Isaiah 22:5 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Isaiah 22:5
For it is a day of trouble, and of treading down, and of perplexity by the Lord GOD of hosts in the valley of vision, breaking down the walls, and of crying to the mountains.
a day (as the warm hours) · noun, common masculine singular construct
trouble
מְהוּמָ֨הme.hu.Mah
H4103
confusion or uproar · noun, common feminine singular absolute
down
וּמְבוּסָ֜הu.me.vu.Sah
H4001
a trampling · conjunction + noun, common feminine singular absolute
perplexity
וּמְבוּכָ֗הu.me.vu.Khah
H3998
perplexity · conjunction + noun, common feminine singular absolute
Lord
לַֽאדֹנָ֧יla.do.Nai
H136
the Lord (used as a proper name of God only) · preposition + proper noun, a title
GOD
יְהוִ֛הYah.weh
H3069
YHWH · proper noun, a title
hosts
צְבָא֖וֹתtze.va.'ot
H6635
a mass of persons (or figuratively · noun, common feminine plural absolute
valley
בְּגֵ֣יאbe.Gei'
H1516
a gorge (from its lofty sides · preposition + noun, common both genders singular construct
vision
חִזָּי֑וֹןchi.za.Yon
H2384
a revelation · noun, common masculine singular absolute
breaking
מְקַרְקַ֥רme.kar.Kar
H6979
to trench · verb, piel active participle, masculine singular construct
walls
קִ֖רkir
H7023
a wall (as built in a trench) · noun, common masculine singular absolute
crying
וְשׁ֥וֹעַve.Sho.a'
H7771
a noble · conjunction + noun, common both genders singular absolute
mountains
הָהָֽרha.Har
H2022
a mountain or range of hills (sometimes used figurative… · definite article + noun, common 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
Isaiah 10:6 I will send him against an hypocritical nation, and against the people of my wrath will I give him a charge, to take the spoil, and to take…
Isaiah 37:3 And they said unto him, Thus saith Hezekiah, This day is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and of blasphemy: for the children are come to the…
Lamentations 1:5 Her adversaries are the chief, her enemies prosper; for the LORD hath afflicted her for the multitude of her transgressions: her children ar…
Micah 7:4 The best of them is as a brier: the most upright is sharper than a thorn hedge: the day of thy watchmen and thy visitation cometh; now shall…
Luke 23:30 Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us; and to the hills, Cover us.
Isaiah 22:1 The burden of the valley of vision. What aileth thee now, that thou art wholly gone up to the housetops?
Jeremiah 30:7 Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it: it is even the time of Jacob’s trouble; but he shall be saved out of it.
Lamentations 2:2 The Lord hath swallowed up all the habitations of Jacob, and hath not pitied: he hath thrown down in his wrath the strong holds of the daugh…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Isaiah 22:1-7
The title of this prophecy is very observable. It is the burden of the valley of vision, of Judah and Jerusalem; so all agree. Fitly enough is Jerusalem called a valley, for the mountains were round about it, and the land of Judah abounded with fruitful valleys; and by the judgments of God, though they had been as a towering mountain, they should be brought low, sunk and depressed, and become dark and dirty, as a valley. But most emphatically is it called a valley of vision because there God was known and his name was great, there the prophets were made acquainted with his mind by visions, and there the people saw the goings of their God and King in his sanctuary. Babylon, being a stranger t…
trouble . . . by the Lord--that is, sent by or from the Lord (see on Isa 19:15; Luk 21:22-24).
valley of vision--(See on Isa 22:1). Some think a valley near Ophel is meant as about to be the scene of devastation (compare see on Isa 32:13-14).
breaking . . . walls--that is, "a day of breaking the walls" of the city.
crying to the mountains--the mournful cry of the townsmen "reaches" to (MAURER translates, towards) the mountains, and is echoed back by them. JOSEPHUS describes in the very same language the scene at the assault of Jerusalem under Titus. To this the prophecy, probably, refers ultimately. If, as some think, the "cry" is that of those escaping to the mountains, compare Mat 13…
For it is a day of trouble,.... To Hezekiah, and also Jerusalem, and all the inhabitants of the land:
and of treading down; the people of it by Sennacherib's army, like mire in the streets, when their cities were taken by him:
and of perplexity by the Lord of hosts in the valley of vision; in Jerusalem, besieged, and threatened with desolation; which threw the king and his nobles, and all the inhabitants, into the utmost perplexity, confusion, and distress; and all this was not merely from men, nor was it by chance, but by the permission and appointment of God, to humble his people for their sins, and bring them to a sense and acknowledgment of them:
breaking down the walls: of the fenced…
The Church Fathers
(Verse 5.) For it is a day of slaughter, and of trampling, and of weeping to the Lord God of hosts in the Valley of Vision. He reveals the reasons according to triple understanding why he said: Depart from me, I will weep bitterly; because Zion is trodden down, once a mountain of visions, and now a valley of weeping.
