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Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Isaiah 66:15

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For, behold, the LORD will come with fire, and with his chariots like a whirlwind, to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire.

15. with fire ] in fire. Cf. Deu 5:22 ff.

and his chariots shall be like the whirlwind (R.V.)] Cf. Hab 3:8; Psa 68:17. The image is derived from the storm-clouds on which Jehovah rides; ch. Isa 19:1; Psa 18:10; Psa 68:33; Deu 33:26. The phrase is applied in Jer 4:13 to the Chaldans (or Scythians).

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

15, 16. In fire and tempest the accompaniments of the theophany Jehovah will appear to take vengeance on His enemies. There is a connexion with the last clause of Isa 66:14 ; but the passage reads like a continuation of Isa 66:6. Comp. ch. Isa 29:6, Isa 30:27 ff.; Psalms 50, 3.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

For behold, the Lord will come with fire – The Septuagint reads this As fire ( hos pur). Fire is a common emblem to denote the coming of the Lord to judge and punish his enemies Psa 50:3 :

Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence;

A fire shall devour before him,

And it shall be very tempestuous round about him.

So Hab 2:5 :

Before him went the pestilence,

And burning coals went forth at his feet.

So Psa 97:3 :

A fire goeth before him,

And burneth up his enemies round about.

So it is said 2Th 1:8, that the Lord Jesus will be revealed in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God (compare Heb 10:27; 2Pe 3:7). So Yahweh is said to breathe out fire when he comes to destroy his foes:

There went up a smoke out of his nostrils,

And fire out of his mouth devoured;

Coals were kindled by it.

Psa 18:8

Compare the notes at Isa 29:6; Isa 30:30. This is a general promise that God would defend his church, and destroy his foes. To what this particularly applies, it may not be possible to determine, and instead of attempting that, I am disposed to regard it as a promise of a general nature, that God, in those future times, would destroy his foes, and would thus extend protection to his people. So far as the language is concerned, it may be applied either to the destruction of Jerusalem, to any mighty overthrow of his enemies, or to the day of judgment. The single truth is, that all his enemies would be destroyed as if Yahweh should come amidst flames of fire. That truth is enough for his church to know; that truth should be sufficient to fill a wicked world with alarm.

And with his chariots like a whirlwind – The principal idea here is, that he would come with immense rapidity, like a chariot that was borne forward as on the whirlwind, to destroy his foes. God is often represented as coming in a chariot – a chariot of the clouds, or of a whirlwind. Psa 104:3 :

Who maketh the clouds his chariot,

Who walketh upon the wings of the wind.

Compare Psa 18:10; see the note at Isa 19:1. See also Jer 4:13 :

Behold, he shall come up as clouds,

And his chariots shall be as a whirlwind.

Chariots were commonly made with two wheels, though sometimes they had four wheels, to which two horses, fiery and impetuous, were attached; and the rapid movement, the swift revolving wheels, and the dust which they raised, had no slight resemblance to a whirlwind (compare the notes at Isa 21:7, Isa 21:9). They usually had strong and sharp iron scythes affixed to the extremities of their axles, and were driven into the midst of the army of an enemy, cutting down all before them. Warriors sometimes fought standing on them, or leaping from them on the enemy. The chariots in the army of Cyrus are said to have been capacious enough to permit twenty men to fight from them.

To render his anger with fury – Lowth renders this, To breathe forth his anger. Jerome translates it, Reddere, that is, to render. The Septuagint, Apodounai, to give, or to render. Lowth proposes, instead of the present text, as pointed by the Masorites, l^ehashyb, to read it l^ehashyb, as if it were derived from nashab. But there is no necessity of a change. The idea is, that God would recompense his fury; or would cause his hand to turn upon them in fury.

With fury – Lowth renders this, In a burning heat. The word used ( chemah) properly means heat, then anger, wrath; and the Hebrew here might be properly rendered, heat of his anger; that is, glowing or burning wrath, wrath that consumes like fire.

With flames of fire – His rebuke shall consume like fiery flames; or it shall be manifested amidst such flame.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Verse 15. The Lord will come with fire – “JEHOVAH shall come as a fire”] For baesh, in fire, the Septuagint had in their copy kaesh, as a fire; .

To render his anger with fury – “To breathe forth his anger in a burning heat”] Instead of lehashib, as pointed by the Masoretes, to render, I understand it as lehashshib, to breathe, from nashab.

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

Here the prophet comes more particularly to expound what indignation should be showed towards his enemies.

The Lord will come with fire; that is, with terrible judgments, nothing being more terrible and wasting than fire; or with fire in a proper sense, understanding it of the fire with which enemies use to consume places brought under their power. With a whirlwind; with a sudden sweeping judgment that like a whirlwind shall destroy this people.

With fury; that is, with fervour; for fury properly so taken is not in God, Isa 27:4, but God sometimes executes justice and judgment more smartly and severely.

His rebukes: by rebukes he means punishments, for it is said God will execute them

with flames of fire. They had contemned the rebukes of his law, now God will rebuke them with fire and sword.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

15. (Isa 9:5;Psa 50:3; Hab 3:5;2Th 1:8; 2Pe 3:7).

chariots . . . whirlwind(Jer 4:13).

renderas the Hebrewelsewhere (Job 9:13; Psa 78:38)means to “allay” or “stay wrath.” MAURERtranslates it so here: He stays His anger with nothing butfury,” c. nothing short of pouring out all His fiery furywill satisfy His wrath.

fury“burningheat” [LOWTH], towhich the parallel, “flames of fire,” answers.

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

For, behold, the Lord will come with fire,…. Either with material fire, with which mystical Babylon or Rome shall be burnt,

Re 18:8, or with indignation and wrath, which shall be poured out like fire, and be as intolerable and consuming as that:

and with his chariots like a whirlwind; making a great noise, and striking great terror; alluding to chariots in which men used formerly to fight:

to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire; a heap of words, to show the fierceness of his wrath, and how severe his rebuke of enemies will be; which will be not a rebuke in love, as of his own people, but in a way of vindictive wrath.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

The prophecy now takes a new turn with the thought expressed in the words, “and fiercely does He treat His enemies.” The judgment of wrath, which prepares the way for the redemption and ensures its continuance, is described more minutely in Isa 66:15: “For behold Jehovah, in the fire will He come, and His chariots are like the whirlwind, to pay out His wrath in burning heat, and His threatening passeth into flames of fire.” Jehovah comes ba’esh , in igne (Jerome; the lxx, on the contrary, render it arbitrarily ka’esh ), since it is the fiery side of His glory, in which He appears, and fire pours from Him, which is primarily the intense excitement of the powers of destruction within God Himself (Isa 10:17; Isa 30:27; Psa 18:9), and in these is transformed into cosmical powers of destruction (Isa 29:6; Isa 30:30; Psa 18:13). He is compared to a warrior, driving along upon war-chariots resembling stormy wind, which force everything out of their way, and crush to pieces whatever comes under their wheels. The plural (His chariots) is probably not merely amplifying, but a strict plural; for Jehovah, the One, can manifest Himself in love or wrath in different places at the same time. The very same substantive clause occurs in Jer 4:13, where it is not used of Jehovah, however, but of the Chaldeans. Observe also that Jeremiah there proceeds immediately with a derivative passage from Hab 1:8. In the following clause denoting the object, , we must not adopt the rendering, “to breathe out His wrath in burning heat” (Hitzig), for heshbh may mean respirare , but not exspirare (if this were the meaning, it would be better to read from , as Lowth does); nor “ ut iram suam furore sedet ” (Meier), for even in Job 9:13; Psa 78:38, does not mean to still or cool His wrath, but to turn it away or take it back; not even “to direct His wrath in burning heat” (Ges., Kn.), for in this sense heshbh would be connected with an object with , (Job 15:13), (Isa 1:25). It has rather the meaning reddere in the sense of retribuere (Arab. athaba , syn. shillem ), and “to pay back, or pay out, His wrath” is equivalent to heshbh naqam (Deu 32:41, Deu 32:43), Hence does not stand in a permutative relation instead of a genitive one (viz., in fervore , ria sua = irae suae ), but is an adverbial definition, just as in Isa 42:25. That the payment of the wrath deserved takes place in burning heat, and His rebuke ( g e arah ) in flames of fire, are thoughts that answer to one another.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

Divine Judgment; Judgment and Mercy; The Enlargement of the Church.

B. C. 706.

15 For, behold, the LORD will come with fire, and with his chariots like a whirlwind, to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire. 16 For by fire and by his sword will the LORD plead with all flesh: and the slain of the LORD shall be many. 17 They that sanctify themselves, and purify themselves in the gardens behind one tree in the midst, eating swine’s flesh, and the abomination, and the mouse, shall be consumed together, saith the LORD. 18 For I know their works and their thoughts: it shall come, that I will gather all nations and tongues; and they shall come, and see my glory. 19 And I will set a sign among them, and I will send those that escape of them unto the nations, to Tarshish, Pul, and Lud, that draw the bow, to Tubal, and Javan, to the isles afar off, that have not heard my fame, neither have seen my glory; and they shall declare my glory among the Gentiles. 20 And they shall bring all your brethren for an offering unto the LORD out of all nations upon horses, and in chariots, and in litters, and upon mules, and upon swift beasts, to my holy mountain Jerusalem, saith the LORD, as the children of Israel bring an offering in a clean vessel into the house of the LORD. 21 And I will also take of them for priests and for Levites, saith the LORD. 22 For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the LORD, so shall your seed and your name remain. 23 And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the LORD. 24 And they shall go forth, and look upon the carcases of the men that have transgressed against me: for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh.

These verses, like the pillar of cloud and fire, have a dark side towards the enemies of God’s kingdom and all that are rebels against his crown, and a bright side towards his faithful loyal subjects. Probably they refer to the Jews in captivity in Babylon, of whom some are said to have been sent thither for their hurt, and with them God here threatens to proceed in his controversy; they hated to be reformed, and therefore should be ruined by the calamity (Jer. xxiv. 9); others were sent thither for their good, and they should have the trouble sanctified to them, should in due time get well through it and see many a good day after it. Many of the expressions here used are accommodated to that glorious dispensation; but doubtless the prophecy looks further, to the judgment for which Christ did come once, and will come again, into this world, and to the distinction which his word in both makes between the precious and the vile.

I. Christ will appear to the confusion and terror of all those that stand it out against him. Sometimes he will appear in temporal judgments. The Jews that persisted in infidelity were cut off by fire and by his sword. The ruin was very extensive; the Lord then pleaded with all flesh; and, it being his sword with which they are cut off, they are called his slain, sacrificed to his justice, and they shall be many. In the great day the wrath of God will be his fire and sword, with which he will cut off and consume all the impenitent; and his word, when it takes hold of sinners’ consciences, burns like fire, and is sharper than any two-edged sword. Idolaters will especially be contended with in the day of wrath, v. 17. Perhaps some of those who returned out of Babylon retained such instances of idolatry and superstition as are here mentioned, had their idols in their gardens (not daring to set them up publicly in the high places) and there purified themselves (as the worshippers of the true God used to do) when they went about their idolatrous rites, one after another, or, as we read it, behind one tree in the midst, behind Ahad or Ehad, some idol that they worshipped by that name and in honour of which they ate swine’s flesh (which was expressly forbidden by the law of God), and other abominations, as the mouse, or some other like animal. But the prophecy may refer to all those judgments which the wrath of God, according to the word of God, will bring upon provoking sinners, that live in contempt of God and are devoted to the world and the flesh: They shall be consumed together. From the happiness of heaven we find expressly excluded all idolaters, and whosoever worketh abomination,Rev 21:27; Rev 22:15. In the day of vengeance secret wickedness will be brought to light and brought to the account; for (v. 18), I know their works and their thoughts. God knows both what men do and from what principle and with what design they do it; and therefore is fit to judge the world, because he can judge the secrets of men, Rom. ii. 16.

II. He will appear to the comfort and joy of all that are faithful to him in the setting up of his kingdom in this world, the kingdom of grace, the earnest and first-fruits of the kingdom of glory. The time shall come that he will gather all nations and tongues to himself, that they may come and see his glory as it shines in the face of Jesus Christ, v. 18. This was fulfilled when all nations were to be discipled and the gift of tongues was bestowed in order thereunto. The church had hitherto been confined to one nation and in one tongue only God was worshipped; but in the days of the Messiah the partition-wall should be taken down, and those that had been strangers to God should be brought acquainted with him and should see his glory in the gospel, as the Jews had seen it in the sanctuary. As to this, it is here promised,

1. That some of the Jewish nation should, by the grace of God, be distinguished form the rest, and marked for salvation: I will not only set up a gathering ensign among them, to which the Gentiles shall seek (as is promised, ch. xi. 12), but there shall be those among them on whom I will set a differencing sign; for so the word signifies. Though they are a corrupt degenerate nation, yet God will set apart a remnant of them, that shall be devoted to him and employed for him, and a mark shall be set upon them, with such certainty will God own them, Ezek. ix. 4. The servants of God shall be sealed in their foreheads, Rev. vii. 3. The Lord knows those that are his. Christ’s sheep are marked.

