Isaiah 48:7 (KJV)

What does Isaiah 48:7 mean?

Isaiah 48:7 says that God has brought about new things that his people could not claim to have known beforehand. God presents these things in a way that prevents the people from saying they had already understood what he was going to do.

God is speaking to the people of Israel. After announcing “new things” in verse 6, God describes them as created “now,” rather than known from the beginning. The imagined reply, “Behold, I knew them,” gives the reason for the timing: it exposes a claim to knowledge the people had not earned.

The Hebrew behind Isaiah 48:7

• “created” — בָּרָא (baraʾ): This word means to create. Here it describes the new things as brought into being, not merely as old information being repeated.
• “heardest” — שָׁמַע (shamaʿ): This word can mean to hear or receive a report. In Isaiah 48:7, it points to the people having had no prior report of these things.

Why Isaiah 48:7 matters

• The verse distinguishes hearing from knowing in advance. God says the people had not “heardest” these things before the day, so their imagined claim, “I knew them,” would be empty.
• The timing also answers a problem raised earlier in the passage. In verse 5, God says he announced earlier events beforehand so the people could not credit their idols for them; in verse 7, the new things are withheld from earlier notice so the people cannot claim prior knowledge.