John Calvin Commentary Isaiah 1:21

"How is the faithful city become a harlot! she that was full of justice! righteousness lodged in her, but now murderers." — Isaiah 1:21 (ASV)

How is the faithful city become an harlot! To make the rebuke more forceful and the people's crime more shocking—their having departed in this way from God and all uprightness—he cries aloud as if he had seen something monstrous. Indeed, it was a change suited to awaken horror that a nation devoted to God and chosen as a royal priesthood (Exodus 19:6), had fallen from lofty piety to the lowest depths of wickedness.

He speaks especially of the city of Jerusalem, which was God’s sanctuary and royal dwelling. He complains that the city, which had formerly been a guardian of justice, is now a den of robbers, and that she who was formerly a chaste and pure virgin has become a harlot. To instill deeper shame in the degenerate Jews, who had departed greatly from their holy ancestors, he adopts an astonished tone, asking himself how this could possibly have happened.

The faithful city. By the word faithful, he alludes, in my opinion, to the conjugal fidelity a wife should preserve toward her husband. Its meaning is undoubtedly more extensive, but when I examine the connection of the passage, I do not hesitate to say that faithful means chaste. For immediately afterward, he uses another term in contrast with it, calling her an harlot. Whereas she once was a virtuous wife, faithful to the marriage contract, she has now become an harlot, and her base conduct brings no blush to her face. The Scriptures frequently call the Church the wife of God (Hosea 2:19–20). Jerusalem held that honorable rank as long as she maintained spiritual chastity and continued in the pure and lawful worship of God; but as soon as she departed from it, she became an harlot.

This astonishment of the Prophet was undoubtedly joined with the deepest grief. For we should consider it something monstrous when people revolt from God and refuse the allegiance they have promised to render. Nor is it possible that right-hearted individuals, when they witness such a revolt, can fail to be affected by the most poignant grief. We read that the angels in heaven rejoice at the conversion of one sinner (Luke 15:7, 10), and therefore they cannot but mourn over the final ruin of any sinner. How much more then will they bewail the ruin and destruction of a whole state and Church!

Besides, that astonishment also conveys a complaint, as if the Prophet had said, “O Jerusalem, from what a flourishing condition have you fallen! Into what distress have you plunged yourself! What shame and disgrace have you brought upon yourself!” When the flourishing state in which she had been, and the respect paid to her in former times, are brought to her remembrance, it should produce a still deeper impression on her mind. For she who was at one time the respected mother of a family is naturally more careful about her honor and reputation than one who has spent her whole life in base and licentious conduct.

It was full of judgment. He shows what fruits were produced by that allegiance to God at an earlier period. We may take judgment as simply another name for uprightness; or, if preferred, we may call it justice when people render to each person their due, and judgment when the cause of the innocent is defended and the poor and needy are avenged. For this is how the words are used in Scripture when they appear together. But as they are not perfectly connected in this passage, I consider judgment to denote uprightness, so that the same thing is expressed twice to explain it more fully.

But now murderers. He shows how Jerusalem became an harlot. It was because the city, formerly distinguished for its love of justice and equity, was now full of murders. The meaning is, as we have said before, not that they were assassins or robbers, but that, by fraudulent and dishonest methods, under the pretense of justice, they had seized the property of others. In short, he means that they did not act fairly and justly toward others, regardless of the esteem in which they were held; for sometimes, and indeed very frequently, it happens that very wicked people are held in high esteem.

The condition to which Jerusalem was reduced should lead us to consider how often Satan exercises what might be called unbounded tyranny over the Church of God. For if ever there was a Church, there was one at that time in Jerusalem; and yet Isaiah affirms that it was a den of robbers, or a slaughterhouse, where they cut people’s throats. But if Satan could freely riot in that Church, let us not wonder that the same thing happens among us. Instead, let us strive not to allow ourselves to be corrupted by such wicked examples.