2. That those who are themselves distinguished thus by the grace of God shall be commissioned to invite others to come and take the benefit of that grace. Those that escape the power of those prejudices by which the generality of that nation is kept in unbelief shall be sent to the nations to carry the gospel among them, and preach it to every creature. Note, Those who themselves have escaped the wrath to come should do all they can to snatch others also as brands out of the burning. God chooses to send those on his errands that can deliver their message feelingly and experimentally, and warn people of their danger by sin as those who have themselves narrowly escaped the danger. (1.) They shall be sent to the nations, several of which are here named, Tarshish, and Pul, and Lud, c. It is uncertain, nor are interpreters agreed, what countries are here intended. Tarshish signifies in general the sea, yet some take it for Tarsus in Cilicia. Pul is mentioned sometimes as the name of one of the kings of Assyria perhaps some part of that country might likewise bear that name. Lud is supposed to be Lydia, a warlike nation, famed for archers: the Lydians are said to handle and bend the bow, Jer. xlvi. 9. Tubal, some think, is Italy or Spain; and Javan most agree to be Greece, the Iones; and the isles of the Gentiles, that were peopled by the posterity of Japhet (Gen. x. 5), probably are here meant by the isles afar off, that have not heard my name, neither have seen my glory. In Judah only was God known, and there only his name was great for many ages. Other countries sat in darkness, heard no the joyful sound, saw not the joyful light. This deplorable state of theirs seems to be spoken of here with compassion; for it is a pity that any of the children of men should be at such a distance from their Maker as not to hear his name and see his glory. In consideration of this, (2.) Those that are sent to the nations shall go upon God’s errand, to declare his glory among the Gentiles. The Jews that shall be dispersed among the nations shall declare the glory of God’s providence concerning their nation all along, by which many shall be invited to join with them, as also by the appearances of God’s glory among them in his ordinances. Some out of all languages of the nations shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, entreating him to take notice of them, to admit them into his company, and to stay a little while for them, till they are ready, “for we will go with you, having heard that God is with you,” Zech. viii. 23. Thus the glory of God was in part declared among the Gentiles; but more clearly and fully by the apostles and early preachers of the gospel, who were sent into all the world, even to the isles afar off, to publish the glorious gospel of the blessed God. They went forth and preached every where, the Lord working with them, Mark xvi. 20.

3. That many converts shall hereby be made, v. 20.

(1.) They shall bring all your brethren (for proselytes ought to be owned and embraced as brethren) for an offering unto the Lord. God’s glory shall not be in vain declared to them, but they shall be both invited and directed to join themselves to the Lord. Those that are sent to them shall succeed so well in their negotiation that thereupon there shall be as great flocking to Jerusalem as used to be at the time of a solemn feast, when all the males from all parts of the country were to attend there, and not to appear empty. Observe, [1.] The conveniences that they shall be furnished with for their coming. Some shall come upon horses, because they came from far and the journey was too long to travel on foot, as the Jews usually did to their feasts. Persons of quality shall come in chariots, and the aged, and sickly, and little children, shall be brought in litters or covered wagons, and the young men on mules and swift beasts. This intimates their zeal and forwardness to come. They shall spare no trouble nor charge to get to Jerusalem. Those that cannot ride on horseback shall come in litters; and in such haste shall they be, and so impatient of delay, that those that can shall ride upon mules and swift beasts. These expressions are figurative, and these various means of conveyance are heaped up to intimate (says the learned Mr. Gataker) the abundant provision of all those gracious helps requisite for the bringing of God’s elect home to Christ. All shall be welcome, and nothing shall be wanting for their assistance and encouragement. [2.] The character under which they shall be brought. They shall come, not as formerly they used to come to Jerusalem, to be offerers, but to be themselves an offering unto the Lord, which must be understood spiritually, of their being presented to God as living sacrifices, Rom. xii. 1. The apostle explains this, and perhaps refers to it, Rom. xv. 16, where he speaks of his ministering the gospel to the Gentiles, that the offering up, or sacrificing, of the Gentiles might be acceptable. They shall offer themselves, and those who are the instruments of their conversion shall offer them, as the spoils which they have taken for Christ and which are devoted to his service and honour. They shall be brought as the children of Israel bring an offering in a clean vessel, with great care that they be holy, purified from sin, and sanctified to God. It is said of the converted Gentiles (Acts xv. 9) that their hearts were purified by faith. Whatever was brought to God was brought in a clean vessel, a vessel appropriated to religious uses. God will be served and honoured in the way that he has appointed, in the ordinances of his own institution, which are the proper vehicles for these spiritual offerings. When the soul is offered up to God the body must be a clean vessel for it, possessed in sanctification and honour, and not in the lusts of uncleanness (1Th 4:4; 1Th 4:5); and converts to Christ are not only purged from an evil conscience, but have their bodies also washed with pure water, Heb. x. 22. Now,

(2.) This may refer, [1.] To the Jews, devout men, and proselytes out of every nation under heaven, that flocked together to Jerusalem, expecting the kingdom of the Messiah to appear, Act 2:5; Act 2:6; Act 2:10. They came from all parts to the holy mountain of Jerusalem, as an offering to the Lord, and there many of them were brought to the faith of Christ by the gift of tongues poured out on the apostles. Methinks there is some correspondence between that history and this prophecy. The eunuch some time after came to worship at Jerusalem in his chariot and took home with him the knowledge of Christ and his holy religion. [2.] To the Gentiles, some of all nations, that should be converted to Christ, and so added to his church, which, though a spiritual accession, is often in prophecy represented by a local motion. The apostle says of all true Christians that they have come to Mount Zion, and the heavenly Jerusalem (Heb. xii. 22), which explains this passage, and shows that the meaning of all this parade is only that they shall be brought into the church by the grace of God, and in the use of the means of that grace, as carefully, safely, and comfortably, as if they were carried in chariots and litters. Thus God shall persuade Japhet and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem, Gen. ix. 27.

4. That a gospel ministry shall be set up in the church, it being thus enlarged by the addition of such a multitude of members to it (v. 21): I will take of them (of the proselytes, of the Gentile converts) for priests and for Levites, to minister in holy things and to preside in their religious assemblies, which is very necessary for doctrine, worship, and discipline. Hitherto the priests and Levites were all taken from among the Jews and were all of one tribe; but in gospel times God will take of the converted Gentiles to minister to him in holy things, to teach the people, to bless them in the name of the Lord, to be the stewards of the mysteries of God as the priests and Levites were under the law, to be pastors and teachers (or bishops), to give themselves to the word and prayer, and deacons to serve tables, and, as the Levites, to take care of the outward business of the house of God,Phi 1:1; Act 6:2-4. The apostles were all Jews, and so were the seventy disciples; the great apostle of the Gentiles was himself a Hebrew of the Hebrews; but, when churches were planted among the Gentiles, they had ministers settled who were of themselves, elders in every church (Act 14:23; Tit 1:5), which made the ministry to spread the more easily, and to be the more familiar, and, if not the more venerable, yet the more acceptable; gospel grace, it might be hoped, would cure people of those corruptions which kept a prophet from having honour in his own country. God says, I will take, not all of them, though they are all in a spiritual sense made to our God kings and priests, but of them, some of them. It is God’s work originally to choose ministers by qualifying them for and inclining them to the service, as well as to make ministers by giving them their commission. I will take them, that is, I will admit them, though Gentiles, and will accept of them and their ministrations. This is a great honour and advantage to the Gentile church, as it was to the Jewish church that God raised up of their sons for prophets and their young men for Nazarites, Amos ii. 11.

5. That the church and ministry, being thus settled, shall continue and be kept up in a succession from one generation to another, v. 22. The change that will be made by the setting up of the kingdom of the Messiah is here described to be, (1.) A very great and universal change; it shall be a new world, the new heavens and the new earth promised before, ch. lxv. 17. Old things have passed away, behold all things have become new (2 Cor. v. 17), the old covenant of peculiarity is set aside, and a new covenant, a covenant of grace, established, Heb. viii. 13. We are now to serve in newness of the spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter, Rom. vii. 6. New commandments are given relating both to heaven and earth, and new promises relating to both, and both together make a New Testament; so that they are new heavens and a new earth that God will create, and these a preparative for the new heavens and new earth designed at the end of time, 2 Pet. iii. 13. (2.) A change of God’s own making; he will create the new heavens and the new earth. The change was made by him that had authority to make new ordinances, as well as power to make new worlds. (3.) It will be an abiding lasting change, a change never to be changed, a new world that will be always new, and never wax old, as that does which is ready to vanish away: It shall remain before me unalterable; for the gospel dispensation is to continue to the end of time and not to be succeeded by any other. The kingdom of Christ is a kingdom that cannot be moved; the laws and privileges of it are things that cannot be shaken, but shall for ever remain,Heb 12:27; Heb 12:28. It shall therefore remain, because it is before God; it is under his eye, and care, and special protection. (4.) It will be maintained in a seed that shall serve Christ: Your seed, and in them your name, shall remain–a seed of ministers, a seed of Christians; as one generation of both passes away, another generation shall come; and thus the name of Christ, with that of Christians, shall continue on earth while the earth remains, and his throne as the days of heaven. The gates of hell, though they fight against the church, shall not prevail, nor wear out the saints of the Most High.

6. That the public worship of God in religious assemblies shall be carefully and constantly attended upon by all that are thus brought as an offering to the Lord, v. 23. This is described in expressions suited to the Old-Testament dispensation, to show that though the ceremonial law should be abolished, and the temple service should come to an end, yet God should be still as regularly, constantly, and acceptably worshipped as ever. Heretofore only Jews went up to appear before God, and they were bound to attend only three times a year, and the males only; but now all flesh, Gentiles as well as Jews, women as well as men, shall come and worship before God, in his presence, though not in his temple at Jerusalem, but in religious assemblies dispersed all the world over, which shall be to them as the tabernacle of meeting was to the Jews. God will in them record his name, and, though but two or three come together, he will be among them, will meet them, and bless them. And they shall have the benefit of these holy convocations frequently, every new moon and every sabbath, not, as formerly, at the three annual feasts only. There is no necessity of one certain place, as the temple was of old. Christ is our temple, in whom by faith all believers meet, and now that the church is so far extended it is impossible that all should meet at one place; but it is fit that there should be a certain time appointed, that the service may be done certainly and frequently, and a token thereby given of the spiritual communion which all Christian assemblies have with each other by faith, hope, and holy love. The new moons and the sabbaths are mentioned because, under the law, though the yearly feasts were to be celebrated at Jerusalem, yet the new moons and the sabbaths were religiously observed all the country over, in the schools of the prophets first and afterwards in the synagogues (2Ki 4:23; Amo 8:5; Act 15:21), according to the model of which Christian assemblies seem to be formed. Where the Lord’s day is weekly sanctified, and the Lord’s supper monthly celebrated, and both are duly attended on, there this promise is fulfilled, there the Christian new moons and sabbaths are observed. See, here, (1.) That God is to be worshipped in solemn assemblies, and that it is the duty of all, as they have opportunity, to wait upon God in those assemblies: All flesh must come; though flesh, weak, corrupt, and sinful, let them come that the flesh may be mortified. (2.) In worshipping God we present ourselves before him, and are in a special manner in his presence. (3.) For doing this there ought to be stated times, and are so; and we must see that it is our interest as well as our duty constantly and conscientiously to observe these times.

7. That their thankful sense of God’s distinguishing favour to them should be very much increased by the consideration of the fearful doom and destruction of those that persist and perish in their infidelity and impiety, v. 24. Those that have been worshipping the Lord of hosts, and rejoicing before him in the goodness of his house, shall, in order to affect themselves the more with their own happiness, take a view of the misery of the wicked. Observe, (1.) Who they are whose misery is here described. They are men that have transgressed against God, not only broken his laws, but broken covenant with him, and thought themselves able to contend with him. It may be meant especially of the unbelieving Jews that rejected the gospel of Christ. (2.) What their misery is. It is here represented by the frightful spectacle of a field of battle, covered with the carcases of the slain, that lie rotting above ground, full of worms crawling about them and feeding on them; and, if you go to burn them, they are so scattered, and it is such a noisome piece of work to get them together, that it would be endless, and the fire would never be quenched; so that they are an abhorring to all flesh, nobody cares to come near them. Now this is sometimes accomplished in temporal judgments, and perhaps never nearer the letter than in the destruction of Jerusalem and the Jewish nation by the Romans, in which destruction it is computed that above two millions, first and last, were cut off by the sword, besides what perished by famine and pestilence. It may refer likewise to the spiritual judgments that came upon the unbelieving Jews, which St. Paul looks upon, and shows us, Rom. xi. 8, c. They became dead in sins, twice dead. The church of the Jews was a carcase of a church all its members were putrid carcases; their worm died not, their own consciences made them continually uneasy, and the fire of their rage against the gospel was not quenched, which was their punishment as well as their sin; and they became, more than ever any nation under the sun, an abhorring to all flesh. But our Saviour applies it to the everlasting misery and torment of impenitent sinners in the future state, where their worm dies not, and their fire is not quenched (Mark ix. 44); for the soul, whose conscience is its constant tormentor, is immortal, and God, whose wrath is its constant terror, is eternal. (3.) What notice shall be taken of it. Those that worship God shall go forth and look upon them, to affect their own hearts with the love of their Redeemer, when they see what misery they are redeemed from. As it will aggravate the miseries of the damned to see others in the kingdom of heaven and themselves thrust out (Luke xiii. 28), so it will illustrate the joys and glories of the blessed to see what becomes of those that died in their transgression, and it will elevate their praises to think that they were themselves as brands plucked out of that burning. To the honour of that free grace which thus distinguished them let the redeemed of the Lord with all humility, and not without a holy trembling, sing their triumphant songs.

Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary

Vs. 15-21: THE LORD’S NAME EXALTED IN JUDGMENT

1. The Lord is pictured as coming with the majesty and power of a mighty Conqueror, (vs. 15-16; Rev 19:11-16); by fire and sword He executes judgment, (Dan 7:10-11; Rev 19:20; Mal 4:1-3; Isa 30:27-30; Mat 13:40-42; 2Th 1:7-8).

2. As One who judges “without respect of persons”, He deals with those of His own people who have corrupted themselves with idols, (vs. 17; Isa 1:28; Isa 1:31; Psa 73:27).

