Albert Barnes Commentary Micah 5

Now gather yourself in troops, O daughter of troops - The “daughter of troops” is still the same who was previously addressed, Judah. The word is almost always used for “bands of men employed in irregular, marauding, inroads.” Judah is called “daughter of troops” on account of her violence, the robbery and bloodshed within her (Micah 2:8; Micah 3:2, and others; Hosea 5:10), as Jeremiah says, Is this house which is called by My Name become a den of robbers in your eyes? (Jeremiah 7:11). She then who had plundered (Isaiah 33:1) would now be plundered; she who had formed herself in bands to lay waste, will now be gathered closely together, in small bands, unable to resist in the open field; yet in vain would she so gather herself, for the enemy was upon her, in her last retreat.

This description obviously has no fulfillment, except in the infliction by the Romans. For there was no event before the invasion by Sennacherib, and therefore in the prophet’s own time, in which there is any apparent fulfillment of it. But then, the second deliverance must be that by the Maccabees; and this siege, which lies, in order of time, beyond it, must be a siege by the Romans.

With this it agrees, that whereas, in the two previous visitations, God promised, in the first, deliverance, and in the second, victory, here the prophet dwells on the Person of the Redeemer, and foretells that the strength of the Church should not lie in any human means (Micah 5:8–15). Here too Israel had no king, but only a judge. Then the “gathering in robber-bands” strikingly describes their internal state in the siege of Jerusalem. And although this was subsequent to and consequent upon the rejection of our Lord, yet there is no reason why the end should be separated from the beginning, since the capture by Titus was but the sequel of the capture by Pompey, the result of that same temper in which they crucified Jesus because He would not be their earthly king.

It was the close of the organic existence of the former people; after which the remnant from among them, with the Gentiles—not Israel after the flesh—were the true people of God.

He has laid siege against us - The prophet, being born of them, and for the great love he bore them, counts himself among them, as Paul mourns over his brothers after the flesh.

They shall smite the judge of Israel with a rod upon the cheek. So Paul said to him who had made himself high priest, God shall smite thee, thou whited wall; for sittest thou to judge me after the law, and commandest me to be smitten contrary to the law? (Acts 23:3).

It is no longer “the king” (for they had said, We have no King but Caesar (John 19:15)) but the “judge of Israel,” they who, against Christ and His Apostles, gave wrong judgment. As they had smitten contrary to the law, so were the chief men smitten by Titus when the city was taken. As they had done, it was done to them.

To be smitten on the cheek signifies shame; to smite with the rod signifies destruction. Now both will meet in one; as, in the Great Day, the wicked shall awake to shame and everlasting contempt, and shall perish forever (Daniel 12:2).

But - And you, Bethlehem Ephratah. With us, the checkered events of time stand in strong contrast, painful or gladdening. Good seems to efface evil, or evil blots out the memory of the good. God orders all in the continuous course of His Wisdom. All lies in perfect harmony in the Divine Mind. Each event is the sequel of what went before. So here the prophet joins what, to us, stands in such contrast, with that simple "And." Yet he describes the two conditions bearing on one another. He had just spoken of the "judge of Israel" struck on the cheek, and, before (Micah 4:9), that Israel had neither king nor "counselor;" he now speaks of the Ruler in Israel, the Everlasting. He had said how Judah was to become mere bands of men; he now says how the "little Bethlehem" was to be exalted.

He had said before, that the rule of old was to come to the tower of the flock, the daughter of Jerusalem; now, retaining the word, he speaks of the Ruler, in whom it was to be established.

Before he had addressed the tower of the flock; now, Bethlehem. But he has greater things to say now, so he pauses: And you! People have admired the brief appeal of the murdered Caesar, “You too, Brutus.” The same energetic conciseness lies in the words, And you! Bethlehem Ephratah.

The name Ephratah is not seemingly added to distinguish Bethlehem from the Bethlehem of Zebulun, since that is only named once (Joshua 19:15), and Bethlehem here is marked to be 'the Bethlehem Judah' by the addition, too little to be among the thousands of Judah. He apparently joins the usual name, 'Bethlehem,' with the old Patriarchal, and perhaps poetic (Psalms 132:6) name 'Ephratah,' either in reference and contrast to that former birth of sorrow near Ephratah (Genesis 35:19; Genesis 48:7), or (as is Micah’s custom) regarding the meaning of both names.

