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This chapter is a prediction of the carrying away of multitudes both of the Egyptians and the Ethiopians into captivity by the king of Assyria. Here is, I. The sign by which this was foretold, which was the prophet's going for some time barefoot and almost naked, like a poor captive, Isa 20:1,2. II. The explication of that sign, with application to Egypt and Ethiopia, Isa 20:3-5. III. The good use which the people of God should make of this, which is never to trust in an arm of flesh, because thus it will deceive them, Isa 20:6.

This prophecy occupies this single chapter. Its design and scope it is not difficult to understand. The time when it was delivered is designated in Isaiah 20:1, and was manifestly in the reign of Hezekiah. The Assyrian empire had extended its conquests over Syria, Damascus, and Ephraim or Samaria 2 Kings 18:9-12. The king of Assyria lied sent Tartan to take possession of Ashdod, or Azotus, the maritime key of Palestine, and there was evident danger that the Assyrians would overthrow the government of Judah, and secure also the conquest of Egypt. In these circumstances of danger, the main reliance of Judah was on the aid which they hoped to derive from Egypt and Ethiopia Isaiah 20:5, as being alone able to repel the Assyrians. They relied rather on that aid than on God. To "recall" them from this, and to show them the vanity of such a dependence, and to lead them to rely on God, Isaiah was sent to them to be a sign; or to indicate by a symbolic action what would be the fate of the Egyptians on whom they were placing their reliance Isaiah 20:4. By showing the Jews what would be the destiny of Egypt, he designed to withdraw them from resting on their assistance, and to turn them to God for protection and aid.

The Prophet Isaiah a sign to Egypt and Cush or Ethiopia, that the captives and exiles of these countries shall be indignantly treated by the king of Assyria, Isaiah 20:1-6.

Tartan besieged Ashdod or Azotus, which probably belonged at this time to Hezekiah's dominions; see 2 Kings 18:8. The people expected to be relieved by the Cushites of Arabia and by the Egyptians. Isaiah was ordered to go uncovered, that is, without his upper garment, the rough mantle commonly worn by the prophets, (see Zechariah 13:4), probably three days to show that within three years the town should be taken, after the defeat of the Cushites and Egyptians by the king of Assyria, which event should make their case desperate, and induce them to surrender. Azotus was a strong place; it afterwards held out twenty-nine years against Psammitichus, king of Egypt, Herod. 2:157. Tartan was one of Sennacherib's generals, 2 Kings 18:17, and Tirhakah, king of the Cushites, was in alliance with the king of Egypt against Sennacherib. These circumstances make it probable that by Sargon is meant Sennacherib. It might be one of the seven names by which Jerome, on this place, says he was called. He is called Sacherdonus and Sacherdan in the book of Tobit. The taking of Azotus must have happened before Sennacherib's attempt on Jerusalem; when he boasted of his late conquests, Isaiah 37:25. And the warning of the prophet had a principal respect to the Jews also, who were too much inclined to depend upon the assistance of Egypt. As to the rest history and chronology affording us no light, it may be impossible to clear either this or any other hypothesis, which takes Sargon to be Shalmaneser or Asarhaddon, etc., from all difficulties. - L. Kimchi says, this happened in the fourteenth year of Hezekiah.

INTRODUCTION TO Isaiah 20

This chapter contains a prophecy of the destruction of the Egyptians and Ethiopians by the Assyrians, which had been prophesied of separately in the two preceding chapters Isaiah 18:1, and now conjunctly in this: the time of it is given, Isaiah 20:1 the sign of it, the prophet's walking naked, and barefoot, Isaiah 20:2 the explanation and accommodation of the sign to the captivity of Egypt and Ethiopia, Isaiah 20:3 the use of this to the Jews, and the effect it had upon them; shame for their trust and dependence on the above nations, and despair of deliverance from the Assyrians by their means, Isaiah 20:5.

Ch. 20. An Assyrian conquest of Egypt and Ethiopia predicted

The chapter is unique amongst Isaiah’s discourses as giving the interpretation of a very remarkable symbolic action performed by the prophet at the command of Jehovah. For three years he went about in the garb of a beggar or captive, an object of astonishment and derision to the respectable inhabitants of Jerusalem. At the end of that time he published this explanation of his strange conduct. It was a public protest against the false hopes then entertained of a speedy deliverance from the Assyrian tyranny through the help of Egypt and Ethiopia (Isaiah 20:6).

