25 For yet a very little while, and the indignation against you will be accomplished, and my anger will be directed to his destruction."
*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
But yet a little while. He means not only the siege of Jerusalem, when Sennacherib surrounded it with a numerous army, (2 Kings 18:17,) but likewise the rest of the calamities, when Jerusalem was overthrown, (2 Kings 25:4,) the Temple razed, and the inhabitants taken prisoners; for against those dreadful calamities it was necessary that the godly should be fortified by these promises. This ought to be carefully observed; for if we neglect it, as other commentators do, we shall not be able to see how the statements agree. Accordingly, the captivity of the people might be called a consumption; for Babylon was like a grave, and banishment was like death. But when the danger was immediate and urgent, and Sennacherib attacked them with his army, and various straits were felt by them in that siege, this consolation was needful; for Judea seemed to be utterly ruined, and to outward appearance no hope of safety was left. My fury and indignation shall be spent. [1] The consolation corresponds to this state of things. "The Lord will spare thee. For a time, indeed, he will delay, and will keep his assistance as it were concealed; but he will at length rescue thee, and will revenge thy enemies whom he has determined utterly to destroy." If it be thought better to interpret klh (chalah) as meaning to consume or spend, then he says that he spends his anger, in the same way that we speak of spending years and our whole life; that is, "I will cherish my anger until I completely destroy the Assyrians." But the word finish brings out the meaning more fully; as if he had said, "until I have discharged all my anger." This is the destruction which he also threatens elsewhere (Isaiah 52:1) to the uncircumcised; for when the hope of mercy has been taken away, he executes his judgment against the ungodly.
1 - The indignation shall cease, and mine anger. -- Eng. Ver.
For yet a very little while - This is designed to console them with the hope of deliverance. The threatened invasion was brief and was soon ended by the pestilence that swept off the greater part of the army of the Assyrian.
The indignation shall cease - The anger of God against his offending people shall come to an end; his purposes of chastisement shall be completed; and the land shall be delivered.
In their destruction - על־תבליתם ‛al-tabelı̂ytām from בלה bâlâh, to wear out; to consume; to be annihilated. It means here, that his anger would terminate in the entire annihilation of their power to injure them. Such was the complete overthrow of Sennacherib by the pestilence; 2-Kings 19:35. The word used here, occurs in this form in no other place in the Hebrew Bible, though the verb is used, and other forms of the noun. "The verb," Deuteronomy 7:4; Deuteronomy 29:5; Joshua 9:13; Nehemiah 9:21,"Nouns," Ezekiel 23:43; Isaiah 38:17; Jeremiah 38:11-12; Isaiah 17:14, et al.
The indignation "Mine indignation" - Indignatio mea, Vulg. ἡ οργη, Sept. μου η οργη κατα σου, MS. Pachom. Μου ἡ οργη ἡ κατα σου, MS. 1. D. 2. So that זעמי zaami, or הזעם hazzaam, as one MS. has it, seems to be the true reading.
For yet a very little while,.... Within a few days; for in a very short time after Sennacherib was come up against Jerusalem his army was destroyed by an angel:
and the indignation shall cease; the indignation of the Lord against his people Israel, shown by bringing the Assyrian monarch against them, of which he was the staff or instrument, Isaiah 10:5,
and mine anger in their destruction; not in the destruction of the Jews, but the Assyrians: the sense is, that the anger of God towards the people of the Jews for the present should be discontinued, when the Assyrian army was destroyed. The Targum is,
"for yet a very little while, and the curses shall cease from you of the house of Jacob; and mine anger shall be upon the people that work iniquity, to destroy them;''
that is, the Assyrians.
For--Be not afraid (Isaiah 10:24), for, &c.
indignation . . . cease--The punishments of God against Israel shall be consummated and ended (Isaiah 26:20; Daniel 11:36). "Till the indignation be accomplished," &c.
mine anger--shall turn to their (the Assyrians') destruction.
A still further reason is given for the elevating words, with a resumption of the grounds of consolation upon which they were founded. "For yet a very little the indignation is past, and my wrath turns to destroy them: and Jehovah of hosts moves the whip over it, as He smote Midian at the rock of Oreb; and His staff stretches out over the sea, and He lifts it up in the manner of Egypt." The expression "a very little" (as in Isaiah 16:14; Isaiah 29:17) does not date from the actual present, when the Assyrian oppressions had not yet begun, but from the ideal present, when they were threatening Israel with destruction. The indignation of Jehovah would then suddenly come to an end (câlâh za‛am, borrowed in Daniel 11:36, and to be interpreted in accordance with Isaiah 26:20); and the wrath of Jehovah would be, or go, ‛al-tabilthâm. Luzzatto recommends the following emendation of the text, יתּם על־תּבל ואפּי, "and my wrath against the world will cease," tēbēl being used, as in Isaiah 14:17, with reference to the oikoumenon as enslaved by the imperial power. But the received text gives a better train of thought, if we connect it with Isaiah 10:26. We must not be led astray, however, by the preposition ‛al, and take the words as meaning, My wrath (burneth) over the destruction inflicted by Asshur upon the people of God, or the destruction endured by the latter. It is to the destruction of the Assyrians that the wrath of Jehovah is now directed; ‛al being used, as it frequently is, to indicate the object upon which the eye is fixed, or to which the intention points (Psalm 32:8; Psalm 18:42). With this explanation Isaiah 10:25 leads on to Isaiah 10:26. The destruction of Asshur is predicted there in two figures drawn from occurrences in the olden time. The almighty Judge would swing the whip over Asshur (‛orer, agitare, as in 2-Samuel 23:18), and smite it, as Midian was once smitten. The rock of Oreb is the place where the Ephraimites slew the Midianitish king 'Oreb (Judges 7:25). His staff would then be over the sea, i.e., would be stretched out, like the wonder-working staff of Moses, over the sea of affliction, into which the Assyrians had driven Israel (yâm, the sea, an emblem borrowed from the type; see Kohler on Zac 10:11, cf., Psalm 66:6); and He would lift it up, commanding the waves of the sea, so that they would swallow Asshur. "In the manner of Egypt:" b'derek Mitzraim (according to Luzzatto in both instances, "on the way to Egypt," which restricts the Assyrian bondage in a most unhistorical manner to the time of the Egyptian campaign) signifies in Isaiah 10:24, as the Egyptians lifted it up; but here, as it was lifted up above the Egyptians. The expression is intentionally conformed to that in Isaiah 10:24 : because Asshur had lifted up the rod over Israel in the Egyptian manner, Jehovah would lift it up over Asshur in the Egyptian manner also.
Indignation - Mine anger towards the Assyrian. Cease - As anger commonly does when vengeance is fully executed.
*More commentary available at chapter level.