Isaiah 31:9 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Isaiah 31:9
And he shall pass over to his strong hold for fear, and his princes shall be afraid of the ensign, saith the LORD, whose fire is in Zion, and his furnace in Jerusalem.
to cross over · verb, qal imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
hold
וְסַלְעוֹ֙ve.sal.'O
H5553
a craggy rock · conjunction + noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
fear
מִמָּג֣וֹרmi.ma.Gor
H4032
a fright (objective or subjective) · preposition + noun, common masculine singular absolute
princes
שָׂרָ֑יוsa.Rav
H8269
a head person (of any rank or class) · noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
afraid
וְחַתּ֥וּve.cha.Tu
H2865
properly · conjunction + verb, qal sequential perfect, 3rd person common plural
ensign
מִנֵּ֖סmi.Nes
H5251
a flag · preposition + noun, common masculine singular absolute
saith
נְאֻםne.'um-
H5002
an oracle · noun, common masculine singular construct
LORD
יְהוָ֗הYah.weh
H3068
Jehovah · proper noun, a title
fire
א֥וּר'ur
H217
flame · noun, common masculine singular absolute
Zion
בְּצִיּ֔וֹןbe.tzi.Yon
H6726
Tsijon (as a permanent capital) · preposition + proper noun, a place name
furnace
וְתַנּ֥וּרve.ta.Nur
H8574
a fire-pot · conjunction + noun, common masculine singular absolute
Jerusalem
בִּירוּשָׁלִָֽםbi.ru.sha.Lim
H3389
Jerushalaim or Jerushalem · preposition + proper noun, a place name
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 29:6 Thou shalt be visited of the LORD of hosts with thunder, and with earthquake, and great noise, with storm and tempest, and the flame of devo…
Malachi 4:1 For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day tha…
Leviticus 6:13 The fire shall ever be burning upon the altar; it shall never go out.
Deuteronomy 32:37 And he shall say, Where are their gods, their rock in whom they trusted,
Isaiah 4:4 When the Lord shall have washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion, and shall have purged the blood of Jerusalem from the midst thereof…
Isaiah 10:17 And the light of Israel shall be for a fire, and his Holy One for a flame: and it shall burn and devour his thorns and his briers in one day…
Isaiah 18:3 All ye inhabitants of the world, and dwellers on the earth, see ye, when he lifteth up an ensign on the mountains; and when he bloweth a tru…
Zechariah 2:5 For I, saith the LORD, will be unto her a wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the midst of her.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Isaiah 31:6–end
This explains the foregoing promise of the deliverance of Jerusalem; she shall be fitted for deliverance, and then it shall be wrought for her; for in that method God delivers.
I. Jerusalem shall be reformed, and so she shall be delivered from her enemies within her walls, Isa 31:6, Isa 31:7. Here is, 1. A gracious call to repentance. This was the Lord's voice crying in the city, the voice of the rod, the voice of the sword, and the voice of the prophets interpreting the judgment: "Turn you, O turn you now, from your evil ways, unto God, return to your allegiance to him from whom the children of Israel have deeply revolted, from whom you, O children of Israel! have revolted." He reminds them…
Rather, "shall pass beyond his strongholds"; he Shall not stop to take refuge in it through fear (Jdg 20:47; Jer 48:28) [GESENIUS].
ensign--the banner of Jehovah protecting the Jews [MAURER].
fire . . . furnace--"light" and "fire," namely, of Jehovah's altar at Jerusalem (Isa 29:1). Perhaps "furnace," as distinguished from "fire," may mean that His dwelling-place (His hearth) was at Jerusalem (compare Isa 4:5); or else the fiery furnace awaiting all the enemies who should attack Jerusalem.
The times of purity and happiness which shall follow the defeat of the enemies of Jehovah's people (Isa 32:1-8). The period of wrath before that happy state (Isa 32:9-14). The assurance of the final p…
Then shall the Assyrian fall, etc. - Because he was to be discomfited by the angel of the Lord, destroying in his camp, in one night, upwards of one hundred and eighty thousand men; and Sennacherib himself fell by the hands of the princes, his own sons. Not mighty men, for they were not soldiers; not mean men, for they were princes.
