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<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "//www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"><html xmlns="//www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" /><meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width; initial-scale=1.0;"/><title>Isaiah 65 Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers</title><link rel="canonical" href="https://biblehub.com/commentaries/expositors/isaiah/65.htm" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="/5001com.css" type="text/css" media="Screen" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="../spec.css" type="text/css" media="Screen" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 4800px), only screen and (max-device-width: 4800px)" href="/4801.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 1550px), only screen and (max-device-width: 1550px)" href="/1551.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 1250px), only screen and (max-device-width: 1250px)" href="/1251.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 1050px), only screen and (max-device-width: 1050px)" href="/1051.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 900px), only screen and (max-device-width: 900px)" href="/901.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 800px), only screen and (max-device-width: 800px)" href="/801.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 575px), only screen and (max-device-width: 575px)" href="/501.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-height: 450px), only screen and (max-device-height: 450px)" href="/h451.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="/print.css" type="text/css" media="Print" /><script type="application/javascript" src="https://scripts.webcontentassessor.com/scripts/8a2459b64f9cac8122fc7f2eac4409c8555fac9383016db59c4c26e3d5b8b157"></script><script src='https://qd.admetricspro.com/js/biblehub/biblehub-layout-loader-revcatch.js'></script><script id='HyDgbd_1s' src='https://prebidads.revcatch.com/ads.js' type='text/javascript' async></script><script>(function(w,d,b,s,i){var cts=d.createElement(s);cts.async=true;cts.id='catchscript'; 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I am found of <i>them that</i> sought me not: I said, Behold me, behold me, unto a nation <i>that</i> was not called by my name.</div>LXV.</span><p>(1) <span class= "bld">I am sought of them . . .</span>—Is this the answer to the previous prayer? Most commentators say “Yes;” but there is, at least, an apparent absence of continuous sequence. A more probable view is that it was written after an interval more or less considerable, and that the prophet utters what had been revealed to him as explaining why the plaintive appeal of <a href="/isaiah/64-12.htm" title="Will you refrain yourself for these things, O LORD? will you hold your peace, and afflict us very sore?">Isaiah 64:12</a> did not meet at once with the answer that might have been looked for.<p>A further question meets us, which has received different answers. Do the opening words speak, as St. Paul implies they do, of the calling of the Gentiles, contrasting their faith with the unbelief of Israel (<a href="/romans/10-20.htm" title="But Esaias is very bold, and said, I was found of them that sought me not; I was made manifest to them that asked not after me.">Romans 10:20</a>)? Taking the text as it stands, the most natural interpretation (there being no reference afterwards to the Gentiles) seems to be that Jehovah speaks to the same people in <a href="/context/isaiah/65-1.htm" title="I am sought of them that asked not for me; I am found of them that sought me not: I said, Behold me, behold me, to a nation that was not called by my name.">Isaiah 65:1-2</a>, and that both alike speak of indifference and hardness. On this view the words may be translated, <span class= "ital">I was ready to answer those who did not enquire, was nigh at hand to be discovered by those who did not seek<span class= "bld">. . .</span> .</span> Such words were a true description of the state of Israel, as they have been of Christian Churches since, and are in close agreement with what follows. On this view St. Paul’s free use of the LXX. rendering must be looked on as analogous to the like application of <a href="/hosea/1-10.htm" title="Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured nor numbered; and it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said to them, You are not my people, there it shall be said to them, You are the sons of the living God.">Hosea 1:10</a>; <a href="/hosea/2-1.htm" title="Say you to your brothers, Ammi; and to your sisters, Ruhamah.">Hosea 2:1</a>, by him (<a href="/context/romans/9-25.htm" title="As he said also in Osee, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved.">Romans 9:25-26</a>) and by St. Peter (<a href="/1_peter/2-10.htm" title="Which in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God: which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.">1Peter 2:10</a>), though in these instances it is beyond question that the words primarily referred to the Jews, and not to the Gentiles.