Nevertheless the dimness shall not be such as was in her vexation. Isaiah 9:1-7 The prophecy explained Bishop Perowne. Let me venture to give what I conceive to be the true rendering of the prophecy — a rendering which at least in its main particulars has the support of the best modern interpreters — and the striking beauty and force and consistency of the whole will become evident. The prophet has been speaking in the previous chapter of a time of terrible distress and perplexity which was close at hand. King and people had forsaken their God. Ahaz had refused the sign of deliverance offered him and was hoping, by an alliance with Assyria, to beat off his enemies. The people in their terror were resorting to wizards and to necromancers for guidance instead of resorting to God. And the prophet warns them that the national unbelief and apostasy shall bring its sure chastisement in national despair. They will look around them in vain for succour. The heavens above and the earth beneath shall be wrapt in the same awful gloom. Nothing can exceed the dramatic force of the picture; it is a night at noonday, the very sun blotted from the heavens; it is a darkness which might be felt. But even while the prophet's gaze is fixed upon it he sees the light trembling on the skirts of the darkness. The sunrise is behind the cloud. "The darkness," cries the prophet, "is driven away." So I venture to render the last words of the eighth chapter. "For there shall no more be gloom to her ( i.e. , to the land) that was in anguish. In the former time He made light of (not 'lightly afflicted' as our A.V. has it), poured contempt upon the land of Zebulun and Naphtali, but in the latter time He hath made it glorious by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, Galilee (the circuit) of the nations." Take this rendering and you have a perfectly exact end very striking prediction. It was not true that the land had first been lightly afflicted and afterwards was more grievously afflicted. But it was true that in the former time the land had been despised; Zebulun and Naphtali and Galilee of the nations had been a byword among the Jews; their territory had been trampled under foot by every invader who had ever entered Palestine. In the former time He did make light of it, He did abase it, but in the latter time He made it glorious with a glory far transcending the glory of any earthly kingdom. For it was here, amid this despised half heathen population, that the true Light shined down, here the Lord of Glory lived, it was here that He wrought His wonderful works and uttered His wonderful words, it was here that He gathered fishermen and tax gatherers to be His first disciples and missionaries to the world. This land was of a truth made glorious by the feet of Jesus of Nazareth. Well may the prophet continue, "The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, on them hath the light shined. Thou hast multiplied the nation, Thou hast increased their joy." The insertion of the negative is an unfortunate mistake which, though found in our present Hebrew text, can be easily explained, and indeed has been corrected by the Hebrew scribes themselves. "They joy before Thee according to the joy in harvest, and as men exult when they divide the spoil. For the yoke of his burden, and the staff upon his shoulder, the rod of his oppression Thou hast broken, as in the day of Midian. For the greaves of the greaved warrior and the battle tumult and the garments rolled in blood shall be for burning for fuel of fire." The A.V., by the insertion of the words "but this," introduces an antithesis which destroys the whole force and beauty of the picture. Strike out those words and all becomes clear and consistent. The meaning is that at the advent of the Prince of Peace all wars shall cease. The soldier's sandals and the soldier's cloak and all the bloodstained gear of battle shall be gathered together and east into the fire to be burned. The heir of David's throne is no earthly warrior; He does not win His kingdom by force of arms. "For a Child is born unto us, a Son is given unto us, and the government shall be upon His shoulder; He shall wear the insignia of royalty. And His name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, Mighty God, Father of Eternity, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of His government and of peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to establish it, and to uphold it with judgment and with righteousness, from henceforth even forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts shall perform this." Such is the majestic vision of light and Peace that dawns upon the prophet's soul in the midst of the national apostasy. ( Bishop Perowne. ) "Nevertheless D. Davies. There is in this world mercifully a compensating balance to all Divine denunciations, a "nevertheless" to all God's judgments, and a Gospel of grace appended to every message of doom. It is this that makes this world, amid all its tragic scenes, a world of mercy. ( D. Davies. ) Clearest promises of Christ in darkest times It is noteworthy that the clearer promises of the Messiah have been given in the darkest hour? of history. If the prophets had been silent upon the Coming One before, they always speak out in the cloudy and dark day; for well the Spirit made them know that the coming of God in human flesh is the lone star of the world's night. It was so in the beginning, when our first parents had sinned, and were doomed to quit the paradise of delights. When Israel was in Egypt, when they were in the sorest bondage, and when many plagues had been wrought on Pharaoh, apparently without success; then Israel saw the Messiah set before her as the Paschal lamb, whose blood sprinkled on the lintel and the two side posts secured the chosen from the avenger of blood. The type is marvellously clear, and the times were marvellously dark. I will quote three cases from the prophetical books which now lie open before us. In Isaiah 28:16 , you read that glorious prophecy: "Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste." When was that given? When the foundation of society in Israel was rotten with iniquity, and when its cornerstone was oppression. Read from verse 14: "Wherefore hear the Word of the Lord, ye scornful men," etc. Thus, when lies and falsehoods ruled the hour, the Lord proclaims the blessed truth that the Messiah would come sad would be a sure foundation for believers. Next, look into Jeremiah 23:5 : "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch," etc. When was this clear testimony given! Read the former verses of the chapter, sad see that the pastors were destroying and scattering the sheep of Jehovah's pasture. When the people of the Lord thus found their worst enemies where they ought to have met with friendly care, then they were promised happier days through the coming of the Divine Son of David. Glance at Ezekiel 34:23 , where the Lord says, "And I will set up one shepherd over them, sad he shall feed them, even My servant David; he shall feed them, and he shall be their shepherd." When came this cheering promise concerning that great Shepherd of the sheep! It came when Israel is thus described: "And they were scattered, because there is no shepherd," etc. Thus, in each case, when things were at their worst, the Lord Jesus was the one well of consolation in a desert of sorrows. In the worst times we are to preach Christ, and to look to Christ. In Jesus there is a remedy for the direst of diseases, and s rescue from the darkest of despairs. ( C. H. Spurgeon . ) Phases of Divine purpose J. Parker, D. D. Let us look at some of the abiding doctrines and illustrations suggested by this noblest effort of the prophet's imagination. Isaiah's wing never takes a higher flight than it does in this prevision of the centuries. 1. The Divine purpose has never been satisfied, if we may so say, with darkness, judgment, desolation. When God has judged a man He would seem to return to see what effect the judgment has had, if haply He may see some hope of returning feeling, of loyalty sad filial submission. God's feeling has been always a feeling of solicitude to bless the nations. We shall do wrong if we suppose that pity comes in only with the historical Christ, that compassion was born on Christmas Day. 2. The Divine movement amongst the nations has always expressed itself under the contrast of light sad darkness (ver. 2). No contrast can be more striking; therefore this is the one God has chosen whereby to represent the Divine movement. God is associated with light, and all evil with darkness. The fulfilment of Divine purpose has always been associated with incarnation, idealised Humanity. 3. Look at the Deliverer as seen by the prophet (ver. 6). The Deliverer is to come as a child, a son, a governor, a name; He is to sit upon the throne of David, sad upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment sad with justice from henceforth even forever. Say there was a secondary application of the terms, there can be no objection to that; but no living man ever filled out in their uttermost spheral meaning all these names but one, and His name is Jesus. 4. Then comes rapture upon rapture. And the pledge of the fulfilment of all is, "The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this." ( J. Parker, D. D. ) The remedy of the world's misery R. Watson. I. THE VIEW TAKEN BY THE PROPHET OF THE MORAL STATE OF THE WORLD PREVIOUS TO THE GLORIOUS CHANGE WHICH MAKES THE SUBJECT OF HIS PROPHECY. 1. The people are represented as walking in darkness. The prophet contemplates the world at large. Light is an emblem of knowledge; darkness of ignorance and error. 2. But darkness alone appears to the mind of the prophet only a faint emblem of the state of the heathen. He adds, therefore, "the shadow of death." In Scripture this expression is used for death, the grave, the darkness of that subterranean mansion into which the Jews supposed the souls of men went after death. Figuratively, the expression is used for great distress; a state of danger and terror. It is an amplification, therefore, of the prophet's thought. Experience has justified this representation of the prophet. The religion of the heathen has ever been gloomy and horrible. II. THE BLESSED VISITATION (Ver. 2). 1. As darkness is an emblem of the religious sorrows which had overcast the world, so light is an emblem of the truth of the Gospel The Gospel is "light." This marks its origin from heaven. This notes its truth. It is "light" because of its penetrating and subtle nature. It is called "light," "a great light," because of the discoveries which it makes. It is life and health to the world. Where it prevails, spiritual life is inspired, and the moral disorders of the soul give place to health and vigour. 