Woe to Ariel. Isaiah 29:1 Ariel Sir E. Strachey, Bart. The simplest meaning of "Ariel" is "lion of God"; but it also signifies "hearth of God" when derived from another root. In the former sense it comes to mean "a hero," as in 2 Samuel 23:20 ; Isaiah 33:7 ; and in the latter it occurs in Ezekiel 43:15, 16 for the brazen hearth of the great altar of burnt offerings, thence commonly called "the brazen," though the rest of it was of stone. There is no doubt that Jerusalem is pointed out by this enigmatical name; and the immediate context, as well as the expression in Isaiah 31:9 — "Jehovah, whose fire is in Zion, and His furnace in Jerusalem" — makes it probable that Isaiah intended to involve both meanings in the word, as though he had said, "Woe to the city of heroes, woe to the city of sacrifices: it shall now be put to the test what God and what man think as to both." ( Sir E. Strachey, Bart. ) Jerusalem, "the lion of God Sir E. Strachey, Bart. David, that lion of God, had first encamped against Jerusalem, and then made it the abode of his royal house, and the capital of his kingdom; so that it became itself an Ariel, the lion of God, in the land ( Genesis 49:9, 10 ). ( Sir E. Strachey, Bart. ) Jerusalem, "the hearth of God F. Delitzsch. By David's pitching his camp and then bringing the sacred ark there, Jerusalem became God's hearth. ( F. Delitzsch. ) Ariel J. A. Alexander. The Rabbins combine the two explanations of the Hebrew word by supposing that the altar was itself called the lion of God, because it devoured the victims like a lion, or because the fire on it had the appearance of a lion, or because the altar (or the temple) was in shape like a lion, that is, narrow behind and broad in front. ( J. A. Alexander. ) Ariel Prof . S. R. Driver, D. D. In either case applied as a symbol of hope. "But she shall be unto Me as an Ariel," i.e. , in the extremity of her need I will enable her to verify her name (Cheyne). ( Prof . S. R. Driver, D. D. ) Woe to Ariel Sir E. Strachey, Bart. After the vicissitudes of 300 years, and in the midst of present dangers, the people of Jerusalem were still confident in the strength of their "lion of God," and year by year came up to the public festivals to lay their accustomed offerings on the "altar of God"; though with little remembrance that it was not in the altar and the city, but in Jehovah Himself, that David put trust, and found his strength. Therefore Jehovah will bring Ariel low; the proud roar of the lion shall be changed for the weak, stridulous voice, which the art of the ventriloquising necromancer brings out of the ground; and the enemies of Jehovah shall be sacrificed and consumed on the hearth of this altar. First, His spiritual enemies among the Jews themselves, but afterwards the heathen oppressors of His people; and the lion shall recover his God-derived strength; and thus, both in adversity and in success, "it shall be unto Me as Ariel." ( Sir E. Strachey, Bart. ) Woe to Ariel Prof. G. A. Smith, D. D. The prophet has a very startling message to deliver: that God will besiege His own city, the city of David! Before God can make her in truth His own, make her verify her name, He will have to beleaguer and reduce her. For so novel and startling an intimation the prophet pleads a precedent: "City which David" himself "beleaguered." Once before in thy history, ere the first time thou wast made God's own hearth, thou hadst to be besieged. As then, so now. Before thou canst again be a true Ari-El I must "beleaguer thee like David." This reading and interpretation gives to the enigma a reason and a force which it does not otherwise possess. ( Prof. G. A. Smith, D. D. ) "The city where David dwelt H. Melvill, B. D. We consider it every way remarkable that David should be mentioned in connection with the woe about to be uttered. If it had been, "Woe unto Ariel, the city where flagrant sins are committed, the city which is overrun with idols, and filled with all kinds of abomination," we should have seen at once the force of the sentence, and must have felt the wrath warranted by the alleged crimes. But why bring it as a chief accusation against Jerusalem — indeed, as the only charge that was to justify God in pouring out His vengeance — that it was the city where David had dwelt? We can hardly think that the definition is meant as nothing more than a statement of fact. David had long been dead; strange changes had occurred, and it would be making the essential term too insignificant to suppose it to contain only a historical reference to an assertion that no one doubted, but which is quite unconnected with the present message from God. We must rather believe that the city is characterised, "where David dwelt," in order to show that it deserved the woe about to be denounced. This is evidently mentioned as aggravating the guiltiness of the city. ( H. Melvill, B. D. ) Good men increase the responsibility of a community H. Melvill, B. D. We seem warranted in concluding that, its having been made eminent by the piety of the servants of God, by their zeal for God, and by their earnestness in preserving the purity of their worship, entails a weighty responsibility on a city or country; so that if, in any after time, that city or country degenerate in godliness, and become, by its sins, obnoxious to vengeance, it will be one of the heaviest items in the charge brought against it, that it was dwelt in by saints so distinguished. ( H. Melvill, B. D. ) National mercies H. Melvill, B. D. I. THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE WOE OF JERUSALEM AND JERUSALEM BEING THE CITY WHERE DAVID DWELT. There are other considerations, over and above the general one of the responsibility fastened on a people by the having had a king of extraordinary piety, which go to the explaining why the woe upon Jerusalem should be followed by a reference to David. David was eminent as a prophet of the Lord; he had been commissioned to announce, in sundry most remarkable predictions, the Messiah, of whom, in many respects, he was, moreover, an illustrious type. It was true, there had been others of whom the prophet might think. There is a peculiar appositeness in the reference to David, because his writings were the very best adapted to the fixing themselves on the popular mind. These writings were the national anthems; they were the songs to be chanted in those daily and annual solemnities which belonged to the Jews in their political as much as in their religious capacity, in which the princes were associated with the priests, so that the civil was hardly to be distinguished from the ecclesiastic. So beloved as David was of God, he must have bequeathed a blessing to the nation: for righteous kings, like righteous fathers, entail good on a nation. Indeed, it is evident, from other parts of Isaiah, that the memory of David was still a tower of strength at Jerusalem, so that, for his sake, was evil averted from the city. When Sennacherib and his hosts encamped against the city, and the heart of Hezekiah was dismayed, it was in terms such as these that God addressed Israel, "I will defend this city, to save it for Mine own sake, and for My servant David's sake." Was it not like telling the Jews that they were no longer to be borne with for the sake of David, to pronounce, "Woe to Ariel, to Ariel, the city where David dwelt"? Was it not declaring, that the period was drawing to a close, during which the conservatism of the monarch's piety could be felt? The prophet might be considered as showing both how just and how terrible those judgments would be. He showed their justice, because the having had amongst them such a king and prophet as David, made the Jews inexcusable in their wickedness: he showed their severity, because it was the city of David which God was about to punish. II. MAKE AN APPLICATION OF THE SUBJECT. We pass at once to the Reformation, and substitute the reformers for David, and England for Ariel. We must consider what it was that the reformers did for us; from what they delivered us; and in what they instructed us. ( H. Melvill, B. D. ) Ariel F. Delitzsch. "It will be to Me as an Ariel" (ver. 2), i.e. , through My help it will prove itself a hearth of God, consuming its enemies like a fiery furnace, or these enemies finding destruction in Jerusalem, like wood heaped on an altar and set ablaze. ( F. Delitzsch. ) Love and chastisement J. Parker, D. D. The Lord has never spared the elect. Election gives Him rights of discipline. We may inflict punishment upon those who are ours, when we may not lay the hand of chastisement upon those who do not belong to us. Love has its own law court. ( J. Parker, D. D. ) Add ye year to year; let the feasts come round in a golden chain W. L. Watkinson. (from R.V.): — Speaking of the gay temper of the Greeks, Quinet describes them as "a people who count their years by their games." In a more serious spirit the Jews counted their years by their religious festivals, We have a Christian year whose festivals celebrate the great events in the life of our Lord. We are adding year to year, the feasts come and go, and it behoves us to inquire what we are doing with them, what they are doing for us. I. THERE IS AN UNSATISFACTORY WAY OF SPENDING THE YEARS. The implied complaint of the text is that the inhabitants of Jerusalem failed to benefit by their recurring privileges, and that the lapse of time brought them nearer to destruction. The trumpet of the new year in vain called them to a new life; the day of atonement passed leaving them with uncancelled sin; the Feast of Tabernacles and that of Pentecost awoke in them no love, constrained them to no obedience to the Giver of the harvest. Is this not true of thousands of those over whom pass the festivals of the Christian year? They are, indeed, all the worse for the lengthening days and multiplying Opportunities. II. THERE IS A TRUE WAY OF SPENDING THE YEARS, and that is in enjoying and improving this life in the fear of God and in the light of eternity. Victor Hugo speaks of an old man as "a thinking ruin." Paul the aged was such a "ruin," and he had something grand to think about. ( W. L. Watkinson. ) As a dream of a night vision. Isaiah 29:7, 8 The visions of sin Homilist. There are two grand truths of a most stirring import unfolded in the text. 1. That wicked men are frequently employed to execute the Divine purpose. The Almighty determined to humble Jerusalem, and He employed Sennacherib as the engine of His justice. "He makes" the wrath of man to praise Him. What a revelation is this of His absolute command over the fiercest and freest workings of the most depraved and rebellious subjects! 