Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.
Ver. 14. Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign.] Give it you, ingratiis vestris, without your leave, of his own proffer. "If we believe not, yet God remaineth faithful." 2Ti 2:13 Rom 3:3 The house of David was as it were great with child with Christ and with God's promises in him; therefore, to be sure, it could not be rooted out, as these two kings designed, before Christ were come into the world. Hence his wonderful conception and birth is made here a sign of his people's safety here and salvation hereafter. And had Ahaz and his people believed this latter, they would not have much doubted of the former, but rather argued with St Paul, "Having given us his Son, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?" Rom 8:32
A sign.] A singular sign - a sign both from above and from beneath; for he joined lumen suae aeternitatis limo tuae mortalitatis, a the light of his eternity to the mud of thy mortality, as a father hath it. Joh 1:14 Php 2:6-7
Behold.] A note of attention and admiration. One compareth it to the sounding of a trumpet before some notable proclamation; another to a hand in the margin pointing to some remarkable matter. So doth this Ecce to Christ's incarnation as a thing in God's decree and to his people's faith already present.
A virgin.] Hagnalmah, that famous virgin, b so long since spoken of; Gen 3:15 that female glory, the Virgin Mary, with whom the angel spake concerning man's salvation, Matthew 1:18 ; Matthew 1:23 Luke 1:27 ; Luk 1:35 as the devil before had done with the first woman, concerning the means of his destruction. Of this virgin mother the sybils are said thus to have prophesied also: -
“ Virginis in corpus voluit dimittere caelo
Ipse Deus prolem, cure nuntiat Angelus almae
Matri, quae miseros contracta sorde levabit. ”
See more in Virgil's 4th Eclog., and Aug. de Civ. Dei, lib. x. cap. 27. Some tell us that when this blessed virgin brought forth there was seen at Rome about the sun the likeness of a woman carrying a child in her arms, and a voice heard saying, Pan, the great God, is born into the world.
Shall conceive and bear a son. ] Shiloh, the son of her secundine Gen 49:10 the true Melchizedek, as man without father, and as God without mother. Heb 7:3 Luk 1:35 But how blank were the Jews when they saw the issue of their late Jewish virgin turned to a daughter! and how silly is that saying of theirs in their Tulmud; c For our sins, which are many, the coming of the Messiah is deferred. Jachiades, upon those words in Daniel 12:4, would have us believe that God sealed up the time of Christ's coming, revealing it to Daniel only. But why take they not notice that the very time of Messiah the prince's coming is set down by Daniel? Dan 9:24-27 and since that time is long since past, let them either condemn the prophet of vanity, or else confess with us that Christ is come already.
And shall call.] Or, Thou (virgin) shalt call, as having the right of nomination.
His name Immanuel.] That is, God with us. as Mat 1:23 See Trapp on " Mat 1:23 " Cuius nomen illius numen facile declarabit. Christ, indeed, was not called by this name Immanuel that we anywhere read of, as neither was Solomon by the name of Jedediah, 2Sa 12:25-26 unless it be Isaiah 8:8; but the import of this name is most truly affirmed and acknowledged to be fully made good in him.
a Bernard.
b Haec simul est genitrix, filia, sponsa Dei. Tot tibi sunt dotes Virgo, quot sidera caelo.
c Sanhed., cap. xi.