Isaiah 6:9,10 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

And he said, Go, &c.— In this commission given by God to the prophet, we have, first, the preface, in which he is enjoined to bear God's denunciation to the Jewish people; whom God does not as usual call his people, but this people; Go and tell this people. We have, secondly, the words themselves, comprehending the divine command, and which God puts into the mouth of the prophet; words, which we find frequently repeated, at least as to their sense, in the gospels, where we shall have occasion to speak more fully concerning them. See Exodus 9:34. In the style of Scripture, the prophets are said to do what they declare will be done; therefore the words, Make the heart of this people fat, is as much as to say, "Denounce my judgments upon this people, that their hearts shall be fat, &c." This prophesy might relate, in some measure, to the state of the Jews before the Babylonish captivity, but it did not receive its full completion till the days of our Saviour; and in this sense it is understood and applied by the writers of the New Testament, and by our Lord himself. The prophet is informed in the 11th and 12th verses, which contain the third part of the divine commission, that this infidelity and obstinacy of his countrymen will be of long duration. There is a remarkable gradation in denouncing these judgments: Not only Jerusalem and the cities should be wasted without inhabitant, but even the single houses should be without men; and not only the houses of the city should be without men, but even the country should be utterly desolate; not only the people should be removed out of the land, but the Lord should remove them far away; and they should not be removed for a short period, but there should be a great, or rather a long forsaking in the midst of the land. And has not the world seen all these particulars exactly fulfilled? Have not the Jews laboured under a spiritual blindness and infatuation, in hearing but not understanding, in seeing but not perceiving the Messiah, after the accomplishment of so many prophesies, after the performance of so many miracles? And in consequence of their refusal to convert and be healed, have not their cities been wasted, and their houses without men? Have they not been removed far away, into the most distant parts of the earth? and has not their removal or banishment been now of about 1700 years duration? And do they not still continue deaf and blind, obstinate and unbelieving? The Jews, at the time of the delivery of this prophesy, gloried in being the peculiar church and people of God; and would any Jew of himself have thought or have said, that this nation would, in process of time, become an infidel and rejected nation; infidel and rejected for many ages, oppressed by men, and forsaken as a nation by God? It was above 750 years before Christ that Isaiah predicted these things; and how could he have predicted them, unless he had been illuminated by the divine vision; or how could they have succeeded accordingly, unless the spirit of prophesy had been the Spirit of God? See Bishop Newton on the Prophesies, vol. 1: p. 233 and Vitringa.