Isaiah 29:4

Isa 29:4 And thou shalt be brought down, [and] shalt speak out of the ground, and thy speech shall be low out of the dust, and thy voice shall be, as of one that hath a familiar spirit, out of the ground, and thy speech shall whisper out of the dust.

Ver. 4. And thou, shalt be brought down.] From those lofty pinnacles of self-exaltation whereunto thy pride hath perched thee.

And speak out of the ground.] Humillime et submissime, thou shalt speak supplication, with a low voice (as broken men), who wast wont to face the heavens, and speak in spite of God and men, speak big words, bubbles of words. See Jer 46:22.

And thy voice shall be as one that hath a familiar spirit.] Cuius vox est gracilis, flebilis, hiulca, confusa, gemebunda.

Out of the ground.] As the devil at Delphi did.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

29:4 God’s goal was to destroy the sinful pride of the people of Jerusalem. Their voice would rise as if from the grave. Through the Assyrians, God would humble his people, but he would not abandon them.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Thy speech shall be no more so lofty, but abased and low as the very charmers, which are in low places, and whisper, so that their voice can scarce be heard.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

Jerusalem shall be as a captive, humbled to the dust. Her voice shall come from the earth as that of the spirit-charmers or necromancers (Isa 8:19), faint and shrill, as the voice of the dead was supposed to be. Ventriloquism was doubtless the trick caused to make the voice appear to come from the earth (Isa 19:3). An appropriate retribution that Jerusalem, which consulted necromancers, should be made like them!

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 4. And thy speech shall be low out of the dust - "And from out of the dust thou shalt utter a feeble speech"] That the souls of the dead uttered a feeble stridulous sound, very different from the natural human voice, was a popular notion among the heathens as well as among the Jews. This appears from several passages of their poets; Homer, Virgil, Horace. The pretenders to the art of necromancy, who were chiefly women, had an art of speaking with a feigned voice, so as to deceive those who applied to them, by making them believe that it was the voice of the ghost. They had a way of uttering sounds, as if they were formed, not by the organs of speech, but deep in the chest, or in the belly; and were thence called εγγαστριμυθοι, ventriloqui: they could make the voice seem to come from beneath the ground, from a distant part, in another direction, and not from themselves; the better to impose upon those who consulted them. Εξεπιτηδες το γενος τουτο τον αμυδρον ηχον επιτηδευονται, ἱνα δια την ασαφειαν της φωνης τον του ψευδους αποδιδρασκωσιν ελεγχον. Psellus De Daemonibus, apud Bochart, i. p. 731. "These people studiously acquire, and affect on purpose, this sort of obscure sound; that by the uncertainty of the voice they may the better escape being detected in the cheat." From these arts of the necromancers the popular notion seems to have arisen, that the ghost's voice was a weak, stridulous, almost inarticulate sort of sound, very different from the speech of the living.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

(4) Shalt speak out of the ground.—The words paint the panic of the besieged, the words pointing probably to Sennacherib’s invasion. They spoke in whispers, like the voice of the spectres which men heard in the secret chambers of the soothsayers. The war-cry of the brave was changed into the feeble tones of those that “peep and mutter.” (See Note on Isa_8:19.)

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And thou shalt be brought down,.... To the ground, and laid level with it, even the city of Jerusalem, as it was by the Romans; and as it was predicted by Christ it would, Luk 19:44 though some understand this of the humbling of the inhabitants of it, by the appearance of Sennacherib's army before it, and of which they interpret the following clauses:

and shalt speak out of the ground, and thy speech shall be low out of the dust; which some explain of the submissive language of Hezekiah to Sennacherib, and of his messengers to Rabshakeh, Kg2 18:14 as Aben Ezra and Kimchi; but it is expressive of the great famine in Jerusalem, at the time of its siege by the Romans, when the inhabitants were so reduced by it, as that they were scarce able to speak as to be heard, and could not stand upon their legs, but fell to the ground, and lay in the dust, uttering from thence their speech, with a faint and feeble voice:

and thy voice shall be as one that hath a familiar spirit, out of the ground, and thy speech shall whisper out of the dust: or peep and chirp, as little birds, as Jarchi and Kimchi, as those did that had familiar spirits; and as the Heathen oracles were delivered, as if they came out of the bellies of those that spoke, or out of caves and hollow places in the earth; and this was in just retaliation to these people, who imitated such practices, and made use of such spirits; see Isa 8:19.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

