Bibelkommentare

This chapter is designed for the comfort and encouragement of those that fear God and keep his commandments, even when they walk in darkness and have no light. Whether it was intended primarily for the support of the captives in Babylon is not certain, probably it was; but comforts thus generally expressed ought not to be so confined. Whenever the church of God is in distress her friends and well-wishers may comfort themselves and one another with these words, I. That God, who raised his church at first out of nothing, will take care that it shall not perish, Isa 51:1-3. II. That the righteousness and salvation he designs for his church are sure and near, very near and very sure, Isa 51:4-6. III. That the persecutors of the church are weak and dying creatures, Isa 51:7,8. IV. That the same power which did wonders for the church formerly is now engaged and employed for her protection and deliverance, Isa 51:9-11. V. That God himself, the Maker of the world, had undertaken both to deliver his people out of their distress and to comfort them under it, and sent his prophet to assure them of it, Isa 51:12-16. VI. That, deplorable as the condition of the church now was (Isa 51:17-20), to the same woeful circumstances her persecutors and oppressors should shortly be reduced, and worse, Isa 51:21-23. The first three paragraphs of this chapter begin with, "Hearken unto me," and they are God's people that are all along called to hearken; for even when comforts are spoken to them sometimes they "hearken not, through anguish of spirit" (Ex 6:9); therefore they are again and again called to hearken, Isa 51:1,4,7. The two other paragraphs of this chapter begin with "Awake, awake;" in the former (Isa 51:9) God's people call upon him to awake and help them; in the latter, Isa 51:17. God calls upon them to awake and help themselves.

This chapter, together with Isaiah 52:1-12, is one connected portion, and injury has been done by separating it. It is a part of Isaiah of exquisite beauty, and is a most suitable introduction to the important portion which follows Isaiah 52:13-15; Isaiah 53:1-12 respecting the Messiah. This is designed chiefly to comfort the Jews in their exile. They are regarded as in Babylon near the close of their captivity, and as earnestly desiring to be rescued. It is somewhat dramatic in its character, and is made up of alternate addresses of God and his people - the one urging the strong language of consolation, and the other fervent petitions for deliverance. The following analysis will give a correct view of the chapter:

I. God addresses them in the language of consolation, and directs them to remember the founder of their nation, and assures them that he is able also to deliver them Isaiah 51:1-3.

1. He speaks of them as pious, and as seeking the Lord Isaiah 51:1.

2. They were to remember Abraham and Sarah - the quarry, so to speak, from which the nation had been hewed; they were to remember how feeble they were, and yet how God had made a great nation of them, and to feel assured that God was equally able to conduct them forth and to multiply them into a great nation Isaiah 51:1-2.

3. A direct promise that God would comfort Zion, and make it like Eden Isaiah 51:3.

II. God calls upon his people to hearken to him, with the assurance that he would extend the true religion even to the Gentile world, and that his salvation should be more permanent than were the heavens Isaiah 51:4-6.

1. He would make his religion a light to the Jewish people Isaiah 51:4. Though now in darkness, yet they should be brought forth into light.

2. He would extend it to the isles - to the pagan world Isaiah 51:5.

3. It should be everlasting. The heavens should grow old and vanish, but his salvation should not be abolished Isaiah 51:6.

III. God assures them that they have no reason to despond on account of the number and power of their enemies. However mighty they were, yet they should be consumed as the moth eats up a garment, and as the worm consumes wool Isaiah 51:7-8.

IV. The people are introduced as calling upon God, and as beseeching him to interpose as he had done in former times in their behalf Isaiah 51:9-10. In this appeal they refer to what God had done in former periods when he cut Rahab, that is, Egypt, in pieces, and delivered his people, and they cry to him to interpose in like manner again, and to deliver them.

V. To this petition Yahweh replies Isaiah 51:11-16 He assures them -

1. That his redeemed shall return with joy and triumph Isaiah 51:11.

2. He that had made the heavens was their comforter, and they had nothing to fear from man, or the fury of any oppressor Isaiah 51:12-13.

3. The captive exile was soon to be unloosed, and they hastened that they might be restored; that is, it would soon occur Isaiah 51:14.

4. Yahweh, who had divided the sea, was their protector. He had given them a solemn promise, and he had covered his people with the shadow of his hand, and he would defend them Isaiah 51:15-16.

VI. The chapter closes with a direct address to Jerusalem, and with assurances that it shall be rebuilt, and that it would he no more visited with such calamities Isaiah 51:17-23.

1. The calamities of Jerusalem are enumerated. She had drunk the cup of the fury of Yahweh; she had been forsaken of those who were qualified to guide her; desolation and destruction had therefore come upon her; her sons had fainted in the streets, and had drunk of the fury of God Isaiah 51:17-20.

