Be astonished, and wander, waver, and stagger: be drunk, and not with wine: stagger, and not with drunkenness.

“What are we to do now, my brothers, when crushed, cast down and drunk but not with strong drink or with wine, which excites and obfuscates but for a while, but with the blow which the Lord has inflicted upon us? He says, "And you, O heart, be stirred and shaken, and gives to the despisers the spirit of sorrow and deep sleep to drink." To [them] he also says, "See, you despisers, behold, and wonder and perish." How shall we bear his convictions; or what reply shall we make, when he reproaches us not only with the multitude of the benefits for which we have continued ungrateful, but also with his chastisements, and reckons up the remedies with which we have refused to be healed?”

“Since you are reasonable, I know that after my exhortation you will not permit yourselves to go beyond the bounds of what you need. But now it is appropriate for me to urge you not only to turn aside from drinking to excess but also to avoid the drunkenness that comes without drinking wine. For this kind is more dangerous. Don't be astonished at what I say, for it is possible to be drunk without wine. That you may know that this is possible, listen to the prophet, who said, "Woe to those who are drunk not from wine." But what is this drunkenness that does not come from wine? It takes many and varied forms. For anger makes us drunk; so too, vainglory, haughty madness, and all the deadly passions that spring up in us produce a kind of drunkenness and satiety that darkens our reason. For drunkenness is nothing more than the distraction of our minds from their natural ways, the straying of reason and the loss of our understanding.”

“stop Be patient to reflect [to think] about your deeds. and wonder And wonder about your corruption. they became blind (הִשְׁתַּעַשְׁעוּ) an expression related to (supra 6:10) “And his eyes are becoming sealed (הָשַׁע),” they were blind, not being able to see [lit., from seeing]. They were intoxicated yourselves (sic) but not from wine. Why? ([Parshandatha claims that this reading is erroneous. The correct reading, according to all manuscripts is:] their wise men, but not from wine.)”

“Woe, Ariel. In this part he sets forth a threat against the people, or against the city; and it is divided into two parts. In the first he threatens the punishment of temporal destruction; in the second, the punishment of spiritual blindness, Be astonished. Concerning the first, two things. In the first he threatens destruction; in the second he sets forth some sort of consolation, and it shall be as a dream. The first into two. In the first, the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians. In the second, by the Romans, and I will encompass. Concerning the first, three things. First he recalls its former dignity. Ariel, that is, lion of God, because by the power of God, in the times of David and Solomon, it feared no one, just as a lion does not either. Proverbs 30: a lion, strongest of beasts, will tremble at the meeting of no one. Or on account of the altar of holocausts, which was there, which consumed animals as a lion does. And so as it is taken in Ezekiel 43: or perhaps on account of its shape, because it was situated after the manner of a lion. He conquered. 1 Kings 17: for I conquered the lion and the bear. Second he sets forth the destruction, positing three things: the cessation of feasts, add, as if to say, for many years. Have rolled around, that is, have perished. Hosea 3: they shall sit many days without sacrifice and without ephod. Siege, and I will encircle with a rampart, namely by the Chaldeans. Ezekiel 4: it shall be in a state of siege; and he hints at the conquest arising from sorrow, and she shall be sorrowful. Lamentations 1: many are her groans, etc. Third he sets forth the restoration made under Jesus the high priest and others, concerning whom the whole of Esdras treats. And it shall be to me; as if to say: retaining only a shadow of its former dignity. But on the contrary: Haggai 2: great is the glory of this latter house, more than of the former. And it must be said that this is said on account of the fact that it was visited by the Son of God himself, even bodily. And I will encompass. Here he threatens destruction by the Romans; and concerning this he sets forth four things. First, the siege, and I will encompass as a sphere, that is, round about. Luke 19: your enemies shall encompass you with a rampart. Habakkuk 1: he shall laugh at every fortification, and shall heap up a mound. Second, the humiliation of the besieged, you shall be humbled; and the sign of the humiliation: you shall speak out of the earth, that is, just as if you were under the earth, you shall even be heard speaking lowly, bearing the words of a python-spirit, who used to chant incantations silently. Zephaniah 3: I will take away out of your midst the evil-speakers of your pride. Or the merit of the humiliation, reproving in them the sin of avarice, you shall speak out of the earth; and of idolatry, and it shall be as of a python-spirit. Third he sets forth the multitude of enemies, and it shall be as dust: Joel 1: a nation has come up; or the destruction of the enemies, as above, 17: it shall