Matthew Poole and continuators on Isaiah 58:10

10 And if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfie the afflicted soul ; then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noon day .

Or, open, as when we break open a Store, or Magazine to satisfie the wants of the needy, it implies Bounty and Liberality. A Phrase contrary to that of shutting up the Bowels, 1 Joh. 3. 17.

Thy affection, i. e. thy pity and compassion, a Metonymy of the Subject, as one that condoles with them in their misery; affectionately, and with delight, Rom. 12. 8. 2 Cor. 9. 7. God loves a chearful giver, as well as a liberal giver, not grudgingly, not of constraint, not because thou must, but because thou wilt, not out of necessity, but of choice: Compassion and Mercy in a work is more than the work of Mercy itself; for this is somthing only without a man but the other is somthing from within, and of himself: This argues a Sympathy, which the other doth not, all without this being as nothing, 1 Cor. 13. 3.

Here the Prophet notes the work that is to be done, as in the former Expression the affection wherewith it is to be done, otherwise it would be no more than what the Apostle Iames reproves, Iam. 2. 15, 16. and the Psalmist joyns them both together, Psal. 37. 21. And then further it implies a compleat and proportionable answering of his wants, that the supply answer the necessity, that is, be such as may satisfie, not barely keep him from starving.

i. e. The person afflicted with wants.

This is the same promise, and expressed in the same figure, as in ver. 8. See the same phrase opened there. The Hebrews delight to express the same things often by a little altering of the phrase; onely here it seems to be carried to an higher degree: There the Light shall break forth, but here Light shall be in obscurity.

In the very darkness of the affliction itself thou shalt have comfort, Psal. 112. 4. There it shall be as the morning still increa sing here as the noon-day in its Zenith, and height of perfection, which shall be without so much as any shadow of affliction▪