Isaiah 40:21Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Why does the prophet inquire: Do you not comprehend, do you not listen, have you not previously heard, have you not been taught, have you not grasped the very foundation of the earth? These truths should be known to you; you are expected to accept these declarations, not merely through hearsay, but having learned them from the beginning, as the essence of creation itself ought to have instructed you. Even though you struggle to perceive them and have received them from others, not just now, but from the very outset, I assert that your wrongdoing is without excuse. The prophet referred to the return from exile, cautioning against the notion that in seeking liberation from hardship and achieving peace, they might revert to their former sinful behavior. Thus, he provided commandments, as if they were pillars, to safeguard them from regressing into their past wickedness.

Having mocked the crafting of idols, he shifts his discourse towards the disgrace and reproach of those who have wandered off course, revealing their grievous mistake by asking: “Or did you not understand or hear?” instead of saying, “did you not understand, did you not hear?” He designates the ends and boundaries of the earth as its foundations, saying: “Understand,” he insists, “all who dwell upon it from edge to edge. Listen, for the message was first delivered to you: what was proclaimed? - That God, in His very nature, is one and only, while the deities forged by human hands are mere wood and stone, lacking any substance.

Do you not realize what has been made clear to every generation throughout time? Have you not been made aware of the wondrous deeds He has accomplished?

Will you not acknowledge it? Will you not listen? Has it not been announced to you from the very beginning? Have you not grasped the foundations of the earth? Initially, I instructed you through the creation around you, and subsequently, I bore witness through the law handed down by Moses, declaring that idols are meaningless and affirming that the Creator of the universe is God himself, who established the vastness of the earth upon the oceans and set it upon the rivers, so that a weighty mass could rest upon the light waters by God’s command.

True faithfulness Have I not instructed you from the start, He asks, regarding the ineffectiveness of false gods? Did you not see Who founded the earth firmly upon its base?

Through the practice of idolatry or worship of created images, even when representations of the true Divine are involved, the glory of the genuine God is diminished. By venerating an idol as if it were the Almighty Himself, worshippers confuse the lifeless creations of humanity with the Creator of all that exists. These idols hinder their perception of the Sovereign of heaven and earth, despite the fact that His creations and the truth of Revelation have borne witness to Him since the dawn of time. Have they failed to comprehend this witness? Have they not come to recognize and revere the One who established the foundations of the earth?