Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
He predicts the destruction of Damascus and the Syrians equally with the Samaritans, and that as few will remain as the few ears of grain left after the harvest. Secondly, in verse 7, he says the remnant, through this disaster that befell them because they had forgotten God, will be converted from idols to God.
Vulgate Text: Isaiah 17:1-14
1. The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus shall cease to be a city, and shall be like a heap of stones in ruin. 2. The forsaken cities of Aroer shall be for flocks, and they shall rest there, and there shall be none to frighten them. 3. And help shall cease from Ephraim, and the kingdom from Damascus: and the remnant of Syria shall be like the glory of the children of Israel, says the Lord of hosts. 4. And it shall be in that day: the glory of Jacob shall be diminished, and the fatness of his flesh shall waste away. 5. And it shall be as one who gathers in the harvest what remains, and his arm shall glean the ears: and it shall be as one seeking ears of grain in the valley of Raphaim. 6. And there shall be left in it like a grape-cluster, and like the shaking of an olive tree, two or three olives at the top of a branch, or four or five on its topmost boughs — its fruit, says the Lord God of Israel. 7. In that day man shall bow toward his Maker, and his eyes shall look to the Holy One of Israel: 8. and he shall not bow toward the altars which his hands have made: and what his fingers have wrought he shall not regard, the groves and the shrines. 9. In that day, the cities of his strength shall be forsaken like plows and crops which were abandoned before the children of Israel, and you shall be desolate. 10. Because you have forgotten the God of your salvation, and have not remembered your strong helper: therefore you shall plant a faithful planting, and sow an alien shoot. 11. On the day of your planting, a wild vine, and in the morning your seed shall blossom: the harvest is taken away on the day of inheritance, and it shall grieve sorely. 12. Woe to the multitude of many peoples, like the multitude of the roaring sea: and the tumult of crowds, like the sound of many waters. 13. The peoples shall sound like the noise of flooding waters, and He shall rebuke him, and he shall flee far off: and he shall be swept away like the dust of mountains before the wind, and like a whirlwind before the storm. 14. In the time of evening, behold, trouble: in the morning, and he shall not stand; this is the portion of those who laid us waste, and the lot of those who plundered us.
Verse 1: The burden of Damascus
1. The burden of Damascus. — Note: The prophecies of Isaiah, as also of the other Prophets, were not published in the order in which they are collected in this volume: for Damascus was overthrown by the Assyrians before the death of Ahaz, and consequently before the disaster of the Philistines; which was inflicted by Hezekiah the son of Ahaz, which he treated in chapter XIV, verse 29, and much more before the disaster of Moab, which he treated in chapters XV and XVI; for that happened long after, namely in the time of Nebuchadnezzar.
The Prophet therefore predicts here the destruction imminent for Syria, whose capital was Damascus, through Tiglath-pileser, IV Kings XVI, 9; who nevertheless left some remnants in it, which 134 years later Nebuchadnezzar destroyed, as Jeremiah predicted, chapter XLIX, verse 23; but afterward Damascus was restored under the Macedonians and the Ptolemies, says St. Jerome, and it is still a noble city of the East, about which see more in Jeremiah XLIX.
Mystically, St. Bernard, in his treatise On the Eleven Burdens of Isaiah, expounds this burden of Damascus thus: "Damascus is interpreted as 'shedding blood,' expressing that corruption inborn in us, which in a certain way draws us, unwilling and resistant, to sin. It is the law in our members, fighting against the law of our mind, and leading us captive into the law of sin, which is in our members. Every vital sense in the body comes from blood; but the vital sense in the soul comes from reason. And you know how the natural motion of sin sometimes absorbs reason itself into a kind of punishment of delight, and renders the whole soul, so to speak, bloodless. But some feel it yet do not consent; they are attacked but not conquered; they are burdened but not cast down. These indeed bear the burden from Damascus; but they are not Damascus. But he who consents and offers the weapons of iniquity to sin is truly a Damascene, shedding his own blood and killing himself with his own hands; he, without doubt, should know that he will be crushed by the weight of punishment described in the burden of Damascus."
