Legal injustice
1 Woe to those who enact unjust laws
and issue oppressive decrees!
2 Woe to those who rob the poor of their rights
and deprive the helpless of justice!
They prey on widows and plunder the orphans.
3 What will you do on the day of punishment?
Where will you flee for help
when disaster suddenly comes?
Where will you save your wealth?
4 You can do nothing but cringe
among the captives and exiles
or fall down among the slain.
Yet for all this Yahweh’s anger does not subside,
his hand is poised to strike.
Assyria: instrument of God
5 Woe to Assyria, the rod of my anger, the staff of my fury!
6 Against a godless nation I send him,
against a people who provoke my wrath I dispatch him,
to plunder and pillage,
to tread them down like mud in the streets.
7 But the mind of his king is far from this,
his heart harbors other thoughts;
what he wants is to destroy,
to make an end of all nations.
8 For he says:
“Are not my commanders like kings?
9 Was it not the same for Calno as for Carchemish,
for Hamath as for Arpad,
and for Samaria as for Damascus?
10 Just as my hands have seized idolatrous kingdoms, whose graven images excelled those of Samaria and Jerusa lem,
11 just as I have dealt with Samaria and her idols, shall I not do to Jerusalem and her idols?”
12 When Yahweh has finished all his work on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, he will punish the king of Assyria for his willful pride and arrogant insolence. 13 For the king says;
“By my own strength I have done this
and by my own wisdom, for I am clever.
I have moved the frontiers of peoples,
I have plundered treasures,
I have brought inhabitants down to the dust,
I have toppled kings from their thrones.
14 As one reaches into a nest,
so my hands have reached into na tions’ wealth.
As one gathers deserted eggs,
so have I gathered the riches of the earth.
No one flapped a wing
or opened its mouth to chirp a pro test.”
15 Does the axe claim more credit
than the man who wields it?
Does the saw magnify itself
more than the one who uses it?
This would be like a rod wielding the man who lifts it up;
will those not made of wood, be controlled by the cudgel?
16 Therefore the Lord, Yahweh Saba oth,
is ready to send a wasting sickness
upon the king’s sturdy warriors.
Beneath his plenty, a flame will burn
like a consuming fire.
17 The Light of Israel will be a fire
and his Holy One a flame –
to burn and devour his thorns and briers
all in a single day.
18 The splendor of his forest and fruitful land
comes undone and raves,
body and soul disappears and passes away.
19 The remnant of the trees in his forest
will be so few, so easy to count,
that a child could make a list of them.
A remnant will return
20 On that day, the remnant of Israel and the survivors of the people of Jacob will no longer rely upon the tyrant who struck them down, but instead will truly rely upon the Holy One of Israel. 21 A remnant will return – a remnant of Jacob – to the mighty God.
22 Yes, Israel! Though your people be as the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them will return; their end has been ordered, justice shall be fully done. 23 The Lord will make a full end, as decreed by Him, all over the land.
24 Thus says the Lord, Yahweh Sa baoth,
“O my people, who dwell in Zion, do not be afraid of the Assyrians who strike you with the rod and lift up their staff against you as did the Egyptians. 25 In a little while my anger against you will be over and will be directed to their destruction.
26 Yahweh Sabaoth will lash at them with a scourge, as he did with the Midia nites at the rock of Oreb, as he did in Egypt when he raised his rod over the sea.
27 On that day, their burden will be lifted off your shoulders, their yoke lift ed off your neck. The yoke will be destroyed.
28 They have gone up from Rimmon
and have come to Aiath;
they have passed through Migron
and stored supplies at Michmash.
29 They have crossed over the pass
and now camp at Geba for the night.
Ramah is in terror;
Gibeah of Saul has fled.
30 Lift up your voice, O daughter of Gallim,
let it be heard at Laishah
and answered at Anathoth.
31 Madmenah is in flight;
the people of Gebim flee for their lives.
32 This day the invaders will halt at Nob;
they will shake their fists
at the mount of the Daughter of Zion,
at the hill of Jerusalem.
33 Suddenly, the Lord, Yahweh Saba oth
lops off the boughs with terrifying violence.
The tall trees are hewn down,
the lofty ones are brought low.
34 With an axe he cuts down the thickets;
and Lebanon, the majestic, falls.
- Proverbs 22,22
- Exodus 22,22
- Deuteronomy 24,17
- Job 31,14
- Zephaniah 1,18
- Isaiah 10,27
- Isaiah 14,24
- Isaiah 30,27
- Jeremiah 51,20
- Micah 4,12
- Isaiah 37,12
- Isaiah 31,9
- Isaiah 1,9
- Isaiah 4,2
- Isaiah 6,13
- Letter to the Romans 9,27
- Isaiah 28,22
- Isaiah 37,6
- Exodus 5,14
- 1 Samuel 21,2
This poem addresses the Assyrians when they were still a threat, perhaps in the campaign of 701 (see the commentary on chapter 31).
In 8:3 we already mentioned Isaiah's son whom he called "Quick to plunder-Booty is Close." Here, his other son's name, mentioned in 7:3, A-remnant-will-return, is explained. Several times in the Bible we find Remnant which refers to the Remnant of Israel, namely, the small group who will remain after God punishes Israel for their infidelity (see Am 5:15).
From the time God spoke to Elijah of the "seven thousand Israelites" (1 K 19:18), the prophets are constantly repeating that the sins of Israel will not cancel God's plans. A remnant will remain when Israel is destroyed, and they will return. This has a double meaning:
- they will return from the countries where they were deported;
- they will return to their God interiorly: they will be converted to the Lord in their hearts.
