Isa 58:3-14 | JFB | STEP | 3. Wherefore-- the words of the Jews: "Why is it that, when we fast, Thou dost not notice it" (by delivering us)? They think to lay God under obligation to their fasting ( ; Mal 3:14). afflicted ... soul-- ( ). Behold-- God's reply. pleasure-- in antithesis to their boast of having "afflicted their soul"; it was only in outward show they really enjoyed themselves. Gesenius not so well translates, "business." exact ... labours-- rather, "oppressive labors" [Maurer]. Horsley, with Vulgate, translates, "Exact the whole upon your debtors"; those who owe you labor ( -10, &c.).

‏ Isaiah 58:3-14

3. Wherefore--the words of the Jews: "Why is it that, when we fast, Thou dost not notice it" (by delivering us)? They think to lay God under obligation to their fasting (Psa 73:13; Mal 3:14).

afflicted ... soul--(Le 16:29).

Behold--God's reply.

pleasure--in antithesis to their boast of having "afflicted their soul"; it was only in outward show they really enjoyed themselves. Gesenius not so well translates, "business."

exact ... labours--rather, "oppressive labors" [Maurer]. Horsley, with Vulgate, translates, "Exact the whole upon your debtors"; those who owe you labor (Ne 5:1-5, 8-10, &c.).

4. ye shall not fast--rather, "ye do not fast at this time, so as to make your voice to be heard on high," that is, in heaven; your aim in fasting is strife, not to gain the ear of God [Maurer] (1Ki 21:9, 12, 13). In English Version the sense is, If you wish acceptance with God, ye must not fast as ye now do, to make your voice heard high in strife.

5. for a man to afflict his soul--The pain felt by abstinence is not the end to be sought, as if it were meritorious; it is of value only in so far as it leads us to amend our ways (Is 58:6, 7).

bow ... head ... sackcloth--to affect the outward tokens, so as to "appear to men to fast" (Mt 6:17, 18; 1Ki 21:27; Es 4:3).

6. loose ... bands of wickedness--that is, to dissolve every tie wherewith one has unjustly bound his fellow men (Le 25:49, &c.). Servitude, a fraudulent contract, &c.

undo ... heavy burdens--Hebrew, "loose the bands of the yoke."

oppressed--literally, "the broken." The expression, "to let go free," implies that those "broken" with the yoke of slavery, are meant (Ne 5:10-12; Jr 34:9-11, 14, 16). Jerome interprets it, broken with poverty; bankrupt.

7. deal--distribute (Job 31:16-21).

cast out--rather, reduced [Horsley].

naked ... cover him--(Mt 25:36).

hide ... thyself--means to be strange towards them, and not to relieve them in their poverty (Mt 15:5).

flesh--kindred (Ge 29:14). Also brethren in common descent from Adam, and brethren in Christ (Jas 2:15).

8. light--emblem of prosperity (Is 58:10; Job 11:17).

health--literally, a long bandage, applied by surgeons to heal a wound (compare Is 1:6). Hence restoration from all past calamities.

go before thee--Thy conformity to the divine covenant acts as a leader, conducting thee to peace and prosperity.

glory ... reward--like the pillar of cloud and fire, the symbol of God's "glory," which went behind Israel, separating them from their Egyptian pursuers (Is 52:12; Ex 14:19, 20).

9. Then ... call ... answer--when sin is renounced (Is 65:24). When the Lord's call is not hearkened to, He will not hear our "call" (Psa 66:18; Pr 1:24, 28; 15:29; 28:9).

putting forth of ... finger--the finger of scorn pointed at simple-minded godly men. The middle finger was so used by the Romans.

speaking vanity--every injurious speech [Lowth].

10. draw out thy soul--"impart of thine own subsistence," or "sustenance" [Horsley]. "Soul" is figurative for "that wherewith thou sustainest thy soul," or "life."

light ... in obscurity--Calamities shall be suddenly succeeded by prosperity (Psa 112:4).

11. satisfy ... in drought--(Is 41:17, 18). Literally, "drought," that is, parched places [Maurer].

make fat--rather, "strengthen" [Noyes]. "Give thee the free use of thy bones" [Jerome], or, "of thy strength" [Horsley].

watered garden--an Oriental picture of happiness.

fail not--Hebrew, "deceive not"; as streams that disappoint the caravan which had expected to find water, as formerly, but find it dried up (Job 6:15-17).

12. they ... of thee--thy people, the Israelites.

old waste places--the old ruins of Jerusalem (Is 61:4; Eze 36:33-36).

foundations of many generations--that is, the buildings which had lain in ruins, even to their foundations, for many ages; called in the parallel passage (Is 61:4), "the former desolations"; and in the preceding clause here, "the old waste places." The literal and spiritual restoration of Israel is meant, which shall produce like blessed results on the Gentile world (Am 9:11, 12; Ac 15:16, 17).

be called--appropriately: the name truly designating what thou shalt do.

breach--the calamity wherewith God visited Israel for their sin (Is 30:26; 1Ch 15:13).

paths to dwell in--not that the paths were to be dwelt in, but the paths leading to their dwellings were to be restored; "paths, so as to dwell in the land" [Maurer].

13. (Is 56:2; Ne 13:15-22). The Sabbath, even under the new dispensation, was to be obligatory (Is 66:23).

foot--the instrument of motion (compare Pr 4:27); men are not to travel for mere pleasure on the Sabbath (Ac 1:12). The Jews were forbidden to travel on it farther than the tabernacle or temple. If thou keep thy foot from going on thy own ways and "doing thy pleasure," &c. (Ex 20:10, 11).

my holy day--God claims it as His day; to take it for our pleasure is to rob Him of His own. This is the very way in which the Sabbath is mostly broken; it is made a day of carnal pleasure instead of spiritual "delight."

holy of the Lord--not the predicate, but the subject; "if thou call the holy (day) of Jehovah honorable"; if thou treat it as a day to be honored.

him--or else, it, the Sabbath.

not doing ... own way--answering to, "turn away thy foot from the Sabbath."

nor finding ... pleasure--answering to, "doing thy pleasure." "To keep the Sabbath in an idle manner is the sabbath of oxen and asses; to pass it in a jovial manner is the sabbath of the golden calf, when the people sat down to eat and drink, and rose again to play; to keep it in surfeiting and wantonness is the sabbath of Satan, the devil's holiday" [Bishop Andrewes].

nor speaking ... words--answering to, "call Sabbath a delight ... honorable." Man's "own words" would "call" it a "weariness"; it is the spiritual nature given from above which "calls it a delight" (Am 8:5; Mal 1:13).

14. delight ... in ... Lord--God rewards in kind, as He punishes in kind. As we "delight" in keeping God's "Sabbath," so God will give us "delight" in Himself (Ge 15:1; Job 22:21-26; Psa 37:4).

ride upon ... high places--I will make thee supreme lord of the land; the phrase is taken from a conqueror riding in his chariot, and occupying the hills and fastnesses of a country [Vitringa], (De 32:13; Mi 1:3; Ha 3:19). Judea was a land of hills; the idea thus is, "I will restore thee to thine own land" [Calvin]. The parallel words, "heritage of Jacob," confirm this (Ge 27:28, 29; 28:13-15).

mouth of ... Lord ... spoken it--a formula to assure men of the fulfilment of any solemn promise which God has made (Is 40:5).