Isaiah: Trusting The Holy One Who Rules The World (XIV)

Judgment Against Babylon (13:1-22)

Neal Pollard

Though Isaiah mentions that this oracle is against Babylon (1), the nation is not specifically named in the judgment until verse 19. James Smith suggests that because this is at the beginning of several such judgments (through chapter 23), that there is a general principle to be learned up front. Specifically, God brings His judgment on every proud nation that forgets Him. Babylon is foreseen as a people stripped of their nobility and power (2ff). What sounds like a more general judgment about any nation which is filled with “the pomp of the arrogant” and the “pompous pride of the ruthless” (11) is applied specifically to Babylon beginning in verses 19-22. 

Clearly woven throughout this chapter is the unmistakable truth of divine judgment. He is the one who commands and summons the instruments of His retribution (3). He wields the destructive weapons of indignation (4-6), making it impossible for the accused to stand (7-8). Isaiah describes God starkly, saying, “Behold, the day of the Lord comes, cruel, with wrath and fierce anger, to make the land a desolation and to destroy its sinners from it. For the stars of the heavens and their constellations will not give their light; the sun will be dark at its rising, and the moon will not shed its light. I will punish the world for its evil, and the wicked for their iniquity” (9-11a). He will work through the hands of another nation, the Medes (17). As the result of their actions, Babylon will be desolate and decimated and a place fit only for scavenging animals to roam (19-22).

What time period is Isaiah foretelling? This is somewhat difficult to determine. Babylon, at the time of Isaiah’s writing, is a fledgling power who will not overthrow Assyria for at least another century. They are a budding power who Judah will foolishly turn to for assistance against Assyria (39:1ff), but Assyria is the reigning, growing power at this time. The Medes would not become the superpower of the world until the sixth century, over 200 years away at the time of Isaiah’s writing. What a demonstration of divine foreknowledge! God through Isaiah is showing His people that He sees the future as if it were the present (or the past!)(46:10). 

Even if it does not seem like it in the present, “the day of the Lord” will come (2 Pet. 3:10). God patiently waits for man to repent, but His judgment cannot be avoided. He calls everyone through His Word to accept it as truth and submit to it. But He gives man the choice of trusting in Him or in themselves.