be carried off like the dust of the mountains before the face of the wind. Fourth he sets forth the destruction itself, and it shall be suddenly: metaphorically, on account of the ferocity of the enemies. Jeremiah 4: he shall come up as a cloud, and as a tempest: his chariots are swifter than eagles. And it shall be as a dream. Here he applies a certain consolation drawn from the punishment of the enemies, because, like a vain thing, they shall come to nothing, carrying back no advantage from the destruction of Judea, just as neither does one who is hungry or thirsty gain anything from food or drink dreamed of. Ecclesiasticus 34: vain hope and a lie are to a senseless man, and dreams lift up the imprudent. Zechariah 12: I will make Jerusalem a stone of burden to all peoples. Note on that word, and it shall be as a dream, that a thing is called a dream, first, on account of vanity. Ecclesiasticus 34: the vision of dreams is according to this; second, on account of brevity. Job 20: like a dream flying up he shall not be found. Third, on account of the obscurity of its knowing. Job 33: through a dream, in a vision of the night. Fourth, on account of the perversity of the soul. Below, 56: sleeping, and loving dreams. Be astonished, here he threatens the punishment of blindness: and first he foretells the blindness of the Jews; second, the conversion of the Gentiles, is it not yet. Concerning the first, two things. First he sets forth the blindness; second he assigns its reason, and the Lord said. Concerning the first, three things. First he foretells the blindness, setting forth those things which disturb the judgment of reason: be astonished, from the consideration of the evils of fault or of punishment. Jeremiah 2: be astonished, O heavens, at this, and, O gates of heaven, be very desolate. And wonder, from the consideration of great things. Psalm 138: wonderful are your works. Waver, from the uncertainty of things to be chosen. James 1: for he who hesitates is like the wind; be shaken, from the inconstancy of purposes. Job 4: your hands have strengthened the staggering. Be drunk, from the anxiety of sorrows. Habakkuk 2: drink also, you, and be fast asleep; the cup of the right hand of the Lord shall come round about you. Second he sets forth the manner of the blindness, for he has mingled; that is, as mingled wine he has given to drink, your eyes, namely the prophets. Above, 19: the Lord has mingled in its midst a spirit of dizziness. Third he sets forth the effect of the blindness, because the book of sacred Scripture and the visions of all the prophets they shall not understand. And it shall be to you. Apocalypse 5: I saw in the right hand of him who sat a book. And the Lord said. Here he sets forth the cause of the blindness, namely their own sin: first as to the affections; second as to the intellect, woe to those who are deep. Concerning the first he sets forth two things. First the fault of contempt of God, but his heart, because they cloak it with words, with lips, with human observances. And they feared. Jeremiah 12: you are near to their mouth, and far from their reins. Matthew 15: you have made void the commandment of God for the sake of your traditions. Second, the punishment, therefore behold I, great, according to their own reputation, or formerly. Obadiah: I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the prudence of the prudent I will reject: 1 Corinthians 1. Woe to those who are deep. Here he sets forth the sin on the part of the intellect, because they did not believe in the providence of God, that he would know the things that are done concerning us: and concerning this he does two things. First the devising of the error is set forth. Now they said that they escaped God's notice, on account of the depth of the heart, where they turned over their wicked counsels: hence he says, who are deep, Jeremiah 17: the heart of man is deep and unsearchable; who shall know it? And on account of the obscurity of the places in which they carried out their wicked works: hence he says, whose are, John 3: everyone who does evil hates the light. Ecclesiasticus 16: do not say, I shall be hidden from God. Second the just rebuke is set forth, it is perverse. You have not made it, because God knows insofar as he is the cause of the thing. Below, 45: woe to him that contradicts his maker. Below, 64: and now, O Lord, you are our father, but we are clay; and you our fashioner, and we are all the works of your hands. Is it not. Here he foretells the conversion of the Gentiles: and concerning this he does three things. First he foretells the conversion to grace. Lebanon, the Gentiles, because it was a mountain in the land of the Gentiles; into Carmel, into the grace which the Jews had through circumcision, because it is interpreted knowledge of circumcision. Into a forest, that is, into the barrenness in which the Gentiles previously were. Below, 32, the same is found. To sacred knowledge, the deaf, namely the Gentiles, who previously had not heard the words of the law. Matthew 2: the blind see. John 9: I have come into this world for judgment, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind. To spiritual gladness, and they shall add. Psalm 9: I will be glad and exult in you, I will sing to your