a burden · noun, common masculine singular construct
Damascus
דַּמָּ֑שֶׂקda.Ma.sek
H1834
Damascus · proper noun, a place name
Damascus
דַמֶּ֙שֶׂק֙da.Me.sek
H1834
Damascus · proper noun, a place name
away
מוּסָ֣רmu.Sar
H5493
to turn off (literal or figurative) · verb, hophal passive participle, masculine singular absolute
city
מֵעִ֔ירme.'Ir
H5892
a city (a place guarded by waking or a watch) in the wi… · preposition + noun, common feminine singular absolute
ruinous
מַפָּלָֽהma.pa.Lah
H4654
something fallen · noun, common feminine singular absolute
heap
מְעִ֥יme.'I
H4596
a pile of rubbish (as contorted) · noun, common masculine singular construct
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
Amos 1:3-5 Thus saith the LORD; For three transgressions of Damascus, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they have thre…
Isaiah 25:2 For thou hast made of a city an heap; of a defenced city a ruin: a palace of strangers to be no city; it shall never be built.
Zechariah 9:1 The burden of the word of the LORD in the land of Hadrach, and Damascus shall be the rest thereof: when the eyes of man, as of all the tribe…
Genesis 14:15 And he divided himself against them, he and his servants, by night, and smote them, and pursued them unto Hobah, which is on the left hand o…
Isaiah 7:8 For the head of Syria is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rezin; and within threescore and five years shall Ephraim be broken, that it…
Jeremiah 49:2 Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will cause an alarm of war to be heard in Rabbah of the Ammonites; and it shall be…
Jeremiah 49:23-27 Concerning Damascus. Hamath is confounded, and Arpad: for they have heard evil tidings: they are fainthearted; there is sorrow on the sea; i…
Micah 1:6 Therefore I will make Samaria as an heap of the field, and as plantings of a vineyard: and I will pour down the stones thereof into the vall…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Isaiah 17:1-5
We have here the burden of Damascus; the Chaldee paraphrase reads it, The burden of the cup of the curse to drink to Damascus in; and, the ten tribes being in alliance, they must expect to pledge Damascus in this cup of trembling that is to go round. 1. Damascus itself, the head city of Syria, must be destroyed; the houses, it is likely, will be burnt, as least the walls, and gates, and fortifications demolished, and the inhabitants carried away captive, so that for the present it is taken away from being a city, and is reduced not only to a village, but to a ruinous heap, Isa 17:1. Such desolating work as this does sin make with cities. 2. The country towns are abandoned by their inhabitant…
The burden of Damascus,.... A heavy and grievous prophecy, concerning the destruction of it; the Arabic version is,
"the prophecy of Isaiah concerning Damascus;''
and the Targum is,
"the burden of the cup of cursing to give Damascus to drink.''
Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city; a kingdom, as the Targum; it was the head of one, but now its walls were demolished, its houses pulled down, and its inhabitants carried captive; this was done by Tilgathpilneser king of Assyria, 2 Kings 16:9 it had been a very ancient city, see Genesis 15:2 and the head of the kingdom of Syria, Isaiah 7:8, and though it underwent this calamity, it was rebuilt again, and was a city of great fame, w…
The burden of Damascus. Here he prophesies against the kingdom of Syria, and mentions the chief city in which the seat of the kingdom lay. It was proper that this calamity, like others which came before it, should be described, that the righteous might confidently believe that God would one day assist them, and would not always permit them to be oppressed by the wicked without end. The king of Syria had formed an alliance with Israel against Judah, as we saw formerly in the seventh chapter; and as the Jews were not able to contend with him, and were deprived of other aids, they might also entertain doubts about God's assistance, as if he had utterly abandoned them. To free them, therefore, f…
The Church Fathers
(Verse 1) Behold, Damascus will cease to be a city, and it will be like a heap of stones in ruin. As indicated in the title, the calling of the nations is signified by Damascus, those who loved or drank blood, who, after believing in Christ, will cease to be cities of their former way of life, and will be like a heap of stones in ruin. For just as heaps of stones, which were scattered in the fields, are gathered into one mound, so a heap of believers from all nations was gathered together in the downfall of the Jewish people, as they fell, and we rose up.
