Isaiah 45

To His Anointed, to Cyrus

The Lord calls a Persian king His anointed, declares that He alone made light and darkness, and invites all the ends of the earth to look to Him and be saved.

Addressed to the exiles, c. 545–539 BC Read with footnotes in Gospel Library

Background

Chapter 44 ended by naming Cyrus. Chapter 45 opens with a formal commission addressed to him: an oracle of the kind ancient Near Eastern gods spoke to the kings they installed.

Chapter 44 ended by naming Cyrus. Chapter 45 opens with a formal commission addressed to him: an oracle of the kind ancient Near Eastern gods spoke to the kings they installed. The language is royal and startling. Cyrus is the Lord’s māšîaḥ, His “anointed,” the word from which Messiah comes. He is the only non-Israelite in the Bible to be given that title.

The comparison with Cyrus’s own propaganda is illuminating. After he took Babylon in 539 BC, Cyrus issued a proclamation on a clay barrel, now called the Cyrus Cylinder, in which Babylon’s god Marduk searched for a righteous king, “took the hand” of Cyrus, and “called his name” to rule the world. Isaiah 45 uses almost the same language: the Lord holds Cyrus’s right hand (verse 1) and calls him by name (verses 3–4). The two texts make opposite claims with the same vocabulary. The Cylinder credits Marduk. Isaiah insists that the Lord did it, “though thou hast not known me.”

The rest of the chapter widens from Cyrus to the whole world. It contains several of the Bible’s strongest statements that there is only one God (verses 5–7, 14, 18, 21–22), and it ends with an invitation to all nations and a vision of every knee bowing.

The thread through the chapter

Isaiah 45 is about a God who works through people who don’t know Him, and wants to be known by everyone.

Isaiah 45 is about a God who works through people who don’t know Him, and wants to be known by everyone.

The Lord takes Cyrus by the hand, levels his road, breaks open bronze gates, and gives him hidden treasure (verses 1–3). Why? Not for Cyrus’s sake, but “for Jacob my servant’s sake” (verse 4), and so that people everywhere “may know… that there is none beside me” (verse 6). Cyrus is the instrument, and he doesn’t even know whose hand is holding his.

Some in Israel apparently objected. A pagan king as God’s anointed? The Lord answers with a potter’s rebuke: does the clay tell the potter what to make? (verses 9–13). God is free to choose His instruments.

Then the vision grows. The nations come to Israel and confess, “Surely God is in thee” (verse 14). The prophet marvels at a God who hides Himself and yet saves (verse 15). The Lord insists that He didn’t create the earth to be empty but to be inhabited (verse 18), and that He hasn’t spoken in secret (verse 19). And finally He turns to the whole world: “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth” (verse 22). He swears by Himself that every knee will bow and every tongue confess (verse 23).

The chapter begins with one foreign king who didn’t know the Lord. It ends with every nation invited to know Him.

Tap any highlighted phrase to open a note beneath its versein the margin.

Verses 1–7

Cyrus, the Lord’s anointed

In plain words

This is what the Lord says to His anointed one, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have taken hold of to subdue nations before him, to strip kings of their armor, to open doors before him so that the city gates will not be shut: “I will go before you and level the mountains. I will shatter the bronze doors and cut through the iron bars. I will give you treasures hidden in the dark and riches stored in secret places, so that you will know that I, the Lord, the God of Israel, am the One who calls you by name. For the sake of Jacob My servant and Israel My chosen one, I have called you by name. I have given you a title of honor, though you don’t know Me. I am the Lord, and there is no other. Besides Me there is no God. I will strengthen you, though you don’t know Me, so that people from the rising of the sun to its setting will know that there is no one but Me. I am the Lord, and there is no other. I form light and create darkness. I make prosperity and create disaster. I, the Lord, do all these things.”

