shall assemble together, and shall worship the Lord in the holy mount of Jerusalem.

PROPHECY VIII.

The dispersion and subsequent restoration of the Jews-The overthrow of the mystic Assyrian.

Isaiah xxx. 17. One thousand, at the rebuke of one; at the rebuke of five, ten thousand of you shall flee. 18. Yet for all this shall the Lord wait to shew favour unto you; even for this shall he expect in silence, that he may have mercy upon you: (for the Lord is a God of judgment; blessed are all they that trust in him.) 19. For the people shall dwell in Zion: in Jerusalem thou shalt in no wise weep: he will be exceeding gracious unto thee at the voice of thy cry: no sooner shall he hear, than he shall answer thee. 20. Though the Lord hath given you bread of distress, and water of affliction; yet the timely rain shall no more be restrained, but thine eyes shall behold the timely rain. 21. And thine ears shall hear the word prompting thee behind, saying, This is the way,

them were sold; and those, who could not be sold were "transported into Egypt, and perished by shipwreck or "famine, or were massacred by the inhabitants." Bp. Newton's Dissert. VII.

walk

walk ye in it; turn not aside, to the right, or to the left. 22. And ye shall treat as defiled the covering of your idols of silver, and the clothing of your molten images of gold: thou shalt cast them. away like a polluted garment; thou shalt say unto them, Begone from me. 23. And he shall give rain for thy seed, with which thou shalt sow the ground; and bread of the produce of the ground: and it shall be abundant and plenteous. Then shall thy cattle feed in large pasture; 24. And the oxen and the young asses, that till the ground, shall eat well-fermented maslin, winnowed with the van and the sieve. 25. And, on every lofty mountain, and on every high hill, shall be disparting streams, and rills of water, in the day of the great slaughter, when the mighty fall *. 26. And the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun snall be seven-fold, in the day when the Lord shall bind up the breach of his people, and shall heal the wound which his stroke hath inflicted.

27. Lo, the name of the Lord cometh from afar; his wrath burneth, and the flame rageth violently:

*When the mighty fall.] "This shall be remarkably ful

"filled at the time when there shall be a terrible destruction "of God's enemies (see Rev. xiv. 20. xix. 21.); when the

great ones of the earth shall fall, denoted here by high "towers; or by towers we may understand the fortifications 46 of the city which is the mystical Babylon." Mr. Lowth in loc.

his

his lips are filled with indignation; and his tongue is as a consuming fire. 28. His spirit is like a torrent overflowing; it shall reach to the middle of the neck: he cometh to toss the nations with the van of perdition; and there shall be a bridle to lead thein astray, in the jaws of the peoples. 29. Ye shall utter a song, as in the night when the feast is solemnly proclaimed; with joy of heart, as when one marcheth to the sound of the pipe; to go to the mountain of the Lord, the rock of Israel. 30. And the Lord shall cause his glorious voice to be heard, and the lighting down of his arm to be seen; with wrath indignant, and a flame. of consuming fire; with a violent storm, and rushing showers, and hailstones. 31. By the voice of the Lord the Assyrian shall be beaten down, he, that was ready to smite with his staff. 32. And it shall be, that wherever shall pass the rod of correction, which the Lord shall lay heavily upon him; it shall be accompanied with tabrets and harps; and with fierce battles shall he fight against them. 33. For Tophet is ordained of old; even the same for the king is prepared: he hath made it deep; he hath made it large; a fiery pile, and abundance of fuel: and the breath of the Lord, like a stream of sulphur, shall kindle it.

COMMENTARY.

After declaring the depressed and enfeebled state, to which Israel should be reduced, Isaiah predicts,

predicts, that the Lord, after long waiting in silence, after a long cessation of the visible interpositions of Providence, will again shew favour unto his people. He will listen to the voice of their cry, and will cause them to dwell with joy in Zion and Jerusalem. Though he hath given them the bread of distress and the water of affliction, and hath withheld from them the gentle rain of spiritual influences whereby his Church is watered and rendered fruitful; yet now the timely rain shall no more be restrained, but the voice of instruction shall make them walk steadily in the paths of righteousness. Then shall they reject all their former abominations, after which their fathers in old times went a whoring; and their land, which had been cursed by God with comparative sterility, shall abundantly give its increase. The light of their political sun and moon shall be sevenfold increased, in the day when the Lord healeth the wound of his people; and, after the day of the great slaughter, after the mighty are fallen, the latter end of Israel shall be more glorious than his beginning.

Having described the millennian felicity of the house of Jacob, the prophet next pourtrays in

* Compare this with the similar phraseology, which Isaiah pses in Chap. xviii. 4. and xlii. 14, to describe the same cespation of supernatural interferences.

P

glowing colours the overthrow of Antichrist*. whom he here, as elsewhere, mystically terms the Assyrian, or the king of the figurative Babylon †. The Name of the Lord, the personal Word of God, cometh from afar, with great indignation, in the day of his second advent. He tosses the confederacy of the nations with the van of destruction, and puts a bridle into the jaws of the peoples. By the Voice of the Lord, Antichrist, even in the

Bp. Lowth seems to apply this prophecy exclusively to the destruction of Sennacherib's army. It may primarily relate to it; but the general tenor of the whole prediction almost necessarily leads us to look beyond that event to the days of Antichrist. The great blessedness of Israel, both temporal and spiritual, which is described as succeeding the overthrow of the Assyrian, by no means accords with the comparatively moderate prosperity of Hezekiah and with the unfortunate reigns of his successors. Such vivid descriptions can only with propriety be applied to the final restoration, and the glories of the Millennium. And, if this description in particular must be thus applied, then the Assyrian must be a mystical character. See Mr. Lowth on Isaiah xxx. 19.

+ Compare Isaiah xiv. 25. and Micah v. 6.

The second person of the blessed Trinity is in differently styled the Word, the Name, and the Voice, of the Lord: and in this manner, those appellations are accordingly understood by the ancient Targumists. (See Jamieson's Vindication of the doctrine of Scripture, Vol. 1. P. 53, 54. See indeed the whole chapter.) The Name or the Voice of the Lord, who here executes vengeance upon his incorrigible enemies, is the same divine person, whose manifestation for the same purpose is described in the Apocalypse xix. 11-16. He is Jesus the Messiah.

midst