Isaiah 64:1-8

1 Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains would tremble before you!

2 As when fire sets twigs ablaze and causes water to boil, come down to make your name known to your enemies and cause the nations to quake before you!

3 For when you did awesome things that we did not expect, you came down, and the mountains trembled before you.

4 Since ancient times no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who acts on behalf of those who wait for him.

5 You come to the help of those who gladly do right, who remember your ways. But when we continued to sin against them, you were angry. How then can we be saved?

6 All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away.

7 No one calls on your name or strives to lay hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us and have given us over to^[a] our sins.

8 Yet you, LORD, are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand.

Isaiah 64:1-8 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO ISAIAH 64

The prayer of the church is continued in this chapter; in which she prays for some visible display of the power and presence of God, as in times past, Isa 64:1-3, and the rather, since unheard of and unseen things were prepared by the Lord for his people; and it was his usual way to meet those that were truly religious, Isa 64:4,5, and she acknowledges her sins and transgressions; the imperfections of her own righteousness, and remissness in duty, Isa 64:5-7, pleads relation to God, and implores his mercy, Isa 64:8,9, represents the desolate condition of Judea, Zion, Jerusalem, and the temple, and entreats divine commiseration, Isa 64:10-12.

Cross References

• 1. Psalms 18:9; Psalms 144:5
• 2. ver 3; Micah 1:3
• 3. S Exodus 19:18
• 4. S Isaiah 30:27
• 5. Psalms 99:1; Psalms 119:120; Jeremiah 5:22; Jeremiah 33:9
• 6. S Psalms 65:5
• 7. S Psalms 18:7
• 8. S Isaiah 43:10-11
• 9. S Isaiah 30:18; 1 Corinthians 2:9*
• 10. S Isaiah 26:8
• 11. S Isaiah 10:4
• 12. S Leviticus 5:2; S Leviticus 12:2
• 13. Isaiah 46:12; Isaiah 48:1
• 14. S Psalms 1:3; Psalms 90:5-6
• 15. Psalms 1:4; Jeremiah 4:12
• 16. S Isaiah 41:28; Isaiah 59:4; Isaiah 63:5; Jeremiah 8:6; Ezekiel 22:30
• 17. S Psalms 14:4
• 18. Deuteronomy 31:18; Isaiah 1:15; Isaiah 54:8
• 19. S Isaiah 9:18; Ezekiel 22:18-22
• 20. S Exodus 4:22; S Jeremiah 3:4; Isaiah 63:16
• 21. S Isaiah 29:16; Romans 9:20-21
• 22. S Job 10:3; S Isaiah 19:25

Footnotes

• [a]. Septuagint, Syriac and Targum; Hebrew "have made us melt because of"