Personified Daughter Zion

Personified Daughter Zion (Isaiah 47: 1-15; 49: 14 – 50: 3; 51: 17 – 52: 12; 54: 1-17)

Babylon’s fall is imagined throughout Isaiah 41–48, climaxing in chapter 47, where Daughter Babylon herself is taunted. Once tender and delicate, she will now sit throneless in the dust. She will be forced to hard labor, her nakedness uncovered. Arrogant Babylon, who assumed she would never know suffering such as she has inflicted, will now be widowed, bereft, and helpless. Babylon’s fall parallels the suffering she once inflicted on Daughter Zion (see, e.g., Lam. 1:1). This vision foreshadows Zion’s rise…