Ah! the Assyrian! the rod of mine anger! and the staff in their hand is mine indignation.
God speaks to a world empire the way a man speaks to a tool in his hand. Two questions follow. How can a cruel pagan empire be God's own rod? And what happens to the rod when God has finished with it?
The nation terrorising the region was not acting outside God's reach. One writer ties the verse to the prophet Habakkuk, who struggled with the same problem: God using a worse nation to correct His own. He also names the part of Israel the Assyrian was sent against.
God had taken that people up as the rod of His anger to chastise many a nation that was far from Him — and Israel among them. Later God used the Chaldeans in the same way. This disturbed Habakkuk. He protested that, bad as Israel might be, the Chaldeans God was about to use to discipline them were worse. We see here what we also see in Habakkuk. God may use an evil nation to chastise His unfaithful people, but only under His strict supervision and control. God was now sending him, as verse 6 says, against a hypocritical nation — clearly the ten tribes and Samaria.
Being God's instrument is not the same as serving God. The Assyrian meant something different from what God meant. There was also a reason God gave Israel up to him.
That is, the Lord employed him as a means of beating down the pride of Israel. "But he does not so intend." He only seeks to gratify his own pride. If only Israel had held to their true boast, the Lord Himself, and humbly looked to Him to plead their cause. But no, they wanted what the surrounding nations wanted; and their God gave them up to the haughty and cruel foe.
The Assyrian looked like the one in charge. One writer names what he really was.
He was only like an axe or a rod in the hand of the Lord and could not dictate to the One who wielded him. The Holy One of Israel would consume him and bring down his pride and importance.
Being useful to God gave Assyria no protection. The pride God used against Israel became the charge against Assyria.
God uses the pride and sin of wicked men to discipline His people. Afterwards He destroys the instrument. The Assyrian, God's rod to strike Israel, glorifies himself against God, who breaks the rod.
Where the ESV reads "my fury," older translations read "my indignation." One writer explains why God lets a later oppressor prosper for a time.
God permits it, because it is the time of His indignation against the Jews... This indignation is the period spoken of in Isaiah 10:5, 24, 25: "For in a very little while my fury will come to an end." There is an indignation with a certain limit.
Some writers see more here than an ancient invasion. They point to verse 12: God punishes the Assyrian only after He finishes His work on Zion.
God uses this rod for the chastisement of His guilty people Israel. But at length God judges this haughty enemy, and with this judgment, His indignation against Israel comes to a close... The Lord has clearly not yet finished His whole work on Mount Zion and Jerusalem. So this punishment of the Assyrian must still be future.
Writers also warn that the Assyrian is not the Antichrist. These are two different people:
Another chief will arise, completely opposed to this Antichrist in Jerusalem, who is allied with the western power. This chief is an outside enemy of the Jews. He is the Assyrian, or Daniel's king of the north, who appears so often in the prophecies. Of him Sennacherib, to a certain extent, was a type.
The picture is not only about empires. One writer applies it to the Midianites, a nation God once used against Israel, and then to God's children today.
The Midianites did not know that the Lord had handed Israel over to them. In reality they were only the rod He chose to punish His people with. As with the Assyrian... When He has done with His rod, He can break it, or burn it... Satan himself is very often the rod used by God for the discipline of His children.
- Rod — Assyria is a tool God picks up. He keeps it under His strict supervision and control; it never acts on its own.
- Blind rod — the tool does not mean what the hand means. The Assyrian served his own pride while doing God's work.
- Broken rod — God uses the pride of wicked men, then destroys the tool. Being useful to God saves no one.
- Limited rod — God's indignation runs for a set time, and He fixed its limit in advance.
- Present rod — even Satan can be a rod in God's hand to discipline His children. When God is done with a rod, He can break it or burn it.
I will send him against a hypocritical nation, and against the people of my wrath will I give him a charge; to take the spoil, and to seize the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets.
God calls a pagan empire "him" and gives it a charge. The invasion looks like Assyria's ambition; Isaiah calls it God's errand. So two questions follow. What had Israel become, that God would hand them over like street mud? And what happens to a nation God uses as His weapon?
The empire that terrified the region was on assignment. One writer names the nation God sent it against, and shows how tightly God held the whole thing. (Older translations read "hypocritical nation" where the ESV has "godless nation".)
In Isaiah's day the power of Assyria was threatening all the nations. God had taken that people up as the rod of His anger to chastise many a nation that was far from Him — and Israel among them. Later God used the Chaldeans in the same way. That is what disturbed the mind of Habakkuk. He protested that, bad as Israel might be, the Chaldeans were worse — and God was going to use them against Israel for their discipline. We see here what we see also in Habakkuk. God may use an evil nation to chastise His faithless people, but only under His strict supervision and control. God was now sending him, as verse 6 says, against a hypocritical nation — clearly the ten tribes and Samaria.
The charge is not open rebellion. It is pretended religion: worship kept up while the heart had moved away. One writer traces that hypocrisy from Isaiah's day to the crowds who met Jesus.
And the Lord said through His prophet, "Because this people draw near with their mouth and honour Me with their lips, while their hearts are far from Me, and their fear of Me is a commandment taught by men" (Isa. 29:13). This was God's word in the prophet's day. Our Lord Jesus confirms it, applying the same word to the Jews in His day (Matt. 15:7-9). Hypocrisy was their character, and it filled the prophet's day. And what is more hateful than hypocrisy? To the tax collectors and prostitutes the Lord said, Come; to the hypocrites He said, Woe. "I will send him against a hypocritical nation."
God gives the charge; the Assyrian never hears it. He marches for his own reasons and reaches God's ends.
Verse 5 of this chapter tells us why God allowed this powerful, destructive nation to attack His people. They were proud of their great victories. But they were only the rod of God's anger. The power they used was only the instrument to show God's indignation. God sent the Assyrian to chasten His people because of their sins. Yet the Assyrian had no idea what God was doing. His heart was full of pride, and he was bent on destroying and subduing nations. He never saw that he was only God's instrument to carry out His will against the nations because of their evil.
"Tread them down like the mire" sounds unlimited. It is not. God fixes both how long the rod strikes and how hard.
Their rescue from Babylon taught them a lesson. The Lord may use the wicked for a time as a rod of anger on His people. But He will not let that rod rest or remain on them. He will argue with His rod. He gives it a measured length as well as a measured severity. In His grace He remembers that the spirit might fail under an oppression that lasts too long.
Serving God's purpose is no protection. The empire that carried out the sentence comes under sentence itself.
God employs the pride and wickedness of the wicked for the chastisement of His people, and afterwards He destroys the instrument. The Assyrian, God's rod to strike Israel, glorifies himself against God, who breaks the rod.
