Commentary upon the Prophecy of Isaiah

Vers. 17. The Lord shall bring upon thee, and upon thy people, and upon thy fathers house (the days that have not come from the day that Ephraim departed from Judah) even the king of Ashur.

Vers. 17. The Lord shall bring vpon thee, and vpon thy people, and vpon thy fathers house (the dayes that haue not come from the day that Ephraim departed frō Iudah) euen the king of Ashur.

Here the Prophet on the other side threatens this wicked hypocrite, who seemed afraid (forsooth) to tempt God, and yet in the mean while sought help from those whom God had forbidden him to meddle withal.¹ To the end then he should not lift up his crest too high in regard of this promise here made unto him, he denounceth his destruction, and testifies, that the help which he expected, to wit, from the Assyrians,² should be altogether for his overthrow. As if he should say, Thou promisest thy self wonders from the king of Ashur, and thinkest that he will stick close to thee, because that (against the commandment of God) thou hast made a league and peace with him; but thou shalt shortly feel what commodity will then redound unto thee by tempting of the Lord. Thou mightest have rested quietly at home, and so would God have been merciful unto thee; but thou lovedst rather to have help of Ashur: well, thou shalt learn by experience, that their cruelty shall far exceed the cruelty of all other enemies. This speech of the Prophet then suits very well with the former; for he presseth the disloyalty and unthankfulness of the king the more near, who in rejecting both the word of God and the sign, had made himself utterly unworthy of any promise at all. Also because that as soon as hypocrites have escaped any fear or danger they turn by and by to their old bias again, he affirms that the Jews can by no means escape but they must be chastised, according as they had well deserved. For this cause he saith expressly, that the house of David (which by a special privilege ought to be exempted) shall be wrapped even under the like calamities. For God so moderates his judgements, that whilst he spares his Church and provides for the safety thereof, he yet in the end causeth the wicked (who are mingled with the good) to feel the rigour of his vengeance.