8. Isaiah Chapter Eight

Isaiah Chapter 8

Warnings concerning Assyria are now given by means of a significant undertaking enjoined upon Isaiah. He was commanded to take a great tablet, or slab (not a parchment roll), and write on it "with a man’s pen" (i.e., in common or popular characters, for all to read without difficulty) "for in Maher-shalal-hash-baz," i.e., plunder speedeth, booty hasteth (Isaiah 8:1). This was confirmed by the granting of a second son to the prophet (for the eldest see Isaiah 7:3) to whom he was bidden to give the same name as on the tablet.

Moreover, since the fulfillment of the prophecy would arouse the people to the fact that God had spoken through him by the mysterious name, the Lord himself says "I will take [as the r.v. rightly renders it] unto Me faithful witnesses to record, Uriah the priest, and Zechariah the son of Jeberechiah" (see 2 Kings 16:10 and 2 Chronicles 29:1 and 2 Chronicles 29:13). These would tell the people how Isaiah had long before foretold, by his inscription and by the name of his son, what had now come to pass (Isaiah 8:2-3).

Before the child, i.e., Isaiah’s, not Immanuel, had learned to say in baby language "my father, my mother," the king of Assyria, Tiglath-Pileser, would have despoiled the capitals of Syria and the northern Israelitic ally (Isaiah 8:4). His prophecy was not designed to be, nor was it actually, a comfort to Ahaz, for the success of the Assyrian King would be only the steppingstone to his attack upon Judah, and that is confirmed in Isaiah 8:5-8. The nation, both Israel and Judah ("this people"), refused the softly-flowing waters of Shiloah ("that which is sent"), Divinely provided at Zion and Moriah and symbolic of God’s promises concerning the throne and lineage of David, and rejoiced in setting their hopes upon earthly powers, Israel and its ruler Remaliah’s son, of Samaria, rejoicing in its alliance with Rezin, King of Syria, and Judah relying upon Assyria (Isaiah 8:6).

Both Israel and Judah, and Syria with them would therefore suffer at the hands of the King of Assyria, symbolically depicted as the rushing overflowing waters of the eastern river, in contrast to the waters of Shiloah (Isaiah 8:7). But Judah, would reach only to the neck-a dangerous height, but kept under Divine restraint, inasmuch as Immanuel would eventually come to Judah, and the land is His possession. Hence the sudden address to him, "Thy land, O Immanuel" (Isaiah 8:8).

God did through Isaiah what He has done ever since, and will do, through His completed Word, confirming the truth of its prophecies by their fulfillment in the course of human events. We may not read Scripture in the light of events, but we can see, as Judah did in Isaiah’s day, the veracity and power of the Divine revelations in their fulfillment. In JIsaiah 8:9, in view of the glory of Immanuel, the prophecy points on to the final gathering of the nations under the Antichrist against the Jews in "the war of Har-mageddon" and the utter overthrow of their confederate effort to annihilate them: "Associate yourselves, O ye peoples" (plural r.v.). Another version gives the meaning "Disquiet yourselves," i.e., "raise the war cry." Let them gird themselves for the attempt. Three times their doom is pronounced, "Ye shall be broken in pieces." Their counsel will be brought to naught. Their propaganda will fail of realization. The scene and the circumstances are the same as those in Psalms 2:1-5; Joel 3:2; Zechariah 14:1-3; Revelation 19:15-21. In Isaiah 8:10 of Isaiah 8:1-22 the nations are bidden to speak the word, i.e., "utter your sentence." It will not stand. The secret of the overflow lies in the great Name Immanuel.

Isaiah 8:11-12 continue the remonstrance against the reliance upon Assyria instead of upon God. Isaiah declares that Jehovah had spoken to him, overpowering him with His hand (see margin), instructing him not to walk in the way of his people. The command in Isaiah 8:12 is addressed to Isaiah and the few with him who feared God and dissociated themselves from the apostasy of the time. The true meaning of the verse is unfolded if the accurate rendering "A conspiracy" is substituted for "A confederacy." The reference here is not to the alliance between Pekah and Rezin. Isaiah and his associates were being accused of a conspiracy against Ahaz and Judah under him, because of the prophet’s denunciation of the alliance with Assyria. This kind of calumny was what prophets had to endure whenever they opposed an appeal by God’s people for the help of Gentile aid (Amos 7:10).

