The Lord Welcomes the Faithful Outsider and Rebukes Blind Shepherds

Isa 56:6-7 The fears of proselytes from among the heathen are also removed. “And the foreigners, who have joined themselves to Jehovah, to serve Him, and to love the name of Jehovah, to be His servants, whoever keepeth the Sabbath from desecrating it, and those who hold fast to my covenant, I bring them to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer; their whole-offerings and their slain-offerings are well-pleasing upon mine altar: for my house, a house of prayer shall it be called for all nations.

” The proselytes, who have attached themselves to Jehovah (על־הא), the God of Israel, with the pure intention of serving Him with love, are not to be left behind in the strange land. Jehovah will bring them along with His people to the holy mountain, upon which His temple rises once more; there will He cause them to rejoice, and all that they place upon His altar will find a most gracious acceptance.

It is impossible that the prophet should be thinking here of the worship of the future without sacrifice, although in Isa 53:1-12 he predicts the self-sacrifice of the “Servant of Jehovah,” which puts an end to all animals sacrifices. But here the temple is called “the house of prayer,” from the prayer which is the soul of all worship. It will be called a house of prayer for all nations; and therefore its nature will correspond to its name.

This ultimate intention is already indicated in Solomon’s dedicatory prayer (1Ki 8:41-43); but our prophet was the first to give it this definite universal expression. Throughout this passage the spirit of the law is striving to liberate itself from its bondage. Nor is there anything to surprise us in the breaking down of the party wall, built up so absolutely between the eunuchs on the one hand and the congregation on the other, or the one partially erected between the heathen and the congregation of Israel; as we may see from Isa 66:21, where it is affirmed that Jehovah will even take priests and Levites out of the midst of the heathen whom Israel will bring back with it into its own land.

Isa 56:6-7 The fears of proselytes from among the heathen are also removed. “And the foreigners, who have joined themselves to Jehovah, to serve Him, and to love the name of Jehovah, to be His servants, whoever keepeth the Sabbath from desecrating it, and those who hold fast to my covenant, I bring them to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer; their whole-offerings and their slain-offerings are well-pleasing upon mine altar: for my house, a house of prayer shall it be called for all nations.

” The proselytes, who have attached themselves to Jehovah (על־הא), the God of Israel, with the pure intention of serving Him with love, are not to be left behind in the strange land. Jehovah will bring them along with His people to the holy mountain, upon which His temple rises once more; there will He cause them to rejoice, and all that they place upon His altar will find a most gracious acceptance.

It is impossible that the prophet should be thinking here of the worship of the future without sacrifice, although in Isa 53:1-12 he predicts the self-sacrifice of the “Servant of Jehovah,” which puts an end to all animals sacrifices. But here the temple is called “the house of prayer,” from the prayer which is the soul of all worship. It will be called a house of prayer for all nations; and therefore its nature will correspond to its name.

This ultimate intention is already indicated in Solomon’s dedicatory prayer (1Ki 8:41-43); but our prophet was the first to give it this definite universal expression. Throughout this passage the spirit of the law is striving to liberate itself from its bondage. Nor is there anything to surprise us in the breaking down of the party wall, built up so absolutely between the eunuchs on the one hand and the congregation on the other, or the one partially erected between the heathen and the congregation of Israel; as we may see from Isa 66:21, where it is affirmed that Jehovah will even take priests and Levites out of the midst of the heathen whom Israel will bring back with it into its own land.

Isa 56:8 The expression “ saying of the Lord ” ( Ne'um Jehovah ), which is so solemn an expression in itself, and which stands here at the head of the following declaration, is a proof that it contains not only something great, but something which needs a solemn confirmation because of its strangeness. Not only is there no ground for supposing that Gentiles who love Jehovah will be excluded from the congregation; but it is really Jehovah’s intention to gather some out of the heathen, and add them to the assembled diaspora of Israel.