3. In His unprecedented overthrow of the international military host sent to oppose Him, the nations will see His glory and power, (vs. 18; Rev 19:17-20; Rev 16:13-16; Zep 3:8-20; Joe 3:9-21).

4. In His great mercy, God will spare some of the enemy hosts who, acknowledging the justice of His judgment, will bear the news of Jehovah’s power and glory to the nations, (vs. 19; comp. Isa 42:12; 1Ch 16:23-34).

5. These, in turn, will bring His elect ones from every nation -presenting them, as an offering, to Jehovah in His holy mountain, (vs. 20; Isa 49:22; Isa 60:4).

6. There having already been a necessary change of priestly order (Heb 7:11-17), the Lord will take priestly servants from among the Gentiles -to offer up spiritual sacrifices in His kingdom, (comp. Rom 12:1-2; Rom 15:16; Php_4:18; Heb 13:15; 1Pe 2:5; 1Pe 2:9).

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

15. For, lo, Jehovah will come in fire. The object of this ( ὑποτύπωσις) lively description is, that believers, when they see worthless men laughing at their distresses, and growing more and more insolent, may not on that account turn aside from the right path, or lose courage; for he intended not only to smite wicked men, who are moved by no threatenings, and scorn all instruction, (225) but to comfort good men, that they may feel that they are happy, because they are under God’s protection; and may not attach themselves to the wicked on account of the prosperity of all their undertakings. Their advantage is, therefore, what he has chiefly in view, that they may be satisfied with God’s protection and grace. But it may admit of doubt whether or not he includes the last judgment, along with the temporal punishments with which he now begins to chastise the wicked. For my own part, I have no doubt that he intends to include that judgment also, along with those which were only the forerunners of eternal destruction.

Will come. This began to be accomplished, when, by carrying away the people to Babylon, God took vengeance on domestic foes. Next, when the time of the deliverance was accomplished, he attacked more severely the wicked Gentiles by an armed force, and ceased not to give other and various proofs of his approach, by which he shewed himself to be present with the elect people, and came in fire to judge their enemies. Lastly, we know that he will come in fire at the last day, to take vengeance on all the wicked. But this passage ought not to be limited to the last judgment, so as to include all the rest. Yet these threatenings, as we shall see soon afterwards, are especially directed by the Prophet against hypocritical Jews.

These metaphorical expressions are very customary in Scripture; for we could not comprehend this dreadful judgment of God in any other way than by the Prophets employing metaphors drawn from known and familiar objects. (2Th 1:8; 2Pe 3:7.) By means of them the prophets endeavor to make a deep impression on our senses, that, struck with the true fear of God, we may not envy the wicked, for whom such dreadful vengeance is prepared. Hence we see how trivial and useless are the speculations of the Sophists, who dispute about the refined nature and qualities of that fire; for the design of Scripture is to point out to us under figures the dreadful judgment of God, which otherwise we could not imagine or understand. This is still more evident from the word “sword,” in the following verse; for it conveys the same meaning.

(225) “ Et se moquent de tout ce qu’on leur dit.” “And mock at everything that is said to them.”

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

3. BUILDING OF ZION

TEXT: Isa. 66:15-24

For, behold, Jehovah will come with fire, and his chariots shall be like the whirlwind; to render his anger with fierceness, and his rebuke with flames of fire.

For by fire will Jehovah execute judgment, and by his sword, upon all flesh; and the slain of Jehovah shall be many.

They that sanctify themselves and purify themselves to go unto the gardens, behind one in the midst, eating swines flesh, and the abomination, and the mouse, they shall come to an end together, saith Jehovah.

For I know their works and their thoughts: the time cometh, that I will gather all nations and tongues; and they shall come, and shall see my glory.

And I will set a sign among them, and I will send such as escape of them unto the nations, to Tarshish, Pul, and Lud, that draw the bow, to Tubal and Javan, to the isles afar off, that have not heard my fame, neither have seen my glory; and they shall declare my glory among the nations.

And they shall bring all your brethren out of all the nations for an oblation unto Jehovah, upon horses, and in chariots, and in litters, and upon mules, and upon dromedaries, to my holy mountain Jerusalem, saith Jehovah, as the children of Israel bring their oblation in a clean vessel into the house, of Jehovah.

And of them also will I take for priests and for Levites, saith Jehovah.

For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith Jehovah, so shall your seed and your name remain.

And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith Jehovah.

And they shall go forth, and look upon the dead bodies of the men that have transgressed against me: for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh.

QUERIES

Why repeat the message of judgment?

What is the sign of Isa. 66:19?

Who is going to come before Jehovah on new moon and sabbath?

PARAPHRASE

Yes, Jehovah must come with His judgment of wrath to prepare the way for the redemption of mankind. He comes in all the awful consuming fierceness of fire when He judges. His sword of judgment will fall upon the world. Those who have rejected the Lord will suffer His wrath and many will die. Yes, the manifest judgment of God is near upon all, both Israelite and Gentile who dedicate and purify themselves to idolatry, who follow those who indulge in perverseness like eating swines flesh, mice and other abominable things contrary to My holy Law. I see what they do and I know their secret thoughts, says Jehovah. The time is coming when I will summon all nations and races to behold the ultimate demonstrations of My glory. At this time, men will see My awesome sign of redemption and judgment in its historical certainty, and some of them will escape the judgment I have pronounced upon the world. Those who escape I will send as messengers with the good news of My salvation to the far reaches of civilization to people who have never heard of Me and have never seen My sovereign omnipotence. These messengers will go to Spain, North Africa, Armenia, Greece and other lands beyond these. They shall proclaim My glory among men of all nations and races. All who hear and obey will become brethren and precious gifts to My honor. They will be brought to My New Zion from all over the world; they will come from different directions, by every means possible. Many will come because some of the children of Israel will have accepted My salvation and offered themselves to Me in obedience. They will become messengers, bringing Gentiles to Me with that same faith and obedience; these Israelites will finally have offered Me clean offerings; these Gentiles will also be considered cleansed and I will consecrate them as My servants, says the Lord. For as surely as the new order which I am creating will last forever, so those who accept My salvation shall be My children forever and their relationship to My name shall stand forever. People from all nations will come into covenant relationship to Me and worship Me according to My will forever. These will behold My judgments upon those who were so favored but who rebelliously rejected My will; this will be a constant reminder of the terrible punishment of the rebellious and of the greatness of redemption to the obedient.

COMMENTS

Isa. 66:15-17 DESTRUCTION OF THE OLD: We repeat, for emphasis, this chapter (66) is an epilogue. First, judgment upon Israel for disobeying the Old covenant (Isa. 66:1-6); second, promise of a new Israel and a new order (Isa. 66:7-14); third, building the new order by destroying the old and opening up citizenship in the New order to the whole world (Isa. 66:15-24). J. A. Alexander, in Commentary on the Prophecies of Isaiah, pub. Zondervan, says these verses are . . . an integral part of the great argument with which the whole book has been occupied, and which the Prophet never loses sight of to the end of the last sentence. The grand theme of these prophecies . . . is the relation of Gods people to himself and to the world, and in the latter stages of its history, to that race with which it was once outwardly identical. The great catastrophe with which the vision closes is the change of dispensations, comprehending the final abolition of the ceremonial law, and its concomitants, the introduction of a spiritual worship and the consequent diffusion of the Church, its vast enlargement by the introduction of all Gentile converts to complete equality of privilege and honor with the believing Jews, and the excision of the unbelieving Jews from all connection with the church or chosen people, which they once imagined to have no existence independent of themselves.

The emphasis of this final prophecy is on the establishment of the New messianic age and the gathering of the Gentiles into covenant relationship. In order to establish its fulfillment the Old order must be abrogated. The abrogation of the Old and the establishment of the New are coincidentalthey are to occur at the same time, i.e., within a generation (cf. Mat. 24:34). The generation of the apostles (Peter, James, John, etc.) did not pass away until God had abrogated the Old order and instituted the New!

Gods judgments are appropriately likened unto fire. Fire fiercely consumes (cf. Heb. 12:29; 2Th. 1:7-8, etc.). and is often representative of torment and punishment (cf. Luk. 16:24; Rev. 14:10-11). Jehovah abrogated the Old order, in fact, at the cross of Christ (cf. Col. 2:14-15; Heb. 9:15-28, etc.). That was when God judged both the Mosaic system and all other human (Gentile) systems through which men tried to earn righteousness before Him. All human governments, religions, and ideologies are essentially human rebellions against the rule of God. They were all judged, exposed as inadequate, and destroyed in the power they might exercise over men at Calvary and the Empty Tomb. All human deviations from faith in God through His promised Son are idolatrous. They all fall under the generalized picture of abomination in Isa. 66:17. They all came to an end together in Gods great redemptive-judgmental work in Jerusalem, 30 A.D., when Old Jerusalem had run its course and used up the time allotted to it (cf. Dan. 9:24-27). When the Suffering Servant had made atonement for sin and was raised from the dead destroying the ultimate power of the devil, Israel was to turn to Jehovah and accept citizenship in New Zion (the church). Some did, but a majority did not. Jehovah, in His longsuffering allowed the Jewish nation to retain its city and temple for another 40 years (until 70 A.D.), and then, by His own providential design He allowed the city and the temple to be destroyed and burned and the nation dispersed over the face of the earth by the Roman empire. Thus the fire of Gods judgment fell both literally and figuratively upon the Old order and consumed it.

Isa. 66:18-24 DEVELOPMENT OF THE NEW: Concurrent to the judgment of the Old order, Jehovah will establish the New order. The phrase time cometh connects the judgment of those who shall come to an end together and the gathering of all nations and tongues to see His glory. All nations would see Gods glory in the two-fold accomplishment of the destruction of the Old and establishment of the New. Jehovahs historical signal that He was fulfilling His promises made through the prophets about all this was the Messiah! All who saw Jehovahs signal that human systems were overthrown believed in the Christ and were saved (escaped) from that perverse generation (cf. Act. 2:40). These escaped ones (the Jews who became Christians at Pentecost and soon thereafter) were sent by the Lord unto the nations (Gentiles) where they announced the great historical events of redemption which glorified God. Perhaps some of the early Gentile converts (e.g., Cornelius) were also among the sent ones. Tarshish, if our conjecture is right, is Spain (at the extreme west of the Great Sea); Pul is probably Put in North Africa (the extreme southern boundary); Lud is probably Lydia in Asia Minor (northern boundary); and Tubal and Javan are Armenia and Greece respectively (generally forming a northern boundary). These nations are mentioned to emphasize the extreme distances to which the escapees shall be sent with their declaration of the glory of Jehovah.

Those escapees who are sent are going to bring brethren out of all the nations. Apparently the apostle Paul had this scripture in mind when he referred to his ministry of bringing the Gentiles to Christ as an offering unto God (cf. Rom. 15:16). The prophets designation of goiym from all nations being brought forth as brethren of the covenant people is unique! Many of the prophets predicted that the Gentiles would one day be brought to Jehovah, but none (save in this one place) referred to them as brethren! The reference to various beasts of burden and vehicles of transportation pictorializes the ease, swiftness and splendor in which the Gentiles will be brought to the Lord. The holy mountain is a favorite phrase of Isaiah to designate the messianic age (cf. Isa. 2:1-4; Isa. 11:9; Isa. 56:7; Isa. 57:3; Isa. 65:11; Isa. 65:25, etc.).

From the Gentiles Jehovah will take priests and Levites. In the New age (the church) all citizens are priests (cf. 1Pe. 2:5; 1Pe. 2:9; Rev. 1:6; Rev. 5:10, etc.). This may have a more specific reference, however, to the special ministry of those sent (even of early Gentile converts) to the extreme boundaries of civilization to bring brethren out of all the nations. In other words, it may refer to Gentile converts chosen especially by God as ministers and missionaries to declare the glory of God, e.g., Timothy, Luke, Cornelius and others.

The next verses (2224) emphasize the finality and perpetuity of the establishment of the New order and the judgment of the Old order. We have already established our view that the term new heavens and new earth as Isaiah uses it means the New Order (the messianic age) (cf. Isa. 65:17 ff). The prophets talk of a whole new age to come when the Servant of Jehovah appears:

There shall be new things told by God (Isa. 42:9; Isa. 48:6-7).

Gods people will sing a new song (Isa. 42:10).

God will make a completely new covenant (Jer. 31:31 ff).

God will put a new heart and spirit in men (Eze. 18:31; Eze. 36:26).

They will have a new name (Isa. 62:2).

There are many other references to the newness of the age to follow the old one where the word new is not specified but inferred. Just as this new creation will be Gods final covenant and just as this new order will last forever, so those who enter into the covenant will be His people forever. That was prophesied by Hosea (Hos. 2:16-23; Hos. 3:5) and fulfilled according to the apostles (Rom. 9:24-33; 1Pe. 2:9-10). The name God gives His New Covenant people will remain upon them forever (cf. Rev. 2:17; Rev. 3:12; Rev. 14:1; Rev. 22:4). Old Israel with its old covenant, old name, and old institutions shall pass away (cf. Jer. 3:15-18) and not even be remembered! But from the old will spring the remnant that survives Gods casting off, and together with the remnant will be a great gathering of Gentiles to form the true Israel of God which is a new creation (cf. Gal. 6:15-16)!

