to add or augment (often adverbial · verb, qal perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
nation
לַגּוֹי֙la.goy
H1471
a foreign nation · preposition with the article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
LORD
יְהוָ֔הYah.weh
H3068
Jehovah · proper noun, a title
increased
יָסַ֥פְתָּya.Saf.ta
H3254
to add or augment (often adverbial · verb, qal perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
nation
לַגּ֖וֹיla.Goy
H1471
a foreign nation · preposition with the article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
glorified
נִכְבָּ֑דְתָּnikh.Ba.de.ta
H3513
to be heavy · verb, niphal perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
far
רִחַ֖קְתָּri.Chak.ta
H7368
to widen (in any direction) · verb, piel perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
ends
קַצְוֵיkatz.vei-
H7099
a limit · noun, common masculine plural construct
earth
אָֽרֶץ'A.retz
H776
the earth (at large · 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 9:3 Thou hast multiplied the nation, and not increased the joy: they joy before thee according to the joy in harvest, and as men rejoice when th…
Genesis 12:2 And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing:
Genesis 13:16 And I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth: so that if a man can number the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be numbered.
Numbers 23:10 Who can count the dust of Jacob, and the number of the fourth part of Israel? Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be…
Deuteronomy 10:22 Thy fathers went down into Egypt with threescore and ten persons; and now the LORD thy God hath made thee as the stars of heaven for multitu…
Nehemiah 9:23 Their children also multipliedst thou as the stars of heaven, and broughtest them into the land, concerning which thou hadst promised to the…
Isaiah 33:17 Thine eyes shall see the king in his beauty: they shall behold the land that is very far off.
Isaiah 44:23 Sing, O ye heavens; for the LORD hath done it: shout, ye lower parts of the earth: break forth into singing, ye mountains, O forest, and eve…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Isaiah 26:12-19
The prophet in these verses looks back upon what God had done with them, both in mercy and judgment, and sings unto God of both, and then looks forward upon what he hoped God would do for them. Observe,
I. His reviews and reflections are mixed. When he looks back upon the state of the church he finds,
1. That God had in many instances been very gracious to them and had done great things for them. (1.) In general (Isa 26:12): Thou hast wrought all our works in us, or for us. Whatever good work is done by us, it is owing to a good work wrought by the grace of God in us; it is he that puts good thoughts and affections into our hearts if at any time they be there, and that works in us both to wi…
hast--prophetical preterite (Isa 9:3).
hast removed . . . far . . . ends of . . . earth--rather, "Thou hast extended far all the borders of the land" [VITRINGA].
John Gill on Isaiah 26:15
Thou hast increased the nation, O Lord, thou hast increased the nation,.... The righteous nation, Isaiah 26:2 the church of God, by the numerous conversions of Jews and Gentiles; when the nation of the Jews shall be born at once, and the fulness and forces of the Gentiles are brought in; when the kingdoms of this world will become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ: this increase is repeated, to denote the certainty of it, and because a matter of great moment and importance:
thou art glorified; as by the destruction of the antichristian powers, so by the enlargement of the church and kingdom of Christ; for now will the voices be heard in heaven, giving praise and glory to God: even…
Thou hast added to the nation. This verse is explained in various ways. Some think that the Prophet here declares that the godly are not merely oppressed by one kind of affliction, but are plunged, as it were, into the lowest misery, and that they see no end of their distresses. Others explain it simply to mean, "O Lord, thou hast bestowed on thy nation various blessings," and think that the Prophet mentions the blessings which God bestowed on his people in various ways, as if he had said, "The people have experienced, not only in one instance, but in innumerable ways, the Lord's kindness and bounty."
But when I attend to what follows, Thou hast enlarged, that is, "Thou hast extended thy ki…
The Church Fathers
(Verse 15.) You have shown mercy to the nations, Lord, you have shown mercy to the nations. Have you been glorified? You have extended all the ends of the earth. LXX: Add evils to them, Lord, add evils to the glorious ones of the earth: you have made all the ends of the earth far away. The evils that the LXX placed second are not found in Hebrew; but because it had said above, Therefore you have brought and destroyed, and you have taken away all their males, following the same meaning, they added from their own, evils: so that those who are glorious on earth may be oppressed by double evils. Furthermore, according to the Hebrews, the meaning is very different and agrees with the previous discussion. The Lord had said, 'Let us have mercy on the wicked.' The prophet had responded, 'And where is your justice? Especially when you have done such great evils to your holy ones.' To which the Lord said, 'And they shall not see the glory of the Lord.' Again, the prophet said, 'Raise your hand to strike, and let them not see your glory, which they do not deserve to behold.' To which the Lord said, 'Let them see even more and be confounded.' Again the Prophet says: Lord, give us peace and possess us, who remember your name. But let the wicked and proud not live, nor rise again in glory, but crush their every memory. And it renders reasons why he desires them to perish. You have shown mercy to the nations, Lord, you have shown mercy to the nations, have you been glorified? And the meaning is: You have often shown mercy to the nations, that is, to the human race, and you have exercised incredible kindness towards them, have they recognized you? Have they not glorified your name? Have they not, on the contrary, distanced themselves far (or even further) from you? For security produces negligence, and negligence begets contempt.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Israel, when it has such cause as this for praising Jehovah, will have become a numerous people once more. "Thou hast added to the nation, O Jehovah, hast added to the nation; glorified Thyself; moved out all the borders of the land." The verb יסף, which is construed in other cases with על, אל ,, here with ל, carried its object within itself: to add, i.e., to give an increase. The allusion is to the same thing as that which caused the prophet to rejoice in Isa 9:2 (compare Isa 49:19-20; Isa 54:1., Mic 2:12; Mic 4:7; Oba 1:19-20, and many other passages; and for richaktâ, more especially Mic 7:11). Just as Isa 26:13 recals the bondage in Egypt, and Isa 26:14 the destruction of Pharaoh in the…
This verse is a confident expression of thanks for God’s blessings. In Isaiah’s time, during King Hezekiah’s prosperous reign, the borders of the nation of Israel were extended, and people gave glory to God for his great deeds.
Rashi on Isaiah 26:15
You have added to the nation to Israel (Tan. Pinchas 16) You added to them Torah and greatness and honor, and the more that You added to them, the more You were honored, for they thank You and praise You for all the bounty, unlike the custom of the heathens (var. of Esau). Therefore, You rejected from before You all other ends of the earth, i.e., all distant nations. Behold, in their bounty, in this manner the Israelites bestow praise and honor upon You, and in their straits.