“Word of the Lord, Jehovah: gathering the outcasts of Israel, I will also gather beyond itself to its gathered ones. ” We only find ה נאם at the commencement of the sentence, in this passage and Zec 12:1. The double name of God, Adonai Jehovah , also indicates something great. עליו (to it) refers to Israel, and לנקבּציו is an explanatory permutative, equivalent to על־נקבציו; or else על denotes the fact that the gathering will exceed the limits of Israel (cf.

, Gen 48:22), and ל the addition that will be made to the gathered ones of Israel. The meaning in either case remains the same. Jehovah here declares what Jesus says in Joh 10:16 : “Other sheep I have which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold and one Shepherd:” “Jehovah one, and His name one,” as it is expressed in Zec 14:9.

Such as the views and hopes that have grown up out of the chastisement inflicted by their captivity. God has made it a preparatory school for New Testament times. It has been made subservient to the bursting of the fetters of the law, the liberation of the spirit of the law, and the establishment of friendship between Israel and the Gentile world as called to one common salvation.

Isa 56:9 It is a question whether Isa 56:9 forms the commencement of a fresh prophecy, or merely the second half of the prophecy contained in Isa 56:1-8. We decide, for our part, in favour of the former. If Isa 56:9. formed an antithetical second half to the promising first half in Isa 56:1-8, we should expect to find the prophets and leaders of Israel, whose licentiousness and want of principle are here so severely condemned, threatened with destruction in the heathen land, whilst true proselytes and even eunuchs were brought to the holy mountain.

But we meet with this antithesis for the first time in Isa 57:13, where we evidently find ourselves in the midst of another prophetic address. And where can that address commence, if not at Isa 56:9, from which point onwards we have that hard, dull, sharp, and concise language of strong indignation, which recals to mind psalms written “in a thundering style” ( Psalter , i.

80) and the reproachful addresses of Jeremiah, and which passes again in Isa 57:11. into the lofty crystalline language peculiar to our prophet’s “book of consolation? ” The new prophetic address commences, like Isa 55:1, with a summons. “All ye beasts of the field, come near! To devour, all ye beasts in the forest! ” According to the accentuation before us (לכל mercha , כלח־יתו tiphchah ), the beasts of the field are summoned to devour the beasts in the forest.

This accentuation, however, is false, and must be exchanged for another which is supported by some MSS, viz. , לכל tiphchah , כלח־יתו mercha , and ביער Beth raphatum . It is true that even with these accents we might still adhere to the view favoured by Jewish commentators, viz. , that the beasts of the field are to be devoured by the beasts of the forest, if this view yielded any admissible sense (compare, for example, that supported by Meyer, “Ye enemies, devour the scattered ones of my congregation”), and had not against it the synonymous parallelism of שדי חיתו and ביער חיתו (Isa 43:20; Psa 104:11, Psa 104:20; cf.

, Gen 3:14). But there remains another view, according to which ביער כל־חיתו is a second vocative answering to שׂדי כל־חיתו. According to the Targum, what is to be devoured is the great body of heathen kings attacking Jerusalem; according to Jerome, Cyril, Stier, etc. , the pasture and food provided by the grace of God. But what follows teaches us something different from this.

Israel has prophets and shepherds, who are blind to every coming danger, and therefore fail to give warning of its approach, because they are sunken in selfishness and debauchery. It resembles a flock with a keeper, and therefore an easy prey (Eze 34:5); and the meaning of the appeal, which is certainly addressed to the nations of the world, the enemies of the people of God, is this: “Ye have only to draw near; ye can feed undisturbed, and devour as much as ye please.

” This is the explanation adopted by most of the more modern commentators. In Jer 12:9, which is founded upon this (“Assemble all ye beasts of the field, bring them hither to devour”), it is also Jerusalem which is assigned as food to the heathen. The parallel in Isa 56:9 is both synonymous and progressive. The writer seeks for rare forms, because he is about to depict a rare inversion of the proper state of things.

חיתו (with the first syllable loosely closed) is the antiquated form of connection, which was admissible even with ביּער following (cf. , Isa 5:11; Isa 9:1-2; 2Sa 1:21). On אתיוּ (= אתוּ), see at Isa 21:12 (cf. , Isa 21:14).

