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Commentary on Isaiah 46 verses 1–4
We are here told,
I. That the false gods will certainly fail their worshippers when they have most need of them, Isa 46:1, Isa 46:2. Bel and Nebo were two celebrated idols of Babylon. Some make Bel to be a contraction of Baal; others rather think not, but that it was Belus, one of their first kings, who after his death was deified. As Bel was a deified prince, so (some think) Nebo was a deified prophet, for so Nebo signifies; so that Bel and Nebo were their Jupiter and their Mercury or Apollo. Barnabas and Paul passed at Lystra for Jupiter and Mercury. The names of these idols were taken into the names of their princes, Bel into Belshazzar's, Nebo into Nebuchadnezzar's and Nebuzaradan's, etc. These gods they had long worshipped, and in their revels praised them for their successes (as appears, Dan 5:4); and they insulted over Israel as if Bel and Nebo were too hard for Jehovah and could detain them in captivity in defiance of their God. Now, that this might be no discouragement to the poor captives, God here tells them what shall become of these idols, which they threaten them with. When Cyrus takes Babylon, down go the idols. It was usual then with conquerors to destroy the gods of the places and people they conquered, and to put the gods of their own nation in the room of them, Isa 37:19. Cyrus will do so; and then Bel and Nebo, that were set up on high, and looked great, bold, and erect, shall stoop and bow down at the feet of the soldiers that plunder their temples. And because there is a great deal of gold and silver upon them, which was intended to adorn them, but serves to expose them, they carry them away with the rest of the spoil. The carriers' horses, or mules, are laden with them and their other idols, to be sent among other lumber (for so it seems they accounted them rather than treasure) into Persia. So far are they from being able to support their worshippers that they are themselves a heavy load in the wagons, and a burden to the weary beast. The idols cannot help one another (Isa 46:2): They stoop, they bow down together. They are all alike, tottering things, and their day has come to fall. Their worshippers cannot help them: They could not deliver the burden out of the enemy's hand, but themselves (both the idols and the idolaters) have gone into captivity. Let not therefore God's people be afraid of either. When God's ark was taken prisoner by the Philistines it proved a burden, not to the beasts, but to the conquerors, who were forced to return it; but, when Bel and Nebo have gone into captivity, their worshippers may even give their good word with them: they will never recover themselves.
II. That the true God will never fail his worshippers: "You hear what has become of Bel and Nebo, now hearken to me, O house of Jacob! Isa 46:3, Isa 46:4. Am I such a god as these? No; though you are brought low, and the house of Israel is but a remnant, your God has been, is, and ever will be, your powerful and faithful protector."
1.Let God's Israel do him the justice to own that he has hitherto been kind to them, careful of them, tender over them, and has all along done well for them. Let them own, (1.) That he bore them at first: I have made. Out of what womb came they, but that of his mercy, and grace, and promise? He formed them into a people and gave them their constitution. Every good man is what God makes him. (2.) That he bore them up all along: You have been borne by me from the belly, and carried from the womb. God began betimes to do them good, as soon as ever they were formed into a nation, nay, when as yet they were very few, and strangers. God took them under a special protection, and suffered no man to do them wrong, Psa 105:12-14. In the infancy of their state, when they were not only foolish and helpless, as children, but forward and peevish, God carried them in the arms of his power and love, bore them as upon eagles' wings, Exo 19:4; Deu 32:11. Moses had not patience to carry them as the nursing father does the sucking child (Num 11:12), but God bore them, and bore their manners, Act 13:18. And as God began early to do them good (when Israel was a child, then I loved him), so he had constantly continued to do them good: he had carried them from the womb to this day. And we may all witness for God that he has been thus gracious to us. We have been borne by him from the belly, from the womb, else we should have died from the womb and given up the ghost when we came out of the belly. We have been the constant care of his kind providence, carried in the arms of his power and in the bosom of his love and pity. The new man is so; all that in us which is born of God is borne up by him, else it would soon fail. Our spiritual life is sustained by his grace as necessarily and constantly as our natural life by his providence. The saints have acknowledged that God has carried them from the womb, and have encouraged themselves with the consideration of it in their greatest straits, Psa 22:9, Psa 22:10; Psa 71:5, Psa 71:6, Psa 71:17.
