Isaiah 13 · a question people ask
"The sun will be darkened" (13:10). Is the chapter speaking of Babylon's fall, or of the end?
The chapter's heading is "The burden of Babylon" (13:1), and 13:19 names Babylon again. Between them it speaks of "the LORD’s day" (13:6) and "the day of the LORD" (13:9), and of the sky: "For the stars of the sky and its constellations will not give their light. The sun will be darkened in its going out, and the moon will not cause its light to shine" (13:10), and "I will make the heavens tremble, and the earth will be shaken out of its place" (13:13). It also says, "I will punish the world for their evil" (13:11). The chapter doesn't say whether its words for the sky are a picture of the day or what will be seen in it, and it names no time. Other prophets speak in words like these: "The sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining" (Joel 2:10, 3:15), and, over Pharaoh (Ezekiel 32:2), "I will cover the heavens and make its stars dark" (Ezekiel 32:7). When his disciples asked, "What is the sign of your coming, and of the end of the age?" (Matthew 24:3), Jesus's answer includes words like 13:10's: "the sun will be darkened, the moon will not give its light, the stars will fall from the sky" (Matthew 24:29). He doesn't name Isaiah. Christians read how his words stand beside 13:10 in more than one way; this chapter's line to Jesus gives the two readings, and these notes choose neither and name no date or event.
The verses
“The burden of Babylon, which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw.”
“Wail, for the LORD’s day is at hand! It will come as destruction from the Almighty.”
“Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldeans’ pride, will be like when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah.”
“The earth quakes before them. The heavens tremble. The sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining.”