Isaiah 29:1-8

3. SUCCESS

TEXT: Isaiah 29:1-8

1

Ho Ariel, Ariel, the city where David encamped! add ye year to year; let the feasts come round:

2

then will I distress Ariel, and there shall be mourning and lamentation; and she shall be unto me as Ariel.

3

And I will encamp against thee round about, and will lay siege against thee with posted troops, and I will raise siege works against thee.

4

And thou shalt be brought down, and shalt speak out of the ground, and thy speech shall be low out of the dust; and thy voice shall be as of one that hath a familiar spirit, out of the ground, and thy speech shall whisper out of the dust.

5

But the multitude of thy foes shall be like small dust, and the multitude of the terrible ones as chaff that passeth away: yea, it shall be in an instant suddenly.

6

She shall be visited of Jehovah of hosts with thunder, and with earthquake, and great noise, with whirlwind and tempest, and the flame of a devouring fire.

7

And the multitude of all the nations that fight against Ariel, even all that fight against her and her stronghold, and that distress her, shall be as a dream, a vision of the night.

8

And it shall be as when a hungry man dreameth, and, behold he eateth; but he awaketh, and his soul is empty: or as when a thirsty man dreameth, and, behold, he drinketh; but he awaketh, and behold, he is faint, and his soul hath appetite: so shall the multitude of all the nations be, that fight against mount Zion.

QUERIES

a.

What is Ariel?

b.

What is the voice as of one that hath a familiar spirit?

c.

What is the meaning of the use of dreaming as an illustration?

PARAPHRASE

Woe to you altar-city, altar-city, Jerusalem, David's city. Let year follow year and the ceaseless round of feasts and sacrifices continue! But I will bring tribulation upon you, altar-city, and there shall be groaning and grief, and you will indeed become to me an altar of sacrifice! The enemy camp that surrounds you will be My camp; the entrenched troops surrounding you will be My troops; the siegeworks built up around you will be My siegeworks. And you shall be humiliated so that you will no longer boast loudly but you will speak humbly and lowyour voice will be but a whisper like the low moaning of a ghost, barely audible. But then suddenly, the multitudes of enemy troops will vanish from their siege against you like dust and chaff when it is blown away in the wind. I, Jehovah of hosts, will come upon them with terrible judgment and power and but multitudes of enemy troops that come upon her will fall short of completing total destruction of Ariel just like when a hungry or thirsty man goes to bed and dreams he is eating and drinking but awakens in the middle of his dream and finds himself only dreaming and still hungry and thirsty. Even so, the appetite of Zion's enemies to devour her will not be satisfied.

COMMENTS

Isaiah 29:1-4 TROUBLE TO ARIEL: Ariel in Hebrew is usually translated the lion of God. Sometimes it is translated the hearth of God. However, in Ezekiel 45:13 ff the same word with the definite article added (hariel) is translated altar. The context of Isaiah 29:1-2 form the basis for our paraphrase of the word as altar-city for it appears Jehovah is speaking irony or sarcasm to Jerusalem. Jerusalem took pride in the multitude of her altars and sacrifices and religiosity (cf. Isaiah 1:10-20). Jerusalem trusted in her own self-righteousness and religiousness rather than in God. She, like Samaria, thought she could solve her own difficulties with her pagan neighbors through deceit, bribery and compromise. So Jehovah, speaking through His prophet Isaiah, warns Jerusalem that He, even the Lord God of Hosts, is going to bring trouble and distress upon Jerusalem. And the city which took such pride in her altars and sacrifices would (Isaiah 29:2) itself become an altar of sacrifice to be used as such by God. All the troops which come to encamp and raise siege works against Jerusalem (the Assyrians in Hezekiah's day, cf. Isa. ch. 36-39) will be, in a very definite sense, God's army. God uses pagan armies to carry out His will (cf. Isaiah 10:5 ff; Jeremiah 27:1 ff; Dan. ch. 7-8, etc.). And Jerusalem, proud, arrogant, haughty and self-righteous, will be humiliated. This undoubtedly has reference to the humiliating experience of Hezekiah and all of Jerusalem when the city was besieged by the Assyrians. In Isaiah 29:4 the Hebrew word keaov (with familiar spirit) describes the weakened, humiliated and inarticulate condition Jerusalem will find herself in when God finishes bringing trouble upon her. She will be so weak that what she says will come as spoken by one prostrate upon the ground and as indistinct, unnatural, inaudible and inarticulate as that coming from a necromancer or medium in a trance. The point is the extreme weakness and powerlessness that is to come upon Jerusalem at the hand of Jehovah.

Isaiah 29:5-8 TRIUMPH OF ZION: But in the city of Jerusalem there are a few, a remnant, who have not trusted in self-righteousness. There is a remnant trusting in Jehovahdisciples of Isaiah who have held fast to the teaching and to the testimony (cf. Isaiah 8:16-22), and God will save Jerusalem from the Assyrians on their account. The instantaneous suddenness with which God will dispose of Jerusalem's enemies is the miraculous event recorded in 2 Chronicles 32, 2 Chronicles 32 and Isaiah 37:36-38. The Lord sent His angel to slay 185,000 Assyrian soldiers in one night and the king of Assyria returned with shame of face to his own land, and some of his own sons struck him down with the sword there. Isaiah 29:6 uses highly figurative language to describe the terror and the swiftness of God's destruction of the Assyrian siege. It may be that God used a literal earthquake, whirlwind, tempest and flaming fire to devour the Assyrians. We are not told specifically how His angel accomplished the destruction. It is interesting to note the figure Isaiah uses to describe the frustrated plans of the Assyrians to devour Jerusalem. Nearly everyone has had the experience of dreaming and awakening with the dream only half completed. In fact, most dreams conclude only partially visualized. Some persons even anticipate in their dream the fact that their dream is going to end incomplete! That is the very nature of dreams. So, the Assyrian attempt to consume Jerusalem is going to come to an end just like a dream. incomplete! frustrated! Evil and ungodly men have dreamed for centuries of usurping God's rule of the universe. They have dreamed grandiose dreams of eradicating God's covenant people, the church, Zion, from among mankind, but their dreams have always ended sooner or later uncompleted, frustrated and shamed. So shall all be that fight against Zion! God says it is so! History demonstrated it to be so!

QUIZ

1.

Why is Ariel most likely to be translated altar?

2.

How would Jehovah encamp against Jerusalem?

3.

What is the point of likening Jerusalem's voice to that of a medium?

4.

How do we know God's judgment upon Jerusalem's enemies was sudden?

5.

How did God deliver Jerusalem from her enemies?

6.

What does dreaming have to do with the downfall of Jerusalem's enemies?