their pendants, bracelets, and veils; Sermons
The habits and the morale in general of the court and the aristocracy are a sure index of the state of the nation. Fashion guides, but is in a measure controlled by the general opinion. Wanton pride and luxury in high places bespeak a general want of moral tone. I. THEIR PRIDE. The picture is minute and scathingly satirical. The daughters of Zion walk with "necks held up." II. THEIR LASCIVIOUSNESS. The "rolling eyes" are often mentioned as characteristic of Aphrodite or Ashtoreth, the unchaste goddess of sensual love. III. THEIR FINERY AND LUXURY. A complete catalogue of articles of personal adornment is given. The instinct for dress and decoration, so strong in women and so graceful if followed with moderation, easily passes beyond the bounds, and becomes an offence and vice. IV. THE REVERSE OF THE PICTURE. The perfumes will be exchanged for a stench, the waistband for the rough cord of poverty, the abundance of flowing hair will be replaced by repulsive baldness. "A brand instead of beauty!" Their husbands will fall in the war. There will be melancholy groups gathering at the public place, the gates; and in vain will they, once lapped in luxury, seek the protection and the honor of the marriage state (cf. 1 Corinthians 7:36). One of our poets has called up the picture of Venice and her women in old days of mirth and folly, which may be compared. "As for Venice and her people, merely born to bloom and drop,
Here on earth they bore their fruitage - mirth and folly were the crop.
What of soul was left, I wonder, when the kissing had to stop?
Dust and ashes!" Only the "sweet and virtuous soul" can give to woman an immortal charm, and ensure her from corrupting and being corrupted. - J. The daughters of Zion are haughty. ("twinkling with the eyes"): — Compare the Talmudic witticism, "God did not create the woman out of Adam's ear, lest she might become an eavesdropper; nor out of Adam's eye, lest she might become a winker."() of A.V., or the "ogling" eyes of others, introduces an idea foreign to the connection. There seems no reference to immorality. It is the pride of beauty and attire, which has no mind for the Ruler above, which is punished with all that makes loathsome. () () The prophet's business was to show all sorts of people what they had contributed to the national guilt, and what share they must expect in the national judgments that were coming. Here he reproves and warns the daughters of Zion, tells the ladies of their faults.I. THE SIN CHARGED UPON THE DAUGHTERS OF ZION. The prophet expressly voucheth God's Authority for what he said, lest it should be thought it was unbecoming him to take notice of such things, and should be ill resented by the ladies. The Lord saith it. Whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear, let them know that God takes notice of, and is much displeased with, the folly and vanity of proud women; and His law takes cognisance even of their dress Such a nice affected mien is not only a force upon that which is natural, and ridiculous before men of sense, but, as it is an evidence of a vain mind, it is offensive to God. And two things aggravated it here — 1. That these were the daughters of Zion — the holy mountain — who should have carried themselves with the gravity that becomes women professing godliness. 2. That it should seem by the connection they were the wives and daughters of the princes who spoiled and oppressed the poor (vers. 14, 15), that they might maintain this pride and luxury of their families. II. THE PUNISHMENTS THREATENED FOR THIS SIN, and they answer the sin as face answers to face in a glass (vers. 17, 18). 1. They "walked with stretched forth necks." But God "will smite with a scab the crown of their head," which shall lower their crests, and make them ashamed to show their heads, being obliged by it to cut off their hair. 2. They cared not what they laid out in furnishing themselves with great variety of fine clothes; but God will reduce them to such poverty and distress that they should not have clothes sufficient to cover their nakedness. 3. They were extremely fond and proud of their ornaments; but God will strip them of those ornaments, when their houses shall be plundered, their treasures rifled, and they themselves led into captivity. 4. They were very nice and curious about their clothes, but God would make those bodies of theirs a reproach and burden to them (ver. 24). 5. They designed by these ornaments to charm the gentlemen, and win their affections, but there shall be none to be charmed by them (ver. 25). () This is a Jerusalem fashion plate.() That we should all be clad is proved by the opening of the first wardrobe in Paradise, with its apparel of dark green. That we should all as far as our means allow us be beautifully and gracefully apparelled is proved by the fact that God never made a wave but He gilded it with golden sunbeams, or a tree but He garlanded it with blossoms, or a sky but He studded it with stars, or allowed even the smoke of a furnace to ascend but He columned, and turreted, and doled, and scrolled it into outlines of indescribable gracefulness. When I see the apple orchards of the spring, and the pageantry of the autumnal forests, I come to the conclusion that if Nature ever does join the Church, while she may be a Quaker in the silence of her worship, she never will be a Quaker in the style of her dress. Why the notches of a fern ear or the stamen of a water lily? Why, when the day departs, does it let the folding doors of heaven stay open so long, when it might go in so quickly?() 1. Much of the worldly costume of our time is the cause of the temporal and eternal ruin of a multitude of men.2. Extravagant costume is the foe of all Christian almsgiving. 3. Is distraction to public worship. 4. Belittles the intellect. Our minds are enlarged, or they dwindle just in proportion to the importance of the subject on which they constantly dwell. 5. It shuts a great multitude out of heaven. You will have to choose between the goddess of fashion and the Christian God. () 1. This wholesale extravagance accounts for a great deal of depression in national finances. Aggregates are made up of units, and so long as one-half of the people of this country are in debt to the other half, you cannot have a healthy financial condition.2. The widespread extravagance accounts for much of the crime. It is the source of many abscondings, bankruptcies, defalcations, and knaveries. 3. It also accounts for much of the pauperism in the country. Who are the individuals and the families who are thrown on your charity? Who has sinned against them so that they suffer? It is often the case that their parents, or their grandparents, had all luxuries, lived everything up, more than lived everything up, and then died, leaving their families in want. ().
