15 Therefore glorify Yahweh in the east, even the name of Yahweh, the God of Israel, in the islands of the sea!
*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
Wherefore glorify Jehovah in the valleys. [1] God's benefits ought to excite us to gratitude, and we testify it by singing his praises. "What return shall we make," as David says, "for all the benefits which he has bestowed on us, but to take the cup of thanksgiving for salvation, and call on the name of the Lord?" The Prophet therefore observes this order; having spoken of the restoration of the Church, he exhorts us to offer the sacrifice of praise. By the valleys, he means countries that are hidden and, as it were, separated from others; for those which are surrounded by mountains are separated and disjoined by nature. The consequence is, that the inhabitants of valleys are less civilized, because they have fewer opportunities of conversing with each other. The meaning is the same as if the Prophet had said, that there will not be a corner so obscure or retired that the praises of God shall not be heard in it. The name of Jehovah the God of Israel. He uses the expression, "the name of the God of Israel," in order to intimate that all nations will call upon the true God; for, as all nations have a knowledge of God that is natural to them, so all easily turn aside to superstition and false worship. (Romans 1:19.) But here he speaks of spreading the true religion through the whole world; and this makes it still more evident that the prophecy relates to the kingdom of Christ, under which true religion has at length penetrated into foreign and heathen nations.
1 - "In the fires, (or, valleys.)" -- Eng. Ver.
Wherefore glorify ye the Lord - The prophet, in this verse, calls upon the people to join in the praise of Yahweh wherever they are scattered. In the previous verse he describes the scattered few who were left in the land, or who had escaped to the adjacent islands in the sea, as celebrating the praises of God where they were. In this verse he calls on all to join in this wherever they were scattered.
In the fires - Margin, 'Valleys.' The Septuagint reads, Ἐν τοῖς νήσοις En tois nēsois - 'In the islands.' The Chaldee, 'Therefore, when light shall come to the just, they shall glorify the Lord.' Lowth supposes that the word: בארים bâ'uriym should have been באיים bâ'iyiym, 'in the islands,' or 'coasts.' But the MSS. do not give authority for this reading; the only authority which Lowth refers to being that of the Septuagint. Other conjectures have been made by others, but all without any authority from MSS. The Hebrew world in the plural form does not occur elsewhere in the Scriptures. The proper signification of the word אור 'ôr is light, and it is applied
(a) to daylight, or daybreak, 1-Samuel 14:36; Nehemiah 8:3;
(b) to light from daybreak to mid-day, Job 24:14;
(c) the sun, Job 31:26; Job 37:21;
(d) light as the emblem of happiness;
(e) light as the emblem of knowledge is also used to denote fire, Ezekiel 5:2; Isaiah 44:16; Isaiah 47:14,
In the plural form it is applied, in connection with the word "Thummim," to the gems or images which were on the breastplate of the high priest, and from which responses were obtained. Exodus 28:30 : 'And thou shalt put in the breastplate of judgment the Urim (האוּרים hâ'ûriym) and the Thummim' (compare Leviticus 8:8; Ezra 2:63). Probably it was thus used to denote the splendor or beauty of the gems there set, or perhaps the light or instruction which was the result of consulting the oracle. The proper meaning of the word is, however, light, and it usually and naturally suggests the idea of the morning light, the aurora; perhaps, also, the northern light, or the aurora borealis. It in no instance means caves, or valleys. Vitringa supposed it referred to caves, and that the address was to the "Troglodytes," or those who had been driven from their homes, and compelled to take up their residence in caves. The word probably refers either to the regions of the morning light, the rising of the sun; or of the northern light, the aurora borealis; and in either case, the reference is doubtless to those who would be carried away to Babylon, and who were called on there by the prophet to glorify God. 'In those regions of light, where the morning dawns; or where the northern skies are illuminated at night, there glorify God' (see the note at Isaiah 14:13). The reasons for this opinion are,
(1) That such is the natural and proper sense of the word. It properly refers to light, and not to caves, to valleys, or to islands.
(2) The parallelism, the construction, demands such an interpretation.
