English · KJV

Isaiah 55:9

“Seek the Lord While He Is Near”Isaiah 55:6–9
King James Version
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.

Bible text: King James Version (1769 Blayney text) · Public domain

KJV (with Strong's)
For as the heavens H8064 are higher H1361 than the earth H776, so are my ways H1870 higher H1361 than your ways H1870, and my thoughts H4284 than your thoughts H4284.

Bible text: King James Version with Strong's numbers · Public domain

Berean Standard Bible
“For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so My ways are higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.

Bible text: Berean Standard Bible · Public domain

American Standard Version
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.

Bible text: American Standard Version (1901) · Public domain

World English Bible Messianic
“For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.

Bible text: World English Bible, Messianic edition · Public domain

Geneva Bible (1599)
For as ye heauens are higher then the earth, so are my wayes higher then your wayes, and my thoughtes aboue your thoughts.

Bible text: Geneva Bible (1599) · Public domain

Young's Literal Translation
For high have the heavens been above the earth, So high have been My ways above your ways, And My thoughts above your thoughts.

Bible text: Young's Literal Translation · Public domain

King James Version — Interlinear
10 Hebrew words
  1. כִּיkiforH3588PrtParticle Conditional
  2. גָבְהוּga·ve·Huthey are highH1361V-Qal-Perf-3cpVerb Qal Perfect 3rd Plural common gender
  3. שָׁמַיִםsha·Ma·yim[the] heavensH8064N-mpNoun Plural Masculine Absolute
  4. מֵאָרֶץme·'A·retzmore than [the] earthH776Prep-m ¦ N-fsNoun Singular Feminine Absoluteמֵmore thanאָרֶץ[the] earth
  5. כֵּןkensoH3651AdvAdverb
  6. גָּבְהוּga·ve·Huthey are highH1361V-Qal-Perf-3cpVerb Qal Perfect 3rd Plural common gender
  7. דְרָכַיde·ra·Khaimy waysH1870N-cpc ¦ 1csNoun Plural common gender Construct with suffixדְרָכַwaysיmy
  8. מִדַּרְכֵיכֶםmi·dar·khei·Khemmore than your waysH1870Prep-m ¦ N-mpc ¦ 2mpNoun Plural Masculine Construct with suffixמִmore thanדַּרְכֵיwaysכֶםyour
  9. וּמַחְשְׁבֹתַיu·mach·she·vo·Taiand my thoughtsH4284Conj-w ¦ N-fpc ¦ 1csNoun Plural Feminine Construct with suffixוּandמַחְשְׁבֹתַthoughtsיmy
  10. מִמַּחְשְׁבֹתֵיכֶםmi·mach·she·vo·tei·Khemmore than your thoughtsH4284Prep-m ¦ N-fpc ¦ 2mpNoun Plural Feminine Construct with suffixמִmore thanמַּחְשְׁבֹתֵיthoughtsכֶםyour
English is a literal word-by-word gloss of the Hebrew, not the KJV's wording. Why?

This is the original text the KJV's translators worked from — each Hebrew word with its own literal English meaning in this verse, prepared by scholars at Tyndale House, Cambridge. The KJV translates whole sentences, not word by word, so its wording differs: one Hebrew word can become several English words, and the KJV may choose “the LORD” where the gloss reads “Yahweh”. Both are faithful — they answer different questions. For the KJV's own rendering, switch to the KJV text.

Words in [ ] are added by the English.

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In the KJVVerse 18,750 of 31,102 · 60.3%

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This verse

God’s ways and thoughts are as far above ours as the heavens are above the earth, and his mercy and his plans share that same height.

“For as the heavens are higher than the earth,”

A comparison drawn from what everyone can see, used to point to a height beyond measuring.

“so are my ways higher than your ways,”

gâbahh, to be high and exalted. God’s conduct and the paths he takes stand far above ours.

“and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

His plans, his offer of abundant pardon among them, rest on a wisdom no one can challenge.

