Isaiah 3:5

5 The people will be oppressed, everyone by another and everyone by a neighbor; the youth will be insolent to the elder, and the base to the honorable.

Isaiah 3:5 Meaning and Commentary

Isaiah 3:5

And the people shall be oppressed, everyone by another,
and everyone by his neighbour
There being no governors, or such as were unfit for government, no decorum was kept and observed, but a mere anarchy; and so everyone did as he pleased, as when there was no king in Israel; and everyone rushed into the house of his neighbour, and plundered his goods; this was the case of Jerusalem, at the time of the siege, it abounding with robbers and spoilers: the child shall behave himself proudly against the ancient;
show no respect to them, nor honour them, as the law requires in ( Leviticus 19:32 ) but behave insolently towards them; and so the Jews say ^F4, that when the son of David is come, as he now would be, young men shall make ashamed the faces of old men, and old men shall stand before young men: and the base against the honourable;
persons of a mean birth and extract would rise up against and insult such as were men of families and fortune, of noble birth and of high degree.

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FOOTNOTES:

F4 T. Bab. Sanhedrin, fol. 97. 1.

Isaiah 3:5 In-Context

3 captain of fifty and dignitary, counselor and skillful magician and expert enchanter.

4 And I will make boys their princes, and babes shall rule over them.

5 The people will be oppressed, everyone by another and everyone by a neighbor; the youth will be insolent to the elder, and the base to the honorable.

6 Someone will even seize a relative, a member of the clan, saying, "You have a cloak; you shall be our leader, and this heap of ruins shall be under your rule."

7 But the other will cry out on that day, saying, "I will not be a healer; in my house there is neither bread nor cloak; you shall not make me leader of the people."