47:1  Get down and sit in the dust, O Virgin Daughter of Babylon; squat on the ground, dethroned, O Daughter of the Chaldeans. You shall no more be spoken of as delicate and refined.

This is not very elegant language. She’s being treated like a slave girl who was the queen who was the harlot queen over all the world. As we’ll see, she is called the eternal mistress, or mistress of kingdoms in the next few verses. Now she’s asked to get down like a slave girl and grind in the dust. ‘Squat on the ground, dethroned, O daughter of the Chaldeans’. Isaiah defines Babylon in chapter thirteen as the wicked and the sinners in the world and so on. The prideful ones, the arrogant, the oppressors, and all those are represented here. In his seven-part structure, Isaiah juxtaposes Zion and Babylon and gives a definition of who each one is. Zion is defined as an elect group of the Lord’s people, those who repent, those who pass certain tests of faithfulness. Babylon, on the other hand, is everybody else. Babylon itself includes many other nations such as Egypt, in this structure I am talking about; they all come under a Babylon umbrella. Isaiah does that using this literary structure. So that he identifies Babylon as not just the wicked in the world in a general sense, but specifically as all these nations; as militaristic and oppressive peoples, even kindred people who are proud in their hearts and even those of Israel who don’t repent who don’t measure up to the level of Zion, they too, are numbered among Babylon and they too, go down into the dust. ‘Dust’ signifying chaos, meaning they become non-entities; they go back to their elemental state; they are buried, their corpses lie in the dust or they disintegrate. Everything that is of this lower world is below the Zion/Jerusalem level disintegrates into its elemental state, turns to chaos.

‘Virgin daughter of Babylon’, alluding to a kind of neo- Babylon or a new version of Babylon- not the old Babylonian empire literally, but there is a new exodus in Isaiah, a new wandering in the wilderness, a new building of the temple, so there is a new Babylon, and all that that implies. A new socio-economic structure in the world based on the manufacture of the works of men’s hands, their promotion and sale; and all of that goes into the dust, that whole economy and all those who belong to it. If they don’t repent and come out of exile and from captivity and bondage, because that socio-economic system is a system that leads to bondage and it is a bondage, spiritually and physically; all those who don’t come out of that, who remain with Babylon go into the dust, they turn to nothing. “You shall no more be spoken of as delicate and refined”, because that was the kind of lifestyle that was implicated here; that was just a façade.

47:2  Take two grindstones and grind flour; unveil, disrobe, bare your legs, wade through streams:

She goes into exile. She has to take two grindstones, in other words, that’s what slaves, the lowest of servants had to do. The unveiling and the disrobing contrasts Zion’s being clothed in robes of glory in chapter fifty two, where it says: “Awake, arise and clothe yourself with power O Zion, put on your robes of glory O Jerusalem, Holy city. Shake yourself free, arise from the dust. Sit enthroned O Jerusalem. Loose yourself from the bands around your neck, O captive daughter of Zion”. It is chapter 52:1,2. It is the exact opposite of what happens here. This girl becomes captive. This one gets down from her throne, this one disrobes, and this one goes into the dust, all opposite things that happen to Zion. The implication being that because those contrasts are so explicit that they happen simultaneously and in Isaiah’s seven-part structure, this is a simultaneous reversal of circumstances for both entities. Those who are Zion are reborn as Zion, they sit on their throne, they receive glory, the glory of God, He exalts them. On the other hand, all those of the other category, come to naught.

47:3  your nakedness shall be exposed and your shame uncovered. I will take vengeance and not be entreated of men,

Because she was really a harlot even though she was famous. In Isaiah’s seven-part structure it is a worldwide system. It includes, as we saw in chapter twenty three a worldwide, seagoing empire that involved trade back and forth among all nations. There, Tyre represents shipping and overseas trade. And that was part of this Babylon economy. John the Revelator in the Book of Revelation, in his description of the harlot Babylon, actually partakes of both Tyre in chapter twenty three, and the harlot Babylon in chapter forty seven of Isaiah, in a sort of synthesis or composite of these two ideas.

47:4  says our Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, whose name is the Lord of Hosts.

The vengeance that comes upon Babylon for her shame because she an oppressor to God’s people happens at the time that he redeems Zion. He redeems Zion by putting down Babylon. That is Zion’s redemption; when he destroys Babylon that is Zion’s redemption. Just like when he destroys Pharaoh’s horses and chariots and horsemen, that is the deliverance of his people who came through the Red Sea. And so it happens here, it is a simultaneous event. That’s why it says ‘our Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel’. That is the redemption of Israel or Zion. Whose name is the Lord of Hosts, the Lord of Power the Lord who musters all his forces, brings them to bear upon this situation.