People IsaiahPlaces Jerusalem, Sodom, ZionTopics Bracelets, Chains, Clothing, Dangling, Delicate, Drops, Earrings, Ear-rings, Mufflers, Pearl-drops, Pendants, Scarfs, VeilsOutline 1. The great calamities which come by sin
10. The different rewards of the righteous and wicked
12. The oppression and covetousness of the rulers
16. The judgments which shall be for the pride of the women
25. The general desolation
Dictionary of Bible Themes Isaiah 3:19 5195 veil
5915 ornaments Isaiah 3:16-24 5476 property
8308 modesty Isaiah 3:18-19 5126 arm Isaiah 3:18-23 5139 bracelet Isaiah 3:18-24 5419 mourning Library A Paradox of Selling and Buying
'Ye have sold yourselves for nought; and ye shall be redeemed without money.'--ISAIAH iii. 3. THE first reference of these words is of course to the Captivity. They come in the midst of a grand prophecy of freedom, all full of leaping gladness and buoyant hope. The Seer speaks to the captives; they had 'sold themselves for nought.' What had they gained by their departure from God?--bondage. What had they won in exchange for their freedom?-- only the hard service of Babylon. As Deuteronomy puts it: …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy ScriptureMarching Orders
'Depart ye, depart ye, go ye out from thence, touch no unclean thing; go ye out of the midst of her; be ye clean, that bear the vessels of the Lord. 12. For ye shall not go out with haste, nor go by flight: for the Lord will go before you, and the God of Israel will be your reward.'--ISAIAH iii. 11, 12. These ringing notes are parts of a highly poetic picture of that great deliverance which inspired this prophet's most exalted strains. It is described with constant allusion to the first Exodus, …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture The Christian view of Sorrow
"A man of sorrow, and acquainted with grief" Is. Iii. 3. There is one great distinction between the productions of Heathen and of Christian art. While the first exhibits the perfection of physical form and of intellectual beauty, the latter expresses, also, the majesty of sorrow, the grandeur of endurance, the idea of triumph refined from agony. In all those shapes of old there is nothing like the glory of the martyr; the sublimity of patience and resignation; the dignity of the thorn-crowned Jesus. …
E. H. Chapin—The Crown of Thorns The Personal History of Herod - the Two Worlds in Jerusalem.
It is an intensely painful history, [581] in the course of which Herod made his way to the throne. We look back nearly two and a half centuries to where, with the empire of Alexander, Palestine fell to his successors. For nearly a century and a half it continued the battle-field of the Egyptian and Syrian kings (the Ptolemies and the Seleucidæ). At last it was a corrupt High-Priesthood - with which virtually the government of the land had all along lain - that betrayed Israel's precious trust. …
Alfred Edersheim—The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah How those are to be Admonished who Praise the Unlawful Things of which they are Conscious, and those who While Condemning Them, in no Wise Guard
(Admonition 32.) Differently to be admonished are they who even praise the unlawful things which they do, and those who censure what is wrong, and yet avoid it not. For they who even praise the unlawful things which they do are to be admonished to consider how for the most part they offend more by the mouth than by deeds. For by deeds they perpetrate wrong things in their own persons only; but with the mouth they bring out wickedness in the persons of as many as there are souls of hearers, to …
Leo the Great—Writings of Leo the Great "But Whereunto Shall I Liken this Generation?"