name, O Most High. Second he assigns the occasion, or reason, of the conversion, from the fall of the Devil: for he has failed who prevailed, through power; the mocker, the deceiver through cunning. Above, 16: the wretch is consumed, from the blindness of the Jewish people: because blindness in part has come upon Israel: Romans 11. Cut down are those who watched: eagerness toward evil. Proverbs 4: for they do not sleep, unless they have done evil. Who to sin, by wicked examples and teachings. Him that reproved, as to the contempt of discipline. Amos 5: they have hated him that reproves in the gate. They have turned aside, as to the vanity of sin, because that which does not attain its end is in vain. Wisdom 5: what has pride profited us, or what has the boasting of riches conferred upon us? Third he sets forth the return of the Jews at the end of the world, therefore thus says; who redeemed, Genesis 11. Not now, that is, in this time, shall he be confounded, with a good confusion. Ecclesiasticus 4: there is a confusion that brings glory; sons, the apostles, murmurers, that is, those who formerly murmured. Above, 27: they that shall go forth with impetus from Jacob, and Israel shall blossom and bud. Or it can be expounded otherwise, of the prosperity which is promised to them once Sennacherib or Nebuchadnezzar has been destroyed. Carmel into a forest; that is, so great shall be the fertility of the land of promise, that the fertility of Carmel shall be reckoned barrenness in comparison to it. The mocker, Sennacherib or Nebuchadnezzar. His sons, the three youths in the furnace of fire: or because their own children shall render the praise of my name, which they themselves did not render in their youth.”

“Here, I. The prophet stands amazed at the stupidity of the greatest part of the Jewish nation. They had Levites, who taught the good knowledge of the Lord and had encouragement from Hezekiah in doing so, Ch2 30:22. They had prophets, who brought them messages immediately from God, and signified to them what were the causes and what would be the effects of God's displeasure against them. Now, one would think, surely this great nation, that has all the advantages of divine revelation, is a wise and understanding people, Deu 4:6. But, alas! it was quite otherwise, Isa 29:9. The prophet addresses himself to the sober thinking part of them, calling upon them to be affected with the general carelessness of their neighbours. It may be read, "They delay, they put off, their repentance, but wonder you that they should be so sottish. They sport themselves with their own deceivings; they riot and revel; but do you cry out, lament their folly, cry to God by prayer for them. The more insensible they are of the hand of God gone out against them the more do you lay to heart these things." Note, The security of sinners in their sinful way is just matter of lamentation and wonder to all serious people, who should think themselves concerned to pray for those that do not pray for themselves. But what is the matter? What are we thus to wonder at? 1. We may well wonder that the generality of the people should be so sottish and brutish, and so infatuated, as if they were intoxicated: They are drunken, but not with wine (not with wine only, though with that they were often drunk), and they erred through wine, Isa 28:7. They were drunk with the love of pleasures, with prejudices against religion, and with the corrupt principles they had imbibed. Like drunken men, they know not what they do or say, nor whither they go. They are not sensible of the divine rebukes they are under. They have beaten me, and I felt it not, says the drunkard, Pro 23:35. God speaks to them once, yea, twice; but, like men drunk, they perceive it not, they understand it not, but forget the law. They stagger in their counsels, are unstable and unsteady, and stumble at every thing that lies in their way. There is such a thing as spiritual drunkenness. 2. It is yet more strange that God himself should have poured out upon them a spirit of deep sleep, and closed their eyes (Isa 29:10), that he who bids them awake and open their eyes should yet lay them to sleep and shut their eyes; but it is in a way of righteous judgment, to punish them for their loving darkness rather than light, their loving sleep. When God by his prophets called them they said, Yet a little sleep, a little slumber; and therefore he gave them up to strong delusions, and said, Sleep on now. This is applied to the unbelieving Jews, who rejected the gospel of Christ, and were justly hardened in their infidelity, till wrath came upon them to the uttermost. Rom 11:8, God has given them the spirit of slumber. And we have reason to fear it is the woeful case of many who live in the midst of gospel light. 3. It is very sad that this should be the case with those who were their prophets, and rulers, and seers, that those who should have been their guides were themselves blindfolded; and it is easy to tell what the fatal consequences will be when the blind lead the blind. This was fulfilled when, in the latter days of the Jewish church, the chief priests, and the scribes, and the elders of the people, were the great opposers of Christ and his gospel, and brought themselves under a judicial infatuation. 