[207]"The term rendered 'startle' has created unnecessary difficulty to some writers. The word means to 'cause to spring or leap;' when applied to fluids, to spirt or sprinkle them. The fluid spirted is put in theaccusative, and it is spirteduponthe person. In the present passage the person, 'many nations,'isin theaccusative, and it is simply treason against the Hebrew language to render 'sprinkle.' The interpreter who will so translate will 'do anything.'"—A. B. Davidson,Expositor, 2nd series, viii., 443. The LXX. has θαυμασονται εθνη πολλα. The Peschitto and Vulgate rendersprinkle.[208]And notour report, orsomething we caused to be heard, as in the English Version,—שמועה is the passive participle of שמע, to hear, and not of השמיע, to cause to hear. The speakers are now the penitent people of God who had been preached to, and not the prophets who had preached.[209]Tender shoot.Masculine participle, meaningsucker, orsuckling. Dr. John Hunter (Christian Treasury) suggests succulent plant, such as grow in the desert. But in Job viii. 16; xiv. 7; xv. 30, the feminine form is used of any tender shoot of a tree, and the feminine plural in Ezek. xvii. 22 of the same. The LXX. read παιδιον,infant.Before Him, i.e. Jehovah. Cheyne, following Ewald, readsbefore us. So Giesebrecht.[210]Took for his burden.Loadedhimself with them. The same grievous word which God uses of Himself in ch. xlvi. See p.180.[211]There is more thanafflicted(Authorised Version) in this word. There is the sense of beinghumbled, punished for his own sake.[212]The possessive pronoun has been put to the end of the lines, where it stands in the original, producing a greater emphasis and even a sense of rhyme.[213]×›×œ× ×• KÅ«llanÅ« so rendered instead of "all of us," in order to be assonant with the close of the verse, as the original is, which closes with kullam.[214]That is, by a form of law that was tyranny, a judicial crime.[215]Cut off violently, prematurely, unnaturally.[216]See p.368.[217]The verbs, hitherto in the perfect in this verse, now change to the imperfect; a sign that they express the purpose of God.Cf.Dillmann,in loco.[218]From the travail of his soul shall he see, and by his knowledge be satisfied.Taking בדעתו with ישבע instead of with יצדיק. This reading suggested itself to me some years ago. Since then I have found it only in Prof. Briggs's translation,Messianic Prophecy, p. 359. It is supported by the frequent parallel in which we findseeingandknowingin Hebrew.[219]Some translatemany,i.e., the many to whom he brings righteousness, as if he were a victor with a great host behind him.[220]Jer. xxiii. 5.[221]Hitzig (among others) held that it is the prophets who are the speakers of ver. 1, and that the voices of the penitent people come in only with ver. 2 or ver. 3. In that case ×©×ž×•×¢×ª×™× ×• would meanwhat we heard from God(שמועה is elsewhere used for the prophetic message) and delivered to the people. This interpretation multiplies the dramatis personæ, but does not materially alter the meaning, of the prophecy. It merely changes part of the penitent people's self-reproach into a reproach cast on them by their prophets. But there is no real reason for introducing the prophets as the speakers of ver. 1.[222]For the argument that it is Israel who speaks here, see Hoffmann (Schriftbeweis), who was converted from the other view, and Dillmann, 4th ed.,in loco. A very ingenious attempt has been made by Giesebrecht (Beiträge zur Jesaia Kritik, 1890, p. 146 ff.), in favour of the interpretation that the heathen are the speakers. His reasons are these: 1. It is the heathen who are spoken of in lii. 13-15, and a change to Israel would be too sudden. Answer: The heathen are not exclusively spoken of in lii. 13-15; but if they were a change in the next verse to Israel would not be more rapid than some already made by the prophet. 2. The words in liii. 1 suit the heathen. They have already received the news of the exaltation of the Servant, which in lii. 15 was promised them. This is the ×©×ž×•×¢×ª× ×•, that isnews we have just heard. ×”×מין is a pluperfect of the subjunctive mood:Who couldor whowould have believedthis news of the exaltationwe havejustheard, and the arm of Jehovah to whom was it revealed!i.e., it was revealed to nobody. Answer: besides the precariousness of taking ×”×מין as a pluperfect subjunctive, this interpretation is opposed to the general effort of the prophecy, which is to expose unbelief before the exaltation, not after it. 3. To get rid of the argument—that, while the speakers own that the Servant bears their sins, it is said the Servant was stricken for the sins ofmy people, and that therefore the speakers must be the same as "my people":—Giesebrecht would utterly alter the reading of ver. 8 from מפשע עמו × × ×¢ למו,for the transgression of my people was the stroke to himto מִפִּשְ××¢Ö¸× ×™Ö°× Ö»× Ö·Ö¼×¢,for their stroke was he smitten.[223]× ×©×‚× and סבל. In speaking of his country's woes, Jeremiah (x. 19) says:This is sickness, ormy sickness, and I must bear it, ו×שׂ×× ×™ ×–×” חלי. Ezekiel (iv. 4) is commanded to lie on his side, and in that symbolic position tobear the iniquity of His people, ×ª×©× ×¢×•× ×. One of the Lamentations (v. 7) complains:Our fathers have sinned and are not, and we bear(סבל)their iniquities.In these cases the meaning of both × ×©× and סבל is simply to feel the weight of, be involved in. The verbs do not convey the sense ofcarrying offorexpiating. But still it had been said of the Servant that in his suffering he would be practical and prosper; so that when we now hear that he bears his people's sins, we are ready to understand that he does not do this for the mere sake of sharing them, but for a practical purpose, which, of course, can only be their removal. There is, therefore, no need to quarrel with the interpretation of ver. 4, that the Servantcarries awaythe suffering with which he is laden. Matthew makes this interpretation (viii. 17) in speaking of Christ's healing. But it is a very interesting fact, and not without light upon the free and plastic way in which the New Testament quotes from the Old, that Matthew has ignored the original and literal meaning of the quotation, which is that the Servant shared the sicknesses of the people: a sense impossible in the case for which the Evangelist uses the words.