Isaiah 52:6

Therefore my people shall know my name: therefore they shall know in that day that I am he that doth speak: behold, it is I.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

52:1-12 The gospel proclaims liberty to those bound with fears. Let those weary and heavy laden under the burden of sin, find relief in Christ, shake themselves from the dust of their doubts and fears, and loose themselves from those bands. The price paid by the Redeemer for our salvation, was not silver or gold, or corruptible things, but his own precious blood. Considering the freeness of this salvation, and how hurtful to temporal comfort sins are, we shall more value the redemption which is in Christ. Do we seek victory over every sin, recollecting that the glory of God requires holiness in every follower of Christ? The good news is, that the Lord Jesus reigns. Christ himself brought these tidings first. His ministers proclaim these good tidings: keeping themselves clean from the pollutions of the world, they are beautiful to those to whom they are sent. Zion's watchmen could scarcely discern any thing of God's favour through the dark cloud of their afflictions; but now the cloud is scattered, they shall plainly see the performance. Zion's waste places shall then rejoice; all the world will have the benefit. This is applied to our salvation by Christ. Babylon is no place for Israelites. And it is a call to all in the bondage of sin and Satan, to use the liberty Christ has proclaimed. They were to go with diligent haste, not to lose time nor linger; but they were not to go with distrustful haste. Those in the way of duty, are under God's special protection; and he that believes this, will not hasten for fear.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Therefore my people shall know my name - The idea in this verse is, that his people should have such exhibitions of his power as to furnish to them demonstration that he was God.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

6. shall know in that day—when Christ shall reveal Himself to Israel sensibly; the only means whereby their obstinate unbelief shall be overcome (Ps 102:16; Zec 12:10; 14:5).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

My people shall know my name; they shall have sensible experience of my infinite power and goodness in fighting for them and against you; whereby they shall be able to put your blasphemous tongues to silence.

They shall know; which word is understood from the foregoing clause, as is very frequent in Scripture.

In that day; when I shall redeem my people: which work was begun by the return of the Jews from Babylon, and afterwards carried on, and at last perfected, by the coming of the Messiah.

That I am he that doth speak: behold, it is I: that all these promises are not the words of a weak, or fickle, or deceitful man, but of him who is the omnipotent, and unchangeable, and covenant-keeping God. Or thus, That I who have formerly spoken to you by my servants the prophets, (for it was the Spirit of Christ which was and spake in them, 1 Peter 1:11) do now speak to you in my own person, being clothed with flesh; which agrees well, as with the analogy of faith, and with divers other scriptures, so particularly with the next verse, and with divers following passages, which so evidently speak of the person and kingdom of Christ, that they cannot without great force be understood of any other.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Therefore my people shall know my name,.... His nature and perfections; his faithfulness in fulfilling his promises to them; his power in delivering them out of their bondage; and his justice in punishing their enemies.

Therefore they shall know on that day that I am he that doth speak: behold, it is I; they shall then see, when the people of God are delivered from the antichristian slavery and bondage, and when Babylon is fallen, that all the promises God has spoken are yea and amen; that Jesus Christ is the true and faithful witness; and that these are his true and faithful sayings, which he has spoken.

Geneva Study Bible

Therefore my people shall know my name: therefore they shall know in that day that I am he that doth speak: behold, it is I.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

6. The contempt thus brought on His name is the crowning motive of Jehovah’s interposition,—another point of affinity with Ezekiel (see Ezekiel 36:21).

my people shall know my name] i.e. shall know by experience what My name imports; comp. “shall know that I am Jehovah,” in Ezekiel (Ezekiel 20:42; Ezekiel 20:44 and often). The second therefore, followed by no new verb, is both superfluous and difficult and should probably be omitted, with LXX.

that I am he that doth speak: behold, it is I] The last words “behold me” are hardly to be taken as obj. of the verb “speak”; they simply repeat the sense of the preceding clause: “They shall know that it is I who speak; here am I” (cf. Ezekiel 5:13).

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 6. - Therefore. Because of the "howling" and the "blasphemy." My people shall know my Name; i.e. "my people shall know by practical experience that I am all that my name of El or Elohim - 'the Strong,' ' the Powerful' - implies." They shall know in that day. The "day" when God would come to their help and deliver them from their oppressors - when they would call upon him, and he would manifest himself (Isaiah 58:9), responding to their appeal as distinctly as though he said, "Here I am." Isaiah 52:6

