Isaiah 26:1

Isaiah 24 to 27 form one section of the book, often called the Little Apocalypse, in which judgment on the nations gives way to God’s final triumph. Chapter 24 shows the whole earth laid waste under his judgment, and chapter 25 celebrates his victory over death and the rich feast he spreads for all peoples. Isaiah 26 is the song his redeemed people sing once those judgments are past, in the kingdom he has set up. The word for song, shîyr, marks places in Isaiah where God’s people answer his mighty acts together with praise, and the song of praise for his salvation in Isaiah 12 is another of them.

“We have a strong city” is the heart of the song. In Israel a city was the centre of its people’s life, trade and defence, and it was only as safe as its walls. Jerusalem, the city of God, had endured many sieges and times of destruction, so a city that would stand against every enemy was a deep comfort to those who lived there. Here the defences come from God: “salvation will God appoint for walls and bulwarks.” The word for salvation, yᵉshûwʻâh, means deliverance, something saved. Scripture uses it even of a rescue God works through people, as when Jonathan “hath wrought this great salvation in Israel”, and it traces every such rescue back to the LORD. The walls, chôwmâh, are the defensive walls of a city, and the bulwarks are its outer ramparts. God sets his own saving work in their place, so the city stands because he saves it.

Scripture speaks of God’s protection in the same terms elsewhere. “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble” (Psalm 46:1). “The name of the LORD is a strong tower: the righteous runneth into it, and is safe” (Proverbs 18:10). Through Zechariah the LORD promises that he will be to Jerusalem “a wall of fire round about” (Zechariah 2:5).

For Judah this song was a word about where to put their trust. The nation was often drawn to lean on alliances and armies, and Isaiah kept calling it back to the LORD alone: “in quietness and in confidence shall be your strength” (Isaiah 30:15).

“Open ye the gates” is a command, and the verb pâthach means to open wide. The song leaves unnamed the ones who open them. They may be the gatekeepers, perhaps angels, or the gates themselves, addressed as if they could hear. The order comes with God’s authority, and the gates of his city swing open at his word. In Israel the city gate was where the city was defended, where the people gathered, where cases were judged and where business was done. Open gates meant welcome, victory and peace, and shut gates meant siege, exclusion or mourning.

Those who enter are “the righteous nation which keepeth the truth”. The word for righteous, tsaddîyq, comes from a root meaning to be just, and it describes people who are upright and live by God’s standard of right. The word translated “truth”, ʼêmûwn, comes from a root meaning to be firm, and it means faithfulness and trustworthiness. To keep it, shâmar, is to guard it, watch over it and hold to it. So this is a people who keep faith with God, holding fast to his word and living by it.

Scripture asks the same question elsewhere about who may come near to God. “Who shall ascend into the hill of the LORD? or who shall stand in his holy place? He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart” (Psalm 24:3–4), and Psalm 15 gives a fuller answer to the question of who may dwell in God’s holy hill. Moses told Israel to keep God’s words in their hearts, to teach them to their children and to talk of them at home and on the road (Deuteronomy 6:6–9). Jesus said that the one who enters the kingdom of heaven is “he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21). Of the New Jerusalem, John writes that those who enter are “they which are written in the Lamb’s book of life” (Revelation 21:27).

This is the best-loved verse of the chapter and the centre of the song’s comfort: “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee.”

“Thou wilt keep” puts God at the start of the sentence as the one who acts. The verb nâtsar means to guard, protect and maintain, the work of a watchman. God himself stands guard over this peace and keeps it in place. “Perfect peace” translates the Hebrew shâlôwm shâlôwm, “peace, peace”. Hebrew repeats a word to mark it as full and complete, and the KJV gives that sense with the word “perfect”. The word shâlôwm names a state of completeness, soundness, welfare, peace and safety, so the doubled word speaks of a peace that is whole in every part.

Isaiah spoke in hard years, through the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, when Assyria threatened Judah and Babylon would follow. Judah was tempted again and again to look for safety in foreign alliances and its own strength. In that setting a promise of perfect peace from God himself spoke straight to a people living with fear on every side.

“Whose mind is stayed on thee” names the one God keeps. The word for mind, yêtser, means the inner self as it forms its thoughts, intentions and purposes. To be stayed, çâmak, is to be propped up, to lean on something, to rest one’s weight on it and hold fast. The picture is a mind that leans its whole weight on God and is held up by him. A psalm says of the righteous man, “He shall not be afraid of evil tidings: his heart is fixed, trusting in the LORD” (Psalm 112:7).

“Because he trusteth in thee” gives the reason. The verb is bâṭach, the same verb that opens the next verse, and it means to be confident and secure in someone. The promise holds two things together. God is the one who keeps, and the one he keeps is the one who leans on him in trust. Trust is the way his peace reaches us, and he is the one who guards it. Later in the chapter the wicked are shown favour and still refuse to learn righteousness (Isaiah 26:10–11), and their unrest stands against the settled peace of the one who trusts.

Verses 1 to 3 describe the city and the peace of those who live in it, and verse 4 turns to the God who secures them both. “Trust ye in the LORD for ever” is a command to all God’s people. Strong’s says the verb bâṭach properly means to hide for refuge, and from there to be confident or sure. “For ever”, ʻad, makes this trust a lasting habit of life, held in every season, in crisis and in calm.

