Chapter 22 consists of the proclamation against Jerusalem (verses 1 – 14) and the judgment on the high official in Jerusalem known as Shebna (verses 15 – 25.)
Chapter 22:1,2.
“The burden against the Valley of Vision. What ails you now that you have all gone up to the housetops, you who are full of noise, a tumultuous city, a joyous city? Your slain men are not slain with the sword, nor dead in battle.”
I think that we can see Isaiah’s reference to Jerusalem as the “Valley of Vision” as a sarcastic remark. The unrepentant inhabitants of Jerusalem had displayed a marked lack of vision concerning the fate that their immorality would bring upon them. They had indulged in revelry and sinful living. The prophet reproaches the people for holding wild parties when they should have been in deep repentance.
The people “not slain by the sword” may refer to death by starvation due to the Babylonian siege.
Isaiah 32:13.
“On the land of My people will come up thorns and briers, yes, on all the happy homes in the joyous city.”
Chapter 22: 3
“All your rulers have fled together; they are captured by the archers. All who are found in you are bound together; they have fled from afar.”
In the prophet’s vision, the military leaders are not slain in heroically defending the city. They are captured fleeing the city to save themselves. They are captured without a struggle even though they had got far away.
2 Kings 25:4 – 6.
“Then the city wall was broken through, and all the men of war fled at night by the way of the gate between the walls, which was by the king’s garden, even though the Chaldeans were encamped all around against the city. And the king went by way of the plain. But the army of the Chaldeans pursued the king, and they overtook him in the plains of Jericho. All his army were scattered from him.”
Chapter 22:4,5.
“Therefore I said, “Look away from me, I will weep bitterly; do not labour to comfort me because of the plundering of the daughter of my people.” For it is a day of trouble and treading down and perplexity by the Lord God of hosts in the Valley of Vision – breaking down the walls and of crying to the mountain.”
Isaiah is inconsolable as he sees the judgment of Adonai on Jerusalem. There may be revelry going on all around him, but he only sees the people’s spiritual emptiness and its consequences.
Lamentations 1:5
“Her adversaries have become the master, her enemies prosper; for the Lord has afflicted her because of the multitudes of her transgressions. Her children have gone into captivity before the enemy.”
Lamentations 2:2.
“The Lord has swallowed up and has not pitied all the dwelling places of Jacob. He has thrown down in His wrath the strongholds of the daughter of Judah; He has brought them to the ground; He has profaned the kingdom and its princes.”
Chapter 22:6,7.
“Elam bore the quiver with chariots of men and horsemen, and Kir uncovered the shield. It shall come to pass that your choicest valleys shall be full of chariots, and the horsemen shall set themselves in array at the gate.”
“Elam” and “Kir” are one. This area came under the control of Assyria, and its soldiers will have become part of the Assyrian army.
In Isaiah’s vision, he sees Assyrian horsemen set themselves in attacking array at the gates of Jerusalem (2 Chronicles 32 and Isaiah 36). These are the forces of Sennacherib which had fought their way through the valleys of Judah, occupying the villages around Jerusalem.
Later, Elam and Kir would be part of the Babylonian empire.
Chapter 22:8 – 11.
“He removed the protection of Judah. You looked in that day to the armour of the House of the Forest; you also saw the damage to the city of David, that it was great; and you gathered together the waters of the lower pool. You numbered the houses of Jerusalem, and the house you broke down to fortify the wall. You also made a reservoir between the two walls for the water of the old pool. But you did not look to its Maker, nor did you respect Him who fashioned it long ago.”
In these verses we seem to see aspects of the Assyrian invasion and the siege by the Babylonians.
Adonai removed His protection from Judah. In preparing for a siege, Jerusalem made elaborate plans.
The “House of the Forest” (of Lebanon) was the national armoury. It was built by order of Solomon and made from cedars from Lebanon (1 Kings 7:2 – 5). The people took the weapons from this armoury.
Seeing that the city’s water supply was inadequate, they collected within the city walls water from the lower pool. Hezekiel addressed their need by having a tunnel dug beneath the city wall connecting the lower pool in the southwestern valley with the old pool, the source of water in the eastern valley.
They demolished houses to get materials to repair the city walls.
They did everything except turn to the Creator of the city who was also the One who was the author of the crisis against whom their physical defences were useless.
Chapter 22: 12.13.
“And in that day the Lord of hosts called for weeping and for mourning, for baldness and for girding with sackcloth. But instead, joy and gladness, slaying oxen and killing sheep, eating meat and drinking wine:” Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die!”
Adonai demanded repentance and renewal. But instead, the people turned to pleasure and partying employing all forms of hilarity and self-indigence. This is not the legitimate joy and gladness of Adonai’s people.
They used eating and drinking as a means of not facing Adonai’s call for righteousness with inevitable consequences.
Luke 17:26 – 29.
“And as it was in the days of Noah, so it will be also in the days of the Son of Man: they ate, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed all of them. Likewise as it was also in the days of Lot: they ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built; but on the day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. Even so will it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed.”
