19:18-25 The words, In that day, do not always refer to the passage just before. At a time which was to come, the Egyptians shall speak the holy language, the Scripture language; not only understand it, but use it. Converting grace, by changing the heart, changes the language; for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. So many Jews shall come to Egypt, that they shall soon fill five cities. Where the sun was worshipped, a place infamous for idolatry, even there shall be a wonderful reformation. Christ, the great Altar, who sanctifies every gift, shall be owned, and the gospel sacrifices of prayer and praise shall be offered up. Let the broken-hearted and afflicted, whom the Lord has wounded, and thus taught to return to, and call upon him, take courage; for He will heal their souls, and turn their sorrowing supplications into joyful praises. The Gentile nations shall not only unite with each other in the gospel fold under Christ, the great Shepherd, but they shall all be united with the Jews. They shall be owned together by him; they shall all share in one and the same blessing. Meeting at the same throne of grace, and serving with each other in the same business of religion, should end all disputes, and unite the hearts of believers to each other in holy love.

Verse 20. - It shall be for a sign. The outward tokens of Jehovah-worship shall witness to God that he has in Egypt now a covenant people, and he will deal with them accordingly. He shall send them a savior, and a great one. This does not seem to point to any earthly deliverer, but to the Savior from the worst of all oppressors, sin and Satan, whom they will need equally with the rest of his people.

And it shall be for a sign and for a witness unto the Lord of hosts in the land of Egypt,.... This refers either to what goes before, that the altar and pillar were signs and witnesses that the Lord was believed in, professed, and worshipped there; or to what follows after, that the Lord's hearing the cries of men, and answering them, by sending a great Saviour to them, is a token and testimony for him of his great love unto them:

for they shall cry unto the Lord because of the oppressors; as men awakened and convinced do, feeling the oppressions of a guilty conscience, and a tempting devil, and an ensnaring wicked world:

and he shall send them a Saviour, and a great one, and he shall deliver them; this is Christ, whom God sent in the fulness of time to be the Saviour of lost sinners; and he is a "great" one indeed, the great God, and our Saviour, Titus 2:13 who is the Son of God, the true God, and eternal life, who has all the perfections of deity in him; the Creator and Upholder of all things; and must have therefore great and sufficient abilities to save sinners to the uttermost; and those that come to God by him he does save and deliver from all their sins, and out of the hands of all their enemies, and from wrath, ruin, and destruction. Abarbinel (e) owns that the Messiah is here meant, as undoubtedly he is; and not the angel that destroyed Sennacherib's army, as Kimchi; for the text speaks not of the Jews, but of the Egyptians. Vitringa thinks that either Alexander, called the Great, or else Ptolemy the son of Lagus, who had the same epithet, and who was also called "Soter", the saviour, is here meant.

(e) Mashmiah Jeshua, fol. 13. 1.

20. it—the altar and pillar.

a sign—(of the fulfilment of prophecy) to their contemporaries.

a witness—to their descendants.

unto the Lord—no longer, to their idols, but to Jehovah.

for they shall cry—or, "a sign … that they cried, … and He sent to them a saviour"; probably, Alexander the Great (so "a great one"), whom the Egyptians welcomed as a deliverer (Greek, Soter, a title of the Ptolemies) out of the hands of the Persians, who under Cambyses had been their "oppressors." At Alexandria, called from him, the Old Testament was translated into Greek for the Greek-speaking Jews, who in large numbers dwelt in Egypt under the Ptolemies, his successors. Messiah is the antitype ultimately intended (compare Ac 2:10, "Egypt").

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