1And it happened in the days of Ahaz son of Jotham son of Uzziah king of Judah that Rezin king of Aram with Pekah son of Remaliah king of Israel went up to Jerusalem to do battle against it, but he was not able to battle against it. 2And it was told to the house of David: “Aram has joined with Ephraim and made its heart and the heart of its people sway like the trees of the forest before the wind.” 3And the LORD said to Isaiah, “Go out, pray, to meet Ahaz, you and Shear-Jashub your son, to the edge of the conduit of the Upper Pool, by the road of Fuller’s Field. 4And you shall say to him, ‘Watch yourself and be tranquil, do not fear and let your heart not quail because of these two smoking tails of firebrands, over the blazing wrath of Rezin and Aram and the son of Remaliah 5inasmuch as Aram, with Ephraim and the son of Remaliah, has devised evil counsel against you: 6Let us go up against Judah and shake it, and we shall break it into pieces for ourselves. And we shall set up within it the son of Tabeel as king.’
7Thus said the Master, the LORD:
It shall not happen and it shall not be,
8that the head of Aram is Damascus,
and the head of Damascus is Rezin.
[And in another sixty-five years
Ephraim as a people shall be smashed.]
9And the head of Ephraim is Samaria,
and the head of Samaria is the son of Remaliah.
you shall not hold firm.”
10And the LORD spoke again to Ahaz, saying, 11“Ask for a sign from the people of the LORD your God, make it deep as Sheol or high above.” 12And Ahaz said, “I will not ask and I will not test the LORD.” 13And Isaiah said, “Listen, pray, O House of David! Is it not enough for you to weary men that you should weary my God as well? 14Therefore the Master Himself shall give you a sign: the young woman is about to conceive and bear a son, and she shall call his name Immanuel. 15Curds and honey he shall eat till he knows how to reject evil and choose good. 16For before the lad knows how to reject evil and choose good, the land, whose two kings you despise, shall be abandoned. 17The LORD shall bring upon you and your people and upon your father’s house days that have not come from the day Ephraim turned away from Judah—the king of Assyria.
18And it shall happen on that day.
The LORD shall whistle to the flies
that are on the edge of Egypt’s rivers
and to the bees that are in the land of Assyria,
19and they shall all come and settle
in the wadis of the unplowed fields,
and in the crevices of the rocks
and among all the thorns and thistles.
20On that day the Master shall shave
with a hired razor along the borders of the River Euphrates
and the beard, too, it shall cut away.
21And it shall happen on that day,
a man shall nurture a calf and two sheep.
22And it shall happen, from all the making of milk,
he shall eat curds,
for all who are left in the midst of the land
shall eat curds and honey.
23And it shall happen on that day,
every place where there will be
a thousand vines worth a thousand silver shekels
shall turn into thornbush and thistle.
24With bow and arrow one would come there,
for thornbush and thistle the whole land shall be.
25But the mountains that are worked with the hoe,
there the fear of thornbush and thistle shall not come,
and it shall be for oxen let loose and the trampling of sheep.
CHAPTER 7 NOTES
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1. And it happened. As the text moves into narrative, it shifts from poetry to prose.
Rezin king of Aram with Pekah son of Remaliah king of Israel went up to Jerusalem to do battle against it. The northern kingdom of Israel entered into an alliance with Aram to oppose Assyria, which was conducting a campaign (734–732 B.C.E.) in trans-Jordan, the eastern Galilee, and along the Mediterranean coast. Their purpose in attacking Ahaz was to force him to join their alliance.
but he was not able to do battle against it. The obvious sense is that the invading forces were unable to secure a decisive victory.
2. made its heart . . . sway. That is, struck terror in their hearts.
3. Shear-Jashub. Like other prophetic progeny, Isaiah’s son has a symbolic name: it means “a remnant shall come back.”
4. the blazing wrath. The Hebrew ḥori-ʾaf is a term for anger that suggests burning and thus picks up the image of the smoking firebrands.