Seek the LORD While He May Be Found

Isaiah 55:6–9

Summary

The LORD has just invited everyone who thirsts to come to him and receive his provision freely, “without money and without price” (Isaiah 55:1–5). These four verses tell us how to answer him. Seek the LORD and call on him while he is near. Let the wicked leave his way and his thoughts and come back to the LORD, who will have mercy and will abundantly pardon. Then God gives the reason his pardon reaches so far: his thoughts and ways are as much higher than ours as the heavens are higher than the earth. The God who is high above us is near to everyone who turns to him, and his forgiveness is as large as his thoughts are high.

Seek the LORD while he may be found

Isaiah 55 stands in the last part of the book, chapters 40–66, where the LORD comforts his people and promises to restore them. Isaiah prophesied long before the Babylonian exile, and these chapters speak ahead to the exiles. They were a people far from their land, with their temple in ruins, who had suffered for their disobedience and idolatry and felt that God had left them. The chapter follows the prophecies of the suffering Servant and of Zion’s glorious future, and it opens with a free invitation to the hungry and thirsty and the promise of an everlasting covenant (Isaiah 55:3). Verse 6 turns that invitation into a call to act now.

To seek, dârash, is to seek, inquire of, require or care for. Seeking the LORD means inquiring of him and consulting him, worshipping him, and wanting his presence and his will. The one we seek is the LORD, Yᵉhôvâh, the covenant name of God, often explained as the Self-Existent or Eternal One. He is the God of Israel, who makes himself known and keeps his covenant.

The command carries a promise inside it. mâtsâʼ is the ordinary word for finding or attaining, and “while he may be found” assumes that whoever seeks him will find him. Moses promised Israel that if they sought the LORD with all their heart and soul they would find him (Deuteronomy 4:29), and the LORD says through Jeremiah, “And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29:13).

The second half of the verse says the same thing again in other words, as Hebrew poetry often does, and makes it more specific. To call, qârâʼ, is to call out to someone, to address him by name, to invoke him. Calling on the LORD is prayer: crying out to him, owning his authority and leaning on his power for help. And he is qârôwb, near, a word from the verb “to approach” that is used of what is near in place, in time or in kinship. James gives the same promise: “Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you” (James 4:8).

Is there a time when God cannot be found?

God is present everywhere and never changes, so the words “while he may be found” do not mean that he is ever truly absent. They speak of a season of grace, a time when God is at work calling people to himself: when his Spirit is moving, when conviction is strong, when the gospel is preached. The psalmist speaks of praying “in a time when thou mayest be found” (Psalm 32:6), and Paul writes, “behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation” (2 Corinthians 6:2). For the exiles the words may also have pointed to the time of God’s favour in restoring the nation, a moment to take hold of while it lasted.

The words also warn. Putting off God’s call can harden the heart and dull it, and Scripture says that the time of finding comes to an end. Proverbs says of those who refused the call, “they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me” (Proverbs 1:28), and Jesus says that once the master of the house “hath shut to the door,” those who knock outside will hear, “I know you not whence ye are” (Luke 13:25). The urgency is part of the kindness. God is near now, and now is the time to answer him.

Seeking and calling

The two verbs belong together, and each has its own weight. Seeking is the turning of the whole person toward God: wanting to know him, his will and his ways, studying his Word, and bringing life into line with his purposes. Calling is that same desire put into words, the direct appeal of prayer to the God on whom we depend for help, guidance and salvation. The heart that seeks him also speaks to him.

Let the wicked forsake his way

Verse 7 says what seeking the LORD means for someone who has gone his own way. The wicked man, râshâʻ, is one who is morally in the wrong, and he is told to forsake, ʻâzab, his way. The word means to loosen, to let go, to leave, and here it describes a decisive break with a sinful course of life. His way, derek, is literally a road, a path worn by walking, and so a course of life and the conduct that fills it. Proverbs joins forsaking and mercy in the same way: “whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy” (Proverbs 28:13).

His way and his thoughts

The unrighteous man is ʼîysh ʼâven, a man of ʼâven, a word for nothingness, trouble and wickedness, and he is to forsake his thoughts, machăshâbâh, his plans, intentions and inner purposes. So repentance reaches both the life others can see and the hidden heart. God calls for a change of conduct and of the motives behind it, the renewing of the mind that Paul speaks of (Romans 12:2). These same two words, ways and thoughts, return in the next two verses, where God sets his own ways and thoughts beside ours.

