---
title: "Clarke"
description: "NOTES ON CHAP. XXIX Verse Isaiah 29:1. Ariel — That Jerusalem is here called by this name is very certain: but the reason of this name, and the meaning of"
image: "/images/missing.jpg"
url: "https://realbiblebelievers.com/commentaries/clarkes-commentary/isaiah/29"
---

NOTES ON CHAP. XXIX
Verse [Isaiah 29:1](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/1). ***Ariel*** — That Jerusalem is here called by this name is very certain: but the reason of this name, and the meaning of it as applied to Jerusalem, is very obscure and doubtful. Some, with the *Chaldee*, suppose it to be taken from the hearth of the great altar of burnt-offerings, which Ezekiel plainly calls by the same name, and that Jerusalem is here considered as the seat of the fire of God, אור אל *ur el* which should issue from thence to consume his enemies: compare [Isaiah 31:9](../../../kjv/isaiah/31/9). Some, according to the common derivation of the word, ארי אל *ari el*, the lion of God, or the strong lion, suppose it to signify the strength of the place, by which it was enabled to resist and overcome all its enemies. Τινες δε φασι την πολιν οὑτως ειρησθαι· επει, δια Θεου, λεοντος δικην εσπαραττε τους ανταιροντας *Procop*. in loc. There are other explanations of this name given: but none that seems to be perfectly satisfactory. - *Lowth*.
From [Ezekiel 43:15](../../../kjv/ezekiel/43/15), we learn that Ari-el was the name of the altar of burnt-offerings, put here for the city itself in which that altar was. In the second verse it is said, I will distress Ari-el, and it shall be unto me as Ari-el. The first *Ari-el* here seems to mean *Jerusalem*, which should be distressed by the Assyrians: the second *Ari-el* seems to mean the *altar of burnt-offerings*. But why is it said, "Ari-el shall be unto me as Ari-el?" As the altar of burnt-offerings was surrounded daily by the victims which were offered: so the walls of Jerusalem shall be surrounded by the *dead* *bodies* of those who had rebelled against the Lord, and who should be victims to his justice. The translation of Bishop Lowth appears to embrace both meanings: "I will bring distress upon Ari-el; and it shall be to me as the hearth of the great altar."
***Add ye year to year*** — Ironically. Go on year after year, keep your solemn feasts; yet know, that God will punish you for your hypocritical worship, consisting of mere form destitute of true piety. Probably delivered at the time of some great feast, when they were thus employed.

Verse [Isaiah 29:2](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/2). ***There shall be heaviness and sorrow*** - "There shall be continual mourning and sorrow"] Instead of your present joy and festivity.
***And it shall be unto me as Ariel*** - "And it shall be unto me as the hearth of the great altar."] That is, it shall be the seat of the fire of God; which shall issue from thence to consume his enemies. See note on [Isaiah 29:1](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/1). Or, perhaps, all on flame; as it was when taken by the Chaldeans; or covered with carcasses and blood, as when taken by the Romans: an intimation of which more distant events, though not immediate subjects of the prophecy, may perhaps be given in this obscure passage.

Verse [Isaiah 29:3](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/3). ***And I will camp against thee round about*** - "And I will encamp against thee like David"] For כדור *caddur*, some kind of military engine, כדוד *kedavid, like David*, is the reading of the *Septuagint*, two MSS. of *Kennicott's*, if not two more: but though Bishop Lowth adopts this reading, I think it harsh and unnecessary.
***Forts*** - "Towers"] For מצרת *metsuroth*, read מצדות *metsudoth:* so the *Septuagint* and five MSS. of Dr. *Kennicott's*, one of them ancient, and four of *De Rossi's*.

