Bible Commentaries
Isaiah 11

Verses 1-9

Isa 11:1-9

Isaiah 11:1-5

Again in this chapter Isaiah returns to one of his favorite topics, the Messiah and his kingdom, revealing that he will descend through the posterity of the family of Jesse, thus the Root of Jesse, the Branch.

This follows logically upon the projected fulfillment of the destruction both of Israel and of Assyria; but it is significant that whereas there were no sprouts or shoots coming up from the felled forest of Lebanon, since cedars do not produce sprouts after being cut down. God’s choice of the metaphor, therefore, in his use of the word "Lebanon" for Assyria, shows that Assyria would never recover from their destruction. However, Judah was represented by another type of tree, such as an oak, that will indeed preserve life after being cut down, and will send forth a sprout or shoot to make a new tree. Note that both Assyria and Israel are by this prophecy doomed to be cut down or destroyed.

True to Isaiah’s promise of a revelation from God a little at a time, "line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there a little" (See Introduction), Isaiah here gives additional information about: (1) the Messiah; (2) kingdom of God; (3) the character of Christians; (4) the punishment of Israel; (5) the destruction of Assyria; (6) the call of the Gentiles; and (7) the triumph of Christianity.

Isaiah 11:1-5

"And there shall come forth a shoot out of the stock of Jesse, a branch out of his roots shall bear fruit. And the Spirit of Jehovah shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of Jehovah. And his delight shall be in the fear of Jehovah; and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither decide after the hearing of his ears; but with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth; and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked. And righteousness shall be the girdle of his waist, and faithfulness the girdle of his loins."

"Out of the stock of Jesse ..." The implication here is that the shoot and the branch to come forth from this stock will not occur until Jesse and the entire Davidic monarchy have completely fallen. Peake would not allow this necessary inference; and upon his unsupported denial of it, insisted that the passage "is not Isaiah’s."^[1] However, it is impossible to suppose that, merely because of Isaiah’s friendship for Ahaz, he would not have delivered the word of God against the House of David. Had not Isaiah many years previously to the "cutting down of Israel" named his first-born Shear-Jashub? And in that name both the stock of Jesse and the shoot or branch appear in the form of the return from captivity inherently prophesied in the name Shear-Jashub. The allegations of scholars such as Peake are unacceptable.

The time indicated for this prophecy came, "When the house of David had fallen into such a state of dishonor and disrepute (Amos 9:11) that the prophet did not refer to it by David’s name, but by the name of David’s father Jesse.”

Both Assyria and Judah were about to be destroyed. Assyria would never rise again, but Judah, like the stump of an oak tree would carry within itself the sap of life and would send forth a Root, a Branch out of the stump of Judah; and in the very midst of this discouraging picture God held forth hope and promise to that small righteous remnant who would return from captivity; and from them the Messiah would be born, and the glory of Israel would once more appear in the New Israel composed of both Jews and Gentiles! The difference in the ultimate fates of Assyria and Judah appears in the prophecy which gave Lebanon as a metaphor for Assyria (a reference to their cedars). As many have noted, "Cedars when felled throw out no fresh suckers.”

The reference here to the coming Messiah as being from the stock of Jesse should not compromise the truth that the Messiah is the Second David. Christ is called the "Root of David" also in Revelation 5:5; Revelation 22:16. "There is a resumption here of the theme of Isaiah 9:6,” namely, that of the Coming Messiah.

"And the Spirit of Jehovah shall rest upon him ..." This refers to the anointing of Jesus Christ on the occasion of his baptism (Matthew 3:16). Note the words "shall rest"; the scriptures plainly reveal that the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus and "remained upon Him." This was the very event that revealed to John the Baptist that Jesus of Nazareth was indeed the Son of God (John 1:32-33).

The anointing of Jesus Christ with the Spirit of God was no partial or incomplete thing, for God gave his Spirit to Christ, "without measure" (John 3:34), this being signified here by the words "shall rest upon him." Peake pointed out that this Holy Spirit fully equipped Jesus with, "Six modes of manifestation, intellectual, practical, and religious.” Just as the measureless gift of the Holy Spirit in Christ was typified by pouring liberal amounts of the anointing oil upon Aaron’s head, the far lesser gift of the Holy Spirit promised to Christ’s followers was typified by the merely "sprinkling" of the anointing oil upon the garments of the ordinary priests.

Isaiah 11:3-4 here contrast the righteous judgment of Christ with that which was evidently common in Judea when this was written. "We can clearly read between the lines the contrast," of the kind of judgment then current on the throne of Israel with the righteous judgment of Jesus Christ. His high regard of the meek and the poor of earth was a constant characteristic of his earthly ministry.