Both its names were derived from 'fruitfulness'; 'House of Bread' and 'fruitfulness'; and, despite centuries of Muslim oppression, it is fertile still.

It had been rich in the fruitfulness of this world; rich, thrice rich, it should be in spiritual fruitfulness. Thus: “Truly is Bethlehem, ‘house of bread,’ where was born the Bread of life, which came down from heaven” (John 6:48, 51). Also: “who with inward sweetness refreshes the minds of the elect,” Angel’s Bread (Psalms 78:25). And: “Ephratah, fruitfulness, whose fruitfulness is God,” the Seed-corn, stored in which, died and brought forth much fruit—all that was ever brought forth to God in the whole world.

Though you are little among the thousands of Judah - Literally, 'small to be,' that is, 'too small to be among,' etc. Each tribe was divided into its thousands, probably of fighting men, each thousand having its own separate head (Numbers 1:16; Numbers 10:4). But the thousand continued to be a division of the tribe after Israel was settled in Canaan (Joshua 22:21, 30; 1 Samuel 10:19; 1 Samuel 23:23). The 'thousand' of Gideon was the meanest in Manasseh (Judges 6:15). Places too small to form a thousand by themselves were united with others to make up the number.

So lowly was Bethlehem that it was not counted among the possessions of Judah. In the division under Joshua, it was wholly omitted. From its situation, Bethlehem can never have been a considerable place.

It lay and lies east of the road from Jerusalem to Hebron, about six miles from the capital (Arculf, Early Travels in Palestine, p. 6; Bernard, Ibid., p. 29; Saewulf, Ibid., p. 44, all state "6 miles"; Maundrell, Ibid., p. 455, states "2 hours"; Robinson, i. 470). It was “seated on the summit-level of the hill country of Judaea with deep gorges descending East to the Dead Sea and West to the plains of Philistia,” “2,704 feet above the sea.”

It lay “on a narrow ridge,” whose whole length was not more than a mile, swelling at each extremity into a somewhat higher eminence, with a slight depression between. As one account puts it: “The ridge projects Eastward from the central mountain range, and breaks down in abrupt terraced slopes to deep valleys on the N.E. and S.” The west end too “shelves gradually down to the valley.”

It was then rather calculated to be an outlying fortress, guarding the approach to Jerusalem, than for a considerable city.

As a garrison, it was fortified and held by the Philistines (2 Samuel 23:14) in the time of Saul, recovered from them by David, and was one of the fifteen cities fortified by Rehoboam. Yet it remained an unimportant place.

Its inhabitants are counted with those of the neighboring Netophah, both before (1 Chronicles 2:54) and after (Nehemiah 7:26) the captivity, but both together amounted after the captivity to only 179 (Ezra 2:21–22) or 188 (Nehemiah 7:26). It still does not appear among the possessions of Judah (Nehemiah 11:25–30). It was called a city (Ruth 1:19; Ezra 2:1, 21; Nehemiah 7:6, 26), but the name included even places which had only 100 fighting men (Amos 5:3). In our Lord’s time it is called a village (John 7:42) or a city (Luke 2:4).

The royal city would become a den of thieves. Christ was to be born in a lowly village. As one has said: “He who had taken the form of a servant, chose Bethlehem for His Birth, Jerusalem for His Passion.”

Matthew relates how the chief priests and scribes, in their answer to Herod’s inquiries about where Christ should be born (Matthew 2:4–6), cited this prophecy. They gave the substance rather than the exact words, and with one remarkable variation: you are not the least among the princes of Judah. Matthew did not correct their paraphrase because it does not affect the object for which they cited the prophecy: the birth of the Redeemer in Bethlehem. The sacred writers often do not correct the translations existing in their time when the variations do not affect the truth.

Both words are true here. Micah speaks of Bethlehem as it was in the sight of men; the chief priests, whose words Matthew approves, speak of it as it was in the sight of God, and as, by the birth of Christ, it was to become.

Thus one says: “Nothing hindered Bethlehem from being at once a small village and the Mother-city of the whole earth, as being the mother and nurse of Christ who made the world and conquered it.” Another states: “That is not the least which is the house of blessing and the receptacle of divine grace.”

