Eventually The Curse will Result In Blessing For God's Own People (Isaiah 24:4-15).
The reason for the coming judgment is clearly stated. It will occur because of man's disobedience to God. That will be why the curse is on the earth, and its inhabitants will be found guilty, and the result will be that all the things which mankind enjoys will be removed. But out from the midst of the chaos the remnant, the gleanings, will lift up their voices at the majesty of Yahweh and He will receive worldwide glory. History will continue to be a record of both judgment and salvation.
Analysis.
a The earth mourns and withers,, the world languishes and withers, the high people of the earth languish, the earth also is polluted under its inhabitants (Isaiah 24:4-5 a).
b Because they have transgressed the laws (torahs), changed the ordinance (statute), broken the everlasting covenant (Isaiah 24:5 b).
c That is why the curse has devoured the earth, and those who dwell in it are found guilty. Therefore the inhabitants of the earth are burned, and few men are left (Isaiah 24:6).
d The new wine mourns, the vine languishes, all the merry-hearted sigh, the gaiety of tambourines ceases, the noise of those who rejoice ends, the joy of the harp ceases (Isaiah 24:7-8).
e They will not drink wine with a song (Isaiah 24:9 a).
e Strong drink will be bitter to those who drink it (Isaiah 24:9 b).
d The city of wastedness (tohu) is broken down, every house is shut up that no man might come in. There is crying in the streets because of the wine, all joy has reached its eventide, the mirth of the land has gone into captivity, in the city desolation is left, and the gate is smitten with destruction (Isaiah 24:10-12).
c For thus will it be in the midst of the earth, among the peoples, as the shaking of an olive tree, as the grape gleanings when the vintage is done (Isaiah 24:13).
b These will lift up their voice, they will shout. For the majesty of Yahweh they cry from the sea (Isaiah 24:14).
a Wherefore glorify Yahweh in the lights (fires), even the name of Yahweh the God of Israel, in the isles of the sea (Isaiah 24:15).
The parallels in ‘a' and ‘b' are parallels of contrast, the kind of contrasts regular in Isaiah. On the one hand there is little hope, but on the other, there is hope brought by God. So in ‘a' the whole world mourns and languishes, including its leading figures, while in the parallel some in the far off lands glorify Yahweh and His name. Always among the devastation are those who respond to God and worship Him. In ‘b' man has broken God's laws and spurned His covenant, while in the parallel in the midst of the earth are the gleanings who will shout at the majesty of Yahweh. In ‘c' the curse devours the earth, men are guilty and few are left, and in the parallel what remains will be like what is shaken from the olive tree and like the gleanings from the grapes. In ‘d' we have the cessation of all revelry, and in the parallel the wasted city producing the same results. In ‘e' the wine will not be enjoyable, and in the parallel the strong drink will be almost undrinkable.
‘The earth mourns and withers,
The world languishes and withers,
The high people of the earth languish.'
There will not only be war and earthquakes, but also blight and devastation. As ever man will misuse the world. The ‘earth' will be in mourning and ‘wither', it will languish and wither, it will be blighted, so much so that even the important, the rich and the wealthy, will suffer. The curse (Isaiah 24:5 compare Genesis 3:17-19; Genesis 8:21) will be exacted in its fullness.
This will be the course of history, this will be the end of history, for God's wrath is continually revealed and will be to the end. The message all through is that man cannot produce his own hoped for Utopia, but will be the same to the end. Whether it be through war or pollution and misuse of the world man is out of control. It is only God who has the final solution. As we look at the world today with man pouring pollution into the atmosphere, and unable to contain it because to do so will interfere with his pleasure, and that in spite of his knowledge of what is happening, with ever growing amounts of pollution coming from poorer countries as they seek to become richer, so that things can only get rapidly worse, we can only wait, knowing that these final days will come.
‘The earth also is polluted under its inhabitants,
Because they have transgressed the laws (torahs),
Changed the ordinance (statute),
Broken the everlasting covenant.
Therefore has the curse devoured the earth,
And those who dwell in it are found guilty.
Therefore the inhabitants of the earth are burned,
And few men are left.'
The reason for all this is the pollution of the earth by its inhabitants. They have brought it all on themselves, and sin is the greatest pollutant. It is because they have gone against God's instructions (His torahs), they have changed what was permanently inscribed as God's ordinance (the word for ordinance or statute is taken from a root ‘engrave' and signifies something permanently laid down), they have broken the everlasting covenant. In view of the parallels with Genesis in the narrative this covenant presumably refers to the everlasting covenant of Genesis 9:16 where the shedding of blood was regulated (compare Numbers 35:33). (Isaiah regularly connects this passage with the first Chapter s of Genesis. Note the idea of the curse given in the Garden (Isaiah 24:6) and the blighted earth (Isaiah 24:4) as compared with Genesis 3:17-19; the reference to the windows of heaven (Isaiah 24:18) as compared with Genesis 7:11; the reference to the everlasting covenant of Genesis 9:16 here; the wine drinking that results in misery (Isaiah 24:7-9), as compared with Genesis 9:20-27; and the reference to the scattering of the inhabitants as at Babel (Isaiah 24:6) in Genesis 11:4. So he sees man as still closely connected with his beginnings and as having broken the everlasting covenant.
Thus mankind is seen as still under God's instruction, an instruction given through their consciences, which instructs them in God's ways, and gives them a sense of natural justice which brings them under the curse (compare Romans 2:14-16). They are seen as bound by His covenant with Noah. And they are seen as blood guilty, and therefore as in breach of that covenant.
