Isaiah 28:20,21 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Bible Comments

For the bed is shorter, &c. For those lying refuges, to which you trust, will not be able to give you that protection which you expect from them, no more than a man can stretch himself upon a bed that is too short for him. For the Lord shall rise up as in mount Perazim Where he fought against the Philistines, 2 Samuel 5:20. He shall be wroth as in Gibeon Where he fought against the Canaanites, (Joshua 10:10, &c.,) and afterward against the Philistines, 1 Chronicles 14:16. That he may do his strange work For this work of bringing total destruction upon Israel was contrary to the benignity of his own nature, and to the usual way of dealing with his people. The calamities and alarms occasioned by the Assyrian invasion under Sennacherib were a partial accomplishment of this prophecy. It was still more fully accomplished in the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, and the Babylonish captivity: but certainly it did not receive its perfect fulfilment till the destruction of that city, and of the church and state of the Jews by the Romans, after their obstinate rejection of their Messiah, the corner- stone, here spoken of. This alone fully answers the import of these awful predictions of divine wrath and vengeance.

Isaiah 28:20-21

20 For the bed is shorter than that a man can stretch himself on it: and the covering narrower than that he can wrap himself in it.

21 For the LORD shall rise up as in mount Perazim, he shall be wroth as in the valley of Gibeon, that he may do his work, his strange work; and bring to pass his act, his strange act.