Chrysostom adds: “He says that the spot, although mean and small, will be glorious. And in truth, the whole world came together to see Bethlehem, where, being born, He was laid, on no other ground than this only.”

And another: “O Bethlehem, little, but now made great by the Lord! He has made you great, who, being great, was in you made little. What city, if it heard of it, would not envy you that most precious Stable and the glory of that Crib? Your name is great in all the earth, and all generations call you blessed. Glorious things are everywhere spoken of you, you city of God (Psalms 87:3). Everywhere it is sung that this Man is born in her, and the Most High Himself shall establish her.”

Out of you shall He come forth to Me who is to be Ruler in Israel - (Literally, 'shall one come forth to Me to be Ruler.') Bethlehem was too small to be any part of the polity of Judah; out of her was to come forth One who, in God’s will, was to be its Ruler. The words 'to Me' include both 'from Me' and 'to Me'.

'From Me' means by My power and Spirit, as Gabriel said: The Holy Spirit shall come upon you, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow you; therefore also that Holy Thing which shall be born of you shall be called the Son of God (Luke 1:35). 'To Me' (for My purpose), as God said to Samuel: I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite; for I have provided Me a king among his sons (1 Samuel 16:1).

So now, one shall go forth from there to Me, to do My will, to My praise and glory, to reconcile the world to Me, to rule and be Head over the true Israel, the Church. He was to go forth out of Bethlehem, as his native place; as Jeremiah says, His noble shall be from him, and his ruler shall go forth out of the midst of him (Jeremiah 30:21); and Zechariah, Out of him shall come forth the cornerstone; out of him the nail, out of him the battle-bow, out of him every ruler together (Zechariah 10:4).

Before, Micah had said, to the tower of Edar, Ophel of the daughter of Zion, the first rule shall come to you; now, retaining the word, he says to Bethlehem, out of you shall come one to be a ruler. The judge of Israel had been struck; now there should go forth out of the little Bethlehem One, not to be a judge only, but a Ruler.

Whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting - Literally, 'from the days of eternity.' 'Going forth' is opposed to 'going forth'; a 'going forth' out of Bethlehem to a 'going forth from eternity'; a 'going forth' which then was still to come (the prophet says, 'shall go forth'), to a 'going forth' which had been long ago (Rup.), “not from the world but from the beginning, not in the days of time, but ‘from the days of eternity.’” For in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God (John 1:1–2).

In the end of the days, He was to go forth from Bethlehem; but, lest He should be thought to have begun His existence then, the prophet adds, His goings forth are from everlasting. Here words denoting eternity and used of the eternity of God are united to impress the belief of the Eternity of God the Son. We have neither thought nor words to conceive eternity; we can only conceive of time lengthened out without end. As one defines it: “True eternity is boundless life, all existing at once,” or, “duration without beginning and without end and without change.”

The Hebrew names used here express as much as our thoughts can conceive or our words utter. They mean literally, 'from before' (that is, look back as far as we can, that from which we begin is still 'before'), 'from the days of that which is hidden.' True, in eternity there are no divisions, no succession, but one everlasting 'now'; one, as God, in whom it is, is One.

But humans can only conceive of infinity of space as space without bounds (although God contains space and is not contained by it), nor can we conceive of Eternity, except as filled out by time. And so God speaks after the manner of men, and calls Himself the Ancient of Days (Daniel 7:9), “being Himself the age and time of all things; before days and age and time,” “the Beginning and measure of ages and of time.”

The word translated 'from of old' is used elsewhere of the eternity of God (Habakkuk 1:12). 'The God of before' is a title chosen to express that He is before all things which He made. Dweller of before (Psalms 55:20) is a title formed to shadow forth His ever-present existence.

Conceive any existence before all else you can conceive; go back before and before that; stretch out backward yet before and before all that you have conceived, ages before ages, and yet before, without end—then and there God was. That 'before' was the property of God. Eternity belongs to God, not God to eternity. Any words must be inadequate to convey the idea of the Infinite to our finite minds. Probably the sight of God as He is will give us the only possible conception of eternity. Still, the idea of time prolonged infinitely, although we cannot follow it to infinity, gives a shadow of our eternal being.

