Isaiah 45:3

And I will give thee treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places,.... What had been laid up in private places, and had not seen the light for many years.

And I will give thee the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that thou mayest know that I, the LORD, which call thee by thy name, am the God of Israel.

The treasures of darkness; such as have been stored up and long kept in dark and secret places, as well in Babylon, 51:13, as in other countries, which Cyrus conquered; and from which he took infinite treasures, as Pliny and others relate. That thou mayest know, by the accomplishment of these predictions.

Isaiah 45:3 And I will give thee the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that thou mayest know that I, the LORD, which call [thee] by thy name, [am] the God of Israel.Ver. 3. And I will give thee the treasures of darkness.] All that Croesus, that rich king, had amassed, and other princes, but especially Babylon (Jeremiah 50:37; Jeremiah 51:13. See Strabo, lib. xv.; Plin. xxxiii. cap. 3. Daniel 5:3). Pliny saith that Cyrus brought out of Asia, which he had subdued, as much treasure as amounteth in our money to three hundred millions. And yet this same Cyrus was within few years after made as poor as Irus; for being in Scythia, and there making show of his great riches at a feast, he was on the sudden slain, and spoiled of all by Tomyris, queen of that country. Justin., lib. i.

(3) The treasures of darkness . . .—The heaped-up wealth of “gold-abounding” Babylon. The capture of Sardis, with all the riches of Crœsus, must have been almost as fruitful in plunder. (Herod. i. 84). The conqueror was to see in his victories the token of the protection of Jehovah, and so accept his vocation as the redeemer of His people.

Verse 3. I will gave thee the treasures of darkness] Sardes and Babylon, when taken by Cyrus, were the wealthiest cities in the world. Croesus, celebrated beyond all the kings of that age for his riches, gave up his treasures to Cyrus, with an exact account in writing of the whole, containing the particulars with which each wagon was loaded when they were carried away; and they were delivered to Cyrus at the palace of Babylon. - Xenoph. Cyrop. lib. vii. p. 503, 515, 540. Pliny gives the following account of the wealth taken by Cyrus in Asia. Jam Cyrus devicta Asia, pondo xxxiv. millia auri invenerat; praeter vasa aurea, aurumque factum, et in eo folia, ac platanum, vitemque. Qua victoria argenti quingenta millia talentorum reportavit; et craterem Semiramidis, cuius pondus quindecim talents colligebat. Talentum autem AEgyptium pondo lxxx. patere l. capere Varro tradit. - Nat. Hist. xxxiii. 15. "When Cyrus conquered Asia, he found thirty-four thousand pounds weight of gold, besides golden vessels and articles in gold; and leaves, (folia, perhaps solia, bathing vessels, Hol.,) a plane, and vine tree, (of gold.) By which victory he carried away fifteen thousand talents of silver; and the cup of Semiramis, the weight of which was fifteen talents. The Egyptian talent, according to Varro, was eighty pounds." This cup was the crater, or large vessel, out of which they filled the drinking cups at great entertainments. Evidently it could not be a drinking vessel, which, according to what Varro and Pliny say, must have weighed 1,200 pounds! The gold and silver estimated by weight in this account, being converted into pounds sterling, amount to one hundred and twenty-six millions two hundred and twenty-four thousand pounds. - Brerewood, De Ponderibus, cap. x. Treasures of darkness may refer to the custom of burying their jewels and money under the ground in their house floors, fearing robbers.

3. the treasures of darkness] i.e. treasures hid in darkness. The following word rendered hidden riches (Heb. maṭ ?môn, held by some to be the original of the N.T. “Mammon”), means properly treasure hidden underground (Job 3:21; Proverbs 2:4; Jeremiah 41:8). The treasures referred to are chiefly the loot of Sardis, which Xenophon describes as “the richest city of Asia next to Babylon” (Cyrop. VII. 2. 11), and of Babylon itself (Jeremiah 50:37; Jeremiah 51:13). If, as is probable, the capture of the former city was past before the date of the prophecy, rumours of the fabulous wealth of Crœsus, which then found its way into the coffers of Cyrus, may have reached the prophet. that thou mayest know &c.] Render: that thou mayest know that I Jehovah am He that calleth thee by name (see on ch. Isaiah 43:1), the God of Israel. The prophet apparently expects that Cyrus will come to acknowledge Jehovah as the true God and the author of his success (see ch. Isaiah 41:25). Whether this hope was actually realised is more than ever doubtful since the discovery of cuneiform inscriptions in which Cyrus uses the language of crude polytheism (Records of the Past, Vol. v., pp. 167 f.). [Cf. Sayce, Higher Criticism and the Monuments, pp. 507–511. Many elements of the prophecy, such as the universal extinction of idolatry, remained unfulfilled, and it is possible that the anticipated conversion of Cyrus to the true faith is one of them (see Ryle’s note on Ezra 1:2 in Cambridge Bible for Schools). The prophet nowhere explains the process by which this spiritual change is to be brought about, but he doubtless regards it as produced by the evidence of prophecy, so frequently dwelt upon in the first nine chapters of the book. The wonderful successes of Cyrus marked him out, to the mind of antiquity, as a favourite of the gods; but the further conviction that Jehovah alone is God proceeds from the knowledge that He alone has foretold his appearance.

And I will give thee the treasures of darkness - The treasures which kings have amassed, and which they have laid up in dark and secure places.

3, 4. Treasures of darkness — Perhaps “darkness” is to offset “riches of secret places” in the parallel member. These treasures were to be taken by Cyrus, or given to him in his various conquests.