The Pulpit Commentary — Isaiah — Volume 1 — Section 141

or tho Authorized Version. The exBCt word would He wute, and grow only "briers anrl j used does not occur elsewhere. Upon all thorns." • buhes; ruther, upon all prutwre,. Ver. 24.-With arrows a.nd with bows. Ver. 20.-Shall the Lord shave with a Only the hunter will go there, armed with razor that ia hired; re.ther, with the hired his wee.pone of chase, to kill the wild anime.la razor; i.e. the razor thot Ahe.z will he.ve that will haunt the thickets. hired (2 Kings xvi. 8). The metaphor well Ver. 25.-0n all hills that shall be digged; expresses the stripping of the land bare by rather, that shall have bun digged in former plunder and exaction (comp. Ezek. v. 1, 12, times, whether for com eulti vation or for and 2 Ohron. xxviii. 19-21). God would any other. There shall not oome thither the use Tigloth-Pileser as hil instrument to fear of briers (so Ewald and Kay). But Jdistress Ahaz. By them beyond the river; almost all other commentators tranRlate, or, in the parh beyond the ri-11er (comp. "Thou shalt not come thither for fear of l Chron. xix, 16). "The river" is un- briers," etc. The briers and thorns of the doubtedly the Euphre.tes, e.nd ihey who East tear the clothes and the flesh. It shall dwell beyond it the Assyrians. By the King be; i.e. "each such place shall be." For of Assyria. Once more e. gloss is suspected, the sending forth of oxen; rather, for the as in ver. 17. The meaning would certe.inly sending in of o-;z:en, Men shall send their be sufficiently pie.in without the clause. cattle into them. as alone able to penetrate The head . . . the hair of the feet . . . the the jungle without hmt. beard. These three represent all the hair on any part of the body. Judah is to be SUPPLEMENTAJI.Y NOTlll. completely stripped. Ver. 14.-Note on tk general purport of Ver. 21.-A man shall nourish a young the Immanuel 'f)'f'fYl)MC'y. Few prophecies oow, and two sheep; literally, two ewes. A have been the subject of so much controversy, stop having been put to cultivation, men or called forth BUch a variety of exegesis, as she.11 return to the pastoral life, but shall not this prophecy of Immanuel Roeenmiiller possess more than two or three hee.d of cattle gives a list of twenty-eight authors who have apiece, the Assyrians having swept off most written dissertations upon it, and himself of the beasts. Tiglath-Pileser, in hie in- adds e. twenty-ninth. Yet the subject is far scriptions, mentions his carrying off horned from being exhausted. It is still asked : ce.ttle and sheep to the amount of many (l) Were the mother and son persons belong- thousands from the countries which he ing to the time of Isaiah himself, e.nd if so, overran or conquered (' Records of the Past,' what persons? Or, (2) Were they the Virgin vol. v. pp. 49, 52). Mary and her Son Jesus? Or, (3) Had the Ver. 22.-For the abundanoe of milk that prophecy a double fulfilment, first in certain they shall give. The small number of the persons who lived in Isaiah's time, and cattle will allow of each having abundant secondly in J011Ua and his mother? pasture. Hence they will give an abundance I. The first theory is that of the Jewish of milk. He shall eat butter; rather, curd.t-- commentators. Originally, they suggested the solid food most readily obtained from tbe.t the mother was Abi, the wife of Ahaz milk (comp. above, ver. 15). Ourdled milk (2 Kings xviii 2), and the son Hezekiah, and wild honey should form the simple diet who delivered Judah from the ABByrian of the remnant left in the land. It is, of power (see Justin, 'Dial. cnm Tryphon.,' course, possible to understand this in a p. 262). But this was early disproved by spiritual sense, of simple doctrine and showing that, according to the numbers of "gospel honey out of the flinty rock of the Kings (2 Kings xvi. 2; xviii. 2), Hezekiah Law;" but there is no reason to think that was at least nine years old in the first year the prophet intended his words in any but of Ahaz, before which this prophecy could the most literal sense. not have been delivered (oh. vii. 1). The Ver. 23.-A thousand vines at a thousand aeoond suggestion made identified the mother Bilverlinga. By " silverlinge" our translators with IeaiaLL'e wife, the" prophetees" of eh. mean " pieces of silver," probably shekels. viii. 3, and made the son a child of his, called "A thousand vines at a thousand shekels" aotually Immanuel, or else his son Maher- may mean either e. thouse.nd vines worth ehalal-hash-baz (oh. viii. 1) under a sym- that amount, or a thousand vines rented at bolioal designation. But ha-'almah, "the that sum llllnually (comp. Oant. viii. 11). virgin," would be a very strange title for The latter would point to vineyards of un- Isaiah to have given his wife, and the rank \ usual goodness, since the shekel is at least assigned to Immanuel in oh. viii. 8 would :eighteeupeuce, anti tho present rent of a not suit any son of Isaiah's. It remains to 1\'ineyard in Palestine is at the r11te of a regard the 'almah as "some young woman ,piastre for each vine, or 2½d, The general actually present," name, rank, and position :meaning would s~em to be th,\t not even unknown, and Immanuel as her son, L\lso /the best vineyards w JUld be oulti·va&ed, bnt otherwise unknown (Cheyne). But th& JIIAUIL I[ 130 'l'HE BOOK OF THE PROPHE'Il ,lSAIA.H,