What proof of wickedness is stronger than this, to forsake the Good One! And what an abundance of deceit it is to provoke the Good and the Meek! But the Jews are accused of the same thing in Jeremiah: "Thou hast forsaken me, the fountain of living water" (Jeremiah 2:13). As he forsakes, each one gathers for himself the measure of wrath on the day of retribution.

"Turn away" (Slav. — "turn away") "backwards."

This is added by Theodotion as an interpretation of the word "to leave," that is, to turn away from God through falling away into the worse. For as he who is perfected stretches out "to the first," so he who sins retreats, departing from the Lord and thereby destroying himself. For it is said: "Behold, they that keep themselves away from Thee shall perish" (Psalm 72:27). Therefore, let us live in such a way that the past will never be better than the future or the present. This is also forbidden by Ecclesiastes: "Thou shalt not say, 'What hath become, that the days of the former shall be greater than these? For it was not in wisdom that thou didst inquire about these things" (Ecclesiastes 7:11). For if the previous ones are better than the following, then we will be told: "In vain have you suffered so much, turning good deeds to naught by subsequent negligence." For Ezekiel says: "If the righteous turn away from his righteousness, and do unrighteousness in all the iniquity which the wicked man has done, all his righteousness which he has done shall not be remembered; in his transgression, by which he transgressed, and in his sins, by which he sinned, he would die in them" (Ezekiel 18:24).

(5) "Why else are you wounded, adding iniquity?"

The meaning of these words is as follows: "For your sins I admonished you, I punished you with a whip. And because you have not repented, but have sinned more, I have continually laid new scourges upon you, so that every part of the body has been covered with the blows of correction." Those who sin are not incurably threatened by the word that will visit them "with the rod of their iniquity, and with the stripes of their iniquity" (Psalm 88:33); and to the incurable he says: "Why else are you wounded?" — "Having experienced the blows upon yourselves, you have despised all the scourges that impel you to conversion. Crushing awaits you." This is the voice of one who is driven to the extreme and despairs of correction, as in Ezekiel: "My zeal will depart from you, and I will not be angry with you" (cf. Ezekiel 16:42). Of the calamities that befall us, some befall as punishment for sins, others for the correction of morality in those who are tempted, and others for the destruction of the hopeless, as was the case with Pharaoh. For this reason, the Prophet threatens the Jews, as hopeless, not with blows, not with scourges, but with destruction.

"Every head is into sickness, and every heart into sorrow. What else are you hurting?"

ye whose bodies and souls are covered with wounds, and there is no correction in anything, but the whole head is sick and the whole heart is grieved? Without a doubt, it is not the bodily member that the Prophet calls the head, that is, pain is not established in one head, but it is said "every head" instead of "every man," according to the usage of the Scriptures. For example: "Take up the firstfruits of all the assembly of the children of Israel according to their kinship, according to their assembly, according to the house of their fatherland, according to the number of their names, according to their heads" (cf. Num. 1:2, 20). Since all the tongue is sinful and all people are full of iniquity, therefore the punishment is extended to all, and "every heart" is grieved, because the people are taken captive for their sins.

(6) "From the feet even to the head there is no integrity in him: neither scab, nor ulcer, nor scorching wound."

The Prophet took the word "head" for a whole person. "From the feet even to the head there is no integrity in him: neither scab, nor ulcer, nor scorching wound," because for each sin the scourges were laid by Him who cares for them. Then, since a scab (wound) is a discontinuity of cohesion in the body from the interruption of contact in some small part, and an ulcer (scar) is a bloody trace of a blow when the body is struck by the striker with something hard, and it occurs on some part of the body; Inflammation is a swelling combined with fever from the confluence of moisture into the greater part of the body, scorching the suffering member with unnatural heat — what does the prophetic word say about those affected by the disease in all parts? "The sickness has touched you," it says, "not like a scab, not like an ulcer, not like a scorching wound. On the contrary, evil has fallen upon you with united forces, so that everything has merged together: the scab, the ulcer, and the wound."

"There is no plaster to apply, below oil, below the obligation."

