A Sign and A Witness

A Study on Isaiah 19

Part 1. The casting down of Egypt

The nineteenth chapter of Isaiah’s prophecy was spoken in the ears of Israel at a time when Egypt, the great earthly power in which they had trusted for so long, was declining to its fall. It is one of the paradoxes of history that the nation that had held their forefathers in bondage and from which they had been delivered by a signal exercise of Divine power should be the very nation to which they would turn for protection only four centuries later. For something like four more centuries Israel flirted with Egypt, making agreements and alliances and generally looking to Egypt for the help they should have expected from God, and then Egypt and Israel fell together and the people of the Lord found they had been trusting, as Rab‑Shakeh the general of Sennacherib’s host on one occasion taunted them with trusting, on a broken reed which would pierce the hand of the man who was foolhardy enough to lean upon it.

Isaiah never wearied of warning his fellow‑citizens of the weakness of Egypt and the folly of trusting in the Egyptians. His warnings were very generally unheeded and so disaster came upon the nation. The same warning comes to us; we have the same God and He still abides by the same principles. He will still deliver the nation that puts its trust in him, and disaster will still overtake the nation that puts its trust in the arm of the flesh. Egypt in prophecy usually pictures the secular world in contrast to the Christian community which has separated itself from the world and no longer holds to its standards. So often, though, members or sections of that community do leave somewhat of their high ideals and lose something of their high faith, and begin to trust to an extent in the standards and policies and weapons of this world. When they do so, the burning words of Isaiah are to the point and applicable to them. "Woe to them that go down to Egypt for help; and stay on horses, and trust in chariots, because they are many; and in horsemen, because they are very strong; but they look not unto the Holy One of Israel, neither seek the LORD... When the LORD shall stretch out his hand, both he that helpeth shall fall, and he that is holpen shall fall down, and they all shall fail together." (Isa.31:1,3) It is impossible not to notice the military "flavour" of these verses. If there is one particular aspect of this modern world that is represented more than others by Egypt, it is the military aspect, the policies and principles and activities that have to do with war between nations. Israel looked to Egypt for protection because Egypt was a powerful military nation, and Israel had forgotten that her own mission was to demonstrate the power and efficacy of the rulership of God, a rulership which has no place for armed conflict between men. That is one of the greatest failures of organised Christianity today; in the face of the apparently overwhelming nature of those militarised forces which threaten our own orderly way of life they know of no effective defence than resource to the same weapons. It is not surprising therefore if, despite the rightness of the cause, they ultimately find that trust in carnal weapons and the policies of the unregenerate man leads to the same type of disasters in our day, that this same trust brought to Israel in their day.

Isaiah’s nineteenth chapter had a message for his own generation and it has a message for us. In both cases the message is prophetic: it spoke, and speaks, of things to come. Like so many of Isaiah’s visions, the Holy Spirit showed him, first, a picture of his own day and the consequences that would arise out of the political situation then existing, and then, by a swift transition of scene, took him forward into the world’s day of judgment and showed him how the same wrong principles, followed this time by all the world, would bring about even greater trouble, but that behind it all was God, waiting to bless all his creatures when the due time for blessing had come. In this particular chapter the first fifteen verses picture the decline and fall of Egypt, from Isaiah’s own day to her utter subjugation by Rome six or seven centuries later, and the last twenty verses picture the Divine restoration of Egypt in the days of the Kingdom—an Egypt that is no longer a symbol of militarism or of the policies of this world, but has become a co‑partner with Israel the restored people of God, and is herself also blessed with the honoured title, given her by the Most High himself, of "Egypt my people." It is obvious from what we know of history and of the Divine Plan that this sequel must take us into the Millennial Age for its accomplishment, and it is in the golden days of that blessed Age therefore that the chapter closes.

"The burden of Egypt." (v.1) This word "burden" is one that, from a root meaning something carried or lifted up, had come to signify a message delivered, an oracle or a prophecy. We sometimes use much the same term when we speak of the "burden" of an individual’s message. In many cases, but not in all, the message is a condemnatory or warning one; but the idea of the word is really that of the charge laid upon the prophet himself to deliver the message and in this case the theme is a message concerning Egypt which Isaiah is under strong obligation to deliver.

"The LORD rideth upon a swift cloud, and shall come into Egypt: and the idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence, and the heart of Egypt shall melt." (v.1) This is quite a remarkable passage. The next fourteen verses describe the literal ravaging of Egypt by her literal enemies, the Assyrians, but here the Lord himself is pictured as leading the attack and, in his entrance to the land, destroying the idolatry thereof. Now that is just what we must accept, that the Lord God is overseeing and overruling the affairs of the nations in order to bring into full effect the provisions of his great Plan. In another place the Assyrians are called the "rod of God’s anger" (Isa.10:5) and even in the narratives of their impact upon the children of Israel it is plain to see that, all unknowingly, they were being used as his instruments in the diverting of human affairs to work out his own ultimate purposes. So here, now that the time had come to show Israel, and us through Israel, the futility of the arm of the flesh, and the sin of ignoring Divine principles, the Lord allowed the Assyrian hosts to achieve successes they had never achieved before. In the spirit of prophecy, and the symbolism of the vision, that fact was shown in symbol by the Lord, the God of Israel, riding upon the heavens in his war‑chariot of thunder clouds, advancing upon the proud empire of the Pharaohs with the multitudes of the Assyrian host behind him; and at that sight the gigantic, impassive statues of all the gods of Egypt took fright and fell down prostrate in their places, and the glory that was Egypt passed away forever.

Just so will it be when the last great conflict of this Day of Trouble comes upon the world. The battle is called the Battle of the Great Day of God Almighty. It is a conflict between contending factions among mankind but it is the overruling power of God that has caused the elements of that conflict so to converge together that the battle takes place when it does. The contestants do not know that; their motives are greed and hate and lust for power, just as were those of the Assyrians advancing to the destruction of Egypt in Isaiah’s day; but all unknowingly they will be fulfilling the purposes of God, and when the conflict is ended it will be the voice of God that calls for peace and commands the allegiance of the shattered remnants of both sides.

Now in verses 2 to 13 Isaiah declares that the Egyptians will fight the Egyptians; there is to be civil war amongst them, and the wisdom and discretion of their governors will vanish. They will seek idols and wizards and the supernatural forces of evil in their extremity, as did Saul in his, when he visited the witch at En‑dor. The people would be given into the hand of a cruel and fierce ruler and the land would languish. The Nile, upon which the prosperity of Egypt depends, would fail to send down sufficient water and there would be consequent famine; the industries of fishing and clothmaking from the native cotton and other textile plants would dwindle and disappear. The princes of Egypt would become as fools and the whole nation as incapable of guiding its own destinies as is a drunken man of walking a straight course. The picture is that of a people, highly organised in science and art and industry, as was Egypt, whose whole economic structure has broken down and which is very near to complete disintegration. It is the picture of a nation having a glorious past, but no future. The melancholy catalogue ends (v.15) with "Neither shall there be any work for Egypt, which the head or tail, branch or rush, (king and prince, artisan and labourer, the "head" and the "tail" of society) may do." For Egypt it is the end.

Ezekiel saw the same thing at a time when the sentence was in the process of execution, and he said of Egypt "It shall be the basest of the kingdoms; neither shall it exalt itself any more above the nations; for I will diminish them, that they shall no more rule over the nations. And it shall be no more the confidence of the house of Israel…but they shall know that I am the Lord (their) GOD." (Ezek.29:15‑16) That word stands as condemnation not only of Israel’s confidence in Egypt three millenniums ago, but of the spiritual short‑sightedness of every Christian in this day who trusts in worldly policies and national armaments to defend God’s cause. And it stands as condemnation of every Christian body that trusts in the arm of flesh rather than in the Lord their God.

Historically, events came to pass just as Isaiah had foreseen. At just about the time he uttered the prophecy—certainly not many years later—the military power of Assyria, which had been steadily increasing for several centuries, for the first time came into collision with the military might of Egypt. At this period Egypt was governed by a powerful Ethiopic dynasty (the 25th dynasty of Pharaohs) and the warlike Ethiopians, always superior in military skill and energy to the more peaceable native Egyptians, formed the mainstay of the Egyptian forces. These Ethiopians were not like the natives of Ethiopia today; they were a highly civilised and physically powerful race, and for a long time dominated Egypt in the north and exercised a profound influence upon the history of nations. They were descendants of the sons of Cush who had migrated in ancient times from the Persian Gulf along the coast of Arabia and crossed the Red Sea into Africa. The Ethiopian viceroy in Egypt was Sabaca (called "So" in Kings 17:4, where he is shown as conspiring with Hoshea King of Israel against Assyria). The failure of that conspiracy and the consequent fall of Samaria and captivity of the "Ten Tribes" laid the way open for the Assyrian advance upon Egypt, and within a few more years Sargon of Assyria was besieging the southern Palestine city of Ashdod preparatory to invading Egypt itself. (Isaiah 20:1 refers to this event; "In the year that Tartan came unto Ashdod, (when Sargon the king of Assyria sent him,) and fought against Ashdod, and took it.") This was the first outward evidence to Israel of the fulfilment of the prophecy of the 19th chapter. Six years later Sargon died and Sennacherib succeeded him; almost at once he was in the field and reduced Egypt to subjection, but suffered his memorable defeat outside Jerusalem when his army was destroyed in a single night by the "angel of the LORD." (Isa.37:36) After that for twenty‑six years there was a cessation of Assyrian aggression both on Egypt and Judea, which is remarkable when it is realised that this coincides with the latter years of the reign of Hezekiah, and God had promised him, after his miraculous recovery, that there would be peace in his days. (Isa.39:8) Sennacherib never tried conclusions with the Lord God of Israel again, but after his death, his son and successor Esar‑haddon (Isa.37:38) invaded Judah, took Manasseh, the son of Hezekiah, then only twenty‑three years old and already an idolator, prisoner to Babylon and went on into Egypt. This time the country was devastated. Esar‑haddon well fills the role of the "cruel…king" prophesied in Isa.19:4. The ancient city of Memphis, the capital ("Noph" in Isa.19:13) was completely destroyed and all its treasures, dating back for more than two thousand years, taken to Nineveh. Thebes, the second holy city (the "populous No" of Nahum 3:8) suffered a like fate, and for the second time—the first being the short‑lived rule of the "Shepherd Kings"—since the sons of Ham entered the country a few generations after the Flood, Egypt became subject to an Asiatic power.

