Isa 10:1 Woe to those who make unjust laws, to those who issue oppressive decrees,
Isa 10:2 to deprive the poor of their rights and withhold justice from the oppressed of my people, making widows their prey and robbing the fatherless.
Isa 10:3 What will you do on the day of reckoning, when disaster comes from afar? To whom will you run for help? Where will you leave your riches?
Isa 10:4 Nothing will remain but to cringe among the captives or fall among the slain. Yet for all this, his anger is not turned away, his hand is still upraised.
Judgment on Arrogant Assyria
Isa 10:5 “Woe to the Assyrian, the rod of my anger, in whose hand is the club of my wrath!
Isa 10:6 I send him against a godless nation, I dispatch him against a people who anger me, to seize loot and snatch plunder, and to trample them down like mud in the streets.
Isa 10:7 But this is not what he intends, this is not what he has in mind; his purpose is to destroy, to put an end to many nations.
Isa 10:8 ‘Are not my commanders all kings?’ he says.
Isa 10:9 ‘Has not Kalno fared like Carchemish? Is not Hamath like Arpad, and Samaria like Damascus?
Isa 10:10 As my hand seized the kingdoms of the idols, kingdoms whose images excelled those of Jerusalem and Samaria—
Isa 10:11 shall I not deal with Jerusalem and her images as I dealt with Samaria and her idols?'”
Isa 10:12 When the Lord has finished all his work against Mount Zion and Jerusalem, he will say, “I will punish the king of Assyria for the willful pride of his heart and the haughty look in his eyes.
Isa 10:13 For he says: “‘By the strength of my hand I have done this, and by my wisdom, because I have understanding. I removed the boundaries of nations, I plundered their treasures; like a mighty one I subdued their kings.
Isa 10:14 As one reaches into a nest, so my hand reached for the wealth of the nations; as people gather abandoned eggs, so I gathered all the countries; not one flapped a wing, or opened its mouth to chirp.'”
Isa 10:15 Does the ax raise itself above the person who swings it, or the saw boast against the one who uses it? As if a rod were to wield the person who lifts it up, or a club brandish the one who is not wood!
Isa 10:16 Therefore, the Lord, the LORD Almighty, will send a wasting disease upon his sturdy warriors; under his pomp a fire will be kindled like a blazing flame.
Isa 10:17 The Light of Israel will become a fire, their Holy One a flame; in a single day it will burn and consume his thorns and his briers.
Isa 10:18 The splendor of his forests and fertile fields it will completely destroy, as when a sick person wastes away.
Isa 10:19 And the remaining trees of his forests will be so few that a child could write them down.
The Remnant of Israel Will Return
Isa 10:20 In that day the remnant of Israel, the survivors of Jacob, will no longer rely on him who struck them down but will truly rely on the LORD, the Holy One of Israel.
Isa 10:21 A remnant will return, a remnant of Jacob will return to the Mighty God.
Isa 10:22 Though your people be like the sand by the sea, Israel, only a remnant will return. Destruction has been decreed, overwhelming and righteous.
Isa 10:23 The Lord, the LORD Almighty, will carry out the destruction decreed upon the whole land.
Isa 10:24 Therefore this is what the Lord, the LORD Almighty, says: “My people who live in Zion, do not be afraid of the Assyrians, who beat you with a rod and lift up a club against you, as Egypt did.
Isa 10:25 Very soon my anger against you will end and my wrath will be directed to their destruction.”
Isa 10:26 The LORD Almighty will lash them with a whip, as when he struck down Midian at the rock of Oreb; and he will raise his staff over the waters, as he did in Egypt.
Isa 10:27 In that day their burden will be lifted from your shoulders, their yoke from your neck; the yoke will be broken because you have grown so fat.
Isa 10:28 They enter Aiath; they pass through Migron; they store supplies at Mikmash.
Isa 10:29 They go over the pass, and say, “We will camp overnight at Geba.” Ramah trembles; Gibeah of Saul flees.
Isa 10:30 Cry out, Daughter Gallim! Listen, Laishah! Poor Anathoth!
Isa 10:31 Madmenah is in flight; the people of Gebim take cover.