<p><span class= "bld">A nation that was not called by my name.</span>—Better, with the LXX., as in <a href="/isaiah/43-22.htm" title="But you have not called on me, O Jacob; but you have been weary of me, O Israel.">Isaiah 43:22</a>; <a href="/isaiah/64-7.htm" title="And there is none that calls on your name, that stirs up himself to take hold of you: for you have hid your face from us, and have consumed us, because of our iniquities.">Isaiah 64:7</a>, <span class= "ital">that has not called on my name. </span>The meaning, on either rendering, is that Israel has sunk to the level of the heathen.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-2.htm">Isaiah 65:2</a></div><div class="verse">I have spread out my hands all the day unto a rebellious people, which walketh in a way <i>that was</i> not good, after their own thoughts;</div>(2) <span class= "bld">I have spread out my hands . . .</span>—Here, of course, the words were meant for Israel, as St. Paul applies them. It may not be without interest to note the fact that the words stand over the portal of the Church of Santa Maria, which stands at the entrance of the Ghetto at Rome. Of how many churches at Rome and elsewhere might it not be said, “Thou art the man,” “The beam is in thine own eye”?<span class= "bld"><p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-3.htm">Isaiah 65:3</a></div><div class="verse">A people that provoketh me to anger continually to my face; that sacrificeth in gardens, and burneth incense upon altars of brick;</div>(3) <span class= "bld">That sacriflceth in gardens.</span>—It is not without significance, as bearing on the date of the chapter, that the practice was common in Judah under Ahaz. (Comp. <a href="/isaiah/1-29.htm" title="For they shall be ashamed of the oaks which you have desired, and you shall be confounded for the gardens that you have chosen.">Isaiah 1:29</a>, Mi. 5; <a href="/ezekiel/20-28.htm" title="For when I had brought them into the land, for the which I lifted up my hand to give it to them, then they saw every high hill, and all the thick trees, and they offered there their sacrifices, and there they presented the provocation of their offering: there also they made their sweet smell, and poured out there their drink offerings.">Ezekiel 20:28</a>.)<p><span class= "bld">Burneth incense upon altars of brick.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">on the bricks, </span>and possibly, therefore, on the roofs of houses, as was common in the idolatrous practices of Judah (<a href="/2_kings/23-12.htm" title="And the altars that were on the top of the upper chamber of Ahaz, which the kings of Judah had made, and the altars which Manasseh had made in the two courts of the house of the LORD, did the king beat down, and broke them down from there, and cast the dust of them into the brook Kidron.">2Kings 23:12</a>; <a href="/jeremiah/19-13.htm" title="And the houses of Jerusalem, and the houses of the kings of Judah, shall be defiled as the place of Tophet, because of all the houses on whose roofs they have burned incense to all the host of heaven, and have poured out drink offerings to other gods.">Jeremiah 19:13</a>). By some interpreters the words are referred, though with less probability, to the brick altars which the exiles are supposed to have used at Babylon, and were forbidden by the Law (<a href="/context/exodus/20-24.htm" title="An altar of earth you shall make to me, and shall sacrifice thereon your burnt offerings, and your peace offerings, your sheep, and your oxen: in all places where I record my name I will come to you, and I will bless you.">Exodus 20:24-25</a>).<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-4.htm">Isaiah 65:4</a></div><div class="verse">Which remain among the graves, and lodge in the monuments, which eat swine's flesh, and broth of abominable <i>things is in</i> their vessels;</div>(4) <span class= "bld">Which remain among the graves.</span>—Probably the rock graves of Palestine, which, although they were ceremonially unclean, were not unfrequently used as dwellings (<a href="/matthew/8-28.htm" title="And when he was come to the other side into the country of the Gergesenes, there met him two possessed with devils, coming out of the tombs, exceeding fierce, so that no man might pass by that way.">Matthew 8:28</a>; <a href="/mark/5-3.htm" title="Who had his dwelling among the tombs; and no man could bind him, no, not with chains:">Mark 5:3</a>). The charge may be one merely of neglecting the precepts of the Law, but possibly also may imply that the graves were frequented, as in <a href="/isaiah/8-19.htm" title="And when they shall say to you, Seek to them that have familiar spirits, and to wizards that peep, and that mutter: should not a people seek to their God? for the living to the dead?">Isaiah 8:19</a>; <a href="/isaiah/29-4.htm" title="And you shall be brought down, and shall speak out of the ground, and your speech shall be low out of the dust, and your voice shall be, as of one that has a familiar spirit, out of the ground, and your speech shall whisper out of the dust.">Isaiah 29:4</a>, for necromantic purposes.