Commentators differ on how far this verse reaches. Some tie it to Samaria in Isaiah's own day. Others say that invasion only pictured something later.
He uses them as the "rod of His anger" against His rebellious people, to break them down because of their apostasy. But this invasion is ruthless and defies God. So He judges them in turn and destroys them, after He has used it to carry out His work of judgment on the Jews and Jerusalem. (See Isaiah 10:5-34. It describes an invasion that was partly fulfilled long ago under Sennacherib. But the prophecy goes far beyond that, to this invasion at the time of the end. The old Assyrian invasion is a picture of it.)
- Cause. God names the sin: hypocrisy. Lips near God, hearts far off. One writer traces it from Isaiah's day to the crowds who heard Jesus.
- Charge. The invasion is God's errand before it is Assyria's ambition. He sends, He commands, and He keeps it all under strict control.
- Blindness. The rod never knows it is a rod. Assyria marched for plunder and pride, and never knew whose will it was carrying out.
- Limit. God measures how hard the rod strikes and how long. He knows the spirit can fail under oppression that lasts too long.
- Reversal. God destroys the instrument afterwards. The rod that lifted itself against the hand holding it gets broken. Assyria's story ends, not Israel's.
But he meaneth not so, neither doth his heart think so; for it is in his heart to extirpate and cut off nations not a few.
God calls the invading empire His own rod, then in the same breath says the man swinging it has no such thought in his mind. This verse opens up that gap between God's charge and the conqueror's ambition. It raises the hardest question here: if God sent him, can God still judge him?
The verse turns on a contrast. God used Assyria to beat down the pride of His people. The king wanted only conquest — and he did not get all he wanted.
The Lord used him as a means of beating down the pride of Israel. "But he does not so intend." He only seeks to gratify his own pride… But surely if the Lord chastises the faults of His people, He will not fail to punish the overbearing wickedness of His enemies. "But it is in his heart to destroy, and to cut off nations not a few."… This he valued, and would have liked yet more, but God did not allow the Assyrian to have all he wished. Supreme dominion was his ambition; but Babylon was given it by the sovereign will of God.
What "his heart" was set on had a target: Jerusalem. He meant to treat it as he had treated the nations around it. Events showed who set the limits.
But the Assyrian himself did not realize this, and so "he does not so intend," but meant to ravage Jerusalem as well as Samaria, doing to them what he had already done to many of the surrounding peoples. As we know from the historical Scriptures, though he distressed and threatened Jerusalem he did not take it… He was only like an axe or a rod in the hand of the Lord and could not dictate to the One who wielded him.
Because his intention was his own, his guilt was his own. The order of events matters: first the chastening, then the reckoning.
God employs the pride and wickedness of the wicked for the chastisement of His people; and afterwards He destroys the instrument. The Assyrian, God's rod to strike Israel, glorifies himself against God, who breaks the rod.
This is not true of one empire only. Powers that hate God still serve designs they know nothing about.
God can use any instruments He will to carry out His purposes… The Assyrian of old, and the beast and ten kings, though hating and blaspheming God, are just His tools, with no knowledge or will of their own, to carry out His unfailing designs.
The verse has a direct use for anyone under attack. It tells you where to take the trouble first. The attacker's motive is not the whole story.
When enemies rise up against us our first appeal should be to God as to why He has permitted it. The enemies themselves may have no thought of God, but they may still be His instruments for the discipline of His people. The cruel Assyrian was the rod of the Lord's anger toward Israel — "he does not so intend"… The Hebrew Christians were ready to faint under their sufferings. Those sufferings seemed to come from the persecution of the ungodly; but they were also the Father's gracious chastening. "For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it" (Heb. 12:1-13).
Commentators see this passage looking on to the Assyrian's final work, not only his ancient one. The last stroke of the rod is also the end of the anger.
But now, from verse 5, we come to a very important change. The Assyrian destroyer comes into view again. The Holy Spirit has his final work mainly in view, for this is the great disaster and last trouble of Jacob… The indignation ends, and so does the Lord's anger, in their destruction. His anger now is turned away and His arm stretched out no more. The rod should be broken and the whip destroyed, because the chastening work is done.
- The rod — God sent Assyria to beat down the pride of His people. The conqueror did it with no thought of serving God.
- The heart — His own aim was conquest without limit. He did not get it. Supreme dominion went elsewhere by God's will.
- The wood — An axe cannot give orders to the arm that swings it; he could threaten Jerusalem but not take it.
- The reckoning — God uses the rod first and breaks it afterwards. He judges a man's pride even when that man's violence served His purpose.
- The comfort — Enemies with no thought of God are still tools in His hand. So take the trouble to God first. His chastening yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.
For he saith, Are not my princes all kings?
These words are not God's. They are the boast of the king of Assyria, and the prophet repeats them as evidence against him. He is counting his conquests and the rank of the men who serve him. And he does it at the very moment God is using him to discipline Israel.
The chapter opens with God calling Assyria the rod of His anger. One writer ties this to the prophet Habakkuk, who struggled with the same thing.
In Isaiah's day the power of Assyria was threatening all the nations. God had taken that people up as the rod of His anger to discipline many nations that were far from Him — Israel among them. Later God used the Chaldeans in the same way. This disturbed Habakkuk. He protested that, bad as Israel might be, the Chaldeans God was going to use to discipline them were worse. We see here what we also see in Habakkuk. God may use an evil nation to discipline His faithless people, but only under His strict supervision and control.
The boast is about rank. The officers under him are not mere generals; every one of them rules territory that once had its own throne. William Kelly reads this as the ambition of a man who wanted the top place in the world — and shows that God set a limit on it.
But be sure of this: if the Lord disciplines the faults of His people, He will not fail to punish the overbearing wickedness of His enemies. "But it is in his heart to cut off and destroy nations not a few. For he says, Are not my commanders all kings?" He valued this, and would have liked more. But God did not allow the Assyrian to have all he wished. Supreme dominion was his ambition, but God in His sovereign will gave that place to Babylon.
The verse begins with "For he says." What follows is the king's own account of his success, and God has no place in it.
Verse 5 of this chapter tells us why God allowed this powerful and destructive nation to attack His people. They were proud of their great victories. Yet they were only the rod of God's anger, and the power they used was only the instrument that displayed God's indignation. God sent the Assyrian to discipline His people because of their sins. But the Assyrian had no idea what God was doing.
From verse 8 the boast runs on into a roll-call of captured cities and a conclusion: if Samaria fell, Jerusalem will fall too. Kelly reads the whole speech as one unit and gives its verdict in a sentence.
But he did not own God… His own doom is therefore sealed.
Years afterwards an Assyrian officer stood outside Jerusalem and used exactly this reasoning on the people listening from the wall. Writers note the flaw in it.
