And it shall come to pass in that day
When the song will be sung, ( Isaiah 27:2 Isaiah 27:3 ) when God will appear to have taken particular care of his church, and is about to bring it into a flourishing condition; when its troubles and afflictions will come to an end, with a sanctified use of them; and when the city of Rome will be destroyed, and all the antichristian powers, then will be the conversion of the Jews; for antichrist stands in the way of that work: [that] the Lord shall beat off;
or "beat out" F7; alluding either to the beating off of fruit from a tree, or to the beating out of grain from the ear; and signifies the separating of the Lord's people in the effectual calling from the rest of the world; as the fruit beaten off is separated from the tree, and corn beaten out is separated from the ear and chaff; for this beating off does not intend judgment, but mercy; and is done not by the rod of affliction, but by the rod of the Lord's strength sent out of Zion, even the Gospel, the power of God to salvation; which, in the ministration of it, should reach from the channel of the river unto the stream of Egypt;
from the river Euphrates, on the banks of which was the city of Babylon, to the river Nile in Egypt, which were the limits and boundaries of the land of Israel, ( Deuteronomy 11:24 ) ( Joshua 1:4 ) ( 13:3 ) and in which places many Jews F8 were, or would be, as in the following verse ( Isaiah 27:13 ) . The Septuagint version is,
``from the ditch of the river to Rhinocorura;''which, Jerom says, is a town on the borders of Egypt and Palestine. The meaning is, that the Lord would find out his people, wherever they were, in those parts, and separate and call them by his grace, and gather them to himself, and to his church and people, as follows: and ye shall be gathered one by one, O ye children of Israel;
``ye shall be brought near one to another, O ye children of Israel F9.''