2. That whilst wicked men execute the Divine purpose, they frustrate their own. Sennacherib worked out the Divine result, but all his own plans and wishes were like the visions of the famished traveller on the Oriental desert, who, hungry, thirsty, and exhausted, lies down and dreams, under the rays of a tropical sun, that he is eating and drinking, but awakes and discovers, to his inexpressible distress, that both his hunger and thirst are but increased. Hell works out God's plans and frustrates its own; Heaven works out God's plans, and fulfils its own. Let us look at the vision before us as illustrating the visions of sin. I. IT IS A DREAMY VISION. It is "as a dream of a night vision." There are waking visions. The orient creations of poetry, the bright prospects of hope, the appalling apprehensions of fear — these are visions occurring when the reflective powers of the soul are more or less active, and are, therefore, not entirely unsubstantial and vain. But the visions which occur in sleep, when the senses are closed, and the consciousness is torpid, and the reason has resigned her sway to the hands of a lawless imagination, are generally without reality. Now, the Scriptures represent the sinner as asleep. But where is the analogy between the natural sleep of the body and the moral sleep of sin? 1. Natural sleep is the ordination of God, but moral is not. 2. Natural sleep is restorative, but moral is destructive. 3. In both there is the want of activity. The inactivity of the moral sleep of the sinner is the inactivity of the moral faculty — the conscience. 4. In both there is the want of consciousness. With the sinner in his moral slumbers — God, Christ, the soul, heaven, hell, are nothing to him. II. IT IS AN APPETITIVE VISION. What is the dream of the man whom the Almighty brings under our notice in the text, who lies down to sleep under the raging desire for food and water? It is that he was eating and drinking. His imagination creates the very things for which his appetite was craving. His imagination was the servant of his strongest appetites. So it is ever with the sinner: the appetite for animal gratifications will create its visions of sensual pleasure: the appetite for worldly wealth will create its visions of fortune; the appetite for power will create its visions of social influence and applause. The sinner's imagination is ever the servant of his strongest appetites, and ever pictures to him in airy but attractive forms the objects he most strongly desires. III. IT IS AN ILLUSORY VISION. The food and water were a mirage in the visionary desert, dissipated into air as his eye opened. All the ideas of happiness entertained by the sinner are mental illusions. There are many theories of happiness practically entertained by men that are as manifestly illusive as the wildest dream. 1. Every notion of happiness is delusive that has not to do more with the soul than the senses. 2. Every notion of happiness is delusive that has not more to do with the character than the circumstances. 3. Every notion is delusive that has not more to do with the present than with the future. He that is preparing intentionally for happiness is not happy, nor can he be: the selfish motive renders it impossible. "He that seeketh his life shall lose it." Heaven is for the man that is now blessed in his deeds, and for him only. The present is everything to us, because God is in it, and out of it starts the future 4. Every notion is delusive that has not more to do with the absolute than the contingent. IV. IT IS A TRANSITORY VISION. In the text, the supposed dreamer was led to feel the illusion which his wayward imagination had practised upon him. "He awaketh, and his soul is empty." Every moral sleeper must awake either here or hereafter; here by disciplinary voices, or hereafter by retributive thunders. ( Homilist. ) Dreaming D. P. Pratten, B. A. As the army of Sennacherib were dreaming, literally or figuratively, of a conquest which had no real existence, so are there multitudes of persons now dreaming that they are accomplishing the great object of their existence who are no more doing so than if they lay wrapped in the slumbers of the night. I propose to speak of them under three heads. All three are capable of being substituted, and often are substituted, for the real and proper business of life. I. PLEASURE. 1. How comes it to pass that people can live such lives, dreaming all the while that they are fulfilling the true purpose of their existence, or, at least, without any uneasy sense that they are criminally failing to do so?(1) One cause of it is that the thing in question is pleasure. "Nothing succeeds like success."(2) Another explanation is, that many of the pleasures for which men live make great demands on their exertions. Some kinds of play are harder than work. Men, therefore, feel it difficult to believe that what bears so near a resemblance to work is not work, and that very work which they were sent into the world to do.(3) A great many of the pleasures of life are enjoyed in association with others. And amidst the exhilaration of spirits, the brisk laughter, the friendly encounters, it is very difficult to believe that a life made up largely of such occupations is not the life we were intended to live.(4) Then, a great deal of the pleasure is intimately associated with fashion.(5) The alleged innocence of the pleasures indulged in contributes also to the deception.(6) Again, it is sometimes said that, however censurable a life of pleasure may be for those in advanced life, it is innocent and even suitable for the young. 2. But it may be said, What is there to show that such a life is only a dream-like substitute for our real life?(1) It leaves our best faculties unused.(2) A life of pleasure, moreover, is a selfish life.(3) A life of pleasure also exposes to temptation.(4) A life devoted to pleasure, too, unfits men for another world. II. WORK. By "work" is meant some secular occupation by which money, or its equivalent, is gained. The Bible praises work. Work keeps us from being dependent on others. It tends to the benefit of those dependent on us. And work is good as furnishing a man with the means of helping his neighbours, and of contributing to the support of the great movements in operation for lessening the suffering and the sin of the world. And work is good, as giving a man influence by means of the wealth it produces. It is also in favour of a life of diligent employment, that it keeps from much evil. And yet neither is work, any more than pleasure, the great end of man; and those who deem it so are indulging in a baseless dream. The moral value of work is to be measured by its motive and its influence. A life of excessive devotion to work is hostile to the higher life of a man. It leaves but little time for those exercises which are found so essential to a life of godliness. It indisposes for such employments. It shuts out the other world by the undue prominence it gives to this. It banishes God from the thoughts. It is a practical neglect of the soul. Others suffer also. Such a life makes us indifferent to the interests of others. III. RELIGION. And this time, you will perhaps say, they are likely to be right. On the contrary, there is more danger of their going wrong here than in either of the previous cases. And for this reason — that the sacred name of religion disposes men to think all is as it should be if they can persuade themselves that they are religious. Religion assumes a great variety of forms, and some of them not only worthless, but pernicious. 1. Can it be questioned that a great deal of the religion of England now is nothing more than amusement, and often amusement of the most childish nature? 2. If religion in other cases seems to go deeper, it is too often only another name for superstition, where chief importance is attached to the conventional sanctity of the persons who officiate, the garments they wear, the sacraments they administer, the postures they adopt, the seasons they observe. 3. Then there is the religion of sentiment, of which the chief object is to awaken certain emotions. 4. There is also a religion in which the intellect performs the principal function. 5. We might speak of that religion which is hereditary, where a man adopts a particular faith or worship because his ancestors did so before him. 6. We might speak of the religion of fashion, where the fashionable gathering forms the great attraction. 