Commentaria in Isaiam
Chapter 20
What in chapter 18 he foretold separately of Ethiopia, and in chapter 19 of Egypt to be laid waste, he here foretells jointly, and threatens both with impending destruction by the Assyrians. Wherefore Isaias is commanded to go naked, to portend the plundering of Egypt and Ethiopia and the nakedness of the captives.
1. In the year that Tharthan came into Azotus, when Sargon the king of the Assyrians had sent him, and he fought against Azotus, and took it: 2. At that time the Lord spoke by the hand of Isaias the son of Amos, saying: Go, and loose the sackcloth from thy loins, and take off thy shoes from thy feet. And he did so, walking naked and barefoot. 3. And the Lord said: As my servant Isaias hath walked naked and barefoot, for a sign and wonder of three years, upon Egypt and upon Ethiopia: 4. So shall the king of the Assyrians lead away the captives of Egypt, and the transmigration of Ethiopia, young and old, naked and barefoot, with their buttocks uncovered, to the shame of Egypt. 5. And they shall be afraid, and confounded, for Ethiopia their hope, and Egypt their glory. 6. And the inhabitant of this isle shall say in that day: Behold this was our hope, to whom we fled for help, to be delivered from the face of the king of the Assyrians: and how shall we be able to escape?
1. IN THE YEAR THAT THARTHAN CAME INTO AZOTUS, WHEN SARGON HAD SENT HIM.—Sanchez thinks that Sargon is Salmanasar, the father of Sennacherib, who in the sixth year of Ezechias laid waste Samaria, and then fell upon the neighbouring Philistines, and besieged Azotus, having sent his general Tharthan.
But others generally, as St. Jerome testifies, judge that Sargon is Sennacherib, who had several names. For Tharthan, who is here said to be sent by Sargon, is said in 4 Kings 18:17 to be sent by Sennacherib; therefore Sargon is Sennacherib. For it was not Salmanasar, as all admit, but Sennacherib who laid waste Egypt and Ethiopia. Josephus plainly teaches this, book 10 of the Antiquities, chapter 1: “In the fourteenth year of Ezechias,” he says, “Sennacherib attacked him with a very well equipped army, and took all the cities of Juda and Benjamin, and was now about to move his camp against Jerusalem; but Ezechias by ambassadors made peace with him, on the condition that he should pay three hundred talents of silver and thirty of gold. The Assyrian took the money, but did not keep the agreement. For setting out himself with his forces against the Egyptians and Ethiopians, he left Rabsaces as general to continue the war on Jerusalem.” Josephus cites at the end of the chapter Berosus, who likewise relates that Sennacherib made war on all Asia and Egypt. From which you may gather that Berosus Annianus, in whom there is no mention of Sennacherib, is very different from the true Berosus. Herodotus, book 2, teaches the same; but from what he had heard from sacred history, that the camp of Sennacherib was destroyed from heaven, he feigned that it was routed by the Egyptians and Ethiopians through mice, which they had obtained from their gods: “For in one night,” he says, “there appeared in the camp of Sennacherib such a multitude of mice that they gnawed the bows of the enemy and the rest of their arms; whereby the king, disarmed, led his army away from Pelusium.” But these are fables of the Gentiles envious of the Jews. From what has been said it is clear that this prophecy of Isaias took place in the fourteenth year of Ezechias.
You will say: In 4 Kings 18, Sennacherib is said to have come only against Juda. I answer: Directly, and in person, he came against Juda, but in company he came also against the neighbours; hence, while he himself remained in Judea, he sent Tharthan to Azotus with part of the forces. Isaias therefore prophesies here against the Egyptians, that Ezechias and the Jews may not, as is their custom, flee to their help, but place their hope in God.
