Isaiah 21:2

A grievous vision is declared unto me; the treacherous dealer dealeth treacherously, and the spoiler spoileth. Go up, O Elam: besiege, O Media; all the sighing thereof have I made to cease.

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Word by word — the Hebrew

Word	Hebrew	Strong’s	Meaning
grievous	קָשָׁ֖ה ka.Shah	H7186	severe (in various applications) · adjective, feminine singular absolute
vision	חָז֥וּת cha.Zut	H2380	a look · noun, common feminine singular absolute
declared	הֻגַּד hu.gad-	H5046	properly · verb, hophal perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
dealer	הַבּוֹגֵ֤ד ha.bo.Ged	H898	to cover (with a garment) · definite article + verb, qal active participle, masculine singular absolute
treacherously	בּוֹגֵד֙ bo.Ged	H898	to cover (with a garment) · verb, qal active participle, masculine singular absolute
spoiler	וְהַשּׁוֹדֵ֣ד ve.ha.sho.Ded	H7703	properly · conjunction + definite article + verb, qal active participle, masculine singular absolute
spoileth	שׁוֹדֵ֔ד sho.Ded	H7703	properly · verb, qal active participle, masculine singular absolute
up	עֲלִ֤י 'a.Li	H5927	to ascend · verb, qal imperative, 2nd person feminine singular
Elam	עֵילָם֙ 'ei.Lam	H5867	Elam · proper noun, a place name
besiege	צוּרִ֣י tzu.Ri	H6696	to cramp · verb, qal imperative, 2nd person feminine singular
Media	מָדַ֔י ma.Dai	H4074	Madai · proper noun, a place name
sighing	אַנְחָתָ֖ה 'an.cha.Tah	H585	sighing · noun, common feminine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person feminine singular
cease	הִשְׁבַּֽתִּי hish.Ba.ti	H7673	to repose · verb, hiphil perfect, 1st person common singular

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 33:1 Woe to thee that spoilest, and thou wast not spoiled; and dealest treacherously, and they dealt not treacherously with thee! when thou shalt…
Jeremiah 49:34 The word of the LORD that came to Jeremiah the prophet against Elam in the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah, saying,
Psalms 60:3 Thou hast shewed thy people hard things: thou hast made us to drink the wine of astonishment.
Isaiah 24:16 From the uttermost part of the earth have we heard songs, even glory to the righteous. But I said, My leanness, my leanness, woe unto me! th…
Daniel 5:28 PERES; Thy kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians.
Revelation 13:10 He that leadeth into captivity shall go into captivity: he that killeth with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience a…
1 Samuel 24:13 As saith the proverb of the ancients, Wickedness proceedeth from the wicked: but mine hand shall not be upon thee.
Psalms 12:5 For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the needy, now will I arise, saith the LORD; I will set him in safety from him that puffe…

Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).

Commentary

Matthew Henry on Isaiah 21:1-10

We had one burden of Babylon before (ch. 13); here we have another prediction of its fall. God saw fit thus to possess his people with the belief of this event by line upon line, because Babylon sometimes pretended to be a friend to them (as Isa 39:1), and God would hereby warn them not to trust to that friendship, and sometimes was really an enemy to them, and God would hereby warn them not to be afraid of that enmity. Babylon is marked for ruin; and all that believe God's prophets can, through that glass, see it tottering, see it tumbling, even when with an eye of sense they see it flourishing and sitting as a queen. Babylon is here called the desert or plain of the sea; for it was a flat…

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Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on Isaiah 21:2

dealeth treacherously--referring to the military stratagem employed by Cyrus in taking Babylon. It may be translated, "is repaid with treachery"; then the subject of the verb is Babylon. She is repaid in her own coin; Isa 33:1; Hab 2:8, favor this. Go up--Isaiah abruptly recites the order which he hears God giving to the Persians, the instruments of His vengeance (Isa 13:3, Isa 13:17). Elam--a province of Persia, the original place of their settlement (Gen 10:22), east of the Euphrates. The name "Persia" was not in use until the captivity; it means a "horseman"; Cyrus first trained the Persians in horsemanship. It is a mark of authenticity that the name is not found before Daniel and Eze…

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John Gill on Isaiah 21:2

A grievous vision is declared unto me,.... The prophet; meaning the vision of Babylon's destruction, which was "hard", as the word signifies, and might seem harsh and cruel; not to him, nor to the Jews, but to the Chaldeans: the treacherous dealer dealeth treacherously, and the spoiler spoileth; that is, according to Jarchi, one treacherous dealer deals treacherously with another, and one spoiler spoils another; the Medes and Persians deal treacherously with and spoil the Babylonians, who had dealt treacherously with and spoiled other nations: and to this sense some read the words, "the treacherous dealer hath found a treacherous dealer, and the spoiler one that spoileth" (n): some take it…

The Church Fathers

We receive the Son's light from the Father's light in the light of the Spirit: that is what we ourselves have seen and what we now proclaim—it is the plain and simple explanation of the Trinity. Let the treacherous deal treacherously, let the transgressor transgress—we shall preach what we know. We shall climb a lofty mountain and shout it out, if we are not given a hearing below. We shall extol the Spirit; we shall not be afraid. If we do have fear, it will be of silence, not of preaching.
— Gregory of Nazianzus, ON THE HOLY SPIRIT, THEOLOGICAL ORATION 5 (31).3

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

Babel — (confusion), Bab’ylon (Greek form of Babel), is properly the capital city of the country which is called in Genesis Shinar, and in the later books Chaldea, or the land of the Chaldeans. The first…
Cyrus — (Heb. Ko’resh), the celebrated “King of Persia” (Elam) who was conqueror of Babylon, and issued the decree of liberation to the Jews (Ezra 1:1, 2). He was the son of Cambyses, the prince of Persia,…
Elam — Highland, the son of Shem (Gen. 10:22), and the name of the country inhabited by his descendants (14:1, 9; Isa. 11:11; 21:2, etc.) lying to the east of Babylonia, and extending to the shore of the…
Medes, Media — (middle land). Media lay northwest of Persia proper, south and southwest of the Caspian Sea, east of Armenia and Assyria, west and northwest of the great salt desert of Iran. Its greatest length was…
Media — Heb. Madai, which is rendered in the Authorized Version (1) “Madai,” Gen. 10:2; (2) “Medes,” 2 Kings 17:6; 18:11; (3) “Media,” Esther 1:3; 10:2; Isa. 21:2; Dan. 8:20; (4) “Mede,” only in Dan. 11:1.…
Babylon · Predictions respecting: Destruction of — Predictions respecting: Destruction of
Cyrus · Prophecies concerning — Prophecies concerning
Medo-Persian Kingdom · Predictions respecting: Conquest of Babylon — Predictions respecting: Conquest of Babylon
Persia · 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).

Isaiah 21:2

Word by word — the Hebrew

Cross-references

Commentary

Matthew Henry on Isaiah 21:1-10

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on Isaiah 21:2

John Gill on Isaiah 21:2

The Church Fathers

Dictionary and topics

Isaiah 21:2

Word by word — the Hebrew

Cross-references

Commentary

Matthew Henry on Isaiah 21:1-10

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on Isaiah 21:2

John Gill on Isaiah 21:2

The Church Fathers

Dictionary and topics

John Calvin on Isaiah 21:2

Keil & Delitzsch on Isaiah 21:1-2

Tyndale Open Study Notes on Isaiah 21:2

Rashi on Isaiah 21:2