Isaiah 38:8

“Behold, I will bring again the shadow of the degrees, &c.] Or lines made on a dial plate, to show the progress of the sun, and what time of day it was. Some think only the shadow was brought back by the power of God, the sun keeping its course as usual; but in the next clause the sun is expressly said to return ten degrees: besides, it is not easy to conceive how the shadow of the sun should go back, unless the sun itself did; if it had been only the shadow of it on Ahaz’s dial, it would not have fallen under the notice of other nations, or have been the subject of their inquiry, as it was of the Babylonians, (<143231>2 Chronicles 32:31): which is gone down on the sundial of Ahaz, the first…”

“bring again--cause to return (Jos 10:12-14). In Kg2 20:9, Kg2 20:11, the choice is stated to have been given to Hezekiah, whether the shadow should go forward, or go back, ten degrees. Hezekiah replied, "It is a light thing (a less decisive miracle) for the shadow to go down (its usual direction) ten degrees: nay, but let it return backward ten degrees"; so Isaiah cried to Jehovah that it should be so, and it was so (compare Jos 10:12, Jos 10:14). sundial of Ahaz--HERODOTUS (2.109) states that the sundial and the division of the day into twelve hours, were invented by the Babylonians; from them Ahaz borrowed the invention. He was one, from his connection with Tiglath-pileser, likely to have…”

“Behold, I will bring again the shadow - The shadow, or shade which is made by the interception of the rays of the sun by the gnomon on the dial. The phrase ‘bring again’ (Hebrew, משׁיב mēshı̂yb) means to cause to return (Hiphil, from שׁוב shûb, to return); that is, I will cause it retrograde, or bring back. Septuagint, Στρέψω Strepsō - ‘I will turn back.’ Few subjects have perplexed commentators more than this account of the sun-dial of Ahaz. The only other place where a sun-dial is mentioned in the Scriptures is in the parallel place in 2 Kings 20:9-10, where the account is somewhat more full, and the nature of the miracle more fully represented: ‘This sign shalt thou have of the Lord,…”

“I will bring: Jos 10:12-14; Kg2 20:11; Ch2 32:24, Ch2 32:31; Mat 16:1 the sun dial: Heb. the degrees by, or, with the sun, Or, as the Hebrew might be rendered, "the steps of Ahaz." The researches of curious travellers in Hindostan, observes Bp. Stock, have lately discovered in that country, three observatories of similar form, the most remarkable of which is to be seen within four miles of Delhi, the ancient capital of the Mogul empire. A rectangled triangle, whose hypotenuse is a staircase (apparently parallel to the axis of the earth), bisects a zone, or coping of a wall, which wall connects the two terminating towers at right and left. The coping itself is of a circular form, and…”