47:5  Sit speechless; retire into obscurity, O Daughter of the Chaldeans. No longer shall you be called, Mistress of Kingdoms.

She has not been speechless; she’s been very vocal up to then. All those who represent Babylon are very vocal, that’s one of the their characteristics. Now, they are suddenly silenced. Another parallel is in chapter twenty-one where Babylon has fallen and all her idol Gods are razed to the ground. There Babylon is put down also and in those chapters all those nations mentioned there from chapter thirteen to twenty-three are all part of this Babylon conglomerate that goes into the dust. So this really a very traumatic and worldwide event because Babylon is worldwide, it is a worldwide banishment of the wicked and destruction of everything that represents Babylon, its entire structure, the whole superstructure, the whole foundation. “No longer shall you be called mistress of kingdoms”. Very similar to John the Revelator’s Babylon who sits upon the hills and the mountains and all the kingdoms of the earth have committed adultery with her.

47:6  I was provoked by my people, so I let my inheritance be defiled. I gave them into your hand, and you showed them no mercy; even the aged you weighed down heavily with your yoke.

‘My people’ is a covenant expression and his covenant people offended God anciently by breaking the law of the covenant, that is why he gave Babylon power over his people. That is why his people came into bondage in this Babylon system.
In chapter fifty-two it alludes to something similar. “My people are taken over without price”, it says in chapter 52:5. Those who govern them act presumptuously says the Lord. That is what it says here; it is the same idea. The people of God are taken over by this oppressive power or force and the Lord’s inheritance is defiled by them. If idolatry is promoted or exists among the Lord’s people, that defiles their land, that defiles their inheritance. If all the trappings of that economy are established in the Lord’s land of Promise, that’s a defilement of the land. ‘I gave them into your hand’; that is the left hand, the King of Babylon, or the King of Assyria, the same individual in Isaiah. He’s given power over them. As he had anciently, so he will again in the end time. ‘I gave them into your hand and you showed them no mercy;’ no mercy because of their wickedness. Because of their wickedness, because of their lack of repentance they came under the law of justice, not the law of mercy. And here was an instrument for no mercy; they were put into hard bondage like it was in Egypt. “Even the aged you weighed down heavily with your yoke.” People who should be on retirement, people who should be taking it easy in their old age; even these people have to work in factories or whatever the situation may be, to stay alive, to make a living. Its not God’s system.

47:7  You thought, I, the Eternal Mistress, exist forever! and did not consider these, or remember her final destiny.

Those who belong to Babylon were under the impression that that system would go on and on and on. ‘I, the eternal mistress, exist forever’. It’s only going to go on and on and on and maybe, even get better as time goes on. Exclusive of the fact that they were God’s people, they’re in bondage, who the Lord had care for and who had come under his covenantal promises and if they would repent he would deliver them from bondage. That never entered her mind. “You did not consider these”. ‘These’ the Hebrew “ela” (Hebrew word) means “these people” or “these people of God,” “these individuals”, “these covenant people”. It also has the connotation of Gods, “these Gods” “ela” can be “these” a pronoun or “Gods”—did not consider the “Gods”. Like “Elohim”, from the same root. The rabbis in the Jewish mysticism Kabala talk about that particular construction and its connotation of meaning “Gods”, or the “exalted ones among the people of God”.

He will remember ‘her’, that is, Zion or Israel’s, final destiny. Zion’s final destiny is to be exalted on her throne. That’s where God wants to put her. But, He can’t put her there if His people are indulging in wickedness. So, someone else rules right now, but that situation is going to come to an end, it is only temporary, so long as the people are wicked, but when they repent and renew the covenant with the Lord, and begin to become faithful, and righteous, then Zion’s final destiny is to be exalted. And that implies the overturning of Babylon. Her destiny is to be made an end of. Her usefulness has served its purpose and she is finished.

47:8  Now therefore hear this, O pampered lady, securely enthroned, thinking to herself, I exist, and other than me there is nothing; I shall not be widowed or bereaved of children:

Babylon, securely enthroned, thinking to herself, “I exist and other than me there is nothing”. Here we have Babylon or this whole system or those who belong to it or this entity assuming Godlike attributes. Because God exists and other than God there is nothing, Isaiah has said so a number of times. Other than God, there is nothing. Without God, we are nothing. Here, she is arrogating to herself those kinds of powers. So at this point, in the progression of things, she is assuming divine status, just like the King of Babylon tries to assume divine status, and have the whole world worship him. So she is becoming that way and that is an anti-God stance, which when it comes to that point, God makes an end of her. When she becomes anti-God. When she becomes anti-God, she becomes anti-His people. People become anti-Christs. Very much like Hitler during the Second World War. He focused on the Jewish people to make an end of them. That is an anti-Christ or anti-God stance and when he does that, he will come to an end. The Lord will make an end of him. She says, “I exist and other than me there is nothing, I shall not be widowed or bereaved of children.” She has plenty of people to support her system, as we saw in chapter twenty-three. Tyre has plenty of colonies; her merchandising centers or ports are all over the world and those are like her children, her offspring. She’s only becoming more entrenched, she thinks, in power, and in authority all over the world. Nothing is going to change that.

