以賽亞書註釋 第 1 章 第 6/24 段

For the divine apostles crossed not only the mainland but also the sea, and brought to the islands the ray of the spiritual light;

for in Cyprus Barnabas and Paul, the holy pair entrusted with the cultivation of the nations, both refuted the falsehood of Elymas and displayed the truth;

and the blessed Paul ordained Titus as apostle of Crete, and Timothy of Ephesus.

These things, then, the all-holy Spirit foretold through the prophet: that they would plunder not only the land but also the sea, and, like certain generals, having overcome and subdued nations that had revolted and deserted to a tyrant, they would bring them to the King of all, and would cross the deeps—having not Jews as pilots and sailors, but men of other race and other tribe.

"And they shall first lay their hands upon Moab, but the sons of Ammon shall first obey."

And this the blessed Paul also teaches us.

For writing to the Galatians he set down these words after the preamble:

for the city now called Philadelphia—it is a splendid city of Arabia—is to this very day called Amman in the local tongue, while Moab is Charachmoba, which lies near Areopolis.

Thus, then, the truth of the prophecy was demonstrated through the apostolic testimony.

"And the Lord shall make desolate the sea of Egypt."

For he shall not only guide the aforementioned nations to godliness, but shall also bring to an end the error of Egypt.

For by the "sea of Egypt" he named its bitter and undrinkable impiety.

"And he shall lay his hand upon the river with a mighty wind."

And likewise he set down the river in place of the error.

For just as they set the hopes of their bodily life upon the river, as gathering their fruits through it, so were they enslaved to the error of the idols.

But nevertheless upon this river also, he says, he shall lay his hand with a mighty wind.

And by "mighty wind" he means the sovereign power of the godly, through whom the precincts of the idols were overturned, and the worship of the demons was forbidden by laws.

"And he shall smite it into seven ravines, so that one may pass through it in sandals."

For when their kingdom had been dissolved by the Romans, it was divided into seven provinces, and it laid aside its former insolence, and became passable to the heralds of the truth.

"And there shall be a highway for my people that is left in Egypt, and it shall be to Israel as in the day when it came out of the land of Egypt."

That is: just as I brought them out of Egypt with a mighty hand and a lofty arm, so will I again bring them into Egypt with wonders, and through these I will guide those also to the truth.

"And thou shalt say in that day:

I will bless thee, O Lord, for thou wast angry with me, and thou hast turned away thy wrath from me, and hast had mercy on me.

Behold, my God my Saviour is the Lord, and I will be confident in him, and I shall be saved by him, and I will not be afraid; for the Lord is my glory and my praise, and he has become my salvation."

The hymn makes plain the acknowledgment of the benefaction;

having learned its cause, with such means as they can they requite their benefactor.

And his is a law that plainly proclaims:

"Offer to God a sacrifice of praise," and again:

"And ye shall draw water with gladness out of the wells of salvation."

By "wells of salvation" he calls the divine Scriptures, from which those who have genuinely believed draw with gladness.

"And thou shalt say in that day:

Praise the Lord, cry out his name, declare among the nations his glorious deeds, remember that his name is exalted, for his name is exalted."

These things befit the choir of the apostles and those who with them believed from among the Jews, who both conveyed the divine teaching to the nations and exhorted one another to fulfil the Lord's commandment which says:

"Go, make disciples of all the nations." "Sing praise to the name of the Lord, for he has done lofty things; declare these things in all the earth."

"Rejoice and be glad, ye that dwell in Zion, for the Holy One of Israel is exalted in the midst of her."

And they call the world into fellowship of the gladness, and exhort Zion especially to praise the benefactor, as the Holy One of Israel having been exalted in her.

And it seems to me that the passage hints not only at the height of the wonders, but also at the saving cross to which they nailed the Master.

