Isaiah 30:27-33

If this is the work of Isaiah, it describes the overthrow of Assyria. The description is very vigorous, and some feel that the loud colours are dashed on too violently to make Isaiah's authorship probable. And the zest with which the disaster is painted is thought to be unworthy of him. But these reasons are far from cogent. Yahweh comes like the dense thunder-cloud from the far horizon, from which the devastating lightning will leap, while torrential rain floods the land. The nations will be passed through the sieve till they are destroyed, and will be guided in the way of ruin. While the Assyrians are being overthrown the Jews are exultant, as when they sing their song by night at the Feast of Tabernacles (or perhaps Passover), or as when they go in procession to the Temple. For Yahweh's voice shall peal out in thunder, while the lightnings flash, the clouds burst, and the hail descends, and the Assyrian is seized with panic. A funeral pyre has been prepared for the hosts of the Assyrian dead, vast in extent, burning fiercely at the blast of Yahweh's breath.

Isaiah 30:27. the name: for primitive thought the name was an essential part of the personality (Genesis 32:27 *). The name of Yahweh in the OT usually means Yahweh in His self-revealing aspect; just as the name manifests the nature, so Yahweh's action discloses His character

Isaiah 30:32. Unintelligible (see CB 2).

Isaiah 30:33. Topheth: Jeremiah 7:31 *, and note on that passage in Cent.B. for the king: either the king of Assyria or Molech.