2. the city . . . the houses . . . the women. The panorama of conquest moves inward, and intensifies, in concentric circles: first the city falls, then the homes are ransacked, and—worst of all—within the homes the women are raped.

but the rest of the people shall not be cut off. This prepares the ground for the great pivot, in which the LORD sallies forth as a warrior-god to route the enemies.

4. the Mount of Olives, which faces Jerusalem from the east. The enemies would have come from the east.

And the Mount of Olives shall split in half. God’s principal weapon in this battle is a cataclysmic earthquake.

5. shall be blocked. The Masoretic Text reads wenastem, “and you shall flee,” but the strong scholarly consensus is that the word should be revocalized to show wenistam, as it does in some Hebrew manuscripts and in three ancient versions.

all the holy ones. These would be the divine entourage.

with Him. The Masoretic reading is “with you,” but almost all the ancient versions have “with Him.”

6. there shall be no daylight nor chill moonlight. This is the construction of many modern versions, but the Hebrew is cryptic.

8. fresh waters shall come out from Jerusalem. Jerusalem thus becomes a source of fructification for all its distant environs. The vision may be inspired by the stream flowing out from the Temple in Ezekiel 47.

10. the city. The Hebrew says only “she,” but “the city” is added in the translation in order to avoid the impression that it is the land that rises high.

12. And this shall be the plague. The prophet is not content with the evocation of Jerusalem dwelling secure but goes on to describe the ghastly fate of its enemies.

their flesh. The Hebrew uses a masculine singular throughout the plague passage, but this is basically a collective noun, hence the plural in the translation.

14. Judah, too, shall do battle in Jerusalem. Hebrew usage also allows one to construe this as “do battle against Jerusalem,” and a few scholars have proposed a background of bitter enmity between the population in Jerusalem and the inhabitants of the outlying districts, but this seems unlikely.

15. like this plague. That is, the plague in which the living body rots.

16. all who remain of the nations . . . shall go up year after year to bow to the King, the LORD of Armies. This passage picks up the idea proclaimed in Third Isaiah that all the nations will embrace the worship of YHWH. It is for this reason that God here is given the epithet King, for He is king of all the earth.

the Festival of Booths. This is the fall festival, which, because it was celebrated after the labor of harvesting was completed, drew the largest throngs of pilgrims. Evidently, the obligation of the sundry nations is just this festival and not all three pilgrim festivals.

17. who does not go up . . . to bow to the King. Unlike the parallel passages in Third Isaiah, this call to universalism is accompanied by a threat to those who do not comply.

18. the clan of Egypt . . . upon them shall be the plague. The withholding of rain is not a threat to Egypt because it has the Nile as its water source, so the Egyptians will be punished by plague.

19. the punishment for the offense. “Punishment” is merely implied in the Hebrew.

20. Holy to the LORD. This is the formulaic phrase that indicates consecration to the Temple. The horses will no longer serve as mounts for battle but will be part of the sacred service.

the pails in the house of the LORD shall be like the basins before the altar. The intention of this statement is obscure. Since the next verse goes on to say that all the pails (others translate the Hebrew term as “pots)—in the kingdom will be inscribed with the words dedicating them to the sanctuary, perhaps the meaning may be that even receptacles commonly used for mundane purposes will be devoted to the service of God.

21. there shall no longer be a merchant in the house of the LORD. The presence of merchants was required in order to exchange gold and silver for chattel that could be offered as sacrifice. Jesus, it will be remembered, objected to such commercial activity in the Temple and drove out the money changers. It would appear that this prophet was actuated by that same impulse of purism or zealotry.