Six sections in chapters 28-35 will open with hoy, a cry often translated "Woe!" Two of those sections occur in this chapter.
Isaiah 29:1-4, Woe to Ariel
Woe to you, Ariel, Ariel,
the city where David settled!
Add year to year
and let your cycle of festivals go on.
Yet I will besiege Ariel;
she will mourn and lament,
she will be to me like an altar hearth.
I will encamp against you on all sides;
I will encircle you with towers
and set up my siege works against you.
Brought low, you will speak from the ground;
your speech will mumble out of the dust.
Your voice will come ghostlike from the earth;
out of the dust your speech will whisper.
The word Ariel, say both Motyer and Grogan, means "altar hearth" and is surely another name for Jerusalem. Why the prophet uses that word is not clear; possibly it is because Jerusalem is the home of the sacrificial system. The city, says Isaiah, will be besieged on all sides. (This happens during the reign of Hezekiah. See 2 Kings 19 and also Isaiah 36-37.)
Isaiah 29:5-8, Siege by hordes
But your many enemies will become like fine dust,
the ruthless hordes like blown chaff.
Suddenly, in an instant,
the LORD Almighty will come
with thunder and earthquake and great noise,
with windstorm and tempest and flames of a devouring fire.
Then the hordes of all the nations that fight against Ariel,
that attack her and her fortress and besiege her,
will be as it is with a dream,
with a vision in the night—
as when a hungry person dreams of eating,
but awakens hungry still;
as when a thirsty person dreams of drinking,
but awakens faint and thirsty still.
So will it be with the hordes of all the nations
that fight against Mount Zion.
The city will be besieged on all sides. The attacks on Ariel will be the things of nightmares -- note the hungry one dreaming of eating, to awake only to discover he is still starving; the thirsty man dreaming of drinking to awake in complete thirst.
The attack of the hordes first happens during the reign of Hezekiah. (2 Kings 19, Isaiah 36-37.) But some aspects of this picture are dramatic even for the siege of Sennacherib, says Grogan, who points to Revelation 20:7-10 as possibly a future version of this siege.
The dramatic appearance of God in verse 6 echoes YHWH meeting with Moses in Exodus 19:16-19.
Isaiah 29:9-10, Drunk and blind
Be stunned and amazed,
blind yourselves and be sightless;
be drunk, but not from wine,
stagger, but not from beer.
The LORD has brought over you a deep sleep:
He has sealed your eyes (the prophets);
he has covered your heads (the seers).
The people acts as if drunk. Prophets have blind eyes and seers have covered heads.
Isaiah 29:11-12, Excuses, excuses
For you this whole vision is nothing but words sealed in a scroll. And if you give the scroll to someone who can read, and say, “Read this, please,” they will answer, “I can’t; it is sealed.”
Or if you give the scroll to someone who cannot read, and say, “Read this, please,” they will answer, “I don’t know how to read.”
The people ignore the prophecy; they do not want to read it; they give excuses. If one hands them the prophecy on a scroll, those who can't read say, "I can't read" while those who can read say, "It is closed."
Isaiah 29:13, Rules without reason
The Lord says:
“These people come near to me with their mouth
and honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
Their worship of me
is based on merely human rules they have been taught.
The religious system in Jerusalem is only outwardly, in outward speech that really means nothing to the heart inside. People simply follow rules, without reason.
Jesus quotes this passage in Matthew 15:8-9.
Isaiah 29:14, But once more
Therefore once more I will astound these people
with wonder upon wonder;
the wisdom of the wise will perish,
the intelligence of the intelligent will vanish.”
The people will be astounded by the rescue that God provides. In 2 Kings 19:35-37, we have the enemy army destroyed by an angel.
Isaiah 29:15-16, Can you hide your plans from YHWH?
Woe to those who go to great depths
to hide their plans from the LORD,
who do their work in darkness and think,
“Who sees us? Who will know?”
You turn things upside down,
as if the potter were thought to be like the clay!
Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it,
“You did not make me”?
Can the pot say to the potter,
“You know nothing”?
This is the third section in chapter28-35 opening with "Woe!" Here the warning is to those who think that God does not pay attention.
In this metaphor, the clay challenges the potter -- why have you made me so? It is the potter who is in charge and has the plans. It is silly to tell YHWH "you know nothing!"
Jeremiah gives a clear parable in Jeremiah 18:1-6 of God being the potter working with clay. This becomes a favorite metaphor for the prophets, showing up here, in Isaiah 45:9 and 64:8, and, in the New Testament, Paul quotes this passage in Romans 9:19-21.
Isaiah 29:17-21, Deaf will hear, blind will see
In a very short time, will not Lebanon be turned into a fertile field
and the fertile field seem like a forest?
In that day the deaf will hear the words of the scroll,
and out of gloom and darkness
the eyes of the blind will see.
Once more the humble will rejoice in the LORD;
the needy will rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.
The ruthless will vanish,
the mockers will disappear,
and all who have an eye for evil will be cut down—
those who with a word make someone out to be guilty,
who ensnare the defender in court
and with false testimony deprive the innocent of justice.
A time of judgment comes. But this will be a good time, as the ruthless, the mockers, those who are evil will disappear. Although verse 17 is a bit confusing, with different interpretations from different translations, Grogan sees the verse as a positive promise: Lebanon will turn into a fertile field so that even the common fertile field looks, in comparison, like a wild forest. (A similar statement appears in 32:15.)
The phrase "in court" is a translation of bashshaar which reads literally as "in the gate." As we saw in Ruth 4:1-10, it was at the gate of the city that judicial decisions were rendered.
Isaiah 29:22-24, Future acknowledgment
Therefore this is what the LORD, who redeemed Abraham, says to the descendants of Jacob:
“No longer will Jacob be ashamed;
no longer will their faces grow pale.
When they see among them their children,
the work of my hands,
they will keep my name holy;
they will acknowledge the holiness of the Holy One of Jacob,
and will stand in awe of the God of Israel.
Those who are wayward in spirit will gain understanding;
those who complain will accept instruction.”
Isaiah once again interrupts his dire words with a statement about a future time when people will turn and acknowledge YHWH, who is the Holy One of Jacob, God of Israel. There is a special emphasis on God's continuing work with the descendants of Jacob.
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