Isaiahchapter 25
12 verses · BSBIsaiah book hub →
Speaks with:Exodus 15×1Psalms 118×1Numbers 23×1Zephaniah 3×1James 2×1Isaiah 32×1
Summary
Chapter summary
Praise opens the chapter: the prophet exalts Jehovah for counsels of old performed in faithfulness (a fortified city made a heap, never to be rebuilt) so that strong and terrible nations fear him. Jehovah is a stronghold to the poor and needy, a refuge from the storm and shade from the heat. On "this mountain" Jehovah of hosts makes for all peoples a feast of fat things and well-refined wines, destroys the veil spread over all nations, and swallows up death for ever, wiping tears from all faces, the line Paul quotes of the resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15:54. The waiting people answer, "Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him." The chapter closes with Moab trodden down like straw and its high fortress brought to the dust.
Context
Prophecy · Isaiah — Isaiah overview
- A. 1–5 A Refuge for the Poor, a Shade from the Heat
- B. 6–8 The Feast of Fat Things and Death Swallowed Up
- C. 9–12 Lo, This Is Our God — and Moab Trodden Down
The outline
A.A Refuge for the Poor, a Shade from the Heatvv. 1 to 5
Read vv. 1 to 5 →B.The Feast of Fat Things and Death Swallowed Upvv. 6 to 8
Read vv. 6 to 8 →C.Lo, This Is Our God — and Moab Trodden Downvv. 9 to 12
Read vv. 9 to 12 →
The world behind this chapter
Isaiah 25The history
The feast is described by a wine steward. A banquet of fat things — the rich cuts, which ordinary people ate only at festivals — and of wine on the lees, well refined. Wine was left to mature on its own sediment, which deepened it, and then strained clear before serving. Saying aged and strained is saying the best in the cellar, held back for the occasion.
The covering that gets destroyed is a real cloth. Mourners veiled their heads, and the same word covers the shroud spread over a corpse and the pall over a grieving face. Isaiah says God will swallow up on this mountain the covering cast over all peoples and the veil spread over all nations — and then swallow up death itself, and wipe the tears off every face.
The city being flattened in the middle of the song is an unnamed fortified city turned into a heap, its palace of strangers gone, never rebuilt. Against it stands what God is to the poor: a stronghold to the needy in his distress, a shelter from the storm, a shade from the heat. In a land where the summer sun and the sudden downpour both killed, those two were the standard measures of safety.
The final image of Moab is a farmyard one, and deliberately undignified: trodden down as straw is trodden into the dung heap. Straw was mixed with dung and dried for fuel, and it was worked in by foot. Moab's proud swimmer spreads his hands, and this is the water he is swimming in.
What it meant to them
The line that would have stopped a Judean cold is the one about death being swallowed up forever. Israel's Scriptures said far less about life beyond the grave than the nations around them assumed; here it is stated flat, with no hedging.
And the response written into the song is a sentence for people who have waited a long time: this is our God, we have waited for him, and he will save us. The waiting is part of the testimony, not an embarrassment to it.
Sources cited
- J. Alec Motyer, The Prophecy of Isaiah: An Introduction and Commentary
- Roland de Vaux, Ancient Israel: Its Life and Institutions
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Isaiah 25. Where this site has examined a place the manuscripts differ, the examination is in the manuscripts room. Every place this site examines →
This page draws on Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Calvin, Commentaries; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.