Isaiah 65:21-23 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

They shall build houses and inhabit them The prophet here describes another privilege of the church in these happy days. They shall enjoy blessings the very reverse of the curses denounced on the disobedient, Deuteronomy 28:30. They shall plant vineyards and eat the fruit of them. See note on Isaiah 62:8. They shall not plant and another eat Which might happen, either through their enemies seizing the fruits of the trees they planted, or through their own premature death before those fruits were brought to perfection. For as the days of a tree are the days of my people Not like the fading of a leaf, to which our present frail state is often compared, but their age shall equal the duration of the trees planted by them; yea, of the oaks, the most long-lived of trees, supposed to last about a thousand years, being five hundred years growing to full perfection, and as many decaying; “which,” says Bishop Lowth, “seems to be a moderate and probable computation.” The LXX. translate this clause, γαρ τας ημερας του ξυλου της ζωης εσυνται αι ημεραι του λαου μου; As the days of the tree of life shall be the days of my people. They shall not labour in vain As those do who do not enjoy the fruit of their labour; nor bring forth Beget and bring forth children; for trouble Those that shall give them trouble by their bad conduct, or by the poverty and misery in which they shall be involved; for they are the seed of the blessed of the Lord, &c. There is a blessing entailed upon them by descent from their ancestors, which their offspring with them shall partake of; who shall be a comfort to them, and whom they shall have the happiness to see walking in the truth.