There were times of rebellion and of temporary national independence. Native Pharaohs exercised control and held the foreigners at bay for a generation or two, but the doom of Egypt had been pronounced and slowly she sank under the pressure of Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, Greek and finally Roman invasions until all pretence of national sovereignty was completely lost. To this day Egypt, the greatest military empire of the ancient world, remains a "base kingdom," (Ezek.29:15) a pawn and a catspaw for the great powers of the earth.

It is just at that point that the vision changes. "In that day" cries Isaiah suddenly "shall Egypt be like unto women: and it shall be afraid and fear because of the shaking of the hand of the LORD of hosts, which he shaketh over it. And the land of Judah shall be a terror unto Egypt, every one that maketh mention thereof shall be afraid in himself, because of the counsel of the LORD of hosts, which he hath determined against it." (Isa.19:16‑17) In one swift flash the Spirit‑illumined mind of the prophet was carried forward from his own day to "that day"—the Millennial Day is always in his mind when he says "in that day"—to a great Egypt which, like its prototype of old, has come to the brink of destruction because of its reliance on the gods of war. But this time there is a difference. This greater Egypt, this military organised warlike world of the Last Day, broken down and at its wits end in consequence of the havoc wrought by its own internecine conflicts and the terrible effectiveness of its engines of war, is in terror of the land of Judah! That is a situation which can only have its application to the greater world, Egypt at the Time of the End, for it has never been true in history previously. From the time that Israel established itself in the land, through all the chequered history of the Judges and the Kings, the Captivity, the days of the Maccabeans and then of the Dispersion, there has never been a time when Egypt went in terror of Judah. In terror, successively, of Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Greece, Rome, Islam, yes, but never of despised Judah. It is only now, when Israel is again established as a nation, and a vigorous, and self‑asserted nation, that even the modern literal Egypt shows any signs of apprehension. The fulfilment must be a future and not a past event and therefore takes its place as an element in the order of events that characterises the dawning of the Millennium. And the association of the name of the Lord of Hosts with the cause of the "terror" certifies that it is not going to be in consequence of any temporary political or military success the present State of Israel is destined to achieve, for that State is founded, like all the Gentile powers, on that very principle of military force that stands condemned in the sight of God, the very principle that in this our day is entering into judgment. It is going to be in consequence of the fact that Judah is backed by the power of God.

The conclusion, therefore, is that this "terror" with which "Egypt" views Judah refers to the same thing that is described in Zech.12:6. "In that day will I make the governors of Judah like an hearth of fire among the wood, and like a torch of fire in a sheaf; and they shall devour all the people round about, on the right hand and on the left: and Jerusalem shall be inhabited again in her own place." The "terror" is due to the fact that a righteous nation, led by the "Ancient Worthies," will be taking up its destined work and impressing the peoples around with a consciousness of the fact that God is working mightily in earth’s affairs and that the days of injustice are numbered.

The Authorised Version inserts a paragraph mark at this point, indicating that a new section of the narrative now begins. That is rightly done, for at this point the reconstruction of this world—Egypt, that has seen the sign of the Kingdom in the fact of restored Judah, commences. From now on, the healing and reconciliation of Egypt commences, and this is Millennial work indeed. The language of Egypt becomes the language of holiness; the cities of Egypt are sacred to the Lord; the altar of offering is set up in the midst of the land and the stone of witness at its border. The Saviour appears, and the Egyptians hail him and worship him; there is no more any war or enmity between the nations but all are one in the brotherhood of mankind and all are blessed of God. These are the things that Isaiah saw and recorded in verses 18‑25 of this thrilling chapter, things that we shall go on to examine in the detail that they deserve.

(To be concluded)
AOH