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Isaiah Chapter
Thirteen
Isaiah 13
Chapter Contents
The armies of God's wrath. (1-5) The conquest of Babylon.
(6-18) Its final desolation. (19-22)
Commentary on Isaiah 13:1-5
(Read Isaiah 13:1-5)
The threatenings of God's word press heavily upon the
wicked, and are a sore burden, too heavy for them to bear. The persons brought
together to lay Babylon waste, are called God's sanctified or appointed ones;
designed for this service, and made able to do it. They are called God's mighty
ones, because they had their might from God, and were now to use it for him.
They come from afar. God can make those a scourge and ruin to his enemies, who
are farthest off, and therefore least dreaded.
Commentary on Isaiah 13:6-18
(Read Isaiah 13:6-18)
We have here the terrible desolation of Babylon by the
Medes and Persians. Those who in the day of their peace were proud, and
haughty, and terrible, are quite dispirited when trouble comes. Their faces
shall be scorched with the flame. All comfort and hope shall fail. The stars of
heaven shall not give their light, the sun shall be darkened. Such expressions
are often employed by the prophets, to describe the convulsions of governments.
God will visit them for their iniquity, particularly the sin of pride, which
brings men low. There shall be a general scene of horror. Those who join
themselves to Babylon, must expect to share her plagues, Revelation 18:4. All that men have, they would
give for their lives, but no man's riches shall be the ransom of his life.
Pause here and wonder that men should be thus cruel and inhuman, and see how
corrupt the nature of man is become. And that little infants thus suffer, which
shows that there is an original guilt, by which life is forfeited as soon as it
is begun. The day of the Lord will, indeed, be terrible with wrath and fierce
anger, far beyond all here stated. Nor will there be any place for the sinner
to flee to, or attempt an escape. But few act as though they believed these
things.
Commentary on Isaiah 13:19-22
(Read Isaiah 13:19-22)
Babylon was a noble city; yet it should be wholly
destroyed. None shall dwell there. It shall be a haunt for wild beasts. All
this is fulfilled. The fate of this proud city is a proof of the truth of the
Bible, and an emblem of the approaching ruin of the New Testament Babylon; a
warning to sinners to flee from the wrath to come, and it encourages believers
to expect victory over every enemy of their souls, and of the church of God.
The whole world changes and is liable to decay. Wherefore let us give diligence
to obtain a kingdom which cannot be moved; and in this hope let us hold fast that
grace whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear.
── Matthew Henry《Concise Commentary on Isaiah》
Isaiah 13
Verse 1
[1] The burden of Babylon, which Isaiah the son of Amoz did
see.
The burden — This title is commonly given to
sad prophecies, which indeed are grievous burdens to them on whom they are
laid.
Babylon — Of the city and empire of Babylon by Cyrus.
Verse 2
[2] Lift ye up a banner upon the high mountain, exalt the
voice unto them, shake the hand, that they may go into the gates of the nobles.
A banner — To gather soldiers together.
Mountain — Whence it may be discerned at a considerable distance.
Withal he seems to intimate, that their enemies should come from the
mountainous country of Media.
Them — To the Medes.
Shake — Beckon to them with your hand, that they may come to
this service, that they may go and fight against Babylon, and take it, and so
enter in to the palaces of the king, and his princes.
Verse 3
[3] I have commanded my sanctified ones, I have also called
my mighty ones for mine anger, even them that rejoice in my highness.
Sanctified ones — The Medes and Persians, so
called, because they were set apart by God, for this holy work of executing his
just vengeance.
Mighty ones — Those whom I have made mighty for
this work.
Highness — Or, as others render it, in my glory, in the doing of
that work which tends to the advancement of my glory. Tho' the Medes had no
regard to God, but only to their own ends.
Verse 4
[4] The noise of a multitude in the mountains, like as of a
great people; a tumultuous noise of the kingdoms of nations gathered together:
the LORD of hosts mustereth the host of the battle.
Nations — The Medes and Persians and other nations, which served
under them in this war.
Verse 5
[5] They come from a far country, from the end of heaven,
even the LORD, and the weapons of his indignation, to destroy the whole land.
