Isaiah 15:2 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Isaiah 15:2
He is gone up to Bajith, and to Dibon, the high places, to weep: Moab shall howl over Nebo, and over Medeba: on all their heads shall be baldness, and every beard cut off.
to ascend · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
Bajith
בַּיִתBayith
H1006
Bajith
Dibon
וְדִיבֹ֛ןve.di.Von
H1769
Dibon · conjunction + proper noun, a place name
places
הַבָּמ֖וֹתha.ba.Mot
H1116
an elevation · definite article + noun, common feminine plural absolute
weep
לְבֶ֑כִיle.Ve.khi
H1065
a weeping · preposition + noun, common masculine singular absolute
Moab
מוֹאָ֣בmo.'Av
H4124
Moab · proper noun, a place name
howl
יְיֵלִ֔ילye.ye.Lil
H3213
to howl (with a wailing tone) or yell (with a boisterou… · verb, hiphil imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
Nebo
נְב֞וֹne.Vo
H5015
Nebo · proper noun, a place name
Medeba
מֵֽידְבָא֙mei.de.Va'
H4311
Medeba · proper noun, a place name
heads
רֹאשָׁ֣יוro.Shav
H7218
the head (as most easily shaken) · noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
baldness
קָרְחָ֔הka.re.Chah
H7144
baldness · noun, common feminine singular absolute
beard
זָקָ֖ןza.Kan
H2206
the beard (as indicating age) · noun, common masculine singular absolute
off
גָּדַעgâdaʻ
H1438
to fell a tree
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Leviticus 21:5 They shall not make baldness upon their head, neither shall they shave off the corner of their beard, nor make any cuttings in their flesh.
Jeremiah 48:1 Against Moab thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; Woe unto Nebo! for it is spoiled: Kiriathaim is confounded and taken: Misgab i…
Numbers 21:30 We have shot at them; Heshbon is perished even unto Dibon, and we have laid them waste even unto Nophah, which reacheth unto Medeba.
Deuteronomy 34:1 And Moses went up from the plains of Moab unto the mountain of Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, that is over against Jericho. And the LORD shewed…
Isaiah 3:24 And it shall come to pass, that instead of sweet smell there shall be stink; and instead of a girdle a rent; and instead of well set hair ba…
Jeremiah 47:5 Baldness is come upon Gaza; Ashkelon is cut off with the remnant of their valley: how long wilt thou cut thyself?
Jeremiah 48:18 Thou daughter that dost inhabit Dibon, come down from thy glory, and sit in thirst; for the spoiler of Moab shall come upon thee, and he sha…
Leviticus 19:27-28 Ye shall not round the corners of your heads, neither shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Isaiah 15:1-5
The country of Moab was of small extent, but very fruitful. It bordered upon the lot of Reuben on the other side Jordan and upon the Dead Sea. Naomi went to sojourn there when there was a famine in Canaan. This is the country which (it is here foretold) should be wasted and grievously harassed, not quite ruined, for we find another prophecy of its ruin (Jer. 48), which was accomplished by Nebuchadnezzar. This prophecy here was to be fulfilled within three years (Isa 16:14), and therefore was fulfilled in the devastations made of that country by the army of the Assyrians, which for many years ravaged those parts, enriching themselves with spoil and plunder. It was done either by the army of S…
He is gone up to Bajith,.... That is, Moab; the king or people of Moab, particularly the inhabitants of the above cities. Bajith signifies house; and here a house of idolatry, as Kimchi interprets it; it was an idol's temple, very likely the temple of their god Chemosh, the same which is called Bethbaalmeon, Joshua 13:17 "the house of Baal's habitation", and is mentioned with Dibon and Bamoth, as here; hither the Moabites went in their distress, to lament their case, ask advice, make supplication, and offer sacrifice:
and to Dibon, the high places, to weep; Dibon was another city of Moab, Numbers 21:30 where probably were high places for idolatrous worship, and from whence it might have the…
He shall go up into the house. [236] So far as relates to the words, some pass by the Hebrew noun vyt, (baith;) but as it signifies a house and a temple, it is probable that it was the word commonly used for a temple, as in many other passages the house of God means the temple [237] (Exodus 23:19, Exodus 34:26; Deuteronomy 23:18; Joshua 9:23.) By representing the Moabites as bowing down before their idols, he at the same time condemns their superstition in worshipping their idol Chemosh, as may easily be inferred from 1 Kings 11:7, Jeremiah 48:7, 13. "The Moabites," says Isaiah, "shall betake themselves to their god when matters are so desperate, but to no purpose; for they shall find in him…
The Church Fathers
(Vers. 2.) The house ascends, and Dibon ascends to the heights in lamentation over Nabo, and over Medaba Moab will howl. Do not be troubled that I am proceeding along the path of history, for you yourself desired that I do so. It is understood, however, that the royal house and the city of Dibon ascend to the idols that are placed on the heights: over Nabo and over Medaba, distinguished cities, the entire province will wail. For in Nabo there was consecrated the idol Chamos, which is called by another name Beelphegor. In all its chapters, there is baldness; every beard will be shaved off. Among the ancients, the shaving of the beard and head was a sign of mourning. By these things, therefore, the magnitude of sorrow is shown, with Jeremiah proclaiming against Moab: Every head is bald, and every beard is shaved off, and there is binding of the hands on every side, and sackcloth on every back (Jeremiah 48:37).