Verse [Isaiah 29:4](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/4). ***And thy speech shall be low out of the dust*** - "And from out of the dust thou shalt utter a feeble speech"] That the souls of the dead uttered a feeble stridulous sound, very different from the natural human voice, was a popular notion among the heathens as well as among the Jews. This appears from several passages of their poets; Homer, Virgil, Horace. The pretenders to the art of necromancy, who were chiefly women, had an art of speaking with a feigned voice, so as to deceive those who applied to them, by making them believe that it was the voice of the ghost. They had a way of uttering sounds, as if they were formed, not by the organs of speech, but deep in the chest, or in the belly; and were thence called εγγαστριμυθοι, *ventriloqui*: they could make the voice seem to come from beneath the ground, from a distant part, in another direction, and not from themselves; the better to impose upon those who consulted them. Εξεπιτηδες το γενος τουτο τον αμυδρον ηχον επιτηδευονται, ἱνα δια την ασαφειαν της φωνης τον του ψευδους αποδιδρασκωσιν ελεγχον. *Psellus* De Daemonibus, apud *Bochart*, i. p. 731. "These people studiously acquire, and affect on purpose, this sort of obscure sound; that by the uncertainty of the voice they may the better escape being detected in the cheat." From these arts of the necromancers the popular notion seems to have arisen, that the ghost's voice was a weak, stridulous, almost inarticulate sort of sound, very different from the speech of the living.

Verse [Isaiah 29:5](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/5). ***The multitude of thy strangers*** - "The multitude of the proud"] For זריך *zarayich, thy strangers*, read זדים *zedim, the* *proud*, according to the *Septuagint*; parallel to and synonymous with עריצים *aritsim, the terrible*, in the next line: the ר *resh* was at first ד *daleth* in a MS. [Isaiah 25:2](../../../kjv/isaiah/25/2).
The fifth, sixth, and seventh verses contain an admirable description of the destruction of Sennacherib's army, with a beautiful variety of the most expressive and sublime images: perhaps more adapted to show the greatness, the suddenness, and horror of the event, than the means and manner by which it was effected. Compare [Isaiah 30:30-33](../../../kjv/isaiah/30/30-33).

Verse [Isaiah 29:7](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/7). ***As a dream*** — This is the beginning of the comparison, which is pursued and applied in the next verse. Sennacherib and his mighty army are not compared to a dream because of their sudden disappearance; but the disappointment of their eager hopes is compared to what happens to a hungry and thirsty man, when he awakes from a dream in which fancy had presented to him meat and drink in abundance, and finds it nothing but a vain illusion. The comparison is elegant and beautiful in the highest degree, well wrought up, and perfectly suited to the end proposed. The image is extremely natural, but not obvious: it appeals to our inward feelings, not to our outward senses; and is applied to an event in its concomitant circumstances exactly similar, but in its nature totally different. See *De S. Poes. Hebr*. Praelect. xii. For beauty and ingenuity it may fairly come in competition with one of the most elegant of Virgil, greatly improved from Homer, Iliad xxii. 199, where he has applied to a different purpose, but not so happily, the same image of the ineffectual working of imagination in a dream: -
***All that fight against her and her munition*** - "And all their armies and their towers"] For צביה ומצדתה *tsobeyha umetsodathah*, I read, with the *Chaldee*, צבאם ומצדתם tsebaam umetsodatham.

Verse [Isaiah 29:9](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/9). ***Stay yourselves, and wonder*** — התמהמהו *hithmahmehu, go on* *what-what-whatting*, in a state of mental indetermination, till the overflowing scourge take you away. [Psalms 119:60](../../../kjv/psalms/119/60).
***They are drunken, but not with wine*** — [Isaiah 51:21](../../../kjv/isaiah/51/21).

Verse [Isaiah 29:11](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/11). ***I cannot; for it is sealed***- "I cannot read it; for it is sealed up."] An ancient MS. and the *Septuagint* have preserved a word here, lost out of the text; לקרות *likroth*, (for לקראות,) αναγνωναι, *read it*.