For the Master himself also thus spoke to the Jews:

'When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am He'; and again:

'As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up.' But let us who have believed in Him look to Him, so that, just as the Jews by gazing upon the bronze serpent blunted the power of the venomous serpents, so we too, by gazing upon Him, may heal the bites of sin, and having fully enjoyed salvation may also obtain the good things that have been promised, by the grace of Him who laid down His soul for us, with whom glory befits the Father together with the all-holy Spirit, now and ever and unto the ages of ages.

VOLUME FIVE. The vision against Babylon which Isaiah the son of Amos saw.

The Assyrians of old had their royal seat in Nineveh, but later in Babylon.

But the divine prophet, having foretold what would befall Sennacherib, who held Nineveh as his royal city, transfers the prophecy to Nebuchadnezzar and his city, Babylon, and foretells the destruction that was to come.

'Upon a level mountain lift up a signal.'

Some have said that the city lay upon a level mountain;

but those who have seen the region with their own eyes do not agree with this account.

I think, then, that by the 'mountain' is signified the former loftiness of Babylon, and by the 'level ground' the humiliation that came upon it thereafter.

'Lift up your voice to them, do not fear, encourage them with the hand.'

These things the prophetic word enjoins upon the enemies: both to encourage one another, and to drive out fear, and to strike terror with the war-cry, and to raise the military standards on high.

'Open, you rulers; I give the command.'

As the Master, He commands those within the city to open in the manner of a master.

Some say that the 'rulers' are evil powers; but I do not think so, but rather one of two things:

either the rulers appointed by the king, or the angels entrusted with the nation from the beginning;

'For He set the boundaries of the nations according to the number of the angels of God.' 'They are sanctified, and I lead them.'

He does not call the enemies of the Babylonians 'holy' because they were holy, for they were impious;

but according to the idiom of divine Scripture. For just as the divine oracles apply the word 'anathema' both to what is exceedingly holy and consecrated to God, and also to what is exceedingly abominable and profane—for we call 'anathema' both the things offered to God and those who for some transgression are cast out of the Church—so too He calls 'holy' not only those consecrated to God but also those set apart for some particular use.

'Giants are coming to appease my wrath, rejoicing and at the same time acting insolently.'

Both Symmachus and Aquila named the 'giants' as 'mighty men'.

'For the day of the Lord of Hosts is near, and destruction will come from God.'

Again He calls the time of punishment 'the day of the Lord'.

For even the mere report of the enemy suffices to produce cowardice.

'And the ambassadors will be troubled, and pangs will seize them as of a woman in labor.'

It is customary for those who are sent on an embassy to do this fearlessly and with great boldness.

But at that time not even this was done without fear;

so greatly did the might of the enemy terrify them all.

'And they will be dismayed, one at another, and will be beside themselves, and will change their countenance as a flame.'

'The ambassadors will be troubled'—Theodotion interpreted it thus:

for just as fire, when it is quenched, becomes ash, so too the blooming color of their faces is changed out of fear.

'For behold, the day of the Lord is coming, incurable, of wrath and anger, to make the whole inhabited world desolate and to destroy the sinners out of it.'

By 'the inhabited world' He here means Babylon and the cities and villages that were subject to her.

'For the stars of heaven and Orion and all the array of heaven will not give their light, and the sun will be darkened at its rising, and the moon will not give her light.'

For just as, when the sun rises, the light of the moon is dimmed and the stars are entirely hidden,

so, when my power appears and punishes the impious, the splendor of those who reign among men becomes as nothing.

'And I will command evils upon the whole inhabited world, and their sins upon the ungodly.'

For not only from these, but also from other men, will I exact penalty for their impiety.

'And I will destroy the insolence of the lawless, and I will humble the insolence of the proud.'

Those who admit into themselves the passion of arrogance recklessly outrage and revile everyone.

But I will take away also their prosperity, and stripping them of their good fortune I will teach their mind to measure itself according to nature.

'And those who are left will be more precious than refined gold, and a man will be more precious than the stone of Sophir.'

'Fireless gold' is that which proves genuine even apart from fire, that is, pure gold, which many now call 'obryzon';

and by the 'stone of Sophir' he means the precious stone, having given it its name from the place.

