The Unbelieving Response of the Majority To God (Isaiah 29:9-14).
There are at least two ways of looking at this passage. One is to see it as Isaiah's words prior to God's amazing deliverance, seeking to inculcate faith but seeing instead obstinacy, in which case Isaiah 29:14 points to that event, the other is to see it as Isaiah's words after that amazing deliverance when the careless final response of the majority of the people to it has left him baffled. The modern Christian is similarly amazed that men do not see the glory of Christ and follow Him.
Analysis.
a Make yourselves hesitate, and wonder. Blind yourselves (literally ‘be smeared', and to do with the eyes), and be blind (Isaiah 29:9 b).
b They are drunk, but not with wine, they stagger, but not with strong drink, for Yahweh has poured out on you the spirit of deep sleep, and has closed your eyes, the prophets, and has covered your heads, the seers (Isaiah 29:10).
c And all vision has become to you as the words of a book which is sealed, which men deliver over to one who is learned, saying, “Read this, I beg you”. And he says, “I cannot for it is sealed”. And the book is delivered to him who is not learned, saying, “Read this I pray you”, and he says, “I am not learned” (Isaiah 29:12).
c And the Lord said, “Forasmuch as these people draw near to me with their mouth, and honour me with their lips, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear of me is but a commandment of men which has been taught them,
b Therefore behold I will proceed to do a marvellous work among this people, even a marvellous work and a wonder.
a And the wisdom of their wise men will perish, and the understanding of their astute men will be hid.
In ‘a' the people are seen at work making themselves hesitate and wonder and then putting a blind on their eyes and blinding their own eyes, and in the parallel the wisdom and understanding of both their wise and astute men will cease and be hidden. In ‘b' their state is seen to be the action of Yahweh who has poured out on them the spirit of stupor and in the parallel it is described as a marvellous work, a work and a wonder. There is nothing as wondrous as the unbelief of men in the face of God revealing His mighty works as he did at Jerusalem with Sennacherib. Or alternately the parallel may mean that He did a marvellous work and a wonder, but because of their stupor they did not appreciate it. In ‘c' all vision has been hid from them because of their unwillingness to see, and in the parallel it is because they have withdrawn their hearts from Him.
‘Make yourselves hesitate, and wonder,
Blind yourselves (literally ‘be smeared', and to do with the eyes), and be blind.
They are drunk, but not with wine,
They stagger, but not with strong drink,
For Yahweh has poured out on you the spirit of deep sleep,
And has closed your eyes, the prophets, and has covered your heads, the seers.
And all vision has become to you as the words of a book which is sealed,
Which men deliver over to one who is learned,
Saying, “Read this, I beg you”. And he says, “I cannot for it is sealed.”
And the book is delivered to him who is not learned,
Saying, “Read this I pray you”, and he says, “I am not learned”.
The use of the imperative vividly brings out Isaiah's own perplexity and growing awareness of the obduracy of the people. Although God had warned Him that the people would mainly continue to be blind he still found it difficult to take in. If this was before the great deliverance it expresses his growing awareness of their deliberate blindness. If this was after the event, the wonder of what happened at the deliverance of Jerusalem would have come home strongly to him, and it represents him as seeing that it had left many of them unchanged. Momentarily, in the exultation of the moment, they might have become convinced but they will soon deliberately begin to hesitate, and then wonder if it ever happened. They will smear over their own eyes by means of their doubt and unwillingness to believe, thus they will finish up blind. They will convince themselves that there was a natural explanation, talk it down and shrug off its effects. They will have seen a wonder of the world and will remain unchanged, even hardened. (Just as the Pharisees will later do with Jesus in the face of even greater wonders).
In either case Isaiah cannot understand it. He is baffled. So he speaks to them almost as in a daze. ‘Make yourselves hesitate (reflexive) and wonder.' He is warning them that if they make themselves hesitate, they will soon begin to wonder whether God will indeed work, or whether He has so worked. Rather they should respond to Yahweh's amazing act, or His past acts, with full belief and gladness of heart. But he senses their hesitation, and fears what the result will be. They will go on hesitating and then they will begin to wonder in the end whether it meant anything significant at all. His words are drawn out of him almost unwillingly, as he warns them what the result of their attitude will be. By smearing up their own vision they will become blind. It is always dangerous to hesitate when the call comes to ‘follow Me'.
If this refers to before the event then the words are to be seen as a rebuke at their continuing unwillingness to trust Yahweh. As he sees their determined opposition to his position of trusting in Yahweh, the One Who in the past has acted so mightily on behalf of their people as their past history reveals, he can only see it as fulfilling what God had said to him at his inauguration as a prophet (Isaiah 6:8-12), that they would be subject to blind unbelief. If after then it is even more incredible, and the rebuke is to be seen as even stronger.
And so in either case he decides that there can be only one explanation for their attitude, it must be because they are drunk. But as he recognises that it must be with something more permanent than wine, he concludes that they must be staggering about, seemingly incapable of understanding, not because of what they have drunk, but because Yahweh has poured out on them a spirit of deep sleep. They are in a divinely wrought coma. It is the only explanation that comes to hand. Indeed on top of their own obduracy he sees an even deeper wonder, that those who profess to be their eyes, who should have helped them to appreciate what had happened, the prophets, seem to have their own eyes closed, while those who should have been in a position to explain everything, the seers, seem to have had their heads covered over lest they see.
His perplexity is understandable. It is always difficult for one who believes to understand deep doubt. Everything seems so clear to believers. Thus they can only then conclude that if there is doubt it is Yahweh's work. It must be because He wants it that way. And in the end they are right. Not because He wants men to be blind and directly acts, but because He has made mankind as he is, to grow in doubt if he refuses to believe. So such blindness and hesitation are not Yahweh's direct work. They are the result of sin and rebellion, and of an unwillingness to be in submission to God. They are the result of man's obstinate free will. And Isaiah sees that that is the case here.
‘And all vision has become to you as the words of a book which is sealed, which men deliver over to one who is learned, saying, “Read this, I beg you”. And he says, “I cannot. The book is sealed.” But he recognises that this is not the result of their extra intelligence. It is because they have closed minds. So he tells these men that they are like those who have a sealed book, which is full of knowledge, but to them it is hidden knowledge because they will not open the seal. In the same way, something has clearly sealed their minds so that they have failed to grasp the significance of what God's activity past or present really means. And when they go to the learned (the prophet and the seer) and beg them to read it, they will demur. They cannot, they say, for the book is sealed, that is, they cannot understand it. But this would not be humility, it would be stubbornness and unwillingness, a further example of blindness. They do not want to see God's ways, they prefer their own.
Then in their perfidy the people take the book to one who is unlearned, and ask him to read, and he refuses, saying, “I am not learned (cannot read fluently)”. No one wants to make the attempt.