Thy come — From the ends of the earth under heaven, which is not
to be understood strictly.
The weapons — The Medes and Persians, who were but
a rod in God's hand, and the instruments of his anger.
Land — Of Babylon.
Verse 7
[7] Therefore shall all hands be faint, and every man's
heart shall melt:
Amazed — To see so impregnable a city as Babylon, so easily and
unexpectedly taken.
Flames — Heb. faces of flame, inflamed with rage and torment.
Verse 9
[9] Behold, the day of the LORD cometh, cruel both with
wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate: and he shall destroy the
sinners thereof out of it.
Behold — Divers words are heaped together, to signify the
extremity of his anger.
Verse 10
[10] For the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof
shall not give their light: the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and
the moon shall not cause her light to shine.
Constellations — Which consist of many stars, and
therefore give a greater sight.
Darkened — All things shall look darkly and dismally; men shall
have no comfort or hope.
Going forth — As soon as he rises. As soon as
they have any appearance or hope of amendment, they shall be instantly
disappointed.
Verse 11
[11] And I will punish the world for their evil, and the
wicked for their iniquity; and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud to
cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible.
The world — The Babylonish empire, which is
called the world, as the Roman empire afterwards was, because it was extended
to a great part of the world.
Verse 12
[12] I will make a man more precious than fine gold; even a
man than the golden wedge of Ophir.
More precious — The city and nation shall be so
depopulated.
Verse 13
[13] Therefore I will shake the heavens, and the earth shall
remove out of her place, in the wrath of the LORD of hosts, and in the day of
his fierce anger.
Therefore — A poetical and prophetical
description of great horrors and confusions, as if heaven and earth were about
to meet together.
Verse 14
[14] And it shall be as the chased roe, and as a sheep that
no man taketh up: they shall every man turn to his own people, and flee every
one into his own land.
It — Babylon.
A roe — Fearful in itself, especially when it is pursued by
the hunter.
A sheep — In a most forlorn condition.
Every man — Those soldiers of other nations,
whom she had hired to assist her.
Verse 15
[15] Every one that is found shall be thrust through; and
every one that is joined unto them shall fall by the sword.
Found — In Babylon, at the taking of it.
Verse 17
[17] Behold, I will stir up the Medes against them, which
shall not regard silver; and as for gold, they shall not delight in it.
Medes — Under whom he comprehends the Persians.
Not delight — Which is to be understood
comparatively. They shall more eagerly pursue the destruction of the people,
than the getting of spoil.
Verse 18
[18] Their bows also shall dash the young men to pieces; and
they shall have no pity on the fruit of the womb; their eye shall not spare
children.
Bows — Under which are comprehended, other weapons of war.
Dash — Or, shalt pierce the young men through, as the
Chaldee, renders it.
Verse 19
[19] And Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the
Chaldees' excellency, shall be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah.
Glory — Which once was the most noble of all the kingdoms.
Beauty — The beautiful seat of the Chaldean monarchy shall be
totally and irrecoverably destroyed.
Verse 20
[20] It shall never be inhabited, neither shall it be dwelt
in from generation to generation: neither shall the Arabian pitch tent there;
neither shall the shepherds make their fold there.
Inhabited — After the destruction threatened
shall be fully accomplished.
Arabian — Who dwelt in tents, and wandered from place to place,
where they could find pasture.
Verse 21
[21] But wild beasts of the desert shall lie there; and their
houses shall be full of doleful creatures; and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs
shall dance there.
Satyrs — The learned agree, that these are frightful and
solitary creatures.
Verse 22
[22] And the wild beasts of the islands shall cry in their
desolate houses, and dragons in their pleasant palaces: and her time is near to
come, and her days shall not be prolonged.
Prolonged — Beyond the time appointed by God.
── John Wesley《Explanatory Notes on Isaiah》
13 Chapter 13
Verses 1-22
Verses 1-5
The burden of Babylon
The prophet’s burden
Whenever we find the word “burden” in this association it means
oracle, a speech of doom; it is never connected with blessing, hope, enlarged
opportunity, or expanded liberty; it always means that judgment is swiftly
coming, and may at any moment burst upon the thing that is doomed.