Isaiah was a preacher-prophet to the people of the Old dispensation. He must communicate his message about the New dispensation in terminology and forms to which those of the old dispensation could relate. So, using the terminology of new moon and sabbath, Isaiah predicts that in the new order there will be faithful, regular, worship of God which will be pleasing to Him. This brief picture of worship in the new dispensation given by Isaiah is dramatically paralleled and expanded in Ezekiel, chapters 4048, and in Zec. 14:16-21. Isa. 66:23 is Isaiahs picture of the situation with new Zion after its creation. Isa. 66:24 is the prophets description of the relationship of the New, true worshipers, to what they see concerning the Old dispensation which has been judged and destroyed or abrogated. The New citizens of Zion are safe within her walls, worshiping Jehovah gladly and truly. Occasionally New Zions citizens look upon the dead bodies of those who have transgressed against Jehovah and the sight of His judgment upon the sinners reminds Zion of the greatness of its redemption and the awful terror of Gods punishment from which she has been saved. The undying worm and the unquenchable fire is figurative use of Gehenna where the Jews disposed of dead carcasses of criminals.

Christians witnessed the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. and were reminded of the fate of all who disobey God and reject His Son and warned that a similar fate awaits an unbelieving world when Jesus comes back to earth at the end of time (Mat. 24:1-51). New Zion is directed to look upon the dead Roman culture of the first and second centuries (Rom. 1:18-32; Revelation, chapters Rev. 17:1 to Rev. 20:6) and rejoice for salvation while also being warned against partaking in Rome s sin.

Isaiahs pictorialization of the great judgment of God upon impenitent Israel and the founding of a new order upon the ashes of the old has parallels: (a) the great battle of Gog and Magog and the new land, city and temple of Ezekiel, chapters 3848; (b) the great battle in the valley of Jehoshaphat and the escape of those who call upon the name of the Lord in Joe. 2:28 to Joe. 3:21; (c) the battle and victory the king will win, the purging of the land, and the practice of purified worship depicted in Zec. 9:9 to Zec. 14:21. So Isaiah closes his great prophecy predicting, not the end of time but the end of the Old dispensation and the creation by God of a New dispensation. Isaiah is predicting the first coming of the Messiah and the establishment of the Messiahs kingdom, the church, not the second coming of the Messiah.

Essentially Isaiahs message is that Gods great plan to redeem the world involves the incarnation of the Word in the person of the Suffering Servant; the atonement for sin by the Servant; the offering of a new covenant relationship of grace through faith; the incorporation into that covenant relationship and the formation of a New Zion from all in the world who will believe and accept its terms; the judgment and punishment forever of all who will not accept it.

QUIZ

How is chapter 66 an epilogue?

Why use fire as a picture of Gods judgments?

In what way is the judgment of the old connected to the establishment of the new?

Why list the names of the nations in Isa. 66:19?

What is unique about the term, bring all your brethren . . .?

Who are the priests, and Levites of Isa. 66:21 and from whence do they come?

Who goes forth to look upon the dead (Isa. 66:24) and when?

How would you sum up the message of the whole book of Isaiah?

And now, dear reader, having lived some portion of each day of our life for the last four years with the majesty and awesomeness of this work from the pen of Isaiah, we are impressed very deeply that the one great necessity for a world of unbelief is it must be brought face to face, mind to mind, heart to heart with the glory of God. Men must be taught, must acknowledge and put their trust in who God is and not in what man can do! The focus of the prophets on the character and nature of God is the true focus of all preaching. Now, in the end of the ages, the glory and personhood of God has been revealed incarnate in Jesus Christ and His accomplished redemption. And that is the ultimate focus of all preaching. Now therefore, be wise. . . .

Psalms 2

Why do the nations rage,

And the peoples meditate a vain thing?

The kings of the earth set themselves,

And the rulers take counsel together,

Against Jehovah, and against his anointed, saying,

Let us break their bonds asunder,

And cast away their cords from us.

He that sitteth in the heavens will laugh:

The Lord will have them in derision.

Then will he speak unto them in his wrath,

And vex them in his sore displeasure:

Yet I have set my king

Upon my holy hill of Zion.

I will tell of the decree:

Jehovah said unto me, Thou art my son;
This day have I begotten thee.

Ask of me, and I will give thee the nations for thine inheritance,

And the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.

Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron;

Thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potters vessel.

Now therefore be wise, O ye kings:

Be instructed, ye judges of the earth.

Serve Jehovah with fear,

And rejoice with trembling.

Kiss the son, lest he be angry, and ye perish in the way.

For his wrath will soon be kindled.
Blessed are all they that take refuge in him.

Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series

(15) With his chariots . . .i.e., the storm-clouds sweeping on their way, while the lightnings and the winds do their work. (Comp. Psa. 18:10; Psa. 68:33)

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

15, 16. Will come with fire The figure partakes of imagery from Sinai a figure always at hand when demonstration of great trial scenes are before us. Isa 34:3.

For by his sword As a mighty warrior.

Plead with all flesh With all men who are hostile to God and his Zion. The tenor of the words in this passage shows God’s pleading “with all flesh,” that is, representatively with the whole hostile Jewish race, to be not literally in words of reasoning, but in terrific pleadings (so to call it) of “fire” and “sword.” Such fierce judgment came at last to tie Jews as a nation, at which time the slain of the Lord was indeed many. Who will say this prophecy was not terribly fulfilled at the destruction of Jerusalem?

But prophecy grows in fulfilment, and who will say the events of A.D. 70 were not a type of after terrific fulfilments in the form of trial-crises, wherein fire and sword played their part, involving Gentile and Jewish atrocities alike? As to what befell, in the sphere of prophecy, the mass of Israel, see Romans 9-11.

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

Isa 66:15-16. For, behold, &c. This passage is wholly figurative, exhibiting God, as about to take vengeance upon the enemies of his church, under the figure of a commander and warrior, as well as of a judge, armed at all points, severely to take vengeance upon those who have provoked his indignation. See chap. Isa 63:1, &c. and Rev 18:8; Rev 14:20; Rev 14:20. Some suppose that this passage refers to the general judgment; but it is rather, according to the whole tenor of this prophesy, to be referred to the judgments of God upon the rebellious Jews, and upon the antichristian enemies of the church.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

9. GENERAL PICTURE OF THE TIME OF THE END AS THE TIME OF JUDGMENT TO LIFE AND TO DEATH

Isa 66:15-24

15For, behold, the Lord will come with fire,

And with his chariots like a whirlwind,
To render his anger with fury,
And his rebuke with flames of fire.

1626For by fire and by his sword

Will the Lord plead with all flesh:
And the slain of the Lord shall be many.

17They that sanctify themselves and purify themselves27 in the gardens,

28Behind one tree in the midst,

Eating swines flesh, and the abomination, and the mouse,
Shall be consumed together, saith the Lord.

1829 For I know their works and their thoughts:

It shall come, that I will gather all nations and tongues;
And they shall come, and see my glory.

19And I will set a sign among them,

And I will send those that escape of them unto the nations,

To Tarshish, Pul, and Lud, that draw the bow,

To Tubal and Javan, to the isles afar off,

That have not heard my 30fame,

Neither have seen my glory;
And they shall declare my glory among the Gentiles.

20And they shall bring all your brethren for an offering unto the Lord

Out of all nations
Upon horses, and in chariots, and in 31litters,

And upon mules, and upon 32swift beasts,

To my holy mountain 33Jerusalem, saith the Lord,

As the children of Israel bring an offering
In a clean vessel into the house of the Lord.

2134And I will also take of them

For priests and for Levites, saith the Lord.

22For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make,

Shall remain before me, saith the Lord,

So shall your seed and your name remain.

23And it shall come to pass, that 35 36from one new moon to another,

And from one Sabbath to another,
Shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord.

24And they shall go forth, and look

Upon the carcases of the men that have transgressed against me:
For their worm shall not die,
Neither shall their fire be quenched;
And they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh.

TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL

Isa 66:15. The words occur exactly as here Jer 4:13. There, too, they stand as second subject of the verb , which is first in order. Jeremiah quotes there Hab 1:8 also. is never used by Jeremiah elsewhere; he employs the word (Jer 17:25; Jer 22:4; Jer 46:9; Jer 47:3; Jer 50:37; Jer 51:21). But Isaiah uses three times, namely Isa 2:7; Isa 22:18, in addition to the present case. , too, is never elsewhere used by Jeremiah. He employs always instead of it (Jer 23:19; Jer 25:32; Jer 30:23) and (Jer 23:19; Jer 30:23). But Isaiah has five times, including the present place, Isa 5:28; Isa 17:13; Isa 21:1; Isa 29:6. On these grounds we can maintain that the words in Jeremiah are a quotation from the place before us.

Isa 66:16. is not the sign of the accusative, but a preposition as 1Sa 12:7; Jer 2:35; Eze 17:20; Eze 20:35 sq.; Isa 38:22; Jer 25:31. This last place recalls forcibly the one before us.

Isa 66:17. I hold this verse to be interpolated by the same hand which inserted Isa 64:9 sqq.; Isa 65:3-5; Isa 65:11; Isa 66:3-6. My reasons are, 1) The-special mention of the Israelites who had apostatized to heathenism is not at all necessary in this connection. For Isa 66:15-16 speak of the general judgment extending to all flesh (Isa 66:16). For what purpose then this particular specification of a single class of men? [Criticism of this kind is not worthy of our author. We might apply it to establish the spuriousness of the greater part of the discourse recorded in Mat 25:31-46. There, too, is an account of the judgment of all nations. Yet only a class of persons guilty of a particular sin of omission is condemned by the Judge. It is enough to say that our Lord and the Prophet had their reasons for particularly specifying a certain class of men as the objects of divine judgment.D. M.]. 2) This verse, as Isa 65:3; Isa 65:11, contains clear allusion to foreign, in particular, to Babylonian heathenism. Such an allusion is suspicious. It cannot be explained from the stand-point of Isaiah. For Isaiah sees into the distant future, it is true, but he does not see as a person standing near. He does not distinguish specific, individual features. [In his remarks on Isa 65:4 Dr. Naegelsbach admits that there is no evidence outside the book of Isaiah that the Babylonians either offered swine in sacrifice, or used them for food. There is really nothing mentioned in this verse which can be proved to be specifically Babylonian. The gardens were connected with idolatrous worship practised by the Israelites at home. See Isa 1:29. The statement that the Prophet could not foresee the practices here mentioned depends on the erroneous theory of prophecy which Dr. Naegelsbach has adopted, and which is animadverted on in the Introduction, pp. 17,18, footnote.D. M.]. 3) The words are very appropriate in the mouth of an exile who thought that he must apply particularly to the renegades of his time the threatening of judgment contained in Isa 66:15-16. [But the words are quite appropriate in the mouth of the Prophet Isaiah, and we are not warranted to assume that these forms of idolatry were practised by the exiles in Babylon. Unless Isaiah is supposed to testify to this fact, we have no evidence of it. In the Babylonian Captivity the people were cured of their propensity to gross idolatryD. M.]. 4) The singular phrase clearly betrays a foreign, later hand; and the manifest corruption of the text in the beginning of Isa 66:18 is also to be regarded as an indication of changes in the original text. [The occurrence of the singular phrase referred to is no sign of the hand of an interpolator, who would rather be careful to avoid saying what would be obscure and ambiguous. An interpolator, too, who understood Hebrew, would hardly have left the difficulty complained of in the beginning of Isa 66:18.D. M.].

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

1. The Prophet here, too, represents the future under the forms of the present. He seta forth its leading features, and again brings together what is homogeneous without regard to intervening spaces of time. He begins, Isa 66:15-16; Isa 66:18, by describing the judgment of retribution on the wicked. [On Isa 66:17 see under Text. and Gram.]. The Prophet surveys together the beginning and end of the judgment. As we see from Isa 66:19, the beginning of the judgment of the world is for him the judgment on Israel. He, therefore, Isa 66:19 sqq., tells what shall take place after the destruction of the visible theocracy. He beholds a sign set in Israel. We clearly perceive here in the light of the fulfilment what he only obscurely, as through a mist, descried. He intends Him who is set for a sign that is spoken against. After this sign has appeared and been rejected, the judgment begins on the earthly Jerusalem. Persons escaped from this great catastrophe go to the heathen to publish to them the glory of Jehovah (Isa 66:19). And the heathen world turns to Jehovah, and in grateful love brings along with it to the holy mountain the scattered members of Israel that had been visited with judgment. These are as a meat-offering which Jehovah receives from the hand of the Gentiles as willingly as He welcomes a pure meat-offering from the hand of an Israelite (Isa 66:20). And then from Gentiles and Jews a new race arises. The wall of separation is removed. The Lord takes priests and Levites indiscriminately from both (Isa 66:21). The new life which throbs in men, as well as in heaven and earth, is eternal life. Hence the new race of men stand on the new earth and under the new heaven eternally before the Lord (Isa 66:22). And all flesh will then render to the Lord true worship forever (Isa 66:23). But the wicked, of whom the Prophet had declared at the close of the first and second Ennead that they have no peace, will be excluded from the society of the blessed, to be a prey of the undying worm and unquenchable fire, and an object of abhorrence.

