Isaiah 25:2

WEB

For you have made a city into a heap, a fortified city into a ruin, a palace of strangers to be no city. It will never be built.

KJV

For thou hast made of a city an heap; of a defenced city a ruin: a palace of strangers to be no city; it shall never be built.

Commentary

For thou hast made of a city an heap,.... Which is to be understood, not of Samaria, nor of Jerusalem; rather of Babylon; though it is best to interpret it of the city of Rome, as Jerom says the Jews do; though they generally explain it of many cities, which shall be destroyed in the times of Gog and Magog, as Aben Ezra an d Kimchi; and so the Targum has it in the plural number; perhaps not only the city of Rome, but all the antichristian states, the cities of the nations, all within the Romish jurisdiction are meant; which shall all fall by the earthquake, sooner or later, and become a heap: of a defenced city, a ruin; or, "for a fall" (c); the same thing is meant as before: it designs the fall of mystical Babylon or Rome, called the great and mighty city, Rev 18:2 , a palace of strangers; which Kimchi interprets of Babylon, which, he says, was a palace to the cities of the Gentiles, who are called strangers; and it is said, that that city was originally built for strangers, that dwelt in tents, in Arabia Deserts; but it is best to understand it of Rome, as before, which is the palace of such who are aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, who have introduced a strange religion, and are the worshippers of strange gods, Dan 11:38 . The Targum renders it, "the house of the gods of the people in the city of Jerusalem;'' and this will be made to be no city, it shall never be built; any more, when once it is destroyed, signified by the angels casting a millstone into the sea, which shall never be taken up again, or found more, Rev 18:21 . (c) "in lapsum".