The reference in Isaiah 11:4 to Messiah’s, "smiting the earth with the rod of his mouth," and his slaying the wicked with "the breath of his lips," is fully equivalent to the declaration that the Messiah will be God. "The creative virtue of the Word belongs properly to Jehovah.” The words of the Holy King prophesied in these verses, "In the last day will consign to everlasting life or everlasting death," every man ever born upon earth.

"Righteousness shall be the girdle of his waist ..." All of these first verses extol the character, ability, integrity, honor, and righteousness of the Holy Messiah.

Isaiah 11:6-9

"And the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling; and a little child shall lead them. And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder’s den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of Jehovah, as the waters cover the sea."

This is one of the most talked-about passages in the Bible; and it is a mainstay of many premillennarian groups of believers, most of whom appeal to the passage in Romans 8:22, "The whole creation groaneth and travaileth together in pain until now," supposing that in the millennium the lower animate creation shall participate in the blessings of Redemption in Christ when that day arrives. Regarding that verse in Romans, "The word for creation means exactly what the same word means in Mark 16:15, namely, all mankind, having no reference whatever to the lower creations such as animals." Theories always assume that such harmony among the lower orders of life once existed in Eden prior to the fall of Adam, and the conditions mentioned in these verses would be merely the restoration of what once previously existed; but there is no Biblical evidence of such. There is not a word in all the Bible that backs up such fantastic theories.

Our understanding of this paragraph views it as not literal in any sense whatever. Note that the peace, harmony, and tranquillity depicted here exist only in God’s holy mountain (Isaiah 11:9), not all over the world. This passage can no more be taken literally than the description of a sprout coming up out of Jesse, or of a rod or a sharp sword coming out of the mouth of Messiah. "The prophet is not looking to a time when animals of the natural world will live without enmity; but he is describing the peace of those in Jehovah’s holy mountain, the kingdom of God.”

As Archer put it, "The picture of the fierce predatory animals living peaceably with the weak and defenseless symbolizes the removal of all natural fear and hostility between men.”

The asp (Isaiah 11:8) probably refers to the "great yellow viper common in Palestine.”

Peake also rejected the notion that this paragraph refers literally to wild beasts, because such a notion would be utterly contrary to the fact that Isaiah attributed the wonderful conditions described "to a diffusion of the knowledge of Jehovah (Isaiah 11:9); ... peace among men (in God’s kingdom) is intended.”

Isaiah 11:1-5 CHARACTER OF THE BRANCH: The Assyrian king will be felled like a mighty tree being cut down. His whole forest (nation) will be felled and will not grow back. Israel is soon to be felled in the captivity. However, from the stump (“remnant”) that is left of Israel, a Shoot or Branch will sprout. This Branch will be a supernatural person. He will have a full measure of the Spirit of the Lord. There can be little doubt that the Branch is the Messiah (Cf. Isaiah 4:2; Jeremiah 23:5; Jeremiah 33:15; Zechariah 3:8; Zechariah 6:12). The main emphasis focuses on His character. He will be in complete contrast to Israel’s human rulers. He will rule righteously, justly, fairly. He will judge according to facts because He will be filled with divine wisdom, divine counsel and divine power. Israel’s human kings, for the most part, delighted in doing their own will. The Branch will delight in doing God’s will (Cf. John 4:34; John 5:30; John 14:31; John 15:10; John 17:4). The absolute righteousness and faithfulness of the Branch will bring a change in the character of those who commit themselves to Him. They will be able to trust Him to take care of all judgment. Thus they will be at peace and harmony with one another and with their surroundings. This leads into the next section.

Isaiah 11:6-9 CONDITION OF THE BELIEVER: The condition of the believer is directly dependent upon the character of the Branch. Without the Branch the believer falls into the sinful and decadent condition which Israel finds itself. Social injustice, political anarchy, human enmity and personal fragmentation are the consequences of impotent human leadership. Sinful, rebellious man is out of harmony with the will of God and out of harmony with God’s whole creation. He trusts nothing and no one. He hopes in nothing. Filled with despair and meaninglessness he cares for nothing. He is at war with himself, with other human beings and with all that surrounds him. He perverts and exploits nature.

But when man finds he has a Divine Ruler who will judge with righteousness and faithfulness, and commits himself in faith and obedience to that Ruler, life begins to make sense. Man finds wholeness in himself, with his fellow man and harmony with his circumstances and surroundings. Nature becomes a help to him, and even those circumstances which seemed before to be contradictory and meaningless now become aids in the perfecting of his character.

