Thomas Aquinas Commentary Isaiah 34:1-17

"Come near, ye nations, to hear; and hearken, ye peoples: let the earth hear, and the fulness thereof; the world, and all things that come forth from it. For Jehovah hath indignation against all the nations, and wrath against all their host: he hath utterly destroyed them, he hath delivered them to the slaughter. Their slain also shall be cast out, and the stench of their dead bodies shall come up; and the mountains shall be melted with their blood. And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll; and all their host shall fade away, as the leaf fadeth from off the vine, and as a fading [leaf] from the fig-tree. For my sword hath drunk its fill in heaven: behold, it shall come down upon Edom, and upon the people of my curse, to judgment. The sword of Jehovah is filled with blood, it is made fat with fatness, with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams; for Jehovah hath a sacrifice in Bozrah, and a great slaughter in the land of Edom. And the wild-oxen shall come down with them, and the bullocks with the bulls: and their land shall be drunken with blood, and their dust made fat with fatness. For Jehovah hath a day of vengeance, a year of recompense for the cause of Zion. And the streams of [Edom] shall be turned into pitch, and the dust thereof into brimstone, and the land thereof shall become burning pitch. It shall not be quenched night nor day; the smoke thereof shall go up for ever; from generation to generation it shall lie waste; none shall pass through it for ever and ever. But the pelican and the porcupine shall possess it; and the owl and the raven shall dwell therein: and he will stretch over it the line of confusion, and the plummet of emptiness. They shall call the nobles thereof to the kingdom, but none shall be there; and all its princes shall be nothing. And thorns shall come up in its palaces, nettles and thistles in the fortresses thereof; and it shall be a habitation of jackals, a court for ostriches. And the wild beasts of the desert shall meet with the wolves, and the wild goat shall cry to his fellow; yea, the night-monster shall settle there, and shall find her a place of rest. There shall the dart-snake make her nest, and lay, and hatch, and gather under her shade; yea, there shall the kites be gathered, every one with her mate. Seek ye out of the book of Jehovah, and read: no one of these shall be missing, none shall want her mate; for my mouth, it hath commanded, and his Spirit, it hath gathered them. And he hath cast the lot for them, and his hand hath divided it unto them by line: they shall possess it for ever; from generation to generation shall they dwell therein." — Isaiah 34:1-17 (ASV)

1. Come near, you Gentiles. In this part, he threatens those who were allies of the Assyrians.

   First, he threatens all of them together.

   Second, he threatens the Idumeans in particular, where it says, behold it shall come down upon Idumea (Isaiah 34:5).

   Concerning the first point, he does two things.

   First, he calls for attention, laying out the order of that attention: so that those approaching might come near, those who are near might hear, and those who hear might listen. As it says elsewhere: give ear, you islands, and hearken, you people from afar (Isaiah 49:1). And he describes the universality of those called together: let the earth hear; and the world, referring to those of middle rank, using the container to signify what it contains; the fullness, referring to the great; every thing that comes forth of it, referring to the lowly. He shows that he is prepared to announce this to all, not that all are able to hear: the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof (Psalms 24:1).

2. Second, he presents the threat, beginning with for the indignation, concerning three things.

   First, concerning the destruction of their people, he describes the indignation of the judge, namely, God: the indignation of the Lord. As it says above: this is the hand that is stretched out upon all nations (Isaiah 14:26); and, to destroy the nations unto nothing (Isaiah 30:28). He describes the killing of men: he has killed them by His authority; he delivered them, as if to say, He handed them over to others to be killed, as to executors: behold I will deliver the men, every one into his neighbor’s hand (Zechariah 11:6). And he describes the casting out of their corpses: their slain shall be cast forth, without burial: his stench shall ascend (Joel 2:20).

   Second, concerning the end of their tyrants: the mountains, that is, the tyrants, shall be melted with their blood, that is, because of the guilt of shedding blood. As it says below: the mountains would melt away at your presence (Isaiah 64:1).

   Third, concerning the destruction of their idols; and on this point, he does three things.

3. First, he shows that the help of idols will cease in wars: and all the host of the heavens, namely, of the air, that is, the demons; or, literally, the spirits, which, according to the opinion of the Gentiles, governed the stars, shall pine away. As it says above: the idols of Egypt shall be moved (Isaiah 19:1). This help will also cease in counsels, namely, insofar as they divined from the stars; and the heavens shall be folded together, that is: just as no one can read what is in a closed book, so they will not be able to foresee in the heavens the evils coming to them: the heaven departed as a book folded up (Revelation 6:14).

   Second, he shows that the worship of idols will cease: and all their host shall fall down. This also shows the ease with which these prophecies will be fulfilled: the stars from heaven fell upon the earth (Revelation 6:13).

   Third, he shows the effect of both: for my sword, that is, my vengeance, is inebriated in heaven, that is, I have carried out vengeance on the demons abundantly: I will make my arrows drunk with blood, and my sword shall devour flesh (Deuteronomy 32:42).

4. Behold it shall come down upon Idumea. Here he threatens the Idumeans in particular, who came with the enemies against Jerusalem, as it says in Obadiah 1:11: when strangers carried away his army captive. And concerning this, he does three things:

   First, he threatens the slaughter of their men.

   Second, the destruction of their land: and the streams thereof shall be turned into pitch (Isaiah 34:9).

   Third, he presents the confirmation of both of these threats, where it says, searchRespicite. Vg.: requirite. diligently in the book of the Lord (Isaiah 34:16).

5. Concerning the first point, he does three things.

   First, he describes the justice of the punishment: behold it shall come down upon Idumea, to crush them; the people of my slaughter, that is, a people deserving to be slaughtered by me: I have brought the destruction of Esau upon him (Jeremiah 49:8).