John Gill on Isaiah 31:9
And he shall pass over to his strong hold for fear,.... This is said of the king of Assyria, departing in haste from the siege of Jerusalem, to some strong hold in his own country, particularly his strong city Nineveh, for fear of the angel, and destruction following him; nor could he think himself safe, until he had got there. Some render it (and the original will bear it), "and his rock shall pass over for fear" (a); his mighty men, his men of valour, in whom he trusted, and put his confidence, who were his strength, on which he depended; these, as many as were left of them, fled away. So the Targum,
"his princes shall flee for fear;''
though these are expressed in the next clause:
and…
The Church Fathers
The prescription of the law must be taken in the more spiritual sense. For there is a spiritual seed which through charity and the fear of God is conceived in the womb of the soul, which in turn travails and brings forth the spirit of salvation. It is in this sense that the passage is to be taken which reads, "Blessed is he who has seed in Zion and kindred in Jerusalem." What, indeed! Even though one is a fornicator, a drunkard or an idolater, will he be blessed, provided only that he has seed in Zion and kindred in Jerusalem? No one in his right mind would say that.
If the breads of the furnace that were baked in secret signify the interior devotion of the mind of the faithful confirmed by the fire of charity, breads which were also commanded by the law to be offered in the sacrifice of the Lord, it is most fitting that the hearts which were made to burn constantly with the flame of intimate love and virtue and to beget words are symbolized through the furnaces in which the same breads were baked. The prophet spoke beautifully about these things when he referred to "the Lord whose fire is in Zion and whose furnace is in Jerusalem." It is also written: "Did our hearts not burn within us when he spoke along the way and opened the Scriptures to us?"
Of this love that is begun here to be perfected from the sight of the Lord in the eternal kingdom Isaiah rightly speaks, saying, "The Lord lives, whose fire is in Zion, and his furnace in Jerusalem." It is, however, greater to be a furnace than a fire because a fire can also be small, but a larger flame is kindled in a furnace. Zion truly is said to be speculation but Jerusalem the vision of peace. Truly we sometimes catch a glimpse of our peace here in order there later to see it fully. Therefore through the Lord's love the fire is in Zion and his furnace in Jerusalem because here we burn in some measure with the flames of his love when we glimpse him, but there we shall burn totally when we shall fully see him whom we love.
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
Furnace — (1.) Chald. attun, a large furnace with a wide open mouth, at the top of which materials were cast in (Dan. 3:22, 23; comp. Jer. 29:22). This furnace would be in constant requisition, for the…
Hezekiah — Whom Jehovah has strengthened. (1.) Son of Ahaz (2 Kings 18:1; 2 Chr. 29:1), whom he succeeded on the throne of the kingdom of Judah. He reigned twenty-nine years (B.C. 726-697). The history of this…
Ensign · General scriptures concerning — General scriptures 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).
He shall pass to his stronghold for fear. [327] He now speaks of Sennacherib himself, who, trembling, shall betake himself in base and shameful flight to his "stronghold" or fortress, Nineveh, as to his nest. (2 Kings 19:36.) The Prophet adds that "his princes," or military officers, whose duty it is to encourage the rest of the soldiers, will be so timid that they shall not venture to join the ranks or await the battle, but shall "flee away from the standard."
Saith Jehovah, who hath a fire in Zion. At length he declares that he is God's herald in making this proclamation, that the Jews may not, as they are accustomed to do, dispute or hesitate as to the accomplishment of it, or afterwards…
The second motive is, that Israel will not be rescued by men, but by Jehovah alone; so that even He from whom they have now so deeply fallen will prove Himself the only true ground of confidence. "And Asshur falls by a sword not of a man, and a sword not of a man will devour him; and he flees before a sword, and his young men become tributary. And his rock, for fear will it pass away, and his princes be frightened away by the flags: the saying of Jehovah, who has His fire in Zion, and His furnace in Jerusalem." The lxx and Jerome render this falsely φεύξεται οὐκ (לא) ἀπὸ προσώπου μαχαίρας. לו is an ethical dative, and the prophet intentionally writes "before a sword" without any articl…
princes will flee: This was fulfilled when Sennacherib fled to Nineveh after God destroyed 185,000 troops (see 37:36-37). • God himself was the fire or flame that would devour Assyria.
Rashi on Isaiah 31:9
And his rock shall pass from fear And his strength shall be weakened from great fear.
shall be dismayed at the miracle Because of the great miracles that the Holy One, blessed be He, performs for Israel.
whose fire is in Zion There the fire will be prepared to burn them.
