Isaias 20:2
At that same time the Lord spoke by the hand of Isaias the son of Amos, saying: Go, and loose the sackcloth from off thy loins, and take off thy shoes from thy feet. And he did so, and went naked, and barefoot.
Open Isaias 20:2 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- in tempore illo locutus est Dominus in manu Isaiæ, filii Amos, dicens : Vade, et solve saccum de lumbis tuis, et calceamenta tua tolle de pedibus tuis. Et fecit sic, vadens nudus et discalceatus.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- τότε ἐλάλησεν Κύριος πρὸς Ἠσαίαν υἱὸν Ἀμὼς λὲγων Πορεύου καὶ ἄφελε τὸν σάκκον ἀπὸ τῆς ὀσφύος σου, καὶ τὰ σανδάλιά σου ὑπόλυσαι ἀπὸ τῶν ποδῶν σου, καὶ ποίησον οὕτως, πορευόμενος γυμνὸς καὶ ἀνυπόδετος.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- בָּעֵ֣ת הַהִ֗יא דִּבֶּ֣ר יְהוָה֮ בְּיַ֣ד יְשַׁעְיָ֣הוּ בֶן אָמוֹץ֮ לֵאמֹר֒ לֵ֗ךְ וּפִתַּחְתָּ֤ הַשַּׂק֙ מֵעַ֣ל מָתְנֶ֔יךָ וְנַעַלְךָ֥ תַחֲלֹ֖ץ מֵעַ֣ל רַגְלֶ֑יךָ וַיַּ֣עַשׂ כֵּ֔ן הָלֹ֖ךְ עָר֥וֹם וְיָחֵֽף
Haydock's commentary
Sackcloth. The prophets lived in poverty, Zacharias xiii. 4. Their persons were prophetic. It is not agreed whether Isaias went quite naked, or only without his upper garment. The former supposition would represent better the condition of slaves, (ver. 4.) and is adopted by St. Jerome, &c. (Calmet)
People are said to be naked when they are almost so, 2 Kings vi., and John xxi. (Haydock)
Yet "nothing is more honest than to obey God." (St. Jerome) (Worthington)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
Clement of Alexandria The Instructor, Chapter XI. On Clothes
The blessed John, despising the locks of sheep as savouring of luxury, chose “camel’s hair,” and was clad in it, making himself an example of frugality and simplicity of life. For he also “ate locusts and wild honey,” sweet and spiritual fare; preparing, as he was, the lowly and chaste ways of the Lord. For how possibly could he have worn a purple robe, who turned away from the pomp of cities, and retired to the solitude of the desert, to live in calmness with God, far from all frivolous pursuits, from all false show of good, from all meanness? Elias used a sheepskin mantle, and fastened the sheepskin with a girdle made of hair. And Esaias, another prophet, was naked and barefooted, and often was clad in sackcloth, the garb of humility. And if you call Jeremiah, he had only “a linen girdle.”
St John Chrysostom The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom, Matthew V. 38, 39, 40
Further: even though one were of necessity to go about naked on account of this sort of self-denial, neither so were it any disgrace. Since Adam too was “naked”in paradise, “and was not ashamed;” and Isaiah was “naked, and barefoot,” and more glorious than all the Jews;and Josephalso, when he stripped himself, did then more than ever shine forth. For to be thus naked is no evil, but to be so clad, as we now are, with costly garments, this is both disgraceful and ridiculous. For this cause, you see, those had praise of God, but these He blames, both by prophets and by apostles.
St Jerome The Letters of St. Jerome, To Marcella
1. The medical men called surgeons pass for being cruel, but really deserve pity. For is it not pitiful to cut away the dead flesh of another man with merciless knives without being moved by his pangs? Is it not pitiful that the man who is curing the patient is callous to his sufferings, and has to appear as his enemy? Yet such is the order of nature. While truth is always bitter, pleasantness waits upon evil-doing. Isaiah goes naked without blushing as a type of captivity to come. Jeremiah is sent from Jerusalem to the Euphrates (a river in Mesopotamia), and leaves his girdle to be marred in the Chaldæan camp, among the Assyrians hostile to his people. Ezekiel is told to eat bread made of mingled seeds and sprinkled with the dung of men and cattle. He has to see his wife die without shedding a tear. Amos is driven from Samaria. …
The Fathers are given as they wrote. Where a passage lays the Passion on the Jewish people, the Church teaches that it cannot be charged against all the Jews then living, nor against the Jews of today, and that all sinners were its authors (CCC 597, 598).