Isaiah 21-23:18

Fallen Fallen is Babylon

So we continue in our series of the oracles by looking over chapters 21-23. Previosly the orcales declarations were given with a sense of optimism. That the nations were subject to the word of the Lord, and that his word is full of glrious promises.

This next series will be with a sense of mystery, foreboding. In fact we will get a sense of doom and darkness that will follow. And we’ll actually see how Isaiah is reacting to these visions. Scripture reveals the distress that it puts on him by the things that he sees.

-Followed by what he sees you’ll see a voice call out of the darkness and promise more darkness, tribes in the desert without supplies. Jersusalem committing sin. Then oracle of Tyre presenting some sense of light at the end of this dark tunnel.

-So its not overall a tale of things getting bettter and better. Rather, divine judgment becoming starker, problems remain unsolved and the people of God living in darkness. But in the darkness again there is some light.

-21:1-10. Going back to v9, what event is being described? The fall of Babylon. Why is the fall of Babylon signficant? What does Babylon repersent? No the question of when this event occurs might be debated. One commentator notes that this matches more closely with the fall that occurs around 689 BC.

-When that event occured, the description we get from the fall of the city is that it was filled with corpses, as for the gods dewelling thee, the hands of the people took them and smashed them. Buildings were burned to the goround, huge volumes of water were released over the ruins.

-Now going back to the beginning, Isaiah has this vision and it begins to reveal more and more of the trouble that is to come. First he sees a picture of a whirlwind. Sweeping the Negeb by the Dead sea, it speaks to him.

-He hears of Elam, and Media, taking up arms to put an end to Assyria. And Isaiah has longed to seend the end of Assyrian reign. Babaylon is going to be the power that threatens Assyraian control in the Mesoptaminan region, and eventually overthrow the kingdom. Something again that Isaiah longs and why does Isaiah long for this, what reason is given at the end of verse two? All the sighing she has caused, another way of saying what? Suffering.

-But Isaiahs attitude toward what he wants shifts when he sees what happens. How does he describe his attitude? The vision is so bad that it becomes pain and grief to him. Isiah is charged to send a lookout that would eventially report the fall of Babylon, the collapse of these gods. And this is the announcement of the Lord.

-Now what is being spoken here is sort of a cryptic message. The actual Babylon becomes the city behind the cryptic title in chapter 21:1, the city of empytiness, and chapter 24:10, the ruined city, to basically reveal the result of what happens when humans attempt to organize a world without God. As Isaih probes forward he sees that there will always be a Babylon principle operating in world history, humans will attemt ( as Gen 11:1-9) to impose order anf unity on the world and to create its own security.

-***Back to Isaiah’s response to the impending doom? What are we to make of that reaction? What lesson could we learn from this interaction? World without God is doomed. It cannot exist. A life without God is doom. What hope do we have apart from God? Where is ou

-Now structrually, here is how this passage is presented. Verses 1-2, Isaiah receives a vision. Most likely concerning the dersert by the sea is where he receieved it. 2nd part of v2 we have the traitor. Traitors and destroyers. From an application standpoint, what we see is that people are not to be trusted. There becomes a breakdown in values. Whenever there is an authority or ruling party present, there will always be someone that wants to overthrow them. The call for Elam and Media to take up arms, shows in this diplomatic game, how loose ones hold to power really its.

-v3-5. Isaiah’s reaction to all this is one of horror. Though he longs to see the fall of Assyria, but the reality of it becomes a horror to him. What could the fall of Assyria at the hands mean for the Lords people? Will they join in an alliance with Babaylon. Chapter 39 shows this interaction between Isaiah and king Hezekiah where he just welcomed in ambassords from Babaylon and Isaiah tells him that all that he possesses will be carried off to Babaylon.

-Would the downfall of Assyria mean the deliverance for Judah? No, because Babaylon is doomed to fall. Again anything against God is doomed to fail. Rev 18:1-10. Isarel’s hope, our hope cannot be in earthly rulers, kingdoms. We have a opportunities to take part in the political process of our nation, but we shouldn’t act as this is the thing that will make all things better.

