Isaiah 23:10














Jehovah Sabaoth hath devised it, to desecrate the pride of all glory. It is possible that reference may be intended to the desecration of the Tyrian temple of Hercules, which is said to have been the oldest in the world. But the reference may be general, and any actual case would but illustrate the general truth. "God did not bring these calamities upon Tyre in a way of sovereignty, to show an arbitrary and irresistible power; but he did it to punish the Tyrians for their pride. Many other sins, no doubt, reigned among them - idolatry, sensuality, and oppression; but the sin of pride is fastened upon as that which was the particular ground of God's controversy with Tyre, for he resists the proud. Let the ruin of Tyre be a warning to all places and persons to take heed of pride; for it proclaims to all the world that he who exalts himself shall be abased." Thomson, in 'The Land and the Book,' forcibly describes the present condition of humbled, ruined Tyre: "It (an insignificant village) is all that remains of her. But weep not for Tyre; this very silence and repose are most eloquent and emphatic on themes of the last importance to the Christian faith. There is nothing here of that which led Joshua to call it 'the strong city' more than three thousand years ago (Joshua 19:29); nothing of that mighty metropolis which baffled the proud Nebuchadnezzar and all his power for thirteen years, until every head in his army was bald, and every shoulder peeled in the hard service against Tyrus (Ezekiel 29:18); nothing in this wretched roadstead and. empty markets to remind one of the times when merry mariners did sing in her markets; no visible trace of those towering ramparts which so long resisted the efforts of the great Alexander; - all have vanished like a troubled dream. As she now is and has long been, Tyre is God's witness; but great, powerful, and populous, she would be the infidel's boast." The point to be illustrated is that God will be sure to deal with individuals and with nations, for the humbling and crushing of pride. He will do so because -

I. PRIDE INVOLVES PERIL TO A MAN'S OWN CHARACTER. There can be no healthy growth where it is present. The passive virtues, which are so specially commended in Christianity, cannot dwell with pride, which is so closely allied with satisfaction in self and the despising of others. Pride is a worm at the loot of the tree of character.

II. PRIDE DESTROYS THE COMFORTABLENESS OF A MAN'S RELATIONS WITH HIS FELLOW-MEN. The proud man tries to keep away from his fellows. And his fellows are glad enough to keep away from him. It is inconceivably miserable for a "man to be placed alone in the midst of the earth."

III. PRIDE SPOILS A MAN'S RELATIONS WITH GOD. They are founded on the proper humility of the submissive and dependent creature. For man the universal law is, "Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time," or else you certainly must, as Tyre, be humbled. - R.T.

In that day, saith the Lord of hosts, shall the nail that is fastened in the sure place be removed.
Even God who drove in the nail can take it out again. No nail once driven in can do without God, saying, I am driven in now, so I care not what may happen. The highest lives in obedience; the strongest man becomes weaker than the weakest when he ceases to pray. Genius cannot keep a man in a high moral elevation. His genius will soon be discovered to be but cleverness, not the blooming out of a life that is hidden in the very mystery of God. Leader of the people! even thou mayest be dispossessed of thy leadership. Great statesmen are in the hands of God. Journalists, thinkers, the advance guard of every name, all these hold their position on their good conduct. Let them be good and faithful servants; let there be no selfishness in their ambition, no vain conceit because of the influence with which God hath clothed them; even the nail that is fastened in the sure place may be removed, the very beam in which it finds a place may be cut in two and burned in unquenchable fire. So, then, we are nothing but in God.

(J. Parker, D. D.)

Eliakim comes to ruin in the exorcise of the plenary power attaching to his office by giving way to nepotism. His family makes a wrong use of him, and with an unwarrantable amount of good nature he makes a wrong use of his official position for their benefit. He therefore comes down headlong, and with him all the heavy burden which the peg sustains, i.e., all his relations, who, by being far too eager to make the most of their good fortune, have brought him to ruin.

(F. Delitzsch.)

