Isaiah 26:18

18 We became pregnant, we writhed; we gave birth [to] wind. We cannot bring about deliverance [on the] earth, and no inhabitants of [the] world are born.

Isaiah 26:18 Meaning and Commentary

Isaiah 26:18

We have been with child
Like women with child; we have been full of hopes and expectations of great things, of deliverance from our enemies, and of the kingdom of Christ being at hand: we have been in pain;
in great distress and anxiety, and in fervent and frequent prayer, travailing in birth, which we looked upon as forerunners of a happy issue of things: we have as it were brought forth wind;
all our hopes have proved abortive, and we have been disappointed in our expectations: we have not wrought any deliverance in the earth:
or, "salvations" have "not been wrought in the earth" ^F6; this explains what is meant by bringing forth wind; salvation and deliverance out of the hand of the enemy not being wrought, as was expected: neither have the inhabitants of the world fallen;
worldly men, the great men, the kings of the earth; particularly such as commit fornication with the whore of Rome, Popish persecuting princes; these as yet are not fallen, though they shall in the battle of Armageddon.

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FOOTNOTES:

F6 (Ura hven lb twewvy) "res salutum non est facta", Vatablus; "salates non fit terra", Montanus; "salutes non factae sunt terrae", Tigurine version; "non sunt factae in terra", Pagninus.

Isaiah 26:18 In-Context

16 Yahweh, in distress they have visited you; they poured out an {incantation}; your discipline [was] on them.

17 Like [a] pregnant woman on the point of giving birth, she writhes; she cries in her labor pains. So we were because of your presence, Yahweh.

18 We became pregnant, we writhed; we gave birth [to] wind. We cannot bring about deliverance [on the] earth, and no inhabitants of [the] world are born.

19 Your dead shall live; {their corpses} shall rise. Wake up and sing for joy, dwellers of [the] dust, for your dew [is] {celestial dew}, and the earth will give birth to dead spirits.

20 Go, my people, enter into your chambers and shut your doors behind you; hide for {a very little} while, until [the] wrath has passed over.