(J. Parker, D. D.)
The power to see
“Which Isaiah did see.” How did he see it? The word “see” needs to
be defined every day. Blind men may see. We do not see with the eyes only, else
truly we should see very little; the whole body becomes an eye when it is fun
of light, and they who are holiest see farthest. “Blessed are the pure in
heart: for they shall see God.” Men see morally, intellectually,
sympathetically, as well as visually. How could Isaiah see this burden of
Babylon when it did not fall upon the proud city for two centuries! Is there,
then, no annihilation of time and space? Are we the mean prisoners we thought
ourselves to be is it so, that we are caged round by invisible iron, and sealed
down by some oppressive power, or blinded by some arbitrary or cruel shadow? We
might see more if we looked in the right direction; we might be masters of the
centuries if we lived with God. Isaiah is never weary of saying that he “saw”
what he affirms. He does not describe it as having been seen by some other man;
having written his record he signs it, or having begun to deliver his prophecy
he writes it as a man writes his will; he begins by asserting that it is his
testament, his own very witness, for he was there, saw it, and he accepts the
responsibility of every declaration. (J. Parker, D. D.)
“Babylon” stands for the spirit of the world
In the New Testament, Babylon, more than any other city, stood for
the personification of the forces of the world against God. In the history of
Israel Babylon was the scourge of God to them. They were as grain under the
teeth of the threshing machine. In the Captivity the Jews felt the weight of
Babylon’s cruelty, so that in the prophetic literature of the Exile, Babylon
became the type of oppression and of the insolence of material force. Thought
is carried back to primitive times in the Book of Genesis, in which Babylon is
pictured in the vain and arrogant attempt to rival God: “Go to, let us build us
a city, and tower whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name,
lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.” So deeply had
the experience of Babylon’s cruelty entered into the heart of Israel that even
in the New Testament, St. John, in the Book of Revelation, uses the word
“Babylon” to describe the material power of Rome. He could not get a better
word than just the old word “Babylon” to represent the overwhelming force of
the great Roman Empire, with its legions of soldiers, with its policy which
made the whole world a network of nerves running back to their sensitive centre
in the haughty city on the Tiber. St. John saw past the glitter and the
conquest, and recognised in pagan Rome the mighty Babylon which lifts her
impious head against God. To him she was the “scarlet woman”; he heard, her say
in the pride of her heart, as the prophet had heard Babylon say, “I sit a queen
and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow.” Thus the very name “Babylon” came to
take on the religious signification of the spirit of the world; it stood for
the dead weight of the material which resists the spirit. (Hugh Black, M. A.)
The doom of Babylon
Here the prophet pronounces doom upon the bloated empire which
seemed to stand so secure, and notes the evidence of weakness in spite of
apparent prosperity and careless trust in material resources. Disregard of
human rights, lusts, and selfishness and pride of life, and the impious atheism
which disregarded all this he declared would all exact their inevitable price.
Cruelty and oppression would react upon the tyrant after their usual historic
fashion. The huge accumulations on which they rested would only attract the
foe, would weaken her hands in her hour of trial, and make her, in spite of her
wealth, an easy prey to the spoiler. To Babylon would come a time when she
would have more money than men. It is a picture of absolute ruin which the
prophet gives, when the great city would be depopulated (Isaiah 13:12). (Hugh Black, M. A.)
The Babylonian spirit
The Babylonian spirit has not left the world, and every great
civilisation (for it is not confined to one) is menaced in the same way by the
temptation of forgetfulness of God, cruelty of sheer force, insolence of pride,
and the empty trust of wealth. Our foes are the old foes with a new face on
them. (Hugh Black, M. A.)
Verse 12
I will make a man more precious than fine gold
Dearth of men a judgment from God
When God caused His scythe to swing through the harvests of
Babylon it was not expected that a single ear would be left in the devastated
field.
Thus the utterance is a menace, a judgment; it is not part of a lecture upon
the dignity of human nature, it is an illustration of the vastness of the sweep
of the judgments of God. (J. Parker, D. D.)
