Yesaya 1:4

1:4 ¹ The sinful nation is as good as dead, ² 

the people weighed down by evil deeds.

They are offspring who do wrong,

children ³  who do wicked things.

They have abandoned the Lord,

and rejected the Holy One of Israel. ⁴ 

They are alienated from him. ⁵ 

Yesaya 1:6

1:6 From the soles of your feet to your head,

there is no spot that is unharmed. ⁶ 

There are only bruises, cuts,

and open wounds.

They have not been cleansed ⁷  or bandaged,

nor have they been treated ⁸  with olive oil. ⁹ 

Yesaya 1:21-22

Purifying Judgment

1:21 How tragic that the once-faithful city

has become a prostitute! ¹⁰ 

She was once a center of ¹¹  justice,

fairness resided in her,

but now only murderers. ¹² 

1:22 Your ¹³  silver has become scum, ¹⁴ 

your beer is diluted with water. ¹⁵ 

[1:4]  ¹ sn Having summoned the witnesses and announced the Lord’s accusation against Israel, Isaiah mourns the nation’s impending doom. The third person references to the Lord in the second half of the verse suggest that the quotation from the Lord (cf. vv. 2-3) has concluded.

[1:4]  ² tn Heb “Woe [to the] sinful nation.” The Hebrew term הוֹי, (hoy, “woe, ah”) was used in funeral laments (see 1 Kgs 13:30; Jer 22:18; 34:5) and carries the connotation of death. In highly dramatic fashion the prophet acts out Israel’s funeral in advance, emphasizing that their demise is inevitable if they do not repent soon.

[1:4]  ³ tn Or “sons” (NASB). The prophet contrasts four terms of privilege – nation, people, offspring, children – with four terms that depict Israel’s sinful condition in Isaiah’s day – sinful, evil, wrong, wicked (see J. A. Motyer, The Prophecy of Isaiah, 43).

[1:4]  ⁴ sn Holy One of Israel is one of Isaiah’s favorite divine titles for God. It pictures the Lord as the sovereign king who rules over his covenant people and exercises moral authority over them.

[1:4]  ⁵ tn Heb “they are estranged backward.” The LXX omits this statement, which presents syntactical problems and seems to be outside the synonymous parallelistic structure of the verse.

[1:6]  ⁶ tn Heb “there is not in it health”; NAB “there is no sound spot.”

[1:6]  ⁷ tn Heb “pressed out.”

[1:6]  ⁸ tn Heb “softened” (so NASB, NRSV); NIV “soothed.”

[1:6]  ⁹ sn This verse describes wounds like those one would receive in battle. These wounds are comprehensive and without remedy.

[1:21]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “How she has become a prostitute, the faithful city!” The exclamatory אֵיכָה (’ekhah, “how!”) is used several times as the beginning of a lament (see Lam 1:1; 2;1; 4:1-2). Unlike a number of other OT passages that link references to Israel’s harlotry to idolatry, Isaiah here makes the connection with social and moral violations.

[1:21]  ¹¹ tn Heb “filled with.”

[1:21]  ¹² tn Or “assassins.” This refers to the oppressive rich and/or their henchmen. R. Ortlund (Whoredom, 78) posits that it serves as a synecdoche for all varieties of criminals, the worst being mentioned to imply all lesser ones. Since Isaiah often addressed his strongest rebuke to the rulers and leaders of Israel, he may have in mind the officials who bore the responsibility to uphold justice and righteousness.

[1:22]  ¹³ tn The pronoun is feminine singular; personified Jerusalem (see v. 21) is addressed.

[1:22]  ¹⁴ tn Or “dross.” The word refers to the scum or impurites floating on the top of melted metal.

[1:22]  ¹⁵ sn The metaphors of silver becoming impure and beer being watered down picture the moral and ethical degeneration that had occurred in Jerusalem.