He tried hard to direct their minds away from the Lord to other things, such as the gods of the nations. Had any of them been able to deliver a nation from the hand of the king of Assyria? What about the gods of Hamath, Arpad, Sepharvaim, Hena and Ivvah? And what about Samaria? All of these had fallen into slavery to Assyria. The answer is simple. None of those nations was depending on the only true God.
One writer holds that the Assyrian of this chapter points beyond the empire of Isaiah's own day.
As so often in Old Testament prophecy, there is a final fulfilment as well as a nearer one, and this is surely the case here… So "the Assyrian," whom we are now to consider, has a double application. He is the great power of that day, centred in Nineveh. He is also that "king of the North," which was Assyria, whom we read of in the last days.
- Rod lifted. God took up a cruel empire as the rod of His anger against His own faithless people — but only under His strict supervision and control.
- Rod boasting. This verse is the rod talking: his officers are kings, and God is nowhere in his account of his success.
- Rod blind. He was proud of his victories and had no idea what God was doing through him.
- Rod limited. He wanted supreme dominion. God refused it and gave that place to Babylon by His sovereign will.
- Rod judged. He refused to own God, and so sealed his own doom — and writers see the same figure rise again as the king of the North in the last days.
Is not Calno as Karkemish? Is not Hamath as Arpad? Is not Samaria as Damascus?
Isaiah 10:9 is the boast of a conqueror listing the cities he has crushed. Each name is meant to prove that resistance is useless. The question is whether Jerusalem belongs on that list — and whether the man saying it knew who had put the sword in his hand.
The speaker is Assyria. The chapter has already called him a tool in God's hand, and commentators read his boast as the tool taking credit for the work.
The Lord used him to beat down the pride of Israel. "But he means not so." He only seeks to gratify his own pride. If only Israel had stood for their true boast, Jehovah Himself, and humbly looked to Him to plead their cause. But no, they sought what the Gentiles sought; and their God gave them up to the haughty and cruel foe. But if the Lord corrects the faults of His people, He will certainly punish the overbearing wickedness of His enemies too.
Even the empire he wanted was not his to take. Kelly notes that supreme rule was his ambition, but God in His sovereign will gave that place to Babylon.
The six names are real places, most of them north and east of Israel. Calno appears elsewhere as Calneh, a name that goes back to Genesis.
Calneh was far to the east, a very ancient city that lasted a long time. (Compare Genesis 10:10 and Isaiah 10:9.) Hamath was a Canaanite kingdom north of the land.
A dated list of Assyrian conquests fixes when several of these names fell.
738 — Arpad, Calno, Carchemish and Damascus taken by Tiglath-pileser III
Samaria, the capital of the northern kingdom of Israel, is the last name in the list — and that is the point of the whole boast. If Samaria fell like Damascus, the Assyrian reasons, Jerusalem will fall like Samaria.
But the Assyrian himself did not realise this. And so "he means not so." He intended to ravage Jerusalem as well as Samaria, doing to them what he had already done to many of the peoples around him. As we know from the historical Scriptures, though he distressed and threatened Jerusalem he did not take it. As verse 12 shows, God would use him to do to Jerusalem what He intended. Then God would punish and humble him. He was only like an axe or a rod in the hand of the Lord and could not dictate to the One who wielded him.
Treating Jerusalem as one more pagan capital was more than a military mistake. One writer sets the Assyrian's words beside those of other nations who struck at Israel.
Even if the Lord had used them as a rod on His people, they should have carried out their commission with a sense of what Israel was, or had been. They should have acted in the spirit of the sailors and the shipmaster who threw Jonah into the sea. But this was not so. The Assyrian had once said, "Shall I not do to Jerusalem and her idols as I have done to Samaria and her idols?" The Chaldean had "brought the vessels of the house of God into the treasure-house of his god." And now the Edomite "entered into the gate of God's people in the day of their calamity."
The boast did not stay on Isaiah's page. Commentators trace the same words on later lips.
Verses 9-14 give his words as prophecy. They are the words that Rabshakeh, the servant of Sennacherib, spoke, and that the king wrote in his letter to Hezekiah. The same boastful spirit that marked Sennacherib then would later mark Antiochus Epiphanes, as prophesied in Daniel 8:10-12; And it would appear in full in the king of the north in the last days (Daniel 8:19-25).
For the people under the blow, the comfort is not that the rod is soft but that God holds it.
Though the Lord may for a season use the wicked as a rod of anger on His people, He will not let that rod rest or remain on them. He will deal with His rod. He gives it a measured length as well as a measured severity, remembering in grace that the spirit might fail under an oppression that lasts too long. Indeed He will end His indignation on Israel by the destruction of that rod.
- Rod. Assyria was a tool God used to beat down Israel's pride — but he did not mean it that way; he was only feeding his own pride.
- Roll-call. The six names were real conquests. Calno was an ancient city far to the east, Hamath a Canaanite kingdom to the north; Tiglath-pileser III took Arpad, Calno, Carchemish and Damascus.
- Reasoning. From that list he concluded Jerusalem was next, intending to do to her what he had done to the peoples around.
- Wrong. He should have acted with some sense of what Israel was. Instead he treated God's city as one more idol-town. He threatened Jerusalem, but he never took it.
- Broken. The rod has a measured severity and a measured length, and God ends the chastening by destroying the rod.
As my hand hath found the kingdoms of the idols, -- and their graven images exceeded those of Jerusalem and Samaria,
These words are not Isaiah's own. They are the boast of the Assyrian king. He lists the kingdoms he has already taken and counts Jerusalem's images as no stronger than theirs. So why does God let such a mouth speak at all — and what becomes of the speaker?
God had already called the Assyrian His rod. The empire that frightened every nation was itself a tool in someone else's hand.
In Isaiah's day the power of Assyria was threatening all the nations. God had taken that people up as the rod of His anger to chastise many a nation that was far from Him — and Israel among them.
This is not a general picture of pride. Commentators name the speaker behind verses 9–14, and say the same boast returns later.
God addresses the Assyrian, or speaks of him, as "the rod of My anger, and the staff in their hand is My indignation" (Isa. 10:5). He was the rod God used to chastise His people in the past, as the history of the kings records. God will use him for the same purpose again in days still to come. The words the prophecy puts in his mouth in verses 9–14 are the words spoken by Rabshakeh, the servant of Sennacherib, and by the king in his letter to Hezekiah. The same boastful spirit that marked Sennacherib then would later mark Antiochus Epiphanes, as prophesied in Daniel 8:10-12. It will appear in full in the king of the north in the last days.
The boast only works if the God of Jerusalem is one more idol. That is exactly how the Assyrian's spokesman saw Him.