The worth of man
Our text is a promise in the guise of a threat. It is a threat to
one nation, but a promise to mankind.
1. A true prophetic insight led to the insertion of this poem in the
story of the troubles of Assyria. Babylon was in her full career of conquest
when Assyria was trembling to her fall. But the history of Babylon was already
written; in that contempt of man, which at the first her pride and lust of
possession revealed, was hidden her own doom. The nation so lavish of human
life was to die utterly out; the empire which sets no value on men, for lack of
men shall perish.
2. How often has this story been repeated! The Italian Campagna was
once the home of a multitude of farmers; the conquests of Rome demanded that
legions should be hurled against the barbarian tribes. Because there were not
men to till the ground, the Campagna has become a foul marshland, the haunt of
fevers, desolate and uninhabitable. Spain sent out her brave and stalwart sons
to ravage the lands of the Indians, to seize on Mexican and Peruvian gold; and
Spain has never since been able to produce and nourish the men who should
enable her to hold her place among the foremost nations.
3. There are other ways in which want of regard for men is evinced
beside that of conquest, and the doom is ever the same. “Peace hath her
victories no less renowned than war”; the victories are, alas! too often
equally immoral, equally fatal. In the heat of business competition, professed
philanthropists, and men personally humane--these two expressions do not always
mean the same thing--become as reckless of lives as the general in the field.
We feel a man to be more precious than gold in the face of sickness and
suffering; if we did but habitually recognise it, much sickness and suffering
would be spared. The ladders are reared against a burning house; one after
another of the inmates is rescued; and when the fire is at its fiercest, and
all are supposed to be out of danger, the frightened face of a child appears at
an upper window. There are tears among the crowd, and wringing of hands. “A
thousand pounds,” says someone, “to him who will rescue that child!” A few
years after, the child is an engine driver, and, drowsy through long hours of
work, he misreads a signal, wrecks his train, and dies, himself the involuntary
instrument of an appalling calamity. And it may be that the very man who
offered the reward, and would have doubled it, made it fivefold, for the saving
of the child, is a director of the railway company whose increasing exaction of
toil from its servants has been the cause of the disaster. And we all are
responsible for these things; we keep up the pressure which compels directors,
managers, merchants, to work their business at full strain. We humane
Englishmen need to he scourged into habitual practical humanity. God has, by
His judgments, to “make a man more precious than fine gold.”
4. In our discussions of what we call “the population question,”
there is a great deal of unconscious inhumanity which will assuredly entail its
curse upon our country. The population of these islands is ever pressing more
and more on the means of the people’s support. In two ways the pressure may be
lightened. Emigration is one of them. But we might do much by the amendment of
our laws, by alteration of our social customs and personal habits, by a check
on extravagant expenditure, and by a juster distribution of the strain of
living, to lighten the pressure at home. It is an anxious question whether we
are encouraging emigration in the best and wisest mode. Consider whom we are
sending out and the result on our future.
5. Our text is prophetic, moreover, of the doom and discipline of the
exclusive spirit. Tennyson has given us a parable of this in the “Palace of
Art.” Browning, too, in his story of Paracelsus, the gifted man who degenerated
into a quack, has marked it as one of the sins of that strangely complex soul
that he would be a philanthropist, but without sympathy, without dependence
upon others. No life of pride or self-sufficiency or exclusiveness is possible
to us, either in the Church or the nation. Nothing on earth is valuable when
man has lost his value. The worth of wealth is what you can do with it for your
fellows. The loftiest prince would gladly mate with the humblest beggar were
they cast alone on some desert island.
6. How wonderful is the fulfilment of our text in the Gospel! It is
the worth of lost humanity which is revealed to us in the redemption by Christ.
Christ will not let us love Him if we love not our brethren for whom He died.
If men are not more precious to us than gold, Christ becomes to us of none
effect.
7. The passion which Christian humaneness becomes in the heart of
Christians is the final earthly fulfilment of our text. The first feeling of
the saved man is gratitude for the grace of God which saved him; and it is a
feeling that abides. To it is added, in the maturity of Christian life, an
abounding confidence that the grace which saved him can save any and every man.
