5. κατανένυγμαι] The word occurs in LXX., Gen. xxxiv. 7, ‘the men were ’; of Aaron, Lev. x. 3; of Ahab, I Kings xxi. 27, 29 in Psalms iv. 4, xxx. 12: in Leviticus and Psalms, the Heb. word is the same as, or akin to, that here used.

Liddell and Scott give for κατανύσσομαι νύσσω, ‘prick’) the meanings (i) be sorely pricked, (ii) be stupefied, slumber: “in latter senses, perhaps corrupted from κατανυστάζω.” Bengel on Acts ii. 37 quotes the Vulgate ’ sunt, and on Rom. xi. 8, which quotes Isai. xxix. 10, “κατάνυξις notat πάθος ex frequentissima punctione in stuporem desinens.” The Heb. verb (or verbs)=(i) be silent, amazed, (ii) be ruined. Consequently the Heb. and Greek words approach one another only in the meanings of ‘stupefaction’ and ‘silence.’ Vulg. has (and here: which Prof. Skinner, on this passage, in Camb. Bible for 55110013, calls an impossible rendering; but it is hardly certain that this is so of the Greek, even if it be of the Hebrew; for it is quite possible that LXX. may have so interpreted the original; and it seems as easy a sense as any to assign to κατανένυγμαι. The force of the expression seems to have some similarity to Jerem. i. 6, ‘I cannot ’: and to ’ reluctance, Exod. iv. 10—13; but with Isaiah it is not so much backwardness as overwhelming surprise and sense of unworthiness. If we take the other meaning,‘I am pricked' might possibly be for ‘I am sore stricken,’ with a reference to the idea that a sight of God heralded death: see Judg. vi. 22, xiii. 22, Exod. xxxiii. 20, Deut. v. 24, 26, and Gen. xxxii. 30; which is the earliest mention for certain of the feelings, though there it seems already familiar.

6. λαβίδι ἔλαβεν] Heb. words also cognates.

7. Like Ezekiel (chap. ii., iii.) and St John (Revel. x. 8—10) Isaiah's experience shows that the work of an apostle or prophet, to whom the secrets of God are revealed—see Amos iii. 7—has a sweet and a bitter side. His lips are purified; but he will not be believed. Yet with Isaiah, more than any other, except St John, the exaltation of spirit remains dominant; we see no sign, after this, of his confidence failing. Jeremiah, by nature, seems to stand at the other end of the scale of temperament; near him, perhaps, Thomas, Hosea, Micah, Habakkuk.

περικαθαριεῖ] The force of the compound is as though the defilements peeled or sloughed off. The Heb. has passive verbs, or their equivalent: Vulg. auferetur. . .mundabitur: Aq. Symm. Theod. ἀποστή- σεται. . .ἐξιλασθήσεται.