<p><span class= "bld">Lodge in the monuments . . .</span>—Here, again, the words probably point to practices more or less idolatrous, and common among the heathen of the time. Jerome (<span class= "ital">in loc.</span>) notes the fact that men went to sleep in the crypts of the Temple of Æsculapius, in the hope of gaining visions of the future, and translates <span class= "ital">in delubris idolorum.</span><p><span class= "bld">Which eat swine’s flesh.</span>—The flesh of swine was apparently forbidden, not on sanitary grounds only or chiefly, but because that animal was sacrificed in the festivals of Thammuz (<a href="/ezekiel/8-14.htm" title="Then he brought me to the door of the gate of the LORD's house which was toward the north; and, behold, there sat women weeping for Tammuz.">Ezekiel 8:14</a>), or Adonis. (Comp. <a href="/isaiah/66-17.htm" title="They that sanctify themselves, and purify themselves in the gardens behind one tree in the middle, eating swine's flesh, and the abomination, and the mouse, shall be consumed together, said the LORD.">Isaiah 66:17</a>.) It may be noted, as against the view that the verse points to the practices of the Babylonian exiles, that no reference to swine has been found in any cuneiform inscriptions. In Egypt, as in Palestine, it was looked upon as unclean (Herod. ii. 47, 48). On the worship of Thammuz, see an article by the Rev. A. H. Sayce, in the <span class= "ital">Contemporary Review </span>for September, 1883.<p><span class= "bld">Broth of abominable things.</span>—The words indicate, as before, a sacrificial feast of unclean meats, and therefore connected with a violation of the Mosaic law, possibly with some form of heathen mysteries or divination from the viscera of slaughtered animals. The word occurs here and in <a href="/isaiah/66-3.htm" title="He that kills an ox is as if he slew a man; he that sacrifices a lamb, as if he cut off a dog's neck; he that offers an oblation, as if he offered swine's blood; he that burns incense, as if he blessed an idol. Yes, they have chosen their own ways, and their soul delights in their abominations.">Isaiah 66:3</a>, once in Deuteronomy (<a href="/isaiah/29-17.htm" title="Is it not yet a very little while, and Lebanon shall be turned into a fruitful field, and the fruitful field shall be esteemed as a forest?">Isaiah 29:17</a>), and frequently in Leviticus (<a href="/leviticus/11-11.htm" title="They shall be even an abomination to you; you shall not eat of their flesh, but you shall have their carcasses in abomination.">Leviticus 11:11</a>; <a href="/leviticus/11-13.htm" title="And these are they which you shall have in abomination among the fowls; they shall not be eaten, they are an abomination: the eagle, and the ossifrage, and the ospray,">Leviticus 11:13</a>; <a href="/leviticus/18-26.htm" title="You shall therefore keep my statutes and my judgments, and shall not commit any of these abominations; neither any of your own nation, nor any stranger that sojournes among you:">Leviticus 18:26</a>; <a href="/leviticus/18-30.htm" title="Therefore shall you keep my ordinance, that you commit not any one of these abominable customs, which were committed before you, and that you defile not yourselves therein: I am the LORD your God.">Leviticus 18:30</a>).<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-5.htm">Isaiah 65:5</a></div><div class="verse">Which say, Stand by thyself, come not near to me; for I am holier than thou. These <i>are</i> a smoke in my nose, a fire that burneth all the day.</div>(5) <span class= "bld">Which say, Stand by thyself . . .</span>—The picture, in its main outlines, reminds us of the proud exclusiveness of the later Pharisees, and the root-evil is, of course, identical. Here, however, the ground of the exclusiveness is not the consciousness of the peculiar privileges of Israel, but rests on what was an actual apostasy. Those of whom Isaiah speaks boasted of their initiation into heathen mysteries (Baal, Thammuz, or the like) as giving them a kind of consecrated character, and separating them from the <span class= "ital">profanum vulgus </span>of the Israelites, who were faithful to the God of their fathers.<p><span class= "bld">I am holier than thou.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">I am holy to thee: i.e., one </span>whom thou mayest not approach. (Comp. <a href="/leviticus/21-8.htm" title="You shall sanctify him therefore; for he offers the bread of your God: he shall be holy to you: for I the LORD, which sanctify you, am holy.">Leviticus 21:8</a>.) By some commentators the verb is taken as transitive, I <span class= "ital">make thee holy: i.e., </span>have power to impart holiness; but this is less satisfactory, both grammatically and as to meaning.