Isaiah 47:7 - Meaning and Application

Babylon, now doomed to ruin, is rightly rebuked for her pride, luxury, and false sense of safety during her days of success. She also trusted in her own wisdom and planning, especially in the guesses and advice of astrologers. These sins are named both to show that God is right in judging her and to humble her under that judgment. When God comes to punish, glory belongs to him, but shame belongs to the sinner.

First, the Babylonians are rebuked for their pride and arrogance. Because of their wealth, power, and wide rule, they had a very high opinion of themselves. This was the language of both their rulers and their people: in their hearts they said, “I am, and there is no one besides me” (Isaiah 47:8, Isaiah 47:10). God, who sees every heart, can repeat to people what they say there even when they never speak it aloud. This is the same language God often uses about himself, because he alone is self-existent, perfect, and supreme. Babylon was claiming for itself what belongs only to God, and that was bold presumption.

They are also rebuked for their love of pleasure and ease (Isaiah 47:8). They were given over to luxury, lived for comfort, and avoided anything that might disturb them. Great wealth and abundance often lead to self-indulgence, and where there is plenty of food, idleness often follows. But if people who live for pleasure would remember that God will judge all these things, it would sober their joy and give them something real to worry about.

They are also rebuked for their careless security and false confidence that their luxury would last forever. They felt safe not because they had thought carefully about how uncertain earthly things are, but because they refused to take that truth to heart. They put themselves to sleep in comfort and pleasure, and expected tomorrow to be even better than today. They did not remember the end of their prosperity, that it fades like a flower, or the end of their wickedness, that it will end in bitterness and judgment. Jerusalem fell terribly because she did not remember her last end (Lamentations 1:9), and Babylon would fall the same way. People are only at ease in sinful ways because they do not think about death, judgment, and what comes after this life.

Their security rested on two things, their wickedness and their wisdom (Isaiah 47:10). First, they trusted in their wickedness, like Doeg, the Edomite who used evil for his own gain (Psalm 52:7). Many have hardened their consciences so much that they will stop at nothing. They think they can overcome every obstacle because they are willing to lie, kill, break promises, and do anything for their own advantage. But the very thing they trust in will destroy them. Second, they trusted in what they called their wisdom, meaning their craft and policy. They thought they could outsmart everyone else and so could defy all enemies. But their wisdom and knowledge led them astray, made them forget themselves, and kept them from preparing for the future.

Their proud monarchy said three things in its security. First, “I will be a lady forever” (Isaiah 47:7). They thought their honor would last forever, not just for a time under God’s rule, but permanently for themselves and their descendants. They were not only proud to be a lady, they were sure they would remain one forever. So also the Babylon of the New Testament says, “I sit as a queen, and I will see no sorrow” (Revelation 18:7). People make a serious mistake when they think their rank will last forever, because death soon lays that honor in the dust. God’s people will be saints forever, but earthly lords and ladies will not remain so forever.

Second, they said, “I will not sit as a widow,” meaning they believed they would never lose their wealth, power, or protector. They thought the state would never be left without a ruler to guide and defend it, and that they would never be cut off from children or people. They were equally sure their prince’s honor and their people’s numbers would continue. Those who are at the height of prosperity often imagine that trouble cannot touch them.

Third, they said, “No one sees me when I do wrong,” and so they thought no one would call them to account (Isaiah 47:10). Sinners often promise themselves freedom from punishment because they imagine their evil can stay hidden. They trust their tricks and plans to protect them, because they think they have carried them out so cleverly that no one can see their deceit.

This security would become their ruin. Their punishment would be complete, and it would strike at the very things they had trusted. “These two things shall come upon you,” the loss of children and widowhood, “in a single day” (Isaiah 47:9).

Both your princes and your people will be cut off, so that you will no longer be a government or a nation. God often brings on smug sinners the very troubles they feared least and thought least likely. These troubles come on them in full, with every bitter detail and nothing to soften them.

Trouble for God’s children does not come in that full, crushing way. Widowhood is not a complete disaster for them, because their Maker is their husband. Loss of children is not complete ruin either, because he is better to them than ten sons. But God’s enemies meet these losses in their fullness. Widowhood and childlessness are each deep sorrows, and together they are even worse. Naomi, the mother-in-law of Ruth, thought she could rightly be called Marah, or “bitter,” when she lost her husband and her sons (Ruth 1:5). Yet even then, her sorrow was not complete, because her two daughters-in-law were still with her as comforts. Babylon, however, will have no such comfort left.

The ruin will also be sudden and shocking. The disaster will come in one day, even in a moment, which makes it far more terrifying, especially for people who were so secure. Evil will come on you, and you will have no time or chance to prepare for it. You will not know where it is coming from, so you will not know where to stand on guard. That is the sense of the Hebrew expression, “you shall not know the morning of it.” We know when day breaks and the sun rises, but we do not know what trouble the day will bring. A storm may rise from a direction we never expected. Babylon claimed great wisdom and knowledge (Isaiah 47:10), but all her wisdom cannot foresee the ruin, and all her skill cannot stop it. Destruction will come like a thief in the night, something she did not even suspect.

Fair warning had been given through Isaiah and the other prophets of the Lord, but Babylon ignored it and would not believe it. So it is fitting that when judgment came, she should receive no other warning. Partly through her own carelessness, and partly through the speed and craft of the enemy, the disaster would catch her completely by surprise. Those who brush aside the warnings of God’s written word should not expect any other notice.

The ruin will also be irresistible, with no defense against it. Mischief will come so suddenly that there will be no time to turn aside, and so strongly that Babylon will not be able to resist it and save herself. No one can stand against God’s judgments when he sends them with his authority. Babylon herself, with all her wealth, power, and numbers, will not be able to stop the harm that is coming.

Babylon is also rebuked for her divinations, her magical and astrological practices, for which the Chaldeans were especially famous, and from which other nations borrowed their superstitions. This is first mentioned as one of her sins that would bring God’s judgment on her (Isaiah 47:9). These evils will come on her to punish her for her many sorceries and great number of charms. Witchcraft is a deeply evil sin, because it gives the devil the honor that belongs to God alone. It makes God’s enemy our guide and the father of lies our oracle. In Babylon, this was a national sin, and the government supported it. It seems that fortune-tellers were even among their chief advisers and rulers. Surely God will call people to account for these things. Notice how many sorceries and charms they had. This sin was so strong that once it was allowed, it spread quickly, and never seemed to stop. Both the deceivers and those deceived kept increasing.

This sin is also described as one of their false sources of confidence, something they trusted in but would find useless. It would not even warn them that judgment was coming, much less protect them from it. They had worked hard at these practices from their youth (Isaiah 47:12). They trained young men in them, and those who studied them labored without rest, reading books, making observations, and trying experiments. Let them now stand up with their charms and show their skill in the crisis. Let them step forward, if they can, against the invading enemy and offer help to their country. But what good would that do? They had worn themselves out with many such plans (Isaiah 47:13). They consulted them all, but got no real answer. The different schemes and different opinions only made their confusion worse and left them more tired. In a crowd of such advisers, there is no safety.

They are also mocked for the many kinds of fortune-tellers among them (Isaiah 47:13). They had astrologers, or sky-watchers, who did not study the heavens to see God’s wisdom and power, as David did, but pretended to predict future events from the stars. They looked at the heavens and forgot the One who made them and set their rule on the earth (Job 38:33), the One who rules over them himself. They had star-gazers who read the fate of nations from the motions of the stars, their joining and parting. They also had monthly prognosticators, or almanac-makers, who told what weather or news each month would bring. Babylon took great pride in this stock of experts, but they were all cheats, and their craft was a fraud.

I do not see how the judicial astrology some people now claim to practice, by which they try to predict future events, can be different from the astrology of the Chaldeans. For that reason, it should not escape the criticism and scorn that this passage gives it. I fear that some people study their almanacs and trust their predictions more than they trust their Bibles and the prophecies found there.

All these pretenders will prove useless in Babylon’s hour of distress. Let them see whether, with all their enchantments, they can win against their enemies or help themselves, stir up courage in their own troops, or weaken the forces that come against them (Isaiah 47:12).

Let them see what help those can give who make a trade of divination. Let them stand up and either save you from the trouble coming on you, or warn you ahead of time so you can protect yourself. Elisha, by telling the king of Israel about the movements of the Syrian army, helped him escape more than once (2 Kings 6:10). But God completely frustrated the diviners when Babylon fell. On the night Babylon was taken and Belshazzar, its king, was killed, all his astrologers, soothsayers, and wise men were helpless before the handwriting on the wall that announced their doom (Daniel 5:8).

They are also mocked because the wise men themselves fell in the same disaster (Isaiah 47:14). People who cannot protect themselves are not likely to help their friends. At best, they are like stubble, useless and ready to burn up. The Persians would clear the way for their own wise men by cutting off Babylon’s, and that fire would consume them. Sinners can expect no other end when they make themselves fuel for a devouring fire. When God sends fire among them, it will not be a small coal to warm them or a hearth fire to sit beside. It will be a fire to consume them. In other words, God’s judgments would burn them to ashes, and nothing would be left of them, because when God judges, he wins.

They are also mocked because of their merchants, and those they dealt with from their youth (Isaiah 47:15). This may mean the astrologers and fortune-tellers they always consulted and traded with. In effect, those men were their merchants, and fortune-telling was one of the best businesses in Babylon. Those who practiced it probably lived as richly and earned as much as the wealthiest merchants. Yet when some of them were destroyed, the others fled to their own regions, and no one remained to save Babylon. They were all miserable comforters.

Or it may mean actual merchants. Just as Babylon’s astrologers failed her, so did her traders. They made sure to save their own goods, then cared little what happened to Babylon. Each one went off to his own place. Every man looked out for himself, but few looked out for their friends. The New Testament Babylon is also lamented by the merchants who grew rich from her, but they wisely stand far away while they grieve her fall (Revelation 18:15), unwilling to do anything to help her. Happy are those who, by faith and prayer, deal with one who will be a very present help in trouble!