7. We might speak of the religious observances in which men engage to fill up time which they are forbidden by custom to employ in secular pursuits; or of the religion which is only occasional and spasmodic; or of that which consists in bustle and superficial activity. These religions all agree in being good for nothing. Some of them do harm. Religion is a life. Religion has two sides. On the one it turns toward God, on the other toward man. But all dreams must come to an end. There is a dread awaking in prospect. Think of the disappointment that will attend the awaking! Let us not be deceived by the apparent reality of the life we are leading. What can seem more real than a dream? yet what more unsubstantial? With the feeling of disappointment will be mingled one of contempt. As a dream when one awaketh, so, O Lord, when Thou awakest, Thou shalt despise their image." We experience a sort of resentment on finding that we have been so deceived by that which had no reality. Will there be nothing like this on awaking from a life wasted in trifling? ( D. P. Pratten, B. A. ) The disappointments of sin S. Martin. The general truth taught by these words is this: wrong-doing promises much, but it certainly ends in bitter disappointment. The good to be gained by sin is seen and tasted and handled only in dream. It is never actually possessed, and visible disappointment is the bitter fruit of transgression. I. THE VERY NATURE OF SIN SUGGESTS THIS FACT. 1. Sin is a wandering from the way which God has appointed for us — the way which was in His mind when He made man — the only way which has ever been in His mind as the right way. There is no adaptation in man's real nature to any way but one, and that is obedience to a Father in Heaven, the result and fruit of true love for that Father. 2. Sin is a practical withdrawing from the protection of Divine providence. It thus wounds, sometimes instantly, and always eventually, the transgressor himself. It is as when a hungry man dreameth, and awaketh, and behold, he is faint. II. LOOK AT A FEW RECOGNISED FACTS ABOUT SIN. 1. The angels who kept not their first estate left their own habitation. So far as we can understand the matter they sought freedom, but they found chains. They sought light; they found darkness. They sought happiness; they found misery, — as when a hungry man dreameth and eateth, and awaketh and finds himself famishing. 2. Our first parents, in yielding to the first temptation, soughs equality with God; but they soon found themselves fallen below the natural human level 3. The general history of sin is found in epitome in the life of every sinner. In families and Churches and nations, in societies of all kinds, we see illustrated the truth that sin everywhere, by whomsoever committed, is the occasion of most bitter disappointment. ( S. Martin. ) Life a dream D. P. Pratten, B. A. Lord Brougham relates an occurrence which strikingly shows how short a thing a dream is. A person who had asked a friend to call him early in the morning, dreamed that he was taken ill, and that, after remedies had been tried in vain by those about him, a medical man was sent for who lived some miles away, and who did not arrive before some hours had elapsed. On his arrival he threw some cold water upon the face of the patient. Thereupon the sleeper awoke. The water was, in fact, applied by his friend, for the purpose of awaking him. The inference is that this apparent dream of hours was the affair of a moment. Such is human life. ( D. P. Pratten, B. A. ) A dream Prof. J. Skinner, D. D. The figure of the dream is applied in two ways. 1. Objectively, to the vanishing of the enemy. 2. Subjectively, to his disappointment. ( Prof. J. Skinner, D. D. ) Disenchantment Prof. J. Skinner, D. D. (ver. 8): — A more vivid representation of utter disenchantment than this verse gives can scarcely be conceived. ( Prof. J. Skinner, D. D. ) Disappointing fancies Mungo Park's Journal. No sooner had I shut my eyes than fancy would convey me to the streams and rivers of my native land. There, as I wandered along the verdant bank, I surveyed the clear stream with transport, and hastened to swallow the delightful draught; but alas! disappointment awakened me, and I found myself a lonely captive, perishing of thirst amid the wilds of Africa. ( Mungo Park's Journal. ) Stay yourselves, and wonder, they are drunken, but not with wine. Isaiah 29:9-12 Spiritual drunkenness J. A. Alexander. By spiritual drunkenness (ver. 9) we are probably to understand unsteadiness of conduct and a want of spiritual discernment. ( J. A. Alexander. ) Spiritual drunkenness worse than bodily, and more prevale R. Paisley. nt : — Drunkenness in itself is a horrible vice, and it is the mother of innumerable more. But besides this there is a spiritual drunkenness. I. This worse drunkenness, says the text, is SPIRITUAL BLINDNESS, SPIRITUAL INSENSIBILITY, OR INSANITY. In this respect it resembles the other drunkenness. The man who is drunk has eyes, but he cannot see; ears, but he cannot hear; a heart that has not ceased to beat, but he cannot understand. He mistakes one person and thing fur another. So it is with the spiritual sort in regard to the spiritual world. Look at a few of the varieties. Drunkenness — 1. From ignorance of the truth. 2. From perversion or profanation of the truth. 3. From rejection of the truth. II. WHAT IS THE QUALITY OR CURSE OF THIS SPIRITUAL DRUNKENNESS, compared with the other? Compare it — 1. In regard to the drunkard's intelligence or powers of perception. 2. In regard to the drunkard's life, affections, passions, habits. 3. In regard to the drunkard's state before God, the salvation of soul and body. What shall we say, if we discover the terrific truth?(1) That the spiritual is more besotting and blinding to the spirit.(2) That it is more maddening and brutalising to the drunkard's life. What crime will the drunkard not perpetrate? But what is the life of the spiritual drunkard who goes on in his wickedness? One lifelong defiance of God.(3) That it is a drunkenness still more infernal, more devilish, and more deadly to both soul and body. ( R. Paisley. ) Judicial blindness H. Melvill, B. D. The Jews are represented as given over by God to a judicial blindness. Now, we regard it as a fixed principle in the interpretation of Scripture that God never does more than leave men to themselves; doing nothing directly to harden them in wickedness, or to place them out of the reach of forgiveness. ( H. Melvill, B. D. ) Drunken, but not with wine J. J. Ingram. Are there, then, other forms of insobriety and resultant demoralisation distinct from that of the familiar cup? The phrases which suggest this abnormal state are continually in our mouths. Thus, we speak of people being intoxicated with delight, with fanaticism, with political excitement, or with the spirit of gambling. Wendell Holmes speaks of people who become intoxicated with music, with poetry, with love, with religious enthusiasm. He remarks how convalescents are sometimes made tipsy by a beef steak. It is said of one that he was too intoxicated with certain good news to be able to imbibe anything else. Indeed, it is told of certain company that it was so intoxicating that some of the circle were compelled to drink to keep themselves sober. ( J. J. Ingram. ) Intoxication J. J. Ingram. What are the main characteristics of intoxication? The drunken man is one who has lost his power of self-control, one to whose eye and thought the proportions and relationships of life have become disordered, one whose vigour, both physically and mentally, has become enfeebled and inefficient. He is a man who for the time being loses his true relation to the things of outer life. He is abnormal. His appetites are deranged, his engrossments disproportionate, his views beclouded or oblique. ( J. J. Ingram. ) For the Lord hath poured out upon you the spirit of deep sleep. The spirit of a deep sleep J. H. Jowett, M. A. "The Lord hath poured out," etc. That is an appalling judgment. What have been the steps which have led up to so terrible a consummation? Men do not lose their moral sensitiveness by a stroke; it is the ultimate issue of a process. Drowsiness precedes sleep; the twilight ushers in the night. We do not reach moral abysses by a precipice; we reach them by a gradient. We do not drop into bondage; we walk into it. 1. Here are the men of my text; what was the first step in the degradation? We have it clearly indicated in the thirteenth verse. If we take the thirteenth verse, and place it before verse 9, we have unfolded before us the process of degeneracy, which is re-enacted in multitudes of lives in every succeeding age. The first step towards moral benumbment is the evisceration of religious worship. Take the heart out of worship, and you will take the life out of morals. "And their fear of Me is a commandment of men which has been taught them." What does that mean? The man-made has supplanted the God-born. And what does that further mean but the intrusion of the casuist into religion? The casuist is he who turns a shining principle into a dull maxim, who makes breaches and loopholes of escape in the great moral law, who changes the searching inwardness of religion into an easy external ordinance, who removes the fearful sense of the eternal, and makes us feel perilously at home in the small demands of his own commandments. 