Worthy.Bible » DARBY » Isaiah » Chapter 35 » Verse 5

Isaiah 35:5 Darby English Bible (DARBY)

5 Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf be unstopped;

Cross Reference

Isaiah 42:6-7 DARBY

I, Jehovah, have called thee in righteousness, and will take hold of thy hand; and I will preserve thee, and give thee for a covenant of the people, for a light of the nations, to open the blind eyes, to bring forth the prisoner from the prison, them that sit in darkness out of the house of restraint.

Isaiah 32:3-4 DARBY

And the eyes of them that see shall not be dim, and the ears of them that hear shall hearken; and the heart of the rash shall understand knowledge, and the tongue of the stammerers shall be ready to speak plainly.

Luke 7:20-23 DARBY

But the men having come to him said, John the baptist has sent us to thee, saying, Art *thou* he that is coming, or are we to wait for another? In that hour he healed many of diseases and plagues and evil spirits, and to many blind he granted sight. And Jesus answering said to them, Go, bring back word to John of what ye have seen and heard: that blind see, lame walk, lepers are cleansed, deaf hear, dead are raised, poor are evangelized; and blessed is whosoever shall not be offended in me.

Matthew 11:3-5 DARBY

and said to him, Art *thou* the coming [one]? or are we to wait for another? And Jesus answering said to them, Go, report to John what ye hear and see. Blind [men] see and lame walk; lepers are cleansed, and deaf hear; and dead are raised, and poor have glad tidings preached to them:

Ephesians 1:17-18 DARBY

that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, would give you [the] spirit of wisdom and revelation in the full knowledge of him, being enlightened in the eyes of your heart, so that ye should know what is the hope of his calling, [and] what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints,

Acts 9:17-18 DARBY

And Ananias went and entered into the house; and laying his hands upon him he said, Saul, brother, the Lord has sent me, Jesus that appeared to thee in the way in which thou camest, that thou mightest see, and be filled with [the] Holy Spirit. And straightway there fell from his eyes as it were scales, and he saw, and rising up was baptised;

John 9:1-7 DARBY

And as he passed on, he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples asked him, saying, Rabbi, who sinned, this [man] or his parents, that he should be born blind? Jesus answered, Neither has this [man] sinned nor his parents, but that the works of God should be manifested in him. I must work the works of him that has sent me while it is day. [The] night is coming, when no one can work. As long as I am in the world, I am [the] light of the world. Having said these things, he spat on the ground and made mud of the spittle, and put the mud, as ointment, on his eyes. And he said to him, Go, wash in the pool of Siloam, which is interpreted, Sent. He went therefore and washed, and came seeing.

Mark 9:25-26 DARBY

But Jesus, seeing that [the] crowd was running up together, rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to him, Thou dumb and deaf spirit, *I* command thee, come out of him, and enter no more into him. And having cried out and torn [him] much, he came out; and he became as if dead, so that the most said, He is dead.

Mark 8:22-25 DARBY

And he comes to Bethsaida; and they bring him a blind man, and beseech him that he might touch him. And taking hold of the hand of the blind man he led him forth out of the village, and having spit upon his eyes, he laid his hands upon him, and asked him if he beheld anything. And having looked up, he said, I behold men, for I see [them], as trees, walking. Then he laid his hands again upon his eyes, and he saw distinctly, and was restored and saw all things clearly.

Mark 7:32-37 DARBY

And they bring to him a deaf [man] who could not speak right, and they beseech him that he might lay his hand on him. And having taken him away from the crowd apart, he put his fingers to his ears; and having spit, he touched his tongue; and looking up to heaven he groaned, and says to him, Ephphatha, that is, Be opened. And immediately his ears were opened, and the band of his tongue was loosed and he spoke right. And he charged them that they should speak to no one [of it]. But so much the more *he* charged them, so much the more abundantly *they* proclaimed it; and they were astonished above measure, saying, He does all things well; he makes both the deaf to hear, and the speechless to speak.

Matthew 20:30-34 DARBY

And lo, two blind men, sitting by the wayside, having heard that Jesus was passing by, cried out saying, Have mercy on us, Lord, Son of David. But the crowd rebuked them, that they might be silent. But they cried out the more, saying, Have mercy on us, Lord, Son of David. And Jesus, having stopped, called them and said, What will ye that I shall do to you? They say to him, Lord, that our eyes may be opened. And Jesus, moved with compassion, touched their eyes; and immediately their eyes had sight restored to them, and they followed him.

