the Week of Christ the King / Proper 29 / Ordinary 34
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English Standard Version
Isaiah 21:5
Bible Study Resources
Concordances:
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People are rushing around shouting their orders: "Set the table! Post the guard! Get something to eat and drink! Officers, get up! Polish your shields!"
Look! They are preparing a great feast. They are spreading rugs for people to sit on. Everyone is eating and drinking. But quick! Grab your shields and prepare for battle. You are being attacked!
They prepare the table, they set the watch, they eat, they drink: rise up, you princes, anoint the shield.
They set the table; they spread the rugs; they eat and drink. Leaders, stand up. Prepare the shields for battle!
Arrange the table, lay out the carpet, eat and drink! Get up, you officers, smear oil on the shields!
Prepare the table, watch in the watch-tower, eat, drink: arise, ye princes, [and] anoint the shield.
They prepare the table, they set the watch, they eat, they drink: rise up, you princes, anoint the shield.
They set the table [for the doomed banquet], they spread out the cloth, they eat, they drink; "Rise up, captains [of Belshazzar's court], oil your shields [for battle, for your enemy is at the gates]!"
Sette thou a boord, biholde thou in to a toting place; rise, ye princes, etynge and drynkynge, take ye scheeld.
They prepare the table, they set the watch, they eat, they drink: rise up, ye princes, anoint the shield.
They prepare a table, they lay out a carpet, they eat, they drink! Rise up, O princes, oil the shields!
In Babylon the high officials were having a feast. They were eating and drinking, when someone shouted, "Officers, take your places! Grab your shields."
They prepare the table, they set the watch, they eat, they drink: rise up, ye princes, anoint the shield.
They make ready the table, they put down the covers, they take food and drink. Up! you captains; put oil on your breastplates.
They set the table, light the lamps, eat and drink — "Get going, princes! Oil the shields!"
Prepare the table, appoint the watch; eat, drink: arise, ye princes, anoint the shield.
They prepare the table, they light the lamps, they eat, they drink--'Rise up, ye princes, anoint the shield.'
Prepare the table, watch in the watch-tower, eate, drinke: arise yee princes, and anoint the shield.
They set the tables. They spread out the cloth. They eat and drink. Rise up, captains, oil the battle-coverings!
They prepare the table, they spread the rugs, they eat, they drink. Rise up, commanders, oil the shield!
Prepare thou the table: watch in the watch towre: eate, drinke: arise, ye princes, anoynt the shielde.
Prepare the tables, watch in the watchtowers, eat, drink; arise, O princes, and anoint the shields.
Ye thought to prepare the table - spread the mat - eat - drink! …Arise ye chieftains anoint the shield!
Prepare the table, behold in the watchtower them that eat and drink: arise, ye princes, take up the shield.
They prepare the table, they spread the rugs, they eat, they drink. Arise, O princes, oil the shield!
Whyle they garnished the table, the watchman loked: and whyle I was eatyng and drynkyng, it was sayde, vp ye captaynes, take you to your shielde.
Prepare the table, eat, drink: arise, ye princes, and prepare your shields.
In the vision a banquet is ready; rugs are spread for the guests to sit on. They are eating and drinking. Suddenly the command rings out: "Officers! Prepare your shields!"
Prepare a table, and spread out a carpet!Eat and drink!Rise up, you princes, and oil the shields!
They prepare the table, they set the watch, they eat, they drink: rise up, you princes, anoint the shield.
Prepare the table, watch in the watchtower, eat, drink: arise, ye princes, and anoint the shield.
Set out the table in order! Spread out the rugs! Eat! drink! Rise up, commanders; smear the shield!
Arrange the table; watch in the watchtower; eat, drink; rise up, rulers, and anoint the shield.
Arrange the table, watch in the watch-tower, Eat, drink, rise, ye heads, anoint the shield,
Yee soone make redy the table (sayde this voyce) kepe the watch, eate and drynke: Vp ye captaynes, take you to youre shylde,
The banquet is spread, the guests reclining in luxurious ease, Eating and drinking, having a good time, and then, "To arms, princes! The fight is on!"
They set the table, they spread out the cloth, they eat, they drink; "Rise up, captains, oil the shields!"
