Verse 4
4. Ah The exclamation denotes mental pain, and answers to our word alas! The adjective of the text is an active participle in the Hebrew.
Seed of evildoers Offspring of wicked immediate ancestors.
Children… corrupters From a word of a reflexive form, hence corrupting themselves. Deuteronomy 4:16; Deuteronomy 4:25. The word denotes violence, moral self-violence, and is used of the antediluvians who “corrupted” their way, so as to compel God to destroy them. Genesis 6:12-13. All the phrases here express intense feeling.
Holy One of Israel This phrase is used by Isaiah more than by any other prophet. It is used in all parts of this collection of the prophecies, and is a proof of one authorship of the whole. It means Him “whose name is holy,” (Isaiah 57:15,) essentially holy; who deigned to choose Israel, and dwell with him: but he forsook God, and turned his back, not his face, to him. Such is the thought stated in the words, they are gone away backward.
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