2. As in the vision light succeeds to darkness, so also joy succeeds to fear and misery. III. SO VAST A CHANGE MUST BE PRODUCED BY CAUSES PROPORTIONABLY POWERFUL: and to the means by which this astonishing revolution is effected the prophet next directs attention (vers. 4, 5). These words speak of resistance and a struggle. In the conduct of this battle two things are, however, to be remarked: the absolute weakness and insufficiency of the assailants, and their miraculous success. The weakness of the instruments used in breaking the rod and yoke of the oppressor is sufficiently marked by the allusion to the destruction of the host of Midian by Gideon and his three hundred men. But it may be said, "Is not all this a splendid vision? You speak of weak instruments effecting a miraculous success; of the display and operation of a supernatural power, touching the hearts of men, and changing the moral state of the world; but what is the ground of this expectation?" This natural and very proper question our text answers. IV. "FOR UNTO US A CHILD IS BORN," etc. (vers. 6, 7). ( R. Watson. ) Light out of darkness G. F. Pentecost, D. D. We are not left in doubt as to what the end of this great prophecy was. In Matthew 4:15, 16 , we have it expounded to us. I. THE GREAT DARKNESS. The prophet first saw the people utterly overwhelmed by the ruthless hand of merciless war. It had been once a prosperous land, but now darkness dense had come over it till it was a veritable "shadow of death." Turning from the immediate political significance of this to its spiritual import, we can easily see in it a picture of the spiritual condition of the world when Jesus came. The whole world was lying in the wicked one. The Jewish people, though they had the living Word of God, had in the darkness of their carnal ambition and lifeless formality lost all true vision of God. The Gentile world was no better. The best which they had was, on the one hand, a sensuous and godless Epicureanism, and on the other a cold and hopeless Stoicism. Turning to the condition of the unconverted people of our own day, we see also darkness and the shadow of death. What light for the soul has all our modern philosophical thinking and scientific research given? II. THE GREAT LIGHT. The light which the prophet saw was the intervention of God for the deliverance of the people from political bondage and physical misery, with some spiritual return to God. That which it typified was the advent and work of Christ. How this light shone upon the darkened world when He came! Truly it was a "great light." The light seen in the face of Jesus Christ is the glory of God, revealing His eternal purposes of grace to all sinful men. Christ lights the world by loving it, i.e. , by revealing the love of God to sinners. III. THE GREAT BLESSINGS. With the coming of the true light came wonderful blessings to the people. This is described in the language of the prophet under several figures of speech. 1. "Thou hast multiplied the nation." If we look to the real fulfilment of this prophecy, what a vast increase in the people of God there has been! 2. "And increased their joy." Of old the people of God rejoiced at their best periods in mere national prosperity. But under the spiritual reign of Jesus the people shall rejoice in better things. The joy of salvation. 3. "According to the joy in harvest." The happiest festival of the Jews was the harvest feast, when the fruits of the earth were all gathered in, and the people blessed God and rejoiced in their riches. But now He gives us a new and better harvest, the ingathering of souls, the first fruits of which were gathered on the day of Pentecost. There is no such pure joy as that which arises in the heart when God's salvation is being accepted by men and women, and His harvest is being gathered. What will it be in that day when the glad harvest home is accomplished? 4. "And as men rejoice when they divide the spoil." This is a figure borrowed from the triumphant joy of the victorious warrior, who, having overthrown the enemy, and taken possession of his goods, divides them as spoil among the victors. Well, so shall, and so do, God's people rejoice over the victories which the Gospel wins over "the god of this world." 5. "Thou hast broken the yoke...and the staff." Hitherto the people had boon under the iron yoke of their oppressors, and beaten by the rod of their taskmasters, as in the old slavery times of Egypt. How happy when that yoke shall be broken, and that cruel staff or rod done away! Under Messiah's reign the cruel bondage of Satan's yoke is broken, and the taskmaster's staff done away. IV. HOW CHRIST DELIVERS. In earthly conflicts battles are fought "with confused noise and garments rolled in blood." The captives were delivered of old by these terrible and sanguinary methods; but Christ delivers His captives by the power of the Spirit of God, "with burning and fuel of fire." The fire is the Holy Ghost, and the fuel of fire is the Word of truth. ( G. F. Pentecost, D. D. ) The nativity of our Lord Clergyman's Magazine. I. LIGHT OUT OF DARKNESS. II. JOY BECAUSE OF THE LIGHT. 1. Because Jesus was born. 2. Because in His incarnation God and man were united. 3. Because through His birth "the yoke" of man's burden has been broken (ver. 4), and the power of his oppressor destroyed. III. THE GROUNDS OF THIS JOY (vers. 6, 7). ( Clergyman's Magazine. ) Good things in the days of the great Messiah E. Erskine. If it be asked, What the great design of God is in the Scriptures? I answer, To bring a lost world to the knowledge of a Saviour. all the prophecies, promises, histories, and doctrines of the Word, do point us to Him, as the needle in the mariner's compass points to the pole star. "To Him bore all the prophets witness." And when apostles under the New Testament were sent unto all nations, with the silver trumpet of the everlasting Gospel in their mouths, what was the great theme of their sermons! It was just to make Christ known among the nations All the lines of religion meet in Him as their centre. The prophet in the close of the preceding chapter, having spoken of dark and dismal days of trouble and distress, comes in the beginning of this, to comfort and encourage the hearts of true believers, with the good things which were coming in the days of the great Messiah. I. There are THREE GREAT NEW TESTAMENT BLESSINGS he condescends upon. 1. Great light should spring up to a lost world (ver. 2). 2. Joy in the Lord (ver. 3). 3. Spiritual liberty (vers. 4, 5). II. It any should ask WHO IS HE, AND WHERE IS HE, THAT SHALL DO ALL THESE GREAT THINGS? You have an answer in the words, "For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given, and the government shall be upon His shoulder," etc. In the words we may notice these things following. 1. The incarnation of the great Messiah; for here the prophet speaks of His birth. 2. His donation. He is the gift of God to a lost world. "Unto us a Son is given." 3. His advancement to the supreme rule and authority. "The government shall be upon His shoulder." 4. His character and designation, in five names here given Him, which show that He has a name above every name, "Wonderful, Counsellor, The Mighty God, The Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace." 5. The relation He stands in to lost sinners of Adam's family. He is born "to us," He is given "to us," and not to the angels which fell. 6. The application and triumph of faith upon all this; for the Church here lays claim to Him, and triumphs in her claim; for the words are uttered in a way of holy boasting. "Unto us this Child is born, unto us this Son is given." ( E. Erskine. ) Fulness of Christ W. Bridge, M. A. There is that in Jesus Christ alone which may and can afford sufficient comfort and relief in the worst of times and conditions. I. WE WILL INQUIRE INTO THE TRUTH OF IT ( Colossians 2:9 ). 1. If you look into Scripture you shall find that the promises and prophecies of Christ are calculated and given out for the worst of times. 2. If there was enough in the types of Christ to comfort and relieve the people of God under the Old Testament in the worst of their times; then there must needs be enough in Christ to comfort the people of God now in the worst of our times. In the times of the Old Testament, in ease they had sinned, what relief had they? A sacrifice to make an atonement ( Leviticus 4:20 ), and so a type of Christ the great Sacrifice ( Hebrews 9:26 ). In case they were in the wilderness and wanted bread, what relief had they? Manna, a type of Christ, "the true Bread that came down from heaven.' In case they wanted water, what relief had they? The rock opened, and "that rock was Christ." In ease they were stung wire the fiery serpents what relief had they? They had the brazen serpent, and that was a type of Christ ( John 3:15 ). 3. If all the promises of good things made to us were originated in Christ, and if all the promises that were made unto Christ of good things to come, do descend upon us, then surely there is enough in Christ to succour in the worst of times. For what are the promises but Divine conveyances? 4. If all our want of comfort and satisfaction doth arise from the want of a sight of Christ's fulness and excellency, and all our satisfaction and comfort doth arise from the sight of Christ's fulness and excellency, then this doctrine must needs he true. II. WHAT IS THAT IN CHRIST THAT MAY OR CAN COMFORT, SUCCOUR AND BELIEVE IN THE WORST OF TIMES AND CONDITIONS? 1. Look what that good thing is which the world can either give or take away, that is in Christ in great abundance; and if that be in Christ in great abundance which the world can neither give or take away, then there is that in Christ that may or can succour, comfort, and relieve in the worst of times. Can the world take away your estate, gold, or silver? Then read what is said in Proverbs 3 , concerning wisdom, where Christ is called wisdom (ver. 13). Can the world take away your liberty? Then you know what Christ says, "Behold, I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it." Can the world take away your life? You know what Christ saith, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." On the other side, what can the world give to you? Can the world give you peace, rest, quietness? Then you know what Christ saith ( Matthew 11:28 ; John 14:27 ). Can the world give you happiness? I am sure Christ can. 2. There is in Jesus Christ the greatest excellency under the best propriety, "My Lord and my God." 3. There is in Jesus Christ the greatest fulness joined with the most communicativeness. 4. The sweetest love under the greatest engagement. Is not a brother engaged to help his brother? A father his children? A husband his wife! Now, suppose there were one person that could stand under all these relations — a brother, a father, a husband; how much would that person be engaged to help? Thus Christ doth; He stands under all these relations. 6. There is that in Jesus Christ that suiteth all conditions. III. HOW FAR THIS CONCERNS US. ( W. Bridge, M. A. ) Immanuel the Light of Life I. There is to be a light breaking in upon the sons of men who sit in darkness, and this light is to be found only in the incarnate God. Let me ILLUSTRATE THIS FACT BY THE CONTEXT. 1. I must carry you back to Isaiah 7:14 . The sign of coming light is Jesus. 2. Further on we see our Lord Jesus as the hold fast of the soul in time of darkness. See in Isaiah 8:8 , the whole country overwhelmed by the fierce armies of the Assyrians, as when a land is submerged beneath a flood. Then you read — And he shall pea through Judah; he shall overflow and go over, he shall reach even to the neck; and the stretching out of his wings shall fill the breadth of Thy land, O Immanuel." The one hope that remained for Judah was that her country was Immanuel's land. There would Immanuel be born, there would He labour, and there would He die. He was by eternal covenant the King of that land, and no Assyrian could keep Him from His throne. If you are a believer in Christ, you belong to Him, and you always were His by sovereign right, even when the enemy held you in possession. We might exultingly have gloried over you, "Thy soul, O Immanuel." Herein lay your hope when all other hope was gone. Herein is your hope now. 3. Further on in the chapter we learn that Jesus is our star of hope as to the destruction of the enemy. The foes of God's people shall be surely vanquished and destroyed because of Immanuel. Note well in verses 9, 10, how it is put twice over like an exultant taunt: "Gird yourselves, and ye shall be broken in pieces; gird yourselves, and ye shall be broken in pieces. Take counsel together, and it shall come to nought; speak the word, and it shall not stand: for Immanuel." Our version translates the word into "God with us," but it is "Immanuel." In Him, even in our Lord Jesus Christ, dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily, and He has brought all that Godhead to bear upon the overthrow of the foes of His people. 