Isa 56:10-11 The prophet now proceeds with צפו (צפיו): the suffix refers to Israel, which was also the object to לאכל. “His watchmen are blind: they ( are ) all ignorant, they ( are ) all dumb dogs that cannot bark; raving, lying down, loving to slumber. And the dogs are mightily greedy, they know no satiety; and such are shepherds! They know no understanding; they have all turned to their own ways, every one for his own gain throughout his border.

” The “watchmen” are the prophets here, as everywhere else (Isa 52:8, cf. , Isa 21:6, Hab 2:1; Jer 6:17; Eze 3:17). The prophet is like a watchman ( tsōpheh ) stationed upon his watch-tower ( specula ), whose duty it is, when he sees the sword come upon the land, to blow the shōphâr , and warn the people (Eze 33:1-9). But just as Jeremiah speaks of bad prophets among the captives (Jer 29), and the book of Ezekiel is full of reproaches at the existing neglect of the office of watchman and shepherd; so does the prophet here complain that the watchmen of the nation are blind, in direct opposition to both their title and their calling; they are all without either knowledge or the capacity for knowledge (vid.

, Isa 44:9; Isa 45:20). They ought to resemble watchful sheep-dogs (Job 30:1), which bark when the flock is threatened; but they are dumb, and cannot bark ( nâbhach , root nab ), and leave the flock to all its danger. Instead of being “seers” ( chōzı̄m ), they are ravers ( hōzı̄m ; cf. , Isa 19:18, where we have a play upon החרס in ההרס). הזים, from הזה, to rave in sickness, n.

act. hadhajan (which Kimchi compares to parlare in sônno ); hence the Targum נימים, lxx ἐνυπνιαζόμενοι A φανταζόμενοι, S ὁραματισταί, Jer. videntes vana . The predicates which follow are attached to the leading word hōzı̄m (raving), if not precisely as adjectives, yet as more minutely descriptive. Instead of watching, praying, wrestling, to render themselves susceptible of visions of divine revelations for the good of their people, and to keep themselves in readiness to receive them, they are idle, loving comfortable ease, talkers in their sleep.

And the dogs, viz. , those prophets who resemble the worst of them (see at Isa 40:8), are נפשׁ עזּי, of violent, unrestrained soul, insatiable. Their soul lives and moves in the lowest parts of their nature; it is nothing but selfish avarice, self-indulgent greediness, violent restlessness of passion, that revolves perpetually around itself. With the words “and these are shepherds,” the range of the prophet’s vision is extended to the leaders of the nation generally; for when the prophet adds as an exclamation, “And such ( hi = tales) are shepherds!

” he applies the glaring contrast between calling and conduct to the holders of both offices, that of teacher and that of ruler alike. For, apart from the accents, it would be quite at variance with the general use of the personal pronoun המה, to apply it to any other persons than those just described (viz. , in any such sense as this: “And those, who ought to be shepherds, do not know”).

Nor is it admissible to commence an adversative minor clause with והמה, as Knobel does, “whereas they are shepherds;” for, since the principal clause has הכלבים (dogs) as the subject, this would introduce a heterogeneous mixture of the two figures, shepherds’ dogs and shepherds. We therefore take רעים והמה as an independent clause: “And it is upon men of such a kind, that the duty of watching and tending the nation devolves!

” These רעים (for which the Targum reads רעים) are then still further described: they know not to understand, i. e. , they are without spiritual capacity to pass an intelligible judgment (compare the opposite combination of the two verbs in Isa 32:4); instead of caring for the general good, they have all turned to their own way ( ledarkâm ), i. e. , to their own selfish interests, every one bent upon his own advantage (בּצע from בּצע, abscindere , as we say, seinen Schnitt zu machen , to reap an advantage, lit.

, to make an incision). מקּצהוּ, from his utmost extremity (i. e. , from that of his own station, including all its members), in other words, “throughout the length and breadth of his own circle;” qâtseh , the end, being regarded not as the terminal point, but as the circumference (as in Gen 19:4; Gen 47:21, and Jer 51:31).