(A. Mackennal, B. A.)
The value of human life
Probably it is not true that human life is held more dear in times
of war; but some sense of the value of the lives sacrificed is apt to dawn upon
the people after the war is over, when the nation finds its resources wasted,
and the people sit desolate in their homes, waiting for the strong and the
brave who shall return no more. It is a hard school in which to learn this
lesson of the preciousness of man; but if it can be learned in no other way it
may well be enforced upon the world, even by such fiery tuition. (W.
Gladden, D. D.)
“How much is he worth?”
One who listens to the talk of the street and the shops, might
easily get the impression that the value of man is a subject of general interest.
“How much is he worth?” is a question often heard. What answers do you hear? He
is worth five thousand dollars; ten thousand; a million; ten millions. And of
one and another it is said with a mixture of pity and contempt, “He is not
worth anything!” Before the war men and women were actually bought and sold for
money. How much is he or she worth, was then in some quarters a question simply
commercial; a question to which a perfectly literal answer could be given. May
it not be well to go a little deeper than the common usage goes into the
meaning of this phrase, and ask, with all seriousness, not concerning this man
or that man, but concerning man, any man, every man, “How much is he worth?”
I. MAN IS WORTH
MORE THAN HIS INSTITUTIONS. Many persons have supposed that the chief end of
man was to support certain institutions. We get many a hint of this error in
our study of the people whose history is contained in the Bible. They thought
that their ceremonial law was vastly more sacred than the men who worshipped by
means of it. If their ritual obstructed human growth, crippled virtue, or
killed charity, no matter; these must stand back and let the ritual be exalted.
And when Christ told them that the Sabbath was made for man and not man for the
Sabbath--that men were of more account than all this ritual machinery, they
were astonished and scandalised; they called Him a blasphemer. This is no
singular phenomenon. History is full of the outworking of this tendency. All
over the world, all along the ages, men have been made the slaves of systems.
When Christ came, His teachings were so entirely out of harmony with this
notion that the people were fairly bewildered by them. What has been said of
religious systems is equally true of political systems. There is now and always
has been a prevalent notion that people were made for governments, and not
governments for people; that it is more important that certain dynasties should
reign, or that certain political institutions should be kept intact, or that
certain parties should remain in power, or that certain policies should be
adopted, than that men should be free and wise and good and prosperous. It is
not true that human institutions are of no value; they are often of great
value. But they are not ends; they are instruments. It follows that those
systems are best which best assist the development of manhood.
II. MAN IS WORTH
MORE THAN HIS COSTLIEST POSSESSIONS. This is another of those truths, often on
our lips, but not more than half believed. Evidence of this is visible in the
respect paid to wealth, even when it is joined to one who is but a caricature
of manhood; even when it is the spoil that has been won by the debasement of
manhood. How plain are the proofs before our faces every day that the
multitudes do not believe a man to be more precious than gold! It is not the
rich alone whose judgment in this matter goes astray; the poor fall into the
same error. They say that money does not make the man, say it angrily and
bitterly, not seldom; but their conduct often shows that they think, after all,
that money does make the man. Their envy of the rich convicts them. Are there
not in our own conduct, sometimes, clear illustrations of this fact? Do we not
often find ourselves preferring gold to manhood; labouring more diligently to
enlarge our possessions than to improve ourselves? It is not true that property
is of no consequence; man’s belongings are good just in proportion as they
assist in the development of his character.
III. IT IS BECAUSE
OF HIS KINSHIP TO GOD THAT MAN IS OF SUCH ILLUSTRIOUS WORTH. And nothing seems
more certain than that these powers may, by disuse or misuse, be impaired and
finally lost. And so cut off by his own act from the source of all light and
love, he is deserted by all generous impulses, by all holy aspirations, and is
left to grovel in the mire of selfishness and carnality. “How much was he worth
when he died? “some man may ask. What if the seer must answer: “He was the heir
of immortality, but he sold his birthright for a song.” (W. Gladden, D. D.)