<p><span class= "bld">These are a smoke in my nose . . .</span>—The point of the clause is that the punishment is represented as not future. The self-exalting idolaters are already as those who are being consumed in the fire of the Divine wrath, and their smoke is “a savour of death” in the nostrils of Jehovah.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-6.htm">Isaiah 65:6</a></div><div class="verse">Behold, <i>it is</i> written before me: I will not keep silence, but will recompense, even recompense into their bosom,</div>(6) <span class= "bld">It is written before me . . .</span>—The thought is that of the great register, the book of God’s remembrance, in which men’s deeds, good and evil, are ever being recorded. (Comp. <a href="/jeremiah/17-1.htm" title="The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron, and with the point of a diamond: it is graven on the table of their heart, and on the horns of your altars;">Jeremiah 17:1</a>; <a href="/psalms/56-8.htm" title="You tell my wanderings: put you my tears into your bottle: are they not in your book?">Psalm 56:8</a>; <a href="/daniel/12-1.htm" title="And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which stands for the children of your people: and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time: and at that time your people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book.">Daniel 12:1</a>; <a href="/malachi/3-16.htm" title="Then they that feared the LORD spoke often one to another: and the LORD listened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the LORD, and that thought on his name.">Malachi 3:16</a>.)<p><span class= "bld">But will recompense . . .</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">without recompensing, </span>or, <span class= "ital">except I recompense. </span>Men took the long-suffering of God as if it indicated forgetfulness (<a href="/romans/2-4.htm" title="Or despise you the riches of his goodness and forbearance and long-suffering; not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?">Romans 2:4</a>; <a href="/2_peter/3-9.htm" title="The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is long-suffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.">2Peter 3:9</a>). They are told that He will at last requite the impenitent “into their very bosom,” their inmost self, for all the evil they have done.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-7.htm">Isaiah 65:7</a></div><div class="verse">Your iniquities, and the iniquities of your fathers together, saith the LORD, which have burned incense upon the mountains, and blasphemed me upon the hills: therefore will I measure their former work into their bosom.</div>(7) <span class= "bld">Which have burned incense upon the mountains . . .</span>—The old inveterate sin of the worship of high places (comp. <a href="/isaiah/57-7.htm" title="On a lofty and high mountain have you set your bed: even thither went you up to offer sacrifice.">Isaiah 57:7</a>; <a href="/hosea/4-13.htm" title="They sacrifice on the tops of the mountains, and burn incense on the hills, under oaks and poplars and elms, because the shadow thereof is good: therefore your daughters shall commit prostitution, and your spouses shall commit adultery.">Hosea 4:13</a>; <a href="/ezekiel/6-13.htm" title="Then shall you know that I am the LORD, when their slain men shall be among their idols round about their altars, on every high hill, in all the tops of the mountains, and under every green tree, and under every thick oak, the place where they did offer sweet smell to all their idols.">Ezekiel 6:13</a>; <a href="/2_kings/15-4.htm" title="Save that the high places were not removed: the people sacrificed and burnt incense still on the high places.">2Kings 15:4</a>; <a href="/2_kings/15-35.htm" title="However, the high places were not removed: the people sacrificed and burned incense still in the high places. He built the higher gate of the house of the LORD.">2Kings 15:35</a>). The worship paid there to other gods, or nominally to Jehovah in a way which He had forbidden, was practically a “blasphemy” or “reproach” against Him.<p><span class= "bld">Their former work.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">I will measure their work first into their bosoms. </span>That was, as it were, the primary duty of the Supreme Ruler.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-8.htm">Isaiah 65:8</a></div><div class="verse">Thus saith the LORD, As the new wine is found in the cluster, and <i>one</i> saith, Destroy it not; for a blessing <i>is</i> in it: so will I do for my servants' sakes, that I may not destroy them all.</div>(8) <span class= "bld">As the new wine . . .