NOTES for Isa 10:15

Assyria, against which this prophecy of Isaiah is directed, was an extremely unattractive country. It was the first military-fascist state in history, practicing genocide and forced resettlement of peoples on a mass scale. Plunder and the destruction of the defenseless became the basis of the policy of this utterly militarized power. "The scourge of God" is what ancient people called not only locusts, but also the hordes of Assyrians. When at the end of the seventh century B.C. Assyria fell under the blows of Babylon, the prophet Nahum said: "All who hear the news of you will clap their hands over you, for upon whom has your unceasing evil not passed?"

And to the words of the Assyrian king, "I took all the earth, and no one... even chirped," the prophet Isaiah proclaims the word of God. "Does the axe boast over the one who hews with it?" says the Lord. This arrogant and proud power, which thought the whole world had submitted to it, turns out to be only a tool in the hands of the true Ruler. And the Lord says that for cruelty and violence, for the robber and murderer, the Light of Israel, his Holy One, becomes fire, becomes a flame that will devour everything high and exalted. This is a very important image: the Light of God, which becomes flame for every sin.

Intuitively we expect two actions from God: the salvation of the good, meaning us, and the punishment of the bad, meaning Assyrians, Chechens, Jews, bourgeois, Catholics, cyclists, pedestrians... But God in His infinite Wisdom performs only one action: He comes. And everything further depends on people themselves. Whether the Light of Israel becomes for you light opening the path to life, or a consuming fire, depends on your will and your moral shape.