Ah, Ariel, Ariel, the city where David encamped! Add year to year; let the feasts run their round.
1. This appears to be another discourse, in which Isaiah threatens the city of Jerusalem. He calls it “Altar,” “Il l’appelle Ariel, c’est à dire, autel de Dieu;” — “He calls it Ariel, that is, Altar of God.” FT509 “Some, with the Chaldee, suppose it to be taken from the hearth of the great altar of burnt-offerings, which Ezekiel plainly calls by the same name...
That it is Jerusalem which is here called Ariel is agreed, for that was the city where David dwelt; that part of it which was called Zion was in a particular manner the city of David, in which both the temple and the palace were. But why it is so called is very uncertain: probably the name and the reason were then well known.
Commenting on Isaiah 29:1-8
Woe to Ariel, to Ariel, the city where David dwelt,.... Many Jewish writers by "Ariel" understand the altar of burnt offerings; and so the Targum, "woe, altar, altar, which was built in the city where David dwelt;'' and so it is called in Eze 43:15 it signifies "the lion of God"; and the reason why it is so called, the Jews say (i), is, because...