   Second, he describes the killing of those of middle rank, describing the diversity of those killed: the sword of the Lord is filled with blood, it is made thick with the blood of lambs and buck goats, with the blood of rams. By all of these are to be understood the various ranks of those killed: this is the sword of a great slaughter (Ezekiel 21:14). He also describes the magnitude of the killing: there is a victim of the Lord in Bosra and a great slaughter in the land of Edom, that is, many animals are killed, as in the banquet of a great king: I slay for you a great victim (Ezekiel 39:17). And concerning the great, he describes their killing: and the unicorns, a fierce animal the size of a cat, with one horn, and thus it signifies the powerful and monarchs, shall go down into death. As it says above: their strong ones, and their high and glorious ones shall go down into it (Isaiah 5:14). And he describes the magnitude of the killing: their land shall be soaked with blood: the land was killedInterfecta. Vg.: infecta. DR: “polluted.” with blood (Psalms 106:38).

   Third, he presents the reason for the punishment: for it is the day of the vengeance of the Lord, the year of recompenses of the judgment of Zion, namely, that Zion might be vindicated against the Idumeans. As it says below: the day of vengeance is in my heart, the year of my redemption is come (Isaiah 63:4). But, according to the Gloss: the judgment of Zion means judgment against Zion; hence it explains everything that follows as concerning the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans.

6. And the streams thereof shall be turned into pitch. Here he presents the threat concerning the destruction of the land. And on this point, he does three things:

   First, he foretells the destruction.

   Second, the desolation of the destroyed land: it shall lie waste (Isaiah 34:10).

   Third, the horror of its desolation: and it shall be the habitation of dragons (Isaiah 34:13).

   Concerning the first point, he describes two things:

   First, the destruction: the land shall be turned into pitch and brimstone, that is, the whole land shall be so burned up by their enemies, as if the water were pitch and the land brimstone: fire and brimstone, and storms of winds (Psalms 11:6).

   Second, he states the duration of the punishment: it shall not be quenched, that is, the effect of this fire will remain forever; its smoke will be the sign and memory of the preceding fire: her smoke ascends for ever and ever (Revelation 19:3). This is to be understood as lasting while the cause of the threat remains, namely, sin. For all prophecies of this sort are to be explained conditionally, just as the Lord Himself explains: I will suddenly speak against a nation . . . If that nation against which I have spoken, shall repent of their evil, I also will repent of the evil that I have thought (Jeremiah 18:7–8).

7. It shall lie waste for ever and ever. Here he describes the desolation of the land.

   First, he foretells the desolation itself concerning its inhabitants: it shall lie waste: he has made me desolate (Lamentations 1:13); and concerning travelers, none shall pass through it: no man shall abide there, nor son of man inhabit it (Jeremiah 49:33). He also foretells the free habitation of beasts: the bittern, which is the same as the pelican, shall possess it, as if without fear, and the ibis, a bird hostile to snakes.Compare to Herodotus 2.76; Pliny the Elder, N.H. 10.40; Isidore, Etymologies 12.7.33. “Ibex, ibicis” is a four-footed beast; “ibis, ibidis” is a bird, and the ibis is envious: the highest of them is the house of the heron . . . the rock is a refuge for the irchins (Psalms 104:17–18).

   Second, he describes the justice of the desolation.

   First, the judgment of justice: and a line shall be stretched upon it, the measure of the punishment against the measure of their fault, and a plummet, the rule of the stone-cutter. As it says above: in measure against measure (Isaiah 27:8).

   Second, he describes the manner of judgment: the nobles thereof shall be no more, those in whom they boasted: I will take away out of the midst of you your proud boasters (Zephaniah 3:11). And thorns and nettles shall grow up in its houses, which they built so carefully, and the thistle,Palliurus. a kind of plant with many thorns, which sticks to cloaks,Pallia. having broad leaves: nettles shall inherit their beloved silver, the bur shall be in their tabernacles (Hosea 9:6), so that as much as she has glorified herself and lived in delicacies, so much torment shall she have (Revelation 18:7).

8. And it shall be the habitation of dragons. Here he shows the horror of the desolation from the monsters which dwelt there: demons, monsters of demons, which appear most often in deserts; the onocentaur, which is half ass and half ox, or this is the illusion of a demon rather than a natural animal; the hairy ones, an ape, or a wild man, or a demon incubus; the lamia, having the feet of a horse and the other members of a woman. They cried out one to another. As it says above: wild beasts shall rest there (Isaiah 13:21).

9. Search. Here he confirms all that was said by the authority of divine inspiration: search, you who are to come, in the book of the Lord, that is, in this book, which I learned from the Lord. Not one of them was wanting, that is, all the monsters I have named will be there; one has not sought for the other, that is, the male for the female. His spirit it has gathered them, namely, the monsters, male and female. And he has cast the lot for them, distributing to each suitable places to stay: heaven and earth shall pass away: but my words shall not pass away (Luke 21:33). Or, if this is explained as concerning Judea, these various monsters are understood to be the various errors of the Gentiles, who were placed there as colonists by the Romans.

10. Man comes near to God :

    • through the reception of grace: we have access through him (Romans 5:2);
    • through the contemplation of divine wisdom: come to God and be enlightened (Psalms 35:5);
    • through the ministry of obedience: the sons of Sadoc, who among the sons of Levi, come near to the Lord, to minister to him (Ezekiel 40:6);
    • through the expectation of firm confidence: come to her as one that ploughs, and sows ;
    • through the spirit of concord: you haveHabetis. Vg.: habemus DR: “we have.” access in one Spirit to the Father (Ephesians 2:18).