Although the feast is one earth, it is on an earth which has been transformed into heaven; for the party-wall between God and the world has fallen down: death is no more, and all tears are for ever wiped away. "And He casts away upon this mountain the veil that veiled over all peoples, and the covering that covered over all nations. He puts away death for ever; and the Lord Jehovah wipes the tear from every face; and He removes the shame of His people from the whole earth: for Jehovah hath spoken it." What Jehovah bestows is followed by what He puts away. The "veil" and "covering" (massēcâh, from nâsac equals mâsâc, Isaiah 22:8, from sâcac, to weave, twist, and twist over equals to cover) are not symbols of mourning and affliction, but of spiritual blindness, like the "veil" upon the heart of Israel mentioned in 2 Corinthians 3:15. The penē hallōt (cf., Job 41:5) is the upper side of the veil, the side turned towards you, by which Jehovah takes hold of the veil to lift it up. The second hallōt stands for הלּט (Ges. 71, Anm. 1), and is written in this form, according to Isaiah's peculiar style (vid., Isaiah 4:6; Isaiah 7:11; Isaiah 8:6; Isaiah 22:13), merely for the sake of the sound, like the obscurer niphal forms in Isaiah 24:3. The only difference between the two nouns is this: in lōt the leading idea is that of the completeness of the covering, and in massēcâh that of its thickness. The removing of the veil, as well as of death, is called בּלּע, which we find applied to God in other passages, viz., Isaiah 19:3; Psalm 21:10; Psalm 55:10. Swallowing up is used elsewhere as equivalent to making a thing disappear, by taking it into one's self; but here, as in many other instances, the notion of receiving into one's self is dropped, and nothing remains but the idea of taking away, unless, indeed, abolishing of death may perhaps be regarded as taking it back into what hell shows to be the eternal principle of wrath out of which God called it forth. God will abolish death, so that there shall be no trace left of its former sway. Paul gives a free rendering of this passage in 1 Corinthians 15:54, κατεπόθη ὁ θάνατος εἰς νῖκος (after the Aramaean netzach, vincere). The Syriac combines both ideas, that of the Targum and that of Paul: absorpta est mors per victoriam in sempiternum. But the abolition of death is not in itself the perfection of blessedness. There are sufferings which force out a sigh, even after death has come as a deliverance. But all these sufferings, whose ultimate ground is sin, Jehovah sweeps away. There is something very significant in the use of the expression דּמעה (a tear), which the Apocalypse renders πᾶν δάκρυον (Revelation 21:4). Wherever there is a tear on any face whatever, Jehovah wipes it away; and if Jehovah wipes away, this must be done most thoroughly: He removes the cause with the outward symptom, the sin as well as the tear. It is self-evident that this applies to the church triumphant. The world has been judged, and what was salvable has been saved. There is therefore no more shame for the people of God. Over the whole earth there is no further place to be found for this; Jehovah has taken it away. The earth is therefore a holy dwelling-place for blessed men. The new Jerusalem is Jehovah's throne, but the whole earth is Jehovah's glorious kingdom. The prophet is here looking from just the same point of view as Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:28, and John in the last page of the Apocalypse.

Isaiah 26:1 Parallel Commentaries

this song

Isaiah 5:1 Now will I sing to my well beloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My well beloved has a vineyard in a very fruitful hill:

Isaiah 27:1,2 In that day the LORD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan the piercing serpent...

Exodus 15:2-21 The LORD is my strength and song, and he is become my salvation: he is my God, and I will prepare him an habitation; my father's God...

Numbers 21:17 Then Israel sang this song, Spring up, O well; sing you to it:

Judges 5:1 Then sang Deborah and Barak the son of Abinoam on that day, saying,

2 Samuel 22:1 And David spoke to the LORD the words of this song in the day that the LORD had delivered him out of the hand of all his enemies...

Jeremiah 33:11 The voice of joy, and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride, the voice of them that shall say...

Ephesians 5:19,20 Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord...

Revelation 19:1-7 And after these things I heard a great voice of much people in heaven, saying, Alleluia; Salvation, and glory, and honor, and power...

in the land

Ezra 3:11 And they sang together by course in praising and giving thanks to the LORD; because he is good...

Psalm 137:3,4 For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song; and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying...

salvation

Isaiah 60:18 Violence shall no more be heard in your land, wasting nor destruction within your borders; but you shall call your walls Salvation...

Isaiah 62:11 Behold, the LORD has proclaimed to the end of the world, Say you to the daughter of Zion, Behold, your salvation comes; behold...

Psalm 31:21 Blessed be the LORD: for he has showed me his marvelous kindness in a strong city.

Psalm 48:12 Walk about Zion, and go round about her: tell the towers thereof.

Zechariah 2:5 For I, said the LORD, will be to her a wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the middle of her.

Matthew 16:18 And I say also to you, That you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

Revelation 21:12-22 And had a wall great and high, and had twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and names written thereon...