Isaiah 45:1-8 - Arthur Peake's Commentary on the Bible

Reader Related Verse
Bible Comments

Isaiah 44:24 to Isaiah 45:8. Yahweh's Commission to Cyrus. Yahweh reminds Israel of His power as sole Creator of the universe. What He created He still controls, so that He falsifies the predictions deduced by the soothsayers from the omens, and makes the diviners look foolish, while He fulfils the predictions of His servants (read plural), the prophets. He it is who has decreed the restoration of Jerusalem, the Temple, and the cities of Judah. The hindrances are compared to a flood, which He will dry up (Exodus 14). He it is who calls Cyrus the shepherd of His people. To Cyrus, whom He has anointed for this commission, whom He supports in his career of victory, delivering to him all fortified cities, He has promised that He will go before him, smoothing difficulties from his path. Brazen gates and the iron bars that strengthen them He will shatter. He will give him the treasures hoarded in secret chambers, Babylon's spoils of conquest. Yet not for his own sake, but for Israel's, has Yahweh called him, though he knew Him not, and given him a title of honour. He, the only God, will gird Cyrus with strength, but kings who oppose him He will disarm, that all men may know He is Yahweh, sole controller of the fates of mankind. Let the heavens flood the earth with righteousness: from the womb of the earth let deliverance and prosperity spring forth, and let the earth produce the triumph of His people.

Isaiah 44:24. is: rather was, i.e. at the creation.

Isaiah 44:25. liars: render, soothsayers.

Isaiah 44:28. Oriental rulers often styled themselves shepherd of the nation.

Isaiah 45:1. loose the loins of: i.e. ungird, and consequently disarm.

Isaiah 45:7. peace: render, prosperity. create: delete as repetition from preceding clause. [If a dualistic doctrine is tacitly attacked here, whose doctrine was it? J. H. Moulton (Early Zoroastrianism, p. 220) says it was that of teachers essentially akin to the Magi. He adds: The existence of such a dualistic tendency within the field from which he drew his observations does not prove any nexus between the Magi and Babylon, unless in their accepting Babylonian ideas as they accepted Persian. But the dualism in question may quite well have been Magian and not Babylonian at all. evil: calamity, not moral evil. A. S. P.].

Isaiah 45:8. Drop down: transitive, having same object as pour down. righteousness: victory. together: render, also.

Related Commentaries of Isaiah 45:1

Isaiah 45:1-8

1 Thus saith the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden, to subdue nations before him; and I will loose the loins of kings, to open before him the two leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut;

2 I will go before thee, and make the crooked places straight: I will break in pieces the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron:

3 And I will give thee the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that thou mayest know that I, the LORD, which call thee by thy name, am the God of Israel.

4 For Jacob my servant's sake, and Israel mine elect, I have even called thee by thy name: I have surnamed thee, though thou hast not known me.

5 I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me: I girded thee, though thou hast not known me:

6 That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the LORD, and there is none else.

7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

8 Drop down, ye heavens, from above, and let the skies pour down righteousness: let the earth open, and let them bring forth salvation, and let righteousness spring up together; I the LORD have created it.