211 The oracle concerning the wilderness of the sea. As whirlwinds in the Negeb sweep on, it comes from the desert, from a terrible land. 2 A stern vision is told to me; the plunderer plunders, and the destroyer destroys. Go up, O Elam, lay siege, O Media; all the sighing she has caused I bring to an end. 3 Therefore my loins are filled with anguish; pangs have seized me, like the pangs of a woman in travail; I am bowed down so that I cannot hear, I am dismayed so that I cannot see. 4 My mind reels, horror has appalled me; the twilight I longed for has been turned for me into trembling. 5 They prepare the table, they spread the rugs, they eat, they drink. Arise, O princes, oil the shield! 6 For thus the Lord said to me: "Go, set a watchman, let him announce what he sees. 7 When he sees riders, horsemen in pairs, riders on asses, riders on camels, let him listen diligently, very diligently." 8 Then he who saw cried: "Upon a watchtower I stand, O Lord, continually by day, and at my post I am stationed whole nights. 9 And, behold, here come riders, horsemen in pairs!" And he answered, "Fallen, fallen is Babylon; and all the images of her gods he has shattered to the ground." 10 O my threshed and winnowed one, what I have heard from the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, I announce to you.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Isaiah 21:1-10
Commentary on Isaiah 21:1-10
(Read Isaiah 21:1-10)
Babylon was a flat country, abundantly watered. The destruction of Babylon, so often prophesied of by Isaiah, was typical of the destruction of the great foe of the New Testament church, foretold in the Revelation. To the poor oppressed captives it would be welcome news; to the proud oppressors it would be grievous. Let this check vain mirth and sensual pleasures, that we know not in what heaviness the mirth may end. Here is the alarm given to Babylon, when forced by Cyrus. An ass and a camel seem to be the symbols of the Medes and Persians. Babylon's idols shall be so far from protecting her, that they shall be broken down. True believers are the corn of God's floor; hypocrites are but as chaff and straw, with which the wheat is now mixed, but from which it shall be separated. The corn of God's floor must expect to be threshed by afflictions and persecutions. God's Israel of old was afflicted. Even then God owns it is his still. In all events concerning the church, past, present, and to come, we must look to God, who has power to do any thing for his church, and grace to do every thing that is for her good.