Commentary on Isaiah Volume 2 John Calvin
COMMENTARY ON ISAIAH
immediately obey the command of God. In this way he enjoins believers to gird themselves manfully for the work, as if many workmen were ready to give assistance, and the emphatic repetition of the word ("Level, level") deserves notice as intended to express certainty.
Pave it with stones. {( }סקלsikkel) sometimes means to remove stones, and sometimes to pave with stones; and I think that it ought rather to be understood here in this latter signification, though commentators are generally of a different opinion. 413
Lift up a standard to the peoples. This is of the same import with the former clause; for the Prophet means that the peoples shall obey the command of God, in the same manner as subjects are wont to obey princes; for they shall assemble and run together when "the standard is lifted up," and shall lend their aid to bring back the people; and thus he extols in lofty terms the power of God, that the Jews might be fully persuaded that they would one day be restored. 414
11. Behold, Jehovah hath, proclaimed. He means that the Lord, by acting miraculously and beyond the judgment or expectation of the flesh, will cause all the nations to know that this is done by his command. It might be objected, How shall it be brought about that the peoples, who now make fierce resistance to God, shall become obedient to him? He assigns the reason, "Because the Lord will proclaim your return, so that they shall acknowledge that at his command you are restored."
Say ye to the daughter of Zion. Undoubtedly this refers literally to the ministers of the word and to the prophets, whom the Lord invests with this office of promising deliverance and salvation to the Church. And hence we conclude that these promises are not merely limited to a single age, but must be extended to the end of the world; for, beginning at the return from Babylon into Judea, we must advance as far as the coming of Christ, by which this prophecy was at length accomplished, and redemption was brought to a conclusion; for the Savior came, when the grace of God was proclaimed by the Gospel. In a word, he foretells that the voice of God shall one day resound from the rising to the setting of the sun, and shall be heard, not by a single nation only, but by all nations.
Behold, the Savior cometh. This is a word which, we know, belongs peculiarly to the Gospel; and therefore he bids the teachers of the Church
413"The words {{( }מאבן{ סקלוsakkelu meeben) are used elliptically for {( }מאבן{, }הדרך{ }סקלוsakkelu hadderek meeben,) 'remove the stones from the road;' for ,{( }סקלsikkel,) which.in general means 'to stone, or to throw stones,' as {}ויסקל ( }דוד{, }את{ }באבנים{vayesakkel baabanim eth David,) (2 Samuel 16:6, 13,) here means to take away many stones, as in Isaiah
5:2; and {( }מאבןmeeben,) as Jarchi remarks, is equivalent to {( }אבן{, }שם{ }מהיותmihyoth sham eben,) 'that there may be no stones there,' at which travellers might stumble. Thus, 'I will make them ,{( }מאדםmeadam) from a man;' that is, that not a man shall be left. (Hosea 9:12.)" — Rosenmuller.
414"Here the style of the Prophet is very Pindarical. First, he speaks to the captives, as if he saw them near the gates of Babylon, and bids them go through them, that is, pass out of the place of their captivity; then, as if he saw workmen in the road, he bids them level the ground, and make it plain, that they may not be tired by ascending and descending steep precipices, nor hurt their feet with sharp stones; then, as if they had not yet received notice of their deliverance, or were not informed of the place where they were to rendezvous, in order to return altogether, he commands a standard to be erected for the people, that is, over their heads, so high that it might he seen by those at the greatest distance." — White.