4. Further on we find the Lord Jesus as the morning light after a night of darkness, The last verses of the eighth chapter picture a horrible state of wretchedness and despair: "And they shall pass through it, hardly bestead and hungry:" etc. But see what a change awaits them! Read the fine translation of the R.V. "But there shall be no gloom to her that was in anguish." What a marvellous light from the midst of a dreadful darkness! It lean astounding change, such as only God with us could work. There am some here who have traversed that terrible wilderness You are being driven as captives into the land of despair, and for the last few months you have been tromping along a painful road, "hardly bestead and hungry." You are sorely put to it, and your soul finds no food of comfort, but is ready to faint and die. You fret yourself: your heart is wearing away with care, and grief, and hopelessness. In the bitterness of your soul you are ready to curse the day of your birth. The captive Israelites cursed their king who had led them into their defeat and bondage; the fury of their agony, they even cursed God and longed to die, It may be that your heart is in such a ferment of grief that you know not what you think, but are like a man at his wits' end. Those who led you into sin are bitterly remembered; and as you think upon God you am troubled. This is a dreadful ease for a soul to be in, and it involves a world of sin and misery. You look up, but the heavens are as brass above your head; your prayers appear to be shut out from God's ear; you look around you upon the earth, and behold "trouble and darkness, and dimness of anguish"; your every hope is slain, and your heart is torn asunder with remorse and dread. Every hour you seem to be hurried by an irresistible power into greater darkness. In such a case none can give you comfort save Immanuel, God with us. Only God, espousing your cause, and bearing your sin, can possibly save you. See, He comes for your salvation! 5. Once more, we learn from that which follows our text, that the reign of Jesus is the star of the golden future. He came to Galilee of the Gentiles, and made that country glorious, which had been brought into contempt. That corner of Palestine had very often borne the brunt of invasion, and had felt more than any other region the edge of the keen Assyrian sword. It was a wretched land, with a mixed population, despised by the purer race of Jews; but that very country became glorious with the presence of the incarnate God. That first land to be invaded by the enemy was made the headquarters of the army of salvation. Even so at this day His gracious presence is the day dawn of our joy. Here read and interpret Isaiah 9:3 . Then shall your enemy be defeated, as in the day of Midian. When Jesus comes you shall have eternal peace; for His battle is the end of battles. "All the armour of the armed man in the tumult, and the garments rolled in blood, shall even be for burning, for fuel of fire." This is the rendering of the Revision; and it is good. The Prince of Peace wars against war, and destroys it. Now is it that the Lord Jesus becomes glorious in our eyes; and He whose name is Immanuel is now crowned in our heart with many crowns, and honoured with many titles. What a list of glories we have here! What a burst of song it makes when we sing of the Messiah (ver. 6). Each word sounds like a salvo of artillery. II. I want to PRESS HOME CERTAIN TRUTHS CONNECTED WITH MY THEME. Immanuel is a grand word. "God with us" means more than tongue can tell It means enmity removed on our part, and justice vindicated on God's part. It means the whole Godhead engaged on our side, resolved to bless us. 1. Jesus is Immanuel ( Matthew 1:21 ). 2. Perhaps you wish to know a little more of the incident in the text which exhibits Jesus as the great light. Our Lord made His home in the darkest parts. He looked about and saw no country so ignorant, no country so sorrowful, as Galilee of the Gentiles, and therefore He went there, and lifted it up to heaven by priceless privileges! 3. We will turn back to where we opened our Bibles at the first, and there we learn that, to be God with us, Jesus must be accepted by us. He cannot be with us if we will not have Him. Hear how the prophet words it: "Unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given." Be sure that you go on with the verse to the end — "and the government shall be upon His shoulder." If Christ is your Saviour He must be your King. ( C. H. Spurgeon . ) Lux in tenebris One evening last week I stood by the seashore when the storm was raging. The voice of the Lord was upon the waters; and who was I that I should tarry within doors, when my Master's voice was heard sounding along the water? I rose and stood to behold the flash of His lightnings, and listen to the glory of His thunders. The sea and the thunders were contesting with one another; the sea with infinite clamour striving to hush the deep-throated thunder, so that His voice should not be heard; yet over and above the roar of the billows might be heard that voice of God, as He spake with flames of fire, and divided the way for the waters. It was a dark night, and the sky was covered with thick clouds, and scarce a star could be seen through the rifts of the tempest; but at one particular time, I noticed far away on the horizon, as if miles across the water, a bright shining, like gold. It was the moon hidden behind the clouds, so that she could not shine upon us; but she was able to send her rays down upon the waters, far away, where no cloud happened to intervene. I thought as I read this chapter last evening, that the prophet seemed to have stood in a like position, when he wrote the words of my text. All round about him were clouds of darkness; he heard prophetic thunders roaring, and he saw flashes of the lightning of Divine vengeance; clouds and darkness, for many a league, were scattered through history; but he saw far away a bright spot — one place where the clear shining same down from heaven. And he eat down, and he penned these words: "The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined"; and though he looked through whole leagues of space, where he saw the battle of the warrior "with confused noise and garments rolled in blood," yet he fixed his eye upon one bright spot in futurity, and he declared that there he saw hope of peace, prosperity, and blessedness; for said he, "Unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given: and the government shall be upon His shoulder: and His name shall be called Wonderful." ( C. H. Spurgeon . ) The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light. Isaiah 9:2 The true Light Bishop Perowne. The prophet's vision has been fulfilled. The true light now shineth; Jesus Christ as the Word made flesh is the true Light which lighteth every man. There is no light in any real sense but that which comes to man through Him. I. Christ sheds light upon SIN. By His words and by His life He testifies to the reality of sin. 1. In Him was exhibited for the first and only time a life perfectly obedient to the will of God, a life the one inspiring motive of which was love to God and love to man, a life in which every thought, every word, every act was influenced only by a regard to the glory of God, a life in which was manifested in perfect union and in perfect harmony every human virtue. Thus Christ has shown us what we ought to be, and in showing us this has shown us what we are. In the presence of His awful purity how deep our impurity appears. 2. And He has tracked sin to its secret hiding. place. He has discovered the fountain in the heart, the evil thought, the murderous hate, the impure desire, the covetousness, the malice, the bitterness which lurk within, and which no human law can touch. He has made us discern not only the evil done and the evil thought, but the good left undone. There is no part of our nature which He has not explored. Never had it been so profoundly, so truly judged, never had man been so discovered to us. 3. Is the light which Christ casts upon sin only a condemning light? Is it a light which shows us our misery only to leave us without hope, which shows us what we ought to be, but gives us no power to attain to the ideal set before us! No, the light which reveals to us our sin, reveals to us also the mercy of God, a love greater than our transgressions, a pardon greater than our sin. It is the light of the Cross that gives us hope. Never does God appear in more perfect holiness than when He pardons sin, and the sinner looking upon the Cross

Benson Commentary Isaiah 9:1 Nevertheless the dimness shall not be such as was in her vexation, when at the first he lightly afflicted the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, and afterward did more grievously afflict her by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, in Galilee of the nations. Isaiah 9:1 . Nevertheless, &c. — In the Hebrew, this verse is joined to the preceding chapter, as it is also in Bishop Lowth’s translation; and if it be considered as connected therewith, and the connecting particle, ?? , be translated for, (which is its usual meaning,) instead of nevertheless, the words may be understood to express an aggravation of the darkness, or misery, threatened in the two former verses, as the punishment of those who should reject the Messiah: thus, For the dimness — Or darkness; shall not be such as was in her vexation, &c. — That is, this shall not be so slight an affliction as that which befell these parts of the country by Pul, 2 Kings 15:19 ; nor as that which succeeded it, by Tiglath-pileser, 2 Kings 15:29 ; which was a heavier stroke than the former; but this shall be far heavier than either of them. Subsequent events, supposed to be here predicted, seem to confirm this interpretation, the calamities which, by the just judgment of God, befell the Jews for rejecting and crucifying the Messiah, being incomparably greater than those brought on the land by Zebulun and Naphtali by any, or all, of the Assyrian invasions. Our translation, however, and most commentators, consider this verse as containing a mitigation of the foregoing threatening, and that the sense of it is this: The calamity of this land and its inhabitants shall be great, yet not so great as that which was brought upon Zebulun and Naphtali by the king of Assyria, because then the Israelites were not only quite rooted out, and carried away into a dreadful captivity, out of which they were not to return; but their calamity was not alleviated by the coming of the Messiah and the gospel light; whereas, before and amidst this darkness, of which I have now spoken, shall a glorious light arise to cheer all who open their eyes to behold it. Thus interpreted, this verse is rather connected with the following than the foregoing verses, and is introductory to them, in which light Bishop