Isaiah 34

Vengeance against Edom

1 Draw near, you nations, to hear; and listen, you peoples. Hear, earth and all who fill it, world and all its offspring.

2 The LORD rages against all the nations, and is angry with all their armies. God is about to wipe them out and has prepared them for slaughter.

3 Their dead will be cast out, the stench of their corpses will rise, and the mountains will melt from their blood.

4 All the stars of heaven will dissolve, the skies will roll up like a scroll, and all the stars will fall, like a leaf withering from a vine, like fruit from a fig tree.

5 When my sword has drunk its fill in the heavens, it will descend upon Edom for judgment, upon a people I have doomed for destruction.

6 The LORD has a sword covered with blood; it is soaked with fat from the blood of lambs and goats, from the kidney fat of rams, for the LORD has a sacrifice in Bozrah, a great slaughter in the land of Edom.

7 Wild oxen will fall with them, steers with mighty bulls, and their land will be drenched with blood; its soil soaked with fat.

8 The LORD has a day of vengeance, a year of payback for Zion's cause.

9 Edom's streams will be turned into pitch, its dust into sulfur, and its land will become burning pitch.

10 Night and day won't be extinguished; its smoke will go up forever. From generation to generation it will lie waste; no one will ever pass through it again.

11 Screech owls and crows will possess it; owls and ravens will live there. God will stretch over it the measuring line of chaos and the plummet stone of emptiness over its officials.

12 No Kingdom There, they will call it, and all its princes will disappear.

13 Thorns will grow up in its palaces, weeds and brambles in its fortresses. It will be a dwelling for jackals, a home for ostriches.

14 Wildcats will meet hyenas, the goat demon will call to his friends, and there Lilith will lurk and find her resting place.

15 There the snake will nest and lay eggs and brood and hatch in its shadow. There too vultures will gather, each with its mate.

16 Consult the LORD's scroll and read: Not one of these will be missing; none will lack its mate. God's own mouth has commanded; God's own spirit has gathered them.

17 God has cast the lot for them; God's hand allotted it to them with the measuring line. They will possess it forever; they will live in it from generation to generation.

Isaiah 34 Commentary

Chapter 34

God's vengeance against the enemies of his church. (1-8) Their desolation. (9-17)

Verses 1-8 Here is a prophecy of the wars of the Lord, all which are both righteous and successful. All nations are concerned. And as they have all had the benefit of his patience, so all must expect to feel his resentment. The description of bloodshed suggests tremendous ideas of the Divine judgments. Idumea here denotes the nations at enmity with the church; also the kingdom of antichrist. Our thoughts cannot reach the horrors of that awful season, to those found opposing the church of Christ. There is a time fixed in the Divine counsels for the deliverance of the church, and the destruction of her enemies. We must patiently wait till then, and judge nothing before the time. Through Christ, mercy is exercised to every believer, consistently with justice, and his name is glorified.

Verses 9-17 Those who aim to ruin the church, can never do that, but will ruin themselves. What dismal changes sin can make! It turns a fruitful land into barrenness, a crowded city into a wilderness. Let us compare all we discover in the book of the Lord, with the dealings of providence around us, that we may be more diligent in seeking the kingdom of God and his righteousness. What the mouth of the Lord has commanded, his Spirit will perform. And let us observe how the evidences of the truth continually increase, as one prophecy after another is fulfilled, until these awful scenes bring in more happy days. As Israel was a figure of the Christian church, so the Edomites, their bitter enemies, represent the enemies of the kingdom of Christ. God's Jerusalem may be laid in ruins for a time, but the enemies of the church shall be desolate for ever.

Footnotes

• [a]. Species uncertain
• [b]. Name of a demon
• [c]. Species uncertain

Chapter Summary

INTRODUCTION TO ISAIAH 34

This chapter is a prophecy of the destruction of all the antichristian nations of the world, and particularly of Rome, signified by Idumea; which is introduced with a call to a general attention to it, it being a very awful and solemn affair, Isa 34:1 utter and universal destruction is declared, as the effect of God's wrath, Isa 34:2 which is expressed by a dreadful scene of blood, to the melting of the mountains with it, and by the dissolution of the heavens, and the hosts of them, Isa 34:3,4 particularly the destruction of Idumea is denounced by the sword of the Lord being on it, and bathed with the blood, both of the common people, and of their princes, signified by various sorts of creatures, Isa 34:5-7 the cause of which is the Lord's vengeance for the controversy of his church and people, injured by Edom or Rome, Isa 34:8 whose desolate and calamitous state is represented as being like that of Sodom, Isa 34:9,10 and should be no more inhabited by men, nor governed by princes, but be the dwelling of wild beasts and unclean birds, Isa 34:11-15 all which is confirmed by the word and Spirit of God, Isa 34:16,17.