Isaiah 9:20

Isaiah 9:20

18 For wickedness ^aburns as the fire;
It shall devour the briers and thorns,
And kindle in the thickets of the forest;
They shall mount up like rising smoke.

19 Through the wrath of the Lord of hosts
^aThe land is burned up,
And the people shall be as fuel for the fire;
^bNo man shall spare his brother.

20 And he shall¹ snatch on the right hand
And be hungry;
He shall devour on the left hand
^aAnd not be satisfied;
^bEvery man shall eat the flesh of his own arm.

21 Manasseh shall devour Ephraim, and Ephraim Manasseh;
Together they shall be ^aagainst Judah.
^bFor all this His anger is not turned away,
But His hand is stretched out still.

Commentaries:

Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown

<< Isaiah 9:19

Isaiah 9:21 >>

hungry—not literally. Image from unappeasable hunger, to picture internal factions, reckless of the most tender ties (Isaiah 9:19), and insatiably spreading misery and death on every side (Jeremiah 19:9).

eat—not literally, but destroy (Psalms 27:2; Job 19:22).

flesh of . . . arm—those nearest akin: their former support (helper) (Isaiah 32:2) [MAURER].

Isaiah 9:18-21

Third strophe.

burneth—maketh consumption, not only spreading rapidly, but also consuming like fire: sin is its own punishment.

briers . . . thorns—emblem of the wicked; especially those of low rank (Isaiah 27:4; II Samuel 23:6).

forest—from the humble shrubbery the flame spreads to the vast forest; it reaches the high, as well as the low.

mount up like . . . smoke—rather. "They (the thickets of the forest) shall lift themselves proudly aloft [the Hebrew is from a Syriac root, a cock, expressing stateliness of motion, from his strutting gait, HORSLEY], in (in passing into) volumes of ascending smoke" [MAURER].

**Other Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown entries containing Isaiah 9:20:**

Ecclesiastes 4:5
Isaiah 9:7
Isaiah 49:26

<< Isaiah 9:19

Isaiah 9:21 >>

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