[224]But they do not tell us, whether they were totally exempted from suffering by the Servant's pains, or whether they also suffered with him the consequence of their misdeeds. For that question is not now present to their minds. Whether they also suffer or not (and other chapters in the prophecy emphasize the people's bearing of the consequences of their misdeeds), they know that it was not their own, but the Servant's suffering, which was alone the factor in their redemption.[225]Mystery of Pain, by James Hinton, p. 27.[226]Psalm cvi. 23;cf.also ver. 32, where the other side of the solidarity between Moses and the people comes out.They angered Him also at the waters of Strife, so that it went ill with Moses for their sakes ... he spake unadvisedly with his lips.[227]See p.352.[228]Isa. xlvi. 3, 4. See pp.179,180of this volume.[229]Ch. xlii. 25.[230]If we remember this we shall also feel more reason than ever against perceiving the Nation, or any aspect of the Nation, in the Sufferer of ch. liii. For he suffers, as the individual suffers, sickness and legal wrong. Tyrants do not put whole nations through a form of law and judgement. Of course, it is open to those, who hold that the Servant is still an aspect of the Nation, to reply, that all this is simply evidence of how far the prophet has pushed his personification. A whole nation has been called "The Sick Man" even in our prosaic days. But see pp.268-76.[231]Jer. li. 4.[232]xl. 39; xlii. 13; xliv. 29; xlvi. 20.[233]1 Sam. vi. 13.[234]Cf.Wellhausen'sProlegomena, ch. ii., 2.[235]There is no exegete but agrees to this. There may be differences of opinion about the syntax,—whether the verse should run,though Thou makest his soul guilt, ora guilt-offering; or,though his soul make a guilt-offering; or (reading ×™×©×™× for תשי×),while he makes his soul a guilt-offering,—but all agree to the fact that by himself or by God the Servant's life is offered an expiation for sin, a satisfaction to the law of God.[236]Cf.Baldensperger (Das Selbstbewusstsein Jesu, p. 119 ff.) on the genuineness of Christ's predictions and explanations of His sufferings.[237]Cf.p.330.[238]See p.334.[239]The question whether this is the land of China is still an open one. The possibility of intercourse between China and Babylon is more than proved. But that there were Jews in China by this time (though they seem to have found their way there by the beginning of the Christian era) is extremely unlikely. Moreover, the possibility of such a name as Sinim for the inhabitants of China at that date has not been proved. No other claimants for the name, however, have made good their case. But we need not enter further into the question. The whole matter is fully discussed in Canon Cheyne's excursus, and by him and Terrien de Lacouperie in theBabylonian and Oriental Recordfor 1886-87. See especially the number for September 1887.[240]Hishumbled,His poorin the exilic sense of the word. SeeIsaiah i.-xxxix., pp.432ff.[241]On the "Motherhood of God" cf.Isaiah i.-xxxix., p. 245 ff.[242]For צדיק, therighteousorjust, which is in the text, the Syr., Vulg., Ewald, and others read עריץ, as in the following verse,terribleorterribly strong. Dillmann, however (5th ed., 1890, p. 438), retains צדיק takes the termsmightyandjustas used of God, and reads the question, not as a question of despair uttered by the people, but as a triumphant challenge of the prophet or of God Himself. He would then make the next verse run thus:Nay, for the captives of the mighty may be taken, and the prey of the delivered, but with him who strives with thee I will strive.[243]The English version,Where is the bill, is incorrect. The phrase is the same as in lxvi. ver. 1,What is this house that ye build for Me? what is this place for My rest?It implies a house already built; and so in the text aboveWhat is this bill of divorceimplies one already thought of by the minds of the persons addressed by the question.[244]Cf.p.221. Dillmann's view thatrighteousnessmeans here personal character is contradicted by the whole context, which makes it plain that it is something external, the realisation of which those addressed are doubting. What troubles them is not that they are personally unrighteous, but that they are so few and insignificant. And what God promises them in answer is something external, the establishment of Zion.Cf.also the external meaning ofrighteousnessin vv. 5, 6.[245]Isaiah. i.-xxxix., p.441.[246]Cf.p.315.[247]Cf.pp.336ff.[248]See pp.247ff.[249]"Das eigentliche Wort 'Liebe' kommt im A. T. von Gott fast gar nicht vor,—und wo es, bei einem späten Schriftsteller, vorkommt, ist es Bezeichnung seiner besondren Bundes-liebe zu Israel, deren natürliche Kehrseite der Hass gegen die feindlichen Völker ist."—Schultz,A. T. Theologie, 4th ed., p. 548.[250]The reserve of this—the limitation of the relation to one of feeling—is remarkable in contrast to the more physical use of the same figure in other religions.