It will be noted that the world is assumed to be under similar restrictions to Israel, even though Israel's were more specific. Israel were bound by the Torah (the Law, the Instruction), and by ordinance and by everlasting covenant (Psalms 105:9-10). The world is seen as being bound by a kind of prototype of these, torahs (‘instructions') which have been established in custom and in conscience (consider Genesis 26:5), of which all men are aware in one way or another (Romans 2:14-16). This comes out to some extent in the great wisdom literature and in the great law codes which have been discovered. They are bound by an ordinance established in man's conscience. But these ‘instructions', once understood, have been deliberately transgressed, have been deliberately changed in order to suit men's tastes and tendencies, and have been deliberately broken because rejected. Mankind is therefore seen as being as guilty as Israel even though the world's revelation from God was of a more general nature than Israel's (compare Romans 1:18 onwards). They close their eyes and are darkened in their minds, and thrust away the demands of conscience.
So the devouring of the earth is to be because of the renewed curse arising from man's sinfulness, the curse first put on man in the Garden of Eden (compare Genesis 3:17-19; Genesis 8:21), now renewed on the people of the world who are all found guilty. The phrase ‘those who dwell on earth' is regularly used in Revelation to indicate those who live regardlessly and do not respond to God. Thus the inhabitants of earth will be burned in the heat of God's burning anger so that only a comparatively small number remain.
The few may be the elect as so often in Isaiah (Isaiah 6:13). ‘Those who find it are few' (Matthew 7:14). Or it may simply indicate a depopulated world.
‘The new wine mourns,
The vine languishes,
All the merry-hearted sigh.
The gaiety of tambourines ceases,
The noise of those who rejoice ends,
The joy of the harp ceases.
They will not drink wine with a song.
Strong drink will be bitter to those who drink it.'
These short staccato lines bring out the speedy failure of man's demand for worldly pleasures. Men had said confidently, ‘let us eat and drink for tomorrow we will die' (Isaiah 22:13), but when the end approaches for nations this philosophy will not work. Indeed it never works for long. The new wine and the vine will be blighted (compare Isaiah 24:4; Isaiah 24:7). Those whose hearts are set on merriment will sigh instead. There will be no music and dancing, no joyful singing. When men drink wine it will be in gloominess. Their very drink will have turned bitter to them. The hedonist will become the moaner. The good times will have gone. Wine and song will no longer satisfy.
‘The city of wastedness (tohu) is broken down,
Every house is shut up that no man might come in.
There is crying in the streets because of the wine,
All joy has reached its eventide,
The mirth of the land has gone into captivity.
In the city desolation is left,
And the gate is smitten with destruction.'
Every land will have its ‘city of wastedness'. The reference here to tohu (formlessness, wastedness) as in Genesis 1:2 takes us back to that formlessness prior to when God spoke and light resulted. This is the city which is as empty and formless as the earth was before light came and before shape was given to creation. It is broken down, its houses are uninhabited because their inhabitants have been cast out into the streets; wine, the very stay of man's life, has ceased to be available; darkness has enveloped all joy; mirth has been taken captive. The world has, as it were, reverted to what it was before God created it, to being ‘tohu'. This refers to each city in the world, as symbolised by the world city. Those places of abounding mirth and jollity are now dark, gloomy and empty. All that is left in the city is desolation. Its very gate through which once flowed the life of the city, and which was also their protection in time of trouble, is a ruin. All that its inhabitants dreamed of has gone. Such is life finally without God, total disaster.
‘For thus will it be in the midst of the earth,
Among the peoples,
As the shaking of an olive tree,
As the grape gleanings when the vintage is done.'
The fewness of the remaining inhabitants (Isaiah 24:6) and the emptiness of the city (Isaiah 24:10-12) is illustrated by the remnants of what comes from the shaking of the olive tree, producing but a little fruit, and by the gleanings of the grapevine after harvesting, when but few gleanings are left (compare Isaiah 17:6). In Israel the gleanings were left for the poor. These represent the remnant who escape from God's judgments (compare Isaiah 6:13). In the words of Jesus, ‘Blessed are the poor, for the Kingly Rule of God is theirs' (Isaiah 61:1; Isaiah 66:2; Luke 6:20; Matthew 5:3).
‘These will lift up their voice, they will shout. For the majesty of Yahweh they cry from the sea. Wherefore glorify Yahweh in the lights (fires), even the name of Yahweh the God of Israel, in the isles of the sea.'
But all is not gloom, for these gleanings, these few, these poor, will lift up their voices and shout. They will declare from the sea (that is the west - the Great Sea was to the west) the majesty of Yahweh. Then Isaiah calls on the east and the farthest isles of the sea to ‘glorify Yahweh'. ‘In the lights' (or ‘fires') is probably a plural of intensity referring to the rising of the light of the sun at daybreak, with its numerous rays shining out, and therefore referring to the east. The isles of the sea, the distant parts, are also to glorify Yahweh, the God of Israel. Those who remain, not only of Israel, but also of the whole earth, will give Him praise. (Compare Isaiah 42:10-12; Isaiah 44:23).
This was what God was aiming for (compare the holy seed in Isaiah 6:13). In the midst of all the devastation God's word has reached out far and wide accomplishing His purpose, and in the midst of the world's devastation will shine out those whom God has separated out to Himself. Out of the seeming fires of destruction will come the refined gold of His people. This sudden turning from gloom to joy is typical of Isaiah. Out of disaster will come blessing.