We believe Isaiah is here speaking figuratively of a condition that will be accomplished in the believer at the first coming of the Messiah. When the Messiah has completed His messianic work, peace will be made possible in the hearts of those who believe. When men believe and obey Him they will be regenerated. They will begin the process of perfecting that will fit them for the time when the “earth shall be full of the knowledge of Jehovah.” Some day even creation itself shall be redeemed (Cf. Romans 8:18-25) and God will create a new heaven and a new earth. But new circumstances do not a heaven make! C. S. Lewis once said that heaven will not be so much the glory that surrounds us as the glory that is in us! Even when God makes a new heaven and new earth with docile animals and a stormless natural order, it will not be heaven without regenerated people. Man had perfect natural conditions to start with in the Garden of Eden! When man listened to a liar (the Devil), he got out of harmony with God and himself and sinful men have been perverting and exploiting everything he can get his hands on since then.

Isaiah is talking here about man’s conversion. Potentially, man’s dominion over creation, which he once enjoyed in Eden but lost, has been restored through the work of God-Man, Jesus Christ (Hebrews 2:5-18). Man can now enter into that potential dominion by faith in Christ, for Christ has destroyed the power the Devil formerly had over man through man’s fear of death. Thus entering this potential dominion, man begins to prepare himself for the realization or consummation of the dominion which will come at the consummation of the ages—the Second Advent of the Messiah!

The condition described in these verses cannot apply to a supposed millennium. Advocates of a millennial theory maintain that even during the millennium there is sin, for after the millennium the nations will again gather for a battle. The picture before us, however, is one in which there is no sin, but in which the fullest manifestation of peace is to be seen. And right now, within the kingdom of the Messiah, there is peace. Of course, the kingdom is still in the world—not of the world. And so the world makes war on the kingdom of God. But within the kingdom itself there is peace! And some day, even the world, nature and all its inhabitants will be at complete harmony.

Verses 10-16

Isa 11:10-16

Isaiah 11:10

"And it shall come to pass in that day, that the root of Jesse, that standeth for an ensign of the peoples, unto him shall the nations seek; and his resting place shall be glorious."

This reference to "the nations" in the Old Testament invariably means to "the Gentiles"; and this is without doubt a prophecy of the reception of the Gentiles into God’s kingdom in the days of Jesus Christ. The opening words here, "in that day," could not refer to any other period.

Isaiah 11:11-16

"And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord will set his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people, that shall remain, from Assyria, and from Egypt, and from Pathros, and from Cush, and from Elam and from Shinar, and from Hamath and from me islands of the sea. He will set up an ensign for the nations, and will assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth. The envy also of Ephraim shall depart, and they that vex Judah shall be cut off: Ephraim shall not envy Judah, and Judah shall not vex Ephraim. And they shall fly down upon the shoulder of the Philistines on the west; together shall they despoil the children of the east: they shall put forth their hand upon Edom and Moab; and the children of Ammon shall obey them. And Jehovah will utterly destroy the tongue of the Egyptian sea a with his scorching wind will he wave his hand over the River, and will smite it into seven streams, and cause men to march over dryshod. And there shall be a highway for the remnant of his people, that shall remain, from Assyria; like as there was for Israel in the day that he came up out of the land of Egypt."

The highly figurative and symbolical nature of the prophecy continues here. What is depicted is the gathering of the Jews, scattered throughout the earth, following the Roman destruction of Jerusalem, "from the four comers of the earth," along with Gentiles from every nation on earth into the kingdom of God by the preaching of the gospel. This is made certain by the words, "The Lord will set his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people that shall remain, there being only two times that God ever did such a thing, once following the Assyrian captivity, and again the second time in the ingathering from the preaching of the gospel. We can find no basis whatever for agreeing with those scholars who speak of the Exodus from Egypt as the first time. In the Exodus, God did not gather his people from "the four comers" but from one nation, not from any scattering or dispersion, but from a concentration in one place, namely, the land of Goshen. This passage speaks of a second gathering from a widespread dispersion: (1) the first following the Assyrian captivity, and (2) the second being the Roman dispersion in A.D. 70.

As Hailey put it, "The first time that God set his hand to recover the remnant involved the Jews under Zerubbabel; and now this passage states that in the days of the Branch (the days of Christ) God would set his hand a second time to recover the remnant from all parts of the earth."

Paul quoted Isaiah 11:10 here (Romans 15:12) as a reference to the calling of the Gentiles in Christ.

This whole paragraph continues to be a picture "of the Messianic age."

We should not be surprised that the promise of victory in Jesus Christ is expressed in terms of the personal wishes and desires of a more primitive age of morality than the one to which we are now accustomed.

"Israel’s most persistent and bitterest enemies throughout the centuries had been the very peoples mentioned in these closing verses; and "They are here taken as types of the enemies of God’s church; and the victory over those enemies promised in Isaiah 11:14," is a reference to the spiritual victories in Christ over all of the obstacles in the way of faith.