[251]Egre, or sudden rush of the tide, or spate, or freshet. The original is assonant: Beshesseph qesseph.[252]So literally; LXX. crystals, carbuncles or diamonds.[253]Cf.Isaiah i.-xxxix., pp.440ff.[254]The structure of this difficult passage is this. Ver. 3 states the equation: the everlasting covenant with the people Israel=the sure, unfailing favours bestowed upon the individual David. Vv. 4 and 5 unfold the contents of the equation. Each side of it is introduced by aLo. Lo, on the one side, what I have done to David; Lo, on the other, what I will do to you. As David was awitness of peoples, aprinceandcommander of peoples, so shalt thou call to them and make them obey thee. This is clear enough. But who is David? The phrase thefavoursofDavidsuggests 2 Chron. vi. 42,remember the mercies of David thy servant; and those in ver. 5 recall Psalm xviii. 43 f.:Thou hast made me the head of nations; A people I know not shall serve me; As soon as they hear of me they shall obey me; Strangers shall submit themselves to me.Yet both Jeremiah and Ezekiel call the coming Messiah David. Jer. xxx. 9:They shall serve Jehovah their God and David their King.Ezek. xxxiv. 23:And I will set up a shepherd over them, and he shall feed them, and he shall be their shepherd. And I Jehovah will be their God, and My servant David prince among them.After these writers, our prophet could hardly help using the name David in its Messianic sense, even though he also quoted (in ver. 5) a few phrases recalling the historical David. But the question does not matter much. The real point is the transference of the favours bestowed upon an individual to the whole people.[255]English version,trees of the field, but the field is the country beyond the bounds of cultivation; and as beasts of the field meanswild beasts, so this meanswild trees,—unforced, unaided by man's labour.[256]Neh. xiii.[257]The original isa hand; a term applied (perhaps because it consisted of tapering stones) to anindex, ormonumentof victory, 1 Sam. xv. 12; or to a sepulchral monument, 2 Sam. xviii. 18.[258]See vol. i., pp. 363, 364.[259]So Ewald, Cheyne and Briggs. Ewald takes lvi. 9-lvii. 11aas an interruption, borrowed from an earlier prophet in a time of persecution, of the exilic prophecy, which goes on smoothly from lvi. 8 to lvii. 11b. We have seen that it is an error to suppose that lvi. 9-lvii. rose from a time of persecution.[260]Ezek. xxi.;cf.xxxiii. 30 f.[261]Delitzsch.[262]Mishpat and mishpatim,cf.p.299.[263]Such as is also expressed by exiles in Psalms xlii., xliii. and lxiii., but there with what spiritual temper, here with what a hard legal conception of righteousness.[264]For these see p.61.[265]Literally,the poor, the wandering. It was a frequent phrase in the Exile: Lam. iii. 19,Remember mine affliction and my homelessness; i. 7, Jerusalem in the dayof her affliction and her homelessness. LXX. αστεγοι, roofless.[266]Probably the fresh flesh which appears through a healing wound. Made classical by Jeremiah, who uses it thrice of Israel,—in the famous text,Is there no balm, etc., x. 22; and in xxx. 17; xxxiii. 6.[267]Jer. xxxi. 12.[268]Cf.Job xxiv. 13.[269]Cf.Amos viii. 5.[270]See pp.43f.[271]Ewald conceives chs. lviii., lix. to be the work of a younger contemporary of Ezekiel, to which the chief author of "Second Isaiah" has added words of his own: lviii. 12, lix. 21. The latter is evidently an insertion;cf.change of person and of number, etc. Delitzsch puts the passage down to the last decade of the Captivity, when for a little time Cyrus had turned away from Babylon, and the Jews despaired of his coming to save them.[272]See pp.219ff.[273]Another slight trace reveals the conglomerate nature of the chapter. If, as the earlier verses indicate, it was Israel that sinned, then it is the rebellious in Israel who should be punished. In ver. 18a, therefore, theadversariesorenemiesought to be Israelites. But in 18bthe foreignislandsare included. The LXX. has not this addition. Bredenkamp takes the words for an insertion. Yet the consequences of Israel's sin, according to the chapter, are not so much the punishment of the rebellious among the people as the delay of the deliverance for the whole nation,—a deliverance which Jehovah is represented as rising to accomplish, the moment the people express the sense of their rebellion and are penitent. Theadversariesandenemiesof ver. 18, therefore, are the oppressors of Israel, the foreigners and heathen; and 18bwith itsislandscomes in quite naturally.[274]Note on mishpat and Ssedhaqah in ch. lix.This chapter is a good one for studying the various meanings of mishpat. In ver. 4 the verb shaphat is used in its simplest sense of going to law. In vv. 8 and 14 mishpat is a quality or duty of man. But in ver. 9 it is rather what man expects from God, and what is far from man because of his sins; it isjudgementon God's side, or God's saving ordinance. In this sense it is probably to be taken in ver. 15,—Ssedhaqah follows the same parallel. This goes to prove that we have two distinct prophecies amalgamated, unless we believe that a play upon the words is intended.[275]Isa. i. 17; Ezek. ii. 18; Psalm ix. 12.[276]Literally,on the sideorhip, the Eastern method of carrying children.[277]Orcoasts. See pp.109ff.[278]Isa. xiv.;Isaiah i.-xxxix., pp.281ff.[279]Isa. xlviii. 18.