Isa 56:10-11 The prophet now proceeds with צפו (צפיו): the suffix refers to Israel, which was also the object to לאכל. “His watchmen are blind: they ( are ) all ignorant, they ( are ) all dumb dogs that cannot bark; raving, lying down, loving to slumber. And the dogs are mightily greedy, they know no satiety; and such are shepherds! They know no understanding; they have all turned to their own ways, every one for his own gain throughout his border.

” The “watchmen” are the prophets here, as everywhere else (Isa 52:8, cf. , Isa 21:6, Hab 2:1; Jer 6:17; Eze 3:17). The prophet is like a watchman ( tsōpheh ) stationed upon his watch-tower ( specula ), whose duty it is, when he sees the sword come upon the land, to blow the shōphâr , and warn the people (Eze 33:1-9). But just as Jeremiah speaks of bad prophets among the captives (Jer 29), and the book of Ezekiel is full of reproaches at the existing neglect of the office of watchman and shepherd; so does the prophet here complain that the watchmen of the nation are blind, in direct opposition to both their title and their calling; they are all without either knowledge or the capacity for knowledge (vid.

, Isa 44:9; Isa 45:20). They ought to resemble watchful sheep-dogs (Job 30:1), which bark when the flock is threatened; but they are dumb, and cannot bark ( nâbhach , root nab ), and leave the flock to all its danger. Instead of being “seers” ( chōzı̄m ), they are ravers ( hōzı̄m ; cf. , Isa 19:18, where we have a play upon החרס in ההרס). הזים, from הזה, to rave in sickness, n.

act. hadhajan (which Kimchi compares to parlare in sônno ); hence the Targum נימים, lxx ἐνυπνιαζόμενοι A φανταζόμενοι, S ὁραματισταί, Jer. videntes vana . The predicates which follow are attached to the leading word hōzı̄m (raving), if not precisely as adjectives, yet as more minutely descriptive. Instead of watching, praying, wrestling, to render themselves susceptible of visions of divine revelations for the good of their people, and to keep themselves in readiness to receive them, they are idle, loving comfortable ease, talkers in their sleep.

And the dogs, viz. , those prophets who resemble the worst of them (see at Isa 40:8), are נפשׁ עזּי, of violent, unrestrained soul, insatiable. Their soul lives and moves in the lowest parts of their nature; it is nothing but selfish avarice, self-indulgent greediness, violent restlessness of passion, that revolves perpetually around itself. With the words “and these are shepherds,” the range of the prophet’s vision is extended to the leaders of the nation generally; for when the prophet adds as an exclamation, “And such ( hi = tales) are shepherds!

” he applies the glaring contrast between calling and conduct to the holders of both offices, that of teacher and that of ruler alike. For, apart from the accents, it would be quite at variance with the general use of the personal pronoun המה, to apply it to any other persons than those just described (viz. , in any such sense as this: “And those, who ought to be shepherds, do not know”).

Nor is it admissible to commence an adversative minor clause with והמה, as Knobel does, “whereas they are shepherds;” for, since the principal clause has הכלבים (dogs) as the subject, this would introduce a heterogeneous mixture of the two figures, shepherds’ dogs and shepherds. We therefore take רעים והמה as an independent clause: “And it is upon men of such a kind, that the duty of watching and tending the nation devolves!

” These רעים (for which the Targum reads רעים) are then still further described: they know not to understand, i. e. , they are without spiritual capacity to pass an intelligible judgment (compare the opposite combination of the two verbs in Isa 32:4); instead of caring for the general good, they have all turned to their own way ( ledarkâm ), i. e. , to their own selfish interests, every one bent upon his own advantage (בּצע from בּצע, abscindere , as we say, seinen Schnitt zu machen , to reap an advantage, lit.

, to make an incision). מקּצהוּ, from his utmost extremity (i. e. , from that of his own station, including all its members), in other words, “throughout the length and breadth of his own circle;” qâtseh , the end, being regarded not as the terminal point, but as the circumference (as in Gen 19:4; Gen 47:21, and Jer 51:31).

