Isaiah 7

Again the LORD spoke again to Ahaz. The first word (7:1–9) was not the last. He speaks again to a king who would not be firm in faith.

The LORD addresses Ahaz a second time. The offer of a sign is still grace after 7:9.

Calvin: as the Lord knew Ahaz was so wicked as not to believe the promise, He enjoins Isaiah to confirm him by adding a sign. When His promises do not satisfy us, He makes additions suitable to our weakness: miracles added to the word are seals.

The second speech is for weakness, not a new gospel.

The range is unrestricted: grave or sky. Your God is still said to this king.

“Ask”—a serious invitation. He may ask. Depth and height are the Lord’s to give. Ahaz is not being toyed with.

Calvin: an unrestricted choice, either above or below. Astonishing forbearance toward this wicked king, that He was willing to give any pledge of His power they chose. He had in view not unbelievers only, but the weak in whom there was a seed of godliness.

Forbearance that still offers a seal. Sign, Lord your God, Sheol, heaven.

Ahaz will not ask, and says he will not tempt the LORD. Wesley: as if I questioned the truth of his word—but this was deep hypocrisy.

A refusal dressed as piety. He could have asked. Unbelief here is still his. Not a works-gospel: the sign was offered, not earned. Not a fake warning: this no still wearies God (v. 13).

Calvin: by a plausible excuse he refuses. Do we tempt God when we accept what He offers? Certainly not. Ahaz speaks falsehood. If God add anything to His word, it is no virtue to reject it as superfluous. He who rejects the signs when offered must also reject the grace. We must not separate those things which the Lord has commanded us to join.

Refusing the offered seal is refusing the word it seals. I will not ask, I won’t tempt the LORD to the test.

Listen now, house of David: is it not enough for you to try the patience of men, that you will try the patience of my God also? Wesley: he reproves them all, the king’s counsellors; is it not wickedness enough; my God—to vex prophets and people, and by ingratitude, unbelief, and disobedience.

An insult to God after an offer. House of David is still addressed for David’s sake (7:2).

Calvin: under pretense of honor he excluded the power of God. The Prophet kindles. House of David is named as reproach: they had degenerated from the family from which the world’s salvation would proceed. They thought they had to deal with men. My God: Ahaz and his like have no right to boast the name; God is on the prophet’s side, not the hypocrites’.

Thy God (v. 11) has become my God.

Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin will conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. Wesley: because you despise me, God of his own free grace will send a nobler sign. How was a birth many ages later a sign of present deliverance? This promised birth supposed the preservation of that city, nation, and tribe in and of which the Messiah was to be born. Immanuel—God with us; God dwelling among us, in our nature (John 1:14); God and man meeting in one person, a mediator. The name describes His nature and office, not merely what He would commonly be called.

Shared christology—the virgin’s son is God with us, God and man in one person. Free grace still gives the sign after the refusal. Judah is kept so Messiah can be born there.

Calvin: an illustrious prediction concerning the Messiah, called Immanuel. Those who apply it to Hezekiah are excessively impudent; Isaiah’s son cannot bear a title so illustrious. Ahaz having rejected the sign, the Prophet reminds him of the foundation of the covenant: the Messiah must be born. True, thou dost not believe, but God will fulfill the promises; He will send His Christ, for whose sake He determines to preserve this city. Though thou art unworthy, God will have regard to His own honor. The discourse is to the adopted body, not as if Ahaz were numbered with the chosen. God with us: the only-begotten clothed Himself with our flesh; a union of person, Christ God-man. All the promises of God in Christ are Yea and Amen.

Same Christ, same virgin, same God with us. The city stands for Christ’s sake, and the covenant for the remnant, though the king is a hypocrite.

He shall eat butter and honey when he knows to refuse the evil and choose the good. Wesley: butter—the common food of children in that country; he—the virgin’s son; know—to discern between good and evil.

The same child is truly a child. Immanuel is man enough to eat and to learn. Immanuel is no phantom.

Calvin: marks of human nature, lest we think the prophet presents an apparition. Christ will actually appear in flesh, reared as children commonly are. For a time He was willing to be deprived of understanding and to endure our weaknesses (Luke 2:52; Heb 2:14). This relates to His human nature, not His divinity.

“Eat”—true humanity of the same Immanuel. Undisputed: curds, honey, refuse the evil, choose the good.

Before the child knows to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land whose two kings you abhor shall be forsaken. Wesley: not only this land preserved until the virgin’s son is born, but the enemies’ land scourged and the two kings destroyed in a very little time. This child—Shear-jashub, pointed at, brought by special command (7:3) for this use. Pekah and Rezin lose their own lands and lives within two years, slain by the king of Assyria.

“Before”—near-term emptying of Syria and Israel. The boy at the pool is a clock. Ahaz’s dread still has a dated end.

Calvin: not the same child as v. 14. He returns from the general doctrine of the Mediator to the immediate subject. The child: children in general, the age marked, not a particular son. Before children born hereafter can distinguish, Israel and Syria are forsaken of their kings. Rezin slain; Pekah gone in Ahaz’s twelfth year. Consolation that makes Ahaz more inexcusable.

The two kings fall on a short clock, distinct from the virgin’s son. Agreed on both sides: before the boy knows, two kings, land deserted. Wesley names Shear-jashub; Calvin names the age. Either way, Rezin and Pekah.

The LORD will bring on you, on your people, and on your father’s house days that have not come since Ephraim departed from Judah, even the king of Assyria. Wesley: although God will deliver you at this time, yet He will requite all your wickedness. Part of the storm in Ahaz’s reign; the rest on sons and successors. The king is their plague, the rod of God’s anger (10:5).

