Mazzaroth

Isaiahchapter 47

15 verses · ASV

This chapter sends 249 cross-references outward and receives 232 — heaviest partner: Isaiah.

Chapter summary

Babylon, addressed as "virgin daughter" throned no longer, receives a sustained taunt-song: come down into the dust, take the millstones, strip the veil, wade the rivers — slave labor and public shame replacing the title "mistress of kingdoms." Jehovah explains the charge: he gave his people into her hand in his wrath, but she showed no mercy, laying a heavy yoke on the aged. Her self-deifying boast, "I am, and there is none else besides me," echoes Jehovah's own refrain from chapter 45, and it draws the sentence: loss of children and widowhood in one day, in a moment. Her sorceries, enchantments, astrologers, star-gazers, and monthly prognosticators are summoned to save her and cannot; they burn as stubble — a fire not for warming — and her lifelong trading partners wander off, leaving none to save.

Drafted from Matthew Henry, Calvin, Gill, Clarke, JFB, and Barnes.

Context

Prophecy · Isaiah — see the Isaiah overview for the book's full setting.

13–15 Mazzaroth

1 Come down, and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon; sit on the ground without a throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans: for thou shalt no more be called tender and delicate.

2 Take the millstones, and grind meal; remove thy veil, strip off the train, uncover the leg, pass through the rivers.

3 Thy nakedness shall be uncovered, yea, thy shame shall be seen: I will take vengeance, and will spare no man.

4 Our Redeemer, Jehovah of hosts is his name, the Holy One of Israel.

5 Sit thou silent, and get thee into darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans; for thou shalt no more be called The mistress of kingdoms.

6 I was wroth with my people, I profaned mine inheritance, and gave them into thy hand: thou didst show them no mercy; upon the aged hast thou very heavily laid thy yoke.

7 And thou saidst, I shall be mistress for ever; so that thou didst not lay these things to thy heart, neither didst remember the latter end thereof.

8 Now therefore hear this, thou that art given to pleasures, that sittest securely, that sayest in thy heart, I am, and there is none else besides me; I shall not sit as a widow, neither shall I know the loss of children: