Isaiah 29

Wesley: seek deep—a metaphor from men who use to dig deep into the earth, that they may hide any thing there. To hide—vainly imagining that they can deceive, not only men, but God, by their external professions. Who—neither God nor man can discover us.

“Who sees us?” is the question of people who think outward religion can hide inward plans. Wesley’s picture of digging deep to bury something fits: the counsel is hidden from men, never from God.

Calvin: woe to them that conceal themselves from Jehovah. They hide themselves in their cunning, as in a labyrinth; they dug for themselves concealment and lurking-places, that by means of them they might deceive God. Who seeth us? Not that wicked men ventured openly to utter these words, but they thus spoke or thus thought in their hearts. They abandoned themselves to all wickedness as if there would never be a judgment of God. He has to do with ungodly men who professed some knowledge of God but in reality denied him.

This is nothing else than to affirm that God is not a Judge. Rulers are principally chargeable. The church hears Judah’s scorners in Isaiah’s century.”

Wesley: surely—all your subtle devices, by which you turn yourselves into all shapes. As clay—it is no more to me than the clay is to the potter, who can alter and dispose it as he sees fit.

They may yet cease turning themselves into shapes. The potter’s right is already the Lord’s over Jerusalem.

Calvin: shall your turning, that is, the purposes which you ponder in your heart, be like potter’s clay? Your pride is astonishing; you act as if you had created yourselves, and as if you had everything in your own power. Whatever men claim for themselves, they take from God, and deprive him of the honour which is due to him. He still exclaims against proud men who cannot endure the authority of God.

They deny that God has created them. The verse stays with Judah’s hiders under the woe.”

Wesley: as a forest—the forest of Lebanon, which was a barren mountain, shall by God’s providence become a fruitful and populous place; and these places which are now fruitful and populous shall then become as barren and desolate as that forest. This is a prophecy of the rejection of the Jews, and of the calling of the Gentiles. The little while is still spoken over Judah, whose counsel was hid in the dark.

Wesley’s Gentile calling is the gospel’s poor of v. 19. Lebanon made orchard is God’s own reverse of what Judah counted fruit.

Calvin: many think that the Jews are compared to Carmel, because they will be barren, and Christians to Lebanon, because they will yield a great abundance of fruits. That opinion is certainly plausible, but Isaiah 32:15 shews that the Prophet here employs the comparison for the purpose of magnifying the grace of God: a forest will become a cultivated field, and the cultivated fields shall yield so great an abundance that they may now be pronounced unfruitful. That the godly may not be discouraged, he passes from threatenings to proclaim grace; he shuts out the ungodly from this hope.

The little while wakes proud sleepers in Judah. Calvin will not trade Jews and Gentiles as labels on two hills. The church hears a renovation after Ariel’s chastisement, not a later orchard pasted onto “Lebanon.”

Wesley: shall see—being, by God’s grace, brought out of gross ignorance and wickedness unto a clear and saving knowledge of the truth.

The deaf and blind are first Judah’s own, then the Gentiles Wesley sees in the verses that follow. The sealed book of vv. 11–12 is opened by grace—gospel illumination both traditions celebrate.

Calvin: after having punished the wicked and purified his Church, he will restore hearing to the deaf and sight to the blind, that they may receive his doctrine. This is the true method of restoring the Church, which we see that Christ also did, not only to the bodies but also to the souls. This is evidently promised, in a peculiar manner, to the elect alone; for the greater part of men always continue in their darkness.

Illumination is the Lord’s, after the purge of v. 14. The sealed book of that generation is opened to the elect. The church hears Judah’s deaf made to hear.

Wesley: meek—the humble and meek believers. Poor—mean and despicable people, such as the Gentiles were in the opinion of the Jews, and such as the greatest part of the first Christians were.

Wesley’s poor are gospel Gentiles and the first Christians. Fresh joy is given where Judah’s hiders had none.

Calvin: he speaks of the humble; our afflictions prepare us for receiving the grace of God; the Lord casts us down and afflicts us, that he may afterwards raise us up. The grace of illumination does not belong indiscriminately to all; for although all have been chastened together, yet not all have had their hearts subdued by affliction, so as truly to become poor in spirit.

Joy is for those affliction has made meek in that people. Calvin will not scatter the gift over the unhumbled. The church reads Judah’s poor after the woe.