[280]See p.210, note. Some points of the speaker's description of himself—for example, the gift of the Spirit and the anointing—suit equally well any prophet, or the unique Servant. The lofty mission and its great results are not too lofty or great for our prophet, for Jeremiah received his office in terms as large. That the prophet has not yet spoken at such length in his own person is no reason why he should not do so now, especially as this is an occasion on which he sums up and enforces the whole range of prophecy. It can, therefore, very well be the prophet who speaks. On the other hand, to say with Diestel that it cannot be the Servant because the personification of the Servant ceases with ch. liii. is to beg the question. A stronger argument against the case for the Servant is that the speaker does not call himself by that name, as he does in other passages when he is introduced; but this is not conclusive, for in l. 4-9 the Servant, though he speaks, does not name himself. To these may be added this (from Krüger), that the Servant's discourse never passes without transition into that of God, as this speaker's in ver. 8, but the prophet's discourse often so passes; and this, that בשׂר, ×§×¨× and × ×—× are often used of the prophet, and not at all of the Servant. These are all the points in the question, and it will be seen how inconclusive they are. If any further proof of this were required, it would be found in the fact that authorities are equally divided. There hold for the Servant Calvin, Delitzsch, Cheyne (who previously took the other view), Driver, Briggs, Nägelsbach and Orelli. But the Targums, Ewald, Hitzig, Diestel, Dillmann, Bredenkamp and Krüger hold by the prophet. Krüger's reasons,Essai sur la Théologie d'Isaïe xl.-lxvi., p. 76, are specially worthy of attention.[281]Literally,opening; but the word is always used of opening of the eyes. Ewald rendersopen air, Dillmannhellen Blick.[282]Any insignia or ornament for the head.[283]The same word as in xlii. 3,fading wick.[284]SeeIsaiah i.-xxxix., pp.438-40.[285]Cf.Krüger,Essai sur la Théologie d'Isaïe xl.-lxvi., pp. 154-55. Lagarde has proposed to read מְ×ָדָּ×, past participle, for מֵ×Ö±×“Ö¹× and מִבּצֵר for מִבָּצְרָה.Who is this that cometh dyed red, redder in his garments than a vinedresser?[286]Ch. lxiii. 18 and lxiv. 10, 11. In the Hebrew ch. lxiv. begins a verse later than it does in the English version.[287]Semites had a horror of painting the Deity in any form. But when God had to be imagined or described, they chose the form of a man and attributed to Him human features. Chiefly they thought of His face. To see His face, to come into the light of His countenance, was the way their hearts expressed longing for the living God. Exod. xxiii. 14; Psalm xxxi. 16, xxxiv. 16, lxxx. 7. But among the heathen Semites God's face was separated from God Himself, and worshipped as a separate god. InheathenSemitic religions there are a number of deities who are the faces of others. But the Hebrew writers, with every temptation to do the same, maintained their monotheism, and went no farther than to speak of theangel of God's Face. And in all the beautiful narratives of Genesis, Exodus and Judges about the glorious Presence that led Israel against their enemies, the angel of God's face is an equivalent of God Himself. Jacob said, theGod which hath fed me, and the angel which hath redeemed me, bless the lads. In Judges this angel's word is God's Word.[288]See pp.398ff.[289]Cheyne. Similarly Bredenkamp, who contends that the prophecy is Isaianic, and to be dated from the time of Manasseh.[290]Cf.Dillmann,in loco.[291]Among Orientals the planets Jupiter and Venus were worshipped as the Larger and the Lesser Luck. They were worshipped as Merodach and Istar among the Babylonians. Merodach was worshipped for prosperity (cf.Sayce,Hibbert Lectures, pp. 460, 476, 488). It may be Merodach and Istar, to whom are here given the name Gad, or Luck (cf.Genesis xxii. 11, and the name Baal Gad in the Lebanon valley) and Meni, or Fate, Fortune (cf.Arabic al-manijjat, fate; Wellhausen,Skizzen, iii., 22 ff., 189). There was in the Babylonian Pantheon a "Manu the Great who presided over fate" (Lenormant,Chaldean Magic, etc., p. 120). Instances of idolatrous feasts will be found in Sayce,op. cit., p. 539;cf.1 Cor. x. 21,Ye cannot partake of the table of the Lord and of the table of devils. See what is said in p.62of this volume about the connection of idolatry and commerce.[292]Bleek (5th ed., pp. 287, 288) holds ch. lxvi. to be by a prophet who lived in Palestine after the resumption of sacrificial worship (vv. 3, 6, 30), that is, upon the altar of burnt-offering which the Returned had erected there, and at a time when the temple-building had begun. Vatke also holds to a post-exilic date,Einleitung in das A.T., pp. 625, 630. Kuenen, too, makes the chapter post-exilic. Bredenkamp takes vv. 1-6 for Palestinian, but pre-exilic, and ascribes them to Isaiah. With ver. 1 he compares 1 Kings viii. 27; and as to ver. 6 he asks, How could the unbelieving exiles be in the neighbourhood of the Temple and hear Jehovah's voice in thunder from it? Vv. 7-14 he takes as exilic, based on an Isaianic model.[293]So Dillmann and Driver; Cheyne is doubtful.[294]Acts vii. 49.[295]1 Cor. x.[296]So, in literal translation of the text,the Onebeing a master of ceremonies, who, standing in the middle, was imitated by the worshippers (cf.Baudissin,Studien zur Semitischen Religions-geschichte, i., p. 315, who combats Lagarde's and Selden's view, that ×הד,one, stands for the God Hadad). The Massoretes read the feminine form of one, which might mean some goddess.[297]Know, Pesh. and some editions of the LXX.;punish, Delitzsch and Cheyne.[298]The Hebrew text has Pul, the LXX. Put. Put and Lud occur together, Ezek. xxvii. 10-xxx. 5. Put is Punt, the Egyptian name for East Africa. Lud is not Lydia, but a North African nation. Jeremiah, xlvi. 9, mentions, along with Cush, Put and the Ludim in the service of Egypt, and the Ludim as famous with the bow.
