Isaiah 21:3-5

Therefore are my loins filled with pain, &c.— We have here a symbolical description of the greatness of the Babylonish calamity; the prophet exhibiting in himself, as in a figure, an emblem of the extreme distress, consternation, and horror, which should ensue upon this occasion. See ch. Isaiah 15:5 Isaiah 16:8. Luke 21:26. The expression, The night of my pleasure, alludes to the remarkable circumstance of Babylon's being taken in the night of an annual festival, which is more fully set forth in the fifth verse. Vitringa renders it very properly, The table is spread: the watchman stands upon the watch; they eat; they drink: Arise now, ye princes, &c. where, as in a picture, the revelling of the Babylonians is described, when the divine command is given to the Medes and Persians to seize this proper moment; Arise, ye princes; anoint the shield, which is to the same purpose with what Jeremiah says, Jeremiah 51:11; Jeremiah 51:28, &c. To anoint the shield is, in this place, by synecdoche, Prepare your arms; and so the Chaldee paraphrast, wipe, and make bright your arms. It is remarkable, that Cyrus, when all things were prepared to invade Babylon, uses words very similar to these of the prophet, "But come, arise; prepare your arms; I will lead you on by the help of the gods." See Herod. lib. 1: cap. 191 and Xenoph. Cyropoed lib. 7. Nothing can be more remarkable than the completion of this prophesy.