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The indignation "Mine indignation" - Indignatio mea, Vulg. ἡ οργη, Sept. μου η οργη κατα σου, MS. Pachom. Μου ἡ οργη ἡ κατα σου, MS. 1. D. 2. So that זעמי zaami, or הזעם hazzaam, as one MS. has it, seems to be the true reading.

For yet a very little while - This is designed to console them with the hope of deliverance. The threatened invasion was brief and was soon ended by the pestilence that swept off the greater part of the army of the Assyrian.

The indignation shall cease - The anger of God against his offending people shall come to an end; his purposes of chastisement shall be completed; and the land shall be delivered.

In their destruction - על־תבליתם ‛al -tabelı̂ytām from בלה bâlâh to wear out; to consume; to be annihilated. It means here, that his anger would terminate in the entire annihilation of their power to injure them. Such was the complete overthrow of Sennacherib by the pestilence; 2 Kings 19:35. The word used here, occurs in this form in no other place in the Hebrew Bible, though the verb is used, and other forms of the noun. “The verb,” Deuteronomy 7:4; Deuteronomy 29:5; Joshua 9:13; Nehemiah 9:21, … “Nouns,” Ezekiel 23:43; Isaiah 38:17; Jeremiah 38:11-12; Isaiah 17:14, et al.

By our afflictions we may learn not to make creatures our confidence. Those only can with comfort stay upon God, who return to him in truth, not in pretence and profession only. God will justly bring this wasting away on a provoking people, but will graciously set bounds to it. It is against the mind and will of God, that his people, whatever happens, should give way to fear. God's anger against his people is but for a moment; and when that is turned from us, we need not fear the fury of man. The rod with which he corrected his people, shall not only be laid aside, but thrown into the fire. To encourage God's people, the prophet puts them in mind of what God had formerly done against the enemies of his church. God's people shall be delivered from the Assyrians. Some think it looks to the deliverance of the Jews out of their captivity; and further yet, to the redemption of believers from the tyranny of sin and Satan. And this, "because of the anointing;" for his people Israel's sake, the believers among them that had received the unction of Divine grace. And for the sake of the Messiah, the Anointed of God. Here is, ver.

In a time of grave national peril, when the hosts of Assyria were invading the land of Judah and it seemed as if nothing could save Jerusalem from utter destruction, Hezekiah rallied the forces of his realm to resist with unfailing courage their heathen oppressors and to trust in the power of Jehovah to deliver. “Be strong and courageous, be not afraid nor dismayed for the king of Assyria, nor for all the multitude that is with him,” Hezekiah exhorted the men of Judah; “for there be more with us than with him: with him is an arm of flesh; but with us is the Lord our God to help us, and to fight our battles.” 2 Chronicles 32:7, 8. PK 349.1

It was not without reason that Hezekiah could speak with certainty of the outcome. The boastful Assyrian, while used by God for a season as the rod of His anger for the punishment of the nations, was not always to prevail. See Isaiah 10:5. “Be not afraid of the Assyrian,” had been the message of the Lord through Isaiah some years before to those that dwelt in Zion; “for yet a very little while, ... and the Lord of hosts shall stir up a scourge for him according to the slaughter of Midian at the rock of Oreb: and as His rod was upon the sea, so shall He lift it up after the manner of Egypt. And it shall come to pass in that day, that his burden shall be taken away from off thy shoulder, and his yoke from off thy neck, and the yoke shall be destroyed because of the anointing.” Verses 24-27. PK 349.2

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