A warning is also contained in Micah 1:16, “Make yourself bald and cut off your hair, because of your precious children; enlarge your baldness like an eagle, for they shall go from you into captivity.”
There are of course a perfectly legitimate time and reason for joy amongst the Lord’s people, especially in the future kingdom and in anticipation of it.
Isaiah 35:10.
“And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with singing, with everlasting joy on their heads. They shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.”
Chapter 22:14
“Then it was revealed in my hearing by the Lord of hosts, “Surely for this iniquity there will be no atonement for you, even to your death,” says the Lord God of hosts.”
These are chilling words for Jerusalem from Adonai. The national sin will not be purged from them until they are punished by death. They will not be forgiven for living raucously and callously when the Lord called for repentance.
We recall the Lord’s prediction about the outcome of Isaiah’s ministry.
Isaiah 6:9,10.
“… Go, and tell this people: “Keep on hearing, but do not understand; keep on seeing, but do not perceive.”
Chapter 22:15 – 25. The Judgment On Shebna.
Chapter 22:15,16.
“Thus says the Lord God of hosts: “Go proceed to this steward, to Shebna, who is over the house, and say, “What have you here, and whom have you here, that you have hewn a sepulchre here, as he who hews himself a sepulchre on high, who carves a tomb for himself in a rock?”
So, who was this fellow, Shebna? The role of “steward” denotes a high government official (perhaps a treasurer), responsible for caring for the king and his dominion. The tone of the Lord is clearly one of contempt, “this steward”.
The reason for Adonai’s contempt is Shebna’s high regard for himself. He has presumptuously built himself a tomb that is like that of a king or mighty leader. Compare his aspirations with the burial of King Asa in 2 Chronicles 16:14.
We can assume that Shebna was better at self-serving than serving the king and the people.
Chapter 22:17 – 19.
“Indeed the Lord will throw you away violently, O mighty man, and will surely seize you. He will surely turn violently and toss you like a ball into a large country; there you shall die, and there your glorious chariots shall be the shame of your master’s house. So I will drive you out of office, and from your position he will pull you down.”
Again, we see in the reference to Shebna the term “mighty man”, a note of contempt. Adonai will bring him down because of his glorious estimate of himself. Adonai says through Isaiah, that Shebna’s attempts to achieve renown are futile. There will be no impressive grave. He will die in obscurity outside of the land, perhaps in Assyria or in Egypt.
Arrogance caused Shebna’s demotion from “steward” to “scribe”. This happened sometime during Hezekiah’s reign but before 701 BC when Sennacherib besieged Jerusalem.
Chapter 22:20,21.
“Then it shall be in that day that I will call My servant Eliakim the son of Hilkiah; I will clothe him with your robe and strengthen him with your belt; I will commit your responsibility into his hand. He shall be a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and to the house of Judah.”
As we have seen the arrogant Shebna was demoted and replaced by Adonai by Eliakim. “Eliakim” means “God will establish”. Clearly, he was held in high regard by Adonai who refers to him as “My servant”. This designation is a high honour limited to a select group: Abraham, Moses, David, Zechariah and Isaiah.
That Eliakim would be a “father to the house of Judah” indicated that he would be a conscientious, responsible and compassionate ruler with full authority. He would receive the authority which Shebna had forfeited by his arrogance,
Chapter 22:22,23.
“The key of the house of David I will lay on his shoulder; so he shall open, and no one shall shut; and he shall shut, and no one shall open. I will fasten him as a peg in a secure place, and he will become a glorious throne to his father’s house.”
The steward had the authority to admit or refuse access to the king; thus, he held the “key of the house of David”. This is evidence of the king’s confidence in Eliakim.
The Lord Yeshua used similar imagery. He is the One who will decide who enters the future Davidic kingdom: Revelation 3:7, “He who has the key of David, He who opens and no one shuts, and shuts and no one opens.”
And in Matthew 16:19, the Lord gave to Peter the authority to give direction to the church; “And I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
Eliakim will be firmly established in his position and will have complete authority in his sphere of service. He holds his position as Adonai’s appointee and only Adonai can remove him.
Eliakim will bring honour (“a glorious throne”) to his father’s house. This contrast to the shame that Shebna brought on his family.
Chapter 22:24. “They will hang on him all the glory of his father’s house, the offspring and the posterity, all vessels of small quantity, from the cups to all the pitchers.”
The phrase to “hang on him” returns to the image of a peg. Isaiah noted that Eliakim’s posterity will refer to him to gain glory for themselves; “all vessels” refers to all persons both influential and insignificant.
Chapter 22:25.
“In that day”, says the Lord of hosts, “the peg that is fastened in the secure place will be removed and be cut down and fall, and the burden that was on it will be cut off: for the Lord has spoken.”
The reference here appears to be to Eliakim. Even Eliakim perhaps could not sustain the burden of government; only the Lord Yeshua can do that. Eliakim’s removal may refer to the captivity of the house of Judah of which he was a representative. Alternatively, it may be that after a time of faithful service, Eliakim faltered and fell, and all hanging on him fell as well.