College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
Isaiah 34:1-7
D. FOES WILL FALL, CHAPTER 34
1. SLAUGHTER
TEXT: Isaiah 34:1-7
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Come near, ye nations, to hear; and hearken, ye peoples: let the earth hear, and the fulness thereof; the world, and all things that come forth from it.
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For Jehovah hath indignation against all the nations, and wrath against all their host: he hath utterly destroyed them, he hath delivered them to the slaughter.
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Their slain also shall be cast out, and the stench of their dead bodies shall come up; and the mountains shall be melted with their blood.
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And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll; and all their host shall fade away, as the leaf fadeth from off the vine, and as a fading leaf from the fig-tree.
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For my sword hath drunk its fill in heaven: behold, it shall come down upon Edom, and upon the people of my curse, to judgment.
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The sword of Jehovah is filled with blood, it is made fat with fatness, with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams; for Jehovah hath a sacrifice in Bozrah, and a great slaughter in the land of Edom.
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And the wild-oxen shall come down with them, and the bullocks with the bulls; and their land shall be drunken with blood, and their dust made fat with fatness.
QUERIES
a.
Who are the nations Jehovah will slaughter?
b.
How are the heavens to be rolled up?
c.
When did Jehovah's sword drink its fill in heaven?
PARAPHRASE
Come close and listen to me, all you nations of the world. All of creation had better pay attention to what I have to say! For the Lord of Creation is filled with wrath against the whole world because it has schemed to usurp His sovereignty by human governments. Because human empires are in rebellion against God's rule of man. God has marked them for utter destruction. Their destruction will not only be total, it will be humiliating and horrifying. It will be as when a city is conquered and its slain are cast out into the streets and left unburied and the stench of rotting flesh permeates everything. The destruction of the world empires will be so complete it could furnish enough blood to wash away the mountains. When God finishes His destruction of all that oppose Him, even the material world will be dissolved. The planets of the heavens will be dissolved, the skies will be taken away just like the scroll is rolled up and put away, and the stars will go out of existence like leaves dying and dropping from a fig-tree. My sword of wrath in heaven is filled to staggering. It is going to stagger forth upon Edom, one of those kingdoms opposing My sovereignty, as an example of the inevitable judgment that is to come upon all kingdoms opposing Me. This sword of the Lord is about to be saturated with blood and gorged with flesh like the sword used to slay lambs and goats. It is Edom that will come under Jehovah's bloody, sacrificial sword. The small and the great, weak and powerful, rich and poor alike are going to be slaughtered in Edom. The land will stagger and reel with blood like a drunken man reels from wine. Their whole land will be saturated with dead bodies.
COMMENTS
Isaiah 34:1-4 JUDGMENT ENVISIONED: Once again Isaiah is bringing a section of his written prophecy to a climactic conclusion. He has done so before in Chapter s 6, 12, and 23. These two Chapter s (34 and 35) are the climactic conclusion to the section warning Judah not to seek help from Egypt (28-35). Chapter s 34 and 35 summarize the reasons Judah should not seek help from pagan, worldly, God-opposing governments: (1) because God has decreed their doom; (2) because God has a glorious future planned for Zion.
What God is going to do will involve the whole cosmos (creation) so (Isaiah 34:1-2) He calls, through the prophet, the whole creation to attention. What God is going to do involves not only the earth but heaven. He is going to defeat all the principalities, powers, world rulers of this present darkness, the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. and disarm them, and make a public example of them, triumphing over them in Christ Jesus (Ephesians 6:12; Colossians 2:15). God is not going to utterly slaughter all the power that opposes Him in Isaiah's day. Furthermore, the total physical destruction of the world is probably not even intended here. The defeat of the spiritual power that opposes God and enslaves men is much more imperative and cosmically significant than the physical destruction. In other words, the victory Christ accomplished over the world, the flesh and the devil, on the cross and at the resurrection was the great slaughter probably referred to here. Of course, God destroyed His enemies, the great world empires that were possessed by the devil to attempt to thwart God's redemptive program in the earth. He destroyed them one by one. And, God will ultimately destroy all physical kingdoms with the destruction of the universe, and He will create a new heaven and a new earth (2 Peter 3:8-13). But all that would be of little consequence without the once-and-for-all defeat of Satan and his hosts at the cross. It was at the cross (and the empty tomb) that God brought to nothing things that are, destroyed the wisdom of the wise, (1 Corinthians 1:18-31), cast out the ruler of this world and destroyed his power (John 12:31; John 16:11; Hebrews 2:14-15; 1 John 3:8). Now this work, culminated in the cross and resurrection, began as God took the people of Isaiah's day and destroyed their pagan enemies, one by one, and delivered a faithful remnant through which God brought the Messiah into the world in order to deliver them from their enemies (cf. Luke 1:67-79). Isaiah is predicting the same great overthrow of the world-opposition as Joel predicts (Joel 2:28 to Joel 3:21; see our comments, Minor Prophets, College Press). It is the same overthrow of world-opposition Isaiah predicted earlier (Isaiah 13-23; see our comments, Isaiah, Vol 1, College Press). It is the same overthrow of world-opposition Ezekiel predicts (Ezekiel 38-39) and Daniel predicts (Daniel 2-11) and Zechariah predicts (Zechariah 9-14). It was accomplished in the cross and resurrection when Christ took captivity captive and will be consummated at His second coming.
