Matthew Henry on Isaiah 14:4-23
The kings of Babylon, successively, were the great enemies and oppressors of God's people, and therefore the destruction of Babylon, the fall of the king, and the ruin of his family, are here particularly taken notice of and triumphed in. In the day that God has given Israel rest they shall take up this proverb against the king of Babylon. We must not rejoice when our enemy falls, as ours; but when Babylon, the common enemy of God and his Israel, sinks, then rejoice over her, thou heaven, and you holy apostles and prophets, Rev 18:20. The Babylonian monarchy bade fair to be an absolute, universal, and perpetual one, and, in these pretensions, vied with the Almighty; it is therefore very just…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on Isaiah 14:17
opened not . . . house . . . prisoners--But MAURER, as Margin, "Did not let his captives loose homewards."
John Gill on Isaiah 14:17
That made the world as a wilderness,.... Both by destroying the inhabitants of it, and by laying waste cities, towns, villages, fields, vineyards, gardens, and all places improved and cultivated, wherever he came, as it follows:
and destroyed the cities thereof; as the Assyrian kings had done, some of which are mentioned in Isaiah 10:9,
that opened not the house of his prisoners; the prison house, in, which they were held; or,
"the gate to his prisoners,''
as the Targum; or rather the words may be rendered, "that opened not to his prisoners", that they might go "home"; or as De Dieu, in short, yet fully, expresses it, "that did not dismiss his prisoners home"; he not only cruelly and inh…
Read the whole note in the consoleJohn Calvin on Isaiah 14:17
He made the world as a wilderness. He expresses the cruel and savage disposition of the tyrant, by saying that he brought desolation on the world, that he overthrew cities, that he did not release prisoners. It is sometimes the custom of conquerors to release prisoners, in order to win their hearts by kindness; but tyrants choose rather to be feared than to be loved. They think that the only way to reign is to strike terror into all by inexorable cruelty. There is no reason to wonder, therefore, that their end is so wretched and dismal; for it is impossible that the Lord should not, after having chastised his Church by their cruelty, give them like for like, and withhold all compassion from…