4. The sad effect of this was that all the means of conviction, knowledge, and grace, which they enjoyed, were ineffectual, and did not answer the end (Isa 29:11, Isa 29:12): "The vision of all the prophets, true and false, has become to you as the words of a book, or letter, that is sealed up; you cannot discern the truth of the real visions and the falsehood of the pretended ones." Or, every vision particularly that this prophet had seen for them, and published to them, had become unintelligible; they had it among them, but were never the wiser for it, any more than a man (though a good scholar) is for a book delivered to him sealed up, and which he must not open the seals of. He sees it is a book, and that is all; he knows nothing of what is in it. So they knew that what Isaiah said was a vision and prophecy, but the meaning of it was hidden from them; it was only a sound of words to them, which they were not at all alarmed by, nor affected with; it answered not the intention, for it made no impression at all upon them. Neither the learned nor the unlearned were the better for all the messages God sent them by his servants the prophets, nor desired to be so. The ordinary sort of people excused themselves from regarding what the prophets said with their want of learning and a liberal education, as if they were not concerned to know and do the will of God because they were not bred scholars: It is nothing to me, I am not learned. Those of better rank pretended that the prophet had a peculiar way of speaking, which was obscure to them, and which, though they were men of letters, they had not been used to; and, Si non vis intelligi, debes negligi - If you wish not to be understood, you deserve to be neglected. Both these are groundless pretences; for God's prophets have been no unfaithful debtors either to the wise or to the unwise, Rom 1:14. Or we may take it thus: - The book of prophecy was given to them sealed, so that they could not read it, as a just judgment upon them; because it had often been delivered to them unsealed, and they would not take pains to learn the language of it, and then made excuse for their not reading it because they were not learned. But observe, "The vision has become thus to you whose minds the god of this world has blinded; but it is not so in itself, it is not so to all; the same vision which to you is a savour of death unto death to others is and shall be a savour of life unto life." Knowledge is easy to him that understands. II. The prophet, in God's name, threatens those that were formal and hypocritical in their exercises of devotion, Isa 29:13, Isa 29:14. Observe here, 1. The sin that is here charged upon them - dissembling with God in their religious performances, Isa 29:13. He that knows the heart, and cannot be imposed upon with shows and pretences, charges it upon them, whether their hearts condemn them for it or no. He that is greater than the heart, and knows all things, knows that though they draw nigh to him with their mouth, and honour him with their lips, yet they are not sincere worshippers. To worship God is to make our approaches to him, and to present our adorations of him; it is to draw nigh to him as those that have business with him, with an intention therein to honour him. This we are to do with our mouth and our lips, in speaking of him and in speaking to him; we must render to him the calves of our lips, Hos 14:2. And, if the heart be full of his love and fear, out of the abundance of that the mouth will speak. But there are many whose religion is lip-labour only. They say that which expresses an approach to God and an adoration of him, but it is only from the teeth outward. For, (1.) They do not apply their minds to the service. When they pretend to be speaking to God they are thinking of a thousand impertinences: The have removed their hearts far from me, that they might not be employed in prayer, nor come within reach of the word. When work was to be done for God, which required the heart, that was sent out of the way on purpose, with the fool's eyes, into the ends of the earth. (2.) They do not make the word of God the rule of their worship, nor his will their reason: Their fear towards me is taught by the precept of men. They worshipped the God of Israel, not according to his appointment, but their own inventions, the directions of their false prophets or their idolatrous kings, or the usages of the nations that were round about them. The tradition of the elders was of more value and validity with them than the laws which God commanded Moses. Or, if they did worship God in a way conformable to his institution in the days of Hezekiah, a great reformer, they had more an eye to the precept of the king than to God's command. This our Saviour applies to the Jews in his time, who were formal in their devotions and wedded to their own inventions, and pronounces concerning them that in vain they did worship God, Mat 15:8, Mat 15:9. 