Commentary on Isaiah 1 part 35/65

He therefore reproaches them, that they made no account of their own glory — namely, to be and to be called God's; for they were His inheritance.

For they have forsaken it, falling away into things more shameful, and serving the works of their own hands, and disobeying the holy prophets, and setting at nought even the salvation which is from God, and honoring a false and senseless hope, the hope set on men.

For they went down, as I said, into the land of the Egyptians.

'Blessed are all they that abide in Him, because a holy people shall dwell in Zion, and Jerusalem wept with weeping;'

And that at the time of the sojourning of our Savior many of those of the blood of Abraham should repent, and being justified through faith, and set free from all sin, should be enriched with the sanctification that comes through the Spirit — He teaches, saying that 'a holy people shall dwell in Zion.'

'For Jerusalem wept with weeping,' He says, 'Have mercy on me.'

And since the God of all is ready unto lovingkindness, and knows how most readily to have compassion, 'He shall have mercy on you,' He says, and shall be attentive to your cry;

for as soon as they behold one repenting, He without delay assents, granting the grace of not remembering wrongs.

But since they did not receive the Redeemer, for this very reason they were given over to destruction.

For they themselves chose this rather.

'And the Lord shall give you the bread of affliction and scant water, and those who deceive you shall no more draw near to you;'

'because your eyes shall see those who deceive you, and your ears shall hear the words of those who led you astray behind you, who say:'

'This is the way, let us walk in it, whether to the right or to the left.' Our Lord Jesus Christ has become for us in the power of the bread of life.

'I am the bread that came down out of heaven, and gives life to the world;'

and water, not sensible and material, but rather divine and spiritual.

For 'With thee is the fountain of life, and thou shalt give them to drink of the torrent of thy delight.' Christ, therefore, is both the life-giving bread and the water;

yet he is found only with sweat and toil.

For indeed the great and choicest of good things would not be attainable by those who lie back and live in luxury, but rather by those who are wont to count as nothing the very sweat and toil expended on this pursuit; thus did such a one seek to learn thoroughly the mystery of Christ.

'If I go up upon the couch of my bed, if I give sleep to mine eyes and slumber to mine eyelids and rest to my temples, until I find a place for the Lord, a tabernacle for the God of Jacob.'

'Behold, we heard of it in Ephrathah, we found it in the fields of the wood.' For Emmanuel was born in Bethlehem, which is Ephrathah.

The God of all things therefore promises to give the bread of affliction and the narrow water to those of Israel who turn back to him — that is, he will graciously grant the life that is in Christ and the knowledge concerning him, which a man may gather and lock away in the treasuries of his own understanding, not sinking back into luxuries, not letting the conduct of his life run to waste, nor yet walking the broad and spacious road, but rather entering through the narrow gate that leads to life.

'If then you receive this bread,' he says, 'you shall become steadfast, not easily led astray, nor readily carried off by the words of those who deceive.'

'For you shall see them and hear their words.'

For in former times, being unable to discern the things that came from them, a man was reckoned as no better than those who neither see at all nor hear the words that are wont to deceive;

but once you have received the bread, you shall assuredly see them and understand full well what sort of men they are in their disposition;

how they are simply at variance, saying:

'This is the way, let us walk in it,' whether to the right or to the left;

for there was no discernment between that which is by nature prone to do wrong

and that which is not such, but their words carried them off heedlessly to any and every thing whatsoever.

'And thou shalt take away the idols overlaid with silver and overlaid with gold;

thou shalt make them fine and scatter them like the water of a menstruous woman, and thrust them out as dung.' It would be fitting, I think, both to set right this matter and to choose it — for those called from among the Gentiles through faith unto the knowledge of the truth, and indeed also for those who are of the blood of Israel.

'And those who lead you astray shall no more draw near to you.'

The wretched Jews had wicked teachers — I mean the Scribes and Pharisees — who wished to draw them off to any and every thing that seemed good in their own eyes, leading them away from the commandment of Moses and persuading them to give heed to the doctrines and precepts of men.

And besides this, Israel was condemned as having fallen into such madness of mind that they chose even to worship lifeless idols.

The children of the Greeks, moreover, had unholy teachers who, possessing a wisdom that was merely of the soul and demoniacal, proclaimed to the world a countless throng of demons, and taught men to worship the creation rather than the Creator.

Having therefore received the bread of life and the life-giving water, both these and those were set free from their ancient teachers — or rather from those who led them astray — and, having condemned the deceit, they took away the idols.

'...for the seed of thy land, and the bread of the produce of thy land shall be plenteous and rich.'