Rabshakeh could not tell the difference between the idols and the Lord. To him the Lord was only an idol, one out of many. Hezekiah had broken down all the idols, so he assumed they were simply different forms of the Lord's worship. That was the pagan idea of God.
Put the two side by side and the boast collapses.
He had no idea that the gods of the nations, including his own, were only helpless idols. The God of Israel, unlike them, created all things.
God had one purpose in this attack. The Assyrian had another.
That is, the Lord used him as a means of beating down the pride of Israel. "But he does not so intend." He only seeks to gratify his own pride. If only Israel had stood by their true boast, the Lord Himself, and looked to Him in humility to plead their cause! But no, they wanted what the nations wanted, and their God gave them up to a proud and cruel enemy. Yet if the Lord chastises the faults of His people, He will surely punish the arrogant wickedness of His enemies too.
Being useful to God is not the same as being safe with God.
God uses the pride and wickedness of evil men to chastise His people. Afterwards He destroys the instrument. The Assyrian, God's rod to strike Israel, glorifies himself against God, who breaks the rod.
The rod does not stay forever. God decides how long it lasts.
The Lord may use wicked people for a time as a rod of anger on His own people. But He will not let that rod stay on them. He will contend with that rod. He sets a limit to how long it lasts and to how hard it strikes, remembering in His grace that their spirit might fail under too long an oppression. In the end He will finish His anger against Israel by destroying that rod.
- Rod, not ruler. The Assyrian counts up the kingdoms he has conquered, but he is only a rod in God's hand. God keeps him under strict control.
- Rod misreads itself. He counts the God of Jerusalem as one more carved image. He is treating the Creator of all things as a helpless idol.
- Rod finds an opening. Israel wanted what the nations wanted instead of boasting in the Lord, so God gave them up to the enemy.
- Rod is broken. God uses the pride of the wicked to chastise His people. Then He destroys the instrument that glorified itself against Him.
- Rod is measured. God limits how hard the rod strikes and how long it lasts. He remembers how much His people can bear.
-- shall I not, as I have done unto Samaria and her idols, so do to Jerusalem and her images?
The Assyrian king ends his boast with cold arithmetic. He has already crushed Samaria, so in his mind Jerusalem must fall next. Behind the swagger is one question: is the God of Israel just one more local god on a conqueror's list?
These words come from a longer speech. God was using the man who spoke them, and he did not know it. One writer sets the boast against the task God gave him — and against Israel's own failure.
The Lord used him to beat down the pride of Israel. But he does not mean it that way. He only wants to satisfy his own pride. If only Israel had held to their true boast, Jehovah Himself! If only they had humbly looked to Him to plead their cause! But no. They wanted what the nations wanted, and their God gave them up to the proud and cruel enemy. Yet if the Lord chastises the faults of His people, He will certainly not fail to punish the overbearing wickedness of His enemies.
Another writer traces what happens to such an instrument afterwards.
God employs the pride and wickedness of the wicked for the chastisement of His people; and afterwards He destroys the instrument. The Assyrian, God's rod to strike Israel, glorifies himself against God, who breaks the rod.
The force of the boast rests on treating Jerusalem's worship as one more local religion. Rabshakeh, the Assyrian king's servant, spoke the same taunt. One writer explains how he thought about Jehovah, the God of Israel.
Rabshakeh could not tell the difference between the idols and Jehovah. To him, Jehovah was only an idol — one out of many. Hezekiah had broken down all the idols, so he imagined that they were different forms of Jehovah's worship. That was the pagan idea of God.
That miscalculation was shared across the Assyrian court. Writing on Nahum, another source describes the same slide from claiming God's backing to sneering at Him.
At first he said that Jehovah had sent him. Then he treated the God of Israel as no better than the pagan gods, who had not been able to protect their worshippers.
Attacking that city was never only a military move. One writer explains why.
To lay hands on Israel, and to show this contempt and hatred of Zion, is a bold act. It shows contempt and defiance of God Himself, because God was with Israel. That is true of the Assyrian, of Babylon, of Edom, and of any other… Even if the Lord had used them as His rod on His people, they should have carried out their task with a sense of what Israel was or had been.
The boast did not hang in the air. God answered it, and a prophet delivered the answer.
Pride gives him his only language… The Lord God was angry. He pronounces a burden on him, and Nahum delivers it. "The Lord is a jealous God and an avenger."
One writer names the men who spoke these words, then follows the same boastful tone forward.
Rabshakeh, the servant of Sennacherib, spoke the words the prophecy gives to the Assyrian in verses 9-14, and the king wrote them in his letter to Hezekiah. The same boastful spirit marked Sennacherib then. Later it marked Antiochus Epiphanes, as Daniel 8:10-12 foretold. And it will appear in full in the king of the north in the last days.
- Rod. God did use Assyria to chastise His people. The conquests behind this boast came from a commission the conqueror never understood.
- Pride. The rod took credit for the hand. He meant only his own pride, and the list of fallen cities was his proof.
- Blunder. His fatal error was one word: "idols." He could not tell the God of Israel apart from carved images. So he assumed Jerusalem would fall like the rest.
- Insult. Because God was with that people, hitting Jerusalem was open defiance of God Himself — not just another siege.
- Answer. God chastises His people, then breaks the rod. The boast drew out Nahum's burden, and the same proud voice returns in later prophecy.
And it shall come to pass, when the Lord hath performed his whole work upon mount Zion and upon Jerusalem, I will punish the fruit of the stoutness of heart of the king of Assyria, and the glory of his high looks.
Assyria was the tool God picked up to strike His own guilty people. This verse says what happens to the tool afterwards: God finishes His work on Mount Zion first, then punishes the proud king who carried it out.
Assyria's power over Israel was real, but God had lent it. One writer states the pattern, then points to a later example:
God uses the pride and wickedness of the wicked to discipline His people. Afterwards He destroys the instrument. The Assyrian is God's rod to strike Israel, yet he glorifies himself against God, and God breaks the rod. In the same way, Napoleon Bonaparte struck all the peoples of the Roman empire in the early nineteenth century. He was in the wrong, and afterwards he was struck himself.
God's charge to the Assyrian and the Assyrian's own plan were two different things, and that gap is why judgment follows.
The Assyrian was first used as a rod to chastise Israel. "Ho, Assyrian, the rod of my anger... I will send him against a godless nation, and against the people of my wrath I will give him a charge, to take the spoil and to seize the plunder... But he does not mean so, neither does his heart think so; it is in his heart to destroy and cut off nations not a few." But he did not acknowledge God... His own doom is therefore sealed.
The order in the verse matters. The Assyrian is not judged while the work on Jerusalem is still running.
