Yesaya 26:19

26:19 ¹ Your dead will come back to life;

your corpses will rise up.

Wake up and shout joyfully, you who live in the ground! ² 

For you will grow like plants drenched with the morning dew, ³ 

and the earth will bring forth its dead spirits. ⁴ 

Yesaya 50:11

50:11 Look, all of you who start a fire

and who equip yourselves with ⁵  flaming arrows, ⁶ 

walk ⁷  in the light ⁸  of the fire you started

and among the flaming arrows you ignited! ⁹ 

This is what you will receive from me: ¹⁰ 

you will lie down in a place of pain. ¹¹ 

[26:19]  ¹ sn At this point the Lord (or prophet) gives the people an encouraging oracle.

[26:19]  ² tn Heb “dust” (so KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV).

[26:19]  ³ tn Heb “for the dew of lights [is] your dew.” The pronominal suffix on “dew” is masculine singular, like the suffixes on “your dead” and “your corpses” in the first half of the verse. The statement, then, is addressed to collective Israel, the speaker in verse 18. The plural form אוֹרֹת (’orot) is probably a plural of respect or magnitude, meaning “bright light” (i.e., morning’s light). Dew is a symbol of fertility and life. Here Israel’s “dew,” as it were, will soak the dust of the ground and cause the corpses of the dead to spring up to new life, like plants sprouting up from well-watered soil.

[26:19]  ⁴ sn It is not certain whether the resurrection envisioned here is intended to be literal or figurative. A comparison with 25:8 and Dan 12:2 suggests a literal interpretation, but Ezek 37:1-14 uses resurrection as a metaphor for deliverance from exile and the restoration of the nation (see Isa 27:12-13).

[50:11]  ⁵ tc Several more recent commentators have proposed an emendation of מְאַזְּרֵי (mÿ’azzÿre, “who put on”) to מְאִירִי (mÿ’iri, “who light”). However, both Qumran scrolls of Isaiah and the Vulgate support the MT reading (cf. NIV, ESV).

[50:11]  ⁶ tn On the meaning of זִיקוֹת (ziqot, “flaming arrows”), see HALOT 268 s.v. זִיקוֹת.

[50:11]  ⁷ tn The imperative is probably rhetorical and has a predictive force.

[50:11]  ⁸ tn Or perhaps, “flame” (so ASV).

[50:11]  ⁹ sn Perhaps the servant here speaks to his enemies and warns them that they will self-destruct.

[50:11]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “from my hand” (so NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV).

[50:11]  ¹¹ sn The imagery may be that of a person who becomes ill and is forced to lie down in pain on a sickbed. Some see this as an allusion to a fiery place of damnation because of the imagery employed earlier in the verse.