Verses 10, 11. - I will multiply men upon you. Jehovah's promise contemplated a return of both sections of the Golah, the whole house of Israel, Ephraim as well as Judah (comp. Ezekiel 20:40), to the land from which they had been deported, and a restoration of the united kingdom to a condition of prosperity in which its cities should again be inhabited, its ruined homesteads repaired, its fields cultivated, and its flocks and herds multiplied (see Ezekiel 16:55; Isaiah 44:26; Isaiah 54:3; Isaiah 61:4) - a condition of prosperity so great that it should surpass any measure or degree of good fortune previously enjoyed (comp. Deuteronomy 30:5; Job 42:12).

36:1-15 Those who put contempt and reproach on God's people, will have them turned on themselves. God promises favour to his Israel. We have no reason to complain, if the more unkind men are, the more kind God is. They shall come again to their own border. It was a type of the heavenly Canaan, of which all God's children are heirs, and into which they all shall be brought together. And when God returns in mercy to a people who return to him in duty, all their grievances will be set right. The full completion of this prophecy must be in some future event.And I will multiply men upon you,.... Who should inhabit the cities on the mountains, and increase very much:

all the house of Israel, even all of it: not the Heathens should be multiplied on them, but the Israelites, all of them, and them only; all the tribes of Israel, the ten tribes as well as the other; and which is repeated for the confirmation of it: by this it appears that the prophecy has a further view than to the return of the Jews from the Babylonish captivity; for all did not return, many remained in the provinces of Babylon; and those that returned were chiefly of the tribes of Judah and Benjamin; but few of the rest came with them. Kimchi thinks the words have respect to the ten tribes, which he says are hid to this day; so Ben Melech.

And the cities shall be inhabited, and the wastes shall be builded; in a literal sense; as well as the church of God, and inheritance of Christ, shall then be in a flourishing condition.