Matthew 9:27-30 DARBY

And as Jesus passed on thence, two blind [men] followed him, crying and saying, Have mercy on us, Son of David. And when he was come to the house, the blind [men] came to him. And Jesus says to them, Do ye believe that I am able to do this? They say to him, Yea, Lord. Then he touched their eyes, saying, According to your faith, be it unto you. And their eyes were opened; and Jesus charged them sharply, saying, See, let no man know it.

Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on Isaiah 35

Commentary on Isaiah 35 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary


Verse 1-2

Edom falls, never to rise again. Its land is turned into a horrible wilderness. But, on the other hand, the wilderness through which the redeemed Israel returns, is changed into a flowery field. “Gladness fills the desert and the heath; and the steppe rejoices, and flowers like the crocus. It flowers abundantly, and rejoices; yea, rejoicing and singing: the glory of Lebanon is given to it, the splendour of Carmel and the plain of Sharon; they will see the glory of Jehovah, the splendour of our God.” מדבּר ישׂשׂוּם (to be accentuated with tiphchah munach , not with mercha tiphchah ) has been correctly explained by Aben-Ezra. The original Nun has been assimilated to the following Mem , just as pidyōn in Numbers 3:49 is afterwards written pidyōm (Ewald, §91, b ). The explanation given by Rashi, Gesenius, and others ( laetabuntur his ), is untenable, if only because sūs ( sı̄s ) cannot be construed with the accusative of the object (see at Isaiah 8:6); and to get rid of the form by correction, as Olshausen proposes, is all the more objectionable, because “the old full plural in ūn is very frequently met with before Mem ” (Böttcher), in which case it may have been pronounced as it is written here.

(Note: Böttcher calls ûm the oldest primitive form of the plural; but it is only a strengthening of ûn ; cf., tannı̄m = tannı̄n , Hanameel = Hananeel , and such Sept. forms as Gesem, Madiam, etc. (see Hitzig on Jeremiah 32:7). Wetzstein told me of a Bedouin tribe, in whose dialect the third pers. praet . regularly ended in m , e.g., akalum (they have eaten).)

According to the Targum on Song of Solomon 2:1 (also Saad., Abulw.), the c hăbhatstseleth is the narcissus; whilst the Targum on the passage before us leaves it indefinite - sicut lilia . The name (a derivative of bâtsal ) points to a bulbous plant, probably the crocus and primrose, which were classed together.

(Note: The crocus and the primrose ( המצליתא in Syriac) may really be easily confounded, but not the narcissus and primrose, which have nothing in common except that they are bulbous plants, like most of the flowers of the East, which shoot up rapidly in the spring, as soon as the winter rains are over. But there are other colchicaceae beside our colchicum autumnale , which flowers before the leaves appear and is therefore called filius ante patrem (e.g., the eastern colchicum variegatum ).)

The sandy steppe would become like a lovely variegated plain covered with meadow flowers.

(Note: Layard, in his Nineveh and Babylon , describes in several places the enchantingly beautiful and spring-like variation of colours which occurs in the Mesopotamian “desert;” though what the prophet had in his mind was not the real m idâr , or desert of pasture land, but, as the words tsiyâh and ‛ arâbhâh show, the utterly barren sandy desert.)

On gı̄lath , see at Isaiah 33:6 (cf., Isaiah 65:18): the infin. noun takes the place of an inf. abs., which expresses the abstract verbal idea, though in a more rigid manner; 'aph (like gam in Genesis 31:15; Genesis 46:4) is an exponent of the increased emphasis already implied in the gerunds that come after. So joyful and so gloriously adorned will the barren desert, which has been hitherto so mournful, become, on account of the great things that are in store for it. Lebanon, Carmel, and Sharon have, as it were, shared their splendour with the desert, that all might be clothed alike in festal dress, when the glory of Jehovah, which surpasses everything self in its splendour, should appear; that glory which they would not only be privileged to behold, but of which they would be honoured to be the actual scene.