And shalt speak out of the ground - (see the note at Isa 8:19). The sense here is, that Jerusalem, that had been accustomed to pride itself on its strength I would be greatly humbled and subdued. Its loud and lofty tone would be changed. It would use the suppressed language of fear and alarm as if it spoke from the dust, or in a shrill small voice, like the pretended conversers with the dead.

And thy speech shall whisper out of the dust - Margin, ‘Peep,’ or ‘Chirp,’ (see the note at Isa 8:19).

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

The Python. The diviner by a spirit. (Challoner) --- Jerusalem shall hardly dare to make a noise. (Calmet)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Thy speech shall be low out of the dust; thou who now speakest so loftily and scornfully against the Lord’s prophets and others, shalt be humbled and confounded, and afraid and ashamed to speak aloud, and shalt in a submissive manner, and with a low voice, beg the favour of thine enemies.

Thy voice shall be, as of one that hath a familiar spirit, out of the ground; who, that they might possess the people with a kind of reverence and horror, used to speak and deliver their answers with a low voice, either out of their bellies, or from some dark cave under the ground.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

4. Shall be brought down — Jerusalem, accustomed to feel secure from its strength, is personified as lying flat to the ground, like a man prostrate.

Thy speech shall be low — Its utmost humility is meant, reduced by starvation till so weak as to speak only in low whispers, or with low undertone, like ventriloquists who feign to speak with the dead. The whole city is in this condition, unable to speak above a breath.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Thy speech shall be low. The feeble cries of a people wasted and worn out by a long siege are intended. These cries would resemble those which seemed to come out of the ground when a necromancer professed to raise a ghost. The Hebrew ohv is used both of the necromancers (Lev_19:31 Lev_20:6, etc.) and of the ghosts which they professed to raise. (1Sa_28:7, 8 2Ki_20:6, etc.) Here the "ghost" is spoken of. Thy speech shall whisper; literally, chirp. (comp. Isa_8:19) The word used occurs only in Isaiah.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And thou - Thou who now speakest so loftily, shall be humbled, and with a low voice, beg the favour of thine enemies. As one - Who, that they might possess the people with a kind of reverence and horror, used to deliver their answers with a low voice, from some cave under the ground.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

“And thou shalt be brought down, out of the ground shalt thou speak, and thy speech shall be low out of the dust, and thy voice shall be like (the voice of) a spirit, out of the ground, and out of the dust shall thy speech mutter.” The simple meaning naturally suggested by the words is, that the person here addressed, to wit, the city or its population, should be weakened and humbled. The last verb properly denotes any feeble inarticulate sound, and is applied in Isa 10:14 and Isa 38:14 to the chirping or twittering of birds.

Joseph Addison Alexander, The Prophecies of Isaiah (1846–1847; New York: Scribner, 1870–1878) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

from the earth shall you speak It shall appear as though the speech that comes out of your mouth comes from below the ground.

shall your speech chirp to supplicate to Me, and because of your supplication, My mercies shall be aroused.

צִפְצוּף is an expression of a whispering (var. weak) voice like the voice of small birds.

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.

And thou shalt be brought down. This applies to the words of Hezekiah’s messengers to Rabshakeh.

Thou shalt speak out of the ground. Thou shalt speak so, as if the voice came from the depth of the earth.

כאב As a potter. Comp. כאבת as bottles.—The potter, because of his vocation, speaks from below.

Ibn Ezra on the Tanakh — English translations: “Sefaria Community Translation” (CC0 1.0 (public-domain dedication)); “Yalkut, Sifsei Chachomim Chumash, Metsudah Publications, 2009” (CC BY 4.0); and “Commentary of Ibn Ezra on Isaiah - trans. by M. Friedlander, 1873” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.