Returning to the LORD

Leaving the old way is half of the command. The other half is “let him return unto the LORD.” shûwb means to turn back or return, and here it is a turning back to God himself. Return was a deep word in Israel’s life with God, the word for repentance and for coming home to the covenant, as in “Return, ye backsliding children, and I will heal your backslidings” (Jeremiah 3:22). Through Ezekiel God promised his people a new heart and a new spirit (Ezekiel 36:26–27), and the return of this verse belongs with that same promise of restoration.

He will have mercy and abundantly pardon

To the one who returns, God promises two things. “He will have mercy upon him”: the verb râcham speaks of deep compassion, love and pity. “For he will abundantly pardon”: the Hebrew, yarbeh lisloach, joins râbâh, which in this form means to make many or to increase, with çâlach, to forgive. God will multiply his pardon. Between the two promises the LORD is called “our God,” ʼĕlôhîym, so the merciful one is the God of the very people who are coming back to him.

This mercy rests on who God is. His pardon is a free gift that flows from his own character, the character he proclaimed to Moses when he named himself merciful and gracious, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin (Exodus 34:6–7). The psalmist says he removes our transgressions as far as the east is from the west (Psalm 103:10–12). Jeremiah says his compassions are new every morning (Lamentations 3:22–23). John writes that if we confess our sins, “he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).

Is any sin too great to be pardoned?

For anyone who truly turns from sin and seeks God’s mercy, no sin is too great for him to pardon. Jesus does speak of one sin, blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, as unforgivable (Matthew 12:31–32). That sin is best understood as a persistent, deliberate and final refusal of God and his grace, which makes it the very opposite of the return this verse calls for. God’s mercy triumphs over judgment for all who come back to him.

My thoughts are not your thoughts

Verse 8 begins with “For,” and it gives the reason for the pardon just promised. People who measure forgiveness by their own standards would judge it undeserved, even impossible, that the wicked should be freely pardoned. God answers that his thinking is of another kind.

The word for thoughts is again machăshâbâh, from châshab, to think, devise or reckon. It means a contrivance, an intention or a plan, which in human hands can be a plot or good advice. Ways is again derek, from dârak, to tread, and used of God it means his conduct, his methods and the paths he takes in dealing with the world. The difference God declares lies in nature and goodness as well as in size. Our thoughts are limited, often centred on ourselves and given to error, and our ways can be crooked and short-sighted. His thoughts are wise and just, and his ways are righteous and always lead to the good purpose he intends.

The verse closes with “saith the LORD,” nᵉʼum, an utterance or declaration. It marks the sentence as the LORD’s own word, spoken with his authority, and it calls for humble trust from all who hear it.

These words spoke straight to the exiles. They had known human kings and their flawed plans, their suffering made them long for a quick and visible restoration, and they were wrestling with questions about God’s justice and his promises. God called them to trust plans wiser than their own reasoning and meant for their good. Through Jeremiah he had told them, “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end” (Jeremiah 29:11).

The rest of Scripture says the same. Paul cries out, “O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!” (Romans 11:33–36). Proverbs tells us to “Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding” (Proverbs 3:5–6). Job, confessing that God can do every thing, owned that he had uttered things too wonderful for him (Job 42:2–3).

As the heavens are higher than the earth

Verse 9 gives the measure of the difference with a picture anyone can see. The heavens stand far above the earth, and God’s ways and thoughts stand that far above ours. The word gâbahh means to be high, lofty, tall or exalted, and in other places it can mean haughty. Here it describes God’s height above his creatures. The picture is real, and the distance it points to is greater still.

David uses the same measure for God’s mercy: “For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him” (Psalm 103:11). The two verses belong together. The height of God’s thoughts in Isaiah is the height of his mercy in the psalm, and both are spoken over the forgiveness of sinners.

The nations around Israel often thought of their gods as larger versions of human power and personality. The LORD is distinct from all he has made and infinitely above it in wisdom and power: “Great is our Lord, and of great power: his understanding is infinite” (Psalm 147:5). He knows all things (1 John 3:20), past, present and future, and he understands our thoughts afar off (Psalm 139:1–6). His plans come from that full knowledge, so they are sure and beyond our searching.