"There shall be a highway ..." This subject will come up again in Isaiah, the meaning being that God will open the way for honest and good hearts to come unto him in Christ Jesus. The reference here to smiting such barriers as the Red Sea and the Euphrates actually promises the removal of all tribal and national boundaries. "Under this new order all barriers will be removed by the power of Jehovah," so that "Whosoever will may come!"

God’s special concern for this "Highway" will be discussed at greater length in Isaiah 35:8 ff.

Isaiah 11:10-13 RALLYING POLESTAR: This first section speaks of the dramatic way in which the Branch, the Messiah, will be a rallying polestar. He will bring together those that were separated through strife and schism. The glory of the Lord manifested in the Messiah will be the polestar. A literal translation of the word “glorious” in Isaiah 11:10 would be “glory.” It is the Hebrew noun kovod and not the adjective. “The word became flesh and dwelt (tabernacled) among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father.” (John 1:14) God’s resting-place is where He has settled down to rule. As the Tabernacle and Temple of the O.T. had the glory of God dwelling in them, so the glory of God now rules and dwells in the Church through Christ (Cf. Isa. 6:19; Isaiah 44:5; Isaiah 55:5; Zechariah 2:4-5).

Around this glory, which would be a Person, men of all nations would gather in unity. Barriers of hatred and separation would be broken down (Cf. Ephesians 2:11-22, etc.). Gentile and Jew would be at peace (Cf. Zechariah 9:9-10).

The great scandal in the history of God’s covenant people was the division caused by envy and jealousy. It happened first in the original family with Cain and Abel. It was repeated over and over and occurred even in the theocracy between Jeroboam and Rehoboam. In fact, Jeroboam is known as “the man who caused Israel to sin.” Involved in this schism in Israel was an apostasy, a complete rejection on the part of the northern tribes of the promises which had been made to the house of David. God sent prophets throughout the subsequent history of the apostate nation, to call it to repentance and to point it to the Messiah who alone could heal the breach. The prophets delight to picture as one of the blessings of the Messianic age the healing of the breach between the northern and southern kingdoms (Cf. Ezekiel 37:15-28). In Christ all national, sectional and regional distinctions will be abolished. The Messiah is the true Polestar of unity.

Isaiah 11:14-16 RANSOMED POSSESSION: This true unity does not hide itself in cringing self-defense, expecting attack. It takes the offensive; the enemies of the Messiah must be conquered. In the strength of unity which the Polestar (Messiah) gives, the ransomed (both Gentile and Jew in one body) “fly upon” the enemy (here represented by the Philistines, Edom, Moab and Ammon) and conquer them. What Isaiah is describing here cannot be understood in a literal sense. It is a picture of the evangelizing of the world by missionaries and Christians all over the world’. The glorious hope here held out for God’s unified people does not consist in a literal despoliation of nomad Arabs of the desert. It rather consists in the glorious task of making the saving power of God known even to those who are enemies of God in expectation of rescuing them from the kingdom of Satan and delivering them to the kingdom of His dear Son. Elton Trueblood has said that a people trying to be a “remnant,” keeping itself pure and undefiled in the midst of a wicked world, may reveal a certain nobility of character, but it is radically different from the pattern taught by Christ. The wonder of heaven is that it is effective, not by keeping itself separate from the world, but rather by penetrating the world. God’s Messianic people (the Church) must conquer or be conquered!

As remarkable as the unity of God’s “remnant” is, the secret of their victory is that the Lord fights for them. Two great obstacles of the ancient world, the tongue of the Red Sea and the Euphrates River, vividly blocked the ancient covenant people from their homeland. In figurative expression Isaiah depicts the supernatural power of God removing obstacles that stand in the way of the “remnant’s” conquests. The greatest of all obstacles to the ransomed ones possessing the nations for God are spiritual obstacles such as lack of love, lack of motive, division, etc. Jesus promised the disciples that if they had faith as a grain of mustard seed they could say to any mountainous obstacle, “be removed” and it would be removed into the deepest sea. Jesus was speaking, of course, of spiritual obstacles.

Not only will God remove the obstacles, He will provide The Way for dramatic, supernatural deliverance. Isaiah is not speaking primarily of the return from Babylonian exile, although that may be the type of the ultimate deliverance. Rather he is thinking of a deliverance so great that it can only be performed by God and it is for all nations. God will provide The Way to bring mankind up out of the house of spiritual bondage and prison of sin, That Way is the Messiah (John 14:6), (Cf. also Isaiah 42:16; Isaiah 43:19; Isaiah 48:21; Isaiah 49:11; Isaiah 35:1-10). On the “remnant” possessing its enemies, see Obadiah 1:20 and Amos 9:11-12.