Isaiah 43:3

Just as in Isa 43:1, kı̄ (for), with all that follows, assigns the reason for the encouraging "Fear not;" so here a second kı̄ introduces the reason for the promise which ensures them against the dangers arising from either water or fire. "For I Jehovah am thy God; (I) the Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour: I give up Egypt as a ransom for thee, Ethiopia and Seba in thy stead. Because thou art dear in my eyes, highly esteemed, and I loved thee; I give up men in thy stead, and peoples for thy life." Both "Jehovah" and "the Holy One of Israel" are in apposition to "I" ('ănı̄), the force of which is continued in the second clause. The preterite nâthattı̄ (I have given), as the words "I will give" in Isa 43:4 clearly show, states a fact which as yet is only completed so far as the purpose is concerned. "A ransom:" kōpher (λύτρον) is literally the covering - the person making the payment. סבא is the land of Mero, which is enclosed between the White and Blue Nile, the present Dr Sennr, district of Sennr (Sen-rti, i.e., island of Sen), or the ancient Meriotic priestly state settled about this enclosed land, probably included in the Mudrya (Egypt) of the Achaemenidian arrowheaded inscriptions; though it is uncertain whether the Kusiya (Heb. Kūshı̄m) mentioned there are the predatory tribe of archers called Κοσσαῖοι (Strabo, xi. 13, 6), whose name has been preserved in the present Chuzistan, the eastern Ethiopians of the Greeks (as Lassen and Rawlinson suppose), or the African Ethiopians of the Bible, as Oppert imagines. The fact that Egypt was only conquered by Cambyses, and not by Cyrus, who merely planned it (Herod. i. 153), and to whom it is only attributed by a legend (Xen. Cyr. viii. 6, 20, λἐγεται καταστρἐψσασθαι Αἰγυπτον), does no violence to the truth of the promi…

The contents of this chapter are much the same with those of the foregoing chapter, looking at the release of the Jews out of their captivity, but looking through that, and beyond that, to the great work of man's redemption by Jesus Christ, and the grace of the gospel, which through him believers partake of. Here are, I. Precious promises made to God's people in their affliction, of his presence with them, for their support under it, and their deliverance out of it (Isa 43:1-7). II. A challenge to idols to vie with the omniscience and omnipotence of God (Isa 43:8-13). III. Encouragement given to the people of God to hope for their deliverance out of Babylon, from the consideration of what God did for their fathers when he brought them out of Egypt (Isa 43:14-21). IV. A method taken to prepare the people for their deliverance, by putting them in mind of their sins, by which they had provoked God to send them into captivity and continue them there, that they might repent and seek to God for pardoning mercy (Isa 43:22-28).