Commentaries:
Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown
THE JUDGMENTS ON ISRAEL WERE PROVOKED BY THEIR CRIMES, YET THEY ARE NOT FINALLY CAST OFF BY GOD. (Isaiah 50:1-11)
Where . . . mothers divorcement—Zion is "the mother"; the Jews are the children; and God the Husband and Father (Isaiah 54:5; Isaiah 62:5; Jeremiah 3:14). GESENIUS thinks that God means by the question to deny that He had given "a bill of divorcement" to her, as was often done on slight pretexts by a husband (Deuteronomy 24:1), or that He had "sold" His and her "children," as a poor parent sometimes did (Exodus 21:7; II Kings 4:1; Nehemiah 5:5) under pressure of his "creditors"; that it was they who sold themselves through their own sins. MAURER explains, "Show the bill of your mother's divorcement, whom . . . ; produce the creditors to whom ye have been sold; so it will be seen that it was not from any caprice of Mine, but through your own fault, your mother has been put away, and you sold" (Isaiah 52:3). HORSLEY best explains (as the antithesis between "I" and "yourselves" shows, though LOWTH translates, "Ye are sold") I have never given your mother a regular bill of divorcement; I have merely "put her away" for a time, and can, therefore, by right as her husband still take her back on her submission; I have not made you, the children, over to any "creditor" to satisfy a debt; I therefore still have the right of a father over you, and can take you back on repentance, though as rebellious children you have sold yourselves to sin and its penalty (I Kings 21:25).
bill . . . whom—rather, "the bill with which I have put her away" [MAURER].
Other Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown entries containing Isaiah 50:1:
Isaiah 27:8
Isaiah 49:21
Isaiah 49:24
Isaiah 50:1
Jeremiah 3:1
Hosea 2:2
Hosea 3:3
DISCLAIMER: Church of the Great God (CGG) provides these resources to aid the individual in studying the Bible. However, it is up to the individual to "prove all things, and hold fast to that which is good" (I Thessalonians 5:21). The content of these resources does not necessarily reflect the views of CGG. They are provided for information purposes only.