2. For, behold, the LORDmy glory.

Isa 66:15-18. The Prophet sees the Lord come to judgment in flaming fire, and he beholds His chariots rush along as a tempest. The image is here, as Psa 18:9; Psa 18:13, borrowed from a thunderstorm. It appears to me better to regard as second subject to than to supply in the translation the substantive verb. For the chariots are not in themselves like a stormy wind, but their rolling is compared with the rushing of a tempest. The plural is certainly the proper plural. For as an earthly commander of an army is accompanied by many chariots, so too is the Lord of hosts. Kleinert justly observes on Habakkuk 3 that the elements, clouds and winds, as media of manifestation, are compared with Jehovahs horses and chariots. In Psa 104:3 the Lord is expressly described as He who maketh the clouds his chariot. cannot possibly denote here as Job 9:13; Psa 78:38, to take away wrath. Here retribution is the subject of discourse. We must, therefore, compare places such as Hos 12:3, where standing alone means to recompense, and Deu 32:41; Deu 32:43, where it is joined with in like signification. In the day of judgment they who have sown evil must reap the wrath of God as necessary harvest (comp. Gal 6:7). God will render his anger to them in the form of , i.e., of burning fury (comp. Isa 42:25; Isa 59:18), and his rebuke comp. Isa 30:17; Isa 50:2; Isa 51:20), in flames of fire (comp Isa 13:8; Isa 29:6; Isa 30:30). Fire must serve not only to indicate the violence of the divine wrath, but also as a real instrument of judgment. for the first judgment of the world was accomplished by water (Genesis 7), the second will be effected by fire. At the first act of the second judgment of the world, the destruction of Jerusalem, fire was not wanting (comp. Joseph. B.J. VI. 7, 2; 8, 5). With fire and sword, igne ferroque, the Lord judges. [What is here said of fire, sword and slaughter, was fulfilled not only as a figurative prophecy of general destruction, but in its strictest sense in the terrific carnage which attended the extinction of the Jewish State, of which, more emphatically than of any other event outwardly resembling it, it might be said that many were the slain of Jehovah. Alexander. D. M.]. Isa 66:17. Here people are spoken of, who make a religious consecration of themselves by sanctifying (comp. Isa 30:29; Isa 65:6; Exo 19:22; Num 11:18 et saepe) and purifying themselves ( in Isaiah only here, comp. Lev 14:4; Lev 14:7-8 et saepe; Ezr 6:20; Neh 12:30; Neh 13:22). They do this (comp. Isa 1:29-30; Isa 61:11; Isa 65:3). The preposition might be taken, with Hahn, as a case of constr. praegnans, if it were possible to find the idea of motion to a place latent in the verbs and . We must, therefore, take in the sense of in relation to, in respect to, i.e. = for (comp. e.g., 1Sa 1:27; Eze 6:10). [In performing their lustrations they have respect to the gardens as places of worship. Translate: that purify themselves for the gardens, not in the gardens as in the E. V.D. M.]. The words are very obscure. The old translators (LXX., Targ., Syr., Arab., Theodoret, Symmachus, Hieronymus) were evidently puzzled with the text, and conjectured its meaning rather than explained it according to certain principles. The later interpreters can be classified according to what they understand by ,) , the last is the reading of the Kri). Seb. Schmidt and Bochart think (after Saadia) of one of the trees, or of a reservoir in the garden, behind or in which the lustration was performed. Others refer to an idol. Abenezra thinks that (Kri) is Astarte. Very many interpreters (after Scaliger) take to be the name of a Syrian divinity, , who is called in Eusebius (Praep. Ev. I. 10) King of gods. And this explanation has been the rather adopted, because Macrobius (Saturn. I, 23) gives as the meaning of this name unus; a statement which is manifestly owing to his want of knowledge of the language. Clericus sees in the name ;. Ben. Carpzov, who is followed by Hahn and Maurer, understands an idol of some kind. Stier, not satisfied with Antichrist, who is thought of by Neteler, understands under the one the idol of the world in the strictest sense, whose place of concealment is the tree of knowledge in the midst of the garden. Majus (con. p. 984) takes in the sense of praeter unum, i.e., beside the only true God (Deu 6:4) they follow an idol set in the midst. But this meaning the words will not bear. That explanation has most in its favor, which refers to a human being. Here we must set aside as philologically untenable the view which, after the Targ. Jon., and the Syriac, would in any way bring out the sense alius post alium. After the example of Pfeifer in the Dubia Vexata, it is better to understand a person placed in the midst who acted as leader, initiator, or hierophant. So Gesenius, Hitzig, Hendewerk, Beck, Umbreit, Knobel, Delitzsch, Seinecke, Rohling is understood by Hitzig, Hendewerk, Beck, Umbreit, Ewald of the middle of the house, the impluvium, the court. But Knobel, Delitzsch, Seinecke, Rohling think of the hierophant standing in the midst, so that is not to be understood in the local sense, but in that of acting after, or imitation. Ewald proposes instead of to read a double : Boettcher would strike out the words . Cheyne regards the place as quite corrupt. It seems to me that the words are either a corrupt reading, or a later expression current in those Babylonian forms of worship. But we have not hitherto been able to explain their meaning satisfactorily. [That Babylonian rites are here referred to is a gratuitous assumption. Of the interpretations put upon the statement that purify themselves for the gardens after one in the midst, the one most entitled to our acceptance is that which regards it as descriptive of a crowd of devotees surrounding their priest or leader, and doing after him the rites which he exhibits for their imitation. Delitzsch is so satisfied with this explanation that he declares that it leaves nothing to be desired. The use of , one, has its reason in the opposition of the one leader of the ceremonies to the many repeaters of the rites after him. D. M.]. is one of the subjects of . Comp. on Isa 65:4. stands frequently in Leviticus parallel with , reptile, e. g., Lev 11:20 comp. ibid. vers, 10, 23, 41. Probably, then, reptiles, such as the snail, lizard and the like, are here chiefly intended. is the mouse (comp. Lev 11:29; 1Sa 6:4 sqq.). On edible mice, or rats (glires) see Delitzsch, Comment. in loc., Bochart, Hieroz. II. p. 432 sqq., Herz. R.-Encycl. XIV. p. 602. [The actual use of any kind of mouse in the ancient heathen rites has never been established, the modern allegations of the fact being founded on the place before us. Alexander. This commentator contends that the Prophet is still treating of the excision of the Jews and the vocation of the Gentiles. And although the generation of Jews upon whom the final blow fell were hypocrites, not idolaters, the misdeeds of their fathers entered into the account, and they were cast off not merely as the murderers of the Lord of Life, but as apostates who insulted Jehovah to His face by bowing down to stocks and stones, in groves and gardens, and by eating swines flesh, the abomination, and the mouse. Isaiah would naturally make prominent, in assigning the causes of divine judgment, the most flagrant transgressions of the law that prevailed in his own time. We have had many examples of his practice to depict the future in the colors of the present.D. M.]. Isa 66:18 is very difficult. It appears to me impossible to obtain an appropriate sense from the text as it stands. I must therefore hold it to be corrupt. The old versions do not enable us to detect any corruption that has taken place since they were made. They all give such translations that they evidently suppose the present Masoretic text. They all use the first person in the rendering of . But this does not justify our inferring a difference of text. It is merely a free translation. The predicate to is wanting. Some would supply [as the E. V.], or (Delitzsch), as was done in some manuscripts of the LXX. But is it possible that the writer omitted the predicate? [The ellipsis is like that in Virgil Quos ego (Aen. I. 139), and belongs to the rhetorical figure of aposiopesis: and I, their works and thoughts(will know to punish). Delitzsch. If an ellipsis is to be supplied, there is none more facile than that assumed in the English version, and which can plead the support of the Targum. But it seems to me better to retain the aposiopesis of the original, with Knobel, Ewald, Alexander and Kay. The last mentioned has this remark: The sentence is interrupted; as if it were too great a condescension to comment on their folly,so soon to be made evident by the course of events. And Ias for their works and their thoughts, the time cometh for gathering all nations.D. M.]. So much can be seen from Isa 66:18, that Gods judgments will rest on a bringing to light not only of the works, but also of the thoughts of the heart (Heb 4:12). is according to the accents to be taken as a participle. The feminine is to be understood in a neuter sense [i.e., it is used impersonally]. stands for the arrival of the right moment: it is come to this that all nations, etc., comp. Eze 39:8. The words seem to be borrowed from Joel 4:2. On the other hand, the Prophet Zephaniah (Isa 3:8) seems to have had this place of Isaiah before him. The expression does not occur exactly elsewhere. We can compare, on the one hand, Gen 10:20; Gen 10:31 (comp. Isa 66:5), on the other, Dan 3:4; Dan 3:7; Dan 5:19; Dan 6:26; Dan 7:14. Comp. Zec 8:23. If this expression really belonged to a later age, we should find in it a confirmation of the supposition that the text of Isa 66:18 also has been corrupted by an interpolator. [The use of the word tongues as an equivalent to nations has reference to national distinctions springing from diversity of language, and is founded on Gen 10:5; Gen 10:20; Gen 10:31, by the influence of which passage and the one before us, it became a phrase of frequent use in Daniel, whose predictions turn so much upon the calling of the Gentiles (Dan 3:4; Dan 5:19). The representation of this form of speech as an Aramaic idiom by some modern critics is characteristic of their candor. Alexander. Some suppose the glory of Jehovah which all nations will be assembled to see to be a gracious display of His glory, and others think that a grand manifestation of judgment is here referred to. In the preceding part of the chapter a revelation of both grace and judgment is foretold. We can take the expression in a general sense for the revelation of Jehovahs perfections. But here a difficulty arises. If in this verse all nations are represented as gathered, as having come to see the glory of the Lord, where are the distant nations who are to be visited according to the following verse by those that have escaped from the judgment? The seeming inconsistency is removed, if we regard Isa 66:19 as describing the way in which the nations will be brought to see the glory of God, and take the as causal: For I will set a sign, etc. For this causal force of comp. on Isa 64:3. This is better than to suppose, with Delitzsch, that all nations and tongues in Isa 66:18 are not to be understood of all nations without exception.D. M.].