-We must trust in the Lord. In his promises. Rulers, kingdoms, political parties aside,What are some other ways we our focus is turned away from God?

-6-9 a lookout is desgnated to show verify the destruction of Babalon. This lookout, or watchman, acts much like a prophet would. Detailing exactly what is witnesses, reporting back to the people the things he saw and what they should lookout for.

-10-Isaiah reports how the message he heard, it comes from the Lord. And that in this message is warning, that those who share their future with Babylon, will also share its doom. This relaiance and this hope in Babylon is repersentative of all human tendancies, in our fears, our worries, we put our hope in other things besides God.

-We can commit ourselfves to sinful habits to cope with the stress our the struggles that we face everyday. And sin will be no more. It will be destroyed, and we commit ourselves to sin, we can face devastation in our own lives.

-So let us trust in the one who comes to crush sin. Trust in the LORD, Yahweh, who is judges righteously, the God who is faithful.

-Verses 11-12. Isaiah warns that the true dawn is to come. But darkness will remain until then. The watchman encouarages the one from Seir to come back. They are to stand firm, its fine to ask when the dawn comes , but essentailly to stick it out ,stand firm in the darkness.

-13–15. An oracle concerning Arabia: uniquely in this series of oracles, the preposition (concerning) is bĕ, meaning ‘in, against’; Arabia is literally ‘Arabs’. The whole is as allusive as the previous two titles (1, 11). The consonants b‘rb could just as easily mean ‘in the evening’ as ‘in/against Arabs’—both in the title and in 13c. ‘Evening’ could prompt the same foreboding as ‘twilight’ (4c).

-This cannot be called a sure interpretation but it suits the cryptic titles characteristic of this series and the place of this oracle in context, Gentiles in a darkening world. Dedanites: niv understands the Dedanites as receiving a command to bring water (14), but in order to justify this understanding it must change the Hebrew indicative tense (‘they bring’) to an imperative. According to the Hebrew, however, the Dedanites are obliged to camp in the thickets, the scrub, off the beaten track. Of Arabia is b‘rb as above: dare we combine the two possible meanings of these consonants as ‘in Arab-eventide’? The people of Tema (14) bring supplies to the fugitives, literally ‘To meet the thirsty, they bring water; those who live in the land of Tema with his bread (the bread he needed) were there to meet the fugitive.’ The same word for fugitives occurs in 16:2–3 of Moabites fleeing from danger. They could have fled to Zion but the Arabian tribes seek to be self-sufficient. The explanation of all this (15 begins with ‘For’) is that the fugitives had been caught up in the actuality of war: ‘swords’ (lit., plural) suggests being caught between two opposing forces—the grim situation of those whose land becomes the battle-arena for others. The restless world has caught them in its grip: where can they find assistance? Will the aid offered by Tema solve the problem?

-16–17. This concluding statement begins with a sovereign word (16, what the Lord [here, ’ădōnāy] says [‘has said’] to me) telling of an imminent end (within one year), shattering Kedar’s power (17, few). This is assured because the Lord, the God of Israel, has spoken. The distressed Dedanites and their helpers of Tema sought to master their world by their own resources. But the thing which brackets the world is the word of the Sovereign, the God of Israel (16a, 17b). It is he who will not allow humankind to be self-sufficient and to make their world their own. The parallel oracle on Moab contained, like this one, an interim fulfilment (16:14), and both contain the words as a servant bound by contract (16), ‘glory’ (here pomp; in 16:14, ‘splendour’) and ‘remnant’ (16:14 and here, survivors). This identity of wording as well as themes bind the oracles together: the Gentile world is in straits, the good news of salvation in Zion is refused, and the sovereign Lord will not allow them to achieve their own security. Kedar: a general title for the Arabian area with its nomadic tribes.

-chapter 22.

-Judgement continues. This time turning toward Jerusalem’s. People had lived there in security for many years and had come to believe that God would protect them forever, no matter how they lived. v1-14 would dash those beliefs.

-Now at the beginning he uses this term valley of vision. Not sure why this is used. Some have said its sort of a mockery, Mount Zion, that because they have not trusted in the Lord, they are not a city that is a shinning beacon on a hill, but low in valley.