2.He will then do them the kindness to promise that he will never leave them. He that was their first will be their last; he that was the author will be the finisher of their well-being (Isa 46:4): "You have been borne by me from the belly, nursed when you were children; and even to your old age I am he, when, by reason of your decays and infirmities, you will need help as much as in your infancy." Israel were now growing old, so was their covenant by which they were incorporated, Heb 8:13. Gray hairs were here and there upon them, Hos 7:9. And they had hastened their old age, and the calamities of it, by their irregularities. But God will not cast them off now, will not fail them when their strength fails; he is still their God, will still carry them in the same everlasting arms that were laid under them in Moses's time, Deu 33:27. He has made them and owns his interest in them, and therefore he will bear them, will bear with their infirmities, and bear them up under their afflictions: "Even I will carry and will deliver them; I will now bear them upon eagles' wings out of Babylon, as in their infancy I bore them out of Egypt." This promise to aged Israel is applicable to every aged Israelite. God has graciously engaged to support and comfort his faithful servants, even in their old age: "Even to your old age, when you grow unfit for business, when you are compassed with infirmities, and perhaps your relations begin to grow weary of you, yet I am he - he that I am, he that I have been - the very same by whom you have been borne from the belly and carried from the womb. You change, but I am the same. I am he that I have promised to be, he that you have found me, and he that you would have me to be. I will carry you, I will bear, will bear you up and bear you out, and will carry you on in your way and carry you home at last."
The prophecy has described those things concerning the conversion of the nations and those concerning the elect of the seed of the sons of Israel, and it now turns once more to address the Jews and intends the complete destruction of idolatry … (following Symmachus, “their idols have become the prey of animals,” that is, cast aside into total destitution). According to the literal sense, this has been fulfilled among us by these very deeds, while according to a spiritual understanding it concerns the heavy and burdensome and diabolic load of deceitful idolatry that used to lie on the souls of people.
These then are imitations that cannot save those who carry them and are nothing other than burdens for the priests and weigh them down to the point of exhaustion. And when captivity came, these were carried off first of all due to the value of the metals from which they were made, and they were not able to free the souls of those carrying them. For it is not as dumb imitations they had a life and any feeling of pain, but they are figuratively ascribed soul and body parts, though having no feeling and body parts.… So it could be said that this error of idolatry was the greatest burden among the nations, one that pressed its worshipers down into the ground and could not save and, in fact, made their souls captive to the devil and his demons.
(Chapter 46, Verses 1, 2.) Bel is broken, Nabo is crushed. Their idols have become beasts and livestock, burdening you with heavy loads until exhaustion. They have melted together and crumbled. They could not save those who carried them, and their souls will go into captivity. Seventy: Bel has fallen, Dagon is crushed. Their statues have become beasts and livestock, bound together as a burden for the laboring, the weak, and the hungry, unable to prevail together. They could not save from war. However, they themselves were led away as captives. After the calling of the Gentiles and the election of the believers from Israel, it is testified that the idols have fallen. Bel has fallen, indeed, he has fallen, or Saturn has been broken: whom the Greeks call Belus and the Latins call Saturn. So great was the reverence for him among the ancients that they not only offered him the human sacrifices of captive and lowly mortals, but also sacrificed their own children to him. But now even that idol itself, which is interpreted as prophecy and divination, signifies that it has fallen silent throughout the whole world after the truth of the Gospel. Or, according to the Septuagint, Dagon, which, however, is not found in Hebrew. And it is the idol of Ashkelon, Gaza, and the other cities of the Philistines. And from a specific case it passes to a general one: their images were made in the form of beasts and animals. Not that the images of the Gentiles were exposed as prey to beasts and animals, but that the religion of the nations is such that the images are of beasts and brute animals, which are especially consecrated to divine worship in Egypt. About which Virgil says (Aeneid VIII, 698):
All the various gods and the barking dog Anubis.
For most of their towns have names derived from animals and beasts, κυνῶν from the dog, λέων from the lion, θμοῦἳς from the Egyptian verb 'to have a bad smell', λύκων from the wolf, not to mention the fearful and horrible onion smell, and the sound of their bloated bellies, which is part of the religious customs of Pelusium. These idols, he says, which cannot save those who carry them, are nothing more than burdens for the priests, weighing them down to exhaustion. And when captivity comes, as payment for the metals from which they are made, the first captive is taken, and they cannot free their own soul or those who carry them. Not that the lifeless images have a soul and some sense of pain, which are devoid of sensation; but that the soul is erroneously called soul, and the limbs of those things which are without sensation and limbs. Otherwise, it is also written in the Proverbs: In the hand of the tongue is death and life. Or it must be said that the heaviest burden among the nations was the error of idolatry, which brought down its worshippers to the ground, and could not save them, but made their souls captive to the devil and demons.