Because his thoughts are this high, his promises stand. The verses that follow compare his word to the rain and snow that come down from heaven and do their work, so that his word accomplishes what he sends it to do (Isaiah 55:10–13). The pardon of verse 7 is part of that word, and it will be kept.

Can we know God’s thoughts at all?

These verses humble us, and they also leave room for real knowledge of God. He has made himself known in his written Word, given by inspiration (2 Timothy 3:16–17), and above all in his Son, “the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person” (Hebrews 1:3). The depths of his wisdom stay beyond us, and still we can truly know him and be saved, for “God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit” (1 Corinthians 2:9–10).

What these verses guard against is presumption, the idea that we can fully grasp God’s ways or dictate them by our own reason. So we study his Word, which is “a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path” (Psalm 119:105). We rely on the Spirit, who guides believers into all truth (John 16:13). We pray, seek the counsel of mature believers, and read the circumstances God sends in the light of Scripture and prayer. Jesus calls his disciples friends because he has made known to them what he heard from his Father (John 15:15), and he told them he had more to say than they could yet bear (John 16:12). God makes his ways known to us as far as we are able to bear them, and where his reasons stay hidden, we trust what he has shown us of his character.

Christ, in whom God comes near and pardons

The nearness of verse 6 is fullest in Jesus Christ. God was near to Israel through his covenant, his law, his prophets and his presence in the tabernacle and the temple, and in Christ the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14). Jesus is “the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6), and whoever has seen him has seen the Father (John 14:9). The accepted time Paul speaks of is the time opened by Christ’s coming, death and resurrection, when “whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Romans 10:13). To seek the LORD today is to seek him through Christ.

The call to forsake and return is the call Jesus made when he began to preach, telling people to repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand (Matthew 4:17). The abundant pardon of verse 7 is given through his blood (Ephesians 1:7), for he is “the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).

The cross is where God’s higher ways are seen most plainly. Who among us would have planned for the Creator to become a servant and die a shameful death for rebels? Yet “the foolishness of God is wiser than men” (1 Corinthians 1:25). The Son “made himself of no reputation” (Philippians 2:7), and God commends his love toward us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us (Romans 5:8). In Christ “are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Colossians 2:3), and through him God has opened “a new and living way” into his presence (Hebrews 10:20).

Coming back to the God who pardons

These verses are good news first of all. God is near and can be found, and he receives the wicked who return and multiplies his pardon to them. If you know what it is to have gone your own way, in what you did and in what you planned in your heart, you can come back to him today, and you will find mercy.

The same verses shape the life that follows. Seeking God and calling on him are the habits of a whole life, in prayer, in his Word and in a heart that listens for his Spirit. When his dealings with you are hard to understand, you can rest in the God whose thoughts toward his people are thoughts of peace, and whose ways are as high above yours as the heavens are above the earth. His forgiveness has that same height.

Last revised

Public-domain commentary

Matthew Henry

From his Commentary on the Whole Bible. Henry wrote on whole passages, and this entry covers Isaiah 55:6–13. He set out his notes in a four-level outline, kept here as he numbered it.

1662–1714 · 8 verses
Passage under commentIsaiah 55:6–13
I. II. Main points1. 2. Sub-points(1.) (2.) Details[1.] [2.] Fine details

We have here a further account of that covenant of grace which is made with us in Jesus Christ, both what is required and what is promised in the covenant, and of those considerations that are sufficient abundantly to confirm our believing compliance with and reliance on that covenant. This gracious discovery of God's good-will to the children of men is not to be confined either to the Jew or to the Gentile, to the Old Testament or to the New, much less to the captives in Babylon. No, both the precepts and the promises are here given to all, to every one that thirsts after happiness, Isaiah 55:1. And who does not? Hear this, and live.

I.Here is a gracious offer made of pardon, and peace, and all happiness, to poor sinners, upon gospel terms, Isaiah 55:6, Isaiah 55:7.

1.Let them pray, and their prayers shall be heard and answered (Isaiah 55:6): "Seek the Lord while he may be found. Seek him whom you have left by revolting from your allegiance to him and whom you have lost by provoking him to withdraw his favour from you. Call upon him now while he is near, and within call." Observe here,

(1.)The duties required. [1.] "Seek the Lord. Seek to him, and enquire of him, as your oracle. Ask the law at his mouth. What wilt thou have me to do? Seek for him, and enquire after him, as your portion and happiness; seek to be reconciled to him and acquainted with him, and to be happy in his favour. Be sorry that you have lost him; be solicitous to find him; take the appointed method of finding him, making use of Christ as your way, the Spirit as your guide, and the word as your rule." [2.] "Call upon him. Pray to him, to be reconciled, and, being reconciled, pray to him for every thing else you have need of."