“LORD JEHOVAH” is the KJV’s rendering of the Hebrew Yâhh Yᵉhôvâh. Yâhh is a short form of Yᵉhôvâh, used in poetry and meaning the same. Yᵉhôvâh is God’s covenant name, which English Bibles print as “LORD” in capitals, following the Jewish custom of leaving the name unspoken. It comes from the verb “to be” and names the self-existent, eternal God, who told Moses, “I AM THAT I AM” (Exodus 3:14). The two forms of the name stand side by side here, and the KJV shows it by printing both “LORD” and “JEHOVAH”. The God we are told to trust is the God who simply is, and who keeps his covenant with his people.

“Everlasting strength” translates tsur olamim, literally “rock of ages” or “everlasting rock”. The word tsûwr means a rock or cliff, and Scripture uses it as a title for God as the Rock. The word olamim means eternity, ages upon ages. So the strength the verse speaks of is God himself as a rock that stands for ever, a refuge that lasts through every age. Israel already sang of God this way. Moses sang, “He is the Rock, his work is perfect” (Deuteronomy 32:4), David sang, “The LORD is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer” (Psalm 18:2), and another psalm says, “In God is my salvation and my glory: the rock of my strength, and my refuge, is in God” (Psalm 62:7). Because God’s strength lasts for ever, the trust we put in him can last for ever too.

Verse 5 opens with “For”, and gives one more reason to trust the LORD: he brings down the proud. “Them that dwell on high” uses yâshab, to sit down and so to dwell or remain, which pictures people settled in their high place as if it were theirs for good. The word for “on high”, mârôwm, means a height or raised place, and figuratively it means dignity or haughtiness. Their loftiness is a matter of pride as well as height.

“The lofty city” stands opposite the strong city of verse 1. One is built on God’s salvation, and the other on human power and self-sufficiency. In Isaiah’s day it called to mind the great cities of empires such as Assyria and Babylon, whose walls and buildings were monuments to their might and whose kings boasted against the God of Israel. For a people who had felt their weight, it was a great comfort to hear that the proudest works of men lie open to God’s judgment.

The phrase “he layeth it low” stands twice in the verse. The verb shâphêl means to bring low or to humble, and saying it again makes the point sure. The verse then traces the city’s fall step by step, from on high to low, to the ground and at last to the dust. The word for dust, ʻâphâr, means dust, dry earth or loose soil, the dust from which man was made and to which he returns. The once lofty city ends level with the ground it towered over.

The same God who brings low also lifts up. Hannah sang, “The LORD maketh poor, and maketh rich: he bringeth low, and lifteth up” (1 Samuel 2:7), and Mary sang that he “hath put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree. He hath filled the hungry with good things; and the rich he hath sent empty away” (Luke 1:52–53). Proverbs gives the rule behind it: “Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall” (Proverbs 16:18).

“The foot shall tread it down” carries the picture to its end. “It” is the lofty city of verse 5, now lying in the dust. The verb râmaç means to tread upon, to trample or stamp, as a potter treads clay or a man walks over what lies under his feet. In that world, treading down a fallen city or a beaten enemy was the sign of complete conquest, as when Joshua had his captains put their feet upon the necks of the kings.

The word for foot, regel, is the ordinary word for the foot used in walking. Then the verse names whose feet these are: “even the feet of the poor, and the steps of the needy”. The poor, ʻânîy, are the afflicted and lowly, and the word comes from a verb meaning to depress or afflict. The needy, dal, are the poor, weak, thin or low, and Strong’s explains the word as properly meaning “dangling”. The word for steps, paʻam, is used here in its plain sense of foot or footstep, beside regel. The two phrases say the same thing twice, in the parallel way of Hebrew poetry, and fix our eyes on the unexpected people who walk over the proud city.

This is a full reversal. The poor are the ones the proud have always trodden upon, and now they walk over the ruins of the city that oppressed them. In the prophets the poor and needy are often also the faithful remnant who rely on God while injustice and foreign rule press on them. Scripture speaks of God’s care for them again and again: “I know that the LORD will maintain the cause of the afflicted, and the right of the poor” (Psalm 140:12), and the LORD hears the desire of the humble and judges for the fatherless and the oppressed (Psalm 10:17–18). He rules over the powers of the earth, for “God is the judge: he putteth down one, and setteth up another” (Psalm 75:7), and “he removeth kings, and setteth up kings” (Daniel 2:21).

These verses are fulfilled in Jesus Christ. He is the refuge and fortress of all who believe, and his death and resurrection are the salvation God appointed for the walls of his people’s city. The church sings this song now, as it waits for the New Jerusalem, where “the Lamb is the light thereof” (Revelation 21:23) and the gates stand open, “for there shall be no night there” (Revelation 21:25).

The fall of the lofty city finds its deepest answer in Christ’s own lowering. He was on high in the glory of God, and he “made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant” (Philippians 2:6–7), and went down to death on the cross bearing our sin. Then “God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name” (Philippians 2:9). He came to found an eternal kingdom built on humility and self-giving love.

He also took his place among the poor and needy of verse 6. “Though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor” (2 Corinthians 8:9), and he said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:3). By his cross he triumphed over the powers of darkness, “having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it” (Colossians 2:15). The lofty city of sin, death and Satan’s rule is brought down by him, and those who trust him share his victory. The final treading down of every enemy comes at his return, when God “will judge the world in righteousness” (Acts 17:31).

These six verses give God’s people a city that stands because God saves it, gates that open at his word, and a peace he guards himself. They show us a God who is the Rock of Ages, strong for ever and worthy of trust for ever, who sees the proud and the poor alike and brings each to the place he has set for them. The song was given for days of fear, when Judah lived in the shadow of Assyria and later Babylon, and it answers that fear with the LORD himself. The mind that rests its weight on him is kept in perfect peace, because he is the one keeping it.