Charles Ellicott Commentary Isaiah 2:22

"Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils; for wherein is he to be accounted of?" — Isaiah 2:22 (ASV)

Cease you from man... — The verse is missing in some manuscripts of the Septuagint version and is rejected by some critics as having the nature of a marginal comment and as not in harmony with the context. The first fact is the most weighty argument against it, but it is not decisive. The other objection does not count for much. To “cease from man” as well as from “idols” is surely the natural close of the great discourse which had begun with proclaiming that people of all classes and conditions should be brought low.

The words whose breath is in his nostrils emphasize the frailty of human life (Genesis 2:7; Genesis 7:22; Psalms 146:3–4). Looking to that frailty, the prophet asks, as the psalmist had asked, What is man? (Psalms 8:1). “What is he to be valued at?” If it could be proved that the verse was not Isaiah’s, it is at least the reflection of a devout mind in harmony with his.