Isaiah,

4 definitions found

From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  Isaiah
       n 1: (Old Testament) the first of the major Hebrew prophets (8th
            century BC)
       2: an Old Testament book consisting of Isaiah's prophecies
          [syn: {Book of Isaiah}]



From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:

  21 Moby Thesaurus words for "Isaiah":
     Abraham, Amos, Daniel, Ezekiel, Haggai, Hosea, Isaac, Jacob,
     Jeremiah, Joel, Jonah, Joseph, Joshua, Malachi, Micah, Moses,
     Nahum, Samuel, Zephaniah, prophet, vates sacer
  
  

From Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary [easton]:

  Isaiah
     (Heb. Yesh'yahu, i.e., "the salvation of Jehovah"). (1.) The son
     of Amoz (Isa. 1:1; 2:1), who was apparently a man of humble
     rank. His wife was called "the prophetess" (8:3), either because
     she was endowed with the prophetic gift, like Deborah (Judg.
     4:4) and Huldah (2 Kings 22:14-20), or simply because she was
     the wife of "the prophet" (Isa. 38:1). He had two sons, who bore
     symbolical names.
     
       He exercised the functions of his office during the reigns of
     Uzziah (or Azariah), Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah (1:1). Uzziah
     reigned fifty-two years (B.C. 810-759), and Isaiah must have
     begun his career a few years before Uzziah's death, probably
     B.C. 762. He lived till the fourteenth year of Hezekiah, and in
     all likelihood outlived that monarch (who died B.C. 698), and
     may have been contemporary for some years with Manasseh. Thus
     Isaiah may have prophesied for the long period of at least
     sixty-four years.
     
       His first call to the prophetical office is not recorded. A
     second call came to him "in the year that King Uzziah died"
     (Isa. 6:1). He exercised his ministry in a spirit of
     uncompromising firmness and boldness in regard to all that bore
     on the interests of religion. He conceals nothing and keeps
     nothing back from fear of man. He was also noted for his
     spirituality and for his deep-toned reverence toward "the holy
     One of Israel."
     
       In early youth Isaiah must have been moved by the invasion of
     Israel by the Assyrian monarch Pul (q.v.), 2 Kings 15:19; and
     again, twenty years later, when he had already entered on his
     office, by the invasion of Tiglath-pileser and his career of
     conquest. Ahaz, king of Judah, at this crisis refused to
     co-operate with the kings of Israel and Syria in opposition to
     the Assyrians, and was on that account attacked and defeated by
     Rezin of Damascus and Pekah of Samaria (2 Kings 16:5; 2 Chr.
     28:5, 6). Ahaz, thus humbled, sided with Assyria, and sought the
     aid of Tiglath-pileser against Israel and Syria. The consequence
     was that Rezin and Pekah were conquered and many of the people
     carried captive to Assyria (2 Kings 15:29; 16:9; 1 Chr. 5:26).
     Soon after this Shalmaneser determined wholly to subdue the
     kingdom of Israel. Samaria was taken and destroyed (B.C. 722).
     So long as Ahaz reigned, the kingdom of Judah was unmolested by
     the Assyrian power; but on his accession to the throne, Hezekiah
     (B.C. 726), who "rebelled against the king of Assyria" (2 Kings
     18:7), in which he was encouraged by Isaiah, who exhorted the
     people to place all their dependence on Jehovah (Isa. 10:24;
     37:6), entered into an alliance with the king of Egypt (Isa.
     30:2-4). This led the king of Assyria to threaten the king of
     Judah, and at length to invade the land. Sennacherib (B.C. 701)
     led a powerful army into Palestine. Hezekiah was reduced to
     despair, and submitted to the Assyrians (2 Kings 18:14-16). But
     after a brief interval war broke out again, and again
     Sennacherib (q.v.) led an army into Palestine, one detachment of
     which threatened Jerusalem (Isa. 36:2-22; 37:8). Isaiah on that
     occasion encouraged Hezekiah to resist the Assyrians (37:1-7),
     whereupon Sennacherib sent a threatening letter to Hezekiah,
     which he "spread before the Lord" (37:14). The judgement of God
     now fell on the Assyrian host. "Like Xerxes in Greece,
     Sennacherib never recovered from the shock of the disaster in
     Judah. He made no more expeditions against either Southern
     Palestine or Egypt." The remaining years of Hezekiah's reign
     were peaceful (2 Chr. 32:23, 27-29). Isaiah probably lived to
     its close, and possibly into the reign of Manasseh, but the time
     and manner of his death are unknown. There is a tradition that
     he suffered martyrdom in the heathen reaction in the time of
     Manasseh (q.v.).
     
       (2.) One of the heads of the singers in the time of David (1
     Chr. 25:3,15, "Jeshaiah").
     
       (3.) A Levite (1 Chr. 26:25).
     
       (4.) Ezra 8:7.
     
       (5.) Neh. 11:7.
     

From Hitchcock's Bible Names Dictionary (late 1800's) [hitchcock]:

  Isaiah, the salvation of the Lord