It would then be equivalent to calling on the scattered people to glorify God in the East, and in the West; in the regions of the rising sun and in the coasts of the sea; or wherever they were scattered. And the sense is,
(1) that they should be encouraged to do this by the prospect of a return;
(2) that it was their duty still to do this wherever they were; and
(3) that the worship of the true God would be in fact continued and celebrated, though his people were scattered, and driven to distant lands.
In the isle of the sea - The coasts and islands of the Mediterranean Isaiah 24:14)
In the isles of the sea "In the distant coasts of the sea" - For בארים beurim, in the valleys, I suppose we ought to read באיים beiyim, in the isles, which is in a great degree justified by the repetition of the word in the next member of the sentence, with the addition of הים haiyam, the sea, to vary the phrase, exactly in the manner of the prophet. איים iyim is a word chiefly applied to any distant countries, especially those lying on the Mediterranean Sea. Others conjecture ביארים biorim, בהרים beharim, באמים beummim, בעמים beammim, בחורים bechorim, באורים beurim, a באר bar, illustrate - Le Clerc. Twenty-three MSS. of Kennicott's, many of De Rossi's, and some of my own, read באורים beorim, in the valleys. The Septuagint do not acknowledge the reading of the text, expressing here only the word איים iyim, εν ταις νησοις, in the islands, and that not repeated. But MSS. Pachom. and 1. D. 2 supply in this place the defect in the other copies of the Septuagint thus,
Δια τουτο ἡ δοξα Κυριου εσται εν ταις νησοις της θαλασσης· εν ταις νησοις το ονομα του Κυριου Θεου Ισραηλ ενδοξον εσται·
"Therefore the glory of the Lord shall be in the isles of the sea: in the islands shall the name of the Lord God of Israel be glorified."
Kimchi says, that by באורים beurim, in the valleys is meant the cities, because they were generally built in valleys. The Vulgate has in doctrinis, and so my old MS., in techingis. Coverdale translates, Praise the name of the Lord God of Israel in the valleys and in the floodis. It should not be revered in the fires; none of the ancient Versions understood it thus. According to which the Septuagint had in their Hebrew copy באיים beiyim, repeated afterwards, not בארים beurim.
Wherefore glorify ye the Lord, in the fires,.... These are the words of the remnant, now triumphing and singing, calling upon others also to glorify the Lord in the fires of affliction and tribulation, in which they had lately been, and had themselves done: or, "in the valleys" (u); in low estates and conditions: or, "in holes" (w); dens and clefts of rocks, where they fled from their persecuting enemies; but neither of these versions suit the state of the true church, as it will be at this time. The word "Urim", here used, which is one of the names of what was put into the breastplate of the high priest, signifies "lights"; which sense of the word the Vulgate Latin version retains, rendering it, "in doctrines glorify the Lord", and so the Targum,
"therefore, when light cometh to the righteous, they shall glorify the Lord;''
and so the words may be rendered, "glorify the Lord for the Urim", or "the lights"; for Christ, who has the true "Urim" and "Thummim", lights and perfections; for the light of his Gospel, and the truths of it, which will now be spread in a most wonderful manner throughout the world; to which times may be applied those words, "arise, shine, for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee--and the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising", Isaiah 60:1 and which will be a just and sufficient reason for giving glory to the Lord:
even the name of the Lord God of Israel, in the isles of the sea; whose name will now be known, not in Israel, or among the Jews only, but in all distant and foreign countries, which are sometimes meant by the isles of the sea; and in all islands, even the most remote, who will have reason to join with them on the continent to glorify God, whose name will now be great in all the earth.
(u) "in vallibus". So Kimchi, Ben Melech, Munster, Pagninus, Montanus, Piscator. (w) "In cavernis vel speluncis", Forerius, Sanctius.
in the fires--VITRINGA translates, "in the caves." Could it mean the fires of affliction (1-Peter 1:7)? They were exiles at the time. The fires only loose the carnal bonds off the soul, without injuring a hair, as in the case of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego. LOWTH reads, in the islands (Ezekiel 26:18). Rather translate for "fires," "in the regions of morning light," that is, the east, in antithesis to the "isles of the sea," that is, the west [MAURER]. Wheresoever ye be scattered, east or west, still glorify the Lord (Malachi 1:11).
In distress - When you are in the furnace of affliction. In the isles - In remote countries, beyond the sea, which in scripture are commonly called isles.
*More commentary available at chapter level.