'And in that day thy cattle shall feed in a fat and spacious place.'

'Your bulls and your oxen that till the ground shall eat chaff mixed with winnowed barley.' The saying is framed, as it were, from the customary experience of those who till the soil, who, whenever they grow rich in the abundant yield of the waters poured down from above and from heaven, then indeed have great fruitfulness in every way, and both a spaciousness that sustains life, and even for the cattle the grass that they crop from the field;

but the mind is again transformed from the things of sense to the spiritual contemplation of the matters set before us.

For 'whenever,' he says, 'the bread of affliction and the narrow water be given to you from God — when you see those who lead you astray and remove your own understanding from them, when you take away the idols and receive the illumination of the true knowledge of God — then you shall also be in spiritual fruitfulness.'

'For there shall be rain for the seed of thy land.'

By 'rain' he means the spiritual comfort that comes through the Spirit,

which enriches the hearts of those who worship God, and indeed renders them fruitful.

'Thou, O God, shalt set apart a bountiful rain for thine inheritance' — clearly the evangelical and saving proclamation, and the comfort that comes, as I said, through the Holy Spirit.

And the prophet Isaiah too said somewhere, as from the person of God, concerning those of Israel, who were a vineyard:

'And I will command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.'

'There shall therefore be rain,' he says, 'for the seed of thy land.'

'But the bread of the produce of thy land shall also be plenteous and rich' — that is, the fruit of thy works shall be unto profit.

For it shall be brought to perfection, and shall be rich and abundant.

For Malachi the prophet addressed those of Israel who had fallen away, saying:

And another again of the saints rebukes certain ones and says:

'And thou wast not mindful of the Lord thy helper;

therefore shalt thou plant an unfaithful planting.'

For unfruitful is the harvest of the unholy, and their labors too are unprofitable, and the outcome of their undertakings has nothing that brings gain.

Fruits, moreover, that are dear to God are those for which the all-wondrous Paul very rightly prays, saying:

'And may the God of righteousness increase your sowing and multiply the fruits of your righteousness.' And to these things the prophet adds that the cattle also shall feed in a fat and spacious place;

and by 'cattle' I think he perhaps means the poor in mind and the more simple, who are slow in understanding, yet who, having once been called through faith unto the knowledge of God, shall find spiritual nourishment and shall feed in a fat place — that is, the God-inspired Scripture, which is truly the spacious place.

For broad and vast is it, and it runs toward godliness.

But the bulls, that is, the oxen that till the ground, he says shall eat chaff mixed with winnowed barley — that is, they shall be in spiritual well-nourishment.

And being filled with solid teachings, they shall till the ground.

By 'bulls' in these words, as I think, he means those who minister the divine proclamation and preach the good tidings with great power.

And the all-wise Paul will again assure us of this, having understood the commandment of the Law spiritually.

For he said, 'It is written, Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treads out the grain.' And he adds, 'Is it for the oxen that God is concerned? Or does he say it altogether for our sakes?' Accordingly, from the excellent nourishment of the calves he shapes forth spiritual truths, and gives us to understand that for those who are chosen, and who render those that serve Christ like some fruitful ground, the all-beautiful and solid nourishment shall be set at hand.

...those that are yoked together. 'And there shall be, upon every high mountain and upon every lofty hill, water passing through in that day, when many shall perish and when towers shall fall.' And this too you shall understand spiritually.

For by 'hills' and 'mountains' he means the holy evangelists and apostles, and all the others too who, after them, became overseers of the holy Churches and ministers of the divine mysteries, who set their minds on nothing earthly, but are as it were lifted up on high.

For it is written that 'the mighty ones of the earth belong to God; they are greatly exalted'; and out of their own understanding, as from a fountain, they cause the divine and heavenly word to gush forth, being themselves first enriched from above with the grace.

'But in that day,' he says, 'this too shall be.'

And by 'day' he again names the season of the coming of our Savior;

in which those of whom the discourse speaks were made manifest, while many perished and towers were cast down — that is, the leaders of the Jews, the Scribes and Pharisees.

For although they had been exalted above all others by reason of the glory of the priesthood and the dignity of leadership, they behaved impiously toward Christ, and slew the very one who had shown them to be exalted, and in addition to this led astray the peoples under their hand.

And other towers also have fallen — the arrogant hosts of the unholy spirits.

'And the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold in that day, when the Lord shall heal the fracture of his people, and shall heal the pain of thy wound.' Some of the interpreters wish that the meaning of the passage set before us ought to be carried over to the time of the consummation of the age.