Since the disease is stronger than the scab, and the ulcer, and the scorching wound, then "there is no plaster to apply" to the wound, "no oil" scabs. "These aids are not needed," says the Prophet, "the attacks are so great that they will not yield to them." Thus, scab is schisms in the Church, ulcers are lying hearts, inflammation is the exaltation of the soul, which is puffed up with irrational self-conceit and therefore "exalts itself on the mind" of Christ (cf. 2 Corinthians 10:5). "Plaster" is a word that humbles vain arrogance with meekness and quietness; and "oil" is the word which, with mercy and compassion, softens the deceit, deceit, and cruelty in the hypocrisy of those who speak lies; and "obligation" is the word that restrains those who seek division.

(7) "Your land is desolate, your cities are burned with fire, your country is devoured before you by strangers, and desolate is turned away from strange people."

Since he despairs of correction, he threatens with extermination. But this did not happen in the time of Isaiah. On the contrary, prophecy usually speaks of the future as having already been. For example: "Thou hast given me gall for food, and hast given me drink for my thirst" (Psalm 68:22). For according to the certainty of the event foretold, as indisputably coming to pass, the future is combined with the past. This happened during the captivity of Babylon. Then the land was devoid of inhabitants, the cities were burned by fire, and the country, in the eyes of the remaining Jews, was devoured by the settlers expelled from Persia: then "the whole country" became "corrupted from strange people."

But according to the higher concepts, according to which the Old Testament applies to us, when we depart from our God, "lift up our hands to a strange god" (cf. Psalm 43:21), then we are given over to strangers, who desolate and corrupt us. For it can be seen that all threats are fulfilled against sinners. "Your land is empty." The Scriptures often call the soul the earth that receives the seeds of the word, as in the Gospel we learn from the Lord's parable that some seeds fell on good ground, which conveniently receives Divine instructions and is capable of bearing fruit. But the soul is empty, which has neither wisdom nor understanding in it, does not live in righteousness, does not walk in truth. "Burn your cities with fire." A city is an assembly of people who, in various kinds of life, are bound together in a common life, and it, since in its affairs many things are vain, such as wood, hay, and straw, is burned on the day of judgment, and the companies of the wicked are given over to the fire. "Strangers devour your country before you," when invading alien thoughts destroy what they have acquired through labor in a previous life with good activity, which filled the soul with spiritual fruits: love, joy, peace, longsuffering, goodness. But if in worldly affairs we treacherously give over the active power of the soul to unclean spirits, then our land is "corrupted by strangers," because we are "God's burden, God's building" (1 Corinthians 3:9). As long as we are the rod that dwells on the vine, bringing to Christ the fruit required of us (John 15:1-2), until then God is our "burdener." And if we fall away from the life-giving root, from faith in Christ, then we dry up and are cast out and burned, and our "edification" on teaching, if we live indecently, is destroyed. For as soon as we are not established on the foundation of the Apostles in the building of our precious buildings, as having no foundation, we fall apart, and our fall is great. Then, as it were, chastity is eaten by intemperance, generosity in alms by love of money, and love by love of enmity. Wherefore it is worthy of pity when the soul, which abounds in the fruitfulness of good works, becomes the food of the adversaries, who are not satisfied with our desolation until they have completely perverted us, for the depravity proceeds from evil instruction, and the soul of the deceived is as it were leveled with the earth. And devastation is the deprivation of former rights. And it's easy to be with the human soul. Look at another young man who has been brought up in an honest life since childhood, who carefully goes to the house of prayer, who is not negligent in doing good according to his ability, who remembers the eternal Judgment, who accepts the word of teaching with love, and then he has crept into fornication: how in him the loss of chastity and the deprivation of fruit is followed by a complete depravity. An evil conscience no longer leads him to the place of prayer, because he did not stand among the faithful, but fell away. He does not stand with those who weep, because he is ashamed. From that time on, he was lazy to pray, inventing imaginary pretexts in response to those who asked. He says: "I am compelled by so-and-so, I cannot wait for the Divine service," and again, for such and such a reason (which happened to him to invent), he leaves the church before the prayer of the faithful. Then, from a gradual habit, the thought of apostasy is born, and he comes to complete destruction. In general, it is characteristic of evil forces, as soon as they deprive us of the fruits of righteousness, not to depart from us until they entangle our minds with errors.