Discovery BoxIsaiah 9:4 
Context9:4 For their oppressive yoke
and the club that strikes their shoulders,
the cudgel the oppressor uses on them, 1
you have shattered, as in the day of Midian’s defeat. 2
Isaiah 14:29
Context14:29 Don’t be so happy, all you Philistines,
just because the club that beat you has been broken! 3
For a viper will grow out of the serpent’s root,
and its fruit will be a darting adder. 4
1 tn Heb “for the yoke of his burden, and the staff of his shoulder, the scepter of the oppressor against him.” The singular pronouns are collective, referring to the people. The oppressed nation is compared to an ox weighed down by a heavy yoke and an animal that is prodded and beaten.
2 sn This alludes to Gideon’s victory over Midian (Judg 7-8), when the Lord delivered Israel from an oppressive foreign invader.
3 sn The identity of this “club” (also referred to as a “serpent” in the next line) is uncertain. It may refer to an Assyrian king, or to Ahaz. For discussion see J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah (NICOT), 1:331-32. The viper/adder referred to in the second half of the verse is his successor.
4 tn Heb “flying burning one.” The designation “burning one” may allude to the serpent’s appearance or the effect of its poisonous bite. (See the note at 6:2.) The qualifier “flying” probably refers to the serpent’s quick, darting movements, though one might propose a homonym here, meaning “biting.” (See J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah [NICOT], 1:332, n. 18.) Some might think in terms of a mythological flying, fire breathing dragon (cf. NAB “a flying saraph”; CEV “a flying fiery dragon”), but this proposal does not make good sense in 30:6, where the phrase “flying burning one” appears again in a list of desert animals.