(Verse 2) Therefore, since every teaching contrary to the truth, which is born without the inspiration of God from human understanding in the darkness of error, has been laid waste by the night, and its arguments, which are understood as walls, have been destroyed by the words of Ecclesiastes; so that they fall into eternal silence, to such an extent that their entire faction turns to repentance and tears, over Nabo, that is, over prophecy and authority, that is, over their leaders, and over Medaba, where there are no fruitful trees, but barren thickets, in which beasts dwell, as it is written in the twenty-eighth psalm: And he will reveal the hidden things of the forest: there will be wailing and lamentation, and all the ornaments of eloquence will be taken away from their heads, so that they remain naked and deformed. And if anything seemed to have masculinity in a beard, when shaved by a Ecclesiastical man, it is considered effeminate and weak.
(Ver. 2.) The house ascends, and Dimon goes up to the high places to mourn. LXX: Be sad for yourselves, for Dimon will perish, where the altar is; there you shall go up to lament. The whole house of adversarial wisdom, and Dibon, which means their downfall, ascends to the high places, where it had pridefully exalted itself: not to offer sacrifices, but to mourn for the sins it had committed before. And truly, falsehood passes like a river, and flows by, and can never stay in a stable dwelling. But the word of God, which is compacted, is stable. And so the manna, which appears like ice upon the face of the earth, does not overflow, but remains. Furthermore, according to the Septuagint, the Moabites are commanded to mourn and lament, not for others, for this is the privilege of the perfected ones over themselves, because even their Dibon, that is, their composed word, which flowed like a torrent, will perish: in which they had as it were an altar of their consecration, and all secular riches. And in the psalm it is said: If riches abound, do not set your heart upon them. But the beginning of salvation is to understand one's own sins and to weep over them.
Dictionary and topics
Bajith — House, probably a city of Moab, which had a celebrated idol-temple (Isa. 15:2). It has also been regarded as denoting simply the temple of the idol of Moab as opposed to the “high place.”
Baldness — From natural causes was uncommon (2 Kings 2:23; Isa. 3:24). It was included apparently under “scab” and “scurf,” which disqualified for the priesthood (Lev. 21:20). The Egyptians were rarely subject…
Bamothbaal — (heights of Baal), a sanctuary of Baal in the country of Moab (Joshua 13:17) which is probably mentioned in (Numbers 21:19) under the shorter form of Bamoth, or Bamoth-in-the-ravine (20), and again…
Beard — The mode of wearing it was definitely prescribed to the Jews (Lev. 19:27; 21:5). Hence the import of Ezekiel’s (5:1-4) description of the “razor” i.e., the agents of an angry providence being used…
Dibon — Pining; wasting. (1.) A city in Moab (Num. 21:30); called also Dibon-gad (33:45), because it was built by Gad and Dimon (Isa. 15:9). It has been identified with the modern Diban, about 3 miles north…
Hair — (1.) The Egyptians let the hair of their head and beard grow only when they were in mourning, shaving it off at other times. “So particular were they on this point that to have neglected it was a…
Medeba — Waters of quiet, an ancient Moabite town (Num. 21:30). It was assigned to the tribe of Reuben (Josh. 13:16). Here was fought the great battle in which Joab defeated the Ammonites and their allies (1…
Nebo — Proclaimer; prophet. (1.) A Chaldean god whose worship was introduced into Assyria by Pul (Isa. 46:1; Jer. 48:1). To this idol was dedicated the great temple whose ruins are still seen at Birs…
Bajith · A place of idolatrous worship in Moab — A place of idolatrous worship in Moab
But just as horror, when once it begins to reflect, is dissolved in tears, the thunder-claps in Isa 15:1 are followed by universal weeping and lamentation. "They go up to the temple-house and Dibon, up to the heights to weep: upon Nebo and upon Medebah of Moab there is weeping: on all heads baldness, every beard is mutilated. In the markets of Moab they gird themselves with sackcloth; on the roofs of the land, and in its streets, everything wails, melting into tears. Heshbon cries, and 'Elle; even to Jahaz they hear their howling; even the armed men of Moab break out into mourning thereat; its soul trembles within it." The people (the subject to עלה) ascend the mountain with the temple of Ch…
In the ancient Near East, actions such as shaving or cutting off their beards revealed deep sorrow (see Jer 48:37).
Rashi on Isaiah 15:2
They went up to the temple, and Dibon Moab went up to the temple, and the people of Dibon to the high places.
to weep These would weep in the temple, and these would weep atop their high places.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
· Shaving, illustrative of severe judgments
— Shaving, illustrative of severe judgments
Dibon · .Taken by Moab — .Taken by Moab
Head · Liable to: Baldness — Liable to: Baldness
Medeba · An idolatrous “high place,” — An idolatrous “high place,”
Moabites · Possessed many and great cities — Possessed many and great cities
Nebo · .Prophecies concerning — .Prophecies concerning
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