2. Now let us mark the progress of the degeneracy. Religious formalism issues in moral laxity. Note the analysis of the process which is given in the ninth verse. First there is dimness of moral vision. "Tarry ye and wonder." The figure is that of a man who pulls himself up in bewilderment. He does not remember quite clearly whether this is the way, or whether he should take the next turning. Moral law does not stand out in clear bold relief. His conscience does not act readily. There is hesitancy. He "tarries"! There is confusion He "wonders"! "Take your pleasure and be blind." With dimness there comes wilfulness. The little truth they saw they resented. The people liked the restfulness of the dulness. There was nothing searching or self-revealing in the adulterated light. They preferred the twilight in which they can partially hide. Let us go on with the analysis. Moral dimness; moral wilfulness; what is the next step in the degeneracy? Moral stupor. "They are drunk, but not with wine. They stagger, but not with strong drink." 3. Now let us proceed to the third step in the appalling gradient. When a man has eviscerated his religion, changing its inwardness to a thin superficialness, and from this proceeds to moral laxity, I am told by the words of my text that by a judicial act of God his stupor becomes fixed. If a man will not, he shall not! Ye have taken the cup of wilfulness, and drugged yourselves into sin, and "the Lord hath poured out upon you the spirit of deep sleep." 4. What is the next step in the awful gradient? "And all vision is become to you as a book that is sealed." The great writings of the great books have no illuminating message. The books are sealed! What books? There is the book of conscience. "Thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it." That book is sealed. There is the book of experience, the teachings of yesterday, the witness of history. "Ask now of the days that are past." That book is sealed. There is the book of nature. The book of nature began to be read by William Wordsworth when the atmosphere of English life had been warmed by the evangelical revival. When the evangelical is dead nature's inner significance is concealed. Let us therefore watch, with intensest vigilance, against the intrusion of all insincerity into our worship. ( J. H. Jowett, M. A. ) The vision of all is become unto you as the words of a book that is sealed. Isaiah 29:11, 12 The universality of spiritual blindness T. Chalmers, D. D. What is affirmed in these verses holds so strikingly true of God's general revelation to the world, that we deem the lesson contained in them to be not of partial, but permanent application. I. There is A COMPLAINT uttered in these verses (1) by the learned, (2) by the unlearned. 1. If a book be closed down by a material seal, then, till that seal be broken, there lies a material obstacle even in the way of him who is able to read the contents of it. Is there any hindrance in virtue of which the critics, and the grammarians, and the accomplished theologians of our age, are unable to reach the real and effective understanding of the words of this prophecy? Yes, and it is wonderful to tell, how little the mere erudition of Scripture helps the real discernment of Scripture. The learned just labour as helplessly under a want of an impression of the reality of this whole matter, as the unlearned; and if this be true of many a priest and theologian, with whom Christianity is a science, and the study of the Bible the business of their profession, what can we expect of those among the learned, who, in the pursuits of a secular philosophy, never enter into contact with the Bible, either in its doctrine or in its language, except when it is obtruded on them? To make the wisdom of the New Testament his wisdom, and its spirit his spirit, and its language his best-loved and best-understood language, there must be a higher influence upon the mind, than what lies in human art, or in human explanation. And till this is brought to pass, the doctrines of the atonement and of regeneration, an

Benson Commentary Isaiah 29:1 Woe to Ariel, to Ariel, the city where David dwelt! add ye year to year; let them kill sacrifices. Isaiah 29:1 . Wo to Ariel — This word signifies a strong lion, or the lion of God, and is used concerning lion-like men, as it is rendered 1 Chronicles 11:22 ; and of God’s altar, as it is translated Ezekiel 43:15-16 ; which seems to be thus called, because it devoured and consumed the sacrifices put upon it, as greedily and as irresistibly as the lion doth his prey. “That Jerusalem is here called by this name,” says Bishop Lowth, “is very certain; but the reason of this name, and the meaning of it, as applied to Jerusalem, are very obscure and doubtful. Some, with the Chaldee, suppose it to be taken from the hearth of the great altar of burnt-offerings, which Ezekiel plainly calls by the same name; and that Jerusalem is here considered as the seat of the fire of God, ??? ?? , which should issue from thence to consume his enemies: compare Isaiah 31:9 . Some, according to the common derivation of the word, suppose that it is called the lion of God, or the strong lion, on account of the strength of the place, by which it was enabled to resist and overcome all its enemies. There are other explanations of this name given, but none that seems to be perfectly satisfactory.” The city where David dwelt — The royal city, and seat of David and his posterity, which is probably here mentioned, because this was the ground of their confidence, and also to intimate that their relation to David, and their supposed interest in the promises made to him and to his seed, should not secure them from the destruction here threatened. Add ye year to year, &c. — The prophet speaks ironically: Go on year after year, and kill sacrifices at the appointed times, whereby you think to appease me; but all shall be in vain. For know, that God will punish you for your hypocritical worship, consisting of mere form, destitute of true piety. As the latter clause, ???? ????? , is literally, Let the feasts go round, it is probable this discourse was delivered at the time of some great feast. Isaiah 29:2 Yet I will distress Ariel, and there shall be heaviness and sorrow: and it shall be unto me as Ariel. Isaiah 29:2 . Yet will I distress Ariel — Notwithstanding all your sacrifices, by bringing and strengthening her enemies against her. And there shall be heaviness and sorrow — Instead of your present joy and festivity. And it shall be to me as Ariel — That is, either, 1st, I will treat her like a strong and fierce lion, which the people, among whom it is, endeavour by nets and pits, and divers other ways, to take and destroy. Or, 2d, I will make Ariel the city like Ariel the altar, filling it with sacrifices, even of men, whom I will slay in my anger; which act of God is called his sacrifice, Ezekiel 39:17-19 . Agreeably to this latter interpretation, Bishop Lowth renders the clause, It shall be unto me as the hearth of the great altar: that is, as he explains it, “all on flame; as it was when taken by the Chaldeans; or covered with carcasses and blood, as when taken by the Romans: an intimation of which more distant events, though not immediate subjects of the prophecy, may perhaps be given in this obscure passage.” Isaiah 29:3 And I will camp against thee round about, and will lay siege against thee with a mount, and I will raise forts against thee. Isaiah 29:3-4 . And I will camp against thee, &c. — That is, by those enemies whom I will assist and enable to take and destroy thee. The prophet may here refer to different sieges of Jerusalem, that of Sennacherib, that of the Chaldeans, or even to that of the Romans. Thou shalt be brought down — thy speech shall be low — Thou, who now speakest so loftily, shalt be humbled, and in a submissive manner, and with a low voice, shalt beg the favour of thine enemies. As of one that hath a familiar spirit, out of the ground — “That the souls of the dead uttered a feeble, stridulous sound, very different from the natural human voice, was a popular notion among the heathen, as well as among the Jews. This appears from several passages of their poets, Homer, Virgil, Horace. The pretenders to the art of necromancy, who were chiefly women, had an art of speaking with a reigned voice, so as to deceive those who applied to them, by making them believe that it was the voice of the ghost. They had a way of uttering sounds, as if they were formed, not by the organs of speech, but deep in the chest, or in the belly, and were thence called ????????????? , ventriloqui. They could make the voice seem to come from beneath the ground, from a distant part, in another direction, and not from themselves, the better to impose upon those who consulted them. From these arts of the necromancers, the popular notion seems to have arisen that the ghost’s voice was a weak, stridulous, almost an inarticulate sort of sound, very different from the speech of the living.” — Bishop Lowth. Isaiah 29:4 And thou shalt be brought down, and shalt speak out of the ground, and thy speech shall be low out of the dust, and thy voice shall be, as of one that hath a familiar spirit, out of the ground, and thy speech shall whisper out of the dust. Isaiah 29:5 Moreover the multitude of thy strangers shall be like small dust, and the multitude of the terrible ones shall be as chaff that passeth away: yea, it shall be at an instant suddenly. Isaiah 29:5-7 . Moreover — Or, rather, But, the multitude of thy strangers — Of the strangers that encamp and fight against thee; shall be like small dust — Dispersed by the least breath of air; and the multitude of the terrible ones — Of the Assyrian army, terrible for courage and ferocity; shall be as the chaff that passeth away — Which is quickly carried away by the wind. Yea, at an instant, suddenly — This dissipation and destruction of thine enemies shall be as instantaneous as it is unexpected. Bishop Lowth, who considers these verses