John Calvin Commentary Isaiah 40:24

"Yea, they have not been planted; yea, they have not been sown; yea, their stock hath not taken root in the earth: moreover he bloweth upon them, and they wither, and the whirlwind taketh them away as stubble." — Isaiah 40:24 (ASV)

It is as if they had not been planted. Though the particle אף (aph) signifies also, in this passage it may be more appropriately rendered “so that.” Thus, the plain meaning will be, “So that you may say that they were not planted or sown.” This is an amplification of what he had formerly said, for he shows that the princes are totally destroyed and rooted out, so that no trace of them is left, as if they had never existed. As long as they remain in prosperity, they appear to be so strong as to be beyond the possibility of being overthrown by any adverse event. However, such changes happen that blot out their name and remembrance, so that you would say that they had never existed; and we see that this has happened not only to individuals but even to very flourishing kingdoms.

Since, therefore, great downfalls are so many tokens of God’s dreadful power, let us learn not to lean on earthly and deceitful supports, but, whatever the amount of our riches or strength, let us depend on him. God does not, as pagans babble, turn this world about like a ball, as if he took pleasure in this game. Instead, whenever any person is highly elevated, they never cease from insolent boasting until they are thrown down headlong, so that the judgments of God are always manifest.

We are also reminded by this that it is wrong to ascribe to fortune or to any other cause the various events that happen. For God was not an instantaneous Creator who would immediately abandon the care of his work, but he incessantly applies his hand, so that nothing is done apart from his will and pleasure. Seeing that various changes thus happen in the world, and seeing that those things which were thought to be firm and stable are transitory and fading, let us turn our minds to that supreme providence of God.

Even while he bloweth on them. Hence he shows how light and trivial before God are those things that commonly dazzle our eyes and fill us with amazement; for we cannot think of any great king without being completely alarmed and stupefied. But he shows that kings and princes are like stubble before God, by whose breath they are driven, as by a whirlwind, at any moment that he pleases. We are therefore taught that we should never be so overwhelmed by the sight of any creature that we fail to render to God the honor and glory due to him.

This should have been carefully considered by the Jews, who would have thought that the Babylonian monarchy, whose captives they were, would never be destroyed, and that they could not be rescued from their hands, if they had not recalled this doctrine: that nothing in this world is so durable that it cannot be dissolved by the breath of God. So that they would not despair of their salvation, the Prophet reminds them that God, as soon as he pleases to thunder from heaven, will crush all the strength of their enemies that terrifies them, so that it will vanish away.