47:9  Bereavement and widowhood shall suddenly overtake you, both in one day. They shall come upon you in full, notwithstanding your many magical feats and exceedingly strong combinations.

These are a woman’s greatest fear, for those are a shame and a disgrace, “shall suddenly overtake you all in one day.” The day, of course, is a rhetorical link to the Day of Judgment. So, in that Day of Judgment, the end of days, the end-time of the world, Isaiah defines that day as a three-year period of judgment and destruction. There, things will suddenly overtake her, very suddenly, very quickly. And all the great destructions of the Old Testament, you look at them and most of them happen very suddenly and very quickly and unexpectedly; like the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. That was sudden and unexpected. The destruction of Pharaoh and his army, that was sudden. Those things were not expected.

“They shall come upon you in full measure of covenant curses. Notwithstanding your many magical feats and exceedingly strong combinations.” This technology of Babylon, this promotion and sell and manufacturing and sell of the works of men’s hands has certain magical attributes, a certain magical thing about it. And you look at today’s technology, for example, and it blows you away. In spite of all that, in spite of the unions, various unions and conspiratorial forces that combine to form exceedingly strong combinations, that system is still very vulnerable when the Lord acts. Men think it is strong, men think it is in place and can’t be moved. There are so many people involved. Like Jeremiah says of Babylon: “Her wounds are incurable”. She can’t be mended; she has certain flaws, certain fundamental flaws in the system that will eventually bring about its destruction. Why? Because when she oppresses Zion, what is she doing? Where the harlot Babylon oppresses Zion, this is very much like fairy stories. The archetypes in fairy stories are the essentially the same as in Isaiah. We have the oppressive stepmother here who oppresses the innocent princess. She is of royal birth and that’s what the harlot Babylon does. She oppresses the woman Zion. So, these are archetypes we are talking about. When she does so, she is bringing upon herself the curses of the covenant the Lord made with his people. Right? With Zion.

If the people of Zion get their act together and begin to observe the laws of the covenant then God is bound by covenant to deliver her from oppression, from bondage, and from threats to her life. The way that He does it is by bringing the covenant curses of his covenant upon those who deny her rights; who infringe upon her rights. In this case it is Babylon. That is why ‘bereavement and widowhood’ are common covenant curses, why they come upon her in full. Now, there is no mercy for her. She showed no mercy. Now, she also receives no mercy.
All the way through Isaiah you will notice that whenever the King of Babylon, the King of Assyria, or Babylon, whatever they do to the Lord’s people happens to them too.

47:10  Secure in your wickedness, you thought, No one discerns me. By your skill and science you were led astray, thinking to yourself, I exist, and there is none besides me!

Wickedness, the opposite of righteousness. You thought: No one discerns me”. No one discerns Babylon really for what it is. All those who are caught up with it and are in the middle of it don’t really realize what it is really doing to them. If people who are in bondage in Egypt; if you’re born into bondage don’t you just accept that is what it is like—that that is life. This is how it is. Babylon has grown stronger and stronger in its power over time and in its ability to control people and yet it creeps up so slowly on them that they don’t realize just what it is doing to them. We pay half of our income, in some cases, to taxes now. We just think that is normal. Right? You look in the bible and the people who were taxed to that degree they considered themselves to be in grievous bondage. And yet, we think, this is just normal. We don’t discern Babylon for what it really is what it is doing to us. “No one discerns me”, she says. She’s getting away with it.

“By your skill and science you are led astray. Thinking to yourself I exist and there is nothing or there is none besides me”. Again, arrogating to herself divine powers, as if she were God. She stands in the place of God to those whom she oppresses. Also the term ‘skill and science’ indicates that there is a very sophisticated technology involved here. And because that technology, in and of itself, is probably good, people think, “This is wonderful!” but when the same technology, which is, in and of itself is good, is used to control and oppress to keep people in bondage then in becomes evil and it works against her.