Such were Zerubbabel and Jeshua the son of Jozadak and those with them who obtained the return.

But the prophecy applies most especially to the men who everywhere came to believe after the saving proclamation.

'For the heaven will be shaken and the earth will be moved from its foundations, because of the fierce wrath of the Lord of Hosts in the day in which His wrath shall come.'

Even the inanimate creation seems to share in indignation with its Maker;

for not only is the earth shaken, but also from heaven fiery whirlwinds are borne down, and thunderbolts and hailstones are hurled, and countless other astonishing things occur, terrifying men and signifying the wrath of God.

'And those who are left will be as a fleeing gazelle and as a straying sheep, and there will be none to gather them, so that a man turns back to his own people and a man flees to his own country.'

When the Assyrians were defeated, those who had come to their aid turned to flight, and some strayed along the roads like sheep, while others, in their dread of the enemy, imitated the swiftness of gazelles in fleeing, since neither king nor general commanded them to stand and fight, or all together to seize their native land.

'For whoever is caught will be pierced through, and those who are gathered together will fall by the sword.'

And those who attempt to stand and fight receive the end of their life at the hands of the weapons of war.

'And they will dash their children to pieces before their eyes, and they will take their wives, and they will plunder their houses.'

Then He adds the name of the enemies:

'Behold, I will stir up against you the Medes, who do not regard silver nor have need of gold.'

They will not consent, upon receiving money, to bring the war to an end, nor will they impose tribute upon you, but they will bring upon you utter destruction.

'They will shatter the bows of the young men, and they will have no mercy on your children, nor will their eyes spare your sons.'

For they will strike down with the spear those who are most valiant among you, and they will unsparingly slaughter those of tender age.

'And Babylon, which is called glorious by the kings of the Chaldeans, will be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah;

it will not be inhabited forever.'

He says that it will be stripped of its former distinction and delivered over to utter desolation, so that its condition may be likened to Sodom and Gomorrah.

'Neither will they enter into it for many generations.'

What has been said seems somehow to be contradictory;

for the one is stated without limit, and the other in a limited way.

But the 'it will not be inhabited forever' is equivalent to:

'they will not enter into it for many generations,' that is, as inhabitants; since even now a few do dwell in it, neither Assyrians nor Chaldeans, but Jews.

'Neither will the Arabs pass through it.'

By 'Arabs' he means those called among us Saracens, who, frequenting the place for the sake of commerce, used to bring and receive in exchange the necessary goods;

and the Palestinians also call the Saracens 'Arabs'.

And of their commerce the blessed Moses also makes mention;

For behold, he says, the Ishmaelite merchants. 'Neither shall the shepherds rest therein.'

Through these words he hinted at the extremity of the desolation.

But if anyone wishes also to understand the saying figuratively, by 'shepherds' he means the kings, who give their subjects rest after the manner of flocks.

But of all these, he says, Babylon shall suddenly become a wilderness.

'And there wild beasts shall rest.'

And this too indicates its being uninhabited.

'And their houses shall be filled with noises.'

When there is no human being who utters a sound, nor horses neighing, nor oxen lowing, nor asses braying, nor any other din arising, the ears take in only a certain echo; and this we ourselves also experience by night when there is utter stillness.

This we ourselves also endure by night when there is utter stillness.

Either, then, the passage hints at this, or that on account of the desolation the ruins of the houses echo back to those who utter sounds.

'And there sirens shall rest, and demons shall dance there, and satyrs shall dwell there.'

Incorporeal indeed is the nature of the demons; but being accustomed to deceive men, they display to them certain monstrous shapes.

From the opinion, therefore, prevailing among men he has assigned the names, and he calls 'satyrs' (onocentaurs) those which the ancients called empusas and those of the present day call ass-legged phantoms, and 'sirens' those who bewitch by all manner of deceits.

The other translators, however, in place of 'sirens' have put 'ostriches.'

