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Isaiah 21 · a question people ask

What does the watchman's answer mean (21:12)?

In the text

The chapter gives the answer and no more: "The morning comes, and also the night. If you will inquire, inquire. Come back again" (21:12). The call comes "out of Seir" (21:11), under the heading "The burden of Dumah" (21:11). The chapter doesn't say who calls, what the night is, when the morning will come, or whether the one who called came back. In Hebrew comes is the verb atah (tap comes), and Come back again is two verbs: shuvu, a form of the verb shuv, and etayu, a form of atah again. These notes leave the answer as the watchman gives it. The chapter on Psalm 130 sets 21:11-12 beside "more than watchmen long for the morning" (Psalm 130:6), for the Hebrew words they share.

The verses

“The burden of Dumah. One calls to me out of Seir, “Watchman, what of the night? Watchman, what of the night?” The watchman said, “The morning comes, and also the night. If you will inquire, inquire. Come back again.””
Isaiah 21:11-12 · World English Bible
“My soul longs for the Lord more than watchmen long for the morning, more than watchmen for the morning.”
Psalm 130:6 · World English Bible

From Favor's study of Isaiah 21

Isaiah 21: Watchman, what of the night?

Isaiah 21 is the only chapter of Isaiah with more than one burden heading, and it has three. Its first heading names no city: Babylon is named only in 21:9, "Fallen, fallen is Babylon" (21:9). And the pains that seize the one who speaks (21:3) are, in Hebrew, the words of Isaiah 13:8, where "the LORD’s day is at hand" (Isaiah 13:6).

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Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain. Every answer cites the verses it rests on. What we believe · All Bible questions