Prepare the table, Set a watchman in the tower, Eat and drink. Arise, you princes, Anoint the shield!
They set the table, they spread out the cloth, they eat, they drink; "Rise up, captains, oil the shields,"
They set the table, they spread out the cloth, they eat, they drink;"Rise up, commanders, oil the shields,"
Contextual Overview
Bible Verse Review
from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge
eat: Isaiah 22:13, Isaiah 22:14, Daniel 5:1-5, 1 Corinthians 15:32
arise: Isaiah 13:2, Isaiah 13:17, Isaiah 13:18, Isaiah 45:1-3, Jeremiah 51:11, Jeremiah 51:27, Jeremiah 51:28
Reciprocal: 2 Samuel 1:21 - anointed 1 Kings 1:49 - General Psalms 127:1 - the watchman Isaiah 14:11 - pomp Isaiah 47:8 - given Jeremiah 46:3 - General Jeremiah 51:39 - their heat Jeremiah 51:57 - I will Nahum 2:5 - recount Habakkuk 2:1 - tower Habakkuk 2:5 - he transgresseth 1 Thessalonians 5:7 - and they
Cross-References
When Abram was ninety-nine years old the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, "I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless,
Then Abraham fell on his face and laughed and said to himself, "Shall a child be born to a man who is a hundred years old? Shall Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?"
He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead (since he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb.
Gill's Notes on the Bible
Prepare the table,.... Set it, spread it, furnish it with all kind of provisions, as at a feast; and such an one Belshazzar made, the night the city was taken: these words are directed to him by his courtiers or queen, as represented by the prophet, in order to remove his fears; see Daniel 5:10:
watch in the watchtower; this is said to his servants, his soldiers, or sentinels, that were placed on watchtowers to observe the motions of the enemy, who were ordered on duty, and to be on guard, that he and his nobles might feast the more securely; and all this being done, a table furnished, and a guard set, he, his nobles, and all his guests, are encouraged to "eat" and "drink" liberally and cheerfully, without any fear of the Medes and Persians, who were now besieging the city; when, at the same time, by the Lord it would be said,
arise, ye princes; not, ye nobles of Babylon, from your table, quit it, and your feasting and mirth:
[and] anoint the shield; prepare your arms, see that they are in good order, get them in readiness, and defend your king, yourselves, and your city, as some; but the princes of the Medes and Persians, Cyrus and his generals, are bid to take their arms, and enter the city while indulging themselves at their feast: it was usual to anoint shields, and other pieces of armour, partly that they might be smooth and slippery, as Jarchi, that so the darts of the enemy might easily slide off; and partly for the polishing and brightening of them, being of metal, especially of brass; so the Targum,
"polish and make the arms bright;''
see 2 Samuel 1:21. Aben Ezra understands the words as an exhortation to the princes, to arise and anoint Darius king, in the room of Belshazzar slain; the word "shield" sometimes signifying a king, for which he mentions Psalms 84:9 so Ben Melech; but they are a call of the prophet, or of the Lord, to the princes of the Medes and Persians, to take the opportunity, while the Babylonians were feasting, to fall upon them; and the words may be rendered thus u,
"in or while preparing the table, watching in the watchtower, eating and drinking, arise, ye princes, and anoint the shield;''
which was done by their servants, though they are called upon.
u ערך השלחן "disponendo, mensam, speculando speculam, comedendo, bibendo, surgite principes, ungite clypeum", Montanus; and to the same sense Grotius.