For then, they say, with an increase of light, even the very luminaries whose nature it is to give light shall come to be so.

But we shall find the sacred Writing saying that 'The sun shall then be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light. And the stars too shall fall, as leaves fall from a fig tree.'

Setting aside, then, that it must be understood in this way, we rather say the following.

'For it is not,' he says, 'that there shall be an increase of light for the luminaries.'

But by 'moon' he rather names those who abide in the light that belongs to the moon, and who are, as it were, illumined only in a bastard and moderate fashion.

And these would be those who are accustomed to live only by the inborn understanding that is in us according to man, not yet having grown rich in the illumination from above — such as are those who have not yet known the God who is by nature and in truth, but who remain as it were in the night, though possessing a moderate gleam which God laid down for the nature of man from its very constitution.

These, having received the light of the true knowledge of God, no longer abide as in night, possessing but a scant and moonlike light, but as in day, henceforth beholding the ray of the sun.

And those who are as in day, and are illumined as it were by the sun, through knowing the God who is by nature, shall receive many times over the illumination that comes upon this.

'The Lord thy God, the Lord is one.'

For they did not yet accurately understand the Law.

But when Christ shone forth, their knowledge advancing to what is better, and the Law being henceforth contemplated spiritually, the light of the sun that was in them shall be well-nigh sevenfold.

For the Sun of righteousness, who is and is understood to be the God of all things, is himself all wisdom.

And it shone forth through the Law upon those descended from Israel.

For He brought them forth, as it were out of an ancient mist, from the error which was in Egypt.

And He prepared them to understand and to confess that He alone is the God and Lord of all things.

But these things shall come to pass, he says, when the Lord shall heal the brokenness of His people, and shall heal the pain of your error.

For we were broken, and were in the pain of a stroke;

for the fear of punishment hung over both Greeks and Jews;

having our mind somewhat slackened, and feeble, and possessing an understanding that was dissolute toward the works of righteousness.

But we have not remained in these things.

For the God of all bestowed the healing, and declared us both delivered from the ancient sickness and exceedingly strong for whatever is pleasing to Him, and justified by faith in Christ;

through whom and with whom to God the Father be glory, together with the Holy Spirit, unto the ages of ages.

{TOME 3.} Behold, the name of the Lord comes after a long time, His wrath burning with glory;

the oracle of His lips is an oracle full of wrath;

and the wrath of His anger shall devour like fire.

And His Spirit, like water rushing in a ravine, shall come up to the neck and shall be divided, to trouble the nations over a vain delusion; and a vain delusion shall pursue them, and shall seize them face to face. Having very clearly declared that the light of the sun shall be sevenfold for those who believe in Christ, at that time in which He shall heal the brokenness of His people, he usefully adds that the divine wrath shall also be against Satan who has done the breaking, and against the demons that are with him.

For the tyranny against us was not destined to come without ending, nor its strength to remain unshaken, especially when Christ the Saviour of all had shone upon the race of men.

The word of the prophecy has come, not as it were naked and unclothed, but rather overshadowed and profound.

For it has been figured as concerning the Assyrians, who ravaged Jerusalem and captured all Judaea, and holding the beloved Israel as spear-won captives, returned to their own land, all but exulting over the divine glory, and supposing that they had prevailed over those who worship Him even without God's willing it.

And indeed Rabshakeh called out to those on the wall, saying: Let not Hezekiah deceive you, saying that the God of Israel will deliver you out of my hand.

[Have the gods of the nations, each one, delivered his own land out of my hand, that they should deliver it?] Boasting arrogantly, therefore, and having babbled many things against the ineffable glory, they of whom the discourse speaks would be caught.

For He brought them back into Judaea, Zerubbabel the son of Salathiel then leading them—who was of the tribe of Judah—and moreover Jeshua the great priest as well.

The force of the prophecy, then, seems in a way, as regards what is manifest, to make mention of the things that befell the Chaldeans and Babylon.

But the true meanings of what has been said are directed against the spiritual Assyrian, that is, against Satan, to whom it is said by God:

As a garment stained with blood shall not be clean, so neither shall you be clean, because you have destroyed My land and have slain My people; you shall not remain unto everlasting time, O evil seed.

Prepare your children to be slaughtered for the sins of their father, that they may not rise up and inherit the land, and fill the land with war; and I will rise up against them, says the Lord of Sabaoth, and I will destroy their name and remnant and seed.

The name of the Lord, then, he says, shall come after a long time.

And if one should choose to understand it historically, after seventy years God had mercy on Israel.