1 Thus saith the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden, to subdue nations before him; and I will loose the loins of kings, to open before him the two leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut;

History & Setting #

A pagan messiah

The word “anointed” is māšîaḥ, from māšaḥ, “to smear with oil.” In the Old Testament it describes kings (Saul, David, and their successors, 1 Sam. 24:6; Ps. 2:2), priests (Lev.…

The word “anointed” is māšîaḥ, from māšaḥ, “to smear with oil.” In the Old Testament it describes kings (Saul, David, and their successors, 1 Sam. 24:6; Ps. 2:2), priests (Lev. 4:3), and once, figuratively, the patriarchs (Ps. 105:15). It became the title of the expected deliverer, “the Messiah,” and in Greek Christos. Cyrus was never literally anointed with oil by an Israelite prophet. The title means that the Lord appointed him to a royal task.

The parallels with the Cyrus Cylinder are close enough that scholars regularly set the two texts side by side. The Cylinder says that Marduk searched all lands for a righteous king of his choosing, took Cyrus of Anshan by the hand, called him by name, and proclaimed him ruler of the world. Isaiah says the Lord holds Cyrus’s right hand and calls him by name. Both texts use standard Mesopotamian royal language. The difference is the claim about who did the choosing.

Many scholars take the similarity as evidence that the author of Isaiah 45 knew Babylonian royal ideology firsthand. Either way, the chapter is a bold piece of theological counter-propaganda: the God who chose Cyrus is not Marduk, but the God of the small nation whose temple Marduk’s city had burned.

Sources: The Cyrus Cylinder, British Museum, London, museum no. 90920. “Cyrus”, Bible Dictionary. Shalom M. Paul, Isaiah 40–66: Translation and Commentary, Eerdmans Critical Commentary. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012. Joseph Blenkinsopp, Isaiah, Anchor Bible, 3 vols. New York: Doubleday, 2000–2003.

2 I will go before thee, and make the crooked places straight: I will break in pieces the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron:

History & Setting #

Gates of bronze and hidden treasures

“Brass” in the KJV usually means bronze. Herodotus (Histories 1.179) says Babylon’s great wall had a hundred gates, all of bronze, with bronze posts and lintels.

“Brass” in the KJV usually means bronze. Herodotus (Histories 1.179) says Babylon’s great wall had a hundred gates, all of bronze, with bronze posts and lintels. The picture of the Lord smashing bronze doors and iron bars fits the city Cyrus was about to enter. (In the event, the Babylonian chronicles report that the city opened without a battle, so the doors were not so much smashed as opened, which fits verse 1 even better: “the gates shall not be shut.”)

The “treasures of darkness” (verse 3) were real too. Cyrus’s conquest of Lydia around 547 BC gave him the legendary treasury of King Croesus of Sardis, whose wealth became proverbial (“rich as Croesus”). Babylon’s wealth followed. The Lord says He gave these riches to Cyrus so that he would know who was behind his success. There is no evidence that Cyrus drew that conclusion.

Sources: James B. Pritchard, ed., Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament, 3rd ed. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969.

3 And I will give thee the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that thou mayest know that I, the LORD, which call thee by thy name, am the God of Israel.

4 For Jacob my servant’s sake, and Israel mine elect, I have even called thee by thy name: I have surnamed thee, though thou hast not known me.

Liken It #

“Though thou hast not known me”

Twice the Lord says it: “though thou hast not known me” (verses 4 and 5).

Twice the Lord says it: “though thou hast not known me” (verses 4 and 5). Cyrus was not a convert. By all the evidence he honored the gods of every land he ruled. The Lord guided and strengthened him anyway, for the sake of Israel.

This is a profound and humbling truth. God works through people who don’t acknowledge Him: governments, scientists, artists, reformers. Nephi saw in vision a Gentile man “wrought upon” by the Spirit of God who crossed the waters to the promised land (1 Ne. 13:12), and other Gentiles “wrought upon” to go forth out of captivity (1 Ne. 13:13). Latter-day Saints have long seen the hand of God in the religious freedom of the United States Constitution, which the Lord says He established “by the hands of wise men whom I raised up unto this very purpose” (D&C 101:80), men who didn’t share Latter-day Saint beliefs.

The flip side is sobering. It is possible to be used by God without knowing Him. Cyrus accomplished the Lord’s purposes and never came to know the Lord. Being useful isn’t the same as being His.