Israel is blessed, but the Assyrian is not yet judged. Israel had been wrong, but the Assyrian had been merciless. God had dealt with Israel. Now He must deal with their foes, as Isaiah 10:12 tells us.
Not the conquest — the heart behind it, and the speech that came out of it. God weighs why a man does what he does:
God takes into account not only what men do, but their purpose in doing it. Jehu carried out the judgment of the Lord on the house of Ahab... But he carried out the Lord's just judgments with harshness, and for his own selfish reasons. That was far from acceptable... Assyria was the rod of His anger, by which He chastised Israel. But the rod boasted itself against the One who lifted it up.
The verses that follow spell the boast out — "By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom" — and God answers it with a question about tools:
He is only an axe and a saw in the hand of God; a staff and a rod wielded by God to do His will. After God has used the Assyrian as His instrument He "will consume the glory of his forest and of his fruitful field."
One writer reads the verse as God's direct word to the empire, a limit set on how far a chosen instrument may go:
God, so to speak, says to this mighty power: I am using you to discipline My straying people. But if you lift yourself up against Me, I must bring you down.
Several commentators take the opening clause as proof that this punishment has not yet happened. The test is simple and checkable:
God uses this rod for the chastisement of His guilty people Israel. But in the end God judges this proud enemy. With that judgment His anger against Israel comes to a close... Now the Lord has clearly not yet finished His whole work on Mount Zion and Jerusalem. So this punishment of the Assyrian is certainly still future.
William Kelly places this blow at the end of the line:
Does this not seem to show that this is the Lord's last act of judgment connected with the blessing of Israel?
- Rod. God lifted Assyria as the rod of His anger against His own people. Its success was a charge given to it, not a strength it owned.
- Rod's own heart. The tool did not mean what God meant. It planned to destroy nations for its own sake, and that gap seals its doom.
- Rod judged by motive. God weighs not only what men do, but why they do it. Jehu did the right work for selfish reasons, and God did not accept it.
- Rod broken last. God finishes His work on Zion and Jerusalem first. Only then does He turn on the merciless foe. Correcting His people and judging their enemy are two different acts.
- Rod still standing. The work on Zion and Jerusalem is not yet finished. So writers here read this punishment as still ahead, and one of them as the last act of judgment before Israel's blessing.
For he saith, By the strength of my hand I have done [it], and by my wisdom, for I am intelligent; and I have removed the bounds of the peoples, and have robbed their treasures, and, like a valiant man, I have brought down them that sit [on thrones];
These words are not the prophet's own. They are the boast of the king of Assyria, who credits his conquests to two things: his own strength and his own wisdom. The chapter raises one question: who was doing the conquering?
God had taken up Assyria as a tool to discipline His people. This verse is the tool talking back.
But the Assyrian himself did not realize this. He did not mean it that way. He intended to ravage Jerusalem as well as Samaria, doing to them what he had already done to many of the surrounding peoples. The history books of Scripture show that he troubled and threatened Jerusalem, but never took it. As verse 12 shows, God would use him to do to Jerusalem what He intended, and would then punish him and humble him. He was only like an axe or a rod in the hand of the Lord and could not dictate to the One who wielded him. The Holy One of Israel would consume him and bring down his pride and importance.
Being useful to God did not make the Assyrian safe.
God uses the pride and sin of the wicked to discipline His people. Afterwards He destroys the tool. The Assyrian, God's rod to strike Israel, glorifies himself against God, who breaks the rod.
The Assyrian's campaigns did carry out God's judgment. That did not make him innocent.
God takes into account not only what men do, but their aim in doing it. Jehu carried out the judgment of the Lord on the house of Ahab, and on all his guilty partners, until not one of them remained alive. By his hand God also punished the wickedness of Jezebel in Jezreel. But the harshness with which he carried out the Lord's just judgments was far from acceptable, and so were his own selfish reasons for it. So God said through the prophet Hosea that in a little while He would punish the house of Jehu for the blood of Jezreel (Hos. 1:4).
He claims to have erased the borders of nations, emptied their treasuries, and toppled kings from their thrones. But those borders were never his to redraw.
It matters little how bold and arrogant the ambition of would-be world-rulers may be. It matters little how vast their preparations for conquest, or how remarkable their apparent success as they push toward their goal. All of it lies in God's hand in the end: "When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, when he divided mankind, he fixed the borders of the peoples according to the number of the sons of God. But the LORD's portion is his people, Jacob his allotted heritage" (Deut. 32:8-9).
(Here Mawson quoted an older translation: "according to the number of the children of Israel.")
The same instinct lives in hearts that never commanded an army. The danger is not only taking credit we never earned. It is taking credit for what God has done for us.
Sadly, what material there is in us! What ignorance of our own hearts! ... We are capable of turning God's actions on our behalf into an occasion for self-satisfaction. Instead of seeing in those gracious actions a reason for heartfelt praise to God, we use them as a reason to exalt ourselves.
Commentators read Isaiah 10 on two levels: the Assyrian power of Isaiah's own day, and a ruler of the last days.
As so often in Old Testament prophecy, there is an ultimate fulfilment as well as a nearer one, and that is surely the case here... In the same way, "the Assyrian" has this double application. It means the great power of that day, centred in Nineveh. It also means the "king of the North" — Assyria again — whom we read of in the last days.
On that reading, this boast is made once more at the end — and God answers it at once.
It would appear that at this time he will consider himself invincible and will say, "By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom, for I have understanding" (Isa. 10:13). The boast will barely be out of his blasphemous mouth before the Lord strikes him and brings him to his shameful end.
- Rod. Assyria's victories were real. But he was only an axe in another's hand, and an axe gives no orders to the one who swings it.
- Rod that boasts. The sin is not the conquering; it is the word "my" — strength and wisdom claimed for himself.
- Rod weighed. God weighs the aim behind the act. Jehu did the right work with wrong motives, and his house paid for it.
- Rod broken. God uses the pride of the wicked to discipline His people. Then He destroys the tool.
- Rod copied. The same boast returns in the last days. It shows up in any heart that turns God's gracious actions into a reason for boasting.
and my hand hath found as a nest the riches of the peoples, and as one gathereth forsaken eggs, have I gathered all the earth; and there was none that moved the wing, or opened the mouth, or chirped.
The Assyrian king ends his boast here: he took the wealth of nations like eggs from an empty nest, and no bird fluttered a wing. But who did it, and what does God do with a conqueror who claims credit for work God gave him?
The whole speech is one long claim of self-made success. Notice the picture he picks: eggs in an abandoned nest cannot fight back, and he says the nations were that easy. What he cannot see is that God handed him every campaign.
