Bible Commentaries
Isaiah 18

Verses 1-7

Message to Ethiopian Ambassadors (18:1-7)

The breadth of the prophet’s horizon is indicated by this lament addressed to the ambassadors of Ethiopia. Actually, these men represent the Egyptian Twenty-Fifth Dynasty, which after 714 B.c. was in control of Egypt. A new king is now on the throne in Jerusalem. His name is Hezekiah (715-687 b.c.), and the Egyptian government is urging Judah, Philistia (see comment on 14:28-32), and the other small nations of lower Syria and Palestine to revolt against Assyria. Isaiah, who had not wanted Ahaz to throw himself at the feet of Assyria in the first place, now is most emphatically against any kind of an alliance for revolt. He addresses the ambassadors, and through them the whole world, saying that the Lord will make known in due time when the overthrow of Assyria will take place. It is necessary, however, to wait on God’s time. It is his decision that Assyria should now rule western Asia, and he will decide when the rule will cease (vs. 7; see 10:5-19). He it is who founded Zion (Jerusalem) ; he is the Lord of his people, and no alliances with other powers are necessary.

Such was Isaiah’s attitude both in the revolt of 714-11 b.c.— in which the prophet’s counsel seems to have been taken seriously, with the result that Judah took little part in the affair (see comment on 20:1-6)—and also in the great revolt in the early years of Sennacherib between 705 and 701 b.c., when Hezekiah was the leader of a revolt (see comment on 28:1—31:9).