capture of Babylon, after defeating Merodach-baladan, and established his son Esar-haddon there (Lenormant, Ancient History, i., p. 400), it is probable enough that the treasures may have been taken thither, and displayed, as if in irony, to the king and the counsellors, who had hoped to profit by them. Sennacherib indeed boasts that he had carried off not only the kings treasures, and his musicians to Nineveh, but his daughters also (Records of the Past, vii. 63).
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
Isa 39:6. Behold, the days come Whoever considers the state of things at this time, the small power the Assyrian had, and that their king was tributary to the king of Babylon, must acknowledge that this was a striking instance of the divine omniscience; and, when he finds that this prediction was verified, at the distance of 150 years after it was pronounced, he cannot desire a stronger instance of the divine authority and prophetical spirit wherewith Isaiah was endowed. See 2Ki 24:13.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
that all: 2Ki 20:17-19, 2Ki 24:13, 2Ki 25:13-15, 2Ch 36:10, 2Ch 36:18, Jer 20:5, Jer 27:21, Jer 27:22, Jer 52:17-19, Dan 1:2
Reciprocal: Gen 49:1 – last days 2Ch 32:26 – General Isa 10:3 – in the desolation Mic 1:16 – for Hab 1:6 – I raise
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
39:6 Behold, the days come, that all that [is] in thy house, and [that] which thy fathers have laid up in store until this day, shall be {e} carried to Babylon: nothing shall be left, saith the LORD.
(e) By the grievousness of the punishment is declared how greatly God detested ambition and vain glory.