Isaiah 3:8

For Jerusalem is ruined, and Judah is fallen: because their tongue and their doings are against the LORD, to provoke the eyes of his glory.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(8) For Jerusalem is ruined . . .—The outward evils of the kingdom are traced to their true source. Men have provoked, in the prophet’s bold anthropomorphic language, “the eyes of His glory,” the manifestation of His being as All-knowing, Almighty, All-holy.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

3:1-9 God was about to deprive Judah of every stay and support. The city and the land were to be made desolate, because their words and works had been rebellious against the Lord; even at his holy temple. If men do not stay themselves upon God, he will soon remove all other supports, and then they must sink. Christ is the Bread of life and the Water of life; if he be our Stay, we shall find that is a good part not to be taken away, Joh 6:27. Here note, 1. That the condition of sinners is exceedingly woful. 2. It is the soul that is damaged by sin. 3. Whatever evil befals sinners, be sure that they bring it on themselves.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

For Jerusalem ... - The prophet proceeds to show the cause of this state of things. 'These are the words of the prophet, and not of him who was chosen leader.' - "Jerome."

Is ruined - It would be so ruined, and the prospect of preserving it would be so completely taken away, that no one could be induced to undertake to defend and protect it.

Judah - The kingdom of Judah, of which Jerusalem was the capital; Note Isaiah 1:1.

Is fallen - Hebrew, "falls;" that is, is about to fall - as a tower or a tree falls to ruin. If the "capital" fell and was ruined, the kingdom would also fall as a matter of course.

Because their tongue ... - This is the "reason" why Judah was ruined. By word and deed - that is, in every way they opposed God. The "tongue" here represents their "language," their manner of speaking. It was proud, haughty, rebellious, perhaps blasphemous.

To provoke - To irritate; to offend.

The eyes of his glory - This is a Hebrew expression to denote "his glorious eyes." The eye quickly expresses anger or indignation. We perceive these passions in the flashing of the eye sooner than in any other part of the countenance. Hence, to "provoke the eyes," is an expression signifying simply to excite to anger, or to excite him to punish them. Lowth proposes to render this 'to provoke the cloud of his glory' - referring to the Shekinah or cloud that rested over the ark in the temple. By a slight variation of the Hebrew text, reading ענן ‛ânân instead of עני ‛ēnēy, it may be so read, and the Syriac so translates it: but the change in the Hebrew text does not seem to be authorized.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

8. Reason given by the prophet, why all shrink from the government.

eyes of his glory—to provoke His "glorious" Majesty before His "eyes" (compare Isa 49:5; Hab 1:13). The Syriac and Lowth, by a slight change of the Hebrew, translate, "the cloud of His glory," the Shekinah.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Of his glorious majesty, whom they ought to reverence and adore.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

For Jerusalem is ruined, and Judah is fallen, This is a reason given why the government of them is refused; they were fallen into such a ruinous condition, that there was no probability of recovering them. And the reason of this their fall and ruin is,

because their tongue and their doings are against the Lord; against the Lord Jesus Christ, whom they reproached and vilified as an impostor, a blasphemer, and a seditious person; and whom they spit upon, buffeted, scourged, and crucified:

to provoke the eyes of his glory; whose glory, as seen by some in the days of his humiliation, was as the glory of the only begotten of the Father; and, upon his ascension, he was crowned with glory and honour: and as his eyes saw, as well as his ears heard, all their blasphemy and wickedness; so they refusing to have him to reign over them, he was provoked to come in his kingdom with power, and cause his wrath to fall upon them to the uttermost, in the destruction of their country, city, and temple.

Geneva Study Bible

For Jerusalem is ruined, and Judah is fallen: because their tongue and their doings are against the LORD, to provoke the eyes of his glory.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

8. Jerusalem is ruined] A reference to the “ruin,” Isaiah 3:6.

their tongue and their doings] In word and deed they defy Jehovah and provoke the eyes of His glory. Cf. Habakkuk 1:13, “of too pure eyes to behold evil.”

8, 9. The ruin so vividly depicted is to the prophet’s mind as certain as if it had been already accomplished, because the moral condition of the country, and especially of its present rulers, is one that Jehovah cannot tolerate. The perfects in Isaiah 3:8 are those of prophetic certainty.

Pulpit Commentary

Verses 8-26. - THE CAUSE OF THE JUDGMENT SHOWN TO BE THE SINS OF JERUSALEM.