Isa 56:12 An office-bearer of the kind described is now introduced per mimesin as speaking. “Come here, I will fetch wine, and let us drink meth; and tomorrow shall be like today, great, excessively abundant. ” He gives a banquet, and promises the guests that the revelry shall be as great tomorrow as today, or rather much more glorious. מחר יום is the day of tomorrow, τὸ ἐπαύριον, for mâchâr is always without an article; hence et fiet uti hic ( dies ) dies crastinus , viz.

, magnus supra modum valde . יתר, or יתר (as it is to be pointed here according to Kimchi, Michlol 167 b , and Wörterbuch ), signifies superabundance; it is used here adverbially in the sense of extra-ordinarily, beyond all bounds (differing therefore from יותר, “more,” or “singularly,” in the book of Ecclesiastes).

Isa 57:1-2 Whilst watchmen and shepherds, prophets and rulers, without troubling themselves about the flock which they have to watch and feed, are thus indulging their own selfish desires, and living in debauchery, the righteous man is saved by early death from the judgment, which cannot fail to come with such corruption as this. “The righteous perisheth, and no man taketh it to heart; and pious men are swept away, without any one considering that the righteous is swept away from misfortune.

He entereth into peace: they rest upon their beds, whoever has walked straight before him. ” With “the righteous” the prophet introduces, in glaring contrast to this luxurious living on the part of the leading men of the nation, the standing figure used to denote the fate of its best men. With this prevailing demoralization and worldliness, the righteous succumbs to the violence of both external and internal sufferings.

אבד, he dies before his time (Ecc 7:15); from the midst of the men of his generation he is carried away from this world (Psa 12:2; Mic 7:2), and no one lays it to heart, viz. , the divine accusation and threat involved in this early death. Men of piety ( chesed , the love of God and man) are swept away, without there being any one to understand or consider that ( kı̄ unfolds the object to be considered and laid to heart, viz.

, what is involved in this carrying away when regarded as a providential event) the righteous is swept away “from the evil,” i. e. , that he may be saved from the approaching punishment (compare 2Ki 22:20). For the prevailing corruption calls for punishment from God; and what is first of all to be expected is severe judgment, through which the coming salvation will force its way.

In Isa 57:2 it is intimated that the righteous man and the pious do not lose the blessings of this salvation because they lose this life: for whereas, according to the prophet’s watchword, there is no peace to the wicked, it is true, on the other hand, of the departing righteous man, that “he enters into peace” ( shâlōm , acc. loci s. status ; Ges. 118, 1); “they rest upon their beds,” viz.

, the bottom of the grave, which has become their mishkâb (Job 17:13; Job 21:26), “however has walked in that which lay straight before him,” i. e. , the one straight plain path which he had set before him (נכחו acc. obj. as in Isa 33:15; Isa 50:10, Ewald, §172, b , from נכח, that which lies straight before a person; whereas נכח with נכח נכחו, signifying probably fixedness, steadiness of look, related to Arab.

nkḥ , to pierce, נכה, percutere , is used as a preposition: compare Pro 4:25, לנכח, straight or exactly before him). The grave, when compared with the restlessness of this life, is therefore “peace. ” He who has died in faith rests in God, to whom he has committed himself and entrusted his future. We have here the glimmering light of the New Testament consolation, that the death of the righteous is better than life in this world, because it is the entrance into peace.

Isa 57:1-2 Whilst watchmen and shepherds, prophets and rulers, without troubling themselves about the flock which they have to watch and feed, are thus indulging their own selfish desires, and living in debauchery, the righteous man is saved by early death from the judgment, which cannot fail to come with such corruption as this. “The righteous perisheth, and no man taketh it to heart; and pious men are swept away, without any one considering that the righteous is swept away from misfortune.

He entereth into peace: they rest upon their beds, whoever has walked straight before him. ” With “the righteous” the prophet introduces, in glaring contrast to this luxurious living on the part of the leading men of the nation, the standing figure used to denote the fate of its best men. With this prevailing demoralization and worldliness, the righteous succumbs to the violence of both external and internal sufferings.

