The Mystery of Ephraim

This chapter deals with the second Being in the Godhead, which the house of Judah hasn’t come to term with; it is composed of God the Father and God the Son, but the Jews couldn’t see nor could identify the Son which is all over in the Scriptures, especially the Torah and the Prophets; and here in Isaiah 49 and 50.

Isaiah 49

¹ “Listen, O isles, unto Me, and hearken, ye people from afar! The Lord hath called Me from the womb; from the bowels of My mother hath He made mention of My name. — Listen, O isles, unto me; these are not the words of Cyrus, nor of the Prophet Isaiah, but of the Son, the Messiah or Christ, calling upon the inhabitants of the isles to hearken to him; by whom are meant the inhabitants of islands properly so called, probably of the house of Israel;

— “Isles” as before stand vaguely for “far off countries.” The invitation is addressed to the nations far and wide.

² And He hath made My mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of His hand hath He hid Me, and made Me a polished shaft. In His quiver hath He hid Me, — and he hath made my mouth like a sharp sword; or “he hath put his words in my mouth as a sharp sword,” as the Targum says; namely, the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, the Logos, and is sharper than a two-edged sword and is said to come out of the mouth of the Son of God; Prophet Isaiah couldn’t have fulfilled this.

³ and said unto Me, ‘Thou art My servant, O Israel, in whom I will be glorified.’

⁴ Then I said, ‘I have labored in vain; I have spent My strength for nought and in vain; yet surely My judgement is with the Lord, and My work with My God.’” — yet surely my judgement is with the Lord; this indicates that below the Lord, the Highest, which could only being the Father, someone else is making judgement and who else except the Son?

— or is manifest before the Lord, as the Targum says; the Lord knew that he had called him to his office; how prudently, diligently and faithfully he had executed it; and what was his right and due and which would be given him; and with this he corrects his former complaint and makes himself easy and quiets and satisfies his mind.

⁵ “And now saith the Lord that formed Me from the womb to be His servant, to bring Jacob again to Him, though Israel be not gathered—yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord, and My God shall be My strength” — who could “bring Jacob again to Him” that is, to confirm them in the worship of the true God; except someone of a high level in rank; not Cyrus, not prophet Isaiah, not any human; it’s an enormous task pointing that this Being is no one else except the Son.

⁶ and He said: ‘It is a light thing that Thou shouldest be My servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved of Israel. I will also give Thee for a light to the Gentiles, that Thou mayest be My salvation unto the end of the earth.’” — “a light to the Gentiles” and not an enforcer of Israel’s systems and values upon the Gentiles however how good they think they are, such as democracy, human rights and others but only as a light to the Gentiles.

⁷ Thus saith the Lord, the Redeemer of Israel, and His Holy One, to Him whom man despiseth, to Him whom the nation abhorreth, to a Servant of rulers: “Kings shall see and arise, princes also shall worship, because of the Lord who is faithful, and the Holy One of Israel; and He shall choose Thee.” — to him whom man despises; to Yeshua, the Son of God, to whom in the days of his flesh; this description most truly and fully agreed with that Isaiah 53:3, for men, both Jews and Gentiles, among whom he lived, did despise him from their hearts.

⁸ Thus saith the Lord: “In an acceptable time have I heard Thee, and in a day of salvation have I helped Thee; and I will preserve Thee and give Thee for a covenant of the people, to establish the earth, to cause to inherit the desolate heritages, — thus saith the Lord; these are the words of God the Father to his Son continued;

⁹ that Thou mayest say to the prisoners, ‘Go forth,’ to them that are in darkness, ‘Show yourselves.’ “They shall feed on the paths, and their pastures shall be in all high places. — show yourselves; among the people of God in his house of his laws, statutes and ordinances when called, converted and enlightened by his spirits;

— or “be revealed” or manifested when they are known to be, what they have not known before the people and children of God. The Targum says, “be revealed to the light.”

¹⁰ They shall not hunger nor thirst, neither shall the heat nor sun smite them; for He that hath mercy on them shall lead them, even by the springs of water shall He guide them. — they shall not hunger nor thirst; all their needs shall be abundantly provided for as a Shepherd will provide for his flock. 

¹¹ And I will make all My mountains a way, and My highways shall be exalted. — mountains a way; God will remove all obstructions out of the way.

