Isaiah 18:4

For so the Lord said unto me,.... The prophet Isaiah, both what goes before, and follows after: I will take my rest; these are not the words of the prophet, as some think, like those of Habakkuk,

For so the LORD said unto me, I will take my rest, and I will consider in my dwelling place like a clear heat upon herbs, and like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest.

I will take my rest, I will sit still, and not bestir myself, either to help this people, or to hinder their enemies. God is said in Scripture to rest or sit still, when he doth not work on the behalf of a person or people; as, on the contrary, he is said to bestir himself when he acts for them. I will consider; or, I will contemplate or look upon them, to wit, the people of whom I am here speaking. So it is only an ellipsis of the pronoun. Now God’ s looking in Scripture is variously used; sometimes in way of favour and mercy, as , &c.; and sometimes in a way of anger and judgment, as , and, as I humbly conceive, in this place. I know some learned men render this and the next word, I will look upon my dwelling-place, and interpret the place of God’ s gracious respect to his church or people, to preserve and deliver it in the midst of all the confusions and combustions that happen in the world; which interpretation seems altogether unsuitable to the scope and business of the chapter, which in all the foregoing and following verses speaks of another sort of people, even of the Egyptians or Ethiopians, of whom therefore this verse also must be understood, or otherwise we make a breach in the context. In my dwelling place; in heaven, the place where God dwells, and where he is said to hear prayers, ,32, as here to consider men and things as elsewhere he is said to hear and to look from heaven, as ; the Hebrew particles beth, in, and mern, from, being put promiscuously one for another, as hath been noted before. Like a clear heat upon herbs, and like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest. The sense is, that God would look upon them, as the sun with a clear heat looks upon herbs, &c. But this may be understood either, 1. In way of mercy, as most take it. And so the sense is, that God would look out and shine forth upon his church and people, and be as comfortable and refreshing to them as the clear heat which shines upon the herbs; or, as others render it, after the rain; or, as a cloud of dew is in the heat harvest. Or, 2. In way of judgment. And so the sense, that God would look upon them with as uncomfortable an influence as the sun with a clear heat upon the herbs, which are scorched and killed by it; and as a cloud of the dew, which brings dew or rain, in the heat of harvest, when it is unwelcome and hurtful. And this sense seems best to agree with the following verse, which continueth the metaphor of a harvest, and manifestly speaks not of refreshing, but of the destruction of the fruits thereof.

Isaiah 18:4 For so the LORD said unto me, I will take my rest, and I will consider in my dwelling place like a clear heat upon herbs, [and] like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest.Ver. 4. I will take my rest, I will consider.] He will sit and bethink himself, as it were, how he may best bestow his poor people. The Assyrian shall go on with his great design for a while, and none shall interrupt him; but the Church meanwhile shall not be unprovided for. Like a clear heat upon herbs.] Or, After rain which makes herbs and plants suddenly to sprout and shoot up amain. God will not only look upon his people, but refresh them in troubles.

(4, 5) I will take my rest . . .—The words that follow paint with marvellous vividness the calmness and deliberation of the workings of Divine judgments. God is at once unhasting and unresting. He dwells in His resting-place (i.e., palace or throne), and watches the ripening of the fruit which He is about to gather. While there is a clear heat in sunshine, while there is a dew-cloud in harvest-heat, through all phenomenal changes, He waits still. Then, before the harvest, when the blossom is over, and the fruit becomes the full-ripe grape, He comes as the Lord of the vineyard, and cuts off the branches with His pruning-hooks. (Comp. the striking parallels of Æsch. Suppl. 90-98, and Shakespeare, Henry VIII., 3:2.)

Verse 4. For so the Lord said unto me - "For thus hath JEHOVAH said unto me"] The subject of the remaining part of this chapter is, that God would comfort and support his own people, though threatened with immediate destruction by the Assyrians; that Sennacherib's great designs and mighty efforts against them should be frustrated; and that his vast expectations should be rendered abortive, when he thought them mature, and just ready to be crowned with success; that the chief part of his army should be made a prey for the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, (for this is the meaning of the allegory continued through the fifth and sixth verses;) and that Egypt, being delivered from his oppression, and avenged by the hand of God of the wrongs which she had suffered, should return thanks for the wonderful deliverance, both of herself and of the Jews, from this most powerful adversary. Like a clear heat - "Like the clear heat"] The same images are employed by an Arabian poet: - Solis more fervens, dum frigus; quumque ardet Sirius, tum vero frigus ipse et umbra. Which is illustrated in the note by a like passage from another Arabian poet: - Calor est hyeme, refrigerium aestate. Excerpta ex Hamasa; published by Schultens, at the end of Erpenius's Arabic Grammar, p. 425. Upon herbs - "After rain"] "אור aur here signifies rain, according to what is said Job 36:11: 'The cloud scatters his rain.'" - Kimchi. In which place of Job the Chaldee paraphrast does indeed explain אורו auro by מטריה matereyh; and so again Job 36:21 and Job 36:30. This meaning of the word seems to make the best sense in this place; it is to be wished that it were better supported. In the heat of harvest - "In the day of harvest."] For בחם bechom, in the heat, fourteen MSS., (several ancient,) the Septuagint, Syriac, Arabic, and Vulgate read ביום beyom, in the day. The mistake seems to have arisen from כחם kechom in the line above.

4–6. The purpose of Jehovah, as disclosed to Isaiah by special revelation. The opening words point back to a definite time when this illumination came to him,—whether in a moment of ecstasy or not it is impossible to say.

For so the Lord said unto me - So Yahweh has revealed his purpose, that is, to execute punishment on the people who have been described in the previous verses.

4. All being thus ready, Jehovah comes now into the scene. In his watchful providence he looks on calmly from the high heavens, and waits up to the right time.