The Pulpit Commentary — Isaiah — Volume 1 — Section 372

CHAPTER XXIII. 'Ant. Juel,' i. 6, § 1). The name" Chittim" is not improbably a variant of "Khittim," Vere.1-14.-TBE BURDEN OJ' TYRE. We "the Hittites," who may ba.ve been the here reach the last of the" burdens "-the first to colonize the island. A fleet from oonoluding chapter of the series of denun- the Western Mediterranean would natu- rally touch at Cyprus on its way to Tyre, oiatory prophecies which commenced with and would there learn the calamity. oh. xiii. It is an· elegy "in three stanzas, Ver. 2.-Be lltill; rather, be n1enl, as in or strophes" (Oheyne)-the first extending the margin. It would be idle to complain from ver. I to ver. 5; the second, thence to or lament. Ye illhe.bitanta of the isle. Tyre ver. 9 ; and the third from ver. 10 to ver: 14. was situated on a small isle, which Alex- An undertone of sadness, and even of com- ander joined to the mainland by means of a mole (Arrian, ' Exp. Alex.,' ii. 23). It is miseration, prevails throughout it, the pro- uncertain, however, whether this isle is phet viewing Tyre as a fellow-sufferer with meant here, or the strip of Phamician coast, Israel, persecuted and oppressed by the aince the Hebrew •; hlls both meanings. eame enemy, Assyria, which was everywhere Thou whom the merchants of Zidon . . . pushing her conquests, and bad recently have repleniabed. During the flourishing period of Tyre (B.o. 1025-585), Zidon, extended her dominion even over Babylon though it had generally kings of its own, (ver. 13). Thie last allusion fixes the date played a secondary part to Tyre, and for of the prophecy to e. time subsequent to B.o. the most pa.rt acquiesced in Tyrian su- 710, when the Assyrian monarch, Sargon, premacy. Its best sailors served in the first conquered the country, and took the Tyrian fleet (Ezek. x:xvii. S), and its mer- chants were content to enrich the recognized title of king (G. ;Smith, 'Eponym Canon,' "chief city." p: 86). Ver. 3.-By great water11; rather, on· Ver.1.-,-Kowl (comp. ob. xiii 6, 81). The great I.Daters; i.e. on the waters of the Me- ~p~ssion is common in the. prophets (see diteJTB.nean (of. Ps. cvii 23; Ezek. :a:vii. Jer. iv, .8; xxv. 34', etc.:· Ezek. -xxi. 12; 26). The Egyptian vessels conveyed tLe xxx. 2; Joel i. 5, 11, 13; Zepb. i, 11 ; Zeeb. corn intended for exportation to the ports xi. 2, etc.), Ye ships of Te,rshish; "Ships at the mouths of the Nile, where it was of Tarsbish '' are first mentioned in con- tre.nshipped aboard Phc:enician craft, which nection with the trade carried on by Solo- carried it on the open sea to the countries mon. Apparently, the term there designates needing it. We never bear of the Egyptians a certain i,lass of ship rather than those disputing the trade of the Meditemmelln engaged in a particular trBde (see the com- with the Phamicions and the Greeks, though ment on 1 Kings xxii. 48 in the' Speaker's they certainly bad trading-vessels at times Commentary,' vol. ii. p. 623). Here, how- on the waters of the Red Sea. The seed of ever, Phamician ships, actually engaged in Sihor; i.e. the corn of the Nile valley. "Si- the tre.do with Tartessus, may be intended. hor,'' or rather .. ShihM," is the only proper Te.rteseW1 Willi a very ancient Pbcanicilln name by which the Nile is designutecl in settlement in the south of Spain, beyond the Hebrew Scriptures. It means" the dar~," the Pillars of Hercules, and was the centre •• the turbid,'' and may be compared with of a most important and lucrative com- the 1uodern "Bahr-el-azral,," used of the merce(eee I Kings x. 22; Herod.,i. 163; Ezek, Eastern or Abyssinian Nile, and with the xxvii. 12, eto.). In the present passage the re- term " Nilus" itself, if that signifies " the turning fleet of merchantmen is addressed, dark blue st,eam." It occurs, as the na.me &Q.d told that the harbour to whioh they are of the Nile, ouly in Josh. xiii. 3; 1 Chron. hastening is closed, the city deeolute. From xiii. 5 ; J er. ii. 18; and the preseut place. the land of Chittim. "Chittim" here, as in Is her revenue; i.e. " produces 11, portion of Gon. x. 4, and elsewhere generally, is pro- her annual income." And she is a ma.rt of bably Cyprns, whose most ancient capitlll nations (so Gcsenius and Ewl\lu). De- was callc,l by the Greeks K,tiun (see Joseph., litzsch and Mr. Cl cyue translate, "It i.t 31'2 THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET ISAIAH. [cH. xxm. l-18,