Isaiah 30:22

Ye shall defile also the covering of thy graven images of silver, and the ornament of thy molten images of gold: thou shalt cast them away as a menstruous cloth; thou shalt say unto it, Get thee hence.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(22) Ye shall defile also . . .—The first effect of the turning of the people was to be the putting away of what had been their besetting sin. The “graven” image possibly refers to the “carved” wooden figure which was afterwards overlaid with silver and gold. (Comp. Isaiah 40:19.) These, which had been worshipped, were now to be cast aside, like that which was the very type of loathsomeness.

Benson Commentary

Isaiah 30:22. Ye shall also — To show your contempt of it; defile the covering of thy graven images — The leaves or plates, wherewith their wooden images were frequently covered: and the ornament of thy molten images — Or, the coat, or covering; Hebrew, אפדת, the ephod, as the word is rendered, Exodus 28:8; and Exodus 39:5; which was a costly and glorious robe. The images also were of gold: for the idolaters spared no cost in the making and adorning of their idols. Thou shalt cast them away, &c. — Thou shalt so deeply abhor idolatry that thou shalt cast away, with indignation, all the monuments and instruments thereof. This prophecy was fulfilled in some measure even before the Assyrian invasion, as we learn from 2 Chronicles 31:1; Hezekiah inciting the people to destroy idolatry out of the land. Probably it was fulfilled still more upon the deliverance of Jerusalem from Sennacherib’s army, which, doubtless, would convince thousands of individuals of the almighty power of Jehovah, of the impotence of idols, and the sin and folly of worshipping them. But it was verified in the whole body of the Jewish nation, at their return from their captivity in Babylon, for they abhorred idols ever after. Add to this, it is accomplished daily in the conversion of souls, by the power of divine grace, from spiritual idolatry, to the fear and love of God. This deliverance from the love and practice of idolatry is the third blessing here represented as being conferred on the people, after the forementioned judgments. In the two following verses we have a fourth.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

30:19-26 God's people will soon arrive at the Zion above, and then they will weep no more for ever. Even now they would have more comfort, as well as holiness, if they were more constant in prayer. A famine of bread is not so great a judgment as a famine of the word of God. There are right-hand and left-hand errors; the tempter is busy courting us into by-paths. It is happy if, by the counsels of a faithful minister or friend, or the checks of conscience, and the strivings of God the Spirit, we are set right when doubting, and prevented from going wrong. They shall be cured of their idolatry. To all true penitents sin becomes very hateful. This is shown daily in the conversion of souls, by the power of Divine grace, to the fear and love of God. Abundant means of grace, with the influences of the Holy Spirit, would be extended to places destitute of them. The effect of this should be comfort and joy to the people of God. Light, that is, knowledge, shall increase. This is the light which the gospel brought into the world, and which proclaims healing to the broken-hearted.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Ye shall defile also - That is, you shall regard them as polluted and abominable. This is language which is often used respecting their treatment of the images and altars of idolatry when they became objects of abomination, and when they were induced to abandon them (see 2 Kings 23:8, 2 Kings 23:10, 2 Kings 23:16). It is not improbable that before destroying them they would express their abhorrence of them by some act of polluting or defiling them, as significant of their contempt for the objects of degraded idolatry (see the note at Isaiah 2:20). The sense of the whole passage is, that the effect of the judgments which God was about to bring upon the nation would be, to turn them from idolatry, to which as a nation they had been signally prone.

The covering - The images of idols were usually made of wood or clay, and overlaid with gold. That gold and silver were used "to plate" them is apparent from Deuteronomy 7:25; and the whole process of making them from wood, and then of overlaying them with plates of gold and silver is described with graphic power and severity of irony in Isaiah 40:19-20; Isaiah 41:6-7.

Thy graven images of silver - Margin, 'The graven images of thy silver.' Probably the construction in the text is correct, as meaning that the images were not made of entire silver, but of wood or clay, plated with silver.

And the ornament - The golden plates or the covering of the images.

Thy molten images - The word 'molten' refers to those which were made by "casting" (see the notes at Isaiah 40:19-20).

Thou shalt cast them away - (see the note at Isaiah 2:20). This would be in accordance with the express direction of Moses; Deuteronomy 7:25 : 'The graven images of their gods shall ye burn with fire; thou shalt not desire the silver or gold that is on them, nor take it unto thee, lest thou be snared therein, for it is an abomination unto the Lord thy God.'

