Isaiah 19:16 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Isaiah 19:16
In that day shall Egypt be like unto women: and it shall be afraid and fear because of the shaking of the hand of the LORD of hosts, which he shaketh over it.
a day (as the warm hours) · preposition with the article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
Egypt
מִצְרַ֖יִםmitz.Ra.yim
H4714
Mitsrajim · proper noun, a place name
women
כַּנָּשִׁ֑יםka.na.Shim
H802
a woman · preposition with the article + noun, common masculine plural absolute
afraid
וְחָרַ֣דve.cha.Rad
H2729
to shudder with terror · conjunction + verb, qal sequential perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
fear
וּפָחַ֗דu.fa.Chad
H6342
to be startled (by a sudden alarm) · conjunction + verb, qal sequential perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
because
מִפְּנֵי֙mi.pe.Nei
H6440
the face (as the part that turns) · preposition + noun, common masculine plural construct
shaking
תְּנוּפַת֙te.nu.Fat
H8573
a brandishing (in threat) · noun, common feminine singular construct
hand
יַדyad-
H3027
a hand (the open one (indicating power · noun, common both genders singular construct
LORD
יְהוָ֣הYah.weh
H3068
Jehovah · proper noun, a title
hosts
צְבָא֔וֹתtze.va.'ot
H6635
a mass of persons (or figuratively · noun, common feminine plural absolute
shaketh
מֵנִ֥יףme.Nif
H5130
to quiver (i.e. vibrate up and down · verb, hiphil active participle, masculine 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
Jeremiah 51:30 The mighty men of Babylon have forborn to fight, they have remained in their holds: their might hath failed; they became as women: they have…
Nahum 3:13 Behold, thy people in the midst of thee are women: the gates of thy land shall be set wide open unto thine enemies: the fire shall devour th…
Isaiah 11:15 And the LORD shall utterly destroy the tongue of the Egyptian sea; and with his mighty wind shall he shake his hand over the river, and shal…
Jeremiah 30:5-7 For thus saith the LORD; We have heard a voice of trembling, of fear, and not of peace.
Jeremiah 50:37 A sword is upon their horses, and upon their chariots, and upon all the mingled people that are in the midst of her; and they shall become a…
Isaiah 10:32 As yet shall he remain at Nob that day: he shall shake his hand against the mount of the daughter of Zion, the hill of Jerusalem.
Zechariah 2:9 For, behold, I will shake mine hand upon them, and they shall be a spoil to their servants: and ye shall know that the LORD of hosts hath se…
Psalms 48:6 Fear took hold upon them there, and pain, as of a woman in travail.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Isaiah 19:1-17
Though the land of Egypt had of old been a house of bondage to the people of God, where they had been ruled with rigour, yet among the unbelieving Jews there still remained much of the humour of their fathers, who said, Let us make us a captain and return into Egypt. Upon all occasions they trusted to Egypt for help (Isa 30:2), and thither they fled, in disobedience to God's express command, when things were brought to the last extremity in their own country, Jer 43:7. Rabshakeh upbraided Hezekiah with this, Isa 36:6. While they kept up an alliance with Egypt, and it was a powerful ally, they stood not in awe of the judgments of God; for against them they depended upon Egypt to protect them.…
like . . . women--timid and helpless (Jer 51:30; Nah 3:13).
shaking of . . . hand--His judgments by means of the invaders (Isa 10:5, Isa 10:32; Isa 11:15).