[207]"The term rendered 'startle' has created unnecessary difficulty to some writers. The word means to 'cause to spring or leap;' when applied to fluids, to spirt or sprinkle them. The fluid spirted is put in theaccusative, and it is spirteduponthe person. In the present passage the person, 'many nations,'isin theaccusative, and it is simply treason against the Hebrew language to render 'sprinkle.' The interpreter who will so translate will 'do anything.'"—A. B. Davidson,Expositor, 2nd series, viii., 443. The LXX. has θαυμασονται εθνη πολλα. The Peschitto and Vulgate rendersprinkle.
[208]And notour report, orsomething we caused to be heard, as in the English Version,—שמועה is the passive participle of שמע, to hear, and not of השמיע, to cause to hear. The speakers are now the penitent people of God who had been preached to, and not the prophets who had preached.
[209]Tender shoot.Masculine participle, meaningsucker, orsuckling. Dr. John Hunter (Christian Treasury) suggests succulent plant, such as grow in the desert. But in Job viii. 16; xiv. 7; xv. 30, the feminine form is used of any tender shoot of a tree, and the feminine plural in Ezek. xvii. 22 of the same. The LXX. read παιδιον,infant.Before Him, i.e. Jehovah. Cheyne, following Ewald, readsbefore us. So Giesebrecht.
[210]Took for his burden.Loadedhimself with them. The same grievous word which God uses of Himself in ch. xlvi. See p.180.
[211]There is more thanafflicted(Authorised Version) in this word. There is the sense of beinghumbled, punished for his own sake.
[212]The possessive pronoun has been put to the end of the lines, where it stands in the original, producing a greater emphasis and even a sense of rhyme.
[213]×›×œ× ×• KÅ«llanÅ« so rendered instead of "all of us," in order to be assonant with the close of the verse, as the original is, which closes with kullam.
[214]That is, by a form of law that was tyranny, a judicial crime.
[215]Cut off violently, prematurely, unnaturally.
[216]See p.368.
[217]The verbs, hitherto in the perfect in this verse, now change to the imperfect; a sign that they express the purpose of God.Cf.Dillmann,in loco.
[218]From the travail of his soul shall he see, and by his knowledge be satisfied.Taking בדעתו with ישבע instead of with יצדיק. This reading suggested itself to me some years ago. Since then I have found it only in Prof. Briggs's translation,Messianic Prophecy, p. 359. It is supported by the frequent parallel in which we findseeingandknowingin Hebrew.
[219]Some translatemany,i.e., the many to whom he brings righteousness, as if he were a victor with a great host behind him.
[220]Jer. xxiii. 5.
[221]Hitzig (among others) held that it is the prophets who are the speakers of ver. 1, and that the voices of the penitent people come in only with ver. 2 or ver. 3. In that case ×©×ž×•×¢×ª×™× ×• would meanwhat we heard from God(שמועה is elsewhere used for the prophetic message) and delivered to the people. This interpretation multiplies the dramatis personæ, but does not materially alter the meaning, of the prophecy. It merely changes part of the penitent people's self-reproach into a reproach cast on them by their prophets. But there is no real reason for introducing the prophets as the speakers of ver. 1.
[222]For the argument that it is Israel who speaks here, see Hoffmann (Schriftbeweis), who was converted from the other view, and Dillmann, 4th ed.,in loco. A very ingenious attempt has been made by Giesebrecht (Beiträge zur Jesaia Kritik, 1890, p. 146 ff.), in favour of the interpretation that the heathen are the speakers. His reasons are these: 1. It is the heathen who are spoken of in lii. 13-15, and a change to Israel would be too sudden. Answer: The heathen are not exclusively spoken of in lii. 13-15; but if they were a change in the next verse to Israel would not be more rapid than some already made by the prophet. 2. The words in liii. 1 suit the heathen. They have already received the news of the exaltation of the Servant, which in lii. 15 was promised them. This is the ×©×ž×•×¢×ª× ×•, that isnews we have just heard. ×”×מין is a pluperfect of the subjunctive mood:Who couldor whowould have believedthis news of the exaltationwe havejustheard, and the arm of Jehovah to whom was it revealed!i.e., it was revealed to nobody. Answer: besides the precariousness of taking ×”×מין as a pluperfect subjunctive, this interpretation is opposed to the general effort of the prophecy, which is to expose unbelief before the exaltation, not after it. 3. To get rid of the argument—that, while the speakers own that the Servant bears their sins, it is said the Servant was stricken for the sins ofmy people, and that therefore the speakers must be the same as "my people":—Giesebrecht would utterly alter the reading of ver. 8 from מפשע עמו × × ×¢ למו,for the transgression of my people was the stroke to himto מִפִּשְ××¢Ö¸× ×™Ö°× Ö»× Ö·Ö¼×¢,for their stroke was he smitten.
[223]× ×©×‚× and סבל. In speaking of his country's woes, Jeremiah (x. 19) says:This is sickness, ormy sickness, and I must bear it, ו×שׂ×× ×™ ×–×” חלי. Ezekiel (iv. 4) is commanded to lie on his side, and in that symbolic position tobear the iniquity of His people, ×ª×©× ×¢×•× ×. One of the Lamentations (v. 7) complains:Our fathers have sinned and are not, and we bear(סבל)their iniquities.In these cases the meaning of both × ×©× and סבל is simply to feel the weight of, be involved in. The verbs do not convey the sense ofcarrying offorexpiating. But still it had been said of the Servant that in his suffering he would be practical and prosper; so that when we now hear that he bears his people's sins, we are ready to understand that he does not do this for the mere sake of sharing them, but for a practical purpose, which, of course, can only be their removal. There is, therefore, no need to quarrel with the interpretation of ver. 4, that the Servantcarries awaythe suffering with which he is laden. Matthew makes this interpretation (viii. 17) in speaking of Christ's healing. But it is a very interesting fact, and not without light upon the free and plastic way in which the New Testament quotes from the Old, that Matthew has ignored the original and literal meaning of the quotation, which is that the Servant shared the sicknesses of the people: a sense impossible in the case for which the Evangelist uses the words.