Verse [Isaiah 29:13](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/13). ***The Lord*** - "JEHOVAH"] For אדני *Adonai*, sixty-three MSS. of *Kennicott's*, and many of *De Rossi's*, and four editions, read יהוה *Yehovah*, and five MSS. add יהוה.
*Kimchi* makes some just observations on this verse. *The vision*, meaning the Divine revelation of all the prophets, *is a book or* *letter that is sealed* - is not easily understood. *This is delivered* *to one that is learned* - instructed in the law. *Read this; and he* *saith, I cannot, for it is sealed*; a full proof that he does not wish to know the contents, else he would apply to the prophet to get it explained. See *Kimchi* on the place.
***And their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men*** - "And vain is their fear of me teaching the commandments of men"] I read for ותהי *vattehi*, ותהו vethohu, with the *Septuagint*, [Matthew 15:9](../../../kjv/matthew/15/9); [Mark 8:7](../../../kjv/mark/8/7); and for מלמדה *melummedah*, מלמדים melummedim, with the *Chaldee*.

Verse [Isaiah 29:17](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/17). ***And Lebanon shall be turned into a fruitful field*** - "Ere Lebanon become like Carmel"] A mashal, or proverbial saying, expressing any great revolution of things; and, when respecting two subjects, an entire reciprocal change: explained here by some interpreters, I think with great probability, as having its principal view beyond the revolutions then near at hand, to the rejection of the Jews, and the calling of the Gentiles. The first were the vineyard of God, כרם אל *kerem El*, (if the prophet, who loves an allusion to words of like sounds, may be supposed to have intended one here,) cultivated and watered by him in vain, to be given up, and to become a wilderness: compare [Isaiah 5:1-7](../../../kjv/isaiah/5/1-7). The last had been hitherto barren; but were, by the grace of God, to be rendered fruitful. See [Matthew 21:43](../../../kjv/matthew/21/43); [Romans 11:30-31](../../../kjv/romans/11/30-31). Carmel stands here opposed to Lebanon, and therefore is to be taken as a proper name.

Verse [Isaiah 29:21](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/21). ***Him that reproveth in the gate*** - "Him that pleaded in the gate"] "They are heard by the treasurer, master of the horse, and other principal officers of the regency of Algiers, who sit constantly in the gate of the palace for that purpose:" that is, the distribution of justice. - *Shaw's* Travels, p. 315, fol. He adds in the note, "That we read of the *elders in the gate*. [Deuteronomy 21:15](../../../kjv/deuteronomy/21/15); [Deuteronomy 25:7](../../../kjv/deuteronomy/25/7); and, [Isaiah 29:21](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/21); [Amos 5:10](../../../kjv/amos/5/10), of *him that reproveth* and *rebuketh in the gate*. The Ottoman court likewise seems to have been called *the Porte*, from the distribution of justice and the despatch of public business that is carried on in the gates of it."

Verse [Isaiah 29:22](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/22). ***Who redeemed Abraham*** — As God redeemed Abraham from among idolaters and workers of iniquity, so will he redeem those who hear the words of the Book, and are humbled before him, [Isaiah 29:18-19](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/18-19).
***Concerning the house of Jacob*** - "The God of the house of Jacob"] I read אל *El* as a noun, not a preposition: the parallel line favours this sense; and there is no address to the house of Jacob to justify the other.
***Neither shall his face now wax pale*** - "His face shall no more be covered with confusion."] "יחורו *yechoro*, Chald. *ut* ὁ μεταβαλει, Theod. εντραπησεται, Syr. נחפרו *necaphro, videtur* *legendum* יחפרו yechepheru: hic enim solum legitur verbum, חור chavar, nec in linguis affinibus habet pudoris *significationem*." - SECKER. "Here alone is the verb חור *chavar* read; nor has it in the cognate languages the signification of shame."

Verse [Isaiah 29:23](../../../kjv/isaiah/29/23). ***But when he seeth his children, the work of mine**********hands*****- "For when his children shall see the work of my hands"] For בראותו *birotho* I read בראות *biroth*, with the *Septuagint* and *Syriac*.

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