-So it would seem Isaiah could be illustrating how low the city has become. Now given the placement here among the nations, specially after Babalyons fall, Isaiah is showing how their alliance, or trust in Babaylon to overthrow the Assyrians is misplaced and only leads to their own destruction.

-So the people are rejoicing and Isisah begins to question their rejoccing, primarily because he foresees the destruction that awaits them.

-The language that he uses in these verses is a certainity of the desstruction that will come for Jersusalem. So the prophets foresees that the people will be dead without fighting. Slain not slain with the sword or dead without fighting.

-Without the bow they were captured. And in this destruction, Isaiah is greived, he cannot be comforted, he refrains from recieving any counsel. He shows deep affection for the people in referecing them as the daughter of my people.

-So you have two contrast statements here. The people are rejoicing, and the prophet is in sorrow.

-After explaining his sorrow, he gives reason behind it ,by explanining his dark vision. And he begins by proclaiming that God, holy and just, is the one who brings the destruction. What looms is a day of the Lord expressed in the destruction of the city, implemented by Elam, and its inescapable.

-Elam, is to the west of Babylon, throughout Isaiah’s period, allied with Babylon against Assyria. Kir, unknown location, but then we are given a depiction of military preperations that will go against Jerusalem.

-this be true of the Lord? Would he so do? These questions are logical and unavoidable—but a negative answer would not be truly biblical. The men of Bethshemish (1 Sam. 6) faced the loss of life consequent on the temerity of ‘looking at’ the ark of the Lord, but they did not query the propriety of divine righteous judgment—even so condign a judgment on so seemingly small a fault. They did not ask ‘Why?’ They trembled before the Holy One: ‘Who can stand in the presence of the Lord, this Holy God?’ (1 Sam. 6:20). Our doubts are the products of an inadequate sense of what holiness is and a limited understanding of the fact that the wages of sin is death, a truth indeed, but one whose application makes us look for get-out clauses.

-From v 8-11, what does Isaiah note that the people reconizg? What do they do? What is the problem?

-Consequently, the priority in every crisis is to fly to God in penitence and contrition (Joel 2:12ff.). Tearing the hair and sackcloth were outward displays of the inner reality of sorrow. 13. Isaiah returns to the theme of verse 2 and reveals why he found their jollity so offensive: they were applauding human works (8–11) and contradicting the mind of God (12). For tomorrow we die: it is most unlikely that they said these words for, with their walls and water, this was the very thing they thought they had secured themselves against.

-The prophet is not reporting their words but verbalizing their attitudes (see on 28:14–15). In their denial of the significance of the spiritual dimension of life, they were in fact affirming that if what they had done did not save them, nothing could. 14. This is an exceedingly solemn verse in both wording and content. Revealed this in my hearing is (lit.) ‘has unveiled himself in my ear’.

-Isaiah stresses objectivity, the coming of revelation from outside; authenticity, a revelation of the Lord himself; and receptivity, the genuine action of the human ear. Sin (‘āwôn): iniquity, the inner reality of sin in the fallen nature, see 6:7. Atoned (√kāpar): covered by an exact payment (6:7). Where (as 12 shows) there is no ‘Woe is me!’ (6:5), there is no sending of the seraph on a mercy-flight to the sinner.

-The sin of unbelief—no looking to the Lord (11), no penitence (12), total reliance on human saving works (8–11)—is the unforgivable sin. This whole passage is a set piece on the contrast between salvation by faith and salvation by works. Cases in point (22:15–25). See p. 170. The decision whether to live by faith or by self-reliant works is individual as well as national.

-In this way Isaiah’s presentation of two case studies constitutes a call to his contemporaries to examine themselves. In addition, on the assumption that Shebna and Eliakim are those mentioned in 36:3, 11, 22 and 37:2, they also provide one of Isaiah’s interim fulfilments in which observers could see the word of the Lord at work before their very eyes. Verses 15–19 focus on Shebna, ‘the self-reliant’. These verses fall into two parts: 15–16, the Lord’s opposition to Shebna; 17–19, the Lord’s intentions for Shebna.