John Gill Commentary Isaiah 17:10

"For thou hast forgotten the God of thy salvation, and hast not been mindful of the rock of thy strength; therefore thou plantest pleasant plants, and settest it with strange slips." — Isaiah 17:10 (ASV)

Because you have forgotten the God of your salvation Who had been the author of salvation to them many a time, in Egypt, at the Red Sea, and in various instances since; and yet they had forgotten his works of mercy and goodness, and had left his worship, and gone after idols; and this was the cause of their cities being forsaken, and becoming a desolation:

and have not been mindful of the rock of your strength ; or strong Rock, who had supplied and supported them, protected and defended them: therefore shall you plant pleasant plants ; or "plants of pleasant fruit" ^F19 , or "plants of Naamanim"; and so Aben Ezra takes it to be the proper name of a plant in the Arabic language, and which he says is a plant that grows very quick; perhaps he means "Anemone", which is so called in that language ^F20 , and is near to it in sound; though rather, not any particular plant is meant, but all sorts of pleasant plants, flowers, and fruit trees, with which the land of Israel abounded:

and shall set it with strange slips ; with foreign ones, such as are brought from other countries, and are scarce and dear, and highly valued; and by "plants" and "slips" may be meant false and foreign doctrines, inculcating idolatry and superstition, which are pleasing to the flesh ^F21 .

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FOOTNOTES:

• F19: (Mynmen yejn) "plantas amaenorum [fructuum]", Piscator.
• F20: Alnaaman "Anemone", in Avicenna, l. 256. 1. "vel a colore sanguineo, vel quod ab illo adamaretur rege", Golius, col. 2409. Castel. col. 2346.
• F21: So Vitringa.