Lowth considers it; although, as has been observed, following the Hebrew, he joins it to the preceding chapter. His translation of it, nearly the same with that of Dr. Waterland, is worthy of the reader’s attention, as it casts a new light on the words. It is as follows: “But there shall not hereafter be darkness in the land which was distressed: In the former time he debased the land of Zebulun, and the land, of Naphtali; but in the latter time he hath made it glorious: Even the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, Galilee of the nation.” The reader must observe, that “Zebulun, Naphtali, and Manasseh, that is, the country of Galilee, all around the sea of Genesareth, were the parts that principally suffered in the Assyrian invasion under Tiglath-pileser; and they were the first that enjoyed the blessing of Christ’s preaching the gospel, and exhibiting his miraculous works among them.” Isaiah 9:2 The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined. Isaiah 9:2 . The people — Israel and Judah; that walked — Or sat, as it is in Matthew 4:16 ; in darkness — Both in the darkness of ignorance, and in the darkness of calamity; have seen a great light — The prophet speaks of what was future, and would not take place till after seven hundred years, as though it were already arrived. Though “there would be very many among the Jews, to whom the Messiah, arising with his new light, would be an offence; who would resist his salutary doctrine, and who would therefore fall into the most grievous calamities, and thick darkness;” yet, “there would be others to whom the Messiah would truly appear with the light of grace and consolation, and who should receive him with the greatest joy, as attaining the summit of their hope and desire.” Accordingly, after the prophet had described the misery of those who, he foresaw, should reject him, he turns his style to describe the felicity of those on whom this Sun of righteousness should arise, setting forth both their joy and the cause of it. Isaiah 9:3 Thou hast multiplied the nation, and not increased the joy: they joy before thee according to the joy in harvest, and as men rejoice when they divide the spoil. Isaiah 9:3 . Thou hast multiplied the nation — Thou hast made good thy promise to Abraham, concerning the multiplication of his seed, by adding his spiritual seed unto the carnal, by gathering in the Gentiles to the Jews, and making them both one people in Christ, John 10:16 ; Ephesians 2:14 . For, in the Scriptures, the believing Gentiles are accounted the seed of Abraham as well as the Jews, Galatians 3:7-9 . Or, as the Hebrew may be rendered, Thou hast magnified the nation, honoured it with peculiar privileges above all other nations, and especially with this transcendent privilege, that the Saviour of the world should be born in it, and live among its people; of which he speaks more fully Isaiah 9:6-7 . And not increased — Or rather, according to the marginal reading in the Hebrew, (which, instead of ?? , not, has ?? , it, him, or them, ) confirmed by many of the ancient versions, Thou hast increased their joy, which reading, it is evident, the next words require. Dr. Waterland’s version of these two clauses is, Thou hast advanced the nation; hast heightened upon her joy. The meaning is, thou hast conferred upon it a very great benefit, and thereby prepared for it the highest joy: joy which shall be to all people; true joy arising from the consolations of the gospel. See Zechariah 2:10-11 ; Luke 2:10 . They joy before thee — In thy presence, and in the place of thy worship; according to the joy in harvest, &c. — When men, with great joy, reap the long-expected fruit of their great labours and expectations, or as when, after a glorious victory, they come to take the spoil. Isaiah 9:4 For thou hast broken the yoke of his burden, and the staff of his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, as in the day of Midian. Isaiah 9:4 . For thou hast broken, &c. — Bishop Lowth translates this verse, For the yoke of his burden, the staff laid on his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor hast thou broken, as in the day of Midian. The Jews had been under the yoke repeatedly, to one hostile people or another, and had been sorely oppressed by them; formerly by the Philistines, Moabites, Ammonites, and Midianites, and, in after times, by the Assyrians, Chaldeans, Persians, and Macedonians; and many and successive deliverances from their oppressors had God granted them. Now, as the yokes which they had been under were emblematical of those of Satan, sin, and death, the spiritual enemies of God’s people, so their deliverances were figures of the spiritual deliverance which believers, whether Jews or Gentiles, receive through Christ. And of this spiritual deliverance and salvation, as the context shows, this verse is to be understood. For the preceding verses foretel the diffusion of gospel light, and those that follow attest the birth of the Messiah, unfold his characters and offices, and set forth the blessings of his peaceful and righteous reign. See Jeremiah 23:6 ; Luke 1:70-74 , where Zacharias, full of the Holy Ghost, seems most admirably to expound this passage of the prophet. As in the day of Midian — When God destroyed the Midianites in so admirable a manner, and by such unlikely and contemptible means, which was an eminent type of Christ’s conquering the powers of darkness, and all his enemies, by dying on the cross, and by the preaching of a few unlearned, and poor, despised men. Isaiah 9:5 For every battle of the warrior is with confused noise, and garments rolled in blood; but this shall be with burning and fuel of fire. Isaiah 9:5 . For every battle of the warrior is with confused noise, &c. — With the triumphant exclamations of the conqueror, and the bitter lamentations of the conquered, and the different cries of the same persons, sometimes conquering and sometimes conquered; and garments rolled in blood — With great difficulty and slaughter. But this shall be with burning, &c. — But this victory, which God’s people shall have over all their enemies, shall be more terrible to their adversaries, whom God shall utterly consume, as it were, by fire. The reader must observe, however, the words ???? ??? , here rendered battle of the warrior, occurring only here, are of very doubtful signification, and of consequence are rendered differently by learned men. Dr. Waterland, from Vitringa, translates the verse, “Every clashing of the noisy warrior, and the garment rolled in blood, shall be thrown to be burned; fuel for the fire.” Bishop Lowth renders it, “For the greaves of the armed warrior in the conflict, and the garment rolled in much blood, shall be for a burning, even fuel for the fire.” It is probable, as Vitringa observes, that the words are intended to signify, that, in consequence of Christ’s appearing in the flesh, and destroying the enemies of his church, a time of peace and tranquillity shall take place on earth, and the instruments of war and slaughter be of no further use. Isaiah 9:6 For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counseller, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. Isaiah 9:6 . For, &c. — Having spoken of the glorious light, and joy, and victory of God’s people, the prophet now proceeds to show the foundation and cause thereof. And, “though he is everywhere most excellent, he is peculiarly so in this passage, which contains an emphatical description of the person and kingdom of the Son of God; the kingdom of peace; the eternal and universal kingdom, in which the church should have the highest cause for joy; which should bring with it an abolition of the whole yoke of sin, and the ceremonial law, and a destruction of all hostile and adverse powers with respect to the saints.” Who then can wonder at the joy of the church in so great a light, in so excellent a Teacher, Mediator, Saviour, and Governor, King, and Lord? Unto us a child is, or, shall be, born — The prophet, as usual, speaks of a blessing which he foresaw with certainty would be bestowed, as if it were conferred already. That the Messiah is here intended, not only Christian but Jewish interpreters, in general, of any credit or reputation, agree. For so the ancient Hebrew doctors understood the place, and particularly the Chaldee paraphrast; although the later Jews have laboured, out of opposition to the Lord Jesus, to apply it to Hezekiah. Which extravagant notion, as it hath no foundation at all in this or any other text of Scripture, and therefore may be rejected without any further reason; so it is fully confuted by the following titles, which are such as cannot, without blasphemy and nonsense, be ascribed to Hezekiah, nor indeed to any mere man or mere creature, as we shall see. The human nature of the Messiah is here first set forth. He shall be the child born, the Word made flesh, and that for us; not only for us Jews, but for us men, for us sinners, and especially for us believers. Unto us a son is given — Or, the son, namely, of the virgin, spoken of Isaiah 7:14 ; the Immanuel, the Song of Solomon of God, so called, not only on account of his miraculous conception, but because of his eternal generation, the Word, who was in the beginning with God, had glory with the Father before the world was, was loved by him before the foundation of the world, and by whom he made the worlds, and created all things. See John 1:1-3 ; John 17:5 ; John 17:24 ; Hebrews 1:2 ; 1 Corinthians 8:6 ; Ephesians 3:9 ; Colossians 1:16 . This person, the Father’s own Son, his only-begotten Son, is given, John 3:16 ; sent forth, Galatians 4:4 ; sent in the likeness of sinful flesh, Romans 8:3 ; though rich, and in the form of God, made in the likeness of men, poor, and of no reputation, Php 2:7 ; 2 Corinthians 8:9 ; given to be our infallible Teacher, our prevalent Mediator, our almighty Saviour, our righteous Ruler, and our final Judge. Accordingly, The government — Of the church, of the world, yea, of all things, for the church’s benefit, Ephesians 1:21-22 ; shall be upon his shoulder — That is, upon him, or in his hands; all power being given to him in heaven and on earth. In mentioning shoulder, he speaks metaphorically; great burdens being commonly laid upon men’s shoulders, and all government, if rightly managed, being a great burden, and this especially being, of all others, the most weighty and important trust. Possibly here may be also an allusion to the ancient custom of carrying the ensigns of government before the magistrates, upon the shoulders of their officers, or, as some think, to the regal robe worn by kings and governors. And his name shall be called — That is, he shall be: for the following particulars are not to be taken for a description of his proper name, but of his glorious nature and qualities; Wonderful — He is wonderful in his person, as God and man, God manifest in the flesh, which union of two such different natures in one individual, intelligent, and self-conscious being, is a great and incomprehensible mystery. Hence we are told, No man knoweth the Son but the Father, Matthew 11:27 ; and he is said to have had a name written, which no man knew but himself; and hence, when appearing to Manoah, he said, Why askest thou after my name, seeing it is secret: Hebrew, ??? , wonderful, the same word here used, Jdg 13:18 . He is also wonderful with respect to his birth, life, doctrine, miracles; his love and sufferings; his death, resurrection, and ascension; his humiliation and exaltation; his cross and crown; his grace and glory. Counsellor — He is so called, because he knew the whole counsel of God, and, as far as was necessary, revealed it to us, and is the great counsellor of his church and people in all their doubts and difficulties, in all ages and nations, being made of God unto them wisdom. He also is the author and giver of all those excellent counsels, delivered not only to the apostles, but also by the prophets, ( 1 Peter 1:10-12 ,) and hath gathered, enlarged, and preserved his church by admirable counsels, and the methods of his providence; and, in a word, hath in him all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. The mighty God — This title can agree to no man but Christ, who was God as well as man, to whom the title of God or Jehovah is given, both in the Old and New Testaments, as Jeremiah 23:6 ; John 1:1 ; Romans 9:5 ; and in many other places. And it is a true observation, that this Hebrew word ?? , eel, is never used in the singular number of any creature, but only of the Almighty God, as is evident by perusing all the texts where this word occurs. The everlasting Father — Hebrew, ??? ?? , The Father of eternity: having called him a child and a son, lest this should be misinterpreted to his disparagement, he adds that he is a Father also, even the Father of eternity, and, of course, of time, and of all creatures made in time. Christ, in union with the Father and the Holy Ghost, is the God and Father of all things, the maker and upholder of all creatures, John 1:3 ; Hebrews 1:3 ; and especially the Father of all believers, who are called his children, ( Hebrews 2:13 ,) and the author of eternal life and salvation to them, Hebrews 5:9 . Or, this title may be given him because he is the father of the new and eternal age, that is, of the economy which is to endure for ever; for Christ is the father of a new generation, to continue through all eternity; the second Adam, father of a new race; the head of a new and everlasting family, in which all the children of God are reckoned. The Prince of peace — This is another title, which certainly does not agree to Hezekiah, whose reign was far from being free from wars, as we see 2 Kings 18., but it agrees exactly to Christ, who is called our peace, Micah 5:5 ; Ephesians 2:14 ; and is the only purchaser and procurer of peace between God and men, Isaiah 53:5 ; and between men and men, between Jews and Gentiles, Ephesians 2:15 ; and of the peace of our own consciences; and who leaves peace as his legacy to his disciples, John 14:27 ; John 16:33 . Isaiah 9:7 Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will perform this. Isaiah 9:7 . Of the increase of his government, &c. — His peaceable and happy government shall be enlarged without end: either without end of duration, for ever, as is expressed in a following clause of this verse, or without limitation: his peaceable and happy government shall be extended to all the ends of the earth. Upon the throne of David — The throne which was promised to David, and to his seed for ever; from henceforth, &c. — From the beginning of it unto all eternity. The zeal of the Lord of hosts, &c. — This great work shall be brought to pass by Almighty God, out of that fervent affection which he hath to his own glory, to the honour of his Son, and to his people. Isaiah 9:8 The Lord sent a word into Jacob, and it hath lighted upon Israel. Isaiah 9:8-12 . The Lord sent a word, &c. — A prophetical and threatening message by me: for now the prophet, having inserted some consolatory passages for the support of God’s faithful people, returns to his former work of commination against the rebellious Israelites; and it lighted — Hebrew, ??? , it fell, that is, it shall fall in the prophetical style. It shall certainly be accomplished; upon Israel — The same with Jacob in the former clause. We have here the third section of the fifth discourse, which reaches to the fifth verse of the next chapter, “and makes,” says Bishop Lowth, “a distinct prophecy, and a just poem, remarkable for the regularity of its disposition, and the elegance of its plan. It has no relation to the preceding or following prophecy, which relate principally to the kingdom of Judah; whereas, this is addressed exclusively to the kingdom of Israel. The subject of it is a denunciation of vengeance awaiting their crimes. It is divided into four parts, each threatening the particular punishment of some grievous offence; of their pride; of their perseverance in their vices; of their impiety; and of their injustice. To which is added a general denunciation of a further reserve of divine wrath, contained in a distich before used by the prophet on a like occasion, ( Isaiah 5:25 ,) and here repeated after each part: this makes the intercalary verse of the poem; or, as we call it, the burden of the song.” And all the people shall know — Namely, by experience. They shall know whether my word be true or false. Even Ephraim, &c. — The people of the ten tribes, and particularly Ephraim, the proudest of them all. And Samaria — The strongest place, and the seat of the king and court. Here we have the first fault of the Ephraimites, namely, the pride and contempt with which they had received the threatenings of the true prophets of God, who had denounced to them the unhappy consequences of their undertakings. Elevated with vain hope, they had declared that they would never desist from their purpose of invading Judah for any denunciations of the prophets; on the contrary, they had boasted proudly, that, strengthened as they were by their present alliance with the king of Syria, though they had heretofore suffered great loss, they had no doubt of repairing their fortune. Though the bricks were fallen down, they would build with hewn stones, &c. — The expression is metaphorically elegant, and denotes the restoration of a fallen state for the better, and the change of a mean and low to a more honourable and excellent situation. For their pride and arrogance, the God who laugheth vain men to scorn, denounces their punishment in the two following verses; and, according to his usual justice, assures them that the union with Rezin, wherein they boasted, should itself prove their destruction. This prophecy was fulfilled by Tiglath-pileser. See 2 Kings 16:17 , Vitringa, and Dodd. Dr. Waterland renders the beginning of the twelfth verse, “The Syrians from the east, and the Philistines from the west.” Though Rezin, king of Syria, was destroyed, yet the body of the nation survived, and submitted themselves to the king of Assyria, and upon his command invaded Israel afterward. And they shall devour Israel, &c. — Like wild beasts. Isaiah 9:9 And all the people shall know, even Ephraim and the inhabitant of Samaria, that say in the pride and stoutness of heart, Isaiah 9:10 The bricks are fallen down, but we will build with hewn stones: the sycomores are cut down, but we will change them into cedars. Isaiah 9:11 Therefore the LORD shall set up the adversaries of Rezin against him, and join his enemies together; Isaiah 9:12 The Syrians before, and the Philistines behind; and they shall devour Israel with open mouth. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still. Isaiah 9:13 For the people turneth not unto him that smiteth them, neither do they seek the LORD of hosts. Isaiah 9:13-15 . For the people turneth not, &c. — We have here the second crime of this refractory people, who, impenitent and stupid, regarded not the chastisement of the Lord, nor turned to him at his reproof. Therefore a total subversion of their state and polity is denounced as the severest punishment upon them. The Lord will cut off, &c., head and tail — High and low, honourable and contemptible, as the next verse explains it; branch and rush — The goodly branches of tall trees, the mighty and noble; and the bulrush, the weakest and meanest persons. In one day — All together, one as well as another, without any distinction. The ancient, &c., he is the head — That is, is signified by the word head, in the former verse; and the prophet that teacheth lies, &c. — Whose destruction he mentions, not as if it were a punishment to them to be deprived of such persons, but partly to show the extent of the calamity, that it should reach to all sorts of persons; and partly to beat down their vain presumptions of peace and prosperity, by showing that those false prophets, which had fed their vain hopes, should perish, and their false prophecies with them. He is the tail — The basest part of the whole people. Isaiah 9:14 Therefore the LORD will cut off from Israel head and tail, branch and rush, in one day. Isaiah 9:15 The ancient and honourable, he is the head; and the prophet that teacheth lies, he is the tail. Isaiah 9:16 For the leaders of this people cause them to err; and they that are led of them are destroyed. Isaiah 9:16-17 . For, &c. — “We have here a defence of the divine judgment, taken from the universal corruption of the people, wherein God sets forth the justice of his proceedings, and shows, that not from choice, but from the iniquities of the people, he is compelled to punish. The leaders of this people — Their governors, both civil and ecclesiastical, especially the latter, their teachers, or the false prophets, last-mentioned; cause them to err — Their governors compelling them by power, and their teachers deceiving them by false doctrines, and evil counsels and persuasions. They that are led, &c., are destroyed — Shall certainly perish; nor will it avail them to plead, in their excuse, that they followed the counsel and conduct of their leaders. The Lord shall have no joy in their young men — Shall not rejoice over them to do them good, as he doth over his faithful people, Isaiah 62:5 ; Zephaniah 3:17 . Neither shall have mercy on their fatherless — Who generally are the special objects of his care and pity, and much less upon others. For every one — Not precisely; for there were seven thousand pious persons among them, when they seemed to Elijah to be universally corrupt; but the body or generality of the people are intended; is a hypocrite — For though they professed to worship the true God, yet indeed they had forsaken him. Every mouth speaketh folly — That is, wickedness, which is commonly called folly. They are not ashamed to proclaim their own wickedness; and the corruption of their hearts breaks forth into ungodly speeches. Isaiah 9:17 Therefore the Lord shall have no joy in their young men, neither shall have mercy on their fatherless and widows: for every one is an hypocrite and an evildoer, and every mouth speaketh folly. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still. Isaiah 9:18 For wickedness burneth as the fire: it shall devour the briers and thorns, and shall kindle in the thickets of the forest, and they shall mount up like the lifting up of smoke. Isaiah 9:18 . For wickedness burneth as fire, &c. — Rageth like a fire, destroying and laying waste the nation. We have here the third great evil, on account of which divine vengeance was about to come upon them; namely, the power of reigning and barefaced impiety; the punishment whereof, denounced in the subsequent verses, is, as usual, assimilated to the vice, namely, destructive factions, which should overthrow their republic. Having rendered themselves hateful to God by their crimes, they shall be destroyed by those crimes, by their dissensions, animosities, divisions, tumults, insurrections, and civil broils, arising from the wickedness of their own dispositions, and issuing in their mutual destruction. Inflamed by envy, avarice, and impurity, they shall perish in this very fire let loose among them by the wrath of God, and permitted to rage uncontrolled, like fire among briers and thorns, Isaiah 9:19 . The latter state of the Israelitish government abundantly proves the exactness of this prophet’s prediction, 2 Kings 15:10 ; 2 Kings 15:30 ; 2 Kings 17:1 ; 2 Kings 17:18-24 . Isaiah 9:19 Through the wrath of the LORD of hosts is the land darkened, and the people shall be as the fuel of the fire: no man shall spare his brother. Isaiah 9:20 And he shall snatch on the right hand, and be hungry; and he shall eat on the left hand, and they shall not be satisfied: they shall eat every man the flesh of his own arm: Isaiah 9:20-21 . He shall snatch on the right hand — They shall plunder and devour one another, without ever being satisfied, or ceasing. They shall eat every man the flesh, &c. — They shall destroy one another by their intestine wars: see Isaiah 49:26 . But it was literally fulfilled when they were reduced to that extremity that they ate the flesh of their own children, 2 Kings 6:28 ; Jeremiah 19:8-9 ; a judgment denounced for their sins by Moses, Deuteronomy 28:53 , where see the note. They together shall fall on Judah — When those tribes have preyed upon and nearly destroyed one another, they shall turn their rage on Judah. The prophet in the above verses describes the infatuation of the Israelites and Jews, who, instead of uniting in a confederacy against their common enemies, the Syrians and Assyrians, with whom they were not singly able to contend, fell out among themselves, and so far destroyed each other, that they became, one after the other, an easy prey to those heathen nations, whom, humanly speaking, they would have been able to have repelled, had they united in a league, and aided each other. But God suffered them to be infatuated, as a punishment of their sins. Isaiah 9:21 Manasseh, Ephraim; and Ephraim, Manasseh: and they together shall be against Judah. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still. Benson Commentary on the Old and New Testaments Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com . Used by Permission.

Expositor's Bible Commentary Isaiah 9:1 Nevertheless the dimness shall not be such as was in her vexation, when at the first he lightly afflicted the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, and afterward did more grievously afflict her by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, in Galilee of the nations. 5 CHAPTER VI KING AND MESSIAH; PEOPLE AND CHURCH 735-732 B.C. Isaiah 7, 8, 9:1-8 THIS section of the book of Isaiah (chapters 7-9:7) consists of a number of separate prophecies uttered during a period of at least three years: 735-732 B.C. By 735 Ahaz had ascended the throne; Tiglath-pileser had been occupied in the far east for two years. Taking advantage of the weakness of the former and the distance of the later, Rezin, king of Damascus, and Pekah, king of Samaria, planned an invasion of Judah. It was a venture they would not have dared had Uzziah been alive. While Rezin marched down the east of the Jordan and overturned the Jewish supremacy in Edom, Pekah threw himself into Judah, defeated the armies of Ahaz in one great battle, and besieged Jerusalem, with the object of deposing Ahaz and setting a Syrian, Ben-Tabeel, in his stead. Simultaneously the Philistines attacked Judah from the southwest. The motive of the confederates was in all probability anger with Ahaz for refusing to enter with them into a Pan-Syrian alliance against Assyria. In his distress Ahaz appealed to Tiglath-pileser, and the Assyrian swiftly responded. In 734-it must have been less than a year since Ahaz was attacked-the hosts of the north had overrun Samaria and swept as far south as the cities of the Philistines. Then, withdrawing his troops again, Tiglath-pileser left Hoshea as his vassal on Pekah’s throne, and sending the population of Israel east of the Jordan into distant captivity, completed a two years’ siege of Damascus (734-732) by its capture. At Damascus Ahaz met the conqueror, and having paid him tribute, took out a further policy of insurance in the altar-pattern, which he brought back with him to Jerusalem. Such were the three years, whose rapid changes unfolded themselves in parallel with these prophecies of Isaiah. The details are not given by the prophet, but we must keep in touch with them while we listen to him. Especially must we remember their central point, the decision of Ahaz to call in the help of Assyria, a decision which affected the whole course of politics for the next thirty years. Some of the oracles of this section were plainly delivered by Isaiah before that event, and simply seek to inspire Ahaz with a courage which should feel Assyrian help to be needless; others, again, imply that Ahaz has already called in the Assyrian: they taunt him with hankering after foreign strength, and depict the woes which the Assyrian will bring upon the land; while others {for example, the passage Isaiah 9:1-7 } mean that the Assyrian has already come, and that the Galilean provinces of Israel have been depopulated, and promise a Deliverer. If we do not keep in mind the decision of Ahaz, we shall not understand these seemingly contradictory utterances, which it thoroughly explains. Let us now begin at the beginning of chapter 7. It opens with a bare statement, by way of title, of the invasion of Judah and the futile result; and then proceeds to tell us how Isaiah acted from the first rumour of the confederacy onward. I. THE KING (chapter 7) "And it came to pass in the days of Ahaz, the son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah, king of Judah, that Rezin, the king of Syria, and Pekah, the son of Remaliah, king of Israel, went up to Jerusalem to war against it, but could not prevail against it." This is a summary of the whole adventure and issue of the war, given by way of introduction. The narrative proper begins in Isaiah 7:2 , with the effect of the first news of the league upon Ahaz and his people. Their hearts were moved like the trees of the forest before the wind. The league was aimed so evidently against the two things most essential to the national existence and the honour of Jehovah; the dynasty of David, namely, and the inviolability of Jerusalem. Judah had frequently before suffered the loss of her territory; never till now were the throne and city of David in actual peril. But that, which bent both king and people by its novel terror, was the test Isaiah expected for the prophecies he had already uttered. Taking with him, as a summary of them, his boy with the name Shear-Jashub-"A-remnant-shall-return"-Isaiah faced Ahaz and his court in the midst of their preparation for the siege. They were examining-but more in panic than in prudence-the water supply of the city, when Isaiah delivered to them a message from the Lord, which may be paraphrased as follows: "Take heed and be quiet," keep your eyes open and your heart still; "fear not, neither be fainthearted, for the fierce anger of Rezin and Remaliah’s son." They have no power to set you on fire. They are "but stumps of expiring firebrands," almost burnt out. While you wisely look after your water supply, do so in hope. This purpose of deposing, you is vain. "Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: It shall not stand, neither shall it come to pass." Of whom are you afraid? Look those foes of yours in the face. "The head of Syria is Damascus, and Damascus’ head is Rezin": is he worth fearing? "The head of Ephraim is Samaria, and Samaria’s head is Reinallah’s son": is he worth fearing? Within a few years they will certainly be destroyed. But whatever estimate you make of your foes, whatever their future may be, for yourself have faith in God; for you that is the essential thing. "If ye will not believe, surely ye shall not be established." This paraphrase seeks to bring out the meaning of a passage confessedly obscure. It seems as if we had only bits of Isaiah’s speech to Ahaz and must supply the gaps. No one need hesitate, however, to recognise the conspicuous personal qualities-the combination of political sagacity with religious fear, of common-sense and courage rooted in faith. In a word, this is what Isaiah will say to the king, clever in his alliances, religious and secular, and busy about his material defences: "Take unto you the shield of faith. You have lost your head among all these things. Hold it up like a man behind that shield; take a rational view of affairs. Rate your enemies at their proper value. But for this you must believe in God. Faith in Him is the essential condition of a calm mind and a rational appreciation of affairs." It is, no doubt, difficult for us to realise that the truth which Isaiah thus enforced, on King Ahaz-the government of the world and human history by one supreme God-was ever a truth of which the race stood in ignorance. A generation like ours cannot be expected to put its mind in the attitude of those of Isaiah’s contemporaries who believed in the real existence of many gods with limited sovereignties. To us, who are full of the instincts of Divine Providence and of the presence in history of law and progress, it is extremely hard even to admit the fact-far less fully to realise what it means-that our race had ever to receive these truths as fresh additions to their stock of intellectual ideas. Yet, without prejudice to the claims of earlier prophets, this may be confidently affirmed: that Isaiah where we now meet him stood on one side believing in one supreme God, Lord of heaven and earth, and his generation stood on the other side, believing that there were many gods. Isaiah, however, does not pose as the discoverer of the truth he preaches; he does not present it as a new revelation, nor put it in a formula. He takes it for granted, and proceeds to bring its moral influence to bear. He will infect men with his own utter conviction of it, in order that he may strengthen their character and guide them by paths of safety. His speech to Ahaz is an exhibition of the moral and rational effects of believing in Providence. Ahaz is a sample of the character polytheism produced; the state of mind and heart to which Isaiah exhorts him is that induced by belief in one righteous and almighty God. We can make the contrast clear to ourselves by a very definite figure. The difference, which is made to the character and habits of men if the country they live in has a powerful government or not, is well-known. If there be no such central authority, it is a case of every man’s hand against his neighbour. Men walk armed to the teeth. A constant attitude of fear and suspicion warps the whole nature. The passions are excited and magnified; the intelligence and judgment are dwarfed. Just the same after its kind is life to the man or tribe, who believe that the world in which they dwell and the life they share with others have no central authority. They walk armed with prejudices, superstitions, and selfishnesses. They create, like Ahaz, their own providences, and still, like him, feel insecure. Everything is exaggerated by them; in each evil there lurks to their imagination unlimited hostility. They are without breadth of view or length of patience. But let men believe that life has a central authority, that God is supreme, and they will fling their prejudices and superstitions to the winds, now no more needed than the antiquated fortresses and weapons by which our forefathers, in days when the government was weak, were forced to defend their private interests. When we know that God reigns, how quiet and free it makes us! When things