Charles Ellicott Commentary Isaiah 40

Comfort ye ... —I start with the assumption that the great prophetic poem that follows is the work of Isaiah himself, referring to the Introduction for the discussion of all questions connected with its authorship and arrangement. It has a link, as has been noticed, with the earlier collection of his writings in Isaiah 35:9-10.

At the outset, the prophet’s mind is obviously projected into the future, which he had been given to see. In this vision, the time of punishment and discipline, having done its work, was to be succeeded by blessedness and peace.

The keynote is struck in the opening words. The phrase my people is a distinct echo of Hosea 2:1. Lo Ammi (that is, “not my people”) has been brought back to his true position as Ammi (that is, “my people”).

Saith your God. —Noticeable as a formula which is at once peculiar to Isaiah and common to both his volumes (Isaiah 1:11; Isaiah 1:18; Isaiah 33:10; Isaiah 41:21; Isaiah 66:9).

Speak you comfortably ... —Literally, Speak you to the heart. The command is addressed to the prophets whom Isaiah contemplates as working towards the close of the exile, and carrying on his work. In Haggai 1:13, Haggai 2:9, and Zechariah 1:13; Zechariah 2:5–10; Zechariah 9:9–12, we may rightly trace the influence of the words as working out their own fulfilment.

That her warfare is accomplished. —The time of war, with all its suffering, becomes the symbol of sufferings apart from actual war. The exile was one long campaign with enemies who were worse than the Babylonian conquerors. In Job 7:1; Job 14:14, the word is applied (rendered by “appointed time”) to the battle of life from its beginning to its end. This, too, may be noted as one of the many parallelisms between Isaiah and Job.

That her iniquity is pardoned. —Strictly, as in Leviticus 26:41; Leviticus 26:43, is paid off, or accepted. The word implies not exemption from punishment, but the fact that the punishment had been accepted, and had done its work.

She has received of the Lord’s hand ... —Primarily, the thought is that Jerusalem has suffered a more than sufficient penalty. (Revelation 18:6.) This seems more in harmony with the context than the view which takes the meaning that Jerusalem shall receive a double measure of grace and favour. In the long run, however, the one meaning does not exclude the other. It is the mercy of Jehovah which reckons the punishment sufficient, because it has been “accepted” (Leviticus 26:41), and has done its work. (Compare to Jeremiah 16:18.)

The voice of him that crieth ... — The laws of Hebrew parallelism require a different punctuation: A voice of one crying, In the wilderness, prepare ye ... This passage is memorable as having been deliberately taken by the Baptist as defining his own mission (John 1:23). As here the herald is not named, so he was content to efface himself—to be a voice or nothing.

The image is drawn from the march of Eastern kings, who often boast of the roads they have made in trackless deserts, as in the Assyrian inscriptions of Sennacherib and Assurbanipal (Records of the Past, i. 95, vii. 64). The wilderness is that which lay between the Euphrates and Judah, the journey of the exiles through it reminding the prophet of the older wanderings in the wilderness of Sin (Psalms 68:7; Judges 5:4).

The words are an echo of the earlier thought of Isaiah 35:8. We are left to conjecture to whom the command is addressed: tribes of the desert, angelic ministers, kings and rulers—the very vagueness giving a grand universality. So, again, we are not told whether the “way of Jehovah” is that on which He comes to meet His people, or on which He goes before and guides them. The analogy of the marches of the Exodus makes the latter view the more probable.

Every valley shall be exalted. — The figure is drawn from the titanic engineering operations of the kingly road-makers of the East, but the parable is hardly veiled. The meek exalted, the proud brought low, wrong ways set right, rough natures smoothed: that is the true preparation for the coming of the Lord, and therefore the true work of every follower of the Baptist in preparing the way. (Luke 3:3–9.)

The glory of the Lord shall be revealed. — Did the prophet think of a vision of a glory-cloud, like the Shechinah which he had seen in the Temple? Or had he risen to the thought of the glory of character and will, of holiness and love? (John 1:14)

All flesh. — The revelation is not for Israel only, but for mankind. So in Luke 3:6, the words are quoted from the Septuagint, all flesh shall see the salvation of God. The phrase meets us here for the first time, and occurs again in Isaiah 49:26; Isaiah 66:16; Isaiah 66:23–24, marking, so to speak, the growing catholicity of the prophet’s thoughts. (See Note on Isaiah 38:11)