Isaiah 19: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

This chapter is a message of judgment against Egypt. The LORD comes to Egypt, and the country turns on itself: its idols tremble, its plans fail, its leaders in Zoan and Noph give foolish advice, the Nile dries up, and its fishing and linen trades collapse under a fierce king. The second half is a series of sayings about "that day": Egypt will fear Judah, five Egyptian cities will speak the language of Canaan, an altar and a pillar to the LORD will stand in Egypt, and the LORD will strike Egypt and then heal it when they cry out to him. It ends with a highway joining Egypt and Assyria, and Israel as a third with them, all three blessed by the LORD.

Claim by Claim

1. 19:1
   • This is the burden concerning Egypt.
   • The LORD rides on a swift cloud.
   • The LORD is coming to Egypt.
   • The idols of Egypt will tremble before him.
   • The heart of Egypt will melt within it.
2. 19:2
   • The LORD says he will stir up Egyptians against Egyptians.
   • Each man will fight against his brother.
   • Each man will fight against his neighbor.
   • City will fight against city.
   • Kingdom will fight against kingdom.
3. 19:3
   • The spirit of Egypt will be emptied out within it.
   • The LORD says he will swallow up Egypt's counsel.
   • They will seek the idols.
   • They will seek the mutterers who charm.
   • They will seek those who consult the spirits of the dead.
   • They will seek the spiritists.
4. 19:4
   • The LORD says he will hand Egypt over into the hand of a harsh master.
   • A fierce king will rule over them.
   • This is the declaration of the Lord, the LORD of hosts.
5. 19:5
   • The waters will dry up from the sea.
   • The river will be parched and dry.
6. 19:6
   • The rivers will stink.
   • The canals of Egypt will dwindle and dry up.
   • The reeds and rushes will wither.
7. 19:7
   • The bare places by the Nile, at the mouth of the Nile, will wither.
   • Everything sown by the Nile will wither.
   • It will be driven away.
   • It will be no more.
8. 19:8
   • The fishermen will mourn.
   • All who cast a hook into the Nile will lament.
   • Those who spread nets on the surface of the waters will languish.
9. 19:9
   • Those who work combed flax will be ashamed.
   • The weavers of white cloth will be ashamed.
10. 19:10
    • Egypt's foundations will be crushed.
    • All who work for wages will be grieved in soul.
11. 19:11
    • The princes of Zoan are utter fools.
    • The wise counselors of Pharaoh give senseless counsel.
    • The prophet asks how they can say to Pharaoh that they are sons of the wise and sons of ancient kings.
12. 19:12
    • The prophet asks where Egypt's wise men are.
    • The prophet calls for them to tell Pharaoh.
    • The prophet calls for them to know what the LORD of hosts has purposed against Egypt.
13. 19:13
    • The princes of Zoan have become fools.
    • The princes of Noph are deceived.
    • They have led Egypt astray.
    • They are the cornerstone of Egypt's tribes.
14. 19:14
    • The LORD has mixed within Egypt a spirit of distortion.
    • They have caused Egypt to stagger in all its work.
    • Egypt staggers as a drunken man staggers in his vomit.
15. 19:15
    • There will be no work that Egypt can do.
    • Neither head nor tail can do it.
    • Neither palm branch nor rush can do it.
16. 19:16
    • In that day Egypt will be like women.
    • Egypt will tremble and be afraid because of the shaking of the hand of the LORD of hosts.
    • The LORD of hosts shakes his hand over Egypt.
17. 19:17
    • The land of Judah will be a terror to Egypt.
    • Everyone to whom Judah is mentioned will be afraid.
    • The fear is because of the counsel of the LORD of hosts.
    • The LORD of hosts has determined that counsel against Egypt.
18. 19:18
    • In that day five cities in the land of Egypt will speak the language of Canaan.
    • Those cities will swear to the LORD of hosts.
    • One of them will be called the City of Destruction.
19. 19:19
    • In that day there will be an altar to the LORD in the midst of the land of Egypt.
    • There will be a pillar to the LORD at Egypt's border.
20. 19:20
    • It will be for a sign and for a witness to the LORD of hosts in the land of Egypt.
    • They will cry out to the LORD because of oppressors.
    • He will send them a savior and a defender.
    • He will deliver them.
21. 19:21
    • The LORD will be known to Egypt.
    • The Egyptians will know the LORD in that day.
    • They will worship with sacrifice and offering.
    • They will vow a vow to the LORD.
    • They will fulfill it.
22. 19:22
    • The LORD will strike Egypt.
    • He will strike and heal it.
    • They will return to the LORD.
    • He will be entreated by them.
    • He will heal them.
23. 19:23
    • In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria.
    • The Assyrian will come into Egypt.
    • The Egyptian will come into Assyria.
    • The Egyptians will serve with the Assyrians.
24. 19:24
    • In that day Israel will be the third with Egypt and with Assyria.
    • Israel will be a blessing in the midst of the land.
25. 19:25
    • The LORD of hosts will bless them.
    • The LORD of hosts says Egypt his people is blessed.
    • The LORD of hosts calls Assyria the work of his hands.
    • The LORD of hosts calls Israel his inheritance.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

19:1

"Burden" renders a Hebrew word meaning both a load that is carried and a formal pronouncement; in Isaiah it labels an oracle spoken against a nation. Riding on the clouds was standard ancient Near Eastern language for a god arriving in power, the same picture Egyptians and Canaanites used of their own gods.