2. LOOSE THE SACKCLOTH.—They err who think that this was only an imaginary vision, and that Isaias did not really go naked, but that the sackcloth so appeared to him in a vision. Note: The sack of Isaias and of the Prophets was a garment of sackcloth woven of the hairs of goats or camels, and they were clothed with it upon the bare flesh, like the Capuchins (as the king of Israel did, 4 Kings 6:30, and Judith, chapter 8, verse 6; so now; for if anyone were to clothe himself with sackcloth not upon the bare flesh, but only outwardly, he would be held a hypocrite); for it was a garment of austerity and penance, to give an example to the people and move them to penance, and at the same time to make satisfaction before God for the sins of the people and to obtain for them pardon and grace from God. This is clear from the fact that false prophets, feigning themselves prophets, put on sackcloth, as the Prophet says: “Neither shall they be covered with a mantle of sackcloth, that they may lie.” And this was the habit of Elias the prophet; for he was “a hairy man, girded with a girdle of leather about his loins,” 4 Kings 1:8; and of St. John the Baptist, whose garment was rough, of camel’s hair. Object this habit to soft heretics, who adorn themselves like the suitors of Penelope, and therefore carp at the peculiar habit of the Capuchins and Monks. So Clement of Alexandria, in book 2 of the Pedagogue, shows that the clothing of Isaias and of the Prophets was rough: “Elias,” he says, “used a sheepskin as his garment, and bound the sheepskin with a girdle made of hair. Isaias was naked, and used no sandals; often also he used sackcloth, which is a garment of humility. And if you also call Jeremias, he had only a linen girdle. Just as well-nourished bodies, if they are naked, show strength and vigour more openly, so the beauty of character, if it is not wrapped in silly trifles, shows more the greatness and magnificence of the soul.”
Note secondly: Hugh, Forerius and Sanchez think that Isaias was not wholly naked, but laid aside the outer garment, which was of sackcloth and prophetic (without which he walked about unbecomingly, as if he were a plain commoner), and kept a shorter inner tunic, which covered the private parts, as Saul, 1 Kings 19:24, is said to have fallen naked, that is, having put off the royal robe; and David naked, that is, having put off the royal dress, to have danced before the ark; for he is said to have been clothed with a linen ephod, so he was not wholly naked. The reason is: for Isaias by this nakedness portended the nakedness of the captive Ethiopians and Egyptians; and these were not to be wholly naked, but clothed in torn and short garments. A similar mortification would it be if a Religious, having laid aside the habit of Religion, were commanded to go out in public with only a doublet and breeches. This opinion is probable, and more chaste and honourable in appearance.
But St. Jerome, St. Cyril (and St. Ambrose on Psalm 39 indicates it), Haymo, and Dionysius assert, and Adam also, that Isaias was wholly naked, even in those parts which natural modesty most covers. And this is proved, first, because in verse 4 it is said that as Isaias walked naked, “so shall the king of the Assyrians lead away the captivity of Egypt, etc., with their buttocks uncovered (the Chaldean translates, their private parts) to the shame of Egypt”; therefore likewise Isaias walked with bare buttocks. If with bare buttocks, what wonder if he walked naked in the rest of his body? Indeed, if covered in the rest of his body, he walked with bare buttocks, by that very fact the more shameful this mockery was, the more ignominious was this spectacle of the Prophet. That therefore Pintus and Montanus leave Isaias breeches, this is not only said gratuitously, but is contrary to this Scripture, and to the custom of the Hebrews, who are not wont to use breeches or femoralia, but long tunics, like the Orientals. We gather this from the fact that God commanded the sacrificing priest to clothe himself with femoralia, as though otherwise the priest, as also the laity, according to the custom of the nation, had lacked them; the femoralia therefore were a garment not of the laity but of the priests and sacred; and this to the end that, if during sacrifice the priest’s robe were opened or scattered, their bare thighs might not appear, as I said on Exodus 28:42.
Secondly, because sackcloth was a garment of penance upon the bare flesh, as I said: therefore, putting off the sackcloth, he was wholly naked.
Thirdly, because Isaias is here said to be made a portent to the people; but it is a portent if one goes about wholly naked, not if in a commoner’s garment. And so Ezechiel was made a portent, eating the dung of oxen, and sleeping 390 days on one side; and Jeremias, when he went about laden with chains; and Zacharias, when he took the instruments of a foolish shepherd; and Osee, when he took a harlot. For God ordered the Prophets from time to time to do certain things plainly strange, in order to strike and bend the hard minds of the Jews, otherwise immovable and inflexible.
Fourthly, because by this nakedness he portended the extreme ignominy, plundering and poverty of the Egyptians; therefore he was plainly naked.
