---
title: Isaiah 17:10
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/isaiah-17-10/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/isaiah-17-10.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: Isaiah 17:10
testament: OT
section: Prophets
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# Isaiah 17:10

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> For you have forgotten the God of your salvation and failed to remember the Rock of your refuge. Therefore, though you cultivate delightful plots and set out cuttings from exotic vines—

## JW Usage

Isaiah 17:10 — "you have forgotten the God of your salvation, and you have not remembered the Rock of your stronghold" — is read by the Watchtower as a general rebuke against Israel's drift into idolatry, applicable today as warning against any believer drifting from Jehovah's organisation. The "Rock" image is treated as a generic metaphor for Jehovah's stability.

## Protestant Usage

The "Rock of your stronghold" picks up a recurring Old Testament image (Deuteronomy 32:18 — "the Rock that fathered you"; Psalm 95:1 — "the rock of our salvation") that the New Testament applies directly to Christ. 1 Corinthians 10:4: "they all drank the same spiritual drink. For they used to drink from the spiritual rock that followed them, and that rock meant the Christ." Paul identifies the wilderness Rock — the same Rock category Isaiah has in mind — as Christ in his pre-incarnate presence with Israel. Forgetting "the God of your salvation" (Elohim of yeshu'ah) and forgetting the Rock are the same forgetting; both apply christologically through the New Testament's identification.

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [The Cross Is Not Pagan — And Paul Boasted In It](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/cross-pagan-symbol-rebuttal.md) — Galatians 6:14 / 1 Corinthians 1:18 / Colossians 2:14 [Practice]