Isaiah 1:7

7 Your country is desolate, your cities are burned with fire; your land, strangers devour it in your presence, and it is desolate, as overthrown by strangers.

Isaiah 1:7 Meaning and Commentary

Isaiah 1:7

Your country [is] desolate
Or "shall be"; this is either a declaration in proper terms of what is before figuratively expressed, or rather a prophecy of what would be their case on account of transgressions; and which had its accomplishment partly in the Babylonish captivity, and fully in the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans; when not only their city and temple, called their house, ( Matthew 23:38 ) , were left unto them desolate, but the whole land; and they were carried captive, and scattered among the nations, where they have been ever since: your cities [are,
or shall be, burned with fire;
as, Jerusalem has been, and other cities in Judea, ( Matthew 22:7 ) your land, strangers devour it in your presence;
before their eyes, and it would not be in their power to prevent it; meaning either the Babylonians or the Romans, or both, and especially the latter, who were strangers and aliens from the commonwealth of Israel: and [it is] desolate, as overthrown by strangers;
who ravage, plunder, and destroy all they meet with, and spare nothing, not intending to settle there, as those who are near do, when they conquer a neighbouring nation. Some think this prophecy was delivered in the times of Ahaz, and refers to the desolation in his time, ( 2 Chronicles 28:17-19 ) but rather, as Joel and Amos prophesied before Isaiah, he may refer to those desolating judgments, they speak of, by the locusts, caterpillars, and fire, ( Joel 1:4 Joel 1:10-12 Joel 1:17-20 ) ( Amos 4:6 Amos 4:11 ) but to consider the words as a prediction of what should be in after times seems best; and so the Arabic version reads the words, "your land shall be desolate, your cities shall be burnt with fire, and your country strangers shall devour before you"; or shall be as overthrown by strangers, being overflown with a flood or storm of rain; so Abendana ^F4.

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FOOTNOTES:

F4 As if it was (Mrz) , which signifies a flood, or overflowing of water, Hab. iii. 10. to which sense Aben Ezra inclines; so Schultens in Job xxiv. 8.

Isaiah 1:7 In-Context

5 Why should ye be stricken anymore? Ye will revolt more and more. The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint.

6 From the sole of the foot even unto the head, there is no soundness in it, but wounds and bruises and putrefying sores; they have not been closed, neither bound up, neither mollified with ointment.

7 Your country is desolate, your cities are burned with fire; your land, strangers devour it in your presence, and it is desolate, as overthrown by strangers.

8 And the daughter of Zion is left as a cottage in a vineyard, as a shed in a garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city.

9 Unless the LORD of hosts had left unto us a very small remnant, we should have been as Sodom, and we should have been like unto Gomorrah.