</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">the must, </span>or <span class= "ital">unfermented juice of the grape. </span>The transition from the denunciations of the preceding verse is abrupt, and suggests the thought of an interval of time and absence of direct continuity. Possibly, however, a link may be found in the “first” of the amended translation, which prepares the way for something that is to follow. God chastens, but does not destroy.<p><span class= "bld">Destroy it not . . .</span>—The thought is that as even one fruitful cluster of grapes will lead the vine-dresser to spare an otherwise fruitless vine in the hope of a fuller blessing in the future, so Jehovah will spare a sinful nation for the twenty or the ten righteous (<a href="/context/genesis/18-23.htm" title="And Abraham drew near, and said, Will you also destroy the righteous with the wicked?">Genesis 18:23-33</a>). The words “destroy it not” are those which stand at the head of Psalms 57-59, as indicating the tune to which they were to be sung; and it is a natural inference that it may have been a popular vintage song, and therefore doubly apt for the prophet’s purpose. May we compare our own song of “Wood-man, spare that tree?” applied, as it has been, to the trees of ancient institutions.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-9.htm">Isaiah 65:9</a></div><div class="verse">And I will bring forth a seed out of Jacob, and out of Judah an inheritor of my mountains: and mine elect shall inherit it, and my servants shall dwell there.</div>(9) I will bring forth a seed out of Jacob <span class= "bld">. . .</span>—Jacob (<span class= "ital">i.e., </span>Israel) and Judah are used to represent respectively the remnants of the two kingdoms that had been carried into captivity.<p><span class= "bld">My mountains.</span>—One of Isaiah’s characteristic phrases (comp. <a href="/isaiah/14-25.htm" title="That I will break the Assyrian in my land, and on my mountains tread him under foot: then shall his yoke depart from off them, and his burden depart from off their shoulders.">Isaiah 14:25</a>; <a href="/isaiah/29-11.htm" title="And the vision of all is become to you as the words of a book that is sealed, which men deliver to one that is learned, saying, Read this, I pray you: and he said, I cannot; for it is sealed:">Isaiah 29:11</a>; <a href="/context/ezekiel/6-2.htm" title="Son of man, set your face toward the mountains of Israel, and prophesy against them,">Ezekiel 6:2-3</a>. Not Zion only, but every hill in Canaan was a sharer in a derived sanctity.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-10.htm">Isaiah 65:10</a></div><div class="verse">And Sharon shall be a fold of flocks, and the valley of Achor a place for the herds to lie down in, for my people that have sought me.</div>(10) <span class= "bld">Sharon.</span>—As elsewhere, the name appears in the Hebrew with the article—<span class= "ital">the </span>Sharon, the rich plain stretching along the coast from Joppa to the foot of Carmel. The LXX., Josephus, and Strabo render it by <span class= "ital">the plain, </span>or <span class= "ital">the woodland. </span>(Comp. <a href="/isaiah/33-9.htm" title="The earth mourns and languishes: Lebanon is ashamed and hewn down: Sharon is like a wilderness; and Bashan and Carmel shake off their fruits.">Isaiah 33:9</a>; <a href="/isaiah/35-2.htm" title="It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing: the glory of Lebanon shall be given to it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon, they shall see the glory of the LORD, and the excellency of our God.">Isaiah 35:2</a>.)<p><span class= "bld">The valley of Achor.</span>—The name, traditionally connected with the sin of Achan (<a href="/context/joshua/7-24.htm" title="And Joshua, and all Israel with him, took Achan the son of Zerah, and the silver, and the garment, and the wedge of gold, and his sons, and his daughters, and his oxen, and his asses, and his sheep, and his tent, and all that he had: and they brought them to the valley of Achor.">Joshua 7:24-26</a>), belonged to a valley running into the plain of Jericho, and is here taken as the Eastern limit of the region bounded by the Sharon on the west. The whole district was to be as a “garden of the Lord” for the restored remnant. (Comp. the striking parallelism of <a href="/hosea/2-15.htm" title="And I will give her her vineyards from there, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope: and she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt.">Hosea 2:15</a>.)<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-11.htm">Isaiah 65:11</a></div><div class="verse">But ye <i>are</i> they that forsake the LORD, that forget my holy mountain, that prepare a table for that troop, and that furnish the drink offering unto that number.</div>(11) <span class= "bld">That forget my holy mountain . . .