Fifthly, because allegorically he represented the nakedness of Christ on the cross, which was full and complete, to expiate the sin of Adam and concupiscence, and the shame and blushing born of it; for they blushed because they saw themselves wholly naked in those members in which lust and concupiscence rebelling against reason hold sway. For this is to man shameful and a cause of blushing. To expiate this nakedness and shame of Adam, Christ on the cross took it upon himself to atone for it, and this was to the virginal Christ a huge ignominy, shame and cross. Christ therefore on the cross hung wholly naked, as he had come forth from his mother’s womb. So teach St. Ambrose, Athanasius, St. Bonaventure, and from them Francis Suarez, part 3, question 46, article 8, section 4, and Jacob Gretser, book 1 On the Cross, chapter 22 and following, Francis Lucas on Matthew 26, and others.
You will say: To go wholly naked is shameful and scandalous, and an incentive to lust; therefore God did not command this to Isaias. I answer to the antecedent that it is true if it be done of one’s own will and wantonness, but not if it be done of necessity, as when someone flees naked from a fire or the destruction of a city; or if it be done by the will and command of God: for then the command of God removes all foulness from this nakedness. Here, however, it was clear to the Jews that Isaias was a Prophet of God, and went naked by God’s command, and this to represent the people, who in like manner were to be stripped by the enemy; hence by this nakedness he incited them more to fear and dread than to lust; especially since his body, already grown hairy, wasted by leanness and fasting, moved horror rather than desire. So God, commanding the Prophet Osee, an honoured man, to take a base harlot (which was shameful and unworthy), wiped away all foulness from the matter. So God, granting polygamy to Abraham, Jacob and others, took away all shamefulness from it by his dispensation. So he commanded the Jews not only to be stripped but also to have the genital parts circumcised.
Note secondly, with St. Jerome and others, the notable obedience and mortification of Isaias, that a noble man of royal stock was not ashamed to walk for three days in a very famous city, preaching, at midday, plainly naked; for although this was in itself indecorous and foul, yet it was made honourable, and was an act of notable virtue, by God’s command: “For nothing is more honourable than the precepts of God,” says St. Jerome. And this to the end that by that triad of days of nakedness he might, by the very deed and his walking, represent the three years of captivity, namely that for three years Egypt and Ethiopia were to be laid waste and stripped of all things, and the men led thence naked to ignominy; for this day, as in Ezechiel chapter 4, verse 6, was reckoned for a year. So St. Jerome and Cyril.
Forerius will have it that Isaias walked naked not three days only, but the whole three years; and the Septuagint have this according to the edition of Caraffa, though the Complutensian edition and others omit “for three years.” But this does not seem true; for by this triad of nakedness he portended a triad of years of the captivity of Egypt to come; but that was to be, not after three years, but after three days from this prophecy. For Sennacherib in this same fourteenth year of Ezechias, in which he attacked Juda, went against Tharaca and the Ethiopians, as I shall say in verse 3.
3. AS MY SERVANT HATH WALKED.—Refer this to verse 4: “So shall the king lead away”; for there the likeness is completed by the rendering; the remaining words that intervene, namely “a sign of three years,” up to “so,” are to be enclosed in a parenthesis.
A SIGN AND WONDER OF THREE YEARS—Understand “which,” namely, the walking of Isaias will be a portent of three years. This can be expounded in two ways: first, that this three-day nakedness of Isaias portended that the devastation of Egypt and Ethiopia would be after three years from this prophecy; secondly, and better, that this devastation will last for three years. For it began in the fourteenth year of Ezechias, in which Sennacherib, hearing that Tharaca king of the Ethiopians was approaching, went against him, leaving Rabsaces in Judea, as Josephus teaches, book 10 of the Antiquities, chapter 1, and Scripture, 4 Kings 19:9; and after three years he returned to Jerusalem, where he was slain by an Angel, as appears there, verse 35, and Isaias 37:36. He was therefore absent, detained by war and the devastation of Egypt and Ethiopia, for three years. So Sanchez. Wherefore what Josephus adds there: “Sennacherib spent much time in preparing the assault on Pelusium, and had already almost levelled a mound to the walls, and seemed about to make an assault shortly, when he heard that Tharsices (this is Tharaca), king of the Ethiopians, was approaching to bring help to the Egyptians; terrified by this rumour, he departed in haste with his men.” This, I say, does not sufficiently agree with what he said before, nor with Scripture, which teaches that Sennacherib heard of the approach of Tharaca not at Pelusium but in Judea; and Josephus seems to have drawn this from Herodotus, who is here plainly fabulous. Wherefore undeservedly a learned man, moved by these words of Josephus, refers this defeat of Egypt and Ethiopia here predicted by Isaias to the times of Assarhaddon, son of Sennacherib; or rather to Nabuchodonosor, who three years after the devastation of Jerusalem laid waste Egypt and Ethiopia.