Verse 2: Aroer
2. AROER. — This city was in Syria, different from the city of Aroer in Judaea: so named because it was arid like a desert, in which tamarisks grow. For "Aroer" in Hebrew means tamarisk. "Aroer" therefore was to the Syrians what Campinia is to the Belgians.
3. HELP SHALL CEASE FROM EPHRAIM. — For Ephraim (that is, the ten tribes) was accustomed to be allied with the Syrians and Damascenes, especially in fighting against Judah. For Samaria, which is soon called "the glory of the children of Israel, and the glory of Jacob," was devastated by the same king of the Assyrians at about the same time, namely in the sixth year of Hezekiah; hence at that time the Syrians could no longer expect help from Ephraim, that is, from the Samaritans.
Verse 5: And it shall be as one gathering in the harvest
5. And it shall be as one gathering in the harvest. — Note, with St. Jerome and Haymo, that the poverty and scarcity of both the Israelites or Samaritans and the Syrians, to which they will be reduced by the Assyrian devastator, is described here through a triple comparison: the first is that they will be as few as the few ears of grain that remain after the harvest in a very large field, for example Raphaim, and are gathered by the poor; second, that they will be as few as the few grape-clusters that escape the harvesters and are left after the vintage; third, that they will be as few as the four or five olives that remain on a shaken olive tree, either because they are hidden under the leaves, or because they are at the top or summit of the tree, so that the hand of the gatherer cannot reach them.
Allegorically, so few will be saved and chosen as the few ears of grain, grapes, and olives that remain after the harvest, and, as St. Jerome says citing others, the remnant of Israel shall be saved; for many are called, but few are chosen. So Blessed Nilus, a man of marvelous sanctity, who flourished six hundred years ago and was the founder of the monastery of Grottaferrata near Tusculum, in which I saw and venerated his tomb; when he was visited by the chief men of the Emperor Constantine, from the book and teaching of St. Simeon he said to them: "Understand that unless you are endowed with virtue, and great virtue, no one will free you from the punishments of hell;" and he added: "Out of ten thousand men scarcely one is saved," and he asserted that St. Basil, Chrysostom, Ephrem, and others said the same. And when he was asked by those chief men whether Solomon was saved or not, he replied: "We read nothing in Sacred Scripture that after his sin he did penance, as Manasseh did. Who therefore can say that he was saved?" So his Life records, and from it Cardinal Baronius, in the year of Christ 976, volume X. See what was said on Numbers XIV, 30 and 38.
Verse 6: Or Four or Five on its Topmost Boughs (of the olive tree)
6. OR FOUR OR FIVE ON ITS TOPMOST BOUGHS (of the olive tree) — ITS FRUIT, — that is, olives, as if to say: Like four or five fruits of the olive tree, that is, the olives that remain on the tree. Our translator read פריה piria, that is, its fruit; others read פוריה poria, and translate, on its fruitful topmost boughs. So Vatablus.
Verse 7: In that Day Man shall Bow
7. IN THAT DAY MAN SHALL BOW, — as if to say: The remnants from this disaster, the Samaritans, as well as some Syrians, who escaped the hands of the Assyrians, leaving behind their deceitful idols which could not save them from this destruction, will flee to God, the true refuge and protector in adversities, and will embrace His faith and worship. This happened at the admonition and encouragement of Hezekiah, II Paralipomenon XXX and XXXI. So St. Jerome.
Hence he adds: "They shall look to the Holy One of Israel," that is, they will return and be converted, from whom they had previously been turned away.
9. THE CITIES OF HIS STRENGTH SHALL BE FORSAKEN, — as if to say: The Assyrians, like a torrent, will invade and overwhelm Syria and Samaria with great force, so that from their fear and terror the most fortified cities of the Israelites will be abandoned by the fleeing citizens, not otherwise than when formerly, at the coming of the children of Israel arriving from Egypt, the terrified Canaanites and Amorites abandoned their plows and crops, and fled into the forests and hiding places. So St. Jerome.
9 and 10. And you shall be desolate (O Samaria!), because YOU HAVE FORGOTTEN GOD, — because you abandoned the ancestral faith and religion of the true God, who is accustomed to be your defense in adversity.
