Verses 9-12
9-12. Stay… wonder; cry The original, and our version from it, in this verse are obscure. Credibly the meaning is: “Stare with amazed look at the prophecy just given, if you will. [Isaiah is addressing the nobles and priests and prophets of Jerusalem.] Revel in sensual pleasures if you will. Deeper blindness will be the certain result. Cling still to your policy of rejecting Jehovah’s aid and seeking Egypt’s.” They stagger, etc. Here the prophet apparently soliloquizes: “Here they stagger and are stupefied by something quite different from the usual wine.” Isaiah 28:7. What this something is he now states to them. Jehovah hath poured… deep sleep, etc. God creates not moral evil; but when projected from the creature, he causes it to react upon and punish itself. Sin stupefies the moral nature. It works “a deep sleep.” It makes dull, or even blind, the intellectual and the spiritual eye. Since, therefore, ye will blind yourselves to divine prophecy, Jehovah allows you all the results of your wilful blindness.
The prophets They are not God’s prophets. Pretending to be prophets they are not true men. They pander to popular vices for popular favour and applause.
Your rulers Your head men, men who have wickedly attained to leadership, claiming to be seers, that is, statesmen.
Hath he covered Covered as to the eyes. They see not the plain truths of God. (It is the same over again in all ages, down to Christ’s time, down to these times.) God leaves them in their blindness. “Like priest, like people.”
The vision of all is become… as… a book that is sealed Parabolic words, these, which teach that what God reveals avails the people nothing. Prophecy by God’s true men is thrown away through the corrupting influence of such leaders.
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