Commentaria in Isaiam
Secondly, the same St. Jerome, Cyril, Procopius and St. Ambrose, in his Exhortation to Virgins, teach that the “light cloud” is the Blessed Virgin, in whose arms the boy Christ was carried into Egypt, and there at once broke the images of the gods, as St. Jerome and many others relate. See what was said on Jeremias chapter 43, at the end. Hence Palladius in the Lausiac History, and Ruffinus, book 2: “We saw,” he says, “in the Thebaid, in the borders of Hermopolis, a temple, into which when the Saviour entered the city, all the idols fell upon their faces on the ground.” Moreover the Blessed Virgin is called a light cloud, because, weighed down by no burden of concupiscence or marriage, says St. Jerome, she rose above all earthly things like a cloud, says Procopius, and lightened the world of the burden and load of its sins. She rains Christ upon us, and through him moistens the interior of our mind and quenches concupiscence. So St. Ambrose, in his book On the Institution of a Virgin.
Thirdly, Procopius understands by the cloud baptism. Christ therefore first entered Egypt in a light cloud, when, incarnate, with a body taken from the Virgin, he was carried thither in her arms as in a Cherubic chariot. Afterwards he entered, as in a heavy cloud laden with waters, which after the ascension poured out upon the Egyptians the heavenly dew and rain of baptism.
Excellently therefore did Christ repay the hospitality of Egypt, when he brought her, superstitiously devoted to so many monstrous idols, to the worship and salvation of the one God; nay, so many swarms of Religious and virgins, so that, as is said in the commentary on Matthew, Egypt was converted by Christ into the paradise of God, and innumerable companies of Angels shine there in mortal bodies:
“Not so does heaven shine with the varied choirs of stars as Egypt is distinguished and adorned by the innumerable dwellings of monks and virgins.” Moreover, that idolatry flowed from Egypt as from a fountain to the Greeks, Herodotus teaches in Euterpe. Mercury Trismegistus, in St. Augustine, book 8 of the City of God, chapter 14: “Egypt,” he says, “is the image of heaven, indeed the temple of the whole world.” This was true in the time not of Trismegistus, but of Christ; for then Egypt itself was the image of heaven, and of the angelic life, and the temple of God. Allegorically, the idols of Egypt fell when the boy Christ entered it, as I have already said; but This was accomplished by the Emperor Theodosius, who in Egypt overthrew the temples of Canopus, Isis and Serapis, and throughout the world the shrines of the idols, in the year of Christ 379. See Baronius. Again, Egypt is the world, which Christ subdued, when through the Apostles he cast down and crushed its idols, errors and vices: “By the title of superstition and malediction the whole world is understood as Egypt,” says Tertullian, in his book Against the Jews, chapter 9.
AND THE HEART OF EGYPT SHALL MELT.—Vatablus: shall liquefy; as if to say: As wax melts, liquefies and flows before the fire, so the spirit and courage of the Egyptians shall be broken, grow soft and collapse before the Assyrians and Babylonians.
2. AND I WILL MAKE THE EGYPTIANS RISE UP AGAINST THE EGYPTIANS.—Because, when the Assyrians invaded Egypt, discord arose among the Egyptians, first of minds, then of arms; for when some wished to surrender to the Assyrians, others to resist, sedition arose among them, so that they destroyed one another by mutual slaughter.
KINGDOM AGAINST KINGDOM.—The Septuagint has nomos against nomos, which the Interpreter of the Royal Bibles does not translate well, “law against law.” For the Septuagint by metonymy calls a province or diocese a nomos, commonly called a territory or jurisdiction; for each has its own peculiar laws and rights. So Leo Castrius, from Procopius and Epiphanius. Hence Pliny, and from him Ortelius in his Theatre, interprets the nomoi as prefectures, which Ortelius counts in Egypt as sixty-six.
