Isaiah 34:13, commentary and pictures

Literally it describes Edom laid waste, its rulers gone and its palaces and fortresses overgrown with thorns, nettles and brambles until the ruins become a dwelling for wild creatures. It is a type of the sin-cursed earth under God's judgment in the day of indignation upon all nations, the day of vengeance when the Lord comes and the nations are gathered to judgment. At Christ's second coming the living wicked are slain, the righteous are made immortal and ascend to heaven to reign with Christ, and the wicked dead remain unraised until the thousand years are ended. Through those thousand years the earth lies broken down and without inhabitant and incapable of supporting human life, its ruined palaces overgrown with thorny plants while the righteous are in heaven and the wicked dead are in their graves. Men and useful beasts are cut off, yet wild beasts, birds of prey and reptiles remain and multiply in the ruins, and Satan, having no nations to deceive, is confined to wander in that desolate wilderness regarded as the abode of demons. The unquenchable fire and smoke ascending forever ends in perpetual desolation with no man passing through, for what is consumed must finally cease to burn when nothing remains to support it, so the wicked perish utterly into smoke and forever here does not mean endless duration.

Context and Type

Literally the verse describes Idumea or Edom laid waste, its rulers and nobles gone, its palaces and fortresses overgrown with thorns, nettles and brambles, and its ruins become a dwelling for wild creatures. Its palaces and fortresses becoming desolate and wild is the picture of that ruin.

The verse belongs to a section of Isaiah, chapters 24-35, that looks especially toward the last days and God's judgments upon the earth. Prophecies concerning Babylon, Idumea and Jerusalem share features having a twofold application. The prophecy of the fall of Babylon is a bold type of the end of the world, and joined with chapter 35 on the return to Zion with songs and everlasting joy it is a type for the gospel dispensation in which all who return from Babylon are included.

Idumea or Edom is a type of the sin-cursed earth and its idolatrous dwellers, and of the world under God's just judgments. The desolation is applied not merely to the small literal land of ancient Idumea, but to the earth or a portion of it receiving God's judgments. That is in the day of indignation upon all nations, the day of vengeance and year of recompenses, when the Lord comes in vengeance, the nations face judgment, and they gather for the battle of the great day of God Almighty.

Millennial Desolation

At Christ's second coming the earth is left desolate, for the living wicked are slain in wrath to destroy sinners out of the land while the righteous are made immortal and ascend with the Lord to heaven to the Father's house and the eternal city, and the wicked dead remain unraised until the thousand years are ended. The overgrowth of thorns in palaces and of nettles and brambles in fortresses, made a habitation of dragons and a court for owls, describes an earth emptied of human life and naturally incapable of supporting human life. The righteous so taken ascend to the New Jerusalem to reign with Christ in the judgment of the wicked during the one thousand years. When Christ appears the living wicked are destroyed and the earth is left desolate, and Isaiah 34:8-15 shows that desolation comes when the wicked are destroyed at His coming.

That desolate condition continues through the thousand years between the two resurrections, with cities broken down and the whole land made desolate without inhabitant. Palaces and fortresses lie in ruins overgrown with thorns, nettles, and brambles while wild creatures use them for shelter and habitation, and no people are there. During that time the righteous are in heaven and the wicked dead remain in their graves until the close of the thousand years. The earth so lies waste and desolate after the Lord destroys man from off it in the day of indignation upon all nations, the day of vengeance and year of recompenses, and remains desolate during the thousand years.

Man and domestic or useful beasts are cut off, but animal and bird life is not extinct throughout the whole day of the Lord. The fire is not yet universal, so beasts and birds remain and multiply on the earth during the thousand years. The animals flee from Christ's presence when He comes while the wicked die, and their destruction at His coming does not mean animal life is extinct throughout the whole day of the Lord. What is left alive is wild beasts, birds of prey, and reptiles, even the most ferocious, doleful, revolting and horrible kinds, which shelter in the ruins. Idumea represents this desolate condition as a type of the earth during the millennium after people are destroyed, and the presence of birds there does not mean they are necessarily destroyed in the upheaval before the earth is entirely engulfed in flame at the end of that period.

The multiplied animal life increases during the thousand years of desolation and will provide food for the wicked when they come up at the end of the thousand years and the dead are raised. Then the saints descend with Christ and the holy city, the wicked dead are raised to surround the city and are destroyed by fire from heaven, and the earth becomes a lake of fire. The earth is left as desolate as the ruins of Carthage and Nineveh until the New Jerusalem descends and the earth is renewed. So Christ's return leaves the earth desolate while the righteous reign with Christ for a thousand years, before the wicked are raised and destroyed and God makes a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness.

During the thousand years Satan has no nations to deceive and is confined to the desolate earth, able to wander only there while all people are dead. The wilderness in its desolation is regarded as the peculiar abode of demons or evil spirits. The mate mentioned in Isaiah 34:15 refers to those wild animals and birds living among the ruined buildings, not to human marriage.

Doctrine and Warning

The burning of Edom with fire that shall not be quenched and smoke ascending forever ends in perpetual desolation where no man passes through, with thorns, nettles and brambles taking over its palaces and fortresses for dragons and owls. Fire that is never quenched and smoke that ascends forever can give place to utter desolation once everything has been consumed. Where smoke ascends, fire is consuming what produces the smoke, and what is consumed must finally cease to burn because at last nothing remains to support the fire. So also the ascent of the smoke of the wicked is testimony that they are consuming in torment, however slowly, until they perish utterly into smoke. The following chapter describes the same land blossoming and inhabited by the ransomed, showing that forever in this context does not mean endless duration.

The overgrown palaces and fortresses made a dwelling for dragons and owls show the earth in its desolated state with no people remaining there. After the judgment the land is not inhabited by people preaching the everlasting gospel, for its only hearers would be the wild creatures dwelling there. There would therefore be no human hearers of the gospel during the so-called glorious age to come after the Advent of the Lord.

The ruin of Idumea, with its rulers and nobles gone and its palaces and fortresses overgrown and desolate and inhabited by wild creatures, illustrates the destruction and desolation that follow rebellion against God. A near day of desolation is coming on the selfish rich who have no pity for the poor and steel their spirit to a brother's woe. Their glittering grand palaces will become mouldering piles where ivy clings and thorns grow, left for ages long with no human foot pacing the halls and no human voice waking an echo, as chambers of the dead. There the owl shall hoot, the satyr cry, the bat flit with noiseless wing, the prowling monster hide, and venomed serpents glide. This proves hoarded piles of shining gold worthless when gold rusts and the owner's frame lies in the dust.