(Isa. 6:12–13)
Isaiah associated the oak and the terebinth not only with apostasy but also with restoration. Both kinds of trees are robust and cannot be destroyed merely by chopping them down, for the remaining stumps will regenerate the tree by sending forth new shoots… . (Isa. 6:12–13).
Accordingly, Isaiah taught that a part of Israel would return like the oak and terebinth, which, though they are eaten or consumed (hayetah lebaer) right to their substance or stumps (matzebeth), yet they possess a seed in them that can regenerate (see Isa. 6:13).
(Terry Ball, Thy People Shall Be My People and Thy God My God: The 22nd Annual Sidney B. Sperry Symposium [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1994], 29.)
This is clearly a prophecy that, although the cities of Judah will be destroyed and the inhabitants scattered, a remnant of that “holy seed” will return to inhabit the land. Further light is shed upon the phrase “shall be eaten” by a marginal reading in the KJV: “when it is returned, and hath been broused.” This has reference to a purging of those who are to be scattered. Isaiah’s analogy of a tree’s being pruned by animals eating the leaves, and by the natural casting off of the dead leaves, indicates that the tenth to return will be of a new generation.
(Monte S. Nyman, Great Are the Words of Isaiah [Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1980], 52.)
The Lord declared to Isaiah that after he had given his message of accusation all the days of his life, and after the land had been devastated and Isaiah was dead, there would be a tenth of the people who would return to the land of Palestine.
This remnant is symbolized in the King James Version by dormant trees, signifying that this rest of the House of Israel will be spiritually fallow. The key to understanding that this verse also refers to Christ lies in the words “the holy seed.” As Paul states in Galatians 3:16, the “seed” referred to in the Old Testament is Christ. And it is that “seed” that comprised the substance, that is the life of Israel, here symbolized by trees. In other words, the Messiah of Israel would be born of the spiritually dormant remnant of Israel living in the land of Palestine and he is the life substance of Israel.
(Paul Y. Hoskisson, The Old Testament and the Latter-day Saints: Sperry Symposium 1986 [Randall Book Co., 1986], 201–202.)