47:11  Catastrophe shall overtake you, which you shall not know how to avert by bribes; disaster shall befall you from which you cannot ransom yourself: there shall come upon you sudden ruin such as you have not imagined.

Because that has been the order of the day, if a problem occurs, just bribe somebody and that takes care of that. You can bribe it away. Not this one, this is going to be a different kind of trouble. “Disaster shall befall you from which you cannot ransom yourself”. Who’s ransomed though? Is someone going to be ransomed out of it? Yes. The people of Zion are going to be ransomed out of it. The Lord keeps saying that over and over, but not Babylon.

“There shall come upon you sudden ruin such as you have not imagined.” When that whole structure collapses, we cannot even imagine what that will be like. It will be like the whole world comes to an end. That is why it is called the end of the world, the end of the present world. It will be a whole new world. Not the New World Order, I dare say, which is a counterfeit of what it is supposed to be, because that is, more or less, the perpetuation of things the way they are now except with more controls, more oppression, more bondage. But this new world will be free. It will be of a higher order, it will be a new paradise as Isaiah describes it. We can hardly imagine that and we can hardly imagine the destruction that will precede it.

47:12  Persist, then, with your combinations and with your many magical feats, at which you have exerted yourself since your youth. It may still be of use to you; perhaps you can hinder it.

Combinations or machinations of people, intrigues, covenants, and orders, and plans and schemes and those kinds of things. Even the occult gets involved and is, perhaps, the center of the whole thing. You see later on in the book of Isaiah they are all a part of Babylon, “and your many magical feats.” Your wonderful technology that just blows people away. But, really, that technology, in and of itself, has nothing to do with Babylon. It is just being utilized for her purposes to dupe people. “…of which you have exerted yourself since your youth.” They will still be of use to you, perhaps you can hinder it. So, now Isaiah is beginning to mock her. Speak of her satirically. It’s been a great effort all this time, if you work a little harder you may be able to avert disaster, you may be able to do something about the trouble that is looming on the horizon.

47:13  But you are powerless, despite all your tactics. Now let those who unravel the heavens, who observe the stars and make predictions month by month, stand by you and save you!

She is a woman and women do use tactics. Men do too, of course, in certain instances. In spite of these tactics and all the machinations, all of the intrigues, she is really powerless before God who has all power. “Now let that those who unravel the heavens, who observe the stars, and make predictions month by month stand by you and save you.” Why? Because those guys have been predicting a wonderful new age, too-- A New World Order. All the things by the year 2000- we will be doing, and all of the kind of technologies, the architectures, all the things we will be doing in the future. And if we follow these statistics that’s where it will lead us and it will just get bigger and better as time goes on. So, we might as well all have a piece of the pie. A bigger piece for me and a small piece for you, of course, and that’s how it works. And all of that is phony, because those people will not be able to predict what’s going to happen. They have never even conceived that all their schemes are going to come to nothing, so he is mocking them. Now all those guys predict, go ahead, let them predict, see how it measures out as to what is going to happen.

47:14  See, as stubble they are burnt up in the fire, unable themselves to escape the hand of the flame. These are no embers to warm anyone; such is no fire to sit by!

A ‘fire’ is, of course, the Day of Judgment, and the destruction by fire and by the sword. It is also a metaphor to describe the King of Assyria or the King of Babylon who destroys the very entity he represents. The ‘stubble’ is a chaos motif, it is like the ‘dust’, they are reduced to nothing. ‘Unable of themselves to escape the hand of the flame.’ Those who do escape, of course, are the people of Zion. Again, the ‘hand’ is the left hand; the ‘flame’ is also the metaphor describing the King of Babylon or the King of Assyria. “These are no embers to warm anyone. Such is no fire to sit by.” Like the fire of the idolaters, half the pieces they made an idol out of and the other half they burned in the fire and they warm themselves by it. See, he really is just mocking her here. This ‘fire’ is a much greater fire; it’s a very destructive fire. It’s a fire that turns everybody to dust and flying chaff in an instant.

47:15  This is what your procurers have profited you—those for whom you have exerted yourself since your youth—each deviates his own way; none is there to save you.

The ‘procurers’ are your salesmen or your pimps. You’ve exerted yourself in this lifestyle from your youth. This is what you were from the beginning. ‘Each deviates his own way’, because they are all deviants that associate with her, in one way or another; more or less. Everyone who follows the Babylon paradigm is deviant in some way from God—the creator-- from his plan. Some of them in gross ways, some of them not. ‘None is there to save you’. No salvation for Babylon when at the very time there is salvation for Zion because of her righteousness and the servant is there to save her—Zion. So, which do you want to be part of? It’s basically your choice.