And as we look along that long vista, our sight is prolonged and stretched out by those millions upon millions of years along which we can look. Although even if each grain of sand or dust on this earth (which are countless) represented countless millions, we would be, at the end, as far from reaching eternity as at the beginning. 'The days of eternity' is only an inadequate expression, because every conception of the human mind must be so.

Equally so is every other expression: From everlasting to everlasting (Psalms 90:2; Psalms 103:17); from everlasting (Psalms 93:2; and of Divine Wisdom, or God the Son, Proverbs 8:23); to everlasting (Psalms 9:8; Psalms 29:10); from the day (Isaiah 43:13), that is, since the day was.

For the word 'from,' to our minds, implies time, and time is no measure of eternity. It only expresses pre-existence, an eternal Existence backward as well as forward—the incommunicable attribute of God. But words of Holy Scripture have their full meaning unless it appears from the passage itself that they do not. In passages where the words 'forever' or 'from before' do not mean eternity, the subject itself restrains them.

Thus 'forever,' looking onward, is used of time equal in duration with the being of whom it is written, as, he shall be your servant forever (Exodus 21:6), that is, as long as he lives in the body. So when it is said to the Son, Your throne, O God, is forever and ever (Psalms 45:6), it speaks of a kingdom that will have no end. Similarly, looking backward, I will remember Your wonders from of old (Psalms 77:12) must necessarily relate to time, because they are marvelous dealings of God in time. So again, the heavens of old (Psalms 68:34) stand simply contrasted with the changes of humans.

But God of old (Deuteronomy 33:27) is the Eternal God. He that abides of old (Psalms 55:20) is God enthroned from everlasting. In like manner, the 'goings forth' here, opposed to a 'going forth' in time (emphatic words moreover being united), are a going forth in eternity.

The word 'from of old,' as used of being, is only used concerning the Being of God. Here too, then, there is no ground to stop short of that meaning; and so it declares the eternal 'going-forth,' or Generation of the Son.

The plural 'goings forth' may be used here either as words of great majesty (as 'God,' 'Lord,' 'Wisdom'—that is, divine Wisdom; Proverbs 1:20; Proverbs 9:1—are plural), or because the Generation of the Son from the Father is an Eternal Generation, before all time, and now, though not in time, yet in eternity still. As the prophet says 'from the days of eternity,' although eternity has no parts, nor beginning, nor 'from,' so he may say 'goings forth' to convey, as we can receive it, a continual going-forth. We think of Eternity as unending, continual time; and so he may have set forth to us the Eternal Act of the 'Going Forth' of the Son as continual acts.

The Jews understood, as we do now, that Micah foretold that the Christ was to be born at Bethlehem, until they rejected Him and were pressed by the argument. Not only did the chief priests formally give this answer, but, supposing our Lord to be from Nazareth, some who rejected Him employed the argument against Him: Some said, “Shall Christ come out of Galilee? Has not the Scripture said that Christ comes from the seed of David, and out of the town of Bethlehem, where David was?” (John 7:41–42). They knew of two distinct things: that Christ was:

1. To be of the seed of David; and
2. Out of the town of Bethlehem.

Christians urged them with the fact that the prophecy could be fulfilled in no other than Christ. One such argument ran: “If He is not yet born who is to go forth as a Ruler out of the tribe of Judah, from Bethlehem (for He must necessarily come forth out of the tribe of Judah and from Bethlehem, but we see that now no one of the race of Israel has remained in the city of Bethlehem, and from then on it has been forbidden for any Jew to remain in the confines of that country)—how then will a Ruler be born from Judea, and how will He come forth out of Bethlehem, as the divine volumes of the prophets announce, when to this day there is no one whatever left there of Israel from whose race Christ could be born?”

The Jews at first met the argument by affirming that the Messiah was born at Bethlehem on the day of the destruction of the temple, but was hidden for the sins of the people. This being a transparent fable, the Jews had either to receive Christ or to give up the belief that He was to be born at Bethlehem. So they explained it: “The Messiah shall go forth from there because he shall be of the seed of David who was from Bethlehem.” But this would have been misleading language. No one ever spoke in such a way that one should be born in a place when only a remote ancestor had been born there.