אבד, he dies before his time (Ecc 7:15); from the midst of the men of his generation he is carried away from this world (Psa 12:2; Mic 7:2), and no one lays it to heart, viz. , the divine accusation and threat involved in this early death. Men of piety ( chesed , the love of God and man) are swept away, without there being any one to understand or consider that ( kı̄ unfolds the object to be considered and laid to heart, viz.

, what is involved in this carrying away when regarded as a providential event) the righteous is swept away “from the evil,” i. e. , that he may be saved from the approaching punishment (compare 2Ki 22:20). For the prevailing corruption calls for punishment from God; and what is first of all to be expected is severe judgment, through which the coming salvation will force its way.

In Isa 57:2 it is intimated that the righteous man and the pious do not lose the blessings of this salvation because they lose this life: for whereas, according to the prophet’s watchword, there is no peace to the wicked, it is true, on the other hand, of the departing righteous man, that “he enters into peace” ( shâlōm , acc. loci s. status ; Ges. 118, 1); “they rest upon their beds,” viz.

, the bottom of the grave, which has become their mishkâb (Job 17:13; Job 21:26), “however has walked in that which lay straight before him,” i. e. , the one straight plain path which he had set before him (נכחו acc. obj. as in Isa 33:15; Isa 50:10, Ewald, §172, b , from נכח, that which lies straight before a person; whereas נכח with נכח נכחו, signifying probably fixedness, steadiness of look, related to Arab.

nkḥ , to pierce, נכה, percutere , is used as a preposition: compare Pro 4:25, לנכח, straight or exactly before him). The grave, when compared with the restlessness of this life, is therefore “peace. ” He who has died in faith rests in God, to whom he has committed himself and entrusted his future. We have here the glimmering light of the New Testament consolation, that the death of the righteous is better than life in this world, because it is the entrance into peace.

Isa 57:3-4 The reproachful language of the prophet is now directed against the mass of the nation, who have occasioned the “evil” from which the righteous is swept away, i. e. , the generation that is hostile to the servants of Jehovah, and by whom those sins of idolatry are still so shamelessly carried on, which first led to the captivity. “And ye, draw nearer hither, children of the sorceress, seed of the adulterer, and of her that committed whoredom!

Over whom do ye make yourselves merry? Over whom do ye open the mouth wide, and put the tongue out long? Are ye not the brook of apostasy, seed of lying? ” They are to draw nearer hither ( hēnnâh as in Gen 15:16), to the place where God is speaking through His prophet, to have themselves painted, and to hear their sentence. Just as elsewhere the moral character of a man is frequently indicated by the mention of his father (2Ki 6:32), or his mother (1Sa 20:30), or both parents (Job 30:8), so here the generation of the captivity, so far as it continued to practise the idolatry by which its ancestors had brought upon themselves the Chaldean catastrophe, is called first עננה בּני (or more correctly עננה), sons of the sorceress (possibly the maker of clouds or storm, Isa 2:6, Jer.

auguratricis ), one who made heathen and superstitious customs her means of livelihood, viz. , the community as it existed before the captivity, which really deserved no better name, on account of the crying contradiction between its calling and its conduct; and secondly , with regard to both the male and female members of the community, ותּזנה מנאף זרע, semen adulteri et fornicariae (Jer.)

, though Stier, Hahn, and others adopt the rendering semen adulterum et quod ( qui ) scortaris . A better rendering than this would be, “Seed of an adulterer, and one who committest adultery thyself,” viz. , (what would be indicated with this explanation by the fut. consec. ) in consequence of this descent from an adulterer. But as זרע (seed, posterity), wherever it is more minutely defined, is connected with a genitive, and not with an adjective, the presumption is that ותזנה מנאף denotes the father and mother.

ותּזנה is an attributive clause regarded as a genitive (Ges. §123, 3, Anm. 1), and more closely connected with מנאף htiw than if it was written ותזנה = וזונה, Isa 1:21): Seed of an adulterer, and consequently (Ewald, §351, b ), or similarly, of one who gave herself up to whoredom. Idolatry, prostitution, and magic are most closely allied. The prophet now asks, “Over whom do ye find your pleasure?

