Yesaya 10:5-6

The Lord Turns on Arrogant Assyria

10:5 Assyria, the club I use to vent my anger, is as good as dead, ¹ 

a cudgel with which I angrily punish. ² 

10:6 I sent him ³  against a godless ⁴  nation,

I ordered him to attack the people with whom I was angry, ⁵ 

to take plunder and to carry away loot,

to trample them down ⁶  like dirt in the streets.

Yesaya 10:15

10:15 Does an ax exalt itself over the one who wields it,

or a saw magnify itself over the one who cuts with it? ⁷ 

As if a scepter should brandish the one who raises it,

or a staff should lift up what is not made of wood!

Yesaya 37:26-27

37:26 ⁸ Certainly you must have heard! ⁹ 

Long ago I worked it out,

in ancient times I planned ¹⁰  it,

and now I am bringing it to pass.

The plan is this:

Fortified cities will crash

into heaps of ruins. ¹¹ 

37:27 Their residents are powerless; ¹² 

they are terrified and ashamed.

They are as short-lived as plants in the field

or green vegetation. ¹³ 

They are as short-lived as grass on the rooftops ¹⁴ 

when it is scorched by the east wind. ¹⁵ 

Yesaya 45:7

45:7 I am ¹⁶  the one who forms light

and creates darkness; ¹⁷ 

the one who brings about peace

and creates calamity. ¹⁸ 

I am the Lord, who accomplishes all these things.

Yesaya 46:10-11

46:10 who announces the end from the beginning

and reveals beforehand ¹⁹  what has not yet occurred,

who says, ‘My plan will be realized,

I will accomplish what I desire,’

46:11 who summons an eagle ²⁰  from the east,

from a distant land, one who carries out my plan.

Yes, I have decreed, ²¹ 

yes, I will bring it to pass;

I have formulated a plan,

yes, I will carry it out.

Yesaya 54:16

54:16 Look, I create the craftsman,

who fans the coals into a fire

and forges a weapon. ²² 

I create the destroyer so he might devastate.

[10:5]  ¹ tn Heb “Woe [to] Assyria, the club of my anger.” On הוֹי (hoy, “woe, ah”) see the note on the first phrase of 1:4.

[10:5]  ² tn Heb “a cudgel is he, in their hand is my anger.” It seems likely that the final mem (ם) on בְיָדָם (bÿyadam) is not a pronominal suffix (“in their hand”), but an enclitic mem. If so, one can translate literally, “a cudgel is he in the hand of my anger.”

[10:6]  ³ sn Throughout this section singular forms are used to refer to Assyria; perhaps the king of Assyria is in view (see v. 12).

[10:6]  ⁴ tn Or “defiled”; cf. ASV “profane”; NAB “impious”; NCV “separated from God.”

[10:6]  ⁵ tn Heb “and against the people of my anger I ordered him.”

[10:6]  ⁶ tn Heb “to make it [i.e., the people] a trampled place.”

[10:15]  ⁷ tn Heb “the one who pushes it back and forth”; KJV “him that shaketh it”; ASV “him that wieldeth it.”

[37:26]  ⁸ tn Having quoted the Assyrian king’s arrogant words in vv. 23-24, the Lord now speaks to the king.

[37:26]  ⁹ tn Heb “Have you not heard?” The rhetorical question expresses the Lord’s amazement that anyone might be ignorant of what he is about to say.

[37:26]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “formed” (so KJV, ASV).

[37:26]  ¹¹ tn Heb “and it is to cause to crash into heaps of ruins fortified cities.” The subject of the third feminine singular verb תְהִי (tÿhi) is the implied plan, referred to in the preceding lines with third feminine singular pronominal suffixes.

[37:27]  ¹² tn Heb “short of hand”; KJV, ASV “of small power”; NASB “short of strength.”

[37:27]  ¹³ tn Heb “they are plants in the field and green vegetation.” The metaphor emphasizes how short-lived these seemingly powerful cities really were. See Ps 90:5-6; Isa 40:6-8, 24.

[37:27]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “[they are] grass on the rooftops.” See the preceding note.

[37:27]  ¹⁵ tc The Hebrew text has “scorched before the standing grain” (perhaps meaning “before it reaches maturity”), but it is preferable to emend קָמָה (qamah, “standing grain”) to קָדִים (qadim, “east wind”) with the support of 1Q Isa^a; cf. J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah (NICOT), 1:657, n. 8.

[45:7]  ¹⁶ tn The words “I am” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons. In the Hebrew text the participle at the beginning of v. 7 stands in apposition to “the Lord” in v. 6.

[45:7]  ¹⁷ tn On the surface v. 7a appears to describe God’s sovereign control over the cycle of day and night, but the following statement suggests that “light” and “darkness” symbolize “deliverance” and “judgment.”

[45:7]  ¹⁸ sn This verses affirms that God is ultimately sovereign over his world, including mankind and nations. In accordance with his sovereign will, he can cause wars to cease and peace to predominate (as he was about to do for his exiled people through Cyrus), or he can bring disaster and judgment on nations (as he was about to do to Babylon through Cyrus).

[46:10]  ¹⁹ tn Or “from long ago”; KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV “from ancient times.”

[46:11]  ²⁰ tn Or, more generally, “a bird of prey” (so NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV; see 18:6).

[46:11]  ²¹ tn Heb “spoken”; KJV “I have spoken it.”

[54:16]  ²² tn Heb “who brings out an implement for his work.”