and men are part of His scheme and working out His ends, when we understand that they are not monsters but ministers, how reasonably we can look at them! Were we afraid of Syria and Ephraim? Why, the head of Syria is this fellow Rezin, the head of Ephraim this son of Remaliah! They cannot last long; God’s engine stands behind to smite them. By the reasonable government of God, let us be reasonable! Let us take heed and be quiet. Have faith in God, and to faith will come her proper consequent of common sense. For the higher a man looks, the farther he sees: to us that is the practical lesson of these first nine verses of the seventh chapter. The very gesture of faith bestows upon the mind a breadth of view. The man, who lifts his face to God in heaven, is he whose eyes sweep simultaneously the farthest prospect of earth, and bring to him a sense of the proportion of things. Ahaz, facing his nearest enemies, does not see over their heads, and in his consternation at their appearance prepares to embark upon any policy that suggests itself, even though it be so rash as the summoning of the Assyrian. Isaiah, on the other hand, with his vision fixed on God as the Governor of the world, is enabled to overlook the dust that darkens Judah’s frontier, to see behind it the inevitable advance of the Assyrians, and to be assured that, whether Ahaz calls them to his quarrel or no, they will very soon of their own motion overwhelm both of his enemies. From these "two smoking firebrands" there is then no real danger. But from the Assyrian, if once Judah entangle herself in his toils, there is the most extreme danger. Isaiah’s advice is therefore not mere religious quietism; it is prudent policy. It is the best political advice that could have been offered at that crisis, as we have already been able to gather from a survey of the geographical and political dispositions of Western Asia, apart altogether from religious considerations. But to Isaiah the calmness requisite for this sagacity sprang from his faith. Mr. Bagehot might have appealed to Isaiah’s whole policy in illustration of what he has so well described as the military and political benefits of religion. Monotheism is of advantage to men not only by reason of "the high concentration of steady feeling" which it produces, but also for the mental calmness and sagacity which surely spring from a pure and vivid conviction that the Lord reigneth. One other thing it is well we should emphasise, before we pass from Isaiah’s speech to Ahaz. Nothing can be plainer than that Isaiah, though advocating so absolutely a quiescent belief in God, is no fatalist. Now other prophets there have been, insisting just as absolutely as Isaiah upon resignation to God the supreme, and the evident practical effect of their doctrine of the Divine sovereignty has been to make their followers, not shrewd political observers, but blind and apathetic fatalists. The difference between them and Isaiah has lain in the kind of character, which they and he have respectively attributed to the Deity, before exalting Him to the throne of absolute power and resigning themselves to His will. Isaiah, though as disciplined a believer in God’s sovereignty and man’s duty of obedience as any prophet that ever preached these doctrines, was preserved from the fatalism to which they so often lead by the conviction he had previously received of God’s righteousness. Fatalism means resignation to fate, and fate means an omnipotence either without character, or (which is the same thing) of whose character we are ignorant. Fate is God minus character, and fatalism is the characterless condition to which belief in such a God reduces man. History presents it to our view amid the most diverse surroundings. The Greek mind, so free and sunny, was bewildered and benumbed by belief in an inscrutable Nemesis: In the East how frequently is a temper of apathy or despair bred in men, to whom God is nothing but a despot! Even within Christianity we have had fanatics, so inordinately possessed with belief in God’s sovereignty of election, to the exclusion of all other Divine truths, as to profess themselves, with impious audacity, willing to be damned for His glory. Such instances are enough to prove to us the extreme danger of making the sovereignty of God the first article of our creed. It is not safe for men to exalt a deity to the throne of the supreme providence, till they are certified of his character. The vision of mere power intoxicates and brutalises, no less when it is hallowed by the name of religion, than when, as in modern materialism, it is blindly interpreted as physical force. Only the people who have first learned to know their Deity intimately in the private matters of life, where heart touches heart, and the delicate arguments of conscience are not overborne by the presence of vast natural forces or the intricate movements of the world’s history, can be trusted afterwards to enter these larger theatres of religion, without risk of losing their faith, their sensibility, or their conscience. The whole course of revelation has been bent upon this: to render men familiarly and experimentally acquainted with the character of God, before laying upon them the duty of homage to His creative power or submission to His will. In the Old Testament God is the Friend, the Guide, the Redeemer of men, or ever He is their Monarch and Lawgiver. The Divine name which the Hebrew sees "excellent through all the earth" is the name that he has learned to know at home as "Jehovah, our Lord". { Psalm 8:1-9 } Jehovah trains His people to trust His personal truth and lovingkindness within their own courts, before He tests their allegiance and discipline upon the high places of the world. And when, amid the strange terrors of these and the novel magnitudes with which Israel, facing the world, had to reckon, the people lost their presence Of mind, His elegy over them was, "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge." Even when their temple is full and their sacrifices of homage to His power most frequent, it is still their want of moral acquaintance with Himself of which He complains: "Israel doth not know; My people doth not consider." What else was the tragedy in which Jewish history closed, than just the failure to perceive this lesson: that to have and to communicate the knowledge of the Almighty’s character is of infinitely more value than the attempt to vindicate in any outward fashion Jehovah’s supremacy over the world? This latter, this forlorn, hope was what Israel exhausted the evening of their day in attempting. The former-to communicate to the lives and philosophies of mankind a knowledge of the Divine heart and will, gained throughout a history of unique grace and miracle-was the destiny which they resigned to the followers of the crucified Messiah. For under the New Testament this also is the method of revelation. What our King desires before He ascends the throne of the world is that the world should know Him; and so He comes down among us, to be heard, and seen, and handled of us, that our hearts may learn His heart and know His love, unbewildered by His majesty. And for our part, when we ascribe to our King the glory and the dominion, it is as unto Him that loved us and washed us from our sins in His blood. For the chief thing for individuals, as for nations, is not to believe that God reigneth so much as to know what kind of God He is who reigneth. But Ahaz would not be persuaded. He had a policy of his own, and was determined to pursue it. He insisted on appealing to Assyria. Before he did so, Isaiah made one more attempt on his obduracy. With a vehemence, which reveals how critical he felt the king’s decision to be, the prophet returned as if this time the very voice of Jehovah. "And Jehovah spake to Ahaz, saying, Ask thee a sign of Jehovah thy God; ask it either in Sheol below or in the height above. But Ahaz said, I will not ask, neither will I tempt the Lord." Isaiah’s offer of a sign was one which the prophets of Israel used to make when some crisis demanded the immediate acceptance of. their word by men, and men were more than usually hard to convince-a miracle such as the thunder that Samuel called out of a clear sky to impress Israel with God’s opinion of their folly in asking for a king; { 1 Samuel 12:17 } or as the rending of the altar which the man of God brought to pass to convict the sullen Jeroboam; { 1 Kings 13:3 } or as the regress of the shadow on the sun-dial, which Isaiah himself gave in assurance of recovery to the sick Hezekiah. (chapter 38) Such signs are offered only to weak or prejudiced persons. The most real faith, as Isaiah himself tells us, is unforced, the purest natures those which need no signs and wonders. But there are certain crises at which faith must be immediately forced, and Ahaz stood now at such a crisis; and there are certain characters who, unable to read a writ from the court of conscience and reason, must be served with one from a court-even though it be inferior-whose language they understand; and Ahaz was such a character. Isaiah knew his man, and prepared a pretty dilemma for him. By offering him whatever sign he chose to ask, Isaiah knew that the king would be committed before his own honour and the public conscience to refrain from calling in the Assyrians, and so Judah would be saved; or if the king refused the sign, the refusal would unmask him. Ahaz refused, and at once Isaiah denounced him and all his house. They were mere shufflers, playing fast and loose with God as well as men. "Hear ye now, O house of David. Is it a small thing for you to weary men, that ye must weary my God also?" You have evaded God; therefore God Himself will take you in hand: "the Lord Himself shall give you a sign." In order to follow intelligently the rest of Isaiah’s address, we must clearly understand how the sign which he now promises differs in nature from the sign he had implored Ahaz to select, of whatever sort he may have expected that selection to be. The king’s determination to call in Assyria has come between. Therefore, while the sign Isaiah first offered upon the spot was intended for an immediate pledge that God would establish Ahaz, if only he did not appeal to the foreigner, the sign Isaiah now offers shall come as a future proof of how criminal and disastrous the appeal to the foreigner has been. The first sign would have been an earnest of salvation; the second is to be an exposure of the fatal evil of Ahaz’s choice. The first would have given some assurance of the swift overthrow of Ephraim and Syria; the second shall be some painful illustration of the fact that not only Syria and Ephraim, but Judah herself, shall be overwhelmed by the advance of the northern power. This second sign is one, therefore, which only time can bring round. Isaiah identifies it with a life not yet born. A Child, he says, shall shortly be born to whom his mother shall give the name Immanu-El-"God-with-us." By the time this Child comes to years of discretion, "he shall eat butter and honey." Isaiah then explains the riddle. He does not, however, explain who the mother is, having described her vaguely as "a"-or "the young woman of marriageable age"; for that is not necessary to the sign, which is to consist in the Child’s own experience. To this latter he limits his explanation. Butter and honey are the food of privation, the food of a people, whose land, depopulated by the enemy, has been turned into pasture. Before this Child shall arrive at years of discretion not only shall Syria and Ephraim be laid waste, but