'And hedgehogs shall make their nests in her houses, and in the temples of her luxury.'

This animal too is a lover of solitude.

And he joined to the desolation the remembrance of her former dissoluteness, showing the justice of the punishment.

'It comes quickly and shall not tarry.'

For one hundred and eighty years intervened between the prophecy and the desolation.

'And her days shall not be prolonged.'

They shall not overstep the appointed limit of the punishment.

Having thus foretold these things concerning them, he also predicts the recall of the Jews.

For to the utter destruction of the Babylonians was joined the liberation of the Jews;

for in the first year of his reign Cyrus commanded that the captives of the Jews should return;

it is clear, therefore, that as soon as he had destroyed Babylon, he restored freedom to these.

'And the Lord will have mercy on Jacob, and will yet choose Israel, and they shall rest upon their own land, and the sojourner shall be joined to them, and shall be added to Jacob.'

'Giôras' in the Greek tongue is interpreted 'proselyte';

and the Jews called 'proselytes' those from among the Gentiles who came over and embraced the polity of the Law.

'And nations shall take them and bring them into their own place, and they shall inherit them and be multiplied.'

For Cyrus sent along with them those who were to conduct them with honour and attendance to their native land.

'And the sons of Israel shall divide them among themselves upon the land of God, for menservants and maidservants.'

'And those who took them captive shall be captives, and they shall be lorded over who had lorded over them, even the Babylonians and all the Assyrians.'

'And it shall come to pass in that day, when the Lord shall give you rest from your sorrow and wrath and from your hard bondage wherein you served them, that you shall take up this lamentation against the king of Babylon.'

The change of circumstances brings about a change of words as well.

The divine prophet, therefore, here too foretells with what words they will address one another after their liberation and return, bewailing as in a tragedy the destruction of the Babylonians.

'And you shall say in that day:'

'How has the exactor ceased, and the taskmaster ceased!' The Babylonian used to exact a most burdensome tribute from all his subjects;

but when the kingdom was overthrown, the subjects were released from the levy.

'The Lord has broken the yoke of sinners, and the yoke of rulers, having smitten a nation of wrath with an incurable blow, striking a nation of wrath with a blow that spared not.'

For a long while the Assyrians held sway over the world; but when they raged against the God of all and burned the divine temple, they fell from their kingdom;

for he called the dissolution of the kingdom and the desolation of the royal city an 'incurable blow.'

'All the earth has rested in confidence and cries aloud with gladness.'

All rejoiced at the destruction of the Babylonians;

for they had treated all men with the utmost savagery.

'And the trees of Lebanon have rejoiced over you, and the cedars of Lebanon shall say:'

'Since you have been laid low, no feller has come up against us.'

Some have supposed that 'Lebanon' here is named for Jerusalem;

but I think that the kings according to nation are called 'cedars of Lebanon,' the height of the kingdom being thus figuratively understood.

'Hades below was embittered at meeting you as you came.'

The divine Scripture is wont to employ personification as well, so as to display matters more clearly.

Here too, then, it introduces death—which is not any substance but an event that befalls—as though it were personal, animate and rational, indignant against the king of the Babylonians.

'All the kings of the nations, all shall answer and shall say to you:'

'He has gathered together,' he says, all the illustrious and conspicuous ones,

who [mock] you and taunt you, saying:

'You too have been taken like us, and among us you have been reckoned.'

'Your glory has gone down to Hades, and your great mirth.'

Through these words the prophetic utterance convicts his prodigious and overweening pride;

for he never expected to be delivered over to death, but on account of his great dominion he supposed himself to be a god.

'Beneath you they shall spread corruption, and your covering shall be the worm.'

Expecting, he says, to ascend into heaven, you have reached the depths of the earth, and instead of the costly purple you have the worms' covering, and instead of the soft bedding, putrefaction and foul-smelling gore.

'How has Lucifer, that rose in the morning, fallen from heaven! He that sent to all the nations has been crushed to the earth.'

who was truly not this, but was imagined to be this.

