Isaiah 37:26

The Holy Bible, Berean Study Bible

Contextual Overview

²¹Then Isaiah son of Amoz sent a message to Hezekiah: "This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: Because you prayed to Me concerning Sennacherib king of Assyria, ²²this is the word that the LORD has spoken against him: 'The Virgin Daughter of Zion despises you and mocks you; the Daughter of Jerusalem shakes her head behind you. ²³Whom have you taunted and blasphemed? Against whom have you raised your voice and lifted your eyes in pride? Against the Holy One of Israel! ²⁴Through your servants you have taunted the Lord, and you have said: "With my many chariots I have ascended to the heights of the mountains, to the far recesses of Lebanon. I have cut down its tallest cedars, the finest of its cypress trees. I have reached its farthest heights, the densest of its forests. ²⁵I have dug wells and drunk foreign waters. With the soles of my feet I have dried up all the streams of Egypt." ²⁶Have you not heard? Long ago I ordained it; in days of old I planned it. Now I have brought it to pass, that you should crush fortified cities into piles of rubble.²⁷Therefore their inhabitants, devoid of power, are dismayed and ashamed. They are plants of the field, tender green shoots, grass on the roofs, scorched before it is grown. ²⁸But I know your sitting down, your going out and coming in, and your raging against Me. ²⁹Because your rage and arrogance against Me have reached My ears, I will put My hook in your nose and My bit in your mouth; I will send you back the way you came.' ³⁰And this will be a sign to you, O Hezekiah: This year you will eat what grows on its own, and in the second year what springs from the same. But in the third year you will sow and reap; you will plant vineyards and eat their fruit.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

long ago: etc. or, how I have made it long ago, and formed it of ancient times, Should I now bring it to be laid waste, and defenced cities to be ruinous heaps.

how I: Isaiah 10:5, Isaiah 10:6, Isaiah 10:15, Isaiah 45:7, Isaiah 46:10, Isaiah 46:11, Genesis 50:20, Psalms 17:13, Psalms 76:10, Amos 3:6, Acts 2:23, Acts 4:27, Acts 4:28, 1 Peter 2:8, Jude 1:4

Reciprocal: Numbers 22:35 - Go Judges 3:12 - and the Lord 1 Kings 11:23 - God 2 Kings 3:25 - beat down 2 Kings 19:25 - Hast thou not Psalms 9:6 - thou hast Isaiah 17:1 - a ruinous Isaiah 22:11 - ye have Isaiah 54:16 - I have Jeremiah 33:2 - the maker Jeremiah 34:22 - I will command Jeremiah 47:7 - the Lord Jeremiah 51:20 - art Ezekiel 28:14 - and I Habakkuk 1:12 - thou hast ordained Revelation 6:4 - power Revelation 13:7 - and power

Cross-References

Genesis 4:10
"What have you done?" replied the LORD. "The voice of your brother's blood cries out to Me from the ground.

Genesis 25:32
"Look," said Esau, "I am about to die, so what good is a birthright to me?"

Genesis 37:20
"Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits. We can say that a vicious animal has devoured him. Then we shall see what becomes of his dreams!"

Deuteronomy 17:8
If a case is too difficult for you to judge, whether the controversy within your gates is regarding bloodshed, lawsuits, or assaults, you must go up to the place the LORD your God will choose.

2 Samuel 1:16
For David had said to the Amalekite, "Your blood be on your own head because your own mouth testified against you, saying, 'I killed the LORD's anointed.'"

Job 16:18
O earth, do not cover my blood; may my cry for help never be laid to rest.

Psalms 30:9
"What gain is there in my bloodshed, in my descent to the Pit? Will the dust praise You? Will it proclaim Your faithfulness?

Jeremiah 41:8
But ten of the men among them said to Ishmael, "Do not kill us, for we have hidden treasure in the field-wheat, barley, oil, and honey!" So he refrained from killing them with the others.

Ezekiel 24:7
For the blood she shed is still within her; she poured it out on the bare rock; she did not pour it on the ground to cover it with dust.

Matthew 16:26
What will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Hast thou not heard long ago?.... By report, by reading the history of ancient times, or by means of the prophets; these are the words of the Lord to Sennacherib. The Targum adds,

"what I did to Pharaoh king of Egypt;''

it follows:

how I have done it; and of ancient times that I have formed it? meaning either the decree in his own breast from all eternity, and which he had published by his prophets, of raising up him, this wicked prince, to be the scourge of nations; or by the "it" are meant the people of the Jews, God's Israel, whom he had made, formed into a body politic, and into a church state, and had done great things for, in bringing them out of Egypt, leading them through the Red sea, providing for them, and protecting them in the wilderness, subduing nations under them, and settling them in the land of Canaan;

now have I brought it to pass, that thou shouldest be to lay waste defenced cities into ruinous heaps t; which some render interrogatively,

now should I bring, it to be laid waste, and fenced cities to be ruinous heaps? that is, the people of the Jews, the city of Jerusalem, and other fenced cities? no, I will not: or the meaning is, that that decree, which he had framed and formed in his own mind from all eternity, he was now bringing to pass; which was, that this king of Babylon should be a waster and destroyer of fortified cities, which he should reduce to heaps of ruin; wherefore he had no reason to vaunt as he had done, for he was only an instrument of executing the purposes and designs of God, though it was not in his heart, nor did he so mean.

t גלים נצים "in acervos et flores", "into heaps and flowers", that is, into heaps of dust, which being moved, and raised by the wind, fly away like flowers and blossoms of trees; so Gussetius, "in acervos volantes, aut ad volandum excitatos, scil. dum redacti in pulveres, magna ex parte, volant, excitati a ventis", Comment. Ebr. p. 502.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Hast thou not heard - This is evidently the language of God addressed to Sennacherib. It is designed to state to him that he was under his control; that this was the reason Isaiah 37:27 why the inhabitants of the nations had been unable to resist him; that he was entirely in his hands Isaiah 37:28; and that lie would control him as he pleased Isaiah 37:29.

Long ago how I have done it - You boast that all this is by your own counsel and power. Yet I have done it; that is, I have purposed, planned, arranged it long ago (compare Isaiah 22:11).

That thou shouldest be to lay waste - I have raised you up for this purpose, and you have been entirely under my control (see the note at Isaiah 10:5).

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Isaiah 37:26. Lay waste defended cities into ruinous heaps - "Lay waste warlike nations; strong fenced cities."] גלים נצים gallim nitstsim. It is not easy to give a satisfactory account of these two words, which have greatly embarrassed all the interpreters, ancient and modern. For גלים gallim I read גוים goyim, as the Septuagint do in this place, εθνη. The word נצים netsim the Vulgate renders in this place compugnantium; in the parallel place, 2 Kings 19:25, pugnantium; and the Septuagint μαχιμων, fighting, warlike. This rendering is as well authorized as any other that I know of; and, with the reading of the Septuagint, perfectly clears up the construction. See the margin on all the preceding verses.