(3) Ye sons of the sorceress.--The words may be purely figurative, as meaning those who practise sorcery, but it is also possible that they may have reference to the female soothsayers, such as are described in Ezekiel 13:17-23.

The adulterer.--Here again the epithet may have had both a figurative and a literal application. (Comp. Matthew 12:39; Matthew 16:4; James 4:4.)

Verses 3-14. - ISRAEL SEVERELY REBUKED FOR IDOLATRY. Though Hezekiah had made a great reformation of religion when he ascended the throne(2 Kings 18:4; 2 Chronicles 29:3-19), and had done his best to put down idolatry, yet it was still dear to large numbers among the people, and was easily revived by Manasseh in the earlier portion of his reign (2 Chronicles 33:2-9). Isaiah now rebukes various kinds of idolatrous practices, and shows the vanity of them. Verse 3. - Draw near hither. Approach, to hear the reprimand which ye so well deserve. Ye sons of the sorceress; rather, of a sorceress. Judah herself, the nation, is the" sorceress" and "adulteress," whose individual children are summoned to draw near. She is an adulteress; for she has transgressed against the mystic marriage-tie which bound her to Jehovah (see Isaiah 54:5, and the comment ad lot.). She is also a "sorceress," since she has bewitched her children, and given herself up to magical as well as to idolatrous practices (2 Chronicles 33:6). Seed of the adulterer and the whore; rather, seed of an adulteress, and that thyself committest whoredom. The congenital tendency has broken out into act. The Israel addressed is as "adulterous," i.e. idolatrous, as the Israel of former times.

57:3-12 The Lord here calls apostates and hypocrites to appear before him. When reproved for their sins, and threatened with judgments, they ridiculed the word of God. The Jews were guilty of idolatry before the captivity; but not after that affliction. Their zeal in the worship of false gods, may shame our indifference in the worship of the true God. The service of sin is disgraceful slavery; those who thus debase themselves to hell, will justly have their portion there. Men incline to a religion that inflames their unholy passions. They are led to do any evil, however great or vile, if they think it will atone for crimes, or purchase indulgence for some favourite lust. This explains idolatry, whether pagan, Jewish, or antichristian. But those who set up anything instead of God, for their hope and confidence, never will come to a right end. Those who forsake the only right way, wander in a thousand by-paths. The pleasures of sin soon tire, but never satisfy. Those who care not for the word of God and his providences, show they have no fear of God. Sin profits not; it ruins and destroys.But draw near hither,.... The death of the righteous, and their happiness after it, being observed: the wicked, who thought themselves safe from danger, and the happier that they were rid of the righteous, those witnesses and prophets which had tormented them, and therefore rejoiced on that account, are here summoned to the divine tribunal, to hear their character, and receive their doom, as follows:

ye sons of the sorceress; the children of Jezebel, the witch, and the prophetess that taught the servants of the Lord to commit fornication, and bewitched with her witchcrafts the sons of the apostate church of Rome; by whose sorceries all nations have been deceived, and of which she repents not, Revelation 2:20,

the seed of the adulterer and of the whore; of the great whore of Babylon, with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication; and whose subjects and children are the seed of this whore, and the sons of this idolatrous church: or, "that committeth whoredom" (g); which aggravates the character, that they were not only the children of adulterous persons, but committed whoredom themselves.

(g) "qua scortata est", Piscator; "quod scortaris", Junius & Tremellius; "qui scortaris", Cocceius.