Isaiah 17:9 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Isaiah 17:9
In that day shall his strong cities be as a forsaken bough, and an uppermost branch, which they left because of the children of Israel: and there shall be desolation.
a day (as the warm hours) · preposition with the article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
strong
מָעֻזּ֗וֹma.'u.Zo
H4581
a fortified place · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
cities
עָרֵ֣י'a.Rei
H5892
a city (a place guarded by waking or a watch) in the wi… · noun, common masculine plural construct
forsaken
כַּעֲזוּבַ֤תka.'a.zu.Vat
H5800
to loosen · preposition + verb, qal passive participle, feminine singular construct
bough
הַחֹ֙רֶשׁ֙ha.Cho.resh
H2793
a forest (perhaps as furnishing the material for fabric) · definite article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
branch
וְהָ֣אָמִ֔ירve.Ha.'a.Mir
H534
a summit (of a tree or mountain · conjunction + definite article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
left
עָזְב֔וּ'a.ze.Vu
H5800
to loosen · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person common plural
because
מִפְּנֵ֖יmi.pe.Nei
H6440
the face (as the part that turns) · preposition + noun, common masculine plural construct
children
בְּנֵ֣יbe.Nei
H1121
a son (as a builder of the family name) · noun, common masculine plural construct
Israel
יִשְׂרָאֵ֑לYis.ra.'El
H3478
Jisrael · proper noun, a place name
desolation
שְׁמָמָֽהshe.ma.Mah
H8077
devastation · noun, common feminine singular absolute
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
Isaiah 27:10 Yet the defenced city shall be desolate, and the habitation forsaken, and left like a wilderness: there shall the calf feed, and there shall…
Amos 3:11-15 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; An adversary there shall be even round about the land; and he shall bring down thy strength from thee, an…
Isaiah 6:11-13 Then said I, Lord, how long? And he answered, Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land be utt…
Isaiah 7:16-20 For before the child shall know to refuse the evil, and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of both her kings.
Isaiah 9:9-12 And all the people shall know, even Ephraim and the inhabitant of Samaria, that say in the pride and stoutness of heart,
Isaiah 17:4-5 And in that day it shall come to pass, that the glory of Jacob shall be made thin, and the fatness of his flesh shall wax lean.
Isaiah 24:1-12 Behold, the LORD maketh the earth empty, and maketh it waste, and turneth it upside down, and scattereth abroad the inhabitants thereof.
Isaiah 28:1-4 Woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, whose glorious beauty is a fading flower, which are on the head of the fat valleys o…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Isaiah 17:9-11
Here the prophet returns to foretel the woeful desolations that should be made in the land of Israel by the army of the Assyrians. 1. That the cities should be deserted. Even the strong cities, which should have protected the country, shall not be able to protect themselves: They shall be as a forsaken bough and an uppermost branch of an old tree, which has gone to decay, is forsaken of its leaves, and appears on the top of the tree, bare, and dry, and dead; so shall their strong cities look when the inhabitants have deserted them and the victorious army of the enemy pillaged and defaced them, Isa 17:9. They shall be as the cities (so it may be supplied) which the Canaanites left, the old in…
forsaken bough--rather "the leavings of woods," what the axeman leaves when he cuts down the grove (compare Isa 17:6).
which they left because of--rather, "which (the enemies) shall leave for the children of Israel"; literally, "shall leave (in departing) from before the face of the children of Israel" [MAURER]. But a few cities out of many shall be left to Israel, by the purpose of God, executed by the Assyrian.