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

22. covering of … images—rather, "images" (formed of wood or potter's clay, and) "covered with silver." Hezekiah, and afterwards Josiah, defiled them (2Ki 23:8, 10, 14, 16; 2Ch 31:1; compare Isa 2:20; De 7:25).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Ye shall defile, to show your contempt of it, and to make it unfit for your own or any other’s use.

The covering; the leaves or plates wherewith their wooden images were frequently covered; of which see Exodus 38:17,19 Num 16:38,39.

The ornament; or, the coat or covering. Heb. the ephod, as this very word is rendered, Exodus 28:8 39:5, which was a costly and glorious robe. The idolaters spared no cost in the making and adorning their idols; and, among others, the image of Jupiter in Sicily had a coat put upon it made all of massy gold.

Thou shalt cast them away as a menstruous cloth; thou shalt so deeply abhor idolatry, that thou shalt east away with indignation all the monuments and instruments thereof.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Ye shall defile also the covering of thy graven images of silver,.... Images made of solid silver, covered with rich and costly garments; or images covered and decorated with plates of silver; see Jeremiah 10:4 these they not only pulled down and defaced, but defiled, to show their contempt and abhorrence of them:

and the ornament of thy molten images of gold; images made of solid gold, covered with an ephod, as the word here used signifies; such an one as the high priest wore, and Micah made for his house of idolatry, Exodus 28:6,

thou shall cast them away as a menstruous cloth; which is not only filthy and loathsome, but defiling; whoever touched it were unclean by the law for a while; or as a woman in her monthly courses, who, during that time, was to be separate from her husband, Leviticus 15:19, &c.; this is used to express the pollution and nauseousness of idols, and of the utter rejection of them:

thou shall say unto it, Get thee hence; Kimchi observes that some say the word signifies "dung; thou shall say to it, thou art dung", and only fit for the dunghill, and to it thou shall go; at the same time cast it out, declaring abhorrence of idols, repentance for worshipping them, and signifying that they would have nothing more to do with them. This shows the efficacy of the word of God when it comes not in word only, but with the power and Spirit of God; it was fulfilled in some measure in Hezekiah's time; see 2 Kings 18:4, and after the Babylonish captivity, when the Jews left off idolatry, and never more returned to it; and when the Gospel prevailed in the Roman Pagan empire, and at the time of the Reformation, and will be more largely accomplished when Popery shall be utterly destroyed through the powerful ministration of the Gospel.

Geneva Study Bible

Ye shall {t} defile also the covering of thy graven images of silver, and the ornament of thy molten images of gold: thou shalt cast them away as a polluted cloth; thou shalt say to it, {u} Be gone from me.

(t) You will cast away your idols which you have made of gold and silver with all that belongs to them, as a most filthy thing and polluted.

(u) Showing that there can be no true repentance, unless both in heart and deed we show ourselves enemies to idolatry.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

22. The renunciation of idolatry.

Ye shall defile] i.e. “desecrate” (2 Kings 23:8 ff.).

covering … ornament] Overlaying … plating, as R.V. An idol consisted of a core of wood or inferior metal, overlaid with a costly layer of silver or gold. The latter part was of course the most valuable, and perhaps also the most sacred (see Deuteronomy 7:25 f.).

cast them away, &c.] scatter them as an unclean thing; Exodus 32:20.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 22. - Ye shall defile also the covering of thy graven images of silver. Idolatry, greatly encouraged by Ahaz, had been strictly forbidden by Hezekiah at the beginning of his reign (2 Kings 18:4); but the present passage, among others, shows how impossible it was for a king, with the best intentions, to effect the extirpation of idolatry, if his subjects were attached to it. Evidently the Jews had, in many cases, secretly maintained their idols and their idolatrous practices, despite the efforts of Hezekiah. But now, in their repentance, they would "defile" (i.e. destroy) both the outer "covering" of precious rectal, and the inner core of wood or stone, or base metallic substance. The ornament of thy molten images of gold; rather, the coating or overlaying. It was usual to overlay with gold or silver molten images of bronze or other inferior metal. Cast them away; literally, scatter; i.e. either grind them to powder (2 Kings 23:6), or at any rate break them to bits, and then disperse the fragments far and wide. Isaiah 30:22