The Jewish prophets portrayed the end of the Jewish dispensation and the beginning of the new era (the Messianic age) as a Day of Jehovah, a great judgment and redemption. The Messianic age was portrayed in eschatological, cataclysmic, cosmic figures of speech. It is even referred to in the New Testament in somewhat the same way: (Just to list a few)
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Matthew 23:37 to Matthew 24:35
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Much modern-day interpretation of O.T. prophecy alleges the main function of the prophets was to predict the so-called rapture, tribulation, millennium, and the Second Coming of Christ. It seems totally incongruous to us that the prophets would devote as much detail as is alleged to the end of the so-called church age. Their main predictive function, as the New Testament plainly points out, was to proclaim the First advent of Christ and the establishment of the kingdom of God upon the earth, the church (cf. 1 Peter 1:10-12; 2 Peter 1:12-21; Luke 24:25-27; Luke 24:44-49, etc.).
If modern readers of the Bible could project themselves back into the days of the prophets or the apostles, or if they could assimilate the Jewishness of those Jews, they might easily understand how eschatological, cataclysmic and cosmic it would seem to talk of the abrogation and abolition of a religious system (Judaism) with 1400 years of heritage. It was their whole existence, politically, socially, religiously. To predict a New Era which would completely replace the Old would seem like a prediction of the end of the world-order. And the prophets were called upon to portray the New Era in just those figures.
Of course, there is always the typical element in every Day of the Lord, which points to God's ultimate Day, the literal, actual consummation of judgment and redemption. And that is probably the case with our text here in Isaiah. Even God's awful judgment of sin in the crucifixion of Christ and God's glorious act of redemption in Christ's resurrection is, in addition to being His literal, historical work of salvation, a prophecy, promise and type of the final, consummating work at Christ's Second Coming.
Isaiah 34:5-7 JUDGMENT EXEMPLIFIED: Edom is now cited as a representative of the God-opposing human governments. Edom was one of the first human governments to oppose God's redemptive work in placing His covenant people in the land of Canaan. The covenant people were later opposed by Ammon, Moab, Syria, Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Greece and Rome. All these, and others, were, in their own times, condemned by the prophets and judged by God. Even the sinful covenant peoples (Israel and Judah) were condemned and judged because they chose carnal, human systems of government rather than government by the rule of God's word. Probably the most graphic symbolism of God's defeat of the attempt by human government to overthrow the rule of God in men's hearts (the establishment of God's kingdom among men) is the symbolism in the book of Danielin the great image (ch. 2) and the four beasts (ch. 7).
The sword of the Lord in heaven is filled with blood. In other words, the wrath of God has been accumulating (cf. Revelation 15:7), and it is symbolized by a sword poised to vent its full fury on God's enemy. God is longsuffering but He will not be opposed forever. The judgment of God is portrayed as a great sacrifice. This is a figure used elsewhere in the Old Testament (Zephaniah 1:7-18; Jeremiah 46:10; Jeremiah 50:27). Sacrifice was worship of the Lord. Slaughtering of animals was never very pretty to behold. In fact, it is always rather revolting. But in spite of the revolting and almost sickening splashing of blood and burning of flesh, God was glorified. The punishing of sin in the innocent and perfect Jesus is an idea both revolting and repulsive to the human egonevertheless God is exalted in it. So, God will be glorified in the slaughter that is necessitated at the judgment of human, God-opposing governments. Edward J, Young considers the lambs and goats of Isaiah 34:6 to be figurative of the general citizenry of Edom and the wild-oxen and bulls of Isaiah 34:7 to symbolize the leaders of the nation. Whatever the case the point being made is the awfulness and completeness of judgment upon those who have so persistently opposed God's redemptive work in the world by opposing His people. This should be a graphic warning to all governments in any age opposing God's people in any way.
QUIZ
1.
Why do Chapter s 34 and 35 seem to form a climax in Isaiah's book?
2.
Cite N.T. passages to show that God defeated His opposition at the cross.
3.
Why do we think Isaiah is predicting the cross and empty tomb accomplishment?
4.
What other O.T. prophets predicted God's defeat of His opposition at the cross and establishment of the church?
5.
Why would the Jewish prophets speak of God's victory as if it were the end of the present world-order?
6.
What N.T. passages confirm this?
7.
Why is it most probable that the O.T. prophets spoke mainly of Christ's first coming?
8.
What part does Edom play in this drama?