The Assyrian thought he was only doing his own will when he punished Samaria and Jerusalem, saying, "By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom" (Isa. 10:13). He did not understand that he was only the rod of God's anger. God was using him to carry out judgment on His rebellious, idol-worshipping people.
These lines are not invented. Commentators trace them to a servant of the Assyrian king, and to a letter the king himself sent to Hezekiah.
In verses 9-14 the prophecy puts words in his mouth. They are the words Rabshakeh, Sennacherib's servant, spoke, and the words the king wrote to Hezekiah. The same boastful spirit that marked Sennacherib then would later mark Antiochus Epiphanes, as Daniel 8:10-12 foretold. And it would appear in full in the king of the north in the last days (Daniel 8:19-25).
God answers this boast. He is the one who picked up this rod, and He tells it what happens if it turns on Him:
God, in effect, says to this mighty power: I am using you to chasten My straying people. But if you lift yourself up against Me, I must bring you down.
The principle reaches well beyond Assyria. God has used many hands that never intended to serve Him.
The Midianites did not know that the Lord had handed Israel over to them. In reality they were only the rod He chose to punish His people with... When He has finished with His rod, He can break it or burn it... Satan himself is very often the rod used by God for the discipline of His children.
Being useful to God is not the same as pleasing Him. The order never changes: first the chastening, then the reckoning.
God uses the pride and sin of the wicked to chasten His people. Afterwards He destroys the instrument. The Assyrian, God's rod to strike Israel, glorifies himself against God, who breaks the rod.
God broke this rod in Sennacherib's own day.
The Lord sent an angel who cut down every mighty man of valour, leader and captain in the camp of the king of Assyria... Sennacherib returned in shame to his own land. In the temple of his idolatrous god, his own sons killed him with the sword. How helpless his god was to deliver him!
Several writers read this passage as reaching past Sennacherib to a last invader, the king of the north. He will make the same boast, and it will end the same way.
It seems he will consider himself invincible and will say, "By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom..." (Isa. 10:13-14). The boast will barely be out of his mouth before the Lord strikes him down to a shameful end.
- Used — Assyria's victories were real, but God assigned them. He uses the pride of the wicked to chasten His people, and the conqueror never knows it.
- Claimed — Verse 14 takes all the credit. The nations came like eggs from an empty nest, and no wing lifted against him. He counts the plunder and forgets the hand that holds him.
- Answered — God's word to this power is plain: I am using you, but lift yourself against Me and I bring you down.
- Broken — When God has finished with a rod, He can break it or burn it. Sennacherib went home in shame, and his own sons killed him in his god's temple — a god helpless to save him.
- Repeated — The same spirit shows up in later oppressors and in one last invader. His boast will barely leave his mouth before his end comes.
-- Shall the axe boast itself against him that heweth therewith? shall the saw magnify itself against him that wieldeth it? As if the rod should wield them that lift it up; as if the staff should lift up [him who is] not wood!
God had just called Assyria "the rod of my anger," a nation sent to discipline His people — and Assyria, seeing only its own victories, took the credit. Verse 15 answers with four questions about tools: can an axe, a saw, a rod or a staff claim glory over the hand that lifts it?
The Assyrian king had claimed his conquests as the work of his own strength and wisdom. He never guessed whose hand he was in.
But the Assyrian himself did not realise this. He did not mean it that way. He intended to ravage Jerusalem as well as Samaria... As verse 12 shows, God would use him to carry out on Jerusalem what He intended, and then would punish and humble him. He was only like an axe or a rod in the hand of the Lord, and he could not dictate to the One who wielded him.
An axe has no aims of its own. Assyria had plenty, and God weighs those aims as well as the blows He allows.
If God put power into the hand of the Gentile, and gave his armies success — even against the nation of His choice, and to the overthrow of Zion, which He loved — He still does not overlook that rod. He sees the pride of heart, the lust of power, the self-will and the violence of the rod He uses to correct His erring people. Again and again these nations invaded His land and destroyed life and property without restraint. They were His instruments for correcting His stubborn and unyielding people. But doing the will of God was far from the thought of any one of them.
Being chosen as the rod gave Assyria no safety. The same rule holds wherever God uses one nation against another.
In God's governmental ways with nations He may use one as His rod to punish another; we see this constantly in Old Testament Scriptures. But it will go badly for the nation He uses if she grows proud of the role. As surely as God rules with justice, so surely will He humble her in her turn — and justly.
The picture also settles what happens to the tool when the work is done. And it reaches further than Assyria.
When He has done with His rod, He can break it or burn it... Satan himself is very often the rod God uses to discipline His children.
The verse looks beyond Assyria's own century. One writer sets it in the closing scene, where two enemies still wait for judgment.
It is the closing scene. The Lord has not even yet carried out His whole work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem. He will not have done it as long as the Antichrist is in the land. Once Christ has dealt with the Antichrist at His appearing from heaven, the Assyrian still remains to be punished. The first is the enemy of Christ's heavenly rights and divine glory, and he denies the Father and the Son. Christ will destroy him by His sudden shining out from heaven. The second dares to oppose Christ's rights over the earth. Christ will deal with him as he deserves when He comes to reign here.
The verse is not only about empires. Anyone God uses faces the same question, and one writer answers it by comparing the worker to a poker.
There is a fine moral lesson here for everyone the Lord uses, in any small way, in His blessed work. We must always remember that God is the doer of every work done on the earth. If He is pleased to use us, let us never forget that we are only instruments, just as helpless and powerless as the poker. No doubt we have enjoyment in the work; but we are not dealing here with the question of enjoyment, but of ability. If any real work is done, God is the doer of it. To Him be all the glory.
- The hand, not the tool. Assyria's victories were real, but the power was never its own. An axe cannot dictate to the hand that swings it.
- The hand's purpose is hidden. The nations God used to correct His people never meant to do His will. Their pride and cruelty were their own, and He did not overlook them.
- The hand judges the tool. Being used as God's rod was no protection. God humbles in its turn any nation that grows proud of the role.
- The hand can break the rod. When God has finished with an instrument, He can break it or burn it. Even Satan serves at times as His rod to discipline God's children.
- The hand is still raised. The Assyrian's boast gets its final answer when Christ comes to reign. Until then, no servant may claim credit: God is the doer of the work.
Therefore shall the Lord, Jehovah of hosts, send among his fat ones leanness, and under his glory he shall kindle a burning, like the burning of a fire
Assyria had just boasted that it conquered nations by its own strength and wisdom. Verse 16 is God's answer: He drains the strength of the empire's best warriors and sets a fire under its glory.
The word "therefore" attaches this judgment to something the Assyrian said. He did real damage to Samaria and Jerusalem. But he counted the success as his own.
