Chapter 29

1 God’s heavy judgment upon Jerusalem. 7 The unsatiableness of her enemies. 9 The senselessness, 13 and deep hypocrisy of the Jews. 18 A promise of sanctification to the godly.

1. Ariel. A symbolic name here applied to Jerusalem or to one section of it. The word is of uncertain derivation and meaning, and may have been coined by Isaiah. It may have been a cryptic word comparable to Sheshach (Jer. 25:26), which stood for Babel (see on Jer. 51:41). There is a possibility that the name meant “altar of God” (see Eze. 43:15, 16, where the word is translated “altar”). Others have suggested the translation “lion of God.” This and the following chapters seem to refer to Sennacherib’s invasion of Judah and his abortive siege of Jerusalem. Before the Assyrian invasion God gave clear warnings of the terrors that lay ahead. The Jews were upbraided for their hypocrisy, stubbornness, and failure to understand the import of coming events.

Add ye year to year. The people were going about their affairs entirely without concern for the future, as if one year would follow another with no change in the pleasant routine of life. They went through the annual round of feasts and kept worshiping at the Temple, yet all the while engaging in crimes that threatened the nation with destruction (see ch. 1:4, 10–13, 21–23).

Let them kill sacrifices. Literally, “the feasts run their round.”

2. Unto me as Ariel. The Lord has pronounced judgment upon Jerusalem, and the city will be to Him as “Ariel”—perhaps as an “altar” (see on v. 1) on which its inhabitants would be the sacrifice (see Eze. 11:3, 7).

3. I will camp against thee. Jerusalem, pictured as under siege. Scenes such as the one described here often appear depicted on Assyrian sculptures (see on Eze. 4:2; see Vol. II, illustration facing p. 64). A ramp was thrown up against the walls of the city, and siege engines were brought up to batter down the defenses (see Jer. 33:4; Eze. 4:2). This is a good description of the method by which Sennacherib planned to take Jerusalem (see 2 Kings 19:32).

4. Be brought down. Jerusalem, though not to be taken, was to be humbled in the dust. In abject humility Hezekiah sent his ambassadors to the Assyrian king, acknowledging himself to be in error, bespeaking his favor, and expressing his willingness to accept such demands as might be made of him (2 Kings 18:14). Jerusalem is compared to a captured enemy groveling before his captor with his face in the dust and muttering vows of submission, in the hope of saving his life (see on Lev. 19:31; Deut. 18:11).

5. Strangers. That is, the enemies surrounding the city.

At an instant. For the sudden and unexpected deliverance of Jerusalem see ch. 37:36.

6. Thou shalt be visited. Jerusalem was to be visited with the judgments of God. Similar language is frequently employed in describing moments when God reveals Himself (Ex. 19:16; Ps. 77:18; Heb. 12:18, 19; Rev. 8:5; 11:19; 16:18). Here the words may be a figurative representation of the terrors of war, or they may be a literal description of some terrible convulsion of nature that burst upon the Assyrian hosts (see on 2 Kings 19:35).

7. A dream. A dream quickly comes and quickly goes. The Assyrian forces would vanish like a dream (Ps. 73:19, 20).

8. An hungry man. In their imagination the Assyrians had already swallowed up Jerusalem. Sennacherib was certain of triumph, but God suddenly disappointed his hopes by wiping out his besieging army and sending him home empty-handed (see ch. 37:36, 37).

9. Stay yourselves. Isaiah invites the people of Jerusalem to pause in their round of activities to consider the true nature of their situation.

Wonder. Literally, “look in astonishment at one another.”

Cry ye out, and cry. Literally, “gaze [anxiously] about, and look.”

Drunken, but not with wine. From the Assyrian hosts Isaiah turns once more to the people of Jerusalem. He had delivered them a message that might well have made them tremble, but they were like men in a stupor, unable to sense the solemn import of the warning. Sense and reason had been lost, not because of intoxication, but because they were so engrossed with the affairs of earth that they could not comprehend the message from Heaven (see on v. 1).

10. Closed your eyes. See on ch. 6:9, 10. The people of Judah were groping about blindly, as if in a stupor (see on v. 9). The eyes of their understanding were darkened. Their rulers, whose business it was to guide the affairs of state, had lost all sense of direction. Their seers, who divined for money, were utterly blind. God had sent them message after message, but with each rejection of light from Heaven they blinded themselves more and more, and their perception of truth became increasingly dull. It was in this sense that the Lord had “closed” their eyes (see on Ex. 4:21).

11. The vision of all. That is, all that Isaiah had spoken to them.

A book that is sealed. In ancient times documents were commonly rolled up and sealed (see on Neh. 9:38; see also illustration facing p. 80, Vol. III). Isaiah’s solemn messages proved to be of no more value to the people of Jerusalem than if the prophet had written them out and sealed them up so that their message could not be read. Unbelief and disobedience had shut away Heaven’s light as effectively as if it had never been revealed. To men who refuse to study it or who refuse to believe its solemn warnings, the Bible is a sealed book. The prophets have given the world inspired messages of light and hope, but today, as then, the world walks on in darkness because it refuses to see (see on Hosea 4:6).