[224]But they do not tell us, whether they were totally exempted from suffering by the Servant's pains, or whether they also suffered with him the consequence of their misdeeds. For that question is not now present to their minds. Whether they also suffer or not (and other chapters in the prophecy emphasize the people's bearing of the consequences of their misdeeds), they know that it was not their own, but the Servant's suffering, which was alone the factor in their redemption.
[225]Mystery of Pain, by James Hinton, p. 27.
[226]Psalm cvi. 23;cf.also ver. 32, where the other side of the solidarity between Moses and the people comes out.They angered Him also at the waters of Strife, so that it went ill with Moses for their sakes ... he spake unadvisedly with his lips.
[227]See p.352.
[228]Isa. xlvi. 3, 4. See pp.179,180of this volume.
[229]Ch. xlii. 25.
[230]If we remember this we shall also feel more reason than ever against perceiving the Nation, or any aspect of the Nation, in the Sufferer of ch. liii. For he suffers, as the individual suffers, sickness and legal wrong. Tyrants do not put whole nations through a form of law and judgement. Of course, it is open to those, who hold that the Servant is still an aspect of the Nation, to reply, that all this is simply evidence of how far the prophet has pushed his personification. A whole nation has been called "The Sick Man" even in our prosaic days. But see pp.268-76.
[231]Jer. li. 4.
[232]xl. 39; xlii. 13; xliv. 29; xlvi. 20.
[233]1 Sam. vi. 13.
[234]Cf.Wellhausen'sProlegomena, ch. ii., 2.
[235]There is no exegete but agrees to this. There may be differences of opinion about the syntax,—whether the verse should run,though Thou makest his soul guilt, ora guilt-offering; or,though his soul make a guilt-offering; or (reading ×™×©×™× for תשי×),while he makes his soul a guilt-offering,—but all agree to the fact that by himself or by God the Servant's life is offered an expiation for sin, a satisfaction to the law of God.
[236]Cf.Baldensperger (Das Selbstbewusstsein Jesu, p. 119 ff.) on the genuineness of Christ's predictions and explanations of His sufferings.
[237]Cf.p.330.
[238]See p.334.
[239]The question whether this is the land of China is still an open one. The possibility of intercourse between China and Babylon is more than proved. But that there were Jews in China by this time (though they seem to have found their way there by the beginning of the Christian era) is extremely unlikely. Moreover, the possibility of such a name as Sinim for the inhabitants of China at that date has not been proved. No other claimants for the name, however, have made good their case. But we need not enter further into the question. The whole matter is fully discussed in Canon Cheyne's excursus, and by him and Terrien de Lacouperie in theBabylonian and Oriental Recordfor 1886-87. See especially the number for September 1887.
[240]Hishumbled,His poorin the exilic sense of the word. SeeIsaiah i.-xxxix., pp.432ff.
[241]On the "Motherhood of God" cf.Isaiah i.-xxxix., p. 245 ff.
[242]For צדיק, therighteousorjust, which is in the text, the Syr., Vulg., Ewald, and others read עריץ, as in the following verse,terribleorterribly strong. Dillmann, however (5th ed., 1890, p. 438), retains צדיק takes the termsmightyandjustas used of God, and reads the question, not as a question of despair uttered by the people, but as a triumphant challenge of the prophet or of God Himself. He would then make the next verse run thus:Nay, for the captives of the mighty may be taken, and the prey of the delivered, but with him who strives with thee I will strive.
[243]The English version,Where is the bill, is incorrect. The phrase is the same as in lxvi. ver. 1,What is this house that ye build for Me? what is this place for My rest?It implies a house already built; and so in the text aboveWhat is this bill of divorceimplies one already thought of by the minds of the persons addressed by the question.
[244]Cf.p.221. Dillmann's view thatrighteousnessmeans here personal character is contradicted by the whole context, which makes it plain that it is something external, the realisation of which those addressed are doubting. What troubles them is not that they are personally unrighteous, but that they are so few and insignificant. And what God promises them in answer is something external, the establishment of Zion.Cf.also the external meaning ofrighteousnessin vv. 5, 6.
[245]Isaiah. i.-xxxix., p.441.
[246]Cf.p.315.
[247]Cf.pp.336ff.
[248]See pp.247ff.
[249]"Das eigentliche Wort 'Liebe' kommt im A. T. von Gott fast gar nicht vor,—und wo es, bei einem späten Schriftsteller, vorkommt, ist es Bezeichnung seiner besondren Bundes-liebe zu Israel, deren natürliche Kehrseite der Hass gegen die feindlichen Völker ist."—Schultz,A. T. Theologie, 4th ed., p. 548.
[250]The reserve of this—the limitation of the relation to one of feeling—is remarkable in contrast to the more physical use of the same figure in other religions.
[251]Egre, or sudden rush of the tide, or spate, or freshet. The original is assonant: Beshesseph qesseph.
[252]So literally; LXX. crystals, carbuncles or diamonds.
[253]Cf.Isaiah i.-xxxix., pp.440ff.
