Woe unto them that decree unrighteous decrees
Crime under colour of law
The prophet has described the sins of Ephraim in a general manner; but on the mention of Judah he proceeds to denounce what we know from the whole tenor of his discourses he felt to be the worst form of the guilt of his own people, with a particularity which it is perhaps not fanciful to attribute to his thoughts being now directed homewards.
The Ten Tribes were far more ferocious and anarchical than the men of Judah; there are more indications in the latter of that national respect for law which so characterises the English, that it has been observed (by Lord Campbell), that though history attributes to us our share in national wickedness, our crimes have almost always been committed under colour of law, and not by open violence,--as in the series of judicial murders in the reigns of Henry VIII, Charles II, and James II. And thus Isaiah, recurring to Judah, denounces the utmost severity of God’s wrath in the day in which He, the righteous Judge, shall come to visit “an hypocritical nation,” whose nobles and magistrates decree, and execute, unrighteous decrees,--“to turn aside the needy from judgment,” etc. (verse 2). They are satisfied, that they are safe in their heartless selfishness, with peace at home and protection abroad restored by their statecraft and their alliance with Assyria. But while they thus rejoice at home, “desolation cometh from afar.” To whom will they fly for help when God has abandoned them? Under whose protection will they leave their wealth, their dignities, their glory, which they have been heaping up for themselves? Captivity or death are the only prospects before them. And yet, as though no judgments could sufficiently condemn and punish their utter wickedness, me prophet repeats--“For all this His anger is not turned away, but His hand stretched out still.” (Sir E. Strachey, Bart.)
God against all unrighteousness
The Lord’s voice is always for righteousness, What is it that is denounced? It the very thing that is to be denounced evermore. There is nothing local or temporary in this cause of Divine offence. The Lord is against all unrighteous decrees, unnatural alliances, and evil compacts. This is the very glory of the majesty of omnipotence, that it is enlisted against even form of evil and wrong. Then, “Woe unto them that decree unrighteous decrees, and that write grievousness which they have prescribed”--scribes or registrars who preserve all the forms of the court, and keep their pens busy upon the court register, writing down every case, and appearing to do the business correctly and thoughtfully; and yet, all the while, these very registrars were themselves plotting “to take away the right from the poor, that widows may be their prey, and that they may rob the fatherless.” The court of law was turned into a means of robbery, as it is in nearly every country under the sun. The scribes who wrote down the law were men who secretly or overtly broke it; the judge used his ermine as a cloak, that under its concealment he might thrust his hand farther into the property of those who had no helper. “For all this His auger is not turned away.” Blessed be His name! Oh, burn Thou against us all; mighty, awful, holy God, burn more and more, until we learn by fire what we can never learn by pity. The Lord speaks evermore for the poor, for the widow, for the fatherless, for the helpless. (J. Parker, D. D.)
Oppressors of the poor and needy
I. THE INDICTMENT drawn up against these oppressors (Isaiah 10:1-2). They are charged--
1. With making wicked laws and edicts. Woe to the superior powers that devise and decree these decrees; they are not too high to be under the Divine check; and woe to the inferior officers that draw them up, and enter them upon record, “the writers that write the grievousness,” they are not too mean to be within the Divine cognisance. Principal and accessories shall fall under the same woe.
2. With perverting justice in the execution of the laws that were made. No people had statutes and judgments” so righteous as they had; and yet corrupt judges found ways to turn aside the needy from judgment, to hinder them from coming at their right.
3. With enriching themselves by oppressing those that lay at their mercy, whom they ought to have protected.
II. A CHALLENGE given them, with all their pride and power, to outface the judgments of God (Isaiah 10:3). Will there not come a desolation upon those that have made others desolate? Perhaps it may come from far, and therefore may he long in coming, but it will come at last. Reprieves are not pardons.
1. There is a day of visitation coming, a day of inquiry and discovery, a searching day which will bring to light, to a true light, every man and every man’s work.
2. The day of visitation will be a day of desolation to all wicked people, when all their comforts and hopes will be lost and gone.
3. Impenitent sinners will be utterly at a loss, and will not know what to do in the day of visitation and desolation.
4. It concerns us all seriously to consider what we shall do in the day of visitation--in a day of affliction, in the day of death and judgment, and to provide that we may do well.
III. SENTENCE PASSED UPON THEM, by which they are doomed, some to imprisonment and captivity. (Matthew Henry.)
Legalised injustice
I. MAGISTRATES AND RULERS ARE ANSWERABLE TO GOD.
II. THEIR DECISIONS WILL BE REVISED.
III. THEIR DECISIONS WILL IN MANY INSTANCES BE REVERSED.
IV. THE CONSEQUENCES OF THEIR INJUSTICE WILL RETURN BACK UPON THEMSELVES. (J. Lyth, D. D.)
Oppression resisted
(Taxation of Henry VIII):--In every county a tenth was demanded from the laity and a fourth from the clergy by the royal commissioners. But the demand was met by a general resistance. .. A revolt actually broke out among the weavers of Suffolk; the men of Cambridge banded for resistance; the Norwich clothiers, though they yielded at first, soon threatened to rise. “Who is your captain?” the Duke of Norfolk asked the crowd. “His name is Poverty,” was the answer, “for he and his cousin Necessity have brought us to this doing.” There was, in fact, a general strike of the employers. Cloth makers discharged their workers, farmers put away their servants. “They say the king asketh so much that they be not able to do as they have done before this time.” Such a peasant insurrection as was raging in Germany was only prevented by the unconditional withdrawal of the royal demand. (J. R. Green’s English People.)