Micah does not merely say that His family came from Bethlehem, but that He Himself should thereafter come forth from there. No one could have said of Solomon or of any of the subsequent kings of Judah that they should thereafter come forth from Bethlehem, any more than they could now say, ‘one shall come forth from Corsica,’ of any future sovereign of the line of Napoleon III because the first Napoleon was a Corsican; or, for us, ‘one shall come out of Hanover,’ of a successor to the present dynasty born in England, because George I came from Hanover in 1714.

Therefore—since God has so appointed both to punish and to redeem, He—God, or the Ruler whose goings forth have been from of old from everlasting, who is God with God—shall give them up; that is, withdraw His protection and the nearness of His Presence, giving them up:

1. Into the hands of their enemies. Indeed, the far greater part never returned from the captivity but remained, although willingly, in the enemy’s land, outwardly shut out from the land of promise and the hope of their fathers (as in 2 Chronicles 36:17).
2. But also, all were, more than before, given up (Acts 7:42; Romans 1:24, 1:26, 1:28) to follow their own ways.

God was less visibly present among them. Prophecy ceased soon after the return from the captivity, and many tokens of the nearness of God and means of His communications with them—the Ark and the Urim and Thummim—were gone. It was a time of pause and waiting, in which the fullness of God’s gifts was withdrawn, so that they might look to Him who was to come. Until the time that she which travaileth hath brought forth—that is, until the Virgin who should conceive and bear a Son and call His Name Emmanuel, God with us, shall give birth to Him who shall save them. And then there shall be redemption, joy, and assured peace. God provides against the fainting of hearts in the long time before our Lord should come.

Then—(And). There is no precise mark of time such as our word 'then' expresses. He speaks generally of what should happen after the birth of the Redeemer. The remnant of His brethren shall return unto the children of Israel.

“The children of Israel” are the true Israel, Israelites indeed (John 1:47); they who are such, not in name (Romans 9:6, etc.) only, but indeed and in truth.

His brethren are plainly the brethren of the Christ: either because Jesus condescended to be born of the seed of David according to the flesh (Romans 1:3), and of them, as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed forever (Romans 9:5); or as such as He makes and accounts them, and is not ashamed to call, brethren (Hebrews 2:11), being sons of God by grace, as He is the Son of God by nature.

As He says, Whosoever shall do the will of My Father which is in Heaven, the same is My brother and sister and mother (Matthew 12:50); and, My brethren are these who hear the word of God and do it (Luke 8:21).

The residue of these, the prophet says, shall return to be joined with the children of Israel; as Malachi prophesies, He shall bring back the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to the fathers (Malachi 3:24, Hebrew). In the first sense, Micah foretells the continual inflow of the Jews to that true Israel who would first be called. All in each generation who are the true Israel shall be converted, made one in Christ, and saved.

So, whereas since Solomon all had been discord, and at last the Jews were scattered abroad everywhere, all, in the true Prince of Peace, shall be one (Isaiah 11:10, etc.). This has been fulfilled in each generation since our Lord came, and shall be still further fulfilled in the end, when they shall hasten and pour into the Church, and so all Israel shall be saved (Romans 11:26).

But “the promise of God was not only to Israel after the flesh, but to all” also that were afar off, even as many as the Lord our God should call (Acts 2:39). All these may be called the remnant of His brethren, even those that were formerly aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and afar off (Ephesians 2:12–14), but now, in Christ Jesus, made one with them—all brethren among themselves and to Christ their ruler.

“Having taken on Him their nature in the flesh, He is not ashamed to call them so,” as the Apostle speaks, confirming it out of the Psalm, where in the Person of Christ he says, I will declare Thy name unto My brethren (Psalms 22:22). There is no reason to take the name brethren here in a narrower sense than to comprehend all the remnant whom the Lord shall call (Joel 2:32), whether Jews or Gentiles. The word “brethren” in its literal sense includes both, and, as to both, the words were fulfilled.