(Verse 1, 3 and following) Hear me, house of Jacob, and all the rest of the house of Israel, who are carried from my womb, who are born from my womb. Even to your old age, I am the one, and even to your gray hairs, I will carry you. I have done it, and I will bear it; I will carry, and I will save. To whom have you likened me, and equalized, and compared me, and made me similar? You who pour out gold from the bag, and weigh silver on the scales, hiring a goldsmith to make a god, and they fall down and worship. They carry him on their shoulders, carrying and placing him in his place, and he will stand, and he will not be moved from his place. But when they cry out to him, he will not hear: he will not save them from distress. Listen to me, house of Jacob, and all the remnant of Israel who are carried from the womb, and be instructed from infancy to old age. I am, and until you grow old, I am: I will sustain you: I have made you, and I will carry you: I will support you, and I will make you safe. To whom do you liken me? See, consider those who go astray and compare gold from a bag, and silver in a scale, and hire a goldsmith. They make it into an idol, and they bow down and worship it. They lift it to their shoulders and carry it. If they place it in its rightful place, it stays and will not move. It cannot hear those who cry out to it, and it will not save them from their troubles. It is not called Jacob or Israel, as we have explained above, because it is inferior, the house of Jacob, and the remnant of Israel, due to their close relationship of flesh and blood, and they are like the waste and remnants of Israel. And it teaches that they were carried from Egypt as infants and sucklings, just as from God, as if from a mother's womb and the pregnant womb, they were carried. Not because the ineffable and incomprehensible majesty of God has a womb or a womb, feet, hands, and other members of the body; but that we may learn the affection of God through our words. Otherwise, the same is sung in the hundred and ninth psalm from the person of God. For in that place where the Seventy translated, 'From the womb before the morning star I begot you,' in the Hebrew script it has 'Merehem,' which is interpreted as 'from the womb.' But at present, not only is it written about the womb and the vulva, that is, Mebeten and Merehem but also Menni, which signifies 'from my womb' or 'from my vulva'. And the meaning is: I who have begotten you from infancy and carried you in my womb and vulva, I myself will protect you even until old age, not my own, but yours, so that divine mercy may teach them to be saved. For the Creator spares his creature, and the good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep (John 10). But the hired hand, whose sheep are not his own, sees the wolf coming and flees. Therefore, because I have made and begotten children, I will bear and carry them myself. According to the Septuagint, which says: 'You who are carried from the womb, and are taught from infancy until old age,' this signifies that it is in vain for them to meditate on the law of God day and night, not having knowledge of God, but venerating the idols of humans and animals. To the extent that they require prophetic correction, by which God speaks to them: 'To whom have you made me similar and equal?' And the rest: what gold and silver they have brought, and what idols they have made by hiring a sculptor, and what works of their hands they have worshiped, which are carried on their shoulders, and which, when nailed and fixed, are unable to move, nor are they able to benefit those who worship them. We pass over the obvious things to uncover the closed mercy of Christ.
But Bel was also honored in other cities. For they say that Bel was the mythical figure Chronos among the godless Greeks, one who was reputedly cruel and bloodthirsty and loved to slaughter humans … whereas the God of the universe is not pleased with such terrible impieties and through one of the holy prophets he said to those who were accustomed to doing this, “You sacrifice humans, for you have run out of cattle.” … The expression “cast down” is apt, since the prophet here speaks of a time near to his own. For we can read in the books of the Kings that when the former people carried the divine ark to the temple of Dagon, as those worshiping the idol went in, they saw Dagon fallen down in front of the ark.
Having discussed the Deity, displayed the believers and confounded the unbelievers, the prophetic text also predicts the destruction of the idols. Some copies carry “Dagon.” That was an idol of the Allophyles [foreigners]. As for Bel, some claim that he was Kronos. Then [Isaiah] generalizes: “Their graven images are gone to the wild beasts and the cattle.” For they did not only manufacture anthropomorphic idols but also idols resembling wild beasts and cattle. The Egyptians, in particular, worshiped representations of monkeys, of dogs, of lions, of farm animals and of crocodiles, whereas the Akaronites even had an image of a fly, and some others worshiped figures of bats. These are the practices that the beginning of the prophetic text has already denounced. He predicts the destruction of all these idols.
“Bel” and “Nebo” are Babylonian idols. Bel is the statue that Nebuchadnezzar erected in the plain of Dura; its name derives from “Babel.” Nebo was the teacher of the school for children in Mabbugh; since he was extremely stern toward the children, one of them, in order to please him, made a statue for him, and they worshiped it and so appeased his anger; and after this generation, people were seduced by that statue, and worshiped it and called it god.
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SUMMARY
Isaiah 46:1 delivers a potent prophetic indictment against the chief deities of Babylon, Bel and Nebo, portraying their humiliating downfall. Far from protecting their worshippers or their city, these once-revered idols are depicted as inert, cumbersome objects, reduced to heavy loads carried by weary animals during the city's impending conquest. This vivid imagery powerfully contrasts the impotence of false gods with the unfailing sovereignty and carrying power of the God of Israel, setting the stage for a declaration of His unique ability to sustain and deliver His people.
