Within a year, according to the years of an hireling (see the comment on Isaiah 16:14). All the glory of Kedar shall fail. "Kedar" is a name of greater note than either Dedan or Tome. It seems to be used here as inclusive of Dedan, perhaps as a designation of the northern Arabians generally. The people of Kedar, like those of Dedan, carried on trade with Tyro (Ezekiel 27:21). They dwelt partly in tents (Psalms 120:5; Jeremiah 49:29), partly in villages (Isaiah 42:11), and were rich in flocks and herds and in camels. Though not mentioned in the inscriptions of Sargon, Sennacherib, or Esarhaddon, the contemporaries of Isaiah, they hold a prominent place in those of Esarhaddon's son and successor, Asshurbanipal, with whom they carried on a war of some considerable duration in conjunction with the Nabathaeans.
HOMILETICS
The sadness of a nation's overthrow.
A nation is God's creation, no less than an individual. And it is a far more elaborate work. What forethought, what design, what manifold wisdom, must not have been required for the planning out of each people's national character, for the partitioning out to them of their special gifts and aptitudes, for the apportionment to each of its place in history, for the conduct of each through the many centuries of its existence! It is a sad thing to be witness of a nation's demise. Very deeply does Isaiah feel its sadness. His "loins are filled with pain;" the pangs that take hold of hint are "as the pangs of a woman that travaileth;" he is "so agonized that he cannot hear," "so terrified that he cannot look" (verse 3). "His heart flutters," like a frightened bird; terror overwhelms him; he cannot sleep for thinking of the dread calamity; "the night of his pleasure is turned into fear." The sadness of such a calamity is twofold. It consists
I. THE SADNESS OF THE FACT. We mourn an individual gone from us—how much more a nation! What a blank is created! What arts and industries are not destroyed or checked! What possibilities of future achievement are not cut off! Again, an individual is only removed; he still exists, only in another place. But a nation is annihilated. It has but one life. There is "no healing of its bruise" (Nahum 3:19), no transference of it to another sphere. From existence it has passed into nonexistence, and nothing can recall it into being. It is like a sun extinguished in mid-heaven.
II. THE SADNESS OF THE CIRCUMSTANCES. The end of a nation comes necessarily by violence, from within or from without—from without most commonly. A fierce host invades its borders, spreads itself over its fertile fields, tramples down its crops, exhausts its granaries, consumes its cattle, burns its towns and villages, carries everywhere ruin and desolation. Wanton injury is added to the injury which war cannot but inflict—fruit-trees are cut down (Isaiah 16:8), works of art are destroyed, good land is purposely "marred with stones" (2 Kings 3:10). And if inanimate things suffer, much more do animate ones. Beasts of burden are impressed and worked to death; horses receive fearful wounds and scream with pain; cattle perish for want of care; beasts of prey increase as population lessens, and become a terror to the scanty remnant (2 Kings 17:25). Not only do armed men fall by thousands in fair fight, but (in barbarous times) the unwarlike mass of the population suffers almost equally. "Every one that is found is thrust through, and every one that is joined to them is slain by the sword" (Isaiah 13:15). Even women and children are not spared. Virgins and matrons are shamefully used (Isaiah 13:16); children are ruthlessly dashed to the ground (Isaiah 13:16; Psalms 137:9); every human passion being allowed free course, the most dreadful excesses are perpetrated. No doubt in modern times civilization and Christianity tend to alleviate in some degree the horrors of war; but in a war of conquest, when the destruction of a nationality is aimed at, frightful scenes are almost sure to occur, sufficient to sadden all but the utterly unfeeling. It should be the earnest determination of every Christian to endeavor in every possible way to keep his own country free from the guilt of such wars.
Half-hearted turning to God of no avail.
There are many who, in the hour of distress, turn to God and his ministers with the question, "Watchman, what of the night? Watchman, what of the night?" They are anxious to be assured that the dark time of their trouble is well-nigh over, and light about to dawn upon their horizon. And they so far believe in God's ministers as to think that they can, better than others, give them an answer to their question. Accordingly, they importune their clergymen with such inquiries as these: "Will this sickness, or the effect of this accident, or this time of slack work, last long? Is there likely to be much more of it? Or may we look to be free from our trouble speedily?" To such the "watchman" had best answer with some reserve, or even with some obscurity, so far as he gives any direct answer at all to their questions. "The trouble will no doubt pass in time—it may be sooner, it may be later; God only knows the times and the seasons which he has put in his own power." But he may take the opportunity of the inquiry to give a very clear lesson. "If ye will inquire, inquire ye: return, come;" that is to say, "Be not half-hearted, beat not about the bush. If ye throw yourselves upon God for one purpose, do so for every purpose; look to him, not for an answer to one inquiry only, but for everything. Return to him—come." "The Spirit and the Bride" are always saying, "Come" (Revelation 22:17). Christ himself has said, most emphatically, Come (Matthew 11:28). If they return and come, they will be no longer Edom, but Israel; no longer aliens and strangers, but "fellow-citizens with the saints and of the household of God" (Ephesians 2:19). Let the cry, then, be sounded in their ears unceasingly, "Return, come."