(Verse 5.) For it is a day of slaughter and treading down, and of weeping from the Lord God of hosts in the valley of vision, searching the wall, and magnifying upon the mountain. LXX: For it is a day of tumult, and of destruction, and of treading down, and of error from the Lord God of hosts in the valley of Zion; they wander about from the least to the greatest: they are wandering upon the mountains. For the Day of Judgment and slaughter and trampling shall never come to Jerusalem, which is interpreted as the vision of peace; but to the ancient name Jebus, which is interpreted as trampling. And also tears or errors, as the Seventy have translated from the Lord of hosts, not that tears and errors are from the Lord; but by the occasion of the holy Scriptures, which the Lord has given to be read, occasions of error are born to those who can say: Why have you made us to err from your ways? (Isa. LXIII, 27). And in another place: The Lord mixed for them the spirit of error (Ibid. XXIX, 10): so that they would not stand on the mountain of Vision, but in the valley of Zion. But this very day, which rises in the valley of Vision from the Lord of hosts, examines the wall of the heretics, which they have constructed against the Church as the strongest defense; and also the magnificent and glorious, that is, their teachers, who boast of standing on the mountain of Christ. We read elsewhere: Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob: and he will instruct us in his ways (Isaiah 2:3). Moreover, what the Seventy translated, they err from the minimum to the maximum, they err over the mountains. We should understand that they are in a greater sin, who are greater, and yet all err from the minimum to the maximum, and err over the mountains: Moses, Jeremiah, and the other prophets, the evangelists and apostles. And when they are in the valley, they wander astonishingly in the mountains.
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
Day — The Jews reckoned the day from sunset to sunset (Lev. 23:32). It was originally divided into three parts (Ps. 55:17). “The heat of the day” (1 Sam. 11:11; Neh. 7:3) was at our nine o’clock, and “the…
Sennacherib — Sin (the god) sends many brothers, son of Sargon, whom he succeeded on the throne of Assyria (B.C. 705), in the 23rd year of Hezekiah. “Like the Persian Xerxes, he was weak and vainglorious, cowardly…
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).
It is a day of trouble. He again declares that the Lord is the author of this calamity, and that the Jews may not gaze around in all directions, or wonder that their enemies prevail against them, he pronounces that they are fighting against God. Though this doctrine is frequently taught in Scripture, still it is not superfluous, and cannot be so earnestly inculcated as not to be forgotten when we come to practice. The consequence is, that we are not humbled in the presence of our Judge, and that we direct our eyes to outward remedies rather than to God, who alone could cure our distresses. He employs the word day, as is usual in Scripture, to signify an appointed time; for when God winks at…
"Therefore I say, Look away from me, that I may weep bitterly; press me not with consolations for the destruction of the daughter of my people! For a day of noise, and of treading down, and of confusion, cometh from the Lord, Jehovah of hosts, in the valley of vision, breaking down walls; and a cry of woe echoes against the mountains." The note struck by Isaiah here is the note of the kinah that is continued in the Lamentations of Jeremiah. Jeremiah says sheber for shod (Lam 3:48), and bath-ammi (daughter of my people) is varied with batḣZion (daughter of Zion) and bath-yehudah (daughter of Judah). Mērēr babbeci (weep bitterly) is more than bâcâh mar (Isa 33:7): it signifies to give one…
The defeat of Judah would be a manifestation of the yet-future day of the Lord (see study note on 2:5-22). Jerusalem would be impotent in the day of disaster.
22:5 Jerusalem’s walls were broken by the invading Babylonians, who breached them with battering rams (2 Kgs 25:4).
Rashi on Isaiah 22:5
trampling (מְבוּסָה), trampling. Comp. (Jer. 12:10) “They trampled (בּוֹסְסוּ) My heritage.” Comp. also (Zech. 10:5): “And they shall be like heroes, trampling (בּוֹסִים) in the mire of the streets.”
destroying the wall a day of destroying the wall.
and shouting, “To the mountain!” (וְשׁוֹעַ). And the voice of a shout to flee to the mountains to escape.
