Isaiah 51:20

"These two things have happened to you— who will grieve with you?— desolation and destruction, and famine and the sword. How can I comfort you?"

Key Reflection

In Isaiah 51:20, the prophet addresses a community experiencing profound hardship, including desolation, destruction, famine, and war. The people are asked who among them can truly empathize with their suffering; this rhetorical question emphasizes the depth of their collective pain and underscores that such calamities have befallen them more than once, leaving little hope for easy consolation.

From the Scholars: Barnes' Notes

Thy sons -Jerusalem is here represented as a mother. Her sons, that is, her inhabitants, had become weak and prostrate everywhere, and were unable to afford consolation. They lie at the head of all the streets -The ‘head’ of the streets is the same which inLamentations 2:19;Lamentations 4:1, is denominated ‘the top of the streets.’ The head or top of the streets denotes, doubtless, the beginning of a way or street; the corner from which other streets diverge. These would be public places, where many would be naturally assembled, and where, in time of a siege, they would be driven together. This is a description of the state produced by famine.

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