¹² Behold, these shall come from far—and lo, these from the north and from the west, and these from the land of Sinim.” — the western countries known to the Hebrews were some of the islands of that sea and a few of the maritime regions; probably referring to where the house of Israel had been taken to; they shall return;

— from the land of Sinim; there have been many different opinions in regard to the ‘land of Sinim’ – the Targum version renders it as land of the south in general; Isti de terra Australi; others, like Ptolemy and Gesenius say the country here referred to is Sina or China; both qualify as “these shall come from far.”

— Sinim; the Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary says “the Arabians and other Asians called China Sin, or Tchin; the Chinese had no special name for themselves, but either adopted that of the reigning dynasty or some high-sounding titles. This view of “Sinim” suits the context which requires a people to be meant “from far,” and distinct from those “from the north and from the west” [Gesenius].

¹³ Sing, O heavens, and be joyful, O earth! And break forth into singing, O mountains! For the Lord hath comforted His people, and will have mercy upon His afflicted. — Sing, O heavens; as in Isaiah 44:23, all nature is invited to join in the chorus of praise for the (1) deliverance of Israel; and (2) of the nations.

¹⁴ But Zion said, “The Lord hath forsaken me, and my Lord hath forgotten me.”

¹⁵ “Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee. — “Does a woman forget her sucking child, so as not to have compassion upon the child of her womb? –

¹⁶ Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of My hands; thy walls are continually before Me. — even though mothers should forget, I will not forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls stand continually before me.”

¹⁷ Thy children shall make haste; thy destroyers and they that made thee waste shall go forth from thee. — MSG “Can a mother forget the infant at her breast, walk away from the baby she bore? But even if mothers forget, I’d never forget you—never. Look, I’ve written your names on the backs of my hands. The walls you’re rebuilding are never out of my sight. Your builders are faster than your wreckers. The demolition crews are gone for good. Look up, look around, look well! See them all gathering, coming to you? As sure as I am the living God”—God’s Decree— “you’re going to put them on like so much jewellery, you’re going to use them to dress up like a bride.

¹⁸ Lift up thine eyes round about and behold; all these gather themselves together and come to thee. As I live,” saith the Lord, “thou shalt surely clothe thee with them all as with an ornament, and bind them on thee as a bride doeth. — all these, to wit, the Gentiles as sufficiently appear from what hath been already said and from that which follow. The sense is, thy kingdom shall not only be restored and established in Jerusalem but it shall be vastly enlarged and adorned by the accession of the Gentiles to it.

¹⁹ For thy waste and thy desolate places and the land of thy destruction shall even now be too narrow by reason of the inhabitants, and they that swallowed thee up shall be far away. — and they that swallowed thee up; the enemies that laid waste thy land and that “absorbed,” as it were thy inhabitants and removed them to a distant land; they shall be all gone and the land shall smile again in prosperity and in loveliness.

²⁰ The children whom thou shalt have, after thou hast lost the other, shall say again in thine ears, ‘The place is too narrow for me; give place to me that I may dwell.’ — the place is too strait for me; there is not room for us all; this is indicative of such an increase as took place when the return of the exiles and shall yet more abundantly than any time before that they will call for more land to dwell in.

²¹ Then shalt thou say in thine heart, ‘Who hath begotten me these, seeing I have lost my children and am desolate, a captive and removing to and fro? And who hath brought up these? Behold, I was left alone; these, where had they been?’” — NOG Then you will ask yourself, “Who has fathered these children for me? I was childless and unable to have children. I was exiled and rejected. Who raised these children for me? I was left alone. Where have they come from?”

— MSG “And your ruined land? Your devastated, decimated land? Filled with more people than you know what to do with! And your barbarian enemies, a fading memory. The children born in your exile will be saying, ‘It’s getting too crowded here. I need more room.’ And you’ll say to yourself, ‘Where on earth did these children come from? I lost everything, had nothing, was exiled and penniless. So who reared these children? How did these children get here?’”

²² Thus saith the Lord God: “Behold, I will lift up Mine hand to the Gentiles, and set up My standard to the people; and they shall bring thy sons in their arms, and thy daughters shall be carried upon their shoulders. — bring … sons in … arms; the Gentiles shall aid in restoring Israel to its own land (Isa 60:4; 66:20). Children able to support themselves are carried on the shoulders from the East; but infants in the arms or astride on one haunch (Isa 60:12). “Thy sons” must be distinct from “the Gentiles,” who carry them; and therefore cannot primarily refer to converts among the Gentiles;

— another interpretation: behold, I will lift up mine hand to the Gentiles; to lift up the hand is a sign of beckoning to, or inviting; and the idea here is that God would call the Gentiles to partake of the blessings of the true religion and to embrace the Messiah (see also Isaiah 11:11; could this time period coincide with Ezekiel 390/40 years?)