3. And I will setall flesh.

Isa 66:19-24. [This verse explains the gathering of all nations mentioned in the previous verse. The Hebrew often employs the simple connective and where we would use for.D. M.]. The mention of , Isa 66:19, implies that the judgment from which they have escaped is not the general judgment. After it there will remain no nations on the earth to whom the messengers could come to announce Jehovahs glory. That judgment, then, from which the messengers have escaped, must be only the first act of the general judgment, i.e., the judgment on Israel. If we consider this place in the light of fulfilment, we must take the destruction of the theocracy by the Romans for this first act of the general judgment, which the Prophet views together with its last act or last acts, just as our Lord does in His oratio eschatological, Matthew 24. They who have escaped from that dreadful catastrophe which befalls the church of the Old Covenant are the church of the New Covenant, for whose flight and deliverance the Lord has so significantly cared in that discourse (Mat 24:16 sqq.). If this is the case, what opinion have we to form regarding the sign, which the Lord, according to the words commencing Isa 66:19, will set among them, i.e., among those on whom that first great act of judgment has fallen? The expression occurs Gen 4:15; Exo 10:2; Jer 32:20; Psa 78:43; Psa 105:27. It alternates with or (Deu 13:2; Jos 2:12; Jdg 6:17; Psa 86:17 et saepe). Of these forms is the most emphatic. It denotes, we might say, setting a sign as a monument for general and permanent observation. To regard this sign as a signal to call the nations does not suit the context [?], for the nations are not called to the judgment upon Israel. The announcement is rather borne to them. Calvins explanation I make a sign on them, namely, on the elect for their deliverance, is justified by the language; but the suffixes in and refer to those who are judged, and not to those who are saved. The old orthodox explanation, according to which the sign is the Spirit poured out upon the disciples as evidence of their divine mission, is exposed to the same objection. When, on the other hand, Hitzig and Knobel consider as the sign, the judgment upon the heathen, a great slaughter, there is this objection that it is to the heathen that they who escaped the judgment go. And when Stier refers the sign to the judgment upon Israel, it seems strange that mention should be made of the sign after the description of the judgment and its happy consequences, and they shall come and see my glory. [But if we regard the at the beginning of Isa 66:19 as explicative or causal, this objection falls away,D. M.]. Ewald, Umbreit, Delitzsch, Seinecke think that the escape of some from the all-destroying slaughter is itself the miracle. But is it something so extraordinary and wonderful that individuals should escape from a slaughter, be it ever so bloody? I would not say with the Catholic interpreters that this is the sign of the cross. But I think that Luke [Simeon] when he, Luk 2:34, speaks of Him who is set for a sign which shall be spoken against had our place before him. And I would refer the sign of the Son of man (Mat 24:30) to the same source. It was the purpose of God, which Isaiah here announces without knowing how it should be fulfilled, that out of the ashes of the old covenant the phnix of the new should arise. [Alexander, who sees in the who go to the nations the first preachers of the Gospel, who were escaped Jews, saved from that perverse generation (Act 2:40), thinks that the sign to be set denotes the whole miraculous display of divine power, in bringing the old dispensation to a close and introducing the new, including the destruction of the unbelieving Jews, on the one hand, and, on the other, all those signs and wonders, and divers miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost (Heb 2:4), which Paul calls the signs of an apostle (2Co 12:12), and which Christ Himself had promised should follow them that believed (Mar 16:17). All these were signs placed among them, i.e., among the Jews, to the greater condemnation of the unbelievers, and to the salvation of such as should be saved. But if we compare Isa 11:10 and its connection with the place before us and the context, it would appear that Messiah is the sign here spoken of.D. M.]. The following names of nations represent the entire heathen world. The Prophet designedly mentions the names of the most remote nations to intimate that to all, even the most distant peoples, the joyful message () should come. Respecting Tarshish (comp. on Isa 2:16) The name Pul occurs as the name of a people only here (as name of a person, comp. 2Ki 15:19). In Jer 46:9; Eze 27:10; Eze 30:5, the name is mentioned in conjunction with . The LXX., too, have in our place . In the places in Jer. and Ezek. just cited the LXX. have for . Bochart understands by Pul the island Philae. Most scholars hold the identity of and , and assume either an error in writing, or an interchange of and (Hitzig). Regarding , it is pretty generally held, after the LXX., to be Libyia. Ebers, indeed, affirms that on the Egyptian monuments Punt or Put always denotes a country east of Egypt, namely, Arabia. We must in regard to this point defer a decision. It is not quite certain what people we have to understand under . In Gen 10:13 is named as the first son of Mizraim; but there, too, in Isa 66:22 the fourth son of Shem is called Lud. Ebers holds, with Rougemont (Lage du bronze), the son of Shem for the Lutennu, i.e., Syrians, while according to him the Ludu or Rutu are the native Egyptians in opposition to the non-Egyptian elements of the kingdom of Pharaoh. Ebers properly leaves it undecided whether these native Egyptians, or the fourth son of Shem is here meant. We cannot apply to the place before us a strict ethnographical measure. We cannot expect that the Prophet should mention the nations of only one part of the world, or that he should mention the nations in regular succession. He means only to name very distant peoples. Do the Egyptians who are never called in the Old Testament by another name than belong to these? The Ludim are celebrated as archers also in Jer 46:9. Under Tubal (Gen 10:2; Eze 27:13; Eze 32:26; Eze 38:2-3; Eze 39:1) the Tibareni, a tribe in the south-eastern corner of the Black Sea, are, since the time of Bochart, supposed to be intended. That are the Greeks is universally acknowledged (comp. Gen 10:2; Eze 27:13; Dan 8:21; Zec 9:13). There will take place a centrifugal and a centripetal motion. After the judgment on Israel, the holy centre will be forsaken, yea, trodden, down (Luk 21:24; Rev 11:2). The escaped of Israel will carry out from the destroyed centre the salvation of Israel to the heathen. The heathen will receive it; but Israel shall not be mixed with them.[But the escaped Israelites who brought salvation to the Gentiles have been in fact blended with the Gentiles who embraced it. That these escaped Israelites should remain distinct from the converted Gentiles is not here affirmed.D. M.]But when the time shall have come (according to Paul: when the fulness of the Gentiles shall have come in, Rom 11:25), a centripetal streaming back will take place, which will find the Israelites still existing among the nations. But they are no longer hated, but loved and highly honored. Jerusalem will again have become a centre, but not for Israel only, but for all nations. The nations will then flow to Jerusalem (Isa 2:2 sqq.; Isa 60:4 sqq.), and take with them the Israelites who will now know aright the Lord their God.[Alexander understands the subject of , Isa 66:20, to be the messengers of Isa 66:19; but the subject of the verb is clearly the heathen won for Jehovah by the testimony of those escaped ones that had gone to them. The messengers could hardly be supposed to be those who supply the multifarious means of conveyance mentioned here. They who do this are moreover, evidently regarded as different from the children of Israel named at the close of the verse. If the subject of the is the Gentile nations, then your brethren would naturally be regarded as the scattered Jews rather than the converted Gentiles. Comp. Zep 3:10 : From beyond the rivers of Cush will they (the Gentiles) bring my worshippers, the daughter of my dispersed, to me as an offering () This passage of Zephaniah is an abbreviation of what Isaiah here says, and determines the sense of as referring to the Jews. See Keil on Zep 3:10.D. M.]The nations will conduct back the scattered Jews most honorably. On horses, in chariots, on couches (comp. Num 7:3), on mules ( only here in Isaiah), on dromedaries (, . . from the root , currere, saltare), will they be brought. And this bringing of His people the Lord will regard as a precious, unbloody offering which the Gentiles render to Him. Heretofore the Gentiles durst not tread the temple of Jehovah to make offerings on His altar in the holy place. But then they will be admitted to this service; and their offering will be as acceptable to the Lord as a pure presented to Him by Israelites (comp. Isa 56:7; Mal 1:11; Mal 3:3). is not to be taken as the future, as if in the present time the meat-offering were not brought in a clean vessel. But it is the imperfect which indicates a lasting condition. is Acc. localis in answer to the question where? For the act of offering is performed in the house of Jehovah by the presentation of the offering (Isa 43:23), not on the way thither. But the offering of the Israelites as a consists not in offering them in the house of the Lord, but in bringing them to the house of the Lord. The Gentiles, who bring them thither on their horses, mules, etc., are, as it were, the clean vessel (comp. Isa 18:7; Psa 68:32). But a still greater thing will happen. The Gentiles will be admitted not only to the congregation of Israel; they will also be admitted to the office of priests and Levites. However much the Prophet is seen to be governed in respect to form by the time to which he belonged, we clearly perceive how in respect to the substance he boldly breaks through the limits of the present time, and prophesies a quite new order of things. For it was a fundamental law of the old theocracy that only those belonging to the tribe of Levi could be admitted to the office of Levites and priests. But in the glorious time future the middle wall of partition (Eph 2:14) will be taken away. Then twain will be made one; there will be one flock and one Shepherd (Joh 10:16). Then the Lord will choose not only out of all the tribes of Israel, but also from the Gentiles, those whom He will add to the Aaronic priests and to the Levites. We are not to explain and for priests and Levites, but in addition to the already existing priests and Levites. All things will become new. The explanation which refers , Isa 66:21, to the (Isa 66:20) is at variance with the context.[Against this interpretation, which applies of them to the restored Israelites, an interpretation which, beside Jewish writers and Grotius, Hitzig and Knobel have put forward, it may be objected that the promise in this view of it would be needless, as the priests and Levites would not have forfeited their right to their hereditary office by a foreign residence. Hofmann shows well how it suits the context to understand of the Gentiles: God recompenses this bringing of an offering, by taking to Himself out of the number of those who make the offering, priests, who as such are added to the Levitical priests. Instead of I will also take of them, as in the E. V., translate: also of them will I take, etc. The expression implies that those to be chosen to the offices of priests and Levites are not the ordinary and regular priests and LevitesD. M.]The time will be that of the . Without it that fundamental change could not be conceived. For in it the powers of the manifest themselves. In Isa 66:22 there are two thoughts combined into one: for as heaven and earth so shall ye also be new, and this new life will be eternal. In Isa 66:23-24 also we perceive this singular blending of what belongs specifically to the present, and of what belongs to a totally different future. The Prophet still sees the old forms of worship, Sabbath and new moon. But at the same time the relations are so fundamentally new that what was not possible even to the Israelites will be possible to all flesh.[The Prophet, in accordance with his constant practice, speaks of the emancipated church in language borrowed from her state of bondage. Alexander.]The males of the Israelites, from their twelfth year, had to appear before the Lord three times in the year. To appear every new moon and Sabbath would have been impossible even for the inhabitants of circumscribed Palestine. But according to the Prophets declaration, this will be in that remote future possible for all flesh. Comp. for a real parallel Zec 14:16. I do not see what objection can be made to taking and in a double sense here. (renovatio) is first, the new moon, then, the month beginning with the new moon, governed, as it were, by it. is pro ratione mensis novilunio suo, i.e. every month on the new moon belonging to it. And is every week on the Sabbath belonging to it. is used even in the Old Testament in the signification of week, Num 23:15; comp. the parallel place, Deu 16:4. And in the New Testament and denote a week.[But there is no need of taking and in a double sense. We cannot take in a double sense in Zec 14:16 and 1Sa 7:16, where the construction is similar. Comp. these places with the one before us to see that there is a valid objection, which our author did not see, to the construction which he proposes.D. M.]The last verse carries out more fully the refrain: There is no peace to the wicked (Isa 48:22; Isa 57:21). The Prophet has here, too, the outlines of the topography of the old Jerusalem before his eyes. As this has outside its walls, but in its immediate neighborhood, a place into which all the filth of the city is thrown, because it was a place profaned by abominable idolatry, namely, the valley of Hinnom, he conceives of Gehenna as adjacent to the new Jerusalem. Our Lord appropriates this view of the Prophet so far that he, too, describes as the place where their worm dieth not, and their fire is not quenched (Mar 9:43-48). with following denotes a qualified seeing, as with pleasure, with abhorrence, with interest. [Here with horror, as appears from the last clause.D. M.] (Comp. Isa 66:5; Isa 53:2; Ps. 22:18; 54:9; Gen 21:16; Gen 44:34, et saepe.) Regarding the worm that dies not and the fire that is not quenched, we are to guard against the extremes of a gross material view and of an abstract ideal one.[Ordinarily, the worm feeds on the disorganized body, and then dies; the fire consumes its fuel, and goes out. But here is a strange mystery of sufferinga worm not dying, a fire not becoming extinct; a remorseful memory of past guilt, and all-penetrating sense of Divine justice. Kay.D. M.] is found besides here only Dan 12:2. The root does not occur in Hebrew. The word is explained from Arabic roots which denote repellere, taedio, contemtui esse. [The Prophet had spoken in Isa 38:14, also, of everlasting burnings. He, whose lips have been touched with the live coal from the heavenly altar, understood that Holy Love must be to all that is unholy a consuming fire (Heb 12:29). Kay.D. M.]

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. On Isa 65:1-2. Our Lord has said, He that seeketh findeth (Mat 7:8). How, then, does it come that the Jews do not find what they seek, but the heathen find what they did not seek? The Apostle Paul puts this question and answers it, Rom 9:30 sqq.; Isa 10:19 sqq.; Isa 11:7. [See also Isa 10:3]. All depends on the way in which we seek. Luther says: Quaerere fit dupliciter. Primo, secundum praescriptum verbi Dei, et sic invenitur Deus, Secundo, quaeritur nostris studiis et consiliis, et sic non invenitur. The Jews, with exception of the (Rom 11:7), sought only after their own glory and merit. They sought what satisfies the flesh. They did not suffer the spirit in the depths of their heart to speak,the spirit which can be satisfied only by food fitted for it. The law which was given to them that they might perceive by means of it their own impotence, became a snare to them. For they perverted it, made what was of minor importance the chief matter, and then persuaded themselves that they had fulfilled it and were righteous. But the Gentiles who had not the law, had not this snare. They were not tempted to abuse the pdagogical discipline of the law. They felt simply that they were forsaken by God. Their spirit was hungry. And when for the first time Gods word in the Gospel was presented to them, then they received it the more eagerly in proportion to the poverty, wretchedness and hunger in which they had been. The Jews did not find what they sought, because they had not a spiritual, but a carnal apprehension of the law, and, like the elder brother of the prodigal son, were full, and blind for that which was needful for them. But the Gentiles found what they did not seek, because they were like the prodigal son, who was the more receptive of grace, the more he needed it, and the less claim he had to it. [There is important truth stated in the foregoing remarks. But it does not fully explain why the Lord is found of those who sought Him not. The sinner who has obtained mercy when he asks why? must have recourse to a higher cause, a cause out of himself, even free, sovereign, efficacious grace. It is of God that showeth mercy, Rom 9:16. Though in after-communion God is found of those that seek Him (Pro 8:17), yet in the first conversion He is found of those that seek Him not; for therefore we love Him, because He first loved us. Henry. D. M.].

2. On Isa 65:2. Gods long-suffering is great. He stretches out His hands the whole day and does not grow weary. What man would do this? The disobedient people contemns Him, as if He knew nothing, and could do nothing.

3. On Isa 65:2. It is clear from this verse gratiam esse resistibilem. Christ earnestly stretched out His hands to the Jews. He would, but they would not. This doctrine the Remonstrants prove from this place, and rightly too, in Actis Synodi Dodrac. P. 3. p. 76. Leigh. [The grace of God which is signified by His stretching out His hands can be, and is, resisted. That figurative expression denotes warning, exhorting, entreating, and was never set forth by Reformed theologians as indicating such grace as was necessarily productive of conversion. The power by which God quickens those who were dead in sins (Eph 2:5), by which He gives a new heart (Eze 36:26), by which He draws to the Son (Joh 6:44-45; Joh 6:65), is the grace which is called irresistible. The epithet is admitted on all hands to be faulty; but the grace denoted by it is, from the nature of the case, not resisted. Turrettin in treating De Vocatione et Fide thus replies to this objection, Aliud est Deo monenti et vocanti externe resistere; Aliud est conversionem intendenti et efficaciter ac interne vocanti. Prius asseritur Isa. lxv. 2, 3. Quum dicit Propheta se expandisse tot die manus ad populum perversum etc., non posterius. Expansio brachiorum notat quidem blandam et benevolam Dei invitationem, qu illos extrinsecus sive Verbo, sive beneficiis alliciebat, non semel atque iterum, sed quotidie ministerio servorum suorum eos compellando. Sed non potest designate potentem et efficacem operationem, qu brachium Domini illis revelatur qui docentur Deo et trahuntur a Patre, etc. Locus XV.; Quaestio VI .25.D. M.].

4. On Isa 65:2. (Who walk after their own thoughts.)

Duc me, nec sine, me per me, Deus optime, duci.

Nam duce me pereo, te duce certus eo.

[If our guide be our own thoughts, our way is not likely to be good; for every imagination of the thought of our hearts is only evil. Henry. D. M.].

5. On Isa 65:3 sq. The sweetest wine is turned into the sourest vinegar; and when Gods people apostatize from God, they are worse than the heathen (Jer 3:11). Starke.

6. On Isa 65:5. [I am holier than thou. A deep insight is here given us into the nature of the mysterious fascination which heathenism exercised on the Jewish people. The law humbled them at every turn with mementoes of their own sin and of Gods unapproachable holiness. Paganism freed them from this, and allowed them (in the midst of moral pollution) to cherish lofty pretensions to sanctity. The man, who had been offering incense on the mountain-top, despised the penitent who went to the temple to present a broken and contrite heart. If Pharisaism led to a like result, it was because it, too, had emptied the law of its spiritual import, and turned its provisions into intellectual idols. Kay. D. M.].

7. On Isa 65:6-7. The longer God forbears, the harder He punishes at last. The greatness of the punishment compensates for the delay (Psa 50:21). Starke after Leigh.