And wishing to show the sudden change of his splendour, he likened him to Lucifer fallen from heaven to earth.

Then he lays bare the vain conceit of his reasonings:

'But you said in your mind:'

'I will ascend into heaven, above the stars of heaven I will set my throne; I will sit on a lofty mountain, upon the high mountains that are toward the north; I will ascend above the clouds, I will be like the Most High.'

For first he fashioned that enormous golden image and commanded all to worship it, snatching away the reverence due to the divine;

then he said to those noble athletes:

'Who is the god that shall deliver you out of my hands?' Now, a 'lofty mountain' is said to lie to the north of the Assyrians and Medes, dividing off from these the Scythian nations, being the highest of all the mountains throughout the world.

And these things not he alone imagined, but also the one who taught him these things.

To this man, in a typological sense, the words of arrogance are fitting; but in truth they belong to the one who has truly fallen from heaven, who has seized for himself the appellation of God, and who has deceived the greater part of mankind.

But now you shall go down to Hades, and to the foundations of the earth.

That is, to the very bottom of the earth.

Those who see you shall marvel over you, and shall say concerning you:

'Is this the man that provoked the earth?'

As for 'provoking the earth,' Symmachus rendered it 'who troubled the earth,' while Aquila rendered it 'who shook the earth.'

'Who shook kings, who made the whole inhabited world a wilderness and cast down its cities; who had no mercy on those held captive.'

For he sacked their cities, ravaged their land, and did not think those he enslaved worthy of any sparing.

Then he adds that, whereas the other kings sitting at home received the end of their life, you shall be cast out upon the mountains like a loathsome corpse, together with many dead men pierced through with the sword, who go down into Hades.

For there shall be no difference between you and the others.

For, cast down upon the earth like the other men-at-arms, you shall become food for birds and beasts.

'Just as a garment defiled with blood will not be clean, so neither shall you be clean.'

And he teaches the reason for this:

He is speaking to the kingdom itself, not to the king alone.

For how was it possible for a man to live forever? Rather, he foretells the dissolution of the kingdom.

He names Israel as His people, and likewise He calls their land His land.

For that land possessed the divine temple.

For the nations that had not yet come to know Him could not properly be called His people.

'Prepare your children, O wicked seed, to be slaughtered for the sins of their father, that they may not rise up and inherit the earth and fill the earth with wars.'

These things he speaks against Nebuchadnezzar himself;

for those who succeeded to his kingdom were overthrown by the Medes and Persians.

For when Belshazzar raged madly against the sacred vessels, this writing appeared upon the wall:

'I will decree their utter destruction.'

Then again he foretells the desolation of Babylon:

'For it shall come to nothing,' he says, 'and I will make it a pit of mire, unto destruction.'

It shall not be delivered from the calamities that come upon it.

For it shall be likened to those who have fallen into a pit of mire and cannot be drawn out.

Yet it is possible to behold the truth of the prophecy also according to the literal sense:

for a channel of the Euphrates cuts through the middle of the city, and from it irrigation is supplied to all the surrounding country;

and when the waters were diverted and flowed wherever they chanced to go, it necessarily became a pit of mire.

'As I have spoken, so shall it be; and as I have purposed, so shall it stand.'

Nothing shall persuade me not to bring to fulfillment what has been declared.

'To destroy the Assyrians upon My land and upon My mountains, and they shall be for trampling.'

And from this it is clear that he calls the same people both Assyrians and Babylonians.

For again, leaving aside Nebuchadnezzar and those who sprang from him and fell from the kingdom, he brings the discourse back to Sennacherib;

for his army, while besieging Jerusalem, suffered that far-famed destruction.

'And their yoke shall be taken away from them, and their glory shall be taken away from their shoulders.'

By 'yoke' he means servitude;

for this lies upon subjects after the manner of a yoke.

'This is the counsel that the Lord has purposed against the whole inhabited world, and this is the uplifted hand against all the nations.'

