Isaiah 19:12

12 Where then are your wise men? and let them tell you now; and let them know what Yahweh of Hosts has purposed concerning Egypt.

Isaiah 19:12 Meaning and Commentary

Isaiah 19:12

Where [are] they? where [are] thy wise [men]?
&c.] The magicians and soothsayers, the diviners and astrologers, who pretended, by their magic art and skill in judicial astrology, to foretell things to come: this is an address to the king of Egypt, who had such persons about him, and encouraged them, by consulting them on occasion, and rewarding them:

and let them tell thee now, and let them know what the Lord of
hosts hath purposed upon Egypt;
or, "against it"; let them tell, if they can, and make known unto thee the purposes of God's heart, the things he has resolved upon, even the calamities and punishments he will shortly inflict upon the Egyptians, of which he has given notice by his prophets.

Isaiah 19:12 In-Context

10 The pillars [of Egypt] shall be broken in pieces; all those who work for hire [shall be] grieved in soul.

11 The princes of Zoan are utterly foolish; the counsel of the wisest counselors of Pharaoh is become brutish: how do you say to Pharaoh, I am the son of the wise, the son of ancient kings?

12 Where then are your wise men? and let them tell you now; and let them know what Yahweh of Hosts has purposed concerning Egypt.

13 The princes of Zoan are become fools, the princes of Memphis are deceived; they have caused Egypt to go astray, who are the corner-stone of her tribes.

14 Yahweh has mixed a spirit of perverseness in the midst of her; and they have caused Egypt to go astray in every work of it, as a drunken man staggers in his vomit.