Isaiah 40:2

Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath received of the LORD's hand double for all her sins. SPEAK YE COMFORTABLY - literally, to the heart; not merely to the intellect. SPEAK YE COMFORTABLY - literally, to the heart; not merely to the intellect. TO JERUSALEM - though then in ruins, regarded by God as about to be rebuilt; her people are chiefly meant, but the city is personified. CRY - publicly end emphatically, as a herald cries aloud (Isaiah 40:3). HER WARFARE - the appointed time of her misery; tsªbaa'aah (H6635), her term service and hardship-a military metaphor ...

2._Speak ye according to the heart of Jerusalem. _Here God commands his servants the prophets, and lays down the message which he wishes them to deliver publicly, when believers shall be called to change their strain from mourning to joy. And yet he does not exhort and encourage them to the cheerful and courageous discharge of their office, so much as he conveys to the minds of believers an assured hope that they may patiently endure the irksomeness of delay, till the prophets appear with this glad and delightful message. To _speak to the heart _(107) is nothing else than “to speak according to the wish or sentiment of the mind;” for our heart abhors or recoils if any sad intelligence is communicated, but eagerly receives, or rather runs to meet, whatever is agreeable. Now, in consequence of the people having been apparently rejected, nothing could be more agreeable than a reconciliation...

1-11 All human life is a warfare; the Christian life is the most so; but the struggle will not last always. Troubles are removed in love, when sin is pardoned. In the great atonement of the death of Christ, the mercy of God is exercised to the glory of his justice. In Christ, and his sufferings, true penitents receive of the Lord's hand double for all their sins; for the satisfaction Christ made by his death was of infinite value. The prophet had some reference to the return of the Jews from Babylon. But this is a small event, compared with that pointed out by the Holy Ghost in the New Testament, when John the Baptist proclaimed the approach of Christ. When eastern princes marched through desert countries, ways were prepared for them, and hinderances removed. And may the Lord prepare our hearts by the teaching of his word and the convictions of his Spirit, that high and proud thoughts m...

Verse Isaiah 40:2. _DOUBLE FOR ALL HER SINS _- "Blessings double to the punishment."] It does not seem reconcilable to our notions of the Divine justice, which always punishes less than our iniquities deserve, to suppose that God had punished the sins of the Jews in double proportion; and it is more agreeable to the tenor of this consolatory message to understand it as a promise of ample recompense for the effects of past displeasure, on the reconciliation of God to his returning people. To express this sense of the passage, which the words of the original will very well bear, it was necessary to add a word or two in the version to supply the elliptical expression of the Hebrew. Compare Isaiah 61:7; Job 42:10;...

SPEAK YE COMFORTABLY - Hebrew, על־לב _‛__al_-_lēb_ as in the margin, ‘To the heart.’ The heart is the seat of the affections. It is there that sorrow and joy are felt. We are oppressed there with grief, and we speak familiarly of being pained at the heart and of being of a glad or merry heart. To speak ‘to the heart,’ is to speak in such a way as to remove the troubles of the heart; to furnish consolation, and joy. It means that they were not merely to urge such topics as should convince the understanding, but such also as should be adopted to minister consolation to the heart. So the word is used in Genesis 34:3 : ‘And his soul clave unto Dinah - and he loved the damsel, and spake kindly (Hebrew, to the heart) of the damsel;’ Genesis 50:

PART III. ISAIAH'S LATER PROPHECIES (CH. 40-66.). SECTION I. THE PEOPLE OF GOD COMFORTED IN TRIBULATION (Isaiah 40:1.). EXPOSITION PREFATORY REMARKS THE Assyrian struggle is over. The prophet has accepted into the depths of his spirit God's announcement that the true spoiler, "the rod of his anger, and the staff of his indignation," is not Assyria, but Babylon. He has accepted the sentence that his people is to go into captivity. Into this future of his nation he throws himself with a faith, a fervour, and a power of realization, which are all his own. "The familiar scenes and faces, among w

SPEAK YE COMFORTABLY TO JERUSALEM, AND CRY UNTO HER,.... Or, "speak to or according to the heart of Jerusalem h"; to her very heart, what will be a cordial to her, very acceptable, grateful, and comfortable; and let it be proclaimed aloud, that she may hear and understand it. By "Jerusalem" is meant the Gospel church, and the true members of it. Aben Ezra interprets it of the congregation of Israel; see Hebrews 12:22: THAT HER WARFARE IS ACCOMPLISHED; this life is a warfare; saints have many enemies to engage with, sin, Satan, and the world; many battles to fight, a great fight of afflictions, and the good fight of faith: this is "accomplished", or "filled up i"; not that it is at an end before this life is, while that lasts there will be a continual conflict; yet all enemies are now conquered by Christ, and in a short time will be under the feet of his people; the Capt

Isaiah 40:1. _Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath receiveth of the LORD'S hand double for all her sins._ God would have his people happy. He knows that we are not in strong, vigorous state, neither do we honour his name while we are lacking in holy joy. Let the sinners be uncomfortable. Let them be «like the troubled sea that cannot rest»; but as for God's people, it is his great joy that they should be happy. He bids his servants again and again to comfort them. Sometimes we are in a condition of warfare, and we are under the chastising rod but now the Lord appears graciously to his servants, and he says, «Your warfare is over: your chastisement is ended.» Now the Lord returns in mercy, and he grants a sense of forgiven sin....

II. THE LATER PROPHECIES OF COMFORT AND GLORY (40-66) Like the first part this second part of Isaiah has three sections. The three sections of the first part revealed the judgments to come upon the Jewish people, Jerusalem, the nations and the earth. The three sections of the second part reveal the great blessings in store for the people of Israel, Jerusalem, the nations and the earth, after the judgments are passed. These sections give the past, present, and the future history of the Jewish people. In the first section (40-48) they are seen prophetically in Babylon, but about to be delivered and brought back to the land. Cyrus is predicted as the chosen instrument. However, this section looks also beyond the return of the remnant from Babylon. Their present dispersion and coming restoration is predicted as well. In the second section (49-57) we find this period of their history more f...

PROLOGUE ANNOUNCING THE END OF THE EXILE. IF. The prophet sees in the triumphs of Cyrus the coming fall of Babylon's empire, and a revolution in the fortunes of the exiles. These are God's voice bidding the prophet and all who hear it encourage His people. Let them speak tenderly to Jerusalem (_i.e._ the nation, not the city). Her forced service is completed, her punishment has been more than adequate to her offence. ISAIAH 40:3. Rapt from earth, the prophet hears a heavenly being in Yahweh's court bidding other spiritual beings prepare in the wilderness a straight path for Yahweh, who shall march with His people back to their city. Let all hills and depressions be levelled. ISAIAH 40:3. Render, Hark! One is calling, Prepare_ ;_ so too in...