Isaiah 27:1 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

In that day, &c. This verse, which Bishop Lowth considers as being connected with the last two verses of the preceding chapter, is translated by him as follows: “In that day shall Jehovah punish with his sword; his well-tempered, and great, and strong sword; Leviathan the rigid serpent, and Leviathan the winding serpent: and shall slay the monster that is in the sea.” And he observes, “The animals here mentioned seem to be, the crocodile, rigid, by the stiffness of the back-bone, so that he cannot readily turn himself when he pursues his prey; hence the easiest way of escaping from him is by making frequent and short turnings: the serpent, or dragon, flexible and winding, which coils himself up in a circular form; the sea-monster, or the whale. These are used allegorically, without doubt, for great potentates, enemies and persecutors of the people of God; but to specify the particular persons or states designed by the prophet under these images, is a matter of great difficulty.” Vitringa, who considers the prophecy contained in verse 19 of the preceding chapter, as referring to the deliverance granted to the Jews under the Maccabees, thinks that by the first two of these creatures, the piercing, or rigid serpent, and the crooked, or winding serpent, “the kingdoms of Egypt and Assyria are meant, as they existed after the times of Alexander the Great; and by the whale, the kingdom of Arabia, and the other neighbouring nations, which were adversaries to the people of God; or that by these three animals are to be understood the persecutors and adversaries of the church, who should exist successively in the world, and be destroyed by the divine judgments.” But whether this be the right interpretation of the allegory is much to be questioned.