Yesaya 7:13

7:13 So Isaiah replied, ¹  “Pay attention, ²  family ³  of David. ⁴  Do you consider it too insignificant to try the patience of men? Is that why you are also trying the patience of my God?

Yesaya 8:10

8:10 Devise your strategy, but it will be thwarted!

Issue your orders, but they will not be executed! ⁵ 

For God is with us! ⁶ 

Yesaya 21:6

21:6 For this is what the sovereign master ⁷  has told me:

“Go, post a guard!

He must report what he sees.

Yesaya 25:10

25:10 For the Lord’s power will make this mountain secure. ⁸ 

Moab will be trampled down where it stands, ⁹ 

as a heap of straw is trampled down in ¹⁰  a manure pile.

Yesaya 29:12

29:12 Or when they hand the scroll to one who can’t read ¹¹  and say, “Read this,” he says, “I can’t read.” ¹² 

Yesaya 33:5

33:5 The Lord is exalted, ¹³ 

indeed, ¹⁴  he lives in heaven; ¹⁵ 

he fills Zion with justice and fairness.

Yesaya 36:4

36:4 The chief adviser said to them, “Tell Hezekiah: ‘This is what the great king, the king of Assyria, says: “What is your source of confidence? ¹⁶ 

Yesaya 38:21

38:21 ¹⁷  Isaiah ordered, “Let them take a fig cake and apply it to the ulcerated sore and he will get well.”

Yesaya 57:3

57:3 But approach, you sons of omen readers,

you offspring of adulteresses and prostitutes! ¹⁸ 

Yesaya 61:2

61:2 to announce the year when the Lord will show his favor,

the day when our God will seek vengeance, ¹⁹ 

to console all who mourn,

[7:13]  ¹ tn Heb “and he said.” The subject is unexpressed, but the reference to “my God” at the end of the verse indicates the prophet is speaking.

[7:13]  ² tn The verb is second plural in form, because the prophet addresses the whole family of David. He continues to use the plural in v. 14 (with one exception, see the notes on that verse), but then switches back to the second singular (addressing Ahaz specifically) in vv. 16-17.

[7:13]  ³ tn Heb “house.” See the note at v. 2.

[7:13]  ⁴ sn The address to the “house of David” is designed to remind Ahaz and his royal court of the protection promised to them through the Davidic covenant. The king’s refusal to claim God’s promise magnifies his lack of faith.

[8:10]  ⁵ tn Heb “speak a word, but it will not stand.”

[8:10]  ⁶ sn In these vv. 9-10 the tone shifts abruptly from judgment to hope. Hostile nations like Assyria may attack God’s people, but eventually they will be destroyed, for God is with his people, sometimes to punish, but ultimately to vindicate. In addition to being a reminder of God’s presence in the immediate crisis faced by Ahaz and Judah, Immanuel (whose name is echoed in this concluding statement) was a guarantee of the nation’s future greatness in fulfillment of God’s covenantal promises. Eventually God would deliver his people from the hostile nations (vv. 9-10) through another child, an ideal Davidic ruler who would embody God’s presence in a special way (see 9:6-7). Jesus the Messiah is the fulfillment of the Davidic ideal prophesied by Isaiah, the one whom Immanuel foreshadowed. Through the miracle of the incarnation he is literally “God with us.” Matthew realized this and applied Isaiah’s ancient prophecy of Immanuel’s birth to Jesus (Matt 1:22-23). The first Immanuel was a reminder to the people of God’s presence and a guarantee of a greater child to come who would manifest God’s presence in an even greater way. The second Immanuel is “God with us” in a heightened and infinitely superior sense. He “fulfills” Isaiah’s Immanuel prophecy by bringing the typology intended by God to realization and by filling out or completing the pattern designed by God. Of course, in the ultimate fulfillment of the type, the incarnate Immanuel’s mother must be a virgin, so Matthew uses a Greek term (παρθένος, parqenos), which carries that technical meaning (in contrast to the Hebrew word עַלְמָה [’almah], which has the more general meaning “young woman”). Matthew draws similar analogies between NT and OT events in 2:15, 18. The linking of these passages by analogy is termed “fulfillment.” In 2:15 God calls Jesus, his perfect Son, out of Egypt, just as he did his son Israel in the days of Moses, an historical event referred to in Hos 11:1. In so doing he makes it clear that Jesus is the ideal Israel prophesied by Isaiah (see Isa 49:3), sent to restore wayward Israel (see Isa 49:5, cf. Matt 1:21). In 2:18 Herod’s slaughter of the infants is another illustration of the oppressive treatment of God’s people by foreign tyrants. Herod’s actions are analogous to those of the Assyrians, who deported the Israelites, causing the personified land to lament as inconsolably as a mother robbed of her little ones (Jer 31:15).

[21:6]  ⁷ tn The Hebrew term translated “sovereign master” here and in vv. 8, 16 is אֲדֹנָי (’adonay).

[25:10]  ⁸ tn Heb “for the hand of the Lord will rest on this mountain”; TEV “will protect Mount Zion”; NCV “will protect (rest on NLT) Jerusalem.”

[25:10]  ⁹ tn Heb “under him,” i.e., “in his place.”

[25:10]  ¹⁰ tc The marginal reading (Qere) is בְּמוֹ (bÿmo, “in”). The consonantal text (Kethib) has בְּמִי (bÿmi, “in the water of”).

[29:12]  ¹¹ tn Heb “and if the scroll is handed to one who does not know a scroll.”

[29:12]  ¹² tn Heb “I do not know a scroll.”

[33:5]  ¹³ tn Or “elevated”; NCV, NLT “is very great.”

[33:5]  ¹⁴ tn Or “for” (KJV, NASB, NIV).

[33:5]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “on high” (so KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV); CEV “in the heavens.”

[36:4]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “What is this object of trust in which you are trusting?”

[38:21]  ¹⁷ tc If original to Isaiah 38, vv. 21-22 have obviously been misplaced in the course of the text’s transmission, and would most naturally be placed here, between Isa 38:6 and 38:7. See 2 Kgs 20:7-8, where these verses are placed at this point in the narrative, not at the end. Another possibility is that these verses were not in the original account, and a scribe, familiar with the 2 Kgs version of the story, appended vv. 21-22 to the end of the account in Isaiah 38.

[57:3]  ¹⁸ tc The Hebrew text reads literally, “offspring of an adulterer [masculine] and [one who] has committed adultery.” Perhaps the text has suffered from transposition of vav (ו) and tav (ת) and מְנָאֵף וַתִּזְנֶה (mÿna’ef vattizneh) should be emended to מְנָאֶפֶת וְזֹנָה (mÿna’efet vÿzonah, “an adulteress and a prostitute”). Both singular nouns would be understood in a collective sense. Most modern English versions render both forms as nouns.

[61:2]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “to announce the year of the Lord’s favor, and the day of our God’s vengeance.