Isaiah 43 Study Notes

43:13 Here the Lord announces the verdict, which is his sole sovereignty. God is fully capable of delivering his people.

43:14 God will turn the Babylonians into fugitives, suggesting that their cities will be defeated and they will wander from place to place. Chaldeans were an Aramaic-speaking tribe of Babylon that rose up in the seventh century BC to lead the charge against Assyria, thus establishing the Neo-Babylonian Empire. The Chaldean tribe’s home base was at the point where the Tigris and Euphrates rivers emptied into what is today called the Persian Gulf. Thus shipping was very important to them.

43:15 The purpose of this verse is to assure God’s people of the certainty and reliability of his prophecy.

43:16-17 God called on his people to remember their great deliverance from the Egyptians at the Red Sea (Ex 14).

43:18-19 The exodus poetically described in vv. 16-17 is described as past events, the things of old. But God turns the hearers’ attention to something new, a new exodus. This time God will create not “a way in the sea” (v. 16), but a way in the wilderness. This future deliverance is pictured as a reversal of nature, with rivers in the desert.

43:20-21 Because of the new provision of water in the wilderness, the animals that live there will be pleased. In the same way, God’s people who have been oppressed by the Babylonians will find new freedom.

43:22-24 Whether Israel literally stopped offering sacrifices or whether they simply offered them hypocritically is not important; proper sacrifices were not being offered. The passage revolves around the word weary. The people were weary of God, so they did not offer requisite sacrifice. But it was not God’s fault—the purpose of the sacrificial laws was not to weary them but to free them from their sins. Since the people refused to see this, God was instead wearied by the sins of his people.

43:25 The people sinned, but God forgave. The idea of removal of sin is communicated by the action of sweeping as well as the mental act of forgetting. To remember something is to act on it, and to forget is to hold back from acting.

43:26-28 Once again a court setting is introduced. God challenged his people to argue their case against him. The reference to Israel’s first father is likely Jacob, whose name was changed to Israel. Jacob was well known for his foolish and sinful ways (Hs 12:1-6).