Isaiah 29:3

3 Like David, I'll set up camp against you. I'll set siege, build towers, bring in siege engines, build siege ramps.

Isaiah 29:3 Meaning and Commentary

Isaiah 29:3

And I will camp against thee round about
Or as a "ball" or "globe" ^F15; a camp all around; the Lord is said to do that which the enemy should do, because it was by his will, and according to his order, and which he would succeed and prosper, and therefore the prophecy of it is the more terrible; and it might be concluded that it would certainly be fulfilled, as it was; see ( Luke 19:43 ) ( 21:20 ) : and will lay siege against thee with a mount:
raised up for soldiers to get up upon, and cast their arrows into the city from, and scale the walls; Kimchi and Ben Melech interpret it a wooden tower. This cannot be understood of Sennacherib's siege, for he was not suffered to raise a bank against the city, nor shoot an arrow into it, ( Isaiah 37:33 ) but well agrees with the siege of Jerusalem by the Romans, as related by Josephus {p}: and I will raise forts against thee;
from whence to batter the city; the Romans had their battering rams.

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FOOTNOTES:

F15 (rwdk) "quasi pila", Piscator; "instar globi", Gataker.
F16 Joseph. de Bello Jud. l. 5. c. 7. sect. 1. & c. 12. sect. 1, 2.

Isaiah 29:3 In-Context

1 Doom, Ariel, Ariel, the city where David set camp! Let the years add up, let the festivals run their cycles,

2 But I'm not letting up on Jerusalem. The moaning and groaning will continue. Jerusalem to me is an Ariel.

3 Like David, I'll set up camp against you. I'll set siege, build towers, bring in siege engines, build siege ramps.

4 Driven into the ground, you'll speak, you'll mumble words from the dirt - Your voice from the ground, like the muttering of a ghost. Your speech will whisper from the dust.

5 But it will be your enemies who are beaten to dust, the mob of tyrants who will be blown away like chaff. Because, surprise, as if out of nowhere,