We have not one, but a couple of tragedies. Eliakim, the son of Hilkiah, follows Shebna, the son of Nobody. The fate of the overburdened nail is as grievous as that of the rolling stone. It is easy to pass this prophecy over as a trivial incident; but when we have carefully analysed each verse, restored to the words their exact shade of signification, and set them in their proper contrasts, we perceive the outlines of two social dramas, which it requires very little imagination to invest with engrossing moral interest.

(Prof. G. A. Smith, D. D.).

The burden of Tyre.
The Tarshish of this chapter is Spain. Chittim is the island of Cyprus. The word "merchant" is the same word that is rendered in other places "Canaanite." The Canaanites were the most energetically commercial men of their time. To be a merchant was to be a Canaanite; to be a Canaanite was to be a merchant, substantially.

I. The world must come, however slowly, to recognise the fact that RULERS THEMSELVES ARE RULED; that the Lord reigneth. There can only be one Supreme. What a glorious dawn is that which will shine above the eastern hills when the world begins to feel that it is reigned over, governed, guided in all its march of progress. The world grows warmer under that recognition. At first the recognition is terrible enough, but it becomes more and more beneficent as things shape themselves.

II. The world must come to recognise the fact that EVEN EMPIRES ARE DEPENDENT UPON CHARACTER FOR THEIR EXISTENCE. For Tyre we may substitute London, Paris, New York, or the countries which they indicate. It is only the letter of this chapter which is ancient; the principle is energetic evermore.

(J. Parker, D. D.)

When the Spirit of God is in a man he cares for no city, how great soever it may be, though he himself may not have whereon to lay his head. There is, however, a spirit in him which makes him greater than all the capitals of the world were they added to one another and constituted into one great avenue of capitals, each house in all the vista crowned or starred with a sceptre thrust from every window. The Galilean fishermen cared nothing for the pomp of Jerusalem; old prophets with ragged mantles on their stooping shoulders hurled Divinest judgment against proud kings.

(J. Parker, D. D.)

The Church has lost this prophetic inspiration, and now she bows down to worldly greatness and tells with delight that a chariot and pair has driven up to her front door. To what cent of indignity has she sunk, even in her very speech! She is now an influential Church, a respectable Church, an intelligent Church, a Church possessed of exceptional advantages, and most careful about her reputation! So the world pays its copper tribute, and says to the Church, Behave yourself! let us do what we like, and you sing your hymns and go up to heaven like any other vapour. Where are the men who can do without food, clothing, shelter? Where are the men who would spurn any offer of patronage? — sons of thunder, sons of judgment; men who never sit down to eat, but snatch their apple as they hasten along the road that they may keep their next appointment to thunder judgment upon unrighteousness, and break in pieces with an iron rod the vessel of impurity.

(J. Parker, D. D.)

Tyre's celebrity dates first from the time of David. In the Assyrian era, however, Tyre had already attained to a kind of supremacy over the rest of the Phoenician cities. It lay on the coast, rather more than twenty miles from Sidon; but being hard pressed by enemies, it had transferred the real seat of its trade and wealth to a rocky island, three miles farther north, and only 1200 paces from the mainland. The strait that separated this insular Tyre (Τύρος) from ancient Tyre (Παλαίτυρος) was, upon the whole, shallow, and the ship channel in the neighbourhood of the island was only about eighteen feet deep, so that a siege of insular Tyre by Alexander was carried out by the erection of a mole. Luther refers the prophecy to this attack by Alexander. But earlier than this event was the struggle of Tyre with Assyria and Babylon, and first of all the question arises, Which of these two struggles has the prophecy in view? In consequence of new disclosures, for which we are indebted to Assyriology, the question has entered a new phase. Down to the present, however, it still permits of only a hypothetical and unsatisfactory solution.

(F. Delitzsch.)

were simply carriers and middle men. In all time there is no instance of a nation so wholly given over to buying and selling, who frequented even the battlefields of the world that they might strip the dead and purchase the captive.

