Isaiah 40:17

All nations before him are as nothing; and they are counted to him less than nothing, and vanity.

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Word by word — the Hebrew

Word	Hebrew	Strong’s	Meaning
nations	הַגּוֹיִ֖ם ha.go.Yim	H1471	a foreign nation · definite article + noun, common masculine plural absolute
counted	נֶחְשְׁבוּ nech.she.vu-	H2803	properly · verb, niphal perfect, 3rd person common plural
nothing	מֵאֶ֥פֶס me.'E.fes	H657	cessation · preposition + noun, common masculine singular absolute
vanity	וָתֹ֖הוּ va.To.hu	H8414	a desolation (of surface) · conjunction + 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

Psalms 62:9 Surely men of low degree are vanity, and men of high degree are a lie: to be laid in the balance, they are altogether lighter than vanity.
Daniel 4:34-35 And at the end of the days I Nebuchadnezzar lifted up mine eyes unto heaven, and mine understanding returned unto me, and I blessed the most…
Isaiah 29:7 And the multitude of all the nations that fight against Ariel, even all that fight against her and her munition, and that distress her, shal…
Job 25:6 How much less man, that is a worm? and the son of man, which is a worm?
2 Corinthians 12:11 I am become a fool in glorying; ye have compelled me: for I ought to have been commended of you: for in nothing am I behind the very chiefes…

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

Commentary

Matthew Henry on Isaiah 40:12-17

The scope of these verses is to show what a great and glorious being the Lord Jehovah is, who is Israel's God and Saviour. It comes in here, 1. To encourage his people that were captives in Babylon to hope in him, and to depend upon him for deliverance, though they were ever so weak and their oppressors ever so strong. 2. To engage them to cleave to him, and not to turn aside after other gods; for there are none to be compared with him. 3. To possess all those who receive the glad tidings of redemption by Christ with a holy awe and reverence of God. Though it was said (Isa 40:9), Behold your God, and (Isa 40:11) He shall feed his flock like a shepherd, yet these condescensions of his grace m…

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Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on Isaiah 40:17

(Psa 62:9; Dan 4:35). less than nothing--MAURER translates, as in Isa 41:24, "of nothing" (partitively; or expressive of the nature of a thing), a mere nothing. vanity--emptiness.

John Gill on Isaiah 40:17

All nations before him are as nothing,.... As if they were nonentities, and were not real beings in comparison of him, who is the Being of beings, the author of all beings which exist in all nations; who are all in his sight, and are not only as grasshoppers, as is after mentioned, but even as nothing: and they are counted to him as less than nothing, and vanity; if there is or could be such a thing less than nothing, that they are; and so they are accounted of by him; they are like the chaos out of which the earth was formed, when it was "tohu" and "bohu", the first of which words is used here; this serves to humble the pride of men, and to lessen the glory of the nations, and the inhabita…

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John Calvin on Isaiah 40:17

All nations. He repeats what he had said, that it is in the power and at the disposal of God to destroy "all nations," whenever he shall think proper; and that, even while they remain in their present condition, they are reckoned as nothing before him. But it may be thought absurd for him to say, that "the nations are nothing," since God created them, that they might be something. I reply, this is said by comparison; for the depravity of the human mind is such that it obscures the divine majesty, and places above it those things which ought to have been subject to God; and, therefore, when we come to that contest, we may boldly declare that everything that is compared with God is worthless.…

The Church Fathers

And the Prophet said, "He rebuketh the sea, and maketh it dry, and drieth up all the rivers;" and again, "He looketh on the earth and it trembleth; He rebuketh the mountains, and they smoke." And again the prophet Isaiah saith, "All the nations are accounted as nothing by Him." Now these things the Spirit of God spake concerning the power of God, that those things which were not He called to come into existence, and that what did exist He called and changed into nothing. To this power also He compareth faith.
— Philoxenus of Mabbug, 13 Ascetic Discourses, Discourse 2 -- On Faith

(Verse 17) All nations are as nothing before him, they are accounted by him as less than nothing and emptiness. LXX: All the nations are as nothing in his sight, and they are counted as worthless. But if all nations are in his sight as if they were not, and are considered as nothing and empty (though in all nations and in Israel also), therefore he himself is also as if he were not, and is considered as nothing and empty. We say this, so that his pride may be broken, and so that he may know that he is like the other nations.
— Jerome, Commentary on Isaiah

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

Isaiah, The Book of — Consists of prophecies delivered (Isa. 1) in the reign of Uzziah (1-5), (2) of Jotham (6), (3) Ahaz (7-14:28), (4) the first half of Hezekiah’s reign (14:28-35), (5) the second half of Hezekiah’s…
Creation · Insignificance of man seen from — Insignificance of man seen from

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 40:17

Word by word — the Hebrew

Cross-references

Commentary

Matthew Henry on Isaiah 40:12-17

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on Isaiah 40:17

John Gill on Isaiah 40:17

John Calvin on Isaiah 40:17

The Church Fathers

Dictionary and topics

Isaiah 40:17

Word by word — the Hebrew

Cross-references

Commentary

Matthew Henry on Isaiah 40:12-17

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on Isaiah 40:17

John Gill on Isaiah 40:17

John Calvin on Isaiah 40:17

The Church Fathers

Dictionary and topics

Keil & Delitzsch on Isaiah 40:17

Tyndale Open Study Notes on Isaiah 40:17

Rashi on Isaiah 40:17