(18) As I have punished the king of Assyria.--Nineveh had fallen before Cyaxares and Nabopolassar, and Babylon was in like manner to fall before Cyrus. The one judgment was the pledge and earnest of the other.

50:8-20 The desolation that shall be brought upon Babylon is set forth in a variety of expressions. The cause of this destruction is the wrath of the Lord. Babylon shall be wholly desolated; for she hath sinned against the Lord. Sin makes men a mark for the arrows of God's judgments. The mercy promised to the Israel of God, shall not only accompany, but arise from the destruction of Babylon. These sheep shall be gathered from the deserts, and put again into good pasture. All who return to God and their duty, shall find satisfaction of soul in so doing. Deliverances out of trouble are comforts indeed, when fruits of the forgiveness of sin.Therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel,.... Because of this cruel treatment of his people, whose God he was; and being the Lord of hosts, and able to avenge himself on their enemies, he threatens as follows:

behold, I will punish the king of Babylon and his land; not Nebuchadnezzar, but a successor of his, Belshazzar, who was slain the night Babylon was taken:

as I have punished the king of Assyria; not Shalmaneser, that carried the tribes captive; but a successor of his, Chynilidanus, the last king of Assyria; who was killed when Nineveh was taken, the metropolis of Assyria, and which was done before this prophecy was delivered. These two kings may figuratively design the Turk and Pope, who will both be destroyed at, or just before, the conversion of the Jews, and their return to their own land; which is prophesied of in Jeremiah 50:19.