Isaiah 7:17

17 The Lord will bring on you, your people, and the house of your father, such a time as has never been since Ephraim separated from Judah-the king of Assyria [is coming].

Isaiah 7:17 Meaning and Commentary

Isaiah 7:17

The Lord shall bring upon thee
These words are directed to Ahaz; and show, that though he and his kingdom would be safe from the two kings that conspired against him, yet evils should come upon him from another quarter, even from the Assyrians he sent to for help, and in whom he trusted; in which the Lord himself would have a hand, and permit them in his providence, in order to chastise him for his unbelief, stubbornness, and ingratitude in refusing the sign offered him, and for his other sins; and the calamities threatened began in his time; and therefore it is said, "upon thee"; for Tilgathpilneser, king of Assyria, to whom he sent for help, instead of helping and strengthening him, distressed him, ( 2 Chronicles 28:20 2 Chronicles 28:21 ) : and upon thy people, and upon thy father's house;
so in the reign of his son Hezekiah, Sennacherib, king of Assyria, invaded the land of Judah, took all its fenced cities, excepting Jerusalem, and came up even to that, ( 2 Kings 18:13-17 ) and in the times of Zedekiah, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came up against Jerusalem, and destroyed it, and carried the people of Judah captive, ( 2 Kings 25:1-21 ) and these are the evil days, the days of affliction and adversity, here threatened: days that have not come, from the day that Ephraim departed from
Judah:
meaning the revolt of the ten tribes from the house of David, in the times of Rehoboam, ( 1 Kings 12:16-20 ) which was a day of great adversity, a great affliction to the house of Judah; and there had been several evil days since, and that very lately; as when the king of Syria came into the land, and carried away great multitudes captives to Damascus; and when Pekah, king of Israel, slew in Judah, on one day, a hundred and twenty thousand valiant men, and carried captive two hundred thousand women, sons and daughters, with a great spoil, ( 2 Chronicles 28:5-8 ) and yet these were not to be compared with the calamitous times yet to come: [even] the king of Assyria;
or "with the king of Assyria", as the Vulgate Latin version renders it; rather the meaning is, that those days of trouble should come by the king of Assyria ^F9, as they did. The Septuagint version renders it, "from the day that Ephraim took away from Judah the king of the Assyrians"; and the Syriac and Arabic versions, just the reverse, "from the day that the king of the Assyrians", or "Assyria, carried away Ephraim from Judea"; neither of them right.

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FOOTNOTES:

F9 (rwva Klm ta) "per regem Assyriae", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator; and which is preferred by Noldius, Ebr. Concord. Part. p. 120, No. 616.

Isaiah 7:17 In-Context

15 By the time he learns to reject what is bad and choose what is good, he will be eating butter and honey.

16 For before the boy knows to reject what is bad and choose what is good, the land of the two kings you dread will be abandoned.

17 The Lord will bring on you, your people, and the house of your father, such a time as has never been since Ephraim separated from Judah-the king of Assyria [is coming].

18 On that day the Lord will whistle to the fly that is at the farthest streams of the Nile and to the bee that is in the land of Assyria.

19 All of them will come and settle in the steep ravines, in the clefts of the rocks, in all the thornbushes, and in all the water holes.