The Assyrian thought he was only doing his own will when he punished Samaria and Jerusalem, saying, "By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom, for I have understanding; I remove the boundaries of peoples, and plunder their treasures…" (Isa. 10:13). He did not understand that he was only the rod of God's anger. God used him to carry out judgment on His rebellious and idolatrous people. So the Lord said to him, "Shall the axe boast over him who hews with it… as if a rod should wield him who lifts it" (verses 5, 15). This proud boasting of the Assyrian only brought God's judgment upon them (verse 12).
A rod belongs to the hand that holds it. When the work is done, the hand that picked it up decides what becomes of it. Verse 16 is that decision.
God says of the Assyrian (Isa. 10): "Ah, Assyria, the rod of my anger; the staff in their hands is my fury," and so on. When He has finished with His rod, He can break it or burn it. Satan himself is very often the rod God uses for the discipline of His children.
Serving God's purpose is no defence. Other nations attacked Judah without knowing they were God's instrument, and God still repaid their motive.
God used those attackers as unconscious instruments to chasten His people. Their motive was entirely of another kind. Eighty years later God measures out to them the punishment their attack on the land of Judah deserved. This is an important principle to keep in mind in any study of God's ways in government, with either men or nations. (See Isa. 10:5-19.)
For Israel, this fire is good news. The chastening has a limit. Burning the rod is where it stops.
Though the Lord may for a season use the wicked as a rod of anger upon His people, He will not let that rod rest or remain on them. He will argue with His rod, giving it a measured length as well as a measured severity. In His grace He remembers that the spirit might fail under too long an oppression. Indeed He will end His indignation on Israel by the destruction of that rod. (Isa. 10:5-25)
The wasting of the "stout warriors" came true one night in Assyria's camp. God needed no army to do it.
A few words record God's judgment: "And that night the angel of the LORD went out and struck down 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians. And when people arose early in the morning, behold, these were all dead bodies." One angel from the Lord was enough to destroy the flower of Assyria's army, and to send Sennacherib back to his own land. There he met the judgment God had reserved for him, just as Isaiah the prophet had said.
This judgment reaches further than one night. Verse 16 belongs to a scene that is still unfinished.
It is the closing scene. The Lord has not even yet performed His whole work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem… The Assyrian still remains to be punished… He dares to oppose Christ's earthly rights, and Christ will deal with him when He comes to reign over the earth.
- The rod is lifted. God sent Assyria against His own people as a deliberate act of discipline, not as an accident of history.
- The rod boasts. The Assyrian credited the strength of his hand and his wisdom, not seeing whose hand held him.
- The rod is burned. When God has finished with a rod, He can break it or burn it. The wasting of the strong men and the fire under the glory is that burning.
- The rod answers for its motive. Serving God's purpose excuses nothing. God judges the instrument for what it wanted.
- The beating ends with the rod. God measures both the severity and the length of the chastening. He ends His anger against His people by destroying the very power He used.
and the light of Israel shall be for a fire, and his Holy One for a flame; and it shall burn and devour his thorns and his briars in one day,
Isaiah has just described Assyria as the rod in God's hand — a nation God used to punish His own people, and then judged for its pride. In verse 17, two of God's own names turn into fire.
Pride turned God's instrument into God's target.
God used Assyria as His rod to punish His guilty people Israel. Then, as in other cases, the rod itself had to bear God's judgment for its pride and wickedness. Some of the passages about the kings of Assyria are prophetic. They refer to what is still future, when as "kings of the north" they will again have to do with Israel, and God will judge them. The indignation against Israel ceases in the destruction of the Assyrian.
The verse calls God Israel's Holy One. That name has a definite meaning.
The name "Holy One of Israel" means that the God of Israel is completely separated from all evil, for He is of purer eyes than to look on evil. This is what the seraphim express too, who cry out in front of His throne: "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts."
Fire says something about what holiness is.
How is fire living holiness? It is judicial holiness — killing holiness, therefore. Our God is a consuming fire. The fire tests every man's work, what it is.
The fuel is named. Thorns carry their own meaning in Scripture, and it reaches back to the beginning.
These thorns and briers picture those whom David calls "worthless men." He says they "shall all of them be as thorns that are thrown away, for they cannot be taken with the hand." You remember that thorns were the sign of the curse at the beginning. They are, as botanists tell us, failed leaves — parts of a plant that cannot do what a leaf was made to do. So the symbol links sinners with the curse upon sin.
Commentators differ on whose thorns these are. Grant reads them of sinners under the curse. Others read on to the next verse, where what burns is the invader's own glory.
After God has used the Assyrian as His instrument, He "shall consume the glory of his forest, and of his fruitful field."
The verse gives one day. For Sennacherib's Assyrian army, one night was enough.
That night the judgment stroke fell. The angel of the LORD struck down the whole Assyrian army of 185,000 men. Prophetically it stands for the end of the Assyrian, who will enter Israel's land during the great tribulation and who will perish like Sennacherib's army.
Prophecy often works on two levels at once.
As so often in Old Testament prophecy, there is an ultimate fulfilment as well as a more immediate one. This is surely the case here. "The Assyrian" has this double application — the great power of that time centred in Nineveh, and also that "king of the North," which was Assyria, that we read of in the last days.
Two enemies fall, and not at the same time.
It is the closing scene. The Lord has not even yet carried out His whole work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem. He will not have finished it as long as the Antichrist is in the land. Once Christ has dealt with him at His appearing from heaven, the Assyrian still remains to be punished. The first is the enemy of the heavenly rights and divine glory of Christ, denying the Father and the Son. Christ will destroy him by suddenly shining out from heaven. The second dares to oppose His earthly rights, and Christ will deal with him as he deserves when He has come to reign over the earth.
The same appearing carries opposite meanings, depending on who is standing there.
When Jesus appears in this way, He will also be a destroying flame of vengeance. He will consume the glory of the forest of wickedness. He will cut down the tall branch of human arrogance, and it will be terrible. To the remnant He has spared in mercy, He is the staff and crown of their unending joy.
- Rod — God used Assyria to punish His people. The rod grew proud, so God judged the rod. Israel's punishment ends when the Assyrian falls.
- Fire — the flame is holiness in action. God stands apart from all evil, so His holiness does not sit beside evil. It consumes it.
- Fuel — thorns and briers trace back to the curse; they are growth that failed its purpose, and that is what burns.
- Day — 185,000 Assyrians dead in one night shows how fast "one day" works, and stands as a sample of the end.
- Remnant — the same appearing burns the arrogant and becomes staff and crown to those God spares.
and it shall consume the glory of his forest, and of his fruitful field, both soul and body; and they shall be as when a sick man fainteth.
God is speaking here about the Assyrian empire. He raised that power up to punish His people, and it grew proud of the work. This verse is the sentence on the tool He used: everything it called its glory goes up in the fire God kindles.
