Isaiah

Isaiah 34

17 verses · Major Prophets · Old Testament

1Come near, you nations, to hear! Listen, you peoples. Let the earth and all it contains hear, the world, and everything that comes from it. 2For Yahweh is enraged against all the nations, and angry with all their armies. He has utterly destroyed them. He has given them over for slaughter. 3Their slain will also be cast out, and the stench of their dead bodies will come up. The mountains will melt in their blood. 4All of the army of the sky will be dissolved. The sky will be rolled up like a scroll, and all its armies will fade away, as a leaf fades from off a vine or a fig tree. 5For my sword has drunk its fill in the sky. Behold, it will come down on Edom, and on the people of my curse, for judgment. 6Yahweh’s sword is filled with blood. It is covered with fat, with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams; for Yahweh has a sacrifice in Bozrah, And a great slaughter in the land of Edom. 7The wild oxen will come down with them, and the young bulls with the mighty bulls; and their land will be drunken with blood, and their dust made greasy with fat.
8For Yahweh has a day of vengeance, a year of recompense for the cause of Zion. 9Its streams will be turned into pitch, its dust into sulfur, And its land will become burning pitch. 10It won’t be quenched night nor day. Its smoke will go up forever. From generation to generation, it will lie waste. No one will pass through it forever and ever. 11But the pelican and the porcupine will possess it. The owl and the raven will dwell in it. He will stretch the line of confusion over it, and the plumb line of emptiness. 12They shall call its nobles to the kingdom, but none shall be there; and all its princes shall be nothing. 13Thorns will come up in its palaces, nettles and thistles in its fortresses; and it will be a habitation of jackals, a court for ostriches. 14The wild animals of the desert will meet with the wolves, and the wild goat will cry to his fellow. Yes, the night creature shall settle there, and shall find herself a place of rest. 15The arrow snake will make her nest there, and lay, hatch, and gather under her shade. Yes, the kites will be gathered there, every one with her mate.
16Search in the book of Yahweh, and read: not one of these will be missing. None will lack her mate. For my mouth has commanded, and his Spirit has gathered them. 17He has cast the lot for them, and his hand has divided it to them with a measuring line. They shall possess it forever. From generation to generation they will dwell in it.

Commentary

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What others are saying

4 commentators · 42 notes on this chapter

Matthew HenryEnglish Puritan / Nonconformist · 1708–17142

Writes as a pastor rather than a critic. Expect devotional and practical application over historical or linguistic analysis, read through a Reformed covenantal frame — and expect the Old Testament to be read forward toward Christ throughout.

Why this voice is here: The most widely read English commentary for three centuries. Included as a baseline: where Henry and a modern voice diverge, the divergence itself is usually the interesting part.

v. 1–8

Here we have a prophecy, as elsewhere we have a history, of the wars of the Lord, which we are sure are all both righteous and successful. This world, as it is his creature, he does good to; but as it is in the interest of Satan, who is called the god of this…

v. 9–17

This prophecy looks very black, but surely it looks so further than upon Edom and Bozrah. 1. It describes the melancholy changes that are often made by the divine Providence, in countries, cities, palaces, and families. Places that have flourished and been…

John GillParticular Baptist / High Calvinist · 1746–176317

The most exhaustive and the most doctrinally committed here. Expect high — even supralapsarian — Calvinism applied consistently, and unusually heavy use of rabbinic and Talmudic sources for Jewish context. Where a passage bears on election or the will, Gill will read it in one direction, and knowing that in advance is the point.

Why this voice is here: The strongest Calvinist reading available in the public domain, and the best on Jewish background. Read alongside Clarke, not instead of him — between them you get both sides of the argument.

v. 1

Come near, ye nations, to hear; and hearken, ye people,.... Not the people of the Jews, as some, whose utter destruction, after their rejection of the Messiah, is here thought to be prophesied of; and much less are these people called upon to hear the Gospel…

v. 2

For the indignation of the Lord is upon all nations,.... All the nations of the earth, which have committed fornication with the whore of Rome, or have given in to her false worship, superstition, and idolatry; which is the reason of God's wrath and…

v. 3

Their slain also shall be cast out,.... Upon the open fields, and there lie unburied, and become meat for the fowls of heaven, who are invited to them as to a supper, even the supper of the great God, Revelation 19:17, and their stink shall come up out of…

Keil & DelitzschGerman Lutheran, conservative-critical · 1861–18757

The technical one, and Old Testament only. Expect Hebrew grammar, textual argument, and direct engagement with nineteenth-century critical scholarship — closer to a scholarly apparatus than a devotional read. Where a modern critic claims a text is late or composite, this is where the conservative counter-argument was made.

Why this voice is here: Old Testament only, and heavy going — but the place to look when someone asserts a passage cannot mean what it appears to.

v. 1–3

What the prophet here foretells relates to all nations, and to every individual within them, in their relation to the congregation of Jehovah. He therefore commences with the appeal in Isa 34:1-3 : "Come near, ye peoples, to hear; and he nations, attend. Let…

v. 4

The judgment foretold by Isaiah also belongs to the last things; for it takes place in connection with the simultaneous destruction of the present heaven and the present earth."And all the host of the heavens moulder away, and the heavens are rolled up like a…

v. 5–7

If we bear this in mind, we shall not be surprised that the prophet gives the following reason for the passing away of the present heavens. "For my sword has become intoxicated in the heaven; behold, it comes down upon Edom, and upon the people of my ban to…

Jamieson, Fausset & BrownScottish Presbyterian / Reformed · 187116

The concise option. Three authors split the canon, so the voice shifts between sections. Expect brief, sober, conservative notes that resolve difficulties rather than dwelling on them — useful for orientation, thinner than Gill or Clarke where a passage is genuinely contested.

Why this voice is here: The quickest way to see what the mainstream Reformed reading of a passage is. Start here, then go to Gill or Clarke when it matters.

v. 2

utterly destroyed--rather, "doomed them to an utter curse" [HORSLEY]. delivered--rather, "appointed."

v. 3

cast out--unburied (Isa 14:19). melted--washed away as with a descending torrent.

v. 4

(Psa 102:26; Joe 2:31; Joe 3:15; Mat 24:29). dissolved-- (Pe2 3:10-12). Violent convulsions of nature are in Scripture made the images of great changes in the human world (Isa 24:19-21), and shall literally accompany them at the winding up of the present…

World English Bible — Public domain