9 Awake! awake! put on strength, O arm of the Lord, awake! as in the old days, in the generations long past. Was it not by you that Rahab was cut in two, and the dragon Wounded? 10 Did you not make the sea dry, the waters of the great deep? did you not make the deep waters of the sea a way for the Lord's people to go through? 11 Those whom the Lord has made free will come back with songs to Zion; and on their heads will be eternal joy: delight and joy will be theirs, and sorrow and sounds of grief will be gone for ever. 12 I, even I, am your comforter: are you so poor in heart as to be in fear of man who will come to an end, and of the son of man who will be like grass? 13 And you have given no thought to the Lord your Maker, by whom the heavens were stretched out, and the earth placed on its base; and you went all day in fear of the wrath of the cruel one, when he was making ready for your destruction. And where is the wrath of the cruel one? 14 The prisoner, bent under his chain, will quickly be made free, and will not go down into the underworld, and his bread will not come to an end. 15 For I am the Lord your God, who makes the sea calm when its waves are thundering: the Lord of armies is his name. 16 And I have put my words in your mouth, covering you with the shade of my hand, stretching out the heavens, and placing the earth on its base, and saying to Zion, You are my people.
17 Awake! awake! up! O Jerusalem, you who have taken from the Lord's hand the cup of his wrath; tasting in full measure the wine which overcomes. 18 She has no one among all her children to be her guide; not one of the sons she has taken care of takes her by the hand. 19 These two things have come on you; who will be weeping for you? wasting and destruction; death from need of food, and from the sword; how may you be comforted? 20 Your sons are overcome, like a roe in a net; they are full of the wrath of the Lord, the punishment of your God. 21 So now give ear to this, you who are troubled and overcome, but not with wine: 22 This is the word of the Lord your master, even your God who takes up the cause of his people: See, I have taken out of your hand the cup which overcomes, even the cup of my wrath; it will not again be given to you: 23 And I will put it into the hand of your cruel masters, and of those whose yoke has been hard on you; who have said to your soul, Down on your face! so that we may go over you: and you have given your backs like the earth, even like the street, for them to go over.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Isaiah 51:9-52
Commentary on Isaiah 51:9-16
(Read Isaiah 51:9-16)
The people whom Christ has redeemed with his blood, as well as by his power, will obtain joyful deliverance from every enemy. He that designs such joy for us at last, will he not work such deliverance in the mean time, as our cases require? In this world of changes, it is a short step from joy to sorrow, but in that world, sorrow shall never come in view. They prayed for the display of God's power; he answers them with consolations of his grace. Did we dread to sin against God, we should not fear the frowns of men. Happy is the man that fears God always. And Christ's church shall enjoy security by the power and providence of the Almighty.
Commentary on Isaiah 51:17-23
(Read Isaiah 51:17-23)
God calls upon his people to mind the things that belong to their everlasting peace. Jerusalem had provoked God, and was made to taste the bitter fruits. Those who should have been her comforters, were their own tormentors. They have no patience by which to keep possesion of their own souls, nor any confidence in God's promise, by which to keep possession of its comfort. Thou art drunken, not as formerly, with the intoxicating cup of Babylon's idolatries, but with the cup of affliction. Know, then, the cause of God's people may for a time seem as lost, but God will protect it, by convincing the conscience, or confounding the projects, of those that strive against it. The oppressors required souls to be subjected to them, that every man should believe and worship as they would have them. But all they could gain by violence was, that people were brought to outward hypocritical conformity, for consciences cannot be forced.