(2.)The motives made use of to press these duties upon us: While he may be found - while he is near.

[1.]It is implied that now God is near and will be found, so that it shall not be in vain to seek him and to call upon him. Now his patience is waiting on us, his word is calling to us, and his Spirit striving with us. Let us now improve our advantages and opportunities; for now is the accepted time. But,

[2.]There is a day coming when he will be afar off, and will not be found, when the day of his patience is over, and his Spirit will strive no more. There may come such a time in this life, when the heart is incurably hardened; it is certain that at death and judgment the door will be shut, Luke 16:26; Luke 13:25, Luke 13:26. Mercy is now offered, but then judgment without mercy will take place.

2.Let them repent and reform, and their sins shall be pardoned, Isaiah 55:7. Here is a call to the unconverted, to the wicked and the unrighteous - to the wicked, who live in known gross sins, to the unrighteous, who live in the neglect of plain duties: to them is the word of this salvation sent, and all possible assurance given that penitent sinners shall find God a pardoning God. Observe here,

(1.)What it is to repent. There are two things involved in repentance: - [1.] It is to turn from sin; it is to forsake it. It is to leave it, and to leave it with loathing and abhorrence, never to return to it again. The wicked must forsake his way, his evil way, as we would forsake a false way that will never bring us to the happiness we aim at, and a dangerous way, that leads to destruction. Let him not take one step more in that way. Nay, there must be not only a change of the way, but a change of the mind; the unrighteous must forsake his thoughts. Repentance, if it be true, strikes at the root, and washes the heart from wickedness. We must alter our judgments concerning persons and things, dislodge the corrupt imaginations and quit the vain pretences under which an unsanctified heart shelters itself. Note, It is not enough to break off from evil practices, but we must enter a caveat against evil thoughts. Yet this is not all: [2.] To repent is to return to the Lord; to return to him as our God, our sovereign Lord, against whom we have rebelled, and to whom we are concerned to reconcile ourselves; it is to return to the Lord as the fountain of life and living waters, which we had forsaken for broken cisterns.

(2.)What encouragement we have thus to repent. If we do so,

[1.]God will have mercy. He will not deal with us as our sins have deserved, but will have compassion on us. Misery is the object of mercy. Now both the consequences of sin, by which we have become truly miserable (Ezekiel 16:5, Ezekiel 16:6), and the nature of repentance, by which we are made sensible of our misery and are brought to bemoan ourselves (Jeremiah 31:18), both these make us objects of pity, and with God there are tender mercies.

[2.]He will abundantly pardon. He will multiply to pardon (so the word is), as we have multiplied to offend. Though our sins have been very great and very many, and though we have often backslidden and are still prone to offend, yet God will repeat his pardon, and welcome even backsliding children that return to him in sincerity.

II.Here are encouragements given us to accept this offer and to venture our souls upon it.

For, look which way we will, we find enough to confirm us in our belief of its validity and value.

1.If we look up to heaven, we find God's counsels there high and transcendent, his thoughts and ways infinitely above ours, Isaiah 55:8, Isaiah 55:9. The wicked are urged to forsake their evil ways and thoughts (Isaiah 55:7) and to return to God, that is, to bring their ways and thoughts to concur and comply with his; "for" (says he) "my thoughts and ways are not as yours. Yours are conversant only about things beneath; they are of the earth earthy: but mine are above, as the heaven is high above the earth; and, if you would approve yourselves true penitents, yours must be so too, and your affections must be set on things above." Or, rather, it is to be understood as an encouragement to us to depend upon God's promise to pardon sin, upon repentance. Sinners may be ready to fear that God will not be reconciled to them, because they could not find in their hearts to be reconciled to one who should have so basely and so frequently offended them. "But" (says God) "my thoughts in this matter are not as yours, but as far above them as the heaven is above the earth." They are so in other things. Men's sentiments concerning sin, and Christ, and holiness, concerning this world and the other, are vastly different from God's; but in nothing more than in the matter of reconciliation. We think God apt to take offence and backward to forgive - that, if he forgives once, he will not forgive a second time. Peter thought it a great deal to forgive seven times (Matthew 18:21), and a hundred pence go far with us; but God meets returning sinners with pardoning mercy; he forgives freely, and as he gives: it is without upbraiding. We forgive and cannot forget; but, when God forgives sin, he remembers it no more. Thus God invites sinners to return to him, by possessing them with good thoughts of him, as Jeremiah 31:20.

