f Israel, an insult to His omnipotence and
grace. If Ahaz had obeyed Him; if he had limited himself to the use of
the human means granted to him by the Lord without trusting in them,
and had placed all his confidence in the Lord, He would have delivered
him in the same manner as He afterwards delivered Hezekiah, in the
first instance from Aram and Ephraim, and then from Asshur also. But
although Ahaz did not follow the prophet, his mission was by no means
in vain. Even before the mission, this result lay open before the Lord
who sent him. The great point was to establish, before the first
conflict of Israel with the world's power, thus much, that this
conflict had been brought about by the sin of the house of David, and
that hence it did not afford any cause for doubting the omnipotence and
mercy of the Lord whose help had been offered, but rejected.

The Prophet seeks out the king at a place to which he had been driven
by his despairing disquietude which was clinging convulsively to human
resources. He endeavours, first, to exert [Pg 29] an influence upon him
by taking with him his son, whose symbolical name, containing a
prophecy of the future destinies of the people, indicated that the
king's fear of a total destruction of the State was without foundation.
After the king has thus been prepared, he endeavours to make a deeper
impression upon him by the announcement, distinct and referring to the
present case, that the enemies should not only entirely fail in their
intention of conquering and dividing between themselves the kingdom of
Judah; but that the kingdom of Ephraim was itself hastening towards
that destruction which it was preparing for its brethren, and that
after sixty-five years it should altogether lose its national
independence and existence, ver. 1-9. But Ahaz makes no reply; and his
whole deportment shows that he does not follow the Prophet's
exhortation to "take heed and be quiet," and that the words: "If ye do
not believe, ye shall not be established," with which the Prophet
closes his address, have not made any impression upon him. In order
that the greatness of the king's hardness of heart may become manifest,
the Prophet offers, in the commission of the Lord, to confirm the
certainty of his statement by a miraculous sign, which the king himself
is called upon to fix, without any restriction, in order that any
suspicion of imposition may be removed. "But Ahaz, the unbeliever, is
afraid of heavenly co