Isaiah 43 Footnotes

43:14 Was this prophecy ever fulfilled? Since Cyrus was welcomed into Babylon without much resistance when he defeated the nation, why would the Persians need to take away defeated Babylonians as fugitives in ships? There is no record in the Bible or secular history of this taking place when Cyrus defeated Babylon, so one could: (1) take this as symbolic picture language of defeat that was applied to the future situation of Babylon; or (2) conclude that the prophet was predicting a different defeat of Babylon, not the Persian conquest of the area in 539 BC.

43:23-24 It was not literally the case that the people never brought the Lord sacrifices; Isaiah had earlier indicated that, from the Lord’s standpoint, they had brought too many (1:11-14). But a right sacrifice requires a pure heart, repentance of sin (Mal 3:3), and devotion to the Lord alone (see note on Am 5:25), or it is no sacrifice. Isaiah was saying that, because these were lacking, all God saw in their sacrifice was their sin.