6. son of Tabeel as king. This would clearly be a puppet king. His patronymic suggests that he was probably an Aramean.
7. Thus said Master, the LORD. As one would expect in a move to formal prophecy, the language now switches from prose to poetry.
8. And in another sixty-five years / Ephraim as a people shall be smashed. This prophecy of the destruction of the northern kingdom, which occurred in 721 B.C.E., looks very much like a later interpellation, invited by the momentum of the prophecy of the interruption of the reign of Rezin and of Pekah. The sixty-five-year span is nevertheless puzzling because this prophecy would have been enunciated perhaps a dozen years before Assyria overwhelmed the northern kingdom.
9. If you trust not, / you shall not hold firm. This cryptic declaration (the Hebrew involves wordplay) is a little enigmatic, though it probably means that if Ahaz does not trust Isaiah and hold out against Rezin and Pekah, he will come to a bad end.
13. Isaiah said. The Hebrew merely says “he said.” The name has been substituted in order to avoid confusion.
to weary. The Hebrew verb sometimes means this, though it also means “to incapacitate,” which is not appropriate in this context. The development of the dialogue appears to be as follows: Isaiah invites Ahaz to ask for a sign, however extravagant (verse 11); Ahaz is afraid to put God to the test (verse 12); Isaiah answers that Ahaz is exasperating God by his unwillingness to ask for a sign (verse 13); Isaiah further says that Ahaz will get a sign whether he likes it or not (verse 14).
14. the young woman. Although this verse generated many centuries of Christological readings emphasizing the virgin birth, the Hebrew ʿalmah does not mean “virgin,” but rather “young woman,” and in Proverbs the ʿalmah is represented engaged in sex. The “sign” here is the name she gives the child, which means “God is with us.” Nevertheless, the identity of the young woman is unclear and has been much debated. She might be the prophet’s wife because there is precedent for prophets begetting symbolic sons, or she might be a woman in the house of David.
15. Curds and honey he shall eat. From infancy, the child will be raised in sumptuous abundance, which, however, will be interrupted by the disaster that will sweep over the land.
17. the king of Assyria. This specification at the end of the sentence is syntactically awkward and may have been added as an explanatory gloss. In any case, the prophecy of an Assyrian onslaught that is an unprecedented disaster for the nation much better suits Sennacherib’s campaign against Judah in 701 B.C.E. than the events of 734–732 B.C.E. with which this segment began.
18. the flies / that are on the edge of Egypt’s rivers / and to the bees that are in the land of Assyria. The swarms of insects—perhaps killer bees in the case of Assyria—are metaphors for the invading armies. There were moments of Egyptian alliance with Assyria, but not in 701 B.C.E.
20. with the king of Assyria. This translation construes the king as the “hired razor” God uses to wreak destruction.
the head and the pubic hair / and the beard. “Pubic hair” is literally “hair of the legs,” but in this case “legs” does appear to be a euphemism for the genitals. Shaving of the head, beard, and pubic area is a way of humiliating prisoners, but here it also serves as a metaphor for destruction that is brutal and shaming but not total.
22. for all who are left in midst of the land / shall eat curds and honey. This sounds as though they are enjoying plenty, like the child Immanuel, but given the dire content of the three verses that follow, it probably means, in what may be an ironic twist, that they will live off the produce of their remaining livestock and what honey they can gather but will be unable to grow crops.
24. With bow and arrow one would come there. Vineyards will turn to brambles, and wild beasts will roam there—hence the need for bow and arrow.
25. there the fear of thornbush and thistle shall not come. Though some understand this to mean “you shall not come because of the fear of thornbush and thistle,” the Hebrew lacks any proposition that could be construed as “because of.” The more likely sense would be: unlike the flatlands, which will be covered with thornbushes and thistles, the mountain slopes, while not amenable to cultivation, will provide pasture for free-roaming cattle.