Isaiah 20 Footnotes

20:2-4 Around 711 BC the Assyrians captured Ashdod, the Philistine city that depended on Egypt for help. Isaiah’s symbolic act of nakedness was a warning to the people of Judah not to trust Egypt, as the people of Ashdod had done, because before long Egyptians also would be taken away naked as prisoners to Nineveh. The term “stripped” can mean one has no clothes on at all (Gn 2:25; 3:7; Jb 1:21), but can also be used in situations where one is almost, but not totally, naked (Jb 22:6; 24:7; Is 58:7). This instruction did not require Isaiah to be “stripped” the entire day, but at various times during those three years his dramatic presence would communicate a vivid warning that was more powerful than a verbal message. The text does not reveal what Isaiah said to people as he went about naked.