Matth. xi. 16.--"But whereunto shall I liken this generation?" When our Lord Jesus, who had the tongue of the learned, and spoke as never man spake, did now and then find a difficulty to express the matter herein contained. "What shall we do?" The matter indeed is of great importance, a soul matter, and therefore of great moment, a mystery, and therefore not easily expressed. No doubt he knows how to paint out this to the life, that we might rather behold it with our eyes, than hear it with our …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning Brief Memoir of Thomas Watson
Compiled by C. H. Spurgeon Thomas Watson's Body of Practical Divinity is one of the most precious of the peerless works of the Puritans; and those best acquainted with it prize it most. Watson was one of the most concise, racy, illustrative, and suggestive of those eminent divines who made the Puritan age the Augustan period of evangelical literature. There is a happy union of sound doctrine, heart-searching experience and practical wisdom throughout all his works, and his Body of Divinity is, beyond …
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity Of Civil Government.
OF CIVIL GOVERNMENT. This chapter consists of two principal heads,--I. General discourse on the necessity, dignity, and use of Civil Government, in opposition to the frantic proceedings of the Anabaptists, sec. 1-3. II. A special exposition of the three leading parts of which Civil Government consists, sec. 4-32. The first part treats of the function of Magistrates, whose authority and calling is proved, sec. 4-7. Next, the three Forms of civil government are added, sec. 8. Thirdly, Consideration …
John Calvin—The Institutes of the Christian Religion Letter Li to the virgin Sophia
To the Virgin Sophia He praises her for having despised the glory of the world: and, setting forth the praises, privileges, and rewards of Religious Virgins, exhorts her to persevere. Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux, to the Virgin Sophia, that she may keep the title of virginity and attain its reward. I. Favour is deceitful and beauty is vain; but a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised (Prov. xxxi. 31). I rejoice with you, my daughter, in the glory of your virtue, whereby, as I hear, you …
Saint Bernard of Clairvaux—Some Letters of Saint Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux "All Our Righteousnesses are as Filthy Rags, and we all do Fade as a Leaf, and Our Iniquities, Like the Wind, have Taken us Away. "
Isaiah lxiv. 6, 7.--"All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags, and we all do fade as a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away." Not only are the direct breaches of the command uncleanness, and men originally and actually unclean, but even our holy actions, our commanded duties. Take a man's civility, religion, and all his universal inherent righteousness,--all are filthy rags. And here the church confesseth nothing but what God accuseth her of, Isa. lxvi. 8, and chap. i. ver. …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning "Thou Shalt Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother. "
From this Commandment we learn that after the excellent works of the first three Commandments there are no better works than to obey and serve all those who are set over us as superiors. For this reason also disobedience is a greater sin than murder, unchastity, theft and dishonesty, and all that these may include. For we can in no better way learn how to distinguish between greater and lesser sins than by noting the order of the Commandments of God, although there are distinctions also within the …
Dr. Martin Luther—A Treatise on Good Works Concerning Salutations and Recreations, &C.
Concerning Salutations and Recreations, &c. [1273] Seeing the chief end of all religion is to redeem men from the spirit and vain conversation of this world and to lead into inward communion with God, before whom if we fear always we are accounted happy; therefore all the vain customs and habits thereof, both in word and deed, are to be rejected and forsaken by those who come to this fear; such as taking off the hat to a man, the bowings and cringings of the body, and such other salutations of that …
Robert Barclay—Theses Theologicae and An Apology for the True Christian Divinity A Sermon on Isaiah xxvi. By John Knox.
[In the Prospectus of our Publication it was stated, that one discourse, at least, would be given in each number. A strict adherence to this arrangement, however, it is found, would exclude from our pages some of the most talented discourses of our early Divines; and it is therefore deemed expedient to depart from it as occasion may require. The following Sermon will occupy two numbers, and we hope, that from its intrinsic value, its historical interest, and the illustrious name of its author, it …
John Knox—The Pulpit Of The Reformation, Nos. 1, 2 and 3. The Prophet Micah.
PRELIMINARY REMARKS. Micah signifies: "Who is like Jehovah;" and by this name, the prophet is consecrated to the incomparable God, just as Hosea was to the helping God, and Nahum to the comforting God. He prophesied, according to the inscription, under Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah. We are not, however, entitled, on this account, to dissever his prophecies, and to assign particular discourses to the reign of each of these kings. On the contrary, the entire collection forms only one whole. At …
Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg—Christology of the Old Testament Isaiah
CHAPTERS I-XXXIX Isaiah is the most regal of the prophets. His words and thoughts are those of a man whose eyes had seen the King, vi. 5. The times in which he lived were big with political problems, which he met as a statesman who saw the large meaning of events, and as a prophet who read a divine purpose in history. Unlike his younger contemporary Micah, he was, in all probability, an aristocrat; and during his long ministry (740-701 B.C., possibly, but not probably later) he bore testimony, as …
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament Links Isaiah 3:19 NIV
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