2. It is a spiritual judgment with which God threatens to punish them for their spiritual wickedness (Isa 29:14): I will proceed to do a marvellous work. They did one strange thing; they removed all sincerity from their hearts. Now God will go on and do another; he will remove all sagacity from their heads. The wisdom of their wise men shall perish. They played the hypocrite, and thought to put a cheat upon God, and now they are left to themselves to play the fool, and not only to put a cheat upon themselves, but to be easily cheated by all about them. Those that make religion no more than a pretence, to serve a turn, are out in their politics; and it is just with God to deprive those of their understanding who part with their uprightness. This was fulfilled in the wretched infatuation which the Jewish nation were manifestly under, after they had rejected the gospel of Christ; they removed their hearts far from God, and therefore God justly removed wisdom far from them, and hid from their eyes the things that belonged even to their temporal peace. This is a marvelous work; it is surprising, it is astonishing, that wise men should of a sudden lose their wisdom and be given up to strong delusions. Judgments on the mind, though least taken notice of, are to be most wondered at. III. He shows the folly of those that though to act separately and secretly from God, and were carrying on designs independent upon God and which they projected to conceal from his all-seeing eye. Here we have, 1. Their politics described (Isa 29:15): They seek deep to hide their counsel from the Lord, that he may not know either what they do or what they design; they say, "Who sees us? No man, and therefore not God himself." The consultations they had about their own safety they kept to themselves, and never asked God's advice concerning them; nay, they knew they were displeasing to him, but thought they could conceal them from him; and, if he did not know them, he could not baffle and defeat them. See what foolish fruitless pains sinners take in their sinful ways; they seek deep, they sink deep, to hide their counsel from the Lord, who sits in heaven and laughs at them. Note, A practical disbelief of God's omniscience is at the bottom both of the carnal worships and of the carnal confidences of hypocrites; Psa 94:7; Eze 8:12; Eze 9:9. 2. The absurdity of their politics demonstrated (Isa 29:16): "Surely your turning of things upside down thus, your various projects, turning your affairs this and that way to make them shape as you would have them - or rather your inverting the order of things, and thinking to make God's providence give attendance to your projects, and that God must know no more than you think fit, which is perfectly turning things upside down and beginning at the wrong end - shall be esteemed as the potter's clay. God will turn and manage you, and all your counsels, with as much ease and as absolute a power as the potter forms and fashions his clay." See how God despises, and therefore what little reason we have to dread, those contrivances of men that are carried on without God, particularly those against him. (1.) Those that think to hide their counsels from God do in effect deny him to be their Creator. It is as if the work should say of him that made it, "He made me not; I made myself." If God made us, he certainly knows us as the Psalmist shows, (Psa 139:1, Psa 139:13-16); so that those who say that he does not see them might as well say that he did not make them. Much of the wickedness of the wicked arises from this, they forget that God formed them, Deu 32:18. Or, (2.) Which comes to the same thing, they deny him to be a wise Creator: The thing framed saith of him that framed it, He had no understanding; for if he had understanding to make us so curiously, especially to make us intelligent beings and to put understanding into the inward part (Job 38:36), no doubt he has understanding to know us and all we say and do. As those that quarrel with God, so those that think to conceal themselves from him, do in effect charge him with folly; but he that formed the eye, shall he not see? Psa 94:9.”

“Stay yourselves, and wonder,.... Stop a while, pause a little, consider within yourselves the case and circumstances of these people, and wonder at their stupidity. Kimchi thinks these words were spoken in the times of Ahaz, with respect to the men of Judah; and so Aben Ezra says, they are directed to the men of Zion; and it is generally thought that they are spoken to the more religious and sober part of them; though, by the following verse Isa 29:10, it appears that the case was general, and that the people to whom this address is made were as stupid as others: cry ye out, and cry; or, "delight yourselves" (s), as in the margin; take your pleasure, indulge yourselves in carnal mirth, gratify your sensual appetite in rioting and wantonness, and then "cry" and lament, as you will have reason to do. Kimchi says, his father rendered the words, "awake yourselves, and awake others"; that is, from that deep sleep they were fallen into, afterwards mentioned: they are drunken, but not with wine; not with that only, for otherwise many of them were given to drunkenness in a literal sense, Isa 28:7 but they were like drunken men, as stupid, senseless, and secure, though in the utmost danger: they stagger, but not with strong drink; unsteady in their counsels and resolutions, in their principles and practices, and stumble in their goings. (s) "oblectate vos", Cocceius; "delicias agunt", Junius & Tremellius; "deliciantur", Piscator.”