Isa 10:32 This day they will halt at Nob; they will shake their fist at the mount of Daughter Zion, at the hill of Jerusalem.
Isa 10:33 See, the Lord, the LORD Almighty, will lop off the boughs with great power. The lofty trees will be felled, the tall ones will be brought low.
Isa 10:34 He will cut down the forest thickets with an ax; Lebanon will fall before the Mighty One.
1 The woe of tyrants. 5 Assyria, the rod of hypocrites, for his pride shall be broken. 20 A remnant of Israel shall be saved. 24 Israel is comforted with promise of deliverance from Assyria.
Isa 10:1 Woe to those who make unjust laws, to those who issue oppressive decrees,
Isa 10:2 to deprive the poor of their rights and withhold justice from the oppressed of my people, making widows their prey and robbing the fatherless.
The evil here denounced is one of which Israel and Judah were both guilty. It is the evil already denounced in Judah in chs. 1:23 and 5:23. The crime was one of injustice against the poor and needy, against widows and orphans, against the unfortunate and the oppressed. Men were thinking only of themselves and of their own interests. The weakness of the age was selfishness and greed, an evil that was gnawing at the very heart of the nation.
Isa 10:3 What will you do on the day of reckoning, when disaster comes from afar? To whom will you run for help? Where will you leave your riches?
Instead of pronouncing judgment against the oppressors of the poor, the Lord, in asking this question, calls upon them to pronounce judgment against themselves. Isaiah had earlier pointed out how in the day of the Lord the wicked would flee to the rocks and caves to hide from the glory of God “when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth” (ch. 2:19).
Isa 10:4 Nothing will remain but to cringe among the captives or fall among the slain. Yet for all this, his anger is not turned away, his hand is still upraised.
The thought is that the unjust judges of vs. 1–3 will, in the day of the Lord’s visitation, find themselves among the prisoners, crouching down with them in terror before the Judge of the universe, and that they will meet the same doom—they will be numbered among the slain.
Judgment on Arrogant Assyria
Isa 10:5 “Woe to the Assyrian, the rod of my anger, in whose hand is the club of my wrath!
Having enumerated the crimes for which His professed people were to be judged, the Lord now sets forth how He will execute judgment against them. God has decreed the sentence, and Assyria is to be how the sentence will be executed.
Isa 10:6 I send him against a godless nation, I dispatch him against a people who anger me, to seize loot and snatch plunder, and to trample them down like mud in the streets.
That is, Judah, for by this time Samaria has been subdued (v. 11).
Compare the name of Isaiah’s son Maher-shalal-hash-baz (ch. 8:3), which means “speed the spoil, hasten the prey.” The Lord had commissioned Assyria to execute judgment against Israel and Damascus (ch. 8:4) as well as against Judah.
Isa 10:7 But this is not what he intends, this is not what he has in mind; his purpose is to destroy, to put an end to many nations.
This is an interesting revelation of the way the Lord works with nations. When certain powers needed to have judgment meted out against them, the Lord used Assyria as His rod for punishment. Assyria, however, had no idea that it was being used as a tool in the hands of the Lord. So far as Assyrian leaders were aware, their policies were determined entirely by their own selfish interests.
In other words, it was not the Spirit of the Lord that influenced Assyria to go against Israel and Judah, but the spirit of the evil one. How, then, can it be said that Assyria was a tool in the hand of the Lord? God’s protecting hand was withdrawn from the power against whom judgment had been decreed, and Assyria was permitted to work out her selfish, evil will. It is thus that the Lord works out His sovereign will in a world that is in rebellion against Him. The purposes of men and demons are overruled to carry out the purposes of God (see on 2 Chron. 18:18; 22:8; Dan. 4:17).
Isa 10:8 ‘Are not my commanders all kings?’ he says.
The lords of Assyria were comparable in power and glory to the kings of other nations, so the Assyrians boasted. So great was their power and so glorious their majesty that the monarchs of neighbouring nations were as nought before them. The rulers of Assyria were fond of giving long lists of vassal kings who paid tribute and did homage to them.
Isa 10:9 ‘Has not Kalno fared like Carchemish? Is not Hamath like Arpad, and Samaria like Damascus?
