A Promise of Loving Care

18, 19. According to Isaiah 4:4, 5, what cleansing is to be effected by Jehovah, and how will it be accomplished?

¹⁸ Next Isaiah shows how the inhabitants of the restored land will come to be holy and what blessings await them. He says: “When Jehovah will have washed away the excrement of the daughters of Zion and he will rinse away even the bloodshed of Jerusalem from within her by the spirit of judgment and by the spirit of burning down,

Isaiah 4:4,

¹⁹ Earlier Isaiah rebuked “the daughters of Zion,” whose moral corruption was hidden beneath their showy ornaments. He also exposed the bloodguilt of the people generally, urging them to wash themselves. (Isaiah 1:15, 16; 3:16-23) Here, though, he looks ahead to the time when God himself will have “washed away the excrement,” or moral filth, and ‘cleansed the bloodstains.’ (Isaiah 4:4, New International Version) How will this cleansing be effected? By “the spirit of judgment” and by “the spirit of burning down.” The coming destruction of Jerusalem and the exile in Babylon will be blasts of God’s judgment and burning anger on an unclean nation. The remnant that survives these calamities and returns home will have been humbled, refined. That is why they will be holy to Jehovah and receive mercy.​—Compare Malachi 3:2, 3.