Isaias 45:1
Thus saith the Lord to my anointed Cyrus, whose right hand I have taken hold of, to subdue nations before his face, and to turn the backs of kings, and to open the doors before him, and the gates shall not be shut.
Open Isaias 45:1 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →In the palace
The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Hæc dicit Dominus christo meo Cyro, cujus apprehendi dexteram, ut subjiciam ante faciem ejus gentes, et dorsa regum vertam, et aperiam coram eo januas, et portæ non claudentur :
- Septuagint (Swete)
- Οὕτως λέγει Κύριος ὁ θεὸς τῷ ⸂⸆⸃ χριστῷ μου Κύρῳ, οὗ ἐκράτησα τῆς δεξιᾶς ἐπακοῦσαι ἔμπροσθεν αὐτοῦ ἔθνη, καὶ ἰσχὺν βασιλέων διαρρήξω, ἀνοίξω ἔμπροσθεν αὐτοῦ θύρας, καὶ πόλεις οὐ ⸆ συνκλεισθήσονται
- Hebrew (WLC)
- כֹּה אָמַ֣ר יְהוָה֮ לִמְשִׁיחוֹ֮ לְכ֣וֹרֶשׁ אֲשֶׁר הֶחֱזַ֣קְתִּי בִֽימִינ֗וֹ לְרַד לְפָנָיו֙ גּוֹיִ֔ם וּמָתְנֵ֥י מְלָכִ֖ים אֲפַתֵּ֑חַ לִפְתֹּ֤חַ לְפָנָיו֙ דְּלָתַ֔יִם וּשְׁעָרִ֖ים לֹ֥א יִסָּגֵֽרוּ
Haydock's commentary
Anointed, often implies one chosen for some great work. Cyrus was to ruin the empire of Babylon, and to set the nations at liberty. He was a proof of the Deity by executing his decrees.
Cyrus. Some copies of the Septuagint seem to have read kurio, "to the Lord," incorrectly. (St. Jerome)
Though Cyrus was not anointed, he is styled thus, in allusion to the custom of the Jewish kings. (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
The Epistle of Barnabas The Epistle of Barnabas, Chapter XII. The cross of Christ
In like manner He points to the cross of Christ in another prophet, who saith, “And when shall these things be accomplished? And the Lord saith, When a tree shall be bent down, and again arise, and when blood shall flow out of wood.” Here again you have an intimation concerning the cross, and Him who should be crucified. Yet again He speaks of this in Moses, when Israel was attacked by strangers. And that He might remind them, when assailed, that it was on account of their sins they were delivered to death, the Spirit speaks to the heart of Moses, that he should make a figure of the cross, and of Him about to suffer thereon; for unless they put their trust in Him, they shall be overcome for ever. …
Tertullian Against Praxeas, The Identity of the Father and the Son, as Praxeas Held It, Shown to Be Full of Perplexity and Absurdity. Many Scriptures Quoted in Proof of the Distinction of the Divine Persons of the Trinity
It will be your duty, however, to adduce your proofs out of the Scriptures as plainly as we do, when we prove that He made His Word a Son to Himself. For if He calls Him Son, and if the Son is none other than He who has proceeded from the Father Himself, and if the Word has proceeded from the Father Himself, He will then be the Son, and not Himself from whom He proceeded. For the Father Himself did not proceed from Himself. Now, you who say that the Father is the same as the Son, do really make the same Person both to have sent forth from Himself (and at the same time to have gone out from Himself as) that Being which is God. If it was possible for Him to have done this, He at all events did not do it. …
St Cyprian Three Books of Testimonies Against the Jews, Testimony XXI
In Genesis: “And the Lord God said unto Abraham, Go out from thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, and go into that land which I shall show thee: and I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and I will magnify thy name; and thou shalt be blessed: and I will bless him that blesseth thee, and I will curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all the tribes of the earth be blessed.” On this same point in Genesis: “And Isaac blessed Jacob. …
St John Chrysostom The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on the Gospel of St. John, John 1.11
He (St. John) had said, speaking of the old times, that “the world knew him not” ( ver. 10 ); afterwards he comes down in his narrative to the times of the proclamation (of the Gospel), and says, “He came to His own, and His own received Him not,” now calling the Jews “His own,” as His peculiar people, or perhaps even all mankind, as created by Him. And as above, when perplexed at the folly of the many, and ashamed of our common nature, he said that “the world by Him was made,” and having been made, did not recognize its Maker; so here again, being troubled beyond bearing at the stupidity of the Jews and the many, he sets forth the charge in a yet more striking manner, saying, that “His own received Him not,” and that too when “He came to them.” And not only he, but the prophets also, wondering, said the very same, as did afterwards Paul, amazed at the very same things. …
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).