Isaiah 56:10-12

The delinquencies of the rulers. The watchmenare the spiritual leaders of the community, who in the earlier post-exilic period were the priests and the prophets (see Nehemiah 6:10-14). Elsewhere the word is used metaphorically only of the prophets (Jeremiah 6:17; Ezekiel 3:17; Ezekiel 33:2 ff.) and to them the description here chiefly applies, although there may be no reason for excluding the priests, with whom the higher authority lay, and who shared in the vices here specified. These guides are blind, not discerning the evils of the time, and dumb, afraid to speak out against them.

they are all ignorant Lit. "they all of them know not." Several codices of the LXX. supply an infinitive (φρονῆσαι), by which the sense and parallelism are improved (cf. the similar phrase in Isaiah 56:11 "they know not how to observe": E.V. "cannot understand").

dumb dogs, they cannot bark in contrast to the true prophet, who "cries aloud and spares not," shewing the people their transgressions (see ch. Isaiah 58:1; cf. Ezekiel 33:1 ff.), and specially gives warning of the approach of an enemy; Ezekiel 33:6. Sheep-dogs are mentioned in Job 30:1.

sleeping R.V. "dreaming," better raving. The word, which occurs only here, means in Arabic to talk deliriously in sickness. Cheyne suggests that it contains a play on the word for "seers," from which it differs in a single letter (hòzîmand ḥôzîm).

loving to slumber The laziness of the dog was proverbial amongst the Arabs: "he delays like a sleepy hound" (Gesenius).