5 I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me: I girded thee, though thou hast not known me:

6 That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the LORD, and there is none else.

7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

Word & Language #

“I make peace, and create evil”

This verse has troubled readers for centuries. Does God create evil? The Hebrew word raʿ has a wide range of meaning.

This verse has troubled readers for centuries. Does God create evil?

The Hebrew word raʿ has a wide range of meaning. It can mean moral evil, but it often means disaster or calamity, as when God “repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them” in Nineveh (Jonah 3:10), where “evil” is rāʿâ. Here it stands opposite šālôm, “peace,” in the sense of well-being. Most modern translations render it “I make weal and create woe” (NRSV) or “I bring prosperity and create disaster” (NIV). The point is not that God authors sin, but that nothing, neither light nor darkness, prosperity nor catastrophe, lies outside His sovereignty. Amos said the same: “shall there be evil in a city, and the LORD hath not done it?” (Amos 3:6).

Many scholars also hear a polemic against a dualistic view of the world, in which a good god and an evil god are locked in combat. That was a central idea of Zoroastrianism, the Persian religion. Whether Cyrus himself was a Zoroastrian is debated. But the statement could hardly be clearer: there is no second power alongside the Lord.

Latter-day Saints may think of Lehi’s teaching that “it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things” (2 Ne. 2:11), and of Mormon’s clarification that “all things which are good cometh of God; and that which is evil cometh of the devil” (Moro. 7:12). God permits opposition and uses calamity, but He is not the source of sin.

Sources: Shalom M. Paul, Isaiah 40–66: Translation and Commentary, Eerdmans Critical Commentary. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012. Francis Brown, S. R. Driver, and Charles A. Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1906.

Verses 8–13

The potter and the clay

In plain words

“Heavens, rain down righteousness from above; let the clouds pour it out. Let the earth open up so that salvation can sprout and righteousness spring up with it. I, the Lord, have created it. Woe to anyone who argues with his Maker, one clay pot among many on the ground! Does the clay say to the potter, ‘What are you making?’ or ‘Your work has no handles’? Woe to the one who says to his father, ‘What are you fathering?’ or to his mother, ‘What are you giving birth to?’” This is what the Lord says, the Holy One of Israel and its Maker: “Will you question Me about My children, or give Me orders about the work of My hands? I made the earth and created mankind on it. My own hands stretched out the heavens, and I commanded all their stars. I have stirred up Cyrus for a righteous purpose, and I will make all his paths straight. He will rebuild My city and set My exiles free, not for payment or bribe,” says the Lord of hosts.

8 Drop down, ye heavens, from above, and let the skies pour down righteousness: let the earth open, and let them bring forth salvation, and let righteousness spring up together; I the LORD have created it.

Restoration Insight #

Righteousness from heaven, truth from the earth

This verse is a small hymn in the middle of the Cyrus oracle. Righteousness rains down from heaven, and the earth opens and salvation sprouts up to meet it.

This verse is a small hymn in the middle of the Cyrus oracle. Righteousness rains down from heaven, and the earth opens and salvation sprouts up to meet it. The Latin Vulgate rendered it memorably: Rorate caeli desuper… aperiatur terra et germinet Salvatorem, “Drop down, ye heavens… let the earth be opened and bud forth a Savior.” The Rorate caeli became a traditional Advent chant sung before Christmas.

A similar image appears in Ps. 85:11: “Truth shall spring out of the earth; and righteousness shall look down from heaven.” Latter-day Saints know a revealed version of it in the Lord’s words to Enoch about the last days: “righteousness will I send down out of heaven; and truth will I send forth out of the earth, to bear testimony of mine Only Begotten” (Moses 7:62). Church leaders have read that as a prophecy of the Restoration: revelation from heaven and the Book of Mormon brought forth out of the ground.

In Isaiah’s own setting, the verse announces that the deliverance Cyrus will bring is God’s own righteousness breaking into the world.

9 Woe unto him that striveth with his Maker! Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the earth. Shall the clay say to him that fashioneth it, What makest thou? or thy work, He hath no hands?

Imagery & Symbol #

The clay talks back

Some in Israel apparently objected to the idea that God would use a foreign king to save them.

Some in Israel apparently objected to the idea that God would use a foreign king to save them. The Lord answers with an image Isaiah used earlier (Isa. 29:16) and Jeremiah developed at the potter’s house (Jer. 18:1–6). A pot has no business telling the potter what to make.

There’s humor in the second question: “thy work, He hath no hands?” The Hebrew probably means “Your work has no handles,” that is, You made a pot without handles; what kind of potter are you? The clay is criticizing the craftsmanship.

Paul uses this passage when he discusses why God chose Israel and then extended mercy to the Gentiles: “Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?” (Rom. 9:20). The point in both places is not that God is arbitrary, but that His purposes are larger than our categories. He can call Cyrus, and He can call the Gentiles.

10 Woe unto him that saith unto his father, What begettest thou? or to the woman, What hast thou brought forth?

11 Thus saith the LORD, the Holy One of Israel, and his Maker, Ask me of things to come concerning my sons, and concerning the work of my hands command ye me.

Word & Language #

“Command ye me”?

The KJV makes this sound like an invitation: Ask Me, command Me. Some readers have connected it with the Lord’s promise that He is “bound when ye do what I say” (D&C 82:10).

The KJV makes this sound like an invitation: Ask Me, command Me. Some readers have connected it with the Lord’s promise that He is “bound when ye do what I say” (D&C 82:10).

In context, though, the verse is almost certainly a rebuke, continuing the potter’s argument of verses 9–10. The Hebrew can be read as a question, and most modern translations do: “Will you question me about my children, or give me orders about the work of my hands?” (NRSV, NIV). The Lord is not inviting Israel to command Him. He is asking, with some irony, whether they intend to.

This is a good example of how a verse can mean something true in general while meaning something different in its own context. It is true that the Lord invites us to ask (Matt. 7:7). But this verse is about humility before the Maker, not about leverage over Him.

Sources: Shalom M. Paul, Isaiah 40–66: Translation and Commentary, Eerdmans Critical Commentary. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012.

12 I have made the earth, and created man upon it: I, even my hands, have stretched out the heavens, and all their host have I commanded.

13 I have raised him up in righteousness, and I will direct all his ways: he shall build my city, and he shall let go my captives, not for price nor reward, saith the LORD of hosts.

Verses 14–17

“Surely God is in thee”

In plain words

This is what the Lord says: “The wealth of Egypt, the goods of Cush, and the tall Sabeans will come over to you and be yours. They will follow you in chains. They will bow down to you and plead with you, saying, ‘Surely God is with you, and there is no other. There is no other God.’” Truly, You are a God who hides Himself, God of Israel, Savior. All the makers of idols will be put to shame and disgraced; they will go off in humiliation together. But Israel will be saved by the Lord with an everlasting salvation. You will never be put to shame or disgraced, for all eternity.

14 Thus saith the LORD, The labour of Egypt, and merchandise of Ethiopia and of the Sabeans, men of stature, shall come over unto thee, and they shall be thine: they shall come after thee; in chains they shall come over, and they shall fall down unto thee, they shall make supplication unto thee, saying, Surely God is in thee; and there is none else, there is no God.

15 Verily thou art a God that hidest thyself, O God of Israel, the Saviour.

Liken It #

The hidden God

Who speaks this line? It may be the nations of verse 14, astonished that the true God was hidden among a small, defeated people.

Who speaks this line? It may be the nations of verse 14, astonished that the true God was hidden among a small, defeated people. It may be the prophet himself, marveling that God works so indirectly, through a Persian king who doesn’t know Him.

The phrase became famous in Christian theology as the Deus absconditus, “the hidden God.” Martin Luther used it to speak of God revealed paradoxically in the weakness of the cross, and Blaise Pascal wrote that any religion that does not say God is hidden is not true.

Notice that the verse puts two titles together: hidden, and Savior. God’s hiddenness doesn’t cancel His saving. Joseph Smith in Liberty Jail asked, “where is the pavilion that covereth thy hiding place?” (D&C 121:1) and received an answer that included a promise: “God shall be with you forever and ever” (D&C 122:9).

16 They shall be ashamed, and also confounded, all of them: they shall go to confusion together that are makers of idols.

17 But Israel shall be saved in the LORD with an everlasting salvation: ye shall not be ashamed nor confounded world without end.

Verses 18–25

Look unto Me and be saved

In plain words

For this is what the Lord says, who created the heavens, the God who formed the earth and made it, who established it; He didn’t create it to be empty but formed it to be lived in: “I am the Lord, and there is no other. I have not spoken in secret, somewhere in a land of darkness. I did not tell Jacob’s descendants, ‘Look for Me in vain.’ I, the Lord, speak the truth and declare what is right. Gather together and come; assemble, you survivors of the nations. Those who carry their wooden idols and pray to a god that cannot save have no knowledge. Speak up and present your case; let them consult together. Who predicted this long ago? Who announced it in ancient times? Wasn’t it I, the Lord? There is no other God but Me, a righteous God and Savior; there is none but Me. Turn to Me and be saved, all the ends of the earth. For I am God, and there is no other. By Myself I have sworn; truth has gone out from My mouth, a word that will not be revoked: Every knee will bow to Me, and every tongue will swear allegiance.” It will be said of Me: “Righteousness and strength are found only in the Lord.” All who are angry with Him will come to Him and be put to shame. All the descendants of Israel will be justified and will boast in the Lord.

18 For thus saith the LORD that created the heavens; God himself that formed the earth and made it; he hath established it, he created it not in vain, he formed it to be inhabited: I am the LORD; and there is none else.

Restoration Insight #

Formed to be inhabited

“In vain” is tōhû, the word used in Gen. 1:2 for the earth “without form” before creation.

“In vain” is tōhû, the word used in Gen. 1:2 for the earth “without form” before creation. The Lord didn’t create the earth to be a wasteland but a home. For the exiles, whose land lay empty and desolate, this was a promise that the land would be lived in again.

The principle is a favorite in latter-day scripture. Nephi said, “the Lord hath created the earth that it should be inhabited; and he hath created his children that they should possess it” (1 Ne. 17:36). The Lord told the early Saints that marriage is ordained of God “that the earth might answer the end of its creation; and that it might be filled with the measure of man, according to his creation before the world was made” (D&C 49:16–17). The earth has a purpose, and the purpose is people, God’s children, living on it and becoming like Him.

19 I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth: I said not unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye me in vain: I the LORD speak righteousness, I declare things that are right.

20 Assemble yourselves and come; draw near together, ye that are escaped of the nations: they have no knowledge that set up the wood of their graven image, and pray unto a god that cannot save.

21 Tell ye, and bring them near; yea, let them take counsel together: who hath declared this from ancient time? who hath told it from that time? have not I the LORD? and there is no God else beside me; a just God and a Saviour; there is none beside me.

22 Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.

Witness of Christ #

Look and live

This short verse may be the most universal invitation in the Old Testament.

This short verse may be the most universal invitation in the Old Testament. It is addressed not to Israel only but to “all the ends of the earth.” And the condition is almost nothing: look.

The idea of saving by looking goes back to the bronze serpent in the wilderness: “every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live” (Num. 21:8). Jesus applied that story to Himself (John 3:14–15). The Book of Mormon returns to it again and again. Nephi lamented that many would not look “because of the simpleness of the way, or the easiness of it” (1 Ne. 17:41). Alma asked, “If ye could be healed by merely casting about your eyes that ye might be healed, would ye not behold quickly?” (Alma 33:21).

A famous conversion came from this verse. In January 1850 a fifteen-year-old named Charles Spurgeon, sheltering from a snowstorm, wandered into a small Methodist chapel where a lay preacher took this verse as his text. Spurgeon later became one of the most influential preachers in England. The invitation is still as short as it was then.

23 I have sworn by myself, the word is gone out of my mouth in righteousness, and shall not return, That unto me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear.

Witness of Christ #

Every knee shall bow

“I have sworn by myself”: there is no one greater to swear by. The book of Hebrews notes the same thing about God’s oath to Abraham (Heb. 6:13).

Paul quotes this verse twice. In Rom. 14:10–11 he applies it to God as Judge. In Philip. 2:9–11 he does something extraordinary: he applies it to Jesus. God has given Jesus “a name which is above every name: that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow… and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.” Paul takes one of the most fiercely monotheistic passages in the Bible, spoken by the Lord who says “there is none else,” and says that it is fulfilled when the world confesses Jesus. New Testament scholar Richard Bauckham calls this a “Christology of divine identity”: Jesus is included in the identity of the one God of Israel.

For Latter-day Saints that is natural, because the Lord who speaks in Isaiah is the premortal Christ. The Book of Mormon applies the same words to the final judgment: “every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess before him” (Mosiah 27:31), and the Doctrine and Covenants describes the day when “every knee shall bow, and every tongue shall confess” (D&C 88:104).

Sources: Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel: God Crucified and Other Studies on the New Testament’s Christology of Divine Identity, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008.

24 Surely, shall one say, in the LORD have I righteousness and strength: even to him shall men come; and all that are incensed against him shall be ashamed.

25 In the LORD shall all the seed of Israel be justified, and shall glory.

Seeing Christ in Isaiah 45

Cyrus is called the Lord’s anointed, His messiah, and he delivers captives, rebuilds the holy city, and does it “not for price nor reward” (verse 13). He is a type, an imperfect foreshadowing, of the true Messiah. But the contrast is as important as the likeness. Cyrus didn’t know the Lord. Jesus is the Lord.

The chapter’s closing verses are among the most important Old Testament texts for understanding how the first Christians thought about Jesus. The Lord, who insists that there is no other God and no other Savior (verse 21), invites the whole world to look to Him and be saved (verse 22), and swears that every knee will bow to Him (verse 23). Paul applies those words directly to Jesus (Philip. 2:10–11). The Book of Mormon does the same, and it gives the invitation a face: the risen Lord in Bountiful, inviting the multitude to come forth and feel the prints of the nails, “that ye may know that I am the God of Israel, and the God of the whole earth” (3 Ne. 11:14).

Liken it to yourself

Where might the Lord be working through people who don’t know Him? Am I willing to see His hand there?
Is it possible that I am being “used” by God without truly knowing Him? What would it take to move from usefulness to relationship?
Have I ever talked back to the Potter? What did I think He was getting wrong?
When God seems hidden, can I still call Him Savior?
“Look unto me, and be ye saved.” What makes that simple act hard for me?

Worth exploring next

Cyrus in history and scripture. Read Isa. 44:24–45:13 next to a translation of the Cyrus Cylinder, and then Ezra 1:1–11.
The potter and the clay. Compare Isa. 29:16, Isa. 64:8, Jer. 18:1–10, and Rom. 9:19–24.
Look and live. Trace the image through Num. 21:4–9, John 3:14–15, 1 Ne. 17:41, Alma 33:18–23, and Hel. 8:14–15.
Every knee shall bow. Compare Rom. 14:10–12, Philip. 2:5–11, Mosiah 27:31, and D&C 76:110–111.
The earth’s purpose. Read 1 Ne. 17:36, D&C 49:15–17, and D&C 88:17–20.

This chapter elsewhere in scripture

Philip. 2:9–11 — Paul applies verse 23 to Jesus.
Rom. 9:19–21 — Paul uses the potter and the clay.
Moses 7:62 — Righteousness from heaven and truth from the earth.

Sources & further reading

Shalom M. Paul, Isaiah 40–66: Translation and Commentary, Eerdmans Critical Commentary. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012.
Claus Westermann, Isaiah 40–66: A Commentary, Old Testament Library. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1969.
Brevard S. Childs, Isaiah, Old Testament Library. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001.
Joseph Blenkinsopp, Isaiah, Anchor Bible, 3 vols. New York: Doubleday, 2000–2003.
The Cyrus Cylinder, British Museum, London, museum no. 90920.
“Cyrus”, Bible Dictionary.
Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel: God Crucified and Other Studies on the New Testament’s Christology of Divine Identity, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008.
Donald W. Parry, Jay A. Parry, and Tina M. Peterson, Understanding Isaiah, Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1998.
Chapter 16: The God of Israel and the Nations (Isaiah 36–47), Old Testament Student Manual: 1 Kings–Malachi (2003).

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