Please note.my interaction with Isaiah 29:  Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.

 

Rather than using the KJV, let me quote from The Dead Sea Scroll Bible (1999) so you see the variants in the Great Isaiah Scroll that Don Parry has intentionally omitted in his book, Harmonizing Isaiah (2001).

 Isaiah 29:1-4

(1) Ah, Aruel, Aruel [Ariel, Ariel – MT, LXX], the city where David encamped! Add [Masculine plural imperative – MT] year to year, let the feasts come round; (2) then I will distress Aruel, and there will be mourning and lamentation, and she will be to me as Aruel. (3)  And I will encamp against you all around, and will lay siege against you with towers, and I will raise siegeworks against you. (4)  And you will be brought down, and will speak from the ground, and your speech will be low from the dust; your voice will be like that of a ghost from the ground, and your speech will whisper from the dust.”

 Heart Issues

Isaiah 29:1 – Could there possibly be a hint of righteous sarcasm in this verse for a rebellious people?

 

Isaiah 29:2-4 – I see no comfort in this terrifying judgment of God.

 The declaration of verse 4 is horribly arresting, dreadfully limiting, shockingly pathetic, and such miserable existence for a people who had stopped their ears to divine revelation from heaven through Isaiah.  So be it.  What they had sought after and thought to be so intellectually, socially, and emotionally satisfying, they got.  Henceforth, they are characterized with only creaturely communication.  Definitely, no words from heaven for them.  They get to fill their gnawing hunger for life direction from spiritists, who are as blind as they are—both originating from the dust.  To get your speech from the dust is not a compliment.  This is an unhappy situation.  It is not victorious trumpeting news on the temple top for all in Zion.  It is feeble, wimpy whisperings and chirpings.  Is anyone able to see this God-given vision of judgment? Or are we all asleep? 

Application:  We have got to heed and follow the writings of Isaiah.  Don’t dissect them of their unity or strip them of their divine urgency for your life today.  If you blow off the precious and powerful revelation given to the Old Testament prophet, no matter how high-minded your personal revelations might appear to audiences, they come only from the dust and not God.

 Isaiah 29:5-8

(5) But the multitude of your enemies [your strangers – MT. the ungodly – LXX] will be like fine dust, and the multitude of the ruthless ones like chaff that blows away.  Suddenly, in an instant (6) you will be punished by the LORD of hosts with thunder, with an earthquake and great noise, with whirlwind and tempest, and the flame of a devouring fire. (7) And the multitude of all the nations that fight against Aruel, even all that fight against her and her fortification [mountain stronghold – MT. Jerusalem – LXX (but different word order)] and distress her, will be like a dream, a vision of the night. (8) And it will be as when a hungry man dreams, and see—he eats but awakes and is empty; or it will be like when a thirsty man dreams, and see—he drinks but wakes up faint, and is still thirsty.  So will the multitude of all the nations be that fight against Mount Zion.”

The commentators, Martin Abegg, Peter Flint, and Eugene Ulrich, of this DSS translation write, “Several possibilities exist for the multitude referred to in Isaiah 29:5.  Is the best reading ‘your strangers,’ mentioned in the Masoretic Text, ‘the ungodly,’ referred to in the Septuagint, or ‘your enemies,’ as found in the 1QIsa^a?  A solution is offered by the parallel phrase later in the verse—“and the multitude of the ruthless ones”—which suggests that the reading in 1QIsaa is the preferred one.  ‘Your enemies’ (or ‘Your foes’) is found in several modern translations, including the Revised Standard Version, the New Revised Standard Version, and the New International Version” (312).

 Heart Issues

Though Zion experiences humbling, chastening judgment, God makes it known that the enemies of Jerusalem will get it far worse.