</span>—The words imply, like <a href="/context/isaiah/65-3.htm" title="A people that provokes me to anger continually to my face; that sacrifices in gardens, and burns incense on altars of brick;">Isaiah 65:3-5</a>, the abandonment of the worship of the Temple for a heathen ritual, but those that follow point, it will be seen, to Canaanite rather than Babylonian idolatry, and, so far, are in favour of the earlier date of the chapter. The same phrase occurs, however, as connected with the exiles in <a href="/psalms/137-5.htm" title="If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning.">Psalm 137:5</a>.<p><span class= "bld">That prepare a table for that troop.</span>—Hebrew, “for <span class= "ital">the Gad,” </span>probably the planet Jupiter, worshipped as the “greater fortune,” the giver of good luck. The LXX. renders “for the demon” or “Genius.” The name of Baal-Gad (<a href="/joshua/11-17.htm" title="Even from the mount Halak, that goes up to Seir, even to Baalgad in the valley of Lebanon under mount Hermon: and all their kings he took, and smote them, and slew them.">Joshua 11:17</a>; <a href="/joshua/12-17.htm" title="The king of Tappuah, one; the king of Hepher, one;">Joshua 12:17</a>) indicates the early prevalence of the worship in Syria. Phœnician inscriptions have been found with the names Gad-Ashtoreth and Gad-Moloch. The “table” points to the <span class= "ital">lectisternium </span>(or “feast”), which was a prominent feature in Assyrian and other forms of polytheism.<p><span class= "bld">Unto that number.- </span>Here, again, we have in the proper name of a Syrian deity, probably of the planet Venus as the “lesser fortune.” Some scholars have found a name <span class= "ital">Manu </span>in Babylonian inscriptions; and Manât, one of the three deities invoked by the Arabs in the time of Mahomet, is probably connected with<span class= "ital"> Mëni the</span> it (Cheyne). See Sayce, as in Note on <a href="/isaiah/65-4.htm" title="Which remain among the graves, and lodge in the monuments, which eat swine's flesh, and broth of abominable things is in their vessels;">Isaiah 65:4</a>.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-13.htm">Isaiah 65:13</a></div><div class="verse">Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, my servants shall eat, but ye shall be hungry: behold, my servants shall drink, but ye shall be thirsty: behold, my servants shall rejoice, but ye shall be ashamed:</div>(13) <span class= "bld">My servants shall eat . . .</span>—The form of the punishment is apparently determined by that of the sin. That had been the orgy of an idol’s feast; the penalty would be hunger and thirst, while joy and gladness would be the portion of those who had abstained from it. The words present a striking parallelism to <a href="/context/luke/6-20.htm" title="And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said, Blessed be you poor: for yours is the kingdom of God.">Luke 6:20-26</a>.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-15.htm">Isaiah 65:15</a></div><div class="verse">And ye shall leave your name for a curse unto my chosen: for the Lord GOD shall slay thee, and call his servants by another name:</div>(15) <span class= "bld">Ye shall leave your name for a curse . . .</span>—The phrase has parallels in <a href="/numbers/5-21.htm" title="Then the priest shall charge the woman with an oath of cursing, and the priest shall say to the woman, The LORD make you a curse and an oath among your people, when the LORD does make your thigh to rot, and your belly to swell;">Numbers 5:21</a>; <a href="/zechariah/8-13.htm" title="And it shall come to pass, that as you were a curse among the heathen, O house of Judah, and house of Israel; so will I save you, and you shall be a blessing: fear not, but let your hands be strong.">Zechariah 8:13</a>; <a href="/jeremiah/29-22.htm" title="And of them shall be taken up a curse by all the captivity of Judah which are in Babylon, saying, The LORD make you like Zedekiah and like Ahab, whom the king of Babylon roasted in the fire;">Jeremiah 29:22</a>, the thought in each case being that the person named is under so heavy a penalty from the wrath of Jehovah that he becomes a representative instance of what that wrath can accomplish, and because the old name, say of Jacob or of Judah, has been thus identified with evil. He will call His chosen ones, the true Israel, as by another name, which shall be for blessing, and not for cursing. (Comp. <a href="/isaiah/62-2.htm" title="And the Gentiles shall see your righteousness, and all kings your glory: and you shall be called by a new name, which the mouth of the LORD shall name.">Isaiah 62:2</a>, <a href="/revelation/2-17.htm" title="He that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit said to the churches; To him that overcomes will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knows saving he that receives it.">Revelation 2:17</a>; <a href="/revelation/3-12.htm" title="Him that overcomes will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out: and I will write on him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, which is new Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from my God: and I will write on him my new name.">Revelation 3:12</a>.)