The date of the prophecy is assured. The expedition mentioned in Isaiah 20:1 took place in 711, and is minutely related in two of Sargon’s own inscriptions (see Schrader, Cuneiform Inscriptions, Vol. ii., pp. 89ff. [Engl. Trans.]). At that time Ashdod was the focus of disaffection in Palestine towards the Assyrian government. Its king, Azuri, had withheld his tribute and joined with the princes of the neighbouring states (Judah included) in an appeal to Egypt for succour. For this he was deposed by Sargon, his brother Akhimit being set up in his place; but Akhimit was in turn removed by the Ashdodites, who chose one Yaman as their leader. Sargon then sent his commander-in-chief against Ashdod; the city was taken and plundered and its inhabitants led into captivity. Yaman had fled to the king of Meluḥḥa, but was delivered up to the Assyrian king. Sargon’s forces seem to have been too much occupied elsewhere to allow the work of chastisement to be carried further, and so for the time Judah escaped the penalty of its meditated revolt.

The chapter is important as shewing that at this date Isaiah still looked forward to a great extension of the Assyrian conquests.

Isa 20:1-6.

CONTINUATION OF THE SUBJECT OF THE NINETEENTH CHAPTER, BUT AT A LATER DATE. CAPTIVITY OF EGYPT AND ETHIOPIA.

In the reign of Sargon (722-715 B.C.), the successor of Shalmaneser, an Assyrian invasion of Egypt took place. Its success is here foretold, and hence a party among the Jews is warned of the folly of their "expectation" of aid from Egypt or Ethiopia. At a later period

(Isa 18:1-7),

when Tirhakah of Ethiopia was their ally, the Ethiopians are treated as friends, to whom God announces the overthrow of the common Assyrian foe, Sennacherib. Egypt and Ethiopia in this chapter

(Isa 20:3, 4)

are represented as allied together, the result no doubt of fear of the common foe; previously they had been at strife, and the Ethiopian king had, just before Sethos usurpation, withdrawn from occupation of part of Lower Egypt. Hence, "Egypt" is mentioned alone in

Isa 19:1-25,

which refers to a somewhat earlier stage of the same event: a delicate mark of truth. Sargon seems to have been the king who finished the capture of Samaria which Shalmaneser began; the alliance of Hoshea with So or Sabacho II of Ethiopia, and his refusal to pay the usual tribute, provoked Shalmaneser to the invasion. On clay cylindrical seals found in Sennacherib's palace at Koyunjik, the name of Sabacho is deciphered; the two seals are thought, from the inscriptions, to have been attached to the treaty of peace between Egypt and Assyria, which resulted from the invasion of Egypt by Sargon, described in this chapter;

2Ki 18:10

curiously confirms the view derived from Assyrian inscriptions, that though Shalmaneser began, Sargon finished the conquest of Samaria; "they took it" (compare

2Ki 17:4-6).

In Sargon's palace at Khorsabad,

inscriptions state that 27,280 Israelites were led captive by the founder of the palace. While Shalmaneser was engaged in the siege of Samaria, Sargon probably usurped the supreme power and destroyed him; the siege began in 723 B.C., and ended in 721 B.C., the first year of Sargon's reign. Hence arises the paucity of inscriptions of the two predecessors of Sargon, Tiglath-pileser and Shalmaneser; the usurper destroyed them, just as Tiglath-pileser destroyed those of Pul (Sardanapalus), the last of the old line of Ninus; the names of his father and grandfather, which have been deciphered in the palace of his son Sennacherib, do not appear in the list of Assyrian kings, which confirms the view that he was a satrap who usurped the throne. He was so able a general that Hezekiah made no attempt to shake off the tribute until the reign of Sennacherib; hence Judah was not invaded now as the lands of the Philistines and Egypt were. After conquering Israel he sent his general, Tartan, to attack the Philistine cities, "Ashdod," &c., preliminary to his invasion of Egypt and Ethiopia; for the line of march to Egypt lay along the southwest coast of Palestine. The inscriptions confirm the prophecy; they tell us he received tribute from a Pharaoh of "Egypt"; besides destroying in part the Ethiopian "No-ammon," or Thebes

(Na 3:8);

also that he warred with the kings of "Ashdod," Gaza, &c., in harmony with Isaiah here; a memorial tablet of him is found in Cyprus also, showing that he extended his arms to that island. His reign was six or seven years in duration, 722-715 B.C. [G. V. SMITH].

1. Tartan--probably the same general as was sent by Sennacherib against Hezekiah

(2Ki 18:17).

GESENIUS takes "Tartan" as a title.

Ashdod--called by the Greeks Azotus

(Ac 8:40);

on the Mediterranean, one of the "five" cities of the Philistines. The taking of it was a necessary preliminary to the invasion of Egypt, to which it was the key in that quarter, the Philistines being allies of Egypt. So strongly did the Assyrians fortify it that it stood a twenty-nine years' siege, when it was retaken by the Egyptian Psammetichus.

sent--Sargon himself remained behind engaged with the Phœnician cities, or else led the main force more directly into Egypt out of Judah [G. V. SMITH].

In the year that Tartan came unto Ashdod - Tartan was one of the generals of Sennacherib. Ashdod, called by the Greeks Azotus, was a seaport on the Mediterranean, between Askelon and Ekron, and not far from Gaza (Reland's "Palestine," iii.) It was one of the five cities of the Philistines, assigned to the tribe of Judah, but never conquered by them Joshua 13:8; Joshua 15:46-47. The temple of Dagon stood here; and here the ark of God was brought after the fatal battle of Eben-ezer (1 Samuel 5:1, following.) It sustained many sieges, and was regarded as an important place in respect to Palestine, and also to Egypt. It was taken by Tartan, and remained in the possession of the Assyrians until it was besieged by Psammetichus, the Egyptian king, who took it after a siege of twenty-nine years (Herod. ii. 157). It was about thirty miles from Gaza. It is now a small village, and is called "Esdud." It was besieged and taken by Tartan as preparatory to the conquest of Egypt; and if the king who is here called "Sargon" was Sennacherib, it probable that it was taken before he threatened Jerusalem.

Sargon the king of Assyria - Who this "Sargon" was is not certainly known. Some have supposed that it was Sennacherib; others that it was Shalmaneser the father of Sennacherib, and others that it was Esar-haddon the successor of Sennacherib - (Michaelis). Rosenmuller and Gesenius suppose that it was a king who reigned "between" Sbalmaneser and Sennacherib. Tartan is known to have been a general of Sennacherib 2 Kings 18:17, and it is natural to suppose that he is here intended. Jerome says that Senacherib had seven names, and Kimchi says that he had eight; and it is not improbable that "Sargon" was one of those names. Oriental princes often had several names; and hence, the difficulty of identifying them. See Vitringa on this place.

In the year that Tartan came unto Ashdod,.... Or Azotus, as the Septuagint here call it; and which is its name in the New Testament; see Gill on Acts 8:40. This Tartan, or whom the Septuagint names Tanathan, and the Arabic version Tathan, was one of Sennacherib's generals, 2 Kings 18:17,

(when Sargon the king of Assyria sent him); to the above place to besiege it. This Sargon is generally thought to be the same with Sennacherib, since Tartan was one of his generals, who might have more names than one. Jerom says he had seven; the Jewish Rabbins (h) eight; though some think a predecessor of his is meant, Shalmaneser; and others his son Esarhaddon, who in the Apocrypha:

"And there passed not five and fifty days, before two of his sons killed him, and they fled into the mountains of Ararath; and Sarchedonus his son reigned in his stead; who appointed over his father's accounts, and over all his affairs, Achiacharus my brother Anael's son.'' (Tobit 1:21)

is called Sarchedon, which might easily pass by pronunciation into Sargon:

and fought against Ashdod, and took it; which was held by the Assyrians till the time of Psammiticus, and was so strong a city, and so well fortified, that it held out a siege of twenty nine years before he could be master of it (i); how long Tartan lay against it, before he took it, is not said; nor is it certain what year he came against it; those who take Sargon to be Shalmaneser place it in the fourth year of Hezekiah's reign, who sent Tartan to Ashdod at the same time that he went against Samaria, 2 Kings 18:9 but others, who think Sennacherib is Sargon, fix it to the fourteenth year of Hezekiah's reign, as Kimchi; who, hearing of Tirhakah king of Ethiopia and Egypt coming against him, went forth to meet him, and subdued him; and at the same time sent Tartan against Ashdod; or rather this was done when he took the fenced cities of Judah, of which this was one, having been taken a little before by Hezekiah from the Philistines; see 2 Kings 18:8 though, if Esarhaddon is Sargon, this must be in the times of Manasseh, perhaps about the twenty second year of his reign, by whom he was taken, and carried captive; but it is most likely to have been in Hezekiah's time.

(h) T. Bab. Sanhedrin, fol. 94. 1.((i) Herodot. l. 2. c. 157.