10. THEREFORE YOU SHALL PLANT A FAITHFUL PLANTING. — First, St. Jerome considers it to be irony. Hence the Septuagint for "faithful" translate unfaithful, which is soon called an alien shoot, that is, a bastard and adulterous one. By these he understands degenerate plants and trees, namely that God will bring barrenness upon them because of the sins of the inhabitants.
Secondly and more aptly, Sanchez says: A field is faithful which does not deceive the farmer's hope and labor, but returns to him what it received with interest and abundant fruit; it is unfaithful which either returns nothing, or, if it produces anything, produces it not for its master but for a stranger. Hence for "alien shoot" one could translate from the Hebrew: you shall sow a shoot for a stranger: and so it happened; for what the Israelites sowed, strangers reaped, namely the Assyrians. The sense therefore is, as if to say: Strangers will ravage the fields planted and cultivated by your hand; and although the plant will be faithful in itself and will bear fruit, it will nevertheless be unfaithful to you, because not you but strangers will gather them. The Lord had threatened this to them, Deuteronomy XXVIII, 51.
Thirdly, some refer these words to the children of the Israelites, whom they, being themselves very wicked, begot as very wicked, and degenerate from the holiness of the Patriarchs, as it were bastards. But this sense is not literal, but symbolical.
Verse 11: On the Day of your Planting, a Wild
11. ON THE DAY OF YOUR PLANTING, A WILD VINE (as if to say: When you have planted a vineyard, you will find growing from it not a vine but a wild vine): AND IN THE MORNING YOUR SEED SHALL BLOSSOM, — as if to say: It will blossom before its time, and therefore will be precocious, and will not ripen.
Such tropologically are those who are entirely absorbed in studies, and do not direct them to the glory of God, to their own and others' salvation, nor season them with virtue and piety; for these produce blossom but not fruit; for it fades away, and all their labor is consumed in a certain vain knowledge and empty speculation.
Secondly, as if to say: On the day when you seemed to be sowing or planting a faithful and fertile plant and vine, in reality you planted a wild vine, which will delight you with vain hope and appearance; but it will give you bitter fruit; for it will indeed blossom, but when it comes to fruit and harvest, the enemy will carry it away, which will bring you heartache and bitterness. For the Prophet speaks in his customary parabolic manner.
ON THE DAY OF INHERITANCE. — That is, when the time has come to possess and inherit it, namely the time of harvest and vintage.
AND IT SHALL GRIEVE, — namely the harvest, that it is being seized by a stranger and enemy; it is personification. Or "it shall grieve," that is, you yourself will grieve, seeing your harvest being gathered by strangers; as a change of person; thirdly, and most plainly, "it shall grieve," that is, it will cause you to grieve, for in Hebrew it is כאב kieb, in the Piel, which is active.
Verse 12: Woe to the Multitude (so the Roman edition
12. WOE TO THE MULTITUDE (so the Roman edition, not "multitude" as the Plantin has) OF PEOPLES. — Some think that Isaiah here passes to Sennacherib and predicts his punishment; for he devastated Judaea and Syria. Hence he says, "and He shall rebuke," that is, God will restrain and check him in the evening, that is, at night, by slaying 185,000, so that in the morning he must flee in the greatest confusion. But this transition seems forced and unusual. Wherefore we shall better say that the Prophet here continues to threaten woe to the Damascenes and Israelites, who often conspired against Judah. Hence he compares the mass, force, and roar of their army to the waves of the sea; for God rebuked these, that is, crushed and shattered them through the Assyrians; just as dust is scattered by the wind, and a whirlwind by a violent storm, and this "in the evening and morning," that is, in the briefest time; for this is what that proverb means, chapter XXXVIII, 12, and Psalm LXXXIX, 6.
Note: About this army he now speaks in the singular, saying: "He shall rebuke him;" now in the plural, saying: "Many peoples shall sound."
13. LIKE A WHIRLWIND BEFORE THE STORM. — The Septuagint translates, like the dust of a wheel of the driving storm; Vatablus, like a ball before the whirlwind. For the Hebrew גלגל galgal signifies something that rolls, such as a whirlwind, a wheel, and a ball, which, once caught by a whirlwind, is entirely spun and hurled by its force. The army of the Damascenes therefore seemed to be a vast mountain, proud and immovable: but behold, before God it was like a wheel and a ball, not only movable but also spinning and unstable.