<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-16.htm">Isaiah 65:16</a></div><div class="verse">That he who blesseth himself in the earth shall bless himself in the God of truth; and he that sweareth in the earth shall swear by the God of truth; because the former troubles are forgotten, and because they are hid from mine eyes.</div>(16) <span class= "bld">Shall bless himself in the God of truth . . .</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">the God of the Amen. </span>In <a href="/revelation/3-14.htm" title="And to the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things said the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God;">Revelation 3:14</a> we have an echo of the Hebrew; in <a href="/john/17-3.htm" title="And this is life eternal, that they might know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.">John 17:3</a> we have as distinct an echo of the LXX. rendering, <span class= "greekheb">τὸν θεὸν τὸν ἀληθινόν</span><span class= "ital">. </span>The words seem to imply that the prophet had entered into the inner meaning of what was to most men only a liturgical formula.<p><span class= "bld">Because the former troubles . . .</span>—The addition of the clause emphasises the thought that it is the truth or faithfulness of God, who keepeth His promise for over, that will lead men to use that new Name as a formula of benediction.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-17.htm">Isaiah 65:17</a></div><div class="verse">For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth: and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind.</div>(17) <span class= "bld">Behold, I create new heavens . . .</span>—The thought reappears in many forms in the New Testament—verbally in <a href="/2_peter/3-13.htm" title="Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwells righteousness.">2Peter 3:13</a>; <a href="/revelation/21-1.htm" title="And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea.">Revelation 21:1</a>, substantially in the “restitution of all things” (<a href="/acts/3-21.htm" title="Whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began.">Acts 3:21</a>), in the “manifestation of the sons of God” (<a href="/romans/8-19.htm" title="For the earnest expectation of the creature waits for the manifestation of the sons of God.">Romans 8:19</a>). The “former things,” the sin and sorrow of the past, shall then fade away from the memory of God’s people, absorbed in the abounding and everlasting joy.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-18.htm">Isaiah 65:18</a></div><div class="verse">But be ye glad and rejoice for ever <i>in that</i> which I create: for, behold, I create Jerusalem a rejoicing, and her people a joy.</div>(18) <span class= "bld">I create Jerusalem . . .</span>—From the prophet’s stand-point, as elsewhere, both in 1 and 2 Isaiah, the earthly city, transformed and transfigured, occupies the central place in the new creation. In the New Testament we note the transfer of the promise to the unseen eternal city, the Jerusalem which is above (<a href="/galatians/4-26.htm" title="But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.">Galatians 4:26</a>; <a href="/revelation/21-10.htm" title="And he carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God,">Revelation 21:10</a>).<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-20.htm">Isaiah 65:20</a></div><div class="verse">There shall be no more thence an infant of days, nor an old man that hath not filled his days: for the child shall die an hundred years old; but the sinner <i>being</i> an hundred years old shall be accursed.</div>(20) <span class= "bld">There shall be no more thence . . .</span>—The prophet sees in the restored city not so much an eternal and a deathless life as the return of the traditional longevity of the prediluvian and patriarchal age (Genesis 5, 11), Life will not be prematurely cut off, as it had been, by pestilence and war. (Comp. <a href="/zechariah/8-4.htm" title="Thus said the LORD of hosts; There shall yet old men and old women dwell in the streets of Jerusalem, and every man with his staff in his hand for very age.">Zechariah 8:4</a>.) He who dies at the age of a hundred will be thought of as dying young; even the sinner, dying before his time as the penalty of his guilt, shall live out the measure of a century. The noticeable fact is that sin is thought of as not altogether extinct—as still appearing, though under altered conditions, even in the restored Jerusalem.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-21.htm">Isaiah 65:21</a></div><div class="verse">And they shall build houses, and inhabit <i>them</i>; and they shall plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them.</div>(21) <span class= "bld">They shall build houses . . .