as containing “an admirable description of the destruction of Sennacherib’s army, with a beautiful variety of the most expressive and sublime images, adapted to show the greatness, the suddenness, and horror of the event,” gives us the following elegant and striking translation of them, which will give the reader a more just and enlarged view of their meaning, than any note wherewith we might attempt to explain it: But the multitude of the proud shall be like the small dust; And like the flitting chaff, the multitude of the terrible: Yea, the effect shall be momentary, in an instant. From Jehovah there shall be a sudden visitation, With thunder, and earthquake, and a mighty voice; With storm, and tempest, and flame of devouring fire. And like as a dream, a vision of the night, So shall it be with the multitude of all the nations, that fight against Ariel; And all their armies, and their towers, and those that distress her. The reader will observe, that this view of the passage has the sanction of the Vulgate version, and is approved by Prebendary Lowth, Vitringa, Dr. Waterland, Henry, and several others. Some, however, think that these verses should be connected with the preceding, and that the prophet continues in them to describe the judgment to be inflicted on Jerusalem. Isaiah 29:6 Thou shalt be visited of the LORD of hosts with thunder, and with earthquake, and great noise, with storm and tempest, and the flame of devouring fire. Isaiah 29:7 And the multitude of all the nations that fight against Ariel, even all that fight against her and her munition, and that distress her, shall be as a dream of a night vision. Isaiah 29:8 It shall even be as when an hungry man dreameth, and, behold, he eateth; but he awaketh, and his soul is empty: or as when a thirsty man dreameth, and, behold, he drinketh; but he awaketh, and, behold, he is faint, and his soul hath appetite: so shall the multitude of all the nations be, that fight against mount Zion. Isaiah 29:8 . “As when a hungry man dreameth; and, lo! he seemeth to eat; but he awaketh, and his appetite is still unsatisfied: and as a thirsty man, &c. So shall it be with the multitude of all the nations, which have set themselves in array against mount Zion.” Thus Bishop Lowth. The Assyrians had swallowed up Jerusalem in their imagination: but God would suddenly disappoint all their hopes, and send them away empty and confounded. For, the reader will observe, “Sennacherib and his mighty army are not here compared to a dream, because of their sudden disappearance; but the disappointment of their eager hopes is compared to what happens to a hungry and thirsty man, when he awakes from a dream, in which fancy had presented to him meat and drink in abundance, and finds it nothing but a vain illusion. The comparison is elegant and beautiful in the highest, degree, well wrought up, and perfectly suited to the end proposed.” Isaiah 29:9 Stay yourselves, and wonder; cry ye out, and cry: they are drunken, but not with wine; they stagger, but not with strong drink. Isaiah 29:9-10 . Stay yourselves and wonder — The prophet, having described the temporal judgment coming on the Jews, (see the contents of the chapter,) proceeds now to predict the spiritual one, the first gradation of which is contained in these and the two following verses, which both describe the judgment and the consequence of it. It is the same with that predicted Isaiah 6:9-12 ; and Isaiah 8:14-15 . On which see the notes. Hebrew, ??????? ????? , Pause and be astonished. Stop and consider the stupidity of this people, and you cannot but wonder at it. Cry ye out, and cry — Through amazement and horror. They are drunken, but not with wine — But with stupidity and folly, which makes them, like drunken men, insensible of their danger, and not knowing what to do. For the Lord hath poured out upon you — Hath suffered to come upon you, in a way of righteous judgment, and as a punishment for your loving, darkness rather than light; the spirit of deep sleep — Hardness of heart, and insensibility of your danger and misery. The prophets and your rulers — Your magistrates and ministers, whose blindness and stupidity are a great curse to the people; hath he covered — Permitted to be covered with the veil of ignorance and stupidity; that is, he hath withdrawn his abused light and grace from them, so that they no more see things in a true light than if a thick veil were spread over them. The prophets and seers here mean the same persons. Isaiah 29:10 For the LORD hath poured out upon you the spirit of deep sleep, and hath closed your eyes: the prophets and your rulers, the seers hath he covered. Isaiah 29:11 And the vision of all is become unto you as the words of a book that is sealed, which men deliver to one that is learned, saying, Read this, I pray thee: and he saith, I cannot; for it is sealed: Isaiah 29:11-12 . And the vision of all — Of all your prophets, or every vision; is unto you as the words of a book that is sealed — Which no man can read while it is sealed up, as books then sometimes were, being in the form of rolls. Which men deliver to one that is learned — That understands the language in which the book is written; saying, Read this — he saith, I cannot; for it is sealed — Mere human learning, without supernatural illumination, will not enable any man rightly to understand the word of God, and things divine: see 1 Corinthians 2:11 ; 1 Corinthians 2:14 . The book is delivered — Unsealed and opened; to him that is unlearned — and he saith, I cannot read it; for I am unlearned. Thus, neither the learned nor the unlearned among the Jews were any better for the messages which God sent them by his servants the prophets, nor desired to be better. Isaiah 29:12 And the book is delivered to him that is not learned, saying, Read this, I pray thee: and he saith, I am not learned. Isaiah 29:13 Wherefore the Lord said, Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honour me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men: Isaiah 29:13-14 . Forasmuch as this people draw near to me — Namely, in acts of worship; with their mouth — Speaking to me in prayer and praise, and promising and professing to serve me; and with their lips do honour me — With mere outward devotion and bodily worship; but have removed their heart far from me — Do not render me that love and gratitude, that regard and obedience, which I require; and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men — By mere human wisdom, and not by my word and Spirit. They worship and serve me, not in such a manner as I have prescribed, but according to men’s inventions, preferring the devices and traditions of their false prophets before my institutions. Or, their religion is merely of human, not of divine, origin: it is the fruit of corrupt nature, and not of renewing grace. I will proceed to do a marvellous work — A thing that will scarce be believed; for the wisdom of their wise men shall perish — Shall disappear and vanish. A veil shall be cast upon the eyes of their minds, and their folly shall be made manifest to all. The most refined arts of their politicians shall not avail their authors, nor be able to preserve them from God’s judgments; and their most wise and learned men shall lose their usual discretion, and be infatuated. This threatening was remarkably fulfilled in the Jews of our Lord’s time, who crucified him out of fear of the Romans, and thereby brought the Romans upon them! And “their learned rabbis, ever since, have minded little else but fabulous stories, and the Cabbalists have vented trifles for profound mysteries.” As, in rejecting Christ and his gospel, they removed their hearts far from God, therefore God justly removed wisdom far from them, and hid from their eyes the things that belonged even to their temporal peace. Isaiah 29:14 Therefore, behold, I will proceed to do a marvellous work among this people, even a marvellous work and a wonder: for the wisdom of their wise men shall perish, and the understanding of their prudent men shall be hid. Isaiah 29:15 Woe unto them that seek deep to hide their counsel from the LORD, and their works are in the dark, and they say, Who seeth us? and who knoweth us? Isaiah 29:15-16 . Wo unto them that seek deep — Hebrew, ???????? , that make, or dig deep; a metaphor from persons digging deep into the earth, that they may hide what they wish to keep safe and unknown. To hide their counsel from the Lord — Who vainly imagine that they can conceal their hypocrisy and secret wickedness from him, and can deceive, not only men, but God, by their external professions and services; or, who think they can carry on their projects without the observation or interposition of Providence. And their works are in the dark — Their wicked counsels are contrived, and their idolatry is practised, in secret and dark places, of which see Ezekiel 8:12 . And they say, Who seeth us? — Neither God nor man can discover us. Surely your turning of things upside down — “Your giving things unexpected turns, or false appearances, to hide your true designs, shall signify no more toward producing the intended effect, than the clay does without the artificer.” Dr. Waterland renders the verse, “This perverseness of yours is as if the potter were reputed as clay; that the work should say of its maker. He made me not; or the thing framed, say of him that framed it, He hath no understanding.” Bishop Lowth reads the passage in the interrogative form, and thereby gives it still more force: “Perverse as ye are! shall the potter be esteemed as the clay? Shall the work say of the workman, He hath not made me?” &c. “We, and