Isaiah 33:4
 Isaiah 33:4 
New International Version (©2011)
Your plunder, O nations, is harvested as by young locusts; like a swarm of locusts people pounce on it.

New Living Translation (©2007)
Just as caterpillars and locusts strip the fields and vines, so the fallen army of Assyria will be stripped!

English Standard Version (©2001)
and your spoil is gathered as the caterpillar gathers; as locusts leap, it is leapt upon.

New American Standard Bible (©1995)
Your spoil is gathered as the caterpillar gathers; As locusts rushing about men rush about on it.

King James Bible (Cambridge Ed.)
And your spoil shall be gathered like the gathering of the caterpiller: as the running to and fro of locusts shall he run upon them.

Holman Christian Standard Bible (©2009)
Your spoil will be gathered as locusts are gathered; people will swarm over it like an infestation of locusts.

International Standard Version (©2012)
Your plunder is gathered as when grasshoppers gather; just like locusts pounce, people have pounced on it.

NET Bible (©2006)
Your plunder disappears as if locusts were eating it; they swarm over it like locusts!

GOD'S WORD® Translation (©1995)
You nations, your loot is gathered as grasshoppers harvest a crop. Like swarming locusts, people rush for your loot.

King James 2000 Bible (©2003)
And your spoil shall be gathered like the gathering of the caterpillar: as the running to and fro of locusts shall he run upon them.

American King James Version
And your spoil shall be gathered like the gathering of the caterpillar: as the running to and fro of locusts shall he run on them.

American Standard Version
And your spoil shall be gathered as the caterpillar gathereth: as locusts leap shall men leap upon it.

Douay-Rheims Bible
And your spoils shall be gathered together as the locusts are gathered, as when the ditches are full of them.

Darby Bible Translation
And your spoil shall be gathered like the gathering of the caterpillar: as the running of locusts shall they run upon it.

English Revised Version
And your spoil shall be gathered as the caterpiller gathereth: as locusts leap shall they leap upon it.

Webster's Bible Translation
And your spoil shall be gathered like the gathering of the caterpillar: as the running to and fro of locusts shall he run upon them.

World English Bible
Your spoil will be gathered as the caterpillar gathers. Men will leap on it as locusts leap.

Young's Literal Translation
And gathered hath been your spoil, A gathering of the caterpillar, As a running to and fro of locusts is he running on it.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

33:1-14 Here we have the proud and false destroyer justly reckoned with for all his fraud and violence. The righteous God often pays sinners in their own coin. Those who by faith humbly wait for God, shall find him gracious to them; as the day, so let the strength be. If God leaves us to ourselves any morning, we are undone; we must every morning commit ourselves to him, and go forth in his strength to do the work of the day. When God arises, his enemies are scattered. True wisdom and knowledge lead to strength of salvation, which renders us stedfast in the ways of God; and true piety is the only treasure which can never be plundered or spent. The distress Jerusalem was brought into, is described. God's time to appear for his people, is, when all other helpers fail. Let all who hear what God has done, acknowledge that he can do every thing. Sinners in Zion will have much to answer for, above other sinners. And those that rebel against the commands of the word, cannot take its comforts in time of need. His wrath will burn those everlastingly who make themselves fuel for it. It is a fire that shall never be quenched, nor ever go out of itself; it is the wrath of an ever-living God preying on the conscience of a never-dying soul.


Pulpit Commentary

Verse 4. - Your spoil shall be gathered. The "spoiling" of Assyria would commence with the discomfiture of the great host. In the historical narrative (2 Kings 19:35; Isaiah 37:36) nothing is said of it; but, beyond a doubt, when the host was to a largo extent destroyed, and the remainder fled, there must have been an enormous booty left behind, which the enemies of the Assyrians would naturally seize. A further spoiling of the fugitives probably followed; and, the prestige of the great king being gone, marauding bands would probably on all sides ravage the Assyrian territory. Like the gathering of the caterpillar. The "caterpillar" (khasil) is probably the grub out of which the locust develops - a very destructive insect. Shall he run. It would be better to render, shall they run. The word, indeed, is in the singular; but it is used distributively, of the various spoilers.


Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And your spoil shall be gathered like the gathering of the caterpillar,.... This is the answer of the Lord to the prayer of his church, signifying that their enemies should flee, be scattered, and perish, and that they should be victorious, and enjoy the spoils of them; which they should gather as easily as the caterpillar or locust, as some render it, gathers and consumes herbs, and every green thing; or as easily as they are gathered, and laid on heaps, being weak and unable to defend themselves: most understand it of the Jews going into the camp of the Assyrians, after the destruction of them by the angel, and gathering their spoil. The Targum is,

"and the house of Israel shall gather the substance of the people, their enemies, as they gather a locust:''

the antichristian locusts or caterpillars are here meant, whose substance shall fall into the hands of the followers of Christ, when they shall have got the victory of them; this is the flesh of the whore, her worldly substance, which the kings of the earth, the Christian kings, shall eat or enjoy, Revelation 17:16,

as the running to and fro of locusts shall he run upon them: or "upon it"; the spoil; as these locusts, of which see Revelation 9:3 run to and fro, and pillaged them in times past, as the creatures, to whom they are compared, run to and fro and destroy the fruits of the earth, so now everyone of the followers of Christ shall run and seize upon the spoil of the antichristian states.


Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

4. The invaders' "spoil" shall be left behind by them in their flight, and the Jews shall gather it.

caterpillar—rather, "the wingless locust"; as it gathers; the Hebrew word for "gathers" is properly used of the gathering of the fruits of harvest (Isa 32:10).

running to and fro—namely, in gathering harvest fruits.

he—rather, "they."

them—rather, "it," that is, the prey.


Isaiah 33:4 Parallel Commentaries

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The Lord is Exalted
3At the noise of the tumult the people fled; at the lifting up of yourself the nations were scattered. 4And your spoil shall be gathered like the gathering of the caterpillar: as the running to and fro of locusts shall he run on them. 5The LORD is exalted; for he dwells on high: he has filled Zion with judgment and righteousness. …

Isaiah 33:3 At the uproar of your army, the peoples flee; when you rise up, the nations scatter.
Isaiah 33:5 The LORD is exalted, for he dwells on high; he will fill Zion with his justice and righteousness.
Ezekiel 25:7 therefore I will stretch out my hand against you and give you as plunder to the nations. I will wipe you out from among the nations and exterminate you from the countries. I will destroy you, and you will know that I am the LORD.'"
Joel 1:4 What the locust swarm has left the great locusts have eaten; what the great locusts have left the young locusts have eaten; what the young locusts have left other locusts have eaten.