Commentaries:
Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown
More detailed description of the despair, which they shall fall into, who sought necromancy instead of God; Isaiah 8:20 implies that too late they shall see how much better it would have been for them to have sought "to the law," etc. (Deuteronomy 32:31). But now they are given over to despair. Therefore, while seeing the truth of God, they only "curse their King and God"; foreshadowing the future, like conduct of those belonging to the "kingdom of the beast," when they shall be visited with divine plagues (Revelation 16:11; compare Jeremiah 18:12).
through it—namely, the land.
hardly bestead—oppressed with anxiety.
hungry—a more grievous famine than the temporary one in Ahaz' time, owing to Assyria; then there was some food, but none now (Isaiah 7:15, Isaiah 7:22; Leviticus 26:3-5, Leviticus 26:14-16, Leviticus 26:20).
their king . . . God—Jehovah, King of the Jews (Psalms 5:2; Psalms 68:24).
look upward . . . unto the earth—Whether they look up to heaven, or down towards the land of Judea, nothing but despair shall present itself.
dimness of anguish—darkness of distress (Proverbs 1:27).
driven to darkness—rather, "thick darkness" (Jeremiah 23:12). Driven onward, as by a sweeping storm. The Jewish rejection of "their King and God," Messiah, was followed by all these awful calamities.
Other Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown entries containing Isaiah 8:21:
Isaiah 7:25
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