And He shall stand - The prophet continues to speak of personal acts of this Ruler who was to be born. He was not to pass away, not to rule only by others, but by Himself. To stand is the attitude of a servant, as Jesus, although God and Lord of all, said of Himself, “He shall come forth and serve them” (Luke 12:37); “The Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister” (Matthew 20:28). “He shall stand” as a Shepherd (Isaiah 61:5), to watch, feed, and guard them, day and night; “He shall stand,” as Stephen saw Christ “standing on the Right Hand of God” (Acts 7:55), “to succor all those who suffer for Him.” : “For to sit belongs to one judging; to stand, to one fighting or helping.” “He shall stand,” as abiding, not to pass from them, as He Himself says, “Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world” (Matthew 28:20): and He shall feed His flock by His Spirit, His Word, His Wisdom and doctrine, His example and life; yes, by His own Body and Blood (John 6:0).

They whom He feeds “lack nothing” (Psalms 23:1).

In the strength of the Lord - He, who feeds them with divine tenderness, shall also have divine might, His Father’s and His own, to protect them; as He says, “My sheep hear My Voice, and I know them and they follow Me, neither shall any man pluck them out of My Hand. My Father Which gave them Me is greater than all, and no man is able to pluck them out of My Father’s Hand. I and My Father are One” (John 10:27–30). With authority, it is said, “He commandeth even the unclean spirits and they come out” (Luke 4:36). His feeding or teaching also was “with authority, and not as the scribes” (Matthew 7:29).

In the majesty of the name of the Lord His God - As John says, “We beheld His glory, the glory as of the Only-Begotten of His Father” (John 1:14); and He says, “All power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth” (Matthew 28:18); so that the divine glory should shine through the majesty of His teaching, the power of His Grace, upholding His own, and the splendor of the miracles worked by Him and in His Name. “Of the Name of the Lord;” as He says again, “Holy Father, keep through Thine own Name those whom Thou hast given Me, that they may be one as We are. While I was with them in the world, I kept them in Thy Name” (John 17:11–12). : “Whoever then is sent to feed His flock must stand, that is, be firm and unshaken; feed, not sell, nor slay; and feed in might, that is, in Christ.” His God, as our Lord Himself, as Man, says, “Unto My Father, and your Father, and to My God and your God.”

But that Majesty He Himself wields, as no mere man can; He Himself is invested with it. : “To ordinary kings God is strength (Psalms 28:7; Psalms 140:7), or gives strength (1 Samuel 2:10); men have strength in God; this Ruler is clad in the strength of the Lord, that same strength that the Lord has, whose is strength. Of Him, as Israel’s King, the same is said as of the Lord, as King of the whole earth (Psalms 93:1); only that the strength of the Messiah is not His own, but the Lord’s. He is invested with the strength of the Lord, because He is Man; as Man, He can be invested with the whole strength of the Lord, only because He is also God.”

And they shall abide - (Literally, sit, dwell) in rest and security and unbroken peace under Christ their Shepherd and their King; they shall not wander to and fro as previously. “He, their Shepherd, shall stand; they shall sit.”

The word is the more emphatic because it stands so absolutely. This will be a sitting or dwelling that will indeed deserve the name. The original promise, so often forfeited by their disobedience, should be perfectly fulfilled: “and ye shall dwell in your land safely, and I will give peace in the land, and ye shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid.”

So Amos and Micah had promised before. And this is the result of the greatness of the promised Ruler, as the similar promise of the Psalm rests on the immutability of God: “Thou art the Same, and Thy years shall have no end. The children of Thy servants shall dwell, and their seed shall be established before Thee” (Psalms 102:27–28). For it follows,

For now - (In the time that Micah saw, as did Abraham, with the eye of faith) “now,” in contrast to that former time of lowliness. His life shall be divided between a life of obscurity and a life of never-ending greatness.

Shall He be great unto the (very) ends of the earth - embracing them in His rule (as David and Solomon had foretold), and so none shall harm those whom He, the King of all the earth, shall protect. The universality of protection is derived from a universality of power. To David God says, “I have made thee a great name, like the name of the great that are in the earth” (2 Samuel 7:9). Of Uzziah it is said, “His name went forth far; for he was marvelously helped, until he was strong” (2 Chronicles 26:15, add 2 Chronicles 26:8); but of the Messiah alone it is said that His power should reach to the ends of the earth, as God prophesies of Himself that His “Name should be great among the Gentiles” (Malachi 1:11, 14).