John Gill on Isaiah 19:16
In that day shall Egypt be like unto women,.... Weak and feeble, as the Targum; fearful and timorous, even their military force; and devoid of wisdom, even their princes and nobles:
and it shall be afraid and fear because of the shaking of the hand of the Lord of hosts, which he shaketh over it: which the Lord may be said to do, when he lifts up his rod, and holds it over a people, and threatens them with ruin and destruction; perhaps this may refer to what was done in Judea by Sennacherib's army, which was an intimation to the Egyptians that their turn was next; and if the shaking of the Lord's hand over a people is so terrible, what must the weight of it be? Some think there is an allusio…
In that day shall Egypt be like women. He again repeats what he had formerly said, that the Egyptians will have nothing that is manly. Some think that he alludes to an effeminate custom, on account of which the ancient historians censured the Egyptians, namely, that, by inverting the order of things, women appeared in public and transacted the affairs of state, and men performed the occupations of women. It is possible that the Prophet may have had this in his eye, but when I take a more careful view of the whole passage, this conjecture cannot be admitted; for here he threatens a judgment of God, which will hold up men to astonishment. If he were speaking of an ordinary custom, this would n…
The Church Fathers
(Verse 16, 17.) On that day Egypt will be like women, and they will be astonished and afraid because of the shaking of the hand of the Lord of hosts, which he will bring against them. And the land of Judah will be a terror to Egypt; everyone who mentions it will fear because of the purpose of the Lord of hosts, which he has planned against it. I think it is better to correct one's own mistakes than to persist in error while being embarrassed to admit one's ignorance. In what I have translated, And the land of Judah shall be for Egypt a joy, for a joy is read in Hebrew Hagga (), which can be interpreted as both a festival (hence Haggai is translated as festival) and fear, which is more significantly translated by Aquila as 'shaking', when someone is fearful and trembling and turns their eyes around, and fears the approaching enemy. Therefore, if we want to take it in a positive sense, that the remembrance of Judah being for Egypt is a joy, it is rightly called a festival. But if, as I think, it turns into fear for the festival, let us understand fear or dread, that when Nebuchadnezzar comes, and all the hands of strong men will be loosened like those of women, even the word Judah is a terror to Egypt, because while they wanted to offer help, they have suffered so many evils. No one doubts in our times that, in comparison to Christians, all the pagans are like women, having weak opinions, and whatever they say is turned into foolishness, while they are astonished at such a great conversion of the people, and they marvel and understand the hand of the Lord, and whoever, of those who bear the name of Christians among the Gentiles, remembers the weakness of idolatry, confesses it out of fear.
(Verse 16, 17.) On that day, Egypt will be like women, and it will be astonished and afraid because of the shaking hand of the Lord of hosts, which he will bring down on it. And the land of Judah will be a terror to Egypt; everyone who thinks of it will fear because of the counsel of the Lord of hosts, which he has determined against it. At that time, which is now, as we have frequently mentioned, it signifies the day when the Lord will send the spirit of error and confusion, so that Egypt will vomit out the wine of dragons and the incurable madness of asps, understanding its own error and its former drunkenness. Egypt will be afraid like a woman, not with the usual fear that anyone may experience, whom Egypt does not love but suffocates and kills; but with a feminine fear, for Egypt alone does Pharaoh desire to live. But when the commotion, or raising up, of the hand of the Lord, by which punishments are demonstrated, moves and lifts up, in order to strike Egypt. Then the land of Judah, that is, the knowledge of the Scriptures, the law and the prophets, the Gospels and the Epistles of the Apostles, will be a cause for celebration for Egypt, if they recognize them: or a cause for fear, if by comparing their teachings and truths, they understand that they have held falsehood. All who remember this land will tremble with the fear that leads to life: For the beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord (Prov. 9:10). And not only in the consummation of the world, but also in the present time, we can receive this; which, every heretic should fear and be frightened by, as it is a teaching of a man knowledgeable in heavenly doctrines. But he will fear and dread the counsel of the Lord, which he has conceived upon Egypt of this world. We briefly go over each thing, in order to move on to the rest.
Dictionary and topics
Egypt — The land of the Nile and the pyramids, the oldest kingdom of which we have any record, holds a place of great significance in Scripture. The Egyptians belonged to the white race, and their original…
Egypt · Prophecies respecting: Dismay of its inhabitants — Prophecies respecting: Dismay of its inhabitants
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 result of all these plagues, which were coming upon Egypt, would be fear of Jehovah and of the people of Jehovah. "In that day will the Egyptians become like women, and tremble and be alarmed at the swinging of the hand of Jehovah of hosts, which He sets in motion against it. And the land of Judah becomes a shuddering for Egypt; as often as they mention this against Egypt, it is alarmed, because of the decree of Jehovah of hosts, that He suspendeth over it." The swinging (tenuphâh) of the hand (Isa 30:32) points back to the foregoing judgments, which have fallen upon Egypt blow after blow. These humiliations make the Egyptians as soft and timid as women (tert. compar., not as in Isa 13:…
An upraised fist (literally waving the hand) was a threatening motion.
Rashi on Isaiah 19:15
that either the head or the tail, the branch or the reed shall do These are the sorcerers and the astrologers who see in the stars that in the sky are heavenly bodies called by these names, formed in the pattern of a head and a tail, and they are placed in Aries. [Other editions read:] In Draco. Alternatively, it can be interpreted like the Targum: a head and a lower dignitary, a prince and a governor.