NAKED AND BAREFOOT.—He expresses it peculiarly, and adds “barefoot” to “naked,” because besides the ignominy, the bare feet of the Prophet brought great trouble and affliction of walking over rough and stony places; and greater was it to be for the Egyptians and Ethiopians, who with bare feet were to go from Egypt on a very long and difficult journey as far as Babylon. From this precept and act of Isaias arose the heresy of the Barefooted, of which St. Augustine, in his book On Heresies, no. 68: “There is another heresy,” he says, “of those who always walk barefoot, because the Lord said to Moses or to Josue: Loose thy shoe from thy feet, Exodus 3, Josue 5; and because the prophet Isaias was commanded to walk barefoot. This is therefore a heresy, because they walk so not on account of affliction of the body, but because they understand the testimonies in that way.”
4. SO SHALL THE KING OF THE ASSYRIANS LEAD AWAY (like cattle, namely like slaves taken in war by the hand; for these victors properly drive before them, as shepherds do their flocks) THE CAPTIVITY (the captives) OF EGYPT, AND THE TRANSMIGRATION (those transmigrating and led away) OF ETHIOPIA, YOUNG AND OLD.—For the young administer and defend the commonwealth by arms, the old by counsels. “For the counsels of old men are the spears of young men,” says Pindar in Plutarch’s Lycurgus. And Aristotle, Politics, book 7, chapter 9: “Strength,” he says, “is in the young, prudence in the old.” And the Poet:
Works are those of men, battles of the young, counsels of the old.
WITH THEIR BUTTOCKS UNCOVERED, TO THE SHAME OF EGYPT.—Some explain “with buttocks uncovered” as if to say: With their garments cut away up to the buttocks, as Hanon did to the servants of David, 2 Kings 10:4. But cutting away is one thing, uncovering another. Barbarian victors were wont, either for mockery or for lust, to uncover the members of captive enemies which modesty covers. Isaias teaches this here, and in chapter 47, verse 2, of Babylon: “Make bare thy shame,” he says, “uncover thy legs,” etc.; and Nahum, chapter 3, verse 5: “I will shew the nations thy nakedness,” he says, “and thy shame”; and elsewhere God often threatens that he will “uncover the ignominy, will reveal the shameful or more modest parts” of this or that nation.
5. AND THEY SHALL BE AFRAID, AND CONFOUNDED.—Those who had placed their hope in the Egyptians and Ethiopians, and gloried in their help and forces, shall fear and be confounded when they see them so ignominiously captured and laid waste.
6. AND THE INHABITANT OF THIS ISLE SHALL SAY.—Juda is here metaphorically called an island. First, because it was situated between the Dead Sea and the Mediterranean.
Secondly, because it was small compared with Babylon, which is called sea in the following chapter, verse 1.
Thirdly, and rather, because, as St. Jerome explains, it was beaten by the waves and wars of neighbouring nations, especially of the Assyrians and Egyptians, as an island is beaten round about by the waves of the sea.
Fourthly, because as an island stands out alone in the sea and puts forth its head, while the rest are overwhelmed by the sea, so Jerusalem alone raised its head and escaped, when Sennacherib overwhelmed the cities of Juda with his forces as with a sea: for this is what he said in chapter 8, verse 8: “He shall go through Juda, overflowing, and passing over shall reach even to the neck,” as if to say: Sennacherib will overwhelm Judea even to the neck, so that Jerusalem alone, which is the head, may stand out and be saved. So Sanchez. These last two senses are more apt and genuine than the others.