Isaiah 28:9

Whom shall he teach knowledge?.... Not the drunken priest or prophet, who were both unfit for teaching men knowledge; but either the true and godly priest or prophet of the Lord, or the Lord himself,

In that day shall the LORD of hosts be for a crown of glory, and for a diadem of beauty, unto the residue of his people, -The prophet now turns to Judah, a gracious promise to the remnant

Whom shall he, to wit, the teacher, which is easily understood out of the following verb; either God, or his prophets, or ministers; teach knowledge? who is there among this people that are capable and willing to be taught the good knowledge of God? A minister may as soon teach a young child as these men.

Isaiah 28:9 Whom shall he teach knowledge? and whom shall he make to understand doctrine? [them that are] weaned from the milk, [and] drawn from the breasts.Ver. 9. Whom shall he teach knowledge?] Quem docebit scientiam? Doceo governeth two accusative cases. Ministers must have (1.) Quem, Whom to teach; and (2.) Quid, What to teach - sc., knowledge. Isaiah had no want of knowledge, as being apt and able to teach; but he wanted a fit audience, as having to do with a sort of drunken sots that were unteachable, incapable. So, Ezekiel 47:11, when the waters of the sanctuary flowed, the miry places could not be healed. Think the same also of those that are drunk with pride and self-conceitedness; who make divinity only a matter of discourse, or that come to sit as judges or critics on their ministers’ gifts, &c. It will be long enough ere such will be taught anything. One may as good undertake to teach a young weanling void of understanding, and in some respects better, for these to their natural corruption and impotence have added habitual hardness and obstinace, to their sinews of iron, brows of brass, and what hope can there be of working upon such?

(9) Whom shall he teach knowledge?—The two verses that follow reproduce the language of the drunkards as they talk scornfully of the prophet. “To whom does he come with what he calls his ‘knowledge’ and his ‘doctrine?’ (better, message, as in Isaiah 28:19). Does he think that they are boys just weaned, who are to be taught the first elements of the religion of the infant school?” Then in their mockery they describe (Isaiah 28:10) his teaching, with what was to them its wearisome iteration, “Always precept upon precept, line upon line . . .”—petty rebukes and puerile harping upon the same note, semper eandem canens cantilenam. We can scarcely doubt that Isaiah was indignantly reproducing, as St. Paul does in 2 Corinthians 10:10; 2 Corinthians 11:16-17; the very words, almost the drunken accents, in which the priests and false prophets had spoken of him.

Verse 9. Whom shall he teach knowledge? - "Whom, say they, would he teach knowledge?"] The scoffers mentioned below, Isaiah 28:14, are here introduced as uttering their sententious speeches; they treat God's method of dealing with them, and warning them by his prophets, with contempt and derision. What, say they, doth he treat us as mere infants just weaned? doth he teach us like little children, perpetually inculcating the same elementary lessons, the mere rudiments of knowledge; precept after precept, line after line, here and there, by little and little? imitating at the same time, and ridiculing, in Isaiah 28:10, the concise prophetical manner. God, by his prophet, retorts upon them with great severity their own contemptuous mockery, turning it to a sense quite different from what they intended. Yes, saith he, it shall be in fact as you say; ye shall be taught by a strange tongue and a stammering lip; in a strange country; ye shall be carried into captivity by a people whose language shall be unintelligible to you, and which ye shall be forced to learn like children. And my dealing with you shall be according to your own words: it shall be command upon command for your punishment; it shall be line upon line, stretched over you to mark your destruction, (compare 2Kg 21:13;) it shall come upon you at different times, and by different degrees, till the judgments, with which from time to time I have threatened you, shall have their full accomplishment. Jerome seems to have rightly understood the general design of this passage as expressing the manner in which the scoffers, by their sententious speeches, turned into ridicule the warnings of God by his prophets, though he has not so well explained the meaning of the repetition of their speech in Isaiah 28:13. His words are on Isaiah 28:9 - "Solebant hoc ex persona prophetarum ludentes dicere:" and on Isaiah 28:14 - "Quod supra diximus, cum irrisione solitos principes Judaeorum prophetis dicere, manda, remanda, et caetera his similia, per quae ostenditur, nequaquam eos prophetarum credidisse sermonibus, sed prophetiam habuisse despectui, praesens ostendit capitulum, per quod appellantur viri illusores." Hieron. in loc. And so Jarchi interprets the word משלים mishelim in the next verse: Qui dicunt verba irrisionis parabolice." And the Chaldee paraphrases Isaiah 28:11 to the same purpose, understanding it as spoken, not of God, but of the people deriding his prophets: "Quoniam in mutatione loquelae et in lingua subsannationis irridebant contra prophetas, qui prophetabant populo huic." - L.

9–13. The occasion of this remarkable encounter was probably a feast held to celebrate the renunciation of allegiance to Assyria. Isaiah has surprised the drunkards over their cups and administered some such rebuke as we read in Isaiah 28:7-8. (On the excesses that often accompanied sacrificial meals, see 1 Samuel 1:13 f.; Amos 2:8.)

whom shall he teach knowledge? - This verse commences a statement respecting another form of sin that prevailed among the people of Judah.

9, 10. These verses appear to imply an interruption on the part of those against whom the prophet is inveighing.