Verse 3-4

The prophet now exclaims to the afflicted church, in language of unmixed consolation, that Jehovah is coming. “Strengthen ye the weak hands, and make the trembling knees strong! Say to those of a terrified heart, Be strong! Fear ye not! Behold, your God will come for vengeance, for a divine retribution: He will come, and bring you salvation.” Those who have become weak in faith, hopeless and despairing, are to cheer up; and the stronger are to tell such of their brethren as are perplexed and timid, to be comforted now: for Jehovah is coming nâqâm (i.e., as vengeance), and g e mūl 'Elōhı̄m (i.e., as retribution, such as God the highly exalted and Almighty Judge inflicts; the expression is similar to that in Isaiah 30:27; Isaiah 13:9, cf., Isaiah 40:10, but a bolder one; the words in apposition stand as abbreviations of final clauses). The infliction of punishment is the immediate object of His coming, but the ultimate object is the salvation of His people ( וישעכם a contracted future form, which is generally confined to the aorist).


Verses 5-7

“Then the eyes of the blind will be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped. Then will the lame man leap as the stag, and the tongue of the dumb man shout; for waters break out in the desert, and brooks in the steppe. And the mirage becomes a fish-pond, and the thirsty ground gushing water-springs; in the place of jackals, where it lies, there springs up grass with reeds and rushes.” The bodily defects mentioned here there is no reason for regarding as figurative representations of spiritual defects. The healing of bodily defects, however, is merely the outer side of what is actually effected by the coming of Jehovah (for the other side, comp. Isaiah 32:3-4). And so, also, the change of the desert into a field abounding with water is not a mere poetical ornament; for in the last times, he era of redemption, nature itself will really share in the doxa which proceeds from the manifested God to His redeemed. Shârâb (Arab. sarâb ) is essentially the same thing as that which we call in the western languages the mirage , or Fata morgana ; not indeed every variety of this phenomenon of the refraction of light, through strata of air of varying density lying one above another, but more especially that appearance of water, which is produced as if by magic in the dry, sandy desert

(Note: See. G. Rawlinson, Monarchies , i. p. 38.)

(literally perhaps the “desert shine,” just as we speak of the “Alpine glow;” see Isaiah 49:10). The antithesis to this is 'ăgam (Chald. ' agmâ' , Syr. egmo , Ar. agam ), a fish-pond (as in Isaiah 41:18, different from ' âgâm in Isaiah 19:10). In the arid sandy desert, where the jackal once had her lair and suckled her young (this is, according to Lamentations 4:3, the true explanation of the permutative ribhtsâh , for which ribhtsâm would be in some respects more suitable), grass springs up even into reeds and rushes; so that, as Isaiah 43:20 affirms, the wild beasts of the desert praise Jehovah.


Verses 8-10

In the midst of such miracles, by which all nature is glorified, the people of Jehovah are redeemed, and led home to Zion. “And a highway rises there, and a road, and it will be called the Holy Road; no unclean man will pass along it, as it is appointed for them: whoever walks the road, even simple ones do not go astray. There will be no lion there, and the most ravenous beast of prey will not approach it, will not be met with there; and redeemed ones walk. And the ransomed of Jehovah will return, and come to Zion with shouting, and everlasting joy upon their head: they lay hold of gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing flee away.” Not only unclean persons from among the heathen, but even unclean persons belonging to Israel itself, will never pass along that holy road; none but the church purified and sanctified through sufferings, and those connected with it. למו הוּא , to them, and to them alone, does this road belong, which Jehovah has made and secured, and which so readily strikes the eye, that even an idiot could not miss it; whilst it lies to high, that no beast of prey, however powerful ( p e rı̄ts chayyōth , a superlative verbal noun: Ewald, §313, c ), could possibly leap up to it: not one is ever encountered by the pilgrim there. The pilgrims are those whom Jehovah has redeemed and delivered, or set free from captivity and affliction ( גּאל , לג , related to חל , solvere ; פּדה , פד , scindere , abscindere ). Everlasting joy soars above their head; they lay fast hold of delight and joy (compare on Isaiah 13:8), so that it never departs from them. On the other hand, sorrow and sighing flee away. The whole of Isaiah 35:10 is like a mosaic from Isaiah 51:11; Isaiah 61:7; Isaiah 51:3; and what is affirmed of the holy road, is also affirmed in Isaiah 52:1 of the holy city (compare Isaiah 62:12; Isaiah 63:4). A prelude of the fulfilment is seen in what Ezra speaks of with gratitude to God in Ezra 8:31. We have intentionally avoided crowding together the parallel passages from chapters 40-66. The whole chapter is, in every part, both in thought and language, a prelude of that book of consolation for the exiles in their captivity. Not only in its spiritual New Testament thoughts, but also in its ethereal language, soaring high as it does in majestic softness and light, the prophecy has now reached the highest point of its development.