a people (as a congregated unit) · conjunction + definite article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
turneth
שָׁ֖בshav
H7725
to turn back (hence · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
smiteth
הַמַּכֵּ֑הוּha.ma.Ke.hu
H5221
to strike (lightly or severely · definite article + verb, hiphil active participle, masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
seek
דָרָֽשׁוּda.Ra.shu
H1875
properly · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person common plural
LORD
יְהוָ֥הYah.weh
H3068
Jehovah · proper noun, a title
hosts
צְבָא֖וֹתtze.va.'ot
H6635
a mass of persons (or figuratively · noun, common feminine plural 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
Jeremiah 5:3 O LORD, are not thine eyes upon the truth? thou hast stricken them, but they have not grieved; thou hast consumed them, but they have refuse…
Hosea 7:10 And the pride of Israel testifieth to his face: and they do not return to the LORD their God, nor seek him for all this.
Isaiah 31:1 Woe to them that go down to Egypt for help; and stay on horses, and trust in chariots, because they are many; and in horsemen, because they…
Isaiah 1:5 Why should ye be stricken any more? ye will revolt more and more: the whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint.
Deuteronomy 4:29 But if from thence thou shalt seek the LORD thy God, thou shalt find him, if thou seek him with all thy heart and with all thy soul.
2 Chronicles 28:22 And in the time of his distress did he trespass yet more against the LORD: this is that king Ahaz.
Job 36:13 But the hypocrites in heart heap up wrath: they cry not when he bindeth them.
Isaiah 26:11 LORD, when thy hand is lifted up, they will not see: but they shall see, and be ashamed for their envy at the people; yea, the fire of thine…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Isaiah 9:8–end
Here are terrible threatenings, which are directed primarily against Israel, the kingdom of the ten tribes, Ephraim and Samaria, the ruin of which is here foretold, with all the woeful confusions that were the prefaces to that ruin, all which came to pass within a few years after; but they look further, to all the enemies of the throne and kingdom of Christ the Son of David, and read the doom of all the nations that forget God, and will not have Christ to reign over them. Observe,
I. The preface to this prediction (Isa 9:8): The Lord sent a word into Jacob, sent it by his servants the prophets. He warns before he wounds. He sent notice what he would do, that they might meet him in the way of…
Second strophe.
turneth not--the design of God's chastisements; not fulfilled in their case; a new cause for punishment (Jer 2:20; Jer 5:3).
John Gill on Isaiah 9:13
For the people turneth not to him that smiteth them,.... Who was the Lord of hosts, as it is explained in the next clause; it was he that had smote the people with the rod of correction and chastisement, by various afflictions and distresses which he had brought upon them; in order to bring them to a sense of their sin and duty, to reclaim and recover them from their backslidings; but they had not such an effect upon them; they returned not to him by repentance and reformation, from whom they had turned themselves by their evil ways; nor to his worship, as the Targum interprets it, to his word and ordinances; for afflictions; unless sanctified, are of no use to restore backsliders. This is t…
But the people hath not turned. [150] The copulative v (vau) is rendered by some interpreters for, as if the Prophet were assigning a reason why the Lord does not cease to employ his scourges in the continual infliction of chastisements; that is, because the people are so hardened and obstinate that they will not repent. When there is no repentance, it is unreasonable to expect that God will yield to obstinate men, as if he were vanquished; and the consequence is, that he prepares himself for inflicting severer punishment. Since, therefore, no chastisements had produced any amendment in Israel, he must perish; for when they had been so frequently struck and punished, and did not at all repen…
The Church Fathers
It is better to turn again when we err than to be free from correction when we stumble. For whom the Lord loves he chastens, and a rebuke is a fatherly action. Every soul that is not chastised is not healed. Is not then freedom from chastisement a hard thing? But to fail to be corrected by the chastisement is still harder.
Against them the prophet complains to the Lord, saying, "You have bruised them, and they have refused to receive correction." … Hence again the Lord says, "The people are not returned to him who has struck them." … Hence the Lord reproaches the people of Israel, captive yet not converted from their iniquity, saying, "The house of Israel is become dross to me; all these are brass, and tin, and iron and lead, in the midst of the furnace." This is as though he said unmistakably, "I wished to purify them in the fire of tribulation, and I wanted them to become silver or gold. But they have turned from me in the furnace into brass, and tin, and iron and lead, because even in tribulation they have rushed forward not to virtue but to vices." When brass is struck, it gives off a greater sound than do other metals. He … who when chastised breaks forth into sounds of murmuring has turned to brass in the midst of the furnace. Tin, however, when skillfully treated, presents the deceptive appearance of silver. He therefore who is not free from the vice of pretence in the midst of tribulation has become tin in the furnace. But he uses iron who plots against the life of the neighbor, and he is iron in the furnace when he does not put away in his tribulations the wickedness of doing harm to neighbors. Lead, again, is heavier than the other metals. He then is found to be lead in the furnace who is so weighed down by the burden of his sin that even in tribulation he is not raised above earthly desires.
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
Afflictions Of The Wicked, The · Are ineffectual of themselves, for their conversion — Are ineffectual of themselves, for their conversion
Anger Of God, The · Against: Impenitence — Against: Impenitence
Israel, Prophecies Concerning · .Of — .Of
Seeking God · The wicked: Not led to, by affliction — The wicked: Not led to, by affliction
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).
Strophe 2. "But the people turneth not unto Him that smiteth it, and they seek not Jehovah of hosts. Therefore Jehovah rooteth out of Israel head and tail, palm-branch and rush, in one day. Elders and highly distinguished men, this is the head; and prophets, lying teachers, this is the tail. The leaders of this people have become leaders astray, and their followers swallowed up. Therefore the Lord will not rejoice in their young men, and will have no compassion on their orphans and widows: for all together are profligate and evil-doers, and every mouth speaketh blasphemy. With all this His anger is not turned away, and His hand is stretched out still." As the first stage of the judgments has…
God’s punishment was intended to bring repentance, not destruction; but Israel was apostate and refused to repent or seek the Lord.
Rashi on Isaiah 9:13
a large arch and a small arch An expression denoting kings and sultans.
כִּפָּה, arcum voltum, arvolt in O.F. [an arch] i.e., those who hover over them like an arch.
a small arch Heb. (אַגְמוֹן). This too is a small arch, and since it is bent over like a rush, (אַגְמוֹן), Scripture calls it אַגְמוֹן. And in the Baraitha of Samuel we find that there are constellations in the heavens, appointed to [influence the world], and these are their names. Here the prophet states that all their savants who prophesy for them and gaze at the stars, the Lord will cut off from them.