5. AND THE WATER OF THE SEA SHALL BE DRIED UP.—Scripture calls an abundance of waters sea. The Nile therefore is here called sea; for this, unless it swells above twelve cubits and covers the fields of Egypt, brings famine upon Egypt, as I said elsewhere from Pliny, book 5, chapter 9. As if to say: I will bring scarcity of water on the Nile, so that it does not overflow, and thus I will bring barrenness and famine on Egypt. St. Jerome adds: It is natural, he says, that drought and pestilence follow God’s wrath and the defeat of a nation, and that all the elements rage against sinners.
Secondly, these things, as also what follows to verse 11, can be taken metaphorically and figuratively, namely so that in the river we understand the kingdom, in the streams the leaders, in the verdure, reed, bulrush and papyrus the whole abundance and wealth of Egypt, says St. Jerome; as if to say: All these things are to be dried up, that is, laid waste and plundered, by the Assyrians. He names the reed (that is, cane and rush), because Egypt abounds in these, and is clothed and adorned with them on the banks of the Nile; and from them it makes ships, sails, ropes, coverlets, paper, and even a juice for food, as Pliny testifies, book 13, chapter 11. As therefore the palm is to the Indians a horn of plenty, and supplies them with everything, so the reed is to Egypt.
9. THEY SHALL BE CONFOUNDED THAT WROUGHT IN FLAX.—Egypt produced excellent and fine flax, as Pliny testifies, book 19, chapter 1, and its use was in sacred rites; whence the Egyptian priests are called by Martial linen-bearers. He says therefore that, the waters drying up, all green things, and the flax of which Egypt boasts, will perish, so that the carders, spinners and weavers of flax will be impoverished and confounded.
Note: for “weaving fine linen” the Hebrew is chorai, which Vatablus and others translate “weaving perforated nets, or full of little holes” (for chur signifies a hole), that is, weaving nets. But he has already spoken of nets, and in Hebrew it is not churai but chorai, which signifies fine linen garments, such as those of heroes and princes. Hence the Septuagint translates: working byssus. And it is known that most precious fabrics were made in Egypt. Perhaps he also notes the indecorous and shameless luxury of women, who clothed themselves in garments so fine that their nakedness showed through and was displayed.
10. AND THE PLACES OF ITS WATERING SHALL BE DRIED UP.—That is, because its irrigated places shall be dry and withering, that is, flaccid or wilting. He soon says the same of the fishers, who make pools beside the Nile, that fish may be carried into them from the overflowing Nile, and there be caught when it ebbs; for these likewise, the Nile failing and its overflow, will be impoverished and confounded, and shall pine and waste away with hunger and distress.
11. THE PRINCES OF TANIS SHALL BECOME FOOLS.—Tanis was the metropolis of Egypt, and the royal city of Pharao, where Moses once disputed with Pharao, and inflicted on him and on Egypt the ten plagues, of which more at Exodus 7, at the end. As if to say: The proud and foolish counsellors and princes of Pharao have given Pharao proud, and therefore foolish, counsel, namely that which follows. True is that saying of Cicero in the Offices: “Arms abroad are of little use unless there be counsel at home”; and that of Vegetius: “Let a leader of war be more cunning than brave”; for an enemy is more easily and safely overcome by art than by arms.
HOW WILL YOU SAY (persuade) TO PHARAO (that he himself think and say, for it is a mimesis): I AM THE SON OF THE WISE, THE SON OF ANCIENT KINGS,—as if to say: Hereditary and as it were natural, from the lineage of so many ages, is my wisdom, as also my royal majesty; therefore I cannot fall from it, or be cast down by the Assyrians or the Chaldeans. So Haymo, Forerius and Sanchez. He tacitly derides the Egyptians, who boasted of their antiquity, as if they had been the first of men, and had existed many thousands of years before. So Lucian, in his book On Astrology, relates that the Arcadians were held stupid for this reason, that they despised astrology, and made themselves older than the moon itself. Hence they were called pre-lunar. Aristophanes, in the Birds, derides with various titles those who boast of their antiquity, and says:
Older than Chronus and the Titans’ feasts; and another: Older than chaos, and the Saturnian reign.