Commentaries and Other Bible Study Helps - Prayer Tents - Prayer Tents

1:1 The superscription for the entire book. vision. A message from God (1 Sam. 3:1; Ezek. 7:26), given in symbolic form. Isaiah the son of Amoz. See Introduction: Author and Title. Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah. See Introduction: Date, and chart.

1:2-9 Isaiah indicts Judah's mindless revolt against God.

1:2 heavens . . . earth. Isaiah calls on the entire cosmos as a faithful witness to God's word (Deut. 30:19; 31:28; Ps. 50:4). Children . . . they. These emphatic words accent the contrast between God's grace and his people's ingratitude. Thus Isaiah summarizes Israel's history up to his time. Israel as a whole is God's "son" (Ex. 4:22-23), and individual Israelites are also "sons" (see ESV footnote; Deut. 14:1); this privilege should have led to gratitude, but it did not. rebelled. See Isa. 66:24.

1:4 Ah is a cry of pain and indignation. sinful. Isaiah's complex vocabulary uses a number of evocative Hebrew words for sin (translated here as iniquity and corruptly) that reveal to the people their true character. the Holy One of Israel. As described above (see Introduction: Date), this is Isaiah's characteristic title for God, occurring 25 times in the book (and rarely anywhere else in the OT); it reflects a central theme in Isaiah's thought. Perhaps it originated in the seraphic cry, "Holy, holy, holy" (6:3). When Isaiah saw God high and lifted up in infinite holiness, it defined his knowledge of God as the Holy One who is righteous (5:16), incomparable (40:25), redemptive (47:4), and lofty (57:15), and who has given himself to Israel. To despise the Holy One is to scorn, in practical ways, all that God is. they are utterly estranged. Their backwardness is beyond self-remedy.

1:5 Why? Not even painful experience makes an impact. Their minds are closed.

1:7-8 This imagery merged into reality in the foreign invasions during Isaiah's lifetime. the daughter of Zion. The city of Jerusalem (37:22).

1:9 Only the power of the Lord of hosts has preserved God's people (1 Kings 19:18). See Rom. 9:29, where Paul quotes this verse to teach God's gracious purpose to preserve a remnant that is truly his people. There is nothing within their own nature to keep God's people from the worst of paganism and its appropriate judgment (see Gen. 13:13; 18:16-19:28; 2 Pet. 2:6; Jude 7; Rev. 11:8).

1:10-20 These verses highlight the hypocrisy of the people's worship. Isaiah, like other prophets who comment on sacrificial practices, recognizes that God appointed the system of worship and authorized the central sanctuary. But these ordinances were always intended to foster true piety among God's people, which would move them to humble purity of heart and energetic promotion of others' well-being. Isaiah denounces the way his contemporaries have divorced the ordinances from their proper purpose. It seems that they treated their worship as a way of manipulating God; they also mixed in elements from Canaanite religions (v. 29). See note on Amos 4:4-5.

1:10-17 God rejects his people's worship, however lavish, because they use it as a pious evasion of the self-denying demands of helping the weak (cf. James 1:27). Even lifting their hands in prayer avails nothing, for your hands are full of blood (Isa. 1:15; see 59:3).

1:17 seek justice, correct oppression. Doing good in God's sight includes seeking the just functioning of society (note, by contrast, v. 23).

1:18-20 let us reason together. Rather than continue in their incomprehension, the people are urged to consider thoughtfully their actual position before God. though your sins are like scarlet . . . red like crimson. Their hands, red with blood (v. 15), can be cleansed (Ps. 51:7). But they must make a deliberate choice (Isa. 1:19-20).

1:21-26 Isaiah chronicles their social abuses.

1:21 a whore. Their covenant with God was comparable to a marriage (54:5). To depart from faithfulness to him is a more shocking sin than the people realize.

1:24-28 the Lord . . . the Lord of hosts, the Mighty One of Israel. In contrast to the worthless leaders of v. 23, Israel's God is a formidable Judge. Startlingly, he calls his own people his enemies! But the judgment here is not the end of the story; its purpose is to smelt away the dross, i.e., to remove the unbelieving members of the people (called rebels and sinners, those who forsake the Lord). Afterward, what remains will be a chastened people of God, those . . . who repent (i.e., who embrace their covenant privileges from the heart). redeemed. This word (Hb. padah) and its synonym (ga’al; see note on 41:14) generally convey the idea of rescue and protection, either for the whole people (1:27; 35:10; cf. 50:2; 51:11), or for a particular person (cf. 29:22). In some places either word carries the idea of exchanging a substitute or ransom (e.g., Ex. 13:13), but that is not relevant here. The prophet looks forward to a cleansed people after the historical judgment of the exile, restored to its mission (Isa. 2:1-5).

1:29 the oaks . . . the gardens. Suggesting pagan, and probably Canaanite, rites of worship (57:5; 65:3; 66:17) mixed into the life of God's own people.

1:31 Self-salvation, though it seems to make the people strong for a time, carries with it its own self-destruction. Apart from repentance (v. 27), the people and their syncretistic oaks and gardens (v. 29) will burn, with none to quench them.