all our works are in the hands of God, as clay in the hands of the potter, to give what form and fashion to them he pleases; and when the finest schemes are laid, he can work things to a quite contrary end.” — Lowth. Isaiah 29:16 Surely your turning of things upside down shall be esteemed as the potter's clay: for shall the work say of him that made it, He made me not? or shall the thing framed say of him that framed it, He had no understanding? Isaiah 29:17 Is it not yet a very little while, and Lebanon shall be turned into a fruitful field, and the fruitful field shall be esteemed as a forest? Isaiah 29:17 . Is it not a very little while, &c. — The following paragraph, to the end of the chapter, relates to the times of the gospel; the prophet foretelling therein, in figurative language, the rejection of the Jews and the calling of the Gentiles. Lebanon, a barren mountain, a desolate wilderness, here stands for the Gentile world. This was to be turned into a fruitful field — Hebrew, ????? , into Carmel, or the vineyard of God, as the word signifies. On the other hand, the fruitful field, what had formerly been the vineyard of God, the Jewish Church, should be esteemed as a forest — See this interpretation confirmed, Isaiah 32:15 ; and Matthew 15:7-8 . Isaiah 29:18 And in that day shall the deaf hear the words of the book, and the eyes of the blind shall see out of obscurity, and out of darkness. Isaiah 29:18-19 . In that day, &c. — In these two verses we have the first happy consequence of Lebanon’s becoming a fruitful field, “the spiritual blessings of light and understanding in divine things, and of joy and consolation to be diffused among the Gentiles, formerly deaf and blind.” The deaf hear the words of the book — That is, the truths of divine revelation are declared to the heathen, and their ears are opened to hear, and their hearts to understand them. And the eyes of the blind to see — They who had been for ages in a state of the greatest spiritual blindness and darkness, shall be enlightened with the clear and satisfactory knowledge of God and his will. The meek also — Humble and meek believers of the Gentiles, opposed to these proud and scornful Jews, spoken of in the former part of this, and in the foregoing chapter; shall increase their joy in the Lord — Shall greatly rejoice in this, that Jehovah is now their God and portion. And the poor among men — The poor in spirit, or the poor of this world, to whom, especially, the gospel has been and is to be preached, or those whom the Jews viewed as a mean and despicable people; shall rejoice in the Holy One of Israel — Whom before they neither knew nor regarded. Isaiah 29:19 The meek also shall increase their joy in the LORD, and the poor among men shall rejoice in the Holy One of Israel. Isaiah 29:20 For the terrible one is brought to nought, and the scorner is consumed, and all that watch for iniquity are cut off: Isaiah 29:20-21 . For, &c. — Here we have the second event connected with the calling of the Gentiles, the punishment of the enemies of God and his truth. For the terrible one is brought to naught — The proud and potent enemies of those meek and poor believers, mentioned in the last verse, such as the unbelieving Jews and their rulers, and the heathen potentates, were in the first age of Christianity. And the scorner is consumed — The scornful opposers of God’s word and servants. And all that watch for iniquity — That early and diligently apply themselves to the practice of wickedness. That make a man an offender for a word — That condemn a man, as if he were a great criminal, for a verbal reproof; and lay a snare for him that reproveth — For God’s faithful prophets and ministers, whose office it is to reprove ungodly men; in the gate — Where the people used to assemble, both upon civil and sacred accounts, and where prophets used to deliver their prophecies. And turn aside — From his right; the just — Hebrew, the just, or righteous one, meaning chiefly the prophets and ministers of God, and especially Christ, often called the Just One, both in the Old and New Testaments; for a thing of naught — Not for any great advantage, but for a trifle, which was a great aggravation of their injustice, or, with vanity, as ???? signifies, that is, with vain and frivolous pretences, or without any colour of reason or justice. Vitringa applies all this to those who opposed Christ and his apostles. Isaiah 29:21 That make a man an offender for a word, and lay a snare for him that reproveth in the gate, and turn aside the just for a thing of nought. Isaiah 29:22 Therefore thus saith the LORD, who redeemed Abraham, concerning the house of Jacob, Jacob shall not now be ashamed, neither shall his face now wax pale. Isaiah 29:22-24 . Therefore thus saith the Lord — These verses contain the third consequence of turning Lebanon into a fruitful field; “a wonderful increase of the true seed of Abraham and Jacob disseminated through the whole world, in whom those patriarchs, according to the promises given them by God, might be able to recognise their true image.” Who redeemed Abraham — From manifold dangers, and especially from idolatry, in which his family and ancestors were generally involved; Jacob shall not now be ashamed — The posterity of Jacob, who had great cause to be ashamed for their continued infidelity, for their persecutions of God’s prophets and righteous servants, and for their rejection of their own Messiah, shall, at last, be brought back unto the God of their fathers, and to their own Messiah. Neither shall his face now wax pale — Through fear of their enemies, who from time to time had molested them, for now they shall be delivered from them all, and shall serve God without fear, Luke 1:74 . But when he seeth his children — When the believing seed of Jacob shall see those children whom they have begotten to God, by the gospel, even the Gentiles; the work of my hands — The children, not of the flesh, but of the promise, whom I, by my almighty grace, have regenerated; in the midst of him — Incorporated with the Jews, into one and the same body; they shall sanctify my name, &c. — Instead of despising and hating the Gentiles, and envying them the grace of God, they shall praise and glorify God with them, and for them. They also that erred — Those Gentiles who had erred from God’s truth, being led aside by a lying spirit to idolatry, and all manner of impiety; shall come to understanding — Shall come to the knowledge of the truth; and they that murmured, &c. — They that would not receive the doctrine of God, but murmured at his faithful teachers who delivered it; shall learn doctrine — Shall receive God’s truth in the love of it. Isaiah 29:23 But when he seeth his children, the work of mine hands, in the midst of him, they shall sanctify my name, and sanctify the Holy One of Jacob, and shall fear the God of Israel. Isaiah 29:24 They also that erred in spirit shall come to understanding, and they that murmured shall learn doctrine. Benson Commentary on the Old and New Testaments Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com . Used by Permission.

Expositor's Bible Commentary Isaiah 29:1 Woe to Ariel, to Ariel, the city where David dwelt! add ye year to year; let them kill sacrifices. BOOK 3 ORATIONS ON THE EGYPTIAN INTRIGUES AND ORACLES ON FOREIGN NATIONS 705-702 B.C. Isaiah: 29 About 703 30 A little later 31 A little later 32:1-8 Later 32:9-20 Date uncertain ----------------- 14:28-21 736-702 23 About 703 WE now enter the prophecies of Isaiah’s old age, those which he published after 705, when his ministry had lasted for at least thirty-five years. They cover the years between 705, the date of Sennacherib’s accession to the Assyrian throne, and 701, when his army suddenly disappeared from before Jerusalem. They fall into three groups:- 1. Chapters 29-32., dealing with Jewish politics while Sennacherib is still far from Palestine, 704-702, and having Egypt for their chief interest, Assyria lowering in the background. 2. Chapters 14:28-21 and 23, a group of oracles on foreign nations, threatened, like Judah, by Assyria. 3. Chapters 1, 22, and 33, and the historical narrative in 36, and 37., dealing with Sennacherib’s invasion of Judah and siege of Jerusalem in 701; Egypt and every foreign nation now fallen out of sight, and the storm about the Holy City too thick for the prophet to see beyond his immediate neighbourhood. The first and second of these groups-orations on the intrigues with Egypt and oracles on the foreign nations-delivered while Sennacherib was still far from Syria, form the subject of this Third Book of our exposition. The prophecies on the siege of Jerusalem are sufficiently numerous and distinctive to be put by themselves, along with their appendix (38, 39), in our Fourth Book. CHAPTER XII ARIEL, ARIEL ABOUT 703 B.C. Isaiah 29:1-24 IN 705 Sargon, King of Assyria, was murdered, and Sennacherib, his second son, succeeded him. Before the new ruler mounted the throne, the vast empire, which his father had consolidated, broke into rebellion, and down to the borders of Egypt cities and tribes declared themselves again independent. Sennacherib attacked his problem with Assyrian promptitude. There were two forces, to subdue which at the beginning made the reduction of the rest certain: Assyria’s vassal kingdom and future rival for the supremacy of the world, Babylon; and her present rival, Egypt. Sennacherib marched on Babylon first. While he did so the smaller States prepared to resist him. Too small to rely on their own resources, they looked to Egypt, and among others who sought help in that quarter was Judah. There had always