But if he should traverse the inner and hidden path of the meanings, he will admit in his mind that the inventor of sin continued for a very long time, laying the yoke of his own perversity upon all who are on the earth, so as both to make them his own worshippers and to bind them fast in the snares of sin.

His wrath burning with glory, and the oracle of His lips an oracle full of wrath.

For Cyrus the son of Cambyses, God urging him on and rousing him to battle, made war upon the land of the Chaldeans, and took by force the city of the Babylonians, and became, as it were, wrath and fire to them; for he devoured them all, so to speak, and, having an irresistible onslaught, appeared to those in that place like water rushing in a ravine, and filled all the nations of the Chaldeans with uproar and confusion, they being justly condemned for a vain delusion.

For they supposed, as I said, that they had prevailed over Judaea even against God's will.

The vain delusion, therefore, seized them.

For the things arising from unmixed wrath were brought upon them by God, and they perished by their own impieties;

and one might behold the arch-evil dragon suffering this very same thing.

For to him too came the oracle of the Lord, an oracle full of wrath.

For they were commanded to depart into the abyss, he himself and the wicked powers with him.

For these also were confounded over a vain delusion.

For he said: I will seize the whole inhabited world in my hand as a nest, and I will take it up as eggs that have been left behind; and there is none who shall escape me or gainsay me.

They were confounded, therefore, being condemned over a vain delusion, and were seized by it.

Must you always rejoice and go continually into My holy places as though keeping a feast, and, like men making merry, enter with the pipe into the mountain of the Lord, to the God of Israel? I said that the Babylonians, having gained mastery over the land of the Jews, danced over the captives, and perhaps even mocking the divine temple, they persisted most impiously.

And in what manner, is not unclear.

O Assyrians, then, he says, you ought not at every season to make merry over My worshippers and to make it an occasion for festivity, none hindering you from going into My holy places, and with pipe and lyre? And these things indeed are according to the historical sense.

But if it be spoken with reference to Satan and those who share his mind, you will understand something of this sort:

For long ages he rejoiced, exalting himself over the ineffable glory, and crushing the saints, and savagely setting himself against the workers of righteousness, and, as it were, attempting to defile the holy things of God, making the matter a feast and delight, and gloating over those he defrauded.

But the wretch has fallen from such things, Christ having thrust him down beyond hope, and having driven off the tyranny against us.

All his delight and gladness, then, has ceased;

he stopped the dance against us, and the nature of things has changed over into the complete opposite.

For we have made our delight and luxury the salvation that is through Christ, and the justification in faith, and the sanctification through the Spirit.

But he who failed of his rule is in unending despondencies, and bewails the overthrow of his own dominion.

And it shall be to him round about, from whence was their hope of help, on which he himself had trusted;

they with pipes and lyre shall war against him by a reversal. The phrase 'by the voice of the Lord', he says, stands for 'the Lord commanding'.

For indeed the Assyrians were defeated, and came under the stroke that was brought upon them, Cyrus and the Persians and the Medes laying them waste, as I said, and having taken them by force and by the will of God.

But before these things they had, resting upon them, the hope of being able to accomplish easy mastery over whatever lands and peoples they might choose.

the hope of aid—their affairs having all but suffered a change and a dissolution into the complete opposite—with lyre and pipes, that is, rejoicing and keeping feast, they shall war against him.

And this might be seen as having come to pass with regard to Satan and the herd of unclean spirits.

For they had in this world countless, or rather even innumerable, worshippers; but by the voice of the Lord, that is, by the preaching of Christ, they have come under the stroke and been defeated, and those whom they expected to have as helpers to themselves, these, contrary to all expectation, underwent the change into the complete opposite.

For they were called through faith and have warred against them.

For temples have been torn down, hills have been shaken, and a multitude of unclean demons have been consumed by fire, and, having condemned him who of old held sway, they have inscribed as King and Lord the God who is so by nature and in truth.

And they have made it a matter of great importance, through every virtue, to pursue the life that is truly of good repute and excellent, casting far away the living in baseness.

For shall you not be required to give account before the days? Has kingship been prepared for you also? A deep ravine, wood lying ready, fire, and much wood.

The wrath of the Lord is like a ravine burning with brimstone. Having said that the Assyrian shall be warred against by those from whom it was likely he should rather expect to be aided, and that he shall suffer things beyond every evil, he necessarily adds these words also.

For since He is seen to have long borne with them, and only with difficulty to have brought the penalties upon those who had transgressed intolerably, He makes, as it were, a defence, and says:

For shall you not be required to give account before the days?

