Commentari biblici

Ch. 23. An Oracle on Tyre

The unique position occupied by Tyre in the ancient world engaged the attention of more than one Hebrew prophet. Ezekiel, in one of the most original and elaborate of his foreign prophecies (ch. 26–28), where he announces her impending overthrow by Nebuchadnezzar, shews the liveliest appreciation of the genius of that great commercial city, her unbounded enterprise, her devotion to material interests, and her self-deifying pride. Very similar in spirit is the simpler and shorter passage now before us, which, however, is not directed exclusively against Tyre, but embraces the older though less famous Zidon, and the whole Phœnician sea-board.

The chapter is clearly divided into two sections:—

i. Isaiah 23:1-14. A poem in three strophes on the destruction of the Phœnician cities and harbours, which is conceived as having already taken place.

(1) Isaiah 23:1-5. Ships of Tarshish, homeward bound, are dismayed on their arrival at Cyprus by the intelligence that the harbours of Phœnicia are closed to them (1); the once populous and thriving coastland lies desolate (2, 3); the sea is now a childless mother and forgets that she ever had offspring (4); Egypt is stricken with terror at the report of the fall of Tyre (5).

(2) Isaiah 23:6-9. The inhabitants of Phœnicia are ironically urged to leave the joyous cities which had been theirs from time immemorial, and seek refuge in their colonies beyond the sea (6, 7). For this is the purpose of Jehovah, to make an end of the regal power of Tyre, and cast contempt on all earthly greatness (8, 9).

(3) Isaiah 23:10-14. But Jehovah’s power reaches over the sea, and not even in their own colonies can the exiled Phœnicians find rest for the sole of their foot. The distant Tarshish disowns their authority, the nearer Cyprus is also, for an unexplained reason, untenable. At the obscure Isaiah 23:13 we lose the thread of the writer’s thought, but in Isaiah 23:14 the poem ends as it had begun with an apostrophe to the ships of Tarshish, whose haven is demolished.

ii. Isaiah 23:15-18 form an appendix written in a prose style (with the exception of the “harlot’s song,” a snatch of popular poetry, in Isaiah 23:16). It announces the restoration of Tyre after the lapse of seventy years, but a restoration under entirely changed conditions, in which the gains of Tyre shall be consecrated to Jehovah and the use of His people.

There appear to be no valid reasons for refusing to ascribe the authorship of Isaiah 23:1-14 to Isaiah. The only serious difficulty is caused by the reference to “the land of the Chaldæans” in Isaiah 23:13; but there the text is in all probability corrupt (see the notes). There are two occasions in the time of Isaiah to which the prophecy has been referred. The earlier is the campaign of Shalmaneser IV. (727–722) against Phœnicia, described at length in a fragment of Menander of Ephesus (Josephus, Ant. ix. 14, 2). Shalmaneser is said to have blockaded the insular part of Tyre for five years; but as his entire reign was only about five years, it is probable that the siege (like that of Samaria) was finished by Sargon. That the city was captured is nowhere stated, and the reticence of Sargon rather suggests that the siege issued in a capitulation. Phœnicia was again ravaged by Sennacherib in the expedition of 701, just before the invasion of Philistia and Judah, when the king of Zidon actually fled to Cyprus. Tyre is not mentioned in the Assyrian record of this campaign. Either of these invasions would furnish an adequate occasion for Isaiah’s prophecy, though the second is perhaps less probable than the first. It may at least be said that the lyrical character of the passage is more intelligible when the prophet was a disinterested spectator of events in Phœnicia, than under the strain of excitement with which he faced the crisis of 701. It is true that Tyre did not then suffer the complete overthrow which is here contemplated; but it was nevertheless the first time that her existence had been seriously threatened, and the absence of a literal fulfilment affords no presumption against the genuineness of a prophecy.

The appendix (Isaiah 23:15-18) has been thought to bear the stamp of a later origin. The seventy years’ duration of the humiliation of Tyre may be based on Jeremiah’s (Isaiah 25:11 f.) determination of the period of Chaldæan supremacy, and the use to which the riches of Tyre are to be put (Isaiah 23:18) is perhaps suggested by such late prophecies as Isaiah 45:14; Isaiah 60:11; Isaiah 61:6. The case, therefore, appears to be closely parallel to that of the oracle on Egypt in ch. 19. In both we have a prophecy which is presumably Isaianic, followed by a supplement which there is reason to regard as post-exilic.