“Stay--rather, "Be astounded"; expressing the stupid and amazed incredulity with which the Jews received Isaiah's announcement. wonder--The second imperative, as often (Isa 8:9), is a threat; the first is a simple declaration of a fact, "Be astounded, since you choose to be so, at the prophecy, soon you will be amazed at the sight of the actual event" [MAURER]. cry . . . out . . . cry--rather, "Be ye blinded (since you choose to be so, though the light shines all round you), and soon ye shall be blinded" in good earnest to your sorrow [MAURER], (Isa 6:9-10). not with wine--but with spiritual paralysis (Isa 51:17, Isa 51:21). ye . . . they--The change from speaking to, to speaking of them, intimates that the prophet turns away from them to a greater distance, because of their stupid unbelief.”

“This enigma of the future the prophet holds out before the eyes of his contemporaries. The prophet received it by revelation of Jehovah; and without the illumination of Jehovah it could not possibly be understood. The deep degradation of Ariel, the wonderful deliverance, the sudden elevation from the abyss to this lofty height - all this was a matter of faith. But this faith was just what the nation wanted, and therefore the understanding depending upon it was wanting also. The shemu‛âh was there, but the bı̄nâh was absent; and all שׁמועה הבין was wrecked on the obtuseness of the mass. The prophet, therefore, who had received the unhappy calling to harden his people, could not help exclaiming (Isa 29:9), "Stop, and stare; blind yourselves, and grow blind!" התמהמהּ, to show one's self delaying (from מההּ, according to Luzzatto the reflective of תּמהמהּ, an emphatic form which is never met with), is connected with the synonymous verb תּמהּ, to be stiff with astonishment; but to שׁעע, to be plastered up, i.e., incapable of seeing (cf., Isa 6:10), there is attached the hithpalpel of the same verb, signifying "to place one's self in such circumstances," se oblinere (differently, however, in Psa 119:16, Psa 119:47, compare Isa 11:8, se permulcere). They could not understand the word of God, but they were confused, and their eyes were, so to speak, festered up: therefore this self-induced condition would become to them a God-appointed punishment. The imperatives are judicial words of command. This growth of the self-hardening into a judicial sentence of obduracy, is proclaimed still more fully by the prophet. "They are drunken, and not with wine; they reel, and not with meth. For Jehovah hath poured upon you a spirit of deep sleep, and bound up your eyes; the prophets and your heads, the seers, He has veiled. And the revelation of all this will be to you like words of a sealed writing, which they give to him who understands writing, saying, Pray, read this; but he says, I cannot, it is sealed. And they give the writing to one who does not understand writing, saying, Pray, read this; but he says, I do not understand writing." They were drunken and stupid; not, however, merely because they gave themselves up to sensual intoxication (יין, dependent upon שׁכרוּ, ebrii vino), but because Jehovah had given them up to spiritual confusion and self-destruction. All the punishments of God are inflicted through the medium of His no less world-destroying than world-sustaining Spirit, which, although not willing what is evil, does make the evil called into existence by the creature the means of punishing evil. Tardēmâh is used here to signify the powerless, passive state of utter spiritual insensibility. This judgment had fallen upon the nation in all its members, even upon the eyes and heads of the nation, i.e., the prophets. Even they whose duty is was to see to the good of the nation, and lead it, were blind leaders of the blind; their eyes were fast shut (עצּם, the intensive form of the kal, Isa 33:15; Aram. עצּם; Talmud also עמּץ: to shut the eyes, or press them close), and over their heads a cover was drawn, as over sleepers in the night. Since the time of Koppe and Eichhorn it has become a usual thing to regard את־הנּביאים and החזים as a gloss, and indeed as a false one (compare Isa 9:13-14); but the reason assigned - namely, that Isaiah's polemics are directed not against the prophets, but against the stupid staring people - is utterly groundless (compare Isa 28:7, and the polemics of his contemporary Micah, e.g., Isa 3:5-8). Moreover, the author of a gloss would have been more likely to interpret ראשׁיכם by השּׂרים or הכּהנים (compare Job 9:24). And Isa 29:11, Isa 29:12 are also opposed to this assumption of a gloss. For by those who understood what was written (sēpher), it is evident that the prophets and rulers of the nation are intended; and by those who did not understand it, the great mass of the people. To both of them, "the vision of all," i.e., of all and everything that God had shown to His true prophets, was by the judgment of God completely sealed. Some of them might have an outward knowledge; but the inward understanding of the revelation was sealed to them. Some had not even this, but stared at the word of the prophet, just as a man who cannot read stares at what is written. The chethib has הסּפר; the keri ספר, though without any ground, since the article is merely generic. Instead of נא־זה קרא, we should write זה קרא־נא in both cases, as certain codices and old editions do.”