Isa 10:10 As my hand seized the kingdoms of the idols, kingdoms whose images excelled those of Jerusalem and Samaria—
The “gods” of Jerusalem and Samaria were thus regarded as inferior to those of many of the nations already conquered by Assyria.
Isa 10:11 shall I not deal with Jerusalem and her images as I dealt with Samaria and her idols?'”
The Assyrians thought of the gods of other nations as being similar to their own gods. To them the God of Jerusalem was basically no different from the god of any other city. As the gods of Samaria had failed to save it, so the God of Jerusalem would not be able to save it from Assyrian might.
Isa 10:12 When the Lord has finished all his work against Mount Zion and Jerusalem, he will say, “I will punish the king of Assyria for the wilful pride of his heart and the haughty look in his eyes.
God had a task to accomplish, one of bringing judgment upon Zion and Jerusalem. Assyria was to be the tool God used to perform that task. But when the work was done the Lord would, in turn, punish Assyria for its pride and arrogancy.
Isa 10:13 For he says: “‘By the strength of my hand I have done this, and by my wisdom, because I have understanding. I removed the boundaries of nations, I plundered their treasures; like a mighty one I subdued their kings.
Assyria was proud of its depredations and its cruelty. Royal Assyrian inscriptions boast of booty taken and blood spilled.
They list in detail the amount of silver and gold, of cattle and goods, carried away, of the number of bodies left impaled on stakes, of the pyramids of corpses left outside city walls, and of the rivers of blood with which they drenched the hills and plains. God knew all about this boasting, and here sets forth the reasons why it was necessary that Assyria be called to account.
Isa 10:14 As one reaches into a nest, so my hand reached for the wealth of the nations; as people gather abandoned eggs, so I gathered all the countries; not one flapped a wing, or opened its mouth to chirp.'”
The treasures and possessions of the nations were regarded by Assyria as simply so much spoil to be taken away. In words very similar to the language of this text the Assyrian kings boasted of seizing the treasures of peoples near and far and carting them away. For instance, the famed library of Ashurbanipal contained, in large part, records and objects taken during the course of Assyrian conquests.
Where the Assyrian armies had been, nothing but death and devastation remained. Assyrian kings describe beautiful regions they left without inhabitant and laid utterly waste and bare. Isaiah has given a vivid and accurate picture of the proud boasts of these Assyrian kings.
Isa 10:15 Does the ax raise itself above the person who swings it, or the saw boast against the one who uses it? As if a rod were to wield the person who lifts it up, or a club brandish the one who is not wood!
Assyria was an instrument in the hands of the Lord, but she was boasting as if she were mightier than God. Little did the kings of Assyria know of Jehovah, who sat on the throne of the universe and guided the affairs of earth, setting up and taking down those whom He would (see Dan. 5:19).
No earthly monarch can accomplish anything without the permission of God, and no nation can continue to exist in opposition to the divine will. Like all the other nations of earth, Assyria was as a mere “drop of a bucket” and as the “small dust of the balance” before the might of God (Isa. 40:15). Assyria needed to learn that the hand of God “is stretched out upon all the nations,” and that His hand can never be turned back by man (ch. 14:26, 27).
Isa 10:16 Therefore, the Lord, the LORD Almighty, will send a wasting disease upon his sturdy warriors; under his pomp a fire will be kindled like a blazing flame.
God will lay His hand upon them and leave them emaciated and gaunt. In other words, Assyrian God would set their glorious palaces afire and make them a heap of smoking ruins (see Amos 1:4). A century after Isaiah uttered this declaration the Assyrian Empire lay in ruins. Nineveh was a mass of ashes, and Asshur, Calah, and Dur Sharrukin were being covered by the desert sands.
Isa 10:17 The Light of Israel will become a fire, their Holy One a flame; in a single day it will burn and consume his thorns and his briers.
In a single day. These words point to some speedy and sudden destruction that would befall the Assyrians. Isaiah here looks forward to such scenes as the destruction of 185,000 men of Sennacherib’s army in one night (ch. 37:36).
Isa 10:18 The splendour of his forests and fertile fields it will completely destroy, as when a sick person wastes away.
Isa 10:19 And the remaining trees of his forests will be so few that a child could write them down.