[254]The structure of this difficult passage is this. Ver. 3 states the equation: the everlasting covenant with the people Israel=the sure, unfailing favours bestowed upon the individual David. Vv. 4 and 5 unfold the contents of the equation. Each side of it is introduced by aLo. Lo, on the one side, what I have done to David; Lo, on the other, what I will do to you. As David was awitness of peoples, aprinceandcommander of peoples, so shalt thou call to them and make them obey thee. This is clear enough. But who is David? The phrase thefavoursofDavidsuggests 2 Chron. vi. 42,remember the mercies of David thy servant; and those in ver. 5 recall Psalm xviii. 43 f.:Thou hast made me the head of nations; A people I know not shall serve me; As soon as they hear of me they shall obey me; Strangers shall submit themselves to me.Yet both Jeremiah and Ezekiel call the coming Messiah David. Jer. xxx. 9:They shall serve Jehovah their God and David their King.Ezek. xxxiv. 23:And I will set up a shepherd over them, and he shall feed them, and he shall be their shepherd. And I Jehovah will be their God, and My servant David prince among them.After these writers, our prophet could hardly help using the name David in its Messianic sense, even though he also quoted (in ver. 5) a few phrases recalling the historical David. But the question does not matter much. The real point is the transference of the favours bestowed upon an individual to the whole people.
[255]English version,trees of the field, but the field is the country beyond the bounds of cultivation; and as beasts of the field meanswild beasts, so this meanswild trees,—unforced, unaided by man's labour.
[256]Neh. xiii.
[257]The original isa hand; a term applied (perhaps because it consisted of tapering stones) to anindex, ormonumentof victory, 1 Sam. xv. 12; or to a sepulchral monument, 2 Sam. xviii. 18.
[258]See vol. i., pp. 363, 364.
[259]So Ewald, Cheyne and Briggs. Ewald takes lvi. 9-lvii. 11aas an interruption, borrowed from an earlier prophet in a time of persecution, of the exilic prophecy, which goes on smoothly from lvi. 8 to lvii. 11b. We have seen that it is an error to suppose that lvi. 9-lvii. rose from a time of persecution.
[260]Ezek. xxi.;cf.xxxiii. 30 f.
[261]Delitzsch.
[262]Mishpat and mishpatim,cf.p.299.
[263]Such as is also expressed by exiles in Psalms xlii., xliii. and lxiii., but there with what spiritual temper, here with what a hard legal conception of righteousness.
[264]For these see p.61.
[265]Literally,the poor, the wandering. It was a frequent phrase in the Exile: Lam. iii. 19,Remember mine affliction and my homelessness; i. 7, Jerusalem in the dayof her affliction and her homelessness. LXX. αστεγοι, roofless.
[266]Probably the fresh flesh which appears through a healing wound. Made classical by Jeremiah, who uses it thrice of Israel,—in the famous text,Is there no balm, etc., x. 22; and in xxx. 17; xxxiii. 6.
[267]Jer. xxxi. 12.
[268]Cf.Job xxiv. 13.
[269]Cf.Amos viii. 5.
[270]See pp.43f.
[271]Ewald conceives chs. lviii., lix. to be the work of a younger contemporary of Ezekiel, to which the chief author of "Second Isaiah" has added words of his own: lviii. 12, lix. 21. The latter is evidently an insertion;cf.change of person and of number, etc. Delitzsch puts the passage down to the last decade of the Captivity, when for a little time Cyrus had turned away from Babylon, and the Jews despaired of his coming to save them.
[272]See pp.219ff.
[273]Another slight trace reveals the conglomerate nature of the chapter. If, as the earlier verses indicate, it was Israel that sinned, then it is the rebellious in Israel who should be punished. In ver. 18a, therefore, theadversariesorenemiesought to be Israelites. But in 18bthe foreignislandsare included. The LXX. has not this addition. Bredenkamp takes the words for an insertion. Yet the consequences of Israel's sin, according to the chapter, are not so much the punishment of the rebellious among the people as the delay of the deliverance for the whole nation,—a deliverance which Jehovah is represented as rising to accomplish, the moment the people express the sense of their rebellion and are penitent. Theadversariesandenemiesof ver. 18, therefore, are the oppressors of Israel, the foreigners and heathen; and 18bwith itsislandscomes in quite naturally.
[274]Note on mishpat and Ssedhaqah in ch. lix.This chapter is a good one for studying the various meanings of mishpat. In ver. 4 the verb shaphat is used in its simplest sense of going to law. In vv. 8 and 14 mishpat is a quality or duty of man. But in ver. 9 it is rather what man expects from God, and what is far from man because of his sins; it isjudgementon God's side, or God's saving ordinance. In this sense it is probably to be taken in ver. 15,—Ssedhaqah follows the same parallel. This goes to prove that we have two distinct prophecies amalgamated, unless we believe that a play upon the words is intended.
[275]Isa. i. 17; Ezek. ii. 18; Psalm ix. 12.
[276]Literally,on the sideorhip, the Eastern method of carrying children.
[277]Orcoasts. See pp.109ff.
[278]Isa. xiv.;Isaiah i.-xxxix., pp.281ff.
[279]Isa. xlviii. 18.