For whom are your common contemptuous actions intended? ” התענּג is only used here, and denotes the feeling which finds pleasure in the sufferings of another. The objects of this malicious contemptuous pleasure (Psa 22:8. , Psa 35:21) are the servants of Jehovah; and the question, as in Isa 37:23, is one of amazement at their impudence, since the men over whom they make merry are really deserving of esteem, whereas they themselves are the refuse of Israel: Are ye not a brook of apostasy, seed of lying?

As apostasy and lying, when regarded as parents, can only produce something resembling themselves; the character of those from whom they are descended is here imputed to the men themselves, even more clearly than before. The genitives of origin are also genitives of attribute. Instead of ילדי (e. g. , Isa 2:6) we have here ילדי before makkeph , with the shortening of a into i .

Isa 57:3-4 The reproachful language of the prophet is now directed against the mass of the nation, who have occasioned the “evil” from which the righteous is swept away, i. e. , the generation that is hostile to the servants of Jehovah, and by whom those sins of idolatry are still so shamelessly carried on, which first led to the captivity. “And ye, draw nearer hither, children of the sorceress, seed of the adulterer, and of her that committed whoredom!

Over whom do ye make yourselves merry? Over whom do ye open the mouth wide, and put the tongue out long? Are ye not the brook of apostasy, seed of lying? ” They are to draw nearer hither ( hēnnâh as in Gen 15:16), to the place where God is speaking through His prophet, to have themselves painted, and to hear their sentence. Just as elsewhere the moral character of a man is frequently indicated by the mention of his father (2Ki 6:32), or his mother (1Sa 20:30), or both parents (Job 30:8), so here the generation of the captivity, so far as it continued to practise the idolatry by which its ancestors had brought upon themselves the Chaldean catastrophe, is called first עננה בּני (or more correctly עננה), sons of the sorceress (possibly the maker of clouds or storm, Isa 2:6, Jer.

auguratricis ), one who made heathen and superstitious customs her means of livelihood, viz. , the community as it existed before the captivity, which really deserved no better name, on account of the crying contradiction between its calling and its conduct; and secondly , with regard to both the male and female members of the community, ותּזנה מנאף זרע, semen adulteri et fornicariae (Jer.)

, though Stier, Hahn, and others adopt the rendering semen adulterum et quod ( qui ) scortaris . A better rendering than this would be, “Seed of an adulterer, and one who committest adultery thyself,” viz. , (what would be indicated with this explanation by the fut. consec. ) in consequence of this descent from an adulterer. But as זרע (seed, posterity), wherever it is more minutely defined, is connected with a genitive, and not with an adjective, the presumption is that ותזנה מנאף denotes the father and mother.

ותּזנה is an attributive clause regarded as a genitive (Ges. §123, 3, Anm. 1), and more closely connected with מנאף htiw than if it was written ותזנה = וזונה, Isa 1:21): Seed of an adulterer, and consequently (Ewald, §351, b ), or similarly, of one who gave herself up to whoredom. Idolatry, prostitution, and magic are most closely allied. The prophet now asks, “Over whom do ye find your pleasure?

For whom are your common contemptuous actions intended? ” התענּג is only used here, and denotes the feeling which finds pleasure in the sufferings of another. The objects of this malicious contemptuous pleasure (Psa 22:8. , Psa 35:21) are the servants of Jehovah; and the question, as in Isa 37:23, is one of amazement at their impudence, since the men over whom they make merry are really deserving of esteem, whereas they themselves are the refuse of Israel: Are ye not a brook of apostasy, seed of lying?

As apostasy and lying, when regarded as parents, can only produce something resembling themselves; the character of those from whom they are descended is here imputed to the men themselves, even more clearly than before. The genitives of origin are also genitives of attribute. Instead of ילדי (e. g. , Isa 2:6) we have here ילדי before makkeph , with the shortening of a into i .