</span>—The proverbial type of national security and peace, as the opposite was of national misfortune (<a href="/leviticus/26-16.htm" title="I also will do this to you; I will even appoint over you terror, consumption, and the burning ague, that shall consume the eyes, and cause sorrow of heart: and you shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat it.">Leviticus 26:16</a>; <a href="/deuteronomy/28-30.htm" title="You shall betroth a wife, and another man shall lie with her: you shall build an house, and you shall not dwell therein: you shall plant a vineyard, and shall not gather the grapes thereof.">Deuteronomy 28:30</a>).<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-22.htm">Isaiah 65:22</a></div><div class="verse">They shall not build, and another inhabit; they shall not plant, and another eat: for as the days of a tree <i>are</i> the days of my people, and mine elect shall long enjoy the work of their hands.</div>(22) <span class= "bld">As the days of a tree . . .</span>—We may think of the cedars of Lebanon or the oaks of Bashan as furnishing the prophet with the ideal standard of longevity. Commonly, as by Homer and other poets, the lives of men have been compared to that of the leaves of deciduous trees; here they are compared to the life of the tree itself. The prophet is still speaking, not of national, but of individual life.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-23.htm">Isaiah 65:23</a></div><div class="verse">They shall not labour in vain, nor bring forth for trouble; for they <i>are</i> the seed of the blessed of the LORD, and their offspring with them.</div>(23) <span class= "bld">Their offspring with them . . .</span>—The picture presented is that of a patriarchal family, including many generations, fathers no longer outliving their children and mourning for their death, as Jacob did (<a href="/genesis/37-35.htm" title="And all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him; but he refused to be comforted; and he said, For I will go down into the grave to my son mourning. Thus his father wept for him.">Genesis 37:35</a>; <a href="/genesis/42-38.htm" title="And he said, My son shall not go down with you; for his brother is dead, and he is left alone: if mischief befall him by the way in the which you go, then shall you bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to the grave.">Genesis 42:38</a>), and as men had often done in the times of war, famine, and pestilence, through which Isaiah had lived.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-24.htm">Isaiah 65:24</a></div><div class="verse">And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear.</div>(24) <span class= "bld">Before they call . . .</span>—In man’s experience of men, often, as things are now, in his relations with God, there is an interval between prayer and the answer. In the new Jerusalem the two would be simultaneous, or the answer would anticipate the prayer.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/isaiah/65-25.htm">Isaiah 65:25</a></div><div class="verse">The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock: and dust <i>shall be</i> the serpent's meat. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the LORD.</div>(25) <span class= "bld">The wolf and the lamb . . .</span>—The words point to what have been called the discords in the harmony of Nature, the pain and death involved, of necessity, in the relation of one whole class of animals to another. In St. Paul’s language, the “whole creation groaneth and travaileth together” (<a href="/romans/8-22.htm" title="For we know that the whole creation groans and travails in pain together until now.">Romans 8:22</a>). In the new heaven and the new earth of the prophet’s vision there would be no such discords. The flesh-eating beasts should change their nature; even the serpent, named, probably, with special reference to Genesis 3, as the starting-point of the discords, shall find food in the dust in which he crawls, and shall be no longer a destroyer. The condition of the ideal Paradise should be restored. The picture finds a parallel, perhaps a <span class= "ital">replica, </span>in Virgil, <span class= "ital">Eel. </span>4. Do the poet and the prophet stand on the same footing? or may we look for a literal fulfilment of the words of the one, though not of the other? The answer must be given in words that are “wary and few.” We dare not, on the one hand, fix times and seasons, or press the <span class= "ital">letter </span>of prophetic visions as demanding a fulfilment. On the other, the permanence of Israel as a people suggests the possibility of a restored Jerusalem, and modern theories of evolution point to the gradual elimination of the fiercer animals as part of the conquests of humanity.<p><span class= "bld"><div id="botbox"><div class="padbot"><div align="center">Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers<br /><br />Text Courtesy of <a href="//biblesupport.com" target="_top">BibleSupport.com</a>. 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