2.If we look down to this earth, we find God's word there powerful and effectual, and answering all its great intentions, Isaiah 55:10, Isaiah 55:11. Observe here,

(1.)The efficacy of God's word in the kingdom of nature. He saith to the snow, Be thou on the earth; he appoints when it shall come, to what degree, and how long it shall lie there; he saith so to the small rain and the great rain of his strength, Job 37:6. And according to his order they come down from heaven, and do whatsoever he commands them upon the face of the world, whether it be for correction, or for his land, or for mercy, Isaiah 55:12, Isaiah 55:13. It returns not re infect - without having accomplished its end, but waters the earth, which he is therefore said to do from his chambers, Psalm 104:13. And the watering of the earth is in order to its fruitfulness. Thus he makes it to bring forth and bud, for the products of the earth depend upon the dews of heaven; and thus it gives not only bread to the eater, present maintenance to the owner and his family, but seed likewise to the sower, that he may have food for another year. The husbandman must be a sower as well as an eater, else he will soon see the end of what he has.

(2.)The efficacy of his word in the kingdom of providence and grace, which is as certain as the former: "So shall my word be, as powerful in the mouth of prophets as it is in the hand of providence; it shall not return unto me void, as unable to effect what it was sent for, or meeting with an insuperable opposition; no, it shall accomplish that which I please" (for it is the declaration of his will, according to the counsel of which he works all things) "and it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it." This assures us,

[1.]That the promises of God shall all have their full accomplishment in due time, and not one iota or tittle of them shall fail, 1 Kings 8:56. These promises of mercy and grace shall have as real an effect upon the souls of believers, for their sanctification and comfort, as ever the rain had upon the earth, to make it fruitful.

[2.]That according to the different errands on which the word is sent it will have its different effects. If it be not a savour of life unto life, it will be a savour of death unto death; if it do not convince the conscience and soften the heart, it will sear the conscience and harden the heart; if it do not ripen for heaven, it will ripen for hell. See Isaiah 6:9. One way or other, it will take effect.

[3.]That Christ's coming into the world, as the dew from heaven (Hosea 14:5), will not be in vain. For, if Israel be not gathered, he will be glorious in the conversion of the Gentiles; to them therefore the tenders of grace must be made when the Jews refuse them, that the wedding may be furnished with guests and the gospel not return void.

3.If we take a special view of the church, we shall find what great things God has done, and will do, for it (Isaiah 55:12, Isaiah 55:13): You shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace. This refers,

(1.)To the deliverance and return of the Jews out of Babylon. They shall go out of their captivity, and be led forth towards their own land again. God will go before them as surely, though not as sensibly, as before their fathers in the pillar of cloud and fire. They shall go out, not with trembling, but with triumph, not with any regret to part with Babylon, or any fear of being fetched back, but with joy and peace. Their journey home over the mountains shall be pleasant, and they shall have the good-will and good wishes of all the countries they pass through. The hills and their inhabitants shall, as in a transport of joy, break forth into singing; and, if the people should altogether hold their peace, even the trees of the field would attend them with their applauses and acclamations. And, when they come to their own land, it shall be ready to bid them welcome; for, whereas they expected to find it all overgrown with briers and thorns, it shall be set with fir-trees and myrtle-trees: for, though it lay desolate, yet it enjoyed its sabbaths (Leviticus 26:34), which, when they were over, like the land after the sabbatical year, it was the better for. And this shall redound much to the honour of God and be to him for a name. But,

(2.)Without doubt it looks further. This shall be for an everlasting sign, that it,

[1.]The redemption of the Jews out of Babylon shall be a ratification of those promises that relate to gospel times. The accomplishment of the predictions relating to that great deliverance would be a pledge and earnest of the performance of all the other promises; for thereby it shall appear that he is faithful who has promised.