One day this Assyrian force was a thing of strength and glory; the next, it had vanished from the earth—like a vast and beautiful forest swept by flames. In the Bible, evil men and nations are compared to stately trees that will be shorn of their pride and beauty (Eze. 31:3–18; Dan. 4:10–26; cf. Isa. 30:27–33).
The Remnant of Israel Will Return
Isa 10:20 In that day the remnant of Israel, the survivors of Jacob, will no longer rely on him who struck them down but will truly rely on the LORD, the Holy One of Israel.
Remnant of Israel.
After the prophet notes the fact that a few of the Assyrians would escape the judgment sent upon them, his mind goes out to those in Israel who would survive the Assyrian invasion. The work of destruction is seldom complete.
Even in the northern nation there were a few who remained after the Assyrians had done their work, and in Judah the people of Jerusalem and a few others escaped the destruction resulting from Sennacherib’s invasion. The idea of the return, or survival, of a remnant, embodied in the name of Isaiah’s son Shear-jashub (ch. 7:3), is a thought to which the prophet constantly returns (chs. 10:21, 22; 11:11, l6; 46:3).
Isa 10:20 In that day the remnant of Israel, the survivors of Jacob, will no longer rely on him who struck them down but will truly rely on the LORD, the Holy One of Israel.
No longer rely. Ahaz placed his confidence in Assyria (2 Kings 16:7–9; 2 Chron. 28:16–21) rather than in God. Assyria, however, was no friend of Judah, or of any other nation for that matter; she was interested only in herself.
God intended that after the terrible destruction wrought by Sennacherib in Judah the “remnant” should place their confidence in Him. He it was who gave them deliverance in response to Hezekiah’s earnest prayer (Isa. 37:14–36), and in Him the faithful remnant would now place their trust. At last they recognized in Assyria a cruel master rather than a friend and helper. Reliance upon God was demonstrated as the only way to safety and victory.
Isa 10:21 A remnant will return, a remnant of Jacob will return to the Mighty God.
When the people placed their confidence in the Lord and had God with them, the greatest powers of earth could not prevail against them. God permitted these trying experiences to come upon His people in order to bring them back to Him (see on ch. 10:13).
Isa 10:22 Though your people be like the sand by the sea, Israel, only a remnant will return. Destruction has been decreed, overwhelming and righteous.
For those who refused to return to the Lord and continued in their hypocritical and worldly ways, the message of the “remnant” brought no hope.
Isa 10:23 The Lord, the LORD Almighty, will carry out the destruction decreed upon the whole land.
Isa 10:24 Therefore this is what the Lord, the LORD Almighty, says: “My people who live in Zion, do not be afraid of the Assyrians, who beat you with a rod and lift up a club against you, as Egypt did.
Be not afraid. The Assyrians will come as a “rod” of judgment (see on ch. 10:5), but do not be afraid of them. They will smite, but they will not destroy. Remain faithful to God, put your confidence in Him, accept His presence with you, and you will be spared. Though many will be lost, a remnant will be saved. Be among that remnant, and “be not afraid.” God sends a similar message to us today.
The manner of Egypt. Pharaoh had exerted all his wrath against the Israelites in Egypt, but could not prevent the Exodus. The Assyrians are also powerful and cruel, but a remnant will escape their blows.
25. Isa 10:25 Very soon my anger against you will end and my wrath will be directed to their destruction.”
Isa 10:26 The LORD Almighty will lash them with a whip, as when he struck down Midian at the rock of Oreb; and he will raise his staff over the waters, as he did in Egypt.
Pharaoh wielded a rod of oppression, but God wielded a rod of deliverance.
When the Lord’s rod was stretched over the sea, the hosts of Egypt perished. As the Lord had prepared a scourge for the enemies of His people in ancient times, so the Lord would again smite the enemies who came against Zion in the days of Isaiah. And what the Lord did then, He will do again today. The faithful remnant, not the wicked, will triumph.
Isa 10:27 In that day their burden will be lifted from your shoulders, their yoke from your neck; the yoke will be broken because you have grown so fat. Isa 10:28 They enter Aiath; they pass through Migron; they store supplies at Mikmash.