(Chapter 17, Verse 1) The Burden of Damascus. Symmachus and Theodotion, The Assumption of Damascus: LXX, The Word against Damascus, adding their own account of what they did in Moab at the beginning. We first read the name of Damascus in Genesis, who was a native of Abraham before Isaac, and he was considered the heir, unless he was born to Sarah by promise (Genesis 15). However, it is interpreted either as a kiss of blood, or one who drinks blood, or the blood of the Cilician garment, all of which are customs of the Gentile people, who before the faith of Christ, were a friend of bloodshed and cruelty, and performed worthy acts of mourning and sackcloth. In the book of Chronicles (2 Chronicles 24), the story is told that at the end of the year, the army of Syria rose up against Joash, the king of Judah, and came to Jerusalem, and killed all the leaders of the people, and sent all the spoils to the king of Damascus, who had come with a few men. And God had delivered a very great multitude into their hands, because they had forsaken the Lord, the God of their fathers. This should be considered in light of the spiritual meaning and the future significance, to determine whether we can apply it to the time of the Lord's coming. At the end of the acceptable year, in which the Gospel was preached by the Savior, a multitude of Gentiles rose up from Damascus in a few men against Judah and Jerusalem, who had forsaken the Lord. And they took away all their wealth of the Law and the Prophets, and sent it to the king of Damascus, namely, the ecclesiastical men and the teachers of the Gospel, who were few in comparison to the whole world, which was still unbelieving at that time, and to the scattered Jews throughout the whole world. And yet the Lord delivered Jerusalem into their hands, because they had forsaken the Son of God, who had been predicted by the prophets before. Therefore, (perhaps it was I), for this reason, I believe that Saul, who later received the name Paul by virtue, because he was a persecutor of the Law, went to Damascus and wanted to fight against the believers from the Gentiles there, and after being defeated, he followed those who were already in Damascus, in order to go back to Jerusalem and conquer the Jews there. And it should not seem contradictory to anyone that in the Chronicles book, joyful things are said about Damascus, and now in Isaiah,…
Dictionary and topics
Burden — (1.) A load of any kind (Ex. 23:5). (2.) A severe task (Ex. 2:11). (3.) A difficult duty, requiring effort (Ex. 18:22). (4.) A prophecy of a calamitous or disastrous nature (Isa. 13:1; 17:1; Hab.…
Damascus — Activity, the most ancient of Oriental cities; the capital of Syria (Isa. 7:8; 17:3); situated about 133 miles to the north of Jerusalem. Its modern name is Esh-Sham; i.e., “the East.” The situation…
Burden · .Of the prophetic message — .Of the prophetic message
Prophets · Were sent to: Predict the downfall of nations — Were sent to: Predict the downfall of nations
Syria · Prophecies respecting: Ceasing to be a kingdom — Prophecies respecting: Ceasing to be a kingdom
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).
The first turn: "Behold, Damascus must (be taken) away out of the number of the cities, and will be a heap of fallen ruins. The cities of Aroer are forsaken, they are given up to flocks, they lie there without any one scaring them away. And the fortress of Ephraim is abolished, and the kingdom of Damascus; and it happens to those that are left of Aram as to the glory of the sons of Israel, saith Jehovah of hosts." "Behold," etc.: hinnēh followed by a participle indicates here, as it does everywhere else, something very near at hand. Damascus is removed מעיר (= עיר מהיות, cf., Kg1 15:13), i.e., out of the sphere of existence as a city. It becomes מעי, a heap of ruins. The word is used intent…
This section contains prophecies of judgment against Damascus, Israel, Ethiopia, and Egypt. The scene moves from the crisis of 734 BC (the alliance of Syria and Israel—see study note on 7:1-25) to the Assyrian crisis in 701 BC (see chs 36–37).
17:1 Damascus, the ringleader in the alliance of Syria and Israel against Judah, fell when the Assyrian king Tiglath-pileser III invaded in 732 BC.
Rashi on Isaiah 17:1
I shall be removed from being a city [The Hebrew denotes] an expression of removing.
removed from a city from being a city.
a depth Heb. מְעִי, an expression of lowness and depth, like the depth of the seas (כִּמְעוֹת).
(Chapter 17, Verse 1) The burden of Damascus: Behold, Damascus will cease to be a city, and it will become a heap of ruins. The cities of Aroer will be deserted for the flocks, and they will have rest with none to make them afraid. The help from Ephraim will cease, and the kingdom from Damascus; and the remnant of Syria will be like the glory of the children of Israel, declares the Lord of hosts. After Babylon and the Philistines and Moab, the attention turns to Damascus, which was once a royal city and held dominion over all of Syria. Antioch, Laodicea, and Apamea had not yet flourished, cities that we know were expanded after the reign of Alexander and the Macedonians. Therefore, since he always provided assistance to the ten tribes against Judah, as the history of the Kings and Chronicles narrates: it also signifies that destruction was approaching from the Assyrians themselves, as the king of the Assyrians said: I have taken Arabia, and Damascus, and Samaria. For just as I have taken those, I will also take you and all the kingdoms. And in the book of Kings we read: The king of the Assyrians went up to Damascus, and captured it, and transferred it to Cyrene (2 Kings 16:9). He also killed Rezin, who was the king of Damascus. All these things were suffered by Jerusalem while Hezekiah was reigning. Look, he said, Damascus will cease to be a city; captivity is now near: the Assyrian has already moved his army. And it shall be like a heap of stones in ruin, only the traces of walls and former power will be shown in the magnitude of the ruins. The deserted cities of Aroer will become pastures. Aroer, which means myrtle, is a tree that grows specifically in solitude and salty soil, and through this the desolation is demonstrated. Let the flocks rest there, and there will be no one to frighten them. Such will be the solitude that even the feared ambushers will not exist. And help will cease from Ephraim; the ten tribes will not have assistance against Judah. And the kingdom from Damascus, from the common or popular edition, is understood to cease. Moreover, when it says that the kingdom ceases and rests, it does not mean perpetual desolation, but it takes away power in the present, through which it used to reign over all of Syria. And the remnant of Syria shall be like the glory of the children of Israel, saith the Lord of hosts: as when they struck the ten…
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
