Isaiah 17:8-14

8 They will not trust the altars they have made, nor will they trust what their hands have made, not even the Asherah idols and altars.

9 In that day all their strong cities will be empty. They will be like the cities the Hivites and the Amorites left when the Israelites came to take the land. Everything will be ruined.

10 You have forgotten the God who saves you; you have not remembered that God is your place of safety. You plant the finest grapevines and grapevines from faraway places.

11 You plant your grapevines one day and try to make them grow, and the next day you make them blossom. But at harvest time everything will be dead; a sickness will kill all the plants.

12 Listen to the many people! Their crying is like the noise from the sea. Listen to the nations! Their crying is like the crashing of great waves.

13 The people roar like the waves, but when God speaks harshly to them, they will run away. They will be like chaff on the hills being blown by the wind, or like tumbleweeds blown away by a storm.

14 At night the people will be very frightened. Before morning, no one will be left. So our enemies will come to our land, but they will become nothing.

Isaiah 17:8-14 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO ISAIAH 17

This chapter contains a prophecy of the ruin of Syria and Israel, the ten tribes; who were in alliance; and also of the overthrow of the Assyrian army, that should come against Judah. The destruction of Damascus, the metropolis of Syria, and of other cities, is threatened, Isa 17:1,2 yea, of the whole kingdom of Syria, together with Ephraim or the ten tribes, and Samaria the head of them, Isa 17:3 whose destruction is expressed by various similes, as by thinness and leanness, and by the reaping and gathering of corn, Isa 17:4,5 and yet a remnant should be preserved, compared to gleaning gapes, and a few berries on an olive tree, who should look to the Lord, and not to idols, Isa 17:6-8 and the reason of the desolation of their cities, and of their fields and vineyards, was their forgetfulness of the Lord, Isa 17:9-11 and the chapter is closed with a prophecy of the defeat of the Assyrian army, who are compared for their multitude and noise to the seas, and to mighty waters, and the noise and rushing of them, Isa 17:12 and yet should be, at the rebuke of God, as chaff, or any small light thing, before a blustering wind, Isa 17:13 and who, in the evening, would be a trouble to the Jews, and be dead before morning; which was to be the portion of the spoilers and plunderers of the Lord's people, Isa 17:14.