Isaiah 5:13 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Isaiah 5:13
Therefore my people are gone into captivity, because they have no knowledge: and their honourable men are famished, and their multitude dried up with thirst.
a people (as a congregated unit) · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix
captivity
גָּלָ֥הga.Lah
H1540
to denude (especially in a disgraceful sense) · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
knowledge
דָ֑עַתDa.'at
H1847
knowledge · noun, common feminine singular absolute
honourable
וּכְבוֹדוֹ֙u.khe.vo.Do
H3519
properly · conjunction + noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
men
מְתֵ֣יme.Tei
H4962
properly · noun, common masculine plural construct
famished
רָעָ֔בra.'Av
H7458
hunger (more or less extensive) · noun, common masculine singular absolute
multitude
וַהֲמוֹנ֖וֹva.ha.mo.No
H1995
a noise · conjunction + noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
up
צִחֵ֥הtzi.Cheh
H6704
parched · adjective, masculine singular construct
thirst
צָמָֽאtza.Ma'
H6772
thirst (literally or figuratively) · 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
Hosea 4:6 My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest t…
Isaiah 1:3 The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib: but Israel doth not know, my people doth not consider.
Isaiah 1:7 Your country is desolate, your cities are burned with fire: your land, strangers devour it in your presence, and it is desolate, as overthro…
Isaiah 27:11 When the boughs thereof are withered, they shall be broken off: the women come, and set them on fire: for it is a people of no understanding…
John 3:19-20 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
Romans 1:28 And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not con…
Isaiah 42:22-25 But this is a people robbed and spoiled; they are all of them snared in holes, and they are hid in prison houses: they are for a prey, and n…
Jeremiah 8:7 Yea, the stork in the heaven knoweth her appointed times; and the turtle and the crane and the swallow observe the time of their coming; but…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Isaiah 5:8-17
The world and the flesh are the two great enemies that we are in danger of being overpowered by; yet we are in no danger if we do not ourselves yield to them. Eagerness of the world, and indulgence of the flesh, are the two sins against which the prophet, in God's name, here denounces woes. These were sins which then abounded among the men of Judah, some of the wild grapes they brought forth (Isa 5:4), and for which God threatens to bring ruin upon them. They are sins which we have all need to stand upon our guard against and dread the consequences of.
I. Here is a woe to those who set their hearts upon the wealth of the world, and place their happiness in that, and increase it to themselves…
are gone--The prophet sees the future as if it were before his eyes.
no knowledge--because of their foolish recklessness (Isa 5:12; Isa 1:3; Hos 4:6; Luk 19:44).
famished--awful contrast to their luxurious feasts (Isa 5:11-12).
multitude--plebeians in contradistinction to the "honorable men," or nobles.
thirst-- (Psa 107:4-5). Contrast to their drinking (Isa 5:11). In their deportation and exile, they shall hunger and thirst.
John Gill on Isaiah 5:13
Therefore my people are gone into captivity,.... Or rather, as Kimchi explains it, "shall go into captivity"; the past for the future; for this cannot be understood even of the captivity of the ten tribes, for they were not carried captive until the sixth year of Hezekiah's reign, 2 Kings 17:6 whereas this prophecy was delivered out many years before, even in the time of Uzziah, as is manifest from the following chapter, Isaiah 6:1 and much less it cannot design the captivity of Judah, but respects the captivity by the Romans, in future time.
Because they have no knowledge; of the work of the Lord, and the operations of his hands; the Septuagint and Arabic versions render it, "because they…
What do servants think of themselves when they dare to despise the Lord's precepts, not even condescending to reread the letters of invitation whereby he asks them to the blessedness of his kingdom? If any one of us sends a letter to his administrator and he in turn not only fails to do what is commanded but even refuses to read over the orders, that person deserves to receive punishment, not pardon; imprisonment, not freedom. Similarly, one who refuses to read the sacred writings that have been transmitted from the eternal country should fear that he perhaps will not receive eternal rewards and even not escape endless punishment. So dangerous is it for us not to read the divine precepts that the prophet mournfully exclaims, "Therefore is my people led away captive, because they had not knowledge." … Doubtless, if a person fails to seek God in this world through the sacred lessons, God will refuse to recognize him in eternal bliss.
(Verse 13.) Therefore, my people have been taken captive because they lack knowledge, and their nobles have perished of hunger, and their multitude has dried up with thirst. This happened literally to the people of Judah under the Roman princes Vespasian and Titus, as both Greek and Latin history relate. And even today, they suffer from this spiritually, enduring not the hunger for bread or the thirst for water, but the hunger to hear the word of God. For they have not regarded the works of the Lord, nor considered the deeds of His hands, nor have they obtained His knowledge who has spoken through the prophets (Amos 8). And in the Psalms it is said of them: They shall convert in the evening, and suffer hunger like dogs, and shall go around the city (Ps. 59:16). But the Gospel teaches that every word of doctrine is called bread and water: Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God (Luke 4:4); And, Whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him, shall never thirst (John 4:13). And in the Psalm it is said: He has led me by the waters of refreshment (Ps. 23:2). And the Lord does not want to send away the hungry in the wilderness, so that they do not faint and fall and be killed by hunger (Matt. XV). And of the just man it is said: I have been young, and now am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread (Ps. XXXVI, 25). Some interpret this that is said: My people have been taken away, because they have no knowledge; and the nobles have perished with hunger, and the multitude thereof is dried up with thirst, generally as referring to Hell and Gehenna, where everyone who does not have the knowledge of God will be punished.
Dictionary and topics
Blindness · 21:14;22:13,14; — 21:14;22:13,14;
Captivity · As a — As a
Famine · General references — General references
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).
Therefore my people are gone into captivity. I do not approve of the interpretation given by some commentators, that in consequence of the teachers having failed to perform their duty, the people, through ignorance and error, fell into many vices, which at length became the cause of their destruction. On the contrary, he charges them with gross and voluntary ignorance, as if he had said that, by their madness, they brought down destruction on themselves. The meaning therefore is, that the people perished because they despised instruction; whereas they might have been preserved if they had listened to good counsels: and therefore he expressly says, My people; that is, the nation which enjoyed…
Therefore judgment would overtake them in this blind, dull, and stupid animal condition. "Therefore my people go into banishment without knowing; and their glory will become starving men, and their tumult men dried up with thirst." As the word "therefore" (lâcēn, as in Isa 1:24) introduces the threat of punishment, gâlâh (go into captivity) is a prophetic preterite. Israel would go into exile, and that "without knowing" (mibb'li-da'ath). The meaning of this expression cannot be "from want of knowledge," since the min which is fused into one word with b'li is not causal, but negative, and mibb'li, as a preposition, always signifies "without" (absque). But are we to render it "without know…
Israel and Judah would go into exile to Assyria (722 BC) and Babylon (586 BC). • The people did not respond to the Lord because they did not know him (see 1:3). They likely knew about him, but their behavior showed that they did not know him in any intimate way.
Rashi on Isaiah 5:13
because of lack of knowledge because their heart was without knowledge.
and its esteemed ones shall die of hunger Heb. וכבודו מתי רעב [lit. and its honor dead ones of hunger.] [Some editions add:] Payment in kind, corresponding to the satiety.
shall be parched from thirst Thirst corresponds to their elaborate drinking feasts.
Heb. צחה Aramaic for thirst.