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The reason for the address is now given in a well-sustained promise. "For thus saith Jehovah, Ye have been sold for nothing, and ye shall not be redeemed with silver. For thus saith the Lord Jehovah, My people went down to Egypt in the beginning to dwell there as guests; and Asshur has oppressed it for nothing. And now, what have I to do here? saith Jehovah: for my people are taken away for nothing; their oppressors shriek, saith Jehovah, and my name is continually blasphemed all the day. Therefore my people shall learn my name; therefore, in that day, that I am He who saith, There am I." Ye have been sold (this is the meaning of Isaiah 52:3); but this selling is merely a giving over to a foreign power, without the slightest advantage accusing to Him who had no other object in view than to cause them to atone for their sins (Isaiah 50:1), and without any other people taking their place, and serving Him in their stead as an equivalent for the loss He sustained. And there would be no need of silver to purchase the favour of Him who had given them up, since a manifestation of divine power would be all that would be required (Isaiah 45:13). For whether Jehovah show Himself to Israel as the Righteous One or as the Gracious One, as a Judge or as a Redeemer, He always acts as the Absolute One, exalted above all earthly affairs, having no need to receive anything, but able to give everything. He receives no recompense, and gives none. Whether punishing or redeeming, He always guards His people's honour, proving Himself in the one case to be all-sufficient, and in the other almighty, but acting in both cases freely from Himself.

In the train of thought in Isaiah 52:4-6 the reason is given for the general statement in Isaiah 52:3. Israel went down to Egypt, the country of the Nile valley, with the innocent intention of sojourning, i.e., living as a guest (gūr) there in a foreign land; and yet (as we may supply from the next clause, according to the law of a self-completing parallelism) there it fell into the bondage of the Pharaohs, who, whilst they did not fear Jehovah, but rather despised Him, were merely the blind instruments of His will. Asshur then oppressed it bephes, i.e., not "at last" (ultimo tempore, as Hvernick renders it), but (as אפס is the synonym of אין in Isaiah 40:17; Isaiah 41:2) "for nothing," i.e., without having acquired any right to it, but rather serving in its unrighteousness simply as the blind instrument of the righteousness of Jehovah, who through the instrumentality of Asshur put an end first of all to the kingdom of Israel, and then to the kingdom of Judah. The two references to the Egyptian and Assyrian oppressions are expressed in as brief terms as possible. But with the words "now therefore" the prophecy passes on in a much more copious strain to the present oppression in Babylon. Jehovah inquires, Quid mihi hic (What have I to do here)? Hitzig supposes pōh (here) to refer to heaven, in the sense of, "What pressing occupation have I here, that all this can take place without my interfering?" But such a question as this would be far more appropriate to the Zeus of the Greek comedy than to the Jehovah of prophecy. Knobel, who takes pōh as referring to the captivity, in accordance with the context, gives a ridiculous turn to the question, viz., "What do I get here in Babylonia, from the fact that my people are carried off for nothing? Only loss." He observes himself that there is a certain wit in the question. But it would be silly rather than witty, if, after Jehovah had just stated that He had given up His people for nothing, the prophet represented Him as preparing to redeem it by asking, "What have I gained by it?" The question can have no other meaning, according to Isaiah 22:16, than "What have I to do here?" Jehovah is thought of as present with His people (cf., Genesis 46:4), and means to inquire whether He shall continue this penal condition of exile any longer (Targum, Rashi, Rosenmller, Ewald, Stier, etc.). The question implies an intention to redeem Israel, and the reason for this intention is introduced with kı̄. Israel is taken away (ablatus), viz., from its own native home, chinnâm, i.e., without the Chaldeans having any human claim upon them whatever. The words יהיליילוּ משׁליו (משׁלו) are not to be rendered, "its singers lament," as Reutschi and Rosenmller maintain, since the singers of Israel are called meshōrerı̄m; nor "its (Israel's) princes lament," as Vitringa and Hitzig supposed, since the people of the captivity, although they had still their national sârı̄m, had no other mōshelı̄m than the Chaldean oppressors (Isaiah 49:7; Isaiah 14:5). It is the intolerable tyranny of the oppressors of His people, that Jehovah assigns in this sentence as the reason for His interposition, which cannot any longer be deferred. It is true that we do meet with hēlı̄l (of which we have the future here without any syncope of the first syllable) in other passages in the sense of ululare, as a cry of pain; but just as הריע, רנן, רזח signify a yelling utterance of either joy or pain, so heeliil may also be applied to the harsh shrieking of the capricious tyrants, like Lucan's laetis ululare triumphis, and the Syriac ailel, which is used to denote a war-cry and other noises as well. In connection with this proud and haughty bluster, there is also the practice of making Jehovah's name the butt of their incessant blasphemy: מנּאץ is a part. hithpoel with an assimilated ת and a pausal ā for ē, although it might also be a passive hithpoal (for the ō in the middle syllable, compare מגאל, Malachi 1:7; מבהל, Esther 8:14). In Isaiah 52:6 there follows the closing sentence of the whole train of thought: therefore His people are to get to learn His name, i.e., the self-manifestation of its God, who is so despised by the heathen; therefore lâkhēn repeated with emphasis, like כּעל in Isaiah 59:18, and possibly min in Psalm 45:9) in that day, the day of redemption, (supply "it shall get to learn") that "I am he who saith, Here am I," i.e., that He who has promised redemption is now present as the True and Omnipotent One to carry it into effect.