[2.]It shall be a representation of the blessings promised and a type and figure of them. First, Gospel grace will set those at liberty that were in bondage to sin and Satan. They shall go out and be led forth. Christ shall make them free, and then they shall be free indeed. Secondly, It will fill those with joy that were melancholy. Psalm 14:7, Jacob shall rejoice, and Israel shall be glad. The earth and the inferior part of the creation shall share in the joy of this salvation, Psalm 94:11, Psalm 94:12. Thirdly, It will make a great change in men's characters. Those that were as thorns and briers, good for nothing but the fire, nay, hurtful and vexatious, shall become graceful and useful as the fir-tree and the myrtle-tree. Thorns and briers came in with sin and were the fruits of the curse, Genesis 3:18. The raising of pleasant trees in the room of them signifies the removal of the curse of the law and the introduction of gospel blessings. The church's enemies were as thorns and briers; but, instead of them, God will raise up friends to be her protection and ornament. Or it may denote the world's growing better; instead of a generation of thorns and briers, there shall come up a generation of fir-trees and myrtles; the children shall be wiser and better than the parents. And, fourthly, in all this God shall be glorified. It shall be to him for a name, by which he will be made known and praised, and by it the people of God shall be encouraged. It shall be for an everlasting sign of God's favour to them, assuring them that, though it may for a time be clouded, it shall never be cut off. The covenant of grace is an everlasting covenant; for the present blessings of it are signs of everlasting ones.

Historical interpretation

Historical reception

2 surviving comments on this verse. Each one is dated, so this reads as a timeline rather than a list.

2 quotes · AD 410–420
Post-Nicene
400

Select a marker to jump to its quote. Markers stagger vertically where authors wrote within a few decades of each other.

d. AD 410PrudentiusPost-NiceneSourceAGAINST SYMMACHUS 2:123-40
“If you would,” he says,
“Ascend to heaven, banish cares of earth.
For far as earth is distant from the sky
And heaven from the world below, so far
Are your vain thoughts from my eternal thoughts,
Ill from good, sin from virtue, dark from light.
I counsel you to shun all passing things
And deem as nought all to corruption prone,
For it is destined to return to nought.
All earth brings forth and holds, at dawn of time
I made; I decked with splendid ornaments
The shining world and formed the elements,
But willed that the enjoyment be confined
Within due bounds, as far as mortal frame
And fleeting human life may have the need,
Not that humanity, by unbridled passion ruled,
Should reckon good alone things sweet and vain,
Which I have preordained to pass with time.
d. AD 420JeromePost-NiceneSourceCommentary on Isaiah
(Vers. 8, 9.) For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. LXX: For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, says the Lord. But as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and your thoughts than my thoughts. Do not think, he says, that what I promise is difficult, and that it seems unbelievable to you, that the impious and unjust can be saved, either the Jewish people or all those among the Gentiles who did not know God. Consider this: there is much difference between my thoughts and yours, and as great as the difference in nature, so too is the difference in will. (Proverbs 19). For many thoughts are in the heart of a man, but the counsel of the Lord remains forever. You, like humans, often, repenting of a promised will, overturn an old desire with a new one. For the Lord frustrates the plans of the nations, and rejects the thoughts of the people, and renders the will of the rulers void (Psalm 33). But the thoughts of his heart endure from generation to generation, and whatever he has decreed cannot be changed. Do you want to know the difference between my plan and yours? Just as the sky's location is far from the earth, and the dwelling place of angels is different from that of humans, so my thoughts are separated from your plans. For it is said of my thoughts: His judgments are inscrutable, and his ways are unsearchable (Rom. XI, 33). Moreover, of yours: They devised a plan, but they could not establish it (Psal. XX, 12). And in another place: Whatever counsel you take, it will be scattered, and whatever you say, it will not remain within you (Isa. VIII, 10). They do not need a clear interpretation, therefore they are tightened rather than discussed.
Source: Quotations drawn from early Church Fathers and historical Christian theologians (AD 100–1500). Some quotes address the surrounding passage context rather than this verse alone.

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