Isaiah 17:6-14

6 Only a few people will survive. They will be like an olive tree that has been beaten. Only two or three olives are left at the top of the highest branch, four or five olives on the rest of the branches," declares the LORD God of Israel.

7 When that day comes, they will look to their maker, and their eyes will look to the Holy One of Israel.

8 They won't look to the altars made by their hands or to the Asherah poles or incense altars which their fingers molded.

9 When that day comes, the fortified cities which other people abandoned because of the Israelites will be like abandoned woods and undergrowth. So it will become a wasteland.

10 You have forgotten the God of your salvation. You haven't remembered the rock, your stronghold. Instead, you have planted the best plants and have set out the imported grapevines.

11 On the day you plant, you will make it grow. On the morning you set out the seedling, you will make it sprout. But the harvest will become a [rotting] pile on a day of grief and incurable pain.

12 How horrible it will be for many people! They will roar like the roaring sea. The noise that the people make will be like the noise from rushing water.

13 The people will make noise like raging water. But the LORD will yell at them, and they will run far away. They will be chased away like husks on the mountains being blown by the wind, like whirling dust being blown by a storm.

14 In the evening there will be sudden terror. Before morning they will be gone. This will be the fate of those who looted us, the destiny of those who robbed us.

Isaiah 17:6-14 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO ISAIAH 17

This chapter contains a prophecy of the ruin of Syria and Israel, the ten tribes; who were in alliance; and also of the overthrow of the Assyrian army, that should come against Judah. The destruction of Damascus, the metropolis of Syria, and of other cities, is threatened, Isa 17:1,2 yea, of the whole kingdom of Syria, together with Ephraim or the ten tribes, and Samaria the head of them, Isa 17:3 whose destruction is expressed by various similes, as by thinness and leanness, and by the reaping and gathering of corn, Isa 17:4,5 and yet a remnant should be preserved, compared to gleaning gapes, and a few berries on an olive tree, who should look to the Lord, and not to idols, Isa 17:6-8 and the reason of the desolation of their cities, and of their fields and vineyards, was their forgetfulness of the Lord, Isa 17:9-11 and the chapter is closed with a prophecy of the defeat of the Assyrian army, who are compared for their multitude and noise to the seas, and to mighty waters, and the noise and rushing of them, Isa 17:12 and yet should be, at the rebuke of God, as chaff, or any small light thing, before a blustering wind, Isa 17:13 and who, in the evening, would be a trouble to the Jews, and be dead before morning; which was to be the portion of the spoilers and plunderers of the Lord's people, Isa 17:14.