Isaiah Chapter 49 verse 12 Holy Bible

ASV Isaiah 49:12

Lo, these shall come from far; and, lo, these from the north and from the west; and these from the land of Sinim.
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BBE Isaiah 49:12

See, these are coming from far; and these from the north and the west; and these from the land of Sinim.
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DARBY Isaiah 49:12

Behold, these shall come from afar; and behold, these from the north and from the west; and these from the land of Sinim.
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KJV Isaiah 49:12

Behold, these shall come from far: and, lo, these from the north and from the west; and these from the land of Sinim.
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WBT Isaiah 49:12


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WEB Isaiah 49:12

Behold, these shall come from far; and, behold, these from the north and from the west; and these from the land of Sinim.
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YLT Isaiah 49:12

Lo, these from afar come in, And lo, these from the north, and from the sea, And these from the land of Sinim.
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Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerse 12. - These shall come from far. The nations shall flow in from all sides to the Redeemer's kingdom (Isaiah 2:2; Isaiah 11:10; Isaiah 60:1-5, etc.). They shall come from the north and from the west; literally, from the north and from the sea, which generally means "the west," but which, in one enumeration of the points of the compass (Psalm 107:3), is certainly "the south." They shall also come from the land of Sinim by which most recent interpreters understand China. But it is highly improbable that an ethnic name which was not known to the Greeks till the time of Ptolemy (A.D. 120) should have recoiled Palestine by B.C. 700. And if "the sea" means "the south" in the preceding clause, the Sinim may be these of Phoenicia (Genesis 10:17), who were among the furthest inhabitants of Asia towards the west. In any case, the reference is, not to the dispersed Jews, but to the remote Gentiles, who would pass from all quarters lute the kingdom of the Redeemer.

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(12) From the west.--Literally, from the sea, which commonly has this meaning. In Psalm 107:3, however, it clearly stands for the south, and is probably used in that sense here. In this case "from far" stands for the south, probably for the distant Ethiopia, where Jewish exiles had already found their way (Zephaniah 3:10).From the land of Sinim.--The region thus named is clearly the ultima Thule of the prophet's horizon, and this excludes the "Sinites" of Canaan (Genesis 10:17), and the Sin (Pelusium) of Egypt. Modern scholars are almost unanimous in making it refer to the Chinese. Ph?nician or Babylonian commerce may have made that people known, at least by name, to the prophet. Recent Chinese researches have brought to light traditions that in B.C. 2353 (and again in B.C. 1110) a people came from a strange western land, bringing with them a tortoise, on the shell of which was a history of the world, in strange characters "like tadpoles." It is inferred that this was a cuneiform inscription, and the theory has been recently maintained that this was the origin of the present Chinese mode of writing. (See Cheyne's "Excursus," 2 p. 20, and an elaborate article on "China and Assyria" in the Quarterly Review for October, 1882.) Porcelain with Chinese characters has been found, it may be added, in the ruins of the Egyptian Thebes (Wilkinson, Ancient Egyptians, 1st ser., iii. 106-109). All recent discoveries tend to the conclusion that the commerce of the great ancient monarchies was wider than scholars of the sixteenth century imagined. The actual immigration of Jews into China is believed to have taken place about B.C. 200 (Delitzsch in loc).