While, then, Isaiah was comforting the faithful with the promises concerning Immanuel, he was to warn them against the popular idea, and against sharing in fears of the people. "Call ye not conspiracy all that this people calls conspiracy. What they fear, fear ye not, nor regard it as dreadful": this seems the true rendering of the verse. Isaiah 8:13 sets a positive command in direct contrast: "Sanctify Jehovah of hosts Himself, and let Him be your fear, and let Him be your dread." To sanctify the Lord is so to live that He has absolute authority and control over the heart and will, over every activity of the life, to walk in His fear, dreading to displease Him. This is the due response to His redeeming grace and love in Christ. "Sanctify in your hearts Christ as Lord" (1 Peter 3:15, r.v.; see Isaiah 29:23 and contrast Numbers 20:12). The effect of the fulfillment of this is that the Lord becomes "a sanctuary" to us (Isaiah 8:14). Just as the Temple was designed to be to Israel the center of their spiritual life, their joy in worship and praise, a place of holiness and peace as well as a defense, so Christ Himself is to the believer. "We live in Him." Our life is "hid with Christ in God." To unbelieving Israel He has become "a stone of stumbling … a rock of offense … for a gin and for a snare." They have been "broken" on the stone and "taken" in the snare (Isaiah 8:15). That was the case with Judah and Israel in Isaiah’s day in their attitude toward Jehovah. So Christ became to them and still is (Romans 9:33; 1 Peter 2:8), till the veil is removed from their heart. In Isaiah 8:16 the testimony refers to what has preceded, concerning both Immanuel and the future condition of Israel. It was to be secured and kept for the godly remnant then and in the coming generation. The law, which the people had cast away (Isaiah 5:24), was similarly to be sealed among the faithful disciples, those who humbly sought to know and follow it (possibly this verse is Isaiah’s prayer instead of the continuation of God’s word to him, and in that case his disciples are "the children" given him by the Lord, Isaiah 8:18). Amidst the darkness of the people from whom God hid his face, Isaiah determines the more steadfastly to wait upon (or for) God and look for Him.

There is a helpful lesson for us in this. Conditions of declension from God and refusal to listen to His Word will be the means, if we abide faithful and stand in His counsels, of directing our hearts the more steadfastly to wait upon Him, that our expectation may be from Him. The backsliding state of some who once gave hopes of being blessed and made fruitful through our ministry, tends to depress the spirit. In these circumstances, and amidst difficulties of whatever nature, the Spirit of God would draw us nearer to Him, that we may ever find our resources in His power still to glorify His Name through us. The prophet finds comfort and assurance in the children the Lord had given Him (Isaiah 8:18), Shear-jashub and Maher-shalal-hash-baz were "for signs and wonders in Israel from Jehovah of hosts, which dwelleth in Mount Zion." The one was a sign that "a remnant would return," the other that "plunder would speed and booty would haste." The sign was a token or pledge by word and deed portending the fulfillment of an event; the wonder was an indication of the divinely supernatural source and cause of it. Thus the two children were tokens of redemption for Israel through judgment. The first part of this verse is quoted in Hebrews 2:13, where the Spirit of God (who is a law to Himself in the matter of quotations from the O.T.) applies it to the spiritual children of God in relationship to Christ. Isaiah’s natural children were symbolically representative of believers, who likewise are to be a testimony in the world.

Instead of accepting the signs and messages given by God, the people made application to those who had "familiar spirits," i.e., to spiritist mediums, as Saul did at Endor, and indulged in the arts of necromancy and wizardry (Isaiah 8:19). The Lord’s remonstrance is twofold; "should not a people seek unto their God? On behalf of the living should they seek unto the dead?" This is the folly of Spiritism. The disastrous character of it is that its dupes, both the mediums and the applicants, put themselves into the delusive and destructive power of evil spirits.

Before every great crisis in human affairs there has been an outburst of spiritism. So it was in Judah and Israel just before the captivity. So it was at the time of Christ’s Incarnation and atoning Death. So it is today. God has provided all that is requisite for our guidance and spiritual needs in the Scriptures of truth (2 Timothy 3:16-17). So it was in the nation of Israel, ere even the Old Testament was completed: "To the law [i.e., the teaching, thorah] and to the testimony! if they speak not according to this word, surely there is no morning for them" (Isaiah 8:20) or "they are a people for whom no morning dawns"; they abide in perpetual darkness. "And they shall pass through it [or rather, "they, the rebellious nation, shall go about therein," i.e., in the darkness], hardly bestead [i.e., hard pressed or hardened] and hungry." Then, instead of repenting, they would fret themselves, curse the king and curse God (or rather cursed by the king and by God), and would "look upward," turning their face in despair toward heaven, to see if light would come from thence, and look downward to the earth, to find relief therefrom: and behold, distress and darkness, the gloom of anguish, and into thick darkness they shall be driven away, i.e., cast out of Immanuel’s land.