The end of civilisation
The end of civilisation is not money, but men. (Hugh Black, M.
A.)
The true history of a man
The true history of a man is the history not of his wars and
conquests, not even of his commerce; the true history of a man is the history
of his conscience, the history of his moral development; for only that can give
permanence and security to his other achievements in science, art, invention,
thought. (Hugh Black, M. A.)
Faulty civilisation
If, in Bacon’s phrase, the “breed and disposition of the people be
not stout,” its civilisation is a dismal failure. (Hugh Black, M. A.)
Christianity dignifies man: agnosticism tends to decade him
In the teaching of Christ man is so dignified by his connection
with God and by his immortal destiny, that everyone who really believes this
creed must feel himself condemned if he treats his brother ill. But strip man,
as agnosticism does, of all the greatness and mystery with which Christianity
invests him--cease to believe that he comes from God, that he is akin to
beingsgreater than himself who care for him, and that his soul is of infinite
worth because it has before it an unending development--and how long will it be
possible to cherish for him the reverence which wins him consideration and
help? The brevity of man’s existence gives him, according to the present
teaching of agnosticism, a pathetic claim to instant help; but who knows
whether in a society given over to unbelief the argument might not tell the
other way, the selfish heart reasoning that sufferings which must end so soon
do not matter? It was in the generation preceding the French Revolution that
atheistic philosophy took its rise. The prophets of the time were predicting an
age of peace and brotherhood, when selfish passion should disappear and cruelty
and wrong no more vex the world. But, when their teaching had done its work,
its fruit appeared in the Revolution itself, whose unspeakable inhumanities
afforded our race such glances into the dark depths of its own nature as can
never be forgotten. It is painful to recall that Rousseau himself, the most
eloquent and, in some respects, the noblest apostle of the new faith, while
preaching universal brother hood, sent his own children one by one, as they
were born, to the Foundling Hospital, to save himself the trouble and expense
of their support. The Revolution did much destructive work for which the hour
had come; but it was a gigantic proof that the love necessary for the work of
reconstruction must be sought in a superhuman source. (J. Stalker, D. D.)
John Ruskin on the value of manhood
With this accords the great lesson of John Ruskin’s teaching and
of his life--one of the greatest of Englishmen, greatest of all as a political
teacher, with somewhat of the passion and power of a prophet. He never wearied
of insisting upon this distinction between money and men. It is at the root of
all his economical writings. He has been rated as a fanatic, as opposed to
machinery and railways and it is not necessary to accept his teachings on money
on all points; all this is but a misunderstanding of him by unthinking and
casual readers. The best of his thought is just a protest against the
prevailing materialistic creed. He lived and died protesting that man is more
precious than discoveries or engineering appliances or electrical contrivances.
He said in his noble language: “It may be discovered that the true bases of
wealth are spiritual and not in rock but in flesh. Perhaps even the time will
come when it will be seen that the consummation of all wealth is in producing
as many as possible full-blooded, bright-eyed human creatures. In some far-away
extremity I can even imagine that England can cast all thoughts of possessing
wealth back to barbaric nations, and that while the suns of Indus may flash
from the turban of the slave, she as a Christian mother may at last attain to
the virtues and treasures of the heathen one, and be able to lead forth her
sons, saying, ‘These are my jewels.’” (Hugh Black, M. A.)
Men more valuable than money
Ill
fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,
Where
wealth accumulates and men decay.
(O. Goldsmith.)
Money for men
The preacher was promising a day of trouble for great Babylon.
“Behold,” he cried, “the day of the Lord cometh, cruel,” etc. Then he came to
the very abyss and extremity of their desolation. Bad enough to have the land
shorn of its harvests, and all the standing grain trampled under the feet of
war horses; bad enough to have the consuming fire lay hold upon its houses; bad
enough to have pride turned into shame, wealth into poverty, power into
captivity. But, thus far, hope was left, for men were left. Leave us men, and
we may live. Leave us men, and you may do your worst; the day will pass, and
tomorrow we will repair the damage, and begin over again, and get our revenge
upon you yet. But there shall be no men. The widows and fatherless children
shall search about the ruined streets, and a man shall be as rare a sight as a
purse of gold. The text sets the emphasis, not on money, but on men. And that
is Christianity. That is what the Master taught. What we all need, whether we
have great possessions or small possessions, is to be interested in men. The
part of a Christian man or woman is to set about making somebody’s life better.
