Isaias 40:19
Hath the workman cast a graven statue? or hath the goldsmith formed it with gold, or the silversmith with plates of silver?
Open Isaias 40:19 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Numquid sculptile conflavit faber ? aut aurifex auro figuravit illud, et laminis argenteis argentarius ?
- Septuagint (Swete)
- μὴ εἰκόνα ἐποίησεν τέκτων, ἢ χρυσοχόος χωνεύσας χρυσίον περιεχρύσωσεν αὐτόν; ὁμοίωμα κατεσκεύασεν αὐτόν;
- Hebrew (WLC)
- הַפֶּ֨סֶל֙ נָסַ֣ךְ חָרָ֔שׁ וְצֹרֵ֖ף בַּזָּהָ֣ב יְרַקְּעֶ֑נּוּ וּרְתֻק֥וֹת כֶּ֖סֶף צוֹרֵֽף
Haydock's commentary
Silver. Is God like these idols? (Haydock)
Who knows not that the workman is better than they are? (Wisdom xiii. 11.) (Calmet)
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 Exhortation to the Heathen, Chapter VIII. The True Doctrine is to Be Sought in the Prophets
And again by Isaiah, “Who shall measure heaven with a span, and the whole earth with his hand?” Behold God’s greatness, and be filled with amazement. Let us worship Him of whom the prophet says, “Before Thy face the hills shall melt, as wax melteth before the fire!” This, says he, is the God “whose throne is heaven, and His footstool the earth; and if He open heaven, quaking will seize thee.” Will you hear, too, what this prophet says of idols? “And they shall be made a spectacle of in the face of the sun, and their carcases shall be meat for the fowls of heaven and the wild beasts of the earth; and they shall putrefy before the sun and the moon, which they have loved and served; and their city shall be burned down.” He says, too, that the elements and the world shall be destroyed. …
Arnobius The Seven Books of Arnobius Against the Heathen. (Adversus Gentes.), Chapter XIV
14. We would here, as if all nations on the earth were present, make one speech, and pour into the ears of them all, words which should be heard in common: Why, pray, is this, O men! that of your own accord you cheat and deceive yourselves by voluntary blindness? Dispel the darkness now, and, returning to the light of the mind, look more closely and see what that is which is going on, if only you retain your right, and are not beyond the reach of the reason and prudence given to you. Those images which fill you with terror, and which you adore prostrate upon the ground in all the temples, are bones, stones, brass, silver, gold, clay, wood taken from a tree, or glue mixed with gypsum. …