8. On Isa 65:8 sqq. [This is expounded by St. Paul, Rom 11:1-5, where, when upon occasion of the rejection of the Jews, it is asked Hath God then cast away His people? He answers, no; for, at this time there is a remnant according to the election of grace. This prophecy has reference to that distinguished remnantOur Saviour has told us that for the sake of these elect the days of the destruction of the Jews should be shortened, and a stop put to the desolation, which otherwise would have proceeded to that degree that no flesh should be saved. Mat 24:22. Henry. D. M.].

9. On Isa 65:15. The judgment which came upon Israel by the hand of the Romans, did not altogether destroy the people, but it so destroyed the Old Covenant, i.e., the Mosaic religion, that the Jews can no more observe its precepts in essential points. For no Jew knows to what tribe he belongs. Therefore, they have no priests, and, consequently, no sacrifices. The Old Covenant is now only a ruin. We see here most clearly that the Old Covenant, as it was designed only for one nation, and for one country, was to last only for a certain time. If we consider, moreover, the way in which the judgment was executed, (comp. Josephus), we can truly say that the Jews bear in themselves the mark of a curse. They bear the stamp of the divine judgment. The beginning of the judgment on the world has been executed on them as the house of God. But how comes it that the Jews have become so mighty, so insolent in the present time, and are not satisfied with remaining on the defensive in their attitude toward the Christian church, but have passed over to the offensive? This has arisen solely from Christendom having to a large extent lost the consciousness of its new name. There are many Christians who scoff at the name of Christian, and seek their honor in combating all that is called Christian. This is the preparation for the judgment on Christendom itself. If Christendom would hold fast her jewel, she would remain strong, and no one would dare to mock or to assail her. For she would then partake of the full blessing which lies in the principle of Christianity, and every one would be obliged to show respect for the fruits of this principle. But an apostate Christendom, that is ashamed of her glorious Christian name, is something more miserable than the Jews, judged though they have been, who still esteem highly their name, and what remains to them of their old religion. Thus Christendom, in so far as it denies the worth and significance of its name, is gradually reaching a condition in which it will be so ripe for the second act of the judgment on the world, that this will be longed for as a benefit. For, this apostate Christendom will be the kingdom of Antichrist, as Antichrist will manifest himself in Satanic antagonism to God by sitting in the temple of God, and pretending to be God (2Th 2:3 sqq.). [We do not quite share all the sentiments expressed in this paragraph. We are far from being so despondent as to the prospects of Christendom, and think that there is a more obvious interpretation of the prophecy quoted from 2 Thess., than that indicated.D. M.].

10. On Isa 65:17. [If we had only the present passage to testify of new heavens and a new earth, we might say, as many good interpreters do, that the language is figurative, and indicates nothing more than a great moral and spiritual revolution. But we cannot thus explain 2Pe 3:10-13. The present earth and heavens shall pass away; (comp. Isa 51:6; Psa 102:25-26). But how can we suppose that our Prophet here refers to the new heavens and new earth, which are to succeed the destruction of the world by fire? In the verses that follow Isa 65:17, a condition of things is described which, although better than the present, is not so good as that perfectly sinless, blessed state of the redeemed, which we look for after the coming of the day of the Lord. Yet the Apostle Peter (2Pe 3:13) evidently regards the promise before us of new heavens and a new earth, as destined to receive its accomplishment after the conflagration which is to take place at the end of the world. If we had not respect to other Scriptures, and if we overlooked the use made by Peter of this passage, we should not take it literally. But we can take it literally, if we suppose that the Prophet brings together future events not according to their order in time. He sees the new heavens and new earth arise. Other scenes are disclosed to his prophetic eye of a grand and joy-inspiring nature. He announces them as future. But these scenes suppose the continued prevalence of death and labor (Isa 65:20 sqq.), which, we know from definite statements of Scripture, will not exist when the new heaven and new earth appear (comp. Rev 21:1-4). The proper view then of Isa 65:17 is to take its prediction literally, and to hold at the same time that in the following description (which is that of the millennium) future things are presented to us which are really prior, and not posterior to the promised complete renovation of heaven and earth. Nor should this surprise us, as Isaiah and the other Prophets place closely together in their pictures future things which belong to different times. They do not draw the line sharply between this world and the next. Compare Isaiahs prophecy of the abolition of death (Isa 25:8) in connection with other events that must happen long before that state of perfect blessedness.D. M.].

11. On Isa 65:20. [The extension of the Gospel every where,of its pure principles of temperance in eating and drinking, in restraining the passions, in producing calmness of mind, and in arresting war, would greatly lengthen out the life of man. The image here employed by the Prophet is more than mere poetry; it is one that is founded in reality, and is designed to convey most important truth. Barnes. D. M.].

12. On Isa 65:24. [It occurs to me that an erroneous application is frequently made of the promise, Before they call, etc. This declaration is made in connection with the glory and blessedness of the last days. It belongs specifically to the millennium. There are, indeed, occasions when God even now seems to act according to this law. (Comp. Dan 9:23). But Paul had to pray thrice before he received the answer of the Lord (2Co 12:8). Compare the parable of the importunate widow, Luk 18:1-7. The answer to prayer may be long delayed. This is not only taught in the Bible, but is verified in Christian experience. But the time will come when the Lord will not thus try and exercise the faith of His people.D. M.].

13. On Isa 65:25. If the lower animals live in hostility in consequence of the sin of man, a state of peace must be restored to them along with our redemption from sin. J. G. Mueller in Herz. R.-Encycl. xvi. p. 45. [By the serpent in this place there seems every reason to believe that Satan, the old seducer and author of discord and misery, is meant. During the millennium he is to be subject to the lowest degradation. Compare for the force of the phrase to lick the dust, Psa 72:9; Mic 7:17. This was the original doom of the tempter, Gen 3:14, and shall be fully carried into execution. Comp. Rev 20:1-3. Henderson. D. M.].

14. On Isa 66:1. [Having held up in every point of view the true design, mission and vocation of the church or chosen people, its relation to the natural descendants of Abraham, the causes which required that the latter should be stripped of their peculiar privileges, and the vocation of the Gentiles as a part of the divine plan from its origin, the Prophet now addresses the apostate and unbelieving Jews at the close of the old dispensation, who, instead of preparing for the general extension of the church and the exchange of ceremonial for spiritual worship, were engaged in the rebuilding and costly decoration of the temple at Jerusalem. The pride and interest in this great public work, felt not only by the Herods but by all the Jews, is clear from incidental statements of the Scriptures (Joh 2:20; Mat 24:1), as well as from the ample and direct assertions of Josephus. That the nation should have been thus occupied precisely at the time when the Messiah came, is one of those agreements between prophecy and history, which cannot be accounted for except upon the supposition of a providential and designed assimilation. Alexander after Vitringa. D. M.].

15. On Isa 66:1-2. What a grand view of the nature of God and of the way in which He is made known lies at the foundation of these words! God made all things. He is so great that it is an absurdity to desire to build a temple for Him. The whole universe cannot contain Him (1Ki 8:27)! But He, who contains all things and can be contained by nothing, has His greatest joy in a poor, humble human heart that fears Him. He holds it worthy of His regard, it pleases Him, He enters into it, He makes His abode in it. The wise and prudent men of science should learn hence what is chiefly necessary in order to know God. We cannot reach Him by applying force, by climbing up to Him, by attempting to take Him by storm. And if science should place ladder upon ladder upwards and downwards, she could not attain His height or His depth. But He enters of His own accord into a child-like, simple heart. He lets Himself be laid hold of by it, kept and known. It is not, therefore, by the intellect [alone] but by the heart that we can know God.

16. On Isa 66:3. He who under the Christian dispensation would retain the forms of worship of the ancient ritual of shadows would violate the fundamental laws of the new time, just as a man by killing would offend against the foundation of the moral law, or as he would by offering the blood of dogs or swine offend against the foundation of the ceremonial law. For when the body, the substance has appeared, the type must vanish. He who would retain the type along with the reality would declare the latter to be insufficient, would, therefore, found his salvation not upon God only, but also in part on his own legal performance. But God will brook no rival. He is either our All, or nothing. Christianity could tolerate animal sacrifices just as little as the Old Testament law could tolerate murder or the offering of abominable things.

17. On Isa 66:5. [The most malignant and cruel persecutions of the friends of God have been originated under the pretext of great zeal in His service, and with a professed desire to honor His name. So it was with the Jews when they crucified the Lord Jesus. So it is expressly said it would be when His disciples would be excommunicated and put to death, Joh 16:2. So it was in fact in the persecutions excited against the apostles and early Christians. See Act 6:13-14; Act 21:28-31. So it was in all the persecutions of the Waldenses, in all the horrors of the Inquisition, in all the crimes of the Duke of Alva. So it was in the bloody reign of Mary; and so it has ever been in all ages and in all countries where Christians have been persecuted. Barnes.D. M.].

18. On Isa 66:10. The idea which is presented in this verse is, that it is the duty of all who love Zion to sympathize in her joy. The true friends of God should rejoice in every real revival of religion, they should rejoice in all the success which attends the Gospel in heathen lands. And they will rejoice. It is one evidence of piety to rejoice in her joy; and they who have no joy when souls are born into the kingdom of God, when He pours down His Spirit and in a revival of religion produces changes as sudden and transforming as if the earth were suddenly to pass from the desolation of winter to the verdure and bloom of summer, or when the Gospel makes sudden and rapid advances in the heathen world, have no true evidence that they love God and His cause. They have no religion. Barnes.D. M.

19. On Isa 66:13. The Prophet is here completely governed by the idea that in the glorious time of the end, love, maternal love will reign. Thus He makes Zion appear as a mother who will bring forth with incredible ease and rapidity innumerable children (Isa 66:7-9). Then the Israelites are depicted as little children who suck the breasts of their mother. Further, the heathen who bring back the Israelites into their home, must do this in the same way in which mothers in the Orient are wont to carry their little children. Lastly, even to the Lord Himself maternal love is ascribed (comp. Isa 42:14; Isa 49:15), and such love as a mother manifests to her adult son. Thus the Israelites will be surrounded in that glorious time on all sides by maternal love. Maternal love will be the characteristic of that period.

20. On Isa 66:19 sqq. The Prophet describes remote things by words which are borrowed from the relations and conceptions of his own time, but which stand in strange contrast to the reality of the future which he beholds. Thus the Prophet speaks of escaped persons who go to Tarshish, Pul, Lud, Tubal, and Javan. Here he has rightly seen that a great act of judgment must have taken place. And this act of judgment must have passed on Israel, because they who escape, who go to the Gentiles to declare to them the glory of Jehovah, must plainly be Jews How accurately, in spite of the strange manner of expression, is the fact here stated that the Gospel of Jesus Christ was proclaimed to the Gentiles exactly at the time when the old theocracy was destroyed! How justly does he indicate that there was a causal connection between these events! He did not, indeed, know that the shattering of the old form was necessary in order that the eternal truth enclosed in it might be set free, and fitted for filling the whole earth. For the Old Covenant cannot exist along with the New, the Law cannot stand with equal dignity beside the Gospel. The Law must be regarded as annulled, in order that the Gospel may come into force. How remarkably strange is it, however, that he calls the Gentile nations Tarshish, Pul, Lud, etc. And how singular it sounds to be told that the Israelites shall be brought by the Gentiles to Jerusalem as an offering for Jehovah! But how accurately has he, notwithstanding, stated the fact, which, indeed, still awaits its fulfilment, that it is the conversion of the heathen world which will induce Israel to acknowledge their Saviour, and that they both shall gather round the Lord as their common centre! How strange it sounds that then priests and Levites shall be taken from the Gentiles also, and that new moon and Sabbath shall be celebrated by all flesh in the old Jewish fashion! But how accurately is the truth thereby stated that in the New Covenant there will be no more the priesthood restricted to the family of Aaron, but a higher spiritual and universal priesthood, and that, instead of the limited local place of worship of the Old Covenant, the whole earth will be a temple of the Lord! Verily the prophecy of the two last chapters of Isaiah attests a genuine prophet of Jehovah. He cannot have been an anonymous unknown person. He can have been none other than Isaiah the son of Amoz!

HOMILETICAL HINTS

1. On Isa 65:1 sq. [I. It is here foretold that the Gentiles, who had been afar off, should be made nigh, Isa 65:1. II. It is here foretold that the Jews, who had long been a people near to God, should be cast off, and set at a distance, Isa 65:2. Henry, III. We are informed of the cause of the rejection of the Jews. It was owing to their rebellion, waywardness and flagrant provocations, Isa 65:2 sqq.D. M.]

2. On Isa 65:1-7. A Fast-Day Sermon. When the Evangelical Church no more holds fast what she has; when apostasy spreads more and more, and modern heathenism (Isa 65:3-5 a) gains the ascendency in her, then it can happen to her as it did to the people of Israel, and as it happened to the Church in the Orient. Her candlestick can be removed out of its place.[By the Evangelical Church we are not to understand here the Church universal, for her perpetuity is certain. The Evangelical Church is in Germany the Protestant Church, and more particularly the Lutheran branch of it.D. M.]

3. On Isa 65:8-10. Sermon on behalf of the mission among the Jews. Israels hope. 1) On what it is founded (Israel is still a berry in which drops of the divine blessing are contained); 2) To what this hope is directed (Israels Restoration).