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

None but such are heirs of the grace that follows the judgment - a people, newly pardoned in response to its cry for help, conducted by faithful teachers in the right way, and renouncing idolatry with disgust. "For a people continues dwelling in Zion, in Jerusalem; thou shalt not weep for ever: He will prove Himself gracious to thee at the sound of thy cry for help; as soon as He hears, He answers thee. And the Lord giveth you bread in penury, and water for your need; and thy teachers will not hide themselves any more, and thine eyes come to see thy teachers. And thine ears will hear words behind thee, saying, 'This is the way, walk ye in it!' whether ye turn to the right hand or to the left. And ye defile the covering of thy graven images of silver, and the clothing of thy molten images of gold; thou wilt scatter them like filthy thing: 'Get out!' thou sayest to it." We do not render Isaiah 30:19, "For O people that dwelleth in Zion, in Jerusalem!" For although the personal pronoun may be omitted after Vav in an apostrophizing connection (Proverbs 8:5; Joel 2:23), we should certainly expect to find אתּה here. The accent very properly marks these words as forming an independent clause. The apparent tautology in the expression, "in Zion, in Jerusalem," is emphatic and explanatory. The fate of Zion-Jerusalem will not be the same as that of the imperial city (Isaiah 13:20; Isaiah 25:2); for it is the city of Jehovah, which, according to His promise, cannot become an eternally deserted ruin. After this promising declaration, the prophet turns and addresses the people of the future in the people of his own time; bâkhō strengthens the verbal notion with the mark of duration; chânōn with the mark of certainty and fulness. יחנך, with an advanced ŏ, as in Genesis 43:29, for יחן. כּ is the shortest expression used to denote simultaneous occurrence; answering and hearing would coincide (shom‛âh, nomen actionis, as in Isaiah 47:9; Isaiah 55:2; Ges. 45, 1b; ‛ânâkh, the pausal form here, as in Jeremiah 23:37). From this lowest stage of response to the penitential cry for help, the promise rises higher and higher. The next stage is that in which Jerusalem is brought into all the distress consequent upon a siege, as threatened by the prophet in Isaiah 29:3-4; the besieged would not be allowed by God to die of starvation, but He would send them the necessary support. The same expression, but very little altered, viz., "to give to eat lechem lachatz ūmayim lachatz," signifies to put any one upon the low rations of a siege or of imprisonment, in 1 Kings 22:27 and 2 Chronicles 18:26; but here it is a promise, with the threat kept in the background. צר and לחץ are connected with the absolute nouns לחם and מים, not as adverbial, but as appositional definitions (like תּרעלה יין, "wine which is giddiness," in Psalm 60:5; and בּרכּים מים, "water which is knees," i.e., which has the measure of the knees, where birkayim is also in apposition, and not the accusative of measurement): literally, bread which is necessity, and water which is affliction; that is to say, nourishment of which there is extreme need, the very opposite of bread and water in abundance. Umbreit and Drechsler understand this spiritually. But the promise rises as it goes on. There is already an advance, in the fact that the faithful and well-meaning teachers (mōrı̄m) no longer keep themselves hidden because of the hard-heartedness and hatred of the people, as they have done ever since the time of Ahaz (נכנף, a denom.: to withdraw into כּנף, πτέρυξ, the utmost end, the most secret corner; though kânaph in itself signifies to cover or conceal). Israel, when penitent, would once more be able to rejoice in the sight of those whom it longed to have back again. מוריך is a plural, according to the context (on the singular of the previous predicate, see Ges. 147). As the shepherds of the flock, they would follow the people with friendly words of admonition, whilst the people would have their ears open to receive their instruction. תּאמינוּ is here equivalent to תּימינוּ, תּימינוּ. The abominations of idolatry (which continued even in the first years of Hezekiah's reign: Isaiah 31:7; Micah 1:5; Micah 5:11-13; Micah 6:16) would now be regarded as abominations, and put away. Even gold and silver, with which the images that were either carved or cast in inferior metal were overlaid, would be made unclean (see 2 Kings 28:8ff.); that is to say, no use would be made of them. Dâvâh is a shorter expression for kelı̄ dâvâh, the cloth worn by a woman at the monthly period. On zârâh, to dispense - to which dâvâh would be inappropriate if understood of the woman herself, as it is by Luzzatto - compare 2 Kings 23:6. With זהבך, the plural used in the general address passes over into the individualizing singular; לו is to be taken as a neuter pointing back to the plunder of idols.