2. God promises deliverance. She was drunken, but not with wine. God had taken out of her hand the cup of trembling, and she should no more drink it again; he would put that cup into the hand of those who had afflicted her, and they should drink it Isaiah 51:21-23.

The prophet exhorts the children of Abraham to trust in the Lord; and briefly, but beautifully, describes the great blessedness which should be the consequence, Isaiah 51:1-3. Then, turning to the Gentiles, encourages them to look for a portion in the same salvation, Isaiah 51:4, Isaiah 51:5; the everlasting duration of which is majestically described, Isaiah 51:6. And as it is everlasting, so is it sure to the righteous, notwithstanding all the machinations of their enemies, Isaiah 51:7, Isaiah 51:8. The faithful, then, with exultation and joy, lift their voices, reminding God of his wondrous works of old, which encourage them to look now for the like glorious accomplishment of these promises, Isaiah 51:9-11. In answer to this the Divinity is introduced comforting them under their trials, and telling them that the deliverer was already on his way to save and to establish them, Isaiah 51:12-16. On this the prophet turns to Jerusalem to comfort and congratulate her on so joyful a prospect. She is represented, by a bold image, as a person lying in the streets, under the intoxicating effects of the cup of the Divine wrath, without a single person from among her own people appointed to give her consolation, and trodden under the feet of her enemies; but, in the time allotted by the Divine providence, the cup of trembling shall be taken out of her hand, and put into that of her oppressors; and she shall drink it no more again for ever, Isaiah 51:17-22.

INTRODUCTION TO Isaiah 51

This chapter gives the church and people of God reason to expect comfortable times and certain salvation, though they had many enemies. They are directed to look to Abraham and Sarah, signified by the rock and hole of the pit, and observe how he was called alone, blessed and increased; which should be improved as an argument to strengthen their faith, that God could and would bless and increase his church, though in a low estate, and bring it into a flourishing one, Isaiah 51:1. They are assured of the publication of the Gospel, expressed by the law, doctrine, and judgment of the Lord; by which means the righteousness and salvation of Christ should be brought nigh to them, as the object of their trust and confidence, Isaiah 51:4, and also of the perpetuity of his righteousness and salvation, when the heavens, and the earth, and the inhabitants of it, should decay, even their revilers and persecutors, and therefore they need not fear their reproaches and revilings, Isaiah 51:6, upon which follows a prayer of faith, that the Lord would exert his power as in former times, when he destroyed the Egyptians, and dried up the Red sea for Israel to pass through, the ransomed of the Lord; from whence it might be concluded, that the redeemed of the Lord would be brought into a very comfortable condition again, Isaiah 51:9 wherefore they had no reason to be afraid of men, since the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth, would deliver, comfort, and establish them, of which he assured them by his prophet, Isaiah 51:12, and though Jerusalem and her sons were, or would be, in a very distressed condition, through the sword and famine, which is described, Isaiah 51:17, yet they should be delivered out of it, and their persecutors should be brought into the same, Isaiah 51:21.

Isa 51:1-23.

ENCOURAGEMENT TO THE FAITHFUL REMNANT OF ISRAEL TO TRUST IN GOD FOR DELIVERANCE, BOTH FROM THEIR LONG BABYLONIAN EXILE, AND FROM THEIR PRESENT DISPERSION.

1. me--the God of your fathers.

ye . . . follow after righteousness--the godly portion of the nation;

Isa 51:7

shows this

(Pr 15:9; 1Ti 6:11).

"Ye follow righteousness," seek it therefore from Me, who "bring it near," and that a righteousness "not about to be abolished"

(Isa 51:6, 7);

look to Abraham, your father

(Isa 51:2),

as a sample of how righteousness before Me is to be obtained; I, the same God who blessed him, will bless you at last

(Isa 51:3);

therefore trust in Me, and fear not man's opposition

(Isa 51:7, 8, 12, 13).

The mistake of the Jews, heretofore, has been, not in that they "followed after righteousness," but in that they followed it "by the works of the law," instead of "by faith," as Abraham did

(Ro 9:31, 32; 10:3, 4; 4:2-5).

hole of . . . pit--The idea is not, as it is often quoted, the inculcation of humility, by reminding men of the fallen state from which they have been taken, but that as Abraham, the quarry, as it were (compare

Isa 48:1),

whence their nation was hewn, had been called out of a strange land to the inheritance of Canaan, and blessed by God, the same God is able to deliver and restore them also (compare

Mt 3:9).