19:2

Egypt was repeatedly split between rival dynasties ruling different stretches of the Nile. "Kingdom against kingdom" pictures one country breaking into competing regions, not war with foreign states.

19:3

The word translated "spirit" means breath, wind, or spirit, and is used of a person's or a nation's nerve and resolve; here Egypt's drains out of her. Egypt was famous across the ancient world for its magicians and for consulting the dead. The verse lists four kinds of specialist, and the precise difference between them is no longer recoverable.

19:4

Where the King James prints LORD in capitals it stands for the personal name of Israel's God, which Jews did not pronounce aloud; "of hosts" means "of armies," the forces at his command. The Hebrew behind "a cruel lord" is plural, harsh masters, and Isaiah never says who is meant.

19:5

The Hebrew calls the Nile "the sea" because of its breadth. Egypt's entire food supply depended on the river's annual flood, so a failing Nile meant famine, not inconvenience.

19:6

"Brooks of defence" is the King James translators' attempt at a Hebrew phrase now generally read as "the canals of Egypt", the irrigation channels dug off the river to water the fields.

19:7

"Paper reeds" are papyrus, the tall marsh plant from which Egypt manufactured the ancient world's writing material and exported it widely.

19:8

To "cast angle" means to throw in a fishhook. An angle was a fishhook, and that old word survives in the word angler, a person who fishes. Fish from the Nile fed a huge number of Egyptians.

19:9

Flax is the plant linen is made from. Egyptian linen was famous and a major export; this describes an industry collapsing, not household work.

19:10

This is one of the hardest verses in the chapter. The Hebrew words can be read as pillars or foundations, or as dams and fish pools; the last group can be the hired workmen or everyone who earns a living. Translations differ widely, and the rendering here picks one of several defensible readings.

19:11

Zoan is Tanis, a city in the Nile Delta that served at times as Egypt's royal capital. Egypt's "wise men" were its court advisers, scribes and priests, proverbial throughout the ancient world for learning. The boast in the last line is ambiguous in Hebrew: it can mean descent from kings of long ago, or from eastern kings.

19:13

Noph is Memphis, the ancient capital of lower Egypt, just south of modern Cairo. "Cornerstones" is a building term applied to leading men, the stones the whole structure rests on. Egypt was administered in provincial districts, which the Hebrew here calls tribes.

19:14

The word for "spirit" is the same one used in verse 3; here it means a spirit of dizziness or reeling, the lurching of someone too drunk to walk straight.

19:15

Head and tail, palm branch and reed are a proverbial pair for the top and bottom of a society: the palm frond stands high, the marsh reed low. Isaiah uses the same figure earlier of Israel's own leaders.

19:16

Calling fighting men "women" was a standard ancient taunt for an army that has lost its nerve; it is about fear, not about women. The raised, shaking hand is the gesture of someone drawing back to strike.

19:17

Judah was a small kingdom of almost no military weight beside Egypt, which is what makes the picture of Egypt flinching at its name a reversal of the normal order of things.

19:18

"The language of Canaan" means Hebrew, the speech of Israel and its immediate neighbors. To "swear to" the LORD is to take a binding oath of allegiance, the ancient way of declaring which side you are on. The name of the fifth city is genuinely uncertain: some Hebrew manuscripts read 'ir ha-heres, City of Destruction, and others 'ir ha-cheres, City of the Sun, which would be Heliopolis, the center of Egyptian sun worship. A single letter separates the two.

19:19

A pillar here is an upright standing stone. Such stones were set up all over the ancient world to mark a border or record a claim, and Egypt in particular planted inscribed stones at its frontiers.

19:20

"A saviour, and a great one": the second word means a defender or champion, the same kind of term used of the leaders who rescued Israel from its enemies in the book of Judges.

19:21

A vow was a formal promise to give God something specific (a sacrifice, a gift, a payment) usually in return for help asked for. Making one and then failing to carry it out was treated as a serious offense.

19:22

The verb behind "smite" is the one used of the plagues sent on Egypt in Exodus, and Isaiah's hearers would have caught the echo. "Intreated" in 1611 English means to be responsive to a plea, not to beg.

19:23

One great trade and army route ran from Egypt up the coast and on to Mesopotamia, with Judah sitting on it between the two empires; armies of both had marched it. The Hebrew verb translated "serve" means both to work for and to worship, so the last clause can be read either as Egypt and Assyria serving alongside one another or as the two worshiping together.

19:24

"The third" means the third partner alongside the other two. The Hebrew word for "land" also means "earth," so the closing phrase can be read as a blessing in the middle of that region or as a blessing to the whole earth.

19:25

"Inheritance" translates a word for a permanently allotted portion of property, especially land passed down within a family. It is the term normally used of the territory given to Israel; here it is used of the people themselves.