Isaiah 22:4

4 For this cause I have said, Let your eyes be turned away from me in my bitter weeping; I will not be comforted for the wasting of the daughter of my people.

Isaiah 22:4 Meaning and Commentary

Isaiah 22:4

Therefore said I
Not God to the ministering angels, as Jarchi; but the prophet to those that were about him, his relations, friends, and acquaintance: look away from me;
turn away from me, look another way; cease from me, let me alone; leave me to myself, that I may weep in secret, take my fill of sorrow, and give full vent to it: I will weep bitterly;
or, "I will be bitter", or, "bitter myself in weeping" ^F14; it denotes the vehemence of his grief, the greatness of his sorrow, and the strength of his passion: labour not to comfort me;
make use of no arguments to persuade me to lay aside my mourning; do not be urgent and importunate with me to receive consolation, for my soul refuses to be comforted: because of the spoiling of the daughter of my people;
his countrymen, which were as dear to him as a daughter to a tender parent, now spoiled, plundered, and made desolate by the ravages of the enemy, in many cities of Judea.

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FOOTNOTES:

F14 (ykbb rrma) "amarificabo me in fletu", Montanus; "amaritudine afficiam me in isto fletu", Junius & Tremellius.

Isaiah 22:4 In-Context

2 You, who are full of loud voices, a town of outcries, given up to joy; your dead men have not been put to the sword, or come to their death in war.

3 All your rulers ... have gone in flight; all your strong ones have gone far away.

4 For this cause I have said, Let your eyes be turned away from me in my bitter weeping; I will not be comforted for the wasting of the daughter of my people.

5 For it is a day of trouble and of crushing down and of destruction from the Lord, the Lord of armies, in the valley of vision; ...

6 And Elam was armed with arrows, and Aram came on horseback; and the breastplate of Kir was uncovered.