Swinging Isaiah like a knife
“Behold, the day of the LORD comes, Cruel, with both wrath and fierce anger, To lay the land desolate; And He will destroy its sinners from it. For the stars of heaven and their constellations Will not give their light; the sun will be darkened in its going forth, and the moon will not cause its light to shine.”
You’ll never understand a book if you only ever read the last chapter. If you thought this quote was from the New Testament you are almost right. It is from Isaiah 13, and Jesus quotes it. It begins: “The burden against Babylon which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw…”
Would Jesus’ audience have thought He was referring to the destruction of the cosmos? Nup. They would (or should) have realised that He was calling Judah a new Babylon, and that the “sun, moon and stars”, the governing lights of her kingdom were about to come crashing down.
Jesus had a sharp mind, and a sharp mouth. A lot sharper than us when we misinterpret Matthew 24.