So Gabriel said to His Mother, “This,” whom she should bear, “shall be great.”

And this Man shall be the Peace - This, emphatically, that is, “This Same,” as is said of Noah, This same shall comfort us (Genesis 5:29), or, in the song of Moses, of the Lord, This Same is my God (Exodus 15:2). Of Him He says, not only that He brings peace, but that He Himself is that Peace; as Paul says, He is our Peace (Ephesians 2:14), and Isaiah calls Him the Prince of peace (Isaiah 9:6), and at His Birth the heavenly host proclaimed peace on earth (Luke 2:14); and He preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh (Ephesians 2:17); and on leaving the world He says, Peace I leave with you, My Peace I give unto you (John 14:27).

He shall be our Peace, within by His grace, without by His protection.

Lap.: “Would you have peace with God, your own soul, your neighbor? Go to Christ who is our Peace,” and follow the footsteps of Christ. “Ask peace of Him who is Peace.”

“Place Christ in your heart and you have placed Peace there.”

When the Assyrian shall come into our land, and when he shall tread in our palaces - Assur stands for the most powerful and deadliest foe, “spiritual and bodily,” as the Assyrian then was of the people of God. For since this plainly relates to the time after Christ’s coming, and, (to say the least,) after the captivity in Babylon and deliverance (Micah 4:10) from it, which itself followed the dissolution of the Assyrian Empire, the Assyrians cannot be the literal people, who had long since ceased to be. In Isaiah too the Assyrian is the type of antichrist and of Satan.

As Christ is our Peace, so one enemy is chosen to represent all enemies who (Acts 12:1) vex the Church, whether the human agents or Satan who stirs them up and uses them.

“By the Assyrian,” says Cyril, “he here means no longer a man out of Babylon, but rather marks out the inventor of sin, Satan. Or rather, to speak fully, the implacable multitude of devils, which spiritually arises against all that is holy, and fights against the holy city, the spiritual Zion, of which the divine Psalmist says, ‘Glorious things are spoken of thee, thou city of God.’ For Christ dwells in the Church, and makes it, as it were, His own city, although by His Godhead filling all things. This city of God then is a sort of land and country of the sanctified and of those enriched in spirit, in unity with God. When then the Assyrian shall come against our city, that is, when barbarous and hostile powers fight against the saints, they shall not find it unguarded.”

The enemy may tread on the land and on its palaces, that is, lay low outward glory, vex the body which is of earth and the visible temple of the Holy Spirit, as he did Paul by the thorn in the flesh, the minister of Satan to buffet him, or Job in mind, body, or estate, but (Luke 12:4) after that he has no more that he can do; he cannot hurt the soul, because nothing can separate us from the love of Christ, and (Rup.) Christ who is our Peace is in us; and of the saint too it may be said, The enemy cannot hurt him (Psalms 89:22).

Rib.: Much as the Church has been vexed at all times by persecutions of devils and of tyrants, Christ has ever consoled her and given her peace in the persecutions themselves: “Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we are comforted of God. For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ” (2 Corinthians 1:4–5).

The Apostles (Acts 5:41) departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His Name. And Paul writes to the Hebrews, “ye had compassion of me in my bonds, and took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, knowing that ye have in heaven a better and more enduring substance” (Hebrews 10:34).

Then shall we raise against him seven shepherds and eight principal men - (Literally, anointed, although elsewhere used of pagan princes.)

The “shepherds” are manifestly inferior, spiritual, shepherds, acting under the One Shepherd, by His authority, and He in them. The princes of men are most naturally a civil power, according to its usage elsewhere (Joshua 13:21; Psalms 83:12; Ezekiel 32:30). The “seven” is throughout the Old Testament a symbol of a sacred whole, probably of the union of God with the world, reconciled with it; eight, when united with it, is something beyond it.

Since then “seven” denotes a great, complete, and sacred multitude, by the eight he would designate “an incredible and almost countless multitude.” Rib.: “So in defense of the Church, there shall be raised up very many shepherds and teachers (for at no time will it be forsaken by Christ; ) indeed by more and more, countlessly, so that, however persecutions may increase, there shall never be lacking more to teach, and exhort to, the faith.”