“Bring”—a deliverance now, and a requital. Assyria is historic, the ally they ran to (7:9).

Calvin: what Ahaz hopes will be his preservation—the Assyrian—will be utterly destructive to him. He might have remained at ease and received God’s help; he chose to call them in. Family of David not exempt. God regulates judgments so as to spare His Church and not let the wicked mixed with the good escape. Amidst the most dreadful deaths the Church remains safe.

The hired help is the judgment. No dispute here: upon you, your people, father's house, Ephraim’s departure, king of Assyria.

In that day that the LORD will whistle for the fly in the uttermost part of the rivers of Egypt, and for the bee in the land of Assyria. Wesley: flies—great numbers; rivers of Nile; bee—Assyrian army, numerous, orderly, fierce. Assyria or Babylon, later one empire, names used promiscuously.

He calls them. The hiss is the Lord’s.

Calvin: the Jews thought Assyria bound by league; he ridicules that. Instead of command, a hiss: Egypt abounds in flies, Assyria in bees. No difficulty; as soon as He gives the sign they run. He shows what efficacy belongs to His secret operation. Everything is governed by the hand of God.

A hiss is enough. Both affirm: that day, fly, Egypt, bee, Assyria.

They shall come, and shall all rest in the desolate valleys, in the clefts of the rocks, on all thorn hedges, and on all pastures. Wesley: valleys they found fruitful but made desolate; rocks to which Israelites fled; bushes—flies and bees rest there; no place escapes.

The land is covered.

Calvin: bees nest in caverns, valleys, bushes. There would not be a corner in which the enemy would not settle. Whether they hide in caverns or seek concealment in valleys, no escape. A concealed bridle on furious beasts.

Every corner under the hiss. Where they meet: ravines, rocks, thornbushes, pastures.

In that day the Lord will shave with a razor that is hired in the parts beyond the River, even with the king of Assyria, the head and the hair of the feet; and it shall also consume the beard also. Wesley: shave—utterly spoil; hired by Ahaz (2 Kgs 16:7–8); scourging them with a rod of their own making. Successive Assyrian kings, and especially Nebuchadnezzar. Head to foot: total destruction of their state, highest to lowest.

They paid for this razor. The Lord still holds the blade.

Calvin: a hired razor is used freely, not spared as one’s own. He will send the Assyrians with mad violence, even if the razor is blunted. Euphrates will not hinder them. From the top of the head to the feet; kings and princes not exempt. The Lord took such vengeance; we ought to fear the razor with which He has already begun to shave us.

God uses Assyria as his instrument, while Judah thinks it has hired Assyria by contract. Neither side disputes this: razor, hired, beyond the River, king of Assyria, head, feet, beard.

In that day that a man shall keep alive a young cow, and two sheep. Wesley: they who used to keep great herds shall esteem it happiness if they can keep one cow and two sheep.

“Keep alive”—scarcity after the shave.

Calvin: not every man, but those who formerly reared large numbers will be satisfied with a few. All reduced to deep poverty. A country wanting inhabitants is a heavier affliction than few herds.

“Keep alive”—remnant poverty, not plenty. Neither side disputes this: that day, young cow, two sheep.

Because of the abundance of milk they shall give he shall eat butter, for everyone will eat butter; everyone left within the land. It will eat curds and honey. Wesley: large pastures from scarcity of cattle; butter the poor used to sell—now none to sell to, so few people left.

Curds and honey here are famine-fare for a leftover, not the child’s diet of v. 15 reused as a slogan.

Calvin: men so few that a small quantity of milk suffices for all. He does not comfort here; he threatens. Everyone that shall be left: smallness of number again.

The land’s leftover eats what the herds can spare because the people are gone. Abundance of milk, curds, honey, left in the land.

It will happen in that day that every place where there were a thousand vines worth a thousand silver shekels, will be for briers and thorns. Wesley: each of a thousand vineyards might have been sold or let for a thousand shekels, yearly rent of excellent vineyards.

“Thousand”—vineyards of Judah (5:1–7) gone to thorn.

Calvin: where the richest cultivation was, briers. Sold for a trifle because there is none to cultivate. No vinedressers after the invading army.

“Thousand”—the vineyard of ch. 5 under the razor. Both traditions hear: thousand vines, thousand shekels, briers, thorns.

People will go there with arrows and with bow, because all the land will be briers and thorns. Wesley: either to hunt, or to defend themselves from wild beasts that abide in desolate grounds.

Hunting ground where vines were.

Calvin: where the richest cultivation existed, opportunity for hunting; wild beasts have their dens. A wretched change: fields turned into woods. Not approached by husbandmen but by hunters.

“Bow”—frightful desolation. Common reading: bow, arrows, briers, thorns.

As for all the hills that were cultivated with the hoe, you shall not come there for fear of briers and thorns; they will become pasture for cattle and ground trampled by sheep. Wesley: hills that used to be dug for vines or choice fruit; fences broken, owners slain or carried away; all sorts of cattle enter and feed.

The tended hill is pasture because the owners are gone. Immanuel was the sign; this is the requital after the refusal.

Calvin: hills once remote become pasturage because men flee there. A most wretched state, when men cannot escape death but by resorting to thorns. Ahaz would despise this, settled on his lees after the siege lifted, relying on Assyria. Isaiah perseveres: destruction would come from the quarter from which he expected preservation.

The ally is the ruin. Common to both: hills, hoe, fear of briers, cattle, sheep.