Their land also is full of idols ,.... Of the Virgin Mary, and of saints departed, whose images are set up to be worshipped in all their churches, and had in private houses: and they worship the work of their own hands, that which their own fingers have made ; namely, idols of gold, silver, brass, wood, and stone, Revelation 9:20 . read more
And the mean man boweth down, and the great man humbleth himself ,.... Both high and low, rich and poor, bow down unto, humble themselves before, and worship idols made by the hands of men: the words for the "mean man" and "the great man" are אדם and איש , "Adam" and "Ish"; and which are also interpreted by Jarchi of little or mean men, and of princes and mighty ones: therefore forgive them not ; their sins of soothsaying, covetousness, and idolatry; and such that worship the beast... read more
Their land also is full of idols "And his land is filled with idols" - Uzziah and Fotham are both said, 2 Kings 15:3 , 2 Kings 15:4 , 2 Kings 15:34 , 2 Kings 15:35 , "to have done that which was right in the sight of the Lord;" that is, to have adhered to and maintained the legal worship of God, in opposition to idolatry and all irregular worship; for to this sense the meaning of that phrase is commonly to be restrained; "save that the high places were not removed where the people... read more
Boweth down "Shall be bowed down" - This has reference to the preceding verse. They bowed themselves down to their idols, therefore shall they be bowed down and brought low under the avenging hand of God. Therefore forgive them not - "And thou wilt not forgive them." - L. read more
Purgation by judgment. The blessed age cannot yet come in. If we suppose the prophet to have been reading the previous oracle as a sabbath lesson out of the elder prophet Joel's scroll, he adds the exhortation, "Let us walk in the light of Jehovah!" Then a sudden pause. For he calls to mind the present corrupt condition of the nation. They cannot pass over to that new and happy condition of things as they now are. Peace can only be the fruit of righteousness. God cannot impart blessings for... read more
THE CONTRAST OF THE PRESENT WITH THE FUTURE . Having shown to Israel the vision of a far-distant future, when holiness and peace would reign upon the earth, and "the mountain of the Lord's house" would draw all men into it, the prophet returns to things as they are—first exhorting Israel to "walk in the light of Jehovah' ( Isaiah 2:5 ), and then showing how far they have withdrawn from the light; Such being the case, punishment must come—mean and great must be equally... read more
National judgments the result of national sins. God's dealings with Israel are to be viewed as a pattern of his dealings with nations generally. He has not two standards of right and wrong, or two rules of action under like circumstances. He is "no respecter of persons." As he dealt with his own peculiar people, so will he deal, so has he always dealt, with the other nations of the world. I. EVERY NATION HAS ITS PROBATION . God proved Israel during the space of above seven... read more
Retribution and its results. In this noble prophetic passage, as charged with poetic grandeur as it is full of religious zeal, we have our thought directed to— I. Two HEINOUS SINS WHICH BELONG TO EVERY AGE AND CLASS . They are these: 1. Disobedience . The divination to which reference is made ( Isaiah 2:6 ) is expressly prohibited in the Law ( Deuteronomy 18:10-12 ); alliance with strangers ( Isaiah 2:6 ) is also forbidden ( Exodus 34:12 ; Dent; Exodus... read more
Full of idols . The historians declare that both Uzziah and Jotham maintained the worship of Jehovah and disallowed idolatry ( 2 Kings 15:3 , 2 Kings 15:34 ; 2 Chronicles 26:4 ; 2 Chronicles 27:2 ), so that we must regard the idol-worship of the time as an irregular and private practice. (It is, perhaps, alluded to in 2 Chronicles 27:2 ; and the fact of its prevalence is stated in Amos 2:1 ; Micah 5:13 .) Perhaps Bishop Lowth is right in regarding it as mainly a continuation of... read more
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Matthew Henry's Complete Commentary - Isaiah 2:6-9
The calling in of the Gentiles was accompanied with the rejection of the Jews; it was their fall, and the diminishing of them, that was the riches of the Gentiles; and the casting off of them was the reconciling of the world (Rom. 11:12-15); and it should seem that these verses have reference to that, and are designed to justify God therein, and yet it is probable that they are primarily intended for the convincing and awakening of the men of that generation in which the prophet lived, it... read more