been, as we have seen, an Egyptian party among the politicians of Jerusalem; and Assyria’s difficulties now naturally increased its influence. Most of the prophecies in chapters 29-32 are forward to condemn the alliance with Egypt and the irreligious politics of which it was the fruit. At the beginning, however, other facts claim Isaiah’s attention. After the first excitement, consequent on the threats of Sennacherib, the politicians do not seem to have been specially active. Sennacherib found the reduction of Babylon a harder task than he expected, and in the end it turned out to be three years before he was free to march upon Syria. As one winter after another left the work of the Assyrian army in Mesopotamia still unfinished, the political tension in Judah must have relaxed. The Government-for King Hezekiah seems at last to have been brought round to believe in Egypt-pursued their negotiations no longer with that decision and real patriotism, which the sense of near danger rouses in even the most selfish and mistaken of politicians, but rather with the heedlessness of principle, the desire to show their own cleverness, and the passion for intrigue which run riot among statesmen, when danger is near enough to give an excuse for doing something, but too far away to oblige anything to be done in earnest. Into this false ease, and the meaningless, faithless politics, which swarmed in it, Isaiah hurled his strong prophecy of chapter 29. Before he exposes in chapters 30 and 31 the folly of trusting to Egypt in the hour of danger, he has here the prior task of proving that hour to be near and very terrible. It is but one instance of the ignorance and fickleness of the people, that their prophet has first to rouse them to a sense of their peril, and then to restrain their excitement under it from rushing headlong for help to Egypt. Chapter 29 is an obscure oracle, but its obscurity is designed. Isaiah was dealing with a people in whom political security and religious formalism had stifled both reason and conscience. He sought to rouse them by a startling message in a mysterious form. He addressed the city by an enigma:- "Ho! Ari-El, Ari-El! City David beleaguered! Add year to a year, let the feasts run their round, then will I bring straitness upon Ari-El, and there shall be moaning and bemoaning, and yet she shall be unto Me as art Ari-El" The general bearing of this enigma became plain enough after the sore siege and sudden deliverance of Jerusalem in 701. But we are unable to make out one or two of its points. "Ari-El" may mean either "The Lion" of 2 Samuel 23:20 , or "The Hearth of God". { Ezekiel 43:15-16 } If the same sense is to be given to the four utterances of the name, then "God’s-Lion" suits better the description of Isaiah 29:4 : but "God’s-Hearth" seems suggested by the feminine pronoun in Isaiah 29:1 , and is a conception to which Isaiah returns in this same group of prophecies. { Isaiah 31:9 } It is possible that this ambiguity was part of the prophet’s design: but if he uses the name in both senses, some of the force of his enigma is lost to us. In any case, however, we get a picturesque form for a plain meaning. In a year after the present year is out, says Isaiah, God Himself will straiten the city, whose inhabitants are now so careless, and she shall be full of mourning and lamentation. Nevertheless in the end she shall be a true Ari-El: be it a true "God’s-Lion," victor and hero; or a true "God’s-Hearth," His own inviolable shrine and sanctuary. The next few verses ( Isaiah 29:3-8 ) expand this warning. In plain words, Jerusalem is to undergo a siege. God Himself shall "encamp against thee-round about" reads our English version, but more probably, as with the change of a letter, the Septuagint reads it-"like David." If we take this second reading, the reference to David in the enigma itself ( Isaiah 29:1 ) becomes clear. The prophet has a very startling message to deliver: that God will besiege His own city, the city of David! Before God can make her in truth His own, make her verify her name, He will have to beleaguer and reduce her. For so novel and startling an intimation the prophet pleads a precedent: "‘City which David’ himself ‘beleaguered!’ Once before in thy history, ere the first time thou wast made God’s own hearth, thou hadst to be besieged. As then, so now. Be-before thou canst again be a true Ari-El I must ‘beleaguer thee like David.’" This reading and interpretation gives to the enigma a reason and a force which it does not otherwise possess. Jerusalem, then, shall be reduced to the very dust, and whine and whimper in it (like a sick lion, if this be the figure the prophet is pursuing), when suddenly it is "the surge of" her foes-literally "thy strangers"-whom the prophet sees as "small dust, and as passing chaff shall the surge of tyrants be; yea, it shall be in the twinkling of an eye, suddenly. From Jehovah of hosts shall she be visited with thunder and with earthquake and a great, noise, -storm-wind, and tempest and the flame of fire devouring. And it shall be as a dream, a vision of the night, the surge of all the nations that war against Ariel, yea all that war against her and her stronghold, and they that press in upon her. And it shall be as if the hungry had been dreaming, and lo! he was eating; but he hath awaked, and his soul is empty; and as if the thirsty had been dreaming, and lo! he was drinking; but he hath awaked, and lo! he is faint, and his soul is ravenous: thus shall be the surge of all the nations that war against Mount Zion." Now that is a very definite prediction, and in its essentials was fulfilled. In the end Jerusalem was invested by Sennacherib, and reduced to sore straits, when very suddenly-it would appear from other records, in a single night-the beleaguering force disappeared. This actually happened; and although the main business of a prophet, as we now clearly understand, was not to predict definite events, yet, since the result here predicted was one on which Isaiah staked his prophetic reputation and pledged the honour of Jehovah and the continuance of the true religion among men, it will be profitable for us to look at it for a little. Isaiah foretells a great event and some details. The event is a double one: the reduction of Jerusalem to the direst straits by siege and her deliverance by the sudden disappearance of the besieging army. The details are that the siege will take place after a year (though the prophet’s statement of time is perhaps too vague to be treated as a prediction), and that the deliverance will come as a great natural convulsion-thunder, earthquake, and fire-which it certainly did not do. The double event, however, stripped of these details, did essentially happen. Now it is plain that any one with a considerable knowledge of the world at that day must easily have been able to assert the probability of a siege of Jerusalem by the mixed nations who composed Sennacherib’s armies. Isaiah’s orations are full of proofs of his close acquaintance with the peoples of the world, and Assyria, who was above them. Moreover, his political advice, given at certain crises of Judah’s history, was conspicuous not only for its religiousness, but for what eve should call its "worldly wisdom": it was vindicated by events. Isaiah, however, would not have understood the distinction we have just made. To him political prudence was part of religion. "The Lord of hosts is for a spirit of judgment to him that sitteth in judgment, and for strength to them that turn back the battle to the gate." Knowledge of men, experience of nations, the mental strength which never forgets history, and is quick to mark new movements as they rise, Isaiah would have called the direct inspiration of God. And it was certainly these qualities in this Hebrew, which provided him with the materials for his prediction of the siege of Jerusalem. But it has not been found that such talents by themselves enable statesmen calmly to face the future, or clearly to predict it. Such knowledge of the past, such vigilance for the present, by themselves only embarrass, and often deceive. They are the materials for prediction, but a ruling principle is required to arrange them. A general may have a strong and well-drilled force under him, and a miserably weak foe in front; but if the sun is not going to rise tomorrow, if the laws of nature are not going to hold, his familiarity with his soldiers and expertness in handling them will not give him confidence to offer battle. He takes certain principles for granted, and on these his soldiers become of use to him, and he makes his venture Even so Isaiah handled his mass of information by the grasp which he had of certain principles, and his facts fell clear into order before his confident eyes. He believed in the real government of God. "I also saw the Lord sitting, high and; lifted up." He felt that God had even this Assyria in His hands. He knew that all God’s ends were righteousness, and’ he was still of the conviction that Judah for her wickedness required punishment at the Lord’s hands. Grant these convictions to him in the superhuman strength in which he tells us he was conscious of receiving them from God, and it is easy to see how Isaiah could not help predicting a speedy siege of Jerusalem, how he already beheld the valleys around her bristling with barbarian spears. The prediction of the sudden raising of this siege was the equally natural corollary to another religious conviction, which held the prophet with as much intensity as that which possessed him with the need of Judah’s punishment. Isaiah never slacked his hold