Charles Ellicott Commentary Isaiah 43

But now ... —The outpouring of love that follows is contrasted with the wrath of the preceding verse.

The Lord that created thee. —The title implies something more than “the Maker of heaven and earth.” Jehovah has created Israel as an entity that specially answers to an archetype in His own purpose, just as other created things did. To “call by name” is everywhere, but pre-eminently in the East, the mark of an individualizing tenderness (John 10:3), almost of a predestinating love that makes the name a witness of its purpose.

When thou passest through the waters ... —The two contrasted forms of elemental perils are used, as elsewhere, proverbially for all forms of danger (Psalms 66:12).

I gave Egypt for thy ransom ... —Speaking after the manner of men, the prophet paints Jehovah as surrendering Egypt and other kingdoms to the arms of Cyrus, as if they were a price paid to him for liberating the Jews of Babylon. Ethiopia (Hebrew, Cûsh) may refer to either the Asiatic or African people who bore that name—Seba as Meroe, between the Blue and White Nile, the modern Dâr Sennâr. Historically, these words find their fulfillment in the conquest of Egypt by Cambyses, who carried out his father’s plans. For the concept of the “ransom,” compare Proverbs 11:8; Proverbs 21:18, and the following verse. As a man would sacrifice any number of slaves to ransom a son, so was it in Jehovah’s dealings with His people.

From the east ... —Even from Isaiah’s standpoint, the dispersion of Israel might well be contemplated in all this wide extent. The Ten Tribes were already carried off to the cities of the Medes (2 Kings 17:6). The Babylonian exile had its beginning under Esarhaddon (2 Chronicles 33:11); others may have been found before the time of Zephaniah (Zephaniah 3:10) beyond the rivers of Ethiopia. Even in the time of Joel the slave-trade of the Phoenicians had carried the sons of Judah and Jerusalem to the western isles of Javan, or Ionia (Joel 3:6).

Bring my sons ... —The words imply an escort of honour, given by the Gentile nations to the returning exiles.