²³ And kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and their queens thy nursing mothers: They shall bow down to thee with their face toward the earth, and lick up the dust of thy feet. And thou shalt know that I am the Lord, for they shall not be ashamed that wait for Me.” — and kings shall be thy nursing fathers and their queens thy nursing mothers; who shall show favour and respect to the elect of God, grant them liberty and protect and defend them in their religious privileges:

— and since the Messiah is the King of kings, and Lord of lords; so this is to be understood not figuratively of apostles and other shepherds who are kings and priests unto God and who feed the church with the milk of the word and the breasts of ordinances; but literally also as kings and queens of the earth;

— and is thought to have had its fulfilment, at least in part in Cyrus, Ahasuerus, Esther and others; but more so as priestly kings and queens as Ezra and Nehemiah, Zerubbabel and others; and will have a far greater accomplishment in the latter day glory;

²⁴ Shall the prey be taken from the mighty, or the lawful captive delivered?

²⁵ But thus saith the Lord: “Even the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the prey of the terrible shall be delivered; for I will contend with him that contendeth with thee, and I will save thy children. — We were lawful captives to the justice of God, yet delivered by a price of unspeakable value. Here is an express promise: Even the prey of the terrible shall be delivered;

— we may view God’s enemies deprived of his prey, bound and cast into the pit; and all the powers that have combined to enslave, persecute or corrupt the church are destroyed; that all the earth may know that our Saviour and Redeemer is Yehovah, the Mighty One of Jacob. And every effort we make to rescue our fellow-sinners from the bondage of God’s enemies is, in some degree, helping forward that great change.

²⁶ And I will feed them that oppress thee with their own flesh, and they shall be drunken with their own blood as with sweet wine. And all flesh shall know that I, the Lord, am thy Savior and thy Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.” — MSG Can plunder be retrieved from a giant, prisoners of war gotten back from a tyrant? But God says, “Even if a giant grips the plunder and a tyrant holds my people prisoner, I’m the one who’s on your side, defending your cause, rescuing your children. And your enemies, crazed and desperate, will turn on themselves, killing each other in a frenzy of self-destruction. Then everyone will know that I, God, have saved you—I, the Mighty One of Jacob.”

Isaiah 50

¹ Thus saith the Lord: “Where is the bill of your mother’s divorcement, whom I have put away? Or which of My creditors is it to whom I have sold you? Behold, for your iniquities have ye sold yourselves, and for your transgressions is your mother put away. — where is the bill of your mother’s divorcement? – God speaks of himself as the husband of his people, as having married his chosen to himself, denoting the tender affection which he had for his people;

— ye have sold yourselves; that is, you have gone into captivity on account of your sins. It has been your own act and you have thus become bondmen to a foreign power only by your own choice; is your mother put away; retaining the figure respecting divorce; the nation has been rejected and suffered to go into exile on account of its transgressions.

² Why, when I came, was there no man? When I called, was there none to answer? Is My hand shortened at all, that it cannot redeem? Or have I no power to deliver? Behold, at My rebuke I dry up the sea, I make the rivers a wilderness; their fish stink because there is no water, and dieth for thirst. — wherefore, when I came, was there no man? – that is, when I came to call you to repentance, why was there no man of the nation to yield obedience? the Targum says, “why have I sent my prophets, and they are not converted?”

— when I called, was there none to answer? – none obeyed or regarded my voice. It was not, therefore, by his fault that they had been punished but it was because they did not listen to the messengers which God had sent unto them;

— is my hand shortened at all? – it was not because God was unable to save that they had been thus punished. The hand is an emblem of strength as it is the instrument by which we accomplish our purposes. To shorten the hand, that is, to cut it off, is an emblem of diminishing or destroying our ability to execute any purpose (see Isaiah 59:1). So in Numbers 11:23 : ‘Is the Lord’s hand waxed short?’

