2. "The ground of consolation is too _general_. The Messiah might be born from the family of Ahaz without the Jewish state being preserved in its then existing condition, and without Ahaz continuing on the throne. The Babylonish captivity intervened, and yet Messiah was to be born. Isaiah would thus have made himself guilty of a false sophistical argumentation."--We answer: What they, at that time, feared, was the total destruction of state and people. This appears sufficiently from the circumstance that the prophet takes his son Shearjashub with him; and indeed the intentions of the enemy in this respect are expressed with sufficient clearness in ver. 6. It is this _extreme_ of fear which the Prophet here first opposes. Just as, according to the preceding verses, he met the fear of entire destruction by taking with him his son Shearjashub, "the remnant will be converted," without thereby excluding a temporary carrying away, so he there also prepares the mind for the announcement contained in vers. 15, 16, of the near deliverance from the present danger, by first representing the fear of an entire destruction to be unfounded. A people, moreover, to whom, at some future period, although it may be at a very remote future, a divine _Saviour_ is to be sent, must, in the present also, be under special divine protection. They may be visited by severe sufferings, they may be brought to the very verge of destruction,--whether that shall be the case the Prophet does not, as yet, declare,--but one thing is sure, that to them all things must work together for good; and that is the main point. He who is convinced of this, may calmly and quietly look at the course of events.