4. On Isa 65:13-16. [The blessedness of those that serve God, and the woful condition of those that rebel against him, are here set the one over against the other, that they may serve as a foil to each other. The difference of their states here lies in two things: 1) In point of comfort and satisfaction, a. Gods servants shall eat and drink; they shall have the bread of life to feed, to feast upon continually, and shall want nothing that is good for them. But those who set their hearts upon the world, and place their happiness in it, shall be hungry and thirsty, always empty, always craving. In communion with God and dependence upon Him there is full satisfaction; but in sinful pursuits there is nothing but disappointment. b. Gods servants shall rejoice and sing for joy of heart; they have constant cause for joy, and there is nothing that may be an occasion of grief to them but they have an allay sufficient for it. But, on the other hand, they that forsake the Lord shut themselves out from all true joy, for they shall be ashamed of their vain confidence in themselves, and their own righteousness, and the hopes they had built thereon. When the expectations of bliss, wherewith they had flattered themselves, are frustrated, O what confusion will fill their faces! Then shall they cry for sorrow of heart and howl for vexation of spirit. 2) In point of honor and reputation, Isa 65:15-16. The memory of the just is, and shall be, blessed; but the memory of the wicked shall rot. Henry.D. M.]

5. On Isa 66:1-2. Carpzov has a sermon on this text. He places it in parallel with Luk 18:9-14, and considers, 1) The rejection of spiritual pride; 2) The commendation of filial fear.

6. On Isa 66:2 Arndt, in his True Christianity I. cap. 10, comments on this text. He says among other things: The man who will be something is the material out of which God makes nothing, yea, out of which He makes fools. But a man who will be nothing, and regards himself as nothing, is the material out of which God makes something, even glorious, wise people in His sight.

7. On Isa 66:3. [Saurin has a sermon on this text entitled Sur l Insuffisance du culte exterieur in the eighth volume of his sermons.D. M.]

8. On Isa 66:13. As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you. These words stand, let us consider it, 1) In the Old Testament; 2) In the heart of God always; 3) But are they realized in our experience? Koegel in Aus dem Vorhof ins Heiligthum, II. Bd., p. 242, 1876.

9. On Isa 66:24. The punishment of sin is twofoldinward and outward. The inward is compared with a worm that dies not; the outward with a fire that is not quenched. This worm and this fire are at work even in this life. He who is alarmed by them and hastens to Christ can now be delivered from them.[It is better not to fall into this fire and never to have any experience of this worm, even though, as some imagine, eternity should not be eternal, and the unquenchable fire might be quenched, and the worm that shall never die, should die, and Jesus and His apostles should not have expressed themselves quite in accordance with the compassionate taste of our time. Better, I say, is better. Save thyself and thy neighbor before the fire begins to burn, and the smoke to ascend. Gossner.D. M.]

Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange

The Lord is here speaking of his judgment upon sinners, who despise his ordinances, and corrupt and pollute them. Mingling ought with them they become a pollution; Exo 20:25 .

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

Isa 66:15 For, behold, the LORD will come with fire, and with his chariots like a whirlwind, to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire.

Ver. 15. For, behold, the Lord will come with fire. ] With hell fire, say the Rabbis here; with the fire of the last day, say we, whereof his particular judgments are as pledges and preludes.

And with his chariots like a whirlwind. ] As he did, when he sent forth his armies, the Romans, and destroyed those murderers, the Jews, and burnt up their city. Mat 22:7 And when they would have rebuilt their city and temple under Julian the apostate, who, in hatred to Christians, animated them thereunto, balls of fire broke forth from the earth, which marred their work, and destroyed many thousands of them.

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

Isa 66:15-17

“For, behold, Jehovah will come with fire, and his chariots shall be like the whirlwind; to render his anger with fierceness, and his rebuke with flames of fire. For by fire will Jehovah execute judgment, and by his sword, upon all flesh; and the slain of Jehovah shall be many. They that sanctify themselves and purify themselves to go unto the gardens, behind one in the midst, eating swine’s flesh, and the abominations, and the mouse, they shall come to an end together, saith Jehovah.”

“Jehovah will come with fire …” (Isa 66:15). This is a reference to the final judgment of God upon the rebellious race of Adam. The prophet Zephaniah devoted his prophecy largely to this event; and Paul and Peter both stressed the “fire” of that Great Day.

“You that are afflicted rest with us at the revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven with the angels of his power in flaming fire, rendering vengeance to them that know not God, and to them that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus: who shall suffer punishment, even eternal destruction, from the face of the Lord and form the glory of his might” (2Th 1:7-9).

The heavens that now are, and the earth, by the same word have been stored up for fire, being reserved against the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men (2Pe 3:7 ff).

The Adamic race is on a collision course with disaster, due to their rejection of God and their preference for wickedness; and in these verses, we have the inspired account of how Almighty God will deal with the situation. His promises are certain to be fulfilled.

“That sanctify themselves … to go unto the gardens, behind one in the midst …” (Isa 66:17). This refers to the people who rebelled against God’s Word and worshipped after the pagan rites of the old Canaanite fertility cults, “behind one in the midst.” On these words, Wardle noted that, “This means that they followed the actions of `one in the midst,’ probably a leader of the ceremonies (Eze 8:11); and in the mystic meals, they ate food regarded by the Law as unclean.”

Isa 66:15-17 DESTRUCTION OF THE OLD: We repeat, for emphasis, this chapter (66) is an epilogue. First, judgment upon Israel for disobeying the Old covenant (Isa 66:1-6); second, promise of a new Israel and a new order (Isa 66:7-14); third, building the new order by destroying the old and opening up citizenship in the New order to the whole world (Isa 66:15-24). J. A. Alexander, in Commentary on the Prophecies of Isaiah, pub. Zondervan, says these verses are . . . an integral part of the great argument with which the whole book has been occupied, and which the Prophet never loses sight of to the end of the last sentence. The grand theme of these prophecies . . . is the relation of Gods people to himself and to the world, and in the latter stages of its history, to that race with which it was once outwardly identical. The great catastrophe with which the vision closes is the change of dispensations, comprehending the final abolition of the ceremonial law, and its concomitants, the introduction of a spiritual worship and the consequent diffusion of the Church, its vast enlargement by the introduction of all Gentile converts to complete equality of privilege and honor with the believing Jews, and the excision of the unbelieving Jews from all connection with the church or chosen people, which they once imagined to have no existence independent of themselves.

The emphasis of this final prophecy is on the establishment of the New messianic age and the gathering of the Gentiles into covenant relationship. In order to establish its fulfillment the Old order must be abrogated. The abrogation of the Old and the establishment of the New are coincidental-they are to occur at the same time, i.e., within a generation (cf. Mat 24:34). The generation of the apostles (Peter, James, John, etc.) did not pass away until God had abrogated the Old order and instituted the New!

Gods judgments are appropriately likened unto fire. Fire fiercely consumes (cf. Heb 12:29; 2Th 1:7-8, etc.). and is often representative of torment and punishment (cf. Luk 16:24; Rev 14:10-11). Jehovah abrogated the Old order, in fact, at the cross of Christ (cf. Col 2:14-15; Heb 9:15-28, etc.). That was when God judged both the Mosaic system and all other human (Gentile) systems through which men tried to earn righteousness before Him. All human governments, religions, and ideologies are essentially human rebellions against the rule of God. They were all judged, exposed as inadequate, and destroyed in the power they might exercise over men at Calvary and the Empty Tomb. All human deviations from faith in God through His promised Son are idolatrous. They all fall under the generalized picture of abomination in Isa 66:17. They all came to an end together in Gods great redemptive-judgmental work in Jerusalem, 30 A.D., when Old Jerusalem had run its course and used up the time allotted to it (cf. Dan 9:24-27). When the Suffering Servant had made atonement for sin and was raised from the dead destroying the ultimate power of the devil, Israel was to turn to Jehovah and accept citizenship in New Zion (the church). Some did, but a majority did not. Jehovah, in His longsuffering allowed the Jewish nation to retain its city and temple for another 40 years (until 70 A.D.), and then, by His own providential design He allowed the city and the temple to be destroyed and burned and the nation dispersed over the face of the earth by the Roman empire. Thus the fire of Gods judgment fell both literally and figuratively upon the Old order and consumed it.

Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary

All Flesh Shall Worship the Lord

Isa 66:15-24

The prophet makes it clear that, whatever blessings accrue in the golden future, they will be apportioned to those alone, who are the Israel of God, not merely by descent but in heart and life. They must be what the Apostle describes in Php 3:3. Those who were bent on practicing idolatrous rites, such as passing in procession, with priests as teachers, through gardens and groves devoted to impurity; or who, by partaking of the flesh of animals forbidden in the Levitical law, had become as Gentiles, must suffer with the heathen.

Isa 66:19 suggests that the restored Jewish remnant are to become the future missionaries of the world; and the book closes with a vision of the Holy City as the focus and center of the religious life of mankind. It is as though, like John, Isaiah beheld her descending from God out of heaven, with wide-open gates, through which the kings of the earth bring their glory and honor, Isa 66:20. The lot of all enemies of goodness is depicted in the everburning fires of Tophet-the rubbish heaps of which are significant of uselessness, Isa 66:24.

For Review Questions, see the e-Sword Book Comments.

Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary

Marg

render his anger (Day of Jehovah)

Isa 2:10-22; Isa 4:1-6; Isa 11:10-13; Isa 13:9-16; Isa 24:21-23; Isa 26:20; Isa 26:21; Isa 63:1-6; Isa 66:15-24; Rev 19:11-21

Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes

the Lord: Isa 30:27, Isa 30:28, Isa 30:33, Psa 11:6, Psa 21:9, Psa 50:3, Psa 97:3, Amo 7:4, Mat 22:7, 2Th 1:6-9, 2Pe 3:10-12

with his: Jer 4:3, Dan 11:40

Reciprocal: Lev 26:28 – in fury Deu 28:20 – vexation Deu 32:22 – For a fire Isa 9:5 – burning Isa 10:17 – for a flame Isa 35:4 – behold Isa 59:18 – fury Isa 65:15 – the Lord Jer 4:13 – his chariots Jer 12:12 – the sword Jer 15:14 – a fire Jer 23:19 – General Jer 46:15 – thy Eze 5:15 – when Eze 36:5 – Surely Eze 38:17 – whom Dan 7:10 – fiery Nah 1:2 – is furious Nah 1:3 – his way Nah 2:4 – chariots Zec 7:14 – scattered Zec 9:14 – whirlwinds Zec 14:3 – General Zec 14:5 – the Lord Zec 14:12 – the plague wherewith Mat 24:21 – General Heb 12:29 – General

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

Isa 66:15-16. For, behold, &c. Here the prophet comes more particularly to show the nature of that indignation which should be exercised toward Gods enemies. The passage, it must be observed, is metaphorical, exhibiting God as about to take vengeance on the enemies of his church, under the figure of a commander and warrior, as well as of a judge, armed at all points, severely to punish those who have provoked his indignation: see Isa 63:1, &c.; Rev 18:8; and Rev 14:20. Some suppose that this passage refers to the general judgment; but it is rather, according to the whole tenor of this prophecy, to be referred to the judgments of God upon the rebellious Jews, and upon the antichristian enemies of the church. The Lord will come with fire With terrible judgments: an allusion possibly to the fire with which enemies use to consume places brought under their power. And with his chariots Like the general of a victorious army. With a whirlwind With a sudden sweeping calamity, that, like a whirlwind, shall destroy all before it. To render his anger with fury That is, with fervour; for fury, properly taken, is not in God, Isa 27:4. But God, at certain times, executes judgment more severely than at others. And his rebukes By rebukes he means punishments, for it is said God will execute them with flames of fire They had contemned the rebukes of the law, now God will rebuke them with fire and sword. For by fire, &c., will the Lord plead with all flesh God at first pleads with sinners by word, but if he cannot so prevail, he will plead with them in a way by which he will overcome; by fire, pestilence, and blood. Thus he threatens to do with all flesh, that is, with all sinners continuing in sin, and especially with the impenitent and unbelieving Jews, who, being favoured with the oracles and ordinances of God, held the truth in unrighteousness, and abused their extraordinary privileges to their greater condemnation: see Rom 2:8-9. And the slain of the Lord shall be many Those whom God should cause to be slain. This was awfully fulfilled in the destruction brought on the Jews by the Romans for crucifying the Messiah; no fewer than eleven hundred thousand, according to Josephus, perishing in the siege of Jerusalem, and at least three hundred thousand more during the war; not to mention the vast numbers that perished in caves, woods, wildernesses, common sewers, of whom no account could be taken; and the great slaughter made of them afterward in the wars waged against them by Adrian, when fifty of their strongest fortresses were razed, and nine hundred and eighty-five of their noblest towns were sacked, and consumed by fire. See note on Deu 28:62.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

66:15 For, behold, the LORD will come with fire, and with his chariots like a whirlwind, to {q} render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire.

(q) This vengeance God began to execute at the destruction of Babylon and has always continued it against the enemies of his Church, and will do till the last day, which will be the accomplishment of it.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes

Worship or destruction 66:15-24

This pericope concludes the sections on the culmination of Israel’s future (Isa 65:17 to Isa 66:24), Israel’s future transformation (chs. 56-66), Israel’s hope (chs. 40-66), and the whole book-Yahweh’s salvation. Like Isa 56:1-8, it clarifies the difference between being a true servant of the Lord and one of His enemies, i.e., a rebel.

"God does not deliver his servants so that they can revel in the experience of sharing his glory (cf. chs. 60-62). Rather, he delivers them so that they can be witnesses of that glory to the world (cf. Isa 6:1-10). . . . This book is not about the vindication of Zion, but about the mission of Zion to declare the God whose glory fills the earth (Isa 6:3; Isa 66:18) to all the inhabitants of that earth (Isa 12:4; Isa 51:5; Isa 60:9; Isa 66:19)." [Note: Oswalt, The Book . . . 40-66, p. 684.]

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

Yahweh "coming with fire and in chariots like whirlwinds" is a picture of Him coming in judgment against His enemies (Isa 66:14; cf. Zec 14:3).

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

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