Barnes' Notes on the Bible
Prepare the table - This verse is one of the most striking and remarkable that occurs in this prophecy, or indeed in any part of Isaiah. It is language supposed to be spoken in Babylon. The first direction - perhaps supposed to be that of the king - is to prepare the table for the feast. Then follows a direction to set a watch - to make the city safe, so that they might revel without fear. Then a command to eat and drink: and then immediately a sudden order, as if alarmed at an unexpected attack, to arise and anoint the shield, and to prepare for a defense. The “table” here refers to a feast - that impious feast mentioned in Daniel 5:0 in the night in which Babylon was taken, and Belshazzar slain. Herodotus (i. 195), Xenophon (“Cyr.” 7, 5), and Daniel Daniel 5:0 all agree in the account that Babylon was taken in the night in which the king and his nobles were engaged in feasting and revelry. The words of Xenophon are, ‘But Cyrus, when he heard that there was to be such a feast in Babylon, in which all the Babylonians would drink and revel through the whole night, on that night, as soon as it began to grow dark, taking many people, opened the dams into the river;’ that is, he opened the dykes which had been made by Semiramis and her successors to confine the waters of the Euphrates to one channel, and suffered the waters of the Euphrates again to flow over the country so that he could enter Babylon beneath its wall in the channel of the river. Xenophon has also given the address of Cyrus to the soldiers. ‘Now,’ says he, ‘let us go against them. Many of them are asleep; many of them are intoxicated; and all of them are unfit for battle (ἀσὺντακτοι asuntaktoi).’ Herodotus says (i. 191), ‘It was a day of festivity among them, and while the citizens were engaged in dance and merriment, Babylon was, for the first time, thus taken.’ Compare the account in Daniel 5:0.
Watch in the watch-tower - place a guard so that the city shall be secure. Babylon had on its walls many “towers,” placed at convenient distances (see the notes at Isaiah 13:0), in which guards were stationed to defend the city, and to give the alarm on any approach of an enemy. Xenophon has given a similar account of the taking of the city: ‘They having arranged their guards, drank until light.’ The oriental watch-towers are introduced in the book for the purpose of illustrating a general subject often referred to in the Scriptures.
Eat, drink - Give yourselves to revelry during the night (see Daniel 5:0)
Arise, ye princes - This language indicates sudden alarm. It is the language either of the prophet, or more probably of the king of Babylon, alarmed at the sudden approach of the enemy, and calling upon his nobles to arm themselves and make, a defense. The army of Cyrus entered Babylon by two divisions - one on the north where the waters of the Euphrates entered the city, and the other by the channel of the Euphrates on the south. Knowing that the city was given up to revelry on that night, they had agreed to imitate the sound of the revellers until they should assemble around the royal palace in the center of the city. They did so. When the king heard the noise, supposing that it was the sound of a drunken mob, he ordered the gates of the palace to be opened to ascertain the cause of the disturbance. When they were thus opened, the army of Cyrus rushed in, and made an immediate attack on all who were within. It is to this moment that we may suppose the prophet here refers, when the king, aroused and alarmed, would call on his nobles to arm themselves for battle (see Jahn’s “Hebrew Commonwealth,” p. 153, Ed. Andover, 1828).
Anoint the shield - That is, prepare for battle. Gesenius supposes that this means to rub over the shield with oil to make the leather more supple and impenetrable (compare 2 Samuel 1:21). The Chaldee renders it, ‘Fit, and polish your arms.’ The Septuagint, ‘Prepare shields.’ Shields were instruments of defense prepared to ward off the spears and arrows of an enemy in battle. They were usually made of a rim of brass or wood, and over this was drawn a covering of the skin of an ox or other animal in the manner of a drum-head with us. Occasionally the hide of a rhinoceros or an elephant was used. Burckhardt (“Travels in Nubia”) says that the Nubians use the hide of the hippopotamus for the making of shields. But whatever skin might be used, it was necessary occasionally to rub it over with oil lest it should become hard, and crack, or lest it should become so rigid that an arrow or a sword would easily break through it. Jarchi says, that ‘shields were made of skin, and that they anointed them with the oil of olive.’ The sense is, ‘Prepare your arms! Make ready for battle!’
Clarke's Notes on the Bible
Verse Isaiah 21:5. Prepare the table - "The table is prepared"] In Hebrew the verbs are in the infinitive mood absolute, as in Ezekiel 1:14: "And the animals ran and returned, רצוא ושוב ratso veshob, like the appearance of the lightning;" just as the Latins say, currere et reverti, for currebant et revertebantur. See Isaiah 32:11, and the note there.
Arise, ye princes, and anoint the shield. — Kimchi observes that several of the rabbins understood this of Belshazzar's impious feast and death. The king of a people is termed the shield, because he is their defense. The command, Anoint the shield, is the same with Anoint a new king. Belshazzar being now suddenly slain, while they were all eating and drinking, he advises the princes, whose business it was, to make speed and anoint another in his stead.
