Albert Barnes Commentary Isaiah 7:25

"And all the hills that were digged with the mattock, thou shalt not come thither for fear of briers and thorns; but it shall be for the sending forth of oxen, and for the treading of sheep." — Isaiah 7:25 (ASV)

And on all hills ... - All the fertile places in the mountains that used to be cultivated with the spade. Vineyards were often planted on the sides of hills, and those places were among the most productive and fertile in the land; see (Isaiah 5:1).

The mattock - The spade; the garden hoe; or the weeding-hook. An instrument chiefly used, probably, in vineyards.

There shall not come thither - There shall not be.

The fear of briers and thorns - This phrase does not make sense as rendered, or if it does, it is not a sense consistent with the connection. The idea of the whole passage is that the land, even the most fertile parts of it, would be given up to briers and thorns; that is, to desolation.

The Hebrew here is ambiguous. It may mean, ‘you will not come there, for fear of the briers and thorns.’ That is, the place that was formerly so fertile, that was cultivated with the spade, will now be so completely covered with thorns and will furnish so convenient a resting place for wild beasts and reptiles as to deter a man from going there.

The Septuagint and the Syriac, however, understand it differently - as denoting that those places would still be cultivated. But this is evidently a departure from the sense of the connection.

Lowth understands it in the past tense: ‘where the fear of briers and thorns never came.’ The general idea of the passage is plain: that those places, once so highly cultivated, would now be desolate.

Shall be for the sending forth ... - This means it will be wild, uncultivated, and desolate - vast commons on which oxen and sheep will feed at large. Concerning “Lesser cattle”. The Hebrew is ‘Sheep, or the flock.’

Sheep were accustomed to range in deserts and uncultivated places and to obtain their subsistence there, under the guidance of the shepherd. The description, therefore, in these verses is one of extensive and wide desolation, and one that was accomplished in the calamities that came upon the land in the invasions by the Egyptians and Assyrians.