For the God of all bears long, and lavishes His kindness upon those who stumble, in the hope that perhaps their minds might be changed for the better, and that, choosing to repent, they might escape the punishment owed to them.

But none of these things having come about, He then brings on the things that proceed from wrath, not doing this before the days, but as at the fitting time at last, and when it has, as it were, come to full measure—that which most befits the serenity and love of mankind of the God who rules over all.

Therefore, O Assyrian, he says, I have been to you kind and long-suffering.

For shall you not be required to give account before the days?

Such is that which was said to the blessed Abraham:

For the sins of the Amorites are not yet filled up unto now. But moreover the blessed prophet Zechariah says that he beheld women, winged after the manner of a hoopoe, and carrying off the measure, and, as in the form of a woman, sin sitting in the midst.

For the Lawgiver metes out to the transgressions of each one the penalties in proportion.

But you supposed, O Assyrian, he says, that for you too it had been prepared to reign perpetually, or to be able to hold sway, and to have unshaken your greed of gain over all things? But you were mistaken of the truth;

For rather you shall inherit a deep ravine, and wood laid ready, and fire.

For thus shall the wrath of the Lord be upon you and upon those who are yours.

And I would say that these very things might most fittingly be spoken to Satan himself.

For he had grudged and defrauded the whole earth of the shining forth of Christ upon it.

But when God and Lord appeared to us, he was driven off like some utterly savage beast from the flock of those who believed, and he departed down into Hades, there to inherit fire and flames.

For the wrath of the Lord shall be to him as a ravine burning with brimstone.

Therefore he was not required before the appointed days, but only when the fitting time at length summoned him to this.

For it was not prepared for him to reign perpetually as well, in the way that it certainly was for Christ, the Savior of all;

'Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever;'

'a scepter of uprightness is the scepter of Thy kingdom.' Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, who put their trust in horses and chariots;

for there was indeed a very great multitude even of horses.

And they had not put their trust in the Holy One of Israel, and they had not sought God.

...shall be set aside, and He shall rise up against the houses of wicked men, and against their vain hope.

An Egyptian man and not God, the flesh of horses, and there is no help. The prophet, having learned what would in due time befall the Assyrians, and that when the Persians and Medes should ravage their land they would be utterly destroyed—God, that is, raising up Cyrus against them—comes to a recollection of the disobedience of those of Israel.

For the Babylonian took Judea, and even the holy city itself—I mean Jerusalem—and carried Israel away captive; then to those who were left behind throughout Judea God gave mercy.

But when they wished to go over to the Egyptians, fearing lest at some later time war might again be brought upon them by the Assyrians, He who is able to save commanded, through the voice of Jeremiah, that they should not go down into the land of the Egyptians.

But since even after this they became disobedient, and supposed that the aid of men would rather save them, they fell in Egypt, and all utterly perished.

The prophet therefore bewails them as wretched;

'For woe,' he says, 'to those who go down to Egypt for help.'

For they took courage not rather in God who is all-powerful, but in horses and chariots;

for there were very many of these in Egypt.

But God of all, being wise, brought evils upon them, and His word shall by no means be set aside.

For He spoke to them, through the voice of Jeremiah, the words that are set down below.

Therefore they shall rise up against the houses of wicked men—that is, of those who had fled for refuge into Egypt—and against their vain hope.

'For they chose as their helper,' he says, 'an Egyptian man and not God, the flesh of horses.'

And most emphatically the prophet speaks, reproving the ignorance of those of Israel.

For what is a horse but merely flesh? And what power has flesh, which is so weak and subject to corruption? Something of this sort the prophet Jeremiah also says:

'Cursed is he who has his hope in man, and will make the flesh of his arm his strength, and whose heart departs from the Lord.' For it is truly good to hope in the Lord rather than to hope in man. But the Lord shall bring His hand upon them;

'and those who help shall grow weary, and all together shall perish.' For since the Egyptians, lifting up their boastful and haughty brow, received those of Israel, yet supposed that the power of their falsely-named gods was superior to that of the God of the Hebrews, they too were given over to the Babylonians;

for they gained possession of the land, and those of Israel who had been caught there perished together with its inhabitants.

For this reason he says the Lord will bring His hand upon them, and that in every way and altogether those who promised them irresistible aid shall grow weary—that is, shall be enfeebled—and all together shall perish.

For thus the Lord said to me:

'In the manner that a lion, or a lion's cub, roars over the prey which it has seized, and cries out over it, until the mountains are filled with its voice, and they were overcome and terrified at the greatness of its rage;'

'so shall the Lord come down to wage war upon Mount Zion, upon her mountains.'