The best good is got when one helps one; when a man goes to his neighbour and
gets acquainted with him, and becomes his personal friend, and sympathises with
him, and uplifts him. You won’t have to go very far to find somebody who is
worse off than you are. Take that somebody up. Interest yourself in that
unhappy life. Perhaps it will take money; perhaps it will take time; perhaps it
will take yourself. Give yourself, anyhow, and as much else as you need to.
But, above all, be generously interested. One of the most helpful people I know
lives in a back, street, in an unpleasant neighbourhood, in a small house.
Everybody in that neighbourhood knows her, and she knows them and their
children. They go to her in their troubles, and she gives them her sympathy. As
for money, she would give that too if she had any to give. She gives herself.
The whole street is better because she lives in it. But if she had the means
which some have, what would she do, I wonder? Would she fall before the
temptation of a comfortable life? Would she get, perhaps, to thinking that
because she had plenty of butter on her bread, so had everybody else? and
because she was contented, all the mutterings of discontented people were but
needless grumblings? Anyhow, it is true that the kindest, most thoughtful, most
helpful people, quickest to bear the hardest inconveniences for a neighbour,
readiest to lift up those that are down, are the poor. It is not your money
that we want so much as your interest. We want your own personal, hand to hand
and heart to heart endeavour. The best use that can be made of money is to use
it for the uplifting of men. (George Hedges, D. D.)
Christ discovered the human soul
I have heard that one of the diamond fields of South Africa was
discovered on this wise. A traveller one day entered the valley and drew near
to a settler’s door, at which a boy was amusing himself by throwing stones. One
of the stones fell at the stranger’s feet, who picked it up and was in the act
of laughingly returning it, when something flashed from it which stopped his
hand and made his heart beat fast. It was a diamond. The child was playing with
it as a common stone; the peasant’s foot had spurned it; the cart wheel had
crushed it; till the man who knew saw it and recognised its value. Was it not
the same careless treatment the soul was receiving when Jesus arrived in the
world and discovered it? A harlot’s soul, sunk in the mud and filth of
iniquity! why, a Pharisee would not stain his fingers to find it. A child’s
soul! the scribes used to discuss in their schools whether or not a child had a
soul at all. (J. Stalker, D. D.)
Manhood more than belongings
Have you ever seen the Apollo Belvedere? It is the statue of a
man, chiselled out of marble, one of the noblest figures that art has ever
produced. Do you think that this statue would be made any nobler or more
beautiful if men should put gold rings on its fingers and gold bracelets on its
wrists, and strings of gold beads upon its neck, and should trick it out with
ribbons and buttons and fringes! Would not these tawdry ornaments detract from
the simple dignity and majesty of that model of manly grace and strength! Well,
the accidents of wealth and rank and office and station cannot add much more of
ornament or value to a true man than could trinkets like these to the beauty of
the Belvedere Apollo. His manhood itself, to all clear insight, is something
infinitely grander and diviner than these belongings. (W. Gladden, D. D.)
The wealth of manhood
A Highland chieftain on a visit to England was taunted with the poverty
of his country, at the table of his host, the occasion being when the large
silver candlesticks were lighted in the spacious hall of the English castle,
and in a gust of mistaken patriotism (common enough in a Scot) the Highlander
declared he had seen better candlesticks in his own castle in Scotland. A wager
was put up, and he could not draw back. The laird’s brother, who understood the
terrific fix his brother was in, placed at the table on either side a gigantic
Highlander holding in his right hand a drawn sword and in his left a blazing
torch, and ere the strangers had recovered from their surprise, he said,
“Behold the chandeliers of my brother’s house! Not one of these men knows any
law but loyalty. Would you compare to these the riches of gold? How say you,
cavaliers, is your wager won or lost?” (H. Black, M. A.)