[280]See p.210, note. Some points of the speaker's description of himself—for example, the gift of the Spirit and the anointing—suit equally well any prophet, or the unique Servant. The lofty mission and its great results are not too lofty or great for our prophet, for Jeremiah received his office in terms as large. That the prophet has not yet spoken at such length in his own person is no reason why he should not do so now, especially as this is an occasion on which he sums up and enforces the whole range of prophecy. It can, therefore, very well be the prophet who speaks. On the other hand, to say with Diestel that it cannot be the Servant because the personification of the Servant ceases with ch. liii. is to beg the question. A stronger argument against the case for the Servant is that the speaker does not call himself by that name, as he does in other passages when he is introduced; but this is not conclusive, for in l. 4-9 the Servant, though he speaks, does not name himself. To these may be added this (from Krüger), that the Servant's discourse never passes without transition into that of God, as this speaker's in ver. 8, but the prophet's discourse often so passes; and this, that בשׂר, ×§×¨× and × ×—× are often used of the prophet, and not at all of the Servant. These are all the points in the question, and it will be seen how inconclusive they are. If any further proof of this were required, it would be found in the fact that authorities are equally divided. There hold for the Servant Calvin, Delitzsch, Cheyne (who previously took the other view), Driver, Briggs, Nägelsbach and Orelli. But the Targums, Ewald, Hitzig, Diestel, Dillmann, Bredenkamp and Krüger hold by the prophet. Krüger's reasons,Essai sur la Théologie d'Isaïe xl.-lxvi., p. 76, are specially worthy of attention.
[281]Literally,opening; but the word is always used of opening of the eyes. Ewald rendersopen air, Dillmannhellen Blick.
[282]Any insignia or ornament for the head.
[283]The same word as in xlii. 3,fading wick.
[284]SeeIsaiah i.-xxxix., pp.438-40.
[285]Cf.Krüger,Essai sur la Théologie d'Isaïe xl.-lxvi., pp. 154-55. Lagarde has proposed to read מְ×ָדָּ×, past participle, for מֵ×Ö±×“Ö¹× and מִבּצֵר for מִבָּצְרָה.Who is this that cometh dyed red, redder in his garments than a vinedresser?
[286]Ch. lxiii. 18 and lxiv. 10, 11. In the Hebrew ch. lxiv. begins a verse later than it does in the English version.
[287]Semites had a horror of painting the Deity in any form. But when God had to be imagined or described, they chose the form of a man and attributed to Him human features. Chiefly they thought of His face. To see His face, to come into the light of His countenance, was the way their hearts expressed longing for the living God. Exod. xxiii. 14; Psalm xxxi. 16, xxxiv. 16, lxxx. 7. But among the heathen Semites God's face was separated from God Himself, and worshipped as a separate god. InheathenSemitic religions there are a number of deities who are the faces of others. But the Hebrew writers, with every temptation to do the same, maintained their monotheism, and went no farther than to speak of theangel of God's Face. And in all the beautiful narratives of Genesis, Exodus and Judges about the glorious Presence that led Israel against their enemies, the angel of God's face is an equivalent of God Himself. Jacob said, theGod which hath fed me, and the angel which hath redeemed me, bless the lads. In Judges this angel's word is God's Word.
[288]See pp.398ff.
[289]Cheyne. Similarly Bredenkamp, who contends that the prophecy is Isaianic, and to be dated from the time of Manasseh.
[290]Cf.Dillmann,in loco.
[291]Among Orientals the planets Jupiter and Venus were worshipped as the Larger and the Lesser Luck. They were worshipped as Merodach and Istar among the Babylonians. Merodach was worshipped for prosperity (cf.Sayce,Hibbert Lectures, pp. 460, 476, 488). It may be Merodach and Istar, to whom are here given the name Gad, or Luck (cf.Genesis xxii. 11, and the name Baal Gad in the Lebanon valley) and Meni, or Fate, Fortune (cf.Arabic al-manijjat, fate; Wellhausen,Skizzen, iii., 22 ff., 189). There was in the Babylonian Pantheon a "Manu the Great who presided over fate" (Lenormant,Chaldean Magic, etc., p. 120). Instances of idolatrous feasts will be found in Sayce,op. cit., p. 539;cf.1 Cor. x. 21,Ye cannot partake of the table of the Lord and of the table of devils. See what is said in p.62of this volume about the connection of idolatry and commerce.
[292]Bleek (5th ed., pp. 287, 288) holds ch. lxvi. to be by a prophet who lived in Palestine after the resumption of sacrificial worship (vv. 3, 6, 30), that is, upon the altar of burnt-offering which the Returned had erected there, and at a time when the temple-building had begun. Vatke also holds to a post-exilic date,Einleitung in das A.T., pp. 625, 630. Kuenen, too, makes the chapter post-exilic. Bredenkamp takes vv. 1-6 for Palestinian, but pre-exilic, and ascribes them to Isaiah. With ver. 1 he compares 1 Kings viii. 27; and as to ver. 6 he asks, How could the unbelieving exiles be in the neighbourhood of the Temple and hear Jehovah's voice in thunder from it? Vv. 7-14 he takes as exilic, based on an Isaianic model.
[293]So Dillmann and Driver; Cheyne is doubtful.
[294]Acts vii. 49.
[295]1 Cor. x.
[296]So, in literal translation of the text,the Onebeing a master of ceremonies, who, standing in the middle, was imitated by the worshippers (cf.Baudissin,Studien zur Semitischen Religions-geschichte, i., p. 315, who combats Lagarde's and Selden's view, that ×הד,one, stands for the God Hadad). The Massoretes read the feminine form of one, which might mean some goddess.
[297]Know, Pesh. and some editions of the LXX.;punish, Delitzsch and Cheyne.
[298]The Hebrew text has Pul, the LXX. Put. Put and Lud occur together, Ezek. xxvii. 10-xxx. 5. Put is Punt, the Egyptian name for East Africa. Lud is not Lydia, but a North African nation. Jeremiah, xlvi. 9, mentions, along with Cush, Put and the Ludim in the service of Egypt, and the Ludim as famous with the bow.