— behold, at my rebuke I dry up the sea; he was able to do it and did do it for the children of Israel and made a passage through the Red Sea for them as on dry land; which was done by a strong east wind he caused to blow, here called his “rebuke” Exodus 14:20.

³ I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering. — God clothe the heavens with blackness; with gross and thick darkness; perhaps referring to the three days’ darkness the Egyptians were in, Exodus 10:12, or with thick and black clouds, as in tempestuous weather frequently; or by eclipses of the sun; there was an extraordinary instance of great darkness at the time of Christ’s crucifixion, Matthew 27:45.

⁴ “The Lord God hath given Me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary. He wakeneth morning by morning; He wakeneth Mine ear to hear as the learned. — the tongue of the learned; the tongue of those who are instructed;’ that is of the eloquent; or the tongue of instruction (παιδείας paideias, Septuagint); that is, he has qualified me to instruct others; it means that on the subject of religion he was eminently endowed with intelligence and with eloquence;

— He waken me morning by morning; that is, he wakens me every morning early; from an instructor who awakens his pupils early in order that they may receive instruction. The idea is that the Redeemer would be eminently endowed under the divine instruction and guidance for his work; he would be one who was, so to speak, in the school of God; and who would be qualified to impart instruction to others.

⁵ The Lord God hath opened Mine ear, and I was not rebellious, neither turned away back. — hath opened mine ear; hath revealed unto me; or rathe, hath given me a power and will to hear and receive his commands as this phrase is used, Psalm 40:6 Isaiah 35:5.

⁶ I gave My back to the smiters and My cheeks to them that plucked off the hair; I hid not My face from shame and spitting. — I gave my back to the smiters; I submitted willingly to be scourged or whipped; this is one prophecy which can be applied to no other one but the Messiah; it was literally fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ (Matthew 27:26; compare Luke 18:33).

⁷ For the Lord God will help Me, therefore shall I not be confounded; therefore have I set My face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be ashamed. — For, or rather, but as this is better rendered; the Lord God will help me; though as a man I am weak and inconsiderable yet God will strengthen me to go through my great and hard suffering.

⁸ He is near that justifieth Me. Who will contend with Me? Let us stand together. Who is Mine adversary? Let him come near to Me. — He is near that justifies me; His Father was “near” him in his whole state of humiliation; he left him not alone; he was at his right hand and therefore he was not moved;

— and “justified” him from all the false charges they brought against him and from all the sins of his people that were upon him; these he took upon him and bore them, upon which he was acquitted; and which is evident by his resurrection from the dead, by his ascension to heaven and session at the right hand of God.

⁹ Behold, the Lord God will help Me. Who is he that shall condemn Me? Lo, they all shall wax old as a garment; the moth shall eat them up. — they all shall wax old; all my enemies shall pass away as a garment is worn out and cast aside; the idea is that the Messiah would survive all their attacks; his cause, his truth and his reputation would live while all the power, the influence, the reputation of his adversaries, would vanish as a garment that is worn out and then thrown away.

¹⁰ “Who is among you that feareth the Lord, that obeyeth the voice of His Servant, that walketh in darkness and hath no light? Let him trust in the name of the Lord, and stay upon his God. — the persons addressed in this call to faith are ‘those who fear the Lord,’ and ‘obey the voice of His Servant.’ It is implied that these two things are necessarily connected so that obedience to Son, the Messiah is the test of true religion for the fear of the Lord does not exist where the word of the Son is neglected or rejected; but those that truly fear God, obey the voice of his Son.

¹¹ Behold, all ye that kindle a fire, that compass yourselves about with sparks! Walk in the light of your fire and in the sparks that ye have kindled. This shall ye have from Mine hand: ye shall lie down in sorrow. — behold, all ye that kindle a fire; this refers to the wicked; in times of darkness and calamity, instead of trusting in God they would confide in their own resources and endeavor to kindle a light for themselves in which they might walk; but the result would be that they would find no comfort and would ultimately under his hand lie down in sorrow;

— the phrase, ‘that kindle a fire,’ refers to all the plans which people form with reference to their own salvation; all which they rely upon to guide them through the darkness of this world; it may include all the schemes of human philosophy, of false religion, of paganism, of infidelity, deism and self-righteousness; all dependence on their own good works or charities ties. All these are false lights which people enkindle, in order to guide themselves when they resolve to cast off God and to resist his spirit.

~ by Joel Huan on April 6, 2022.

Posted in Isaiah