(Prof. G. A. Smith, D. D.)

People
Assyrians, Isaiah, Kittim, Tarshish, Zidon
Places
Assyria, Canaan, Cyprus, Egypt, Nile River, Shihor, Sidon, Tarshish, Tyre
Topics
Along, Brook, Daughter, Girdle, Harbor, Harbour, Longer, Nile, O, Overflow, Pass, Plough, Restraint, River, Strength, Tarshish, Worked
Outline
1. The miserable overthrow of Tyre
15. Her restoration and unfaithfulness

Dictionary of Bible Themes
Isaiah 23:9

     4930   end
     5813   conceit
     5961   superiority
     6708   predestination
     8276   humility
     8401   challenges
     8805   pride, results

Isaiah 23:8-9

     5857   fame

Library
The Agony, and the Consoler
Is this your joyous city, whose antiquity is of ancient days? Isaiah xxiii. 7. It is difficult to describe the agony of terror which fell on the wretched inhabitants of the gayest city of the East when they awoke to a sense of the folly into which they had been driven. These soft Syrians had no real leaders and no settled purpose of rebellion. They had simply yielded to a childish impulse of vexation. They had rebelled against an increase of taxation which might be burdensome, but was by no means
Frederic William Farrar—Gathering Clouds: A Tale of the Days of St. Chrysostom

A Prayer for the Spirit of Devotion
6. O Lord my God, Thou art all my good, and who am I that I should dare to speak unto Thee? I am the very poorest of Thy servants, an abject worm, much poorer and more despicable than I know or dare to say. Nevertheless remember, O Lord, that I am nothing, I have nothing, and can do nothing. Thou only art good, just and holy; Thou canst do all things, art over all things, fillest all things, leaving empty only the sinner. Call to mind Thy tender mercies, and fill my heart with Thy grace, Thou
Thomas A Kempis—Imitation of Christ

How those are to be Admonished who have had Experience of the Sins of the Flesh, and those who have Not.
(Admonition 29.) Differently to be admonished are those who are conscious of sins of the flesh, and those who know them not. For those who have had experience of the sins of the flesh are to be admonished that, at any rate after shipwreck, they should fear the sea, and feel horror at their risk of perdition at least when it has become known to them; lest, having been mercifully preserved after evil deeds committed, by wickedly repeating the same they die. Whence to the soul that sins and never
Leo the Great—Writings of Leo the Great

On the Interpretation of Scripture
IT is a strange, though familiar fact, that great differences of opinion exist respecting the Interpretation of Scripture. All Christians receive the Old and New Testament as sacred writings, but they are not agreed about the meaning which they attribute to them. The book itself remains as at the first; the commentators seem rather to reflect the changing atmosphere of the world or of the Church. Different individuals or bodies of Christians have a different point of view, to which their interpretation
Frederick Temple—Essays and Reviews: The Education of the World

The Essay which Brings up the Rear in this Very Guilty Volume is from The...
The Essay which brings up the rear in this very guilty volume is from the pen of the "Rev. Benjamin Jowett, M.A., [Fellow and Tutor of Balliol College, and] Regius Professor of Greek in the University of Oxford,"--"a gentleman whose high personal character and general respectability seem to give a weight to his words, which assuredly they do not carry of themselves [143] ." His performance is entitled "On the Interpretation of Scripture:" being, in reality, nothing else but a laborious denial of
John William Burgon—Inspiration and Interpretation

Isaiah
CHAPTERS I-XXXIX Isaiah is the most regal of the prophets. His words and thoughts are those of a man whose eyes had seen the King, vi. 5. The times in which he lived were big with political problems, which he met as a statesman who saw the large meaning of events, and as a prophet who read a divine purpose in history. Unlike his younger contemporary Micah, he was, in all probability, an aristocrat; and during his long ministry (740-701 B.C., possibly, but not probably later) he bore testimony, as
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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