Commentary - Isaiah 50:1-3

Bird's-eye view

In this passage, the Lord confronts His people, who are in exile and feeling abandoned. They have drawn all the wrong conclusions. They think God has either divorced them permanently or sold them into slavery because He was weak and in debt. God demolishes these accusations with a series of sharp, rhetorical questions. He is a covenant-keeping God, not a fickle husband who issues a certificate of divorce. He is the sovereign Creator, not a debtor forced to sell His children. The reason for their miserable condition is stated plainly: it was their own iniquities, their own transgressions. The fault lies entirely with them. God then pivots to underscore His undiminished power. The problem wasn't His inability to save, but their refusal to answer when He called. He is the God who rebukes the sea and clothes the heavens in blackness. His hand is not too short. This section serves as a divine cross-examination, forcing Israel to face the truth of their sin and the reality of God's absolute power to deliver, which sets the stage for the introduction of the obedient Servant who will accomplish the very deliverance they need.

Outline

• 1. A Divine Refutation (Isa 50:1)
  • a. No Certificate of Divorce (v. 1a)
  • b. No Creditor's Claim (v. 1b)
  • c. The True Cause: Israel's Sin (v. 1c)
• 2. A Divine Rebuke (Isa 50:2-3)
  • a. The Unanswered Call (v. 2a)
  • b. The Unshortened Hand (v. 2b)
  • c. The Unquestionable Power (vv. 2c-3)

Context In Isaiah

This passage comes just before the third "Servant Song" (50:4-9). The first two songs introduced the Servant and His mission. Here, in verses 1-3, God addresses the faithlessness of the nation of Israel, which stands in stark contrast to the faithfulness of the coming Servant. The nation's deafness to God's call (v. 2) will be answered by the Servant who has a listening ear (v. 4). The nation's predicament, which they wrongly blame on God's weakness, will be solved by the Servant who trusts in God's strength. Therefore, these verses function as a legal and theological preface, clearing the deck of all human excuses and false accusations against God, thereby magnifying the necessity and glory of the Servant's work.

Commentary

1 Thus says Yahweh, “Where is the certificate of divorce By which I have sent your mother away? Or to which of My creditors did I sell you? Behold, you were sold for your iniquities, And for your transgressions your mother was sent away.

The Lord opens His case like a prosecutor in court. He begins with two sharp, rhetorical questions aimed directly at Israel's self-pitying and accusatory heart. The people are in exile, and they have concluded that God has cast them off permanently. God's first question is, "Where is the certificate of divorce?" Under the law of Moses (Deut. 24:1), a divorce required a legal document. God is demanding that they produce the paperwork. Of course, there is none. The covenant God made with their mother, the nation of Israel, was a marriage covenant. And while He had put her away for a time because of her adulteries, He had not finalized a divorce. The separation was disciplinary, not terminal. He is a covenant-keeping God, and His ultimate intention is restoration, not dissolution.

The second question is equally pointed: "Or to which of My creditors did I sell you?" This addresses another wicked assumption: that God was somehow overpowered or outmaneuvered by the gods of Babylon. Perhaps Yahweh was in debt to Marduk and had to sell His children to settle the account. The thought is blasphemous, and God dismisses it with contempt. The sovereign Lord of heaven and earth owes nothing to anyone. He is never in a position of weakness. He is not a petty kinglet who has to liquidate His assets to pay off a stronger rival.

Having dismissed their false charges, God delivers the true verdict. "Behold, you were sold for your iniquities." The language of being "sold" is metaphorical, but the cause is literal and direct. The reason for their bondage in Babylon was not God's faithlessness or God's weakness, but their own sin. It was a transaction they initiated through their rebellion. Sin has consequences, and the exile was the bill coming due. They sold themselves. And for their transgressions, their mother, the nation, was sent away. The responsibility is laid squarely at their feet. This is not cosmic bad luck. This is the predictable and just result of persistent, high-handed covenant breaking.

2 Why was there no man when I came? When I called, why was there none to answer? Is My hand so short that it cannot ransom? Or have I no power to deliver? Behold, I dry up the sea with My rebuke; I make the rivers a wilderness; Their fish stink for lack of water And die of thirst.

God continues His interrogation. He had not been silent or absent. He "came" and He "called," speaking to them repeatedly through His prophets. But the response was a deafening silence. "Why was there no man when I came?" No one stepped forward to greet Him. No one rose to the occasion. "When I called, why was there none to answer?" This reveals the depth of their spiritual stupor. The problem was not a lack of revelation from God, but a lack of reception by the people. Their ears were stopped and their hearts were hard.

And so God presses the central issue. Is the problem with Me or with you? "Is My hand so short that it cannot ransom? Or have I no power to deliver?" This is the heart of the matter. A short hand was a Hebrew idiom for powerlessness. Israel was tempted to think that their God was simply not strong enough to rescue them from the Babylonian superpower. God rejects this slander forcefully. The issue has never been His ability. The arm of the Lord is the very instrument of salvation, as Isaiah has said before and will say again. His power is infinite.

To prove His point, God reminds them of who He is. He is the Lord of creation, with absolute power over the natural world. "Behold, I dry up the sea with My rebuke." This is a clear echo of the Exodus, the foundational act of redemption where God parted the Red Sea. The God who did that is more than capable of dealing with Babylon. He can de-create as easily as He created. "I make the rivers a wilderness; Their fish stink for lack of water And die of thirst." He can turn sources of life into places of death with a simple word. This is not a God who is hemmed in by circumstances. This is the God who makes the circumstances.

3 I clothe the heavens with blackness And make sackcloth their covering.”

God concludes this display of His cosmic power with one final image. He controls the very lights of the heavens. He can turn day into night, clothing the sky with blackness as a man puts on a garment. He makes sackcloth their covering, an image of mourning and judgment. The God who can put the heavens into mourning is the God who judges the nations. This is de-creation language, used by the prophets to describe the fall of kingdoms. The God who brought such judgment on Egypt and who would bring it on Babylon is the same God who disciplined Israel. His power is absolute, both to judge and to save. The people in exile needed to recalibrate their understanding of God. Their problem was not that God was too weak, but that their sin was too great. And yet, the very God whose power is this terrifying is the only one whose hand is mighty enough to save.

Application

When we find ourselves in difficult straits, our first temptation is often the same as Israel's: we question God. We conclude that He has abandoned us, or that He is not powerful enough to handle our particular mess. We effectively ask for a certificate of divorce, or we accuse Him of being a weak creditor. This passage is a potent corrective. God forces us to look in the mirror. More often than not, the trouble we are in is a direct consequence of our own sin, our own foolishness, our own refusal to answer when God has called.

We must take responsibility for our sin. We are sold for our iniquities. This is not to say that all suffering is a direct result of a specific sin, but it is to say that we live in a fallen world because of sin, and our personal rebellions frequently bring a host of troubles to our doorstep. We have no right to blame God for the consequences of the actions He explicitly warned us against.

At the same time, this passage is filled with profound encouragement. Our God's hand is not short. He has all power to deliver. The same power that parted the Red Sea and can turn off the sun is the power at work for our salvation. Our situation is never too far gone for Him. Our sin is great, but His power is infinitely greater. The cross of Jesus Christ is the ultimate demonstration of this. There, the heavens were clothed in blackness as God judged sin in the flesh. And there, God's hand, which is never too short, reached down to ransom us, not because we answered His call, but so that we could.