on the truth that in the end God would save Zion, and keep her for Himself. Through whatever destruction, a root and remnant of the Jewish people must survive. Zion is impregnable because God is in her, and because her inviolateness is necessary for the continuance of true religion in the world. Therefore as confident as his prediction of the siege of Jerusalem is Isaiah’s prediction of her delivery. And while the prophet wraps the fact in vague circumstance, while he masks, as it were, his ignorance of how in detail it will actually take place by calling up a great natural convulsion; yet he makes it abundantly clear - as, with his religious convictions and his knowledge of the Assyrian power, he cannot help doing-that the deliverance will be unexpected and unexplainable by the natural circumstances of the Jews themselves, that it will be evident as the immediate deed of God. It is well for us to understand this. We shall get rid of the mechanical idea of prophecy, according to which prophets made exact predictions of fact by some particular and purely official endowment. We shall feel that prediction of this kind was due to the most unmistakable inspiration, the influence upon the prophet’s knowledge of affairs of two powerful religious convictions, for which he himself was strongly sure that he had the warrant of the Spirit of God. Into the easy, selfish politics of Jerusalem, then, Isaiah sent this thunderbolt, this definite prediction: that in a year or more Jerusalem would be besieged and reduced to the direst straits. He tells us that it simply dazed the people. They were like men suddenly startled from sleep, who are too stupid to read a message pushed into their hands ( Isaiah 29:9-12 ). Then Isaiah gives God’s own explanation of this stupidity. The cause of it is simply religious formalism. "This people draw nigh unto Me with their mouth, and with their lips do they honour Me, but their heart is far from Me, and their fear of Me is a mere commandment of men, a thing learned by rote." This was what Israel called religion-bare ritual and doctrine, a round of sacrifices and prayers in adherence to the tradition of the fathers. But in life they never thought of God. It did not occur to these citizens of Jerusalem that He cared about their politics, their conduct of justice, or their discussions and bargains with one another. Of these they said, taking their own way, "Who seeth us, and who knoweth us?" Only in the Temple did they feel God’s fear, and there merely in imitation of one another. None had an original vision of God in real life; they learned other men’s thoughts about Him, and took other men’s words upon their lips, while their heart was far away. In fact, speaking words and listening to words had wearied the spirit and stifled the conscience of them. For such a disposition Isaiah says there is only one cure. It is a new edition of his old gospel, that God speaks to us in facts, not forms. Worship and a lifeless doctrine have demoralised this people. God shall make Himself so felt in real life that even their dull senses shall not be able to mistake Him. "Therefore, behold, I am proceeding to work marvellously upon this people, a marvellous work and a wonder! and the wisdom of their wise men shall perish, and the cleverness of their clever ones shall be obscured." This is not the promise of what we call a miracle. It is a historical event on the same theatre as the politicians are showing their cleverness, but it shall put them all to shame, and by its force make the dullest feel that God’s own hand is in it. What the people had ceased to attribute to Jehovah was ordinary intelligence; they had virtually said, "He hath no understanding." The "marvellous work," therefore, which He threatens shall be a work of wisdom, not some convulsion of nature to cow their spirits, but a wonderful political result, that shall shame their conceit of cleverness, and teach them reverence for the will and skill of God. Are the politicians trying to change the surface of the world, thinking that they "are turning things upside down," and supposing that they can keep God out of account: "Who seeth us, and who knoweth us?" God Himself is the real Arranger and Politician. He will turn things upside down! Compared with their attempt, how vast His results shall be! As if the whole surface of the earth were altered, "Lebanon changed into garden-land, and garden-land counted as forest!" But this, of course, is metaphor. The intent of the miracle is to show that God hath understanding; therefore it must be a work, the prudence and intellectual force of which politicians can appreciate, and it shall take place in their politics. But not for mere astonishment’s sake is the "wonder" to be done. For blessing and morality shall it be: to cure the deaf and blind; to give to the meek and the poor a new joy; to confound the tyrant and the scorner; to make Israel worthy of God and her own great fathers. "Therefore thus saith Jehovah to the house of Jacob, He that redeemed Abraham: Not now ashamed shall Jacob be, and not now shall his countenance blanch." So unworthy hitherto have this stupid people been of so great ancestors! "But now when his (Jacob’s) children behold the work of My hand in the midst of him, they shall hallow My name, yea, they shall hallow the Holy One of Jacob, and the God of Israel shall they make their fear. They also that err in spirit shall know understanding, and they that are unsettled shall learn to accept doctrine." Such is the meaning of this strong chapter. It is instructive in two ways. First, it very clearly declares Isaiah’s view of the method of God’s revelation. Isaiah says nothing of the Temple, the Shechinah , the Altar, or the Scripture; but he points out how much the exclusive confinement of religion to forms and texts has deadened the hearts of his countrymen towards God. In your real life, he says to them, you are to seek, and you shall find, Him. There He is evident in miracles, -not physical interruptions and convulsions, but social mercies and moral providences. The quickening of conscience, the dispersion of ignorance, poor men awakening to the fact that God is with them, the overthrow of the social tyrant, history’s plain refutation of the atheist, the growth of civic justice and charity-In these, said the Hebrew prophet to the Old Testament believer, Behold your God! Wherefore, secondly, we also are to look for God in events and deeds. We are to know that nothing can compensate us for the loss of the open vision of God’s working in history and in life about us, -not ecstasy of worship nor orthodoxy of doctrine. To confine our religion to these latter things is to become dull towards God even in them, and to forget Him everywhere else. And this is a fault of our day, just as it was of Isaiah’s. So much of our fear of God is conventional, orthodox, and not original, a trick caught from men’s words or fashions, not a part of ourselves, nor won, like all that is real in us, from contact with real life. In our politics, in our conduct with men, in the struggle of our own hearts for knowledge and for temperance, and in service-there we are to learn to fear God. But there, and wherever else we are busy, self comes too much in the way; we are fascinated with our own cleverness; we ignore God, saying, "Who seeth us? Who knoweth us?" We get to expect Him only in the Temple and on the Sabbath, and then only to influence our emotions. But it is in deeds, and where we feel life most real, that we are to look for Him. He makes Himself evident to us by wonderful works. For these He has given us three theatres-the Bible, our country’s history, and for each man his own life. We have to take the Bible, and especially the life of Christ, and to tell ourselves that these wonderful events did really take place. In Christ God did dwell; by Christ He spoke to man; man was converted, redeemed, sanctified, beyond all doubt. These were real events. To be convinced of their reality were worth a hundred prayers. Then let us follow the example of the Hebrew prophets, and search the history of our own people for the realities of God. Carlyle says in a note to Cromwell’s fourth speech to Parliament, that "the Bible of every nation is its own history." This note is drawn from Carlyle by Cromwell’s frequent insistence, that we must ever be turning from forms and rituals to study God’s will and ways in history. And that speech of Cromwell is perhaps the best sermon ever delivered on the subject of this chapter. For he said: "What are all our histories but God manifesting Himself, that He hath shaken, and tumbled down and trampled upon everything that He hath not planted!" And again, speaking of our own history, he said to the House of Commons: "We are a people with the stamp of God upon us…whose appearances and providences among us were not to be outmatched by any story." Truly this is national religion:-the reverential acknowledgment of God’s hand in history; the admiration and effort of moral progress; the stirring of conscience when we see wrong; the expectation, when evil abounds, that God will bring justice and purity to us if we labour with Him for them. But for each man there is the final duty of turning to himself. "My soul repairs its fault When, sharpening sense’s hebetude, She turns on my own life! So viewed, No mere mote’s breadth but teems immense With witnessings of providence: And woe to me if when I look Upon that record, the sole book Unsealed to me, I take no heed Of any warning that I read!" The Expositor's Bible Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com . Used by Permission.