the Lord Himself will have laid waste Judah. "Jehovah shall bring upon thee, and upon thy people and upon thy father’s house days, that have not come, from the day that Ephraim departed from Judah; even the king of Assyria." Nothing more is said of Immanuel, but the rest of the chapter is taken up with the details of Judah’s devastation. Now this sign and its explanation would have presented little difficulty but for the name of the Child-Immanuel. Erase that, and the passage reads forcibly enough. Before a certain Child, whose birth is vaguely but solemnly intimated in the near future, shall have come to years of discretion, the results of the choice of Ahaz shall be manifest. Judah shall be devastated, and her people have sunk to the most rudimentary means of living. All this is plain. It is a form which Isaiah used more than once to measure the near future. And in other literatures, too, we have felt the pathos of realising the future results of crime and the length to which disaster lingers, by their effect upon the lives of another generation:- "The child that is unborn shall rue The hunting of that day!" But why call the Child Immanuel? The name is evidently part of the sign, and has to be explained in connection with it. Why call a Child "God-with-us" who is not going to act greatly or to be highly honoured, who is only going to suffer, for whom to come to years of intelligence shall only be to come to a sense of his country’s disaster and his people’s poverty. This Child who is used so pathetically to measure the flow of time and the return of its revenges, about whom we are told neither how he shall behave himself in the period of privation, nor whether he shall survive it-why is he called Immanuel? or why, being called Immanuel, has he so sordid a fate to contrast with so splendid a name? It seems to the present expositor quite impossible to dissociate so solemn an announcement by Jehovah to the house of David of the birth of a Child, so highly named, from that expectation of the coming of a glorious Prince which was current in this royal family since the days of its founder. Mysterious and abrupt as the intimation of Immanuel’s birth may seem to us at this juncture, we cannot forget that it fell from Isaiah’s lips on hearts which cherished as their dearest hope the appearance of a glorious descendant of David, and were just now the more sensitive to this hope that both David’s city and David’s dynasty were in peril. Could Ahaz possibly understand by Immanuel any other child than that Prince whose coming was the inalienable hope of his house? But if we are right in supposing that Ahaz made this identification, or had even the dimmest presage of it, then we understand the full force of the sign. Ahaz by his unbelief had not only disestablished himself ( Isaiah 7:9 ): he had mortgaged the hope of Israel. In the flood of disaster, which his fatal resolution would bring upon the land, it mattered little what was to happen to himself. Isaiah does not trouble now to mention any penalty for Ahaz. But his resolve’s exceeding pregnancy of peril is borne home to the king by the assurance that it will devastate all the golden future, and must disinherit the promised King. The Child, who is Israel’s hope, is born; he receives the Divine name, and that is all of salvation or glory suggested. He grows up not to a throne or the majesty which the seventy-second Psalm pictures the offerings of Sheba’s and Seba’s kings, the corn of his land shaking like the fruit of Lebanon, while they of the city flourish like the grass of the earth-but to the food of privation, to the sight of his country razed by his enemies into one vast common fit only for pasture, to loneliness and suffering. Amid the general desolation his figure vanishes from our sight, and only his name remains to haunt, with its infinite melancholy of what might have been, the thorn-choked vineyards and grass-grown courts of Judah. But even if it were to prove too fine a point, to identify Immanuel with the promised Messiah of David’s house, and we had to fall back on some vaguer theory of him, finding him to be a personification, -either a representative of the coming generation of God’s people, or a type of the promised tomorrow, -the moral effect of the sign would remain the same; and it is with this alone that we have here to do. Be this an individual, or a generation, or an age, -by the Name bestowed upon it, it was to have been a glorious, God-inhabited age, generation, or individual, and Ahaz has prematurely spoiled everything about it but the Name. The future shall be like a boy cursed by his fathers, brought into the world with glorious rights that are stamped in his title, but only to find his kingdom and estates no longer in existence, and all the circumstances dissipated in which he might have realised the glorious meaning of his name. Type of innocent suffering, he is born to an empty title, his name the vestige of a great opportunity, the ironical monument of an irreparable crime. If Ahaz had any conscience left, we can imagine the effect of this upon him. To be punished for sin in one’s own body and fortune, this is sore enough; but to see heaven itself blackened and all the gracious future frustrate, this is unspeakably terrible. Ahaz is thus the Judas of the Old Testament, if that conception of Judas’ character be the right one which makes his wilful desire to bring about the kingdom of God in his own violent fashion the motive of his betrayal of Jesus. Of his own obduracy Ahaz has betrayed the Messiah and Deliverer of his people. The assurance of this betrayal is the sign of his obduracy, a signal and terrible proof of his irretrievable sin in calling upon the Assyrians. The king has been found wanting. II. THE PEOPLE (chapter 8) The king has been found wanting; but Isaiah will appeal to the people. Chapter 8 is a collection of addresses to them, as chapter 7 was an expostulation with their sovereign. The two chapters are contemporary. In Isaiah 8:1 , the narrative goes back upon itself, and returns to the situation as it was before Ahaz made his final resolution of reliance on Assyria. Isaiah 8:1-4 imply that the Assyrian has not yet been summoned by Ahaz to his assistance, and therefore run parallel to Isaiah 7:3-9 ; but Isaiah 8:5 and following verses sketch the evils that are to come upon Judah and Israel, consequent upon the arrival of the Assyrians in Palestine, in answer to the appeal of Ahaz. These evils for land and nation are threatened as absolutely to the people as they had been to the king. And then the people are thrown over, { Isaiah 8:14 } as the king had been; and Isaiah limits himself to his disciples ( Isaiah 8:16 )-the remnant that was foretold in chapter 6. This appeal from monarch to people is one of the most characteristic features of Isaiah’s ministry. Whatever be the matter committed to him, Isaiah is not allowed to rest till he has brought it home to the popular conscience; and however much he may be able to charge national disaster upon the folly of politicians or the obduracy of a king, it is the people whom he holds ultimately responsible. The statesman, according to Isaiah, cannot rise far above the level of his generation; the people set the fashion to their most autocratic rulers. This instinct for the popular conscience, this belief in the moral solidarity of a nation and their governors, was the motive of the most picturesque passages in Isaiah’s career, and inspired some of the keenest epigrams in which he conveyed the Divine truth. We have here a case in illustration. Isaiah had met Ahaz and his court "at the conduit of the upper pool, in the highway of the fuller’s field," preparing for the expected siege of the city, and had delivered to them the Lord’s message not to fear, for that Syria-Ephraim would certainly be destroyed. But that was not enough. It was now laid upon the prophet to make public and popular advertisement of the same truth. Isaiah was told to take a large, smooth board, and write thereon in the character used by the common people-"with the pen of a man"-as if it were the title to a prophecy, the compound word " Maher-shalal-hash-baz. " This was not only an intelligibly written, but a significantly sonorous, word-one of those popular cries in which the liveliest sensations are struck forth by the crowded, clashing letters, full to the dullest ears of rumours of war: "speed-spoil-hurry-prey." The interpretation of it was postponed, the prophet meantime taking two faithful witnesses to its publication. In a little a son was born to Isaiah, and to this child he transferred the noisy name. Then its explanation was given. The double word was the alarm of a couple of invasions. "Before the boy shall have knowledge to cry, My father, my mother, the riches of Damascus and the spoil of Samaria shall be carried away before the king of Assyria." So far nothing was told the people that had not been told their king; only the time of the overthrow of their two enemies was fixed with greater precision. At the most in a year, Damascus and Samaria would have fallen. The ground was already vibrating to the footfall of the northern hosts. The rapid political changes, which ensued in Palestine, are reflected on the broken surface of this eighth chapter. We shall not understand these abrupt and dislocated oracles, uttered at short intervals during the two years of the Assyrian campaign, unless we realise that northern shadow passing and repassing over Judah and Israel, and the quick alternations of pride and penitence in the peoples beneath it. We need not try to thread the verses on any line of thought. Logical connection among them there is none. Let us at once get down into the currents of popular feeling, in which Isaiah, having left Ahaz, is now labouring, and casting forth these cries. It is a period of powerful currents, a people wholly in drift, and the strongest man of them arrested only by a firm pressure of the Lord’s hand. "For Jehovah spake thus to me with a strong hand, and instructed me, that I should not walk in the way of this people." The character of the popular movement, "the way of this people," which nearly lifted Isaiah off his feet, is evident. It is that into which every nation drifts, who have just been loosened from a primitive faith in God, and by fear or ambition have been brought under the fascination of the great world. On the one hand, such a generation is apt to seek the security of its outward life in things materially large and splendid, to despise as paltry its old religious forms, national aspirations and achievements, and be very desirous to follow foreign fashion and rival foreign wealth. On the other hand, the religious spirit of such an age, withdrawn from its legitimate objects, seeks satisfaction in petty and puerile practices, demeaning itself spiritually, in a way that absurdly contrasts with the grandeur of its material ambitions. Such a stage in the life of a people has its analogy in the growth of the individual, when the boy, new to the world, by affecting the grandest companions and models, assumes an ambitious manner, with contempt for his former circumstances, yet inwardly remains credulous, timid, and liable to panic. Isaiah reveals that it was such a stage which both the kingdoms of Israel had now reached. "This people hath refused the waters of Shiloah, that go softly, and rejoice in Rezin and Remaliah’s son." It was natural, that when the people of Judah contrasted their own estate with that of Assyria, or even of Damascus, they should despise themselves. For what was Judah?