CONTEXT
EXPOSITION AND ANALYSIS
Key Word Analysis
Verse Breakdown
Literary Devices
Isaiah 46:1 employs several powerful literary devices to convey its message with striking impact. Personification is evident in the depiction of Bel and Nebo "bowing down" and "stooping," attributing human actions of defeat and submission to inanimate idols. This makes their humiliation more vivid and impactful, emphasizing their forced subservience. Irony is central to the verse: the very gods worshipped for their power and protection are shown to be utterly powerless, becoming burdensome objects that need to be carried by weary animals. This stark contrast highlights the absurdity and self-defeating nature of their worship. Furthermore, Symbolism is deeply embedded, with the "heavy loaden" idols symbolizing the futility and exhaustion inherent in all forms of idolatry—anything that takes the place of God becomes a burden rather than a source of strength or liberation. The "weary beast" symbolizes the spiritual and physical toll on those who devote themselves to false hopes and misplaced trust, ultimately leading to weariness and disillusionment.
THEOLOGICAL AND THEMATIC CONNECTIONS
Isaiah 46:1 serves as a foundational text for understanding the biblical critique of idolatry and the unique nature of the God of Israel. It asserts Yahweh's absolute sovereignty over all other so-called gods, demonstrating their utter powerlessness in the face of His divine decree. Unlike the gods of Babylon, who are carried as burdens by weary animals, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is the one who carries His people, sustains them from birth to old age, and delivers them from their burdens. This contrast highlights the active, personal, and redemptive nature of the true God versus the inert, demanding, and ultimately useless nature of idols. The theological implication is clear: true security and help come only from the living God, not from man-made constructs or anything that usurps His rightful place in our lives.
REFLECTION AND APPLICATION
Isaiah 46:1 calls us to a profound self-examination of what we truly place our trust in. While literal idol worship of statues may be less common in many modern contexts, the principle remains acutely relevant. Anything that consumes our primary allegiance, promises ultimate security, or demands our deepest devotion apart from God becomes a functional "idol." This could manifest as the relentless pursuit of wealth, status, power, comfort, personal achievement, or even self-reliance. The verse warns that such "idols," no matter how appealing they seem initially, ultimately become a "heavy loaden" burden, leading to weariness, disappointment, and a profound lack of true peace or fulfillment. Our lives become burdened by the effort required to maintain these false gods, and they inevitably fail to deliver on their promises when we need them most. The application is to consciously and continually shift our reliance from these transient, powerless things to the living God, who alone is capable of sustaining, carrying, and delivering us through all of life's challenges, offering true rest for our souls.
Questions for Reflection
FAQ
What is the significance of Bel and Nebo in this verse?
Answer: Bel (Marduk) and Nebo (Nabu) were the chief deities of Babylon, representing its religious and political power. Bel was the patron god of the city and its creator deity, while Nebo was the god of wisdom and prophecy. By specifically naming these two, Isaiah emphasizes that even the most revered and powerful gods of Babylon are utterly powerless before the God of Israel. Their humiliation signifies the complete downfall of Babylon's religious and political system, demonstrating that no human-made power or deity can stand against the divine will of Yahweh, who alone is sovereign over all nations and their gods, as seen in Isaiah 45:5-7. The prophecy highlights that these gods, far from being able to protect their city or their worshippers, themselves become helpless burdens.
CHRIST-CENTERED FULFILLMENT
Isaiah 46:1, with its vivid depiction of idols as burdensome and impotent, finds its ultimate Christ-centered fulfillment in the person and work of Jesus Christ. The pagan gods, Bel and Nebo, are shown to be carried by weary beasts, unable to bear the weight of their own existence, let alone the burdens of their worshippers. This stands in stark contrast to Jesus, who is the true God who carries His people and bears their burdens. He is the one who invites all who are "weary and heavy-laden" to come to Him for rest, promising that His "yoke is easy and His burden is light" (Matthew 11:28-30). While idols are a burden to the weary, Christ is the one who bears the weariness for His people. He did not need to be carried; rather, He willingly carried the ultimate burden of humanity's sin and guilt on the cross (Isaiah 53:4-6), fulfilling the prophetic picture of the Suffering Servant. Through His atoning sacrifice, He removes the heavy load of sin and offers a divine exchange: our burdens for His perfect peace and righteousness (2 Corinthians 5:21). Thus, the impotence of idols in Isaiah 46:1 powerfully foreshadows the omnipotence and redemptive power of Christ, the only one truly capable of sustaining and saving His people.