Instead of drawing ever closer to God and walking with Him, they were estranged from Him. They veered ever further from the pathway of holiness. Hosea, a contemporary of Isaiah, commented mournfully that “Israel slideth back as a backsliding heifer” (Hosea 4:16).

 A favorite expression of Isaiah. He uses it altogether 25 times, as compared with only 6 by all other OT writers. When Isaiah first saw God in vision, seated upon His throne, he also heard the angelic choir singing, “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts” (ch. 6:3). The holy character of God made a deep impression upon the prophet. He recognized God as, above all else, a holy being, and aspired to be like Him. Henceforth, Isaiah’s great task in life was to keep before Israel a picture of the holiness of God and the importance of putting away sin and striving earnestly for holiness of life.

 Divine love “is not easily provoked” (Cor. 13:5; cf. Eze. 18:23, 31, 32; 2 Peter 3:9), but Israel had so spurned Gods’s grace and so disregarded His precepts that He could no longer bear with them without denying His own character and confirming them in their evil ways.

 That is, in preference for another master, the prince of evil (see on John 8:44).

 See on ch. 5:4. They who might have been an “holy seed” (ch. 6:13) became an evil plant producing worthless fruit.

 The very ones God had chosen to be “an holy people” unto Him (Deut. 14:2) had become a sinful nation. Ingratitude for the blessings bestowed upon them was the cause of their unholy state (see on Deut. 8:10-20; Hosea 2:8, 9; Rom. 1:21, 22). Forgetting God as the giver of the good things they enjoyed, they became openly apostate and flagrantly disobedient. Negative forgetfulness developed into positive rebellion.