John Gill on Isaiah 17:9
In that day shall his strong cities be as a forsaken bough, and an uppermost branch,.... Meaning the strong cities of Ephraim or Jacob, the ten tribes, which should be forsaken of their inhabitants; having fled from before the enemy, or being slain or carried captive; like a bough of a tree, that is forsaken stripped of its leaves, and an uppermost branch of a tree that is dead and dry, and has nothing on it:
which they left; or "as they left", or "were left":
because of the children of Israel; "from the face of" them; or for fear of them; that is, the same cities which the Canaanites left; and as they left them, or were left by them, for fear of the Israelites; the same, and in the same m…
(Verse 9) On that day, her fortified cities will be abandoned like plowed fields and empty after the harvest. They will become a wasteland, just like the cities of the Israelites that were abandoned before them. This prophecy is not against Damascus, but against the ten tribes known as Israel. Just as when the people of God arrived from Egypt, all the nations living in the promised land were suddenly filled with fear and dropped their plows and left their crops and unfinished tasks, fleeing for safety on foot, so too shall the land of Israel remain deserted for a long time. I am amazed that Aquila interpreted 'pro aratris et acervis frugum' as 'testam et Emir'; Symmachus, 'silvam et Amir'; LXX, 'Amorrhaeos et Evaeos'. Only Theodotio put the Hebrew word, 'Ars Et Emir', which is more correctly read as 'Hores () Et Amir ()', that is, plows and heaps of grain.
(Verses 9, 10.) On that day your fortified cities will be deserted like plowed fields and cornfields that have been deserted by the children of Israel. And it will be desolate, because you have forgotten your God, your Savior, and have not remembered your strong helper. LXX: On that day your cities will be deserted like the cities abandoned by the Amorites and the Hivites before the children of Israel. And they will be deserted because you have abandoned your God, your Savior, and have not remembered the Lord, your helper. Just as under Moses and Joshua the son of Nun, the Amorites and the Eves and the other nations dwelling in the promised land abandoned their plows and crops and heaps in the fields and fled, lest they be seized by enemies, so too the land of Judea and all its mighty cities, with the Romans ravaging Judea and besieging Jerusalem, were deserted by their inhabitants. And there is an apostrophe to the very land of Judea, that is, to those who dwelt in it. But all these things you have suffered, because you have forgotten your God and Savior, who is called Jesus, whom the Law and the Prophets constantly proclaimed would come to you; and you have not remembered your strong helper, who has always come to your aid. Therefore, the reason for the desolation of the cities of Judea is the forgetfulness of the Savior, who, at the beginning of this prophecy, said: Israel did not know me, and my people did not understand me.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Cities · Were frequently: Depopulated — Were frequently: Depopulated
Israel, Prophecies Concerning · .Of — .Of
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).
In that day shall his strong cities be as a forsaken bough. He follows out what he had begun to say about driving out the inhabitants of the country; and as the Israelites, trusting to their fortified cities and to their bulwarks, thought that they were in safety, he threatens that they will be of no more use than if enemies were marching through desert places. The view entertained by some, that chvrs (chOrEsh) and zvvt (azubath) [6] are proper names of towns, is a forced interpretation. I understand them rather to denote unpleasant and disagreeable places, or that the walls and ditches will contribute no more to their defense than if the Israelites dwelt amidst thickets and bushes.
As they…
Third turn: "In that day will his fortified cities be like the ruins of the forest and of the mountain top, which they cleared before the sons of Israel: and there arises a waste place. For thou hast forgotten the God of thy salvation, and hast not thought of the Rock of thy stronghold, therefore thou plantedst charming plantations, and didst set them with strange vines. In the day that thou plantedst, thou didst make a fence; and with the morning dawn thou madest thy sowing to blossom: a harvest heap in the day of deep wounds and deadly sorrow of heart." The statement in Isa 17:3, "The fortress of Ephraim is abolished," is repeated in Isa 17:9 in a more descriptive manner. The fate of the s…
The Hivites and Amorites were members of the original population of Canaan; they were to be destroyed when the Israelites conquered the land (see Deut 20:17).
Rashi on Isaiah 17:9
the cities of his strength [The antecedent is] Israel.
like the abandonment of the forest and the many branched trees Forsaken like this forest, desolate without people.
forest Heb. הַחֹרֶשׁ. This is a forest, as [Onkelos] translates בְחוּרְשַָׁא בַיַעַר, in the forest (Deut. 19:8).
and the many branched trees This, too, is a forest, a place of trees. Like the abandoned cities of the Amorites, which they left in desolation in the days of Joshua like the forest and the many branched trees and fled because of the children of Israel, and the land of Israel was desolate.
