Isaiah 9:20 - Calvin's Commentary on the Bible

Bible Comments

20. Every one shall snatch on the right hand. It is equivalent to a phrase in common use, prendre et ravir a toutes mains , to take and seize at all hands. This mode of expression denotes either insatiable covetousness or insatiable cruelty; for the eagerness to snatch excites to savage cruelty. That they will be insatiable he expresses more emphatically, by saying that, in consequence of being impelled by blind fierceness and inconceivable rage, they will suck their brother’s blood as freely as they would devour the flesh which was their own property. The bitterness of the vengeance is greatly heightened by this circumstance, that the children of Abraham, and the holy posterity of the chosen race, break out into such beastly fury. Let us therefore remember that it is a dreadful proof of heavenly punishment, when brothers are hurried on, with irreconcilable eagerness, to inflict mutual wounds.

Isaiah 9:20

20 And he shall snatchf on the right hand, and be hungry; and he shall eat on the left hand, and they shall not be satisfied: they shall eat every man the flesh of his own arm: