Isaiah’s New Heavens and New Earth (Part 6): Birth, Labor, Rebuilding, Rejoicing
By Robert E. Cruickshank Jr. with Daniel E. Harden
Daniel E. Harden (Editor)
Copyright © Robert E. Cruickshank, Jr. (May 25, 2025)
All Rights Reserved
“Before she was in labor, she delivered; Before her pain came, she gave birth to a boy.
Who has heard such a thing? Who has seen such things? Can a land be born in one day? Can a nation be given birth all at once? As soon as Zion was in labor, she also delivered her sons. ‘Shall I bring to the point of birth but not give delivery?’ says the Lord. ‘Or shall I who gives delivery shut the womb?’ says your God” (Isaiah 66:7-9).
In Isaiah 65:17, the “new heavens and new earth” (return from exile) are introduced and contrasted with the “former things” that would send the Israelites into exile. The “former things” included pagan garden rituals (Isa. 65:3), necromancy (Isa. 65:4), and festal celebrations to false gods (Isa. 65:11-12). For this unfaithfulness, they would “bow down to the slaughter” (Isa. 65:12).[1]
Throughout Isaiah 65:1 to 66:6, the prophet oscillates between the unfaithful who would be taken into exile and the faithful who would return from exile, continually contrasting the two. Along the way, he notes the challenges the faithful returnees would face. These challenges would come from within and without, and the books of Ezra and Nehemiah show how it historically played out. Fittingly, Isaiah’s narrative up to this point culminates with Nehemiah’s success and his rivals being put to shame in Isaiah 66:5-6,[2] completing the restoration process.
Next, the words that follow in verse 7 appear unexpected, disjointed, and out of place: “Before she was in labor, she delivered; Before her pain came, she gave birth to a boy” (Isa. 66:7).
At first glance, Isaiah’s words here seem like an abrupt change from all that precedes them. So much so that commentators generally see the prophecy “suddenly” taking on “a new direction” in this verse.[3] But is Isaiah really making a sharp turn? As we’ve seen, Isaiah is replete with repetition, reinforcing his points, and refreshing his themes. The same thing is going on here in Isaiah 66:7-9. Isaiah isn’t veering off course, he’s expressing the new beginning of 65:17 in a fresh way to drive home his point.
In 65:17, the restoration is expressed in terms of a new heavens and earth. In 66:7-9, it’s a new birth. In 66:8, it’s a nation born in a day (Isa. 66:8).
A New Nation Born on a New Day
Just as Isaiah’s context reboots in these verses, the formerly dead nation rebooted once the exile was over. Israel was reborn the day Cyrus called the Jews back home from all over his kingdom (Ezra 1:1-7).[4] Like his contemporary Isaiah, Micah also casts the captivity and return from exile in childbirth imagery:
“Agony has gripped you like a woman in childbirth. Writhe and groan, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in labor, for now you shall go out from the city and dwell in the open country; you shall go to Babylon. But there you shall be rescued; there the LORD will redeem you from the hand of your enemies” (Mic. 4:9-10).
Isaiah and Micah both track on the same theme, and they illustrate how the dual metaphor of labor and childbirth functioned in the pre-exilic period.[5] It was an image of exile and restoration, as to be expected. In each passage, the woman in labor is Zion, and her “children” (ben) are finally brought forth in Isaiah 66:8.
Children of the New Nation
Comporting with the picture Isaiah paints, Nehemiah refers to the returning exiles as “children” (ben) twenty-five times in Nehemiah 11. Strikingly, the number of returning “children” (ben) more than doubles the number of captives taken – fulfilling the double-restoration prophecy of Zechariah 9:12.[6]
But their troubles would also be doubled before the restoration was complete. Actually, their troubles would be tripled.
With that said, it’s precisely those upcoming troubles to which Isaiah’s strange birth order speaks. Isaiah says that the woman brought forth “before she travailed” and gave birth “before her pain came” (Isa. 66:7). Once again, we have a fitting description of the restoration period after the return from exile.
While the image of painless childbirth signifies the exiles returning without struggle, the struggle would come, nonetheless. During the restoration, the rebirth of the nation took place before the challenges they’d face. Isaiah’s picture of a mother giving birth before her labor begins perfectly portrays how it all played out.
We’ve previously noted the harsh resistance encountered by restoration leaders like Zerubbabel and Nehemiah as they fulfilled their God-given roles.[7] But between the rebuilding of the temple and the rebuilding of the wall, the Jewish returnees would face the greatest challenge of all – the attempt to wipe them out … completely.
The survivors (Neh. 1:2) had returned from captivity (Ezra 1:1-11). Relatively speaking, that was the easy part. Now, they must fight for their survival. That would be the hard part. And that fight would begin in the Persian capital city of Susa and extend throughout the entire empire (Esth. 3:12-15; 8:9; 9:2-3).
Now for the Hard Part
The exiles returned peacefully and prosperously under Cyrus’s decree, bringing back an enormous amount of “silver and gold,” along with “goods and cattle” (Ezra 1:5–11; 2:69; 5:14; 6:5; 7:15–16, 18, 22; Neh. 7:71–72).[8] This would entice their enemy, Haman the Agagite (Gog of Magog)[9] “to capture spoils,” “seize plunder,” and “carry away” the Jews’ “silver and gold” and “livestock and goods” (Ezekiel 38:12-14).[10] His goal was to “annihilate, kill, and destroy all the Jews, both young and old, women and children,” in a single “day” (Esth. 3:13). He wanted them eradicated.
We all know the rest of the story, as Paul Harvey might have said. God raised up His Myrtle Tree (Esther) to take Gog of Magog (Haman) down.[11] Once again, the tables would be turned. Haman wanted to eliminate the Jewish race. But it was the corpses of Haman’s forces that littered the ground, instead of the other way around (Esth. 9:11-16). To be exact, there were 80,000 of those corpses when all was said and done. Like Zerubbabel before her, and Nehemiah after her, Esther prevailed – and her enemies failed.
In all three cases (Zerubbabel, Esther, Nehemiah), this fits the profile of Isaiah 66:7. The birth of the nation came before the resistance to the restoration. Mother Zion brought forth her children before her actual labor pains started, just as Isaiah had imparted (Isa. 66:7-9).
The Gates and the Wall, The Mourning, and the Rejoicing
Following the birth (return from exile) and labor pains (opposition to Zerubbabel, Esther, and Nehemiah), we have a description of resultant joy: “Be joyful with Jerusalem and rejoice for her, all you who love her; Be exceedingly glad with her, all you who mourn over her” (Isa. 66:10). This is a theme Isaiah uses repeatedly throughout his prophecies,[12] and this verse speaks of the joy in Jerusalem’s future once the restoration is complete. Only then would the time of mourning officially end, and the rejoicing begin. As pointed out in the previous article, the completion came when Nehemiah rebuilt the wall.
As John Watts notes, “The achievements of Zerubbabel and Joshua were memorable. They accomplished more in a short period than anyone could have expected.”[13] After the temple was rebuilt, Esther eliminated the Jews’ greatest threat, and Ezra led the second major wave of exiles back (Ezra 7:1ff). But the time of mourning wasn’t over yet.
Back in the capital city of Susa, the king’s cupbearer (Neh. 1:11) still wasn’t satisfied. He “wept and mourned for days…fasting and praying before the God of Heaven” (Neh. 1:4). Why? Because the work still wasn’t finished. There was one last mountain to climb. Or, more specifically, one last wall to build.
Nehemiah knew what he had to do. The “remnant” who “survived the captivity” was still “in great distress and reproach” as Jerusalem’s wall remained “broken down” and her gates “burned down” to the ground (Neh. 1:3).[14] He must go to the place of his “fathers’ tombs” (Neh. 2:3) and finish rebuilding the city by restoring that wall and repairing those gates (Neh. 2:5). Only then will the mourning truly cease, and the rejoicing fully begin, as Isaiah foresees in Isaiah 66:10.
By the time we get to chapter 66, Isaiah had already made the connection between the completion of Jerusalem’s gates and wall and the completion of the period of mourning. In the previous article, we noted how Isaiah 60:10 portended the events of Nehemiah. Isaiah said that “foreigners will build up your walls” (Isa. 60:10), and fittingly, Nehemiah completed the wall with the Persian Empire funding it all. Once that happened, Isaiah says, “…you will call your walls salvation and your gates praise” (Isa. 60:18). Then, and only then, “the days of your mourning will be finished” (Isa. 60:20).
Isaiah’s earlier theme from chapter 60 reverberates here in chapter 66 as the time of mourning comes to an end and the time of rejoicing begins. The period of mourning began in the “nineteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon” (2 Kg. 25:8), when he “burned the house of the Lord” (2 Kg. 25:9) and “broke down the wall around Jerusalem” (2 Kg. 25:10). The prophet Jeremiah repeats the words of 2 Kings 25:9-10 in Jeremiah 52:12 and expresses his mourning in places like the book of Lamentations and Psalm 102.[15]
Jeremiah mourned because the city was abandoned, the temple was destroyed, and Jerusalem’s wall had come crumbling down. Jeremiah’s mournful voice is heard echoing in Nehemiah’s own voice over a half century later. After Zerubbabel led the exiles back home to the city (Ezra 2:1-2, 70, 3:1) and rebuilt the temple (Ezra 6:14-15), the voice of mourning finally ended when Nehemiah put the final brick in the rebuilt wall.
Nursed, Nourished, and Nurtured
So far, Isaiah has spoken of birth, labor pains, and joy. As would be expected, he now speaks of the child (the restoration community) being nursed, nourished, and nurtured:
“So that you may nurse and be satisfied with her comforting breasts,
So that you may drink fully and be delighted with her bountiful breasts. For this is what the Lord says: ‘Behold, I extend peace to her like a river, And the glory of the nations like an overflowing stream; And you will be nursed, you will be carried on the hip and rocked back and forth on the knees” (Isa. 66:11-12).
This verse speaks of the “glory” of the nations “overflowing” like a “stream” to nurse and carry God’s people. This completely reverses Israel’s pre-exilic relationship with the nations and Isaiah’s earlier words where he spoke of that hostile situation. In Isaiah 8:7, the “King of Assyria” comes in “all his glory” as he sweeps through Judah’s land with overwhelming force.[16] The imagery is completely flipped around in Isaiah 66:12 as the post-exilic conditions are the polar opposite of the pre-exilic conditions. In this verse, the “glory of the nations” is an “overflowing stream” that supports and sustains God’s people.
Through the course of our series, we’ve seen how this played out. First and foremost, the entire return from exile was sanctioned and commissioned by Cyrus himself (Ezra 1:1-7). The temple was rebuilt with Persian tax money from the surrounding territories (Ezra 6:4-12).[17] Esther and Mordecai secured the Jews’ right to arm and defend themselves with King Ahasuerus’s seal of approval (Esth. 8:11).[18] And Nehemiah restored Jerusalem’s wall with lumber supplied from King Artaxerxes’s forest (Neh. 2:8).[19]
Before the exile, the glory of the foreign nations came in like a flood, destroying the Israelites’ land (Isa. 8:7). After the exile, the nations’ glory was the sustaining stream that nourished and restored that land (Isa. 66:12).
Isaiah 8:17 specifically mentions the “king of Assyria” as the sweeping force of destruction. A little over 200 years later, the new “king of Assyria” was part of the healing stream of reconstruction (Ezra 6:22). The role-reversal imagery between Isaiah 8:17 and 66:12 helps anchor Isaiah 66 to its historical context and demonstrates its role in Biblical context. Like all that precedes it, this firmly secures the fulfillment of these prophecies in the restoration period after the return from exile.
Recap
The focus of Isaiah 66:7-12 is Israel’s post-exilic restoration. Rather than a thematic disconnect in Isaiah’s context, verses 7-9 reiterate the renewal motif introduced in 65:17. The childbirth imagery symbolizes the nation’s sudden rebirth. The painless birth reflects the ease of Israel’s return from exile under Cyrus’s decree.
But the initial return was only the beginning, and the labor pains would follow. This is why Isaiah has the labor pains following the birth. The full restoration would not come without adversity. That adversity indeed came through the threats encountered by Zerubbabel, Esther, and Nehemiah.
Isaiah’s imagery then moves from birth and pain (Isa. 66:7-9) to a fuller picture of rebuilding and rejoicing (Isa. 66:10-12). Nehemiah’s final act of rebuilding the city walls marks the completion of Isaiah’s prophetic arc. Once the monumental task of restoring the city was finished and finalized, Jerusalem’s joy was realized.
In verses 11-12, the once-hostile nations nourish and nurture God’s people, reversing the destructive flood of Isaiah 8 into the life-giving stream of Isaiah 66. The rich imagery Isaiah uses in Isaiah 66:7-12 continues to root the prophecy in the historical events of the restoration period after the return from exile.
Takeaways for Today
The Assyrians took the northern tribes captive in 722 BC, and the Babylonians took the southern tribes captive in 605-586 BC. The Persian King Cyrus called the captives back home in 536 BC. This reminds us that God’s promises are fulfilled at God’s appointed time, and we need to trust His timing.
Just as Zion gave birth before labor, sudden breakthroughs often follow long seasons of faithfulness, and rapid change often follows long preparation. The exile lasted for quite some time. It was like a long, dark night for the Israelites.
But joy comes in the morning (Ps. 30:5), and we can look forward to the joy that dawns once we make it through hard times as well. God disciplines those He loves (Heb. 12:6), and like the exiles, we must learn the lessons He’s trying to teach us when we’re going through those times.
The obstacles the returnees faced remind us that the path to restoration often includes resistance. Like Israel’s returnees, believers should expect opposition even in the midst of God’s blessings. Like Zerubbabel, Esther, and Nehemiah, believers today must trust in God amid that opposition.
All in all, these verses in Isaiah teach us that joy follows faithful perseverance and diligent obedience. The rejoicing in Isaiah 66:10 came after the mourning due to exile was over. God turns our mourning into dancing (Ps. 30:10) and our sorrow into joy (Jn. 16:10).
——————————————————————————————————————————
[1] See: Robert E. Cruickshank Jr. with Daniel E. Harden, Isaiah’s New Heavens and New Earth (Part 1): Former Things and New Things – The Burros of Berea https://bit.ly/3XZP9tQ https://bit.ly/3XZP9tQ
[2] See the previous 5 installments in this series of articles for the details on all of this, found on Cruikshank’s Corner – The Burros of Berea https://bit.ly/43snQtZ
[3] Goldingay, John. Isaiah 56-66 (ICC): A Critical and Exegetical Commentary (T&T Clark, 2025): 494.
[4] See: Robert E. Cruickshank, Jr., Isaiah 66:8 in 1948? Dispensationalism’s Warp Speed Hermeneutic – The Burros of Berea https://bit.ly/43dDTNh
[6] See: Robert E. Cruickshank, Jr., Double Restoration and Trouble with Equations: Pop-Prophecy and Zechariah 9:11-12 – The Burros of Berea https://bit.ly/3ZiMMTl Notice that in Zech. 9:11-13, the returning exiles would include both Judah (the Southern tribes) and Ephraim (the Northern tribes).
[7] See: Robert E. Cruickshank Jr. with Daniel E. Harden, Isaiah’s New Heavens and New Earth (Part 3): Wolves and Lambs, Serpents and Dust, and the Chosen Young Man – The Burros of Berea https://bit.ly/4mgjdvQ ; Isaiah’s New Heavens and New Earth (Part 5): Your Brothers Who Hate You – Nehemiah and the Enemies Within – The Burros of Berea https://bit.ly/3YZpcLu
[8] See: Robert E. Cruickshank, Jr., Gog and Magog, Part 7: God’s Myrtle Tree – The Burros of Berea https://bit.ly/4k3G2RQ
[9] See: Robert E. Cruickshank, Jr., Gog and Magog, Part 1: From Saul and Agag to Mordecai and Haman – The Burros of Berea https://bit.ly/4dmluBv
[10] See: Robert E. Cruickshank, Jr., Gog and Magog, Part 8: The Goal of the Attack – The Burros of Berea https://bit.ly/4k3QJnx
[11] See: Cruickshank, Gog and Magog, Part 7.
[12] The themes of sorrow and joy is not new for Isaiah, nor is it foreign for other prophets. Isaiah uses mourning and tears in conjunction with punishment and exile (Isa. 3:26; 22:12; etc.) but at the restoration, their mourning will cease (Isa. 30:19) and they will rejoice (Isa. 35:10). These are common themes that appear all through Isaiah. Those being judged are mourned, and the returnees will rejoice. Jeremiah also often uses such terms (see, for example, Jer. 31:13). Judgment is met with tears, while complete realization of promises is met with rejoicing. The same holds true for Isa. 66:10, where the actual rejoicing isn’t achieved in fullness until all opposition is overcome.
[13]John D. Watts, World Biblical Commentary: Isaiah 34-66 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2005): 932.
[14] In modern times, we tend to miss the significance of gates in Biblical times. Gates were vital to city life, serving multiple key functions:
- Defense and Security: Gates controlled access to cities and were fortified to protect inhabitants from enemies (Nehemiah 3:1–32; 2 Chronicles 14:7).
- Legal and Civic Activities: Gates functioned as centers for legal proceedings, public announcements, and civic decision-making. Elders judged cases at the gate (Deuteronomy 21:18–21; Ruth 4:1–11; Proverbs 31:23).
- Commerce and Trade: Markets were often set up near gates, making them hubs of economic activity (2 Kings 7:1, 18).
- Spiritual Symbolism: Gates were so important that they came to symbolize a believer’s relationship with the Lord. “Enter his gates with thanksgiving…” reflects the gate as an entry into God’s presence (Psalm 100:4). Jesus referred to a “narrow gate” leading to life, signifying spiritual discernment (Matthew 7:13–14).
For more on the importance of gates in the ancient world, see: Zach Davis, “Esther 2: Jesus in the Life of Mordecai” – https://bit.ly/3F68bZr
[15] See: Robert E. Cruickshank, Jr., A Walk Through Psalm 102 – The Burros of Berea https://bit.ly/42DMtVf
[16] While Judah was also supposed to take a hit from Assyria, we know from Isaiah 37 that Hezekiah’s faithfulness to the Lord averted this (cf. Mic. 3:12; Jer. 26:18-19). In the following century, Judah would oscillate between faithfulness (e.g., the reforms under Josiah) and unfaithfulness. Eventually, Judah fell to the Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar. None of this detracts from the connotations of the imagery being used and how the imagery of Isaiah 8:7 is reversed in 66:11-12.
[17] See: Cruickshank and Harden, “Isaiah’s New Heavens and New Earth (Part 3).”
[18] See: Robert E. Cruickshank, Jr., Gog and Magog, Part 7: God’s Myrtle Tree – The Burros of Berea https://bit.ly/4k3G2RQ . For all intents and purposes, Esther and Mordecai crafted the Persian version of the Second Amendment.
[19] See: Cruickshank and Harden, “Isaiah’s New Heavens and New Earth (Part 5).”