Hearken unto me - That is, to the God of their fathers, who now addresses them. They are regarded as in exile and bondage, and as desponding in regard to their prospects. In this situation, God, or perhaps more properly the Messiah (compare the notes at Isaiah 1), is introduced as addressing them with the assurances of deliverance.

Ye that follow after righteousness - This is addressed evidently to those who sought to be righteous, and who truly feared the Lord. There was a portion of the nation that continued faithful to Yahweh. They still loved and worshipped him in exile, and they were anxiously looking for deliverance and for a return to their own land.

Look unto the rock whence ye are hewn - To Abraham the founder of the nation. The figure is taken from the act of quarrying stone for the purposes of building; and the essential idea here is, that God had formed the nation from the beginning, as a mason constructs a building; that he had, so to speak, taken the materials rough and unhewn from the very quarry; that he had shaped, and fitted them, and moulded them into an edifice. The idea is not that their origin was dishonorable or obscure. It is not that Abraham was not an honored ancestor, or that they should be ashamed of the founder of their nation. But the idea is, that God had had the entire moulding of the nation; that he had taken Abraham and Sarah from a distant land, and bad formed them into a great people and nation for his own purpose. The argument is, that he who had done this was able to raise them up from captivity, and make them again a great people. Probably allusion is made to this passage by the Saviour in Matthew 3:9, where he says, 'For I say unto you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham.'

The hole of the pit - The word rendered 'hole' means such an excavation as men make who are taking stones from a quarry. It expresses substantially the same idea as the previous member of the verse. This language is sometimes addressed to Christians, with a view to produce humility by reminding them that they have been taken by God from a state of sin, and raised up, as it were, from a deep and dark pit of pollution. But this is not the sense of the passage, nor will it bear such an application. It may be used to denote that God has taken them, as stone is taken from the quarry; that he found them in their natural state as unhewn blocks of marble are; that he has moulded and formed them by his own agency, and fitted them into his spiritual temple; and that they owe all the beauty and grace of their Christian deportment to him; that this is an argument to prove that he who had done so much for them as to transform them, so to speak, from rough and unsightly blocks to polished stones, fitted for his spiritual temple on earth, is able to keep them still, and to fit them for his temple above. Such is the argument in the passage before us; and such a use of it is, of course, perfectly legitimate and fair.

Ye that follow after righteousness - The people who, feeling the want of salvation, seek the Lord in order to be justified.

The rock - Abraham.

The hole of the pit - Sarah; as explained in Isaiah 51:2.

Hearken unto me, ye that follow after righteousness,.... After having declared the doom of the wicked, and those that trust to their own righteousness, the Lord returns to them that fear him, whom he describes as such that "follow after righteousness"; not the righteousness of the law, it is the character of carnal Israel to follow after that; nor is that attainable in the way it is pursued by such; nor is there any justification by it; nor is following that consistent with seeking the Lord, in the next clause: but the righteousness of Christ is meant; not his essential righteousness as God; nor the righteousness of his office as Mediator; but that which consists of his active and passive obedience; of which he is the author and giver, and is in him as its subject: this is what is commonly called imputed righteousness, an evangelical one, the righteousness of faith, and is justifying: "following after" this supposes a want of one; a sense of that want; a view of this as out of themselves, and in another; a love and liking of it, and a vehement desire for it; and what determines to an eager pursuit of it are its perfection, suitableness, and use: now such persons are called to hearken to the Lord; to the Word of the Lord, as the Targum; to Christ, to his Gospel, and to his ordinances, particularly to what is after said:

ye that seek the Lord: the Lord Christ, for life and salvation; for righteousness and strength; for more grace from him; a greater knowledge of him, and of doctrine from him, as the Targum; and more communion with him; that seek his honour and glory in the world, and to be for ever with him; who seek first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; that seek him where he may be found, affectionately and sincerely, carefully, diligently, constantly, and for everything they want:

look unto the rock whence ye are hewn; which is in the next verse interpreted of Abraham; so called, not so much for the strength of his faith, as for his old age; when he looked like a hard dry rock, from whom no issue could be expected; and yet from hence a large number of stones were hewn, or a race of men sprung:

and to the hole of the pit whence ye are digged; that is, to Sarah, who was for a long time barren, whose womb was shut up, but afterwards opened; and from whom, as from a cistern, (to which a wife is sometimes compared, Proverbs 5:15) flowed the waters of Judah, Isaiah 48:1 or the Jewish nation. Jerom thinks Christ is meant by both, the Rock of ages, in whom is everlasting strength; to whom men are to look for salvation, righteousness, and strength; and out of whose pierced side flowed blood and water: and in this sense he is followed by Cocceius, who interprets the rock of Christ, the Rock of salvation; out of whose side flowed the church, as out of the hole of a pit or cistern.