Here begins a poem that pictures an invader approaching from the north to the immediate vicinity of Jerusalem, striking terror to the hearts of the inhabitants. At the time of his first invasion (in the 14th year of Hezekiah) Sennacherib did not approach Jerusalem from the north. His armies reached the Mediterranean seacoast at Sidon, then marched southward to Philistia, and from there advanced inland toward the cities of Judah.
It was to Lachish, southwest of Jerusalem, that Hezekiah sent his message promising tribute (2 Kings 18:14). But there seem to have been two invasions of Sennacherib Isaiah’s poem here sets forth in a striking way the terror that would overwhelm the inhabitants of Jerusalem as the enemy force approached nearer and ever nearer the city, laying waste the country as they came.
Some have assumed that we find here a description of an actual advance on Jerusalem by some Assyrian army, perhaps that of Sargon, the record of which has been lost. That is possible but not probable. It may refer to the approach of the portion of Sennacherib’s army sent against Jerusalem while the other force headed toward Egypt. The purpose of this poem is to picture the fright of the inhabitants of Jerusalem and the surrounding area as an enemy force draws near.
Isa 10:29 They go over the pass, and say, “We will camp overnight at Geba.” Ramah trembles; Gibeah of Saul flees.
From Michmash the route leads downward through a deep ravine and up a steep ascent to Geba, (9.2 km.) from Jerusalem. Ramah of Benjamin (2.6 km., west of Geba) and Gibeah, the city of Saul (3.4 km., south of Ramah), are on the direct road between Michmash and Jerusalem.
Isa 10:30 Cry out, Daughter Gallim! Listen, Laishah! Poor Anathoth!
Isa 10:31 Madmenah is in flight; the people of Gebim take cover.
Isa 10:32 This day they will halt at Nob; they will shake their fist at the mount of Daughter Zion, at the hill of Jerusalem.
Nob, the city of the priest Ahimelech and the site of the tabernacle in the days of Saul (1 Sam. 21:1), was possibly on Mt. Scopus, northeast of Jerusalem. Here the poem leaves the invader shaking his fist at the daughter of Zion, that is, at Jerusalem, a goal so near and yet so utterly beyond his reach. Compare the defiant words of the Rabshakeh standing just outside the walls of the city, but unable to enter (2 Kings 18:19–35).
Isa 10:33 See, the Lord, the LORD Almighty, will lop off the boughs with great power. The lofty trees will be felled, the tall ones will be brought low.
Isaiah now lifts his eyes from the terror-stricken inhabitants of Jerusalem and beholds the Lord of hosts seated upon the throne of the universe, keeping watch above His own.
Man proposes, but God disposes.
Proud and boastful Assyria plans to cut down Judah as she has the other nations of the East, but Assyria must learn that there is a God who rules the nations of earth. See 2 Kings 19:20–34 for Isaiah’s encouraging word to Hezekiah concerning the way the Lord would reveal His power against the hosts of Sennacherib and save Jerusalem.
Isa 10:34 He will cut down the forest thickets with an ax; Lebanon will fall before the Mighty One.
When the mighty Sennacherib came against Judah he “reproached the Lord” with his proud boast: “With the multitude of my chariots I am come up to the height of the mountains, to the sides of Lebanon, and will cut down the tall cedar trees thereof, and the choice fir trees thereof: and I will enter into the lodgings of his borders, and into the forest of his Carmel” (2 Kings 19:23).
These words can be understood both literally and figuratively. The Assyrians certainly planned to cut down the beautiful cedars of Lebanon for their own use. But they likewise planned to accomplish the ruin of nations symbolized by stately trees (see on Isa. 10:19). Israel had already been cut down, and Assyria planned that Judah should be next.
The Lord, however, makes it clear that what will be accomplished in this regard will be by His direction and will, not by the purpose or might of man. Israel had fallen only because God had removed His protecting hand. Eventually, Judah would also fall, as Isaiah himself had predicted (ch. 2:11–13).
It was the Lord, however, who would lay low the majestic tree of Judah, not Assyria, as Sennacherib purposed. Isaiah has foretold the doom of proud and mighty Assyria, but without forgetting that the pride of Judah would likewise be humbled, that those once beautiful and stately “trees” would be cut down before the Lord.