For the overthrow of the Assyrians and Babylonians was a relief for all the nations, since they held dominion over all who dwelt in Asia and Egypt.

And those who dwelt in Europe, learning of their sudden reversal, received benefit thereby.

'For what the holy God has purposed, who shall frustrate? And His uplifted hand, who shall turn back?' This He also declared through the blessed Moses:

'I will kill and I will make alive; I will smite and I will heal, and there is none that can deliver out of My hands.' Here, having concluded the prediction against Babylon, he turns his discourse to the Philistines.

The Hebrew tongue calls the 'Foreigners' Philistim, and this name, when rendered into Greek, denotes Palestine.

These the Seventy call 'Foreigners' (Allophyloi), inasmuch as they were neighbors to the Jews but of another race, and did not share kinship with the Jews.

Accordingly the prophetic word says:

'In the year in which Ahaz the king died, this oracle came to pass.'

'Rejoice not, all you Foreigners, that the yoke of him who smote you is broken.'

For this reason he became an easy prey to all his neighbors; and not only did the ten tribes together with the Syrians make war upon him, but the Foreigners too, in addition to the others, plundered many of his cities and villages.

Nevertheless they rejoiced upon learning of his death, hoping to take all the cities of the Jews.

To these the prophetic word gives the charge not to rejoice, as though the kingdom that had contended against them had been utterly dissolved on account of the impiety of Ahaz.

'For out of the seed of serpents shall come forth the offspring of asps, and their offspring shall come forth as flying serpents.'

The admirable Hezekiah, having become godly and thereby enjoying the divine favor, put an end to the insolence of the Foreigners.

This one he calls 'the offspring of asps,' not as imitating their wickedness, but as one who inflicted such a blow upon the Foreigners.

'And the poor shall be pastured through the Lord, and needy men shall rest in peace.'

'The Jews now despised by you as worthless,' he says, 'shall be shepherded by God and delivered from the wolves that assail them, and shall pass their days in peace.'

And by these words he signifies the deliverance from the Assyrians.

'And He shall destroy your seed with famine, and He shall destroy your remnant.'

'He shall waste you with want and famine, and deliver you over to a most pitiable death.'

'Wail, O gates of the cities; let the troubled cities cry out, all you Foreigners, for smoke is coming from the north, and there is no remaining among his appointed ranks.'

The gates are neither rational nor animate;

therefore, by 'the gates' he hints at those standing upon the gates and lamenting the evils that are coming.

for terror shall dissolve those drawn up in array.

'And what shall the kings of the nations answer? That the Lord has founded Zion, and through Him the lowly of His people shall be saved.'

'But while all of you are being taken captive, Zion shall without toil prevail over her foes, and by these very events you shall learn that the Lord of all takes forethought for her and delivers her from the evils that assail her, on account of the piety of her inhabitants.'

Having thus concluded also the prediction concerning the Foreigners, he foretells to the Moabites the things that shall come to pass:

'By night Moab shall perish, for by night the wall of Moab shall perish.'

By 'night' he means, as I suppose, either the ignorance of what was to befall them or the gloom of their impiety.

And it is likely that the capture of the city also took place at night.

The Moabites trace their descent from Lot.

They had as their capital the city now called Charachmoba.

Chamos was the idol of the Moabites, for which they had built the altar.

'There you shall go up to weep, over Nabau and Medaba of Moab.'

Medaba is now a very great village of Arabia.

He says that they weep beside the altar, mocking their senseless sacrifices.

Then he bids them wail and to bloody their arms with beating, and to display their mourning by wrapping themselves in sackcloth, and to lament both in their houses and in the streets, since Esebon and Eleala have been overthrown, and the lamentation has run all the way to Iasa.

For since the loins receive the belt, the loosing of it signifies cowardice, since through the belt he likewise signifies courage.

'For gird up your loins like a man,' he says; and again:

'Let your loins be girded'; and elsewhere: