Isaiah 18:6

The Holy Bible, Berean Study Bible

Contextual Overview

¹Woe to the land of whirring wings, along the rivers of Cush, ²which sends couriers by sea, in papyrus vessels on the waters. Go, swift messengers, to a people tall and smooth-skinned, to a people widely feared, to a powerful nation of strange speech, whose land is divided by rivers. ³All you people of the world and dwellers of the earth, when a banner is raised on the mountains, you will see it; when a trumpet sounds, you will hear it. ⁴For this is what the LORD has told me: "I will quietly look on from My dwelling place, like shimmering heat in the sunshine, like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest." ⁵For before the harvest, when the blossom is gone and the flower becomes a ripening grape, He will cut off the shoots with a pruning knife, and remove and discard the branches. ⁶They will all be left to the mountain birds of prey, and to the beasts of the land. The birds will feed on them in summer, and all the wild animals in winter.⁷At that time gifts will be brought to the LORD of Hosts-from a people tall and smooth-skinned, from a people widely feared, from a powerful nation of strange speech, whose land is divided by rivers-to Mount Zion, the place of the Name of the LORD of Hosts.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

Isaiah 14:19, Isaiah 34:1-7, Jeremiah 7:33, Jeremiah 15:3, Ezekiel 32:4-6, Ezekiel 39:17-20, Revelation 19:17, Revelation 19:18

Reciprocal: Psalms 80:12 - broken Isaiah 17:11 - the harvest Jeremiah 16:4 - meat Ezekiel 31:13 - General

Cross-References

Isaiah 32:8
But a noble man makes honorable plans; he stands up for worthy causes.

Matthew 13:33
He told them still another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into three measures of flour, until all of it was leavened."

Acts 16:15
And when she and her household had been baptized, she urged us, "If you consider me a believer in the Lord, come and stay at my house." And she persuaded us.

Romans 12:13
Share with the saints who are in need. Practice hospitality.

Galatians 5:13
For you, brothers, were called to freedom; but do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh. Rather, serve one another in love.

Hebrews 13:2
Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it.

1 Peter 4:9
Show hospitality to one another without complaining.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

They shall be left, together unto the fowls of the mountains, and to the beasts of the earth,.... That is, both sprigs and branches; with the fruit of them, which being unripe, are disregarded by men, but fed upon by birds and beasts; the fruits by the former, and the tender sprigs and green branches by the latter; signifying the destruction of the Ethiopians or Egyptians, and that the princes and the people should fall together, and lie unburied, and become a prey to birds and beasts; or the destruction of the Assyrian army slain by the angel, as Aben Ezra and others; though some interpret it of the army of Gog and Magog, as before observed; see Ezekiel 39:17:

and the fowls shall summer upon them, and all the beasts of the earth shall winter upon them; not that the one should feed upon them in the summer time, and the other in the winter; the fowls in the summer time, when they fly in large flocks, and the beasts in the winter, when they go together in great numbers, as Kimchi; but the sense is, that the carnage should be so great, there would be sufficient for them both, all the year long.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

They shall be left together - The figure here is dropped, and the literal narration is resumed. The sense is, that the army shall be slain and left unburied. Perhaps the “branches and twigs” in the previous verse denoted military leaders, and the captains of the armies, which are now represented as becoming food for beasts of the field and for birds of prey.

To the fowls of the mountains - Their dead bodies shall be unburied, and shall be a prey to the birds that prey upon flesh.

And to the beasts of the earth - The wild animals: the beasts of the forest.

And the fowls shall summer upon them - Shall pass the summer, that is, they shall continue to be unburied. “And the beasts of the earth shall winter upon them.” They shall be unburied through the winter; probably indicating that they would furnish food for the fowls and the wild beasts for a long time. On the multitude of carcasses these animals will find nourishment for a whole year, that is, they will spend the summer and the winter with them. When this was fulfilled, it is, perhaps, not possible to tell, as we are so little acquainted with the circumstances of the people in relation to whom it was spoken. If it related, as I suppose, to the people of Nubia or Ethiopia forming an alliance with the Assyrians for the purpose of invading Judea, it was fulfilled probably when Sennacherib and his assembled hosts were destroyed. Whenever it was fulfilled, it is quite evident that the design of the prophecy was to give comfort to the Jews, alarmed and agitated as they were at the prospect of the preparations which were made, by the assurance that those plans would fail, and all the efforts of their enemies be foiled and disconcerted.