Verse 17
Behold, I will stir up the Medes against them
The Medes
The Medes care not for gold, but for blood, though it be the blood
of boys and infants.
(Sir E. Strachey, Bart.)
The Medes and gold
“Ye Medes and others who now hear me, I well know that you have
not accompanied me in this expedition with a view of acquiring wealth.”--Speech
of Cyrus to his army. (Xenophon, Cyrop. V.)
The Medea
The worst terror that can assail us is the terror of forces, whose
character we cannot fathom, who will not stop to parley, who do not understand
our language nor our bribes. It was such a power with which the resourceful and
luxurious Babylon was threatened. With money the Babylonians did all they
wished to do, and believed everything else to be possible. They had subsidised
kings, bought over enemies, seduced the peoples of the earth, The foe whom God
now sent them was impervious to this influence. From their pure highlands came
down upon corrupt civilisation a simple people, whose banner was a leathern
apron, whose goal was not booty nor ease but power and mastery, who came not to
rob but to displace. (Prof. G. A. Smith, D. D.)
Verses 19-22
Babylon . . . shall be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah
The re-entries of nature
All this we may say is historical and local.
On the other hand, all this is moral and suggestive. This process may take
place in the Babylon of the mind. The greatest mind is only safe whilst it
worships. The most magnificent intellectual temple is only secure from the
judgment and whirlwind of heaven in proportion as its altar is defended from
the approach of every unworthy suppliant. If we hand over God’s altar, whether
mental or ecclesiastical, to wrong custodians, or devote either to forbidden
purposes, then make way for God’s judgments: wild beasts of the desert shall
lie there; and the houses that were full of beauty and colour and charm shall
be full of doleful creatures; and the wild beasts of the islands shall cry in
their desolate houses, and dragons in their pleasant palaces. This may happen
to any one of us. Beware of arrogancy, pride, worldliness, self-sufficiency;
beware of the betrayal of trusts: nature will re-enter if we be unfaithful. We
speak of our wisdom in putting cautionary covenants into all our legal
documents, and especially a man assures himself that he is doubly safe when he
has secured the right of re-entry under certain breaches of agreement; he says
to himself with complacency, That is justifiable; I have arranged that in the
event of certain things failing I shall re-enter. Nature always puts that
clause into her covenants. She re-enters in a moment. If the gardener is too
late by one day with his spade or seed or other attention, nature begins to
re-enter; and if he tarry for a week he will find that nature has made great
advances into the property. It is so with education, with the keeping up of
intelligence, with the maintenance of healthy discipline; relax a month, and
nature re-enters, and nature plays the spoiler. Nature is not a thrifty,
careful husbandman. Nature has a function of desolation; she will grow weeds in
your richest flower beds if you neglect them for a day. God re-enters by the
spirit of judgment and by the visitations of anger. Herein His providence is
but in harmony with the kingdom which He has instituted within the sphere which
we call husbandry, and even within the sphere which we denominate by education
or discipline. It is one government. Neglect your music for a month, and you
will find at the end that nature has re-entered, and you are not wanted; you
have not brought with you the wedding garment of preparation up to date. There
must be no intermission; the last line must be filled in. Nature will not have
things done in the bulk, in the gross: nature will not allow us simply to write
the name; she will weave her web work all round the garment if we have
neglected the borders, and paid attention to only the middle parts. (J.
Parker, D. D.)
Babylon: an Arab superstition
It is said that at this very day the Bedouin or wandering Arab has
a superstitious fear of passing a single night on the site of Babylon, and that
the natives of the country believe it to be inhabited by demons in the form of
goats. (Sir E. Strachey, Bart.)
Satyrs
There seems to have been an ancient belief among the Jews
themselves that demons took the form of goats--appeared as satyrs in fact. (Sir
E. Strachey, Bart.)
Satyrs
The word which most versions and commentators agree with the LXX
in rendering “demons” or “satyrs” is used in Leviticus 17:7, 2 Chronicles 11:15 for demons which
the Jews worshipped. (Sir E. Strachey, Bart.)
──《The Biblical Illustrator》