Daily Verse Isaiah 44:22 | Daily verse by Faithlife

[SC Facilitator]

 

[Lori Jane]

Cross References:​

Is 43::25 | I, I am the one who blots out your transgressions for my sake, and I will not remember your sins.
1 Co 6:20 | For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God with your body.
Is 43:1 | But now thus says Yahweh, he who created you, Jacob, and he who formed you, Israel: “You must not fear, for I have redeemed you. I have called you by your name; you are mine.
Is 48:20 | Go out from Babylon! Flee from Chaldea! Proclaim it with a shout of rejoicing; proclaim this! Send it forth to the end of the earth; say, “Yahweh has redeemed his servant Jacob!”
1 Pe 1:18 | because you know that you were redeemed from your futile way of life inherited from your ancestors not with perishable things like silver or gold,
2 Sa 12:13; 2 Ch 6:21; Job 22:23; 30:15; Ps 51:1, 9; Is 4:4; 31:6; 33:24; 43:1, 25; 44:23; 45:22; 48:20; 55:7; Je 31:34; 33:8; 36:3; Mal 3:7; Mt 20:28; Ac 3:19; 1 Co 6:20; 1 Pe 1:18–19

 

[Lori Jane]

Commentaries:​

44:22 your transgressions Compare 43:25.

I have redeemed you See 43:1, 18.

John D. Barry et al., Faithlife Study Bible (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012, 2016), Is 44:22.

Notes for 44:22

35 tn Heb “I blot out like a cloud your rebellious deeds, and like a cloud your sins.” “Rebellious deeds” and “sins” stand by metonymy for the guilt they produce. Both עָב (’av) and עָנָן (’anan) refer to the clouds in the sky. It is tempting for stylistic purposes to translate the second with “fog” or “mist” (cf. NAB, NRSV “cloud … mist”; NIV “cloud … morning mist”; NLT “morning mists … clouds”), but this distinction between the synonyms is unwarranted here. The point of the simile seems to be this: The Lord forgives their sins, causing them to vanish just as clouds disappear from the sky (see Job 7:9; 30:15).
36 tn Heb “redeem.” See the note at 41:14.


Biblical Studies Press, The NET Bible First Edition Notes (Biblical Studies Press, 2006), Is 44:22.

44:21–23. The contrast between Israel and deluded people who make and worship idols (vv. 9–20) is striking. Believers in Israel were redeemed but idol-makers were deceived. Israel was to remember that God can foretell the future (vv. 6–8) and that idols are really nothing (vv. 9–20). Therefore she should worship the Lord who has forgiven her sins (cf. 43:25) and redeemed her. Some, however, think these things refer to what follows and that Israel was to remember she had been redeemed. In either case the nation was to sing. In fact all nature is personified as being asked to sing (cf. the mountains in 49:13) about Him who redeemed Jacob and who displays His glory in Israel (cf. 43:7). In contrast with the other nations’ spiritual darkness, Israel will live in the light of God’s glory.

John A. Martin, “Isaiah,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures, ed. J. F. Walvoord and R. B. Zuck, vol. 1 (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1985), 1099.

21–22 “Redeemed” translates the Heb. word גאל, which is used in law for the family member who steps in when a husband dies and takes the widow as a wife to raise up sons to inherit the dead man’s estate (cf. Ruth and Lev 25:25–49; see Comment on 41:14 and Excursus: “Redeem” [גאל] above). The word is used in Exodus, parallel to פדה, “ransom,” to describe God’s salvation of Israel from Egypt. Here it describes God’s new role of active intervention on behalf of his people and his city in contrast to his giving up Israel to the ban (43:28) as part of the judgment announced in 6:9–13.

John D. W. Watts, Isaiah 34–66, Revised Edition., vol. 25, Word Biblical Commentary (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, Inc, 2005), 689.

Verse 22. I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins—“I have made thy transgressions vanish away like a cloud, and thy sins like a vapour”] Longinus admired the sublimity of the sentiment, as well as the harmony of the numbers, in the following sentence of Demosthenes: Τουτο το ψηφισμα τον τοτε τῃ πολει περισταντα κινδυνον παρελθειν εποιησεν ὡσπερ νεφος. “This decree made the danger then hanging over the city pass away like a cloud.” Probably Isaiah alludes here to the smoke rising up from the sin-offering, dispersed speedily by the wind, and rendered invisible. He who offered his sacrifice aright was as sure that the sin for which he offered it was blotted out, as that the smoke of the sacrifice was dispersed by the wind, and was no longer discernible.

Adam Clarke, The Holy Bible with a Commentary and Critical Notes, New Edition., vol. 4 (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife Corporation, 2014), 178.

44:22a. I am wiping away your acts of rebellion like thick cloud, your failings like thunder cloud. The LXX opens the verse ἰδοὺ γὰρ (‘because behold’), and it does indeed provide the backing for v. 21. While the verbal links with 43:25 provide circumstantial support for the niphal reading of the last verb in v. 21, the nature of the clauses thus provides further circumstantial support for the qal reading. It is another exhortation. These various links would also support the translation of the verb in this verse as a literal aorist, referring to the stance Yhwh has long taken to the people, not to a recent new stance. On the other hand, the first part of this spiral (43:22–28), like the first part of its predecessor (42:18–25), has underlined the present, ongoing problem of Israel’s rebelliousness and resistance. Both substantially and rhetorically something more is appropriate than a reminder of Yhwh’s acts in the past. Already vv. 1–5 have been notable for their increased use of yiqtol verbs with their explicit focus on the future. More likely, then, the qatal verbs in vv. 22–23 also refer to events to come. They are further instances of the instantaneous or performative qatal. The transition from aorist meaning parallels that in 41:10b (see there, also 42:1b). They affirm that the problem raised by the first section in this spiral is being handled

In a climate such as that of the Middle East, the sun’s warmth can quite quickly clear considerable morning cloud, and God can do the same with Jacob-Israel’s wrongdoing. If it is possible to distinguish between the two words for heavy cloud, ʿāb (cf Job 30:15) denotes cloud in mass, ʿānān (cf Hos 6:4; 13:3; Job 7:9) rain cloud (cf LXX γνόφον). The second term then heightens the parallelism. Neither word refers to mere mist (ʿēd, nāsîʾ). The sun can make heavy cloud briskly disappear so that it then shines brightly.


John Goldingay and David Payne, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Isaiah 40–55, ed. G. I. Davies and G. N. Stanton, vol. 1, International Critical Commentary (London; New York: T&T Clark, 2006), 364–365.