Matthew Henry on Isaiah 32:1-8
We have here the description of a flourishing kingdom. "Blessed art thou, O land! when it is thus with thee, when kings, princes, and people, are in their places such as they should be." It may be taken as a directory both to magistrates and subjects, what both ought to do, or as a panegyric to Hezekiah, who ruled well and saw something of the happy effects of his good government, and it was designed to make the people sensible how happy they were under his administration and how careful they should be to improve the advantages of it, and withal to direct them to look for the kingdom of Christ, and the times of reformation which that kingdom should introduce. It is here promised and prescrib…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on Isaiah 32:2
a man--rather, the man Christ [LOWTH]; it is as "the Son of man" He is to reign, as it was as Son of man He suffered (Mat 26:64; Joh 5:27; Joh 19:5). Not as MAURER explains, "every one of the princes shall be," &c.
rivers--as refreshing as water and the cool shade are to the heated traveller (Isa 35:6-7; Isa 41:18).
John Gill on Isaiah 32:2
And a man shall be as an hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest,.... Or, "that man"; the King Messiah before mentioned; who had agreed to become man, was promised and prophesied of as such, had often appeared in a human form, was to be incarnate, and now is; though he is not a mere man; were he, he could not be what is here said of him, "as a hiding place, and covert from the wind and tempest", of his Father's wrath, raised by sin; and which all men are deserving of, and on whom it must fall, unless secured from it by Christ; who has bore it in the room and stead of his people, has turned it away, and delivered them from it, and all the effects of it, so that nothing of it…
Read the whole note in the consoleJohn Calvin on Isaiah 32:2
And that man shall be. How great is the importance of well-regulated government the Prophet shews plainly by these words, when he calls that king a hiding-place from the wind, and a covert from the rain; for mankind can never be so happy as when every one voluntarily abstains from every kind of violence and injustice, and when they conduct themselves peaceably and without restraint. Since, therefore, most men are urged and driven by their furious passions to acts of injustice, men would be embroiled in incessant quarreling if a remedy were not provided in the laws and courts of justice; but as many rulers, by a tyrannical exercise of power, raise more troubles than they allay, it is not with…