Wesley’s heading for vv. 18–24 is these scorner and oppressor being cut off, the rest shall be converted. That watch: that early and diligently apply themselves to the practice of wickedness.

Conversion of the rest waits on this cutting. They might have ceased watching to do evil.

Calvin: he speaks not of the Chaldeans or Assyrians, but of those who wished to be reckoned in the number of the godly, and boasted of being the seed of Abraham. The restoration of the Church consists in this, that the Lord raises up those who are cast down; the purification is first necessary, for so long as the bad hold the highest place, everything is soiled and corrupted.

The ruthless are Judah’s own, named inside the house. The church hears a cutting in Isaiah’s Jerusalem, not a later code for “scoffer.”

Wesley: that make a man—that condemn a man, as if he was a great criminal. For him—for God’s faithful prophets and ministers. The gate—there the people used to assemble, both upon civil and sacred accounts, and there prophets used to deliver their prophecies. Turn—from his right. The just—the faithful ministers of God. Nought—not for any great advantage, but for a trifle. The gate is Jerusalem’s in that century.

Those who pervert justice target the one who rebukes them at the city gate. Wesley reads this as hostility toward God’s faithful prophets.

Calvin: they carefully observed and watched for the prophets’ words, that they might take them by surprise. Who have laid snares for him that reproveth in the gate: they hated him that reproveth in the gate, and abhorred him that speaketh uprightly. They have turned aside the righteous man for nothing. He will not suffer the wickedness of the ungodly to pass unpunished.

The snare is laid in Judah’s own gate, against the reprover of that hour. The church reads an empty plea.

Wesley: redeemed—from manifold dangers, and especially from idolatry. Jacob—the Israelites or posterity of Jacob, who had great cause to be ashamed for their continued infidelity, shall at last be brought back to the God of their fathers, and to their Messiah. Pale—through fear of their enemies.

Wesley’s Messiah is the end of Jacob’s shame. They may yet be brought back.

Calvin: he comforts the people, that they may not despair in that wretched condition to which they shall be reduced—when the people have been brought into a state of slavery, the temple overturned, the sacrifices taken away. Who redeemed Abraham: he recalls the attention of the people to the very beginning of the Church. This favor does not belong to proud or obstinate persons who refuse to bend their neck, but only to the humble, whom shame constrains to hang down their heads. He introduces Jacob as moved with shame on account of the enormous crimes of his posterity.

Abraham’s Redeemer keeps a remnant when the house looks dead.

Wesley: he seeth—when the believing seed of Jacob shall see those children, whom they have begotten to God, by the gospel, even the Gentiles. The work—the children, not of the flesh, but of the promise, whom I, by my almighty grace, have regenerated. In the midst—incorporated with the Jews, into one and the same body. Shall sanctify—they shall glorify God, with them and for them. The midst is still Jacob’s house, Israel with those the gospel begets.

When Jacob sees the children God has given—Wesley reads them as Gentile believers—they will honor the Holy One together. Grace brings in a new family that sanctifies God’s name.

Calvin: work of my hands—he meant to express the astonishing work of redemption; those whom God adopts to be his children are made by him, as it were, new men. We must not judge of the salvation of the Church by the present appearances of things. They shall hallow my name: the end of redemption is that the goodness of God might be celebrated among us. He adds fear, because hypocrites honor God with their lips; praises are of no value unless we sincerely obey him.

The children are God’s new-making in Jacob’s midst after the shame. The church hears a sanctifying of the Holy One of Jacob.

Wesley: that erred—those Gentiles who erred from God’s truth. Murmured—they that murmured at God’s faithful teachers, shall now receive God’s truth in the love of it. The heading still governs: the rest shall be converted, after scorner and oppressor are cut off.

Instruction is received in love, not charted as a later age. Wesley’s Gentiles and Calvin’s murmurers both sit after Judah’s hidden counsel.

Calvin: in making preparation for the restoration of the Church, the Lord enlightens by his word those who formerly wandered astray in darkness. He does this by the secret influence of the Spirit; for it would be of little value to be taught by the external word, if he did not also instruct our hearts inwardly. Murmurers: those who formerly murmured against the prophets, and could not endure their warnings, would be obedient and submissive. Hence we see how wonderful is the mercy of God, who brings back into the path those who were highly unworthy.

The erring of that generation are made teachable. Calvin and Wesley agree the Holy One of Jacob is sanctified; this understanding does.