(11) The vision of all . . .--Better, the whole vision, i.e., the entire substance of Isaiah's teaching. The words perhaps imply that this had been committed to writing, but that to the unbelievers they were as "the roll of a sealed book." The same imagery meets us in Revelation 5:2. The wise of this world treated its dark sayings as seals, which forbade their making any attempt to study it. The poorer unlearned class could plead a more genuine and less guilty ignorance, but the effect was the same with both.

Verse 11. - The vision of all; i.e. "the entire vision" - all that Isaiah has put before them in vers. 1-8. As the words of a book that is sealed; rather, the words of a letter (marginal rendering) or writing. Written documents were often sealed up to secure secrecy, the sealing being done in various ways. When the writing was on a clay tablet, it was often enclosed in a clay envelope, so that the document could not be read till the outer clay covering was broken. Rolls of papyrus or parchment were secured differently. One that is learned; i.e. "one that can read writing," which the ordinary Jew could not do, any more than the ordinary European in the Middle Ages. Neither the learned nor the unlearned Jews would be able to understand Isaiah's prophecy, so as to realize and accept its literal truth. They were devoid of spiritual discernment. Even the rulers were but "blind loaders of the blind."

29:9-16 The security of sinners in sinful ways, is cause for lamentation and wonder. The learned men, through prejudice, said that the Divine prophecies were obscure; and the poor urged their want of learning. The Bible is a sealed book to every man, learned or unlearned, till he begins to study it with a simple heart and a teachable spirit, that he may thence learn the truth and the will of God. To worship God, is to approach him. And if the heart be full of his love and fear, out of the abundance of it the mouth will speak; but there are many whose religion is lip-labour only. When they pretend to be speaking to God, they are thinking of a thousand foolish things. They worship the God of Israel according to their own devices. Numbers are only formal in worship. And their religion is only to comply with custom, and to serve their own interest. But the wanderings of mind, and defects in devotion, which are the believer's burden, are very different from the withdrawing of the heart from God, so severely blamed. And those who make religion no more than a pretence, to serve a turn, deceive themselves. And as those that quarrel with God, so those that think to conceal themselves from him, in effect charge him with folly. But all their perverse conduct shall be entirely done away.And the vision of all is become unto you as the words of a book that is sealed,.... The prophecies of all the prophets contained in the Scriptures; or all the prophecies in the book of Isaiah, concerning the Messiah, were no more seen, known, and understood, both by the priests and the people, than if they had been in a book, written, rolled up, and sealed. And this was owing, not to the obscurity of these writings, or because they were really sealed up, but to the blindness and stupidity of the people, whose eyes were closed, and their heads covered; and the prophecies of the Scriptures were only so to them, "unto you", not unto others; not to the apostles of Christ, whose understandings were opened by him, to understand the things written concerning him, in the law, in the prophets, and in the psalms; but the Jewish rulers, civil and ecclesiastical, as well as the common people, understood them not, though they were the means of fulfilling many of them; and they were as ignorant of the prophecies concerning their own ruin and destruction, for their rejection of Christ; see Luke 24:27,

which men deliver to one that is learned; or, "that knows the book" (u); or "letters", as the Septuagint; see John 7:15 such were the Scribes, called or "letter men", men that could read well, and understood language:

saying, Read this, I pray thee; or read this now, as the Targum, and interpret it, and tell the meaning of it:

and he saith, I cannot, for it is sealed; which Kimchi says was an excuse invented, because he had no mind to read it, or otherwise he could have said, open, and I will read it; or he might have broke off the seal; but knowing there were difficult things, and things hard to be understood, in it, did not care to look into it, and read it, and attempt to explain it to others.

(u) "scienti librum", Montanus; , Sept.; "scienti literas", V. L. Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Cocceius.