Isaiah 47:9 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

These two things shall come to thee— This prophesy was twice fulfilled; having been accomplished the very night that Babylon was taken, when the Persian slew the king himself, and a great number of the Babylonians: and it was fulfilled a second time, when besieged by Darius. Being determined to hold out to the last extremity, they took all their women, and each man choosing one of them whom he liked best out of his own family, they strangled all the rest, that unnecessary mouths might not consume their provisions. By means of this shocking expedient they sustained the siege and all the efforts of Darius for twenty months, and the city was at last taken by stratagem. As soon as Darius had made himself master of the place, he ordered 3000 of the principal men to be crucified, and thus this prophesy was signally fulfilled, both by the hands of the Babylonians themselves, and by the cruelties exercised upon them by the conquerors. Bishop Newton. We may render the latter part of the verse, They shall come upon thee in their perfection, notwithstanding the multitude of thy sorceries, and the force of thy enchantments.