12. Him that is not learned. That is, one who makes no profession of understanding the ways of God, as did the prophets of v. 10. A man may be wise in the ways of the world but unlearned in the things of God. At the same time a man may be a mere novice in worldly learning and yet wise in the ways of God. Prejudice and unbelief close the eyes of man’s spiritual understanding to what God has revealed for the enlightenment and blessing of the world.

13. With their lips. The people of Jerusalem made a labored pretense of religion, but in their hearts they did not even know God. Thus it was also in the days of Christ (see on Matt. 7:21–23; 15:8, 9; Matt. 23:4; Mark 7:6–9). The people were hypocrites (see on Matt. 6:2). Their worship consisted of ritual utterly devoid of true communion with Heaven (see 2 Tim. 3:5). They looked upon their outward performance as meeting the requirements God had made, and thought thereby to merit divine favor (see on Micah 6:6–8).

14. Wisdom of their wise men. When men leave God out of their reckoning their wisdom turns to folly. Not loving the light, they are left to walk in darkness (see 2 Thess. 2:12; cf. Hosea 4:6). This proved to be the experience of the Jewish leaders. They darkened counsel by “words without knowledge” (Job 38:2), and the light of the nation was doomed to go out in darkness.

15. Who seeth? They sought to hide their hypocritical attitude, motives, and actions, in the hope that neither men nor God would detect their true character.

16. Upside down. They were attempting, as it were, to have the potter take orders from the clay. They regarded themselves as having wisdom greater than that of the Creator. These spiritual leaders were virtual atheists, who masqueraded under the guise of religion.

17. Yet a very little while. Isaiah was a prophet of hope as well as of doom. He was a true optimist. He saw not only the darkness of the present but also the glorious light of the future (see on ch. 9:2). Though Judah might perish and its fruitful fields become barren, the time was coming when the earth would again be replenished, when the wilderness would become “a fruitful field, and the fruitful field be counted for a forest” (ch. 32:15; see also chs. 35:1; 41:17–19; 55:13).

18. The blind shall see. See on ch. 6:9, 10. Isaiah foresees a time when the conditions of vs. 10–12 would be reversed. Compare Isa. 35:5, 6; 42:7; 52:15; 60:1–5; Luke 1:79; 4:18; John 8:12; Acts 26:17, 18; 2 Cor. 4:4; Eph. 1:18.

19. The meek also. The time would come when the gospel would go to all peoples of earth, the small as well as the great, and the poor as well as the rich (see pp. 28–30).

20. The terrible one. The enemy of God and of His people. Probably a reference to Sennacherib and his arrogant message (see v. 5; cf. ch. 25:4, 5). The truth here stated applies to every enemy who opposes the onward progress of the work of God.

21. Make a man an offender. Perhaps Isaiah had been accused of a lack of patriotism because of his messages of reproof and warning. Those who are reproved turn against their reprovers and endeavor to devise means, however unfair, of entrapping these representatives of God in order to bring about their downfall and silence their voice of reproof.

Turn aside the just. That is, plan a deliberate miscarriage of justice (see Ex. 23:6; Amos 5:12; Mal. 3:5).

A thing of nought. Heb. tohu, translated “without form” in Gen. 1:2. The accusations brought to make the reprover appear as an offender were utterly without basis in fact.

22. Not now be ashamed. Abraham and Jacob here represent all the true people of God. As the Lord had delivered the fathers of the nation, so He will deliver their descendants from all enemies. Sennacherib’s attack would bring shame and fear, but Isaiah foresaw a brighter day beyond to which the faithful might look forward.

23. Fear the God of Israel. The ultimate triumph of right is here revealed. The “terrible one” (v. 20) has been brought to nought, Jacob is no longer ashamed (v. 22), and his long-lost children have been brought back to the fold. As the faithful of all the earth are brought into the fold they will join Jacob in worshiping and serving the Lord.

24. They that murmured. In Isaiah’s time, as in the wilderness (Ex. 17:2, 7; Num. 14:22; 20:3; Deut. 1:27; 6:16; Ps. 95:10, 11; 106:25). Isaiah proclaims that there is hope for even the most hardened and rebellious.

Shall learn doctrine. Many of those who have erred (see chs. 28:7; 29:10–13) will escape the darkness (ch. 29:18) and profit from the experiences through which they have passed. Although the vast majority of the people would fail to profit by the messages of counsel and warning repeatedly sent them through the messenger of the Lord, there would be a small “remnant” (see chs. 1:9; 11:11, 16; etc.) whose hearts would respond and turn to the Lord.

Ellen G. White comments

9    EW 123; 5T 259

13   1T 188

13, 14  8T 78

13–15TM 382

13–16TM 96

18, 19  MH 194; PK 697; 8T 78

18–21TM 96

18–24TM 383

21   TM 408

22–24AA 382

24   PK 697