1. The returning ships are apprised, at the last stage of their voyage, of the disaster that has overtaken their mother-country. Ships of Tarshish may mean here, literally, “ships trading with Tarshish” (Tartessus) at the mouth of the Guadalquivir in Spain. See on Isaiah 2:16.

it is laid waste] The unexpressed subject is best left indefinite,—“a destruction has been wrought.”

no house, no entering in] i.e. “no house (harbour) to enter in.” Cf. ch. Isaiah 24:10 “every house is shut up so that none can enter.” The last word, however, might be joined with the following clause, which would then run: since leaving the land of Chittim, &c. The vessels learn of the fall of Tyre, not at Cyprus, but on their voyage thence. The Chittim are the inhabitants of Kition, in the south of Cyprus, rounded by the Phœnicians. The name was extended to the whole island, and ultimately in biblical usage to the islands and coasts of the Mediterranean (Daniel 11:30).

it is revealed to them] whether by rumour from flying vessels, or by eye-sight as they approached the shore, does not appear.

2. The prophet next apostrophises the inhabitants of the coast (render so, as in ch. Isaiah 20:6), i.e. Phœnicia, calling them to be still, or rather dumb, with bewilderment.

the merchants (in Heb. collective sing.) of Zidon] Zidon is generally interpreted throughout this prophecy as standing for Phœnicia as a whole. This is perhaps unnecessary, although it can easily be justified by usage (see Deuteronomy 3:9; Jdg 3:3; 1 Kings 11:1, &c.). Zidon is said to have been the most ancient of the Phœnician settlements, and its merchants might naturally be spoken of as having founded the commercial prosperity of the country.

3. The easiest translation would be: and on great waters the seed of Shihor, the harvest of the Nile, (was) her revenue, and it (i.e. her revenue) was the gain of the nations. Shihor might be a name for the Nile, as in Jeremiah 2:18; and the meaning would be that the revenue of Tyre (or Phœnicia) was derived from the sea-traffic in Egyptian grain. This was no doubt the case to some extent; but to suppose that the corn trade with Egypt was a principal source of wealth to Tyre is contrary to all the information we possess. The expression of the thought, moreover, is involved and enigmatic, and even if we call to our aid the subtle suggestion that Tyre, with no agriculture of her own, nevertheless reaped a rich harvest by her command of the sea, the idea is still unworthy of Isaiah, and of the rest of this poem.

The translation mart in E.V., instead of “gain” or “merchandise” is hardly justifiable.

4. even the strength of the sea] Better as R.V. the stronghold of the sea. The fine figure of the lonely sea denying that she ever had children is somewhat marred by the introduction of this clause, as if the poet had corrected himself by an afterthought, and changed the subject of personification from the sea to Tyre. One is tempted to remove the words as a gloss.

I travail not, nor bring forth, &c.] Render with R.V. I have not travailed, nor brought forth, neither have I nourished young men, nor brought up (cf. ch. Isaiah 1:2) virgins.

5. The verse should be read as in R.V. When the report cometh to Egypt, they shall be sorely pained at the report of Tyre. Assyria being the common enemy of Egypt and Tyre, the report of the latter’s fall is received with the utmost anxiety in Egypt.

6. The second strophe commences here with a summons to the Phœnicians to betake themselves to their Spanish colony for refuge, their own country being at the mercy of the invader. So the Tyrians, when attacked by Alexander the Great, sent all those unfit for war to Carthage, another western colony. Gesenius instances also the projected emigration of the Dutch merchants to Batavia in 1672 if the independence of Holland should be overthrown.

7. The reference is of course to Tyre, the principal subject of the prophecy.

whose antiquity … days] Next to Zidon, Tyre was regarded as the most ancient city of Phœnicia. Her priests claimed for their temple the fabulous antiquity of 2300 years in the time of Herodotus (II. 44); Josephus dates the city’s foundation 240 years before the building of Solomon’s Temple (Ant. viii. 3, 1).

her own feet shall carry her …] Render: whose feet used to carry her.… The reference is not to the future captivity or flight of the Tyrians (for which the expressions are unsuitable) but to the long journeys and residence in foreign parts of her enterprising merchants.