The forest here is not woodland. Isaiah is using a picture the prophets use often.
A tree is an apt and familiar figure of human greatness; of pride and of high position among men.
So the fire falls on his greatness itself.
The reason for the fire is given a few verses earlier. God had used this empire as a tool; the tool began to congratulate itself.
God will punish the Assyrian, because he boasts of what he does. He says, "By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom, for I am prudent. I have removed the boundaries of the peoples, and have robbed their treasures." He is only an axe and a saw in the hand of God, a staff and a rod wielded by God to do His will. After God has used the Assyrian as His instrument He "shall consume the glory of his forest, and of his fruitful field."
The fire in the verse before is God Himself. One writer links that flame with the appearing of Christ.
When Jesus is revealed, He will also be a destroying flame of vengeance, to consume the glory of the forest of wickedness. He will cut down with terror the full bough of human arrogance, while to the remnant of His mercy He is the staff and crown of their unending joy.
The verse says the fire takes "both soul and body." One writer renders that line this way.
Isaiah 10:18: And shall consume from the soul even to the flesh.
Commentators differ on the timing. Some read the verse as history already fulfilled. They point to Sennacherib, the Assyrian king who attacked Jerusalem when Hezekiah ruled.
We know how all this was fulfilled in the days of Hezekiah. Samaria was led away captive. But when Sennacherib tried with proud boasts to take Jerusalem, his forces received a decisive blow straight from the hand of God. Two of his own sons killed him soon afterwards, as we read in 2 Kings 19:37.
Others hold that the words reach on to a final scene, where Christ deals with the Assyrian as King on earth.
It is the closing scene. The Lord has not even yet performed His whole work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem... the Assyrian still remains to be punished. The Antichrist is the enemy of the heavenly rights and divine glory of Christ, denying the Father and the Son. Christ will destroy him by His sudden shining out from heaven. The Assyrian dares to oppose His rights on earth, and Christ will deal with him when He has come to reign over the earth.
The burning of the forest is not the chapter's last word. It is the turning point.
When the Assyrian has done his work, it is the ceasing of the indignation against Israel: an important point in Israel's history. The destruction of the Assyrian (not of Antichrist) is the end of Jehovah's anger. The Antichrist will have appeared and been judged before this. The remnant shall return, the remnant of Jacob, to the mighty God, who will search out and punish the glory of man's high looks on all sides.
- Rod. Assyria was an axe and a saw in God's hand, sent to chastise His people — never acting on its own.
- Pride. The tool boasted of its own strength and wisdom, and that boast, not its usefulness, sealed its doom.
- Fire. The flame that burns the forest is God Himself. One writer sees it in the appearing of Christ — terror to the proud, joy to the remnant.
- Completeness. The burning takes "both soul and body." The glory of forest and fruitful field is not damaged but consumed.
- End. When the rod is broken, God's long anger against Israel is over. The blow that ends an empire also ends His people's punishment.
And the remainder of the trees of his forest shall be few yea, a child might write them.
This verse pictures Assyria as a burnt forest, with only a handful of trees left — few enough for a child to write down. Why did God burn the very tool He used to punish His people, and what still stands when the smoke clears?
The trees are the Assyrian's strength and splendour. The fire that thins them out is God's answer to his boasting.
The Assyrian boasts of what he does. He says, "By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom, for I have understanding; I remove the boundaries of peoples, and plunder their treasures." So God will punish him. He is only an axe and a saw in the hand of God; a staff and a rod wielded by God to do His will. After God has used the Assyrian as His instrument He will "destroy the glory of his forest and of his fruitful land."
A tool has no claim on the hand that holds it. When the discipline is done, the tool itself comes under judgment. Writers see the same pattern later in history.
God uses the pride and wickedness of evil men to chasten His people; and afterwards He destroys the instrument. The Assyrian, God's rod to strike Israel, glorifies himself against God, who breaks the rod. So in the early part of the nineteenth century Napoleon Bonaparte struck all the peoples of the Roman empire. But he was in the wrong, and afterwards he was struck himself.
God also sets a limit to that rod, for the sake of the people under it.
Though the Lord may for a season use the wicked as a rod of anger upon His people, He will not let that rod rest or remain on them. He will deal with His rod. He gives it a measured length of time as well as a measured severity. In His grace He remembers that the spirit might fail if the oppression lasts too long. Indeed He will end His indignation on Israel by the destruction of that rod.
The thinning of this forest was literal history.
We know how all this was fulfilled in the days of Hezekiah. Samaria was led captive. But when Sennacherib tried with proud boasts to take Jerusalem, the hand of God struck his forces a decisive blow. Soon after, two of his sons killed him, as we read in 2 Kings 19:37.
Commentators read the passage as having two horizons.
As so often in Old Testament prophecy, there is an ultimate fulfilment as well as a nearer one, and that is the case here… "the Assyrian," whom we are now to consider, has this double application. He is the great power of that day, centred in Nineveh. He is also that "king of the North," which was Assyria, that we read of in the last days.
That future scene has an order to it. Two enemies fall, and not at the same moment.
It is the closing scene. The Lord has not yet done His whole work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem. He will not have finished it as long as the Antichrist is in the land. Once Christ's appearing from heaven has dealt with the Antichrist, the Assyrian still remains to be punished. The first is the enemy of Christ's heavenly rights and divine glory, denying the Father and the Son. Christ will destroy him by His sudden shining out from heaven. The second dares to oppose Christ's rights on earth. He will be dealt with when Christ comes to reign over the earth.
The fall of this enemy is more than destruction. It marks a turning point for Israel.
When the Assyrian has done his work, God's indignation against Israel ceases. That is an important point in Israel's history. The destruction of the Assyrian (not of Antichrist) is the end of Jehovah's anger. The Antichrist will have appeared and been judged before. The remnant shall return, the remnant of Jacob, to the mighty God… Christ will maintain Israel.
The cutting down is not the end of the story. What follows in the next chapter grows out of the stump.
The image used here fits perfectly. It prepares the way for Messiah, who is brought in by the next and connected chapter — the shoot from the stump of Jesse, and the fruitful sprout to grow from his roots.
- Rod. Assyria was an axe and a saw in God's hand, used to chasten His people — never an independent power.
- Boast. The rod claimed the victory as its own strength and wisdom, and that boast is why God turned to punish it.
- Fire. The burning consumes the glory of his forest, so that the survivors are few enough for a child to write down.
- Few. History showed this in Sennacherib's shattered army and his death at his sons' hands. Prophecy points on to a later invader from the north.
- Shoot. When that enemy falls, God's indignation ends, the remnant returns to Him, and the felled forest gives way to the shoot from the stump of Jesse.