1. The sins of the men. (Vers. 8-15). These are declared to be partly sins of speech, but mainly sins of act (ver. 8). Of sins of speech the only one specified is the open and shameless declaration of their wickedness (ver. 9). Under the head of sins of act are enumerated

(1) childishness and effeminacy;

(2) irreligion and leading people away from God (ver. 12);

(3) oppression of the poor and afflicted (vers. 14, 15).

The enumeration of the sins is mixed with exhortation and comment in such a way as to give rise to the conjecture that we have here, not the original prophecy as the author penned it, but a later "summary" of several prophetical discourses, which summary itself is "a little fragmentary" (Cheyne). Verse 8. - Jerusalem is ruined; or, has come to ruin - the "perfect of prophetic certainty" (Cheyne) - (comp. Amos 5:2, "The virgin of Israel is fallen"). Their tongue and their doings. Sins of the tongue are denounced in the Old Testament as well as in the New, though not, perhaps, so frequently (see Exodus 20:7; Exodus 21:17; Exodus 22:28; Exodus 23:1, 2; Psalm 31:18; Psalm 94:4, etc.). To provoke the eyes of his glory. This is an unusual metaphor. God's glory seems here to be identified with himself, as being of his very essence; and thus "provoking the eyes of his glory" is simply provoking him to look on them with anger. Isaiah 3:8

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The prophet then proceeds, in Isaiah 3:8-12, to describe this deep, tragical misery as a just retribution."For Jerusalem is ruined and Judah fallen; because their tongue and their doings (are) against Jehovah, to defy the eyes of His glory." Jerusalem as a city is feminine, according to the usual personification; Judah as a people is regarded as masculine.

(Note: As a rule, the name of a people (apart from the personification of the people as beth, a house) is only used as a feminine, when the name of the land stands for the nation itself (see Gesenius, Lehrbegr. p. 469).)

The two preterites Câs'lah and nâphal express the general fact, which occasioned such scenes of misery as the one just described. The second clause, beginning with "because" (Chi), is a substantive clause, and attributes the coming judgment not to future sin, but to sin already existing. "Again Jehovah:" אל is used to denote a hostile attitude, as in Isaiah 2:4; Genesis 4:8; Numbers 32:14; Joshua 10:6. The capital and the land are against Jehovah both in word and deed, "to defy the eyes of His glory" (lamroth ‛ēnē Chebodo). עני is equivalent to עיני; and lamroth is a syncopated hiphil, as in Isaiah 23:11, and like the niphal in Isaiah 1:12 : we find the same form of the same word in Psalm 78:17. The kal mârâh, which is also frequently construed with the accusative, signifies to thrust away in a refractory manner; the hiphil himrâh, to treat refractorily, literally to set one's self rigidly in opposition, obniti; mar, stringere, to draw tightly, with which unquestionably the meaning bitter as an astringent is connected, though it does not follow that mârâh, himrâh, and hemar (Exodus 23:21) can be rendered παραπικραίνειν, as they have been in the Septuagint, since the idea of opposing, resisting, fighting in opposition, is implied in all these roots, with distinct reference to the primary meaning. The Lamed is a shorter expression instead of למען, which is the term generally employed in such circumstances (Amos 2:7; Jeremiah 7:18; Jeremiah 32:29). But what does the prophet mean by "the eyes of His glory?" Knobel's assertion, that Châbod is used here for the religious glory, i.e., the holiness of God, is a very strange one, since the Châbod of God is invariably the fiery, bright doxa which reveals Him as the Holy One. but his remark does not meet the question, inasmuch as it does not settle the point in dispute, whether the expression "the eyes of His glory" implies that the glory itself has eyes, or the glory is a quality of the eyes. The construction is certainly not a different one from "the arm of His glory" in Isaiah 52:10, so that it is to be taken as an attribute. But this suggests the further question, what does the prophet mean by the glory-eyes or glorious eyes of Jehovah? If we were to say the eyes of Jehovah are His knowledge of the world, it would be impossible to understand how they could be called holy, still less how they could be called glorious. This abstract explanation of the anthropomorphisms cannot be sustained. The state of the case is rather the following. The glory (Châbod) of God is that eternal and glorious morphē which His holy nature assumes, and which men must picture to themselves anthropomorphically, because they cannot imagine anything superior to the human form. In this glorious form Jehovah looks upon His people with eyes of glory. His pure but yet jealous love, His holy love which breaks out in wrath against all who meet it with hatred instead of with love, is reflected therein.