Isaiah 23:8-10

Who hath taken this counsel, &c.— The prophet here informs us of the great executor of this judgment, namely, God himself. To do this the more elegantly, he introduces a chorus of men, astonished at this unexpected fate of so glorious a city, and inquiring into the author and causes of it; to which the prophet replies, not only declaring the efficient, but also the final cause of this great and strange event: subjoining afterwards, Isaiah 23:10 an apostrophe to the Tyrians themselves, expressive of the greatness of their calamity. The reader will observe a fine gradation both in the question and the answer. This counsel is taken not only against Tyre, a fortified city, founded on a rock, and defended by the sea, but against Tyre the crowning city, the city which as it were wore a crown among the rest; the royal Tyre, as an ancient writer calls it; excelling in power and glory: whose merchants were princes. Tyre was the most celebrated place in the world for its trade and navigation; the seat of commerce, and the centre of riches; and therefore it is called the mart of nations; Isaiah 23:6. Ezekiel, commenting upon these words, (chap. 27.) recounts the various nations whose commodities were brought to Tyre, and bought and sold by the Tyrians. It was in this wealthy and flourishing condition when the prophets foretold its destruction; particularly Isaiah, even 125 years at least before it was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar. The prophet in his reply shews that the counsel was taken by one well equal to the task; the Lord of Hosts: and the reasons which moved him to this counsel, he tells us, were, the pride of this people, and their consequent vices: so Ezekiel censures the pride of the king of Tyre, in arrogating to himself divine honours. He then adds an apostrophe to Tyre; Pass, O Tyre, through thy land; that is to say, as well through Tyre itself as the country subject to it, heretofore excellently fortified, and every way properly defended: and now, behold the same nation, without a girdle; i.e. every where loosed, dissolved, and broken; and pass it like a river, plain, and level with the ground, without fortifications, or any mode of defence: for, as a river flowing gently along, as a plain superficies, in which there is nothing to stop your course, if you pass over it in a boat; so your land, plundered and laid desolate by the enemy, its fortifications levelled with the ground, will supply you with a plain and even superficies, that you may pass over it like a river, without any opposition; for there is no girdle, no strength or fortress, remaining. The prophet here elegantly calls Tyre the daughter of Tarshish or Tartessus, because, though heretofore the people thereof were indebted to Tyre, yet upon the destruction of this city, Tartessus, Gades, or Carthage, should be looked upon as the metropolis of the Tyrian nation. Tartessus should henceforth be considered as another Tyre. All the honourable of the earth, at the end of the 9th verse, would more properly be rendered, All the honourable of the land. See Vitringa; who reads the 10th verse, Pass over thy land as over a river, O daughter of Tarshish: there is no binding any more.