Isaiah 31
Egypt can’t help Judah
My goodness, look at those foolish people.
They’ve gone to Egypt for help.
They’re putting their faith in livestock:
Horses pulling chariots loaded with charioteers.
The army looks strong enough,
So, Israel doesn’t look to their Holy One.
They don’t even mention Egypt to him.
He’s out of the loop.
He can hurt you.
You can count on him to do what he says.
He doesn’t bluff.
He’ll attack evil groups of people
And anyone who lends them a hand.
3Egyptians are human, not God.
Horses are fresh meat, not Spirit.
When the LORD throws a punch
Judah’s helpers in Egypt
Stumble, tumble, and drop.
Then Egypt and Judah die together.
4The LORD said,
“I’ll charge them like a growling lion
And guard their corpses like a young lion.
People might object and scream like shepherds.
But that wouldn’t deter a lion
And it won’t move me.
I’m coming to Mount Zion [1] of Jerusalem.
I’m coming there to fight.
5God will hover above Jerusalem,
Protecting it like birds guard their nests.
He won’t let the enemy destroy Jerusalem.
He’s going to save the city.” [2]
Shame on you
6People of Israel, you should be ashamed of yourselves for turning your backs on God. Stop it. Go back to the LORD. 7You’re covered in guilt for worshiping idols you made with your own hands. There’s coming a day when you’ll destroy them and throw them out. 8Assyrians will fall in battle,
But not in a battle with people.
Young soldiers will run for their lives,
Get captured as slaves,
And put to work.
As its people watch and die in terror,
And panicked commanders desert their posts.”
This message came from the LORD.
He’s cooking with fire [3] in Jerusalem.
He’s flaming mad and hot as an oven.
Footnotes
“Zion,” an endearing nickname for Jerusalem, perhaps a bit like Big Apple for New York City or City of Angels for Los Angeles. Mount Zion refers to the ridgetop on which the city was built, just across the Kidron Valley from the Mount of Olive ridge of hills.
Some scholars say this refers to Assyrian King Sennacherib’s devastating invasion in 701 BC. Assyrians had destroyed the northern Jewish nation of Israel about 20 years earlier. Judah, in the south, was the only surviving Jewish nation. Sennacherib destroyed most cities during that campaign. And he defeated Egyptians who came to their rescue. Then he lay siege to Jerusalem when Hezekiah was king. But he left suddenly. A Bible writer said an angel killed 185,000 of his soldiers (2 Kings 19:35). A Greek writer 250 years later, Herodotus, wrote that the army got stopped by a rat infestation that killed some of the soldiers. Some scholars speculate that the rats carried diseases—plagues such as bubonic, septicemic, pneumonic. Those three diseases—all from the same bacterium (yersinia pestis)—affect the immune system, blood, and lungs.
God is cooking chicken wings here. He’s steaming hot. Many scholars say this image of fire and an oven are metaphors for God’s anger, expressed earlier as fire in 30:27-33.
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