CHAPTER LXVI _This chapter treats of the same subject with the foregoing._ _God, by his prophet, tells the Jews, who valued themselves much_ _on their temple and pompous worship, that the Most High_ _dwelleth not in temples made with hands; and that no outward_ _rites of worship, while the wors... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:2. _AND ALL THOSE THINGS HAVE BEEN__ _- "And all these things are mine"] A word absolutely necessary to the sense is here lost out of the text: לי _li, mine_. It is preserved by the _Septuagint_ and _Syriac_.... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:3. _HE THAT KILLETH AN OX_ IS AS IF _HE SLEW A MAN_ - "He that slayeth an ox killeth a man"] These are instances of wickedness joined with hypocrisy; of the most flagitious crimes committed by those who at the same time affected great strictness in the performance of all the external... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:5. _YOUR BRETHREN THAT HATED YOU - SAID_ - "Say ye to your brethren that hate you"] The _Syriac_ reads אמרו לאחיכם _imru_ _laacheychem_; and so the _Septuagint_, Edit. Comp. ειπατε αδελφοις ὑμων· and MS. Marchal. has αδελφοις and so Cyril and Procopius read and explain it. It is not... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:6. _A VOICE OF NOISE FROM THE CITY, A VOICE FROM THE_ _TEMPLE, A VOICE OF THE LORD_] It is very remarkable that similar words were spoken by Jesus, son of Ananias, previously to the destruction of Jerusalem. See his very affecting history related by _Josephus_, WAR, B. vi., chap. v.... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:8. _WHO HATH SEEN__ _- "And who hath seen"] Twenty MSS., (four ancient,) of _Kennicott's_, and twenty-nine of _De Rossi's_, and two ancient of my own, and the two oldest editions, with two others, have _umi_, adding the conjunction _vau_; and so read all the ancient versions. _AND wh... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:9. _SHALL I BRING TO THE BIRTH_] האני אשביר _haani ashbir_, num ego matricem frangam; MONTANUS. The word means that which immediately precedes the appearance of the fetus - _the breaking_ _forth_ of the _liquor amnii_. This also is an expression that should be studiously avoided in p... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:11. _WITH THE ABUNDANCE OF HER GLORY_ - "From her abundant stores."] For מזיז _mizziz, from the splendour_, two MSS. and the old edition of 1488, have מזיו _mizziv_; and the latter ז _zain_ is upon a rasure in three other MSS. It is remarkable that _Kimchi_ and _Sal. ben Melec_, not... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:12. _LIKE A RIVER, AND - LIKE A FLOWING STREAM_ - "Like the great river, and like the overflowing stream"] That is, the Euphrates, (it ought to have been pointed כנהר _cannahar_, ut fluvius ille, _as the river_,) and the Nile. _THEN SHALL YE SUCK_ - "And ye shall suck at the breast... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:15. _THE LORD WILL COME WITH FIRE_ - "JEHOVAH shall come as a fire"] For באש _baesh, in fire_, the _Septuagint_ had in their copy קאש _kaesh, as a fire_; ὡς πυρ. _TO RENDER HIS ANGER WITH FURY_ - "To breathe forth his anger in a burning heat"] Instead of להשב _lehashib_, as pointed... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:17. _BEHIND ONE_ TREE - "After the rites of Achad"] The Syrians worshipped a god called Adad, _Plin_. Nat. Hist. xxxvii. 11; Macrob. Sat. i. 23. They held him to be the highest and greatest of the gods, and to be the same with Jupiter and the sun; and the name Adad, says _Macrobius_... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:18. _FOR I_ KNOW _THEIR WORKS_] A word is here lost out of the present text, leaving the text quite imperfect. The word is יודע _yodea, knowing_, supplied from the _Syriac_. The _Chaldee_ had the same word in the copy before him, which he paraphrases by קדמי גלן _kedemi gelon_, their... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:19. _THAT DRAW THE BOW_] I much suspect that the words משכי קשת _moshechey kesheth, who draw the bow_, are a corruption of the word משך _meshek, Moschi_, the name of a nation situated between the Euxine and Caspian seas; and properly joined with תבל _tubal_, the Tibareni. See _Bochar... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:20. _AND IN CHARIOTS__ _- "And in counes"] There is a sort of vehicle much used in the east, consisting of a pair of hampers or cradles, thrown across a camel's back, one on each side; in each of which a person is carried. They have a covering to defend them from the rain and the sun... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:21. _AND FOR LEVITES_] For ללוים _laleviyim_, fifty-nine MSS., (eight ancient,) have וללוים _velaleviyim_, adding the conjunction ו _vau_, which the sense seems necessarily to require: and so read all the ancient versions. See Joshua 3:3, and the various readings on that place in _Ke... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Isaiah 66:24. _FOR THEIR WORM SHALL NOT DIE_] These words of the prophet are applied by our blessed Saviour, Mark 9:44, to express the everlasting punishment of the wicked in Gehenna, or in hell. Gehenna, or the valley of Hinnom, was very near to Jerusalem to the south-east: it was the place... [ Continue Reading ]