COMMENTARY OF RABBI SOLOMON

**

JARCHI,

ON ISAIAH, CHAP. XI.

1. BUT there shall come forth a rod from the trunk of Jesse: And if you should say, behold, (these are) consolations for Hezekiah and his people, (assuring them) that they shall not fall into his hand; but what shall become of the captivity which was carried captive to Chalah and Chabor? has their hope perished? It has not wholly perished, for king Messiah will come, and redeem them.-A rod; a royal sceptre: and a branch; it means, a sucker of a tree; and a branch shall sprout forth from his roots. And the whole subject of this prophecy, and (what is said) at the conclusion of it-and it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall raise† his hand a second

* He means, if it should be said that the consoling representations in the former chapter are only assurances to Hezekiah and the people of Judah, that they should not be subjected to the power of Sennacherib, king of Assyria, and have no reference to the Israelites, who had been removed from their native country.

+ Literally, add.

time-behold it is announced for the consolation of those who had been taken captive by the Assyrians.

והריחו ביראת י' .3

Shall fill (him with) the spirit of the fear of the Lord: in French, je ranimerai lui.*—He shall not judge according to the sight of his eyes: for through the wisdom of the holy one, blessed be he, (which is) within him,† he shall know and understand who is just and who is guilty.

4. 1 (Eng. tr. with equity :) The word (expresses) ease and tenderness. And he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth : according to the Targum; and he shall strike the guilty of the earth.-And with the breath of his lips and with the discourse of his lips.

5. And righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins and righteous persons shall surround him, adhering to him like a girdle.

*The printed text in Buxtorf's Bible, and in the Bomberg edi

-for which Breithaupht gives in his trans אירארכמיר לוי tion is

lation erounemer, and in a note airounemer, both of which are unintelligible. He thinks that the original is undoubtedly corrupted. This is probably the case. Hochstädter, in his edition of Isaiah, with the commentaries of Kimchi, Aben Ezra, and others, reads , and, supposing the first part of the word to indicate the future tense, gives the French which I have introduced in the text. Still there appears no reason why Jarchi should have employed the first person.

+ Lit. in the midst of him.

+ Analogous to the English use of smoothness, softness.

6. And the fatling: the fatted ox. 8. And shall sport.-On the hole of the asp on the hole of the ground in the midst of which the serpent makes his habitation, (nest ;) in French, grotte. (asp, denotes) a serpent, which, on becoming* old, grows deaf, and is called pathen, and is incapable of being charmed: as it is said, which will not hearken to the voice of charmers.t-And upon the den (1, cave, hole,) of the basilisk. Jonathan ‡ explains (it) of the appearance of the round balls (pupils) of the eye of the basilisk serpent; but Menachem interprets it (by) cavern and dusty hole. And thus (we have) of the Chaldees; and thus

glorify ye the Lord.||-31, a boy who is weaned from his mother's breasts.-, Shall put his hand. Jonathan explains (it thus :) shall stretch out his hand; like, the sounding again (echo,)

* Literally, from that it becomes.

+ Ps. lviii. 6. The pathen is the species of serpent spoken of. The author of the Chaldee Targum of the Prophets.

§ Some one of the old Rabbies. Wolf mentions thirty-seven of the name, vol. i. pp. 762-778, and iii pp. 684-703.

|| It is hardly necessary to suggest to the reader, that this is only a fancy, drawn from a similarity in the words. The first citation from Gen. xi. 31, refers to the name of a place, Ur, and the term employed in the other, Isa. xxiv. 15, means fires. In the latter passage, Jarchi seems to have understood it of the Urim, and the whole quotation to mean, honor the Lord by Urim. The analogy lies simply in this point, that the words imply the idea of the communication of light.

of the mountains,* and like 177, which denotes elevation of the voice, this (word) also expresses elevation. But the he final, (which) enters into, (that is, belongs to.) this word as radical, falls

קנה בנה עשה away, like

.to know the Lord דעה את וו' .9

10. For an ensign (a standard) of the people : that the people may raise a standard in order to be collected to it.

11. A second time: as he acquired (delivered) them from Egypt, which deliverance of theirs was complete, without servitude ;t but the deliverance of the second house was not of the (that) number, for behold they were subjected to Cyrus. And from the islands (or coasts) of the sea. These are the islands (or coasts,) of Chittim, Javanim.§

12. And he will set up a standard: in French, perche; and it will be a sign to collect to it, (or, to him, that is, God,) and to bring the captivity of Israel (as) a present to him.

13. Ephraim shalt not envy Judah: Messiah, the son of Joseph, and Messiah, the son of Judah, will not envy each other.

* Ezek. vii. 7.

† Lit., pure, so that they should not serve.

That denoted by the phrase, a second time. The reason is that it was incomplete, inasmuch as they continued in subjection to the Persian Government.

§ Or, according to the reading in the Bomberg Bible, Chittim, Romans, sons of Esau.