Isaiah 8:11

The Holy Bible, Berean Study Bible

Contextual Overview

⁹Huddle together, O peoples, and be shattered; pay attention, all you distant lands; prepare for battle, and be broken; prepare for battle, and be dismayed. ¹⁰Devise a plan, but it will be thwarted; state a proposal, but it will not happen. For God is with us." ¹¹For this is what the LORD spoke to me with a strong hand, instructing me not to walk in the way of this people:¹²"Do not call conspiracy everything these people regard as conspiracy. Do not fear what they fear; do not live in dread. ¹³The LORD of Hosts is the One to regard as holy. Only He should be feared; only He should be dreaded, ¹⁴and He will be a sanctuary. But to both houses of Israel He will be a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense, a trap and a snare to the dwellers of Jerusalem." ¹⁵Many will stumble over these; they will fall and be broken; they will be ensnared and captured.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

with a strong hand: Heb. in strength of hand, Jeremiah 20:7, Jeremiah 20:9, Ezekiel 3:14, Acts 4:20

instructed: Psalms 32:8, Proverbs 1:15, Jeremiah 15:19, Ezekiel 2:6-8

Reciprocal: 1 Kings 18:46 - the hand Job 27:11 - teach Isaiah 7:4 - fear not Philippians 3:18 - many Philippians 4:12 - I am

Cross-References

Genesis 8:12
And Noah waited seven more days and sent out the dove again, but this time she did not return to him.

Genesis 8:14
By the twenty-seventh day of the second month, the earth was fully dry.

Nehemiah 8:15
So they proclaimed this message and spread it throughout their towns and in Jerusalem, saying, "Go out to the hill country and bring back branches of olive, wild olive, myrtle, palm, and other leafy trees, to make booths, as it is written."

Romans 10:15
And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written: "How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!"

Gill's Notes on the Bible

For the Lord spake thus to me with a strong hand,.... In the strength of prophecy, as the Targum explains it; and so all the Jews' interpreters understand it of prophecy, as in Ezekiel 1:3: or, "the Lord spake thus to me, when he took (me) by the hand" t; as parents or masters take hold of the hands of children, while they are advising and instructing them, as expressive of their great affection for them; and when they would retain them with them, or restrain them from doing amiss:

and instructed me that I should not walk in the way of this people: or join with them in desiring and seeking for the help of the king of Assyria, against Rezin and Remaliah's son; or in being willing to surrender up into their hands:

saying; as follows:

t בחזקת היד "apprehensione manus", Piscator; "cum manu me apprehenderit", Tigurine version.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

For the Lord spake thus - Spake that which immediately follows in the next verse. Warned him not to Unite in the alliance with foreign kingdoms which the nation was about forming.

With a strong hand - Margin, ‘With strength of hand.’ That is, when the hand of God urged me. A strong prophetic impulse is often represented as being produced by God’s laying his hand on the prophet; or by his being thus, as it were, urged or impelled to it; Ezekiel 3:14 : ‘The hand of Jehovah was strong upon me;’ 2 Kings 3:15 : ‘And it came to pass, that when the minstrel played, the hand of the Lord came upon him;’ Jeremiah 20:7 : ‘O Lord, thou art stronger than I, and hast prevailed;’ see also Ecclesiastes 2:24; 1 Kings 18:46; 2 Kings 3:15; Ezekiel 33:22; Ezekiel 40:1; compare the Introduction, section 7. 11. (3.) The meaning is, that the prophet was strongly, and almost irresistibly, urged by the divine influence, to say what he was about to say.

That I should not walk ... - That I should not approve, and fall in with the design of Ahaz, and of the nation, in calling in the aid of the Assyrian armies.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Isaiah 8:11. With a strong hand - "As taking me by the hand"] Eleven MSS., (two ancient,) of Kennicott's, thirty-four of De Rossi's, and seven editions, read כחזקת kechezkath; and so Symmachus, the Syriac, and Vulgate. Or rather with a strong hand, that is, with a strong and powerful influence of the prophetic Spirit.